authorization bill) has not been used in behalf of the poor except as agricultural problems caused its use to divert surplus commodities. We question why the administration of the Food Stamp Act, if it is to be considered as a welfare program, is considered by committees concerned with the well-being of an industry rather than human welfare.

THE SHARED RESPONSIBILITY CONGRESSIONAL BRANCH

Several of the witnesses pleaded that this committee should take the responsibility for assuring food for the poor. The witnesses pointed to public testimony which, they said, suggested that other committees involved have primary responsibility for farmers rather than the hungry poor.

Testimony also underlined the near impossibility of establishing a clearcut authority in the Congress for one committee with knowledge of the poor to hear the food needs of the poor. There are health aspects to malnutrition. There are educational aspects to poor nutrition knowledge. There are welfare aspects to a dollar-short food budget. There are school problems involved in teaching hungry children.

Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare Wilbur J. Cohen summed up the problem:

These existing Federal and Federal-State programs to feed the hungry and improve nutrition have stemmed from various sources. Some arose as agriculture programs, some as welfare programs, some as innovations to fight poverty. Each of these had independent policies and separate responsibilities and this separation and independence existed in both the executive and the legislative branches. Under these circumstances it is difficult to shape consistent goals or coordinate programs.

Between the House and the Senate such categories as these require hearings before five committees, not counting the appropriation process. Since there never has been declared a national hunger policy, those who attempt to clarify the rules and regulations through congressional action face a seemingly insurmountable task.

IMPLEMENTATION OF THE RESOLUTION

Senate Resolution 281 calls upon the executive branch to immediately meet the food, medical, and related basic needs of the Nation's poor to the fullest extent. Testimony demonstrated that the executive branch, were it to use its existing powers in an imaginative manner, could accomplish much of this goal. Since restraints are inferred from past congressional actions and testimony, it is now up to the House and the Senate to clarify the determination of this country to eliminate widespread and chronic hunger and malnutrition. But to accomplish that goal, we must evaluate our own attitudes toward providing food and basic necessities to the poor.

A shortage of food in our society is indefensible, but so, too, is the situation of a child-just marginally fed and probably only marginally well-who cannot obtain the shoes with which to go to school, or the soap with which to appear clean in public. We have the resources to meet the basic needs of the poorest of our poor, and we do not wish

the select committee to study hunger in a manner unrelated to a destitute way of life. We propose that the select committee consider this as it reviews the problems of hunger in our country.

It should be the particular province of the select committee to review the legislative process, and the experience and interests of various committees which might claim an interest in the health, education, welfare, as well as food aspects of hunger. The responsibility for food and medical assistance programs should be assigned to committees where the needs can most quickly be met, and where the comprehension of the problems involved best can be understood. Such a review should cooperate with any similar endeavors in the House of Representatives, for it will do no good to remedy the problem in one branch of Congress while ignoring the other.

It should be the province of the select committee to review the best means by which the private sector, with its intricate processing and distribution system, and its knowledge of innovations in food and nutrition, can be used to eliminate chronic hunger and malnutrition in our country. Testimony discloses that little of the food technology available today is being imaginatively implemented to help the hungry poor.

It should be the province of the select committee to study the means by which this food-rich Nation can bring within the reach of every person, rich or poor, rural or urban, black or white, an adequate supply of nutritious food on a dependable basis throughout 12 months of the year. Such a goal should recognize the various food needs of an infant, a pregnant mother, or an aged solitary person. Those that fear that such food availability runs counter to the Puritan ethic might well heed the words of Mr. Roy Alverson, State superintendent of the Alabama school lunch program, whose testimony was related to us by one of our witnesses:

Mr. Chairman, you can't teach a hungry child. You can't teach a hungry child the right way. A hungry child can learn, but he learns the wrong things. He learns that the world is against him, that he is hungry, and finally, he will turn out to be a dropout and go out and commit crimes and things like that, and if you feed him, then you can teach him, and when you teach him, you can make a citizen out of him.

It should be the commitment of this select committee to assess the position of county and State welfare personnel and regulations in order that the present confused screening and certification devices may be clarified, simplified, and standardized. Particular attention should be paid to the needs of low-income families, and to transient, migrants, infants, the aged, and pregnant mothers.

The select committee should also cooperate fully with any similar hunger investigatory body authorized by the House of Representatives, or by the executive branch, for prompt action by all parties seems a humanitarian urgency.

COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATIONS

The subcommittee, therefore, recommends that the select committee be established; be funded for field and office staff, travel, and research,

be afforded access to private consultants, organizational and individ ual; be empowered to interview employees in every level of the Federal, State, and county governments; be licensed to take depositions and other testimony; and be authorized to bring back to this body, and to the President, recommendations which will enable this country to guarantee freedom from hunger and malnutrition, and to provide medical assistance and other basic necessities to the poor. We feel the select committee itself, after organizing and reviewing the task as signed to it, should determine the extent of staff, budget, and committee powers it will require and present its own request to the Senate for funds and authorities. The select committee is to report back early in the 91st Congress, and is to make legislative recommendations to the Senate.

Transcript of Floor Debate on Senate Resolution 281, July 30, 1968

[From the Congressional Record, July 30, 1968]

SELECT COMMITTEE ON NUTRITION AND HUMAN NEEDS

Mr. SPARKMAN. Mr. President, I yield such time as he may need to the Senator from Pennsylvania [Mr. Clark].

Mr. CLARK. Mr. President, a parliamentary inquiry.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania will

state it.

Mr. CLARK. Is there pending business before the Senate?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is correct. The unfinished business is the Foreign Assistance Act of 1968.

Mr. CLARK. I thank the Chair.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending business may be temporarily set aside in order that the Senate may proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 1394, Senate Resolution 281, to establish a Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the resolution will be stated by title.

The LEGISLATIVE CLERK. Senate Resolution 281, to establish a Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the request of the Senator from Pennsylvania?

There being no objection, the Senate proceeded to consider the resolution which had been reported from the Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, with amendments, on page 2, line 5, after the word "under", insert "the following"; in line 6, after the word "laws", strike out "including"; in line 8, after the word "the" where it appears the first time, strike out "Tariff" and insert "Agricultural"; in the same. line after "1935" strike out "the Office of" and insert "the Agricultural Act of 1949, Emergency Food and Medical Services Amendment to the"; in line 10, after the word "Opportunity", strike out "Food Assistance"; in line 11, after the word "Act", strike out "the school lunch" and insert "the Food Stamp Act of 1964, the National School Lunch Act of 1946"; in line 13, after the word "child", insert "aid, medical assistance, "; in the same line, after the word "relief", strike out "commodity"; in line 14, after the word "food,", strike out "fiber," and insert "medical"; in line 15, after the word "other", insert "related"; on page 3, line 1, after the word "and" where it appears the second time, strike out "three" and insert "two"; in the same line, after the word "and" where it appears the third time, strike out "two" and insert "one"; in line 3, after the word "Senate", strike out "without regard to committee assignments," and insert "from other committees," in line 4, after the word "the", strike out "unmet" and insert "food, medical, and other related"; in line 6, after the word. "Senate", insert "and terminate its activities"; in line 10, after the word "food.", strike out "clothing," and insert "medical assistance,"

and in the same line, after the word "other,", insert "related"; so as to make the resolution read:

Resolved, That the President, the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, the Office of Economic Opportunity, the Department of Agriculture. the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and any and all other agencies with applicable authorities shall use to the fullest possible their authorities under the following existing laws, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the Johnson-O'Malley Act, section 32 of the Agricultural Act of 1935, the Agricultural Act of 1949. Emergency Food and Medical Services Amendment to the Economic Opportunity Act, the Food Stamp Act of 1964, the National School Lunch Act of 1946, and all other authorities for child aid, medical assistance, and relief programs, to meet immediately the food, medical, and other related basic needs of the Nation's poor to the fullest extent possible; and be it further

Resolved, That there is established a select committee of the Senate composed of three majority and two minority members of the Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, three majority and two minority members of the Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, and two majority and one minority Members of the Senate appointed by the President of the Senate, from other committees, to study the food, medical, and other related basic needs among the people of the United States and to report back to the Senate and terminate its activities not later than the opening of the ninety-first Congress legislation necessary to establish a coordinated program or programs which will assure every United States resident adequate food, medical assistance, and other related basic necessities of life and health: Provided further, That the select committee shall recommend to the Senate appropriate procedures for congressional consideration and oversight of such coordinated programs.

Mr. CLARK. Mr. President, 1 year ago the Senate Subcommittee on Employment, Manpower, and Poverty of the Committee on Labor and Public Welfare conducted 2 days of hearings in response to a growing body of evidence that hunger and severe malnutrition existed in certain parts of the United States. Those hearings documented that hunger did in fact exist, although the geographical focus of the problem was blurred when one looked beyond the delta area of Mississippi. Recognizing the need for congressional response to such a national issue, 39 Senators of both parties cosponsored Senate Resolution 281, introduced by Senator George S. McGovern, calling for the establishment of a select committee of the Senate to report back to the Senate not later than the opening of the 91st Congress the "legislation necessary to establish a coordinated program or programs which will assure every U.S. resident adequate food, medical assistance, and other related basic necessities of life and health."

Forty-three witnesses were invited to testify or submit testimony. They included representatives from the following categories-some witnesses fall into more than one category and are so listed: