lic, as to whether or not we should sustain the major basic decisions that the committee tentatively made and which are embodied both in this print and in the earlier print, which is in a different form.

This is in the form of a House resolution. Clearly, we cannot act in this committtee without a quorum and we do not at the moment have a quorum. So we will merely be discussing.

At the request of the members of the committee I last week sent out a letter to every Member of the House soliciting their comments on our tentative product. We had already begun to receive comments, formally and informally, from Members of the House and others. We solicit the views of all who are interested.

Those views will be circulated and they will be considered; as we rather informally deal with a subject, those views in personal conversation, in telephone conversation, and in writing. Having views in writing is a little easier for us to deal with systematically but inevitably in the process we will be hearing from people on an individual basis, on a group basis, representatives of groups, and so on. We solicit all the comments that we can obtain.

Although we have expressed our tentative sort of consensus, we are locked into nothing at this stage of the game. Frankly, I think we have a rather extraordinary good product.

Just for the record and for your interest I will say that this is not the product of the chairman, of the chairman and the vice chairman, of the chairman, the vice chairman and the staff. It is very much the product of the committee.

I will describe the process a little bit. The committee, has had weeks of hearings. There is an index so you will have no difficulty in finding the part of the hearing that you might be interested in. They are not just hearings that you can't find anything in. They are available with a separate index.

After the series of hearings we began a whole series of informal discussions. The first part was very pleasant. It was very pleasant to inform ourselves as best we could as to what the problems were and how perhaps we should deal with the problems.

Then we came to the difficult part, which is where one suggests change. As one suggests change one upsets somebody, or somebody else, or perhaps a great number of people. There was a very interesting transition as we moved from absorbing to deciding.

At some point in time we decided to get together for 2 days in a row. It happened in my house, with a much more crowded situation than this. Seven of the members of the committee were able to be there. We used a draft proposed by Mr. Martin as the basis for discussion.

At the conclusion of that 2-day effort we thought we were beginning to come close to some principles. We then asked Mr. Sarbanes and Mr. Steiger to work with the staff to come up with more specific proposals.

For example, there had been a great question in the committee as to whether we would go for a one-track approach or two-track approach, one-track meaning that each Member of the House would have one major committee assignment; two tracks suggesting that there might be a two-committee assignment approach.

The recommendation of that effort was then discussed exhaustively and at length, but again informally, and resulted in the final product.

We are well aware that there are a great many questions in the minds of a great many interest groups and a great many Members.

What we propose to do today is to initiate the process that will lead up to a formal and final action. We discussed doing this and I think we will proceed to discuss in fact, but, obviously, will not be able to act unless we have a quorum-and perhaps not want to act-on the question of whether we have reconsidered in the light of some of the suggestions, in the light of some of the complaints the notion of having one committee assignment per Member, one major committee assignment, which, in turn, inevitably leads to a certain kind of committee organization setup different from the kind of committee organization setup you would have if you assumed that each Member might have two committee assignments.

As you know, our tentative proposal suggests 15 major committees and 5 minor committees with a Member only being able to be assigned to one of the major committees. Obviously, the others and they are not really minor but could be considered track 2 as compared with track 1, because one of the ones that we list as a dual assignment is the Budget Committee which nobody would suggest is minor. So the thing we will discuss today is the question of whether we want to hew to that idea, generally speaking, of a major committee assignment among relatively equal committees for each Member.

I will ask Mr. Martin if he wishes to add to that very brief summary of an enormously complicated process.

Mr. MARTIN. You have covered it very adequately, Mr. Chairman. I have no further comment.

Chairman BOLLING. Does any other Member wish to talk?

If they do not wish to add to it or subtract from it, I would suggest that we ask Mr. Steiger to start out on the question of why we decided and what the arguments were for having the single-assignment approach as the beginning of a discussion.

Mr. STEIGER. Mr. Chairman, to refresh your memory let's go back to the first page of the committee report that accompanied that first initial draft.

Don't hold me to it, but there were four things that struck me as fundamental in the decision to strive to achieve essentially a one-track system. The first was that one of the problems that the House has at the present time is a lack of comprehensiveness. That is to say that the present committee system makes it more difficult for the House to have a perception of a public policy issue because we are fragmented and split.

Second, there was a concern raised as to the use of a Member's time, and the difficulty that, again, the present system allows, the difficulty of having Members who can spend an adequate amount of time when they find themselves split in some cases between two committees, in some cases between three committees, in some cases between three committees and a joint committee.

That one individual who serves on three committees and a joint committee has a difficult time trying to figure out what he is doing in any one of the committees.

Third, there was the thought that the committee, itself, that is to say the role of the committee within the House, important as it always has been, ought to retain and, in fact, be enhanced in importance, and, therefore, we tried to create a system that allowed competing views

within the same committee, and also, fourth, allowed for Members to come from different areas of the country with different perspectives and different backgrounds in terms of their approach to policy issues. Those four fundamental principles were the bases on which I think in the initial draft this committee opted for a one-track system. It may not be perfect, and I think all of us can argue about whether that initial draft succeeded in creating equal committees on the 15. On balance, I am satisfied that we came very close to doing it. But what it did do, in my judgment, and what it does give to the House, is a way by which we strengthen the capability of the House, one, in a comprehensive view of issues; two, in enabling the House to have a more rational system for determining what was going on; and, third and fourth, to make sure that the committees attracted, or at least tried to make sure that the committees attracted, different kinds of Members from different parts of the country, and also tried to enable the committee, within itself, to have some competing factions which would better balance the judgment of that committee.

I don't know what more, Mr. Chairman, I could add to that. That about sums up why we came to where we are at the present time.

Mr. MARTIN. If the chairman will yield, I think, Bill, everybody agreed that we had testimony after testimony from the Members raising the point and complaining, if I may use that word, concerning dual committee assignments and having to be in two or three subcommittees at the same time. They simply couldn't adequately cover the subject matter that was assigned to them under their jurisdiction. Our first committee print that we circulated contains an explanation of some of the problems such as this that Members face. I haven't had a single Member come up and object to the one-track system which we have proposed. Therefore, I would say it is acceptable and the committee should adopt it. We have a quorum here now, Mr. Chairman. Chairman BOLLING. That sounds like a call for direct action. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. If the gentleman will yield, I fervently hope we stick by our guns and do advocate that Members have one standing committee only. I think too many of us are grasshoppers. Inevitably we have to be grasshoppers with so many different issues on which to vote and form judgments. But I think in committee assignments we are grasshoppers and we don't really focus enough. That, plus the fractionating of jurisdictions of the committees, creates a very real problem.

As a practical matter there are some vested interests on the part of Members in the two or three committees which they now hold. Coming over to this meeting, I was told by a young Member that he wished he could get on Foreign Affairs, which would be his major interest if he could get on. But he wouldn't consider getting off of Agriculture because politically it was important to him, or he felt it was important to him, that his district be represented on the Agriculture Committee. To a very considerable extent there is an interest on the part of many Members in the protection of their political interests, as they see it, in assignment or continued assignment to a particular committee. Whether or not that means he will focus a great deal of personal attention or not is another question.

There has been a suggestion made that there should be some kind of grandfathering to allow a Member to continue a major interest on

one committee that would evaporate if he should be forced to choose between the two committees which he is now on, or if jurisdiction should be transferred out of a committee on which he serves. So we must recognize a practical situation, even though merit may be on the side of single track, that there are Members who feel strongly that they like the two-track system and don't want to see it changed or would be reluctant to see it changed.

Mr. MARTIN. Peter, I understand the Foreign Affairs Committee does a great deal of travel. That wouldn't influence this gentleman's opinion, would it?

Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. I am not sure why he is so interested in Foreign Affairs, but he views his service on Agriculture as important to his district and he would be reluctant to get off.

I serve on the Committee on Committees, the Republican group that assigns Members. We have a lot of applications for service on committees on the basis of political considerations. This is in spite of the fact that these Members already serve on a major committee. So we have a practical problem with respect to what seems to be a very modest and reasonable suggestion, that no Member should serve on more than one standing committee at any time.

Chairman BOLLING. If I may make a comment which is procedural before we go on, is there anybody in here who is not interested in this subject? We have indicated what we will talk about today. We may or may not act on it.

What we are going to talk about is the question of the fundamental decision that we made at the beginning of one major committee assignment for each Member, which has implications that lead to a limited number of committees.

The next thing we talk about, when we dispose of this conversation, is going to be, with or without action, the question of jurisdiction. It is not that we made a mistake in estimating the amount of public interest in the markup, as we got the only room available. We have a problem of some people on the outside who might be interested in this subject and if there are any of you on the inside who are not interested in the subject, if you would, let the ones on the outside come in. That would be fine.

We are not trying to get anybody to leave. We will, as I said, see if it is possible to get a larger room. For a long, long time we had a large room and had some fascinating hearings and a great many other interesting things. It took us a long time to get the room but often we had almost no public audience. Now we are at a stage where we could only get this room today and we seem to have more people than there is space in the room.

If there is anybody not interested in the one-track approach argument I wish they would let somebody who is come in.

The one-tier system is absolutely fundamental to the whole concept of this committee report, the tentative committee report, that one member will have one major assignment. There will be 15 major committees and 5 not minor ones but 5 on which you can serve additionally if you serve on 1 of the 15. You can't say they are minor committees because the proposed Budget Committee is one of the ones on which there can be dual service.

Mr. Stephens?

Mr. STEPHENS. I agree that what you have said that it is very fundamental to decide this before we can decide the other things. I think we ought to look at one or two things that it would effect if it is as fundamental as we think it is. That is, the recommendation we have for the so-called minor committees.

In essence, that is supposedly what we have now. That is why people are on two committees, except when you have designated some of the major committees as exclusive committees. We have that now.

There are two particular areas that have raised the question in my mind as to what we would do in redesignating some of the committees that we first recommended we abolish, and redesignating them as major committees and minor committees. There are two, specifically, that I am thinking of, Small Business and Merchant Marine and Fisheries. As to whether they would be considered in our first tentative decision as minor committees or whether we bring them back in as major committees should be determined.

If we did bring them back as minor committees and allow dual committee membership, then you have seven committees, and when you are getting down to that you are abandoning the idea of having one committee to serve on. Those committees will meet.

Mr. MARTIN. You are chairman of the Small Business Subcommittee in Banking and Currency, aren't you?

Mr. STEPHENS. Yes.

Mr. MARTIN. Has your subcommittee been active?

Mr. STEPHENS. No, not up until this year.

Mr. MARTIN. Was it last year?

Mr. STEPHENS. No.

The work of the Subcommittee on Small Business in Banking and Currency up until last year was handled by the full committee. When the subcommittee was created, after rule changes were made that the chairman of the committee couldn't also be chairman of a subcommittee, then I became the chairman of the subcommittee. But it has not been an active committee.

I have stated many times the reason it hasn't is because of the split in the jurisdiction of the oversighted and the legislative functions.

Right now I don't know whether we want to call for a solution to that, but it has to be taken into consideration, as to how far we are going to continue to say that you can serve on two committees and not to do away with what we hope will be to encourage people to spend more time with their committee assignments.

Mr. MARTIN. Bob, wasn't one of the original intents, and I think it is set forth in this report on the first page, probably, that we were going to try to equalize the workload between the committees of the House?

Mr. STEPHENS. Yes.

Mr. MARTIN. From a practical standpoint I don't think you can equalize the workload between the Small Business Committee and the Merchant Marine and Fisheries, House Administration, Veterans Affairs and Standards of Official Conduct with Interstate and Foreign Commerce, Education and Labor, Ways and Means and so on. I think they are going to have to be on the right side of the column. Now we have five on the right side. When we end up with five or end up with six or seven, I think we could still be following funda