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![handle is hein.animal/pttwlrsak0001 and id is 1 raw text is: 77TH CONGRESS 1 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES REPORT
1st Session f No. 883
PROTECTION OF WALRUSES IN ALASKA
JUNE 28, 1941.-Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on the state
of the Union and ordered to be printed
Mr. PATTON, from the Committee on the Territories, submitted the
following
REPORT
[To accompany H. R. 1606]
The Committee on the Territories, to whom was referred the bill
(H. R. 1606), for the protection of walruses in the Territory of Alaska,
having considered the same, recommend that the bill do pass without
amendment.
The objects and purposes of the bill, which has received the clear-
ance of the Bureau of the Budget, are to prohibit the killing of
walruses except (a) by natives for food and clothing for themselves,
(b) by others in need of food when other food is not available, and
(c) for scientific specimens under permits issued by- the Secretary of
the Interior, and to prohibit exportation from the Territory of raw
ivory obtained from walruses.
Walruses originally were abundant throughout Bering Sea and the
western Arctic Ocean. They were hunted ruthlessly by whalers in
the latter part of the nineteenth century and today they are extinct
over much of their former range. Protective measures are necessary
to maintain the remaining walrus herds at their relatively low level
of abundance.
The walrus in Alaska has its highest and chief value as a food and
clothing resource for the natives and no risk should be run of its
extermination, either by the natives themselves or by others. At the
present time Eskimos dwelling in two or three of the villages strategi-
cally located along the migration routes of the walrus herds, kill more
animals than are required for their local food and clothing needs in
order to secure the raw walrus ivory which has a market value of about
60 cents a pound. Such killing of walruses for ivory alone reduces the
meat supply available to the natives who are not so fortunately located.
One of the inducements for wasteful killing of walruses is the export
of ivory in the raw state. Such export is forbidden by this bill. This
may temporarily reduce the earnings of a few Eskimos who have raw](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.animal/pttwlrsak0001&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)