It all used to be a fuseplug, and I do not know why they built any levee over there at all until they got it all straightened out.

Mr. RANSDELL. General, was it not just as straight over there as it was on the Mississippi side?

General FERGUSON. The old law definitely decided that the Yazoo be protected and that the other side not. Now, I do not know how it came about, but that is it. We were trying to make a solution that would really save everybody, and we know if we stay in the river we have certain Federal rights.

Mr. RANSDELL. Yes.

General FERGUSON. And we hoped that we could in a reasonable time make it comparatively safe; but there is no Federal executive officer who dares go in there and close that up unless you had a definite, positive, mandatory order. If Congress wants to do it. then, of course, they are the proper authority. It would be a great burden put on an executive man to tell him to close that when he thinks it ought to be closed.

I believe that with a 6-year program we would get some results, we know, from reservoirs and from the river. It is a pretty wise man that can see 6 years ahead in this country now.

Mr. RANSDELL. Yes; it is. But if we could get some of these very arresting reservoirs started, like those Mr. Whittington is so much interested in and Mr. McClellan up there in Oklahoma, and these that you speak of, let us say, on the Arkansas and the White, cost of $127,000,000 and do not require you to spend that $103,000,000, would it not be at least reasonably expected to shut up some of that 65 miles? That is a long stretch. I do not want to ask an embarrassing question, though, of the General.

Mr. DEAR. Mr. Chairman, there is just one question that I might ask, because I have got to leave.

The CHAIRMAN. We are going, too, at 4 o'clock. I have some people here who want to leave on the night train.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. I think we might let Mr. Dear ask the question.

The CHAIRMAN. Yes; go ahead.

Mr. DEAR. My idea is this, that if we do not abandon the Eudora spillway, if the Government would buy the property outright sufficient to get a spillway down either through the Boeuf or on the east of the Macon Ridge, we would have a most wonderful reservoir. in the first place, and by buying it outright and moving the people out it would be less expensive than the system of reservoirs we have been talking about this afternoon.

Now, have you made any calculations along that line?

General FERGUSON. We know the acreage of that, but we know perfectly well, as you all know, that when the Government goes to buy anything under forced conditions it pays about four prices for it.

Mr. DEAR. Would it be necessary to build a spillway, General, 10 miles wide? My idea is that if you put a spillway which begins to spill when the river gets at a certain stage and spills into the channel it would be, as a matter of fact, a reservoir, and at the same time an adequate spillway, and then it would not take anything like 5 miles, would it?

General FERGUSON. Well, it just depends on the size of the flood that you want to assume. It would be a terrible mistake to make a floodway there for a superflood and when the superflood came not be able to carry it.

Mr. DEAR. How would the amount compare?

General FERGUSON. It is very difficult to make an estimate.

Mr. DEAR. The Government could put it into a preserve in connection with this flood control.

General FERGUSON. If you put a price on it and bought it as a forest reserve it would be at such an upset price; but if you just go out and say you must buy that land, it is perfectly hopeless to make an estimate.

Dr. DEAR. You say the present reservoir is $127,000,000 for those reservoirs that will take 3 years to construct, if you had the rightsof-way and all of the difficulties were overcome?

General FERGUSON. We looked upon that as simply an additional factor, along with the benefits, and you still have not met your superflood.

Mr. DEAR. Could you not take that much money, though, and put your floodway down at the basin, either basin, and from an engineering standpoint carry the superflood by the property?

General FERGUSON. Of course, there is no way to estimate what property will cost that I know of except to say that you will pay so much for it.

Mr. RANSDELL. After all, is there any way to estimate how long you will be in the courts to get the flowage rights and title? That will take some time, ordinarily.

The CHAIRMAN. All right; are you through with General Ferguson?

Mr. WHITTINGTON. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. General, we thank you very much. I think it will be necessary to meet tonight at 7:30 in order to hear these gentlemen who want to be heard.

Mr. RANSDELL. We would like Mr. Jacobs to make a statement. The CHAIRMAN. Judge Montgomery has a short statement to make in relation to the Yazoo.

STATENENT OF M. B. MONTGOMERY, CHANCELLOR, ELEVENTH CHANCELLOR DISTRICT, YAZOO CITY, MISS.

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Gentlemen, I will not take but just a few moments of your time.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. If you do not mind, give your name and residence.

Mr. MONTGOMERY. My name is M. B. Montgomery, residence Yazoo City, Miss., occupation, chancellor, eleventh chancellor district of the State of Mississippi.

I just want to call to the attention of the committee here in a brief way the situation that exists on the lower reaches of the Yazoo River, so that the committee will be familiar with the situation that presents itself in that area.

You will recall that for a number of years there was no jurisdiction at all over the backwater areas affected by backwater from the Mississippi River, and that in the caurse of time it worked around

where the Congress decided to intervene, and the jurisdiction of the Mississippi River was extended so as to embrace the tributaries of the Mississippi insofar as affected by backwater.

At that time Colonel Potter was the president of the Mississippi River Commission, and in 1924 with reference to the backwater area on the Yazoo River he went before the Finance Committee of Congress and the problem was considered important enough for an actual appropriation of 71⁄2 million dollars to be included in the flood-control appropriation for that year. That, of course, was based upon the condition that the local interests would contribute the other one third necessary for the construction of those works.

As the matter continued to develop, then under the Jadwin plan, of course, it was still retained that the local interests be required to contribute one-third, and the other two-thirds of the cost of construction would be paid by the United States.

Now, then, after having been near enough to our relief to have secured an appropriation of 71⁄2 million dollars, it appears that under the present bill the backwater areas are not mentioned. It seems to me that we have been eliminated from any prospect of relief against a situation that exists there at this time.

I am comparatively a young man, and even in my own lifetime I have observed lands that formerly were in cultivation have now be come wild and are growing up and almost have become useless for purposes of agriculture, for the reason that they have grown up with trees and rubbish and undergrowth.

Issaquena County, Miss., is in this area, and at one time Issaquena County was the largest cotton-producing county in the entire State of Mississippi. At the present time there are less than 300 white qualified electors in Issaquena County, and it is on record in that county that one white man assassinated another upon a highway and they could not obtain a jury in Issaquena County to try him, because they all had a fixed opinion with reference to the guilt or innocence of this party and could not qualify for jury service.

Until this day that man has not been tried for the crime of murder and is still a resident of Issaquena County.

So it now has continued to move. It is going to move on northward. Yazoo City at the present time is a town of some 6,000 people, where I make my home, and unless something is done to correct the situation that exists on the lower reaches of the Yazoo River, Yazoo City will dwindle and in time will become a trade center only for the hill population of the county that it now furnishes. The delta portion will just simply be abandoned and just grow up and become waste.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. Judge, will it interfere with you if I ask just a question?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. No, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. The area that you speak for is the backwater area, and that begins at Vicksburg and extends along to the foothills by Satartia and then comes over to the city of Yazoo City?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. So that Yazoo City on the east side is substantially in the middle of that backwater area?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. And you are asking that the protection of that backwater area be included by the adoption of the plan no. 4?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. That is recommended in this report?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. I was just getting to that.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. And that would protect something like 600,000 acres of land?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. At a cost of about $14,000,000?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. And I wanted to ask you further: In addition to protecting the Yazoo City area, a town of 6,000 people, there are towns like Belzoni, the county seat of Humphreys County, a place of about 3,500 or 4,000 people, and a good many more smaller towns like Carter, where Mr. Thompson lives, Silver City. There are numerous towns in that backwater area?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. On the east side as well as the west side?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir. There is also in that area Myersville and other towns a lot nearer to the Mississippi River.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. Your area has contributed to the payment of levees along the Mississippi River for many years?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir. Those levee districts when they were organized, why, all of this territory was placed within either one or the other of these levee districts, and we were required to pay taxes for the upkeep of levees on the river proper just the same as any other lands in the Yazoo Delta. We have continued to do that, but we have never been able to get any protection down in this lower area. Of course, the former theory was that as soon as the mainline levees could be built up to standard grade and specification, then they would come in this backwater area and would take over our problem and give us some relief. But, of course, they did not get the levees up to grade and specification prior to the enactment of the flood-control plan in 1928, and since that time we have not been able, of course, to receive any relief in any way.

Now, the flood-control plan provides for a survey on the Yazoo River that was made by the district engineer, and that plan provided for a system of backwater levees that would protect this area. That is the plan that Mr. Whittington just spoke of a minute ago.

We do not have any money down there to do any engineering work with. We do not have any money to make any express investigation of the situation, and the only thing that we can do is to rely upon the agencies of the United States. We come here and call your attention to the situation that exists there, and all we can do is just submit ourselves to you gentlemen's tender mercy, and we want a careful consideration of this situation, and if possible we want it provided that these backwater areas will be included in the proposed plan.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. Judge, may I ask you if it is not true that among the first plans in the Yazoo Basin to be settled were these backwater areas?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. The Yazoo Basin was settled from Vicksburg, and there are some citizens living in this area now who came into the area on steamboats and started the settlement. When the lands up in Bolivar County and Sunflower County and the other counties

in the northern Yazoo Delta were canebrakes and had not been opened up to cultivation, these lands down in the lower region of the Yazoo Basin were in full cultivation. That was the starting point for the settlement in the Mississippi Delta. Those lands are just as rich as any lands in the entire Delta, and they have all more or less at one time been in cultivation, but have been forced to be abandoned on account of the water situation.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. Has the water level or water gage in the backwater area increased through the construction of levees on the main river?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir; it has been increasing annually. Mr. WHITTINGTON. The largest flood that we ever had there prior to 1927 was the 1882 flood?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. You have a flood mark down there in the District of Columbia left by the 1882 flood, on one of these buildings. Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. And this flood of 1927 you had substantially 10 to 11 feet higher of flood than you had 50 years ago?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. In the backwater area?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. Yes, sir. And I also want to call attention, Mr. Whittington, to the fact that we have two lines of railroad that run through that backwater area. There is the line of the Y. & M. V. that runs from Silver City on down to Vickburg, and the line of the Y. & M. V. that runs from Greenwood on down through Yazoo City to Jackson.

I thank you, gentlemen, and I certainly appreciate it if you all can do anything for us.

The CHAIRMAN. You have in mind that levee construction can give you protection?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. I was listening there a moment ago to what the general was saying, and you spoke something about your cut-offs. But it seems to me that the plan that is necessary for our protectionof course, that is a matter for the engineers to determine-we have gotten to the point down there now where we are not squabbling over plans. We will take anything that we can get to keep from being drowned. It seemed that the plan that has been selected by the district engineers is a plan that would start a levee on the south end of the Mississippi River Levee, which is about 10 miles above Vicksburg, and would carry that to the Yazoo River, and then proceed up the west bank of the Yazoo River to a point which would be above the backwater elevation at Vicksburg, which, as I understand, is right around 170 miles, I believe it is, from Vicksburg.

Is not that correct, Mr. Whittington? So it would be around about Morgan City.

Mr. WHITTINGTON. It is about 186 up to Greenwood. But it is substantially as the judge says.

The CHAIRMAN. If the Government should decide to build those levees, could you furnish those rights-of-way?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. In 1930, back when I was very hopeful of being able to get some needed relief, Mr. J. F. Barber, an attorney of Yazoo, and myself prepared an act which authorized the organization of this area into a district which would compare very similarly to the