Evening star., 1937-04-26

small" items.
A case in point is the recommended
ton by a Senate committee last week
that Sl50000 be appropriated to au-
thorize the Federal Trade Comrnis-
sion to investigate the public utilities
and what they have been doing to
fight public ownership.
For seven years-from 1929 to 1886
the Federal Trade Commission in
vestigated and issued periodical reports
on how bad the utilities were. Every
phase of utility propaganda" and
efforts Ito control public opinion" were
thoroughly probed SO that if there is
anything bad about the utilities which
hasn't been brought to light, it was
certainly due to an oversight which
nobody has yet pointed out.
Findings Publicized.
What is more the commissions find
tngs were thoroughly publicized so
that considerable portion of the
American people now believe the util-
tiles are financial pirates and what
not. The people who still think that
maybe the utilities did accomplish
something with the money they bor-
rowed from the public and that maybe
they did do something constructive in
an engineering sense are not likely to
be affected by any more Federal Trade
Commission reports
AS for the utilities, everybody knows
that when the death sentence" came
up in Congress, they fought for their
lives just as any criminal would have
q right to do. There is certainly no
news in the fact that the utilities do
not like public ownership and that
they have been trying to influence
public opinion against the use of pub
lie funds to destroy their businesses.
If they didn't fight such tactics on
the part of the Government, their
stockholders would be justified in fir
ing the executives of the public
utility companies and getting some
body else to protect their investments.
Why, it might be asked, after seven
years of study is it desired to revive
and continue the persecution of the
utility companies? Certainly if it
Gas really important to uncover any
thing that has not before been I'M
covered, it would be much more eco
nomical to offer a prize or reward OF
$4,000 for anybody in the United
States who could reveal anything bad
about the utilities which the previous
Investigations and sundry volumes of
printed reports by the Federal Trade
Commission has not revealed. This
would save about $145 900 out Of the
s15o,000 about to be appropriated.
Motive Involved.
The truth of the matter is that the
new investigation is sought as means
of strengthening the hand OF those
who want to go into local situations
and make case for the destruction of
the business of the local power COM
panies so that more requests will come
for money from the P w. A. to help
build municipal ownership plants as
a threat to the existing companies.
Unless there is more of a demand for
the use of power from municipalities,
the big Federal projects, like the T.
V. A., will not find it easy to
Justify their existence throughout the
country
So the taxpayers are about to be
asked to spend $150,000 to help
destroy $12OOo,OOO,0OO industry
which has in it the makings of con-
structive program, this very year, for
the employment of Workmen and
the purchase of much durable goods.
If the purpose of the investigation is
to tell Congress something it needs to
know in order to write future legisla-
tion-that's the official excuse for all
stigations-somebody might also
offer another prize of few thousand
dollars to learn what has been omitted
from the present public utility holding
company act, passed year ago, that
should have been included
The death sentence" for holding
companies is in the law notWithstand-
ing the desperate efforts of the utility
companies to eliminate it, and 80 are to
be found in the statute vast powers
over the utility industry by the Fed
eral Power Commission and the Sc
curities and Exchange Commission,
which have authority themselves to
conduct continuing investigations.
Then there's another authorization
of about $30O0,000 for a memorial to
Thomas Jefferson. For many decades
the memory Of President Jefferson has