Montana

Montana appears chiefly as a political constituency in the account of Burton K. Wheeler’s later career. Its significance lies in the contest over the Missouri Valley Authority: Wheeler’s alliance with corporate opponents of the project helped fracture his remaining support among the state’s Democrats.

Montana as a Political Base

The narrative locates Wheeler’s political fortunes in Montana through the support he eventually loses there. Rather than describing the state’s landscape or towns, it makes Montana legible through a changing relationship between a senator and his electorate: positions Wheeler took in national debates came to have consequences for his standing at home.

The Missouri Valley Authority Dispute

In 1944, Wheeler claimed that Communists were behind the Missouri Valley Authority, the proposed counterpart to the Tennessee Valley Authority. He sided against liberals and with Montana Power Company and Anaconda Copper Company in helping defeat the measure. The episode places Montana within a conflict over public authority and corporate influence, while showing Wheeler making a politically consequential choice in the name of opposing communism.

Electoral Consequences

Wheeler’s intervention in the Authority fight was followed by the loss of the last of his Montana Democratic support. In 1946, he was defeated in the Senate primary by Leif Erickson, identified as a young Montana liberal. The state therefore serves as more than a setting: it is the electoral arena where Wheeler’s alignment against the Authority became part of his political decline.