347 As the shovel works along, there are caves, but they are cleaned up before they begin to lift the coal off the bottom which has been uncovered. I do not remember any accident or injuries, caused by caves from the high wall or slides. Possibly there have been, but I have no knowledge of them. Now, if I may be permitted, I want to go back for a moment to the reason why we think it will not be the Secretary of Interior himself who will promulgate the proposed rules and regulations under this legislation. When I was with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, I had three bureaus, one of forestry, one of water, and one of public parks. We had a bureau chief in each department. The legislature or others would agitate or decree that rules and regulations should be formulated governing certain angles of forestry, certain regulations for public parks, certain regulations for the bureau of water, and in no instance was I the man who actually wrote those rules, because the men who headed the bureaus were the men competent to promulgate those rules and regulations; and, having confidence in them, I should say that 99 percent of the time I accepted the rules and regulations as written by them. And I would say that the Secretary of the Interior of the United States, in a Government as large as this, would practically be forced to adopt that same procedure. He would accept the rules and regulations written by his Chief of the Bureau of Mines. That is the basis of my contention that he would write the rules. Mr. LUCAS. Do you tell this committee that you are convinced that your industry will be damaged, if not destroyed, if this legislation is passed? Mr. STEWART. If the legislation contains the provision that the rules and regulations are to be promulgated by the Bureau of Mines, no matter whether it be Mr. Forbes or somebody else, and that those rules and regulations are going to have the full force and effect of law, without the right to court appeal. Something was said here about due process of law, but the bill as written does not provide for that. We may assume that we have due process of law. I am not a lawyer. Sometimes people don't get it unless it is expressly made a part of the bill. Mr. LUCAS. He has not answered my question yet. Will you complete your statement? You started out with an "If." If these things are true, then you think you will be hurt? Mr. STEWART. If these things are true, we fear we will be hurt. Mr. KELLEY. All right. Mr. Mahoney? Thank you, Mr. Stewart. STATEMENT OF FRANKLIN H. MOHNEY, EXECUTIVE SECRETARY, Mr. MOHNEY. I have a very brief statement which I would like to read into the record. Like the previous witness, I, too, represent an open-pit organization. My name is Franklin H. Mohney. I am executive secretary of the Mineral Producers' Association, with offices in the Empire Building, Kittanning, Pa. This association is made up of about 75 bituminouscoal-producing companies, both large and small, producing coal in central end western Pennsylvania by the open-pit or strip-mining method. Although we are small compared with the two major trade associations of bituminous-coal-mine operators in our State, we do represent a substantial portion of the production and a fair cross section of the open-pit-mining industry in Pennsylvania. My apperance before this subcommittee today is to present some of the views and thoughts of these operators as they pertain to mine safety and the possible effect of the safety record in the mine if police power over coal mines were to be granted to the Federal Government. These views, as expressed at a recent meeting of the board of directors of the Mineral Producers' Association, are in oppsoition to H. R. 268 or similar legislation. Our members are convinced that legislation such as this will not further promote safety in the coal mine. In taking this stand of opposition, our members are cognizant of their responsibility to their employees and to the public, and I do not believe there is anything they would not do or attempt to do to promote safety in the mining industry. They feel that, if legislation such as that represented by H. R. 268 were to be enacted, in the regulation of our mining industry we definitely would have conflicting police power between the State and the Federal Governments. Under the existing situation the coal-mining industry in Pennsylvania is regulated by State laws that have been enacted as a result of long experience to meet the varying conditions in our widely separated fields of coal. These laws definitely prescribe the rights, duties, and liabilities for those engaged in the industry, regardless of their size or whether they are producing for interstate or intrastate commerce. Under these laws there is no "twil ght zone," a zone of possible confliction between two regulatory agencies. All mines in Pennsylvania. come under the jurisdiction of the State department of mines. If these mines were also under Federal police power, would not there be many mines in which a definite doubt could arise as to whether the product being mined could be definitely classified as interstate commerce, and thus be subject to the jurisdiction of the Federal mine inspector? In our association there are many small operations, strip mines, located on a man's own farm. These individuals sell their coal at the pit and are consequently engaged only in the mining phase of the industry. Since their output is small, their product is primarily for local consumption and definitely does not enter the interstate-commerce field. Under whose jurisdiction, then, will this mine be? The annual production of coal in the bituminous region of Pennsylvania has increased from 1,300,000 tons in 1877 to 104,000,000 tons in 1951. The number of inspectors has increased from 3 to 29, plus 2 electrical inspectors and 4 mine rescue instructors, in the same period. The fatalities per million tons produced have decreased from a high of 9.95 in 1877 to a new low of 0.67 in 1951. The safety record of the bituminous region has shown a steady and constant improvement, reaching for 1951 the best ever achieved in the history of the State. This remarkable record has been achieved under State jurisdiction under a safety-inspection system equal if not superior to any in the Nation. We feel that the present State laws are adequate, and we are not convinced that Federal regulation of mine safety can guarantee this same continued improvement in the safety record which the mining industry has experienced under State control. Now, let us turn to the open-pit-mining phase of the industry. Though long established, strip mining did not really come of age until the advent of World War II. Motivating its rapid growth at this time was an unprecedented demand for coal, a severe manpower shortage, and the inactivity in construction work, thus making idle much excavating and road machinery, machinery normally not associated with the mining industry as we generally know it. Open-pit mining is a method of mining where the material overlying a seam of coal-sand, rock, clay, gravel, earth, or shale-is stripped off with large draglines or shovels, thrown aside, with the exposed coal then being loaded by additional shovels directly into vehicles to be hauled to the tipple or the cleaning plant. Basically the production of coal by this method is a quarrying operation rather than one of deep mining. It is an operation little different from the open-pit mining of clay, sand, limestone, bauxite, or what have you. Because of this fact, we feel that we should be subject only to the rules and regulations that apply to other quarries. As a coal mine we have neither the gas nor the explosive hazard which seemingly is so much a part of the coal industry. We do not have the roof falls and cave-ins, nor need we worry about proper timbering. Sufficient and safe ventilation is not one of our problems; we need no air shafts, no fans. Strip mining clearly does not possess the dangers seemingly so inherent to the deep-mining phase of the coal industry. To add substantiation to this statement, we have reproduced tables comparing the production and the number of fatalities occurring in the strip mines and the deep mines in Pennsylvania. Table III then combines the conclusions of these two, showing a comparison between the percent of total production which is strip-mined and the percent of fatalities occurring in strip mines. (The tables referred to are as follows:) TABLE I.-Bituminous-coal production in Pennsylvania, 1941-50 TABLE II.-Fatalities in the Pennsylvania bituminous-coal industry, 1941–50 Mr. MOHNEY. For example, in 1946, 25.2 percent of the total production was strip-mined, but that phase of the industry had only 4.6 percent of the fatalities. This is correspondingly true for each of the 10 years noted. Were strip mining to possess the same dangers as deep mining, should not these percentages be equal or very near thereto? Similarly, in comparing fatals per million tons produced and production per fatal, the strip-mining phase has clearly a better record. The graphs on the following pages illustrate this point. Graph I shows the downward trend in fatals per million tons produced in both the strip and deep mines for the years 1941 to 1950 and also illustrates the greatly decreased number of fatals per million tons in the strip-mining industry. Graph II shows a correspondingly upward trend in production per fatal in each phase of the industry. Regardless of how we compare these two phases of the coal industry, the safety record of the strip mine is consistently better than that of the deep mine. (The graphs referred to appear on p. 351.) Mr. MOHNEY. If we were to look at this graph, for example, in 1946 we had almost 8,000,000 tons of coal produced for each fatal accident. In 1950 we dropped a little bit, but we had over 4,000,000 tons of coal produced for each fatal accident. If we were to make a study of the case histories of some of the fatals occurring in a strip mine, we would find that they take no general pattern as a large portion of the reports of those fatals finds the individual responsible for his own death. In most cases the fatalities are single ones. In only one or two cases has there been more than one fatality caused by the same hazard. One in particular about which I am thinking occurred in 1947. In that accident the gas tank on a power shovel exploded killing four men in the explosion and resulting fire. This is the only incident in a strip pit in Pennsylvania approaching a major disaster as classified by the Bureau of Mines. This study of the fatals and how they have occurred shows further differences between strip and deep mines, added substantiation to our argument that strip mines are quarrying operations having the same occupational hazards and, in all probability, corresponding accident and fatality rates. In concluding and briefly summarizing this statement, my appearance here has been to present the thoughts and views of the members of the Mineral Producers' Association on mine-safety legislation. We are generally opposed to legislation of the nature of H. R. 268, for reasons expressed by spokesmen for other segments of the coal industry and because we feel that there will be conflicting police |