Imperial Valley press., 1941-11-28

WASHINGTON. Nov % - Gossip
in Washington has it that after
Federal Loan Administrator Jesse
Jones got his famous 3000-word lei
ter from Secretary of the Interior
Harold IckeS bawling the daylight>
out OF Jones for the contract he
signed with the Aluminium Company
of America. the air around the Fed
eral Loan headquarters was every
shade of the rainbow. and smoke
poured from the windows.
For a while. there were periodic
drafts of letters IN reply. all NJ
which were red hot. but none Was
sent. The drafts expressed What
was left. all right. which was to the
general effect that Harold could e
lump off any OF all of his Depart
ment of interior dams. facing either
way. All SuavC banker Jones ever
admitted was that to be accused,
OF making a CONTRACT unfavorable
to the government was novel eH-
perienCe" 1t was a classic of un-
reinstatement. His reply to Ickes W.
q short telegram.
What got the Ickes goat was pri-
marily the fact that power for one
Of the plants, a 90million pound
per-year plant to cost Sll million OF
Sl2 million was to be located in TIE
vicinity of Bonneville where the
power would have to come from
Grand Coulee and Bonneville dams
Department Of Interior pets. Ickee
has consistently battled the Alum
mum Company because he believed i
to be Q monopoly.
THE SECRETARY SAW RED
With this background IckeS had
a natural opposition TO giving Alcoa
a contract to build and operate any
big new government plant. Even as
a private citizen, Ickes would have
a perfect right. to this opposition,
but as secretary Of the interior with
overlordship of the Bonneville
Power Authority, he saw red at be-
ing maneuvered into a position OF
having a furnish a big block Of
power to this one of his many per-
Sonal devils.
Perhaps IckeS had natural
chagrin that Jones Defense Plant
Corporation stood to make 85 per
cent of the profits from this con-
tract, while Ickes Bonneville Power
Authority had to furnish power at
a fixed maximum rate and like II,
Anyway, Ickes baked on the con-
tract. threatening to withhold his
approval Of granting power to the
Aluminium Company even though to
do so would put IckeS in the posi-
ton of being the gent holding up
expansion of aluminium production
for defense.
The way Jones negotiated the
contract, however, there was pro-
vision that if electric power were not
available at any of the proposed
sites, that plant need not be built.
If Ickes granted no power to the
company for the Bonneville plant,
the plant would go some place else,
and Ickes would be in the position
of cutting off his own nose by pre-
venting a new industry from COM
ing into the northwest.
MORE KICKING AROUND
Earlier, there had been another
squabble with IckeS on the matter
Of picking site for of one of these
new northwest aluminium plants.
Ickes wanted it at Cascade Locks.
near one Of his new reclamation
projects. Both the aluminium Com
pany and the Reynolds Metals Com
pany turned down the site and the
OPM rejected it because there was
no labor supply Immediately avail
able. That made Harold feel kicked
on the metal Shins, too.
Not having his way worth a darn,
IckeS sulked. He picked the con-
tract to pieces A newspaper column
appeared with blast at Jones for
still being capitalist who could
be counted on to trade the gov
ernment's shirt away The Truman
committee Investigators went into
action, summoning Arthur Davis
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