4^ 



The point made by Charles Callison of the National Audubon So- 

 ciety concerning the qualifications of individuals to be recommended 

 by the Chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality for appomt- 

 ment by the President to the Marine Mammals Commission, is one 

 with which we in the Society for Animal Protective Legislation agree 

 most strongly. Not only do we fear, as he does, that "the fur industry 

 or other commercial and industrial interests whose purpose is exploita- 

 tion, not conservation" will demand representation on the small, three- 

 man Commission, but we fear that some scientists who have what 

 amounts to a vested interest in the killing of sea mammals because 

 of the nature of their specialties and jobs, might exert an unduly great 

 influence. It has been suggested that a broader base which would give 

 the concerned public a substantial voice in decisions should be pro- 

 vided. At the very least, and this is what we suggest, the qualification 

 for Commissioners should be as broad as that specified for the scien- 

 tific advisory committee. (See recommendations on contents of 

 legislation.) 



There is a scientific "new wave" which does not depend upon car- 

 casses for its data. The lead article in the August 13 issue of Science 

 required no killing of the hmnpback whales who are its subjects. 

 Because of the importance, of this article, I wish to submit it for the 

 use of the subcommittee. Far more scientific effort should, indeed 

 must, be devoted to the, study of living mammals of the sea in their 

 natural environment. This will require open minds, the putting aside 

 of often repeated techniques wlhich have already yielded the bulk 

 of the information they are capable of eliciting. Some of these tech- 

 niques have already demonstrated their inherent weaknesses. As Dr. 

 Kay pointed out in previous hearings, the age of all the whales of 

 the world suddenly doubled when scientific \dews changed. (It is 

 significant that it was a 5-year cessation of whale killing during the 

 war which showed the then established scientific data to be off by a 

 factor of 2.) 



The study of the dead, like the study of close cai>tives, belongs to 

 a period from which we seem to be at last emerging. As the fear of 

 losing the animals, the plants, the air, and the water that we have 

 so long taken for granted comes over us, young scientists have ap- 

 peareato use the scientific method in ways my generation would not 

 have considered or even thought of. This subcommittee has heard 

 testimony from a few of them, but there are more — siome who cannot 

 be located within a reasonaible period because they spend much of 

 their time at the bottom of thb sea. I would like to quote from the 

 opening of a book by one of these oceanographers, Robert Stenuit, 

 author of "The Dolphin, Cousin to Man." 



He quotes from Aesop (600 B.C.) ; Oppian (second century, A.D.) ; 

 the New Zealand G^azette, 1956; and Isvestia, 1966. Two of these 

 quotations will convey the idea clearly. Oppian writes : 



It is an offence tx) the Gods to hunt dolphins, and he can no longer approach 

 the Gods to offer a sacrifice nor touch their altars with pure hands, who of his 

 own will has been the cause of the destruction of dolphins. He makes impure 

 even those living under his roof, because the gods hold the massiacre of the 

 monarchs of the deipths to be as execrable as the murder of a human. 



M. Alexander Ishkov, Minister of Fisheries of the U.S.S.R., writes : 



The capture of dolphins is henceforth prohibited in all the territories of the 

 Soviet Union * * *. I believe that it will be possible to preserve all dolphins. 



