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Show -29- competently the vast burden placed upon it is a subject of common concern, and the Supreme Court, Congress, and the Interstate Commerce Commission have been alive to the necessity of observing the limits to effective legal, action by the Federal Government and of preserving the specialized local - interests of the States. But apart from considerations of practical states-- manship in administration, the facts governing supervision of railroads are decisively different from those which characterize the electric power prob- lem. 111 The differences present issues of policy as well as of constitution- al law. For the three processes of generation, transmission and distribu- tion, interrelated though they be as a single network, give ri3e practically to separate emphases and separate social concerns. For this reason, as well as because of certain assumptions underlying our dual system of govern- ment, the problems of legal authority must be analyzed critically as to the scope of its operation over the different parts. When dealing with hydro-electric development we are sharply faced by the constitutional authority of Congress over water power sites on navigable waters and the public domain, and the reservation of that authority to the States over sites on non-navigable waters. About eighty-five per cent, of the available sites are thus under Federal control,112 now lodged in the Federal Power Commission, 113 leaving fifteen per cent, of the sources of this energy within the authority of the States. Even more dependent upon State action is the success of the mine-mouth movement. For, thus far, the widest scope of State authority .over the coal fields has been sanc- tioned by the Supreme Court, even though production within the States IHstatement of Secretary Hoover to the Super Power Conference, New York, Oct. 13, 1923; Hard, Giant Negotiations for Giant Power (I92l|) Sur- vey Graphic, 577. 112second Annual Report of Federal Power Commission (1922) 7. H3The grave evils of unregulated exploitation of water power resources by private capital were forcibly brought to public attention by President Roosevelt in vetoing the James River Project. See note 108. The movement for safeguarding the public interest was given impetus by President Taft's veto of the Coosa River Project. (62d Cong. 2d Sess., I48 Cong. Reo. H7965 Report of Secretary of War for 1911, 32-35, 179). Th© Federal Water Power Act of 1920 (i+1 Stat. at L. 1063) is the legislative culmination of this effort. See Conover, Federal Power Commission, U. S« Govrt. Ser. Monographs, No. 17, pp. I47-6I+. Congress, under its power over navigable streams, as- sumed control over the surplus water in these streams* See Howell, Feder&l Power of Legislation as to Development of Water Power (1916) 50 Am. L» Rev. 883; First Annual Report of Federal Power Commission (1921) h&* The Act seeks to promote water-power development on terms sufficiently attractive to private capital and also duly protective of the public interest. Per- mits are required of all hydro-electric enterprises on navigable streams. Such licenses, for which an annual rental charge is made* are conditions precedent to the construction of any hydro-eleotric plant. The license runs for fifty years. The Commission is further authorized to investigate* alone or in cooperation with State agencies, the water resources of the nation and publish data concerning them. The conduct of hydros electric plants is placed to a large extent under the supervision of the Commission* |