The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1924-12-01
SENATOR LADD ON MUSCLE SHOALS
Opposes government ownership and is for Henry Ford
offer-magazine discusses his views.

United States Senator +. +. Ladd
of North Dakota has taken up cud-
gels in behalf Of the acceptance Of
Henry Ford's bid for Muscle Shoals,
and against government ownership
of the big nitrate and power plants.
Senator Ladd, in an article in The
Saturday Evening Post, outlines his
views on the subject, and his views
also are discussed by the magazine
in an editorial.
Senator Ladd is held By the mag
azinc to be inconsistent in his views
on public ownership.
In the course Of his article on
Muscle Shoals, Senator Ladd argues
against government ownership of it.
in part, as follows:
! Returning to Muscle Shoals, the
difficulties which make it danger
Gus for government operation arc
not merely the difficulties of power
development. The air-nitrogcn fer
! tilizer industry exists in large COM
mcrcal form only in Germany
while in the United States there
is no such developed industry and
there are no presidents to follow
One of the most competent electro
| chemical engineers in the United
States well expressed the situation
before our committee when he said
''This art is changing so fast that
YOU can hardly follow it,.
Why Invite Failure:
"ln this new industry amy plant
however we'll designed, admitted,
may become obsolete even before it
construction is completed, as on
large Muscle Shoals plant alread.
has become. How, then, can an.
reasonable man insist upon takin.
the taxpayers money by the score
of millions Of dollars and sinking
it in great fertilizer plants undo
such conditions when, with the For
offer accepted, private capital agree
to research these improved process
es, carry the research work through
Ito IA commercial scale, and to adop
such processes as prove their WORTH
inSuring that the nitrate plant vii
be kept up to date for 100 year
with no expense whatever to-. tn
Government?
81 doubt if anyone can imagin
that we would have had the pres
ent remarkable perfection Of tn
modern automobile = if the frs
horseless carriage had been turnc
over to the Department of Agricul
ture to develop; yet the problem
of the automotive industry are sin
pie indeed when compared with tn
problem Of preparing and delivcrin
to the farmer an adequate supply 9
plant foods at prices that will er
, able them to be applied profitabl
in sufficient quantity to our grea
field crops. To put such a problel
Of large scale development and pre-
duction into the hands of a govern
ment bureau is, in my judgment, t
invite disastrous failure which ca
and undoubtedly will be held up d
horrible example by those VIII
oppose government ownership an
operation as a policy.
1T is most significant fact tn;
many of the interests that oppose
the operation of Muscle Shoals b
the Government in 1920, and tn;
have bene fighting the Ford pr'
posal, offer no objection to the go'
crnmcnt- operation bill of Senate
Norris; but the amazing thing
that the senator cannot see th'
the power companies and their Wa
Street allies who favor his bill an
who have offered no proposal
their own in the Senate do so b.
cause the senator's bill is NEAR
of defeating the Ford proposal al
provides wide-open gateway to tt
power that these interests long ha,