Mr. FORISTEL. If that be true, certainly the Interstate Commerce Commission is not interested in the labeling and packaging of that type of cargo, because you do not have any mixed transportation, that is motor carrier and barge line, do you?

Mr. PERRIN. Not at the present. You may have under emergency. But you do not have

Mr. FORISTEL. Under emergency, what kind of container would you carry gasoline and oil in?

Mr. PERRIN. You would not carry it in any different containers than they carry it now.

Mr. FORISTEL. And they would package it the same way.

Mr. PERRIN. They would package it the same way.

Mr. FORISTEL. This group, I believe, are probably the only unregulated group, or as close to not being regulated in the entire transportation system, would you not say?

Mr. PERRIN. I would say so.

Mr. FORISTEL. This group, I believe, are making money. I think they have had a rather profitable operation up to date. Assume that, at least. Most of our other carriers in the country, railroads and air lines, and trucking in the main, are not doing so well, are they? Mr. PERRIN. That is as I understand it.

Mr. FORISTEL. I do not know if it is a strange coincidence that those who are regulated are not doing so well, and those who are not regulated are.

Do you have any recommendations along those lines?

Mr. PERRIN. I would not care to comment on it myself.

Mr. FORISTEL. I have no further questions.

Do you have anything more to say?

Mr. PERRIN. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Crost, do you have any questions?
Mr. CROST. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. In the event of a restoration, the powers similar to the war powers would be granted by the Congress

Mr. PERRIN. Undoubtedly they would. But of course, even during the war we ran into situations in ODT that we definitely could not handle under the authority that had been granted by the Congress.

You know, the rate situation is sort of a different breed of cats, and handling the equipment itself. We run into that difficulty with respect to rates on the full utilization of the different modes of transportation all the time.

The CHAIRMAN. Is there any criticism on, the part of the Interstate Commerce Commission as to manner in which the Coast Guard has been regulated?

Mr. PERRIN. I would say not, Mr. Chairman, no. The only purpose of the bill, as I told you, basically is to trye to put all the regulations of this nature in one agency. That is about it.

I think the Commission feels that perhaps it would result in some economies to the Government. As I understand it, saving money today is very important.

The CHAIRMAN. That is right. We have an awful difficult time trying to find out how to save because the economies we think we initiated in the Congress we find do not always turn out to be economies downtown.

Mr. PERRIN. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. So we are not always too sure that the transfer of one function from one agency to another, or even the consolidation, is economical. We had thought, in the past, that it had been, but we find it is the execution for many, many employees.

Have you any opinion as to what the Senate action in the committee might be on this bill?

Mr. PERRIN. I have no opinion on it at all.

The CHAIRMAN. Has it been scheduled, to your knowledge?

Mr. PERRIN. I do not think that it has. I have no opinion on it at all.

The CHAIRMAN. This bill does not in any fashion give you the authority to regulate rates.

Mr. PERRIN. NO. Or operating rates, or the record and report requirements, or any of the financial practices. In other words, the Transportation of Explosives Act and the Interstate Commerce Act are separate and distinct. To make them subject to this regulation, the Transportation of Explosives Act would not by any stretch of the imagination make them subject to the Interstate Commerce Act, from which they are now exempt.

The CHAIRMAN. Might it constructively cause changes in the rates by virtue of the regulations imposed?

Mr. PERRIN. I do not think so.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Crost?

Mr. CROST. Mr. Perrin, this bill was proposed by the ICC, was it not?

Mr. PERRIN. That is right.

Mr. CROST. When you proposed the bill, when you felt that there was a need for such a bill, did you have in mind the contract barge carrier in particular? Were you thinking of other types of carriers principally?

Mr. PERRIN. No. They had in mind all types of carriers. As I recall the bill even applied to private carriers in interstate Commerce.

It is no less a danger for a private carrier to be transporting goods that are dangerous or explosive in interstate commerce than it is for a common carrier or a contract carrier. The fact is that the nature of the operation does not minimize the danger.

Mr. CROST. The reason I asked the question is this: When I asked you before if you had some specific examples of things that were wrong in the picture and needed changing, in cases where greater uniformity was desired, I think you started to give some examples outside of this contract barge field. Then I asked you in particular about the contract barge field and I got the impression from the answer that you gave that the problems in that particular field, namely, contract barge, were not so serious as to constitute your primary interest when you proposed the bill.

Mr. PERRIN. The bill was not aimed directly at the contract carriers, I can say that. It was directed at all the carriers. The Commission did not particularly have in mind this particular group of carriers when they drew the bill up. It was to cover, as I say, all types of transportation for the express purpose of providing a common form where shippers and carriers could go for regulations and uniform regulations, that is, uniform to the extent that you can make them uniform.

Its further objective was to take care of situations where regulations were prescribed, say, for a motor operation and in the course of the transportation the shipment was transferred from the motor carrier to an airline.

Obviously, the need for protection on an air line would be greater than it would be, possibly, in a motor carrier. To try to iron out regulations to cover those situations was one of the primary purposes in the act. And then, of course, in addition to that, if the proposed act is compared to the present, you will see that there is quite a bit of revision with respect to certain things.

I might say this is in the present laws in the Criminal Code of the United States, and it is proposed to put this new law in the Criminal Code. But there is a provision in the new law for injunctive relief. In other words, a civil remedy, which is not in the present act. Commission felt that was desirable. Personally, I think it is too. Mr. CROST. Thank you.

The

Mr. PERRIN. There is one other question I think was raised by the first witness here that I would like to answer. He brought out the point about the definition of explosives and dangerous articles. I think if you will compare the two acts, the proposed definition is substantially the same as the present one. Even under the present law a carload of coal could be actually classed as combustible. Of course there is no regulation to cover it. But it could be.

A carload of hay could be combustible under certain conditions. But obviously the Commission will not-that is, I think they will not— prescribe any regulations covering it.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Perrin, it is my understanding that this is not restricted to water carriers. It covers air as well.

Mr. PERRIN. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. It would take the regulatory authority away from the Civil Aeronautics Board.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Perrin.

You will be with us for the remainder of the hearing in case we should care to ask you any other questions.

Mr. PERRIN. Yes, sir.

(The chairman instructed that a copy of a report submitted by the Treasury Department be inserted in the record. The report was originally submitted to the Senate Interstate and Foreign Commerce Committee.)

Hon. WALLACE H. WHITE, Jr.,

Chairman, Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce,

United States Senate, Washington, D. C.

JUNE 11, 1947.

MY DEAR MR. CHAIRMAN: Further reference is made to your letter of April 23, 1947 enclosing a copy of the bill S. 1141, to amend the Transportation of Explosives Act, as amended, and requesting the views of the Treasury Department on this proposed legislation.

The purpose of S. 1141 is to repeal expressly R. S. 4472, as amended (46 U. S. C. 170), and vest the regulation of the transportation of explosives and dangerous articles on board vessels in the Interstate Commerce Commission, and to effect minor changes in the authority of the Interstate Commerce Commission within its present jurisdiction.

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Under existing law, the transportation of explosives and other dangerous articles on board vessels is regulated by the Coast Guard under the authority of R. S. 4472, as amended, the former Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation having been incorporated into the Coast Guard under the provisions of Reorganization Plan No. 3, 1946. Transportation of explosives and other dangerous articles not on board vessels is regulated by the Interstate Commerce Commission under the authority of sections 232-236 of the Criminal Code (18 U. S. C. 382–386).

As early as 1871 the supervising inspectors of the Steamboat Inspection Service, the agency charged with the enforcement of other safety provisions on board vessels, had regulatory power over the carriage of dangerous cargoes on vessels. The authority was conferred by the act of February 28, 1871, chapter 100, which dealt comprehensively with safety regulations on vessels, and was codified in the Revised Statutes as section 4472. The act of March 4, 1921, chapter 172, however, amended section 233 of the Criminal Code to authorize the Interstate Commerce Commission to formulate regulations governing transportation of explosives or other dangerous articles on vessels which were common carriers and engaged in interstate or foreign commerce. In the years following 1921 the Interstate Commerce Commission made several attempts to promulgate regulations under this new authority. But the conflicts between the regulations of the Interstate Commerce Commission and the regulations and statutes administered by the Steamboat Inspection Service caused such confusion that in 1937 the Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation, successor to the Steamboat Inspection Service, undertook the task of drafting new legislation to clarify the situation. The result was the act of October 9, 1940, chapter 777 (46 U. S. C. 170), which amended Revised Statutes 4472 by making it a completely modern law for governing the carriage of dangerous cargoes on vessels. This act took away from the Interstate Commerce Commission all authority over the transportation of explosives or other dangerous articles on board vessels, with the exception of a provision making Interstate Commerce Commission regulations binding upon shippers making shipments of explosives or other dangerous articles via common carriers engaged in interstate or foreign commerce by land or water. This provision of control was agreed upon to assure uniform regulations governing descriptive names, packing, marking, labeling, and the use of specification containers. The Coast Guard now administers Revised Statutes 4472, as amended.

Since the beginning of the propulsion of vessels by machinery all safety laws governing construction, equipment, manning, and stowage of dangerous cargoes, with the exception noted in the preceding paragraph, have been administered by the same agency. It is believed that that one agency, which is now the Coast Guard, should not be divested of supervision over one aspect of vessel safety while it retains responsibility for all other aspects. The enactment of S. 1141 would give another Government agency regulatory power over affairs of the merchant marine without any new advantage to the industry.

Article 24 of the International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea, 1929, provides that carriage of cargoes dangerous to life or safety is forbidden. The government of each nation determines for itself what is dangerous cargo. If the Interstate Commerce Commission is made the agency of this Government for enforcing that provision it will introduce another agency into the membership of the Committee of the International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea. Several other effects of enactment of the bill do not seem desirable. Another Government agency would become an interested party in the investigation of some marine casualties. "Hazardous articles," the carriage of which is now regulated, are not included in the definition "dangerous articles" in the bill. The authority contained in the amended section 236 (e) could result in the injection of local police power into merchant marine affairs in a field now occupied exclusively by the Federal Government. The bill does not appear to offer any benefit not provided by the present statute which would recommend its enactment.

The Treasury Department, for the reasons stated, recommends against the enactment of S. 1141.

The Department has been advised by the Bureau of the Budget that there is no objection to the submission of this report to your committee.

Very truly yours,

E. H. FOLEY, Jr., Acting Secretary of the Treasury,

Mr. FORISTEL. I would like to call Commodore Shepheard of the United States Coast Guard. He represents his organization and the Treasury Department.

Commodore SHEPHEARD. H. C. Shepheard, United States Coast Guard, Chief of the Office of Merchant Marine Safety.

Mr. FORISTEL. Would you raise your hand and swear that the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

Commodore SHEPHEARD. I do.

TESTIMONY OF COMMODORE H. C. SHEPHEARD, UNITED STATES COAST GUARD, CHIEF OF THE OFFICE OF MERCHANT MARINE SAFETY

The CHAIRMAN. Do you have a prepared statement, Commodore? Commodore SHEPHEARD. No; I do not.

I would like to make a brief reference in opening to a very interesting paper recently presented before the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers entitled "Various Governing Bodies and the Effect of Their Regulations on Shipping." Very brief mention is made of this bill in this paper, and I quote:

Another bill which was presented before the Eightieth Congress, first session, was S. 1141, to amend the Transportation of Explosives Act. This bill, if passed, would transfer the cognizance of handling of explosives on shipboard from the United States Coast Guard to the Interstate Commerce Commission.

Taus, more proposed laws, more proposed governing bodies, and more regulations, when the real need is for consolidation and simplification.

I concur with that statement.

There is one other quotation I would like to make, which is the theme of the whole paper:

* the effect of laws and regulations governing our merchant marine, will in the final analysis determine whether or not we shall continue to have a merchant marine.

What concerns me is whether or not we are going to have another agency entering into the field of design, construction, operation, manning, and inspection of vessels.

Is there to be another agency entering into the design, construction, inspection, operation, and manning of vessels? Another agency to investigate marine casualties? Another agency to license merchant marine officers and seamen-to try them for negligence, looking toward suspension and revocation of said licenses and certificates? For the successful administration of the control of dangerous cargo on vessels these are all vital activities and at present all within the scope of Coast Guard duties, and which if duplicated by another agency of the Government would be costly and cause more serious confusion to industry. The Coast Guard is looked upon as the maritime safety organization. It does seem logical that, aside from its glamorous rescue work and so on, that the organization which is called upon to extricate vessels and seamen when they are in distress should have some control over those vessels, and seamen before they are operated or in port.

Even if this bill were enacted there are other provisions of the navigation and inspection laws which would authorize the Coast Guard to prevent the operation of the vessels if, in the opinion of an inspector, it could not be operated with safety to life.