The CHAIRMAN. I do not know but that might not suit some fellows. Senator ANDERSON. I agree with that. But it is not the purpose of reporting out a bill favorably to put language in it that tends to bring about defeat.

The CHAIRMAN. That is not my purpose, because I am not at all sure but what the Alaska bill will pass. If they are tied together, I think they are pretty sure to pass.

Senator SMATHERS. I think the only way this could be settled is to get the record to see what we agreed to at the time we finally agreed to report the bill out.

Senator ANDERSON. These two volumes are here. We have asked for a list of what we agreed on and they said this is what we agreed on. Where are the two volumes? We can go through them page by page.

Senator SMATHERS. I do not know whether it would be more offensive to have this cancellation provision in or out.

Senator ANDERSON. Did you go through this transcript carefully? Mr. FRENCH. Yes. Senator Butler's revocation provision was discussed, but there was no final decision on it by the full committee.

Senator ANDERSON. We had a list of things and I took it upstairs, and I went through these things page by page to see what was in there. I do not recall any decision and the record does not show any such decision. That is all I have to say about it. We have been trying to get something. We discussed this on the 4th day of February and took our action on it, and we tried to get a bill back up to the floor. We hoped that it might be done in a week. It is the 24th day of February, 20 days later. We are not to the floor yet, and if this happens to delay it further, it will not gain a bit of time, because the problem they face is bringing out the Hawaii bill after they have finished with the Bricker amendment.

The CHAIRMAN. When will that be?

Senator ANDERSON. They hope tomorrow. It might happen today. The CHAIRMAN. Have they got an agreement to vote?

Senator ANDERSON. No. If the Hawaiian bill was out, they might get an agreement to vote.

Senator SMATHERS. The majority leader said he is going to keep us late tonight and late tomorrow night. Certainly he ought to have broken the strength of the talkers by late tomorrow night.

The CHAIRMAN. It certainly is not my intention to delay getting this bill printed and on the floor in final reported form.

Senator SMATHERS. Why do you not offer that amendment on the floor, Mr. Chairman?

The CHAIRMAN. Frankly, I thought it would be much better to rewrite the bill all we want to in committee before it goes to the floor.

Senator ANDERSON. I feel wholly differently, Mr. Chairman, about the first suggestion that you have made, about the disposition of these lands. We thought once of suggesting that we set a time limit before they could start the disposition of the lands so that they would have a chance to get organized, and could not do it in the first week. We all know there is a sudden pressure to get hold of everything that a State has. I thought that it might be desirable to say that this arrangement, this sort of requirement that they could only lease them,

should last for a period-Senator Cordon one time suggested 25 years I started to say 10 years, and subsequently any sale should reserve to the State a sixteenth. I think it requires much more than that in an area of this nature. I do not think that does any violence to the bill. But I do think that the cancellation of the naval oil reserve is a very serious matter. While the Navy does not mind it being transferred back to the Department of Interior, I do not think they understood that when it got transferred back to the Department of Interior and thrown into the public domain, it might immediately be selected by the State of Alaska and leases given to friends or foes pretty rapidly, throwing away the investment of millions of dollars by the Federal Government in the discovery of actual oil. I do not believe any State would want to see that done.

For instance, we have a lot of very rich oil land that is now coming into being in the Western States, at greater depths than they have ever known, at ten to twelve or thirteen thousand feet. A lot of that has been in an area where the Federal Government has found out that oil apparently does not exist. Now they have discovered that oil is down there, away down below. Would you transfer that piece of public domain and allow the State of New Mexico to select it and give a lease to somebody else on this area when a well has cost over $1 million to bring it in.

I think that the people that own it now, the Government, ought to hang on to it for the present. My only point is that we did try to get a bill that we could report out with the amendments in it. I think Senator Cordon has done a wonderfully fine job of preparing it. I would be hopeful that we could

The CHAIRMAN. There was no doubt, was there, about the committee agreeing to cancel all coal reserves?

Senator ANDERSON. No, and that is done.

The CHAIRMAN. There was no doubt, was there, that the State was to have an opportunity to take over in its 100 million acres, if that was the figure, any unused or unappropriated lands, even if they were on reservations? Page 685 of the transcript, for February 4, down at the bottom of the page, the following appears:

Senator CORDON. I do want to say, Mr Chairman, and then I am through, that the suggestion of the chairman can be included in this bill without difficulty and any areas now under lease can be made available for selection subject to lease with the State taking the position of the Federal Government. That can be done.

Without going into a lot of detail that is exactly the understanding that I had, and it is the basis of my feeling. I doubt very much if the State of Alaska will immediately select any part of this 49 million acres, because it is going to be tremendously expensive to operate. That is the reason the Navy gave it up.

Senator ANDERSON. We read this very carefully the other afternoon when we were discussing this very point. I do not know what the right answer is. I merely point out that Senator Cordon was saying that to put language in the bill that would accomplish what you desire would be a very simple thing. It could be done. You said if we do that you will be satisfied, and Senator Clements said, "I heartily agree with that." Then Senator Cordon made additional comments and nowhere was the matter brought up and disposed of. I do not know how far to go with a draft of this nature.

43175-54-23

Mr. BENNETT. That one word was overlooked in that suggestion of Senator Cordon. It said "now under lease," trying to determine the intent of that was difficult, and the original section, you will recall Senator Anderson, expanded that so that the State could have selected lands which were under lease in the future as well as those that were under lease now. To that extent there was some question even at the time of drafting that original lease language whether it was within the scope because he did use the word "now."

Senator ANDERSON. As I remember, there was a provision to that that we had a great deal of difficulty in understanding.

Mr. BENNETT. It was not so much a question of understanding but the power reserved to the Secretary to unitize all the leases and whether the State would be in a position to do it actually more effectively than get the rents and royalties from those leases.

Mr. FRENCH. Original subsection (k) permitted the selection of lands under lease.

Senator ANDERSON. Section (k) was one of the original sections? Mr. FRENCH. No, sir. The one we are discussing in committee print No. 3.

Senator ANDERSON. We never saw such a suggestion as that.
Mr. FRENCH. Until we discussed it.

Senator ANDERSON. That is right. It has never been considered by the committee.

Mr. FRENCH. It was my understanding and interpretation of the language you have just read that led to the drafting of subsection (k) that appeared in committee print No. 3.

Senator ANDERSON. Do you see any difficulty that might arise by the transfer of lands that are now under lease where you have to substitute the State for the Federal Government as those leases go on? Is there any problem there? Are you going to have any problem of that nature in your area where on the tidelands and submerged lands the States have made leases already, and there is no problem involved?

Senator DANIEL. I do not think you will have any trouble. The only trouble you would have is if you had some sales made on a smaller area than that which is included within a larger lease. The present existing lease may be that a well on that piece of that subdivided tract will hold the other tracts. You do run into difficulties like that just in a private sale. If you buy a part of a tract of land that is under a lease covering other lands, development on the other lands may hold your lease, too, even though they are not producing right on your tract. That is about the only difficulty I see.

The CHAIRMAN. The burden of our discussion-I do not say the testimony, but the burden of the discussion-in all these hearings has been that the State of Alaska would have to get the income from royalties coming in under contracts made by the Department of the Interior. When it came to the Forest Service, that is not under Interior. That is under Agriculture. I know we agreed in discussion that the lease money that comes in from leasing of those forest lands will be turned over to the State.

Senator ANDERSON. Thirty-seven and one-half percent, and then 372 percent of this woud go to the State, just exactly the same. There is no difference in this at all. You get 372 percent of the forests and 372 percent of these public domain lands.

The CHAIRMAN. We amended the Forest Act so that that fund that is building up can be disposed of.

Senator ANDERSON. Very proper. I know the Indians are going to howl, but they really have no right to howl, because it is a very proper thing to do, in my opinion, to amend that act and make this money available to the State. Let me see if I can say this. I would like to have everyone feel when we report out the bill that we met all the real questions that were decided by the committee. I would feel much better if we settled this so that you felt we had done the thing that you thought we had done. I would rather waive the provision that relates to existing leases that are now made, because I can see the chairman would feel probably that had been agreed to, and if we could do that, I would not object to it in the slightest. I would have great objection to the naval reserve, because I am sure we did not reach a decision on that. I did go through these records very carefully, and I know no decision was reached on the naval reserve.

The CHAIRMAN. Of course, I know certain elements in the old States that own all of the surface of their lands and everything under it as well who will holler like everything because the Federal Government is giving away something up there in Alaska. It may be the proper decision and wise decision not to ever make Alaska a State. According to the theory of these gentlemen, Alaska should be kept a resource for all the other 48 States, and we should quit talking about statehood. But that is just about the conclusion that we ought to come to if we are not going to give them anything to live on.

Senator ANDERSON. They will have a lot to live on. Mr. Chairman, I would be agreeable if it would be agreeable with you that the only change we will make in this bill, which is before us as committee print No. 4, will be to carry out the point of the discussion where there may be a misunderstanding as to what final decision was reached, particularly where Senator Cordon said that it would not be difficult to permit the State to select from lands which were now under lease. If the staff work out language which will cover only lands under lease at the time of the passage of the bill, that will be completely satisfactory to me."

The CHAIRMAN. Does that proposal take the place of some of the other provisions now in here?

Mr. BENNETT. No, sir. It would be in addition for the State of Alaska.

The CHAIRMAN. The committee counsel has given me some notations here that are simply technical in nature which I think we can authorize him to correct. I do not think it needs to go on the record.

Mr. FRENCH. Permit me to suggest that the first one ought to be discussed. It is quite important. The point is that we are limiting the right of selection to 25-year period in the case of the grants in subsections (b) and (c), but not limiting it in the other cases.

Senator ANDERSON. We agreed that we would leave it just that way, with several million acres floating. We discussed that you could not possibly anticipate which direction these cities might grow, that a new pulp plant might change the whole thing, and that pulp plant might die down and a new one might be built at Petersburg, for example, and then they would want this language. Therefore we would leave that grant floating.

The CHAIRMAN. Very well. We will stand adjourned then until further call. I expect to report the committee's bill, as amended, later today.

(By direction of the chairman the following are made a part of the record :)

DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY,

Hon. HUGH BUTLER,

OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY, Washington, February 17, 1954.

Chairman, Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs,

United States Senate, Washington 25, D. C.

MY DEAR SENATOR BUTLER: Reference is made to my letter of February 13, 1954, in which I advised you that representatives of the Office of the Judge Advocate General of the Navy had contacted members of the staff of your committee in order to provide technical assistance in drafting language for inclusion in the proposed Alaska statehood bill, to the end that the lands and minerals now comprising Naval Petroleum Reserve No. 4 may be made available for selection by the new State.

Pursuant to these arrangements, the following language, for addition to section 5 of committee print No. 2, is suggested to accomplish the purpose of the committee:

"(h) The public lands set apart as a naval petroleum reserve by Executive Order No. 3797-A, dated February 27, 1923, and the public lands withdrawn by Public Land Order 82 of January 22, 1943, as amended by Public Land Order 323 of August 14, 1946, except such of those lands as the President may hereafter designate, shall be returned to the public domain under the administration of the Department of the Interior upon the admission of Alaska into the Union as a State."

It may be well to note that the committee's purpose might be accomplished through other legislative language. The first to suggest itself would be specific reservations, by appropriate provisions in the bill, of those lands and installations which it may be determined are necessary for the use of the United States. In fact, the Department of the Air Force would have preferred this approach. In view, however, of the desire of the committee to have language which would accomplish its purpose at the earliest practicable time without the delay which would result from the necessary survys of land and facilities to be reserved to Federal agencies, the approach set forth herein is considered to be the most feasible to accomplish the committee's purpose. Sincerely yours,

THOMAS S. GATES, Jr., Acting Secretary of the Navy.

ALASKA SALMON INDUSTRY, INC.,
Seattle 4, Wash., February 10, 1954.

Re Alaska statehood bill.

Hon. GUY CORDON,

United States Senator,

Senate Office Building, Washington, D. C.

MY DEAR SENATOR CORDON: Thanks for your letter of February 4 enclosing committee print of the new statehood bill and a copy of the Submerged Lands Act.

I have examined the new provisions of the bill, and I agree that the adoption of the Submerged Lands Act operates to transfer title of the tidelands to the new State. I think that defect in the previous legislation has been completely cured. The question which remains in my mind is the effect of subsection 5 (m) as it appears on page 15. I understand that this has been tentatively proposed as an alternate to the last sentence of section 4. I think subsection 5 (m) states the general rule with respect to the riparian or littoral rights of upland owners. I do not think it conforms with the views generally held in Alaska by members of the bar or the Alaska courts with respect to the rights of the present occupants of Alaska tidelands. I think subsection 5 (m) might well be in diminution of present existing rights as now recognized and enforced by Alaska decisions.