Images de page
PDF
ePub

is because they sit in Cabinet meetings with the President. I do believe, as has already been indicated, that when the President sees that the will of the Congress is that this be an independent agency, because it is the best thing for the country, for the best interests of all of the country, he, too, will go along with this bill-which I trust this committee will bring to the floor of the House very shortly-to restore to this agency its independence. It can go forward then as an independent agency to do the full job that must be done for our merchant marine.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee.
The CHAIRMAN. Are there questions?

Mr. Byrne?

Mr. BYRNE. I have no questions.
The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Hanna?
Mr. HANNA. No questions.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Lennon?

Mr. LENNON. I wish the gentleman to know that we all appreciate his statement.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Watkins?

Mr. WATKINS. I really appreciate the gentleman giving his time to come and join with us, and supporting this new agency that we want to create as a plus.

Mr. MULTER. May I suggest that we use the term "re-create," to give back the independence it did have, and should have.

Mr. WATKINS. What we want to have, in my opinion, is a rebirth of an industry that has died, is dead.

We say that we only carry 7 percent of the freight on the waters, and that is a disgrace, and when I stand by Mr. Celler and watch the ships, I watch other things, and see them sail, and I see the time spent of two and a half hours to lift wooden hatches off and take the tarpaulins off to prepare for the loading of a ship, whereas a button can be switched in 5 minutes-in 2 minutes they can remove that hatch. No wonder we are going backwards. It is the lack of interest of our Government, I think, that is causing it.

Mr. MULTER. I am in complete agreement.

Mr. WATKINS. I think the shipbuilders have lost heart, and the shipbuilding which has been taking a tremendous loss year after year, in my county, has had no support, and has been given no heart to go ahead, because they felt as though perhaps it was an industry that was dead, and perhaps the shipyard was no longer needed.

I certainly welcome a distinguished gentleman like you coming here and backing this committee.

Mr. MULTER. Thank you, sir.

Mr. WATKINS. This committee is trying hard to let this industry survive.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Roth?

Mr. ROTH. I have no questions.
The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Helstoski?

Mr. HELSTOSKI. I have no questions.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Pollock?

Mr. POLLOCK. I have no questions.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Multer, for giving your time here today.

Mr. WATKINS. Mr. Chairman, may I amend a very brief statement which I made here?

My time was being consumed by one of my colleagues from Alabama. I will not name him.

I would like with your permission to say that only having the oppor tunity to listen to part of Mr. Pelly's statement, a gentleman whom I respect and admire so much, with his great ability and the effort and time of his life that he has given on this committee, that after reading his statement and being able to digest it quickly, as I did, I want to compliment the gentleman for his statement, and I want to say to him that I concur 100 percent, and I hope that I would have wisdom to perhaps add something, but I doubt if I do.

So I want the record to say that I agree with you, Mr. Pelly. Mr. PELLY. Mr. Chairman, I trust that the record will show that I express appreciation for the gentleman's kind words.

The CHAIRMAN. Our next witness will be Mr. Rosenthal, from New York.

STATEMENT OF HON. BENJAMIN S. ROSENTHAL, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK

Mr. ROSENTHAL. Thank you very, very much, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, it is with mixed feelings that I appear before you today.

I am pleased to testify before this distinguished committee, and to aid its work for the betterment of the American maritime industry.

As the sponsor of H.R. 1200, and one of the more than 100 Congressmen who have submitted companion bills to H.R. 159, I am proud to voice my support for passage of this measure.

Yet, it is with a sense of regret that I speak to you today. I regret the current disastrous state of the American maritime industry, and I regret that maritime does not currently have an independent voice in our Nation's Government.

However, this situation can be corrected by the enactment of the legislation pending before you.

I have before me another list of statistics on the current state of our maritime industry to add to those already presented during these hearings. These statistics tell the woeful tale of the decline of American shipbuilding.

The key to revitalization of our maritime industry, once maritime independence is achieved, will be a strong American shipbuilding program, a program designed to restore American supremacy in international shipping.

I am sure the members of this committee will agree that the most important element in our future maritime course must be a return to the principles of the Merchant Marine Act of 1936.

Those principles required that the ships of the American merchant marine be built in the shipyards of this country, that they be built by American workmen, and manned by American seamen.

Unfortunately, we abandoned the principles of the Merchant Marine Act of 1936, or rather we failed to act on them in our maritime policies during the last two decades.

Those principles are still in the code books. The Merchant Marine Act is still law, although some members of the administration have proposed scrapping it completely, and building American ships in foreign shipyards.

I am grieved to report that the current state of the American shipbuilding industry deeply reflects the abandonment of the build-American principle, and the neglectful policies the U.S. Government has pursued since the end of World War II.

During World War II, American shipyards established worldwide production records which I doubt have been equalled before or since. During the war American shipyards produced more than 1,000 ships a year to keep the vital sea supply chain moving to our Allies and our troops.

After the war, American shipbuilding entered the doldrums. The United States fell back upon its war-built merchant tonnage, and ignored the necessity to build new merchant ships to meet its future cargo needs.

Like Rip Van Winkle, American shipbuilding capability has been asleep for 20 years.

A few days ago the Maritime Administration released a report which showed that in all those 20 long years the 27 major shipyards delivered only 644 merchant ships, and only 511 of those vessels entered American-flag service.

Only 664 ships delivered from 1946 to 1966. I find that evidence of absolutely incredible neglect of this country's maritime needs. Just as ships are a strategic element of this Nation's defense capability, shipbuilding is a strategic industry for that defense capability. Without shipyards, a nation cannot build the ships it needs in wartime to carry its soldiers, its military hardware, and the raw materials for its strategic industry.

Perhaps even more than the American steel industry, the American shipbuilding industry is the most crucial element of this country's national defense. For without ships to carry the minerals needed for steel, the blast furnaces of this Nation would soon grow cold and grey.

During the 20-year hiatus of national neglect, from 1946 to 1966, American shipbuilding capability slipped away, American shipyards dwindled and died, skilled men who trained all their lives to send American-flag ships sliding down the ways to serve the commercial and defense needs of our Nation have left the industry for lack of work.

I have first-hand knowledge of the adverse economic effect on the people involved, and on the city of New York itself, brought on by the closing down of a shipyard.

When the New York Naval Shipyard was phased out a year ago, many of those skilled technicians were forced to leave the area, and to seek employment elsewhere. And many others found it necessary to turn their talents to other industries, thus resulting in a tremendous loss of expertise within the maritime industry.

And now the administration proposes to stifle the last breath of this vital American industry, and send our shipbuilding business into the hands of foreign countries.

Only when the United States has an independent Maritime Administration will the principle of the Merchant Marine Act of 1936 be restored to operation and will there be an adequate building program for our shipyards, thus giving a much needed "shot in the arm" to our American maritime industry, which should be second to none.

I have been here all morning throughout the hearings, and I have learned a great deal, and have enjoyed it very, very much.

I want to associate myself, if I might, with the remarks of all of those who have appeared, and with the trend of the questioners. I think the committee and all the witnesses have made out an important case for the establishment of an independent maritime agency.

The only other thing that I want to tell the committee about is my experience of the past 4 years. I have been on the Executive and Legislative Reorganization Subcommittee of the Committee on Government Operations, as has the chairman of this committee.

That subcommittee has considered many reorganization plans and establishment of new departments, and the one thing that I have learned from that experience, which really is the thrust of those proceedings, is that if an agency is not independent, and if it does not have free access to the President, if its head does not sit at the Cabinet level, then it simply cannot get anywhere.

The present situation with the maritime industry, which you are all so much more familiar with than I am, suffers because of the fact that they have inadequate representation at the highest levels of govern

ment.

And nothing will ever be accomplished, in my judgment, on behalf of the martime industry until they have direct access to the President's decisionmaking process.

They cannot have it by dealing with an Assistant Secretary, an Under Secretary, or an Administrator in the Commerce Department or the Transportation Department or the Agriculture Department or any other department.

The only way that this industry, in which America has such a deep interest will receive its due share of attention from the Federal bureaucracy is to have access to the highest levels of government.

I have made a modest study of what has happened to other agencies in the development of new agencies, and I am absolutely con vinced that the only way that the maritime industry can receive its due share is by the establishment of an independent agency as outlined in your bill, Mr. Chairman which I support.

The only other comment I want to make briefly is to comment on the exchange between some of the members and Mr. Celler.

The passage of your bill, Mr. Chairman, will be notice to the public and to the American political system that Congress can occasionally initiate that we no longer have to sit back and react to legislation or resolutions or recommendations sent up by the executive branch, that this is a field where we have taken the pulse of the Nation, that we understand the economics and the defense considerations, and that on this one occasion Congress is going to take the initiative, and is going to make policy.

And I would suspect that the President will recognize the leadership of Congress, and will respond accordingly.

Again, Mr. Chairman, I thank you for the opportunity to testify, and I thank all the members of the committee for the opportunity to hear the questioning and the dialog, from which I learned so much this morning.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you for appearing.

Some of your remarks that you made before remind me of the statement that was made last year, about moving a body from one burial ground to another by putting maritime in the Department of Transportation.

I think that is approximately correct.

Are there any questions?

Mr. LENNON. Mr. Chairman, to follow our distinguished colleague's statement in the record of this particular hearing, I think it would be interesting to our colleagues who are not members of the committee to recognize that in 1950, when we had independent status of the Maritime Administration, we were carrying out 41.4 percent of our country's exports and imports in American-flag vessels.

It went into the Department of Commerce that year, 1950. It fell from 41.4 percent to 27.9 percent in a period of 4 years, in this Department of Commerce, and from 1954 to 1964, a period of 10 years, it fell from 29.9 percent to 8.3 percent, and it continues to fall now, until today we are carrying approximately only 7 percent of our exports and imports in American-flag vessels.

That is something to be shocked about.

Mr. ROSENTHAL. This does not shock me, frankly, because it is inevitable in the substructure of our Government that, when an agency becomes a subsidiary of another branch, they are at the whim and at the caprice of subadministrators in terms of budgeting.

This seems to me to be the evil of not having it as an independent agency.

Mr. LENNON. I agree with the gentleman, because I had the opportunity to examine and to question the gentleman representing the Bureau of the Budget here, and I took about seven pages I see from the record last year, trying to establish just what you said, and I think we did finally establish it.

Mr. HANNA. Mr. Chairman?

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Hanna.

Mr. HANNA. If I may, I would like to take this opportunity to make a comment on Mr. Morton's very incisive questioning to our dean in regard to why there has not been more money applied to this problem. I think it is the difference between the human reaction to initiation as against rehabilitation.

There is always a lot more glamor for reaching for something that is brand new than the struggle to renew something that has gotten into a state of disrepair.

That is precisely the problem here. You have much more energy required, a lot more disillusionment and patience that are going to be present than in striking out for the bold new things that have never been done before.

Mr. ROSENTHAL. That is what is known as the Joan Crawford argument.

« PrécédentContinuer »