(The additional material referred to follows:)

Western pine lumber industry 1960 production of lumber and jobs

1 Includes box factories, remanufacturing, furniture, millwork plants, etc., operated in conjunction with sawmills in region.

Mr. OLSEN. No questions.

Mrs. Prost. Thank you, Mr. Stoddard.

Our next witness is Mr. A. M. Derr, superintendent, Richfield Public Schools, District No. 376, Richfield, Idaho.

You may proceed, Mr. Derr.

STATEMENT OF A. M. DERR, SUPERINTENDENT, RICHFIELD PUBLIC SCHOOLS, DISTRICT NO. 378, RICHFIELD, IDAHO

Mr. DERR. The Honorable Mrs. Pfost, members of the committee, and friends, I am A. M. Derr of Richfield, Idaho. I was born and grew up in northern Idaho, served in the Idaho Legislature, have engaged in farming, ownership and operation of forest lands, have taught school, and am interested as a citizen, in promoting the welfare of the State of Idaho.

The proposed Wilderness Act is inimical to the welfare of the people of the State of Idaho and to its visitors. It is a confusing hodgepodge act that tries to be all things to all people. It is based on a false philosophy, is totally unnecessary, costly to taxpayers, and in violation of the laws of God and man. It is startling that such triviality and animus should be accorded credence by responsible citizens.

The purpose of the bill is to set aside over 14 million acres of land, for fun for a few, and exclude all others as spoilers. The land is already set aside for that purpose.

Its purpose is to set aside over 14 million acres of land of which 3 million are in the State of Idaho, and of that land 32 percent is commercial forest to be set over for one use, the sole use of recreation and enjoyment of the few who are able to pack or walk into the area. All other uses are denied.

There are concommitant uses urged for the bill, such as a need for all this land as a place to commune with God. Isn't this governmental promotion of a religion prohibited by the Constitution?

Another small group need sole use of all the acres to escape from civilization, and get well physically and mentally. Is this last significant in the purposes of the bill? The entire package is wrapped up in a sentimental appeal that is quite valid, for wilderness, like motherhood, is loved by all of us. Are people to be selected for these by Congress?

Two Cabinet members now administer most public land involved. They are the Secretaries of Agriculture and Interior. They are appointed by the President-they work for him. They are his men. So the lands are actually under Presidential control unless the Secretaries are insubordinate.

Under article IV, section 3, clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution, Congress has the power to administer Federal lands. It could not lose this authority if it wished. It has always had, and still has, the power to pass any act, at any time, governing the management of public lands. It cannot "regain control," as is claimed, since it never lost control. Neither can Congress set this land aside forever. The next Congress could pass a new act and completely change any administrative use or procedure.

The circumambient provisions of the bill jockey the administration of the lands through secretaries, to the President, and back to Congress. There, a sort of veto arrangement is set up, a backhanded attempt at legislation, apparently in the futile expectation that this would prevent a future Congress from writing a new act for management of the land involved.

Hidden under all this confusion and verbosity, it is a dangerously false philosophy that sets up waste and mismanagement as an ideal, and condemns industry and most of the people of the United States as unfit to manage and use their own resources. This sort of philosophy needs circumlocution to hide it, but the actual administration of the land is little changed by the bill.

The bill purports to support the principles of multiple use and sustained yield, but nullifies both in its single use dedication. This is confusing. Which principle shall determine use?

Rights of prospectors to locate ore, file mineral claims, and mine and sell ore are supported by a clause in the bill, but in other paragraphs, there shall be no roads-no machinery, and, in substance, no mining, unless the President can be persuaded to intercede and permit specific special use. Such permission would need to be granted in violation of the basic single-use principle of the wilderness act. It is unlikely the President would grant many requests. It is obvious that age-old rights to find and mine ore on the public domain are being repealed, despite confusing words to the contrary.

One clause says they can go in and prospect for ore and the next says they can have no roads to take it out and no machinery to mine

it and they will have to get an impossible situation of Presidential approval to operate in the area. În other words, it is so confused it makes for an impossible situation and, overall, in order to get Presidential approval they would have to convince the President, apparently, that this philosophy of single use is the ideal philosophy.

It takes years to find and develop mines. The Government has heretofore aided and encouraged development of mines, but this is a complete reversal. Mining is discouraged on wilderness land, except under the most exceptional circumstances. Who will prospect if he cannot mine the ore? Very few will prospect now, for even if they found ore, and were permitted to mine it, they could not make a profit. Price of domestic ore is a legitimate field for Congress to explorenot waste time on some unnecessary bill like the wilderness bill. We need industry to provide employment. We resent the discouragement and gratuitous insults provided by this bill.

What is so bad about the appearance of a mine, that these wilderness people should have their fun spoiled when they see one? A pile of rock from a mine is not greatly different from any other pile of rocks. Few of the mines are operating, and they will not operate at present prices. They will remain closed until prices justify operation. Of course no new mines are being developed.

About 1 million kilowatts of power are developed in the area that is affected by the bill. Almost 3 million potential kilowatts remain to be developed. Our electrical needs of the future will not be provided for with cheap hydroelectric power unless the President overrules the save-it-for-fun principle of the wilderness bill. Wilderness proponents have stated that powerlines are eyesores. They do not see beautiful lakes, but only scars where dirt was gouged to make a dam. They see no beauty in development-only in waste can their lust be satisfied.

Water rights are given lipservice in the bill, but only are recognized as regarding established rights. The main aim is to keep the wilderness untrammeled-unused. All water not appropriated will apparently be taken over by the Federal Government. Any future use will have to be approved by the President.

Twenty counties in Idaho were declared disaster areas in 1961, due to water shortage. Floodwaters of a few years back were desperately needed this year, and storage of such water from cycles of plenty to cycles of scarcity is now possible unless the wilderness bill prevents it. The Government is pouring money into the area in attempt to rescue farmers and businesses about to be ruined by drought. While aid and recognition is extended with one hand, the real remedy is being ignored, and the other hand of Government is being drawn back to strike into oblivion the already prostrate people dependent on water for their lives. States rights are being submerged, and water rights are being grabbed as the primary purpose of the bill, while it presents a clause stating it will not affect these rights. One purpose or the other is a deceit, for they are counter to each other. The bill is presented as an aid in tourist attraction, but proceeds to do everything possible to keep tourists out of the area. How many tourists with their women and children will ever get into the wilderness, the wilderness area, with no roads, and no way to get in except to walk or hire a pack string?

How many could ride horses if they could afford them? How many now visit inaccessible areas of the national parks where they have to walk or pack for miles? You can get some idea from records of the U.S. Forest Service which show a visitation of eight people per thousand acreas per year in the primitive area.

Wilderness proponents say, "Anyone can use the area." They must walk or pack in. Anyone can have ice cream with horseradish on it, too, but how many want it that way? Should we be required to eat it that way because a few might like it? Shall we be required to use the land to which we have an equal right with wilderness people, on bird-watcher basis, or be denied any right to use it?

What about this legislation devoting billions of dollars of resources for use of a few for their exclusive fun? Will Congress be expected to devote a few million more to some other small group that might like to be entertained in Europe, for instance?

"Wilderness, once used, is forever lost," they say. This false statement imputes to man more power than he possesses. Down through the eons of time, nature has devastated areas of wilderness with a thoroughness than man cannot approach, yet nature has restored these areas, just as it restores any devastation or change wrought by man.

What does man destroy? He cuts a few trees, and the young growth quickly grows to a vigorous, healthy stand of timber. Dams create beautiful artificial lakes, that control floods, protect fish, wildlife, and industry all the way down the stream, by keeping an even flow of water the year around.

Is this objection to industrial use a true and valid objection to artificial lakes and roads and powerlines, or is it a vengeful blow in a hate-industry theme which these misguided aesthetes hope to promote as a national policy?

One labor union man said, "If the big companies are opposed to the wilderness bill, I am for it." He admitted he would not approve murder as a policy, just because big companies were opposed to murder. Is this stand based on sense or logic?

The bill purports to protect commercial forest area, which is about one-third of the area to be included in wilderness, yet it makes no appropriation for fire protection and provides no access roads. Timber sales build most access roads in the national forest but this burden will now be shifted elsewhere. The present road program is said to be 40 years behind at this time. Do they think they can build roads overnight to control a raging fire?

Is there a whisper of a suggestion here that since fire is a natural phenomenon, well-let 'er burn?

The bill avers it will not interfere with the National Forest Act, but goes right ahead to take the area out of the national forest category, to classify it as "wilderness." Have many of the wilderness folks volunteered to pay the 9-cents-per-acre fire-protection costs, or will this be paid by the hated industries they have excluded, or by taxpayers in general? How will they control bugs, disease, erosion, and other problems faced by sensible management, or are these, as a natural thing, to be allowed to progress without attention?

A lot of sloppy sentimentality has been spilled in print and over the lecture platform about the necessity for a wilderness bill, but it is all

based on false philosophy. In the first place, it is an inferential insult to all western industry, when they are told, in effect, that they are not fit to enter the wilderness area-that they are all spoilers.

In the second place, it is a fallacy to assume that wilderness is lost, once used. Modern industry preserves wilderness. Young healthy timber, bright running streams, water conservation, prevention of erosion, better fishing and hunting, all of these are promoted by industry today, and are part of sensible management and multiple use.

A few hundred feet from a road, over a ridge, you could not tell whether you were a few feet or a thousand miles from evidences of civilization. Millions of acres of private land are in wilderness under managed programs, which include use for fun, as one of the legitimate uses. National forest management, where it has the time, energy, personnel, and money is attempting to duplicate the tree-farm principle, and management for multiple use on its holdings.

How about dedication of all this public land to a single use? Is this not a dedication to waste? What will happen to timber ready to harvest, when no roads, and no machinery are permitted? Will it not mature, die, and waste, a tangle of fallen timber, useless to man, and a source of bug and disease infestation to nearby stands of timber? What sort of perverted sense of the esthetic requires this waste and mismanagement of valuable resources in order to have fun? What will happen to the men whose jobs depend on harvest of timber, and its manufacture? What will happen to wildlife in these dead and tangled areas where the principal living things are those that subsist on death?

While Congress debates such asinine philosophy, the mining and lumbering industries are being economically starved to death. Most of the small lumbermen in Idaho are already finished finanically. Certainly they have not cut the allowable cut on available land-where would they sell it? Farmers have price and water trouble while foreign imports cut the jobs from under American workingmen day by day, and the markets are filled with foreign products which displace those made here. Congress considers how to kick American industry in another spot, with a wilderness bill.

The idea that we may save a wilderness area intact is baloney. Living things grow, mature, and die. Nature replaces them with young growth, but management by man sustains and hastens this process. It is a false philosophy to have to preserve wilderness through mismanagement or no management at all. Modern industry's use of wilderness is part of conservation-it is necessary, and vital.

The "hate industry" undertone that permeates the wilderness bill is a product of intellectual sterility and misinformation. It has no place in a bill in Congress. It is subtle and vindictive, although it has some legitimate source of origin in industrial abuses of a past generation when some resources had to be wasted to make room for new industry such as farming.

Passage of the wilderness bill will sow the seeds of discord that could rightfully result in industry refusing to allow recreational use of any of its land. If this selfish pattern is set by the National Government, why shouldn't a landowner or farmer notify the public that henceforth his land is limited to use to his industrial purposes. A

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