Business: Should Lockheed Be Saved?

THE U.S. Government is being confronted with a major and difficult question of principle—and practice—involving the nation's way of doing business. Lockheed Aircraft Corp., the biggest defense contractor, is in a deep cash crisis, and it is looking to Uncle Sam for a bailout. The company wants Congress to authorize an unprecedented federal guarantee of a $250 million loan to save its wholly commercial L-1011 plane, a medium-range "airbus" designed to carry 250 passengers. If Congress refuses, the company's management warns that Lockheed will skid into bankruptcy, upsetting a business empire that employs 75,000 people in 26 states. This would add...