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This interests me. Let me ask another hard question. Could we produce enough fluorspar for our needs without any trouble?

Mr. CLOONAN. We certainly can.

The CHAIRMAN. Are you sure you have the supply?

Mr. CLOONAN. We have a tremendous reserve in the United States, in all the States that I have just mentioned. And I understand that in Montana just recently a reserve has been discovered which could take care of the entire requirements of the United States for the next 10 years.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you think there is any use of saving this fluorspar in the United States for future use?

Mr. CLOONAN. No, I do not. I believe, as I stated here, some imports are necessary, but I believe that our own domestic mines should be kept in operation. I might say the industry is now on the ropes. With only 30 percent of the total market, this fluorspar is going to pile up.

Assuming that they have a cost of $20 to $25 a ton, every time they pile up a thousand tons, there is $25,000; and being a comparatively small industry, I doubt that they can go very far in stockpiling fluorspar at the properties.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you know anything about the conditions under which the fluorspar is mined in the foreign countries?

Mr. CLOONAN. Very cheaply. As the gentleman pointed out, 93 cents day labor against our labor charge, practically similar to what is existing in the lead-zinc industry of $14 to $15 a day. As I stated in here, the cost of production in foreign countries has been denied. I might say even in the tariff investigation in 1928, of which I have a copy here, costs were denied at that time.

The CHAIRMAN. What do you mean by "denied"?

Mr. CLOONAN. That is, access to the cost records was denied.

The CHAIRMAN. What countries lead in the importation of fluorspar? What are the heavy importing countries?

Mr. CLOONAN. Well, there is Mexico, West Germany, Spain, Canada, and Italy.

The CHAIRMAN. Is that the order?

Mr. CLOONAN. That is the order of prominence, practically.

The CHAIRMAN. I haven't any other questions. Thank you for a very, very excellent statement. We will try and look into this matter, Mr. CLOONAN. Mr. Chairman, we would like to have this material incorporated into the record of the proceedings.

The CHAIRMAN. It will be incorporated. Everything that we do will be in the record unless we otherwise indicate.

Mr. CLOONAN. Mr. Chairman, may I make another statement? Upon further analysis of it, we believe that the Simpson bill, with its provisions probably carried over to the fluorspar industry, might, or we should say would, greatly increase the standing of the domestic producer.

The CHAIRMAN. Let me ask this: It is not in the Simpson bill now at the present time?

Mr. CLOONAN. No. It should be included.

The CHAIRMAN. That will be a job for you boys to see is done. You understand we are not a legislative committee at all. We are just a

research committee, you might say, for all the Members of Congress. That is really our job.

Mr. CLOONAN. I assure you of our support.

The CHAIRMAN. So that means that you have a job of your own to do, and you should certainly put some pressure on the group down there, or at least see that they understand what your problems are. The CHAIRMAN. We have also under fluorspar a Mr. Warner; is that correct?

Mr. Warner, you are the next speaker.

STATEMENT OF GEORGE A. WARNER, MANAGER, SHATTUCK-DENN MINING CORP., FLUORSPAR BRANCH, ALBUQUERQUE, N. MEX.

Mr. WARNER. May I read from some notes and present a statement some time later?

The CHAIRMAN. All right.

Mr. WARNER. My name is George Warner, manager of the ShattuckDenn Mining Corp., fluorspar branch, Albuquerque, N. Mex.

What has been said here on lead and zinc, and what Mike has just mentioned on fluorspar, can naturally apply to fluorspar. I don't see any reason why we should repeat why we are in such a predicament. The fact that you people are here is proof enough that we are all in the same boat.

What I did want to point out, though, is that apparently we are not alone in this thing. We are talking about our mining industry here in the United States. I would like to read a little comment made in Belgium by a group of glass producers in Belgium. I summarized a lot of their comments. Every place where it says or mentions glass or glass products, we could apply mining. We could say any metal at all. If you will bear with me, I will just read the summary. This conference was held in Brussels and was similar to the one we are having here today only it was the glass producers.

The CHAIRMAN. When?

Mr. WARNER. The date, I am sorry, I don't have. But I have the note that is a special report to the American Glass Review dated April 11. I have copied this thing down and summarized it here.

I wrote this letter to Charles Willis in Phoenix. You will meet with him next week. I said:

The recent gripe made by the Belgian glass industry sounds just like one of our own small mine operators. The following quotations are from the Belgian tableware and crystal producers.

Please remember what I said, that any place I mention glass you can use any metal.

"No. 1, Belgian tableware crystal producers bitterly score government for sacrificing industry."

We have been cursing our Government agencies, too.

"Some factories are even closing."

Our mines are closing.

"Our exports are decreasing constantly because foreign countries are closing their markets to us while we are opening our home markets to our competitors." We are griping about the imports of lead into this country. "The Belgian Government is to blame for this. It is neglecting our inter ests. It is sacrificing our medium- and small-sized industries. Reports state

that many small-size industries are forced to close due to a flood of manufactured articles coming into Belgium from France, Holland, Germany, Great Britain, and the United States. And while this is happening"

the report continues

"barriers of many kinds are being met by Belgium products when entering some of these countries."

The report continues:

"That several speakers discussed the question of support given by the authorities to some of the small industrial plants in France and Germany."

The griping small-business men declared:

"By means of a form of disguised dumping, Governments of France and Germany and Great Britain helped their exporters to get a footing on markets where Belgium products hitherto were well established."

Emphasis was made on the disguised dumping of foreign competitors. The glass industry stated that

"Exports of Belgium glass products have dropped from 100 in 1937 to 35 today." That is the proportion.

"Employment dropped from 10,000 of a few years ago to less than 3,000 today." This is in the glass industry.

Severe criticism was aimed at Germany and France. Agencies in those neighboring countries were making certain grants to exporters amounting to 30 percent of the export value. Belgium's small manufacturers accused their Government of favoring the heavy industries at the expense of the small outfits." There is a lot more, all in the same line of thinking.

"Even the Swedish manufacturers are griping against the communistic Hungarian Government. The Swedes are asking their Government to invoke an antidumping law against Hungarian products. Japan is invading the European markets with subsidized small articles."

These cries from other countries point up the fact that the small-business groups in the United States are not all alone in the problems of everyday existence. The problem is not small nor easily solved. Something, however, must be worked out in order to avoid another catastrophe similar to the Hitler era in Germany, Mussolini's eruption of Italy, Egypt's very recent overthrow of the decadent governing body, and the thing that is happening in South Africa today.

England decided that a socialized state was not the answer, and we here in America decided that our form of government badly needed a change. We wonder if the Russians are beginning to think that their theory of government is fatal.

I summed that up stating that before the 30th I would have some testimony for Congressman Hill in Phoenix. At least I would not be strictly silent.

Perhaps this thing is more or less of a coincidence, but I wanted to point it out because whatever your committee recommends to Congress, Congress is going to have a challenge to come up with something that will be as good if not better than what the Swedes and Japs and Belgians and French and all the other foreign countries are doing today, the same as we are, the same as your committee is doing. They are apparently going around discussing these things, getting some ideas, and that is a challenge.

I have one recommendation which I wanted to sum up, that we try to put on our statutes some type of antidumping law. One is proposed by Mr. Gross in H. R. 2949. This bill puts a little teeth in the obsolete antidumping law that we do have, in that it requires any suspected government to open up their records for investigation to

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see whether or not they are subsidizing or helping smaller outfits to dump stuff into this country.

I especially approve of statements 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10 on page 4 which would have the jurisdiction to order any person to appear and give testimony and produce books, records, and other writings or both to the investigating country, to see whether or not they are trying to circumvent our antidumping laws.

I

Frankly, I am not sure that a tariff increase will be the answer. want to point out the reason for that type of thinking. Our own Government, the DMPA has already anticipated a tariff increase on the importation of acid-grade fluorspar in a contract they made with the Canadian Government, the Newfoundlanders. The DMPA has. granted the Newfoundland Fluorspar Corp. a floor price which is $5 above the present market price in this country for acid fluorspar. The CHAIRMAN. Was that a treaty?

Mr. WARNER. No, it was a deal made by Howard Young's organization, the Defense Materials Procurement Agency, and it was released to the press on July 17, 1952.

The CHAIRMAN. How long does it run, do you know?

Mr. WARNER. It runs for 5 years.

Gentlemen, Mr. Young's group not only has agreed to pay the St. Lawrence Fluorspar Corp. $65 per ton of acid-grade fluorspar, f. o. b. Wilmington, Del., but remember the $65 figure is $60 above similar contracts made to Colorado producers of fluorspar, the Ozark-Mahoning Mining Co.

The CHAIRMAN. How about the grade?

Mr. WARNER. The same grade.

The CHAIRMAN. Were you here yesterday?
Mr. WARNER. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Did you hear that testimony about who owns all of these companies around the world? Who owns this company in Canada, do you know? Do you actually know?

Mr. WARNER. I don't know, but it has been supported by some of our American companies. Apparently it is being supported by our own. DMPA to the extent of—

The CHAIRMAN. That is the taxpayers, you mean?

Mr. WARNER. Right.

The CHAIRMAN. The DMPA does not have anything, except what it takes out of our skin?

Mr. WARNER. Right. They not only pay the $65 or rather the $5 above our floor price, but they have granted the St. Lawrence Fluorspar Corp. $1,250,000 to build a mill in Delaware.

The CHAIRMAN. Where were all you folks who are producing flourspar when these agreements were made?

Mr. WARNER. I will tell you where I was.

The CHAIRMAN. One would not do any good. I said all of you. Do you have any organization? That is interesting testimony to me. Mr. WARNER. I am sorry, we did not have a very closely knit organization for one particular reason. There are only three independent fluorspar producers in the United States today, and we all three are being represented here today. Mike Cloonan, Ozark-Mahoning Mining Co.; myself, Shattuck-Denn Mining Corp.; and Mr. Jones from

another company. We are not subsidized by any major industry or

fluorspar company.

The CHAIRMAN. Are you going to have additional testimony at Phoenix?

Mr. WARNER. There will be some, yes.

You asked where we were. In March of 1952, Mr. Mall of GSA states that our president was in Washington submitting a proposition to the Government for 2,000 short tons of acid grade fluorspar. We wanted $65, but we were turned down because Mr. Mall's group considered this excessive.

Gentlemen, at the same time they were making a deal with St. Lawrence for $65 and giving them money to produce it. They were not giving us any money. We just wanted the market to sell it. We had all it takes, a lot of guts, to do the job.

That is one reason why I claim an antidumping law is what we need rather than a tariff, because our own Government agencies have provided to circumvent a tariff if it goes in, to the extent of $5 a ton. I want to go further. They have guaranteed the St. Lawrence Flourspar Corp. that they will pay them $65 for any material that they are unable to sell at or above such figure.

In other words, if the St. Lawrence Fluorspar sells it for $40 a ton, the DMPA makes up the difference of $25 to them. That is subsidy for a foreign material, being paid by the American taxpayers about which the Belgians are griping because governments are subsidizing their own little industry over there.

I have another recommendation. I wish you would take this back to Congress, too. In view of the fact that our Government has not yet spent any money to build this St. Lawrence fluorspar mill in Wilmington, Del., my understanding is it has not even been started as yet, I would suggest that we pay the St. Lawrence people off for any damages they have accrued so far in getting that contract through and send them home and save what money is left for our own American taxpayers.

The CHAIRMAN. I do not want to hear any of you miners finding fault with the little old subsidy on butter after hearing that.

Mr. WARNER. I would not have mentioned this, Congressman, but I am going to. The greatest fear we have in the fluorspar business is that whenever an agency controls a big surplus of butter and turns around and dumps on the American market, by that you will start a precedent in which they will also dump a heck of a lot of these stockpiled metals that they have all over the United States. And they will dump it on the market because-well, look at what the boys did with butter. So don't dump it. I would suggest you give it away to the Mexican people. They never tasted butter and it might create a

taste.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much.

I might say to all of you that we came out here for a lead and zine hearing, and now the flourspar people appear to be in worse shape than lead and zinc. I am afraid that the further it goes the worse it is going to get.

Mr. Jones, if you will come up and finish this fluorspar off, we will guarantee to give you some further hearings on this and dig into this. That might be as interesting as that overcoat business you saw in the paper last night.

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