I’ve reported before on the tireless efforts of the Bureau of the Budget under Brig. Gen. Lord to root out government waste and to drive down the deficit.
In a bit of correspondence from 1928, it appears that Gen. Lord didn’t shy away from demanding that the White House join in these efforts. This is all a bit quaint, but sometimes one wishes the government would be as savings-minded as it was in Coolidge’s day.
Here, Lord relates a new scheme to place a reminder of the cost of letters on each correspondence clerk’s desk:
He encloses a copy of the placard with the exhortation “Write fewer letters – write briefer letters” (it should be noted that letter postage was a mere 2 cents in 1928, so it was indeed surprising that a letter cost the government 26 cents):
And here’s the -appropriately brief- response from Coolidge’s secretary Everett Sanders:
