VI.-BOOKS.

(1) The record card system herein described shall be applied to all the records and memoranda of any Bureau, except in cases where books are kept in connection with accounts with the Treasury Department, or such as deal with appropriations or the accounts of disbursing officers, or as may be otherwise prescribed by law.

(2) No more than one set of books shall be kept in any Bureau, and the same shall cover the entire business of such Bureau for which books are required.

(3) All books authorized to be kept by these orders shall contain a statement on the opening page of the authority under which they are commenced or continued, and the use made or to be made of the contents thereof.

(4) Requisitions for funds shall be press-copied in books, and any further record in respect to a requisition shall be noted on such press copy.

VII. PRECEDENTS AND DECISIONS.

(1) On or before June 15, 1894, there shall be prepared in each Bureau a complete card index of all precedents and decisions now contained in book or other form in such Bureau.

(2) Such files shall thereafter be kept up from day to day. (3) As soon as any decision is made in any Bureau, except such as refer to matters pertaining peculiarly and of interest solely to the Bureau in which the decision is made, a copy of such decision shall be transmitted by the Department messenger system as a circular from one chief of Bureau to another, so that notation may be made on the precedent and decision file of such Bureau of any matters of interest thereto.

(4) All decisions not printed in full by the Adjutant General shall, before their publication, be submitted to the officer by whom they have been written for approval as to the form thereof.

(5) All decisions or precedents received by any Bureau shall be forthwith transmitted for record, if necessary, to the precedent

(6) Answers to inquiries shall, so far as practicable, be made in the form that has been approved and established in prior answers to similar inquiries or in determining similar questions.

(7) A copy of the decision made by the Secretary of War upon the basis of any opinion or report furnished by any chief of Bureau will be forthwith transmitted to the chief of Bureau by whom such opinion or report has been supplied.

(8) No prior decision of any Bureau shall be reversed in any case involving substantially the same state of facts without the approval of the Secretary of War.

VIII. MONEY ACCOUNTS AND PROPERTY RETURNS.

(1) Property returns shall be examined and the officer notified within the quarter succeeding the quarter for which each return may have been rendered.

(2) Money accounts shall be examined and transmitted with the necessary papers to the Treasury Department within twenty days from the date when such accounts may have been received.

(3) Chiefs of bureaus will assign such number of clerks to the examination of money accounts and property returns as will enable such examination and action on papers to have been brought up to the requirements above provided on or before the first day of July, 1894.

(4) In case of papers incomplete and involving correspondence with the officer from whom the same have been received, the limitation as to time above specified (subdivision 3) will take effect on receipt of the corrected papers, such correction of papers to be effected as quickly as practicable.

IX.-ANNUAL REPORTS.

(1) The annual reports of chiefs of Bureaus, except as otherwise prescribed by law, shall be confined to a succinct general statement in narrative form, with brief tables, if any, of the state and operations of and recommendations made relative to the branch of the service to which they respectively pertain.

(2) Such reports shall be made and transmitted in typewritten form to the Secretary of War on or before the first day of October in each year.

X.-STOREROOMS.

(1) All books, files, and papers not in use and contained in storerooms shall be arranged and catalogued on cards according to such arrangement.

(2) Such catalogue shall not contain books, files or papers which are useless, and which might be destroyed, but the same shall be separated and placed apart from those above mentioned, and legibly marked "Useless Papers."

(3) Papers in boxes may be catalogued generally, and their continued arrangement in that shape will be sufficient.

(4) Such cataloguing, separation, and marking shall be completed on or before June 15, 1894.

XI. HISTORIES.

(1) All chiefs of Bureaus shall send to the Secretary of War, within one week from the date of receipt of this order, a written statement of all histories or historical sketches, or any other work of a literary character not pertaining to the administrative business, and relating to their respective Bureaus, now in course of preparation, indicating

(a) Scope of proposed work.

(b) Approximate number of pages which the same will comprise when completed.

(c) Date when the same was commenced.

(d) Approximate date when completion thereof is contemplated.

(2) No further work shall be done in such matters without the direction of the Secretary of War.

XII. INQUIRIES AND INFORMATION.

(1) All answers to inquiries concerning, or in any way pertaining to, the services, or any other matter relating to officers or enlisted men of the volunteer forces in the war of the rebellion, or any prior war, shall be made through the Record and Pension Office, and not otherwise.

(2) No information, written or oral, shall be directly or indirectly communicated respecting the business of the Department,

to any person whatsoever not on duty in one of the Bureaus of the Department, without the express authority of the chief of Bureau concerned,

XIII.-ARMY DIRECTORY.

(1) The Army Directory issued in the Adjutant-General's Office shall be the only communication issued by any Bureau of the War Department respecting the residence, station or duties of officers or enlisted men.

(2) The distribution from any Bureau other than the AdjutantGeneral's Office of rosters, lists, or other papers containing information as to the residence or station of the personnel of any part of the military establishment will be discontinued.

XIV.--ARMY REGULATIONS.

(1) No order will be made affecting any existing paragraph of the Army Regulations except as a specific amendment of the whole of the paragraph or paragraphs thereby to be affected.

(2) No revision of the Army Regulations shall take place except by virtue of a written order of the Secretary of War, which shall specify the scope of the contemplated revision.

(3) The Army Regulations shall include the general regulations of all Bureaus of the War Department.

XV.-ORDERS.

(1) All copies of orders relating to the permanent military establishment shall be distributed from the Adjutant-General's Office, and all loose copies of such orders issued in any year prior to 1894, and contained in any Bureau, shall, on or before June 15, 1894, be transferred to the Adjutant-General's Office.

(2) Official copies of orders and other papers shall be authenticated solely by an impressed seal of the Burean issuing the same, e. g.,

"Adjutant General's Office,
Official Copy."

XVI.-EFFECT OF THESE ORDERS.

(1) The provisions of these orders apply to the office of the Secretary of War.

(2) All orders, regulations, or parts thereof, inconsistent with the foregoing provisions, are, to the extent of such inconsistency, hereby revoked and repealed.

(3) The provisions of the foregoing orders will be strictly enforced, and any willful or intentional variation therefrom will be construed to be a disobedience, and in case of any employé will be made the ground of immediate discharge of the person found delinquent.

(4) These orders, except as herein otherwise provided, shall take effect July 1, 1894.

DANIEL S. LAMONT,
Secretary of War.