Mr. ZIMMERMAN. I believe that you have stated that these lands have been taken and confiscated by the Government.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. ZIMMERMAN. Because of the fear and mental distress which your people have entertained about what might come over you and destroy you; and, for that reason, there has been a decision which has amounted to confiscation.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Not at all, Mr. Zimmerman; not at all. The Government has appropriated the right to use our lands and it makes no difference whether or not the Government uses them in fact. It is the right to use-a servitude-which has been taken from us. It has excluded our own exclusive dominion over our own lands. The Government says to us, however, "From now on you can use your land when we happen not to need it for a floodway." It is as though the Government took the roof off our houses and the rain never comes. We cannot sue the Government for damages. It is the appropriation of an easement over our land, if they never use it. The right of the Government to use our land comes first, and we are not permitted to do anything which will interfere with the Government using us for a floodway whenever necessary. We must hold ourselves in readiness for the Government to turn its river over us as an auxiliary channel at any time. We can never plant a crop with any assurance of gathering it. The Government's rightof-way for water over our land is omnipresent and omnipotent. We merely have what is left. This has practically destroyed our market values.

Mr. ZIMMERMAN. If the Army engineers are correct, that the straightening of these bends in the river will lower the flood stage in the river-they confidently believe that will happen?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. I am sure it will to some appreciable extent. Mr. ZIMMERMAN. And that they will also protect the areas, the backwater areas, down in Mr. Whittington's district. That will also give you people further guaranty and insurance that you will never be flooded?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. No; Mr. Zimmerman. You see, in 1927 the waters, if they had been confined under the present plan, would have been 9 feet above the present fuseplug levee; and if a lower flood occurs, within 9 feet, it would run over our fuseplug. Now, we rely upon the assertion in the report that that fuseplug is going to break; and the only assurance we can see that they can give us is to build that fuseplug levee to the height and strength of the levee opposite us on the Mississippi side.

Mr. ZIMMERMAN. Let us be practical.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. That is practical.

Mr. ZIMMERMAN. That fuseplug levee has been there since 1927. Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. ZIMMERMAN. And it has carried every flood?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. That is because we have not had large floods. By the law of averages, we are due to have another real flood most any year now. We are in for another destructive wetting very soon if the Congress doesn't help us now, this session.

Mr. ZIMMERMAN. That is because we have not had large floods? Mr. WILLIAMSON. It has been the lowest water level I have known about.

Mr. ZIMMERMAN. And if we lower the level in the river still this would blow the plug?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir. You would have to lower it more than 9 feet before you would take care of the 1927 flood. The engineers figure on a superflood; and we just want to be protected, just as the other people along the river are protected; and, if we cannot be, we want the Government to take our land and pay us for it as is contemplated by the Fifth Amendment of the Federal Constitution. Mr. ZIMMERMAN. If we get the Arkansas and St. Francis and Yazoo Basins over here, it will lower that.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. That will not help my people at all. Their lands are already forfeited for taxes and the time for redemption is running and what happens in the next generation will not help those people a bit.

Mr. MCCLELLAN. I am not certain as to this levee that constitutes the fuseplug levee. Was that built by local interests?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. The Government contributed very materially, I do not know how much; in the latter years, $2 for $1. But the southeast Arkansas bond issue of approximately $3,000,000 was put into the levee, and that is a lien on our lands.

Mr. MCCLELLAN. I understand that there has been Government contribution on that basis, but this levee was constructed by a local district with the Government aid?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. MCCLELLAN. And the people bonded themselves to put up that levee that Mr. Whittington suggests might be destroyed?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir. The engineers then thought we would have complete flood protection and when the Cypress Creek was closed it was necessary to spend approximately $3,000,000 more to take care of that surface drainage water, so that the land in that area was mortgaged, at Government invitation, about $6,000,000 for levees and resulting drainage made necessary by the Government plans.

Mr. MCCLELLAN. The $6,000,000 has been a local contribution for the building of the system that the Government recommended?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir; and that will now be destroyed if this plan is caried out. For this we seek compensation.

Mr. MCCLELLAN. Now, one further question with reference to the consequences of the condition that has existed since 1928, the passage of this law, as to whether or not it is just a local affair of the people living there, who own property, that they are going to be destroyed, or that their danger has been increased. I will ask you whether that fear, spoken of as fear, is shared by any Department of the Government?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. The funny part of it is that we did not know what shape we were in until we got to St. Louis and the Reconstruction Finance Corporation and the Federal land bank told us about it.

Mr. MCCLELLAN. In other words, the Government agencies will not loan you money in that area?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. That is corerct. They say that the flood menace is of such certainty that our farm lands have no loan value. Our credit is destroyed so long as the act of May 15, 1928, leaves us as the floor of a national floodway.

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Mr. MCCLELLAN. So that there has been confiscation to the extent that the loan values have been destroyed?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. The loan and market values have been destroyed to that extent certainly. They have no loan value. Our land has no loan value now. The market value is so seriously impaired as to have impoverished large numbers of our citizens.

Mr. MCCLELLAN. The same Government that created the condition now says that it cannot loan the money because of that condition. Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir. Uncle Sam wets us and then gets mad at us because we are wet and will not lend us any money.

Mr. MCCLELLAN. The thought that I am getting at is that, prior to that time, the area that is now subject to this danger enjoyed the same privilege in that respect, in values, that other areas did?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Prior to that time we enjoyed insurance; we enjoyed good credit; we made magnificent crops; our fortunes were accumulated. Our improved, cultivated lands were selling, before the passage of this act, at $125 per acre cash. Now, they are being forfeited, as not worth the taxes. More than 180,000 acres have been forfeited, and lost to the former owners, because they are not worth 1 year's assessment of taxes, being in this floodway.

Mr. FERGUSON. May I ask this question: Your statement there about the destruction of the value of the land, because you allowed the building of that fuseplug levee; you understand, I recognize your position, but that has not affected growing crops there?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir; it has prevented the growing of crops, Mr. FERGUSON. Why?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Our farmers have to borrow the money with which to raise their crops. Any of those large plantations need about $50,000 a year to handle a crop. We are prevented from financing our crops.

Mr. FERGUSON. You could not get seed loans from the Government agencies?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Not for plantations.

Mr. FERGUSON. I understand.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. We have 408 families on the plantation in which I am interested.

Mr. FERGUSON. Who owns the mortgages on these lands, that they would rather forfeit the mortgages than pay the taxes?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. Busted life-insurance companies and other companies whose mortgage values have been destroyed by this floodway to the extent no equity is left in their security. On foreclosure there are no bidders for property on the floor of a Federal floodway.

Mr. FERGUSON. Don't you know that that condition exists in all parts of the country and that there are lots of agricultural sections where the land has depreciated in value, regardless of fuseplug levees?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. That is true. But in those other sections there is hope. We are told by the Federal lending agencies that, because of the flood menace and because of this excessive bonded indebtedness on our lands, that we can never hope to participate in any financing to handle the bonded indebtedness. Our depression began May 15, 1928, long before the general economic crash, and now we are denied any hope of participating in any general recovery

program. We are isolated and condemned as a floodway for the general welfare of the rest of the Nation.

Mr. FERGUSON. You suggest that the Federal Government acquire these lands but you object very strenuously to the local interests acquiring them. Do you think it is possible for the Federal Government to acquire those lands without the consent of the State? Mr. WILLIAMSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. FERGUSON. They can go in and condemn those lands if the State agency objects?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. I do not think there is any doubt whatever about that, because it is a national problem, a Federal project.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. You stated that the closing of Cypress Creek caused additional damages?

Mr. WILLIAMSON. The Cypress Creek drainage district bond issues. Mr. WHITTINGTON. I will just state again, for the record, that I have never at any time suggested that the levee on Cypress Creek or anywhere else be taken down, unless the people are compensated for any damages that they have sustained by any act of the Government.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. I am sure

Mr. WHITTINGTON (interposing). I am merely asking you if there is any difference in the measure of your damages.

Mr. WILLIAMSON. As I understand it, Mr. Whittington, you have always championed our rights to compensation; and that is the reason why we have always come to this committee with confidence and

assurance.

STATEMENT OF WADE 0. MARTIN, ST. MARTINVILLE, LA.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Wade O. Martin, who desires to get away as soon as possible, has a short statement to make.

Mr. MARTIN. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, in order to save time, I have reduced my statement to writing.

My name is Wade O. Martin and I live in St. Martinville, Parish of St. Martin, La. St. Martinville is the ancient capital of the Atchafalaya Basin, established in 1732. The basin runs through the very heart of the historical land of Evangeline and also through the famous "Sugar Bowl" of Louisiana.

I am neither an engineer nor a lawyer and I make no pretense of special or technical knowledge in flood-control matters. I am just an ordinary flood fighter, with 25 years of practical experience and a general knowledge of the complicated problem which confronts us with respect to the control of floods on the Mississippi River and its tributaries.

The Louisiana Flood Committee, which I represent, was created by a special act of the legislature and is therein designated as the official organ and mouthpiece of the State with respect to all floodcontrol matters affecting our people as a whole. This committee is composed of approximately 75 active members, all of whom are deeply concerned in the subject at issue, and most of whom are large landowners and taxpayers in various parts of the affected area in Louisiana.

With respect to engineering problems, the Louisiana Flood Committee is advised by the State board of engineers.

I might add here that, because of a difference of opinion between Mr. Klorer and Mr. Jacobs, both of the State board of engineers, that, with respect to the arbitrary designation of the width of the Eudora Floodway, that I am advised by Mr. Jacobs to the effect that the Army engineers, after having made field surveys and studied the situation more accurately, may come to the conclusion that 10 miles is not absolutely necessary and they may, of their own accord, reduce the width. Mr. Klorer took the arbitrary position that, in his opinion 10 miles was necessary. I believe Mr. Jacob's position is the wisest and safest.

I also differ with Mr. Klorer regarding the construction of a fuseplug weir at Old River which he stated was impossible and should not be done because it would interfere with the protection and interests of the city of New Orleans. This committee has doubtless noticed that at all past hearings New Orleans had very large delegations here to represent its interests. The fact that not one single man from New Orleans has come to this hearing is an indication that New Orleans considers itself as well protected as it is possible to protect it; and I believe as does Mr. Jacobs that the construction of a fuseplug weir across Old River would be a very smart undertaking because it would do three things at one time. It would not interfere with the protection of New Orleans or any other section of the river below Old River Landing.

It would give protection except once in 25 years to the backwater area in the lower part of the Eudora Floodway or in the neighborhood of Concordia Parish. It would protect those people from backwater floods and it would dry up the Atchafalaya Basin and also the lower end of the Eudora Basin; and, in the event of a big flood, would serve as a reservoir with a capacity of something like 3,000,000 acres. That would be a reservoir of sufficient capacity to take the crest off the river during 23 days. However, this should not be done until the Atchafalaya River has been sufficiently improved to carry a maximum flood of a million second-feet. After that is done we will have a large reservoir and great floodway for simultaneous use during emergency flood periods and no backwater area during ordinary flood periods. So on that point I agree with Mr. Jacobs. With respect to legal questions the committee is advised by some of the best and most experienced attorneys in the valley.

After having carefully studied the Markham recommendations now under consideration by your honorable committee, and, after having held two State-wide meetings, featured by free and general discussions, and participated in by State officials, the State board of engineers, several distinguished attorneys, all Louisiana levee boards, drainage commissioners, police juries, mayors, civic organizations, and a large number of landowners in the affected areas, including the opponents who are present at this hearing, the Louisiana Flood Committee, in behalf of the State of Louisiana, approves the engineering features of the Markham recommendations, provided it is found to be impossible to obtain such reservoirs as would control the floods, and impossible to obtain funds with which to continue river improvements by cut-offs and so forth.

With respect to the issues involved, the Louisiana Flood Committee is not for or against any particular section of the State. It represents and speaks for the overwhelming majority of our peo