AMERICAN NOTES: Help Wanted

Contrary to popular myth, bureaucracies do not run on momentum alone. They need people. Yet the Nixon Administration has been operating for months with one-fourth of its sub-Cabinet posts either empty or filled with stand-in appointees. At a recent celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, eight of eleven high department offices were represented on the podium by acting officials. As they were introduced to the bureaucracy-wise audience of mainly H.E.W. workers, the ludicrousness of their transient titles touched off muffled titters that soon turned to roars of laughter. At present, offices such...

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