TABLE 2.-Major Programs of Federal Grants to State and Local State programs (minor local participation, if any): Employment security administration___. Agricultural research and marketing---. Fish and wildlife restoration___. Forestry cooperation_--- Support of land-grant colleges---- Homes for disabled soldiers and sailors___. Supervision of on-the-job training for veterans_. Total Federal welfare programs-State and locally administered: Public assistance categorical relief__ Child welfare_. Crippled children's services___. Maternal and child health services___ Total Grand total_. $197, 779, 364 13, 083, 507 12, 474, 131 10, 275, 566 5, 030, 000 3,722, 190 1,890, 574 244, 255, 332 1, 329, 933, 470 6,388, 437 11, 814, 776 13, 299, 919 1,361, 436, 602 2,752, 643, 201 The total includes $2,743,483,383 payments for fiscal year 1953 and payments for four smaller programs-water pollution studies, defense community facilities and services, homes for disabled soldiers and sailors, and supervisors of on-the-job training for veterans totaling $9,159,818. Shared taxes are omitted. Table 2 contains abundant evidence that many Federal-State activities have a great bearing on local governments. What in theory is a Federal-State relationship, and classified statistically as a FederalState grant, often turns out to be an indirect aid to local government. The figures indicate too that half of the money from Federal grants is paid out for social-welfare programs which had their origin in Federal laws. The Pattern of Governmental Activity The whole pattern of Federal-State-local governmental activity is closely intermingled. The problem is more than one of statistical reporting. Only a relatively few categories of governmental activities in the United States are wholly performed and entirely financed by a single level of government. This results in part from the inherent nature of federalism, in part from the growing economic interdependence of all geographic areas in this country, and in part from a convenient division of labor between levels of government. A partial list of governmental activities has been made and is part of this report: THE PATTERN OF GOVERNMENTAL ACTIVITY A. Federal Activities—Federally Financed and Administered: 7 1. National defense except the National Guard and some parts of civil defense. 2. Conduct of foreign relations. 3. Insurance-bank deposits, life insurance for members of armed services. 4. Aids to navigation such as the Coast Guard, lighthouses, astronomical observations, hydrographic surveys, navigational information, shipping regulations, use of navigable streams. 5. Weather information and time observation. 6. Coinage and regulation of money. 7. Granting copyrights, patents and trademarks. 8. Regulation of commodity exchanges. 9. Control of foreign trade. 10. Subsidization of agricultural commodities. 11. Establishing standards for biological products. 12. Old age and survivors' insurance. 13. Guarantee and purchase of mortgages. 14. The postal service. B. State Activities-State Financed and State Administered: 1. Incorporation, inspection and control of the insurance business. 2. Administration of workmen's compensation insurance. 3. Industrial hygiene. 4. Training schools for the deaf, dumb, and blind. 5. Unemployment compensation insurance. 6. Licensing certain professions such as dentistry, medicine, pharmacy, law, engineering, and architecture. 7. Supervision of horse and dog racing. 8. Production of petroleum. 9. Public higher education. 10. Incorporation of businesses generally. C. Local Activities-Locally Financed and Locally Administered: 1. Registration of voters and conduct of elections. 2. Fire fighting. 3. Protective inspections including building inspection, plumbing inspection, electrical inspection, gas inspection, boiler inspection, elevator inspection, and smoke inspection. 4. Construction and maintenance of local streets and highways except those that are part of the State highway system. 5. Sewers and sewage disposal (except a few State agencies). 6. Street cleaning. 7. Garbage and waste collection and disposal. 8. Health inspections including dairy farms and milk plants, food handlers, housing, local abattoirs, and water supply. 9. Publicly owned, public-service enterprises, including abattoirs, buslines, street railways, gas plants, water works, terminals, markets, cemeteries, and telephone systems. 7 Adapted from Carl H. Chatters and Marjorie Leonard, An Inventory of Governmental Activities in the United States, published by Municipal Finance Officers Association, Chicago, 1947. D. Activities in Which the Federal and State Governments Are Both Engaged: 1. The regulation of business and industry including banking, sale of securities, railroads, trucks and busses, water carriers, air transportation, transmission and sale of electricity and gas, petroleum extraction, telephone and telegraph. 2. Standards of weights and measures. 3. Services to agriculture including agricultural research; dissemination of information; experimentation with crops, farms and animals; plant experimentation, disease control and quarantine; marketing statistics, reports, agreements; agricultural advisory services, and soil conservation. 4. Fish, shellfish, and wildlife conservation and restoration. 5. Petroleum-regulation of leases. 6. Enforcing food and drug laws. 7. Services to veterans including hospitals, homes, credit facilities, and reemployment. 8. Forestry and reforestation. E. Activities divided between Federal, State and Local Governments with each government paying directly its own costs: 1. Police protection and law enforcement including a. Police records and statistics including identification. b. Detention and custody of prisoners. c. Police communications. d. Prevention and investigation of crimes. e. Probation and parole of prisoners. f. Control of prostitution, liquor, and narcotics. g. Fish and game protection. 2. Maintenance of hospitals. a. General hospitals. 3. General libraries. 4. Recreation facilities. a. Forest parks and camps. b. Monuments and historical sites. F. Overlap in Federal, State, Local Research, Planning, and Records: 1. Police records and statistics. 2. Highway engineering and research. 3. Water conservation and utilization. 4. Pollution of lakes and streams. 5. Health-in many phases. 6. Educational research and statistics. G. Federal-Local Contacts in Activities Due Primarily to Federal Financial Interest in an Activity. (See the 23 activities listed in the opening paragraph of this chapter). Overlapping Activities Certain facts affecting local government stand out from the above listings: 1. In four important functional areas all levels of government operate with little if any sharing of costs and with each government pay ing its own costs. These are: Police protection and law enforcement, maintenance of hospitals, general libraries, and the provision of recreation facilities. 2. There is much done by all levels of government in research, planning, statistics, and records in several functions although this does not necessarily imply duplication or unnecessary work. 3. While the State governments spend their own money plus related Federal aid mainly for highways, health, social welfare programs, and education, there are only a few instances where the State alone both finances and carries out these functions directly by its own employees. Much of State expenditures is channeled through local political subdivisions-the local units functioning as spending and administrative agents of the State. The States themselves have a surprisingly small number of activity categories which are wholly financed and carried out by them. These include: The licensing of professions, public higher education, the supervision of horseracing, workmen's compensation insurance, unemployment compensation insurance, incorporation of businesses generally, and the supervision of the private insurance business. 4. Local governments consisting of counties, cities, towns, townships, boroughs, and special districts perform and finance alone many very important activities primarily related to the daily life of the individual citizen in the community where he lives. Such activities include the registration of voters and the conduct of elections, fire protection and fire fighting, protective inspections, construction and maintenance of local roads and streets, sewers and sewage disposal, street cleaning, garbage and waste collection and disposal, and many public service enterprises such as publicly owned gas, light and water plants, buslines and street railways. Opinions on Federal-Local Relations From the local government viewpoint there is little feeling or little evidence either that the Federal Government has taken over some services belonging to local governments, or that the Federal Government is duplicating the services of local government. When the question is put, "Can the performance or domination of local activities by the National Government be considered as a basis for Federallocal conflicts?" the answer based on the evidence must be "No." The predominant local activities are elections, police, fire, education, local public works, and local public utilities. There may be some questions on the fringe of educational activity such as vocational training, the school-lunch program, and federally impacted areas. No questions of conflict arise over elections, fire fighting, local public works, or local public utilities. Some mutterings are heard about conflicts in police jurisdiction but the local police are still free from domination by State or Federal authorities. This contrasts sharply with the situation in other countries throughout the world. The activities which can be considered as strictly "local activities" are being narrowed in number and scope by the financial limitations on small areas, by the mobility of persons and things, and by speed and ease of communication. Local control of some activities must be kept to fortify the concept of a democratic government. These essentials are primarily elections, schools, local courts, and the police. Most other activities must be conceived on a broader geographic base. The chief areas where some difficulties arise in Federal-local relations are: 1. The Federal domination of policy through strings attached to grants-in-aid. These strings are sometimes dictated or encouraged by "functional autocracies" made up of the functional specialists at two or more levels of government. Specialists have tended to build up proprietary and "professional" interests in their own functions with administrative loyalties running vertically rather than remaining with their own level of government. For example, county and State public or social welfare officials sometimes have stronger loyalties vertically than horizontally. This results in even a desire for "strings attached." Another result has been a new competition between functional interests, e. g., between welfare and highways, so that the struggle in the welfare field is not always between Federal, State, and local forces but sometimes between welfare groups and other interest groups at all levels. There is also a conflict between the generalists (staff people, such as budget and finance officers) and the functional specialists who are supported by their counterparts at all levels. The specialists and technicians with a functional interest want to be free from popular control and from the necessity of harmonizing their specialized interests with the overall interests of the communities they represent. Part of the antidote for this serious situation is to give grants for broader purposes and to require Federal and State grants to go through the State or local budgetary process of the receiving government. 2. The standards imposed by the Federal Government as a condition for receiving grants-in-aid. The examples and standards set by both the Federal and State Governments tend to greatly affect local matters pertaining to finance, personnel, and quantity and quality of many local services. One particularly sore point is salaries. Federal salary levels are higher than the prevailing rates for many positions in many geographic areas. This forces the salary costs of local government and private business upward and deprives them of ca |