The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-05-08
SOME MUSCLE SHOALS FACTS


 SOME MUSCLE SHOALS FACTS Henry Ford's refusal to appear before the senate committee in explanation or defense of his offer for Muscle Shoals is based on sensible reasons. As he says, his able rep resentatives have repeatedly appeared to dis cuss and explain and clarify the terms of the offer until they are clearly understood by anybody who wants to understand them. The effort of the committee is patently no longer directed along sincere lines of in- quiry, but it almost avowedly aimed at delay and defeat of the Ford offer by failure to report 1t at this session. The inquiry has long since departed from the merits of the offer itself and has turned to an unfriendly scrutiny and misrepresentation of the mo- tives of those who support the Ford offer. As Mir. Ford says, there has even been at tempt on the part of Senator Norris to cast aspersions upon President Coolidge in the connection. That being the case, Mir. Ford has abundant Justification for refusing to deliver himself into the hands of enemies who have no apparent intention of giving a square deal. If the majority of the com mittee do desire to deal fairly, they will re- port the measure to the senate, either ia. vorably or unfavorably, in order that de- cision may be reached.
 Nevertheless, certain pertinent and illum- mating facts have crept into the record in spite of the committee enemies of the meas ure. For example, Engineer Waldo, repre- senting industrial interests in the Tennessee Valley, has shown why it is that the appli- cation of the provisions of the federal water power act to the Muscle Shoals project would be unjust to both Mir. Ford and the project. Mir. Waldo cited court decisions to prove that a lease granted under the federal water power act could not be terminated tat the conclusion of any period, save in cases where the federal government owned the riparian rights, or where 1t could be demonstrated that dams obstructed navigation. At Mus cle Shoals the government owns both sripa- rian rights and dams. Mir. Waldo declared that the proposed lease to Ford for one hundred years would be one of the short est, because the majority of those granted by the power commission would endure for ever.
 Strangely enough, the committee, which is supposed to be informed in matters pertain ing to the; subject under Inquiry. received this information, which waszsupported by citation ofszcourt decisions, with surprise Evidently, in spite of all the time that has been consumed by the committee in these Shoals hearings, the committees knowledge of elementary and outstanding facts is still rudimentary. It is almost proof that the committee has not applied itself conscien- tiously to gaining an understanding of the water power act and to learning the distinc- tion between the Muscle Shoals proposition and ordinary power sites. On the contrary, 1t has evidently been the majority purpose to learn all it could in disfavor of the Ford offer and to encourage all testimony in favor of some other plan. Nobody is deceived by the Norris protestations of support of the plan of government operation. His attitude contributes to the defeat of the Ford offer and the success of some alternate offer, for everybody knows that government operation is undesirable and out of the question. Therefore, tofespouse government operation is in realityyto pave the way for the power companies offer.
 It also strikes the average citizen as both significant and peculiar that Mir. Norris should 80 zealously seek to impute unworthy motives to supporters of the Ford offer, when it is evidently so much easier to show inn proper and self-seeking tactics on the part of those forwarding the bids of the power monopoly and the chemical trust Taking 1t by and large, the support of the Ford offer is based on genuine belief that it's opera tion would result in the greatest good to the greatest number;- whereas support of the offer of either of the trusts is based primarily on the private advantage, with the public advantage not at all accelerated thereby; for everything that the trusts expect to do with Muscle Shoals they can do with any other power site. What Henry Ford proposes to do cannot 30 easily be done elsewhere, with out additional great investment ::SaEhile the great fundamental purpose of establishing and maintaining an emergency source of war explosives is entirely lost sight of in all but the Ford offes. It is time for the senate to call the hand of this weird committee.
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