[H. R. 8031, 85th Cong., 1st sess.]

A BILL To permit farmers in areas affected by excessive rainfall and flooded conditions to include acreage in the acreage reserve program up to July 15, 1957

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the reserve acreage of the 1957 crop of a commodity under the acreage reserve program authorized by the Soil Bank Act may include acreage in areas determined by the local county committee to be eligible for participation in such programs by reason of excessive rainfall and flooded conditions: Provided, That on or before July 15, 1957, the producer has filed such application as the Secretary may require for inclusion of acreage in the acreage reserve under this Act: Provided further, That acreage may be included in the acreage reserve under this Act only if any crop which may have been planted thereon has been plowed under or otherwise physically incorporated into the soil, or clipped, moved, or cut to prevent maturing.

[H. R. 8033, 85th Cong., 1st sess.]

A BILL To permit farmers in areas affected by excessive rainfall and flooded conditions to include acreage in the acreage reserve program up to July 15, 1957

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the reserve acreage of the 1957 crop of a commodity under the acreage reserve program authorized by the Soil Bank Act may include acreage in areas determined by the local county committee to be eligible for participation in such programs by reason of excessive rainfall and flooded conditions: Provided, That on or before July 15, 1957, the producer has filed such application as the Secretary may require for inclusion of acreage in the acreage reserve under this Act: Provided further, That acreage may be included in the acreage reserve under this Act only if any crop which may have been planted thereon has been plowed under or otherwise physically incorporated into the soil, or clipped, mowed, or cut to prevent maturing.

[H. R. 8032, 85th Cong., 1st sess.]

A BILL To provide that in 1957 farmers in areas adversely affected by excessive rainfall and flooded conditions may plant their unused cotton acreage allotments to rice

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That notwithstanding any provision of part V of subtitle B of title III of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938, as amended, any farmer in an area determined by the local county committee to be eligible by reason of excessive rainfall and flooded conditions may plant to rice an acreage equal to any acreage of the acreage allotment of the farm for cotton for 1957 which was not planted to cotton: Provided, That no penalty or other detriment shall accrue by reason of such planting: Provided further, That acreage so planted shall be considered to have been planted to cotton for the purposes of computing State, county, and farm acreage allotments for future years.

Mr. POAGE. First is H. R. 8051 by our colleague, Mr. Albert. Of course, Mr. Albert is prepared to give us a statement on that subject. I believe he has two bills.

Mr. ALBERT. Yes.

Mr. POAGE. They are H. R. 8051 and H. R. 8052. We will be glad to hear from you, Mr. Albert.

STATEMENT OF HON. CARL ALBERT, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA

Mr. ALBERT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First I want to ask unanimous consent to place in the record and to read a part of it a

telegram from the Governor of Oklahoma, the Honorable Raymond Gary.

Mr. POAGE. Without objection, it will be placed in the record. (The telegram referred to follows:)

Congressman CARL ALBERT,

WILLIAMSBURG, VA., June 25, 1957.

House Office Building, Washington, D. C.:

I would appreciate your presenting the contents of this telegram to the committee in the morning that is holding the hearing on the soil bank bill: The farmers of Oklahoma have endured several years of severe drought conditions. Many of them prior to this year have exhausted their capital assets in an effort to continue in the business of farming and ranching. We had promise of the best wheat crop in history. Pasture conditions were excellent up until a few weeks ago when we had a series of devastating floods on the Cimarron, the Washita, the Red, the Grand, the Arkansas, and the Canadian Rivers. As a result of these floods many of our farmers have not only lost their crops but have had severe damage inflicted upon their land through silt deposits and erosion. Some have lost their entire livestock herds and they have buildings damaged. Many of them are now wondering what move they can make in order to hold on and continue. My recommendation would be that two things be done: (1) Provide for cash grants to these farmers who have lost their crops by way of enacting a soil bank bill in line with the one that is now before the committee; (2) provide for a very liberal long-range refinancing program for all the farmers in the disaster areas who feel they need to take advantage of such a program, and this program be drafted in such a way that a farmer will not have to sign an equivalent of a pauper's oath in order to receive the benefits of this program. The farmers of Oklahoma and other devastated areas are waiting anxiously a decision of the Congress of the United States.

Mr. ALBERT. I will read this portion:

Gov. RAYMOND GARY.

The farmers of Oklahoma have endured several years of severe drought conditions. Many of them prior to this year have exhausted their capital assets in an effort to continue in the business of farming and ranching. We had promise of the best wheat crop in history. Pasture conditions were excellent up until a few weeks ago when we had a series of devastating floods on the Cimarron, the Washita, the Red, the Grand, the Arkansas, and the Canadian Rivers. As & result of these floods many of our farmers have not only lost their crops but have had severe damage inflicted upon their land through silt deposits and erosion. Some have lost their entire livestock herds and they have buildings damaged. Many of them are now wondering what move they can make in order to hold on and continue. My recommendation would be that two things be done: Provide for cash grants to these farmers who have lost their crops by way of enacting a soil bank bill in line with the one that is now before the committee; provide for a very liberal long-range refinancing program for all the farmers in the disaster areas who feel they need to take advantage of such a program, and this program be drafted in such a way that a farmer will not have to sign an equivalent of a pauper's oath in order to receive the benefits of this program. The farmers of Oklahoma and other devastated areas are waiting anxiously a decision of the Congress of the United States.

Signed "Gov. Raymond Gary."

Mr. Chairman, I talked with Governor Gary, who is attending the governors' conference, and had he not been on the program he would have personally appeared this morning in support of this legislation.

Bills similar to the bills introduced by me have been introduced by all my colleagues from Oklahoma on both sides of the Capitol and two of my colleagues who have bills are absent because they are in executive sessions of their own committees. Congressman Jarman is in executive session with the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce on the Natural Gas Act and Congressman Edmondson is in a session of the Committee on Public Works which is writing up the general public works bill.

I ask unanimous consent that both my colleagues who are not here. have the privilege of inserting their remarks in the record.

Mr. POAGE. Without objection, that will be allowed. Mr. ALBERT. Now, Mr. Chairman, I think most of the members of the committee are familiar with the reasons prompting the introduction of these bills, H. R. 8051 and H. R. 8052. For the benefit of those who may not be familiar with the situation, and for the background of the members generally, I might review the situation.

We have had a series of devastating spring and early summer rains and floods in Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Damages to farm lands, highways, bridges, homes, business establishments and community facilities run into many, many millions of dollars.

The Red Cross, the Civil Defense Administration, the Public Health Service, and the Small Business Administration moved in to render emergency assistance. This is still going on.

As far as the farmers of Oklahoma were concerned, they faced a problem without parallel in the history of the State. For the 5 years immediately preceding this they had suffered from the most severe drought they had ever known. They made practically no crops at all for that entire period. The members of this committee are well acquainted with what we went through in the drought years. You were very generous in helping us to meet that problem.

Needless to say, we were hoping the dry cycle would break this year. We were hoping we would get an adequate amount of rainfall to enable us to make a good crop for the first time in 6 years. But we certainly didn't expect the break to come with such a vengeance.

Heavy rains began falling in March, and they continued through April, May, and early June. Many farmers still are unable to get in their fields. Many bridges still are out, and many roads are still unrepaired.

Wheat, oats, and barley were the first crops to be washed out. Where they weren't washed out, they were damaged so by the wet weather that only a small percentage of these crops could be harvested. Many alfalfa fields were ruined by flooding streams, and even where they weren't affected by high water, farmers couldn't get in the fields. to cut the hay.

As the catastrophic nature of these heavy rains and floods became apparent, the entire Oklahoma delegation in Congress sought an audience with the Secretary of Agriculture to see what could be done to provide the farmers with some relief. We met with the Secretary in his office on June 4.

After we presented the problem to the Secretary, he told us he was very sympathetic and wanted to help us all he could. But unfortunately his assistance did not extend as far as we would have liked.

We asked the Secretary about increasing allotments for two of our basic crops, peanuts and cotton, to try to make up for some of the losses. The Secretary said this could not be done.

We asked about increasing price supports. He said no.

We asked whether he could make some seed, feed, and/or fertilizer available to farmers in the disaster areas. The answer again was "No."

The Secretary did, however, have this encouragement to offer the Farmers Home Administration stood ready to make loans to farmers. These loans, he said, would be on a liberal term at 3-percent interest.

This sounded better than nothing. However, I am afraid it sounded better than it has worked out in practice. For example, I had one letter from a constituent who wrote, and I quote:

They require a mortgage on your land, crop, and cattle or a combination of two of these; the only catch is that after a 5-year drought all of these things are already mortgaged, and where a man has lost his feed crop, and maybe needs to borrow $10,000 or some large sum to buy feed to winter his cattle or in some cases feed the year around, they require this be paid back in 18 months.

So you can see how at least some of the farmers feel about these FHA loans.

We asked the Secretary about reopening the soil bank so that farmers who had lost practically everything in the disaster areas could be included this year as an emergency relief measure. We reminded the Secretary that he had gone along with this idea last year to help our drought-ridden farmers. But he declined to recommend this.

The Secretary's refusal to go along with this suggestion prompted the introduction of H. R. 8051 and H. R. 8052. Bills identical to these have been introduced in both the House and Senate by all members of the Oklahoma delegation.

These two bills provide alternative ways of arriving at the same end. The net effect of both would be to make cash payments to farmers as though they had qualified for the soil bank before the closing date for that program. What our farmers in Oklahoma need is cash-cash to feed and clothe themselves and their families until they can make a fresh start. Some of our farmers still are going to try to make peanut and cotton crops this year. They would not be affected by this legislation. But others have been so badly flooded that they don't have a chance to make a crop this year. It is this group who do not plant on their allotted acreage that we are trying to help through this legislation.

H. R. 8051 would set up a program identical to the soil bank for which farmers in disaster areas could qualify. The payments they would get would be equivalent to the soil bank payments. This bill would meet the Secretary's objection in that it would not make the emergency program a part of the soil bank, but it would operate on the same basis as the soil bank and would have the same effect as far as the farmer is concerned. It would be effective for this year only.

The second bill, H. R. 8052, would accomplish the same thing in another way. It would simply reopen the soil bank to farmers in disaster areas so that they could put their land in this year just as they were able to do in the drought areas last year.

Under both bills, it would be up to the President, acting under Public Law 875, to determine the disaster areas to be covered. Any producer of a basic commodity in a disaster area could participate in the emergency program to the extent his acreage was reduced below his allotment because of the heavy rains and floods.

I had a letter just 3 or 4 days ago from the county agent of my home county indicating the seriousness of this problem as of today. About 15 percent of the cotton and about 10 percent of the peanuts in my home county have been planted. Most of these have been planted in the last few days. Planting of both these crops must be done by July 1 if they are to have any chance at all of maturing before frost next fall. Even now it is very late and farmers are running a great risk if they do decide to plant.

Wheat and oat losses, even on uplands away from the streams, are heavy because of heavy moisture content. Both in quality and yield these crops are worse than the county agent had anticipated. The situation in which many of our farmers find themselves is desperate. Unless they get some cash in their hands, they will have no alternative but to quit farming. Unfortunately there are no jobs available in Oklahoma that they can turn to. If they do leave their farms, most of them will have to leave the State to find employment. I think we should help them all we can.

I appreciate consideration of these bills.

Mr. ANDRESEN. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. POAGE. The two bills as I understand it are somewhat contradictory. You would not pursue both at the same time?

Mr. ALBERT. I am introducing them in the alternative so the committee will have before it a soil bank bill and an emergency bill. Mr. POAGE. Mr. Andresen.

Mr. ANDRESEN. I appreciate the condition you have so well explained. I am wondering this. Has your State legislature taken any action?

Mr. ALBERT. Yes, sir. The last important piece of legislation passed by the State legislature was to increase the gasoline tax by 1 cent to be used exclusively in the emergency. This, of course, is going to be greatly absorbed by the enormous losses of bridges and roads and extraordinary burdens placed upon our State at a time when they have to have matching funds to meet Federal payments. Mr. ANDRESEN. That is an increase of 1 cent in the gasoline tax? Mr. ALBERT. Yes.

Mr. ANDRESEN. Have they made any direct appropriations? Mr. ALBERT. Not any direct appropriations for individual relief, no; but we do have a relief program operated by the State which is being taxed heavily as a result of this extraordinary measure throwing more and more people on public welfare.

Mr. POAGE. Are there any further questions of Mr. Albert?

If not, I believe Mr. Gathings has a couple of bills that are somewhat along the same line.

Mr. GATHINGS. Yes, my bills are about the same. The objective is similar. Our situation in Arkansas is similar to the situation that has been so well explained by the gentleman from Oklahoma. Mr. Mills and I introduced companion bills. He is with us today. He could give us a statement as I believe he has another meeting.

Mr. POAGE. Would you prefer to have Mr. Mills make a statement in regard to the bills?

Mr. GATHINGS. Yes, I would like to discuss this legislation further with the committee, however.

Mr. POAGE. Mr. Mills, we are glad to have you.

Mr. ALBERT. I know that three of my colleagues have appeared. Will the Chair please note that?

Mr. POAGE. I will. I had intended to let the authors present their bills, but since Mr. Gathings said he preferred Mr. Mills to do it, I suggest he proceed.

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