The Copeland Committee was organized to investigate air traffic safety and the operations of the Bureau of Air Commerce

United States government role in civil aviation

Governments have played an important part in shaping air transportation. This role began as early as 1783, when the king of France summoned the Montgolfier brothers to demonstrate their balloon. In 1892, the French War Ministry backed an attempt to build a heavier-than-air flying machine...

 by Congress. There were a number of factors that prompted Congress to commission this report including the TWA airline crash outside of Kansas City on May 6, 1935 that killed five people including Senator Bronson M. Cutting

Bronson M. Cutting

Bronson Murray Cutting was a United States Senator from New Mexico, publisher, and military attaché.-Biography:Bronson Cutting was born in Great River, Long Island, New York, on June 23, 1888 at his family's country seat of Westbrook. He was the third of four children born to William Bayard...

 of New Mexico

New Mexico

New Mexico is a state located in the southwest and western regions of the United States. New Mexico is also usually considered one of the Mountain States. With a population density of 16 per square mile, New Mexico is the sixth-most sparsely inhabited U.S...

. The Senate appointed Royal S. Copeland

Royal S. Copeland

Royal Samuel Copeland was an American academic, homeopathic physician, and politician who held elected offices in both Michigan and New York . He represented New York in the United States Senate from 1923 until 1938.-Early life and medical career:Born in Dexter, Michigan to parents Roscoe P....

(the chairman of the Commerce Committee) to head the committee. The preliminary report (June 30, 1936) gave a scathing account of the Bureau of Air Commerce for providing insufficient funding and maintenance of airway navaids.