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attend newer schools which were necessitated by the move to suburbia. He falls behind in his schoolwork, not because of less native intelligence, but because there is little incentive to achieve. Classes are crowded, facilities are limited, just as his home is crowded, and cultural advantages such as books are virtually unknown. Such children too often grow up to repeat the pattern of broken homes, unemployment, and mental depression which characterized their own parents.

S. 2528, by including under Public Law 874, the aid to dependent children recipients and children in families of the unemployed in certain areas, provides a practical approach to aiding these who need it

most.

This is an ingenious and facile method of providing assistance to school districts in areas of unemployment. Since it is in the national interest socially, economically, and morally, that the vicious circle of chronic unemployment in this country be eliminated, it is proper that the Federal Government assist schools in meeting their share of this challenge. It precludes any Federal control-a most desirable feature of the impacted aid program-and would require a minimum of additional administrative personnel. The estimated 2 million children who would be included under the proposal are those most apt to become dropouts unless their elementary school opportunity is improved to a degree that they can profit from secondary, vocational, or higher education.

The National Education Association supports S. 2528 as a realistic approach to improving the educational opportunity of those children now most neglected in our public schools. We do not consider this as an adequate substitute for general Federal aid to education, but rather as an essential factor in the war on poverty, which must be basically a war on ignorance. We urge the committee to act favorably on S. 2528.

Now, turning to the other bill before this subcommittee, in addition to the amendment to Public Law 874, we urge the enactment of S. 2725 which will aid those communities stricken by a major disaster to restore and operate their public schools with a minimum of interruption.

The tragic Alaskan earthquake pointed up the need for such standby authority as is provided in S. 2725. Had this law been in effect, the anxiety, the delay, the confusion which resulted from the disaster could have been appreciably lessened. We recognize the remarkable job that the Federal Reconstruction and Development Planning Commission for Alaska and other agencies did in coming to the relief of that State, and commend them for it. However, we still feel that, because of the destruction of a large portion of the local and State property tax base which was suffered, there will be need for further assistance for the operation of the public schools. We in the National Education Association feel that S. 2725 can meet that need, and any others that may arise in other parts of the country.

S. 2725 if enacted is a law we all hope will never be needed. However, experience shows that natural disasters such as earthquakes, tidal waves, floods, hurricanes, tornadoes and the like have not yet been completely conquered by man nor are they likely to be in the near future, if ever. Thus S. 2725 is needed for such major disasters as may occur. This is a carefully thought out proposal, with adequate safeguards against possible abuses. It is in keeping with the

philosophy of civil defense, disaster relief-and sound educational finance.

The National Education Association urges the committee to adopt S. 2528 and S. 2725 as sound and proper amendments to Public Laws 874 and 815, and it commends the chairman of this committee for his perceptiveness in proposing such improvements in this financing program.

Senator MORSE. Thank you very much, Mr. McKay. I will have something to say about your testimony in just a moment, but before I do that, I refer to the conversation and visit that we had before the hearing started in which we were talking about some of the effects of the Alaskan earthquake, and I will make a statement shortly for the record with regard to the effect of the earthquake on Crescent City, Calif., 2,000 or more miles away from the initiation of the earthquake in Alaska.

I understood you to say that the earthquake created a very serious disaster situation in Crescent City. I was aware of it but not aware of it to the degree that you pointed out to me. I thought it would be well if you would summarize for this record what you told me and relate it to S. 2725 because I think that is the kind of a situation that S. 2725 could be of some assistance in resolving.

Mr. MCKAY. Senator Morse, while the example of Alaska is current and dramatic, it is surprising and little known, perhaps, that one of the side effects of that earthquake was felt in California, as you say, over 2,000 miles away, where through the results of a tidal wave that was generated by the earthquake, there was very heavy loss of life, in fact, a greater loss of life in Crescent City, Calif., than in some of the major Alaskan cities and very heavy property damage resulted, and of course, some hours delayed from the quake itself in Alaska. And ironically, California would be in a position to receive some aid from the Alaska quake if a bill such as this had been in effect at the time of that disaster.

Senator MORSE. We did not suffer as much damage at Waldport as in Crescent City, but Waldport on the coast of Oregon and several of our other coast towns suffered a similar amount of property damage. I certainly think we should have on the statute books a law that provides for the kind of emergency assistance that this law provides for.

With regard to your statement that the bill, 2528, for some assistance to impacted school districts that are impacted because of the large number of dependent children, children on welfare, families on welfare, unemployed people in the school district, offered by me, certainly it is not a substitute for the kind of legislation for elementary and secondary schools that is needed. I shall be very brief in these comments, but I want this in the record once more.

I am only offering this bill, along with the cosponsors, because school districts that are impacted, with large numbers of dependent children and welfare families and unemployed, particularly representative school districts in slum areas, are much more hurt economically, much more hurt from the standpoint of not having adequate tax base, than the school districts that are getting huge sums of money at the present time under the so-called Federal impacted area laws, 874 and 815 laws. I supported those laws. Just yesterday in the full committee there was accepted the unanimous recommendation of my subcommittee to extend those laws for another 2 years, but it was also provided

that the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare should conduct a thorough study and investigation of the operation and administration of those laws. No doubt about the fact that the spot check sampling of the Comptroller General of the United States shows that a lot of money is going into too many school districts of this country under the impacted area laws that in my judgment those districts are not entitled to receive in comparison with the needs of a great many other school districts of this country that do not have a Federal installation in their vicinity.

In fact, if you will look at the chamber of commerce propaganda and brochures from the communities into which these Federal installations were finally placed, and review all the promises made by the chambers of commerce and community groups to get those installations located in their communities, you will appreciate the point that I now make. Those installations themselves over the years have greatly raised the tax base of those communities. Many of those communities are much better able to support their schools than communities in which there are no Federal installations at all. They are much better able to support their schools than the cities with schools in the slum areas and the areas having schools where there are large numbers of dependent children, welfare families, and unemployed people.

Now, I should vote to continue impacted area school aid legislation after careful study has been made and we find what school districts there are that really deserve the money on the basis of the fact that they are impacted. By that I mean placed at a disadvantage because of the fact that the Federal Government has moved in with a Federal installation.

Do not forget, in many of the districts these installations we are now talking about have been in existence now for 15 or 20 years. For all the taxpayers of the United States to be pouring that kind of a discriminatory subsidy into some of those school districts has almost become a shakedown and a racket.

Let us face the facts.

I am a little disappointed that some of our educators of this country are not coming forward themselves and asking for a housecleaning in regard to this matter of Federal subsidy in areas where there is an atomic energy plant or shipyard or reservation or whatnot when they are in a much better position to support adequate schools on a tax base than the kinds of school districts we are talking about in this bill that I am offering.

Now, that statement of mine will be misunderstood by some, but only by those who want to misunderstand it because they cannot deny the facts. The facts are perfectly clear. We must continue to come to the assistance of school districts that are in fact now impacted as a result of the operations of the Federal Government. When we are providing this kind of Federal aid to the benefit of a third of the boys and girls going to elementary and secondary schools in this country, I also sometimes get a little out of patience with those who do not want to do something for the other two-thirds of our young students, many of whom are attending schools much more impacted. Of course, the fact that we are giving this kind of Federal aid to a third of our school districts just knocks into a cocked hat the old bromides about Federal aid to education being a bad thing be

cause of Federal intervention or Federal control. In all my years presiding over this subcommittee, when that argument has been offered by a witness, I simply paused long enough to say, "Come on, give me some evidence." No witness to date has offered a scintilla of evidence of Federal interference, domination, or control of a single school district in this country. We have got to get this out in the open again and again until it is scotched.

Now, I agree with everything that you say about the importance of providing adequate Federal aid to the elementary and secondary schools, much more important than providing aid to the colleges and universities of this country, as important as that is. No one has worked harder than the chairman of this subcommittee for Federal aid to the colleges and universities of this country and I will continue to so do, but what I am trying to do here and now is to get as many people as I can to see and understand the fact that we must look at the educational problem in this country in its totality. In my judgment it is more important that we provide adequate support for a child's beginning in the educational ladder climb than that we provide educational support at the end of it at the college and university level. You and I know what our obstacles have been. You and I know that there are some very serious political factors that have made it impossible for us to date to pass a general Federal aid to education bill. I close this little gratuitous advice this morning for this record by saying that unless the American people face up to it, unless the American people face up to it quickly, and stop wasting the potential brainpower of this country, unless they do something to provide the aid to tackle the problems that are created, that are basically the cause of some of the disturbances that blot the social scene of America today, we are headed for a score or two score of years of serious trouble in this country. We cannot waste the precious brainpower resource of this country the way we are doing it and not pay a tragic bill by way of social cost.

As chairman of this subcommittee I pledge that although I have not been able to carry out yet the promise that I made that I was going to give the Senate an opportunity to vote on every segment of S. 580, which was President Kennedy's great legislative program, I shall in this session have done my best to get votes on as many segments of it as possible. I have not been able to get clearance yet for a general Federal aid to education bill for elementary and secondary schools, but I say for this record this morning that come the next session of Congress, I am going to be right in there calling for hearings on proposals of this type again. I may again be confronted with what I have been confronted with in the last 2 years. I may have to segmentize again. This is only a segment that I am offering this morning because I was blocked in trying to get a general Federal aid bill for a variety of reasons which are well known to you, Mr. McKay. I close by saying that the NEA has been criticized by some, unjustly and unfairly, for its work in the field of seeking to obtain Federal aid to education for elementary and secondary schools. I commend the NEA. I want to testify that it has been a great source of strength to this committee in helping us to accomplish what we have already accomplished and I am therefore greatly pleased that in your statement this morning you have pointed out that this bill and the other

bills we have offered are no substitutes for a general Federal aid to education bill for elementary and secondary schools. I agree. Next session of Congress, I am going to continue to press for general aid and shall meet such opposition as it arises.

The Senator from Texas.

Senator YARBOROUGH. Mr. Chairman, I commend the distinguished chairman of this subcommittee for calling these hearings. It is my honored privilege to be a cosponsor of the bills S. 2528 and S. 2725, and I want to make a remark off the record here.

(Discussion off the record.)

Senator YARBOROUGH. I want to say, Mr. Chairman, that I am not discouraged about the output of education legislation of this 88th Congress. I am disappointed it is not more, but with the five acts that have already been passed, we have an educational legislative output that is one of the most fruitful in the history of this country.

We have the Medical Education Act to build medical schools and lend money to students who go there to help students borrow money which relieves that much pressure on the National Defense Education Act loans, and the College Facilities Act to build academic facilities and libraries in colleges; and the Vocational Education Act which has the work-study plan to pay students to work half a day so as to earn enough money to go to school half a day, to build residences in vocational schools with Federal Government assistance for the first time in history. We also have the Mental Retardation Act which has special educational provisions to train teachers of both the mentally retarded and any handicapped child, and then the Library Facilities Act which extends the Library Act to cities of any size to get books into the hands of people. And now we have the action of the full committee yesterday, sparked by the action of your subcommittee in the expansion of the National Defense Education Act into certain. fields of social science. I regret that the National Defense Education Act does not apply to all the field of social science.

I yield to the distinguished chairman.

Senator MORSE. I am so glad the Senator from Texas has made the statement he made because although we know that there are many needs still to be met, President Johnson is quite right when he pointed out at the time that he signed the higher education bill, the MorseGreen Act and the Vocational Education Act, the Morse-Perkins bill, that those bills along with the other bills that the Senator from Texas has mentioned constitute greater progress in this Congress than has been made in all of the 100 years preceding. More progress has been made in the matter of education legislation in this session of Congress than in a century. In fact, the last great landmark educational bill, as President Johnson pointed out, was the Morrill Act of 1862, and I do not want the Senator to be embarrassed at all when I say that we could have made a much better record if we could have adopted the most democratic educational bill that anyone has proposed, and that is the GI bill for peacetime veterans to do for them what the GI bills of World War II did for World War II and Korean veterans.

We are going to fight for that come the next session of Congress, along with an elementary and secondary school aid bill. But I am glad that you have put in this record the accomplishment of the Congress in this session. From my vantage point sometimes I can

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