reason for the cutback in our dollar profit. There was also a dropoff of employment of the number of prisoners last year of about 500, but we are coming back, Senator. We are all right now. We have the same ups and downs that private business has, especially private business that deals with the Government. We are doing fine now. We have a good backlog of orders all the way around.

RELATIONSHIP OF PRISON AND PRIVATE INDUSTRIES

We have had very pleasant relationships, incidentally, with private industry this past year. The Board of Directors of our corporation have worked with us very cooperatively, and I think things are going along pretty well.

Senator KILGORE. In other words, you are not getting any substantial kick from private enterprise?

Mr. BENNETT. None at all, Senator.

Senator KILGORE. And they are represented on the Board of Directors?

Mr. BENNETT. Yes, sir. We have a representative of retailers, who is Mr. James Palmer, president of Marshall Field & Co. We have a representative of agriculture, who is Mr. Emil Schram. We have a representative of industry, who is Mr. Berry Beaman, of Michigan. We have a representative of the Defense Department, who is Mr. Frank A. Reid, of New York. We have a representative of labor, who is Mr. Gorge Meany; and we have a representative of the Attorney General, who is Mr. Sanford Bates. They have been very helpful to us, and Mr. Meany particularly has been one of our very helpful members. They have all been very helpful, Senator.

USE OF HONOR PRISONERS AS FIRE FIGHTERS

Senator KILGORE. Another thing I wanted to ask you was this applies partially to you and also to the armed services-if you had the funds to operate them, how many, shall we say, forestry companies of honor prisoners could you form like those sent out to the national forests to keep them, do planning, and things of that kind? The reason I am asking that is this: We have had two serious epidemics of forest fires in West Virginia. The first one started when the CCC was in operation. There was no trouble. The CCC just quelled it. We had another when the CCC went out of business, and it really cost us several million dollars' worth of valuable timber.

I wonder if the Federal prisons, in the national forests only, could take honor prisoners who are susceptible to being in a minimumsecurity place. I know it is going to cost us some money. Ordinarily, we are appropriating money everywhere to Agriculture and also to Interior for that very kind of job, which is being done by contractors, which I think could be better done by these companies. What is your opinion on that?

SITUATION AT PRISON CAMPS

Mr. BENNETT. Senator, let me say, first of all, that we have had very good success with these prison camps around. There is a little brochure describing the one in your State at Mill Point, W. Va. If you want a sample, you may keep that, and I have plenty of them,

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and you can send them around. We have all told now, Senator, of those camps, 6 with a total population now of about 1,300 men. We have one in the chairman's district at Tucson, Ariz. We have 2 in Arizona, 1 in Florence, Ariz., and 1 at Tucson. We have 1 up here in Pennsylvania. We have 1 on an Army reservation down at Alabama, and we have 1 out on the island at McNeill Island, Wash.

You ask me how many men more we could put out. That depends, Senator, on the character of the intake of our population. We think we are getting almost all of the people out to these camps who can be trusted out there.

Senator KILGORE. In other words, you have enough camps now that you think can be taken care of without putting men out in additional camps?

Mr. BENNETT. So long as the population we get remains as it is. I was going to say in 1939 we had commitments of 11,000 violators of the internal revenue laws, mostly bootleggers. This year the number of people of that kind that will be committed to us, usually for relatively short sentences, will probably not be more than 2,500. Those are the kind of fellows that we are putting out, income-tax violators, men who have more to lose by running away than they have by staying.

STANDBY CAMPS

Incidentally, Senator, we have some standby camps now that are under the jurisdiction of the Bureau. One, for instance, is at Tule Lake, Calif. Another one is down here in Florida. We can reopen those on a minute's notice, the minute our population trend begins to change, so I do not look forward to the fact that we need to reopen one of those immediately. But, of course, I cannot tell. If we should be getting a larger number of minimum custody cases from the Army, for example, it could make a difference.

JEFFERSON BARRACKS

Senator KILGORE. For instance, I thought about Jefferson Barracks. There is a whole raft of those boys locked up there that could be used in many camps, based upon what I was told by the people in charge there, mostly AWOL cases, homesick cases, boys who ran off 2 or 3 times and went home.

Mr. BENNETT. We have told the War Department that up to the amount of our appropriation--you see, that is another thing-up to a population of 21,300 this year, we would take their minimum-custody men as fast as we could. We will do that, and most of those men will go to the camps and minimum-custody institutions.

Senator KILGORE. Of course, there is a certain amount of selfishness with me in this because I am from West Virginia where there is the George Washington National Forest, and there has been good work in the Monongahela. Then you ought to have one in George Washington National Forest and go ahead with just a steady program of fire trails, access roads, planting, and things of that kind.

ADDITIONAL PERSONNEL IN ESTIMATE

Mr. BENNETT. Senator, that about completes, together with my general statement, the material about our appropriation, "Salaries and expenses of the Bureau of Prisons." I would like to emphasize 1 or 2 things, Senator. First of all, there is no money in that appropriation for additional personnel to amount to anything. There are just 63 jobs.

Senator KILGORE. What are they?

Mr. BENNETT. I will be glad to submit them for the record.

PERSONNEL

Senator KILGORE. Two chaplains, 10 classification and parole officers, and 51 correctional offices; is that right?

Mr. BENNETT. That is right.

Senator KILGORE. How about those classification and parole officers? Are not they pretty badly needed?

Mr. BENNETT. Oh, yes. We have five members on the parole board now and, of course, they cannot operate unless they get the information from the institutions. So they are calling for more reports. Our employees are working overtime to get them out, and we want to relieve the load on them and provide a little better service. for the parole board.

QUESTIONED USE OF INMATES FOR CLERICAL WORK

Senator KILGORE. I just want to ask a question for the record about this use of inmates who do that clerical work.

Mr. BENNETT. That is very unfortunate, Senator. It is very unfortunate that we have to use inmates to do clerical work in certain parts of our institutions, particularly in the parole and record offices, where they have to type the records of the other people and the “heat” is on them, as the boys express it.

Senator KILGORE. And also where they have to get out the records for the parole board to act upon, and with the underground you have in there, that stuff leaks fast, does it not?

Mr. BENNETT. It certainly does; and it is very embarrassing at times. Unfortunately, Senator, it has been embarrassing to some of the judges and others who work with the courts.

Some years ago, Senator, a probation officer was killed, was shot, by a prisoner because the prisoner got word of the statement he had made about this prisoner. He got it through this channel, and it has been very unfortunate.

Senator KILGORE. Do not you remember the ramifications at Atlanta when you were down there about which a certain man came in to see you, making a leak?

Mr. BENNETT. Yes. It is very unfortunate, but I have no way of remedying it at this time. We just have to be very careful in the selection of our men that we put in there.

ADDITIONAL PERSONNEL FOR CONFIDENTIAL WORK

Senator KILGORE. I realize that you do not like to go behind the budget estimates, but if we would correct this system, I wonder if you could file for the record, for the use of the committee, a statement of how much additional personnel will be necessary to take care of those records that should be kept confidential.

Mr. BENNETT. Yes, sir; I will be very happy to.

Senator KILGORE. And the cost.

Mr. BENNETT. Yes, sir.

Senator KILGORE. It looks to me like a very bad system.

Mr. BENNETT. It is very unfortunate, I think, very unfortunate. (The statement referred to follows:)

Civilians required to replace prisoner clerks in parole and record offices

Annual cost for 25 GS-5 and 28 GS-4 clerks, $174,150.

RISE OF POPULATION IN PENAL INSTITUTIONS

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Senator KILGORE. You were talking about the increase in population in penal institutions. To what do you attribute it? Is it just normal increase?

Mr. BENNETT. Senator, yes. Of course, we have the normal increase in proportion to the civilian population. Too, there has been a considerable increase in the number of automobile theft cases that are coming into our institutions.

Senator KILGORE. That is the Dyer Act cases?

Mr. BENNETT. Dyer Act cases.

In addition to that, the average incidence of certain types of offenders has increased. Another thing that has happened is that I think the number of men being paroled and so on has been decreased somewhat. Mr. Andretta points out that the number of enforcement agents have been increased."

Senator KILGORE. I notice that beginning in 1941 there has been a steady increase in auto theft. Except for 2 years, however, narcotics and marihuana have been rather constant. Robbery, kidnaping, and burglary seem to be practically constant. District of Columbia and Territorial is pretty constant. Liquor dropped off.

Mr. BENNETT. Immigration has dropped off.

Senator KILGORE. Yes. To what do you attribute the increase of auto thefts?

Mr. BENNETT. More automobiles in the first place, and in the second place, I think unfortunately, Senator, there are more young people who are trying to escape from some situation-stealing an automobile to get to some distant point. There is no question, Senator, that the amount of juvenile delinquency is on a pretty sharp upward grade.

MILITARY PRISONERS AWAITING TRANSFER

Senator KILGORE. How many military prisoners are awaiting transfer to Federal institutions now?

Mr. BENNETT. Senator, they have a backlog of about 1,500 they would like to give us. However, we just do not have the facilities for them. Particularly we do not have the facilities for the more serious offenders.

Senator KILGORE. Could you check up on how many serious ones there are that you still have facilities for and how many they would like to transfer?

Mr. BENNETT. I have no facilities for serious offenders. I am declining to take any of them.

Senator KILGORE. How many have they informed you they would like to transfer?

Mr. BENNETT. About 400.

Senator KILGORE. I know I heard the colonel down at the disciplinary barracks. He wanted to transfer the whole 1,500 over to you. Mr. BENNETT. He wanted us to take over a lot. I did not think I could take them.

Senator KILGORE. You would say then about how many that under the law they could turn over to you that you cannot take?

Mr. BENNETT. About 1,500.

COMPARISON OF CUSTODIAL COSTS IN INSTITUTIONS AND DISCIPLINARY BARRACKS

Senator KILGORE. And is it not a fact also, that the custodial cost of the prisoner in a disciplinary barracks exceeds the custodial cost of those in the Federal penal institution?

Mr. BENNETT. Yes; that is a fact.

Senator KILGORE. I think we got up to about 1 person in custodial work for every 2 prisoners in Leavenworth Barracks, and what was it in the Leavenworth Prison?

Mr. BENNETT. I do not know that I can answer that.

Senator KILGORE. It was 1 to 7 or something like that. That included all this classification for parole and everything else.

Mr. BENNETT. You just take the one item of food costs alone; say 50 cents per man per day on his food alone if he was with us. take that one item alone.

Senator KILGORE. Yes. They get the full allowance.

Just

Mr. BENNETT. Yes. You just take some of these other items. You cannot figure it in dollars, because the Army uses as their personnel enlisted men, and you cannot translate their value over into civilian costs very well without getting yourself involved in a lot of qualifications, but I can tell you the difference is considerable.

Senator KILGORE. I remember when I used to feed my men for 26 cents a day. I remember when I fed prisoners, internees, in World