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Mr. KRAMER. Oh, yes; they have. I have worn out the telephone between California and Washington to let them know what is going on. These fellows in the Government agencies are jealous of each other, and they don't want one to know what the other fellow knows what they are doing.

Mr. CURTIS. Suppose we enact this bill and get some information for the benefit of the Secretary of the Interior. Do you think he will use it in connection with the oil situation?

Mr. KRAMER. I don't think there is any shortage of gasoline anywhere. I don't think any one has had a hard time getting it. I haven't.

Mr. LELAND FORD. Mr. Taylor, do you represent the Department of the Interior?

Mr. TAYLOR. No, I represent the Department of Commerce.
Mr. LELAND FORD. I understood the Interior.

Mr. TAYLOR. No; that was corrected.

Mr. LELAND FORD. I am interested from the standpoint of oil production. We have a problem in California whereby we have oil down there that we cannot take out at all. They cut us down and told us we could not produce it. There is over 250,000 barrels a day that we cannot produce.

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Now, to get back to Mr. Grant's question. Section 3: This is going to lead into that very question of misuse of information. I don't want to do anything I want to clarify my statement to begin with— that will not be helpful. At the same time, I do not want to open the door to somebody who is going to step into this thing and crucify certain industries that they want to crucify, particularly where they cannot now get the information with which to crucify them. I don't want to furnish them that information for destructive purposes. I am going back to Mr. Grant's question. This section says: "Any individual census, or any information contained therein for the purposes of national defense." In that connection, I was a former supervisor of Los Angeles County, and I find that governmental departments now say everything they ask for is now national defense. No matter how remote it may be from national defense, somebody will figure out a line like they have in the interstate commerce, where for instance if you go down and buy a modest cup of coffee, you are engaging in interstate commerce, according to the C. I. O., for one, because the coffee came from Brazil and the sugar from Cuba. That may be a little overdrawn, but at the same time some of their decisions have been just as overdrawn.

Mr. LELAND FORD. The proposition here is to open this up on the grounds of national defense. If it is national defense pure and simple, all right; I do not believe anybody would oppose it. It is not the use I am against, it is the misuse, and what might be interpreted as national defense. I would hate, to be very frank, to have the Department of the Interior come in and get a lot of oil statistics on the pretense of national defense and then turn around and close down our oil wells some more, or else take them over.

I agree with Mr. Grant that that paragraph is rather too broad. We will admit there is a use for this in the emergency, and we want to be helpful. At the same time, let us be safe. I think that program should be modified in some manner as to prohibit misuse and still permit the giving of this information where it is justified, and where it is honestly needed.

Mr. TAYLOR. Well, my feeling, Mr. Congressman, is that both the Secretary of Commerce and the President will keep very firmly in mind what you are worried about, and that the rules and regulations which will be proposed will meet what you have in mind.

Mr. LELAND FORD. Yes; but it says "national defense." I should think that would be pretty hard to qualify.

Mr. TAYLOR. But under such regulations as imposed by the Secretary of Commerce. I don't know how you could qualify national defense.

Mr. KINZER. Mr. Secretary, interested as you are in commerce and in the whole subject of industrial marketing, I am just wondering this; this bill changes the manufacturers' census. Do you feel that the biennial census of manufacturers should be taken out of the picture and that a 5-year census would help the general industrial marketing problem?

I am just wondering that, and I would like your answer.

Mr. TAYLOR. I think I have to go back to what I mentioned earlier. A census, after all, is an audit.

Mr. KINZER. Yes.

Mr. TAYLOR. It doesn't show the flow at all. It is just taking a picture of, let us say, an individual on a certain day. Unless you combine that with a flow chart, if you want to call it that, or an earnings statement, you cannot tell anything about that companyor I wouldn't know how to. Take the balance sheet of a particular company I don't care what company it is on a particular day. That is the way the company looks then, but where it has been and where it is going you cannot tell.

Mr. KINZER. I just have been wondering whether, in the change you recommend in this Manufacturers' Biennial Census, of a 5-year period, whether you are embarking upon a policy, or desire to, of currently running all census reports and investigations through a 5-year period, and whether, in so doing, you are of the opinion you are contributing to the benefit of the general subject of industrial marketing, which is dependent on the information you propose to furnish

them.

Mr. TAYLOR. We would not be advocating this bill if we did not think so.

Mr. ALLEN. This does not cover agriculture, does it?

Mr. TAYLOR. No, sir.

Mr. TALLE. In line with the reference to balance sheets, which the witness just made, while they are photographs, if you get them in succession, every month, let us say, you get a pretty good idea of where the business is going; but this would seem be be a photograph over a 5-year period, and I am wondering whether data which may be 3, 4, or 5 years old would be of any value to a business, especially under the conditions we find ourselves in, where the picture is shifting rapidly. Would it not be moving away from the opportunity to give business information, rather than toward it?

Mr. TAYLOR. Do you want me to answer that?

Mr. TALLE. Yes.

Mr. TAYLOR. In our opinion, we get a more complete composite picture under what we have recommended in this bill. That is a matter of opinion, naturally.

Mr. TALLE. But would not the data be obsolete?

Mr. TAYLOR. No; because the current data would be so much more complete.

Mr. TALLE. Your census data would be current for such a short period.

Mr. TAYLOR. Oh, no; it would be supplemented by current data, which we could describe, using financial terms, as earnings statements, if you will. For instance, no company I know of gets an actual audited balance sheet more than once a year. They have the trial balance that comes along and with it the earnings statement. It is not necessary to get into an accounting discussion, but I make this comparison. The changes which come from the earnings statements are reflected, naturally, in your balance sheet, but you have to have a combination of the two, really to know what is going on.

Mr. TALLE. Businessmen write me and tell me that the 2-year census has been valuable.

Mr. TAYLOR. I am sure it is.

Mr. TALLE. They do not believe what you would do under the fiveyear plan would be so effective.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Talle, may I interrupt?

Mr. TALLE. Certainly.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Taylor, I feel that I probably owe the committee an explanation, that I did not ask you this at the inception. I might have spared you some unnecessary explanation. It is correct, Mr. Taylor, that you have been Under Secretary only since Mr. Jones has been Secretary of Commerce?

Mr. TAYLOR. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. Therefore, gentlemen, Mr. Taylor has had to ask Dr. Reed and some of these other gentlemen to answer some of these questions. It may have been more or less embarrassing to him. I would like to ask you this, Mr. Taylor; when you came to my office, at my request, I asked you where this bill had its inception, and you told me, as I recall, that this bill was in process of preparation before Mr. Capt became Director of the Census.

Mr. TAYLOR. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. And it was Mr. McClure who was working on its preparation.

Mr. TAYLOR. If I recall it, I gave you a history of the bill, which was a situation which the O. P. M. people and myself created. Then, in order to find out the practical aspects of it, Mr. McClure, who was on the Census staff, as was also Dr. Reed and Mr. Capt, did most of the work of the preparation of the language in connection with our attorneys and with Mr. May and others of O. P. M.

I

Mr. KRAMER. Who do you mean by others in the O. P. M.? would like to find out who they are. My information is that they change overnight.

Mr. TAYLOR. Mr. May has been there right from the beginning. Haven't you?

Mr. KRAMER. In O. P. M.?

Mr. MAY. Yes, sir.

Mr. KRAMER. Who were the others you mentioned?

Mr. TAYLOR. Mr. McClure, who is the Assistant Director of the Bureau of the Census. At that time he was not Assistant Director. The CHAIRMAN. He is here, and will testify.

Mr. TAYLOR. Again attempting to answer your question, the idea for the bill and the necessity for the bill arose in my mind and that of the officials of the O. P. M., in order to meet the situation.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, then, another question that I put to you when you were in my office and I feel this committee would be interested in knowing that now, and that was with reference to the curtailment on the part of the different agencies in seeking the same information by harassing business and industry throughout the country with innumerable questionnaires. You stated it was your objective to bring about a consolidation, and vest in the Bureau of the Census the inquisitorial power for the collection and compilation of statistics.

Mr. TAYLOR. That is correct.

The CHAIRMAN. There was an other thing, and while it was not before us at that time; as chairman of the committee I was deluged with letters from different people in protest against this bill, who seemed to be interested from the standpoint of collecting the statistics released as a consequence of these censuses and, I believe, publish it in the interest of the business in which they are principally interested. One of them wrote to Mr. Kramer, and sent me a copy of the letter; they all wrote me. They also asked me to attend a conference in Canada or send some member of the committee, and I understand that that is the same group that you addressed about 2 weeks ago.

Mr. TAYLOR. No; that is not the same group that I addressed 2 weeks ago.

The CHAIRMAN. I thought it was the same ones that wanted us to attend.

Mr. TAYLOR. No, no.

The CHAIRMAN. I thought perhaps you could give us some current light on the situation.

Mr. TAYLOR. I think I can give you some current light on that, because there was a meeting, I think of the Industrial Advertisers. Dr. REED. National Industrial Advertisers Association.

Mr. TAYLOR. That was being held in Canada, I think the day after or the day before the trip that I went on to Canada to address the Canadian Chamber of Commerce. They felt they would like to have had me come over there and explain things to them. Frankly I did not realize they were having their meeting; otherwise I would have been very glad to do it. As a result of their discussion, which I think was a rather uninformed discussion of this bill, they wrote us a great many letters, and I imagine they wrote similar letters to the members of your committee, worrying about the provisions of this bill. We prepared an answer, which I believe in most cases cleared up any of their doubts. I would be very glad to introduce that letter in the record, also several of the replies. (By order of the chairman, letters referred to by Under Secretary Taylor supplied by the Director of the Census with his exhibits.)

The CHAIRMAN. Without objection that will be included in the record.

NATIONAL INDUSTRIAL ADVERTISERS ASSOCIATION, INC.,
Youngstown, Ohio., September 9, 1941.

The Honorable JESSE JONES,

Secretary of Commerce, Washington, D. C.

DEAR MR. JONES: In your capacity as Secretary of Commerce, I come to you today as the representative of over 1,000 prominent industrial manufacturing

concerns, represented by the 1,700 members of the National Industrial Advertisers Association.

Next attached is your copy of a letter I have written to the Honorable Guy L. Moser, chairman of the House Census Committee, whose group is now studying bill S. 1627. As I have explained to Mr. Moser, the vast majority of our membership feels that the biennial census of manufactures should not be discarded in behalf of the same census on a 5-year basis. To do so would be disastrous to the market research and analysis programs conducted by many of the largest member companies of our group.

Under your able administration of the complicated affairs of the Department of Commerce, we feel free in approaching you on this subject which is very important. Any efforts in behalf of retaining the census of manufactures on the biennial basis will be warmly received not only by the membership of National Industrial Advertisers Association, Inc., but by the companies which the members represent.

Yours very truly,

RICHARD P. DODDS, President.

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE,
OFFICE OF THE UNDER SECRETARY,
Washington, September 24, 1941.

Mr. RICHARD P. DODDS,
President, National Industrial Advertisers Association, Inc.,

Chicago, Ill.

MY DEAR MR. DODDS: After reading your letter of September 9 to Secretary Jones, by which you transmitted a copy of your letter to Hon. Guy L. Moser, chairman of the House Census Committee, I am convinced that it is based upon a misunderstanding of Senate bill 1627. This measure must be considered not merely as applying to the census of manufactures alone. It must be viewed in the light of how it affects the entire commercial and industrial community of the country and, at the moment, how it affects the Nation's defense needs.

The bill provides a well-rounded, fundamentally sound statistical program designed to meet the current and long-time needs of business, industry, and government as well. We in the Department of Commerce sincerely believe the passage of S. 1627 as it now stands will give you and other business interests alike additional and more valuable statistical assistance rather than less.

Under existing law we are authorized to take a census of business and mineral industries only once in every 10 years, while the census of manufactures is provided for every 2 years. Clearly such a program is sadly unbalanced and seriously inadequate for the legitimate needs of businessmen generally. Moreover, manufactures, business, and mineral industries are so closely interwoven in our economic fabric that it is unwise, even wasteful, to cover one in a census without at the same time covering all three. This bill provides for taking concurrently every 5 years a census of manufactures, a census of business, and a census of mineral industries. Having all three of these censuses comparable as to time is a really great improvement over present practices. That improvement will benefit all businessmen rather than harm them because it will provide a complete and reliable picture of our economic life and activities which cannot be had under present laws.

Upon reading your letters to the Secretary and to Congressman Moser, I gather the impression that you have overlooked what we consider one of the outstanding gains which will be accomplished by the bill under discussion. You will note that the measure provides that "the Director of the Census be authorized, when directed by the Secretary of Commerce, to collect, compile, collate, and publish current or periodic statistical data supplemental to any census or other statistical inquiry authorized by law." Herein lies a tremendous advantage to all users of factual information. The Bureau of the Census would be authorized to collect, in an effective manner, current information during intercensal periods as often as our rapidly changing conditions of life may require.

There are other reasons why S. 1627 is wise legislation. For example, in complying with our present laws the Bureau is burdened with the enormous job every 10 years (in the years ending with 0) of taking a complete census of population, unemployment, agriculture, irrigation; drainage, business, manufactures, and mineral industries. This means coverage of approximately 3,000,000 business concerns, 185,000 manufacturing plants, 26,000 mineral extraction establishments, 6,000,000 farms, 100,000 irrigation enterprises, 80,000 drainage systems, and

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