We have I do not know how many continental teachers. I do not believe we can find at least I am informed to that effect-local people who can do the work and who have the background required for teaching.

Also, we have a veterinarian, we have a horticulturist, we have an agronomist, and many other professional people. They are being appointed from the United States and sent down there and paid from Federal funds. I do not know whether we can find, momentarily, natives to take all these professional positions. I think to put the matter on the basis of a legislative fiat, requiring that a change must be made all at once, would be very drastic.

Instead, I believe that the adoption of a policy would be more desirable. Governor Pearson has followed the policy of giving local people positions wherever it has been possible. Such a policy will achieve the result desired by some with least confusion.

I merely wanted to make the point in connection with professional people, that our officials might experience very considerable difficulty in finding natives who could be put into those positions.

The CHAIRMAN. With regard to the persons appointed to that service, do you follow the figures presented in the Budget with regard to the number of persons and the salaries they receive? Do you follow those figures closely?

Lieutenant Governor CRAMER. Fairly closely, I should say. I do not think that last year there was a very great amount of the appropriation turned back.

Mr. KLEINDIENST. We follow the Budget exactly.

The CHAIRMAN. How is it with regard to personal services in the municipalities; do you follow that?

Mr. KLEINDIENST. That is in the discretion of the governor and the councils.

The CHAIRMAN. Did you have there the same salary reduction that we have had here this year, that is, 8% per cent?

Mr. KLEINDIENST. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. That applies to all employees of the municipalities? Mr. KLEINDIENST. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. It does not apply to the municipalities?

Mr. KLEINDIENST. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. But it applies to all persons in the central administration.

Mr. KLEINDIENST. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. That is handled as a separate budget now, is it? A few years ago it used to be handled all together.

Mr. KLEINDIENST. It is a separate budget now; yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. And it does not come before the councils at all for discussion or anything else?

Mr. KLEINDIENST. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Who appears before the budget officer before the budget is sent up here? Is that someone from the Department of the Interior?

Mr. KLEINDIENST. Mr. Burlew is the budget officer of the Interior Department.

The CHAIRMAN. And the governor comes with the budget officer when the budget is presented?

Mr. KLEINDIENST. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. I wanted to ask Governor Cramer a personal question. When did you first go to the Virgin Islands? Lieutenant Governor CRAMER. In March, 1931.

The CHAIRMAN. You went down with Governor Pearson?
Lieutenant Governor CRAMER. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. You have been stationed on St. Croix since that time?

Lieutenant Governor CRAMER. I have been stationed on St. Croix; yes, sir.

ADDITIONAL STATEMENT OF F. ANDERSEN

Mr. ANDERSEN. Mr. Chairman, I would like to say that with a very large portion of what Mr. Schroeder said I agree, only I did not have the courage to say it. I do not agree that the situation is completely hopeless. It is not. It is quite possible, with the help of the Federal Government, to have the people of the Virgin Islands make a living in the Virgin Islands. They can not do it, however, in a day's time. There were patriotic citizens who were willing to risk a considerable portion of their capital and courage in the past for the welfare of the people of the islands.

You must realize that a group of islands like St. Croix and St. Thomas, certainly St. Croix, where the people are engaged in agricultural pursuits, involves very considerable risk. That is true because the drought and hurricanes can at certain times destroy an entire crop.

It is only possible, therefore, to work with a long sight in view, and with very considerable capital behind each enterprise. And these patriotic people have carried that along most admirably.

But the enterprises are so small that that kind of activity does not interest American capital. They are too small for that purpose..

I have discussed this matter repeatedly with some of our biggest sugar men, and with our bankers and other friends in New York, and they entirely agree with me in that point, that it is out of proportion to what American capital generally meets when it goes outside of the continental United States.

How is it then possible for the future to help these people help themselves? Only by the Federal Government going in and taking a portion of the risk that is involved, and I am convinced that if the Federal Government will do so, with a long sight in view, there will not be any material loss in it, and in the long run it will be much cheaper to help out people in those enterprises than through the dole system.

The CHAIRMAN. I should like to ask what you have to say about the educational system as it has been carried on in St. Croix for the last 10 years.

Mr. ANDERSEN. I have not agreed with the system. I do not think it was the system for the islands; that it should be outside the hands of the Government and the colonial council, and that some brilliant institution like Harvard, or Columbia, or the Carnegie Institution, should be requested to make a survey as to what are the fundamental requirements of education, and in what way these people can be best educated to help themselves. I do not believe that the parties who have had charge of education there ever since

the transfer of the islands have understood the fundamental difference between what is required in the islands and on the mainland.

The CHAIRMAN. What has been the trouble with education there, specifically?

Mr. ANDERSEN. I think the people have been educated by teachers going into the islands with a view of making them able to compete with white people in the United States. Therefore, those people in the islands who have come up here and gone to Harvard and other institutions in the United States have suffered great hardships, and I know a number of them who would like to go back again.

The CHAIRMAN. What have you to say about the criticism made by Mr. Schroeder with regard to small homesteads?

Mr. ANDERSEN. I think they could not be made to succeed by the people working certainly on 5 or 10 acre plots; they must be much larger plots, 100 or 200 acres. It must be done on a cooperative basis. The Government must take a hand in it, if it is to succeed in such a way, at least until sugar prices become a little better, and the industry otherwise gets on its feet. They must work on a cropsharing system.

The CHAIRMAN. What can a homesteader hope to do?

Mr. ANDERSEN. There is only one crop he can raise and cultivate and make money, and that is sugarcane. Almost everything under the sun has been experimented with. A large number of crops have been experimented with by the Federal experiment station after the transfer of the islands, and so far not a single thing has been found that is commercially fitted to cultivate, except sugarcane.

The CHAIRMAN. You think the money we have spent on the agricultural experiment station has been chiefly wasted?

Mr. ANDERSEN. No; I would not say that, because it has indirectly benefited the people. But directly, I think it has been wasted; yes. Lieutenant Governor CRAMER. May I point out, Mr. Chairman, that there has been such an educational survey made; it was made in 1928 by a very able commission headed by Doctor Ryan. The report that was made then is the basis of our present educational program. The CHAIRMAN. It was my recollection that a very good report was made, and one of the members of the commission was a very promenent educator. As I recall, Hampton Institute and the Tuskegee Institute also were represented on the commission.

Lieutenant Governor CRAMER. Yes; and a vocational school was established last year, following the recommendation made in that report.

I had occasion not long ago to look into matters in the British Island of Grenada myself. I found that at Grenada there were over 16,000 small holdings of from 2 to 7 acres. That is the island in the British group that is always pointed out as being the most satisfactory from the viewpoint of the general conditions of the people living there. Grenada is usually referred to as being very successful in the solution of its economic problems.

The CHAIRMAN. And the holdings there are about 7 acres? Lieutenant Governor CRAMER. Between 2 and 7 acres. 16,000 in that range.

There are

In St. Croix we particularly inquired of the people interested in taking homesteads, asking them how much land they could work.

The general conclusion was that a man with an average-sized family could take over 6 acres with best results.

Mr. ANDERSEN. May I say, Mr. Chairman, that there is a vast difference between Grenada and St. Croix. The island of St. Croix suffers a great deal of serious drought, while on the island of Grenada there is an overabundance of rain. There has practically never been any dry weather there. Therefore, of course, that is an advantage to them.

The CHAIRMAN. I have been asked to allow Mr. Jacobsen to make a brief statement in connection with this matter.

STATEMENT OF E. E. JACOBSEN, ATTORNEY AT LAW, 612 NORTHWEST TWELFTH AVENUE, MIAMI, FLA.

Mr. JACOBSEN. Mr. Chairman, the only thing I would like to speak about is the judicial question.

The CHAIRMAN. What is your residence?

Mr. JACOBSEN. I live in Miami, Fla., at 612 Northwest Twelfth Avenue.

I happened to be counsel in a case appealed to the third circuit. It was a very important case involving title to real estate, and I do not think, from what Mr. Schroeder says, that he really knows some of the problems confronting the judicial end of the government in the Virgin Islands.

Under the enabling act the words "where compatible" were used with the changed sovereignty, that the laws should remain in force and effect "where compatible.'

That has been a great source of trouble to the circuit court in Philadelphia in construing those laws. This was particularly true in the particular case to which I have referred, in connection with the right of redemption after foreclosure of a mortgage. It was necessary to trace the law back to 1664, and from 1664 down to the present law passed by the colonial council in 1926, which did give a right of redemption within one year.

While that was the particular question which went up to the higher court, whether, under foreclosure, the right of redemption does not exist in the mortgagor, the circuit court of appeals, following the Supreme Court, said there was no right of redemption.

But, collaterally, there was a very important question there, and that was the question as to whether or not under this changed sovereignty various other questions would not arise in reference to a foreclosed mortgage, and it was all very troublesome, and caused me to go down there.

I think when Mr. Schroeder says it can be put under the Puerto Rico law he does not appreciate the peculiar indirect problems arising because of the changed sovereignty.

I think there is probably not enough work to occupy a judge all the time, but I do think that the real situation should not be minimized by the committee in passing an organic act.

The CHAIRMAN. Your position is this, that because of the previous legal history of the islands and there being a totally different legal background of their courts and procedure, and, if I may so term it, their common law, it requires a specialist rather than one who is merely acquainted with conditions on the mainland or in Puerto Rico.

Mr. JACOBSEN. Yes.

Mr. SCHROEDER. Are there any such specialists down there now? Mr. JACOBSEN. I do not believe there are any.

Mr. SCHROEDER. Then is not the United States district judge at Puerto Rico competent?

Mr. JACOBSEN. I think the problems come up far more frequently than you would expect.

Mr. SCHROEDER. That may be so, but they still would be competent.

SUPPLEMENTAL STATEMENT BY ARNOLD M. GOLDMAN AND JOSEPH ALEXANDER, DELEGATES FROM THE COLONIAL COUNCIL OF THE MUNICIPALITY OF ST. CROIX, VIRGIN ISLANDS

In discussing the powers of the municipal committee as created by paragraph 63 of the colonial law, Lieutenant Governor Cramer made reference to the abolishment of the various commissions which had to do with schools, hospitals, quarantine, and other municipal affairs and stated that these commissions had voluntarily relinquished their authority to the governor under a law passed in 1918 by the colonial councils of the two municipalities.

This statement of Lieutenant Governor Cramer is not entirely correct. The fact is that these commissions surrendered their authority at the request of the governor during the World War upon the representation of the governor that the work of the administration would be facilitated by turning over their functions to the governor. The commissions surrendered their rights as a war measure in 1918, as we remember it, shortly after the transfer of the islands to the United States. It is doubtful if the councils would have passed this law terminating the commissions except as just stated.

Another point made by Lieutenant-Governor Cramer to which we wish to take exception is his statement that natives with the necessary ability could not be found locally or abroad to fill the necessary professional positions that are required for the administration of the affairs of the islands. In support of this statement Mr. Cramer pointed to the fact that at present there is but one native doctor on the islands. It is our belief that no systematic effort has been made by the present administration to determine whether native talent is available or not. In the case of nurses, we believe that a considerable number of well-trained, native-born nurses can be found in the Virgin Islands and in continental United States. With respect to lawyers and other professional men, a considerable number are living abroad because there appears to be no opening for them at home. We wish to recommend to the committee that as many natives be appointed as possible, and that a systematic effort be made to find qualified natives for openings as they occur.

Section 24 of the bill under consideration gives the governor the power to appoint all officers and employees of the municipal governments of St. Croix and St. Thomas. We feel that future appointments by the governor of some of the officers and employees that are not a part of the central administration, should be confirmed by the municipal councils, the same as appointments are confirmed here by the Senate. We feel that such a provision would tend to influence the governor to select natives where suitable persons are available rather than to bring them from continental United States.

The CHAIRMAN. If there are no further statements to be made, the hearings are closed.

(Thereupon, the joint committee adjourned.)