Senator DwORSHAK. It is nothing else but.

Secretary UDALL. The children only go to school with children from Indian homes where in many areas you have the older generation in a fairly high degree of semiliteracy, and this is a very serious handicap. As all of us know, a great deal of the learning process takes place at home.

Senator DwORSHAK. I recall also you had boarding schools set up where it was not convenient to have schools out on the reservations and you brought the children into the larger areas where you could provide better facilities. We have such a school at Brigham City in Utah. You are asking for $20 million more to build these Indian schools on reservations.

Secretary UDALL. Yes. These will not all be built on reservations. There will be a varied pattern in that regard.

Senator DwORSHAK. Do you not think when you plan construction of reservation schools you are actually getting away from the use of public schools by the Indian children and there will be the implicit encouragement for the children to remain on the reservations and they will lose the value of the contacts by attendance at public schools. Are you aware of that?

Secretary UDALL. No, we are very conscious of that. We would hope to profit by our experience under this new departure in the program and to use this approach wherever possible. We are running into this difficulty, Senator, and I shall be candid in reporting it to

you.

ATTITUDE OF INDIAN PARENTS

With so many of our Indian programs, you have these competing situations also that make for the toughest sort of decisions. The Indians themselves sometimes, and the parents feel very strongly about this, want to have the children stay near home. We are finding, for example, on the Navajo Reservation they have strong leadership there, and they feel particularly at the high school level that they ought to go to school nearer home. Where a tribe takes a very strong view of that kind, it presents a very difficult choice. I think this type of blend that we have been getting, and we have it in my own State and I have watched it work, it seems to me is working quite well. We are not proposing to reverse that policy but we have to adapt here and there depending on circumstances.

Senator DwORSHAK. But as you provide additional classroom facilities on the reservation to that same extent you will discourage the children attending those Indian schools from going to public schools. Perhaps the distance is too great but if you emphasize the building of these schools on the reservations, whether you are planning finally to achieve that purpose, you are discouraging the children from going to public schools. Aren't you fearful of that?

Secretary UDALL. This $20 million crash program is not an entirely on-reservation program.

PERCENTAGE OF ON-RESERVATION SCHOOLS IN PROGRAM

Senator DwORSHAK. What percentage is on the reservation?
Secretary UDALL. I can't tell you.

Senator DwORSHAK. Half of it?

Secretary UDALL. No, I really couldn't furnish you a figure because we are in the planning process.

Senator DwORSHAK. Could we get that information later on in the hearing from whoever is best qualified?

Secretary UDALL. Yes. I would be sure, for example, in Alaska, probably in this Mississippi situation, probably most of the funds will be spent on that type of schools. It is this matter of compromising the feelings of some of the Indian people with some educational practice.

Senator DwORSHAK. How did we arrive 10, 20, or 15 years ago at the point where the Indians seemed to demand the absorption in the public schools of their children? They wanted to become full-fledged American citizens. The initial step is to expose the Indian children to our American school system and have indoctrination of our American ideals and our educational system.

If we are going in one direction for 10 or 15 years and then we reverse and go in the opposite, we are never going to reach any specific goal. I won't belabor the point, Mr. Chairman, but I do hope we get a little something on this.

Secretary UDALL. You put your finger on a very good point and I assure you our thought is moving in the same direction.

Senator DwORSHAK. I have been following this, Mr. Secretary, for 20 years in the House and Senate and I think I have been convinced that instead of integrating the Indians, if we finally intend to make full-fledged citizens of them, we have to make available the same opportunities and particularly in education that our own American children have. If we fail to do that, we are aggravating a situation which has been challenging us for many years.

Secretary UDALL. I quite agree. You state in a different way, and perhaps more fully, the point I was making earlier in a colloquy with Senator Young. Our need is to get our Indian people in the mainstream of American life instead of off in an eddy. There are many ways we can do this. There are many ways we are not doing it. The educational problem is a very important facet of it. There is no question about it.

Senator DwORSHAK. Thank you.

BUREAU OF COMMERCIAL FISHERIES

Secretary UDALL. Mr. Chairman, just covering very briefly two or three other points, we have in our Bureau of Commercial Fisheries some very important responsibilities. Here again we just had our people over to Rome to an international conference. For example, we went down under the foreign-aid program and taught the Peruvians how to fish and we have taught them so well that they have taken away a lot of our markets. This has created some very serious problems.

Our domestic industries need the help that we can provide, again by research. This is our role. We work very closely with industry. The oceanography program that Senator Magnuson and others here have been so instrumental in pushing in the past is of increasing importance.

RESEARCH ON FISHERIES IN NORTHWEST PACIFIC

We have had to ask for extra crash funds, as it were, to prepare research on the fisheries in the northwest Pacific so that we can be ready to sit down in about a little over 18 months with the Japanese and Canadians and discuss a new treaty.

Senator MAGNUSON. Did the House allow that amount?

Secretary UDALL. We got the bulk of it, Senator. We have our general research program, our program for northwest fisheries, and also our program in trying to get fish over high dams for which we are asking funds. This problem is raised on the Snake River in the salmon.

Senator CHAVEZ. Are you reclamaing in this matter?

Secretary UDALL. Yes. We feel in this area of research in commercial fisheries very strongly that the full amount that we requested is needed now and we can use it now very effectively. We are going to have to cripple one program or the other if we don't get the full amount of funds. We do feel that this problem of getting fish over high dams is a very serious problem. The dam constructed at Brownlee on the Snake River by the Idaho Power Co.-their success has been very poor and a fishery source has undoubtedly been partially destroyed as a result.

We blame ourselves because we don't have the answers. We have to have a stepped up program and a very rapidly stepped up program. Senator DwORSHAK. Is that the crash fisheries program you proposed?

Secretary UDALL. Yes.

FUNDS FOR LOWER COLUMBIA RESEARCH

Senator MAGNUSON. What did you get for the lower Columbia research in the House? Is it the amount that you asked for? Do you recall off-hand?

Secretary UDALL. No. I can't tell you off-hand. I have been informed $527,000, which was the budget estimate. We got the lower Columbia amount.

Senator MAGNUSON. I want to say to the committee that I hope the amount the Department of Interior thinks is reasonable for what I would like to term "international research" or in the oceans would be allowed because we are rapidly getting into more and more international problems in fisheries.

RUSSIAN FISHERIES PROGRAM

As the Secretary knows, the Russians have a program on fisheries that is almost fantastic. They have new, modern ships that are in every part of the international waters. They have a quota for each branch. They have oceanographers aboard every fishing ship. it is posing more and more these problems of international agreements leading to conservation.

But

We have always been at a low level on those things, but the Secretary has been trying-and the Senator from California and I once went down and said they ought to put more at a policy level in the State Department and otherwise.

IMPORTANCE OF INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES

Senator KUCHEL. That is right.

Senator MAGNUSON This is going to be in the next 25 years the most important thing. That is, what are we going to do about our international fisheries. If not, the Russians will take it over completely.

Secretary UDALL. Senator, I could not agree with you more. The fish are an international resource whether we like it or not. We have our domestic fish which don't roam the high seas. But the commercial fish are an international resource and the country which is most aggressive and which understands the nature of this resource best, which researches it the fullest and has the most aggressive program, will come in terms of this great industry, this great product of nature and dominate the field. There is no question about it in anyone's mind.

NORTH PACIFIC PACT

Senator MAGNUSON. We are having some success, I will say to you. The Russians belong to the North Atlantic Pact, but they do not belong to the North Pacific Pact. We are very hopeful within the next few months that they may ask to become a member of the North Pacific Pact so that we may sit down and do something about conservation.

Secretary UDALL. We certainly need it.

CRASH UNIVERSITIES PROGRAM

Senator DwORSHAK. Can you tell us very briefly what you are planning on that crash fisheries program? We are getting a lot of inquiries from our State in the area because many people are fearful that there will be an unnecessary delay in water resource development in the area. How much money do you have in your budget for that? Secretary UDALL. Our request was for $526,000 which is an increase of $224,000.

Senator DwORSHAK. What do you mean, an increase? You didn't have a crash program before.

Secretary UDALL. This is an extension to our existing program. Senator MAGNUSON. They had that much before.

Secretary UDALL. We are stepping it up about double.

Senator DwORSHAK. How long a period do you think this will take? Secretary UDALL. We can't say. This is a tough problem. We have asked our people to lay out a program and get some new people in and go after it. We might come up with an answer quicker than we think, but it might take longer.

Senator DwORSHAK. Usually, it is a cycle of 4 years in the salmon from spawning until they return. Some people contend that would be the minimum time required for this survey and study. On the other hand, you have had a program in progress for some time. You mentioned the Brownlee Dam. It has been criticized, or at least the program, notwithstanding the fact of the dam the Idaho Power Co. has expended $8 million. The supervision has been by the Fish and Wildlife Service, Corps of Engineers, and the various commissions in the Columbia Basin.

Everybody is willing to cooperate but it seems all they are doing is running into difficulties. As you mentioned a while ago, very little success has been attained so far. I hope as you plan this you will also be thoroughly cognizant of the fact that our good friends down in the lower basin are pushing for acceleration of their water resource program with the lower Snake dams and up in the middle Snake we are almost constantly involved in controversies whether private utilities or public utilities districts in the State of Washington are going to get permission and authorization to build these dams. I am sure, having been a resident of the West, even though the Southwest for a long time, you are cognizant of these developments and the importance of preventing an unnecessary delay. I should give you a chance probably to delineate what you plan to do but apparently you say that it is just in the initial stages. Do I understand you correctly?

Secretary UDALL. Yes, that is right, Senator.

Senator DWORSHAK. You can't give us any particular details? Secretary UDALL. I think my people, when they come up, can. Senator DwORSHAK. I know you will be on top of this whole program and will largely influence it. I do hope that while we all recognize the need of solving some of the fisheries problems in that area that we also do not want to delay the normal water resource development in the area. You will give us some assurances that you are also aware of that important aspect of the overall problem.

Secretary UDALL. I certainly am, Senator. At the same time I take my responsibilities to industry such as the salmon industry and protection of the fish. I think it is as serious a responsibility as the building of dams. We have to harmonize the two whenever we can in order to see that they do not conflict whenever we can and protect both resources.

Senator DwORSHAK. I understand.

Senator MAGNUSON. I understand that the Department of Interior is going ahead and beefing up this program because, regardless of what the decisions are and who builds the dams in the Middle Snake, the fish problem is still there. Whether it be a public dam or any other public utility commission, we still have the problem.

Secretary UDALL. That is right.

Senator MAGNUSON. The whole intent of the Department is to beef up the program and see what we might come out with.

HELIUM CONSERVATION PROGRAM

Secretary UDALL. Yes, indeed. The one other program I would like to mention, Mr. Chairman, which is again as all of you know, a new program just authorized, and I think a very sound and wise conservation program, is the helium conservation program authorized last year. We are just putting that into effect. If we are going to get this program launched in a direct partnership with private industry on it, we will have to move actively and get this program underThe one problem we have had in order to set up these private extraction plants, and in order for these companies to make a longterm investment amortized over the life of the program, they have to have adequate assurance that Congress has laid out a plan of sufficiently long term so that they can warrant the type of investment that is made.