The Daily Alaska empire., 1950-04-27
SALMON MAN
 BLASTS 331 A5. GREAT HOAX
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(Continued from Page Cne) Elaborate pamphlets containing ArnoldS statement, photostats and statistics about 100 pages long were prepared for each Senator.
 "The plain, ungarnished truth, his statement said, lis. that ii Alaska, with it's noncontiguity, lack of developed resources and hetero- geneous population is qualified for admission, so IS Puerto Rico. Ii Alaska is admitted and Puerto Rico barred, the distinction will be purely on racial grounds"
 Meanwhile, the committee yester- day heard some two-dozen witnesses plead for Alaskan statehood. Many of them are Alaska residents who .. were here for the hearing. w. O. Smith told the committee the Alaska fishing industry is worth s125.o00.000 a year and IS self -perpetuating.
 But there is no free enterprise in the industry" Smith said, an Alaskan fisherman himself. Hits Fish Traps
 "The fisheries are controlled by :, the Fish Industry and the Federal Fish and Wild Life Service he said. This large industry should be under the control of the State of Alaska"
 He said the Industry" controls one-half of the salmon-trap supply and thus controls one-half of all the. fish coming from the Alaskan waters.
 He said outlawing of fish traps would expand the canning indus trys life from three weeks to three months year.
 British Columbia and the State of Washington have outlaWed fish traps" he said The canning sea- son in British Columbia is three months long. In Alaska it is all over in three weeks.
 He said fishermen who don't have traps cant compete" with those who do Eight canning companies, he said, own one-half of the allow able 400 fish traps. He said that fish trap areas are bought and sold contrary to the regulations of the Fish and Wildlife Service"
 Statehood, he said, would give control of the fisheries to Alaskans.
 Robert Atwood, publisher of the Anchorage (Alaska) Times, said the House-passed bill would not change the question concerning the rights of aboriginals in Alaska ' He said he favored the bill.
 Budget Surplus.
 vGohn Hellentfa1,S who called him. self a native Alaskan lawyer" said he is "passionately" in favor ot statehood. City Attorney for An chorage, he said his city would have $230.000 budget surplus this year.
 ''The people who made this sur plus possible are the people who will be helping to run the State ot Alaska" he said They've had plenty of training"
 He said it was silly" for Sena- tors to question witnesses about fish traps. That is our problem" he said, and we should settle it."
 Mayor J. A. Talbot of Ketchikan, a Republican with 36 years resi- dence in Alaska, labeled as 'falla- cious" the arguments that the pre- sent statehood bill does not provide for enough land.
 ''The present statehood bill would give Alaska about the same amount of land given the more recently ad- mitted territories" he declared, and we are not asking for more favorable terms than other terri tories received, although we might make a good case for more liberal terms cn account of our strategic position in the national defense picture"
 Talbot expressed confidence Alaska would develop more rapidly as a state, as have other former territories.
 There is a great deal being said these days about free election and determination of people all over the world he added. Alas kans have proven unmistakably that they want statehood"