Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1933-07-23
OREGON IS IN LINE
WITH REPEAL VOTE
Substantial Majority Given
Observation-Disclosures in
Friday BaIIoting.
BY RALPH WATSON.

Special Dispatch to The Star.
PORTLAND, Greg, July 22.-Early
returns coming in slowly last night
from Oregons vote on repeal Of the
eighteenth amendment indicated a sure
victory for the anti prohibition forces
by q substantial majority and brought
the State in line as the twentieth to 60
for repeal.
President Roosevelt the other day in
formed Oregons Senators, McNary and
Steiwer, that he favored the construc''
ton Of two dams across the Columbia
River, one on its lower reaches to be
built as q Federal project with Federal
funds for navigation development pri-
marily and power production secon-
darby. the other farther up: at Grand
Coulee, for power primarily, to be
financed 70 per cent by the Govern
ment and 30 per cent by development
district, as a f-liquidating project.
This expressed intention Of the Chief
Executive has brought closer to realiza-
ton the unmeasured industrial and eco
nomic expansion Of the vast Columbia
basin country, for. which leaders OF the
Oregon country have been battling Tor
years past.
The Columbia is a major river of the
Nation and the world. Rising in the
high Rockies, it drains an immense ter
ritory, running through the Inland EN-
pire country, which produces a large
proportion Of the wheat of the United
States. Breaking through the Cascade
Mountains, it furnishes a water grade
for transportation into the interior,
Middle West and East, forming q nat
ural gateway to north Pacific Ocean
commerce terminals with the Orient,
and through the Panama Canal with
the Atlantic.
Five miles wide at its mouth, at
Astoria, with 40-foot channel leading
to the sea, the Columbia has from 80
to IS feet 100 miles up to Portland.
and a channel easily developed to that
depth on up to Warrendale, the first
dam site on the lower river included
in the report Of the board of Army
engineers in its recently completed gen
eral plan for development and control
of the river.
Nature fashioned the Columbia for
power production. Where it breaks
through the Cascades-the Columbia
Gorge-its immense volume narrows to
surge past high basaltic cliffs. over
bed of basalt. HarneSSed to full capac-
ity, 1t holds more potential horsepower
than Niagara, Muscle Shoals or Boulder
Dam. Both below and above the white
water of the gorge, the river is capable
of easy navigation at least to Lewiston,
Idaho.
The Warrendale dam, as an illustra-
ton, would produce between zoe, 900 and
100000 basic horsepower of electric
energy. This, according to Government
engineering estimates, could be pro-
duced for two mills per kilowatt at the
dam site. as compared with two mills
at Boulder Dam. Boulder Dam power,
delivered at Los Angeles. would cost az
mills. Power from the Warrendale dam
in the Columbia would cost rs mills
at Portland.
Under the Columbia development, in
dustries located adjacent to the dam
site would buy their power for mills
and deliver their products aboard deep
sea vessels at their plants for trans
portation, at ocean rates, to the markets
OF the world.
Oregon, by constitutional amendment
and legislative statute, has set up the
machinery for the financing, construc-
ton and operation of public owned dis
tribution lines for the conveyance of
power from any Columbia river power
project to consumption points.