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j ‘ 144-161.5 eistIK114 F1I A451014 COMPANY ?s1 -I0 641 ANTON tO ::. ..1 AUSTIN 76705 .x … ..2,1? ‘ct,Y:4:’.:4.:.:, . J.: .t . ,h+. 4’4,:-..4.4:4;t1,-,W.`,; ,….,::er: 4:,,,.. .. 4,, 47….. .+1 . s. THE FOLIAN& CANo E CAA’ At-o CANOES , KAYAKS PAPPLS, WATM00F 15AGS, MG. ASKFate Otee2CHUM . ‘ Majors lose depletion allowance matter of who got the guns to Carrasco in the first place.” Briscoe said at the time, “My request to them was certainly not limited to those questions.” Will Gray, Cuevas’ attorney, planned to call as his first defense witness Reuben Montemayor, who was Carrasco’s attorney and who tried to help negotiate Carrasco’s offer of hostages in exchange for freedom. Montemayor also witnessed the shoot-out at Huntsville. On Feb. 26 of this year, Briscoe named Montemayor to the board of the Department of Corrections. Gray said he wanted to know why Montemayor was appointed to the board in view of his relations with Carrasco and the impending trial of Cuevas. Even if Gray finds out, that will still leave unanswered the question of why Carrasco, who had ‘allegedly killed over 40 people, was assigned to a medium-security unit at Huntsville and given a prison job as porter to Father O’Brien, a job that gave him some relative freedom. Carrasco had previously escaped from prison in Guadalajara, Mexico. And the Huntsville authorities had received a letter from federal narcotics agents warning them that Carrasco would attempt an escape. A special court of inquiry is due to take up these questions, after Cuevas’ trial is M.I. 18 The Texas Observer Austin The oil depletion allowance is no more for the major oil companies, but oil-state forces, led by Texans Lloyd Bentsen and Charles Wilson, preserved the tax advantage for certain independent producers. Senator Bentsen, in proposing the exemption for independents, stated that he was opposed to the allowance for the major companies. Bob Eckhardt of. Houston was the only Texan in the House of Representatives to vote to end the allowance for the majors. The oil companies’ astronomical profits created the climate in which the loophole could no longer be maintained for the majors. Congressman Wilson of Lufkin, while voting to retain’ the allowance across the board, opened the campaign to exempt independents producing 3,000 barrels a day or less in the. House, but lost, 216-195. Bentsen picked up the effort in the Senate, but liberals cut the level of production for the exemption down to 2,000 barrels. THE QUESTION was whether such an exemption would be, as Sen. Ernest Hollings said, a “loophole within a loophole.” Wilson said 3,000 barrels of oil was one-third of one-tenth of one percent of U.S. production. Oil critics rejoined that on a yearly basis, Wilson was exempting producers of more than a million barrels. CLASSIFIED Classified advertising is 20i per word. 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Realtors, 7007 Preston Observations Both House and Senate opponents of the Wilson amendment emphasized that it would retain the allowance for companies grossing $10 or $12 million a year for which the exemption . would be a $2.5 million benefit annually. The case for the exemption went to the original theory of the oil depletion allowance. As first rationalized, it was a spur to the wildcatters who find new oil. As Wilson and Bentsen said, in the main independents find most of the new oil; majors produce from established fields. Wilson said independents found 60 percent of the new oil in Texas between 1967 and 1971 and that the majors’ 40 percent was found mostly in safe, already-producing fields. The Young Turks of the House forced through the Democratic caucus a motion making repeal of depletion the order of business. The sponsor of this move said producers of 3,000 barrels a day are “big oil,” not “mom and pop operators.” Wilson argued that with depletion independents will go on producing, but without it they will sell out to majors to get capital gains tax benefits. Without protecting independents, he said, the oil industry “will be controlled by the eight men who head the eight major oil companies.” Eckhardt assured the House that . the Wilson amendment precluded “all major escapes” whereby majors might use it to get back depletion for themselves. A California congressman warned that leases might be “split up” to get the benefit, to which Eckhardt responded that this was prevented, perhaps except for new production. The Senate, faced with the House’s outright repeal of all depletion by a vote of 248-163, seemed to assume that repeal was inevitable and the question was whether to exempt independents. On March 10, Bentsen was a target of a Common Cause report, suggestive of menace for his presidential plans. The lobby group said that persons connected with oil gave Bentsen $134,954 in political contributions in the last 18 months. \(Common Cause also zeroed in on three other members, of the Senate finance introduced an amendment comparable to Wilson’s House proposal. He, too, spoke of over.