Statement by the President Upon Signing Order Establishing the President's Scientific Research Board.

I HAVE SIGNED Executive Order 9791 today. It establishes a Presidential Research Board with Reconversion Director John R. Steelman as Chairman. Its members are the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of the Interior, the Secretary of the Navy, the Secretary of War, the Federal Loan Administrator, the Federal Security Administrator, the Federal Works Administrator, the Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, the Chairman of the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Chairman of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, and the Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development.

The order directs the Reconversion Director to prepare a report of (1) his findings with respect to the Federal research program and his recommendations for providing coordination and improved efficiency therein; and, (2), his findings with respect to non-Federal research, development and training activities, a statement of the interrelationship of Federal and non-Federal research and development, and his recommendations for planning, administering and staffing Federal research programs to insure that the scientific personnel, training and research facilities of the Nation are used most effectively in the national interest.

National security and the development of the domestic economy depend upon the extension of fundamental scientific knowledge and the application of basic principles to the development of new techniques and processes. The Nation has a vast reservoir of war-accelerated technological development which must be applied speedily and effectively to the problems of peace--stepping up productivity in both industry and agriculture, creation of new farm and factory products and advancement of medical science. Fundamental research, necessarily neglected during the war, must be resumed if scientific progress is to continue.

The Federal Government has played and will play an important role in all areas of research, but the share of our national income which can be devoted to research has definite limits. The order lays the groundwork for a general plan designed to insure that Federal scientific research will promote the most effective allocation of research resources between the universities, the research foundations, industry and the Federal Government.

There must be no duplication, overlapping or inefficiency to hamper Federal research. In view of the current level of Federal expenditures, our research activities must be conducted with minimum expenditures consistent with the essential objective of a Federal program.

I am concerned over the current shortage of scientific personnel and ask for a careful inquiry into this phase of the research program.