460 HISTORY OF THE COMNflTTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY 



this year. While the sum is relatively small, such items have a cumulative effect which 

 is significant. 



Although I believe the study is justified, its relative priority is low and I do not 

 believe there is any important reason that it must be started while our Nation is 

 engaged in a costly war in southeast Asia. 



Those who argue that it cannot be delayed assume that the study will result in a 

 major changeover to the metric system. I am not presently inclined to favor such a 

 changeover, although I do support a study to obtain full information on the proposal. 



The committee ran into the same buzzsaw of opposition from the 

 Rules Committee in 1966. Senator Pell chafed at the delay, lobbying 

 several committee members in an effort to get his bill moving. But the 

 votes simply were not there and the leadership felt the study bill 

 could not possibly muster a two-thirds majority under the "suspen- 

 sion of rules" procedure which bypassed the Rules Committee. 



After six years without success, Chairman Miller patiently and 

 doggedly tried again in the new 90th Congress in 1967. At the very 

 first meeting of the new committee on February 21, 1967, he quickly 

 brought up the study bill with this comment: 



This bill was introduced toward the end of the last session of Congress and got 

 tied up in the Rules Committee. I think it has been thoroughly heard. Do I hear a 

 motion? 



The debate was predictable. Chairman Miller observed: 



Going on the metric system is not a simple matter. It will take perhaps a genera- 

 tion to get its full acceptance. * * * If we are going to successfully do business with 

 countries that are on the metric system we have to use a common standard of measure- 

 ments. * * * Part of the reason for the study is to, first, make sure that it is economi- 

 cally feasible to do this -many of us feel that it is, but I would like to have confirma- 

 tion that it is— and secondly, to give the people an opportunity, to start educating 

 them in this new field. 



Fulton again brought up his concurrent resolution to make the 

 decision first and study how to implement that decision. Miller's 

 answer was that "the gentleman never formally asked for a hearing 

 on the resolution." Waggonner wanted to be sure the bill did not 

 authorize anybody to enforce the use of the metric system, and Wydler 

 asked to include minority views in the report 



Wydler expressed the same objections that he had in 1966, adding: 



I, therefore, support the authorization with the reservation that no money be 

 spent on this proposal until world conditions improve and budgeting problems 

 decrease. 



Rules Committee Chairman Howard W. Smith, that implacable 

 foe of the metric system, had been defeated in Virginia's Democratic 

 primary in 1966 in a surprise upset. This paved the way for the Science 

 Committee to get its metric study bill through the Rules Committee 

 in time for consideration by the 90th Congress. On June 24, 1968, the 

 House leadership scheduled the bill for action. 



