Mr. JOHNSON. Indians of some of the tribes in Oklahoma have not accepted this reorganization act nor are they in sympathy with it.

Mr. DODD. We are making loans from that fund to Oklahoma Indians because the original act excluded Oklahoma from certain sections; Oklahoma was included in all of the money sections of the bill.

Mr. JOHNSON. That is correct.

ADVANCEMENT TO NAVAJO TRIBE FOR MARKETING OF SURPLUS SHEEP AND GOATS

I find new language in this item; a proviso relating to sheep and goats on the Navajo Reservation, which reads:

Provided further, That not to exceed $275,000 may be advanced to the Navajo Tribe of Indians for the purchase, feeding, sale, slaughter, or other disposition of sheep, goats, and other livestock belonging to the Navajo Indians, including the erection of necessary structures, the installation of utility services, the purchase of machinery and equipment (including passenger-carrying vehicles), materials and supplies, the purchase or lease of land or buildings, salaries of employees, traveling expenses, printing, binding, and advertising, and all other necessary expenses.

Mr. COLLIER. Mr. Chairman, this is an item of great importance. I might add that it is the purpose under this provision to loan the Navajo Tribe of Indians some money to make it possible for them to market the surplus sheep and goats economically and efficiently.

Mr. RICH. What do you intend to do with that $275,000? Do you plan on building slaughterhouses and manufacturing establishments? Mr. COLLIER. There would undoubtedly be some slaughterhouse facilities constructed.

The situation is this: May I for a moment give you a picture of what they are up against down there?

Mr. JOHNSON. Go ahead, Mr. Collier.

Mr. COLLIER. I would like to explain why it is necessary.

NATURE AND CONDITION OF NAVAJO RESERVATION

Mr. COLLIER. The Navajo Reservation is a semidesert area, badly damaged by erosion.

The sheep are all of a peculiar tough type, that can run 10 miles a day in the process of getting enough to eat.

Ordinarily out in the West when you are going to market your lambs and where they have not been raised on good pasture, or fairly good pasture, it is customary to put them up and fatten them, to bring up their weight, and you get your money that way.

Now, under the conditions by which sheep and goats are raised on the Navajo Reservation, they are so scrawny that you cannot sell them to advantage. In fact you can get little or nothing for them, for it is necessary to fatten them first. And the situation now is, that being unable to sell them, or being unable to sell them for more than a nominal amount, the Navajos keep them on the range, and the range already is terribly overloaded. The range is terrifically overgrazed. As a result of the range being overgrazed, the animals are so poor on the range that the Indians do not get their money out of them and this result is due to the fact that there is no adequate marketing system, and particularly because they have no means of fattening their lambs.

Now, if there was some means of fattening the lambs, these anin's could be slaughtered; and the Navajos would get the money and tie sale would reduce overgrazing. The poorest of the cull stock co.. be canned for human consumption or for dog and cat food: and ta: is true likewise of the wild horses.

APPROPRIATION WOULD PROVIDE REVENUE AND PERMIT RANGE TO COME DA A

Now the purpose of this appropriation is twofold.

It is to enable the Navajos to get a revenue for the hundreds of thousands of their animals that they cannot sell now, and then it w:.. get those hundreds of thousands of animals off the range, relieving the range, and allowing it to come back, so that the remaining stow a can prosper.

It is set up as a revolving fund, and we are hopeful, in fact we believe, that it will be an economical operation and will pay out y a after year.

Mr. JOHNSON. You expect to get some money back?

Mr. COLLIER. We do not know why we should not Of course. could not guarantee it.

Mr. RICH. How close to this Navajo Tribe do you have yo slaughterhouses?

Mr. COLLIER. You must go to Phoenix or Los Angeles or El Paso Mr. RICH. How far is that?

Mr. COLLIER. They are, roughly, 500 miles away.

Mr. RICH. They are the nearest ones?

Mr. COLLIER. Am I right on that?

Mr. COOLEY. There is Denver.

Mr. COLLIER. But Denver is still farther.

The main fact is that the packing plant would be a minor ite. : the outlay of this money. If we had the money to fatten the arina. an get them to the market, they would no longer need to be held o the range, taking the place of better animals that should have tie

range.

Mr. LEAVY. Do these flocks of sheep and goats belong to individ owners or are they owned by the tribe collectively?

Mr. COLLIER. They belong to individuals, and they vary in size This Navajo area forms a great part of the Colorado River watershed It is the area which is shedding now an appalling at silt into Boulder Dam. It is the area where the Government thr› the Soil Conservation Service, is spending heavily to save the and unless we can cut down the animal overpopulation, all the e 1s in Vain It is of vital concern to the Nation as a whole, rot n to the Navajo Tribe

Mr Rich Could you get those Indians to sell their irpl .*
Mr COLLIER. Yes

Mr Rich Why would it not be a good tlang to run them in and haul them out”

Mr CoFER But then you would have to fatten them what we want to do.

Mr. LEAVY I think they are only 300 miles from Phoenix
Mr. Coot

Yes

T:

Mr Coung Bat you cannot get much for them if you d fatten them first They can be fattened, or they can be si q; the South and fattened upon grass,

Mr. RICH. You are suggesting putting the Government up in the establishment of slaughterhouses and meat canneries.

Mr. COLLIER. This is a loan to the Indians.

Mr. LEAVY. I do not think there is anything in this loan which would put us in the meat-packing business.

Mr. COLLIER. I might state that the Navajo Indians have been very responsive. They have cut the sheep population, as I recollect the figures, from around 1,250,000 to around 820,000 out on their reservation. They have cut the goat population in half in the last 3 years. But the range is still terribly overloaded.

Mr. JOHNSON. Do you propose to cut it?

Mr. COLLIER. The ultimate carrying capacity of this range areaI might have to correct my figures in minutiae-would be approximately one-half a million sheep units, and it is now carrying about a million.

Mr. LEAVY. As a member of the agricultural subcommittee, about 10 days ago this matter was gone into quite extensively; and it was brought out at that time as the result of overgrazing that the erosion problem has been created; that the land is washing away rapidly, and not only a tremendous amount of land destroyed from a productivity standpoint but it is interfering very greatly with the use of the waters of the Colorado River, and it has made necessary a quite extensive program in soil conservation.

Mr. JOHNSON. I will say that I was over a great deal of that country last year and this soil is eroded worse than I had anticipated.

Mr. COLLIER. The Navajos have done some quite remarkable things recently. They have adopted range regulations which are quite thorough. They are making sacrifices. They are doing what they can do, but unless we devise some means of getting the scrub stock off, and marketing the lambs, we will still continue to have a surplus of useless or inferior animals on the land, undoing much of the good that the Government is accomplishing.

Mr. JOHNSON. Why would it not be possible to finance this matter out of the Wheeler-Howard Act?

Mr. COLLIER. They are not under the act. They rejected the act by about 400 votes in 16,000 votes cast, and they cannot vote again without enabling legislation. If they were under the act, that is precisely what we would do.

Mr. JOHNSON. Are there any further questions?

AMOUNT REQUIRED FOR CONSTRUCTION OF PLANT, ETC.

Mr. RICH. What percentage of increase are you asking for? There is a difference of $135,000 more than you are asking for this purpose. What part of that $135,000 are you going to use for building a manufacturing establishment?

Mr. DODD. The total amount for new construction that we put in there would not exceed $50,000. That would include the plant and equipment, stock corrals, and feeding plants, and things of that sort. It would probably not run over $50,000.

Mr. RICH. Then for what purpose would you utilize that equipment and plant in another year?

Mr. DODD. It is a constantly revolving proposition.

Mr. RICH. What do the people of Oklahoma and the people of Arizona and the people of California and the people of other States

say in regard to business of that kind set up by the Government showing the work that you are proposing to do?

Mr. COLLIER. They will not object.

Mr. RICH. You are certainly competing with them.

Mr. COLLIER. This is for a tribe of Indians.

Mr. RICH. Don't the Indians send their stock to these people in those States?

Mr. COLLIER. I think in regard to the competitive market that it is just a drop in the bucket; that nobody cares and nobody will bother about it.

Mr. LEAVY. All money that they get from selling the stock they a... spend for commodities that they need.

Mr. COLLIER. Aside from that, I think it would be a very we thing in fact, a necessity for us to stop the overgrazing on that land. If we do not do it, our pasture will cost us uncounted nällions and it will also result in putting the Navajo Tribe of 45,000 people - a the dole; if we do not secure a control of erosion it will shorten the f of the Boulder Dam to the extent that the Boulder Dam never may pay out.

We are dealing with a tremendously big thing concerning the whole country. The money involved here is very little in comparison to what will be necessary if this is not done.

Mr. RICH. Do you think that the people in slaughterhouse business in those States are perfectly satisfied?

Mr. COLLIER. I am satisfied that we will never get a murmur against this plan from them.

Mr. LEAVY. Is that a reimbursable fund?

Mr. COLLIER. Yes.

Mr. RICH. Is this a loan to this tribe?

Mr. DoDD. It is a loan to this tribe.
Mr. RICH. And not a grant?

Mr. DODD. No; not a grant.

INDUSTRIAL ASSISTANCE TO INDIVIDUAL TRIBE MEMBERS

Mr. JOHNSON. On page 106 are "Tribal funds for industrial a---tance, and so forth". I do not think it will be necessary to lase much time on this. This is similar to the succeeding item

Mr. Dopp. In justification of that item I offer the following

statement:

Regular appropriation, 1937 act.

Deduct nonrecurring and other items not required in 1938 Specifie

revolving fund appropriations

Base for 1938

Increases requested for 1938

Seminoles, Florida

Rosebud, South Dakota

Total estimate, 1938

The purpose of this approbriation is fully set forth in the text of the to is by Ped in about the same manner as the appropriation from the Treasury

The estimates submitted to Congress for the fscal year 1936 cotta request for the appropriation of $13.000 from the tribal funds bel 1 se du Fan be a i. Înd are of W seoran W the at broj tishion * the House it was amended to pelo de acoronatura titalog $36 funds of numerous other tribes specified in the text of the item

These funds became available too late to make loans during the last fiscal year, but arrangements are now being made to use them for various industrial purposes.

For 1936 appropriations aggregating $116,000 were made for the following tribes:

Fort Apache, Arizona, $25,000; Fort Peck, Montana, $30,000; Pyramid Lake. Nevada, $11,000; Cheyenne River, South Dakota, $25,000; Shoshone, Wyoming, $25,000.