SPACE SCIENCE AND APPLICATIONS IN THE 1970'S 31 5 



THE COMMITTEE AND APOLLO IN 1971-72 



Opening the hearings on NASA's authorization on March 2, 

 1971, Chairman Miller began by introducing Apollo 14 astronauts 

 Alan Shepard, Stuart Roosa, and Edgar Mitchell, their parents, their 

 wives, and then their children. Amid the glare of television lights, 

 Chairman Miller pronounced: 



We are opening hearings in the most crucial period of our space program. The 

 decisions made based on these hearings will largely determine the direction and 

 emphasis in our national space program in the 1970's. 



A month later, when Chairman Teague had his Manned Space 

 Flight Subcommittee visiting TRW Space Systems in Redondo Beach, 

 Calif., he observed: 



There is more pressure for the Federal dollar today than there has ever been since 

 I have been in Congress — and it gets down to it's the easiest thing in the world to 

 vote against the space program. 



On May 3, 1971, Chairman Miller in an address to the Third 

 International Conference on Space Technology in Rome, Italy, tried 

 very hard to paint the bright side of the space picture, but he had to 

 acknowledge with some realism: 



The mood in our country is entirely different than it was in the past decade. The 

 very success of the Apollo program has diminished the sense of urgency in space 

 competition — at least in my country at the present time. The talk in the political 

 arena is about new national priorities, not necessarily including the space program. 



When Teague commented on the NASA authorization in his 

 annual floor speech on June 3, 1971, he confessed: 



The budget recommended to you today is a minimum budget. It is a budget that 

 delays and defers programs which are in the national interest to move along at a 

 faster pace. Three lunar exploration flights remain. Our ability to conduct lunar 

 exploration is then at an end. 



The committee's role in 1971 and 1972 was to insure that as 

 many of the scientific experiments on the canceled Apollo flights as 

 possible should be transferred to the concluding flights. Vigorous 

 oversight was maintained to verify that safety and reliability were 

 not sacrificed, and that the funds, personnel, equipment, and facilities 

 being utilized for the Apollo flights were being transferred as quickly 

 as feasible to future projects like Skylab and Space Shuttle. 



On April 20, 1972, true to tradition, the committee brought the 

 NASA authorization bill to the House floor on the same day that 

 Apollo 16 astronauts John W. Young and Thomas K. Mattingly 

 landed on the Moon. In an unusual move, Teague's Manned Space 

 Flight Subcommittee recommended no increases over the NASA 

 budget. The subcommittee's deliberations were thorough and wide- 

 ranging. Teague, in presenting what was to be his last authorization 



