Presidential Papers, Doc#449 To Everett Richard Cook, 2 October 1953. In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower
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Doc #450

Document #449; October 2, 1953
To Everett Richard Cook
Series: EM, WHCF, Official File 51
The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Volume XIV - The Presidency: The Middle Way
Part III: The Space Age Begins; October 1957 to January 1958
Chapter 6: Building strength when there is "no perfect answer"

 

Dear Everett:1 Thank you very much for sending me your views concerning the long term TVA plan.2 As you well recognize, our first purpose of achieving what is best for the nation and all its citizens is often complicated by differences of opinion on methods and by our basic economic needs. These many factors entered into our determination of the 1954 TVA program, which we hoped would produce the best equation of them.

Your comments should be most helpful in our periodic reviews of the program, and I shall see that they are brought to the attention of the appropriate officials.3

Occasionally, I have visitors from other valley areas who support the TVA theory very earnestly; but they insist that before the Federal government spends another nickel in the TVA area, similar developments must be intiated and completed in their own. I have heard enough arguments about these things to know that they are very complex. The theory and practice of Federal participation in such projects is scarcely one for a short and friendly letter. It could easily be a subject for an entire evening's steady conversation, but I truly appreciate having your outlined opinions.4

I am glad that you enjoyed the dinner last week. It was a very enlightening and interesting evening for me.5

With warm personal regard, Sincerely

1 Cook, of Memphis, Tennessee, was a cotton merchant and exporter. He had established a raw cotton business in 1916 and in 1919 had become president of Cook & Company, Inc. A decorated World War II veteran, he had served with the Army Air Forces in the United Kingdom, North Africa, and Italy. Following the war Cook was an adviser on agriculture and food matters for several government agencies.

2 The President had asked Cook to write regarding his views on proposed plans for further development of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) in Tennessee, specifically on whether the government should support construction of a steam plant at Fulton, Tennessee, in anticipation of a predicted power shortage in Memphis due to Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) needs at the Paducah installations. Cook's letter of September 28 is in the same file as the document. Eisenhower's reply was drafted by L. Arthur Minnich and retyped with the President's revision. For background on the TVA see David E. Lilienthal, The Journals of David E. Lilienthal, vol. I, The TVA Years, 1939-1945 (New York, 1964); and Roscoe C. Martin, ed., TVA, The First Twenty Years: A Staff Report (University, Ala., 1956).

Cook had argued for the construction of the steam plant at Fulton on the strength of the area's need to serve munitions installations, as well as its ongoing navigation and flood-control projects. He pointed out that TVA's hydroelectric plants required auxiliary steam plants and that the proposed Fulton plant would be located on the Mississippi River "with a view to economy of operation . . . so that coal from Illinois and Kentucky could be furnished at a lower transportation cost." Cook said that he agreed with the people of Tennessee, who felt that they had a right to expect the completion of the overall plan, a plan that he believed fused local and national needs and would benefit the country as a whole. "Yet, at the same time," Cook concluded, "I am of the personal opinion that all operations of the Government in business ultimately should come to an end." He asked Eisenhower to be sure that such a move would not weaken the defense of the nation or become a "give-away" program.

3 Copies of Cook's letter and the President's reply were sent to Budget Director Dodge on September 30, 1953. The controversy over continuing federal support for TVA projects was quickening, and Eisenhower would find himself in the thick of it. At a press conference in June he had cited TVA as an example of "creeping socialism." Now, in preparation for a meeting with Tennessee Governor Frank G. Clement on October 8, he had asked Budget Director Dodge to send him an analysis of TVA operations (Public Papers of the Presidents: Eisenhower, 1953, pp. 433-34, 704-5; New York Times, Oct. 9, 1953; Dodge to Eisenhower, Oct. 6, 1953, and Eisenhower to Dodge, Oct. 8, 1953, both in AWF/A, Dodge Corr.).

4 Clement would arrive at the White House on October 8 armed with a sixteen-page paper outlining the "legislative conception" of the TVA, which, he said, demonstrated that "men can develop their resources by democratic means, for the benefit of all the people and . . . to the greater glory of God." Clement went on to trace the origins of TVA in 1933 and to describe in detail the development of flood control, navigation improvement, and power generation in the Tennessee Valley during the past twenty years. By 1956, he predicted, TVA would supply 25 billion kilowatt-hours a year to the AEC's plants at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Paducah, Kentucky. AEC demands, he said, would require "nearly double the amount of hydroelectric power that can be produced on the TVA system in a year of average rainfall. This power must obviously be provided by new steam power plants" (Clement presentation, Oct. 8, 1953, AWF/A: TVA). Clement would propose the creation of a special commission to study TVA's programs.

Eisenhower was unconvinced, and he said so at his press conference the same afternoon (Public Papers of the Presidents: Eisenhower, 1953, pp. 650-51; New York Times, Oct. 9, 1953). It was the President's position that the federal government, since it had paid for the development of TVA power plants, should have access to a reasonable portion of that power. He was concerned that TVA was becoming increasingly dependent upon steam power, a significant departure from the original concept of the Authority as a means to control the waters of the Tennessee River system. He would write later in his memoir Mandate for Change that he could see "no justification in building a steam plant for Memphis, to be paid for by the nation's taxpayers, any more than for any other city in the United States" (p. 377). Eisenhower would continue to argue for nonfederal public and private development of public utilities (see e.g., Dodge's draft, "Proposed Statement with Regard to the Tennessee Valley Authority," Nov. 23, 1953, AWF/A: Dodge 1955 Budget; see also Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, pp. 376-85).

Meanwhile, the Congress wrestled with a revised Eisenhower budget for TVA totaling $190,822,000 in FY 1954, a cut of $63,533,000 from the Truman budget. On July 20 Congress approved the final version of the Second Independent Offices Appropriation bill (H.R. 5690), providing $188,546,000 for TVA; both houses cut out the $30 million requested for construction of the steam power plant at Fulton. Still to be resolved were questions of funds for relocation of TVA headquarters and appropriations for a TVA resource development program (Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report 11, July 17, 1954, pp. 951-52; July 24, 1954, pp. 986-87; Aug. 21, 1954, p. 1093).

On October 31 the President would receive yet another appeal for support of TVA programs, this time from Democratic Senator Estes Kefauver, of Tennessee, a member of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary (Oct. 30, 1953, same file as document). Kefauver asked Eisenhower to consider TVA's "effectiveness in fields entirely aside from power generation," pointing out that private industry would be greatly affected were it not for TVA's navigation projects on the Tennessee and Mississippi rivers. The Senator's letter would be filed "without reply or acknowledgment" (Bryce Harlow to Wilton B. Persons, Dec. 14, 1953, ibid.). For developments see no. 979.

5 On Wednesday, September 23, Cook had attended one of the President's regularly scheduled stag dinners at the White House.

Bibliographic reference to this document:
Eisenhower, Dwight D. To Everett Richard Cook, 2 October 1953. In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, ed. L. Galambos and D. van Ee, doc. 449. World Wide Web facsimile by The Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission of the print edition; Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/first-term/documents/449.cfm

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