they will change their minds and moderate their views a little bit. So you and I have something in common. We are both optimists. Thank you very much for your patience with me. You have been a splendid witness.

Governor HUGHES. Thank you, sir.

Chairman DODD. I think I can with some competence comment on the character of your testimony, having presided at these firearms hearings for more than 4 years. And I would say that you are at the head of a list of most impressive witnesses. Your testimony has been the most impressive we have received over a period of 4 years. It has been outstanding. I think it will be most helpful, most informative. not only to the subcommittee and the Senate but to the Congress as a whole.

Governor HUGHES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Senator TYDINGS. One part of your testimony which concerns me was where you say that the police forces constitute the thin line of protection between an orderly society and those who would disrup it by violence and guns. I think you stated that policemen are of the one unanimous opinion that guns must be controlled if the safety of American citizens is to be protected. I wonder if you have any opinion on the effect on the morale of local police officers and State police and those who have to go into these situations, riots and civil disorders. knowing that they are not backed up by the force of Federal law in any way insofar as gun control is concerned?

Governor HUGHES. They are puzzled and they are upset. I know that is so for our police officers in New Jersey after all, these peopl are out front. When we are in our easy chairs watching the television, they are going up an alley after a man who might arrange it that they both do not come out of that alley. They risk their lives every day, and it is just too bad that there have to be so many guns around. There are many areas where police must work in teams, you have to send two police to make them safe, sometimes safe from childrer. juveniles with guns.

Senator TYDINGS. One other point. We got on the NRA, the Nitional Rifle Association, and I wondered if you realized that the NRA was not a regulated lobbyist group, but they have over a million dol lars in revenue annually from the sale of advertising to firearms manufacturers and ammunition manufacturers on which they do not pay taxes. I wonder if you are aware of these facts?

Governor HUGHES. Well, as far as the ability of their lobbying effort is concerned, I would say that they are very powerful, because when the Congress of the United States for 4 years, in the face of the most tragic danger to the people of the country, does not enact a bi to control a commerce which is within its exclusive jurisdiction, ther it has great influence. It may not be a lobbyist, but it has great influ

ence.

Senator HRUSKA. Would the Senator yield for a brief question! Senator TYDINGS. Yes.

Senator HRUSKA. I am rather intrigued by your reference to a pecuniary interest of the NRA in this matter. Are they a profit or a nonprofit corporation?

Governor HUGHES. I do not know.

Senator HRUSKA. The National Rifle Association, are they a profit corporation or a nonprofit corporation?

Governor HUGHES. I am sure I do not know, except insofar as

Senator HRUSKA. I will tell you, they are nonprofit, because they do not pay taxes on any of their income. Where does the pecuniary interest come in?

Governor HUGHES. They print a magazine, and I am quite sure it has quite a few Winchester and other advertisements in it. They have aroused a complete mystification of sportsmen and decent citizens throughout this country on the false supposition that this bill or any bill like it would prevent them from possessing guns. They are very persuasive.

Senator HRUSKA. Where does the pecuniary interest of the association come in? We have had testimony

Senator TYDINGS. They have $5 million a year in revenues, over a million dollars of which comes from the sale of advertising on firearms and ammunition alone. The salaries and remunerations which go indirectly and directly to their officers and directors, not to mention the emoluments they may receive directly or indirectly from munitions makers and gunmakers, all go to support the Governor's

statement.

In 1963, one of the interesting things to me was the executive director was prepared to adopt a version of gun control legislation which Senator-I think Dodd-had proposed. Then all of a sudden, he reversed his position and by 1964 or 1965-and I think the chairman can better comment on the actual sequence of events than I, because he was here and I was not-all of this at least would lead an objective person that perhaps there was more influence than just the legitimate needs of the sportsmen playing on the policies of the top officers of the National Rifle Association.

Senator HRUSKA. Of course, Senator Dodd reversed his position, too. He is no longer willing to enact the bill he first introduced on this subject, so he must have suffered some change of heart, also.

it.

Chairman DODD. I did not reverse my position; I just strengthened

Senator HRUSKA. They think they strengthened it when they took the position I did.

Chairman DODD. You took my bill, and that is what it is. That is the first one I introduced. As things worsened, I felt the bill was not strong enough. That is not a reversal of position. That is a strengthening of position. I do not think that the bill I first introduced was strong enough. That is why I have changed it. The conditions have worsened, and it has to be stronger.

Governor HUGHES. We had long colloquy with people from the National Rifle Association, and we were just about reaching an agreement on a bill of some firmness when something would happen. I would imagine that the manufacturers pulled in the reins a little bit. When the attitude was changed, so we were never able to reach a consensus, and we had to pass a bill-as I say, by one vote.

Senator TYDINGS. One more question, Governor. In the activities that the snipers conducted, the armed activity against law enforcement officers of New Jersey, what, in your judgment, would have been the effect had they been using the machineguns and antitank guns

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and more sophisticated weapons which S. 1 would prohibit being imported into this country? What would have been the effect if they had gotten these weapons in any large supply and used them from the rooftops?

Governor HUGHES. It would be disastrous. It was bad enough; God forbid it should ever be worse in this country. But I think it would be disastrous.

I am sure that the people in this country are puzzled about the hesitation of the Congress to enact this bill which prevents such importation, because there are people in this country ready to u these deadly things, and who say on the street corners here in Washington that they recommend their use.

Senator TYDINGS. Governor, I might just add my comments to Senator Kennedy's and Senator Dodd's, that your testimony has been superb. I, for one, am going to request of Chairman Eastland, as I am sure Senator Kennedy will also, that you be requested, if you can arrange it in it in your schedule, to appear before the full Judiciary Committee when we take up the whole matter of antiriot legislation. I think your insight and your perception of the big picture in both the long-term and short-term problems are excellent.

Governor HUGHES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman DODD. We all thank you, Governor, for your testimony. (Governor Hughes' prepared statement follows:)

STATEMENT OF Gov. RICHARD J. HUGHES OF NEW JERSEY

Mr. Chairman, Congress is now faced with the immediacy of a decision on the enactment of a strong, meaningful interstate gun control bill.

Every time a policeman is killed by a wanton criminal, every time a mentally unstable person shoots down helpless citizens, the question is asked. "Why must we make it so easy for everyone to purchase firearms of every kind with abo lutely no questions asked?"

We asked ourselves this question in New Jersey during the last several years and in 1966 enacted the strongest State gun control law in the nation.

Under this law, since its effective date of August 2, 1966, 42,000 fingerprint applications were processed as of June 30, 1967. Among these were disclosed 3,069 arrest records deriving from State Police and FBI files. A total of 30.00 identification cards under the New Jersey statute (representing virtual lifetime authority to purchase rifles and shotguns, subject to revocation only in case later disqualification) were issued and 12,000 permits to purchase hand guns were issued. The identification card was denied in 547 cases, 75 per cent of these denials by reason of criminal records and the remainder for medical reasons and other instances where issuance would not be compatible with the publ health, safety and welfare. A total of 248 permits to purchase hand guns wer denied with the same general allocation of disqualification reasons.

The FBI has reported consistently throughout the years that 30 per cent of all firearms murders are committed with longarms, that is rifles and shotg New Jersey's record indicates that for the first three months of 1967 only 11 per cent of all firearms murders were committed with longarms.

Moreover, of 1501 atrocious assaults reported in New Jersey for this period 172 or 11 per cent were committed with guns, as against the FBI reporting that nationwide 17 per cent of all atrocious assaults are committed with guns

But a State can only do so much for itself and it is perfectly obvious tro all of the evidence in our possession that many guns are being parchand New Jersey residents quite easily in other states and through the mails The recent tragedies in our cities, aggravated and prolonged by co deadly snipers, many of whom obviously weapons from other states even greater burden of responsibility on men in public office to do about federal gun control now.

Moreover, the recent appeals by subversives and arm themselves for the purpose of rioting

the final piece of evidence needed by Congress to do what it should have done a long time ago and not to continue the tragedy of bowing to a powerful lobby to omit the doing of something so obviously necessary for the safety of the families and decent citizens of America.

It is not only tragic, but has elements of a national scandal at this important posture of our nation's affairs, that Congress should even consider the denial of the protection of an interstate gun control law to Americans threatened not only by criminals, narcotics addicts, mentally unstable persons, but by extremists who openly and inexcusably call for armed revolt in our cities.

It is nothing less than reprehensible that organizations such as the National Rifle Association, which has so very much of pecuniary interest in the outcome and which realizes better than anyone else that strong gun control legislation can be enacted without in any way inhibiting the activities of responsible sportsmen and decent citizens, stands on empty platitudes and a distorted sense of the word freedom in taking a position which, no matter how one looks at it, adds up to support of the selfish and the encouragement of violence with guns. It is time that all of us, including associations of gun dealers, gave more thought to the safety of the people of America and the policeman on the street, whose job is already dangerous enough. Our police forces constitute the thin line of protection between an ordered society and those who would disrupt it by violence and with guns, and these policemen are of one unanimous view that guns must be controlled if the safety of American citizens is to be protected.

We are sure in New Jersey that, despite our rigid gun control law, no sportsman and no decent citizen desiring to possess or obtain a gun is subjected to more than inconvenience equivalent in a way to obtaining a motor vehicle registration or driver's license. This is a small sacrifice indeed for the public interest and for the safety of America.

Despite the strict gun control legislation in New Jersey we have seen no discernible effect on legitimate sportsmen, since more hunting licenses were sold in New Jersey in 1966 than 1965 and the bag of deer incident to the September hunting season was the third highest in the history of the modern deer herd. In New Jersey, hunting license sales average about 150,000 per year.

People are inclined to exaggerate the political impact of enacting gun control legislation. In New Jersey our gun control law was passed by a narrow margin, and I can tell you that even members of my own party were initially very apprehensive about the threat of political retaliation and yet this political retaliation is nothing more than a myth. In 1965, in running for my second term as Governor, I campaigned strongly and in unmistakable terms for strict gun control legislation. My opponent campaigned just as hard against it. There were the familiar platitudes about the "right of the people to bear arms," a nonsensical reference, which would include narcotic addicts, convicted criminals and mentally unstable persons.

The people in New Jersey had no difficulty in discerning the facts in this matter and, in scrutinizing the results of this election, I have not been able to find a trace of substantial citizen objection to my position on the gun control issue.

The public opinion polls consistently show that an overwhelming majority of American citizens favor strict gun controls, realizing that they are necessary for their own protection. A recent authoritative poll made in New Jersey by the same group which forecast my 1965 election (with impressive accuracy), which poll was very comprehensive in nature, asked this question, "Suppose a candidate for state office voted for the gun control law which makes it impossible for certain unqualified people to obtain guns and other firearms. Would this make you more likely to vote for him, less likely to vote for him, or wouldn't this make much difference to you one way or another?" A total of 68 per cent answered "more likely," 10 per cent answered "less likely," and others were unconcerned or didn't know.

This poll is in accordance with other authoritative polls which have been taken in the country. The people time and again have re-expressed their deep concern about the loose guns being circulated.

In New Jersey we speak from experience. We campaigned long and hard for a gun control bill. We withstood the threats of reprisals at the polls, as I have indicated. We fought some of the gun dealers, their money and their political effort.

Our legislators overcame the invective and threats of a vociferous and loud minority at public hearings and by highly organized mail campaigns. They passed a law that was needed.

New Jersey has done its job through a Legislature which showed the courage to do what is right. The effectiveness of this job is deeply hampered by the failure of Congress to act on federal gun control legislation. I believe that the people of America expect Congress to show courage at this time and to act in the protection of the families, the police, the people of America in enacting this bill Chairman DODD. Our next witness is Dr. Halbert E. Fillinger. Mr. Quinn Tamm is here, Mr. James V. Bennett, and Mr. David Cohen. I want to assure them that we are going to reach them all right, but Dr. Fillinger has to return to Philadelphia as I understand it, and we wanted to accommodate him as well as we could.

Senator HRUSKA. Dr. Fillinger, did Mr. Killeen come with you?

STATEMENT OF DR. HALBERT E. FILLINGER, PRESIDENT, PENNSYLVANIA ANTIQUE GUN COLLECTORS ASSOCIATION; ACCOMPANIED BY WILLIAM F. KILLEEN

Dr. FILLINGER. He did, sir.

Senator HRUSKA. This is Mr. William F. Killeen, who was 7 years assistant district attorney and chief of the homicide division for t city of Philadelphia. He tried and supervised the trial of many murder cases that were up before him, as many as 200 a year, Mr. Chairman.. He is collaborating with Dr. Fillinger, as I understand it, in this

matter.

Chairman DODD. We are glad to have Mr. Killeen here as well. Dr. Fillinger is president of the Pennsylvania Antique Gun Colle tors Association. He is a practicing forensic pathologist and the assistant medical examiner for the city of Philadelphia.

Doctor, I am sure there are many other honorable and creditable things in your record, but we do not have them here. We are glad to have you here and to hear your testimony.

Dr. FILLINGER. Thank you, Senator.

I have been directed by the commissioner of health in the city of Philadelphia to preface any remarks I make before this group with the comment that I am speaking only as a private citizen, and that my opinions are strictly my own opinions and in no way reflect any opinion of the city of Philadelphia and have no official standing as far as the city of Philadelphia and its officials are concerned.

I have statistics with me on the files of all of the homicides since the first of this year, pursuant to your subpena, and am prepared to back up any statistical statement I make. My opinions, sir, are my own opinions and not reflective of any opinion of the city of Philadelp Chairman DODD. Well, that is fine.

Senator HRUSKA. Are the records to which you will refer publ records?

Dr. FILLINGER. They are.

Senator HRUSKA. They are available to anyone?

Dr. FILLINGER. They are available to anyone with a right to know— that is, an attorney or anyone who is a statistician or anyone with a legitimate interest. Our records are available without

Senator HRUSKA. What is your present position with the city? Dr. FILLINGER. I am assistant medical examiner in forensic pathol. ogy.

Mr. Chairman, I wish to thank you for the invitation to appear bfore this committee and make available to you certain facts and sta