The CHAIRMAN. In other words, we have the same cubic feet opening, but you divert simply in the end of the opening and not in the

extent.

Mr. BAKER. Yes.

Mr. NEWTON. And if you will go down on the mountain side and pull down some more dirt on the side where you don't navigate and close up the opening, you will raise the level of that lake some more. Mr. BAKER. That is entirely possible, but Congress has not proposed that.

The CHAIRMAN. Yes; Congress has considered that at this session. We have considered the question of trying to place regulatory works, deepening channels, in every way to remedy the very deplorable conditions on the Great Lakes. That has been before the committee, and we have adopted the provisions, and they will go into this bill.

Mr. HULL. Well, this deplorable condition is on account of the lack of rainfall.

Mr. SEGER. Mr. Secretary, during our hearings it developed by testimony presented by engineers that the Lake levels could be kept up by compensatory or regulatory works. If that is practicable, then all the opposition would be removed?

Mr. BAKER. No; all the opposition would not be removed; the majort part of it would.

Mr. NEWTON. That part of it pertaining to navigation would be removed, would it not?

Mr. BAKER. But, gentlemen, the question you are dealing with here is so much larger than the one we are talking about.

The CHAIRMAN. Could you not answer it this way? If you install the regulatory works and prove you have the amount of water you need for navigation, there would be no objection

Mr. BAKER. Create the surplus first and use it afterwards; but this is the answer, Mr. Chairman: The State of Illinois has 70 miles of front on this entire waterway system, and it contributes the State of Illinois contributes, if everything is allowed to be as nature fixed it and the Calumet and the Chicago Rivers make their natural flow into Lake Michigan-the State of Illinois, which has only 70 miles of front on this system would contribute 1,200 cubic second-feet to the maintenance of the Lake levels, that is all.

Now, what Illinois and Chicago have done with their 70 miles. of front as against 3,000 miles of frontage that New York and Pennsylvania and the other States have, what they have done is to reverse the flow of the Chicago and Calumet Rivers, so that they do not contribute a drop, but they take away their natural contributions and then abstract in addition to that waters contributed by other States to the extent of eight times as much. Now, I think that is the serious question. What Illinois and Chicago can do, and what you authorize them to do, Ohio can do; we could reverse the flow of the Cuyahoga River.

Mr. HULL. They did start to do that once, didn't they?

Mr. BAKER. Well, they ought to be stopped if they did. I suppose so. But if you recognize that once you will destroy the water system, and I don't want Cleveland left on dry land, away from any navigable water.

92637-26-4

Mr. MICHAELSON. Why does the gentleman charge up to Illinois the acts of nature for which Illinois or Ohio or Pennsylvania or any other State are equally responsible?

Mr. BAKER. I tried to exclude that. If you are talking about the 212 feet, I said at the opening that we charged Chicago with only 6 inches of it.

Mr. MCDUFFIE. Do I correctly understand you, Mr. Secretary, to take the position that those who agreed upon a treaty dealing with this problem did not take into consideration the amount of water that was being abstracted for sewage purposes at Chicago?

Mr. BAKER. No, sir; I did not say that.

Mr. MCDUFFIE. I did not mean to say you said that, but I am asking you your judgment as to the treaty rather than what you said probably. As I caught the import of your suggestion it was that there was a difference between diversion and abstraction in the minds of those who were dealing with this matter when the treaty was agreed upon; in other words, wherever a city was simply diverting water and putting it back the existing diversions were not to be disturbed, but those who made the treaty probably did not consider the amount of water that was being abstracted at Chicago or elsewhere, as far as that is concerned.

Mr. BAKER. No, sir; I do not think that would be a fair thing for me to say. What I think happened is this. When the treaty makers got together they realized that the Government of the United States had a difficult question with Chicago. There is always a question when the Federal Government is undertaking to control State actions. They realized that there was a difficulty between the Government of the United States and the city of Chicago, which was exemplified by the existence of a suit at that time; and so they said we will make this ratio at Niagara Falls so as to give recognition to the fact that an American company is on the Canadian side, transporting its power back to the Untied States, and we will simply put in here that this is made without prejudice to existing diversions. Now, the controversy between Mr. Hull and me as to the use of the word "diversion" is whether that was a recognition on the part of Canada of the 6 inches as a permanent status

Mr. MCDUFFIE. And you are of the opinion that it recognized the abstraction of 4,167 cubic feet that was accepted as the legal diversion.

Mr. BAKER. I think that is what they thought was legal at the time they made that treaty.

Mr. McDUFFIE. You do not think that they thought that that 10,000 cubic feet, or any amount above 4,167 cubic feet, was considered as the existing legal diversion?

Mr. BAKER. That is my understanding of it.

Mr. HULL. I would like to ask a question. Probably you or some one else can answer this. What is the amount of tonnage attributed to the lake traffic by the ores of the Misabi range?

Mr. BAKER. Something like 80,000,000 tons a year.

Mr. SABIN. About 50,000,000.

Mr. MANSFIELD. In the hearings before it was 59,000,000 long tons or 66,000,000 short tons.

Mr. DEAL. How long is it estimated that that traffic will continue?

Mr. SABIN. That has never been developed, authorities varying in their opinions on that; but it is generally supposed that there is sufficient to last for a great many years. The ore bodies have not been fully developed yet; they are only developed as they are needed. Mr. DEAL. Twenty or thirty years then, anyway?

Mr. SABIN. Oh, yes; more than 60 years, at least.

Mr. MCDUFFIE. Mr. Secretary, how much water is to-day being diverted at Chicago, according to your understanding?

Mr. BAKER. Eight thousand two hundred cubic second feet. The CHAIRMAN. This report fixes it at 8,250 cubic second feet. Mr. BAKER. That is measured at Lockport, Mr. McDuffie.

Mr. HULL. Plus the domestic water?

Mr. BAKER. No; that is the total diversion, as I understand, measured at Lockport.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, gentlemen, we will take a recess until 2 o'clock, if there is no objection.

Mr. BAKER. Am I to come back?

The CHAIRMAN. I think, Mr. Secretary, that it would be wise for you to come back, because I think during recess something may occur to some of the members that they would like to ask you about. What you have said has been useful and enlightening, and we might want to review the subject a little bit further with you. Let me say this to the members of the committee. We have promised a hearing of 30 minutes to another project at 2 o'clock, so we will meet here at 2 and then adjourn at 2.30 to the caucus room.

(Whereupon at 1.10 p. m. the committee adjourned until 2 o'clock p. m.)

AFTER RECESS

Following the consideration of other business, the committee resumed hearings on the Illinois River project in the caucus room, House Office Building, at 3.45 o'clock p. m.

The CHAIRMAN. Does any member of the committee want to ask any further questions of Secretary Baker?

(No response.)

The CHAIRMAN. Who is in charge of the Great Lakes side? Whom do you want to present?

Mr. BAKER. We have no other witness to offer.

Mr. HULL. Why not adjourn until tomorrow morning? We have only two witnesses.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, you are in charge.

Mr. HULL. But are they all through?

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Secretary, so far as the Great Lakes side is concerned, do you have anything more to offer?

Mr. BAKER. We have nothing more to offer, but we would like to have the privilege of offering anything in rebuttal should circumstances so require.

The CHAIRMAN. Of course.

Mr. HULL. I do not want to bring my witnesses on until you are through.

Mr. SOSNOWSKI. We would like to be heard to-morrow morning, if you do not mind.

Mr. BAKER. I would like to say in addition that Mr. Sabin, vice president of the Lake Carriers' Association, and an engineer of long experience with the Lakes, and General Bixby, who was formerly Chief of Engineers, are both here, and if there be any engineering aspects which should occur to the members of the committee as a result of what I said or of what the committee asked me that has not been adequately covered, I would be glad to have either witness respond to any questions you care to ask.

The CHAIRMAN. Then, if it is satisfactory, we will consider the Great Lakes side closed except for rebuttal and except for the statements of the members from the Great Lakes section, and Mr. Hull will call Mr. Barnes.

STATEMENT OF M. G. BARNES, CHIEF ENGINEER, DIVISION OF WATERWAYS, STATE OF ILLINOIS

The CHAIRMAN. Now, what I think will interest the committee the most is this: This report comes in in a definite form, for certain things. Now, it may be interesting to go off into other things, but what we are particularly interested in, I think, is what is in this report and its recommendations. That is what is before us. Follow your own course and what is suggested by Mr. Hull, but so far as I am individually concerned, and I think so far as the members of the committee are concerned, that interests us more than anything else. Mr. NEWTON. May I ask Mr. Barnes a question?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes.

Mr. NEWTON. Have you mapped out a course that you had planned to follow?

Mr. BARNES. In a general way; yes.

The CHAIRMAN. If you prefer to follow it, follow it, of course. Mr. NEWTON. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Barnes is not a public speaker, and it seems to me that if you would let him follow his course until he gets through it would be better.

The CHAIRMAN. That will be perfectly satisfactory.

Mr. BARNES. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, I am here representing the State of Illinois, its administration, and especially the Division of Waterways, which division deals with all waterway matters in our State.

Mr. NEWTON. May I ask what your position is?

Mr. BARNES. I am chief engineer of the State Division of Water

ways.

Mr. NEWTON. And how long have you held that?

Mr. BARNES. Eight years.

Mr. NEWTON. How long have you been connected with the State in the waterways division?

Mr. BARNES. Ever since the 1st of January, 1917, and, for your information and the information of the committee, I might also say that I spent eight years on the improvement of the New York Barge Canal and four years on a study and improvement of the Great Lakes system, so that I have a little knowledge along those lines.

Mr. NEWTON. Am I correctly informed that you spent some time. at the Soo in connection with the work there?

Mr. BARNES. Yes, sir; four years.

Mr. NEWTON. That is what you referred to as your Great Lakes experience?

Mr. BARNES. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Were you then associated with the engineering service?

Mr. BARNES. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. All right, Mr. Barnes.

Mr. BARNES. I want to offer as an exhibit in this hearing a letter from Mr. William F. Mulhill, superintendent of waterways, addressed to Maj. Rufus W. Putnam, under date of January 25, 1926, bearing on this question. Mr. Mulhill has set forth quite clearly the position of the State and what it aims to do in the improvement of waterways.

In general it is interested in cheaper transportation. The farmers and merchants and manufacturers and others of the Middle West are terribly handicapped at this time because of high transportation costs, and we confidently believe that the proper improvement of the rivers of the Mississippi Valley will aid materially in relieving the farmers from their present distressing situation.

As you know, the Middle West is more than a thousand miles farther from the sea than other nations competing for the same trade. That means that we must pay this exorbitant freight rate before we are on a parity with other nations, and, in addition to that, we also have the highest paid labor in the world, probably, and taking these two things together our farmers and merchants feel keenly the need of cheaper transportation.

The State of Illinois has been trying for 30 years to secure better transportation down the Illinois River. We came before Congress at least 25 years ago asking for an appropriation. We were told in effect by certain Congressmen that what we wanted was to develop power and not navigation, and they told us to go on and develop our power and when we came to navigation Congress would help us. We want back and went through every county in the State and secured an amendment to our constitution permitting an appropriation of $20,000,000 for power and waterways.

Since that time, war has intervened and prices have increased enormously and it is taking every dollar of our money to develop waterways and we are spending nothing for water power.

So that we have kept our faith with Congress in the appropriation and expenditure of our money for transportation purposes, and if power is to be developed the money must come from some other source, and I do not know where from. I doubt if we can get it through another amendment to our constitution.

But the point is that we are keeping faith with Congress. When Congress told us to go back and appropriate money and that they would then aid us, we have done that, and we are spending our money now.

Mr. NEWTON. How much money has been expended?

Mr. BARNES. About $3,000,000 has already been expended and about $2,000,000 contracted to be expended. We are letting con-. tracts now, and I am hurried to get home from this meeting to prepare other contracts now ready for letting.