New Britain herald., 1927-01-29
SPENDING $125,O0O,000 ON BOULDER PROJECT

read about the big power project in Tennessee. The time will come when the Boulder dam project will be equally well known. When construct ed it will far surpass Muscle Shoals in size.
 Political and legal questions aris- ing out of the Boulder dam project promise to be on par with its big ness. They have already begun and are destined finally to reach tn. Supreme Court.
 The Boulder dam project, which is pending before both houses of Con- gress under the name of the Swing Johnson bill, authorizes the govern ment to construct 8 550-foot dam in the Colorado river, at a point where it forms the boundary between Nevada and Arizona; and to erect and operate a hydro-e electric power plant with an installed capacity of 100000 horsepower, and with a steady capacity of 55o.000 horse power which is about three times the steady capacity of the government plant at Muscle Shoals.
 A huge project, surely! But that isn't all. This government affair will call for flood control, irrigation of desert lands, creation of stable do- nestle water supplies and settlement Of rights to the waters of a river which flows through seven American states.
 One of the knotty questions which must be decided is whether the fed eral government should finance such a project through the sale of elec- tric power, or whether it should per- init private enterprise to lease the power plant and sell the power after the government has built the dam and made it possible to create the electric current.
 The slowness with which Congress has settled similar point in con- nection with Muscle Shoals indicates there will be no precipitate handing over of Boulder dam power to private interests.
 Another controversy challenges the validity of the entire project, this being due to the opposition of Ari- zona and more recently of Utah to the Swing Johnson bill. It is the con- tention of Arizona that it is not within the power of Congress and the legislatures of six states to make an agreement for the division of water in which seven states have an interest. In other words, Arizona wishes to insist upon an unanimous agreement or none at all.
 This contention is not deemed a dangerous one to the project, but will at all events be a time-consumer to decide. More important, perhaps, is the Arizona contention that the federal government hasn't the right to appropriate the water of the Colo- rado river for the generation of power, for irrigation, and for domes- tic purposes in defiance of the pre- cedent that the right to appropriate water for these purposes belongs ex- clusively to the states.
 The contention may give the friends of states rights an oppor- tunity for extended discussion; yet on the face of it, 1t would seem ridiculous for one state to claim
  riparian rights to the exclusion of the rights Of other states to the waters.
 The Boulder dam project will be the biggest thing of the kind that ever came before Congress. It will cost approximately s125, 5,OOo,0O0. As source of irrigation for large areas it is expected to make the deserts of the southwest blossom as a rose;;" but the most important func- tion-at least the function which will cause the greatest discussion-will be the production of power, and whether the government should operate it's vast plant or sell it to private interests.
 President Coolidge once stated 1t was his policy to have Hess govern ment in business" It was a nice phrase, but the government hasn't succeeded in relinquishins much of it's business since that time. The Shipping Board only the other day refused to sell any more of it's large liners at the prices offered, Con- gress has failed to turn the govern ment out of Muscle Shoals, and now this great Boulder project arises with government power operation as the central problem 10 be discussed. The discussion, at least, ought to prove educational,
 WHERE WOMEN LEAD
 Jane Addams says women are not