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The committee now recognizes the sponsors of the proposed legislation-Resolutions 2, 3, 4, 15, 102, 122, 159, and 2536-who may now make a short statement or insert their statements in the record.

STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN D. DINGELL, REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MICHIGAN

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I come before the committee realizing above everything else that time is of the essence. We are now in a grave national emergency. The deep waterway should have been completed 20 years ago. In my service in the Congress for nearly a score of years I have heard repeatedly that now was not the time, or that the project was too costly; that it may affect adversely some selfish or purblind element, some clique or some faction.

Now, I am of the opinion that the committee knows all of the facts, and, knowing that, I can only say I am hopeful that the committee will act promptly and positively. I hold to the theory that the desirability of constructing the St. Lawrence deep waterway as an essential project for the security of this Nation both as to its security from attack and its economic security is not even a debatable question. To my notion it is not even debatable whether the project will pay for itself from the standpoint of navigation costs or power development. We have gone all through that prior to the construction of the Panama Canal, and we had nothing to go on at that time. templated building a canal 3,000 miles away from home through the jungle, cutting through a mountain range, and having no prospect whatsoever of a tremendous revenue potential such as we have in this instance.

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I want to call your attention to the fact that this high-grade iron ore that we are now producing in the Mesabi Range and in northern Michigan nears exhaustion and must be replaced and that the imported ore prospectively constitutes a revenue potential that can readily be taxable at a nominal toll rate. As I understand it, it is contemplated to levy a toll of about 50 cents per ton. It will without a question of a doubt pay for the initial costs of construction, and certainly there is no doubt in anybody's mind as regards the power possibilities and the amortization of the original costs of the power plant.

Now, there are some blinded, selfish interests that are trying to block this dual project either because of provincial regional reasons or because of other equally unjustified objections. These must of necessity for the interests of the Nation be swept aside. To me it is as clear as anything could be that the same spurious arguments which failed in the Panama Canal instance as regards the railroads and even the employees who are being misled in this case are clearly out the window.

Now, let me prove something to you at this juncture. If we do not provide for the basic iron ore, an essential to this great interior development in the Great Lakes area and around it, which is the greatest industrial area in all the world, if it withers, does anyone presume that our eastern seaboard will become prosperous because of the withering effect on the economy of the interior part of the United States of America? That is senseless. That is untenable. You cannot be half prosperous and half poor any more than you can be half slave and half free.

Therefore, it is mandatory for reasons of economic stability that existing steel mills be fed a high-grade ore at the cheapest possible price in an uninterrupted flow. This ore in volume is available in Quebec, Newfoundland, and, if needs be, can be brought from South America and from the newly found iron ore areas in Africa, and there can be no question at all about the essential needs of the people of the United States being served while preserving their own security and for hemispheric defense.

Now, then, I want to point up one thing which may trouble many of you from certain districts as regards the attitude of the railroads. The iron ore that comes in to South Chicago, to Gary, to Detroit, to Toledo, to Cleveland, and to Erie is handled as follows. At the Gary, Chicago, and Detroit steel mills the ore is dumped directly at the steel mills without any railroad transportation on its arrival. In Toledo and Cleveland, supplying the great Mahoning steel valley, and at Erie it is necessary to ship that ore to the steel mills inland, as far south as Pittsburgh and Youngstown.

Now, if the iron ore is not replaced by importation through the completed, developed deep-sea waterway from foreign sources, the railroads will lose all of that business. It will just disappear without replacement. But if you bring in available foreign ore to these lake ports there will be no loss to the railroad workers. For whatever amount goes to Chicago, to Gary, and to Detroit there will be no change in the method of hauling; it will all be water-borne. It will just be the change in the source, and possibly the volume of the supply. But in Toledo and Cleveland and Erie that imported ore will be dumped on the docks there and will be shipped inland to the existing steel mills. If we do not get replacement ore, there will be no work for the railroads or for the railroad employees.

Now, I have gone to bat for the railroad workers on the economic score every time and my position is unchanged-only their promise is erroneous. I cannot accept it in this instance.

Mr. McGREGOR. Mr. Chairman, I am going to interrupt because it was my understanding my distinguished friend from Michigan had a prepared statement to submit to the committee, and I agreed not to raise a point of order. Now he is making a number of controversial statements, and not submitting his prepared statement and I do not think it competent information, because he mentioned that 50-centa-ton rate, and even the Secretary of State has told us that tolls have not been agreed to. I will be very happy to have you submit your statement, my colleague, but if you are going to make a speech on it and some of your statements are questionable, I am going to raise a point of order. It is entirely up to you.

Mr. DINGELL. I presume your point of order might be raised and your committee may sustain it. But the fact of the matter is that I am here in my own right to make a statement in my own words, be it right or wrong according to your viewpoint, and I am still privileged to be wrong without your checking me or in any manner curtailing the substance of what I have to say.

Mr. MCGREGOR. I certainly do not want to do that, my colleague. I want you to have the right to say what you want to say.

Mr. DINGELL. If I come before the committee here and now and I am going to have my statement censored by you or any other person I want to state an objection for the record.

Mr. MCGREGOR. I certainly would not object to any statement you made but

Mr. DINGELL. I serve notice in my committee we will censor your

statement too.

Mr. McGREGOR. I make a point of order. A quorum is not present and we have no authority to sit after the House is in session. Mr. DINGELL. And I want to say this: The people in Ohio have changed their idea about the waterway of late, too.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, a point of order has been made by Mr. McGregor that a quorum is not present.

Mr. MCGREGOR. I will withdraw my point of order.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. McGregor. Withdrawn.

Mr. DINGELL. If you will read the statements you will find specifically that a reference has been made to tonnage

The CHAIRMAN. Pardon me for interrupting.

Mr. DINGELL. For tonnage tolls of anywhere from 50 cents to $1.25. I surmise that that will be a matter that will come up eventually before the Senate in a treaty in order that we might make some toll-rate concessions to American agriculture.

Now, there is no question upon that point. That is in one or the other statements. I believe it is in Mr. Sawyer's statement. I do not know what the Secretary of State said, but I do know that the contemplated figures in my bill are from 50 cents to $1.25 a ton. That is not subject to any controversy or point of order for that

matter.

Now, I think perhaps my good friend from Ohio would feel better if I did not continue on that score, so, Mr. Chairman, I will desist, and I will ask the privilege if I choose to insert a further statement in the record.

The CHAIRMAN. You may.

Mr. McGREGOR. I move his request be granted.

Mr. DINGELL. I feel pretty much put out that I should be challenged here simply because I did not come up with a prepared statement. The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Dingell, we will give you another opportunity to appear before this committee.

Mr. DINGELL. I beg your pardon?

The CHAIRMAN. We will give you another opportunity to appear before the committee if you so desire.

Mr. DINGELL. I want to make clear one thing, Mr. Chairman: That both Resolutions 3 and 4, which are identical, are precisely the resolutions upon which the Secretary of State spoke, and also that they are predicated on House Joint Resolution 271 which I have introduced here in the last session, and which more or less I have pursued over the entire 20 years of my membership in the House.

Mr. BLATNIK. Mr. Chairman, will the Chair yield for a moment? Mr. Chairman, there are few who have devoted more of time in a more conscientious, a more sincere, and a more determined way to benefit not only his district or any one small part of the country but in behalf of the entire country, than has the gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Dingell, who has authored House Joint Resolution 3. It is a privilege of mine to be able to introduce an identical resolution, House Joint Resolution 4.

Mr. LARCADE. Mr. Chairman, may I say a word?

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Larcade.

Mr. LARCADE. I would state that the committee had originally not planned to sit beyond 12 o'clock, but due to the fact that the Secretary had to meet some other engagements and in order to facilitate the Members of Congress it was understood that they had prepared statements to file and that they would be subject to questioning at a later date by the members of the committee.

Mr. DINGELL. Let me say to my good friend Mr. Larcade from Louisiana that I would have been here promptly at 10 o'clock but what happened was that my secretary gave me the number 534, which was the telephone number, and I wandered around looking for the hearing room on the fifth floor of the old building. I went around about three times and covered my daily walk on the inside of the Old House Office Building before I finally found out that it was in this building.

Mr. LARCADE. The circumstances were such that we were not able to give the gentlemen an opportunity to answer questions.

Mr. DINGELL. I saw the agenda of the chairman, and my name appeared at the very top of his list, and I presumed I was going to be called to at least insert my statement in the record inasmuch as basically the hearings were predicated upon my resolution.

Mr. LARCADE. That is absolutely correct, Congressman, and the reason I interrupt at this time is for the purpose of suggesting that you be given an opportunity to return at a later date, at which time the members will be able to question you.

Mr. DINGELL. I will be happy to lay myself open to any questioning, because I think on some of these points that have been raised here I can give you a curbstone opinion that will knock the spots off the opposition and convince you that I am right.

Mr. LARCADE. I am not arguing that point, Congressman. What I am trying to do is arrange it so that other members that also have resolutions may be able to introduce them and appear before the committee and issue statements they have prepared to give to the press at this time. That was the understanding, I believe, Mr. Chairman, to let the gentlemen appear notwithstanding the point of order made by the gentleman from Ohio.

Mr. DINGELL. I want to say this. I think a lot of opposition is beginning to get a little religion on this whole question of the St. Lawrence deep waterway.

Mr. LARCADE. As I said, I am not arguing that point at this time. Mr. DINGELL. I understand your position.

Mr. LARCADE. But I am trying to work out a way whereby it will be possible and agreeable to you, sir, to return at some future time to appear before the committee in order that the committee may be able to interrogate you.

Mr. DINGELL. I will be subject to the call of the Chair at any time and lay myself open to any questions that the committee may see fit to put to me.

The CHAIRMAN. Thanks very much.

Now, we have another statement to be put into the record by Congressman Kilburn.

(The statement of Representative Clarence E. Kilburn is as follows:) COMPLETION OF THE ST. LAWRENCE SEAWAY

(Statement of Representative Clarence E. Kilburn of the Thirty-fourth Congressional District of New York before the House Committee on Public Works, February 20, 1951)

Mr. CHAIRMAN. I am happy to have the honor and privilege of again appearing before the Committee on Public Works to urge and support the early report and passage of a resolution providing for the completion of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence seaway and power project. As you know I have introduced House Joint Resolution 2 which is before your committee along with other similar resolutions. I am pleased to join with the other champions of the St. Lawrence project in urging passage of the legislation.

As President Truman so effectively stated in his budget message the defense program has attached a new and special urgency to the completion of the St. Lawrence project. I am convinced that public support for this great project is very strong now particularly in view of its contribution to our national security, and I believe that if it is brought to a vote in both the House and Senate it will pass. I scarcely need to remind you that Governor Dewey and many other officials and leaders join with President Truman in urging early completion of the St. Lawrence project.

Our civilian and military leaders are vigorous in their pleas for early action on the St. Lawrence project because of the vital contribution it will make to expediting our defense program and strengthening our national security in these critical times. I believe, that it is especially significant that Mr. Charles E. Wilson, head of the the Office of Defense Mobilization, now says that we need the St. Lawrence project although he has publicly opposed it in the past.

We need the St. Lawrence project now for the large quantity of low-cost hydroelectric power which it will make available. Such power is greatly needed in the whole northeastern area where a large part of the industry producing defense goods is located.

We need the St. Lawrence project now to maintain and expend the Nation's iron and steel industries which are so important to our defense and security programs. The seaway will provide economical and safe access to the large deposits of iron ore in Labrador and Quebec. You are all familiar with the fact that the iron ore reserves in the Mesabi Range at the head of Lake Superior are dwindling. We must act at once to assure ready access to a high grade, rapidly expansible, iron-ore supply.

While consideration of national security give a new and special urgency to completion of the St. Lawrence project I wish to point out, as I have for many years, that the project is justified and highly desirable as a public improvement which will add measurably to the strength and stability of our peacetime economy. The need for low cost hydropower is steadily expanding. Completion of the seaway will bring greatly reduced transportation rates to both producers and consumers in a large area inhabited by a third of our population. It will open to ocean traffic the great agricultural and industrial areas of the Great Lakes and stimulate interstate as well as foreign trade. Furthermore, the St. Lawrence project will be self-liquidating as to costs.

In connection with the power development part of the St. Lawrence project I wish to emphasize that the New York Power Authority should handle the power to be generated. They are best equipped to do it and can distribute it more economically. Under the method of allocation provided by the Federal-State accord of 1933, New York State is ready, willing, and able to assume its share of the expense, and I am confident that arrangements can be made which protect the interests of the United States and of other States.

In conclusion, I strongly urge the prompt report and passage of the St. Lawrence project enabling legislation and early completion of this great project which is so vital to our national security.

The CHAIRMAN. We also have another statement to go into the record by Congressman Zablocki.

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