I have little to add to this discussion for the simple reason that my colleague, Dr. Coats, has said much of what I wanted to say, said it more interestingly, with a Dorothy Dix touch which I, in my academic restraint, cannot give, and also said it with more authority because of his long and distinguished public service. I can do little more than underscore a few broad propositions.
My first proposition is an emphasis upon the basic fact that public administration is the administration of the state, and not simply the administration of individual departments of government. It has to deal with the management of the state in its aggregated activities, and hence broadly with the whole subtle art of government. The tone of that management never depends simply upon what industrious and zealous civil servants in their offices may do, or how they may do it, but, among other things, upon the effective organization of parliamentary committees, the conscience and intelligence of their members, the modes of planning parliamentary work, and even the quality of discussion within the conclaves of parties, or the antics and verbal orgies of the demagogue in public debate. The genuine and profitable study of public administration in a democratic state cannot be narrower than the broad frame of government, if we are to appreciate duly the ultimate end sought—the competent management of the state. One phase of national government, designated by text-book writers as the administrative, cannot logically or wisely be isolated from other phases which in turn determine its character. To the institutions of general government must be applied those principles and axioms concerning organization which Henri Fayol, Major Urwick, Mary Follett, and many others, with varying wisdom and clarity, have done much to elaborate.
