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Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, first, let me say that I appreciate the opportunity of testifying before this committee in behalf of my State of Alaska.

During the recent drive for statehood, Alaskans were well aware that their attainment of full participation in our country's affairs entailed not only the securing of full political rights in the sisterhood of States, but the assumption of their full share of the responsibility as well.

I have read with great interest Mr. Metcalf's bill, H.R. 22, and his eloquent and exhaustive extension of remarks in support thereof, and fully recognize the seriousness of the widespread shortage of school facilities which has assumed the proportions of an ominous national problem.

In the interest of brevity, however, I will forgo detailed comments about the general problem and limit my testimony to pertinent data from my own State of Alaska.

Concerning Alaska's classroom needs, I must point out that figures furnished by the Alaska Department of Education demonstrate that we are in a position similar to that of our sister States. Alaska needs classrooms.

Our average deficiency over the last 4 years has been 176 rooms. Although Alaska has lately been building an average of 137 rooms each year, we still have a present need of approximately an additional 200 schoolrooms.

Also, I am informed that this deficiency, unless precluded by this legislation, will become greater in the years ahead, partly as a result of the opening up of Alaska by virtue of the stimulus of statehood. Even prior to statehood our growth was steady. Between 1955 and 1958 we showed an increase of 8,251 students, our total enrollment being 36,330 in 1958 as compared to 28,079 in 1955.

By 1962 it is expected that our total enrollment will approach if not exceed 50,000 students. In the years that follow, this estimate may be doubled, probably in the ensuing 10 years.

Like her sister States, Alaska is faced not only with overcoming the existing shortages of classrooms, but in spite of vigorous efforts, is faced with a mounting deficiency as the upcoming and ever expanding category or preschool children reaches school age.

Alaska's problem is made more acute by the fact that newly acquired statehood brings with it new financial responsibilities, especially during the next few years when the necessary transitional steps are being taken.

It is my firm conviction that Federal aid for school construction need entail no Federal interference with State and local jurisdiction over administration of the schools of our country. It would merely help the States and local school districts to do a better job in carrying out the essential function of educating the youth of our country.

In conclusion, and for the reasons I have just stated, I support pending legislation which would bring about Federal aid for school con

struction.

May I state again that I very much appreciate the opportunity which you have afforded me to testify before this committee.

Thank you.

Mr. BAILEY. Mr. Rivers, the committee would be interested in knowing whether prior to your acquiring statehood your schools were conducted by the Territorial government.

Mr. RIVERS. Yes, Mr. Chairman. We have had a very excellent and high grade-school system in Alaska now for many years and we have been proud of it.

Mr. BAILEY. How are they supported?

Mr. RIVERS. By what were Territorial appropriations from tax revenues derived through our system of taxation.

Mr. BAILEY. Were they on civil service?

Mr. RIVERS. The schoolteachers, all the employees of the Territory of Alaska, now the State of Alaska.

Mr. BAILEY. Were they under civil service of the Federal Government?

Mr. RIVERS. They were on a Territorial retirement system. They had nothing to do with the Federal Government with the exception of a few outlying schools in the Arctic which were Federal schools.

But the large scope of our educational system in Alaska is a State educational system, not Federal. Those few native schools from the Arctic and out on the westward shore are rapidly being defederalized and being turned over to Alaska.

Mr. BAILEY. What were the salaries?

Mr. RIVERS. We were paying the highest salaries for comparable positions on the North American Continent. I can give you a schedule of that if you like.

Mr. BAILEY. With the loss of Federal assistance, now that you have become a State, what position are you in financially to support your education?

Mr. RIVERS. We have lost nothing so far as education is concerned, by virtue of statehood. We have been running our own schools and paying for them anyway.

But there are other things, other financial burdens attached to statehood and that is going to make it a little harder perhaps.

Mr. BAILEY. What sources other than property tax do you have available in your Territorial government?

Mr. RIVERS. The State and the Territory of Alaska had no property tax whatsoever. The local cities and school districts had a property tax. The State had a business license tax, State income tax, which is 14 percent of the amount you pay to the Federal Government. Mr. BAILEY. Fourteen percent?

Mr. RIVERS. Yes. That is of what you pay to the Federal Government, which we think is a very fair and easily collected income tax. Then we have a lot of excise taxes.

Mr. BAILEY. Does the individual in reporting his taxes send in a check to pay 14 percent of what he paid the Federal Government? Mr. RIVERS. Yes, he need make only one computation.

Mr. BAILEY. I thought those Federal income tax returns were sacred and nobody had a chance to see them unless there was court action involved?

Mr. RIVERS. Except Alaska Tax Commissioner. The Federal Government makes these facts from those returns available to a State authority like a tax commissioner. That is as far as it goes.

Mr. BAILEY. So you do have a way of checking on whether he is sending in 14 percent of the right amount?

Mr. RIVERS. Yes; we do.

Mr. BAILEY. I was just thinking of the taxpayer.

Mr. LAFORE. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. BAILEY. Yes, sir.

Mr. LAFORE. There is a lag between the Federal tax. My point is it is not anticipated. He does it on the actual tax he pays the Government a little later.

Mr. RIVERS. That is right.

Mr. BRADEMAS. This is to say that in the State of Alaska you now have a built-in factor of progressive civi; is that not right?

Mr. RIVERS. What was that word, Mr. Brademas?

Mr. BAILEY. They are proposing the same type of legislation that might be in West Virginia. The legislature has a bill before it now, but they are only taking 5 percent instead of 14 percent.

Mr. RIVERS. I see. We were thinking of the taxpayers when we put it in that form because it makes it very easy and avoids double computations, all the problems of figuring out your taxes.

If you once go through it with all the exemptions and allowances that come under the Federal internal regulations, you divide by what would make 14 percent of the amount you pay the United States and that is what you owe the State.

Mr. BRADEMAS. The point I am getting at is that your State taxes, unlike the taxes of most States in the Union, are more progressive than regressive; is that not right, because the Federal income tax is also based on ability to pay.

Mr. RIVERS. Yes.

Mr. BRADEMAS. Which means that Alaska might offer a very useful example as the newest State for some of the rest of the States to consider, which is very important so far as education is concerned because one of the problems we hear so much about from many States is that it is impossible for them to raise enough State taxes to pay for the cost of education and yet many groups within States refuse to permit an amendment of the tax laws in order to get more revenue.

Mr. BAILEY. Mr. Rivers, in granting statehood to Alaska, was there not a considerable amount of public land owned by the Federal Government turned over to the State of Alaska?

Mr. RIVERS. About one-fifth, 103 million acres, Mr. Chairman..
Mr. BAILEY. Will that be a source of revenue to the State?

Mr. RIVERS. Well, that works

Mr. BAILEY. Is the State empowered to sell those public lands or lease them?

Mr. RIVERS. It work this way: we have a selection procedure that is being worked out now with the Interior Department and when that land is selected over a period of the next 25 years we will have 103 million acres of what is now Federal public domain.

The agricultural part may be sold and the mineral part may be. leased.

Mr. BAILEY. Minerals cannot be sold?

Mr. RIVERS. That is right. That is a restriction in the statehood bill, but it will be about 10 years before we start getting much money from the State domain. That is our problem now, or part of our problem.

Mr. HILL. It is an interesting point in a place where you have difficulty reconciling principles with what actually takes place.

If it is a small amount of Federal funds, of course, the State and local units can refuse to take it. If it grows larger and larger and as taxes increase, it becomes impractical and politically impossible for them to refuse it.

In principle it is the same thing in refusing a dollar as a million dollars, but in reality it is not. But it is significant that we do have institutions that have refused to take part in this program.

Mr. BAILEY. Let me ask you a question at this point: We seem to be specializing in Indiana. Do you elect your State superintendent of schools in Indiana, or is he selected by a Governor?

Mr. HILL. We elect him.

Mr. BRADEMAS. We just elected a new one who will take office on the 16th of March. He is a very distinguished educator named William Wilson, who supports Federal assistance for education unlike his predecessor who was, as you know, a militant opponent of Federal aid to education.

Mr. BAILEY. Maybe there is some hope for Indiana after all.

Mr. HIESTAND. Would you not agree with the idea, with the philosophy, that where the Federal Government and the Congress votes vast sums to Federal aid there also accompanies it a responsibility to the taxpayers of the United States to see that these vast sums are properly spent in the States for the purpose written into the law? Mr. HILL. I agree completely, sir.

While I do not want Federal control of schools, I think in my school district in Indiana we are capable of deciding the policies for ourselves and I think Indiana is and I think Indiana wants to help the school districts in that State to meet their needs when they declare what they are; once the Federal Government begins to spend money for certain educational functions, it should make certain that the money is spent for the purposes established in the bill.

I do not think you can separate the spending and the regulations and control over these funds and I do not think you should take money from the American taxpayers and send it to some State or some school district without determining that they spend it as it should be.

Mr. BAILEY. Dr. Hill, we have three other witnesses scheduled for this morning. Suppose you move along with the rest of your presentation.

Mr. UDALL. I wanted to ask another question, if I may, with due regard for the requirement of time.

I notice you are expressing some concern here, in fact, you mention educational television, the fact that we are going to wake up and find one type of instruction all over the country. Of course, several States already have television instruction, notably such as the supposed backward State of Alabama, which has a statewide educational network or it is in the process of construction.

I have an invitation from the American Chemical Society and Encyclopedia Britannica to attend a premiere showing, a week or so from now, an entire course in chemistry on film which has been produced in cooperation with these two organizations.

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We already have one national program that you can see if you are in the right place at 6 o'clock in the morning that a lot of adults and school kids are taking in physics and so on.

It seems to some of us who have studied this problem, and we would like to think we are as concerned about economical and efficient operation of schools as anyone, that proper use of educational television may not only mean superior instruction, but may mean some very substantial savings in instruction if you get a statewide educational network or if you have in some areas a standardized lesson by superior instructors.

I was wondering if you really regard the development of educational television as a threat to proper schooling. Do you not see in it also some of the things I see as a potential?

Mr. HILL. I did not express any opposition to educational television. I am not opposed to it. I think it is very beneficial and should be used much more than it has been used and in different ways.

The point in the statement was that I thought there would be demands brought forth for a national educational television network as well as these other things which I have enumerated.

The concentration of the thing at the Federal level is what I consider dangerous.

Mr. UDALL. You see, this present high school physics course taught by Dr. White and this course that will be produced will be sold all over the country. This teacher will be teaching by film this particular subject matter in classrooms probably in every State in the union. I just wonder whether you regard that, getting down to a specific, as a bad development. Does this create alarm in your mind? Mr. HILL. No, sir; I think this is a desirable program.

Mr. UDALL. This will permit many high schools that do not even have physics or chemistry courses to have the courses and it has proven that some of these kids can do just as good a job with some help on the side, taking the course by film as others will do where they have the high school coach teaching chemistry.

Mr. HILL. So far there is no reason to believe that high school children cannot learn as effectively by television in consultation with a teacher as they can by being in the presence of a teacher and in the absence of television.

I favor very much more use of educational television. This is one thing, though, that I think will be demanded at the Federal level, but it is not the only one, there are numerous others.

Mr. BAILEY. The Chair would like to observe that this is both interesting and informative, but it does not have too much to do with H.R. 22 and the administration proposal.

Let us get back on course.

Mr. HILL. It is a little difficult to get back on course without consuming too much of your time, but these things do have to do with H.R. 22 because they are part of the entire program.

One bill does not stand alone in education. As I mentioned earlier, the fact that the Federal Government enters into this program in a big way, I think, will bring forth demands not only for educational television, but for minimum salaries at the national level, national certification of teachers, Federal requirements for kindergarten, nurseries and a whole host of other things.

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