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the criminals would know it, it would be a catastrophe to the Government.

I have already taken up too much of your time, and I thank you for your attention.

Mr. SWANSON. The assertion has been made here that about 80 per cent of all the litigation which arises now in the eastern district of Kentucky arises in what is the proposed southern district. What is your judgment on that proposition?

Senator ROBSION. Eighty per cent?

Mr. SWANSON. Yes.

Senator ROBSION. If that is true, which I can not agree with yet, then it looks to me like we ought to turn this cow around and put the court up here and bring those folks up here instead of taking us way down there. That is the greatest argument I have heard yet for this change.

Of course, this is a mountainous country. It is a mineral country and it was a timber country, and the population of Kentucky outside of the railroad maps, the great increase of population, is in this country where we believe in the Roosevelt doctrine of great families. Down here the country is great; up in here there are wonderful people, bluegrass people, but less people in here according to the 1920 census. But there is a great deal of litigation arising up here, and it is going to increase. There are big coal operations, big timber operations, railroad building, development, and so forth, and I think they certainly ought to have a district up there. The business justifies it. Why, that new judge could come in there and know the people and know their problems and know their country and give real service. A thing that struck me most at these Federal courts was at London. Sometime ago I was there, and I am telling you I could scarcely, with the aid of the officers, get into the courtroom. The courtroom was packed. The halls were packed. The stairs were packed. Out on the sidewalks was packed-poor folks brought out of their own environment into an environment they knew little about. There they were. Well, I was one of those who helped to pass the parole law. This Government is spending every year a great deal of money in cooperation with the States to reclaim men disabled in industry. Yet, I see here in the press of the courts-and we passed a parole law-I see in the press of business here scores and scores and scores of boys swept away, when, if we had more courts and the court had more time to look into their cases we could reclaim them for something higher and better and the reclamation would be more than just a mere training of their hands and feet in which we spend so much money and in which we believe.

Mr. CHRISTOPHERSON. Has the judge in this district a parole officer?

Senator ROBSION. Yes, sir; I think he has a parole officer. Mr. CHRISTOPHERSON. Is the right there exercised pretty frequently? Are many of them paroled?

Senator ROBSION. Well, Mrs. Langley says she has never seen one, and here is a lawyer here who says he has never seen one. I am telling this committee that they are so crowded there and run over with this great army of folks they can not do for them what that judge said he wanted to do, and I say to you I think he is one of the

best in the world, and I think the district attorney is one of the best, sirs, in these United States. He has that reputation; that record. Mr. CHRISTOPHERSON. There is no doubt with this record no judge could handle the volume of business he handles in this court and do it with that degree of consideration that criminal administration should have.

Senator ROBSION. As I say, Judge Cochran is seventy-odd years of age, a great man, and he dispatches business wonderfully well; but you and I know it is humanly impossible to handle that amount of business, besides the civil business and other things to do, and do it with that deliberation, insuring justice and fairness to every litigant that our laws of our land and our courts should give.

Mrs. LANGLEY. I feel that some reference has been made to Mr. Thatcher, our distinguished Congressman from Louisville, in regard to his interest in the judge, and that it is only fair to him to explain some little incidents that happened soon after I introduced this bill. We discussed it on the floor and suggested that maybe it could not be worked out and passed on the floor (H. R. 6254), but a bill for a special judge could be favorably reported out by the committee. In deference to my wishes he did not introduce that bill, although he is in perfect good faith, as he was at that time. Senator ROBSION. I want to say that it is Judge Thatcher's business to look after the business over there.

Mr. THATCHER. I will tell you what I am going to do. You (the committee) have heard the testimony and you have heard the statements. I am going to introduce a bill for a third judge so you can have the whole picture before you, and you will not have to have any further testimony on that bill. You have heard the testimony. From our standpoint, in western Knetucky, we believe that is the only solution of the question of congestion and we are also sure it will afford a solution to the congestion in the eastern district, because in that district you can have as many additional places for holding court as may be necessary.

Senator ROBSION. If you feel we have not made a correct division of the districts I suggest that you advise what we ought to take off of the western district and put in it?

Mr. THATCHER. The trouble about it is this: If the State of Kentucky were in the form of a square it would be simple; but here [indicating on map] you run down in this great stretch or pocket-western Kentucky--and you can not go south of Louisville and put western district counties into the eastern or the proposed southern district, except a few on the border. It is physically impossible to take much territory of the western district which produces district court business and put it into another district. Then, railroad and other connections in this section are with Louisville; and Louisville, having a population of more than 350,000 and growing all the time, has the bulk of the civil and criminal business of the western district. Seventy-five per cent of the civil business and maybe 80 per cent of the criminal business arise there and must be tried there. If Louisville were a smaller place it would be simple. So you have to take Louisville into the equation so far as the western district is concerned; and it would be most unjust to ignore the needs of the western district. We believe that the proper solution is a third judge, just like they have in State after State in this Union, such as Ohio, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and many others where addi

tional judges are provided for additional needs, and they go where the business requires their attention, a sort of flexible system, which obviates the necessity of creating new districts and many additional officers. If the business here in this section

Mrs. LANGLEY. We are discussing this bill are we not?,

Mr. THATCHER. Oh, yes.

Mrs. LANGLEY. Well, when we get to your bill we can discuss that. Mr. THATCHER. Well, I am discussing the whole situation, and when I introduce my bill for a third judge and more places for holding terms of court the committee will have the whole situation before you.

Mr. LANGLEY. We have two delegates here from my district who would like to be heard. First, I would like to introduce Mr. M. K. Eblen, president of the Hazard Bar Association.

STATEMENT BY M. K. EBLEN, PRESIDENT OF THE HAZARD BAR

ASSOCIATION

Mr. EBLEN. There is one matter which I especially want to call to your attention, and that is the statement coming from the opposition to the effect that we are taking 80 per cent of the eastern district's business, criminal and civil, and putting it in the southern district. At this time there are seven places for holding court in the eastern district, namely Franklin, Covington, Catlettsburg, and Lexington. Those places are left in the eastern district. That is where they say they will have 20 per cent of the buisness left. London, Richmond, and Jackson-the other places in the eastern district-are put over in the southern district.

Anyone who has ever attended those courts knows that there is more criminal business transacted in the courts that are left in the eastern district than is transacted in the courts that are left in the southern district. Covington, Lexington, and Catlettsburg are the three largest criminal courts in the district. Frankford is a small one. On the other hand, over here I have to show you that there is less criminal business in the southern district, and I will say I have attended Judge Cochran's court for the last six years every term at Lexington. I have had occasion to defend numerous parties there charged with violations of the prohibition law. I know exactly how the court is conducted and I have known for four or five years, and I presume the other courts-I occasionally have attended the Covington court and the Lexington court. They seem to operate those courts on the same scale.

Mr. CALVERT. May I ask him a question? Is it not a fact that criminal cases which are tried at Lexington and Covington and Catlettsburg that at least 75 or 80 per cent of them are cases which arose in the territory which is proposed to be set over into the southern district of Kentucky?

Mr. EBHEN. They are not, sir. Absolutely they are not.

I believe that it is conceded by everyone here that a court should be at Pineville, and a court should be at Hazard, and possibly at Pikeville. The advocates of this measure believe they should have at other points. The biggest question is as to what is the proper remedy. The expense seems to be the big problem. That is the thing that is worrying the gentleman over here that is opposing the bill. I do not believe there would be any additional expense except a United States attorney, the marshal, and the clerk.

These other places will have to have deputy clerks, anyway. They will have to have sufficient number of deputy marshals to serve the papers. If they are the only additional officers that will probably be an additional expense of around $15,000 a year. Whether or not that should interfere materially with the establishment of another court, I do not know; but I do not think it should. If this committee as Senator Robsion has said, could only attend one of those courts, if you could just see that train leaving Sunday night up there at McRoberts going to that Jackson court, about 10 coaches long filled with defendants and their witnesses; and again Monday morning, and if you could be there and see that little courthouse or post office at Jackson filled with those poor people, and see the corridors so jammed you could not get through it; they can not call them one at a time. They call about 20 at a time, in droves, and they call each one and take his plea and give him their sentences.

The others stand aside, and they call the docket, an average of 500 cases for the last four or five years. It will take two or three days to call that docket. I have not the figures, but I believe that between two-thirds and three-fourths of them will plead guilty. Then they come back to the beginning of the docket and begin to try those that have pleaded not guilty and nearly always they do not have time to finish the balance of the cases and they are continued. They say they are up with the docket. They are not up with the criminal docket at Jackson. If they are this is the first time, because they have had a special term; they have continued the March docket, those that they did not finish, till September, to try what they call the old cases and come back six months later to try those. Then the new term, next week, they will try the new cases and half of the jury cases, and six months later they will try the rest of those. That is at Jackson.

Mr. THATCHER. Would you have a court at Jackson and one at Hazard? Would you, just as a matter of justice?

Mr. EBHEN. If it was a business proposition I was trying to run and save money and time I would not. I would have a court at Hazard, because I think 85 or 90 per cent of the business at Jackson comes from Hazard and above Hazard, and it ought to be at Hazard. That is where it ought to be.

Mr. CHRISTOPHERSON. Is there anything further?

Mrs. LANGLEY. We have Congressman Walker here, who wishes to offer an amendment to this bill (H. R. 8254). I am in hearty accord with his amendment.

STATEMENT BY HON. LEWIS L. WALKER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF KENTUCKY

Mr. WALKER. I want to file first an approval of this bill from the Danville Bar Association, the largest city of my district, and also from the chamber of commerce of Danville, in the form of a telegram: DANVILLE, KY., April 7, 1930.

Hon, LEWIS L. WALKER,

Member U. S. House of Representatives,

Washington, D. C.

Danville Bar Association and this organization heartily approve bill to establish new Federal court district with a court at Danville. Would a committee from here be of any assistance to your sponsorship of bill?

DANVILLE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE,
JAY W. HARLAN, Secret ry.

And I want to say that I think the only question involved here is a matter taking the court to the business or to the people. And the fact that Mrs. Langley and Mr. Finley and Senator Robsion, who live in that southern district, are so urgently in favor of it reflects here beyond any doubt that it is almost the universal sentiment of the people of that district that this relief should be granted. I am not going into the arguments concerning the details. But the amendment I am going to offer creates another court in the new eastern district. You will observe that by giving the southern district that Judge Cochran loses three courts and they have put no other court in the eastern district, only leaving him four courts.

Now, what I want to do is to make another court in the eastern district, which will made five courts in the eastern district, and that court is at Danville, in my district.

Danville is one of the most convenient

Mr. CHRISTOPHERSON. Where is Danville located?·

Mr. WALKER. It is located right here [showing on map] and I want to move Garrard County and Lincoln County and Casey County out of the southern district into this eastern district. They say they are so much trouble down there, and I want to move those three counties out of the southern district into the eastern district. They are in my congressional district.

Mr. CHRISTOPHERSON. What counties are they?

Mr. WALKER. Garrard, Lincoln, and Casey. Danville is the county seat of Boyle. It is in 12 miles of Lancaster, the county seat of Garrard. You can drive a car there in 40 minutes. It is within 10 miles of Stanford, the county seat of Lincoln. You can drive there in 20 minutes. It is within 20 miles of Harrodsburg; it is within 40 miles of Liberty, the county seat of Casey County. It is 30 miles of Lebanon, the county seat of Marion County, and it is within 30 miles of Springfield, the county seat of Washington County.

There are about seven counties that will be within half an hour to an hour's drive of that court. The fact of the business is I know of no city in the State where you could locate a court that would accommodate so many people by such slight driving and travel as the court at Danville. As I say, it is within 10 miles of 3 county seats, and within 20 to 30 miles of 4 other county seats.

I explained it to Mrs. Langley and she was perfectly agreeable to it, and she thinks it is a good addition to the bill. The eastern district loses three courts by this new southern district and this only adds one court. In other words, they have two courts less if you allow this Danville court than they now have under the old eastern district, and I think it is a very valuable addition to the bill and would be a great service to the people of those seven counties there. Give them a court practically in their own counties. They can drive there in from 30 minutes to an hour.

Mr. SWANSON. How large a place is Danville?

Mr. WALKER. About 8,000. It is the location of Center College, and is one of the finest places in Kentucky outside of Lexington. Mr. SWANSON. Have you good roads there?

Mr. WALKER. Yes, sir; good roads, improved highways leading to every one of these county seats from Danville.

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