August 5, 1965
PAGE 19567
S.944, Cabinet-level Council on Marine Resources
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, I wish to praise the chairman [Mr. MAGNUSON] for his efforts in bringing S. 944 to the floor of the Senate. His leadership in the area of fisheries and oceanographic science within the Congress is well known and deeply appreciated by his colleagues.
I appreciate, too, the extent of the hearings the Senator had held on this legislation. These I know have been extensive and have contributed greatly to our knowledge. Also, it is worthy of note that the House Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries is currently conducting 3 weeks of hearings on the several alternatives currently before the Congress in the field of oceanography.
For the record let me recapitulate these alternative courses of action. These are:
First. By establishing a National Oceanographic Council -- in effect a cabinet level coordinating committee and by calling for accelerated marine research and resource development.
Second. By establishing a National Commission on Oceanography to investigate, study and recommend an overall plan for an adequate national oceanographic program.
Third. By establishing a new operating commission type agency to coordinate the marine activities of other departments and agencies, and by furthering the exploration of the Continental Shelf and Great Lakes, and accelerating the use of the resources of these areas.
Fourth. By combinations of the above.
Fifth. By establishing national oceanographic policy with coordination by the President's Office of Science and Technology.
Sixth. By establishing a NASA-like National Oceanographic Agency to develop and sponsor a Government-wide program.
Seventh. By grouping existing agencies with marine and marine related missions together within an existing department. In this respect both the Departments of Commerce and Interior have been suggested with some lack of conviction.
Eighth. By establishing a new Department, as in S. 2251 introduced by me and 20 other Senators, by consolidating and coordinating the existing major agencies with oceanographic and atmospheric missions, and by accelerating our national exploration of the marine environment, marine resources, and civilian occupation of world ocean areas.
All these proposals have some merit and problems or deficiencies, as the other body is currently discovering.
The bill before us, S. 944, may be recognized as a first step forward achieving the "national will" and coordination I feel to be so necessary in our national ocean program. I am pleased to see a broader approach taken in the final committee print than was evident in the initial printing of S. 944.
In this respect the retitling of the bill emphasizing marine resources rather than oceanographic science per se is a forward step. Similarly, the broadening of the bill's objectives to include the accelerated development of the resources of the marine environment and the encouragement of private investment capital in exploration, technological development and economic utilization is an important contribution toward the day when we truly do have a unified and stimulating national oceanographic effort.
There is, of course, a great way to go in encouraging the exploration of the Continental Shelf, Great Lakes, and world oceans. We need to explore and locate resources -- then develop and use them for the enhancement of our national economy. There is a great way to go also in encouraging the civilian economic occupation of the world oceans in fisheries and trade so we may keep abreast or ahead of other nations in efforts to strategically occupy 70 percent of the earth's surface.
For example, just last month Russia extended her "oceanographic" investigations in Cuban waters, and we are all familiar with the tremendous expansion of the Russian fishing fleet off our shores and throughout the world oceans. Our military and State Department people are very concerned with this civilian occupation and its strategic implications.
There is a great way to go also in achieving an adequate correlation between our programs for the marine and atmospheric environment. The President recognized this in his reorganization plan combining the Coast and Geodetic Survey with the Weather Bureau. Moreover, such close correlation is essential to a future program of ocean use by this Nation. For example, one of the prerequisites of expanded private investment in the marine environs is more accurate forecasting of oceanic weather and weather Caused forces which affect man's activities. Further, I feel correlated inquiry and study is essential to improve understanding of the air-sea interface in preparation for the day when man may ameliorate or modify the tremendous storm forces and climatic patterns which so drastically affect our welfare and economy. Our Nation faces a water crisis on many fronts. Now in the Northwest we are experiencing the drought so common to parts of the West.
Scientists tell us that our continental climatic weather patterns are spawned in the ocean areas -- particularly the vast South Pacific. Our need to correlate our marine and atmospheric affairs is urgent. Our need to accelerate our program efforts in this interrelated area is essential -- added inputs of investment for research and development are required.
Another observation I should like to make is our need for improved Federal-State-local cooperation in our oceanographic program and related pursuits.
This is tremendously important, particularly in community and regional economics and in environmental pollution -- in the Great Lakes, our bays and estuaries, and, as Captain Cousteau recently pointed out, in the oceans themselves. Here then in S. 944 we take a first step in recognizing some of these national needs and bring some national statute to our oceanographic effort.
I am confident that this first step will be rapidly followed by great strides forward as our national will is focused on the promise and challenge offered by the resources and environs of the marine world around us -- and confident too that the coordinated and accelerated national program envisioned in my bill, S. 2251, will soon come to pass.
Recently, the eminent authority on ocean explorations, Capt. Jacques-Yves Cousteau addressed the Ocean Science and Ocean Engineering Conference here in Washington.
Although some of his remarks have received press coverage, I believe it most appropriate now, as the House-Senate conferees meet on S. 4, the Water Quality Act of 1965, and as the House Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries deliberates alternative approaches to constructive development of a coordinated oceanographic program for this Nation, for the Congress to examine the full text of Captain Cousteau's remarks.
I have been struck with the acute perspective with which he discusses the oceanic pollution problem and the challenges and problems before mankind as he uses, develops, and occupies the vast marine world around us.
I ask unanimous consent that Captain Cousteau's speech with the introductory remarks of Dr. James H. Wakelin, Jr., former Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research and Development, be printed at this point in the RECORD.