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The Postwar 7A `& Organization r ~ of Science No contractor was more concerned than the National Academy of Sciences about the demobilization plans of the Office of Scientific Research and Development. Through its members and the mecha- nism of the Research Council, the Academy had been involved in almost every aspect of OSRD operations. The Division of Medical Sciences had been the foundation on which OSRD'S Committee on Medical Research had built its program. The Academy-Research Council had directed much of the metallurgical research and had had a significant role in the development of new weapons and equipment, including the atomic bomb. Nor was any contractor more aware than the Academy of the revolution that had occurred during the war years in the relationship of the federal government to science. Without precedent were the centralization of scientific research in OSRD, its scale of operations, the autonomy accorded it, direct appropriations from Congress, and its method of operation contracting for federal research and develop- ment with the universities, industry, and other independent institu- tions. 433

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434 / The Postwar Organization of Science The Academy in ~ g40 had demurred at the suggestion that it might assume direction of wartime research and development, only to become indispensable to the operations of both NDRC and OSRD. President Tewett, assessing that experience five years later, saw in the Academy's administration of huge sums of federal money for scien- tific research under contract with OSRD and its own subcontracts with academic institutions and industrial organizations, "another role . . . [an] enlargement of the function of the Academy-Research Council." And he saw, too, that its "professional advisory and consultative services ... [might in the future] be successfully combined with an operating function such as the administration and supervision of research~sub-contracts."i The impact of the war years left an indelible imprint on both the Academy and Council. Their activities in aid of so many departments of Government—both civil and military have so firmly established the capacity of both organizations to give completely unbiased scientific advice at the highest level and to administer intricate research undertakings, that increased calls on them in the future are inevita- ble.2 As the end of the war and the termination of OSRD approached, the Academy, as well as Congress and the military, became increasingly concerned with the necessity of continuing the military-civilian al- liance for weapons research. They wanted especially to maintain that unique invention of the war, the partnership in science between the federal government and the universities that had so rapidly equipped the armed services with new weapons. That partnership, the Academy felt, could replenish in peacetime the nation's store of basic research, largely exhausted during the war. The Academy sought through the establishment of its Research Board for National Security the continuation of weapons research. It saw in the establishment of the National Science Foundation a means for the federal support of basic research. Two other imperatives- continuation of the programs in medical research and the control of atomic energy and its research by a nonmilitary agency—were also of concern to the Academy. Clearly, the federal government would continue to support large- scale programs of research in the universities, private institutions, and industry, both for future national defense and for the nation's general welfare, and needed only a mechanism through which it might ~ NAS, Annul Reportfor 1944-45, pp. As, 3~. 2 NAS, Annual Reportfor 1946-47, p. i.

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 435 continue to draw on the vast research capacity of the nation in peacetime. The apparent danger was that with the termination of OSRD at the end of the war science would lose the freedom required for productivity, a freedom less likely to prevail in peacetime with government agencies subject to continual legislative scrutiny, to ma- neuvering for funds, and to continual political pressures. Perhaps no one was more aware of the difficulties of science under federal auspices than the National Academy, through its long associa- tion with the scientific agencies of the government. Thus, when it was proposed to continue the alliance of government and science after the war, the foremost question was the control of research funds. Van- nevar Bush, intent on ensuring the freedom of scientists by insulating them from political pressure, posed repeatedly two basic principles for successful Government participation in scientific research. First, the research organization must have direct access to Congress for its funds; second, the work of the research organization must not be subject to control or direction from any operating organization whose respon- sibilities are not exclusively those of research.3 These were the principles upon which Bush and his colleagues sought to base the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and the National Science Foundation. Research Board for National Security The War and Navy Departments, aware that OSRD would terminate automatically at the end of the war, were anxious to retain the collaboration of top-level scientists in the postwar research program.4 In April ~944, Secretary of War Stimson and Secretary of the Navy Forrestal called a joint service conference of forty senior military personnel to discuss ways and means, and invited Bush, his assistant Lyman Chalkey, Hewett, and Hunsaker of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics to attend. At the conference, Jewett offered the services of the National Research Council. Still almost wholly organized at that time for the planning and direction of 3 U.S. Congress, House, Committee on Military Affairs, Research and Development. Hear- ings before the Committee on Military Affairs on H. R. 2946, 78th Cong., fist sees., May 22, 23, 29, ~945, p. 5 (hereafter cited as Research and Development. Headings, May ~945). 4 For background on the discussions of this need within the military, see Michael S. Sherry, Preparing for the Next War: American Plans for Postwar Defense, 1941-1945 (New Haven: Yale University Press, ~977).

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436 I The Postwar Organization of Science military research, the Research Council provided an established mechanism for continuing the operations of OSRD. Dr. Jewett re- ported that the Policy Committee of the Research Council, whose members included Conant, Richards, and Millikan, had agreed in a meeting the night before that it would be "very easy to revamp the [Research Council] to set it up for the permanent handling of military problems."5 Acting on the recommendation of the conference, in May the Secretaries of War and Navy appointed a Committee on Postwar Research, chaired by Charles W. Wilson, Vice-Chairman of the War Production Board and President of General Electric, and comprising Jewett, Hunsaker, Merle Tuve as Bush's designee, Karl Compton, and four Navy and four Army representatives. The committee was to study the postwar needs of the services, the Academy-Council offer, and the best means for carrying out the fundamental research re- quired. Four months later, on September ~4, ~944, the Wilson committee reported that, although the services should retain their own research programs and facilities, "a way should be found for keeping the country's outstanding scientists interested in military research" after the demobilization of OSRD.6 To this end, the committee recom- mended that Congress be asked to create a research board for national security (RBNS) as a permanent and independent agency in the federal government. However, the committee considered it likely that Congress would be slow to act and was concerned that the momentum for action on the research board would be lost if the war came to an early end. As an expedient, the committee recommended that the service Secretaries ask the Academy to create immediately an interim body, also called research board for national security, to function pending successful congressional action. Both plans called for a board of forty members, under a civilian chairman, half of them officers with technical responsibilities in the two services and half civilians from science, engineering, and industry. An executive com- mittee of five would formulate and direct long-range programs of research on behalf of the services through contracts with existing . . . . private Institutions. 5 "Proceedings of Conference to Consider Needs for Post-War Research and Develop- ment for the Army and the Navy," April 26, 1944, pp. 1, 12-13 (NAS Archives: AG&Depts: War: Conf to Consider Needs . . . Jnt w Navy Dept). 6 Wilson committee report, September 14, 1944, in Research and Development. Hearings, May 1945, pp. 64~9; NAS Archives: AG&Depts: War: Com on Post-War Military Research: Int w Navy Dept: 1944.

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 437 Unlike the permanent RBNS, which would receive its funding through direct congressional appropriations, the Academy RBNS would rely on special items in the annual appropriations bills of the War and Navy Departments. A second difference was that the mem- bers of the temporary AcademY RBNS would be appointed by the ~ , , President of the Academy, while the members of the federal RBNS would be appointed by the President of the United States. (The twenty civilian members of the permanent board were to be nomi- nated by the Academy President.) The precedent established early in the war, permitting federal agencies to advance funds to the Academy, was critical to the Wilson committee's recommendations. For the Academy to undertake a program that might, as Dr. Jewett implied, come to rival that of OSRD, would otherwise necessitate a capital of millions: This obstacle has been substantially removed both by the Acts of Appropria- tions to OSRD which provide reimbursement to the Academy for certain overhead expenses, and more particularly, by the authority given the Army and the Navy to advance funds to provide working capital for work requested ... by a formal contract, or contracts, in which the Services request the Academy to do certain things and in which provision is made for advance of the funds needed, the actual expenses of the work (without remuneration) to be later accounted for.7 On November 9, ~944, Secretary of War Stimson and Secretary of the Navy Forrestal formally requested Dr. Jewett to establish the temporary RBNS within the Academy. By February ~945 its organiza- tion was complete; the Executive Committee of five comprised Karl T. Compton as Chairman; Roger Adams; Alphonse R. Dochez of Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons; Brig. Gen. William A. Borden, Director of the New Developments Division, War Department Special Staff; Rear Adm. Julius A. Furer, Coordinator of Research and Development, Navy Department and a member of the OSRD Council.8 The Research Board was launched with much acclaim in the press and with Academy expressions of high hopes for its future. Compton, who had chaired the ill-starred Science Advisory Board a decade before, saw it as "definitely understood Eto be] a long-term and 7 Frank B. Jewett to Joel H. Hildebrand, December 5, ~944 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.82). ~ Henry L. Stimson and James V. Forrestal to President, NAS, November 9, ~944 (NAS Archives: ORG: NAS: RBNS: General); Rear Adm. J. A. Furer, "Post-War Military Re- search," Science 100 :461-464 (November 24, ~ 944).

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438 / The Postwar Organization of Science forward looking element of national policy."9 A number of research projects were soon submitted by the Army and Navy to the Executive Committee of RBNS and assigned to various members for considera- tion and further study. A Despite the fanfare, Hewett was dissatisfied by the temporary status of the Academy RBNS. In hearings before Representative Clifton A. Woodrum's House Select Committee on Post-War Military Policy in January ~945, he disclosed that the Wilson committee had agreed, though only by a single vote, to seek early establishment of a perma- nent agency, and that he, Compton, and Hunsaker had strongly opposed such a step: "Possibly some years of post war experience will demonstrate to Congress the necessity of such an independent agency but until we have had that experience ... [it would be] highly dangerous" to hastily legislate the creation of an agency which would be "devilishly hard to modify or eliminate." More to the point, Jewett remained convinced that experience would show the Research Board established under Academy auspices on an interim basis "to be the best permanent mechanism for accomplishing the desired objec- tives."~ Hewett felt that the majority of the Wilson committee had been unduly influenced by the Academy's need to obtain its funding through the Army's and Navy's appropriations bills, unlike an inde- pendent agency, which could receive funds directly from Congress. "[T]he principal argument in favor of an independent agency," he told the Woodrum committee, "was that it would be easier to get money that way." While acknowledging the strength of that argu- ment, Hewett considered it "a very questionable basis on which to build a vital part of our national defense mechanism." A permanent RBNS within the Academy, on the other hand, would be able to draw on the Academy's long tradition of unbiased, nonpartisan advice to the 9 The organization appeared in K. T. Compton, "Research Board for National Secu- rity," Science 101:22~228 (March 2, ~945); K. T. Compton, "Establishment of RsNs," American Scientist 33 :1 15 (April ~945). For Compton's earlier reluctance to head RsNs, see Compton to Jewett, December 4, ~944 (Oswald Veblen Papers, Box 33, Library of Congress). A Minutes of the Meeting of the [RsNs], March lo, ~945 (NAS Archives: ORG: NAS: Runs: Meetings). The Navy representatives present assured the civilians that the Board would be free to go beyond the military's suggestions to include fields of basic research. "Statement of Frank B. Jewett . . . before the Select Committee on Post-War Military Policy," January ~9, ~945, pp. 8-~o (NAs Archives: coNc: Select Committee on Post- War Military Policy); iewett to Robert A. Millikan, September ~8, ~944 (NAS Archives: AG&Depts: War: Com on Post-War Military Research: Jnt w Navy Dept).

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 439 government. And, as a nonstatutory body within the Academy, the RBNS could be modified easily as experience dictated. To overcome objections to an Academy RBNS, Woodrum and others on his committee asked Jewett if direct congressional funding would be a satisfactory solution. In a supplementary memorandum ad- dressed to the committee, Jewett stated that after further considera- tion he was "of the opinion that if Congress so desires this can be done . . . without jeopardy to the basic idea of complete independence of the Academy...."~3 Woodrum and Hewett found a sympathetic ear in Representative Andrew I. May, Chairman of the House Committee on Military Affairs. On April ~ 8, ~ 945, May introduced H.R. 2946, a bill authorizing appropriations directly to the Academy for a "perma- nent" program of scientific research in the interest of national secu- rity.14 At hearings before May's committee the following month, the Army supported H.R. e946. The Wilson committee's recommendation of an independent federal agency had been opposed by Army representa- tives on the committee, and in February ~945 General Borden had reiterated his department's opinion that care must be exercised in avoiding any arrangement which would take away from the War Department the . . . authority over the development of the weapons and other materials needed by the Army ... [and that the establishment ofl an independent agency might make it difficult [to maintain the Army's voice in the decisions of the Board]....~5 Echoing Jewett's remarks, Borden told the May committee that experience was needed with the Academy RBNS before consideration could be given to the creation of an independent agency. Implicitly, he agreed with Jewett that only "possibly" would this experience lead to an acceptable proposal for such an agency. He also presented to the May committee a letter from Secretary Stimson stating that the is "Statement of Frank B. jewett," p. 9. i3"Supplementary Statement by Dr. Jewett," February ~4, ~945 (NAS Archives: CONG: Select Com on Post-War Military Policy). ~4 Jewett to Millikan, February ~3, ~945 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.8~ General). A copy of the bill appears in NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.82.6. For correspondence on drafting of the bill, see NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.8~.5. t5 Rear Adm. ]. A. Furer, "Memorandum for the Assistant Secretary of the Navy," February 22, ~945 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.82.5); Jewett to Millikan, September ~8, ~944, cited above. See also Daniel l. Kevles, "Scientists, the Military, and the Control of Postwar Defense Research: The Case of the Research Board for National Security, ~944-~946," Technology and Culture 16:2~29 (January ~975).

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440 I The Postwar Organization of Science Research Board's "organization under the National Academy of Sciences will provide the flexibility, independence, and prestige necessary" for its success. i6 The opposition to a permanent Academy RBNS was formidable. Of the four Navy representatives on the Wilson committee, all but Furer had voted for an independent agency.~7 The others were concerned that an agency dependent on the services could be dissolved or denied funds at the whim of future Secretaries. And, the Academy appeared to be primarily "an honorary society," which had been found unsuited to direct military research in either of the World Wars. ~8 Fifteen years later, Furer wrote that "objections to using NAS came from those who believed that the Academy was too conservative and was composed too largely of older men who would not be sufficiently progressive to meet all of the requirements of effective collaboration with the armed services."~9 Furer did not agree with the contention that "the National Academy of Sciences did nothing during the peace period to solve the Navy's research problems." Furer felt the Academy had, in fact, "made an excellent job of everything it has been requested to do," and he placed the blame on the Navy itself, which had failed to turn to the Academy often enough in the prewar era.20 But Furer's views did not prevail. Adm. A. H. Keuren, Director of the Naval Research Laboratory, warned the May committee that PER. z946 would give the Academy RBNS inevitable permanence, and urged Congress to create immediately a permanent independent agency: "An independent Federal agency would simplify the ques- tions of direct responsibility and accountability to Congress, as com- pared with an agency under the aegis of a corporation." 0 1 6 Research and Development. Hearings, May 1945, pp. 31-32, 4o. 17Jewett to Maj. Gen. C. C. Williams, September 13, 1944 (NAS Archives: AG&Depts: War: Com on Post-War Military Research: Jnt w Navy Dept). ~8 L. L. Cochrane, Chief of Bureau of Ships, to Capt. T. A. Solberg, August 26, 1944, attached to "Report of Meeting of Committee on Post-War Research," August 31,1944; Capt. C. L. Tyler to Rear Adm. J. A. Furer, July fi, 1944, attached to "Report of Meeting of Committee on Post-War Research," July 6, 1944 (NAS Archives: ibid.). ~9J. A. Furer, Administration of the Navy Department in World War II (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1959), pp. 801-803. The matter of age and conservatism is interesting in view of the fact that the median age of the twenty civilian members of the Academy RBNS was slightly over fifty-five; that, subsequently, of the Advisory Committee to the Office of Naval Research, successor to RBNS, was fifty-three; and that of the National Science Board, established in 1950, was fifty-six. 20 Furer, draft of "Memorandum for Assistant Secretary of the Navy," enclosed in Furer to.lewett, February 23, 1945 (NAS Archives: Hewett file 50.82.5). 2t Research and Development. Hearings, May 1945, pp. 74, 76.

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 44i The Academy's private corporate status was also emphasized in a letter to Representative May from the Acting Secretary of the Navy, H. Struve Hensel. He opposed "providing for grants to a non- governmental agency" as proposed by H.R. 2946 and supported S. 825, a bill introduced by Senator Harry F. Byrd on April 4, ~945. Following closely the recommendations of the Wilson committee majority, S. 825 would establish an independent federal RBNS, ap- pointed by the President and, through him, reporting annually to Congress.22 Vannevar Bush also opposed a permanent Academy RBNS and suggested that the May committee amend H.R. 2946 to indicate specifically that it was a temporary measure.23 He had reason. On November ~7, ~944, eight days after the service Secretaries had requested the creation of a temporary Academy RBNS, President Roosevelt asked Bush for a report on a program for federal support of scientific research after the war. Since the report was to be transmitted to the President in June ~945, Bush had kept its contents confidential. When Bush testified before the May committee in May ~ 945, not even Jewett was aware that Bush's report, Science, the Endless Frontier, would recommend the creation of an independent federal agency, a National Research Foundation, to provide federal support for all areas of science, including the military research Hewett en- visioned for the Academy's RsNs.24 Perhaps the most powerful opponent of the Academy RBNS was Harold D. Smith, Director of the Bureau of the Budget. Late in March ~945, he warned President Roosevelt that the Academy was "very jealous of its non-governmental status, and under its control the Research Board for National Security would not be responsible to any part of the Government.... A matter as crucial to the national interest as the direction of research on weapons of war," he insisted, "should be carried on by an agency responsible to the Commander- in-Chief." At Smith's suggestion, Roosevelt sent letters on March 3~, ~945, to Forrestal and Stimson barring the transfer of any funds to the Academy for RsNs.25 22 Ibid., pp. 79-80. For Jewett's reaction to the Byrd bill, see his April ~ 7, ~ 945, letter to Congressman Clifton A. Woodrum (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.82.5). 23 Research and Development. Hearings, May ~945, pp. ~3-~4. 24 Roosevelt to Bush, November ~7, ~944; Jewett to Millikan, March ~6, ~945; Jewett to Vannevar Bush, June 6, ~945 (NAS Archives: Hewett file 50.22); Vannevar Bush, Science, the Endless Frontier (Washington: Government Printing Office, ~945), pp. 27-28. 25 Kevles, "Scientists, the Military, and Control of Postwar Defense Research," cited above, p. 35; Roosevelt to Stimson and Forrestal, copies to Bush and Harold D. Smith,

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442 / The Postwar Organization of Science Harry Truman's succession to the presidency upon the death of Roosevelt on April ~s moved the Academy to seek a reevaluation of Smith's objections. Hewett wrote Representative Woodrum that he found it hard to believe that after the long interval since [Stimson and Forrestall requested formation of RBNS and of all the publicity which attended putting it in operation, the President realized fully the consequences of the letters he signed.... I am hopeful that the situation can be cleared up satisfactorily when the Secretaries can consider the matter with President Truman.26 Despite Academy counsel, the service Secretaries were reluctant to take their case directly to the President or the Budget Director. Jewett wrote Harvey H. Bundy, Special Assistant to the Secretary of War, that six months had passed and the Academy's expenses of organizing the Research Board were still being met out of OSRD and Carnegie funds. The proposed service contracts with the Academy had be- come unduly restrictive, contained unworkable patent provisions, and imposed in minute detail limitations on the operations of the Board.27 In his reminiscences of the war years, Admiral Furer wrote of the likelihood "that the influence which from the beginning opposed the participation of NAS in the general program helped to mold opposi- tion to the contracts [proposed between the services and the Acad- emy]." The services had presented tight contracts to the Academy, remembering some of their ideological clashes in the operation of Bush s OSRD.28 Clearly, the initial excitement associated with the Board was gone, and, in his letter to Bundy, Jewett spoke of it in hyperbole and in the past tense: It was the initiation of a great new experiment in a hitherto unexplored and untried area where there were few if any guiding rules . . . a great experiment undertaken in a great way . . . a pioneering experiment in every sense of the word—in a different sector and on a grand scale it was like sending Lewis and Clark to explore the northwest country or Major Powell to traverse the Grand Canyon of the Colorado for the first time.29 March 3~, ~945, and draft of memorandum, Harvey H. Bundy to Stimson, April 6, ~945 (OSRD Box go). 26 Jewett to Woodrum, April ~7, ~945 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.82.5). See also "Minutes of the [RBNS] Executive Committee Meeting," April 12, ~945, p. ~ (NAS Archives: ORG: NAS: RBNS: Executive Com: Meetings). 27 Hewett to Bundy, May 8, ~945, and April So, ~945 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.8~.9). 28 Purer, Administration of the Navy Department in World War II, pp. 80~-803. 29 lewett to Bundy, May 8, ~945 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.8~.9).

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 443 A final attempt to break the impasse came late in May with a suggestion from the Budget Bureau that RBNS members acquire governmental status by being appointed concurrently "unpaid offi- cials of the United States." Hewett found this unacceptable. To do so would involve the members in the morass of federal conflict-of- interest statutes and, more important, jeopardize the Academy's traditional independence.30 On June 8, ~945, in letters to Stimson and Forrestal with copies to Bush and Smith, Truman reaffirmed Roosevelt's policy, declaring that "every function of control of program developments with respect to the military research must at all times be lodged solely within the framework of the government."3i It would be his unalterable policy for all science legislation. Meanwhile, he asked that OSRD continue to function after the war, pending the establishment of a permanent agency for military research, and that RBNS be replaced by a joint Army-Navy advisory board. The Academy reaction was that "the muddle . . . has been made more muddled by Mr. Truman's letters."32 Replying to the President's letter of June 8, Bush stated his views unequivocally: I have given much thought to this subject and I have come to the conclusion that for this Office [OSRD] to undertake post-war research would be highly undesirable, for reasons which become apparent only when the matter is studied at some length. It would reverse the understanding which I had for a long period with President Roosevelt, and with the Appropriations Commit- tee. It would be contrary to the general principle that war agencies should not carry on into the peace.... It would be contrary to the understanding I have had with the scientists, who fill most of the important posts in this Office on a voluntary basis and without compensation, and who were enlisted for the war effort.... Most important there are the conflict of interest statutes. Some of these are very old and admit of interpretations which would practically prevent the use of voluntary personnel by any governmental contracting agency.... It would be quite impossible to conduct our affairs, in the way in which we have gone about it during the war, without using scientists and engineers of high standing on a voluntary basis.... There should certainly be established a permanent civilian agency for .Rinre there ma well he peacetime civilian research on military matters~J1AA=~_ At__ AAA"] ''=AA ~` 30 Draft of letter from Stimson and Forrestal to RBNS members, May 26, 1945; Jewett to H. Strove Hensel, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, June 4, 1945 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.81 General). 31 Truman to Stimson and Forrestal, June 8, 1945 (copy in RBNS: General). 32Jewett to Bundy, June 13, 1945 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.81 General). NAS Archives: ORG: NAS:

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464 I The Postwar Organization of Science tific Research Board to be headed by the Assistant to the President, John R. Steelman, Director of the Office of war Mobilization and Reconversion. The members of the Board were: Robert P. Patterson, Secretary of War; James Forrestal, Secretary of the Navy; Julius A. Krug, Secretary of the Interior; Clinton P. Anderson, Secretary of Agriculture; W. Averell Harriman, Secretary of Commerce; John D. Goodloe, Administrator, Federal Loan Agency; Watson B. Miller, Administrator, Federal Security Agency; Maj. Gen. Philip B. Fleming, Administrator, Federal Works Agency; Charles R. Denny, Jr., Chair- man, Federal Communications Commission; Jerome C. Hunsaker, Chairman, National Advisory Committee of Aeronautics; Vannevar Bush, Director, Office of Scientific Research and Development; David Lilienthal, Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission; Gordon R. Clapp, Chairman, Tennessee Valley Authority; Gen. Omar N. Bradley, Ad- ministrator, Veterans Administration; and I. Donald Kingsley, who was named Executive Secretary. The Board was to report on the research programs of federal scientific agencies, the nature of non- federal research and development in the nation, and the interrelation of federal and nonfederal research.93 It seemed possible that with the current large-scale federal support of basic research projected for ONR, the Army's research division, and the National Institute of Health, and in view of the increased support of scientific research voted by Congress to some fifty other federal agencies, the immediacy of the need for a national science foundation had passed. Steelman reported otherwise: "The drying up of European scien- tific resources, the disruption of normal international exchange of scientific knowledge, and the virtual exhaustion of our stockpile of basic knowledge" made a national science foundation imperative. Federal support of research and development, particularly of basic research and health and medical research in the universities, industry, and government, must be accelerated as rapidly as possible, so that before the end of a decade expenditures for these purposes would be the Board of Tele-Rama, Inc., to study its application to industry, business, and government, and to offer the committee's services as a clearinghouse for its promotion and organized support. During the Korean War, operations research became of special concern to the Science Advisory Committee (SAC) in the Office of Defense Mobilization. See NRC report "Operations Research with Special Reference to Non-Military Applica- tions," April ~95~, and "Scientists and Mobilization: Some Views of the Science Advisory Committee on the Role of Academic Scientists," September ~ I, 1951 (NAS Archives: EXEC: ODM: SAC); Don K. Price, Government and Science, pp. 12~128. 93 Copy of Executive Order 979~, October ~7, ~946, in OSRD Box 32; NAS Archives: EXEC: President's Scientific Research Board: ~947.

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 465 at least 1 percent of the national income. The foundation, under a director appointed by the President and a part-time advisory board of eminent scientists and educators equally divided between government and nongovernment representatives, should support basic research and medical research outside the purview of other agencies and institutions, develop a long-range federal program of science scholarships and fellowships, and assist the universities in expanding their laboratory facilities and acquiring research equipment.94 Word of the preparation of the Steelman report brought on a rash of bills to create the science foundation. One, introduced by Senator Elbert D. Thomas (S. 5~5), was identical to the Kilgore-Magnuson bill (S. 1850) that had passed the Senate the previous session. Another, introduced by Senator H. Alexander Smith (S. 526), was a return to the original Magnuson bill. Four bills identical to Smith's S. 526 were also introduced in the House, among them Representative Wilbur D. Mills's H.R. 1830.95 Challenged by the new legislative activity, a coalition of the scientific community, under the auspices of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, resolved to present a united front before Congress. Its moving spirits saw with concern the extent to which federal research was becoming firmly established in military hands and that the repeated failure of the scientists to come to any agree- ment among themselves had prevented Congress from creating the foundation. On February 23, ~947, representatives of almost seventy scientific societies, the members of the disbanded Bowman committee, and those of the still-active Committee for a National Science Foundation came together in the Inter-Society Committee on Science Foundation Legislation. The group included Chairman Edmund E. Day, Presi- dent of Cornell; Vice-Chairman Harlow Shapley, President of AAAS; an Inter-Society Executive Committee, including Dael Wolfle, Isaiah Bowman, Ralph W. Gerard, Henry Allen Moe, and W. Albert Noyes, fir.; and invited representatives of the Joint Research and Develop- ment Board, the President's Scientific Research Board, the U.S. Public Health Service, and the Office of Naval Research. They met to consider the chief point of contention in science legislation, the administration of the proposed foundation. By vote, 63 percent of the 94 The President's Scientific Research Board, Science and Public Policy. A Report to the President by John R. Steelman, vol. I, A Program for the Nation (Washington: Government Printing Office, ~947), pp. 3-7, 6~7~. 95 Science 105:171 (February ~4, ~947); NAS Archives: CONG: Bills: NSF: ~947. S. 525 and S. 526 were compared in Science 105:253-254 (March 7, ~947).

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466 / The Postwar Organization of Science members of the Inter-Society Committee supported a Presidentially appointed director; 18 percent a large Presidentially appointed (forty-eight-member) board that would select the director; and 18 percent a small AEc-type board. Chairman Edmund Day reported the results of the poll to Repre- sentative John H. Wolverton's House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce at hearings held early in March.96 The hearings were otherwise notable only for Vannevar Bush's predictable support of Mills's H.R. ~830, Dr. Bronk's strong support of research in the social sciences, and Dr. Jewett's continued resistance to any science foundation. Jewett felt that for fundamental research and education in science to be left to the foundation as a federal agency would be to make them completely vulnerable to all kinds of social and political pressures. He saw the foundation as duplicating Academy functions, since both basic research and education were already well provided for in the Academy's National Science Fund and its National Research Fellowships program, which wanted only augmentation, preferably through changes in the tax statutes to increase the attractiveness of voluntary personal contributions.97 In time, however, Jewett came to see that supervision of a national program of either basic research or science education was not within the scope of the Academy, and that the very proliferation of new science agencies, the acceleration of federal support of science, and the consequent extension of the frontiers of science would stretch the capabilities of the Academy to their utmost. Of the plethora of bills then before Congress, Senator Smith's S. 5~6, after some tinkering, was to raise the greatest hopes for a science foundation that would be satisfactory to the Administration. In its original form, the bill provided for a governing board of twenty-four Presidentially appointed members from science, en- g~neering, education, and public affairs, and an executive committee 96 Science 105:227 (February 28, ~947); U.S. Congress, House, Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, National Science Foundation. Hearings before the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, on H.R. 942, H.R. 1815, H.R. 1830, H.R. 1834, and H.R. 2027, 80th Cong., fist sees., March ~7, ~947, pp. 63~4. 97,Jewett's extended views appeared in National Science Four~ian. Hearings, March 6, ~947, pp. 73-76, ps~-~°, and in a fifty-eight-page privately printed pamphlet, "The Case for Continuing Private Support of Fundamental Science," March ~8, ~947 (NAS Archives: CONG: Bills: National Science Foundation). Dr. Jewett in his late sixties had his share of "fixed ideas" and sometimes found it difficult "to accommodate himself to developments in the present very rapidly shifting scene in which science and engineering fmd themselves" [Merriam H. Trytten, Di- rector, NRC Office of Scientific Personnel, to Bronk, July ~7, ~947 (NAS Archives: ibid.)].

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The Postwar Organization of Science / 467 of nine, elected by the board, which would appoint the director. The National Academy and leading education associations were to rec- ommend nominations for board members to the President, and the bill included a provision that the unexpended funds and the remain- ing contracts of OSRD were to be transferred to this "successor agen- cy," enabling it to begin operations shortly after its establishment. On May I, Edmund Day wrote Senator Smith and Representative Wolverton offering the Inter-Society Committee's endorsement of S. 5~6, with amendments reducing the size of the board from twenty- four to nine members and calling for Presidential appointment of the director after consultation with the board. The second of these amendments, that calling for Presidential appointment of the di- rector, was adopted by the Senate, as was one providing for distribu- tion of part of the funds on a geographic basis. The bill passed the Senate late in May, and the Academy, assured of the President's interest in establishing a foundation without delay and certain that the bill represented an acceptable compromise, canvassed its membership for nominations for the twenty-four members of the foundation, as called for by the bill.98 On July ~5, ~947, a House version of S. 526 was passed and in conference the two amendments were struck from the Senate's bill. It was the original S. 5~6 that both houses passed that summer and sent to the White House. The President, deeming it basically the same as the Magnuson bill, which had the director responsible to a part-time board rather than to the President, withheld his approval. It died by pocket veto on August 6.99 The veto shocked many of the leaders of science into accepting the fact that the nation's scientific enterprise, with a current budget of more than one billion dollars and the Steelman projection of twice that sum within the next decade, could no longer be considered apart from national policy and politics. Science was not merely auxiliary to the development of industry, medicine, and national defense, free to operate under the direction of existing organizations with a minimum of control by Congress and the President. It had become a national resource, subject to national planning, and responsible to the Presi- dent. The veto registered a further shock, for by default it left the 98 Jewett to Bush, June 5, ~947 (NAS Archives: ORG: NAS: Com on Nominations for Proposed National Science Foundation). 99 Truman report on S. 526, August 6, ~947 (NAS Archives: CONG: Bills: National Science Foundation: ~947); Meyerhoff, "The Truman Veto," Science 106:23~237 (September ~ 2, ~947); Dael Wolile, "The Inter-Society Committee for a NSF: Report for ~947," Science 106:529-533 (December 5, ~947).

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468 I The Postwar Organization of Science control of federal funds for research grants in the hands of the Army, Navy, and Air Force.~°° In November ~947, Harlow Shapley organized a committee that included Academy members Conant, K. T. Compton, Arthur L. Day, and Luther P. Eisenhart, who agreed that Truman's insistence on his appointment of the foundation director must be complied with.~°i As Vice-President of the AAAS Inter-Society Committee, Shapley also met with Senator Smith, Congressman Wolverton, representatives of the Bureau of the Budget, and Vannevar Bush, and urged the legislators to prepare new bills based on the Senate's amended version of S. 526.~°2 The brief hearings that June on identical bills, S. 2385 (Smith) and H.R. 6007 (Wolverton), were chiefly remarkable for the almost total absence of representatives of the scientific community and for Dr. Jewett's objections submitted to the legislators, which included a reprint of Samuel Johnson's Rambler No. 91 ~ ~ 75 it, on the hazards to scientific research of dependence upon government support: The Sciences, after a thousand indignities, retired from the palace of Patron- age, and having long wandered over the world in grief and distress, were led at last to the cottage of Independence, the daughter of Fortitude; where they were taught by Prudence and Parsimony to support themselves in dignity and quiet. ~03 The hearings came at a bad time. Congress was fighting a rising tide of inflation and developing legislation for Truman's European Re- covery Program. In the further distraction of a Presidential election year, neither science bill was acted on. A Restatement of Academy Policy The ultimate creation of a national science foundation, Dr. Jewett felt, would enhance rather than diminish the need for the National 'A Science and Public Policy, Vol. I, pp. 12, ~3; Science 106:141 (August ~5, ~947); Washington Association of Scientists, "Towards a National Science Policy?", Science 106:385-387 (October 24, ~947). 'a' Shapley to Bronk, November 5, ~947 (NAS Archives: CONG: Bills: National Science Foundation: ~ 947). ~02 WolRe, "Inter-Society Committee for a NSF," Science 107:235 (March 5, ~948). t03 U.S. Congress, House, Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, National Science Foundation. Hearings before the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, on H.R. 6007 and S. 2385, Both Cong., ad sees., June I, ~948, pp. ~ ~8-~23.

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 469 Academy of Sciences. "It is clear," he wrote, "that the Academy and Research Council should be kept in a virile state."~04 The Academy's limited endowment, however, did not provide funds sufficient to support an expansion of the Research Council's activities. Jewett knew that the increased importance of science and technology to the nation would mean a growing need for the services of the Research Council. Additional income and office space would be necessary. Preliminary discussions with foundation trustees were en- couraging, but Jewett realized that any formal request needed to be supported by a clear statement of the Research Council's unique capabilities, its intended activities, and its projected needs.~05 He had become increasingly concerned, also, about problems of internal organization disclosed by the wartime activities of the Academy. The rules governing the operations of the Research Coun- cil had served fairly well during the war, but had proved cumbersome at times and not sufficiently specific with respect to authority and responsibility. This had been particularly evident in the many ac- tivities in the Academy and Research Council in which both had interests, and whose smooth operation, as Dr. Jewett said, had de- pended upon the good personal relationship of the President of the Academy and the Chairman of the Research Council. In December ~ 945, at Dr. Jewett's request, Ross G. Harrison, Chairman of the Research Council, appointed a committee to survey the functions of the Research Council, its future activities, and its relationships. The members were: Lewis H. Weed (Chairman), Chairman of the NRC Division of Medical Sciences; Luther P. Eisenhart, Vice-President of the Academy and Chairman of the NRC Division of Physical Sciences; and William W. Rubey, Chairman of the NRC Division of Geology and Geography. The Weed report a month later called for a maximum of autonomy in Research Council operations, closer personal contact with federal officials, and appointment of a full-time Chairman of the Council.~07 In May, Jewett turned these recommendations over to a special i04 NAS, Annual Report for 194546, pp. 6-7 i05 jewett to Ross G. Harrison, May 28, 1945 (NAS Archives: ORG: NAS—NRC: Reorganiza- tion). i06 Jewett to members of the Council of the NAS, April ~9, ~946 (ibid.). ~07 [Weed report], "Report of Committee to Survey Functions of Research Council," February 28, ~946 (ibid.). As Dr. Jewett said, "The National Academy of Sciences had been negligent in this obligation [to implement the Executive Order establishing the Research Council] and should be more active in the National Research Council" (NAS, Annual Report for 194647, p. ~6).

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470 I The Postwar Organization of Science Ross Granville Harrison, Chairman of the National Re- search Council, 1938-1946 (Photograph courtesy Sterling Memorial Library, Yale Univer- sity). committee under Isaiah Bowman. The principles for the reorganiza- tion of the Research Council, "to strengthen fit] as the chief operating agency of the Academy," were approved by the Council of the Academy a month later. In July new Articles of Organization and Bylaws, besides ensuring the Research Council of stronger support by the Academy and the greater autonomy it needed in its operations, redefined the duties of the Research Council's Executive Board and its Chairman, the functions of its committees, and of officers of divisions. in Proposing this autonomy and an improved NAS-NRC relationship, Jewett earlier that year had asked Detlev Bronk whether he would consider becoming full-time Chairman of the Research Council. Bronk had recently left his post as Coordinator of Research in the Office of the Army Air Surgeon to return to the University of Pennsylvania as head of its Johnson Research Foundation. Bronk felt ~°8 Jewett to Bowman, Bush, Adams, Weed, May 17, 1946, and "Comments from Members of Informal Committee. . ." (NAS Archives: Hewett file 50.71); NAS, Annual Report for 194546, pp. 3-4, 12; 194647, pp. 161-165. For the revision, see 194849, pp. 11, 17-19, 121-135.

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 47 ~ that he must reserve some time for the Foundation and for his own research, but he agreed to accept the appointment, effective July I, 6.~°9 Jewett's presidency, Bush wrote to him that spring, had been a notable one, for the pages he had written in the war record of the Academy, for his "remarkable" success in putting Academy finances in order, and for the order he had brought into the Academy- Research Council structure and relationship.~° The last months of ~946 and the following spring were a time of reappraisal and restoration, as the new Academy-Research Council administration took stock of its mission and attempted to restore its premises, both literally and figuratively, from the neglect of the war years. The whole of the interior of the building was then undergoing repair and repainting, and extensive landscaping was being done. Except for the Committee on Medical Research, which remained until January ~94;, the offices of OSRD and other wartime agencies had departed; but their places were immediately taken by the expanding activities of the Research Council and its new committees. Indeed, one committee had to be housed in the Munitions Building across the street, and the temporary partitions in the exhibit rooms, the audi- torium balconies, and the library had to remain in place. Reappraisal of the Research Council mission appeared in Bronk's first report and a similar reassessment of the Academy in ~ewett's farewell address to the membership at the autumn meeting in ~947. Dr. Bronk, who was to give something more than half his time to the chairmanship, was not to make the Research Council "the most powerful centralized scientific institution in the Nation," as Jewett had said a full-time chairmanship promised. But he did set the Re- search Council firmly to the task at hand. The postwar world of science had "burdened and tempted the Council" with enormous challenges, but it had already begun, and would continue, its "efforts to avoid large-scale administrative operations which can be done better by other agencies and which distract the Council from its primary scientific objectives." As Bronk said, the NRC was recognized as a cooperative agency in the nation for the promotion of military i09 Jewett to Bronk, March 28, ~946; Jewitt to members of the NAS Council, June ~ I, ~946 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.7~); Bronk to Jewett, June lo and 26, ~946 (NAS Archives: ORG: Appointments: Chairman NRC). I Bush to Jewett, April 26, ~946 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.7~, Reorganization of NRC). ~ ~~ NAS, Annual Report for 194546, pp. ~20; 194647, p. 24. 'l2 Jewett to Bronk, March 28, ~946 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.7~).

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472 I The Postwar Organization of Science security and general welfare, but more important, "a powerful agent for the furtherance of scientific research, for the development of national research, and for the translation of scientific knowledge into socially useful achievements."~3 At the same time that Bronk was resetting the course of the Research Council, Dr. Jewett, reflecting on his eight years as Presi- dent of the Academy, worked on his last address to the membership, a position paper on the role of the Academy in its relation to the federal government. ~ 14 Before a full meeting of the Academy members in closed session that November, he called on them to look again at the Act of Incorporation. No other legislative directive in the history of the federal government, he said, compared in brevity, simplicity, sweep- ing powers, and consummate flexibility with that "astounding docu- ment." Equally remarkable, nothing in its wording contained the slightest attempt to shackle the Academy to the problems or to the philosophy of ~863. It was extremely doubtful whether anything like it could have succeeded in the halls of Congress at any time in the years since. In less than forty words the Act of Incorporation in effect created in the whole domain of science a supreme court of final advice beyond which there was no higher authority in the Nation and ensured that so far as was humanly possible its findings would be wholly in the public interest uninfluenced by any elements of personal, economic, or political force.~5 ' NAS, Annual Report for 1946-47, pp. 3 ~-33, 38. For example, the Committee on Growth of the Division of Medical Sciences had recently accepted responsibility for dispersing funds of the American Cancer Society for cancer research and training. In the next eleven years a total of $25 million was disbursed on the recommendation of the committee [NAS, Annual Report for 194546, p. 46 et seq.; R. Keith Cannan, "Cancer Research and the Committee on Growth, ~945—~956, NAS—NRC, News Report 6:53—57 (July—August ~956)]. Besides eliminating a number of unnecessary committees in the Research Council that first year, Bronk restructured the fellowship program; expanded the Committee on Radioactivity, making it the Committee on Nuclear Science; established a Chemical-Biological Coordination Center and a Pacific Science Board; saw activated a Committee on Atomic Casualties, a Committee on Undersea Warfare, and a Building Research Advisory Board; and appointed a Committee on UNESCO. NAS, Annual Report for 194647, pp. 34-38. ti4 Foreshadowed in the Academy's report for ~946-47 (pp. I, ~6), jewett's paper, "The Academy Its Charter, Its Functions and Relations to Government," was read at the November ~7, ~947, business session of the Academy. It was subsequently pub- lished in NAS, Proceedings 48 :481-490 (April ~ 5, ~ 962). ~ ~ 5 Proceedings, ibid ., p. 482 .

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The Postwar Organization of Science 1 473 If the federal government in the past had not made full use of the Academy it created, the Academy had also failed to promote its availability. The mobilization of science in the war just ended had demonstrated as never before the enormous range and effectiveness of the Academy and the Research Council when responding to its obligations to the government. And the recent reorganization within the Academy sought to assure continuation of that effectiveness by confining Academy committees to those which are wholly concerned with matters of advice at top scientific level and assigning all others to the Research Council ... [and by conferring] on the Research Council the maximum of autonomy compatible with the fact that it is a Committee of the Academy; that its power to serve effectively stems from the authority of the Academy Charter; and that in the last analysis the Academy is responsible for its acts. Jewett also banished the long-held notion that the Academy could act for the government only when called upon and had no power of initiative or privilege of providing advice. The "whenever called upon" provision in the Charter related only, he said, to the obligation of the government to reimburse the Academy for expenses incurred in government service, and neither in theory nor in practice, except as the Academy so elected, had ever possessed any validity.~7 The Charter of the Academy was still, after eighty-four years, the source of its opportunity for service, and only as its Constitution and Bylaws acted in any way to modify the intent and operation of its Charter was there any limit on the future activities of the Academy. is Proceedings, ibid., pp. 483, 487. 7 Proceedings, ibid ., p. 488. Dr. Bronk, in his Annual Report for 194647 (pp. 3~-32), agreed that a time of revolutionary changes confronted the nation and that the Research Council was beginning a new period in its history. Henceforth it would be "more than a waiting agency through which governmental and private organizations [might] seek assistance from the scientists of the country." The Council intended to be "adventurous in seeking opportunities for leadership and useful action in all fields." t~8 Knowing that Dr. Hewett was to discuss Academy policy that day, Joe H. Hilde- brand, head of the University of California department of chemistry, concluded the day's meeting with some remarks that he hoped would pave the way for a change in the concept of the office of the President. Although Jewett had already raised and answered many of his questions, why, Hildebrand asked, had the Academy given way to another agency in time of war? Why did its opinions seem to be expressed only when the government thinks to ask for them? It was the business of the officers of the Academy to execute policy, but why should not Academy policies be more imaginative and aggressive? Why, above all, had Academy members no opportunity to discuss questions of science and public policy? (NAS Archives: ORG: NAS: Meetings: Autumn: ~ 947).

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474 / The Postwar Organization of Science Dr. ~ewett's restatement of the Academy mission was unequivocal. But he was still not certain that in the recent reorganization of the Research Council he had found the best solution to the "multiple Academy-Research Council dilemma," namely, the relationship be- tween the President of the Academy and the Chairman of the Re- search Council. Would it ensure greater Academy effectiveness to make the Research Council chairmanship a career job and the presi- dency an honorary position, or perhaps to provide two Vice- Presidents of the Academy, one to succeed the President and the other to preside over the Research Council? Or should the direction of the Academy and the Research Council be combined under a single head? Should the head of the Research Council be required to be a member of the Academy? I know there are two schools of thought in the Academy and I sympathize with both. My eight years as President has taught me, however, that some of the things the ivory tower boys would like are impossible as things are now set up. Possibly Richards [the new Academy President] or his successor can find an answer which will satisfy all the members and all the conditions but I doubt it.~9 Dr. Jewett's personal conviction that the Chairman of the Research Council ought also to be a member of the Academy and so automati- cally a member of the Academy Council would be met a decade later. So, too, would the question of Academy initiative in serving the government on "any subject of science or art." ~9 Jewett to Yerkes, May 7, ~947; Jewett to Carmichael, May 26, ~947 (NAS Archives: Jewett file 50.7 ~ ).