Secretary ICKES. It ought to be in one department. Mr. RICH. Now, if we were to enact this bill into law, do you have there any idea that the President of the United States would combine the grazing set-up that is in your Department with the grazing force that is now in the Agricultural Department? Secretary ICKES. He ought to, and I would urge him to, and I would hope that the Secretary of Agriculture would join in that. Mr. RICH. The Secretary of Agriculture a year ago said that he would, and the President has the power at the present time under the authority given to him to do that. Secretary ICKES. No; I think not, Congressman. Mr. RICH. Mr. DeRouen, the chairman of the committee, told us that the President did have that power. Secretary ICKES. When the original bill was passed he did have that power, but he does not have it now. Mr. RICH. Why, did we shear him of that power? Secretary ICKES. The bill under which he had the power expired by its own limitation in March. Mr. WHITTINGTON. That was brought out before you came in this morning, Mr. Rich. That act provided that it should expire, just as the pending act would no longer be in effect after 2 years. Mr. RICH. But what I am trying to get at is whether this act is going to get you any place. Secretary ICKES. I agree thoroughly with you in theory, and I would use every bit of persuasion that I have to see that the grazing is combined under one department, because it ought to be. . Mr. RICH. I am very glad to have your statement because I tried to dwell on that point in our committee, because I thought it was good business. Secretary ICKES. I agree with you. I do not believe in overlapping in having 2 or 3 units doing the same thing. Mr. RICH. Now, if we adopt this bill, is it your idea that we are going to stop this overlapping in departments? Secretary ICKES. Precisely. Mr. RICH. That is a good thing to do, if we can accomplish it. Secretary ICKES. That is the purpose of this bill, to give the Congress and the President the power to stop overlapping. It is not only bad administration, but expensive. Mr. MCKEOUGH. I have just a couple questions, Mr. Secretary. Secretary ICKES. I may say that I ought to leave in 8 minutes to attend a Cabinet meeting. Mr. MCKEOUGH. There are 22 departments or divisions now in the Department of Agriculture, you said? Secretary ICKES. I so understand. Mr. MCKEOUGH. And, as I understood the reading of your statement, there was but 1 of the 22 that indicated any opposition to the bill? Secretary ICKES. The only one that has appeared. Mr. MCKEOUGH. Just so there will not be any misunderstanding, I want to have the record indicate that from the Department of Agriculture as an entity, there was no opposition to this progressive legislation? Secretary ICKES. I learned yesterday for the first time that the Secretary of Agriculture had written a letter to the Senate committee opposing the bill. I read the letter carefully. I did not understand the basis for his opposition, and then I have not been able to understand the basis for the objection presented at the hearing before the Senate committee. Mr. MCKEOUGH. And that is the only Cabinet officer in charge of a department that has officially registered a protest? Secretary ICKES. As far as I know, that is all. Mr. SILCOX. May I correct that statement? My statement was not a voluntary statement. I appeared at the Senate hearings at the request of the Secretary of Agriculture, and so stated into the record. I was not appearing for the Forest Service. I am appearing today for the Secretary of Agriculture under his direction, and I do not want the statement to go into the record that I was a volunteer witness, speaking purely for the Forest Service, either before this committee or the Senate committee. I was requested by the Secretary of Agriculture to represent him at this hearing, and I am merely carrying out that request. Mr. WHITTINGTON. I would suggest that we proceed, because the Secretary has to go. Mr. QUINN. The whole story of the bill is to make the title of the department more expressive of its work, and to effect economy and efficiency by the elimination of overlapping, by coordinating all branches of the Government operating on what are properly public works? Secretary ICKES. That is correct. Mr. HOUSTON. You read your statement before I go here, but Mr. Quinn, I think, has brought out the fact that, in your department, it is mostly conservation work? Secretary ICKES. Yes. Mr. HOUSTON. You have charge of the conservation of all natural resources, oil, gas, minerals, and timber? Secretary ÍCKES. To the extent that any power resides in any department of the Government; yes. Mr. HOUSTON. I want to commend you on your administration of oil. I am more or less familiar with that. My district has oil, and I know how the oil men feel about it. But I was interested in your statement that, under this decision, probably the oil business was more or less in a state of confusion. Secretary ICKES. It is in bad shape. We should have legislation. Mr. HOUSTON. Now, under your administration and leadership, oil has gone from 10 cents a barrel to a dollar, and stayed there, for the benefit of everybody connected with the oil business, one way or the other, some 12 or 13 million people. Secretary ICKES. I think that we have done a very good job on oil. Mr. MCKEOUGH. What is the price now? Mr. HOUSTON. Around a dollar a barrel. Mr. McKEOUGH. It is still there? Mr. HOUSTON. Unless it has dropped in the last few hours. Mr. HULL. How many bureaus is it intended to transfer under this act if it shall be passed from the Department of Agriculture, if you have sufficient persuasive power to accomplish it? Secretary ICKES. I cannot answer that. I wish I could. For Mr. Silcox's benefit, I have not discussed it with the President. Mr. HULL. But there has been more or less discussion of the transfer of the Forest Service to your Department? Secretary ICKES. There has been a lot of apprehension. Mr. HULL. Is there not a conservation bureau there? Secretary ICKES. Not that I know of. Do you mean the Biological Survey? Mr. HULL. Yes. Secretary ICKES. I have not discussed any of it with the President. It is all within the power of the President and of the Congress if this bill passes. Mr. HULL. And that is the real purpose of the bill Secretary ICKES. To give the President the power to make interchanges of bureaus, in the interest of efficiency and economy. Mr. HULL. And this act expires in 2 years? Secretary ICKES. In 2 years. Mr. HULL. And if, after that time, it is found that it does not work at all Secretary ICKES. Then Congress can always extend the life of the law. Mr. HULL. But, so far as this bill is concrened, if you transfer the Forest Service to the Interior Department, and in the course of 2 years it is found to have been unsatisfactory, then it remains there, no matter how unsatisfactory? Secretary ICKES. Oh, no; Congress can enact a statute transferring it back. It always has that power. Mr. HULL. You will ask for the approval of Congress to any such transfer, if I understand you correctly? Secretary ICKES. No. Mr. HULL. Then what reports will the President make to Congress, and what will be the procedure? Secretary ICKES. Congress may disapprove within 60 days. Mr. HULL. And, if Congress does not disapprove, that is fixed? Secretary ICKES. Yes. Mr. HULL. Would there be any objection to amending the bill to provide that the President may, with the consent of Congress, do these things? Secretary ICKES. You have that power now. I mean that Congress can pass a bill now. Mr. HULL. I am talking about this particular bill, under which the President may do this without the consent of Congress, and Congress may then register its disapproval, but is there any objection to your including Congress in that power? Secretary ICKES. Congress has the veto power, which is just as effective as the power to initiate. If Congress has any interest in saving money, and in efficient organization, then, I say, regardless of this bill, the Executive, subject. to the review of Congress, ought to have the power to interchange bureaus. Mr. HOFFMAN. I think that the gentleman has the same idea that I had in mind, which is that line 11, section 5, page 4, shall be changed to read shall be submitted to Congress while in session and shall not become effective. unless Congress shall express its approval thereof. Is that your idea, Mr. Hull? Mr. HULL. I do not know why we should not put in this bill a provision that all of these transfers shall be made by and with the consent of Congress. Why put all of the power in the Executive? Mr. WHITTINGTON. If the gentleman will permit me, the language of the pending bill is the identical language of the bill that we passed here, known as the "economy bill", in 1932, and as the economy bill of 1933, and it was the observation and experience of this committee that Congress would not abolish many bureaus because of the objections that would come to the Members of Congress; and, as I say, this is the language of those two acts that we passed previously. Secretary ICKES. And there was no abuse of power under those previous acts. I cannot share the fear of the Department of Agriculture. Mr. HOUSTON. This is the idea, to concentrate the authority into one department? Secretary ICKES. That is it. Mr. RICH. I cannot see where there would be any harm, so far as the Forest Service, which is now in the Department of Agriculture, is concerned, if it were under the Secretary of the Interior, the same as it is now under the Secretary of Agriculture. I would like to ask this of Mr. Silcox, but I would like to know from you why it could be administered better in the Department of the Interior than in the Department of Agriculture, or vice versa? Secretary ICKES. I am not unwilling to admit Mr. RICH. Suppose that you were not the head of the Department. Suppose that we had Republicans in there for 4 years. Secretary ICKES. You know that sometimes it is easy to raise a bogey man and fight from behind a bogey man where you cannot fight the issue in the open. Mr. WHITTINGTON. I think that you have made a very fine state ment. Mr. RICH. Suppose that we leave out the first section of the bill, and pass the bill without the change of name. better than to not pass it at all? Would not that be Secretary ICKES. What objection is there to that? Mr. RICH. I do not know that there is any objection. Secretary ICKES. It is just like my telling you that you may or may not name your baby. Mr. RICH. Suppose that the bill is passed and that the name is not changed; it certainly can function the same. SECRETARY ICKES. Oh, yes; but I would like to see the name changed. I hope that you will have the same argument on the name presented that I listened to before the Senate committee. Mr. RICH. May I have the privilege of asking Mr. Silcox the same question that I asked the Secretary of the Interior? Mr. WHITTINGTON. I imagine that Mr. Silcox will make a state ment. Mr. GASQUE. Mr. Burlew, would you care to make a statement? STATEMENT OF E. K. BURLEW ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT TO THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR Mr. BURLEW. My name is E. K. Burlew, administrative assistant to the Secretary of the Interior, and the only thing that I want to say is that this whole discussion relating to what bureaus will be transferred is really not in this bill, for the reason that when the transfers are proposed by the President, it then comes before Congress, to this committee, and this committee can hold those hearings and pass on the merits of any proposal just as it has in the past, and, as the Secretary has stated, when the President had the power, he did not do violence to the present organizations in connection with transfers. But, unless you get a set-up which will have as its objective conservation, the Government will continue to dissipate its conservation energies, or neglect them, just as it has in the past. It is just like setting up a filing system; you may not have anything to put in it for a good many years, and it may take 10 years to get some new bureaus in the new Conservation Department, but unless you have your set-up, you are neglecting conservation. We are not proposing the transfer of the Forestry Service or of the Bureau of Public Roads or anything of that sort. We are merely saying that if you will set up a department which will have for its purpose conservation, then all of the energies of the Government can be devoted to building up that function of the Government, which we think is a real function of the Government. I am in sympathy with The rest of the discussion is superfluous. Mr. HOFFMAN. Here is what bothers me. the whole purpose of the bill, but I want to give all of the departments an even break. If the President should make a recommendation, and no one in Congress should oppose it or it should naturally drift along for 60 days, then it would become a law. Would it not be fair to say in this bill that none of these orders shall become effective unless Congress has taken affirmative action? In other words, as provided here, the President makes a recommendation, and when he has made it, it sticks. You say that if we want to, we can kick it over, but we will not do it. Mr. MCKEOUGH. Why not? Some Mr. HOFFMAN. How often do we do it? We do not want to say that the President does not know more about that than we do. of us are a little backward in doing that. Mr. MCKEOUGH. Do I understand that the Republican side of the House would not object if they thought it was wrong? Mr. HOFFMAN. Not if we thought it was wrong, but I might hesitate just the same as if I were on the jury, and I was the only one of the twelve that was thinking a certain way. I would think it over. Mr. MCKEOUGH. It still would not do any harm if Congress overrode your objection. Mr. HOFFMAN. No, but here you give this Department the advantage, or the President the advantage. I know that every once in a while we will pass some amendment in the Committee of the Whole and then go back and that majority that passes the amendment, or some fellow on the Democratic side, will wave whatever it is that he waves-it used to be the flag Mr. GINGERY. Mr. Chairman Ir. HOFFMAN. I am sincere about this. |