Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1916-04-20
UBIQUITOUS
SHIELDS BILL
What Clifford Pinchot, Milford, Pike
County, Pa, Has to Say About 1t
III a Personal Letter to the Editor.

April 10, 1916.
Mr.. A. L. Fontaine, Editor, The Wood
County Reporter, Grand Rapids,
Wis.
Ny Dear Mr.. Fontaine:-
The iniquitous Shields bill, giving a.
way the water powers of our naviga-
bic streams, about which l wrote you
on February Is, has been driven thru
the Senate, but it has not passed the
! House. There is still a good chance
not only to stop this raid on public
property, but to pass a fair and hon
est waterpower bill in its place
Everything l said about the Shields
bill in my letter to you was confirmed
in the debate. According to it's own
supporters, this bill turns over to the
power interests waterpower equiva-
lent to twice the mechanical power of
every kind now used in the United
States, or enough to meet the needs
of two hundred million people, This
it does IN perpetuity, although pre-
tending to limit the grant to fifty
years. Small wonder there is pressure
to get it through.
! On March 21, substitute for the
| Shields bill was reported to the House
Of Representatives. Unlike the
Shields bill, this House bill makes no
perpetual grant of public waterpower,
but wisely and in fact sets limit of
| fifty years. Nevertheless, it is not yet
a good bill. For example, it gives a.
way the public waterpowers without
compensation. There is no reason why
the waterpower corporations should
not pay for what they get. The rest
of us do. The House bill should be
amended accordingly.
If the House corrects it's own bill
and then passes it, the good bill from
| the House and the bad bill from the
| Senate will go to conference, and the
difference will be adjusted by the con-
ferees. The managers of the water
power campaign believe that ma
jority of the conferees viii be friendly
| to them, and Will report a bill in their
interest. They will then try to rush
the conference bill through, probably
| in the confused and crowded final
| hours of the session. Such plan has
often served the special interests in
the past, and it is dangerous now.
During the debate on the Shields
| bill, this course was openly advised.
| There was under discussion an amend
ment giving preference to the appli-
cant for a public waterpoWer who Of
| fers the best terms to the public. One
of the supporters of the Shields bill,
ferring to the amendment as "bad and
vicious" went on to say: at is some
thing that we can eliminate in confer
ence. We might let it go in and
then dispose of it in conference" (Con-
gressional Record, March 8, 1916, page
4285).
We can beat this plan only by let
ting the people understand the facts.
This the power interests have set out
| to prevent by confusing the public
mind with interested statements and
personal attacks.
I am asking for your help once more
to get the House to pass a good bill,
and then to stand by it, no matter
what the conferees may do. If the
House stands firm, the people will win
! this fight. But the House needs to
know that the people are behind it.
Let me call your attention again to
the Ferris bill, a good bill dealing with
waterpower on public lands and Ma
tional Forests, which has twice passed
the House An undesirable substitute
the Myers bill, now before the Senate,
gives the public waterpowers away in
perpetuity. Under it, the power in
terests could occupy and exploit the
Grand Canyon itself, the greatest ma
tural wonder on this continent.
The waterpower interests want ev-
erything or nothing. In the last eight
years they have killed eight water
power development bills that were fair
both to the corporations and to the
public. What the people need is wa
terpower development on equitable
terms without further delay. They can
have what they want by letting
the House know it.
Sincerely yours,
Clifford Pinchot