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and to the state of the world in general, it was thought wise to do this until we settled down.

Mr. KEATING. It was a matter of security.

Mr. GRAHAM. Yes, sir.

Mr. KEATING. That security was more likely to be attained by having this done by the Coast Guard than by Commerce?

Mr. GRAHAM. Yes; as one of the established agencies of the Government of long standing. Their reputation was impeccable.

Mr. LEWIS. In other words, it was keeping the Government's hands on as much as possible. Now, if you believe in that theory, that is well and good.

Mr. GRAHAM. May I supplement what I said?

Mr. SPINGARN. It would still be under the Government anyway. Mr. GRAHAM. A number of the war powers acts have not yet been repealed in their entirety. That could be done in two ways, through the President by proclamation by declaring the war over, or by the Congress taking action. The President requested that Congress take no action. We are still operating under it. We had it yesterday under rent control, and that is what is wrong in the situation. There is hope on the part of the legislators this will continue until we get to a solid basis. What you are driving at is the question of directives and what authority the Government arrogates to itself.

Mr. SPINGARN. I should say that prior to 1903 these functions were in the Treasury and they were transferred to Commerce where they remained until 1942, when transferred to the Coast Guard.

Mr. LEWIS. Do you mean the same identical powers which you are exercising were exercised then by other Government departments? This question of double jeopardy

Mr. SPINGARN. The Merchant Marine Act of 1936 for the first time made these hearings applicable to seamen as well as licensed personnel. From 1871 until section 4450 was passed it had been applicable to licensed personnel, that is officers. The Merchant Marine Act of 1936 expanded that to include unlicensed personnel.

Mr. GRAHAM. Is this not the honest fact? We are all trying to get to an honest solution of this. With the building of more vessels and offenses becoming increasingly more numerous, it took wider control and care not to have these offenses. If we were to drop back and not have a Merchant Marine, it would probably drift back into the easy status.

Mr. SPINGARN. You are quite right. Congress has consistently recognized the Coast Guard as the central safety-at-sea agency. In 1915 it combined the Revenue Cutter Service and the Life Saving Service to make the Coast Guard. In 1939 the Lighthouse Service was placed in the Coast Guard. In 1942 the merchant marine hearing and inspection functions were transferred to the Coast Guard and this was made permanent in 1946.

Mr. GRAHAM. The whole purpose throughout that was to increase efficiency and decrease operating costs.

Mr. SPINGARN. That is right.

Mr. LEWIS. I do not see how you could get any decrease in cost or increase in efficiency. Now, the captain on a ship, and I have been on sea voyages and I know how they conduct them, knows that is the proper thing to do for any offense, but what about this double jeopardy?

I think that is simply unconstitutional and I do not think we have the power to give the Coast Guard or anybody else the authority to come in and impose a second sentence.

Mr. SPINGARN. We, of course, are administering the laws as we find them.

Mr. GRAHAM. We have placed the burden on you.

Mr. SPINGARN. I have not examined the constitutional question, but I do not believe there is any legal question of double jeopardy. Mr. LEWIS. It is this Congress which is at fault.

Mr. KEATING. The last Congress. Not this one. The last one. Mr. SPINGARN. Since 1871 these laws have been in effect.

Mr. REEVES. To clarify the position of my colleague from Ohio, I would like to ask him this question: It is your point the authority or function should either be taken away from the master of the ship and vested entirely in the Coast Guard or vice versa ?

Mr. LEWIS. That is right.

Mr. REEVES. And that should be subject to some review or appeal. Mr. LEWIS. Yes, sir.

Mr. GRAHAM. Or follow Mr. Volpian's suggestion and let it remain with the master and let the Coast Guard have nothing to do with it? Mr. LEWIS. That is right. The Coast Guard comes into this picture secondarily and both the witness on behalf of the masters, mates, and pilots last Monday and the witness now on behalf of the seafarers feel that the Coast Guard should not be in this. It seems to me they have a pretty good case.

Mr. GRAHAM. Granting that is true, but we put this burden on the Coast Guard.

Mr. LEWIS. That is the reason I said it is the fault of Congress and we ought to change it.

Mr. GRAHAM. All right, go ahead Mr. Spingarn.

Mr. SPINGARN. I would like also to point to the statement made by Senator Cordon in the Senate on April 9. Senator Cordon is chairman of the Treasury Appropriations Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations and he introduced a companion bill to H. R. 2966, namely, S. 1077 on April 9. It was referred to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, and at that time he said, and I am referring to page 3321 of the Congressional Record of April 9

Mr. KEATING. This is in the Senate hearing?

Mr. SPINGARN. No; on the floor of the Senate. He said:

It will be a waste of money to require the Coast Guard to employ civilian examiners because in many instances their time cannot be fully occupied in the work for which they would have to be employed, and their time would be utterly wasted. Quite evidently, the situation as it now exists was not foreseen at the time that the Administrative Procedure Act was before the committee and was enacted into law. The Coast Guard will require about $280,000 annually in addition to its other necessities in order to maintain this group of civilian examiners. If, on the other hand, the Administrative Procedure Act can be amended so as to exclude the Coast Guard from its operation in connection with this handling of inspection of merchant marine this amount can be saved each year. Mr. KEATING. With all due respect in the world for the distinguished Senator, I am not impressed with the argument we are going to save any substantial amount, and to talk about saving $280,000 the full amount is entirely erroneous. We have an admission here there will be $150,000 that is now being spent by the Coast Guard officers who are

exclusively doing this type of work and on top of that there is certainly some additional figure. There may be a minor saving, but certainly the saving of money does not seem to be the reason.

Mr. SPINGARN. I would like to ask Captain Richmond if he would make a statement on the economy feature.

Mr. GRAHAM. All right.

Captain RICHMOND. Gentlemen, prior to December 11, of last year, we had handled these hearings by hearing details or hearing units in domestic ports and foreign ports. The officers attached to those details, many of whom were former employees of the Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation, although Reserve commissioned officers under war authority, were actually designated as both what we call a hearing officer and an examining officer. I want to change those names to conform to APA and what is called an examiner and investigator. We had approximately 100 of those officers, although the number varied. The problem of the APA requirement that your examiner be separated entirely from the investigatory function was recognized, so on December 11, last year, in order to comply with the APA, we appointed 29 officers to act as examiners.

We recognized that in some ports many of these officers could not be kept busy all the time

Mr. GRAHAM. May I interrupt. Do those 29 cover 43 ports or only 29?

Captain RICHMOND. They cover a limited number of ports. They cover 9 of our 14 districts and the foreign ports.

Mr. GRAHAM. I see.

Captain RICHMOND. One of the problems that confronted us at that time was we were unable to get an interpretation of what duties were not inconsistent with examining work. Therefore, we were reluctant to appoint any officers until we had to actually hear a case in ports where there was a small number of cases, for the reason we simply did not want to see them be on something that would preclude them from doing other duties.

So, as I say, we appointed 29. Since that time we have gotten rulings that these officers can work on annual or other inspections of unmanned vessels, special surveys and dry dock inspection, inspection and waivers, inspection of land boilers for other Government agencies, and investigation of our own Coast Guard personnel. There would be nothing in that which would be inconsistent with their sitting as an examiner on merchant marine.

We estimate of those 29 probably 50 percent of their time is utilized in merchant marine hearings. Nine of those people are overseas.

Mr. KEATING. Those 29 in the past had been engaged exclusively in this kind of work?

Captain RICHMOND. The first few days after December 11, I would say yes, but since we received the interpretation of other duties they have been utilized in such duties also.

Mr. KEATING. I understood you at the last hearing when the question was put to you how many men were exclusively conducting these hearings, you said there were 29.

Captain RICHMOND. I realize that I gave that impression. The 29 were those that have been designated. The only ones eligible to hear these cases, but since that we got the rulings on what additional work they were able to do.

Mr. GRAHAM. That clarifies it, captain.

Captain RICHMOND. I might say that if the 20 in the United States were on a 50 percent basis, that would be in effect 10 people doing exclusive hearing work. Just from a practical standpoint let us assume there are 10 people exclusively, on a man-year basis.

Now, as far as the proceedings themselves are concerned, an impression has been given to the committee that the way these cases arise is that the Coast Guard examines the logbook and then determines whether they will have a hearing. That, sir, is not true. A case can arise by that method, I agree, and if we look at the log and see a specific case which we think justifies a hearing we proceed.

Mr. KEATING. Do you in fact inspect the logbook?

Captain RICHMOND. We have to a certain extent. Now not to the extent we did during the war when certain types of cases were very prevalent. In other words A. W. O. L.'s were important when it caused a vessel to miss a convoy. When a vessel missed a convoy it could mean the loss of lives, loss of the cargo, or ammunition that would not get to the fighting front. We got complaints from the officers of the ships in some instances, and in some instances the unions themselves reported the dereliction of men and officers.

Mr. KEATING. What proportion of the cases which you try involve officers?

Captain RICHMOND. Of the 3,762 hearings that had been held in the 12 months from March 1946 to February 1947, 735 hearings were on holders of licenses, and 3,027 were on holders of certificates. Thirty-three licenses were revoked and 602 were suspended; 171 certificates were revoked and 2,810 were suspended.

Mr. SPINGARN. The officers have licenses and the men certificates.
Mr. KEATING. Was anybody ever found not guilty?
Captain RICHMOND. Yes, sir.

Mr. KEATING. How many?

Captain RICHMOND. Of the officers approximately 100 were dismissed. These are actual hearing cases.

Mr. KEATING. The complaint was dismissed?

Captain RICHMOND. The complaint was dismissed after the hearing. For certificated men approximately 288 cases were dismissed.

Mr. KEATING. Now there were 100 of the 700 cases of officers dismissed?

Captain RICHMOND. Yes, sir. Now, those were actual hearing cases. Mr. SPINGARN. Of course, perhaps it should be noted there were the hearing cases, but there were some 18,000 investigations.

Captain RICHMOND. There were 4,807 investigations based on complaints against licenses and 13,578 unlicensed personnel.

Mr. KEATING. That never came to a hearing?

Captain RICHMOND. No, these figures I gave you first were the proportion that came to a hearing.

Mr. GORSKI. Down to 3,700?

Captain RICHMOND. Down to 3,700, yes, sir. Immediately a complaint is made to the local office, an investigating officer is dispatched to the vessel to investigate and find out if there is any basis for the complaint.

Mr. GRAHAM. May I interrupt. I do not like to throw you off, but it is somewhat new to all of us. Would not the logbook of the ship

be the best primary evidence in the way of written facts you can get to start the investigation.

Captain RICHMOND. It is presumptive, sir, but we prefer to get the testimony of witnesses in spite of what has been said. I served overseas in this type of work and I relied on the testimony adduced before me by the witnesses far more than any log statement, because the statement has been made if a master logs a man it may be second hand information. It is, however, an official record and the district court accepts it.

Mr. KEATING. A man has no way of logging the master.

Captain RICHMOND. A man has no way of logging the master, that is true, sir. In making investigations, however, our officers have been advised not simply to look at the logbook, but to talk to all interested parties. They have been instructed to talk to the delegates of the union. The union has a delegate on board ship.

Mr. KEATING. The union has a delegate on board ship?

Captain RICHMOND. Yes, usually three, the black gang, the deck, the steward's department, and the deck force.

Mr. GRAHAM. The black gang?

Captain RICHMOND. I am falling into marine terms. That is the engine room. The investigating officer has the right to decide there is no actual basis for the complaint or he can, in fact, admonish the man. If he thinks there is a prime facie case, he may set the case for hearing before what is now the examiner.

Mr. KEATING. I would appreciate it if you would pursue those cases of complaints being made and those that went to hearing, and divide those between officers and men.

Mr. GRAHAM. That would probably take a little time. Let him submit it for the record.

Captain RICHMOND. I will be glad to.

Mr. GRAHAM. All right, go ahead.

Captain RICHMOND. We attempt to hold the hearing as soon as possible, acknowledging the rights of all of the parties.

Now, during the war when ships had to get out, if necessary, we would hold the hearing on board ship if it was desirable. Our officers would go out in the evenings in order to hear the case when they had witnesses present.

The big difficulty, as Mr. Spingarn pointed out in his statement, is that if a ship comes in it has to be paid off in 48 hours and your witnesses are gone. Our attempt has been to get the case heard when people who know about it are present. At the time of setting this hearing we serve the person charged, as we call him, with charges and specifications, which inform him of the offense he is charged with, tell him of his right to counsel and his right to subpoena witnesses in his own defense and advise him of all of his rights.

As I say the case is heard in the office ashore, if it can be done, because it has a more dignified setting. In many cases you are able to get witnesses to the office when you cannot get them aboard ship. Mr. KEATING. The Coast Guard office?

Captain RICHMOND. Yes, sir; the Coast Guard office ashore. The examiner is another officer. In the present system he is not familiar with that particular case. He has not been advised of the case. He is selected, not as indicated here by the person who was going to have

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