626 INVESTIGATION OF THE EUK-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 



The Chairman. Why did you not ask him about the different 

 sizes in then classifications ? You remember that was the real source 

 of the trouble, do you not ? 



Mr. Lembkey. 1 did not desire to get any information on that 

 point. I supposed that was settled by the catalogues and by the 

 statements already published. 



The Chairman. 1)o you not think it would have thrown some 

 light on this if you had just asked what their classifications meant 

 as to sizes ? 



Mr. Lembkey. I do not know that it would have thrown any 

 further light than that already given the committee, Mr. Chairman. 

 The catalogues of this firm have been published from year to year. 



The Chairman. Yes, but it has been stated to this committee that 

 that has a reference to the different sizes, and others say it does 

 not have, so that it would be very interesting to the committee if 

 you had asked Lampson & Co. to explain that classification as far 

 as sizes are concerned. 



Mr. Lembkey. I shall be very glad to address a letter to Lampson 

 v& Co. attempting to obtain that information. 



The Chairman. I think you had better do that. 



Mr. Lembkey. Mr. Elliott has introduced in his report, hearing 

 No. 1, page 97. and reported in full a letter of instructions dated 

 May 14, 1896, from C. S. Hamlin, Acting Secretary of the Treasury, 

 to J. B. Crowley, special agent in charge of the Seal Islands, which 

 prohibits during the year 1896 the killing of yearlings and seals 

 whose skins weigh less than six pounds. By this letter he seeks to 

 prove that the taking in subsequent j^ears of skins weighing less than 

 6 pounds was a violation of regulations. It is proper to call the atten- 

 tion of the committee to the fact that this order in terms refers to 

 the year 1896 only and can not have any application to killing during 

 any subsequent year, unless evidence is brought to show that the 

 instructions by subsequent action of the department was made 

 applicable to succeeding years. 



Mr. Elliott has not produced any evidence to show the continuous 

 application of this regulation beyond the year to which it is intended 

 to apply, and as a matter of fact there is no such evidence anywhere 

 to my knowledge, even though it were not produced by Mr. Elliott. 

 His claim, therefore, that the taking of skms weighing less than 6 

 pounds in years subsequent to the year 1896 was a violation of this 

 regulation which, according to its own terms, was applicable only 

 to that year and to that year alone, is not a valid claim. As a matter 

 of fact instructions issued by the several departments to govern the 

 taking of seals on the islands were annual instructions and intended 

 to apply to the year only in which they were issued or until super- 

 seded by subsequent instructions, which were always issued yearly. 

 This may be seen by reference to the instructions for 1905 and follow- 

 ing, on pages 150/240, 477, 581, 702, 955, and 1191, of Appendix 

 A to these hearings. In the annual instructions for each of these 

 years this paragraph, which is repeated in each of the pages cited, 

 may be found: 



The instructions embodied in this letter are to remain in force until they are super- 

 seded by later ones, and in the event of your failure to receive revised instructions for 

 a subsequent season the directions here given are to be followed for such season so 

 far as they are applicable. 



