The Daily Alaska empire., 1951-01-20
EXCHANGE I5 HEATED,
 STATEHOOD
Issue Brought Up at Hear ing-DeniaI Made of h.
 tent 10 Defraud Govt
By FRANK w. vAILLE

| WASHINGTON, Jan. 20 = QP =
 The Senate Investigating Commit
 tee hearing into allocation of fed , eral funds for the Palmer, Alaska,
 airport has been recessed indefin-
 itely, after heated exchange over !, whether the inquiry was an offshoot
 of the Alaska statehood fight
 The assertion that the statehood
 question was involved in the Palmer | investigation was made yesterday by Stanley McCutcheon. speaker of the Alaska House of Represen- 1 tatives and attorney for the Terri ! torial Aeronautical Commission. McCutcheon also denied that there
 was any intent to defraud the gov- ernment and asserted that the Civil Aeronautics Administration
 knew exactly what we were doing
 every step of the way" Land Values Involved The subcommittee is investigat- ing circumstances concerning the
 commissions rejection of one CAA- approved application for funds for
 an airport at Palmer and it's sub
 mission of a second request listing
 higher land value figures. The sec
 ond request would have raised fed- eral participation in the program |
 from $94.750 to $l45,125. McCutcheon frequently crossed
 with the committee and it's counsel during his testimony. At one time, while reading ex' cerpts from his diary, McCutcheon
 admonished committee members sharply: Now pay attention" Later, when committee counsel
 Barney Flanagan broke in during
 the middle of statement, Mc- Cutcheon cautioned, Now MT. Flanagan, if you won't interrupt
 me, I won't interrupt you When Flanagan asked if Mc- Cutcheon had discussed with Chris Lample, CAA administrator of
 Alaska public airports, an agree ment between the Territorial Con- mission and the Palmer Airport Association for return of $145,000 of .. the $150,OO0 purchase price. the Alaskan rose in his chair and de- clared:
 My dear MT Flanagan, I'll say we did"
 McCutcheOn Rebuffed McCutcheon was rebuffed by the committee in his efforts tc tie the airport investigation to the state ] hood question and also was denied permission to read lengthy an- ! swer to charges which he said had ; been made concerning the airport applications during the statehood fight on the floor of the Senate. His answer was accepted however | for inclusion in the record. 1 Although definite throughout his l testimony that CAA personnal had ] been aware that the commission did not actually own the airport land at the time of it's first appli- ! cation, McCutcheon refused to be pinned down to definite answer later when questioned by Senator l Mcclellan (D-ArkD
 False Qualification The Senator asked repeatedly i whether, when McCutcheon certi- l fled the application as commission
 counsel, he did not know, and CAA
 officials in Anchorage did not
 know that it was a false certifica- tion."
 T signed the statement" McCut-
 cheon replied.
 You didn't answer my question" ] Senator, I have said I signed the application and you have heard my testimony" McCutcheon said. T
 will say no more."
 If you want to leave your testi-
 mony at that" replied Mcclellan,
 T can draw no other conclusion" Later when Senator Mundt D- SD asked virtually the same ques- ton regarding whether the CAA had knowledge that the commission did not own the land, McCutcheon | replied.
 Brunt Carried to CAA "Absolutely-there's no doubt in
 my mind."f
 At one point he testified that George s. Schwamm, commission