The Emmett index. [volume] (Emmett, Idaho) 1893-1925, 1922-04-06
Nitrogen fixatioh means cheap. con-

Nitrogen fixatioh means cheap, con-
centrated fertilizers in large tonnage
and for this the cotton and corn belts
will rise up and call him blessed.
Chilean nitrate's grip will be loosed
and there will be more crops with less
labor, greater earning capacity per
man and farm, and 4 mighty encour-
agement to the man between the plow
handles. To the Nation Ford offers
cheap, large-scale explosive produc-
ton in wartime, absolute indepen-
dence Of Chile and the banishing of
that nightmare Of some disaster to
tho Panama Canal cutting Us off
from our raw explosive material sup
ply.
Electric furnace development as
visioned by Ford means improved
steel production, relief from that Old
Man Of the Sea, "Pittsburg Plus"
help to building and industry, phos-
phoric acid for potash fertilizer and
still more help to farmers through
cheap fertilizer and more crops with
less labor. Out of these furnaces he
proposes vast production of light me-
tails, steels, aluminums, ferro-alloys
and poison gas materials, with result
ing military preparedness and sound
er national security. With this come
cheaper and wider use of motorcars
and their cheaper operation. 1t will
be recalled that Henry Ford is in the
motorcar business.
Navigation improvement Of the
Tennessee River will make it possible
for the coal, fertilizers. raw rock
phosphates, light metals, acids and
gases to move to farms and factories
in the Mississippi Basin or to the sea
by boat. The Ford idea is to make
real use Of the inland rivers, to trace
national policy in which waterways
are paid for by waterpower and to
offer cheap hauling to great section
of America. The transportation end
of the scheme looks to the coming cleo
trification of railroads and mines, CIV
ing greater rail revenue capacity at
less cost and greater earning capacity
per man, car and mine.
The Ford offer was about as well
come as tsn-inch shell falling in the
middle of tea party. Maybe he can
do all these things, and maybe he
can't, but Henry Ford proposes them.
You can see who will be hit and hit |
hard if Congress accepts the plan. 1t |
is easy, also, to see why the farmers
are back of Ford to a man and why |
preparedness advocates lean to his
offer. All this helps to explain why it |
is that SO many corporations that
were nonchalantly poohpooing Muscle
Shoals q year ago are now shouting |
that Ford is q false alarm, that he
will fail at Muscle Shoals, and why, at
the same time, some of them are hur-
rying in bids and rolling rocks and
telling trees across the road in front
of Ford.
Somebody, good many somebodies,
are troubled. They know Ford at
Muscle Shoals means Ford competi-
ton, and that is terrific, market
wage-raising, brain-sweat-
ing competition.
If Henry Ford is all wrong, If he
is a puttering, doddering, futile and
foolish dreamer, then why this muss-
ing of hair, this tearing of shirts and
this rush to discredit a thing that
would coon discredit itself? Why are
the prophets of failure so anxious to
block the experiment? Why this so
sudden tenderness and anxiety over
Federal funds?
Out of the flood of technical argu-
nents, figures, assertions, charges
md counter-charges, these questions
stick up like shafts Of steel and con-
,rota