proposed in Senate Joint Resolution 46, believing that its benefits to American agriculture will be immeasurably greater. We have stated our conviction that the production of cheap fertilizer is of enormous importance to the welfare of this country. Likewise we believe that the development of its water-power resources is extraordinarily significant. It seems to us a very fortunate circumstance that two such important questions affecting the public welfare can be advanced together by the proper development of the Muscle Shoals properties. The opportunity to produce cheap electric power there offers unlimited possibilities for service to the States and communities which will be directly affected if the Norris resolution is adopted. At the same time we believe an even greater usefulness will be served because the whole country will profit if we can discover at Muscle Shoals what the generation and distribution of electric power would cost and what a fair charge to the consumer of electric current everywhere may be. The question of the disposal of Muscle Shoals has been before you for years. Until the Congress acts the Secretary of War is unable to make effective disposal of the power because of the handicaps he suffers by the limitations on his power to contract. Because of those difficulties, with which your committee is familiar, the power is now being sold to the only company having transmission lines to the properties, the Alabama Power Co., and the consumer of electric current in industry and in the home is not benefited by the low cost of its generation. Likewise the assistance possible to farmers by the cheap production of nitrogen for fertilizer is deferred. For this reason we believe that there is a special appeal in an attempt of the Government to experiment now for a 10-year period in the development and operation of these Government-owned properties as proposed in Senator Norris's bill. There seems to be no doubt but that the consumers need for cheaper power and the farmers need of cheap fertilizer can both be met under this plan and that the national defense will be adequately safeguarded. No private lease yet proposed has given these assurances. The League of Women Voters has never taken any action on the general question of Government ownership. We have acted on this specific question, however, and we now do earnestly hope that Senate joint resolution 46 may pass the Senate and that it may be favorably reported by your committee and passed by the House. The action of the league has not been hasty. Our indorsement of measures is not secured by resolution in our conventions. It is given only to those proposals which embody principles adopted as a part of our program of work. According to our constitution every item in the program that is proposed to be voted upon at the convention must be submitted in printed form to every State league at least three months in advance. Each item on the program is voted upon at every convention and during the three months preceding, study and discussion of the proposed program is undertaken by local leagues all over the country. The delegates in the convention may act with a full knowledge of the reasoned convictions of those whom they represent. When an item appears on our program for study or for action it is supported by printed material. In the several years that Muscle Shoals has been included we have prepared and distributed a considerable amount of information about it. As a sample I am attaching to this statement two pamphlets published by the league. "Electric power and the public welfare" applies to the general question of power; the other, "Facts about Muscle Shoals," has been widely used by our membership in their study of this question. We have fostered discussion groups, study classes and public meetings in almost every State during the past few years. This autumn an official delegation of the leagure visited Muscle Shoals and reported the result of its investigation there to our membership. The report of their first hand observation substantiated the point of view which I have laid before you. I write therefore to express the earnest conviction of a body of women citizens who have formed their opinions only after study of all sides of the question. We are concerned that such an enormous investment of the people's money should be safeguarded, that the intent of the act of 1916 should be carried out, and that the hope of cheaper electricity for every home may be more quickly realized because of a wise solution of this problem now. BELLE SHERWIN, President. FACTS ABOUT MUSCLE SHOALS FOREWORD This publication is designed primarily for reference use. Its purpose is to give members of the League of Women Voters ready access to the salient facts in the Muscle Shoals situation. Unfortunately it is impossible to secure, in any quantity, copies of committee hearings and reports, the great interest in Muscle Shoals having exhausted the supply at the Government Printing Office. Since this primary source of material is exhausted, important aspects of the subject are presented here for the convenience of those who may wish to refer to them. The publication makes no attempt to present an argument. The documents chiefly consulted in the preparation of this publication are the following: Report of the Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, April 20, 1922. (S. Rept. 831.) The Federal water power act. Majority and minority reports of the Muscle Shoals inquiry appointed on March 26, 1925. (H. Doc. No. 119.) Hearings before the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry on Senate Joint Resolution 35, to suspend the jurisdiction of the Federal Power Commission to issue licenses on the Tennessee watershed, January 11, 18, and 19, 1926. Hearings before the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry on House Concurrent Resolution 4, S. 2147, S. 2956 (held on February 1 and 2, 1926, and constituting Pt. I), on S. 2147, S. 2956, S. 3081, and S. 3123 (held on February 17, 1926, and constituting Pt. II), and S. 2147, S. 2956, S. 3081, and S. 3123 (held on February 18, 19, 20, 23, and 24, 1926, and constituting Pt. III). The speech of Senator Norris on March 8, 1926. The majority and minority reports of the Joint Committee on Muscle Shoals, April 19, 1926. (S. Rept. No. 672.) Report upon the improvement of rivers and harbors in the Florence, Ala., district by M. C. Tyler, major, Corps of Engineers, United States Army, 1926. EARLY HISTORY Muscle Shoals is a war legacy. If there had been no war about $160,000,000 of the people's money would not have been invested at Florence, Ala. But in 1916 the United States was on the eve of entering the war and therefore about to need explosives in enormous quantities. Nitrogen is necessary for gunpowder, and our chief source of supply was Chile.' The alternative to depending upon Chile was to get nitrogen from the air and the Congress accepted the second alternative. On June 3, 1916, it passed the national defense act, which authorized the President to select one or more places in the United States where an abundance of cheap water power could be developed for the purpose of extracting nitrogen from the atmosphere. President Wilson chose Muscle Shoals, on the Tennessee River, in northern Alabama. To construct the Wilson Dam and the various plants at Muscle Shoals power was necessary. Accordingly the Government contracted with the Alabama Power Co., which had a steam plant at Gorgas, the mouth of a coal mine, 90 miles south of Muscle Shoals. This Gorgas plant was only half large enough to supply the power needed for construction work at Muscle Shoals, so the Government entered into a contract with the Alabama Power Co. to double its capacity. As Senator Norris, chariman of the Senate Committe on Agriculture and Forestry, describes it, "The Gorgas plant has been well likened to a scrambled egg. All the property is on land owned in fee by the Alabama Power Co. It is located at the mouth of the coal mine likewise owned by the Alabama Power Co. The enlargement of the main building was done at the expense of the Government. There are other buildings where the Government built the building and the power company put in the machinery. The railroad used in the operation of the plant was partially constructed by the Alabama Power Co. and in part by the Government. The buildings in which the employees are housed are part of them owned by the power company and part by the Government." 1 During the years 1914 to 1920 we imported 7,725,767 tons of Chilean nitrate, costing approximately $550,000,000. “As a result of this policy of depending upon Chile for nitrates, however, it was necessary to divert 128 of these vessels, aggregating 700,000 tons, or 20 per cent of the entire transport fleet, for the sole purpose of bringing nitrate of soda from Chile, and this was at a time when it was clearly evident that the outcome of the war was chiefly dependent upon the ability of the United States to secure ships." (Report of the Muscle Shoals inquiry, p. 15, 16.) The original contract between the United States Government and the Alabama Power Co. provided that when Muscle Shoals was finished the Government would sell its interests in the Gorgas plant and transmission line to the Alabama Power Co. The company claims this contract is binding, although the legal advisers of the War Department say it is not, on the ground that at the time the contract was made the Secretary of War had no authority to sell property belonging to the United States. THE PHYSICAL LAYOUT "The section of river * * * known as the Muscle Shoals section flows in a westerly direction through the northern part of Alabama from the head of Browns Island (171 miles below Chattanooga, Tenn.) to Florence, Ala. (256.5 miles above the mouth of the river), a distance of 36.6 miles. The drainage area above Florence is 30,514 square miles. The discharge at Florence varies from about 8,000 second-feet at extreme low water to about 450,000 second-feet at extreme high water. At places in the Muscle Shoals, which cover the greater part of this section, the current is rapid, exceeding 10 miles per hour, and the slope is as great as 15 feet per mile. The fall in the entire section is 134 feet, and the width between banks varies from 1,000 to 9,600 feet. (See U. S. Geological Survey topographical map of Muscle Shoals and Rogersville, Ala., quadrangles.) "Original conditions.-This consisted of a series of rock shoals, with steep slopes, swift currents, and low-water depths as small as 6 inches, separated by pools of greater depths and slight slopes. The shoals were a complete barrier to upstream navigation at all times and to downstream traffic except at high stages and at great hazard."2 Dam No. 2 is the Wilson Dam. "The dam proper is divided into three parts; the lock on the right bank of the river for the protection of navigation; the spillway dam, which occupies the northly three-fourths of the river bed; and the power house, which continues the dam to the left or south bank of the river. The total length, bank to bank, is approximately 4,500 feet. The dam section is 2,890 feet long, and the power house section 1,184 feet. The remaining distance, or 426 feet, is taken up by the lock and abutment connections." (Report of the Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, April 20, 1922, p. 5.) When finished it will be the largest concrete dam in the world-when the river is at its highest it is estimated that three times as much water will pour over it as goes over Niagara. In spite of all this, Muscle Shoals has a weak spot. The flow of the river is far from constant. It varies with the seasons and so its possibilities range from more than 1,000,000 horsepower to less than 100,000. If something could be done to equalize this flow so that a quantity of power larger than the minimum could be steadily produced, the worth of Musele Shoals would be increased and the cost of power proportionately lessened. There are two ways of equalizing the flow: By storage dams and by supplementary power from steam plants. By the first method, surplus water is held in reservoirs during flood seasons and then released when the river falls. By the second, coal is rushed into near-by steam plants as the river falls, and power made from steam temporarily makes up for the loss of water power. The Government already has two steam plants at Muscle Shoals-one at nitrate plant No. 1, capable of developing 6,000 horsepower, and one at nitrate plant No. 2, with a capacity of 120,000 horsepower. By the use of these two plants in connection with the Wilson Dam, a great volume of "secondary power' (power that fluctuates with the rise and fall of the river) can be turned into "primary power" (power that is constantly available). THREE DIVISIONS OF THE QUESTION A discussion of the Muscle Shoals question falls naturally into three divisions: (1) Nitrogen, (2) navigation, and (3) power. Before considering these three in relation to the bids for Muscle Shoals made by individuals, fertilizer or power companies, or in relation to the facts of present operation by Army engineers, it may clear the atmosphere to take them up one by one-as nearly as possible in a vacuum. Extract from the 1926 Report Upon the Improvement of Rivers and Harbors in the Florence, Ala., District by M. C. Tyler, Major, Corps of Engineers, U. S. A., in Charge, page 1135. I. NITROGEN When the Congress passed the national defense act it contemplated the use of nitrogen for two purposes-for explosives in war time and for fertilizers in time of peace. Two nitrogen plants are already built at Muscle Shoals: "United States nitrate plant No. 1.-Construction of this plant was begun by the War Department in October, 1917. The site, near Sheffield, Ala., had been selected by the President. The nitrogen fixation process to be used had been selected on recommendation of the President's nitrate supply committee, and was a modification of the Haber-Bosch process used in Germany. The plant was designed for production of 30 tons of ammonia per day, with all the additional equipment for converting ammonia either into concentrated nitric acid or into the explosive known as ammonium nitrate. "When operation of the ammonia process was attempted many difficulties were encountered and these were never entirely overcome. In January, 1919, the need for munitions having passed, further attempts to operate the ammonia process were discontinued and the plant put in stand-by condition, in which it has since remained. "Included in what is usually listed as nitrate plant No. 1 there are, in addition to the various parts of the plant proper, a steam power plant of 5,000-kilowatt capacity, an attractive industrial village, and approximately 1,900 acres of land. The total construction cost including the village, all improvements, etc., is recorded as $12,887,841.31, and of this amount $53,369.43 came from funds appropriated under section 124 of the national defense act. "United States nitrate plant No. 2.-Construction of this plant was begun in December, 1917, and by November, 1918, the plant was ready for operation at part capacity. It is located at Muscle Shoals, Ala., about 5 miles from plant No. 1. The nitrogen fixing method used is known as the cyanamide process. The crude calcium cyanamide produced is converted into ammonia and finally into ammonium nitrate, the later stages of the process being essentially the same as used in plant No. 1. The plant was completed and given a trial run at part capacity in January, 1919, with entirely satisfactory results. It was then put in stand-by condition and has so remained to date. 66 'Besides the plant proper, the plant No. 2 properties include a steam-electric plant, an industrial village, the Waco lime quarry, and a tract of about 2,300 acres of land. The total cost, exclusive of the Warrior River power station and transmission line sold since the war, amounted to $67,555,355.09, none of this money coming from the funds appropriated under section 124 of the national defense act. The rated capacity of the plant is usually expressed as 40,000 tons of fixed nitrogen per year." 3 FERTILIZER AT MUSCLE SHOALS Varying points of view.-Ever since the close of the war there have been a number of points of view as to the nitrogen-fertilizer aspects of Muscle Shoals. During these nine years also the development of scientific processes for nitrogen fixation has gone rapidly forward, compelling changes in the judgments of those who have kept pace with methods of getting nitrogen from the atmosphere. Whatever one's individual convictions may be as to nitrogen fixation, there can be only one starting point in any discussion of nitrogen at Muscle Shoals. This starting point is the national defense act of 1916. This is the act that authorized this enormous expenditure of the people's money. Section 124 of the act authorizes the President "to make or cause to be made such investigation as in his judgment is necessary to determine the best, cheapest, and most available means for the production of nitrates and other products for munitions of war and useful in the manufacture of fertilizers and other useful products by water power or any other power as in his judgment is best and cheapest to use." With the close of the war soldiers and explosives yielded first claim to Muscle Shoals to farmers and fertilizers. The act had so provided. But the act had done something more-it had coupled with the word "fertilizer" two adjectives'cheapest" and "best." Minority report of the Muscle Shoals inquiry appointed by the President. Report dated Nov. 14, 1925, pp. 76 and 77. Cheapness may be secured in the production of almost any commodity in either of two ways-quantity production or production improved methods. In the years following the war nitrate plant No. 1 figured only slightly in the nitrogen discussion--it was generally accepted as a nitrogen failure. Discussion, however, has been rife as to plant No. 2 with its possible capacity of 40,000 tons a year. There seems to be no dispute as to the usual ingredients of ordinary fertilizer. They are nitrogen, phosphoric acid, and potash. Ordinary fertilizer has these chemicals in the ratio 2-8-2, plus large quantities of dirt. Concentrated fertilizer has less dirt and the ratio of 10 parts nitrogen, 40 parts phosphoric acid, and 10 parts potash. This latter is five times as concentrated as the first. It is obvious that if ordinary and concentrated fertilizers are equally good for crops and equally convenient to use, a farmer would rather use the one that may be transported for the least money-here 3 tons of concentrated as against 15 of ordinary. The opinion of the Muscle Shoals inquiry.—It was the opinion of the majority of the Muscle Shoals inquiry in 1925 that "the results in each case showed that the claim which has been frequently made that improved fertilizers could be produced at Muscle Shoals and delivered to the farmer for a much lower price than he is now paying for them, has a sound basis in fact" (p. 54). "The study shows that the farmer can buy the average grade of mixed fertilizer at $36.78 per ton, conveniently bagged for use. He can buy the same amounts of the same plant foods in the form of unmixed ingredients for $26.82, while the estimated cost delivered of the same plant foods in a concentrated mixture from Muscle Shoals would average $20.74 per ton, with a resulting average saving of $16.08 per ton, or about 43 per cent of the present cost” (p. 60). The opinion of a consulting engineer. Another slant on the question is that of Hugh L. Cooper, consulting engineer in charge of the construction of Dam No. 2:4 "To at this time take another leap into a chemical field that is registering new improvements about every six months, by committing public or private money to further vast investments in fertilizer and nitrogen plants until chemistry is on a firmer ground than it is now, is a plan to pile up more monumental folly and get nowhere in so doing. "The amount of fertilizer that can be sold from a plant at or near Muscle Shoals in any event will be determined by the freight rates and the rapidity with which the farmers will take on the use of an entirely new fertilizer. No edict of law will ever be found successfully telling the farmer or any other business man how to run his business. By the slow process of evolution do we register all our progress, and the farmer is no exception to this rule. To require, therefore, the annual manufacture of 500,000 or any other great number of tons of a new kind of fertilizer at Muscle Shoals in advance of an established market demand for the same is deciding on a plan that is in defiance of the laws of good economics and good sense. * ** * * ** "If the Congress of the United States will open the door to the question of whether Muscle Shoals is a proper place for the manufacture of nitrate for national defense purposes and for fertilizer, it will find that this question should be left open until such time in the future as chemistry can speak positively as to what are undoubtedly the best plans for financing. When those plans for financing are developed, through competitive agencies-and there are many such agencies at work in the United States-then if this successful competitive plan required location at Muscle Shoals the power held in reserve for them should be sold to the best bidder at the standard fair rate of return on the power investment just as the power would be sold for general industrial use." The opinion of the director of the Fixed Nitrogen Research Laboratory at Washington. At one of the Senate hearings 5 Senator Norris put a question to F. G. Cottrell, Director of the Fixed Nitrogen Research Laboratory of the Department of Agriculture at Washington: "I would like you to give us your judgment as a scientific man, whether you can make fertilizer, get your nitrogen by plant No. 2 at Muscle Shoals, and make it cheap enough so that you can still have 8 per cent profit on your business, and sell it at a less price than you can buy fertilizer right on the market to-day?" After some discussion Doctor Cottrell • From the hearings before the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, Feb. 1 and 2, 1926, p. 11. Before the Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, Feb. 19, 1926. |