Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. He is on both lists?

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir, and he owned individually, or in partnership with others, land in both Hudspeth County, Tex, and Otero County, N. Mex., and as we covered a little bit ago, the May 31 letter rejected the certification that he had filed with respect to this farm involving the displaced owner, George Hudson.

The CHAIRMAN. That is in Texas?

Mr. Moss. That was in Texas.

The CHAIRMAN. He is on the New Mexico list?

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir; he is also on the New Mexico list in connection with a farm involving a displaced owner named Joe Lawrence, Jr. The CHAIRMAN. We don't have that on here.

Mr. Moss. Not in that detail; no, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. We have Dr. Truett L. Maddox and John T. Kelley. Is that the one that was rejected?

Mr. Moss. As best I can explain this, Kelley did have some individual operation, and the certifications that he filed covered those. Now, the certifications that were filed by Dr. Maddox

The CHAIRMAN. Was Maddox rejected?

Mr. Moss. They have just been rejected.
The CHAIRMAN. Just been? When?

Mr. Moss. In the last-this week.

The CHAIRMAN. Just this week rejected?

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you mean Maddox was rejected this week? Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Kelley was rejected in May?

Mr. Moss. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. What is your next one?

Mr. Moss. Gordon Parks.

The CHAIRMAN. What happened to him?

Mr. Moss. I am going back to the list of those that were rejected

The CHAIRMAN. He filed a certificate?

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir. I am going back to the May 31, 1962, letter. The CHAIRMAN. He was rejected on May 31, 1962?

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Who else?

Mr. Moss. Lillie Mae and J. W. Hill.

The CHAIRMAN. I have here J. W. Hill. I don't have Lillie Mae on

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Who else?

Mr. Moss. That is all that are covered.

The CHAIRMAN. If I am correct, if I followed you correctly, everyone who filed certificates have now been turned down?

Mr. Moss. There is one that we haven't mentioned.

The CHAIRMAN. Who is that? Did I overlook someone?
Mr. Moss. That is Don Vinson. I guess he doesn't appear.
The CHAIRMAN. He is not on our list.

Mr. Moss. No, sir. Well, Don Vinson is a son-in-law of Dinger. and he became involved as a seller with respect to 70 acres of the allotment.

The CHAIRMAN. What is his name?

Mr. Moss. Don Vinson, V-i-n-s-o-n.

The CHAIRMAN. Then should this list be amended to include hir.? Mr. Moss. Yes, sir. Don Vinson really should be listed.

The CHAIRMAN. Would that be in Texas?

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. What county?

Mr. Moss. That is Reeves County, Tex.

The CHAIRMAN. How much cotton did he have?

Mr. Moss. He had 70 acres of allotment.

The CHAIRMAN. When was he turned down?

Mr. Moss. His certification has not been acted upon yet.

The CHAIRMAN. Did you send him one?

Mr. Moss. He filed one and-Mr. Chairman, it was my understanding that Vinson filed a certification and that it is now under investigation.

The CHAIRMAN. You just say now "under investigation"?

All right. We will add him to the list to show that he filed and it is now under investigation, with no action taken on it.

Let me ask you this, now. Marcus Dingler and Dennison filed no certification. When was theirs filed or what happened to it? Mr. Moss. Marcus Dingler filed no certification.

The CHAIRMAN. When was he canceled out?

Mr. Moss. His 1961 allotment was canceled on April 25, 1962.
The CHAIRMAN. April 25, 1962. All right.

Duke and Shaw. What happened to them?

Mr. Moss. Their 1961 allotment was canceled on the same date. The CHAIRMAN. What was the date?

Mr. Moss. April 25, 1962.

The CHAIRMAN. What about Lattner?

Mr. Moss. Lattner's 1961 allotment was canceled on the same date. The CHAIRMAN. Would that also be true about Dr. Lindley, John Ivey, Wallace, that partnership? What happened to that one? Mr. Moss. That one, the 1961 allotment was canceled on April 26,

1962.

The CHAIRMAN. What happened to Mr. G. V. Clayton? What happened to his?

Mr. Moss. His 1961 allotment was canceled on May 3, 1962.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, I think we have covered all of them except Billie Sol Estes. What happened to his?

Mr. Moss. Well, as we have said, he did not file the seller's certification, and the 1961 allotment was canceled on April 25, as to the farms in Pecos County, I believe, and April 26, 1962, as to the farms in Reeves County.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, let me ask you this: Why did it take so long to get these canceled?

Mr. Moss. Mr. Chairman, as we have mentioned here, this seller's certification procedure was sent to the State offices on January 31, 1962. The CHAIRMAN. I understand.

Mr. Moss. The people, several of them, who were affected by it, and in addition to those I named earlier I believe there may have been one or two others who made trips to Washington to discuss this same problem with people in the Department

The CHAIRMAN. Did Billie Sol Estes come up here to discuss his? Mr. Moss. No, sir; I don't believe he did.

The CHAIRMAN. Did he send his attorneys up here to discuss his? Mr. Moss. I don't think he did.

The CHAIRMAN. He had involved 3,123.1 acres; is that correct? Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, let me ask you just as a matter of practical aspects of this, here is a man with all of this cotton in controversy. In fact, all of these were suspect by this time, I guess, or you wouldn't have sent out that certificate, would you, and asked that it be signed? Mr. Moss. That is true.

The CHAIRMAN. The whole works were suspect. Here is a man, Estes, with 3,000-some-odd acres and he was a special suspect by that time, was he not?

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Why does it take the Department of Agriculture 3 months to bring a question like that to a conclusion? Mr. Moss. Well, Mr. Chairman

The CHAIRMAN. This is directly under your division.

Mr. Moss. The people, as we have seen here, many of these are relatively small operators.

The CHAIRMAN. This one I am talking about is not.

Mr. Moss. Well, I had wanted to tell you that part of the reason was based on the visits made to Washington by such people as Marcus Dingler, who made it clear to us and to the lawyers in the Department that if he could not work out some kind of arrangement so that he could keep this 308 acres, or this 330.5 acres, that the expense that he had gone to in order to get this land ready for cotton in 1961 was such that it would bankrupt him.

The CHAIRMAN. What did that have to do with Mr. Estes?

Mr. Moss. Because Estes was in the same position as Dingler insofar as the approval of these allotments was concerned.

The CHAIRMAN. Was it a fact that you were trying not to do anything about it?

Mr. Moss. We were trying our best to do what was reasonable under the circumstances.

The CHAIRMAN. You sent out this request for them to simply stateWhat you were confronted with, or what was presented to you was what was alleged to be, and what you had found out in Alabama, was a scheme and device to get this cotton acreage allotment out of the eminent domain pool into cultivation; isn't that correct?

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. You are confronted with it here, and something prompted you, certainly there had been enough to prompt you, to send out a certificate saying, "Now, you must sign this if you want these cotton allotments approved. Cooperate with us. Give us a certificate that this was a bona fide sale and in good faith."

Mr. Moss. Well, specifically, some of these people came in and sai that the people that they had dealt with had not made the payna's and didn't think that they would.

The CHAIRMAN. Wasn't this of enough importance for the Dep ment of Agriculture to summon Estes in here for a conference a'z it?

Mr. Moss. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. It wasn't?

Mr. Moss. I think we felt that the burden was on him, and that f he wanted the allotments, then it was up to him to provide these ortfications. But we were dealing with the others.

The CHAIRMAN. You let him go ahead and plant the crop, di: you?

Mr. Moss. No, sir, I don't think he planted any 1962 cotton on t basis of these pooled allotments.

The CHAIRMAN. Did any of these plant their 1962 crop?

Mr. Moss. Yes; I think some of them did.

The CHAIRMAN. Estes didn't plant any cotton this year at all? Mr. Moss. That is our understanding, that his plantings in were limited to his regular allotment.

The CHAIRMAN. He didn't plant on any of these that were controversy?

Mr. Moss. That is our information.

The CHAIRMAN. When was he arrested?

Mr. Moss. I believe it was March 29.

The CHAIRMAN. That was a little before cotton planting time. wasn't it?

Mr. Moss. Just a little; yes.

The CHAIRMAN. That is why he maybe didn't get around to it.

Senator CURTIS. You referred to these other farmers coming to Washington. During what period did they come in?

The CHAIRMAN. He is going to supply that, I believe.

Mr. Moss. Yes, sir; we will supply that, but actually they came in. several of them, after this procedure was issued on January 31. Senator CURTIS. How much after?

Mr. Moss. I would say-well, here is a record that on March & this Dingler was in Washington. That was March 8, 1962. I would say that Duke was here just a little after that.

The CHAIRMAN. Let me ask you what about these that did file their certificates. What happened to them? You say some of them were canceled or rejected in May, most of them in May, on May 31, those that filed. Why were they rejected?

Mr. Moss. Various reasons, Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Was any one of them approved? Was a singe one of them approved?

Mr. Moss. No, sir. Those that were filed were all rejected.

The CHAIRMAN. All rejected?

Mr. Moss. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Why?

Mr. Moss. Different reasons. Some of them changed the word g on the form. Some we learned had gone back and renegotiated the contract that they had made originally with the displaced owner. It was a variety of reasons.

The CHAIRMAN. I take it even after sending this out there was not a single one of them approved even though they filed the certificate? Mr. Moss. No, sir. But during that period of February and March there were a number of inquiries, and these visits I mentioned. I have not mentioned this, but Mr. Dennison was in touch with Washington. I don't recall that he came here, but he wrote in and he called in.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you got his letters?

Mr. Moss. Anything he wrote, I believe, is addressed to the General Counsel. I do not have those.

The CHAIRMAN. The General Counsel has those letters?

Mr. Moss. I am sure he does.

The CHAIRMAN. Have they been made available to the committee? Mr. O'DONNELL. I don't know, Senator. I will check. I think they probably have.

The CHAIRMAN. I would like to request the General Counsel, if he hasn't, to make those letters available to the committee. I want to see what is going on during this period of time.

I want to be absolutely fair to your department, your section, and to you, Mr. Moss. This is an issue. This is one of the matters in which we are inquiring into as to the efficiency, how this thing all happened, and came about. All I want is to make the record speak the truth in these things so we get a true picture of just what happened.

If you have letters from Dennison during that time that you were negotiating about this thing, let's get the record complete on it. Do you have copies of the letters yourself, in your division? Mr. Moss. No, sir; we do not.

The CHAIRMAN. Why would not such correspondence come through your division?

Mr. Moss. Well, Dennison, I think, had certain variations on this procedure.

The CHAIRMAN. Wouldn't it come through your division?

Mr. Moss. Not if he addressed it to the General Counsel; no, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Would you know anything about any communications with the General Counsel on matters such as this?

Mr. Moss. On most matters we work closely together.
The CHAIRMAN. You would know about the letters?
Mr. Moss. They would tell us on something like this.

The CHAIRMAN. When would you see one? Dennison writes the General Counsel. Does the General Counsel send you a copy of that letter for your files?

Mr. Moss. Not necessarily.

The CHAIRMAN. How do you know the General Counsel, then, received the letter?

Mr. Moss. I believe in this matter they called and told us that they had received a letter from Dennison.

The CHAIRMAN. "They"? Who called you?

Mr. Moss. I don't recall

The CHAIRMAN. Then would you go down and see the letter?

Mr. Moss. I could; yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Did you?

Mr. Moss. I don't believe I did on this one.