Availability of Federally Owned Property to Private Enterprise
Actually no clean demarcation can be made between this and the preceding section. A graduation can be established, moving from statutes lending the power of eminent domain to private enterprise, to those emphasizing government acquisition and lending or leasing, and ultimately to those principally concerned with providing government-owned equipment to private enterprise—the equipment presumably already in the hands of the government or subject to acquisition under other statues.
One of the very first Acts to provide for placing educational production of munitions of war stipulated that initial orders placed with any person, firm, or corporation for supplying such munitions, accessories, or parts, could include a complete set of such gages, dies, jigs, tools, fixtures, and other special aids and appliances, including drawings as needed for the production of munitions in quantity in the event of emergency.[310] The title to all such facilities was to remain in the government of the United States. The fiscal 1941 Navy Department Appropriations Act granted the Navy funds to furnish Government-owned facilities at privately owned plants,[311] and a July 1940 Act to expedite the strengthening of the national defense accorded like authority to the President.[312] Section 303 (a) (d) of the Defense Production Act of 1950 gave the President a general power to purchase raw materials including liquid fuels for government use or for resale, and when in his judgment it would aid the national defense, to install government-owned equipment in plants, factories, and other industrial facilities owned by private persons.[313]