166 NATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHIC PROGRAM LEGISLATION 



STATEMENT OF HON. BOB WILSON, A REPEJSSENTATIVE IN 

 CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA— Resumed 



Mr. Lennon. Yesterday, we cut you off as soon as you finished 

 your statement, and I wondered if you had any afterthoughts. 



Mr. Wilson. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. 



I have been listening to the testimony on these other bills with great 

 interest. I am a firm believer that politics is the art of the possible, 

 and I recognize that my bill, which calls for a complete new independ- 

 ent agency, is something in the future. We would have a problem, 

 unless the President was enthusiastically back of this concept, in 

 forcing it through against his wishes. 



But, mherently, I would say in the bills that call for a Cabinet 

 level council, you are going to build in a problem, in that the major 

 problem that exists today is the minor oceanographic interest of a 

 number of important departments, headed by Cabinet level officers. 

 It is not the inclination of any department or Cabinet level officer, 

 and I can understand it, to cut off a part of his own activity in, which 

 he is interested but this proliferation is the problem that we face in 

 oceanography today. 



Now, I have heard the Inter- Agency Committee on Oceanography 

 mentioned several times. I believe the establislunent of that commit- 

 tee was a forward step, a tremendous forward step, in oceanography. 

 I think it is one of the reasons that interest has been created in recent 

 years, and there has been a better coordination of activities as a result 

 of this Inter- Agency Committee, under the leadership of Bob Abell, 

 particularly. I think it has done a tremendous job, but it isn't enough, 

 to accomplish the job that needs to be done. 



Of all the bills that have been submitted to this committee for 

 immediate action, your bill, Mr. Chairman, holds actually the most 

 practical promise in that it sets up an independent or an advisory 

 committee on oceanography, made up of people outside the Govern- 

 ment who can probably take a less biased view on the over-all prob- 

 lems of oceanography. I like the idea of the tying it into the Presi- 

 dent's Office of Science and Technology, because this is a means of at- 

 tracting executive attention to the over-all problem. 



I would think that S. 944 as passed by the Senate, which sets up 

 Cabinet officials as the policymaking body, is a mistake. I know 

 that most Cabinet officials belong to from 15 to 20 similar organiza- 

 tions. They haven't time to give it any real attention, and you would 

 be just, in effect, putting it into a pigeonhole, a Cabinet level pigeon- 

 hole, if you put this program into a committee of that type. I would 

 much rather have an advisory committee on oceanography made up 

 of tremendously knowledgeable experts outside the Government who 

 are on fire on this problem, who are concerned about it, and who come 

 in with a meaningful recommendation for the future. 



Mr. Lennon. Thank you very much, Mr. Wilson. 



Mr. Casey? 



Mr. Casey. Congressman Wilson, I appreciate your comments, and 

 I think that you are right. The Executive has to be interested in it, 

 and, as I see your proposal, you want this, kind of, patterned after 

 the NASA organization. 



Mr. Wilson. That is right. 



