AMERICAN RELIEF LEGION, New York, December 11, 1918. Mr. WILLIAM BULLOCK, 150 Nassau Street, New York City. MY DEAR MR. BULLOCK: Your letter of December 9 received. The president, Mrs. Olive Cromwell Field, instructs me to say to you that the bill you are about to put through, No. 4972, meets with her hearty approval. Wishing you success in your endeavor, I remain, Yours, very truly, Mrs. ARTHUR T. MONK, Corresponding Secretary. AMERICAN VICTORY UNION, AMERICAN FRIENDS OF MUSICIANS IN FRANCE, 150 Nassau Street, New York City. MY DEAR SIRS: Your letter has been received, and I regret delay in my reply. With the main points of the bill, as I read it in the paper you kindly sent me, I am in sympathy. I realize that this provision is a protection to ourselves as well as one for the public. I wish to say, however, that with one section, namely, section 4, I must take issue. The fact that the bill demands a filing of a statement setting forth the moneys collected or gifts donated the preceding month between the 1st and 5th days of each month means that a pressure is brought to bear upon our office. While perfectly willing to comply with such demands, and while being entirely in a position to do so, I must ask why the certified accounting done for us once every six months by Price, Waterhouse & Co., the well-known auditors, is not sufficient guarantee. In order to reduce our expenses to the lowest possible point we have a very small office and working staff. The result of the bill would be to considerably increase our office expenses, a thing hardly to be desired by the Government. This is the only point which makes me hesitate to fully indorse the passage of this bill, the purpose of which we can only fully approve and indorse. Yours, very sincerely, MABEL C. TUTTLE, Chairman. AMERICAN ARTISTS' COMMITTEE OF ONE HUNDRED, WILLIAM BULLOCK, Esq., Director General American Victory Union, DEAR SIR: I have in hand a letter from you as director general, under date of November 23, addressed to the secretary of the American Artists' Committee of One Hundred. Mr. Faxon, in asking me to answer the letter, comments that the Senate bill 4972, copy of which was inclosed in your letter, does not concern the work of the American Artists' Committee of One Hundred. Having read the bill as well as your letter, I am of the same opinion. We collect money in the United States and send it to the Fraternité des Artistes, which distributes it in relief work among the families of French soldier artists; that is to say, the women and children and other dependents. None of the money is used in connection with any armed force. Inasmuch as this bill seems to me to be in the right direction I have no objection to indorsing it as chairman of our committee. We shall not have a meeting of our executive committee until the early part of the new year, so that my indorsement should be simply as chairman of the committee. Very truly, yours, Wм. A. COFFIN, Chairman, Honorary President Fraternité des Artistes. Mr. WILLIAM BULLOCK, Director General American Victory Union, SERBIAN AID FUND, New York, December 5, 1918. 150 Nassau Street, New York, N. Y. DEAR SIR: We can see no objection to the passage of such a bill as you forward to us in your letter of November 23, although there might be one or twomodifications in it to fit present conditions. Yours, truly, MARY T. CONKLIN, Secretary. BLIND AND CRIPPLED RELIEF FUND, Mr. WILLIAM BULLOCK, General Director American Victory Union, 150 Nassau Street, New York City. DEAR MR. BULLOCK: Your letter of December 2 at hand, and in reply 1 wish very highly to commend the bill introduced by Mr. Ashurst in the United States Senate, and which is now before the Committee on Military Affairs. As soon as I heard of this bill I sent a letter stating my approval of it to Mr. Barry Smith, of the National Investigation Bureau, highly indorsing it. I think its passage is not only a protection to the honest charities but is of the gravest necessity to stamp out dishonest dealings in the name of patriotism. We wish in every way to comply with anything this bill may require of us. Yours, very truly, MRS. WENDELL PHILLIPS, President. NEW YORK, December 2, 1918. Mr. WILLIAM BULLOCK, Director General, American Victory Union, 150 Nassau Street, New York City. DEAR MR. BULLOCK: Replying to your letter of November 26, the bill, copy of which you were so good as to inclose with your letter, will be laid before the board of directors of the British and Canadian Patriotic Fund at their next meeting, which will be held shortly. In the meantime, I believe I can assure you that the British and Canadian Patriotic Fund will heartily approve this bill and will be glad to comply with its provisions. The only criticism I have to the bill is that section 4 entails a very large amount of work on the part of the treasurer and secretary of all such associations and in our case would probably at least double the entire overhead expenses of the fund, with the exception of the administration of actual relief. We have only one paid officer, a woman who handles for us the direct relief work and who is paid either $25 or $35 a week, and one stenographer, who is paid less than that amount. We have not considered it necessary to keep up our records to within five days, as called for in this bill. I do not think it will be practical for very many of the volunteer associations to report an accurate outline of money collected, sources of such money, expenditures of such money, etc., on as close a basis as a five-day report without adding a good deal to their overhead expense. Yours, very truly, C. M. KEYS. AMERICAN COMMITTEE FOR DEVASTATED FRANCE (INC.), WILLIAM BULLOCK, Director General, American Victory Union, 150 Nassau Street, New York City. DEAR SIR: We acknowledge, with thanks, the receipt of your letter of November 22 last, with its inclosed copy of United States Senate bill 4972, entitled "A bill to regulate the collection and expenditure of money, other than by the Government of the United States or by its authority, for the use and benefit of the armed forces of the United States and of its allies, and especially of France, Great Britain, Italy, Belgium, Serbia, Greece, and Montenegro, or for any auxiliary organizations of said Governments maintained and operated for the use and benefit of such armed forces." While we are in hearty accord with the spirit of the bill, we submit for your consideration certain provisions of it which we suggest are possibly unwise. We are in so thorough accord with the spirit of the bill that, while we do not take the liberty of suggesting its extension so far as to include the subjects immediately hereinafter mentioned, we should have been well content had it gone so far as (a) To have covered all appeals made by individuals, associations, or corporations for a philanthropic or benevolent purpose of any sort regardless of whether or not it was for the use or benefit of, or in connection with, armed forces of the United States or of any other nation. (b) To have required as a prerequisite to any form of solicitation the issuance of a license therefor by the Department of Justice, which license be revocable at any time. (c) To have required that the accounts of collections and disbursements be, with specified frequency, audited by certified public accountants, whose certificate should be attached to all accounts filed with the Department of Justice. (d) To have prohibited any soliciting individual or any officer or director of any soliciting association or corporation from directly or indirectly deriving any salary or profit for services in such solicitation or for service in the philanthropic or benevolent work for which such solicitation was made. We, however, suggest that section 4 of the bill contains provisions possibly unwise, such provisions being those which provide in effect that every soliciting corporation shall file with the Department of Justice during the first five days of each calendar month a statement showing in detail such financial transactions for the immediate preceding calendar month as included (a) the names of contributors and the amounts of their contributions; (b) the dates and amounts of payments and the names and addresses of the several recipients thereto. We respectfully suggest that it would be impossible within such period of five days to marshal the accounts of an organization having its office in, say, New York City, obtaining its funds from subscribers scattered throughout the United States, and disbursing such funds in part in the United States for the purchase of clothing and other war-relief materials sent to France, and in part in France, not only for corresponding purpose but also for other extensive and diversified relief measures requested by the French Government. Our own organization had prior to November 1, 1918, (a) raised in France cereal sufficient to support 4,000 persons for one year; (b) furnished to French farmers 1,000,000 vegetable plants and 72,000 fruit trees; (c) fed 257,000 French and American soldiers in emergency canteens of eight weeks; (d) since March 1, 1918, shipped to France over $115,000 worth of new clothing and workroom supplies. This sort of work and our other activities involved the making of a very large number of small disbursements, which certainly, as regards the disbursements in France, could not report within five days, for our experience has been that the monthly reports of our disbursements in France, regularly sent by our representatives there, can not be produced more rapidly than to reach us six weeks after the close of the month to which the disbursements relate, and these accounts are made up under the oversight of competent auditors in France. We have intruded upon you some of the details as to the nature of our own transactions in order to bring out more clearly what we believe to be the reasonableness of our criticism. Does it not seem to you that the relief contemplated in the bill could be as surely obtained were there substituted for the provisions of section 4 of the bill, provisions that no solicitation should be commenced or continued unless pursuant to a license from the Department of Justice and in strict conformity with such rules and regulations as the Department of Justice might from time to time promulgate, a violation of any of these rules and regulations being made a crime. Congress, from necessity, is a body more slowly moving than is the Department of Justice and should the Department of Justice frame the rules and regulations for the conduct of soliciting organizations, it could by new rules or by amendment of former rules, permit the continuance of such relief work as the Department of Justice thought deserved a continuance, in cases where it did not develop until after the promulgation of the rules and regulations that the soliciting organization in question was thereby prevented from functioning. Very truly, yours, AMERICAN COMMITTEE FOR DEVASTATED FRANCE (INC), Chairman Executive Committee. AMERICAN VICTORY UNION, 115 Nassau Street, New York City. PATRIOTIC SERVICE LEAGUE, DEAR SIR: Your letter of December 11 has just been received having been forwarded from another address and I have not had time to read the text of the bill nor to lay it before the executive committee. I may state, however, that the Patriotic Service League is very much in favor of a proposal for the regulation of patriotic societies and has always supported similar efforts and sends a monthly statement of its account to Mr. Barrett Smith of the Charities Information Association and is now gladly complying with the suggestions of Mr. Smith in his new organization. I will be happy to lay your bill before the committee at the first opportunity. Very truly, yours, L. A. FRYE. AMERICAN COMMITTEE FOR RELIEF OF BABES OF BELGIUM, New York, December 14, 1918. Director General, 150 Nassau Street, New York. WILLIAM BULLOCK, ESQ., DEAR SIR: Acknowledging your favor of 9th inst., we are heartily in favor of the passage of bill No. 4972, as introduced by Mr. Ashurst. This committee has ceased its activities and its affairs are being settled up, and the organization disbanded. DEAR SIR: In the absence of the president of the Belgian Relief Fund, Rev. J. F. Stillemans, I am answering your letter of the 25th ultimo in my capacity as secretary of this committee, to let you know that I approve of the passage of the measure, copy of which you inclose. As soon as Rev. J. F. Stillemans, our president, returns I will communicate to him the contents of your letter. Yours, very truly, O. A. NYS, Secretary. AUTHORS' LEAGUE FUND, WILLIAM BULLOCK, Esq., American Victory Union, 150 Nassau Street, New York, N. Y. DEAR MR. BULLOCK: At yesterday's meeting of the executive committee I presented your letter of November 25, together with the inclosed bill for the restriction of certain charitable organizations. I am glad to report that the committee voted its unqualified indorsement of the measure. Yours, very truly, E. SCHULER, Secretary. POLISH VICTIMS' RELIEF FUND, Mr. WILLIAM BULLOCK, Director General American Victory Union, 150 Nassau Street, New York City. DEAR SIR: We are in receipt of your letter of November 23 asking for an expression of our opinion regarding the proposed Ashurst bill, which has been referred by the Senate to the Committee on Military Affairs. I have the honor to state, on behalf of the Polish Victims' Relief Fund, that we entirely agree with the majority of the paragraphs of this bill. However, we consider that section 4 would necessitate the maintenance of a whole staff of accountants in order that these requirements might be completely complied with. It would naturally necessitate a certain amount of expenditure which so far we have not incurred. As far as the other paragraphs are concerned, it will not change to any extent our status, since we are now sending monthly reports to the War Trade Board, quarterly reports to the National State Defense Council of Illinois, and semiannual reports to the National Investigation Bureau of New York. However, if this bill is understood in its literal sense, it will be conducive to the suppression of all relief work within the United States, for it is a material impossibility to obtain personal receipts from the war sufferers abroad to whom the money goes. We hold receipts for every cent we have sent out to different organizations in Switzerland, France, and England, but we have only the statements of these organizations, published from audited accounts every year, as to the final disposition of the money. You must take into consideration the fact that many of the Polish war sufferers who benefited by the moneys collected by us in America do not know how to read or write, and therefore could not sign any receipts. This is a frank opinion for which you have asked. I can assure you only that we shall always comply with any new regulations which may be established exactly as we have always complied with all the laws of the United States in the past. Very sincerely, yours, AMERICAN VICTORY UNION, W. O. GORSKI, Honorary Executive Secretary. WOMEN'S APPAREL ASSOCIATION, New York, November 28, 1918. 150 Nassau Street, New York City. GENTLEMEN: In reply to your favor of November 24, would say that the Women's Apparel Association approves the passage of bill No. 4927. This association is most anxious to have a bill passed which would enable one to easily detect a legitimate organization, conducted on a businesslike and honest plan, from those run in a wasteful, and often dishonest, manner. Hoping that this bill will pass the Senate, I remain, Very truly, yours, MARY WALLS, Secretary. STAGE WOMEN'S WAR RELIEF, Mr. WILLAM BULLOCK, American Victory Union, 150 Nassau Street, New York City. DEAR SIR: In reply to your letter of November 23 regarding bill No. 4972, for the United States Senate; the Stage Women's War Relief is glad to go on record as supporting and advocating this bill. Yours, most sincerely, JOSEPHINE SHERWOOD HULL, BLIND AND CRIPPLED RELIEF FUND, Mr. WILLIAM BULLOCK, 150 Nassau Street, New York City. DEAR MR. BULLOCK: Your letter of the 9th instant received. I wrote you a letter on December 3, signifying my approval of the bill introduced by Mr. Ashurst, and that we wished in every way to comply with anything in this bill may require of us. Yours, very truly, ELAINE HALE PHILLIPS, 103162-19-6 |