appointment. Any member may be removed by the President for neglect of duty or malfeasance in office. Vacancies in the Commission, so long as there shall be three members in office, shall not impair the power of the Commission to execute its functions, and three of the members in office shall constitute a quorum for the transaction of the business of the Commission. Each member shall receive a salary at the rate of $12,000 per annum.

(b) No person shall hold office as a member of the Commission who, within three years prior to his appointment, shall have been employed by, or have had any pecuniary interest in, any carrier by water or substantial pecuniary interest in any other person who derives a substantial portion of his revenues from any business associated with ships or shipping. Each member shall devote his full time to the duties of his office. It shall be unlawful for any member, officer, or employee of the Commission to be in the employ of any other person, firm, or corporation, or to have any pecuniary interest in, or hold any official relationship with, any carrier by water, shipbuilder, contractor, or other person, firm, association, or corporation with whom the Commission may have business relations. (c) The Commission shall, through its secretary, keep a true record of all its meetings and the yea-and-nay votes taken therein, on every action, order, contract, or financial transaction approved or disapproved by the Commission. It shall have an official seal which shall be judicially noticed, and shall adopt rules and regulations in regard to its procedure and the conduct of its business.

(d) The Commission may make such expenditures as are necessary in the performance of its functions from funds made available to it by this Act or hereafter appropriated, which further appropriations are hereby authorized.

(e) Without regard to the civil-service laws or the Classification Act of 1923, as amended, the Commission may appoint and prescribe the duties and fix the salaries of a secretary, a director for each of not to exceed five divisions, a general counsel, a clerk to each member of the Commission, and not more than three assistants, not more than a total of twelve each of naval architects, special experts, attorneys, and examiners and not more than two inspectors at each shipyard at which vessels are being constructed by it or under its supervision. No employee so appointed may receive an annual salary at a rate in excess of that provided under the Classification Act of 1923, as amended. The Commission may, subject to the provisions of the civil-service laws and the Classification Act of 1923, as amended, appoint such other officers, engineers, inspectors, attorneys, examiners, and other employees as are necessary in the execution of its functions: Provided, That trained and satisfactory present employees of the United States Shipping Board Bureau or United States Shipping Board Merchant Fleet Corporation shall be eligible for transfer to the Commission, and if after the expiration of a probationary period of six months from the date of employment the Commission shall certify to the United States Civil Service Commission that the services of any employee so transferred are satisfactory, the employee shall thereupon acquire the same status as though certified after examination by the Civil Service Commission.

(f) Each member, any employee of the Commission, and any

shall receive necessary traveling and subsistence expenses, or per diem allowance in lieu thereof, within the limitations prescribed by law, while away from his official station upon official business of the Commission. Expenditures by the Commission shall be allowed and paid on the presentation of itemized vouchers therefor approved by the Commission or a designated employee thereof.

(g) This section shall take effect immediately upon approval of

this Act.

SEO. 202. All money, notes, bonds, mortgages, and securities of every kind, contracts and contract rights, lands, vessels, docks, wharves, piers, and property and interests of every kind, owned by the United States, and now controlled by the Department of Commerce as the successor to the powers and functions of the former United States Shipping Board, by virtue of the President's Executive order of June 10, 1933, are hereby transferred to the Commission. SEO. 203. The United States Shipping Board Merchant Fleet Corporation shall cease to exist and shall stand dissolved. All the records, books, papers, and corporate property of said dissolved corporation shall be taken over by the Commission. All existing contractual obligations of the dissolved corporation shall be assumed by the United States. Any suit against the dissolved corporation pending in any court of the United States shall be defended by the Commission upon behalf of the United States, under the supervision of the Attorney General, and any judgment obtained against the dissolved corporation in any such pending suit shall be reported to Congress in the manner provided in section 226, title 31, United States Code, for reporting judgments against the United States in the Court of Claims.

SEC. 204. (a) All the functions, powers, and duties vested in the former United States Shipping Board by the Shipping Act, 1916, the Merchant Marine Act, 1920, the Merchant Marine Act, 1928, the Intercoastal Shipping Act, 1933, and amendments to those Acts, and now vested in the Department of Commerce pursuant to section 12 of the President's Executive order of June 10, 1933, are hereby transferred to the United States Maritime Commission: Provided, however, That after the date of the passage of this Act no further construction loans shall be made under the provisions of section 11 of the Merchant Marine Act, 1920, as amended.

(b) The Commission is hereby authorized to adopt all necessary rules and regulations to carry out the powers, duties, and functions vested in it by this Act. After the expiration of two years from the effective date of this Act, the President is authorized to transfer, by Executive order, to the Interstate Commerce Commission any or all the regulatory powers, regulatory duties, and regulatory functions which, by this title, are vested in the United States Maritime Commission.

(c) The orders issued by the United States Maritime Commission in the exercise of the powers transferred to it by this title shall be enforced in the same manner as heretofore provided by law for enforcement of the orders issued by the former United States Shipping Board, and violation of such orders shall subject the person or corporation guilty of such violation to the same penalties or punishment as heretofore provided for violation of the orders of

SEO. 205. Without limiting the power and authority otherwise vested in the Commission, it shall be unlawful for any common carrier by water, either directly or indirectly, through the medium of an agreement, conference, association, understanding, or otherwise, to prevent or attempt to prevent any other such carrier from serving any port designed for the accommodation of ocean-going vessels located on any improvement project authorized by the Congress or through it by any other agency of the Federal Government, lying within the continental limits of the United States, at the same rates which it charges at the nearest port already regularly served by it. SEC. 206. All sums of money now in the construction loan fund created by section 11 of the Merchant Marine Act, 1920, as amended, together with the proceeds of all debts, accounts, choses in action, and the proceeds of all notes, mortgages, and other evidences of indebtedness, hereby transferred to the Commission, and all of the proceeds of sales of ships and surplus property heretofore or hereafter made, including proceeds of notes or other evidences of debt taken therefor and the interest received thereon, shall be deposited in the Treasury of the United States and there maintained as a revolving fund, herein designated as the construction fund, and shall be controlled and employed by the Commission in carrying out the provisions of this Act. All moneys received by the Commission under the provisions of titles IV, V, VI, and VII, of this Act shall be deposited in its construction fund, and all disbursements made by the Commission under authority of said titles shall be paid out of said fund. Further appropriations by Congress to replenish said fund are hereby authorized.

SEC. 207. The Commission may enter into such contracts, upon behalf of the United States, as may, in its discretion, be necessary to carry on the activities authorized by this Act, in the same manner that a private corporation may contract within the scope of the authority conferred by its charter. All the Commission's financial transactions shall be audited in the General Accounting Office according to approved commercial practice as provided in the Act of March 20, 1922 (42 Stat. 444): Provided, That it shall be recognized that, because of the business activities authorized by this Act, the accounting officers shall allow credit for all expenditures shown to be necessary because of the nature of such authorized activities, notwithstanding any existing statutory provision to the contrary. The Comptroller General shall report annually or oftener to Congress any departure by the Commission from the provisions of this Act. SEC. 208. The Commission shall, at the beginning of each regular session, make a report to Congress, which shall include the results of its investigations, a summary of its transactions, its recommendations for legislation, a statement of all receipts under this Act, and the purposes for which all expenditures were made.

SEC. 209. (a) There are hereby authorized to be appropriated such sums as are necessary to carry out the provisions of this Act.

(b) All appropriations and unexpended balances of appropriations available for expenditure by the United States Shipping Board Bureau and United States Shipping Board Merchant Fleet Corpo ration which would otherwise be applicable to functions transferred

to enable the United States Shipping Board Merchant Fleet Corporation to operate ships or lines of ships which have been or may be taken back from purchasers by reason of competition or other methods employed by foreign shipowners or operators as appropriated by the Independent Offices Act, 1928, approved February 11, 1927 (44 Stat. 1082), and reappropriated by the Department of Commerce Appropriation Acts, shall be available for expenditure by or at the direction of the Commission for any and all objects of expenditure authorized by this Act in the discretion of the Commission, without regard to the requirement of apportionment under the Antideficiency Act of February 27, 1906 (U. S. C., title 31, sec. 665).

(c) After the transfer, under section 404 of this Act, to the Commission of the powers and duties of the Postmaster General with respect to existing ocean-mail contracts entered into pursuant to title IV, Merchant Marine Act, 1928 (U. S. C., Supp. VII, title 46, secs. 891e to 891r, inciusive), all appropriations and unexpended balances of appropriations available for expenditure by the Post Office Department for the transportation of foreign mails under contracts authorized by the Merchant Marine Act, 1928, less any amount necessary to be paid out by the Post Office Department, shall be available for any and all objects of expenditure authorized by this Act, by or at the direction of the Commission, without regard to the requirement of apportionment under the Antideficiency Act of February 27, 1906.

(d) Funds made available under the provisions of subsection (b) of this section shall be available for expenditures authorized by the Commission under the provisions of section 201 of this Act as soon as a majority of the members of the Commission shall have taken the oath of office, notwithstanding the provisions of section 907 of this Act.

SEO. 210. It shall be the duty of the Commission to make a survey of the American merchant marine, as it now exists, to determine what additions and replacements are required to carry forward the national policy declared in section 101 of this Act, and the Commission is directed to study, perfect, and adopt a long-range program for replacements and additions to the American merchant marine so that as soon as practicable the following objectives may be accomplished:

First, the creation of an adequate and well-balanced merchant fleet, including vessels of all types, to provide shipping service on all routes essential for maintaining the flow of the foreign commerce of the United States, the vessels in such fleet to be so designed as to be readily and quickly convertible into transport and supply vessels in a time of national emergency. In planning the development of such a fleet the Commission is directed to cooperate closely with the Navy Department as to national-defense needs and the possible speedy adaptation of the merchant fleet to national-defense require

ments.

Second, the ownership and the operation of such a merchant fleet by citizens of the United States insofar as may be practicable.

Third, the planning of vessels designed to afford the best and most complete protection for passengers and crew against fire and all

SEC. 211. The Commission is authorized and directed to investigate, determine, and keep current records of

gate,

(a) The ocean services, routes, and lines from ports in the United States, or in a Territory, district, or possession thereof, to foreign markets, which are, or may be, determined by the Commission to be essential for the promotion, development, expansion, and maintenance of the foreign commerce of the United States, and in reaching its determination the Commission shall consider and give due weight to the cost of maintaining each of such steamship lines, the probability that any such line cannot be maintained except at a heavy loss disproportionate to the benefit accruing to foreign trade, the number of sailings and types of vessels that should be employed in such lines, and any other facts and conditions that a prudent business man would consider when dealing with his own business, with the added consideration, however, of the intangible benefit the maintenance of any such line may afford to the foreign commerce of the United States and to the national defense;

(b) The type, size, speed, and other requirements of the vessels, including express-liner or super-liner vessels, which should be employed in such services or on such routes or lines, and the frequency and regularity of the sailings of such vessels, with a view to furnishing adequate, regular, certain, and permanent service; (c) The relative cost of construction of comparable vessels in the United States and in foreign countries;

(d) The relative cost of marine insurance, maintenance, repairs, wages and subsistence of officers and crews, and all other items of expense, in the operation of comparable vessels in particular services, routes, and lines under the laws, rules, and regulations of the United States and under those of the foreign countries whose vessels are substantial competitors of any such American service, route, or line; (e) The extent and character of the governmental aid and subsidies granted by foreign governments to their merchant marine;

(f) The number, location, and efficiency of the shipyards existing on the date of the enactment of this Act or thereafter built in the United States;

(g) To investigate and determine what provisions of this Act and other Acts relating to shipping should be made applicable to aircraft engaged in foreign commerce in order to further the policy expressed in this Act, and to recommend appropriate legislation to this end;

(h) The advisability of enactment of suitable legislation authorizing the Commission, in an economic or commercial emergency, to aid the farmers and cotton, coal, lumber, and cement producers in any section of the United States in the transportation and landing of their products in any foreign port, which products can be carried in drycargo vessels by reducing rates, by supplying additional tonnage to any American operator, or by operation of vessels directly by the Commission, until such time as the Commission shall deem such special rate reduction and operation unnecessary for the benefit of the American farmers and such producers; and

(i) New designs, new methods of construction, and new types of equipment for vessels; the possibilities of promoting the carrying of American foreign trade in American vessels; and intercoastal and inland water transportation, including their relation to transporta