Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-06-02
FEDERAL UTILITY
CONTROL IS URGED
BY GOV. P|NCHOT
Governors Farley Told
Power Intrigues Menace
Popular Government.
ROOSEVELT ADVOCATES
PLANNING SLUMP CURE
New York Executive Sees Relief
From Depression Federal
Responsibility.
Ry the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
FRENCH LICK, Ind, June a.
Federal control Of public utilities and
governmental planning to prevent
periods of economic depression were
policies advocated today at the second
session of the Annual Governors Con-
ference.
proposed that the public utilities be
placed under Federal supervision. Gov
Franklin D. Roosevelt Of Ney York
made the suggestion that the Govern
steps to alleviate economic distress.
Avoided RefOrestation.
The Pennsylvania executive had been
assigned subject on reforestation.
but instead he discussed utilities and
their relation to politics.
The domination of public utilities
in political affairs" he said. lis a grave
and imminent danger to government by
the people"
Gov Roosevelt did not depart so far
from his assigned subject as did Gcv.
Pinchot, but at the outset OF his adj
QreSS on Lana OLulLdLlOl anu OIdIc
Planning he said:
AT a time when our country, in
common with most of the rest of the
world, is suffering from severe dis
location of economic progress, people
naturally are asking properly questions
about the future.
Starving Amid Food.
1T seems strange to them that with
the capacities for production developed
to the highest degree the world has ever
seen there should come this severe de-
preston, when many eager to work
cannot find food for their families,
while at the same time there is such a
surplus OF food supplies and otner
necessities that those who are growing
crops or manufacturing can find no
markets"
The New York Governor expressed
the belief that both State and National
governments must accept the RESPONSE
bility of remedying the situation along
definitely constructive, not passive
lines"
The power of public utilities in politi-
cal affairs is a grave and imminent dam
ger to government by the people, Gov
Pinchot continued in his address.
The power of the public utilities. he
said, is manifest in every political as
sembly from Congress to town meeting.
Gov. Pinchots address was accepted
in political circles as his bid for the
Republican presidential nomination in
1882.
Utility Power Strongest.
THE strongest political power in my
own commonwealth is the power of the
organized public utilities" he continued
And 1 venture there is hardly a single
State where the pressure OF public util-
ity lobbyists upon the Legislature and
the government is not known.
In Pennsylvania the Republican
party is in power. The public utilities
do not dominate the Republican party
or rather the men and women of whom
it is composed, but they own and oper-
ate the party machinery. They control
the State chairman, the national COM
mitteeman, and other officials are buSily
occupied in doing the will of the pub
lie utilities in defeating the will OF the
voters"
Not Party Question.
The speaker said this was not mat
ter of good parties or bad parties, but
of interests which use parties in their
business. IF the Democratic party
were in power in Pennsylvania I have
no doubt its party machinery also
would be controlled by the organized
public utilities of the State he added.
Gov Pinchot traced the growth 'of
the electric industry. which started less
than two generations ago. and now has
total investment of approximately
$4,000 200, 900.
To-day. according to the Bureau OF
Applied Economics, about 90 per cent
of the total electric power generated in
the United States is under the DONNA
ton and control of four major interests.
And these interests working together
tremendously under a common policy
and toward a common end-which Is
the milking OF the public.
twenty-five years ago when I pre-
dicted the coming of a unified electric
power trust. I was laughed at. Six
ICNn,,ti,,,,nl az, para Onliir,nn &