In the droughts of recent years, the ground-water work has been particularly important, because as the surface streams have disappeared, the residents of the drought-stricken areas have wanted to know, of course, whether they could get water beneath the surface or not, and after the shallow wells have dried up, whether by going deeper into the ground they could get additional water. So, we are occupying the field there much as we do the geologic field and the topographic field. We occupy a field which is not occupied by other governmental entities.

CLASSIFICATION OF LANDS

We have, in addition, a fourth major unit, one of whose functions is given the Geological Survey by its organic act, namely, the classification of lands. That is now promarily the classification of lands as to their mineral content. For a time after the enactment of the enlarged Homestead Act, and then the Grazing Homestead Act, we were charged with the function of making the classifications that were necessary in order that those acts might be administered. The agricultural classification function has now been passed on to the Grazing Unit of the Department of the Interior.

We still have the function of classifying lands as to their mineral quality, their mineral character.

We have classified the very valuable phosphate deposits of eastern and northeastern Idaho, and western Wyoming; the potash deposits of southeastern New Mexico; and the coal lands, wherever they are, to determine whether the lands are coal lands or not, in order that the homesteaders who enter them or States that acquire them may get a title that reserves the mineral, if it is present under the land, or a title which is without reservation if there are no minerals there. So that mineral-land classification and classification as to waterpower values are functions of the Survey, essential to the Department's administration of the land laws.

LEASING LAWS

In the same unit of the Survey there is centered the function of administering the related problems of the leasing laws of the United States, as they apply to minerals. Our coal lands are now leased. Our oil lands are now leased. Our potash lands are leased. Our phosphate lands are leased. Our nonmetalliferous mineral lands in general are leased. The Secretary of the Interior is charged, of course, with determining the terms of the leases under the acts of Congress, seeing that these leases are operated with due regard to the prevention of waste of the resources, and prevention of the loss

of life.

This technical task of administering the leasing laws, which falls upon the Secretary of the Interior, is transferred by him, in turn, to the Geological Survey. We have a considerable staff of engineers and geologists constantly engaged in that work.

Those are the four technical units, the geologic, the topographic, water resources, and land-classification units.

139751-37-pt. 1-21

ALASKA SURVEY ACTIVITIES

We have a fifth unit, which is geographic. Alaska is a little empire in itself. It has an area of 600,000 square miles or thereabouts, and we have created for the administration of the Survey functions in Alaska what we call the Alaskan branch, whose chief is here to answer your detailed questions.

Topographic mapping, geologic mapping, examination of the mineral deposits, reporting on the mineral production of Alaska are all functions of that branch.

Those are the five major branches of the Survey. The rest of the Survey consists of services to these field branches.

ACTIVITIES OF DIRECTOR'S OFFICE

The office of the Director is the first item you will meet, and the appropriations for it include, of course, provision for the Director and his immediate associates, provision for our accounting group, whose tasks have grown more complex as the Treasury requirements and the Comptroller General's requirements have become more complex. In it is our editorial group. Among the central units is the little group that distributes the 750,000 maps annually, most of them being sold, and such of our reports as are distributed from our own office, though the reports are generally sold by the Superintendent of Documents.

We also have an instrument repair shop that serves our topographic engineers and our geologists and our water resources group, all of whom require instruments, often of types which are not required widely elsewhere. All these services last mentioned are services subsidiary to our main field functions which I have earlier described to you.

OVERLAPPING WITH OTHER DEPARTMENTS

Mr. FITZPATRICK. Do you know of any overlapping with any other departments, such as the War Department, the Land Office, the Department of Agriculture, the Navy Department, or any particular department that is doing anything that is being overlapped by yours or other departments?

Dr. MENDENHALL. I think I can honestly say, Mr. Fitzpatrick, that there is no overlapping with any of the older groups in government. The Survey has grown up with these groups. We know the men who are doing work that is in any wise related to ours, and we are in constant cooperation and consultation with them. Where the language of their laws and ours might permit an overlapping on the borders of our functions, we see that we do not overlap but that we cooperate instead.

COOPERATION WITH OTHER DEPARTMENTS

The language in this bill which you are considering today provides for the transfer of funds if some other unit of Government desires the sort of service which is one of the special functions of the Geological Survey. We render that service for them by a transfer of

finds instead of their attempting to do for themselves scientific or technical work for which we have the staff and the equipment and they do not.

I do not know all the new services in the Government by any means. I do not know what all of them are doing. But as to the Soil Conservation Service, for example, we are cooperating. They are studying the erosion of soils from certain areas under varying ditions. They want the run-off measured, and the silt measured, and the measurement of related stream flow; and the measurement of these things is a function of the Survey. We cooperate with them in doing it by an interchange of personnel and an exchange of funds.

FLOOD-CONTROL STUDIES

Mr. FITZPATRICK. Is it the same way with flood control, too, Doctor?

Dr. MENDENHALL. Of course, we are not a construction agency. We do not build the works for the control of floods.

Mr. FITZPATRICK. You also said something about your surveys for 3d control.

Dr. MENDENHALL. We study floods. We study the run-off, its stribution, where these floods are concentrated, the quantity, and e amount of water that passes a given point at a given time and he sources of this water. These reports make available the history of the flood, its source, how it has grown as it passed downstream, how it has diminished as it has passed out of the area of contrated rainfall. Those data are fundamental data for the conSrection organizations like the Army engineers, who later may

d works to control the floods. They do not make those studies f floods in the broad way in which we do, but they utilize the ave data that we get. Other units of Government or local governents that need to know what water supplies are available, whether ey are diminished water supplies due to drought, or increased wer supplies through flood, or what can be done in the developtent and control of them, are also given information and assistance. We are cooperating very intensively, for example, with the city New York in studying the ground waters under the western end Long Island.

Mr. FITZPATRICK. We are going to spend millions there during the - 10 or 11 years. Did they take some of your data?

Dr. MENDENHALL. They are depending upon our data to deter

how much water they can safely pump out from under the tern end of Long Island. We are also cooperating with Greater V-w York in determining the amount of water that will be availA in the Delaware River Basin.

So, I think I can answer your question by saying that we are overlapping the activities of other units of government unless ay be minor, incidental overlapping here and there. When we ver that we cooperate instead of overlapping.

SALARIES, OFFICE OF DIRECTOR

Mr. FITZPATRICK. The first item is salaries, for the Director of the Geological Survey, and other personal services in the District of Columbia, $140,000.

Dr. MENDENHALL. The justification in support of this item is as follows:

This item provides for the administrative and business units required for the Geological Survey as a whole. The increasing burden upon this small staff, whose number had been sharply curtailed in 1933 brought it last year to a point where it was entirely unable to cope properly with its responsibilities. Conditions have been somewhat improved this year through partial restoration of the earlier appropriation figure ($150,000 in 1932; $128,000 in 1936; and $140,000 in 1937), which has permitted restoration of some of the positions dropped in 1933 and a small increase in the Division of Accounts whose burden has grown steadily heavier with continued new requirements imposed by the General Accounting Office, the Treasury Department, and other agencies. While additional assistance is badly needed, no further change is proposed in these estimates for 1938 which are identical with the appropriation, $140,000 for the current year.

The units provided for by this item, and the number of employees in each for several years as a basis for comparison, are shown in the following table:

The duties and responsibilities carried by these units have been described to the committee in preceding years. They are absolutely essential and prerequisite to the technical activities and output of the engineering and scientific branches, and to safe and proper conduct of the bureau's work under controlling laws, regulations, and policies.

Mr. FITZPATRICK. I notice in your total budget, you spend about 45 percent of the total amount here in the District of Columbia.

Dr. MENDENHALL. Yes, sir. Now, in the first place, as to this item we have just been talking about, the "salaries" item, on page 308 of the bill, for the Director of the Geological Survey and other personal services in the District of Columbia." That item provides for our editorial staff, our accounting staff, our library staff, that Mr. Collins has just been talking about, and several other general services centering about the Director's office. All of that item necessarily is spent in the District of Columbia.

Further down you will see an item for printing and binding, $120,000; preparation of illustrations for reports, $22.000, and engraving and printing, $120,000. We have a map-printing plant there. All those men, necessarily, are in our central office in the District of Columbia throughout the year. Necessarily, also, the clerical and drafting services of each of the field branches do not go into the field. The clerical services run through all of these field units,

of course, the geologic branch, the topographic branch, the water resources branch, the Alaskan branch, and the conservation branch.

AMOUNT OF APPROPRIATION EXPENDED FOR PERSONAL SERVICES IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Perhaps it is necessary to sketch here briefly these permanent services that have to be here. Now, our field services, of which the Alaskan branch is one

Mr. FITZPATRICK. While I think about it, Doctor, I have a copy of a table here that you gave me earlier in response to my request. I would like to have you put that in the hearing. I think it is quite an explanation. It is condensed, and I think it will serve the purpose better than going over each one of those items, because the total amount is $2,827,000, and out of that you spent $1,279,000 in the District. In other words, 45 percent of the total appropriation is spent here in the District of Columbia.*