power between the State and Federal Governments. Too, it is our belief that the present mine-safety law in Pennsylvania is adequate, with there being no guaranty that the safety record of the coal industry can be improved by giving the Federal Government police power over the coal mines. Should Congress decide to pass such legislation as this, we feel that, because of the nature of strip mining, its being a quarrying operation rather than one of mining, it should not be drafted so as to include the bituminous coal open-pit mining industry.

Mr. KELLEY. Any questions? Mr. Lucas?

Mr. LUCAS. Mr. Mohney, while my colleague from Pennsylvania, Mr. McConnell, was discussing this subject with Mr. Stewart, he developed that probably the only phase of your operations which might be classified as dangerous and perhaps come under the description in the statute or under the interpretation of the statute as imminent danger would be the use of blasting powder. I meant to ask Mr. Stewart this question, and I will ask you. Is the use of explosives in your industry regulated by Pennsylvania law?

Mr. MOHNEY. I am sorry, I couldn't answer that question. I believe it is, sir. I can't give you any definite particulars regarding the law to regulate that.

Mr. LUCAS. Do you know whether or not Pennsylvania has any general statute regulating the use of dynamite and TNT and nitroglycerine?

Mr. MOHNEY. I am sure they do, but I could not give you the definite provisions of the law, sir.

Mr. LUCAS. With the chairman's permission, I would like to ask Mr. Stewart that question.

Mr. STEWART. With the permission of the chairman, Mr. Wallin, the president of our association, is an operator himself and is familiar with these laws and can answer that question with authority.

Mr. LUCAS. Mr. Wallin, come up, please, and identify yourself for the reporter. I think this is important.

Mr. WALLIN. I am J. H. Wallin, president of the Central Pennsylvania Open Pit Mining Association.

Mr. LUCAS. Now may I put my question to you, sir? Is there any regulation of the use of explosives in your industry by the State of Pennsylvania?

Mr. WALLIN. There is.

Mr. LUCAS. Does it apply only to your industry or does it apply generally to the use of explosives by any citizen in Pennsylvania or anyone within the State of Pennsylvania?

Mr. WALLIN. It applies to the general use of explosives in any kind. of quarrying operation. I might add that the shooting of the overburden in our industry is done by experts. In other words, the large powder companies have men who are specialists, one of whose duties is to go around to the mines and shoot the overburden. That is the only place, really, that we use powder. There is one exception, that we do shoot some coal sometimes. That is done by local men. But that is all regulated by State law.

Mr. LUCAS. May I inquire, Mr. Wallin, if you have ever had an accident with the use of powder in your operations?

Mr. WALLIN. Not in my operations, no, sir.

Mr. Lucas. Mr. Mohney, do you know of any fatality or accident with the use of explosives in your industry?

Mr. MOHNEY. No, sir, I don't. I have here the Safety Sentinel, which is the publication of the Pennsylvania State Department of Mines, which outlines the fatalities occurring in the mines of Pennsylvania for the past 2 years. In 1950 we had six fatalities, and in 1951 we had six fatalities.

Mr. LUCAS. I am addressing myself to the imminent danger of the use of powder or explosives in your industry, and you do not know whether there has been a fatality of that type?

Mr. MOHNEY. I do not know. I was trying to bring out that in the past 2 years there is no record of any fatalities from the use of explosives. Most of these accidents have been by some other method. Mr. LUCAS. I think that is all.

Mr. KELLEY. Mr. Tackett?

Mr. TACKETT. I gather that you gentlemen engaged in strip mining are contending that you should not be classified under the general laws. governing coal operators, but as quarries of any kind of minerals.

Mr. MOHNEY. That is our contention, sir, because the same material in your region, bauxite, I believe, and phosphate, is produced in a similar manner. They strip off that which overlies the seam and then load the coal or the bauxite or phosphate. We feel that it is a quarrying operation.

Mr. TACKETT. There are not any of these nine imminent danger items which Mr. McConnell has listed and has been reading to various witnesses to determine whether or not those are all of them, that apply to strip mining; is that correct?

Mr. MOHNEY. The fifth one mentioned there, explosives, possibly could occur. To the best of my knowledge, it hasn't happened in recent years. It could occur, though.

Mr. TACKETT. Would you be able to determine for the benefit of this committee whether or not every State that produces coal does have regulations equal to that of the Federal Bureau of Mines relative to the use of explosives in strip mining and other quarrying?

Mr. MOHNEY. I couldn't tell you now, sir, but I imagine that information could be found.

Mr. TRACKETT. I know we do have such in our State, but of course we have a lot of strip mines there in bauxite and phosphorus, and we have a lot of strip mining in coal operations.

That is all.

Mr. KELLEY. The strip mines, however, are regulated under the Pennsylvania Bituminous Coal Act.

Mr. MOHNEY. Yes, sir.

Mr. KELLEY. That is all. Mr. McConnell?

Mr. McCONNELL. I have no questions.

Mr. KELLEY. Counsel?

Mr. FORSYTHE. You spoke of a good bit of the coal from these strip mines being sold right at the pit.

Mr. MOHNEY. Yes, sir.

Mr. FORSYTHE. In the first place, how much tonnage does the group that you represent produce?

Mr. MOHNEY. The group I represent puts out approximately 30 percent of its annual production in Pennsylvania by this method. I would say about 6,000,000 tons.

Mr. FORSYTHE. Do you have a rough idea of what group of purchasers you sell to?

Mr. MOHNEY. For the entire group I could not say.

Mr. FORSYTHE. Could you break it down?

Mr. MOHNEY. For the small ones, they may sell for the domestic market in the home; they may sell to electric utility companies in the immediate area. A lot in our immediate area is shipped to the lakes, to be sent into Canada, which would be in interstate commerce. Mr. FORSYTHE. You spoke of a good bit of it being sold locally and therefore not in interstate commerce. I was trying to follow that a little bit further.

That is all, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. Lucas, I was reading this list of disasters that have occurred, and I see that in 1941 there was one at Du Quoin, Ill., in which seven were killed as a result of explosives, and that is the only one that I see listed here in which there was a major disaster in a strip mine since 1909.

Mr. LUCAS. Do you know whether or not the State of Illinois regulates the use of explosives?

Mr. GRAHAM. No.

Mr. KELLEY. The committee will recess until tomorrow morning at 10 o'clock, when we will reconvene in the caucus room in this building.

(Whereupon, at 7 p. m. the subcommittee recessed until 10 a. m. the following day.)

COAL MINE SAFETY

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY, 21, 1952

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON COAL MINE SAFETY, COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND LABOR, Washington, D. C.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to recess, at 10 a. m. in the caucus room, House Office Building, the Honorable Augustine B. Kelley, chairman of the subcommittee, presiding.

Present: Representatives Kelley, Lucas, Bailey, Perkins, Tackett, McConnell, Morton, and Vail.

Also present: Fred G. Hussey, chief clerk; John S. Forsythe, general counsel: David N. Henderson, assistant general counsel; and John O. Graham, minority clerk.

Mr. KELLEY. The committee will please be in order.

The gentleman from West Virginia, Mr. Ramsay, has a statement to make.

You may proceed.

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE ROBERT L. RAMSAY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA

Mr. RAMSAY. Gentlemen of the committee, I want to thank you for this opportunity of appearing before you to present my views in regard to additional legislation pertaining to mines, coal mines principally. I have had some experience in the mines. In fact, I earned every penny I spent going to college working in mines. After that, I practiced law. After I was admitted to the practice of law of course I had a great deal of legislation pertaining to mines and miners. I fully know the inadequacy of our laws to protect against the explosions and dangers that confront the miner every day.

I have looked over these bills, and it seems to me that unless there is a provision in legislation that will make it possible for the enforcement of the legislation, when danger is imminent, we will be no better off than we are with the present laws as they are at this time.

The State laws are wholly inadequate. West Virginia, of course, is the greatest coal-mining State in the Union. Yet, it is very seldom that there has been a governor of the State who was favorable toward the workingmen or the men who work in the mines.

I can remember-it is not so today so much-that only a man could be appointed a mine inspector who had been recommended by the mine companies. Of course, you know what kind of inspection they had.

I remember a mine I worked in where a man asked for 2 weeks for props, and he had them promised, promised by the mine foreman that

355

props would be brought into the mine. He worked constantly under that promise, but the props never came until the roof fell down and the man was killed.

I want to call your attention to just what the laws are in West Virginia when a man is injured or killed by reason of the fault and neglect of the company, regardless of how negligent it may be. In most States notwithstanding your compensation laws, where a company is guilty of gross negligence, damages may be recovered, but that is not so in West Virginia. Early in West Virginia they passed a law that it was necessary for the company to employ mine foremen who had had 2 years' experience. Immediately after that the court held that whenever the company had employed a man with 2 years of mine experience, it had fulfilled every duty it owed to the employees of that company. Regardless of the fact of whether he was a competent miner or not, if he had had 2 years' experience, our court held that he then became a common employee with the miner and he was a fellow servant, and therefore if the miner desired to sue he had to sue the mine foreman and couldn't sue the company. That is the law today.

I remember one time I had a case in which a check weighman had been killed, a check weighman employed by the miners. We have the check weighman system, of course, as they have everywhere. The company has a check weighman and the miners have a check weighman. This check weighman represented the mines.

A car broke

loose from an incline and went down into the place where he was weighing, and killed him. I brought suit in that case, as attorney for his family, and recovered, and the Supreme Court held that under the law at the present time he did not come under the compensation.

Immediately a bill was passed by the legislature putting all check weighmen, regardless of whether they represented the company or the men, under the law so that the company could not be sued in the event that any injury might befall him.

That is the situation there. You have your inspectors, of course. Our inspectors, I am glad to say, in West Virginia are much better now than they were years ago. But as I have intimated, years ago a man could not be employed as an inspector by the Government, by the State, unless he first had the endorsement of the men who owned the mine. You can imagine what kind of inspection there was.

It

I worked in mines where the lamp could hardly burn because of the inadequacy of air. The great dangers in the mine are, first, of course, gas explosions. A gas explosion itself doesn't kill so many men. is the afterdamp, which spreads out all over the mine. To attempt to confine that in an area where there is gas in an area is useless, because as soon as the explosion goes, it goes all through the mine into every section of it. That is why so many men are killed under gas explosions.

A falling roof may be the cause. In the east side of the mine the roof is good and in the west side it is bad. There the closing of an area is all right. There is no question about that. You will never protect against gas and the explosions that kill thousands of men unless you make it possible to close the entire mine when the gas in that mine has become dangerous.

In the two explosions that have occurred I understand that your mine inspectors importuned the company to close that mine, that it