The Reminiscences of an Astronomer

by Simon Newcomb

At the following session of Congress Senator Hale introduced an amendment to the naval appropriation bill, providing for the expenses of a commission to be appointed by the Secretary of the Navy, to consider and report upon the organization of the observatory. The House non-concurred in this amendment, and it was dropped from the bill.

At the same session, all the leading astronomers of the country united in a petition to Congress, asking that the recommendation of the Secretary of the Navy should be carried into effect. After a very patient hearing of arguments on the subject by Professor Boss and others, the House Naval Committee reported unanimously against the measure, claiming that the navy had plenty of officers able to administer the observatory in a satisfactory way, and that there was therefore no necessity for a civilian head.

Two years later, Senator Morrill offered an amendment to the legislative appropriation bill, providing that the superintendent of the observatory should be selected from civil life, and be learned in the science of astronomy. He supported his amendment by letters from a number of leading astronomers of the country in reply to questions which he had addressed to them.

This amendment, after being approved by the Senate Naval Committee, was referred by the Committee on Appropriations to the Secretary of the Navy. He recommended a modification of the measure so as to provide for the appointment of a "Director of Astronomy," to have charge of the astronomical work of the observatory, which should, however, remain under a naval officer as superintendent. This arrangement was severely criticised in the House by Mr. Thomas B. Reed, of Maine, and the whole measure was defeated in conference.

In 1892, when the new observatory was being occupied, the superintendent promulgated regulations for its work. These set forth in great detail what the observatory should do. Its work was divided into nine departments, each with its chief, besides which there was a chief astronomical assistant and a chief nautical assistant to the superintendent, making eleven chiefs in all. The duties of each chief were comprehensively described. As the entire scientific force of the observatory numbered some ten or twelve naval officers, professors, and assistant astronomers, with six computers, it may be feared that some of the nine departments were short-handed.

In September, 1894, new regulations were established by the Secretary of the Navy, which provided for an "Astronomical Director," who was to "have charge of and to be responsible for the direction, scope, character, and preparation for publication of all work purely astronomical, which is performed at the Naval Observatory." As there was no law for this office, it was filled first by the detail of Professor Harkness, who served until his retirement in 1899, then by the detail of Professor Brown, who served until March, 1901.

In 1899 the Secretary of the Navy appointed a Board of Visitors to the observatory, comprising Senator Chandler, of New Hampshire, Hon. A. G. Dayton, House of Representatives, and Professors Pickering, Comstock, and Hale. This board, "in order to obviate a criticism that the astronomical work of the observatory has not been prosecuted with that vigor and continuity of purpose which should be shown in a national observatory," recommended that the Astronomical Director and the Director of the Nautical Almanac should be civil officers, with sufficient salaries. A bill to this effect was introduced into each House of Congress at the next session, and referred to the respective naval committees, but never reported.

In 1901 Congress, in an amendment to the naval appropriation bill, provided a permanent Board of Visitors to the observatory, in whom were vested full powers to report upon its condition and expenditures, and to prescribe its plan of work. It was also provided in the same law that the superintendent of the observatory should, until further legislation by Congress, be a line officer of the navy of a rank not below that of captain. In the first annual report of this board is the following clause:—

"We wish to record our deliberate and unanimous judgment that the law should be changed so as to provide that the official head of the observatory—perhaps styled simply the Director—should be an eminent astronomer appointed by the President by and with the consent of the Senate."

Although the board still has a legal existence, Congress, in 1902, practically suspended its functions by declining to make any appropriation for its expenses. Moreover, since the detachment of Professor Brown, Astronomical Director, no one has been appointed to fill the vacancy thus arising. At the time of the present writing, therefore, the entire responsibility for planning and directing the work of the observatory is officially vested in the naval superintendent, as it was at the old observatory.