The suggestion has been made-I think it has some merit-that you could probably put a claim limitation on it, that you could give a moratorium for the 10 claims, or 15 claims. Beyond that number, then, of course, the work would have to be done.

I was very much interested in rechecking this to find that since the turn of the century the Congress of the United States has declared 23 moratoriums. So there is ample precedent. It is the little fellow that has to go out and do this work and spend a few dollars that might not have those few dollars to do it that it was designed to help, and I am glad to have your expressions, and if you develop anything further along that line I would be very happy to have it.

Mr. GORDON. If I may add one further statement, I would say that five claims would be more nearly the number.

Both you and Senator Malone are familiar, as well as Governor Russell and myself, with mining conditions, and if a man has exempted from assessment work 5 claims, which is 100 acres, that will just about protect him in anything worthwhile and not have him tie up a whole tremendous area.

Senator BIBLE. By the same token, beyond the 5 claims those that are trying to do acquire a lot of claims when they go back for nonassessment work would be required to do the 100-per-year annual assessment work. I think there is some middle ground for working out the bill that could be of help to the small man. It is designed to help the little fellow.

Senator BARRETT. Mr. Chairman, I would like to say that I agree with you on that matter of waiving the assessment work on these claims, particularly so because of the situation that prevails in our State with reference to the uranium mining industry at the present time. We have a large number of our people who went out and spent large sums of their own money and put forth great efforts on their part at the request of the Government itself to find uranium in this country, and now, after they have spent the money and spent their time and put out their efforts, the Atomic Energy Commission refuses now to grant authorization for mills to process the ore, and they have an absolute monopoly on it. And, of course, there is no market for it, and these fellows find themselves high and dry.

The worst thing about it is the fact that we have contracts with Canada and other foreign countries for more than half of our needs in the line of uranium concentrates. There is some question whether they will even extend those contracts when they expire in the next 3 or 4 years, and these people will find themselves in the position where there will never be a market for the ore that they have discovered at the request of the Government. And certainly it would be unfair and unjust and improper to require those people to continue to spend the money each year to protect their claims, because of the fact that they cannot sell their ore on account of the position taken by the Atomic Energy Commission itself.

I believe probably we ought to have general legislation. I do not know whether it ought to be just confined to 5 claims or not. Some of these fellows have as many as 30 and 40 claims. They would still go broke even if you protected them to the extent of 5 claims. That is all I have to say on that.

I would like to ask Mr. Gordon one question.

Senator BIBLE. Certainly, Senator Barrett.

Senator BARRETT. We have a Sugar Act that has been in operation for a long while, and it has handled this question of our domestic industry as against foreign imports in a pretty good shape. It has protected both the producers in this country and the consumers in a pretty respectable fashion, in my judgment.

Essentially the act provides for an import quota and it assigns to these foreign countries so much of our domestic market, and retains, of course, for our own producers about a third of the market in the case of sugar. It imposes a tax on the foreign producers, and it makes payment to the domestic producers. So it is in the nature of an import quota and a duty imposed on foreign production coming into this country, with the payment made to the producers of sugar beets and sugar cane in this country.

Do you think that we could work out a formula that would protect the producers of tungsten, we will say, in your State, or copper in your State, to the extent where they would be able to compete against foreign production if we had some such arrangement for those minerals?

Mr. GORDON. That is entirely possible, Senator. It would need considerable study.

The tungsten situation is rather a difficult one. In the last Engineering and Mining Journal market report they quote tungsten at $19.50 to $20 per short ton unit of tungsten trioxide. That is f. o. b. domestic mines or mills, as the case may be. That is tungsten trioxide, and that includes a duty of $7.93 per short ton unit.

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Foreign trioxide is quoted from $11 to $11.50 a short ton unit. So, with a tariff of $7.93, imported tungsten in this country can be chased for $17.93 to $19.43 a short ton unit with comparatively molybdenum-free tungsten changing a slightly higher price.

My people tell me that in consideration of the wages paid in Nevada, which will average, I would say, about $2.20 for an 8-hour shift, plus the tremendous increase in the cost of all supplies and equipment, their costs of producing tungsten are on the order of $35 a short ton unit. Senator BARRETT. It is roughly twice as much.

Mr. GORDON. Right. And that is due entirely to the difference in the wage scale.

I don't want to be facetious, but I am somewhat familiar with the subsidization of the Korean tungsten situation, and while I don't know--I haven't been in Korea-I imagine they might give their miners a couple of fish and a bowl of rice a week, and we cannot compete on the basis of $22 a day with that sort of thing.

I think the unfortunate part of it is that the American taxpayer advances the money to put them in production.

I think that your suggestion on sugar, Senator, is possible. I think such a thing might be worked out. Isn't there a wool bill also that is similar?

Senator BARRETT. Yes. It is similar to a certain degree. The Wool Act merely continues the tariff. That was one of the bases upon which the act was predicated, that the tariff would be held at a constant figure, and the tariff on wool and wool textiles is used for the purpose of making payments to the wool producers of this country up to the difference between the average cost of wool produced here and incen

tive levels set by the Secretary of Agriculture. And, of course, it has worked out quite satisfactorily all the way around. However, it is a little different from the approach of the Sugar Act.

Mr. GORDON. It is on that order.

Senator BARRETT. Yes. And if we could work out a formula, it seems to me that would be sufficient to protect against foreign competition for those producers who are doing business on a pretty fair economic basis; it might not be sufficient to protect the marginal producer, but it could protect the good workmanlike producers of the country.

Mr. GORDON. I may say one thing, Senator. It would be impossible for any legislatiton or any tariff to protect certain producers that are marginal. I mean it would be ridiculous. We cannot build up tariffs to take care of those people; for instance, tungsten with .2 and mercury with 3 or 4 pounds. There has to be a reasonable middle ground in there to protect legitimate, going, if I may say, worthwhile producers who have a reasonable grade of ore.

In other words, we cannot get into philanthropy and charity on a thing of that kind and take care of people who have extremely marginal mines.

Senator BARRETT. I agree, and it is something that we better be realistic about and come up with some proposal that is workable.

I appreciate very much the testimony from your citizens from Nevada. I think they have made a very worthwhile contribution. I have always felt that way about the Governor, and I believe his engineer is very well qualified.

I know that they have taken the lead in the west as far as mining is concerned, and I should like to commend them for their efforts, and I hope that they can come up with some concrete proposal that will be a basis upon which we can all unite and try to work out something here in this Congress.

Senator BIBLE. Thank you very much, Senator Barrett.

Senator MALONE. Mr. Chairman.

Senator BIBLE. Senator Malone.

Senator MALONE. This sugar situation is handled solely by Congress, is it not?

Senator BARRETT. Yes.

Senator MALONE. The duties and the quotas and everything. And recommended hearings are held by the proper committees of the Senate, the Senate Finance Committee and the Ways and Means Committee in the House, and then whatever Congress passes, that is the way it is handled, is it not?

Senator BARRETT. That is right.

Senator MALONE. It is not handled in Geneva, and nobody can trade the industry for any foreign policy.

Senator BARRETT. That is right.

Of course, we have to take into consideration that it is a little easier to work out these problems for wool and sugar because they are socalled deficit commodities. We produce roughly about a third of the sugar that we consume in this country, and we produce less than half of the wool that we consume in this country. So it does lend itself to a little easier solution.

But I am constrained to believe that we could take the formula in both of these acts and work out something that would be reasonably satisfactory for nearly all of the other industries in the country, not only mining but everything else.

Senator BIBLE. Thank you very much for your suggestions, Senator Barrett, and I will suggest to my able and good friend, Louie Gordon, when he returns to the invigorating climate of Nevada that he give them very prompt study.

Mr. GORDON. I might say, Mr. Chairman, I feel that you are unduly complimenting me.

Senator BIBLE. I have known you many years, and I am delighted to do it.

Mr. GORDON. Thank you very much.

Senator BIBLE. Bob Stopper.

STATEMENT OF ROBERT STOPPER, SENIOR PARTNER, MINERVA SCHEELITE MINING CO., WHITE PINE COUNTY, NEV.

Mr. STOPPER. My name is Robert Stopper. I am the senior partner in the Minerva Scheelite Mining Co. with tungsten operations in White Pine County, Nev. I am a graduate geologist of Stanford University, and have had 13 years' practical mining experience. In addition, I was a commodity geologist for the United States Geological Survey for 2 years.

I appreciate the opportunity to appear before this committee. I am appearing as a small mine operator that is familiar with not just administration of a mine but also development, exploration, mining, milling, and, most important, marketing problems.

I will not burden you gentlemen with statistics that have already been brought before this committee in other testimony.

I would like to make one fact clear. I am not here for a handout. I am here to request action be taken to stabilize the domestic mining industry which has nearly been put out of business in the past 18 months.

The domestic mining industry is being forced out of business by imported metals and minerals from low-wage scale countries. It is evident that we must have some sort of an adjustment between our high standard of living and the lower standards that exist in foreign countries. If conditions are not changed so the domestic mining industry can operate at a reasonable profit, it will cease to exist.

I think it imperative that the domestic mining industry be kept operative, if for not other reason than national security. Recent experience has shown that we cannot depend on outside sources of raw materials in time of emergency, and I think a necessary foundation for mobilization is a stable operating domestic mining industry. It is my opinion that the domestic mining industry can best be stabilized on a long-range basis by the use of fair and adequate import taxes and quotas.

Experience has shown the present laws are ineffective in providing fair and reasonable equalizing tariffs. This is due to the provisions of the 1934 Trade Agreements Act. I hereby recommend that said act be allowed to expire in June of this year so that the Congress of the United States can resume their constitutional responsibility for the regulation of tariffs.

Senator BIBLE. Thank you very much.

Senator MALONE. Mr. Stopper, I think you made a very good witness, and your being in the business yourself is a help.

How did you stay in business the last 5 or 6 years, with the exception of 1958 and the latter part of 1957?

Mr. STOPPER. Under the provisions of the Aspinall Act.

Senator MALONE. What was that act? It fixed a price enough above what we though here would be the difference in the labor and the taxes and cost of doing business here and the chief competing nation? Is that what it was?

Mr. STOPPER. That is correct, Senator.

Senator MALONE. Is there any other way of doing it, by special legislation of that kind, which I do not like either? It is simply something that has to be suggested every year or two and is a very unstable thing, as shown by the fact that from 1953 we went along and then 4 times the House turned down the appropriation, and, therefore, you went out of business. Is that right? Is that not it?

Mr. STOPPER. That is correct.

Senator MALONE. Can a miner depend on the job, or an investor depend on investments, in your opinion, in mining where legislation must be renewed every 3 or 4 years or an appropriation must be made every year in order to keep one in business?

Mr. STOPPER. No; a miner or investor cannot, and until we have some stabilization the investments in mines, I believe, will continue to decrease.

Senator MALONE. How long does it take a mine investor to get in business, generally speaking, and what is the procedure? Suppose you are a mining engineer and you represent some capital. I think that is the usual way. You have a few thousand dollars that is ready to go to work. What do you do? How do you start out to operate?

Mr. STOPPER. It is a very difficult job, Senator. I have been through it with personal experience and, believe me, I have worked my head and back off. I don't have hands like these from punching a typewriter, gentlemen.

This particular mine that we are operating now we have operated for 11 years. It has operated for 24 of the past 25 years. At the conclusion of World War II the former operators considered the mine worked out and shut it down. So we took it over. It took us approximately 2 years to get that mine back into production.

Does that answer your question?

Senator MALONE. It does to some extent. But if you did not have a mine that had been operated, and if you had the money and you would know that you might find a certain grade of ore and a certain amount, that is to say, with the experience a geologist could tell something about it, you start out to find that. You find it, and then you develop it, and maybe several, before you get anything that is worth putting very much money in. Then when you get a good deal of money in it maybe that does not work out. How do you find these mines? What is involved in it?

Mr. STOPPER. Exploration.

Senator MALONE. You find prospects?

Mr. STOPPER. I think the prospector, as we normally think of him, is a thing of the past.