figure 25 men, any mine that may have at any time employed more than 25 men, notwithstanding the number of men now employed, should be covered. Of course, that presents another administrative problem. How are you going to know how many men once worked in a mine.

Mr. WELSH. I think it raises a legal problem, too.

Mr. McCONNELL. Gentlemen, you will recall that three different times I suggested that we exempt small mines from the application of this law, and we never could come around to an understanding of what would be a small mine, and where that exemption should take place. I am in general sympathy with the idea of what is intended by exempting small mines, because of the difficulties of finding many of these very small mines in the country and inspecting them, but I do not know where we should draw that line, and I cannot quite figure it out. I am not satisfied so far.

Mr. Howe. Could I ask you a question? You are assuming, accepting the Bureau's figure of five or more men being a major disaster? Mr. McCONNELL. That has been brought out in the hearings. Mr. Howe. You are going to have to say or use some criteria, and then how could you reconcile, say you exempted men from mines that had 25 men or less than 25 men, and you had a disaster in that mine that killed, say, all 25 of them, or 23 of them, or 24 of them?

Mr. LUCAS. If it employed 25 men, they would not all be mining coal.

Mr. ANKENY. They would all be exposed to the hazard. Mr. Chairman, it looks to me like you have, if you want to exempt mines of a certain size, you have a natural dividing line in here, inasmuch as title 2 is entitled "Prevention of Major Disasters in Mines," and you could not have a major disaster in any mine in which four men were employed, because you must have five men or more killed in order to have a major disaster.

Mr. LUCAS. Is major disaster defined in the bill?

Mr. WELSH. No; but I think the term has become so current that it is accepted throughout the industry.

Mr. SCHORR. I think it is just used by the Bureau of Mines, and in my own thinking I do not accept it as meaning anything except a statement that somebody makes.

Mr. SLOMAN. I wanted to make an observation in reference to Mr. Lucas' point. We have conditions whereby mines are operated by large companies, and then they retreat to a certain point, leaving only entry stumps and room stumps, and these larger companies find it unprofitable or for other reasons they do not want to work it, and frequently small operators will take over these large partly worked-out mines and complete the working of the coal. There is a case where a mine may have employed at one time 1,000 men, and there might be a relatively small number of men that will be finally employed to finish the mine entirely.

It seems to me, and then, too there may be a considerable territory of that mine left open, but the small operator may find it convenient for one reason or another to work a part of that mine. It would seem to be a rather difficult administrative job, to say the least, to draw a line as to whether that mine is a small mine or not.

Mr. LUCAS. That is granted, Mr. Sloman. May I ask a question of Mr. Ferguson. Should an amendment be drafted providing that

this act shall not apply to mines employing 25 or less men, but exempt-let me say that again-exempt mines employing presently 25 or less men except those which have at any time in the past produced a certain number of tons of coal per year?

Now, surely the Bureau of Mines knows the history of most of the large or all of the large mines in the country, and they would know whether a small operator or a group of unemployed miners are reopening an abandoned mine. What do you think about that, Mr. Welsh?

Mr. WELSH. Offhand, I am not too sure, but I will assume for the purpose of this discussion that the Bureau does have reasonably accurate figures. It seems to me that you still have this problem that the number of men engaged in the mine operation there bears no relation to the hazards because the hazards, as Mr. Hyslop pointed out, exist because of the very physical size of the lay-out. It is not the number of men engaged in it. The abandonment of the mine was probably due to some of these hazards and the difficulties of complying with the law.

Mr. LUCAS. That is not in response to my question, Mr. Welsh. You know whether or not a mine has produced a large or relatively large number of tons of coal annually. You have records extending back a number of years. If we except from the exemption such mines, would we not be providing the Congress with some reasonable line of demarcation between small mines and large mines?

Mr. WELSH. I do not think so.

Mr. SLOMAN. I would like to try to answer that question, Mr. Lucas, by this statement: Our records are fairly good for the last 20 years. Well, 25 men 20 years ago, before we got into the point of mechanization that we are today, would not produce near the tonnage that 25 men would produce today, or could produce today. Therefore, I do not think that you could arrive at a reasonable basis for comparison on the tonnage standpoint. Of course, we have more hand mining in the smaller mines today that we do in the larger mines.

Mr. LUCAS. Then let us exempt any reopened mine and exempt from the exception any reopened mine notwithstanding the number of men employed or the number of tons produced.

Mr. HYSLOP. I think that would be a more difficult distinguishment than the one you suggested; and I think it would be practical, if Congress chose to do so, to make distinction based on the former production or the former number of men employed by a mine, and I think that that would be a practical distinction to make. But, if you try to make it on the basis of a mine that has been reopened, then you certainly raise a lot of questions, because if you take a mine that has been idle for 2 weeks-is that a reopened mine when it starts to work again? You will immediately run into that class of question.

Mr. LUCAS. Gentlemen, evidently we do not have the answer, but I am going to propose such an amendment here in the committee; and, if it is not adopted here, I am going to propose something on the floor, and I would like to have your ideas, especially the Bureau of Mines, and I think I have the right to ask the Bureau of Mines to give me their suggestions as to what a small mine is, and how it might be defined legislatively.

Mr. ANKENY. Mr. Chairman, I would like to suggest that if such an amendment is proposed, that any mine that employs less than five

men at any one time underground be the basis of exemption, because then you are conforming to the title of your legislation.

Mr. LUCAS. That goes back to a regulation of the Bureau of Mines describing what you understand a major disaster amounts to.

Mr. ANKENY. That is commonly accepted and has been for many years. The definition of "major disaster," one in which five or more persons have been killed, regardless of property damage, or any other consideration.

Mr. LUCAS. I may have been discourteous to Mr. Ferguson, and we ought to permit him to speak on this.

Mr. FERGUSON. Go right ahead.

Mr. McCONNELL. In connection with those five men or less, would that pretty well eliminate these little family mines, like father, son, and maybe a couple of children, or something like that?

Mr. ANKENY. To a large extent, it would.

Mr. McCONNELL. That would also include the little mines hard to locate that you mentioned.

Mr. ANKENY. Very much so.

Mr. KELLEY. Mr. Ferguson, did you have something to say?

Mr. FERGUSON. I just wanted to briefly point out, I think, one thing that you might have overlooked. What you will do by eliminating any of these mines is to encourage the continuance of a condition which now exists throughout the country. In other words, you are going to say to these small fellows, "We now give you carte blanche and you can go in there and kill yourselves at any rate which you feel necessary, because the States do not go to these small mines," and in the State of Pennsylvania, for instance, five-man mines are exempted from coverage by the State act, and that is true in other States. I can not name them to you.

Mr. McCONNELL. Is "5" one of the figures used a great deal?

men.

Mr. FERGUSON. In the State of Pennsylvania, it is a mine of five I might point out a concrete example. In the State of Montana, we have a law that says in mines where five or more men are employed they shall have to have a certified mine foreman on any one shift; in other words, to be employed. So, one particular operator, in order to get around the provisions of the act, where he formerly had one shift of 15 men inside his mine, to get away from the provisions of the code he tried to put his mine on a three-shift operation and fired his mine foreman. He worked five men on each shift and, therefore, was out from under the act. He was no longer incurring any penalties by working as he pleased.

I want to say to you in all seriousness in proposing this legislation the Mine Workers are entirely sincere, and we came down here and we have modified our position in line with the thinking of the industry and in line with the thinking of the Bureau of Mines. We have come up here with what we believe is a good piece of legislation. We honestly and sincerely believe it will solve many of the problems. that now exist. But, if you emasculate the act to the point where you are going to exempt the very people we are trying to reach, you are going to fail in the very things we are here to do.

Mr. LUCAS. Mr. Ferguson, if I may respond to that, we owe a duty to other than the miners in passing legislation. Mr. FERGUSON. I agree, sir.

Mr. LUCAS. I think, as a practical matter, we are going to have to exempt small mines, and I do not know how we are going to define it. Mr. HowE. Could I ask you a question, Mr. Lucas? Supposing that amendment is offered and accepted, would there be any consideration given to the opinions of the men who are working? Say you did exempt a mine that employed 25 men or less, and supposing that those men in that mine were not satisfied with conditions, would there be any possibility of an appeal on their part to the Bureau of Mines or to the Federal Inspection Service for an inspection and the right of enforcement if they found things were as the men claimed? Mr. LUCAS. That brings up the thought which I have had for some time, and I asked some questions about it in our earlier hearing, regarding levying some sort of costs against the mine for this inspection. I think that we could provide, or I believe that it could be drafted, allowing a small mine to accept or to solicit Federal inspection and obtain it, especially in connection with some fee which might be charged for the inspection. I intended to ask all of you this question, and so I shall now, since it seems to be related. Could it be reasonably done, gentlemen? Could we require or could we levy a small fee for the costs of this service of the Federal Government against the mine which is inspected?

Mr. SCHORR. May I answer?

Mr. LUCAS. You know what I would say if I continued; so, go right ahead.

Mr. SCHORR. If your question is one as to the law, I say Congress could do that lawfully, and it is upon the theory that it is part of the policing expense of the mine, and I do not judge at all about the wisdom of doing that.

Mr. LUCAS. How would it affect your operation, Mr. Schorr? You are a big operator, and you have Federal mine inspectors in your mines all of the time, and every time they make an inspection they present you with a copy of their opinions. Could there not be charged something at that time, or could not some fee be attached? When we get an automobile inspected, there is a fee attached, and we pay the fee.

Mr. PERKINS. Do you not think it would be discriminatory for the big mines to get an investigation, in accordance with this act, and then charge the little man, in the event the men wanted an investigation, for that investigation?

Mr. LUCAS. If all of the mines were paying the same fee for the same services, perhaps paid by the day or by the hour, or by the job, that would answer Mr. Howe's question as to allowing a small miner to come into the Bureau and say, "We would like to have Federal inspection to satisfy and keep up the morale of our employees." You would then call in the services of the Bureau. If we are going to have to double your inspection force, Mr. Welsh—————

Mr. WELSH. I do not believe that that figure has ever been as firmly stated as doubling; has it?

Mr. LUCAS. You used the figure awhile ago.

Mr. SLOMAN. Well, when that estimate was previously given, it was a very rough estimate, and it was made on the Price bill, which of course is not now being considered by this committee, and no estimate was given on this new legislation. So, I do not think you can hold us

too strongly to that. But I would like to make another observation. Apparently there is some sentiment in the committee, from what Mr. Lucas and what Mr. McConnell have said, that there is going to be some division point, or at least there is going to be an attempt made. I can assure you gentlemen that the Bureau of Mines records are replete with disasters of very serious proportions that have occurred in mines employing 25 or less men. I want to personally strongly urge you—and I believe I can speak for the Bureau of Mines-that, if you do insist on a division, you make it at the five-man level rather than at the 25-man level. I think it would be a grave mistake to cut it at 25, and I say that in all seriousness. I think that you will give us in the Bureau of Mines a piece of legislation that will be impracticable, to say the least.

I want to make that as strong as I can: That, if you do insist on a cut-off point-of course, we in the Bureau do not think there should be a cut-off point-but, if you do insist on it, certainly do not cut it at 25.

Mr. KELLEY. Well, 25 men today in a mine can produce quite a bit of coal, and it might be a mine that is rather deep and should be subject to the provisions of this bill, as far as ventilation is concerned, rock dusting, and haulage, and permissable equipment, and so on. So, what you would be doing, really, if you make the cut-off point at 25 or less, you are placing the mines above that at a serious economic disadvantage. There is no question about that.

Mr. SLOMAN. That is true, and we have found, if you want to class them as a group of "25 or less" men, those are our most hazardous mines from the standpoint of what the accident records have been. I am not prepared here today to give you that record, but I can assure you that what I say is true, and I think Mr. Ankeny will bear me

out.

Mr. ANKENY. That is right.

Mr. LUCAS. You are using the term "most hazardous." Does that mean those which have had the most major disasters?

Mr. ANKENY. Those that have had the most accidents.

Mr. LUCAS. Now, that is another thing entirely.

Mr. SLOMAN. I would not want to put ourselves on record exactly as saying as to the number of major disasters. They have been sizable, I assure you, Mr. Lucas; and, of course, a mine employing 25 men could not have 119 men killed, like Orient; but I assure you there are lots of them that have had five or more men killed. The proportion is very high. If you would insist on that record, we could dig it up for you, but I can assure you that it would be from our standpoint a very grave mistake.

Mr. MCCONNELL. What you are saying is that in relative proportion to the number of men employed, it would be considered major?

Mr. HYSLOP. Not only that, Mr. McConnell, but I think they would agree to this: That the percentage of mine fires and mine explosions has been very high in a small mine; very often a mine explosion or a mine fire occurs that does not kill anybody, but it might have killed somebody. Again, frequently it kills one man because some fellow decides that he is going back into the mine for some reason after everybody else has gone home, and maybe the fan has been down 3 or 4 days, and he just turns a switch on and starts the fan, walks back in, and the place is full of gas. It does not come under the popular