Montana labor news., 1938-01-06
Let Us Have No Truce

Continually the kept press harps upon the
possibilities of a truce between the admins
tration and the utilities. The press is in large
part an fundamentally of the utilities. That
which the utilities fail owning outright they
dominate in large part by advertising con-
tracts. 1t is unfortunate but true that too
many publishers who are otherwise free
agents are remarkably susceptible to influ-
ence from advertisers. They remain quiet
in the face of fragrant abuses, rotten service,
extortionate rates-because they are afraid
the utilities will withdraw advertising sup
port. Such is the voice of the cash register!
But what are the prospects of a truce be-
tween the utilities and Roosevelt? When the
utilities own press clucks approval of such a
truce the rank and file of American citizens
can be certain that the truce referred to is
one based on terms of the utilities. The utili-
ties are like the Old Guard of Napoleon: they
die but never surrender.
The chief trouble with the Roosevelt adj
ministration has been its reluctance to ma
tionalize the power industry. We have in
this country tremendous potential power de-
velopment running to waste because of the
incapacity of the Power Trust to develop it.
We have in this country rates for electricity
that gouge the pocketbooks of the American
people. A natural resource is water power.
1t surely was not placed upon this earth for
the enrichment of a few favored insiders
while the rank and file of the population are
financially unable to use the wonderful in
strument. Hundreds Of thousands have not
even been approached by the power lines of
the private companies! Yet the utilities COM
plain that they have been i'll treated by
Roosevelt and his administrations. 1t re-
sembles the case of a burglar complaining
because his victim meekly asks for carfare
to get home from the scene Of the stickup.
Electricity should be almost the cheapest
thing available. God certainly never intend
ed it to serve the few through profits at the
expense of the multitude. 1t should be as
cheap as water and almost as available as air.
The only solution of the electric utility prob
lem is government ownership and operation
providing cheap rates to everybody as is done
in Ontario, in Seattle, in Tacoma, and nu-
merous other places. Any other solution is
playing into the hands of the utilities and if
Roosevelt agrees to restrict his yardstick
power program, by which a guage on the
rates of power companies can be had, he is
weakening and his battle against the en-
trenched forces Of greed is lost. This is true
because the power forces are the center of
the web which is continually attacking the
Roosevelt reform administration from every
angle. Every attack on the New Deal has as
its center the selfsh-proft-g lutted private
power industry's moguls. Without their in
spiration the efforts of the other cooperative
Old Dealers would amount to little.
The kept press will refer to the thousands
Of stockholders and the thousands of workers
in the power industry. 1t will wall that in
dividual initiative is imperiled by govern
ment ownership. This is bunkum of the
purest fabric and the editors that write such
junk know it as well as anyone even remote
ly acquainted with the matter but the editors
have their orders and they write for the Pow
er Trust. What good worker for a private
utility monopoly would not work equally as
well for a publicly owned monopoly? There
is but one reservation made here: the case of
the sons of wealthy power executives who
ladle out soft jobs in the utility setups for
their sons. Later on we read Of these fellows
in the American Magazine or similar success
story periodicals telling about the fellow who
worked up to the top of a big corporation
from a small job.
If Roosevelt makes any truce with the
utilities he is lost and so are the people of
America. This fight against monopoly must
be fought to the last ditch.-WeStern Neus.