Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1954-07-20
Free Enterprise and the Atom

Senator's Lehman, Morse, Murray and
number Of their minded colleagues
have not won any credit for themselves
with their extravagant attack on the much
needed move to amend the Atomic Energy
Act Of 1946 In order to encourage greater
participation by private enterprise in the
development of nuclear power for Industrial
and other non-nilitary purposes.
From listening to these gentlemen-all
members Of the self-Styled little band Of
liberals" in Congress one gets the impress
sion that they honestly believe that our
thoroughly outmoded 1916 law cannot be
so amended without resulting In "give-
away" Of "Such proportions as to dwarf the
imagination" But at the same time, even
II he has only some rudimentary knowledge
of the facts involved, one also gets the i'm
preston that the Senators are talking
through their hats in way that makes the
mind reel with wonder over how silly, and
how reckless, our elected representatives
can become when they give free rein to
their doctrinaire prejudices.
For the amendments in question
amendments whose substance has been Wig
orously and unanimously Endorsed by the
f1ve-member Atomic Energy Commission
do not open the road to anything even re-
motely comparable to So-called "give-
away" Their sole purpose, actually, is to
speed up our country's progress toward the
achievement Of economically feasible nu-
clear power through projects like the one
now being undertaken by the Acc In CO.
operation with the Duquesne Light Com
pany Of Pittsburgh-a history making co.
000-kilowatt project in which the company
is relieving the American taxpayer of a con-
siderable burden by agreeing to pay about
$50 million of the costs that the Federal
Government would otherwise have to bear
In carrying out the enterprise.
Nationally and internationally, Of
course, with just such projects as this, it is
Of utmost Importance for the United States
to do everything possible to achieve world
leadership as soon as it can in Harvesting
the atom in way that will enable nuclear
power to compete on a relatively equal foot
ing with the conventional sources Of energy
in producing electricity, running factories,
Illuminating cities, etc. But this goal is
something that cannot be attained by the
Acc working alone behind wall of secrecy,
with private enterprise frozen out Of the
picture and left doing little or nothing on
the sidelines-a point that has been well
and repeatedly emphasized by Commits
sioner Thomas E. Murray and numerous
other experts.
Thus, as Mr.. Murray put 1t some time
ago, Gust as am convinced that initially
the Federal Government must sponsor and
finance full-scale power reactor develop
ment, so am equally convinced that such
sponsoring and financing will fall far short
OF what is needed unless there are enlisted
in this cause the coSt-cutting drives, the
know-how, skills and competition of many
segmentS of Americas business and indus
try" And it is primarily for that reason
that the current steps have been taken to
amend the 1946 law to provide incentives to
free enterprise as regards such things as
atomic investments, leasing arrangements,
patent rights and ownership of certain IA
cilitieS
Accordingly, in opposing all this with
the completely specious "give-away" charge,
Mr.. Lehman and his group have In effect
called for continuing Government monop-
oily that would result-as the Acc itself
has unanimously warned-in deplorable
and perhaps very dangerous delays in the
development Of American nuclear power
for peacetime purposes. Happily, however,
most members of Congress good, solid
majority-seem to have vision enough to
vote against such delays by voting for the
Speed-up amendments