ask unanimous consent to include them in the record, if I feel that they should go in.

The CHAIRMAN. If there is no objection, they will be included in the record.

Mr. REED. Mr. Chairman, I might suggest one other way in which this bill might be improved from the service standpoint, and that would involve a very small change on page 1 of the bill. It would enable us to use data collected by other sources, like the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce, insofar as possible, by putting in there in the 10th line after the word "collect" the word "collate," making it read:

That the Director of the Census be, and he is hereby authorized and directed to collect, collate, and publish monthly statistics.

That gives us the right to use the statistics from other sources as well

as our own.

The CHAIRMAN. Are there any other questions?

Dr. Dedrick, Special Assistant to the Director of the Census, is here. Will you testify on this bill?

STATEMENT OF CALVERT L. DEDRICK, ASSISTANT CHIEF STATISTICIAN, STATISTICAL RESEARCH DIVISION, BUREAU OF THE CENSUS

Mr. DEDRICK. Mr. Chairman I do not know whether I have much to add to what has already been said. I would like to review just a little of the hearing so far.

Section 1 of the bill provides for the collection at monthly intervals of data which we now collect at quarterly intervals, except for the brewers' and distillers' dried grains (p. 2 from line 15 on). Here is a schedule, a very simple schedule, which is sent to all soap manufacturers, lard manufacturers, oil processors of all types. A similar simple schedule will be sent monthly instead of quarterly. Section 2, as Dr. Reed has pointed out, would make unnecessary extended hearings on subsequent small bills for the modification of the subjects contained in this type of industrial reporting service.

Section 4 provides confidential protection for these data. I should explain that under our present authorization we collect these data by order of the Secretary of Commerce under the general authorization of the organic act of the Department of Commerce to collect special information. These data, while we do protect them confidentially, are not specifically covered by the confidential protection features of our law. We therefore include in section 4 the specific confidential protection of these informations, so far as the informants are concerned.

The CHAIRMAN. What line is that on?

Mr. DEDRICK. Line 12, page 3, which says:

That all data furnished to the Bureau of the Census by any individual establishment under the provisions of this Act shall be considered as strictly confidential and shall be used only for the statistical purposes for which furnished, and shall not be used for purposes of taxation, regulation, or investigation.

The statistics will be available to all agencies, and we will be able to use data gathered by other agencies if Dr. Reed's suggestion of adding the word "collate" on page 1, line 10, is incorporated.

I believe that is the only statement I wish to make, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. BARTON. This form has 66 items on it.

Mr. DEDRICK. Yes.

Mr. BARTON. Do any other departments of the Government send this same manufacturer forms which require furnishing the information which is covered here? Filling out Government questionnaires has become one of the largest industries of this country, as you know, and I just wondered whether the poor fellow who gets this form quarterly, and is now going to get it monthly, also gets one from Mr. Wallace and Mr. Morgenthau, and two or three other people, asking for the same thing.

Mr. DEDRICK. No, except for a few items which are components of other products, such as Mr. Lemke has asked about oleomargarine, for example. The manufacturers of oleomargarine do receive different reports, duplicate reports from the Internal Revenue and from us.

A few of the manufacturers of some of the cottonseed byproducts, I believe, receive requests from the Department of Agriculture for marketing information, but not production information. We have tried our best in the Bureau of the Census to cut down that duplication. There is no agency of the Federal Government, Mr. Barton, that suffers as much from duplication of statistical reports by other agencies as the Bureau of the Census.

The CHAIRMAN. From what source, Doctor, could we secure compiled lists that would answer definitely Mr. Barton's question as to the number of duplications of questionnaires that go out and from what source?

Mr. DEDRICK. I am afraid it would take a somewhat extended research to find the full answer to that question. The growth of regulatory agencies with overlapping functions, of semi-regulatory agencies, and of informational agencies is such as to result in many questionnaires the results of which are not published; that is, the results are not published and given to the public, but the data are gathered by the agency for its own administrative purposes.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you find a growing resentment on the part of the business men and people who receive these questionnaires? Do business men resent so much duplication and being annoyed by so many requests that may seem, to them, more or less trivial, perhaps?

Mr. DEDRICK. We have heard many such complaints. On the other hand, we are quite gratified that representatives of trade associations and business executives have said in public that, although they turn down and throw into the wastebasket questionnaires from other agencies because they never get anything back from them, they fill out census questionnaires because the census always delivers statistics which are valuable to them.

The CHAIRMAN. Could they not be compiled by the Census Bureau which is equipped for this sort of thing, and thus eliminate duplication? Mr. DEDRICK. If I may answer that individually rather than as a representative of the Department, I feel that considerable progress could be made along that line.

The CHAIRMAN. Would the proposed reorganization plan now under consideration in the Senate, eliminate some of these duplications if adopted?

Mr. DEDRICK. That is a pretty stiff question, is it not, Mr. Chairman? [Laughter.] I am not posted on that subject.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Barton, do you wish to ask further questions on that point?

Mr. BARTON. One more question, Mr. Chairman. This Central Statistical Bureau, to which Dr. Reed referred, there is a good idea that is a failure, is it not? I mean the Bureau has been so cut down. in its appropriation and has been used by the administration as a statistical organization rather than a supervisory and coordinating organization, that it really does not function; is not that true?

Mr. MOSER. As a matter of fact, the Census Bureau is one agency of the Government that has functioned for more than 100 years and functioned efficiently, and I will say this on the record.

* * *

Mr. BARTON. May I say one more word? I think the experience of business with the Census Bureau has been highly satisfactory. When I was appointed on this committee I took occasion to write some of the leading industries for any comment or criticism they had about the functioning of the Bureau, and the responses were very gratifying. But this duplication of so-called fact finding some of the facts being of doubtful validity-is one of the greatest nuisances that has grown up here in Washington. If it were possible for Congress to investigate the whole fact-finding and statistical activity of all the many departments and bureaus and find some way of simplifying it and putting it all together under the Census, or much of it under the Census at least, I think we would be doing a very great service to the people. Now, that may lie outside the functions of this committee. Maybe it is the job of some other committee.

Mr. DUNN. May I say this off the record?

* * *

Mr. MOSER. Right at that point, let me amplify on what Mr. Barton has said.

The CHAIRMAN. Is this off the record?

Mr. MOSER. It is off the record, or you may publish it. What I want to say is this I will amplify on what Mr. Barton has said. While he calls it a "nuisance" I say it is a curse to our democracy. There is not a single Member of Congress, who has not had industry or somebody in his district that has complained about the duplication of all this effort and the compilation of reports and statistics of these various bureaus, and if it is at all possible, and in line with your suggestion, if you conceive that it is possible that this committee could function beneficially by bringing forth legislation to exterminate that practice, I will go on record right here and now among my colleagues and before you as being wholeheartedly in favor of it and will give it my ardent and faithful support.

The CHAIRMAN. Are there any more questions you desire to ask these gentlemen from the Department? Mr. Barton, do you have anything more?

Mr. BARTON. No, sir.

Dr. REED. I want to take this opportunity to thank you gentlemen for giving the careful consideration that you have to this matter. I have found all of you whom I have contacted quite interested in our work and very cooperative and desirous of taking a sympathetic attitude toward the work, and we appreciate that very much.

The CHAIRMAN. We are grateful to you, Dr. Reed, Mr. Zimmerman, and Mr. Dedrick for your courtesy in coming before the committee. Mr. BOYER. Mr. Chairman, I found I was mistaken about those letters, and I will not include them in the record.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Kinzer, do you wish to offer an amendment to the bill?

Mr. KINZER. Yes, Mr. Chairman. In view of the testimony here given, and in line with what Congressman Moser and Congressman Barton have said, together with the statement of Dr. Reed who testified, and I would like to amend the bill by striking out, beginning on page 2 with line 14, after the semicolon, the balance of that paragraph, lines 14, 15, 16, and 17.

The CHAIRMAN. After the semicolon in line 14, strike out the following four lines?

Mr. KINZER. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Lines 14, 15, 16, and 17?

Mr. KINZER. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Allen, does that include your idea of amendment?

Mr. ALLEN. I am not going to make my amendment, the amendment that I spoke of.

The KINZER. Is there any second to Mr. Kinzer's motion?

Mr. LEMKE. May I make a suggestion first on that amendment? I want to say something on that.

The CHAIRMAN. Yes, sir, Mr. Lemke.

Mr. LEMKE. I feel that the Census Bureau is the only proper bureau to get this information, for this reason: That it has no other baby to protect. All these other bureaus have babies to protect, their own policies, and their information is not reliable, in many cases. It is propaganda rather than information, and I feel that rather than limiting the Bureau of the Census we ought to get all this information from the Bureau of the Census, so that everyone will know where he can get reliable information.

The reason that the Bureau of the Census acts differently than these other bureaus is not due to its personnel or people appointed, but it is that it is simply a fact-finding commission. It undertakes nothing else, while these other agencies send out propaganda, and I know that the information that I get from the Census Bureau is reliable, if it covers it, and it is generally at variance with what I get from these other bureaus, who try to bolster up their own policies, and I have no hesitancy in saying that they are so human that they sometimes distort facts. They have done it before the same committees that I am a member of. Therefore I feel very much that it ought to be left in here and that we ought to continue to give more of these fact-finding duties to the Bureau of the Census rather than to the other bureaus.

Mr. BOYER. Mr. Chairman, I feel the same way about it.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Kinzer, Mr. Thomas did not hear the discussion as to just where you want to eliminate the language.

Mr. THOMAS. Mr. Chairman, I came in a little late, and I would like to hear from Mr. Kinzer as to why he wants that part eliminated. Mr. KINZER. We have heard statements here from Dr. Reed and Mr. Zimmerman to the effect that the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce secures the information here indicated in lines 14 and 15 and supplies it about a month later than this Bureau will supply it. Now, we have no way of limiting that Department under this bill at all, but having in mind the statement here by Mr. Moser and Mr. Barton and others, I can see no reason why we should have that duplication. That is not a matter for the Census, except insofar as it provides the information, as Dr. Reed stated, to the Department of Commerce.

Mr. MAHON. Mr. Chairman, I am not sure just what language it is that Mr. Kinzer wants to strike out.

Mr. KINZER. The language

and the quantities of brewers' and distillers' dried grains produced, shipped out, and held at breweries, distilleries, and related establishments.

I do not think this is a brewers' bill.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Kinzer, I do not believe it is compulsory. It is purely voluntary.

Mr. KINZER. On page 1 it says:

That the Director of the Census be, and he is hereby, authorized and directed to collect, collate and publish monthly statistics.

The CHAIRMAN. I thought it was left to the discretion of the Secretary of Commerce.

Mr. LEMKE. Mr. Chairman, I still feel that the language should be left in this bill, because if you continue to hand this all over to these different bureaus you might as well abolish the only fact-finding commission that we have. It is entirely a fact-finding commission, and now we are limiting them and beginning to chisel away from them continually, and have been doing so for some time. Now, let us begin at the other end. I think this committee should get together and appoint a special committee to study these duplications and cut them

out.

Mr. KINZER. If I may be permitted to say a word further. Going down a little further, in section 2, page 3, line 1, there is this language:

These supplemental inquiries shall be undertaken at the public expense in event only that the Secretary of Commerce, after due investigation, shall find the inquiry necessary to serve a broad public need of urgent nature.

So it is still under control of the Secretary of Commerce. Mr. LEMKE. I am willing to concede that this bill does not go as far as I want to go, but I do not want to give the impression to these bureaus that we are in favor of giving them more power. Let us start in and give it to the place where it belongs, and then I am willing that this committee get together and have a committee appointed to investigate these duplications, and let us place them where they ought to be, before an impartial board.

Mr. KINZER. You mean reorganization of the Bureau?

Mr. LEMKE. Reorganize the personnel rather than the facts. Mr. MAHON. Mr. Chairman, it seems that the members of the committee have confidence in the Census Bureau, and these gentlemen who have appeared here, whether they have said so or not, we all recognize that they are in favor of the amendment which Mr. Kinzer has offered. So if we have confidence in their judgment in these matters and feel that they are doing good work, I think we ought to trust them to go ahead.

Mr. POAGE. I did not get that impression from them. I heard them all the way through, and I certainly got exactly the opposite impression.

The CHAIRMAN. May I suggest on that point, they merely said they did not have any objection, but they did not approve the idea. Mr. MOSER. They offered no objection to it.

The CHAIRMAN. Naturally they would not object from the legislative point of view. But they did not approve.