COMPENSATION OF DISBURSING OFFICER OF THE A member of the Board of Children's Guardians of the District of Co- TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OFFICE OF COMPTROLLER OF THE TREASURY, August 19, 1895. SIR: I am in receipt of your letter of the 15th instant, in which you state that the Board of Children's Guardians wish to be advised whether they will be authorized in paying a salary to the disbursing officer of the Board for his services, and also whether they would be warranted in paying such salary for services rendered during the fiscal year 1895. The appropriations for your Board for the fiscal years 1895 and 1896 contain the following clause (28 Stat., 260, 762): "For the Board of Children's Guardians, created under the act approved July twenty-sixth, eighteen hundred and ninetytwo, namely: For administrative expenses, including salary of agent, expenses in placing and visiting children, and all office and sundry expenses, four thousand dollars." In the act of July 26, 1892 (27 Stat., 268), creating the Board, it was provided: "That there shall be created, in and for the District of Columbia, a board to be known as the Board of Children's Guardians, composed of nine members, who shall serve without compensation, the said board to be a body politic and corporate and to have the powers and to be constituted in the manner hereinafter provided." Section 3 of the act provides for the election by the Board from its own members of a president, vice-president, and secretary, and for the employment by the Board of not exceeding two agents subject to the approval of the Commissioners of the District of Columbia. Under these provisions of law I am clearly of the opinion that the Board is not authorized in paying a salary to its disbursing officer, such disbursing officer being also a member of the Board and required by the act creating the Board to serve without compensation. USE OF CONTINGENT APPROPRIATIONS. When an item is properly payable from an appropriation for contingent expenses, the discretion of the officer charged with the duty of expending said fund is not subject to review by the accounting officers upon any question as to the necessity or advisability of his expenditures. TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OFFICE OF COMPTROLLER OF THE TREASURY, August 19, 1895. SIR: I am in receipt of your letter of the 19th ultimo, in which you submit for my decision a question involved in the payment of the bill of H. Buchanan, amounting to $128, for furnishing for your office the portraits of former secretaries of the Territory. The appropriation, "Legislative expenses, Territory of Arizona, 1896," is as follows: "For legislative expenses, namely: For rent, messenger, postage, stationery, fuel, lights, printing, and incidental ex penses for secretary's office, two thousand dollars." This appropriation for the expenses of your office is disbursed by you and is under your control. I know of no provision of law prohibiting the purchase of portraits or pictures for your office. The responsibility for the payment of this bill, as an incidental expense of your office, rests with you. If you approve such an expenditure as a necessary and proper expense of your office the bill may be paid from the appropriation above quoted and you will be credited accordingly in the settlement of your accounts. It is no part of the duty of the Comptroller to decide upon the necessity or advisability of expenditures which come within an appropriation for incidental expenses and are not prohibited by any law or regulation. The responsibility for incurring an expense, as to the necessity or expediency of which opin ions may differ, must be assumed by the officer under whose control the appropriation is put, and the exercise of his discretion is not, in ordinary cases, subject to review by the accounting officers. Respectfully, yours, Mr. CHAS. M. BRUCE, R. B. BOWLER, Secretary of Arizona Territory, Phoenix. IN RE ACCOUNT OF J. V. GUILLOTTE, UNITED In the absence of any law or regulation governing the calculation of salary due to a person employed at a monthly salary who serves a fractional part of a month, such proportion of the monthly salary should be paid as the number of days served bears to the whole number of days in in the month in which the service is rendered. TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OFFICE OF COMPTROLLER OF THE TREASURY, August 20, 1895. Marshal Guillotte appeals from the settlement by the Auditor for the State and other Departments of his account under the appropriation "Miscellaneous expenses, United States courts," for the period from July 1, 1894, to March 31, 1895. In that account was a voucher for $33.33, amount paid to the stenographer to the circuit judge at New Orleans for services during the last eight days in October, 1894. Of this amount the Auditor disallowed the sum of $1.09 on the ground that the correct amount for eight days in October at $125 per month, the salary allowed by the Attorney-General, was $32.24. The question presented is simply whether in paying for frac tional parts of a month a person employed at a monthly salary it is proper to consider each month as containing thirty days, as the marshal did, and pay one-thirtieth for each day's service, or whether a proportionate amount should be paid for each day's service, varying according to the number of days in the particular month for which payment is made. To adopt the former plan would lead to overpayments in cases where two or more persons served during the month in the same position if the month happened to have thirty-one days or underpayments if it contained less than thirty days. If a person serving ten days in any thirty-one-day month should be paid one-third of the monthly salary, the person serving the remaining twenty-one days would practically receive no compensation for the thirty-first day. In the absence of any law or regulation governing the matter I am clearly of the opinion that where a person employed at a monthly salary serves a fractional part of the month he is entitled to such proportion of the monthly salary as the number 11268-VOL 2—6 of days he has served bears to the whole number of days in the month in which the service is rendered. R. B. BOWLER, Comptroller. LIFE RENTAL OF TELEPHONE FOR AGRICULTURAL DEPARTMENT. Under an agreement to pay a stipulated sum as a life rental of telephone instruments, such sum may be paid on delivery of the same, as the contract is at that time completed by the contractor, and section 3648, Revised Statutes, prohibiting payment for articles prior to delivery, has no application. TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OFFICE OF COMPTROLLER OF THE TREASURY, August 20, 1895. SIR: I am in receipt of yours of the 19th instant, inclosing an account of the American Bell Telephone Company of Boston, Mass., for the "life rental" of sixteen hand telephones and sixteen solid back transmitters, at $10 each set; total, $160. You ask whether you are authorized to pay said account. It appears that these instruments are furnished by the American Bell Telephone Company, the patentee, for the use of the Government of the United States, in connection with lines owned by the Government, for governmental purposes only. The only objection to the payment that is suggested is found in the following clause of section 3648 of the Revised Statutes: "And in all cases of contracts for the performance of any service, or the delivery of articles of any description, for the use of the United States, payment shall not exceed the value of the service rendered or of the articles delivered previously to such payment." The rental of these instruments is clearly not a service within the meaning of that section. The agreement with the Bell Telephone Company is one for the use of a patented article. which they deliver and for which use during the life of the instrument, or of the patents, they are to receive a fixed sum. The agreement of the telephone company is entirely completed upon the delivery of the instruments to the Government with the right to use them for the time indicated. There is noth ing, therefore, in section 3648 of the Revised Statutes which prohibits the payment of the account. If the agreement had been for an annual or other periodical payment as rental for the use of the instruments the decision would of course have been otherwise. You are therefore authorized to pay the bill of the American Bell Telephone Company in the sum of $160. Respectfully, yours, Mr. F. L. EVANS, R. B. BOWLER. Comptroller. Disbursing Clerk, Department of Agriculture. SUBSISTENCE OF SUPERINTENDENT OF COAST AND GEODETIC SURVEY WHEN IN THE FIELD. When the Superintendent of the Coast and Geodetic Survey visits parties in the field, the chief of the party furnishing him with subsistence at his own expense may be reimbursed therefor by being credited in his accounts with a per diem allowance, in the same manner as such per diem commutation could be paid directly to the Superintendent. TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OFFICE OF COMPTROLLER OF THE TREASURY, August 20, 1895. SIR: I am in receipt, by your reference, of a letter of the 7th instant, from the Superintendent of the Coast and Geodetic Survey, in which he submits for your approval the following regulation: "An allowance of $2.50 per diem for the subsistence of the Superintendent, when furnished by them, will be credited to the personal accounts of chiefs of parties by the disbursing agent on all occasions when the Superintendent may be visiting their parties, for short periods, upon his tours of inspection and examination. The disbursing agent will advise the chiefs of parties as to the amounts and the disposition made of the credits accruing to them." You ask for my decision upon the question whether such an allowance to be so credited is authorized. In the appropriation for the field work of the Coast and Geodetic Survey for the fiscal year 1896 (act of March 2, 1895, 28 Stat., 921) is found the following clause: "For commutation to officers of the field force while on field duty, at a rate to be fixed by the Secretary of the Treasury, not exceeding two dollars and fifty cents per day each.” |