legislative proposals concerning the granting of rights-of-way across Federal lands, including the bills mentioned above. You further stated that you would not hear any testimony regarding the desirability and routing of the Trans-Alaska pipeline, because these hearings would only deal with the right-of-way issue. We intend to bide by your stated rules; however, we must point out at the very beginning that the so-called right-of-way legislation, in our judgment is the Alaska pipeline issue.

If S. 1081, for example, becomes law in its present form, it will in fact be the bill and the vehicle by which Congress authorizes the trans-Alaska pipeline. While it is true that S. 1081 will have other results also, we know, and so does everyone else, that the Alaska pipeline will be one of its immediate and primary results.

S. 1081, among other things, authorizes the Secretary, presumably the Secretary of Interior, although it is not so stated to grant, issue or renew rights-of-way over, upon or through the Federal lands for pipelines and other systems for the transportation of oil or natural gas and storage in terminal facilities in connection therewith, section 3(a).

These rights-of-way shall extend to the lands occupied by the pipe and its appurtenances, lands occupied by its maintenance facilities, and such adjacent lands as are necessary to protect the environment and to provide for access, operation, maintenance, or public safety. (Subsection C.)

Under certain conditions, the pipeline systems shall be constructed and operated as common carriers. The Secretary is further directed to grant nonexclusive and multiple use rights-of-way, whenever practical and consistent with certain environmental policies and engineering practice, and to require applicants for right-of-way to use them in common, where appropriate. (Section 4.)

The Secretary further shall specify the boundaries of each rightof-way, but only as precisely as is practical. Section 5(a). He may authorize the use of such additional lands as he determines to be necessary for the construction, operation, maintenance or termination of the project, or for access thereto. (Section 5(a).)

The Secretary determines the duration of each right-of-way, section 5(b), and is apparently given full power to issue regulations and terms and conditions regarding such matters as extent, application, charges, location and construction, et cetera. (Section 5 (c).)

The Secretary shall issue regulations to protect the environment, section 5(d), and each right-of-way permit shall contain terms and conditions for environmental protection among other things, section 6, but again it is all up to the Secretary and what he deems necessary, section 6.

Many of the complex and complicating features of this legislation, as well as an analysis of the other bills, have been omitted in this brief analysis; but the thrust and substance is the same:

From henceforth, the Secretary of Interior has fundamentally a free hand to issue permits for pipelines such as the Alaska pipeline, without regard to any former statutes limiting the amount of rightof-way.

The present Secretary of Interior has already stated his intention and desire to grant a permit for the trans-Alaska pipeline. He has stated that he has felt that existing environmental regulations, already promulgated and required by his department, are sufficient. He has stated these things in the face of a rising tide of protests, well documented, about the enormous environmental damage that will be done if the pipeline is constructed in its present form.

Thus, the effect of this bill in its present form will be to permit the Secretary to do what he says he is going to do: to issue a permit for the Trans-Alaska pipeline. It will be up to him to set the regulations in terms of the permit, but he says he has already done this; even if he does it again, he will certainly issue the permit.

And further, in our judgment, it is incorrect to say that the Federal courts will be able to consider the pipeline issue on its environmental merits, once this legislation eliminates the alleged technicalities of the recent decision.

If this eventuality occurs, and the matter goes back into court, the court will be only able to consider a procedural matter; it will be only able to consider whether or not the Department of Interior has complied with certain procedures set forth and required by the National Environmental Policy Act. It will not ever be able to consider the pipeline on its merits.

I think Mr. Smith brought this out well during the last hearing. Thus we see the practical result of this legislation as authorizing the Alaska pipeline. That is why the pipeline should be a proper subject of discussion today, and if not, proper discussion of it should be permitted in some other form of Congress.

Vasts amounts of public land and coastline are involved in any decision which authorizes this pipeline. Other nations are involved, and they are very disturbed. Other alternatives exists to the present proposed route of the pipeline. They should all be given a full airing by Congress, and Congress should decide. And the Alaska pipeline issue should be decided on its own merits, rather than through the vehicle of some technical amendments to the present right-of-way laws, important as these may be.

It has been stated that there is an urgency to rush this right-of-way legislation through, because the recent Federal court decision on the pipeline allegedly has cast a cloud over all Federal rights-of-way, for all purposes. However, to the best of our knowedge, very few, if any grants of rights-of-way across Federal lands, other than the Alaska pipeline itself, have been or are likely to be challenged in the near future on the grounds of failure to comply with the terms of the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920.

And, of course, the court decision itself only dealt with that specific act and not with statutes or regulations authorizing rights-of-way for transmission lines, aqueducts, cow paths, or other facilities.

A recent check by our office with the Federal Power Commission revealed the information that, at least for the next half year or so, there appear to be no pipeline or other facilities about to be constructed which would require a larger right-of-way than presently permitted under law. Thus, it appears to us that there is no immediate

urgency for such legislation; and because it is so complex, and we will point out below, there is ample time for further consideration of all of its complex aspects and the long term adverse environmental effects it may have.

The intent of present pipeline right-of-way legislation. The court case, Wilderness Society, et al. v. Morton, in its opinion, quoted extensively from the very lengthy legislative history of section 28 of the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920, see pages 23 to 39. It points out that bills were introduced and debated on the floor of Congress on this precise subject as early as 1914, and that as originally drafted, section 28 provided not for 25 feet on either side of the pipeline, but only for 10 feet.

Over the intervening years between 1914 and 1920, the bill came in and out of committee, with a variety of different widths in it, but the largest number was 25. As the court states on page 24: "The number '25' was not pulled out of thin air, but was resolved upon after apparently set-forth legislative history indicates, Congress knew very well what it was doing when it set the right-of-way limit and it had a deliberate intent in mind."

To quote again from the court's opinion, page 38: "Congress felt that in the past, when it granted rights-of-way to railroads, it had been much too generous in giving away valuable public lands, and it did not want this to be repeated."

In other words, the present right-of-way limitation was carefully thought out and debated successfully through at least three separate sessions of Congress, and all merits and demerits of a larger or smaller right-of-way were carefully considered.

Throughout it all remained one single thread of concern of Congress in those times that it did not want to repeat this mistake of vast giveaways of public land to private interests such as had occurred during the infamous railroad era, of the late 19th century.

We submit the same principle obtains today, and that Congress should pass no legislation which would in effect amount to another giveaway of public lands, at the discretion of the Secretary of the Interior. Vast public resources are at stake here, more important than even those affected by the railroads in the last century.

Congress should keep its authority and control here, and should consider such extra large projects as the Alaska pipeline or others of that magnitude, on their merits, one by one. At the very least, it should not delegate to the Secretary of the Interior, who has already said what he is going to do, a decision of such magnitude and such far reaching

consequences.

The bills before us are extremely far reaching, and involve many complex questions. Because of the shortness of notice and time to prepare, we have not been able to go into all the problems in detail. But a few things come immediately to mind.

For example, it deals not just with pipelines for oil and natural gas, but also with reservoirs, canals, and other water transportation and distribution facilities; pipelines for other materials; slurry and conveyor belts for solid materials; electric transmission wires, radio and television communication systems, roads, trails, railroads, livestock

driveways, and airways, and such other necessary transportation or other systems which are in the public interest.

Beyond that, at least two of the bills, S. 1081 and S. 1041, assume that the communications and transport facilities are common carriers, but set up no true regulatory process for handling them. S. 1081 waives the common carrier requirement for projects subject to State public utility commissions, but neither bill says anything about the regulatory process for all other situations. This emphasizes the problem of near-completed administrative discretion, which we have already spoken of above.

We feel that if the intent is to deal meaningfully with rights-of-way provisions, and not just to authorize the Alaska pipeline, the Federal Government should set up a quasi-judicial regulatory process for making the normal findings; that the project meets the test of public necessity, that it is a plan best adapted to serve the public interest, that the project meets the test of public necessity, that the project is of optimum size and in the correct location, and the rates are reasonable. Under no circumstances do we feel that the Federal Government should just sit back and supinely let common carriers have free rein to cross vast acreage of public domain.

The Federal Government should play a major regulatory role in the traditional sense, with much more than mere administrative proceedings and not even the semblance of judicial process.

Also, the bills basically seem to assume that the Federal Government should accommodate most applicants, if sufficient stipulations are made, without approaching the question from the standpoint of compatibility with land use planning and management schemes.

Section 6 of S. 1081 merely seems to suggest that the matter can be handled under conditions in the permit: but section 4 encourages common corridors if they are consistent with national and State land use policies. We would suggest that there really needs to be an emphasis on identifying corridors and management plans from the very outset, and upon discouraging all nonconforming applications; it is a matter of what comes first:

The bills also do not seem to deal with a number of other specific concerns, such as requirements for renewal of obsolete facilities, interventions by third parties into regulatory proceedings, fixed terms for facilities, such as for relicensing at the end of standard terms, and limits to administrative discretion.

This last may be particularly important, because by having no limits on the width of rights-of-way or on the numbers of rights-of-way, the Secretary could grant away tens of millions of acres in patchwork quilt of concessions to private enterprise. And this is precisely the entire situation that Congress, in its wisdom, back early in the century wanted to avoid when it set the original right-of-way limitations.

In summary, far reaching and important questions are raised by the so-called right-of-way legislation. They are much too complex to rush through under any claim of alleged urgency. The urgency simply does not exist, and where there are problems for individual carriers or facilities, they can be dealt with on a specific basis in the interim.

On that latter point, Mr. Chairman, I would like to call your attention to the last page of my statement which is a little parable found

in the Anchorage Daily News on March 3 of this year about the lost tribe of the Yanquis. It says:

Once upon a time there was a tribe called the Yanquis. They occupied a once fruitful land which they obtained from native tribes by trading firewater and trinkets. Their history was especially promising as tribes go until a wonderous animal multiplies in their land.

The animal was a cross between a Yak and a Auk and was called a Yuk. It was bred by one Fenryhord the Wealthy, as he later was known, and by a General named Motor. Yuks would carry up to six people but had to be guided lest they bump into other Yuks.

The King of the Yanquis declared that the Treasury would pay to provide pathways for the Yuks wherever they were guided, whether it be through dwellings, workshops, beanfields, pasturelands, temples or across waterways. Since Yuks fed themselves entirely on oily black liquid seeping from the ground, the population kept seeking new black liquid seeping places, and later pumped the black liquid from great depths, though sometimes accidentally flooding streams, harbors and fields with the black liquid, though they tried hard to avoid such occurrences.

Especially when the choke, a kind of halter, was used, and while waiting for other Yuks to pass before, Yuks released an unhealthy gas from the rear end which caused some villages to have air which was not fit to breathe.

Since everyone had a Yuk and since all travelling was done on Yuks, generations of Yanquis became lame, lazy and overweight because they no longer walked anywhere.

Yanquis, once renowned for their skills as traders and for their industry, sold their possessions, their silver and gold, their beans and poultry, milk and meat to get black liquid with which to feed their Yuks. Neighboring tribes kept raising the prices of the black liquid as they noticed the Yanquis were using up every drop of their own.

Critics among the Yanquis of overuse of the Yuk were stoned and banished as well as those who proposed that if the Yanquis tribe was more thrifty in their use of the black liquid they would not always be so broke.

Finally, the Yanquis tribe vanished from the earth. Some say this was because, since all Yanquis had Yuks, and since they were always traveling about, they never stayed anywhere long enough to breed. This is probable, thought in earlier times the sleekest Yuks were often obtained by male Yanquis to improve their breeding prospects with female Yanquis.

But now the Yuks remain, the Yanquis have vanished from the earth.

We offer this parable for the committee's perspective on the mature and deeper implications of the so-called energy crisis and the panic atmosphere it has created.

Coming back from the parable, we see the legislation as fundamentally have the effect, intentional or otherwise, of authorizing the highly controversial and environmentally disastrous trans-Alaska pipeline. If this is so, this will be a result which we predict will haunt Congress for years to come.

At the very least, the pipeline questions should be dealt with on its own merits, and not as an ancillary, as here, to some other legislations. Finally, there are very complex questions involved in the legislation before us, purely on a right-of-way basis alone. Many different sectors and segments of society are involved, and many fundamental issues are raised. Many people need to be heard from, so that we can truly work out legislation that does not, once again, lead us into the sort of give aways that led Congress to enact the restrictive terms of the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Evans. We appreciate having your statement.