CONTENTS Statements of— Page Ames, Harry C., Mississippi Valley Barge Line Co.... 1178 1219 Barrett, O. S., The Barrett Line, Inc... Bartley, Guy, The Inland Waterways Corporation 1063 1075 Bayless, Herman A., Mississippi River System Carriers' Association__ 1092 Bell, Marcus L., Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railway. 1384 Benton, John E., National Association of Railroad Presidents and Cady, Samuel H., Chicago & North Western Railway. 1395 961, 1003 Clay, Cassius M., Reconstruction Finance Corporation. 1761 1175 1189 1619 1443 Eastman, Hon. Joseph B., Interstate Commerce Commission____ 1701, 1727 1189 1043 1554 1454 Hadlick, Paul E., Federal Transportation Association- 1370 1350 1319 1669 Jones, Hon. Jesse H., Reconstruction Finance Corporation. 1761 1145 1499 1360 McGrath, Tom J., Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen Petersen, W. J., Pacific Coast Ship Owners' Association.. 1205 Root, Elihu, Jr., Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Bonds Protective 1614 Ross, John H., Inland Water Petroleum Carriers' Association_ 1105 Walter, Luthur M., Chicago Great Western Railroad _ . TO REDISTRIBUTE THE FUNCTIONS OF THE INTERSTATE COMMERCE COMMISSION TUESDAY, MARCH 7, 1939 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON INTERSTATE AND FOREIGN COMMERCE, Washington, D. C. The committee met at 10 a. m. in the hearing room, New House Office Building, Hon. Clarence F. Lea (chairman) presiding. The CHAIRMAN. The committee will please be in order. We have with us Mr. Childe this morning, and we will be very glad to hear from him. STATEMENT OF C. E. CHILDE, OMAHA, NEBR. Mr. CHILDE. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, my name is C. E. Childe. I live at Omaha, Nebr., and by profession I am a transportation counsel. I appear here as chairman of the traffic committee of the Mississippi Valley Association. The Mississippi Valley Association is a nonprofit corporation. Its membership is comprised of shippers and other citizens of 22 States in the Mississippi River Basin, extending from Pennsylvania on the east as far as Montana and the Rocky Mountain States on the west. It takes in the whole area between the Alleghenies and the Rockies and between Canada and the Gulf. The object of the Mississippi Valley Association is to promote the commerce of the interior of the United States. This interior area, as you gentlemen know, is rich in raw materials. It produces most of the agricultural, mineral, and forest products of the United States, and these natural resources are largely undeveloped. Our citizens are not lacking the intelligence or in energy or ambition to develop this area, but we have not sufficient population to do it. We are sadly lacking not only in manpower but in manufacturing industries to utilize the raw materials which we produce, or which we have available for production, and by so doing to add to employment and create new wealth and to raise our standard of living, which are the objectives of our association. ADEQUATE TRANSPORTATION THE MOST NEEDED THING The one thing which this interior of the United States needs above all else, as we see it, is adeqaute low-cost transportation, and I wish to put emphasis on the words "low cost." Our transportation costs in the interior are so much higher than in the coastal and Great Lakes areas that we have been unable to attract population and provide the jobs for the people that are needed for a normal, healthy, economic growth. It is because of our freight rates that both the raw materials and the manufactured products in the interior are restricted and curtailed as to markets, both domestic and foreign, and it is because of high freight rates that agricultural and industrial producers have had to take lower prices, which has in turn had a depressing effect on wages and profits and general prosperity. And high freight rates have meant that the consumers have had to pay higher prices, and thus the cost of living has been increased and the standard of living has been reduced. RETARDED VOLUME OF COMMERCE RESULT OF HIGH RATES The retarded volume of commerce which the high freight rates of the interior have brought about is the principal cause, in our opinion, for the lack of prosperity of the railroads and the other transportation agencies as well. We are a shippers' organization and wish to present to you to the best of our ability from a shipper's point of view what we think is needed and what is not needed in transportation legislation at this time. SOUND, ECONOMICAL TRANSPORTATION OF ALL KINDS NEEDED We want sound and economical transportation of all kinds at the lowest possible cost to the shipper and consumer and at a profit to the carrier. We are for rail, highway, water, pipe-line, and air transportation, if you please. We are not interested in favoring one above the other, because the public needs them all. WATER TRANSPORTATION Our organization has been active in promoting inland waterway development on the Mississippi, Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, and other interior navigable waters, because water transportation is inherently cheaper; it is the lack of low-cost water transportation which has been the principal handicap of the interior as compared with the coastal and Great Lakes areas. Now, water transportation has its disadvantages. It is slow. It is less flexible than other forms. It is limited as to the channels which can be used, but the combination or coordination, if you please, of water transportation on our inland waterways with rail and highway and pipe-line transportation can serve the people of the whole interior of the United States, not only in the Mississippi Valley Basin but in the intermountain country, and give all that area a lowering of freight rates and bring it nearer to an economic equality and thus promote the development of the interior. DEVELOPMENT OF ALL MODES OF TRANSPORTATION FAVORED We favor the development of rail, highway, and pipe-line transportation to the fullest extent that they can serve the public interest and we favor the removal of all injurious and unnecessary and expensive regulation and restrictions, and the elimination of waste ful and uneconomical practices from all transportation agencies, including the railroads. Mr. BULWINKLE. Mr. Chairman―― The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Bulwinkle. Mr. BULWINKLE. Does the gentleman wish to proceed and make his statement without being interrupted? Mr. CHILDE. In the interest of time, I perhaps could go more rapidly without interruptions, but if the gentlemen wish to ask me questions to clear up any point that I do not make clear, I will be glad to answer them. Mr. BULWINKLE. All right, I wish right there that you would make one point clear, Mr. Childe. Mr. CHILDE. Yes, sir. ELIMINATION OF UNECONOMICAL PRACTICES Mr. BULWINKLE. And that is this: You said you favored the elimination of uneconomical practices in the transportation systems, did you not? Mr. CHILDE. Yes, sir. Mr. BULWINKLE. Well now, name those uneconomical practices, so far as the railroads are concerned. Mr. CHILDE. I have in mind first the unnecessary and wasteful competitive practices which have arisen. I have in mind the operation of obsolete or obsolescent facilities of the railroads; I have in mind such things as make-work wage bills or wage practices—in short the many things which have been pointed out to you and to the country generally by the investigations in the past few years of the Coordinator of Transportation. Mr. BULWINKLE. Well, what would you suggest the railroads do? Mr. CHILDE. Well, I intended to cover that in my statement. Mr. BULWINKLE. All right, sir. Mr. CHILDE. And perhaps the best way for me to answer you would be to proceed. Mr. BULWINKLE. All right. Mr. CHILDE. But if I do not cover it, I hope you will call my attention to the omissions. Mr. BULWINKLE. All right. OPPOSED TO REGULATIONS AND RESTRICTIONS WHICH INCREASE RATES Mr. CHILDE. We are opposed to the regulations and restrictions on any transportation agency which would have the effect of raising transportation costs or interfering with needed transportation service, because the public has to pay for those higher costs. I would like to read the resolutions which were adopted at the last annual meeting of the Mississippi Valley Association at St. Louis, November 1938, pertaining to the subject we have before us here. They are short: We favor adequate railway transportation as the largest unit in the necessary transportation system for the interior, and we recognize the additional costs imposed upon the railroads must be added to the freight bill to be paid by the producer and consumer. We are therefore opposed to any bills which would unnecessarily increase the cost of railroad operation. |