NATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHIC PROGRAM LEGISLATION 



TUESDAY, AUGUST 3, 1965 



House of Representatives, 

 Subcommittee on Oceanography of the 

 Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries, 



Washington^ D.C. 



The subcommittee met at 10 a.m., pursuant to call, in the caucus 

 room, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Alton Lennon (chairman 

 of the subcommittee) presiding. 



Mr. Lennon. Ladies and gentlemen, this is not a church so you 

 won't have to sit in the back seats. We would appreciate it if you 

 who are attending these hearings would come to the seats in the first 

 five or six rows. Thank you very much. 



The meeting will please come to order. Today we are beginning 

 hearings on a number of bills designed to strengthen the Nation's 

 efforts in its study of the exploitation of the ocean resources of the 

 world. I think these hearings and the results they achieve will rank 

 high in importance among the legislative activities of this Congress. 



There are 16 bills before us this morning, dealing with some T ap- 

 proaches designed to state our national objectives in the field of 

 oceanography and to establish the best organizational mechanism to 

 implement those objectives. 



(The bills and agency reports follow :) 



[H.R. 921, 89th Cong., 1st sess.] 

 A BILL To establish the National Oceanographic Agency 



Be it enacted 'by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States 

 of America in Congress assemMed, That there is hereby estahlished. an independ- 

 ent agency which shall be known as the "National Oceanographic Agency" (here- 

 inafter referred to as the "Agency" ) . 



Sec. 2. There shall be at the head of the Agency an officer to ibe known as 

 the Administrator. The Administrator shall be appointed hy the President, with 

 the advice and consent of the Senate. 



Sec. 3. The Agency shall establish a coordinated national program for ocean- 

 ography and related sciences including meteorology. In order to implement that 

 program the Agency shall have authority to carry out research projects and pro- 

 grams of the United States in this broad area. 



Sec. 4. There is hereby transferred to the Agency all functions relating to 

 oceanography and related sciences which are vested on the date of enactment 

 of this Act in any officer, employee, department, agency, and instrumentality 

 of the United States. There are hereby transferred to the Agency so much of 

 the personnel, property, records, and unexpended balances of appropriations, 

 allocations, and other funds, of any department, agency, or instrumentality of the 

 United States with respect to which any function is transferred under this 

 section, as the Director of the Bureau of the Budget determines necessary in 

 connection with the exercise by the Agency of the functions so transferred. 



Sec. 5. All orders, regulations, directives, and other official acts of any officer 

 or employee of the United States with respect to functions relating to oceanog- 



