March 29, 1976
Page 8386
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, as we vote today to approve the conference report on the Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1975, the final version of legislation establishing a 200-mile fisheries conservation zone, we reach the conclusion of a long struggle in Congress to create for our fishermen a climate in which their industry can grow and prosper.
I commend my colleagues, particularly Senator MAGNUSON and Senator STEVENS, for their diligent pursuit of this legislation. For years we have struggled in Congress to provide a means through which the valuable protein resources of our coastal fisheries could be protected against exploitive and destructive practices of foreign fleets. It has been a difficult fight but we persevered and have won the concurrence of the House and it now seems the endorsement of President Ford.
The need is obvious and the difficulty of international agreement increasingly apparent. But the conclusion of the struggle to enact a 200-mile limit is only the beginning of the larger effort to restore our coastal fisheries and to assure our fishermen of their fair and proper share of the catch.
I had the privilege earlier this month of addressing the Maine Fishermen's Forum in Rockport, Maine regarding the implications for them of the 200-mile limit and was encouraged by the positive attitude evident at that gathering. Maine fishermen recognize that the 200-mile limit offers not a final solution but a challenge, and an opportunity for a new beginning. They are prepared to accept that challenge and pursue this new opportunity.
The challenge extends not only to our fishermen in Maine and around the country, but also to those of us in Congress who will be called on to provide continued support through implementing legislation and an expanded Coast Guard enforcement effort. And it extends to the State and Federal administrators who will develop and operate the management program mandated under H.R. 200 and to our State Department negotiators, working to achieve international agreement on the Law of the Sea and renegotiating the fisheries agreement required by this legislation. We must look to international cooperation for a long-range oceans policy and the State Department has a major role to play in that effort.
The Eastland resolution approved in the last Congress provides the mechanism through which fishermen may propose a program of Federal support and submit that program to the Congress as a comprehensive package. The assembly which I addressed in Rockport was gathered to launch a month-long series of hearings and forums along the Maine coast. I look forward to the results of these sessions with high expectations. And, I look forward with high expectation to our experience under this bill and to a new and continuing awareness of the problems of our fishermen which this legislation represents.