National Affairs: Spread Out

By presidential order, Harry Truman last week tried to reverse a decision of Congress on the thorny question of whether defense plants should be dispersed throughout the country. He instructed Mobilizer Charles Wilson to see to it that all new defense plants are built ten to 20 miles away from established industrial centers or from other key plants. Those that do not conform will not get allocations of Government-controlled materials, Government contracts, or benefits of tax preference.

As soon as the news hit the teletype, Capitol Hill howled. Only last month, a coalition from the heavily industrial New England, Middle Atlantic and Great Lakes states had beaten down an attempt by Alabama’s Congressman Albert Rains to force dispersal of new defense plants into less populated inland areas. Cried House Republican Leader Joe Martin of Massachusetts: “When [the President] can so flout the will of the Congress, we … might as well shut up shop and go home.” Rhode Island’s Senator Theodore Francis Green, a Democrat, insisted that it was easier to build defenses for “compact industrial areas” than “scattered plants.” Of the Easterners, only Massachusetts’ air-minded Senator Henry Cabot Lodge had a good word for the President’s order. “I know from military experience,” said he, “that greater safety can be achieved in this manner.”