city, county, State, and Federal Governments, demonstrated the values of this type of facility in assisting in meeting farm labor supply problems. The establishment of possibly 10 or a dozen such centers on highways connecting major areas of employment, and providing the minimum facilities as described above for use while en route, would seem advisable at this time. The location should be based on a study of the flow of migrant traffic and should preferably be located considerable distances from areas of employment to eliminate their use by workers while employed. Such facilities will aid in promoting the more effective interstate movements, contribute to the welfare and morale of the worker and minimize community problems. We believe these facilities would aid in retaining workers in the farm work force. The CHAIRMAN. I also wish to file for the record a statement of the National Canners Association with respect to S. 984 and H. R. 3048, which is a House bill on the same subject, dated March 15, 1951, and signed by John F. McGovern, chairman of the National Canners Association. Senator THYE. Mr. Chairman. The CHAIRMAN. Senator Thye. Senator THYE. I just wished to comment very briefly on the National Canners Association statement submitted by Mr. John McGovern, who represents the National Canners. I just wanted to say that Mr. McGovern is a Minnesota man representing the Minnesota Valley Canning Co., and it is one of the very best we have in the Northwest. I am not only personally acquainted with Mr. John McGovern, but I am also well acquainted with the cannery he represents in the State of Minnesota, and I am happy to see his statement in the record. I am sorry he is not here in person to comment concerning the statement he has submitted for the record. (The statement referred to is as follows:) STATEMENT FILED BY THE NATIONAL CANNERS ASSOCIATION The following statement is presented by the National Canners Association and expresses the sentiments of its members with respect to legislation proposed in S. 984 and H. R. 3048 relative to the importation of foreign and off-shore workers for employment in agriculture. The National Canners Association is a nonprofit trade association of about 1,000 members operating in 46 of the 48 States and in each of the Territories. Members of this Association, including both independent canning companies and cooperative canning enterprises, pack approximately 75 to 80 percent of the Nation's pack of canned vegetables, fruits, juices, and other commodities. We believe that all employers of foreign and off-shore workers should be afforded like and equal consideration in whatever legislation is enacted and it is therefore respectfully suggested that: 1. The waiver of the head tax and bond, as proposed in the said bills with respect to users of imported Mexican nationals, likewise be afforded users of workers from the British West Indies and other points of foreign origin. 2. The language of S. 984 and H. R. 3048 be couched in such terms as to permit the continuation of the highly satisfactory employer to Government contractual relationships presently existing with respect to the importation of British West Indies nationals, but not worded, as these bills now are, so as to foreclose the users of British West Indies nationals from the benefit of waiver of head tax, bond, and other exemptions. 3. It is further proposed that the following paragraph be added to S. 984 and H. R. 3048: "Nothing in this Act shall be construed as limiting the authority of the Attorney General, pursuant to the general immigration laws, to permit the importation of aliens of any nationality for agricultural employment as defined in section 508, or to permit any such alien who entered the United States legally to remain for the purpose of engaging in such agricultural employment under such conditions and for such time as he, the Attorney General, shall specify." This language is desirable to make it clear that the definition of agricultural employment as contained in section 508 of the respective bills, is applicable in all cases of importation of foreign labor. Respectfully submitted. JOHN F. McGOVERN, Chairman, National Canners Association, War Manpower Committee. The CHAIRMAN. This meeting was called for the express purpose of hearing Senator Chavez and some of the witnesses he asked us to have appear. I am sorry to advise that Senator Chavez is ill and cannot be present. Therefore, I am suggesting that permission be given to him to file a statement at his convenience, provided it is not later than Monday of next week. Senator MUNDT. Mr. Chairman? The CHAIRMAN. Senator Mundt. Senator MUNDT. I would like to file in the record two telegrams which have come to me, requesting their testimony be placed in the record. One is from C. S. Kale Canning Co., of Bellingham, Wash., and one is from the Kelley, Farquhar & Co., from Tacoma, Wash. They are interested in this problem from the standpoint of the Northwest people. The CHAIRMAN. Without objection, they will be placed in the record. (The telegrams referred to are as follows:) Hon. KARL E. MUNDT, Senate Office Building, Washington, D. C.: TACOMA, WASH., March 15, 1951. Growers and processors throughout Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Montana faced with severe agricultural labor shortage this season. Kelley, Farquhar & Co. are requesting a favorable hearing and passage of Senate bill 1106 known as Emergency Farm Labor Supply Act of 1951. Request this wire be read into the hearing of the Committee on Agriculture and Forestry. Senator KARL E. MUNDT, KELLEY, FARQUHAR & Co. BELLINGHAM, WASH., March 16, 1951. Senate Office Building, Washington, D. C.: Re Senate bill 984 and Senate bill 1106, we believe that provisions should be included to approve some northwest point as port of entry. Not to include such provision would place undue hardship and handicap on the northwest area during an emergency not of our making. C. S. KALE CANNING CO., The CHAIRMAN. Is Senator Magnuson present? (No response.) The CHAIRMAN. The first witness is Resident Commissioner A. Fernós-Isern of Puerto Rico. Will you step forward please? Will you give your name in full and identify yourself for the record, please, sir. STATEMENT OF A. FERNÓS-ISERN, RESIDENT COMMISSIONER OF PUERTO RICO Mr. FERNÓS-ISERN. I am Dr. A. Fernós-Isern, the Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico. The farm labor bills under consideration have the worthy purpose of assisting the necessary development of agriculture in a time of emergency. Also, and by reason of geographical location, a problem of national scope may be partly solved by using the manpower which a neighboring friendly nation is willing to provide in accordance with certain conditions subject to agreement. It has been proposed that the farmers pay for the transportation of imported workers from recruitment centers in the country of origin to reception centers at the border. Transportation from reception centers to farms would have to be paid either by the worker or the employer according to whatever agreement be made between them. As the distance from the place of employment and the reception centers increases, this would place a heavier transportation burden on the farmer, the worker, or both. The provisions would practically restrict the place of recruitment to a $20 transportation radius and effectively mark the geographical boundaries of the bill's operation. I am not saying that the $20 limit is unreasonable. I am saying that it sets a definite limit for recruitment. The problem of farm labor in an important and sizable section of the national agricultural area would thus be solved. But there are two other important problems meriting consideration which would not be so expeditiously solved through the operation of this bill. Perhaps they should be treated separately. They are 1. The problem of areas which, because of geographical location, are far away from reception centers. These areas may find themselves afflicted with acute farm labor shortages and unable to plant, cultivate, or harvest their crops because of the expense of transportation from reception centers to farms. 2. Areas within the limits of United States jurisdiction with an excess of farm labor-unable to afford the expense of transportation to reception centers and/or from reception centers to farms very distant from reception centers. To require the farmers of such shortage areas to spend far above $20 transportation costs per laborer brought from afar to the reception centers and/or additional travel expenses from the reception centers to the farms might be ruinous to them. To expect the workers to pay transportation costs to reception centers or from reception centers to distant farms is to deter them from becoming available. Still, during this emergency, it is to the national interest to produce agriculture commodities in one area and to utilize the unemployed of another area. But the worker and the crop must be at the same place at the right time. It is to these two interrelated problems that I wish to call the attention of the committee. Successful from the farmers' point of view have been the experiments. of bringing here United States citizens from Puerto Rico where there are at least 100,000 available farm workers. They have gone to upState New York, to Florida, to Pennsylvania, to Michigan, and some even to Oregon and Washington. And they have saved many crops. From the point of view of the workers, these experiments have not been a complete success in some instances in this sense: The workers had to spend so much in transportation plus subsistence that they actually made little or nothing above expenses. These workers leave their families in Puerto Rico and they have to support them. They must have some money left to send home and buy clothes for them selves as well as to meet other needs. This circumstance has reduced greatly the number of Puerto Ricans who are able to come, although they are willing to come. I do not wish these workers to be confused with those from the urban areas of Puerto Rico who have migrated to the seaboard cities. These persons from both high- and low-income groups move from Puerto Rico to the large cities just as many others from other sections of the Nation migrate to the large urban centers. Instead of these, I refer now to farm laborers, who live in Puerto Rico's rural areas and who upon going back to the island return to those rural areas. From 65 to 70 percent of Puerto Rico is rural. We have a total population of 2,200,000. Therefore, I am speaking of a rural population of one and one-half million people of which 100,000-or one in 15-is today unemployed or underemployed and would welcone a chance of employment on a fair basis in the mainland. I suggest to the committee, that consideration be given to a program which might give these Puerto Rican workers a chance to participate in the national effort in the mainland as they cannot do in Puerto Rico and give the farmers of the mainland a chance to avail themselves of the opportunity to accept their cooperation. Governmental assistance in this national effort to bring together men without land to work upon, and land without men to make it produce where neither employer nor worker could economically finance necessary transportation costs entirely by themselves-would, it seems to me, be as justified an expense as the deployment of the fighting services to the places where they are most needed in a military campaign. I submit we are faced with these three problems, interwoven with certain basic relationships, but which require somewhat different treatment. I believe the three problems can be solved either together or separately, but all three should be solved. The CHAIRMAN. Any questions? Senator THYE. No questions. The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much. Mr. FERNÓS-ISERN. Thank you. The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Curry. Mr. CURRY. Mr. Chairman, Mrs. Ruth Muskrat Bronson is here with me. The CHAIRMAN. And Mr. Rainer? Mr. CURRY. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. All right, sir, you may proceed. STATEMENT OF JAMES E. CURRY, ATTORNEY; JOHN RAINER, EXECUTIVE SECRETARY; MRS. RUTH MUSKRAT BRONSON, MEMBER, NATIONAL CONGRESS OF AMERICAN WASHINGTON, D. C. INDIANS, Mr. CURRY. My name is James E. Curry, and I am attorney for the National Congress of American Indians. I am also attorney for a number of Indian tribes around the country. I will not mention the names of them because I do not speak directly for them in this behalf, but I am sure their sentiments would agree with those I intend to express. I am sure that the Indians of the country would favor legislation such as is here proposed. Many of them now form a part of the great army of transients or itinerant workers, as Senator Thye will know. They become a part of that group of people traveling around the country. They run into very serious difficulties, find difficulties of housing and discrimination against them, and great discomfort. Oftentimes their natural desire to become a part of the general community is apt to be thwarted by the discomforts that they encounter when they go out and off the reservations to work. I have taken a look at one of the bills which was introduced by Senator Chavez. I have not studied the others. I assume they are all substantially the same, excepting that I understand that there is a greater emphasis in the Chavez bill on the use of American citizens rather than noncitizens. I would say that the Indians, too, would prefer for that emphasis to be placed, and since they are the first Americans, they would like even greater emphasis to be placed on them. Now I might mention one other point, and that is that services something like this are available to Indians through the Indian Bureau. They do not do a very complete job, and they say it is because they do not have sufficient funds, but the Indians think that it would be better for them to get the services of general Government offices in addition to, or even in place of, the services that they get from the Indian Bureau. The reason for that is just this: That on an Indian reservation the Indian Bureau now is doing a not discreditable job, but it may be doing too much of a job. In a white community, when a man wants a job he goes to a factory and gets a job. Nine times our of ten when an Indian on the reservation wants a job, he goes to the superintendent or Commissioner of Indian Affairs. And the same is true if he sends his children to school. He does not go to a school board, he goes to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs or his representative. The same is true if he wants a loan. He goes to the Commissioner of Indian Aaffirs, and even some of his funds are in the hands of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, which means that there is too much Commissioner of Indian Affairs. I do not mean that the Commissioner of Indian Affairs should be eliminated, but there are just too many of the functions of the community that are conducted through this one Federal representative. A great deal of good can be done if the Indians, little by little, get more and more service from other organizations. That is the purpose, I think, of the clause in the Chavez bill which provides that Indians shall be entitled to the benefit of this law in spite of the fact that similar services may be available to them in some places. The CHAIRMAN. Do you know how much the Interior Department spends for the purpose of trying to find jobs for Indians? Mr. CURRY. I would not know. Mrs. Ruth Muskrat Bronson, who is with me, years ago was an official of the Bureau, and then she was an expert on some of those things. Perhaps she can answer that question. The CHAIRMAN. Would you know? Mrs. BRONSON. No; I would not know the exact figures. This year they are spending more than they have spent for some time. Up until |