as

Mr. FRASER. Yes. I should perhaps draw attention to the second paragraph on the right-hand column where the poll results are stated as follows: "Twice as many farm residents dislike fast time *** like it," so I think it is true that in our rural communities there is still considerable opposition to daylight saving, but I would only supplement that observation with the fact that of those who dislike daylight saving there is still a substantial majority who would like to have Congress set uniform dates if we are to have it. That is indicated at the bottom of the poll.

Mr. VAN DEERLIN. In other words, they would like to make the best of a bad thing?

Mr. FRASER. That is right.

Mr. VAN DEERLIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LONG. Mr. Curtin.

Mr. CURTIN. No questions, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LONG. Mr. Fraser, thank you very kindly. As I said before, we appreciate your coming.

Mr. FRASER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. LONG. The next witness is Congressman Fulton of the State of Tennessee. Mr. Fulton, will you come forward, please. We are happy to have you. It is my understanding you have a gentleman with you you would like to accompany you. Feel free to bring him on up if you would like and identify him for the record and conduct it any way you see fit.

STATEMENT OF HON. RICHARD H. FULTON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TENNESSEE

Mr. FULTON. All right. I will introduce my witness from Nashville after I complete my testimony.

Mr. Chairman, may I take this opportunity to say how pleased I am to be afforded this opportunity to appear before you today in behalf of legislation which I think will put an end to the confusion arising from the annual advent of the saving time season.

A 2 a.m., Sunday, April 26 of this year, the Nation was thrown anew into the annual time scramble. On that date in 24 States, clocks were advanced 1 hour. The move affected over half the Nation's population, over 100 million persons, stretching from Maine to California and running from Minnesota to New Mexico.

After April 26, five more States joined in the observance of daylight saving time. Thus, daylight saving time, before the clocks are returned to standard observance, will have been observed in 29 States to some degree. I say to some degree because, as the enclosed chart will show, not all States are uniform in their observance of this socalled fast time. Indeed, there are 13 States where observance is on a local option or some other basis. In addition, in 21 States there will be no observance at all.

Thus, we find that while there is some pattern of observance of daylight saving time in this Nation each year, the picture is more accurately described as one of confusion rather than clarity. Obviously, all this time confusion has an effect on our lives.

And how does this have effect? Mr. Chairman, to begin with, there is the personal inconvenience which one suffers. For example: when

we in Washington advanced our clocks an hour last April 26, our time here moved 2 hours ahead of the standard time observed in my congressional district, Metropolitan Nashville-Davidson County, Tenn. In other words when it is 8 a.m. here, it is only 6 a.m. in Nashville less than 500 miles to the west, and yet the time differential is exactly the same in the Texas-Oklahoma region, 1,500 miles to the west.

I might say here that Tennessee does have a rather strange situation. The State legislature in 1947 outlawed daylight saving time. We had a very powerful man in the State legislature at that time who lived only 35 miles from the capital city and because the city was observing fast time and his small town was not he missed his bus to Nashville, and he was so angry the following morning that he introduced a bill in the State legislature and because of his great influence the bill passed, and so we do have a law in Tennessee that prohibits us from having daylight saving time even in any area.

The fact is in 1956 there was a movement started for the voluntary adoption of central daylight time on a publicly stated date. Everyone would simply turn his clock back an hour. This problem was very difficult and it was not mandatory, and government agencies were expressly prohibited from observing this fast time. We like to think, and we do think, that particularly metropolitan Nashville is progressive, and along these lines of progressiveness we just last year adopted a new metropolitan government which took in our entire county system, and the Nashville Chamber of Commerce and both of our daily newspapers have editorially endorsed the uniform daylight saving time bill that I have before you today.

There are of course personal inconveniences which can be endured. There are, however, additional effects of this situation which are more serious and of greater significance.

The time gap created by the nonuniformity of savings time observance can work a serious hardship upon the conduct of commerce and business. For instance, when persons in Nashville, Memphis, and New Orleans wish to conduct business with the great trade centers of the East, they discover that they must call before 10 a.m., or the people back east have gone to lunch. By the time the easterner has returned from lunch, there is about an hour for business before the folks in Tennessee and Louisiana are at lunch. When they, in turn return to their offices, it is almost time for the eastern commuters to leave their businesses for the day.

This may seem to be an exaggeration but I can tell you that communication at this time of year between my office and Nashville is extremely difficult in terms of contacting people. But there are still more adverse effects caused by these annual time switches.

There are certain industries and the transportation industry is a good example, which suffer a serious monetary loss because of these time changes.

Our Nation's motorbus operators estimate they lose $250,000 a year in printing costs necessitated by the moving of the clock forward and back again in various States. The railroads allege that the printing of timetables to conform with local time shifts over the country costs them over a million dollars a year. Add to this total $1.6 million spent each year by the country's broadcasters for facilities to tape and "save"

programs for showing in prime time around the Nation and this business of time switching becomes not only confusing but costly.

There is seemingly no limit on the improbability of situations which can be created by this confusion. We are all aware, I am sure, of that celebrated 35-mile ride between Steubenville, Ohio, and Moundsville, W. Va., which actually caricatures the matter. Until 1963, when the State of West Virginia made daylight saving time mandatory on a statewide basis, one could travel this 35-mile length of highway and actually change his clock seven times to conform to local time observance customs.

This is, admittedly, a rare and extreme case. But we must realize there is no law, regulation, or authority to assure this situation will not be repeated, and repeated often, in other areas of the United States at other times.

The Congress can and should put an end to this annual confusion. As a great nation of growing population and economic might, we cannot afford to have the conduct of our commerce and industry hindered in any way by the antiquated manner in which we deal with the problem of time.

The bill which I have introduced will end this annual confusion. It will do it by putting the Nation on mandatory daylight saving time for 3 months of each year. My bill, H.R. 6284, would require that all clocks in the Nation be moved ahead 1 hour on the last Sunday of May each year. They would revert to standard time on the first Sunday of September.

At this point, I would like to make these observations. The effective dates I recommend are not in harmony with the majority of those effective dates in States today observing daylight saving time. In other bills this committee will consider during these hearings, there are considerable variations in execution and termination of savingtime observance. Since the introduction of H.R. 6284, it has occurred to me that actually a 6-month observance beginning the last Sunday in April each year and terminating the last Sunday in October might comply more with the majority of States now observing saving time.

On the other hand, it is reported to me that many parents, especially parents of young children in the elementary grades, would prefer saving time only during the summer months while the children are out of school. It seems to me, however, that the 6-month period might be the most practical for the reasons mentioned above and I urge the committee to give its favorable consideration to the 6-month period in any bill which it might report.

This brings us to two very important considerations. Do the people want daylight saving time and does the Congress have the authority to provide it?

I submit that there is widespread support for and approval of saving time in this Nation. In our most important and largest national trading center, the New York, New Jersey, New England area, some 34 million Americans annually observe daylight saving time.

In the Middle West, the important lake-trade States of Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio, with a combined population in excess of 28 million persons, annually observe daylight saving time.

The entire length of our west coast, with its important trade centers, observes daylight saving time involving some 20 million Americans in the States of Washington, Oregon, and California. Now, if you will add to these areas where daylight saving time is not observed, but where the people wish it were observed, you add significantly to the total of over 100 million Americans currently observing daylight saving time each year.

One of these areas deprived of saving time is my own district of Metropolitan Nashville-Davidson County, Tenn. The public support for saving time in this trade area of nearly half a million persons is illustrated by the support given my bill by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce; the Nashville Tennessean, our morning newspaper; and by the Nashville Banner, our evening newspaper. In addition, various civic groups have endorsed this proposal for nationwide observance of uniform daylight saving time.

The trend today is to savings time. The trend in this Nation over the past 80 years has been to saving time as State after State, area after area, and locale after locale move to observe it. With this trend to saving time and with over half our Nation's population observing it and additional hundreds of thousands of persons desiring to do so if permitted, I believe it can be said in fairness and with validity that daylight savings time does enjoy the support of the people and that it is desired.

Now, does the Congress have the authority to require nationwide observance of uniform daylight savings time?

The Constitution states that:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States, respectively, or to the people.

It would seem to me, after review of the Constitution, this legislation proposed in H.R. 6284 falls within the powers which are delegated to the United States by the Constitution when considered in the light of the powers delegated to the Congress to regulate interstate commerce as well as those dealing with fixing the standard of weights and measures.

Of the two powers, the power to fix the standard of weights and measures would seem to afford the preferable source of authority; for the measure of control thereby vested in Congress is plenary, and unencumbered by jurisdictional restraints.

Should Congress determine that the national interest requires uniform observance of a national standard for measuring time during the winter and summer months, respectively, then an unassailable presumption of constitutionality immediately would attach thereto without the necessity of proving, as would be the case with similar legislation grounded upon the commerce clause, that the Federal Government is competent to preempt the entire area to be regulated; that is, Congress is possessed of power to extend the application of its regulation of time to unquestionably local, or intrastate activities.

Equally complete avoidance of legal controversy is less likely to be achieved subsequently to a decision to rest a nationwide system of standard and daylight saving time upon the commerce power. Al

though the principle is well established (Houston, E. & W.T.R. Co. v. U.S. 234 U.S. (1914)) that Congress is competent, in order to effect a regulation of interstate commerce, to extend the application of such regulation to all local activities which burden or adversely affect such commerce, nevertheless, there remains the possibility that certain local transactions, conducted in obedience to conflicting State or municipal standards for measuring time, would be viewed as having such a remote and tenuous connection with interstate commerce that the application to the former of a national time standard could not constitutionally be required. Any such result manifestly would prevent the attainment of that uniformity of acceptance which is essential to the effective operation of a Federal regulation of time.

There would, therefore, appear to be no justifiable grounds for suspecting that the terms of my bill would be open to challenge. It might be well, however, to include specific language in the bill to preempt the power of States and localities.

To sum up, uniformity in time would bring order into the generally confused pattern of summer life in the country, in legal questions, contractual matters, licenses, recreation, and personal and business commitments. It would save costs in fuel for lighting, in printing of schedules, and other purposes.

Therefore, Mr. Chairman, I respect fully urge favorable consideration of H.R. 6284 by this committee.

(The attachment to Mr. Fulton's statement follows:)

COMMITTEE FOR TIME UNIFORMITY, WASHINGTON, D.C.

I. EXTENT OF OBSERVANCE IN 1963 OF DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME IN THE UNITED STATES

II. EXTENT OF UNIFORMITY IN DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME SWITCH OVER DATES, 1963

A. Switch from standard to daylight saving time

1

1. Of the 16 States observing daylight saving time on a statewide basis, all 16 States switched to daylight saving time on the fourth Sunday in April.

1 These data have been derived from 1963 reports received from official sources within the individual States. A 1964 survey will be completed within the next few weeks.