1 - American Memory

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nations where government controls and operates industry, both man-
agement and workers.
At the same time, I also have a deep commitment to the public in-
terest, to the general welfare of our citizens. On those occasions when
collective bargaining, mediation, conciliation, and other normal proc-
esses have failed to settle labor-management disputes, then in the
public interest, for the public good, something must be done.
This is why I have worked hard to secure remedial legislation to
give Hawaii and the other Pacific Islands under the American flag
security in their oceanborne commerce with the west coast.
As you know, only 2 months ago, on July 17. the Senate debated
and approved S. 1566, the Hawaii and U.S. Pacific Islands Surface
Commerce Act. which I coauthored and cosponsored with my colleague
from Hawaii, Senator Daniel K. Inouye, and which is substantially
similar to the bill before your subcommittee, H.R. 7189.
As I told my colleagues during that debate, I can recall no other
legislation in my 15 years in the Senate since Hawaii statehood whose
enactment has been of greater importance to the people of my State.
It is only through such legislation that the people of the island State
of Hawaii can he safeguarded from the disastrous impact of stoppages
in shipping operations on the west coast—stoppages which have dis-
rupted our ocean lifeline for a total of 464 days in seven major strikes
and for more than 1.000 days in scores of lesser strikes since World
War II.
I am deeply gratified that the Senate responded to Hawaii's appeal
by voting passage of S. 1566 by the decisive margin of 58 yeas to
39 nays.
CONTINUOtIS OCEAN SHIPPING ESSENTIAL FOR HAWAII
To briefly recapitulate my earlier testimony, the geographical posi-
tion of Hawaii, nearly 2.500 miles distant from the U.S. mainland,
renders the island State extraordinarily dependent upon and vulner-
able to interruptions of a single mode of transportation—ocean ship-
ping—which moves nearly all of the imports and exports essential for
our people and economy. To cut into or sever that ocean lifeline is to
cut to the very heart of Hawaii's economic health and security.
Sea transportation normally carries 99 percent of all goocls which
travel between Hawaii and the U.S. mainland. Aircargo, which carries
the remaining 1 percent, can expand in an emergency to carrj- at most
only 3 percent of normal freight tonnage.
Approximately 80 percent of all physical commodities purchased
by Hawaii's 881,000 people are imported, primarily from the U.S.
mainland, and almost entirely shipped from the west coast. Recent
figures indicate 79.5 percent of our oceanborne imports arrive from
the west coast ports, 2.3 percent from tiie east coast, and 18.2 percent
from foreign sources, excluding petroleum products.
Almost without exception, tne goods and supplies essential to
modern living in Hawaii are either imported or import dependent. To
cite one example, our construction industrv requires imports of lum-
ber, nails, plumbing fixtures, roofing, and even the silica sand and
gypsum rock needed to produce cement and concrete products.