The Billings gazette. [volume] (Billings, Mont.) 1896-1919, 1908-12-08
SHELTER FUMES AND WATER
SUPPLY.

Wherever there have been SmelterS,
there also are men who find fault.
Go to any great reduction plant in
The state, and you will visit the site
of a, former wilderness.
Before the furnaces we're installed
few men ever visited that section.
With the establishment Of the smell
tiers, however, there vas an immedi-
ate demand for farm products, and
the tiller of the soil appeared. Some
of them located right in the track of
the smoke, and the result is that their
crops were destroyed.
Suits followed, to abate the nut
sance, on the ground that the smelters
were running the crops. On the other
hand, we must not lose sight of the
fact that if the smelters were closed
permanently, the farmer would be
ruined, for the market the reduction
plant furnishes for his produce would
be destroyed. He would find himself
In the wilderness, and would be COM
PEELED to seek new fields.
For the farmer, like any other man,
Is a business man, and the moment
the depot in which his product Is
marketed is removed, that moment he
stares failure in the face.
The shelters, of course, may i'm
prove conditions, we believe, with
profit to themselves, by installing
sulphuric acid plants. Whenever this
proposition has been made in the
past, the reduction plants have fought
it-but always they have been com
PEELED to come to it or shut down. As
between doing one thing or the other,
the course they will adopt is plain.
There is a constant and growing de-
mand for sulphuric acid, and as the
demand is greater than the. supply,
there is ample justification for the in.
creased expense.
Compromise is necessary, and the
first step must come from the smell
tiers. There is no question about the
fumes destroying vegetation-and
while it is possible to fight farmers in.
dividually, it is not possible to fight
the national government and win
when the question: of preserving the
forests, and, hence, the water supply,
is raised.
State courts, lawyers, great corpo
rations and influential men apale
into insignificance when the farmer al
lies himself on the side of the forest
~ commission and as a consequence
on the government side of the ques
ton, for the preservation Of the water
supply is Of more Importance than
the reduction Of copper, the mines al
Butte and all the Investments made
there combined. For, in the broader
sense, the mines there are local
while the water supply affectes every
body in the valley below, as Tar as
the water runs. M
1t is a federal, not a local question
this matter of water supply.
We are of the opinion that a farmer
In the vicinity of the smelter is rails
ing a tempest in q teapot--for ms
must have known what the result
would be when ne located, but the
farmers in the valley below hold 9
greater club over the shelters thar
the husbandman close to the fur
naces.
The simple way out Of the question
ID to add the acid plants. This vii
settle the matter Of the fumes, and
increase the profits of the shelters.
Regardless Of. the sentiment, loca
or otherwise, we must face facts a.
we find them, and in this contest be
tween the smelter on the 2 side
and the farmer on the other, the re
duction plant always loses. In every
case SO far, the furnaces have beer
compelled to close.
Compromise is an easy matter a
the present time, and unless advant
age is taken of the situation now, thu
point may be reached when it will Is
too late.
THE DUTCH BLOCKADE OF vENE
GEtEN aNAa1SHE hEgtSN4