RETURN OF ALIEN PROPERTY-No. 3 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS, STATEMENT OF J. B. WOODSIDE, OF THE GENERAL ACCOUNT- * * * * Mr. GARNER. You gentlemen are from the comptroller's office? Mr. WOODSIDE. Yes, sir. Mr. GARNER. In the course of the hearings on the Alien Property Custodian bill it developed that Mr. McCarl had been requested by the President to make an investigation of the Alien Property Custodian's office, by a letter from the President, that he did not have sufficient funds, and that he transferred the funds from the Alien Property Custodian to his office to the extent of $20,000, in order to make that investigation. Do you know anything about it? Mr. WOODSIDE. I do not know the details of that, Mr. Congressman, but I do know that we were requested by the President to make an audit of the Alien Property Custodian's funds. In the same letter he authorized the use of any funds in the Alien Property Custodian's office which were available. I might say that the year before we made this up, the President authorized the hiring of a firm of private accountants to make an audit of the Alien Property Custodian's funds, and I think they paid out of those funds something like $150,000 for that audit. Mr. GARNER. I am glad to hear you say that. That is additional information. Here is the point that I want to direct your attention to, if I may. I happened to be a member of the subcommittee that created the office of which Mr. McCarl is the head. It was made a matter of discussion by all of us, the proposition of removing him from the temptation of the influence of any human being. I have been an admirer of some of his work. They say that some of it probably was not justifiable, etc. But if he sanctioned the violation of a law in order to get sufficient funds to make this investigation, merely at the request of the President, then I think that he puts himself in a very unenviable place in criticising anybody else for violating the law. You had no right to transfer from the Alien Property Custodians appropriation money to the appropriation for Mr. McCarl, any more than you have to transfer from one appropriation of a department to another. Mr. Madden has written you a letter about it, or has written somebody in your department a letter about it, and I hope the matter will be explained, but if your department is in the attitude of having transferred from one appro 1 priation to another at the request of the President, I want to hear your defense of it. Mr. WOODSIDE. I am not able to defend that, sir. I think that the comptroller ought to be given an opportunity to defend it himself. Mr. OLDFIELD. I should like to have that letter put in the record. Mr. GARNER. Mr. Madden told me that he wrote a letter to the comptroller's office. Mr. OLDFIELD. Why can't we get those communications in the record? Mr. GARNER. I merely want to ask these gentlemen, because they happen to be here, what they know about it, if they know anything about it. Mr. OLDFIELD. I want to ask you this question. Why can not they put this correspondence in the record? The comptroller and the President are not above the law. Mr. GARNER. The President's letter is in the record. It is on the President's letter that I am basing my statement. Mr. WOODSIDE. If I may, I would object to what I say in regard to this going in the record, because I am not familiar with it. I am not able to defend the position of the office in the case. Mr. GARNER. I will make the request of you, if I may be permitted to do that as a members of the Ways and Means Committee, to ask Mr. McCarl to send to the chairman of the committee or to myself, if he prefers, an explanation of his action, to state by what authority of law he transferred from the funds of the Alien Property Custodian $20,000 to his office in order to make an audit of the Alien Property Custodian's office. Mr. WOODSIDE. I shall be glad to ask him. Mr. HAWLEY. Since this has become a matter of record, I think in justice to the Comptroller General his reply ought to go in the record. Mr. GARNER. I shall be glad to have that. (The statement of the Comptroller General, above referred to, is as follows:) Hon. WILLIS C. HAWLEY, WASHINGTON, April 24, 1926. Acting Chairman Ways and Means Committee, House of Representatives. MY DEAR MR. HAWLEY: With reference to the inquiry of Representative John N. Garner at a recent hearing of the Ways and Means Committee, as to the General Accounting Office making an investigation of the financial transactions of the Alien Property Custodian and the transfer of the sum of $20,000 from the appropriation for the Alien Property Custodian to reimburse the appropriation of the General Accounting Office, I am pleased to transmit herewith a statement fully setting forth the position of the General Accounting Office in undertaking the investigation in question and in adjusting the appropriations as a result of the expenses incurred. I appreciate being permitted to present this statement for incorporating into the hearings of the committee, and if further information is desired or I can be of any further service I will be pleased to be so advised. Sincerely yours, J. R. MCCARL, Comptroller General of the United States. [Inclosure] With reference to the inquiry at the recent hearings of the committee as to the General Accounting Office making an investigation of the financial transactions of the Alien Property Custodian, and the transfer of the sum of $20,000 from the appropriation for the Alien Property Custodian to reimburse the appropriation |