Mr. EASTMAN. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. You think it is practical?

Mr. EASTMAN. Yes; except that I do not think they can get along on as little rubber as the Baruch committee estimates. Our own estimates with respect to that matter indicate that, even with the greatest conservation, they will have to have somewhat more rubber than is allowed for in that report.

Of course, if it gets to such a situation where there is not enough to go around, if they should only allow as much as they indicate, or, rather, if Mr. Jeffers, the Rubber Director, should only allow as much as that, and we could not reduce down to the limits required and keep all of the vehicles in operation, those which are of the greatest need to the public at the present time will have to be kept in operation first, and those which are of the least importance will be discontinued first.

As I indicated from the very start, we have appreciated the importance of this matter, and we have outstanding various orders which relate to the operation of both trucks and busses, and also taxicabs. Those orders are for the purpose of combining their operations, eliminating empty mileage, avoiding unnecessary operations, particularly in the case of local distribution trucks, and so on.

The same is true with respect to the busses and taxicabs. Those orders have had good results. We know that already a very large amount of mileage has been saved. The field, however, is one of enormous difficulty because of the tremendous variations in the operation of these vehicles; and also because of the fact that more than half of them are owned by individual owners. That is, more than half are owned by men who only have one or two trucks, and, of course, that is particularly true in the case of the farmers.

We were brought to the conclusion that further steps for this conservation were necessary for three principal reasons. In the first place, gasoline rationing was established in the East. Under the system which was instituted, the amount of gasoline which is to go to operators is determined by the local rationing boards. At a very early date, the Office of Price Administration came to the conclusion that the local boards were not fitted for that purpose, when it came to the operations of these commercial vehicles.

There are, of course, in many cases, very large fleets of these vehicles, whose operations extend far beyond the local community which is represented by a local rationing board. Therefore, they came to us, and they said:

We want you to determine how much gas should go to each of these operators in the eastern territory and we will accept your certificate with reference to that matter in the case of each operator, and the local rationing boards will give the gasoline that you say is necessary.

We said that we were willing to undertake that, but that we would have to have a larger organization than we had, if we were to get down to that detail and undertake that work.

We were also convinced from what we knew of the rubber situation, that the gasoline rationing would not be limited to the eastern territory, that it would eventually be extended throughout the Nation. We felt that that was inevitable. And so we felt that it was necessary to be ready to do the same thing as was desired in the East, throughout the Nation, which meant a Nation-wide organization.

In the next place, our experience with the orders which we had outstanding indicated that the enforcement of those orders, in view of the tremendous number of these vehicles and I parenthetically call your attention to the figures that I gave. Only about 600,000 out of the total of nearly 5,000,000 are operated by public carriers. The rest are in the hands of business concerns, individuals, and farmers. The CHAIRMAN. What is that percentage?

Mr. EASTMAN. 600,000 out of nearly 5,000,000; I should say that was about 12 percent in the hands of public carriers.

Mr. TURNEY. Half of those are intercity.

Mr. EASTMAN. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Half of the commercial vehicles or half of the total?

Mr. TURNEY. Of the 600,000; 300,000 are intercity trucks.

Mr. TABER. You do not mean intercity trucks; they are for hire, but are operating regular schedules; is that what you mean?

Mr. TURNEY. No; that includes the irregular route carriers, also. The CHAIRMAN. But they are public carriers?

Mr. TURNEY. They are public carriers.

Mr. EASTMAN. Our orders which were outstanding were stated in broad terms, and enunciated certain general principles which were to be followed. We had an organization to follow that up with the operators, but there was no good means of enforcement and we did not reach the individual operations closely enough, in our opinion. We felt that we had to bring the necessity for conservation home to the individual operator. And so, for these purposes of gasoline rationing, and of enforcement, and of bringing the matter home to the individual operator

The CHAIRMAN. What was the second one?

Mr. EASTMAN. Gasoline rationing

The CHAIRMAN. Enforcement and bringing the matter homeMr. EASTMAN. To the individual operator, we devised a system for the issuance of what we called certificates of war necessity. Each operator will have such a certificate which will cover the operations he is engaged in performing, but which will limit the amount of mileage that he can operate in that connection, and also will have requirements with respect to the loads that he must carry.

The CHAIRMAN. You check his mileage by his speedometer; how do you check his load?

Mr. EASTMAN. In the first instance, we require a report from him as to what he has been doing. Then we require, from that time on, a weekly record of what he is doing in the way of mileage.

Many of the trucks are not equipped with speedometers. However, it is known where they run and what the lengths of the hauls are, and most of them can figure it out in that way; they know about what mileage they are operating, and, also, the amount of gasoline they get is a check on what they do.

Mr. LUDLOW. That order applies only to commercial vehicles?

Mr. EASTMAN. Commercial vehicles, trucks, busses, taxicabs, driveit-yourself vehicles. I think it covers hearses as well.

Mr. TABER. You do not find any great abuses so far as the hearses go, do you?

Mr. EASTMAN. We included that because it was in that category in the O. P. A. regulations.

These certificates will also classify the operator with respect to the degree of the essentiality or importance to the war effort of his operations, so that we will have this classification, and in case tires are so short that they will not go around, we will know to whom to give them first.

We will also get, through this system, what has never been had before, and that is a complete inventory of the commercial vehicle operations in this country. It has been largely a matter of estimates so far. Take the Interstate Commerce Commission; that does not begin to cover this field, because most of this is a field of private operations.

The certificates will have certain requirements with respect to tires and vehicle maintenance. The vehicles must be brought in for inspection at certain times, so that they will not wear their tires down beyond a point where they can be recapped; and so, if wheels are out of line, or other things which lead to undue wear upon tires, or they are not maintaining them otherwise properly, then they can be checked up.

The sanctions for this will be, in the first place, that they will not be allowed to operate without a certificate; and in the second place, they will not be able to get gasoline or tires or repair parts without having such a certificate. And for violation of its provisions, the certificate can be taken away.

We have no intention, of course, of administering that in any arbitrary or ruthless way. It is intended to get the willful offender, if he persists, and will not be applied without warnings or until it becomes a flagrant offense.

It will establish a means, we believe, of continuing control of individual operations. I think of it as establishing a sort of loop or cordon around them, which can be pulled tighter as necessities require.

At the start, I have no doubt that the limitations that we put in will be too generous; they will have to be pulled in as we get more experience and knowledge of the operations, because there certainly is an imperative necessity for limiting operations. They have got to be limited if

Mr. LUDLOW. How are you going to police such an enormous undertaking?

Mr. EASTMAN. In the first place, we shall have an organization, which is what this appropriation is for. That organization will consist of 9 regions with a director in each region. Then there will be about 144 districts throughout the country each in charge of a district manager, and certain examiners working under him. We are trying to get for that purpose trained men who know something about the motor industry. And it has been surprising the caliber of the men that we have been able to get for some of those places, because a lot of men who have been in the motor-trucking industry are out of jobs at the present time.

We shall also work in close cooperation with the State commissions in this work. And we have every assurance of cooperation from State officials generally. Some of the States have already adopted our orders so that it is made a State offense to disobey them. And we will have, we hope, the services of the State and municipal police forces in enforcement, in addition to our own men.

The purpose, as I say, is not to save gasoline or to save rubber. What we want to save is mileage, and to preserve these vehicles until the new supply of synthetic rubber can be created which will enable us to go on on something more like the old-time basis. And unless we do save those vehicles, we foresee a very perilous time so far as the transportation of the country is concerned, because this country has gone way out of the horse-and-buggy era into the highway automotive era as no country on earth has done.

Mr. RABAUT. Did you say that it was not to save rubber?

Mr. EASTMAN. Not primarily to save rubber. Why do we save rubber? We save rubber because we want to save the transportation. That is the basic thing to save, the transportation which is being performed.

Mr. ROGERS. To make the rubber last.

Mr. RABAUT. That is what I mean.

Mr. EASTMAN. Let me illustrate it in this way: Suppose you cut down the mileage of all passenger automobiles in the country to an average of 5,000 miles per year. Then you allow the people to use those 5,000 miles in any way they see fit, and they use it for joy riding. You would not be accomplishing your purpose, which is to save essential transportation of the country. That lies at the bottom of it, as I see it.

Mr. RABAUT. I do not think the Government is doing very much to save the transportation of the country when we find standing around in fields so many automobiles with good tires on them. Everybody has been talking about tires since I was a kid and everybody tells us that standing around is the tire's weakest point. That is where it wears out. A rubber tire is only as good as its weakest link, and where it stands is the place where it is most likely to go quickly-standing around in the mud, as I have seen them stand.

I talked about this to Mr. Henderson when he was up here. I saw in the city of Detroit these big Fruehof trailers, with four and six tires on them, standing in the mud. I went through another town here lately and there were a whole lot of cars standing under a tent in mud that was about 6 inches deep.

Mr. EASTMAN. I agree with you that not enough has been done along those lines.

Mr. TABER. Mr. Eastman, I am getting this suggestion from farmers. They have not had to make a statement as to what their needs are, and in a great many cases they are being allocated for a couple of months enough gasoline to run them a year for their requirements. There should be no books issued without there being required a statement as to what their needs are.

Mr. EASTMAN. That is precisely the purpose of this, so far as the commercial vehicles are concerned; not only are they required to make a statement but the statement is checked.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you completed your statement, Mr. Eastman? Mr. EASTMAN. I have practically completed my statement in regard to this particular topic. I have men here who can explain the details of the organization.

DEPARTMENTAL AND FIELD PERSONNEL, MOTOR TRANSPORT DIVISION

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Eastman, in the tabulation you give on page 12 of the justifications, you are asking for a total personnel for this pur

pose of 2,690; 30 in Washington and 2,660 in the field, at the annual cost of $6,156,060. Now this estimate you have here of $5,790,000 is to cover what period?

Mr. EASTMAN. Eight months of this year.

Mr. ROGERS. From November 1.

Mr. WIGGLESWORTH. $4,770,000 is for this item, I think, Mr. East

man.

Mr. EASTMAN. Yes; that includes not only the personnel but also the

expenses.

The CHAIRMAN. This is an entirely new activity on the part of your agency?

Mr. EASTMAN. So far as these issues of certificates of war necessity are concerned.

The CHAIRMAN. What would be the situation in case you were not able to secure this money?

Mr. EASTMAN. We just could not carry on with that work which we have undertaken.

The CHAIRMAN. It would not interfere with the rest of your work? Mr. EASTMAN. No.

JURISDICTION OVER GASOLINE RATIONING

The CHAIRMAN. What jurisdiction do you exercise over private trucks?

Mr. EASTMAN. Private cars.

The CHAIRMAN. Passenger cars and private motor vehicles of all kinds?

Mr. EASTMAN. I was going to bring this particular matter to your attention. The question of who should do the rationing with respect to gasoline for private motor vehicles was left for the determination of Mr. Jeffers, as Rubber Director.

The Baruch committee, in making its recommendations, said:

In order to insure that this mileage will in fact prevail the committee recommends that Nation-wide gasoline rationing be instituted at the earliest possible moment under policies to be determined by the Office of Defense Transportation and implemented by the Office of Price Administration.

And in the summary of its recommendations, it said:

Nation-wide gasoline rationing to hold the average annual mileage to 5,000 miles under the general direction of the Office of Defense Transportation.

Now, immediately upon his appointment Mr. Jeffers took that matter under consideration and had conferences. He was very anxious to get gasoline rationing into effect as quickly as possible, and he concluded that that could be best done by establishing it on the basis that now prevails in the Eastern States, and by also leaving it in the hands of the Office of Price Administration.

At the same time, in view of the effect that that might have upon transportation service of the public, considered broadly, he arrived at the conclusion that the Office of Defense Transportation should review the gasoline rationing from that standpoint, after it is in operation, and report upon it.

So, on September 25, he directed this brief memorandum to Mr. Leon Henderson and myself:

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