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The cuts which we have made in the domestic spending bills were not easy because, although there has been a general outcry for cutting Federal spending, we found little agreement on where the cuts should be made. I, for example, have received approximately six times as many letters and telegrams asking me to increase appropriations as I have received asjcing me to reduce them. A majority of those who favored reductions did not specify where they should be made but many of the requests for increas came from substantial business and professional men who often said they believed in economy but not in the case of an activity or program which they had personally observed and believed was valuable.
It is, of course particularly hard to turn down requests for funds for such obviously needed and valuable things as heart and cancer studies and other medical research or for the carrying out of promises of Federal aid for hospitals and highways on which States have relied and already have made their own funds available. Our Appropriations Committee was forced to take a hard-boiled attitude because we recognized the absolute necessity for a gradual reduction in Federal spending and it was only in rare cases that we agreed to go above the amounts approved by the House. One such exception was the hospital construction program for which we allowed the $60,000,000 recommended by President Eisenhower as compared with the $50,000,000 approved by the House and the $75,000,00 urged by local officials and medical groups. We felt we should go that far to
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