March 3, 1977
Page 6151
ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS SUBMITTED ON S. 826
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I rise in support of S. 626, the Reorganization Act of 1977.
This bill will give the President the authority to create or abolish agencies and to transfer functions between agencies unless one House of Congress disapproves within 60 days.
It will give President Carter virtually the same authority to initiate reorganization of the executive branch of our Government that his predecessors have had for nearly all of the last 35 years.
I believe that reorganization authority is one of the tools we must enact if we are ever to bring the Government back under control. Together with zero base budgeting, which President Carter is implementing, and sunset legislation, which I have sponsored with a majority of this body, both Congress and the President can be equipped with an arsenal of weapons to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the Government.
The need for these tools is all too obvious. We need only look at the hundreds of agencies that have grown up over the past few decades — at the mounting cost of bureaucratic overhead — at the countless instances of programs that failed to meet objectives.
Ultimately, we need only to look at the millions of Americans who have lost confidence in Government to carry out the simplest of tasks.
This bill provides a necessary first step to win back some of that confidence and I urge that we make the most of this opportunity.