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Mr. PARKER. Oh, I have before me a bill introduced by Mr. Walsh. known as House joint resolution 382, which is as follows:

[H. J. Res. 382, Sixty-fifth Congress, third session.]

JOINT RESOLUTION Directing the United States Coast Guard to resume its operations under the Treasury Department.

Whereas the public interest requires that the Coast Guard resume its normal functions in connection with the protection of the customs revenue, enforcement of the navigation laws, and the conservation of life and property at sea and along the coast, at the earliest practicable time and regardless of the date when peace may be officially proclaimed; and

Whereas the Coast Guard is no longer required by the Navy Department for the active prosecution of war: Therefore be it

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That, in accordance with the intent of the act approved January twenty-eighth, nineteen hundred and fifteen, entitled "An Act to create the Coast Guard by combining therein the existing Life-Saving Service and Revenue-Cutter Service," the Coast Guard shall cease to operate as a part of the Navy, and resume its operations under the Treasury Department from and after the date of the adoption of this joint resolution.

Capt. AUSTIN. No, sir; that is not the bill we are considering. We are considering Mr. Campbell's bill, being H. R. 13392.

The CHAIRMAN. You may proceed with your statement, Capt. Austin.

Capt. AUSTIN. There are three branches of the public service interested in this, as I stated at the outset-the Coast Guard officers, the Navy Department, and certain civilians. I will state the reasons why they desire the passage of this bill: The opponents of this measure will state perhaps, and have stated, that we are advocating this measure on account of self-interest, on account of desiring promotion, and things of that kind. Well, of course that enters into our desires to a certain extent; we would just as soon be promoted. We would like to be promoted, and are ambitious, like anybody else. But there is another and stronger reason why we desire this legislation, and that is this: Because for the last 18 months, during the active conduct of the war and while the Coast Guard was cooperating with the Navy, we were detailed to larger and more responsible duties on naval vessels and throughout the operations of the Navy. And our men have performed those duties satisfactorily, and made good in those positions, and do not desire to go back to what we consider insignificant details under the Treasury Department. That is one reason that influences the Coast Guard officers in asking this transfer.

And here is a point that perhaps some of you gentlemen are not familiar with: Coast Guard officers are educated at an academy maintained by the Treasury Department for the education of officers in that service.

Mr. PARKER. The same as Annapolis, the place where naval officers are trained?

Capt. AUSTIN. Yes, sir. When they graduate from that Coast Guard Academy the officers are fitted fundamentally not only for Coast Guard duties, but they are fitted for more responsible duties under the Navy. They go out from that academy and serve on the small vessels of the Coast Guard, where they soon become proficient to perform any duty that may be required of them. In the Coast Guard on account of the slowness of promotion, and promotion in

that service is limited, the officers soon become able to perform any duty, and they are competent to be commanding officers of those vessels as has been demonstrated in the war; yet on account of the system, they must perform the duties of junior officers. Officers who are able to take charge of the manipulation and organization of big machinery plants are compelled to be junior engineers and watch officers on these small vessels, such vessels as under the Navy system would assign to such jobs petty officers or perhaps chief petty officers. That is not only humiliating to those officers but results in a dead loss to the Government. Those officers are interested in doing away with that condition. These conditions would be borne without a murmur of discontent if it were not for the fact that bigger and more responsible positions are available, and during the past eighteen months we have served on such details and made good. Mr. COOPER, of Ohio. What is your position?

Capt. AUSTIN. I am a captain in the Coast Guard.

Mr. COOPER, of Ohio. What has been your duty in the last eighteen months? I mean as to the Coast Guard?

Capt. AUSTIN. Acting as a part of the navy. We have been performing duty as navigating officers on cruisers and commanding officers on patrol vessels, and any duty, just the same as naval officers of our same rank.

Mr. PARKER. You speak of promotion. When did you graduate from the academy?

Capt. AUSTIN. In 1905.

Mr. PARKER. Did you take rank as ensign then?

Capt. AUSTIN. No, sir; third lieutenant of the Coast Guard.

Mr. PARKER. When did you become first lieutenant and captain? Capt. AUSTIN. I became second lieutenant in 1906, and first lieutenant in 1914, and that is still my permanent rank. I am a temporary captain in the Coast Guard under the Navy Department.

Mr. CAMPBELL. I would now like to ask that Capt. Austin stand aside for the present, so that I may call Admiral McKean.

The CHAIRMAN. Very well.

Mr. CAMPBELL. I will ask Admiral McKean to come forward.

STATEMENT OF ADMIRAL J. S. MCKEAN, ACTING CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS.

Mr. CAMPBELL. I wish you would state why you would favor placing the Coast Guard under the Navy

Admiral MCKEAN. As a matter of Navy Department policy the Secretary of the Navy stated in his hearing before the House Naval Affairs Committee, when the question was brought up there, that until he had consulted with the Secretary of the Treasury and the President he was not ready to advocate any particular policy for the Navy Department in reference to this legislation, but that the coast guard was now in the Navy and would remain with the Navy and under the Navy Department until peace had been declared and a presidential order restored it to the Treasury Department and it resumed its original functions.

As to the desirability of this legislation, the absorption of the Coast Guard into the Navy, my personal views and I think the views

of the Navy have been that the Coast Guard should have been a part of the Navy some time ago, and we were convinced of our theoretical ideas by the practical experience gained during the war. The law already provides that it shall be and remain a part of the Navy during the war. But they are not a part of the Navy in time of peace. And a Navy that is not organized for war in time of peace is not efficient. You have to adapt vessels. You have to reorganize, and you have to change their training somewhat. It takes time for that; time to refit vessels, and there is delay. We were very fortunate in having the conditions such during this war that the delay was not of great importance. We can not expect that again. For efficiency in war, and I believe efficiency in peace, and I am certain for economy, the Coast Guard should be absorbed by the Navy. We can perform their duties. We are performing them now. A part of their vessels are doing Coast Guard work and a part of our own. It is all being done under the district commandants. They use Coast Guard vessels when they are best suited for the work, and they use naval vessels when they are best suited for the work in hand. We use their personnel the same as our own. We have found them very valuable, and theirs a very efficient organization. We need them. I believe they need us. An absorption of the Coast Guard by the Navy would mean a reduction in overhead expense. We have two academies, and we have separate supply stations and repair stations and all that, and we can take care of the Coast Guard without trouble when absorbed into the Navy. We are taking care of it in war times, when that work is only a very small part of what we have to take care of. And we can do it without additional expense along many lines; without additional schools, without additional recruiting stations, without additional offices in Washington, and without the overhead expenses of two organizations. It is a military organization and fundamentally does not belong in the Treasury Department. Its duties are comparatively simple and are comparatively limited. As you have heard Capt. Austin say, in the Navy Department these young ambitious officers will have a broader field, with larger opportunities, and I hate to discourage anybody or to see men discouraged by being put back to minor jobs, that a junior can do in the process of his training for higher duties.

That is in general the departmental view and my own personal views. We have used coast guard men for all sorts of duties. We have used them with the fleet. We have used them in the districts. We have used them for patrol work. And in all these duties they have done well. They are a fine crowd. They should be encouraged instead of being discouraged, though that is not the main reason for recommending this change.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Esch, you may examine the admiral.

Mr. ESCH. Admiral, has this bill the indorsement of the Secretary of the Navy?

Admiral MCKEAN. As to his official indorsement, no, sir; not yet to my knowledge.

Mr. Escн. This bill was introduced by Mr. Campbell on the 14th day of December, and I assume it has been submitted to the Secretary of the Navy, as it has been submitted to the Secretary of the Treasury, though I do not believe there is anything on file from the Secretary of the Navy.

Admiral MCKEAN. I do not think it has been officially referred to the Secretary of the Navy or I would probably have run across the reference.

Mr. Escн. Let me ask the clerk of the committee: Mr. Davis, has this bill been referred to the Secretary of the Navy?

Mr. DAVIS. No, sir; it has not.

Mr. ESCH. It has not been formally referred to him?
Mr. DAVIS. No, sir.

Mr. Escн. It ought to have been referred to the Secretary of the Navy as well as to the Secretary of the Treasury, so as to get the views of both departments.

The CHAIRMAN. I directed that the bill be so referred, and thought that it had been done.

Mr. CAMPBELL. I will say that I furnished the Secretary of the Navy with a copy of the bill, and owing to its interfering with or taking over from another braneh of the Government, namely, the Treasury Department, a part of its work, he said while he was personally friendly to the bill he did not care to interfere to that extent, though he might later come out for the bill. At the present time he is not making any statement.

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Mr. ESCH. So that you are voicing your own private opinion, Admiral?

Admiral MCKEAN. I gave in the beginning what the Secretary of the Navy said in his hearing before the House Committee on Naval Affairs. The other part of it is my own personal opinion and the Navy's opinion in so far as I represent naval opinion.

Mr. Escн. The Revenue-Cutter Service, which was the service. that preceded the Coast Guard Service, but identical with it, antedated the Naval Establishment, did it not?

Admiral MCKEAN. I am not sure of that. I think probably it did. I think they had to get revenues before they had any navy.

Mr. ESCH. So that the old revenue cutter service was the oldest established service we had in the Government; the Navy came afterwards. Do you know what the result has been of the effort to consolidate the old Revenue-Cutter Service with the Navy Department? Admiral McKEAN. Absolutely none.

Mr. ESCH. Do you know that there had been efforts made in prior years to do that?

Admiral McKEAN. I have heard of it in my service at various times. Sometimes it was agitated by the Revenue Cutter Service, and sometimes by elements in our own service, and

Mr. ESCH (interposing). And it has never been accomplished? Admiral MCKEAN. I think the Navy was rather on the fence until within the last few years; but the Coast Guard, as the inheritor of the Revenue Cutter Service, has, I believe, under the administration of its present officers, become more military and more useful to the Navy in time of war than the old Revenue Cutter Service was, through increased efficiency and from the fact that they have taken over the Coast Patrol, which becomes a very important part of the defensive system of the country, and the communication system in time of war.

Mr. Escп. You mean the Life Saving Service?

Admiral MCKEAN. Well, what we call the Coast Guard is the real name for the whole business.

Mr. ESCH. But, it is now a part of the Coast Guard; both of those services have been consolidated by a recent act?

Admiral MCKEAN. Yes, sir.

Mr. Escн. I notice in section 1 of this bill it says:

That the personnel and matériel of the Coast Guard, except such harbor vessels as may be necessary for the proper performance of customs duties, shall become permanently a part of the United States Navy.

That contemplates still the maintenance of a separate force for the collection of customs, doesn't it?

Admiral MCKEAN. Yes; I should take that to mean simply harbor boats to put inspectors aboard their vessels, and to carry them about, and maybe to do some harbor police work in connection with the inspector of customs office in the port..

Mr. EscH. Also, you do not take away by this bill the enforcement of the navigation laws. You leave that still in the Treasury Department, as shown by lines 5 and 6, page 2, of the bill, "except the duties of protection of the customs revenue and enforcement of the navigation laws and other laws pertaining to motor boats." That is not to be taken away, nor are the laws as to motor boats. Now the point I am making is this: You take away from this Revenue Cutter Service, or this Coast Guard Service, as it is now known, certain functions, certain materials, and certain personnel, but still leave the administration or enforcement of the navigation laws and the laws relating to motor boats, as well as laws relating to customs revenue, where they are? That would mean the maintenance of an establishment to carry out those laws; is that right? Admiral McKEAN. I should not think it would take much of an establishment. It is simply harbor police to be connected with the inspectors' forces in a port. In one port it may involve one motor boat, and in another harbor more. That is just harbor police, and is not Coast Guard Service, including cutters, and all that.

Mr. ESCH. Do you say that it applies only to motor boats? Doesn't the Customs Service have work to do in the Behring Sea in connection with pelagic sealing?

Admiral MCKEAN. No, sir; it has nothing to do with the Customs Service. That is the duty of the Department of Commerce, and the Secretary of Commerce is authorized to requisition the service of naval vessels for that duty, as well as of coast guard vessels.

Mr. ESCH. Coast guard vessels perform that duty?

Admiral McKEAN. But the idea is that they will not do it in the future. The Navy has had three or four gunboats up there, and one coast guard vessel. We have it broken up now, and it only takes one gunboat.

Mr. Escн. They always maintain a vessel up there, don't they, at least one?

Admiral MCKEAN. I think so; yes, always one.

Mr. ESCH. So that there would have to be some establishment left even if this bill became a law?

Admiral MCKEAN. Oh, no; the Navy can do that with the same cutter and the same officers and the same personnel.

Mr. EscH. Why do you specifically exempt the navigation laws, the protection of customs revenue, and the laws relating to motor boats from this bill so that there will be some matériel and personnel left?

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