Mr. SCRUGHAM. On page 10 of the justification there is a statement in regard to vacant public lands undisposed of in Southern States. Have you ever had a special force to take care of this area before? Mr. BURLEW. I would like to have Mr. Smith, the Director of Investigations, answer that question.

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Chairman, we have handled that work through detailing an agent from one of the western offices. For any work in the eastern area involving the public lands, we have had an agent from the Montana office on detail, after which, as soon as he completed those cases, he would return to his official station in Montana.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. I believe that you also handle things like fraudulent homestead entries.

Mr. SMITH. That is right.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. And the taking of timber from timberlands under the jurisdiction of the Interior Department.

Mr. SMITH. That is right.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. Do you duplicate the function of the Secret Service, or of the Department of Justice, in any respect?

Mr. SMITH. We do not.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. There is no overlapping of endeavor in any sense whatever?

Mr. SMITH. No. In those cases where there may be a trespass, we cooperate with the Department of Justice in submitting the report of the agent for any action that they may consider necessary.

RELATION TO THE DIVISION OF GRAZING

Mr. SCRUGHAM. In connection with the administration of the Taylor Grazing Act, there will undoubtedly be a number of cases of trespass on the grazing areas up for investigation. Has any proprovision been made by your Division to investigate the extremely probable cases of trespass that you will get, if you have not already gotten them?

Mr. SMITH. We have been doing that work. In any case where there is a violation shown, the report is submitted to the United States attorney in the field.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. Is there any way of reimbursing the Government appropriations by fees to be charged under the operation of the Taylor Grazing Act? What I am getting at, is this charged against the return of the fees, the fees paid in under the Taylor Grazing Act? Mr. SMITH. I do not believe it is.

Mr. BURLEW. It is not; no, sir. This is a separate staff entirely from the Division of Grazing, which benefits from the receipt of the fees.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. Is it contemplated that the Division of Grazing will have their own investigating division?

Mr. BURLEW. No, it will be handled by this Division, which we feel is especially qualified to do it, and is independent of the Division of Grazing.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. What new provision, if any, has been made for expanding the Division of Investigations to take care of the necessities arising from the administration of the Taylor Grazing Act?

Mr. BURLEW. The trespass cases that you have referred to are handled in the first instance by the Division of Grazing. That is, we have graziers who really police the range, but we have nowhere

near a sufficient number of them. When we find a trespass that should be prosecuted criminally, the Division of Investigation takes it up, and they get the evidence and present it to the United States attorney.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. The grazier discovers the violation, but he has no police power.

Mr. BURLEW. Of course, he can call it to the attention of the district advisory board or to the administrative officers of the grazing offices.

Mr. SCRUGHAM. And they in turn call in the Division of Investigations for the preparation of the case before the courts?

Mr. BURLEW. That is right, and that is presented directly to the United States attorney. It does not go through the Washington

office.

Mr. RICH. You have raised a very important question, and evidently in the past that has been under the Department of Agriculture. I have listened to the discussions relating to the administration of grazing under the Agricultural Department, and we have heard the representative from the Interior Department. There is not a man in Congress who thinks that we should have two separate divisions taking care of this work. Secretary Ickes thinks that it ought to be consolidated, and Secretary Wallace said that it should, but whenever they want to take it out of his Department, he objects.

I think that if the Members of Congress have any backbone or guts, they will put this work in the hands of one department. It will never be done efficiently if you do not do that.

STATUS OF UNALLOTTED PUBLIC LAND

Mr. JOHNSON. Could you advise the committee as to the amount of unallotted public land in the United States?

Mr. BURLEW. The public land that was withdrawn is, I think, 162,000,000 acres, of which 142,000,000 are in grazing districts. Mr. SCRUGHAM. Are there any further questions?

Mr. O'NEAL. That does not include Alaska, of course?

Mr. BURLEW. No.

Mr. FITZPATRICK. I understand that only 80,000,000 acres were turned over for grazing?

Mr. BURLEW. Right.

Mr. FITZPATRICK. And that now they are adding 60,000,000, which brings it up to 140,000,000.

Mr. JOHNSON. Is it contemplated that any of this land will be open for homesteads, or is it permanently withdrawn?

Mr. BURLEW. It is withdrawn for the time being. It is not open for homesteads as long as the withdrawal stands.

Mr. JOHNSON. I get a great many letters of inquiry about that, and I remember that before it was withdrawn, when an inquiry was made the Land Office would say, "Tell us what county you are interested in, and we will then be glad to tell you how much public land is open in that county." The person interested would not know in many cases the names of the counties, and that was very unsatisfactory.

Mr. BURLEW. Of course, we have had the opinion in the Interior Department for a number of years that the remaining public domain

was not suitable for homesteading. All of the good land has been occupied, and the settlers that would get on this barren soil would last a year or two and lose their money and move out.

But we have thousands of cases in the Division of Investigations where they are straightening out this mess, trying either to put the homesteader off or to make him live up to the contract that he has with the Government.

They just have not been able to exist on these homesteads in recent years.

Mr. JOHNSON. Some cannot exist on the good land, for that matter. Mr. SCRUGHAM. Let us try to expedite the hearing.

Mr. LEAVY. Just one question.

INABILITY OF GRAZIERS TO MAKE ARRESTS

Does the Interior Department exercise jurisdiction or control in any way over forest grazing land?

Mr. BURLEW. No; not over the national forest grazing lands.

Mr. LEAVY. And the graziers, as I think you called them, do not have the police power to make arrests where there is a clear-cut case of trespass, summarily, without process?

Mr. BURLEW. They do not.

Mr. LEAVY. And the offender could escape before they went through the necessary preliminaries to secure the legal process?

Mr. SMITH. The trespass is taken up with the district attorney, who takes some action.

Mr. LEAVY. But I have in mind the situation that the chairman told us about a little while ago, when we were off of the record, where you may be miles from a district attorney and many miles from where you could have your process issued, and before the criminal process could be issued, the offender could be miles away, even though your man actually caught him in the commission of crime.

Mr. BURLEW. We get action on those cases very quickly, and I do not think that the likelihood of anything like that happening would be very great.

CONTINGENT EXPENSES, DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

Mr. SCRUGHAM. On page 17 of the bill is the item, "Contingent expenses, Department of the Interior."

(The item referred to, together with the justification therefor, are reproduced below.)

For contingent expenses of the office of the Secretary and the bureaus and offices of the Department; furniture, carpets, ice, lumber, hardware, dry goods, advertising, telegraphing, telephone service, including personal services of temporary or emergency telephone operators; street-car fares for use by messengers not exceeding $150; expressage, diagrams, awnings, filing devices, typewriters, adding and addressing machines, and other labor-saving devices, including the repair, exchange, and maintenance thereof; constructing model and other cases and furniture; postage stamps to prepay postage on foreign mail and for specialdelivery and air-mail stamps for use in the United States; traveling expenses, including necessary expenses of inspectors and attorneys; fuel and light; examination of estimates for appropriations in the field for any bureau, office, or service of the Department; not exceeding $500 for the payment of damages caused to private property by Department motor vehicles; not exceeding $2,500 for the purchase of a motor-propelled passenger-carrying vehicle for the official use of the Secretary of the Interior to be immediately available; purchase and exchange of motor trucks, motorcycles, and bicycles, maintenance, repair, and operation of

two motor-propelled passenger-carrying vehicles and motor trucks, motorcycles, and bicycles to be used only for official purposes; rent of Department garage; expense of taking testimony and preparing the same in connection with disbarment proceedings instituted against persons charged with improper practices before the Department, its bureaus, and offices; expense of translations, and not exceeding $1,000 for contract stenographic reporting services; not exceeding $700 for newspapers; stationery, including tags, labels, index cards, cloth-lined wrappers, and specimen bags, printed in the course of manufacture, and such printed envelopes as are not supplied under contracts made by the Postmaster General, for the Department, and its several bureaus and offices, and other absolutely necessary expenses not hereinbefore provided for, $103,940; and, in addition thereto, sums amounting to $45,200 for stationery supplies shall be deducted from other appropriations made for the fiscal year 1938 as follows: General Land Office, $3,500; Geological Survey, $6,000; Freedmen's Hospital, $1,000; Saint Elizabeths Hospital, $2,200; National Park Service, $10,000; Bureau of Reclamation, $7,500; any unexpended portion of which shall revert and be credited to the reclamation fund; Division of Investigations, $2,000; Bureau of Mines, $9,000; Division of Grazing $4,000; and said sums so deducted shall be credited to and constitute, together with the first-named sum of $103,940, the total appropriation for contingent expenses for the Department and its several bureaus and offices for the fiscal year 1938.

JUSTIFICATION OF ESTIMATE FOR CONTINGENT EXPENSES

The contingent fund provided by this appropriation item consists of a direct appropriation to meet expenses of the Washington offices of the Department which is supplemented with sums made available indirectly by deductions and transfers from various bureau and office appropriations as specified in the appropriation text to cover purchases of stationery. The items of expenditure include stationery, office supplies and materials, telephone and telegraph services, travel expenses of the Secretary's office, transportation of things, electricity, rent, repairs, and alterations, equipment, including furniture and labor saving devices, and special and miscellaneous current expenses.

DIRECT APPROPRIATION FOR THE WASHINGTON OFFICES

For the fiscal year 1938 the sum of $103,940 is requested as a direct appropriation for expenses of the Washington offices. This provides an increase of $9,940 over the appropriation of $94,000 for the fiscal year 1937, but is slightly less than the amount available for the fiscal year 1936, since, in that year the regular appropriation was supplemented by a $10,000 item made available in the Second Deficiency Act of 1935, making the total for the year $104,000.

In expending this appropriation the funds are apportioned (1) to items designated as fixed charges and which include rent, electricity, communication services, travel expenses, etc., (2) to maintenance of the Department garage, (3) to photostat supplies, and (4) to various bureaus and offices to provide office supplies and materials, furniture, and labor saving devices.

The estimate for 1938 reflects a decrease of $560 in fixed charges, due to the discontinuance of an item for electricity, and provides increases totaling $10,500 in bureau allotments. In effect, this restores the bureau allotments to amounts comparable to funds available for the fiscal year 1936. Briefly, the additional funds are needed for the following purposes:

Office of the Secretary, $2,500.-This sum is requested for the purchase of a new automobile for the Secretary. It has been customary to provide a new car for the Secretary every 2 years; but this year it is a question of replacement rather than exchange, because the only Interior Department automobile available for the Secretary was practically demolished in an accident a few weeks ago. Due to the need for immediate replacement, the estimate provides that funds for this purpose shall be immediately available.

General Land Office, $1,000.--For the present fiscal year the General Land Office is operating under an allotment of $3,500 which is insufficient for normal requirements of the office. The increase is needed to provide replacements of typewriters and other labor-saving devices and to provide adqeuate office supplies for the transaction of current business. Expenditures for the office in 1936 totaled $4,929.

Bureau of Indian Affairs, $1,000.-The 1937 allotment for this office is $6,000. This allotment is also insufficient for normal operating needs. In fact, for the past few years the work of the Indian Office has been seriously handicapped by

economy measures necessary to keep expenditures within the sims allotted. The increase is needed principally for office supplies and materials. Actual expenditures for the Indian Office in 1936 totaled $7,387.

Office of Education, $1,000.-The 1937 allotment for the Office of Education is $3,000 which is $1,068 less than the sum expended in 1936. Additional needs of the office consist, for the most part, of replacements of office machines and equipment.

Geological Survey, $2,000.-An allotment of $4,500 is available for the Geological Survey during the present fiscal year, a sum $2,067 less than the amount expended in 1936. The increase requested for 1938 is needed for replacement of office devices and equipment which are worn out and no longer serviceable. For a number of years the Geological Survey has been unable to take care of normal replacements of computing machines and other labor-saving devices essential to the scientific and technical work of the office.

National Park Service, $2,000.-The 1937 allotment for the National Park Service if $6,000 or $2,215 less than the amount expended in 1936. The increase for 1938 is necessary to meet increasing demands for stationery and office supplies resulting from expansion of activities during the past few years.

Bureau of Mines, $1,000.-An allotment of $4,000 is available for the Bureau of Mines during the present fiscal year as compared with actual expenditures of $4,755 in the fiscal year 1936. The increase for 1938 is needed for increased activities of the Bureau. Although the appropriations for the Bureau were increased approximately 50 percent in 1936 no additional funds were made available under this appropriation for increased contingent needs.

In providing for all expenses, other than salaries of the various offices located in Washington, this appropriation item is of vital importance to the efficient operation of the Department. Without adequate office supplies, labor saving devices, and communication service the work of the several offices is seriously hampered and any delays or inefficiencies on this account are reflected in field offices throughout the country and in various services rendered by the Department. It is therefore essential that contingent needs be adequately provided for.

TRANSFERS FOR STATIONERY FROM OTHER APPROPRIATIONS

As authorized in the 1937 appropriation text sums aggregating $41,700 have been deducted from various bureau appropriation items and transferred to the contingent fund for the purchase of stationery. The estimate for 1938, with increases amounting to $3,500 in the estimates for the Division of Investigations, the Division of Grazing, and the Geological Survey, provides a total of $45,200 to be made available in this manner.

The increases, for which justifications will also be furnished with the respective bureau appropriation items, are for the following activities:

Division of Investigations, $1,000.-This increase is needed to provide for expanded activities proposed in the 1938 estimates for the Division and to meet demands from field offices that cannot be met under the present limitation.

Division of Grazing, $2,000.-This amount is needed to provide for increased activities resulting from extension of grazing areas from 80,000,000 acres to 142,000,000, as provided in the act of June 26, 1936.

Geological Survey, $500.-The amount available in 1937 is inadequate to meet the demands for stationery supplies.