The Act of June 10, 1926, known as the “Equalization Act,” declared its purpose to be “to provide for the equalization of promotion of officers of the staff corps of the Navy with officers of the line.” In practice it has not only failed to “equalize promotion” in the staff corps as a whole with that in the line but it has also produced distinct inequalities among the staff corps themselves.
Although these results affect only about eighty officers at the present time, they Weigh heavily upon the future promotion of every staff officer below the rank of captain. They create a condition which time, instead of curing, merely aggravates—one which cannot but undermine the morale and efficiency of the whole naval service. It was a defective method of carrying out the first process under the act that caused all the trouble. Only another act of Congress, however, can now correct that error.
(a) What the act aimed at.—Formerly, each staff corps had separate promotion. The number of officers in the upper ranks of each corps was limited to a percentage of the total number in the corps, and promotions could be made only by selection to fill vacancies. Various combinations of circumstances after the Personnel Act of 1916 went into effect, produced wide variations in the length of service of officers in the same rank in the staff corps and line. By 1926, among about nineteen hundred forty staff officers about 12 per cent were behind their line contemporaries in reaching selective ranks, while about 3 per cent Were ahead. Those behind were in the upper ranks of all staff corps except chaplain. Those who were ahead were largely chaplains; the rest were constructors in the commander’s list. In transmitting to the Speaker of the House the draft of the bill which afterward became the “Equalization Act,” the Secretary of the Navy wrote in part as follows:
The enclosed bill provides that staff officers shall have the same promotion, or the same opportunity for promotion, as officers of their own time in the line; and that qualified staff officers may be advanced at the same time as their qualified contemporaries in the line. . . . The proposed bill provides that staff officers in those corps wherein promotion has lagged behind the line shall have the same opportunity for immediate promotion as have been already enjoyed by their contemporaries, or running mates, in the line. In general, [it] places all officers of the Navy in the same promotion status up to the grade of rear- admiral.
The representative of the Bureau of Navigation and the Judge Advocate General in the hearings before a congressional committee gave testimony to the same general effect.
In order to couple “contemporaneous promotion after equal length of service” with “equal opportunity for selection,” the act endeavored to limit the ratio of selections to eligibles in the staff to that exhibited by the results of selection board action in the line over periods of years. This differentiation between limiting the number of officers in various ranks and limiting the ratio of selections is important to remember, because it was precisely by confusing these two ideas that the basic purpose of the act was defeated.
From a careful study of the Secretary of the Navy’s letter recommending the bill, the questions of the committees of Congress during the hearings on it, the statements and answers of Navy Department representatives before those committees, and the act itself, it is apparent that the primary intents of the act were:
(1) to cause the simultaneous promotion of officers of equal length of service, in the line and all staff corps,
(2) to equalize the “opportunity” for selection to the three uppermost ranks—except that only a specifically limited number of staff officers could have the rank of rear admiral, and
(3) to make the actual record of promotions in the line the pacemaker for similar and contemporaneous processes in all the staff corps.
(b) How far the act fell short.—How far the act has missed its first point of aim; namely, “contemporaneous promotion of officers having equal length of service,” is revealed by examining the records and prognostications of the Bureau of Navigation.
Officers of the |
may reach the rank of |
as compared with line contemporary |
Medical corps |
commander captain |
at same time 3 years later |
Dental corps |
commander |
at same time |
Supply corps |
commander captain |
4 years later at same time |
Chaplain corps |
commander captain |
at same time at same time |
Construction corps |
commander captain |
at same time 7 years later |
Civil engineer corps |
commander captain |
4 years later 3 years later |
The above table shows that the act has missed its first point of aim by a wide margin in five cases where staff promotion is from three to seven years behind the line. As to “equal opportunity for selection when eligible,” the records of the Bureau of Navigation show a most irregular dispersion. Line officers who have had four years’ service in a selection rank are eligible for selection for promotion to the next higher rank but in practice selections are made only to the number of the vacancies that are expected. This has confined selections to the upper part of the list. In the staff corps only those whose line running mates have been selected are eligible and of these only a certain number can be promoted, as prescribed in the formulas of the Equalization Act. How different the “opportunities” thus presented have been in line and staff is shown by the following table:
|
Ratio of selection |
|
To Commander |
To Captain |
|
Line |
.857 |
.871 |
Medical Corps |
.754 |
.748 |
Dental Corps |
.926 |
… |
Supply Corps |
.731 |
.851 |
Chaplain Corps |
*… |
*… |
Construction Corps |
*… |
.529 |
Civil Engineer Corps |
.600 |
.857 |
* Note: No promotions since “equalization.”
It is therefore obvious that the act has neither made contemporaneous promotion possible among officers of equal length of service nor given them equal opportunity for selection when they became eligible.
Moreover, in every case in which a staff officer is belated in reaching the rank of commander or captain, even though he has never been “passed over” and has never enjoyed “equal opportunity” for selection, he suffers the penalty of having to take as his new running mate a line officer who is not his real “contemporary,” but has had shorter service and will therefore be reached for promotion to the next higher rank (and make the staff officer eligible) later than the original “contemporary.” For example, taking the worst case, the officer of the Construction Corps who (if he is not passed over) can next be promoted to the rank of captain, will in reaching that rank be seven years behind the officers of the line with whom he graduated from the Academy. He must then take as his new running mate a line officer who is several years his junior both in age and length of service, and he must thereafter rank with other staff officers who entered the naval service long after the constructor graduated.
(c) Why the act failed.—The act failed to do what it declared it intended to do, and what its Navy Department proponents assured Congress that it would do, because it never got a fair start. When the act was passed, the promotion status in the staff corps was as follows:
Staff Corps |
Medical |
Supple |
Chaplain |
Construction |
Civil Engineer |
Captains whose line contemporaries were rear admirals |
11 |
1 |
0 |
4 |
0 |
Captains whose line contemporaries were captains |
22 |
21 |
6 |
16 |
5 |
Captains whose line contemporaries were of junior rank |
0 |
0 |
9 |
0 |
0 |
Commanders whose line contemporaries were captains |
53 |
39 |
0 |
6 |
9 |
Commanders whose line contemporaries were commanders |
12 |
8 |
0 |
13 |
6 |
Commanders whose line contemporaries were of junior rank |
0 |
0 |
30 |
14 |
0 |
Lieutenant commanders whose line contemporaries were commanders |
75 |
39 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
Other lieutenant commanders |
243 |
36 |
15 |
18 |
26 |
To bring all staff corps into step with the line and with each other was, therefore, a first essential. Without that, it was impossible for the act to accomplish its purpose in the future. This first essential has generally been known as the “squaring away process.” But it was just here that the muddle was made. The act did not say:
Staff officers are eligible for promotion as soon as, but not until, their line contemporaries are promoted; subject to selection and examination, the same proportion of them may be promoted as have been promoted among their line contemporaries,
but did say substantially:
As soon as possible after the passage of this Act, the Secretary of the Navy shall appoint boards to select staff officers for promotion to the ranks of captain and commander. For promotion to the rank of captain in any corps that number may be selected which will make the total in the rank of captain 91 per cent of the number, in the ranks of captain and commander in that corps, whose line running mates are captains. For promotion to the ranks of commander in any corps, that number may be selected which will make the total in the rank of commander 91 per cent of the number, in the ranks of commander and lieutenant commander in that corps, whose line running mates are commanders.
Ninety-one per cent had been computed to be the ratio of selections in the line to total numbers between the senior and junior selected over a period of years.
Reduced to mathematical terms, these clauses as applied by the Navy Department may be expressed thus:
if a be the number of staff officers in the rank of captain whose line running mates have already been selected for promotion to the next higher rank,
and b the number whose running mates are of the same rank,
and c the number of commanders whose running mates have been selected for the next higher rank,
to find x the number of staff officers of the c group who may be promoted to the rank next above the one which they now hold,
we have x=.91(b+c) — (a-+-b)
whence x=.91c—a—.09b.
After the number of captains to be promoted has been computed, same formula (with the ranks lowered one notch) computes the number of lieutenant commanders who can be promoted to the rank of commander.
By this formula it is obvious that the proportion of the waiting eligibles who could be promoted is not 91 per cent, but is less than 91 per cent by the entire number of officers a, who were also behind their running mates, and by 9 per cent of the number b, who had been fortunate enough to keep up with their running mates.
The more captains who were behind their running mates, the fewer commanders could be promoted. The more commanders who must be left behind, the fewer lieutenant commanders could be promoted to a rank equal to that of their contemporaries.
Moreover, in this formula
x=0
when a = .91c+.09b.
In other words, in a staff corps in which there were nearly as many captains whose running mates were rear admirals as there were commanders whose running mates were captains, no commanders could be promoted at all—thus penalizing the juniors because their seniors must perforce remain behind their contemporaries.
At one extreme stood the Civil Engineer Corps, where there were no captains with rear admiral contemporaries. The number of commanders who could be promoted in this corps was therefore computed to be
x= (.91X 9) - 0 - (.09 X 5) = 7.74.
Eight of the nine eligibles thus got under the wire, nearly 90 per cent, the highest ratio in any staff corps, because no captain in that corps was behind his line contemporary. The one commander left behind, however, prevented the promotion of either of the two eligible lieutenant commanders.
At the other extreme stood the Construction Corps. In that corps the number of captains behind their running mates in rank was nearly equal to the number of commanders who were behind theirs. In this case the number of commanders, already left behind by their line running mates, who could be promoted was computed to be
x = (.91X6) -4 -(.09X16) =0.02.
Therefore, none of the six eligible commanders in the Construction Corps could be promoted at all, because so many captains in that corps were contemporaries of rear admirals in the line!
When the fog of the “squaring away process” cleared away, this is what had happened:
Corps |
For promotion to |
||||||||
Rear admiral |
Captain |
Commander |
|||||||
Eligibles |
Selection allowed |
“Opportunity” |
Eligibles |
Selection allowed |
“Opportunity” |
Eligibles |
Selection allowed |
“Opportunity” |
|
Medical |
11 |
0 |
.00 |
53 |
35 |
.66 |
75 |
49 |
.65 |
Supply |
1 |
0 |
.00 |
39 |
33 |
.85 |
39 |
25 |
.64 |
Construction |
4 |
0 |
.00 |
6 |
0 |
.00 |
0 |
0 |
— |
Civil engineer |
0 |
0 |
— |
9 |
8 |
.89 |
2 |
0 |
.00 |
Note: Chaplains are omitted from this table because no chaplain was behind his line contemporary in rank. |
Far from correcting the inequitable results of the “squaring away process,” the later workings of the act merely perpetuated them. Subsequent promotions could be made only when new eligibles were made by reason of their running mates having been selected for promotion in the line. When this happens the number of new eligibles in each staff corps is multiplied by the ratio of selections recently made in the line (number of selections divided by number of officers between senior and junior selected, inclusive) to determine how many of all the eligibles, both new and old, in the staff corps can be promoted.
For example, in the Construction Corps where none of the six eligible commanders could be promoted in “squaring away,” four more became eligible by the action of the next line selection board. The ratio of selections in the line was then about 91 per cent. There were now ten eligibles but only four promotions were possible—a 40 per cent “opportunity.” And so on through all ranks in all staff corps.
One amazing effect of these provisions is that the opportunity for promotion of a left-behind staff corps eligible, even one who has never been reached for selection to his own corps, depends not on the disappearance of his seniors from the active list, nor upon the continued advancement of his original line contemporary, but upon the continuance on the active list of some Junior until the latter’s running mate in the line is selected for promotion, thus making the junior staff officer eligible, and authorizing a promotion in the staff corps.
In such a situation as is above set out, ff is small wonder that selection boards Usually select the senior eligibles, not the junior. The members of the board realize, as the rest of the corps do, that the seniors never had a fair chance. Eligibles never reached by selection therefore increase in number year by year, postponing more and more the selection of officers who come after them.
(d) How to get the act back on its target.— It is of no use now to debate whether or not “equalization” is best for the naval service. That question has been settled by the enactment and approval of this act. Its failure to produce the results promised by its proponents is due mostly to defects above pointed out, in its initial process.
Obviously, promotion cannot be equalized throughout the line and staff corps of the Navy unless all the staff officers who have been left behind in rank by their line contemporaries are given a fair and equal chance for promotion to equal rank. Moreover, staff officers who have not been passed over for selection in their own corps ought not be penalized by loss of precedence (and time of eligibility for future promotion) because some of their seniors were unfortunately behind their contemporaries in rank when the act was passed, nor for failing to be promoted when a defective formula made promotion impossible.
To get all corps into step with the line and with each other with equal “opportunity” for all, a new and non-defective “squaring away” is necessary. In that process, all the staff officers now eligible for the next higher rank should, after selection, be promoted. To be fair, the number of selections permitted in each staff corps in this process must be sufficient to make the total number of officers in that corps who shall have then been promoted beyond any given rank bear to the total number of officers in that corps whose running mates have been selected for promotion beyond that rank the same ratio as has been exhibited by the action of selection boards in the line.
The Bureau of Navigation records show that to afford officers in the various staff corps an “equal opportunity” with their contemporaries in the line there would have to be thirteen additional promotions to captain, and thirteen to commander in the Medical Corps; five to captain in the Construction Corps; nine to commander in the Supply Corps, and one to commander in the Civil Engineer Corps.
Moreover, to do justice to those officers who have lost precedence by having to take new running mates junior to their contemporaries, that penalty should be removed. Any officer who shall have been promoted without having been passed over for selection in his own corps should have a commission in his new rank bearing the same date as that of his original line contemporary; and any officer who has been promoted after having been passed over should take as his running mate the line officer next junior to the running mate of his immediate senior now on the active list in his own corps, and have a commission in his new rank bearing the same date as the commission of that new running mate.
Conclusion.—In order to secure an equitable “squaring away” the following legislation is proposed:
(1) A bill to correct certain defects in Act of June 10,1926, in order that officers of all the staff corps of the Navy may have equal opportunity for contemporaneous promotion with line officers having equal length of service. Be it enacted, etc.
That there are hereby immediately authorized, subject to selection and examination as now prescribed by law, promotions of eligible officers in the next lower rank in their respective corps as follows:
In the Medical Corps, thirteen to the rank of captain and thirteen to the rank of commander;
In the Supply Corps, nine to the rank of commander;
In the Construction Corps, five to the rank of captain;
In the Civil Engineer Corps, one to the rank of commander.
(2) Special selection boards in the several corps mentioned in section one hereof, shall be appointed immediately upon the approval of this Act, in the manner now prescribed by law, to give effect to section 1 hereof.
(3) Every staff officer who, without being “passed over” as defined by the Act of June 10, 1926, has been since that date, or shall be by virtue of this act, promoted to the rank of commander or captain, shall be given a commission in that rank as of the same date as that borne by the commission in that rank of his line contemporary, by reason of whose selection the staff officer in question originally became eligible for selection.
(4) Every staff officer who, after having been “passed over,” has since that date been or shall by virtue of this act be promoted shall be given a commission in his new rank as of the date of the commission of the staff officer in his own corps who is next above him on active list in his new rank.
(5) No back pay or allowances shall be due by virtue of this act.
(6) All acts and parts of acts which conflict with this act are hereby set aside.
. . . But the ultimate proof of the man comes when the unexpected happens and no time is left for the slow decision. A quick decision must he made or destruction of ship or life will follow. . . . Only the man who can live up to this demand of an emergency is the born leader of a ship, as far as mere navigation is concerned. Experience for which mankind has dearly paid has shown that there are two types of men who utterly fail. One type becomes paralyzed under the pressure of the sudden responsibility .... The other type instantly opens the channels of motor discharge but the flood impulse rushes into any chance course and a haphazard result, & foolish decision, or an unconsidered hasty action is the outcome. The right man is of the third type which under the pressure of danger without loss of time instinctively grasps the whole complex situation, is not carried away by any chance impression, does not overlook what is significant in the unexpected event, sees the important things great and the insignificant small. Coolly he chooses in immediate response the attitude which he would take if he had time for careful deliveration.—Munsterberg.