at $2.98 shipped direct to the homeowner from some foreign country. One collection is not enough for the planting the homeowner has in. mind. He collects 3 more advertisements from his neighbors, sends in 4 orders; 1 addressed to himself; 1 to his wife and 1 for each of his 2 children-all separate orders with separate remittances. The orders would undoubtedly clear through a New York agent so that checks could be written on an American bank and cashed in New York without the added expense of foreign money orders. All four shipments would be duty-free.

This is not an impossible situation. At the present time, 2-year-old nursery grown shrubs from Holland are being laid down in Boston at 25 cents wholesale, including a 12% percent ad valorem tariff. The average wholesale American price for 2-year-old nursery grown shrubs comparable to those imported is 49.7 cents. This is not an inflated price.

An analysis of wholesale prices of common 2-year-old nurserygrown shrubs covering the past 30 years shows the price today almost comparable to that of 30 years ago. From 1921 to 1951, the farm prices of deciduous shrubs has increased only 14 percent. With high labor costs and high costs of operating supplies, and higher and higher distribution costs, the American grower is not in economic position which would enable him to compete with the flood of foreigngrown nursery stock, which we are certain would be offered direct to the consumers of this country by foreign mail-order concerns. cannot speak for the bulb growers of this country, but the situation could be even more serious for them than for the nurserymen.

I

Last year I pointed out the problem which would be raised by having importations of plant materials in small packages in meeting the requirements of the Plant Quarantine Act of 1912 and the Nursery Stock, Seed and Plant Quarantine regulations of the United States Department of Agriculture. I would again call this danger to the committee's attention.

Raising the duty-free limit from $1 to $3 would permit the economic shipment of dormant plants of many kinds, bulbs, and forms to this country in small orders direct to the customer. These shipments would be subject to the regulations of International Plant Quarantine No. 37, insofar as inspection and fumigation at our ports of entry are concerned. It was maintained a year ago and reiterated here that the personnel at our ports of entry is not adequate to cope with any additional inspection and fumigation load. Serious delays in inspection and fumigation of importations were experienced this spring at Hoboken, N. J., our major port of entry on the east coast.

The House, in action last week on the United States Department of Agriculture appropriations bill, has reduced appropriations for this work $100,000 for fiscal 1954. We can safely assume, therefore, that the USDA will be even less able to inspect, fumigate, and clear shipments of imported plant material after June 30, 1953, than they were during this past fiscal year.

It is our judgment that a large percentage of these duty-free packages containing plant materials would never be intercepted by the port-of-entry inspectors for inspection and fumigation. The result would be inevitably the virtual revocation of the international nursery stock, seed, and plant quarantine to the eventual disadvantage of American agriculture, horticulture and forestry.

We have introduced many plant pests from foreign lands in spite of our quarantine service, but there are still many more serious pests abroad that have not found their way to our shores up to this time. A casual examination of the past-interception records of the United States Department of Agriculture is proof of this.

The Federal expenditures alone for the attempted eradication or control of only 14 of these introduced pests, including such important pests as the Japanese beetle, the European cornborer, the white pine blister rust, the Dutch elm disease, citrus canker, and others, have amounted to $239,904,214. We cannot take a chance of introducing more of these foreign pests in duty-free uninspected and nonfumigated mail order parcels from abroad, which would be broadcast over the entire country. It is our opinion, too, that the 48 State departments of agriculture, which are charged with the obligation of protecting their agricultural resources from introduced pests, would be much concerned about this proposal. They already have difficulty in intercepting and inspecting at destination or post office terminals, small mail order packages of nursery stock originating in the United States.

Instead of saving money, section 13 of H. R. 5106 might well result in permanent losses to our natural resources. We believe importations of living plant materials should be reduced rather than encouraged if we wish to protect our forests and our agriculture from introduced plant pests.

Section 13 of H. R. 5106, we believe, would result in a flood of small package shipments of plants which would escape inspection and fumigation as required by quarantine number 37, thus destroying in large degree the protection now afforded by a strict enforcement of this quarantine.

For these reasons, Mr. Chairman, we would register our opposition to section 13 of the pending proposal as now written.

We would recommend its elimination from the bill or if not that, then an amendment which clearly eliminates from consideration, importations of plants or plant parts capable of propagation. That concludes my statement, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. JENKINS. I take it you are engaged, no doubt, or you are representing the nursery people of the country, and your problem is one that comes from the importation of herbs and plants and seeds, and things of that sort?

Mr. WHITE. Not seeds so much as the nursery plants, fruit trees, ornamental shrubs, ground covers, things like that.

Mr. JENKINS. Are there any other questions?

We have none. Thank you very much, Mr. White.
Mr. WHITE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. JENKINS. Do you have anything additional you would like to have inserted into the record?

Mr. WHITE. Not unless there is some data that you wish me to insert into the record to support these statements.

Mr. JENKINS. They may be inserted if you desire so.

Mr. WHITE. Thank you very much.

Mr. JENKINS. The next gentleman is Mr. Burnstine, who represents the National Jewelers Association.

STATEMENT OF B. N. BURNSTINE, OF BURNSTINE'S INC., WASHINGTON, D. C., REPRESENTING NATIONAL JEWELERS ASSOCIATION

Mr. BURNSTINE. My name is B. N. Burnstine. I am a Washington jeweler, and I represent the National Jewelers Association. I have a statement referring particularly to section 321, the administrative exemptions. The association has a membership of 1,800 jewelers, located in all sections of the United States. It is the considered opinion of our membership that raising tariff exemption to $3 on the myriad of imported consumer goods items would not result in a demonstrable savings to the Government, but would actually provide a net revenue loss.

Mr. JENKINS. Let me ask you a question there. I do not suppose you have any figures to tell us as to what you think the loss would be, have you?

Mr. BURNSTINE. No; but in this statement I cite one particular

case.

The exemption of tariff on articles in our industry, such as jewelry, watches, silverware, and kindred articles, and on which there is in existence a high retail excise tax, lowers the price at the consumer level to such an extent that foreign exporters, in competition with domestic industry, could build a lucrative business in the United States with small sales, direct to the consumer, with telling effects on our industry. An article of jewelry costing $3 in the country of origin, could be imported by an individual duty free. That same article imported in quantity by a businessman would carry a duty of $1.05, making the landed cost $4.05. Without figuring wholesale and retail distribution costs, this article would carry a retail excise tax of $0.81, selling to the consumer at a total cost of $4.86. The minimum loss to the Government would be $1.86. This figure will be theoretically much higher if you give consideration to distributor costs and profits, with added loss of tax from business profits, et cetera.

It is impossible to estimate the loss to the jewelry business that the raising of the exemption would cause, but it would prove substantial in terms of lost production, employment, sales, income, income tax, and excise tax.

The lure of direct foreign imports, duty free, is captivating. Imagine advertisements featuring: Cutlery and silver giftware from Sheffield, England; Paris creations in costume jewelry; low priced watches from Switzerland; silver jewelry from Mexico and the innumerable articles from Japan.

Our nationally circulated periodicals would be full of advertisements of foreign exporters telling the American consumer how he can buy more cheaply than from American businessmen, without paying their share of tariffs and taxes.

Further, we believe that that part of the proposed Customs Simplification Act that raises the exemption, would in actuality be a tariff measure and as such has no place in an "administrative" bill. The National Jewelers Association asks that the tariff exemption remain at $1.

Mr. JENKINS. I presume that this change would affect your business about as much as any business in the country.

Mr. BURNSTINE. I think more so, particularly in view of the high retail excise tax and traditionally jewelry items bear a high tariff. So your drop in price to the consumer level is pretty great.

Mr. JENKINS. You would not suffer any loss in transportation, like vegetables and flowers would?

Mr. BURNSTINE. No.

Mr. JENKINS. In other words, these commodities would come in from Canada, also, and the foreign sellers will circulate catalogs in this country.

Mr. BURNSTINE. I think it would be tremendous. There is no way of exactly estimating it, but it would be very, very substantial to our industry. I think it would be a real, definite blow.

Mr. JENKINS. If they sent a 98-cent article here, that would displace about $3.

Mr. BURNSTINE. I would say you are quite correct there.

Mr. JENKINS. Any other questions? If not, we thank you very much for your statement.

The next gentleman is Mr. Tipton, general counsel, Air Transport Association of America.

STATEMENT OF STUART G. TIPTON, GENERAL COUNSEL, AIR TRANSPORT ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA, WASHINGTON, D. C.

Mr. TIPTON. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, my name is Stuart G. Tipton. I am general counsel of the Air Transport Association of America, which includes as its members practically all of the certificated airlines of the United States. We welcome the opportunity to discuss H. R. 5106 with the committee.

The simplification and expedition of customs clearance procedures means more to air transportation than to any other means of transport today, because speed is all we have to sell. Any delays occasioned by customs procedures deny to the shippers the speed we offer and such delays are beyond our power to avoid. The Bureau of Customs is cooperating to adapt customs procedures to this new mode of transport, but there remain statutory requirements devised to regulate slower-moving transport, which now stand in the way of important air transport improvements. These only Congress can remove. We can lift a package off the ground in Paris at 7 o'clock in the evening of one day and set it down in New York at 6:30 the next morning, or in Chicago by 10:30 that morning, or in Mexico City by 7 o'clock that night. The flying operations have been mastered. The most important obstacle remaining that prevents us from giving service with that speed is customs entry and clearance procedure.

We are the only means of transport that can carry goods between inland points such as Paris and Chicago without at least two transshipments from rail to boat and boat to rail. In surface transportation, the customs procedures can be related to these transshipments in such a way as not to add materially to the delay in the movement, but in air transportation these customs procedures can be the greatest single cause of delay.

It is appropriate that Congress review the customs procedures now because since 1930, when the present tariff law was enacted, air transport has grown from small to an enormous carrier of traffic. The international cargo business of the United States flag certificated

airlines has grown from 8,000 pounds per year in 1931 to 92 million pounds in 1952. This is an increase of more than ten thousand fold. The travelers coming to the United States on aircraft in 1952 numbered 877,843. This is a larger number than were brought by vessels last year, or any year since 1929. This growth is reflected in the emphasis given air transport by the Customs Bureau. In New York City alone the customs inspectors who are assigned solely to aircraft increased from none in 1930 to 126 in 1952. In addition, 12 men were used part-time at the airports for the entry of baggage. We come here because one of the most important means to improve our service to shippers and passengers is to secure changes in the statutes governing customs procedures.

My testimony will be divided into two general parts. First, I will discuss several sections in H. R. 5106, which we endorse, which should be enacted in their present form as speedily as possible. These are sections 11, 14, 16 and 17 (c). Secondly, there are sections which apparently are designed to solve problems which are very important to the development of air transportation, but the provisions are inadequate and should be revised.

Mr. JENKINS. Let me ask a question there. You say "and which should be enacted in their present form as speedily as possible." Then there are other sections that you say you do not approve. Would you prefer not to have those sections or would you prefer to have other sections doing what they propose to do, but in better language?

Mr. TIPTON. I will explain that in detail in a moment, Mr. Chairman. I will explain it in detail rather than brief it now, if that is all right with you.

Mr. JENKINS. That is fine. Proceed.

Mr. TIPTON. Section 11 of the bill would authorize the Secretary of the Treasury, by regulation, to admit to the United States supplies and ground equipment for aircraft without payment of customs duties. The ground equipment necessary to handle and service aircraft when it lands at various airports is usually specially designed for a given aircraft. It is far more efficient to use such standard and uniform equipment whether the aircraft operates in Germany, Great Britain, or India. This amendment may not result in an increase of importations into the United States, because most of the important products are manufactured here. But the legislation is necessary to enable our Government to secure reciprocal rights in other countries into which our carriers must take their equipment.

Section 14 would amend the Tariff Act of 1930 to authorize the Secretary of the Treasury to grant exemption from the application of the customs laws for vehicles and equipment used in connection with aircraft accidents, for search, rescue, investigation, repair and salvage. This is needed so that in the event of an aircraft accident customs entry procedures will not impede search and rescue efforts. The greatest expedition is necessary not only to save lives, but to salvage cargo and very expensive modern airplanes. The enactment of this provision should not result in a great inflow of foreign goods into this country, because here we have an abundance of the supplies necessary to search for aircraft and rescue its occupants, but the enactment of this provision will be the basis for our Government securing similar privileges in foreign countries where, in the event of