COPY
February 10, 1936
My dear Mother:
Apparently Northern Vermont did not receive the broad¬
cast of my speech. The farthest north that I have
learned of anyone being able to hear it is Burlington.
I make no criticism of the broadcasting, but I do not
understand it.
I enclose herewith a copy of that speech, and a copy
of the speech that I intend to deliver in St. Louis
on the 13th.
You will find the remarks on Huey Long's career in
The Record of January 22, 1936, p. 790
Best love from Mildred and me.
Your affectionate son,
Mrs. Chauncey G. Austin,
91 South Main Street,
St. Albans, Vermont.
Two speeches enclosed
RELEASE ON DELIVERY
RADIO SPEECH OF SENATOR WARREN R. AUSTIN, OF VERMONT,
delivered over The Yankee Network, WJSV on Thursday,
February 6, 1936, at 7 to 7:15 P. M.
"THE SUPREME COURT AND GOVERNMENT BY THE PEOPLE"
— - ----
Fellow New Englanders:
The invitation of The Yankee Network to speak to the people of
New England, in a fifteen minute broadcast, regarding issues pending
in this Seventy-fourth Congress, excites consideration of the pending
proposals to amend the Constitution, and Resolutions or Bills, all
tending to altar the American form of government by curbing the Su-
preme Court and increasing the power of Congress and the President.
They bring to instant prominence the questions: Shall the people
continue to rule? or Shall an uncurbed Congress and Executive monop¬
olize sovereignty?
One proposal of amendment would prohibit any Court of the United
States or of any State passing on the constitutionality of Federal
Statutes. (H.J.R. 329, Quinn)
One proposal would prohibit any Federal Court from declaring a
statute unconstitutional. (H.J.R.296 Knute Hill)
One joint resolution declares that the right to hold statutes
unconstitutional does not exist, and that the Courts have usurped
this power, forbids its further exercise, and makes the act of passing
on such question automatically vacate the office of the judge.
(H.J.R. 301, Monaghan)
Four bills would take away the power of inferior Federal Courts
to pass on the question, thus stripping the Supreme Court of the
largest part of its jurisdiction, viz.: on appeals.
(H.R. 9478, 8054, 10128, 10315)
The first amendment above mentioned would also repeal the Tenth
Amendment which is that part of the Bill of Rights saving to the
people of the several States all sovereignty not granted to the
Federal government. (H.J.R. 329)
Another class of amendments proposed would curtail the powers of
the Court by granting to Congress power over local affairs: produc¬
tion, mining, manufacturing, agriculture, labor, etc.
One of this group (H.J.R. 323, Wood) grants enough power to
-2
Congress to create a completely socialized State. It enables Con¬
gress to tax instrumentalities of States. But the New Deal is most
conspicuously delineated in Sec. 3 of it, reading:
"The Congress shall have power to delegate its legisla¬
tive power to the President and/or to such agencies as he may
select."
Another group of fourteen proposals of amendment and bills
would curtail the Supreme Court's power by various changes: in
number of members, by requiring more than a majority rule, by pro¬
viding for advisory opinions, and by limitations of time for testing
the question.
One amendment (H.J.R. 454) would curb the Court as to produc¬
tion and sale of farm products, and give Congress power to issue
money based on farm commodities. One would give Congress control
over farm production. (H.J.R. 429) One would increase the scope of
the General Welfare Clause so as to curb the Court.
Jointly and severally they present the issues of home rule and
free government immediately before us.
Ve have enjoyed home rule and government by the people nation¬
ally because of two characteristics of our Federal System, viz.:
(1) Reservation to the people of the several States
of all sovereignty not expressly granted by them to the Federal
government; and
(2) Division of Federal functions, executive, legis¬
lative, and judicial, into three separate departments designed to
check government against overreaching the will of the people, ex¬
pressed in writing.
These two fortresses of liberty have been defended by decisions
of the Supreme Court declaring void statutes which conflicted with
the Constitution.
The Constitution is the people's law. It was made fixed by
them because they had suffered tyranny under an unfixed Constitu-
tion.
It protects the citizens from their Government. It cannot be
changed by their Government. It can be changed only with their
consent.
-3
Meantime, there must be some place to which citizens may go
for protection against alteration by usurpation. They established
the Supreme Court as that place. They did this by their Constitu¬
tion. The Supreme Court derives its judicial power by a direct
rant from the people. It cannot be taken away save by the people.
In this it is unique. It does not receive its power from Congress,
as other Federal Courts do. The jurisdiction of the Supreme Court
is divided by the Constitution into original and appellate jurisdic-
tion, and the latter only is subject to exceptions and regulation
by Congress.
Thus, the United States, until afflicted with the New Deal,
avoided centralization and decentralization, tyranny and anarchy,
and maintained the highest degree of relative liberty and oppor¬
tunity, among all governments, by the devices of independent sover¬
eign States and limited and balanced Federal powers expressed in the
written commission of the people.
New Deal Acts, such as N.R.A. and A.A.A. were void becuaso
they struck down local self-government - without which the liberty
reserved by the people did not and cannot exist. When required by
specific cases brought by citizens to the Court, the Supreme Court
functioned, as directed by the people, and declared the N. R. A.and
A.A.A. inoperative.
The Court was the people's institution specially established
for this purpose.
The denial of its right and power is not new. The Court has
had to withstand such attacks many times. Jefferson bitterly ex-
pressed his reaction to the decision in Gibbons vs. Ogden, which
mapped out the course that Congress would follow for a century in
regulating interstate commerce: "That body, like gravity, ever
acting with noiseless foot and unalarming advance, gaining ground
step by step and holding what it gains, is engulfing insidiously the
special governments into the jaws of that which feeds them." He
was wrong, as proven by the decisions on N.R.A. and A.A.A., which
saved those special governments.
This was the important period when the Court, under Marshall,
was giving strength and vitality to Nationalism. The critics then
-4
were the States rights proponents.
Jackson was in collision with the National Bank case, and
Lincoln with the Dred Scott case, respectively. Lincoln's notes for
debate with Douglas say: „I might as well preach Christianity to
a grizzly bear as to preach Jefferson and Jackson to him." Douglas
asserted: "He* * keeps appealing each day from the Supreme Court
of the United States to political meetings in the Country." "The
Dred Scott decision was pronounced by the highest tribunal on earth.
From that decision there is no appeal this side of Heaven."
Federalists condemned the Court one day and acclaimed it another.
States Righters complained one day, and gave thanks another. New
Dealers praised it for the Gold Clause Decision, and criticized it
for the N.R.A. decision.
But the Court is in possession of the right. It has exercised
it for a century and a half as a logical development of the American
System. Such judicial power was exercised in the several States.
The Constitutional Convention assumed it to exist. Twenty-three
of the twenty-five men who dominated the Convention have been shown
to recognize it. Every New England State acknowledged the right.
Connecticut adopted the Constitution on a representation by
Oliver Ellsworth: "If the United States go beyond their powers, if
they make a law which the Constitution does not authorize, it is
void; and the judicial power, the national judges, who to secure
their impartiality, are to be made independent, will declare it to
be void."
Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont, in
1798, adopted resolutions counter to the famous Virginia and Ken¬
tucky resolutions touching the alien and sedition, laws which ex¬
pressly held that the authority of deciding on the constitutionality
of any act or law of the Congress of the United States was vested
exclusively in the judicial courts of the United States.
(Congress or the Supreme Court, pp. 186,191)
Though not expressly described in the Constitution, the right
is clear, by necessary implication and inevitable practice. This
right of the Court to declare statutes unconstitutional has been
the rod by which the people have ruled their government. The cer¬
-5-
tainty of its use, notwithstanding the roaring of the transgressors,
has punctuated the history of our remarkable progress, politically,
socially, and economically. Its use has been the marvel and admira¬
tion of statesmen, jurists, and historians of other countries.
(Gladstone, Bryce, and DeToqueville, notably)
It has preserved our constitutional form of Government. It
has prevented a gap occurring between the limits of the powers of the
several States and those of the Republic, and likewise, it has pre¬
vented the overlapping of those powers. It has made the frontiers
and boundaries of jurisdiction clear.
When National sovereignty was at low ebb, the Court, under
Marshall, turned the tide.
When the backwash of the war between the States threatened to
engulf the South, the Court under Salmon P. Chase erected a dyke
against the reaction.
Now, when the Federal Government attempts to destroy local
self-government, the Court, under Hughes, throws up the barrier of
judicial protection.
Recognizing that, by consent of the people, the form can be
changed, i. e., through amendment; and assuming, but not admitting,
that it can be changed without consent of the people, i.e., by sta¬
tute - Do we want it changed in this respect?
Do we want a Parliamentary form of government?
Do we want to raise the power of statute law to the supremacy
of a Constitution?
Such is the tendency of the amendments, resolutions and bills
now pending.
Even the comparatively conservative amendments expressly enable
Congress to legislate regarding production, manufacturing, and min¬
ing.
If the Federal Government occupies this field, local self¬
government will be driven out because a federal statute and a state
statute cannot occupy the same field. This field reaches the
horizon of State life.
Assuming the need for bringing capitalistic civilization to a
policy of social and economic justice, is the method advocated com¬
-6
mendable, or is it too dangerous?
The Supreme Court does not determine or change policy. Its
action is but a brake on speed.
Its power is simply the authority to dispose of a controversy
before the Court in which one citizen who is a party to a case claims
rights guaranteed to him by the Constitution. It is not the abso¬
lute negative or revision which was refused by the Constitutional
Convention.
(Formation of the Union, pp. 147, 548-551, 852).
The Court applies it in the determination of the specific is¬
sue by measuring the statute with the fundamental law relied upon by
the citizen.
If public opinion cherishes the centralization of power and
the destruction of local self-government involved in the New Deal,
the negation of the Court can be surmounted by these amendments.
The general consequence of centralization was expressed by a
great New Englander, President Calvin Coolidge, in May, 1926, thus:
"No method of procedure has ever been devised by which
liberty could be divorced from local self-government. No plan
of centralization has ever been adopted which did not result
in bureaucracy, tyranny, inflexibility, reaction, and decline.
The scope and effect of the "must" legislation passed by Con¬
gress and found void by the independent, nonpolitical, unbiased and
courageous action of the Court, persuade those who are not New Dealers
that wecannot afford to curb the Court and aggrandize Congress.
It is hoped that consideration of the other possibilities in¬
volved in the use of such power as the pending legislation would
vest in Congress will persuade some New Dealers themselves.
An omnipotent Congress could: Muzzle the press and destroy free
speech; enter our homes and search and seize without warrants; dra¬
goon us with troops quartered in our houses; cut off communication
between States and between persons within States; regiment every
business and every farm; take over and communize the economic ac¬
tivity of the people; enslave us to a State religion; take away the
right to trial by Courts and juries, and subject us to penalties
and punishments by acts of Congress; take our property without com¬
-7—
pensation; abolish process of law, and create inquisitions; it could
abolish States and set up soviets, and it could legislate the com¬
bination of President and Congress into permanent autocracy.
Granting that such a catalogue of dire possibilities lacks the
authenticity of even probability; yet, we ought always to consider
possible evils of a proposition to change the form of our government.
A probable evil from removing judicial power which should be a fiery
cross rallying New Dealers as well as Republicans and Democrats
against the propositions, is the different and conflicting inter¬
pretations of the Constitution - as many as there are States -
which could occur if we did not have the Supreme Court to unite us
in one interpretation for all States and for all people.
In effect the proposals affirm that the States have finished
their usefulness and ought to be extinguished; that the America of
balanced powers has passed its zenith, and that we ought to have a
President with powers comparable to those of Hitler or Mussolini,
through a Congress authorized to delegate to him all legislative
functions.
Is this the destiny of the America we are so proud of? No,
not while Americans remain worthy of freedom. Yes, if Americans
become incapable of self-discipline and self-government. Not a
written Constitution, not a Supreme Court, could then save this
America.
The perpetuity of our free institutions will be secure so long
as the people sanctify their Constitution and keep the power in
their own hands to amend it. Indeed, I favor a more direct use of
that power than is provided for now.
There is another group of resolutions proposing to amend the
method of ratification of a constitutional amendment. All four of
them would permit ratification by vote of the people in elections
in three-fourths of the States. They differ from each other in the
following respects:
One cuts out action by conventions and legis¬
latures and substitutes an election to be held
according to laws adopted in each State, or in
-8
defect thereof, law enacted by Congress.
(S. 198, Lonnergan)
One adds to the present methods majority vote
in the Congressional election next held after
submission, or in a special election held on
date and in manner designated by the President,
not less than four, nor more than six months
after submission. (S.J.R. 186, Schwellenbach)
One cuts out the present methods and requires
ratification by majority vote at any General
Election held within seven years after Submis-
sion. (H.J.R. 34, Griffin.)
One abolishes present methods and provides for
ratification by a majority of electors in the
next election for Federal Representatives held
not less than three months after proposal. This
amendment would also compel Congress to propose
an amendment on the application of the legisla¬
tures of two-thirds of the several States, or of
a majority of the electors of each thereof, vot¬
ing at a regular election. This would abolish
the Convention for proposing amendments now a¬
vailable on application of the legislatures of
two-thirds of the States.
Out of these latter proposals should develop a change in the
fundamental law which will bring the people and the Constitution
nearer together. The sanction of broad public interest, and the
belief in the wisdom of what John Locke called "a standing law to
live by" should give the Constitution additional vitality.
We New Englanders are bred, trained, and disciplined to pre-
serve institutions like local self-government and balanced Federal
power.
Instinctively we strengthen the citadel that guards them - the
Supreme Court.
RELEASE FOR MORNING PAPERS
OF FEBRUARY 14, 1936, and THERZAFTER
SPEECH OF
SENATOR WARREN R. AUSTIN, OF VERIIONT
delivered at the
LINCOLN DAY DINNER
ASSOCIATION OF YOUNG REPUBLICANS OF MISSOURI
THURSDAY EVENING FEBRUARY 13, 1936
AT ST. LOUIS,
LINCOLN AND HOME RULE"
-----
Abraham Lincoln, with constant reliance upon a higher
power for strength and guidance, and with unfailing faith in the
American people, gave to posterity a sublime public character which
we memorialize today.
To honor his great spirit, we bring the pledge of devo¬
tion of service and sacrifice to save, as he saved, popular govern¬
ment from peril.
We give fresh application to present conditions of the
principle which dominated his official conduct by emblazoning on
Republican banners his best known and best beloved statement:
"Now, we are contending that this Nation under
God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that govern¬
ment of the people, by the people for the people, shall
not perish from the earth."
This electorate is deprived of the testimony of a
Presidential election which tended to show either approval or
disapproval of the New Deal because the present Administration
was elected on a platform wholly inconsistent with the New Deal.
Various straw ballots taken by the Literary Digest and
others indicated an early support of it, and a later opposition to
it. The recent tally of votes in Missouri approximates 56.71%
against the New Deal.
The weight of opinion is apparently so balanced between
the autocracy of the New Deal and the liberalism of Republican prin-
-2
ciples, that a right decision depends largely on a thorough trial
of the issue in the people's forum.
Assuming certain objectives, to wit:
An abundance of the necessities of life, at prices within
consumers'
reach, by increased production;
Regularization of employment;
Continuance of upward trend of real wages - not necessar¬
ily high money wages;
Security, by encouragement of thrift and saving, and by a
sound and stable currency;
Protection of the aged, infirm, and unemployed by laws
enacted in the proper jurisdictions, which do not destroy the prin¬
ciples of self-help and freedom;
Protection of the American worker by adequate tariffs;
Parity of the value of farm products with the value of the
products of industry, by co-ordinating export bounties with tariff;
Adaption of capitalism to real competition in bad times,
as well as in good times;
Active encouragement of the profit system as opposed to
bhe service system, but passing on to the masses the benefits of
technological advances as they are made;
Removal of the Government from the field of business, and
From unwarranted interference with private enterprise;
Stimulation of expansion, and progress, by freedom of pri¬
vate enterprise, and by a free, competitive economic system;
Enforcement of anti-trust statutes, and suppression of
monoply;
And generallv, promotion of the rights for the security of
which „Government are instituted among Men, deriving their just
powers from the consent of the governed,";
we recognize the difference, the distinction, and the contrast be¬
tween the methods of attaining them promoted by the New Deal and by
Republican principles:
On the one hand, the effort to attain them is at the
cost of home rule, and that system of checks and balances in the Fed¬
eral structure which is the essential guardian against centralization,
usurpation, and tyranny.
On the other hand, Republicanism seeks the objectives
within the Constitution, and without changing the structure of Govern¬
ment, or crushing that freedom which has ever stimulated individual
thrift, enterprise, invention, progress, and the higher endeavor.
Democrats many of them not believing (privately) in the
New Deal, nevertheless publicly deny that liberty is destroyed, self-
government trespassed upon, and the brakes on excessive power re¬
moved. Taking them at their word, they are stumbling blindly into
the slavery of dictatorship.
But New Dealers knowingly espouse it. The record estab¬
lishes the facts.
Two amendments of the Constitution proposed and pending in
the 74th Congress excite the reaction "It Can't Happen Here".
But it has happened here, and only the action of the Su¬
preme Court has put a brake on its speed.
Elimination of Home Rule.
The Court, by refusing itself to amend the Constitution,
and by declaring void amendments made solely by Congress, has up¬
held the dominion of the people over their own laws.
Now, the New Dealers would disable the Court from again
doing this and take from the people their sovereign control.
These two proposals of amendment would specifically accom¬
plish this:
"SEC. 2. The tenth amendment of the Constitution of the
United States is hereby repealed." (H.J.R. 329, Mr. Quinn)
"SEC. 3. The Congress shall have power to delegate its
legislative power to the President and/or to such agencies as he
may select." (H.J.R. 323, Mr. Wood, D., Missouri)
The devasting effect of such amendments shocks public opin¬
ion into action when the proposal is made formal and regular, to be
ratified, by vote after deliberation.
It has happened here. Surreptitiously, one by one under
the smoke screen of emergency, the exclusive powers of Congress have
been delegated to the President or some Executive agency:
To lay and collect taxes;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among
the several States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof;
-4-
To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper
for carrying into execution the foregoing powers,
and all other powers vested by this Constitution
in the Government of the United States, or in
any Department or officer thereof.
These are some of the powers included within the inclusive¬
ness and exclusiveness of Art. I., Section 1. of the Constitution:
„All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in
a Congress of the United States,
etc.
The A.A.A.
Nevertheless -
The Secretary of Agriculture was authorized by the A. A. A.,
with the approval of the President, to make regulations with the
force and effect of law to determine the amount and incidence of the
Processing Tax. Morever, the Secretary was made the supreme author¬
ity over the amount of rentals and benefits, whereas, absolutism in
respect to the whole Act was vested in the President. This central¬
izing characteristic was coined into the Cotton, Tobacco, and Sugar
Acts.
The A.A.A. has been declared unconstitutional by the Su¬
preme Court, and the Cotton, Tobacco, and Potato Acts have been re¬
pealed by the Senate, on a recommendation by the President made "be¬
cause of the tormination of the programs of agricultural production
adjustment under the act of May 12, 1933, as amended, known as the
'Agricultural Adjustment Act', to which the three acts mentioned were
auxiliary." (The Congressional Record, Senate, February 3, 1936,
p. 1406)
Tariff
By the Tariff Act of 1934, legislative power and the Sena¬
torial duty to ratify Treaties were delegated to the President. The
words which have been used so many times during this Administration
that they have become a slogan of the New Deal „The President
is hereby authorized" in this act, comprehend the power,-
To enter into foreign trade agreements with foreign
-5-
governments or instrumentalities thereof;
To proclaim modifications of existing duties and other
import restrictions within limits, as to rate, of 50%
above and 50% below existing rates, and provided
that he may not transfer any article between the du¬
tiable and free list;
In effect the Act gives the President power to open
the great markets of the United States - a continent -
to the whole world on any articles in consideration for
the market of a country not so large as one of our
several States. Whatevertreaty may be made cannot be
exclusively applicable to one country, but must apply
to the same article of all foreign countries, under
the most favored nation obligation, without any quid
pro quo from the other countries.
If Columbia, a relatively small importer into the United
States, pays a consideration for reduced tariff on her coffee, then
Brazil, a large importer, must enjoy the same reduction, although she
pays nothing for it.
Thus, the President may reduce or raise the general level
of duties, and thereby the United States would become the most ill¬
favored nation on earth.
The United States has most-favored-nation treaties with
forty-eight nations. Before the New Deal a legislative act was re¬
quired to denounce them. Under the Tariff Act of 1934 they can be
denounced as to individual items by the President alone. That country
among the forty-eight which pays the consideration for reduction of
the tariff on a commodity has lost protanto its treaty rights.
By this Tariff Act the flexible feature of the Tariff Act
of 1930 was made inapplicable to articles dealt with by the President.
This part of the Act transferred from a non-political, independent,
scientific Board, with its special knowledge, and experience for gui¬
dance, to the President, the technical work of adapting the tariff to
domestic and international conditions.
The Act delegated in part the taxing power, the power to
-6
regulate commerce, and the treaty-making power.
The injury from all such acts, which concerns us as Ameri¬
cans, is the change in structure and spirit of our government by an
irregular and unlawful act. Reference to them tonight is made to
bring out the real issue between the New Deal and the people. Time
is not available to discuss now the material damage already inflicted
on agriculture which was the first great classification of American
life attacked by the Treaties already made. Suffice it to say that
tariff duties on cattle, horses, live poultry, chickens and guineas,
dead, cheese, cream, maple sugar, hulled oats, cereal breakfast foods,
apples, strawberries, blue berries, cherries, grass and clover seeds,
green peas, seed potatoes, turnips, hay, lumber and timber, have been
lowered, notwithstanding Mr. Roosevelt's statement as a candidate for
President, at Baltimore:
"My friends - - -
"Of course, it is absurd to talk of lowering tariff duties
on farm products *** I know of no effective excessively
high duties on farm products. I do not intend that such
duties shall be lowered. To do so would be inconsistent
with my entire farm program, and every farmer knows it and
will not be deceived."
Were they deceived?
The concessions granted to Canada for a consideration, re¬
duced the duty on cattle imported from Canada approximately 50%.
My attention has been called to a computation tending to
show that under the Most Favored Nation obligation 500,000 head of
cattle chilled and frozen can enter this country from Argentina with
a reduction of 50% in the tariff, and that in all probability
125,000,000 pounds of fresh, chilled or frozen beef from Argentina
will be dumped into the United States. This ought to interest the
slaughtering and meat packing industry of the Middle West.
In passing, reciprocity treaties properly made and rati¬
fied, have proved harmful. They provoked competing alliances among
other groups in self-defense. The most notable example is the treaty
with Canada ratified by the Canadian Parliament in 1855 and abrogated
by the Congress in 1865.
-7-
Two great Vermonters, Morrill and Collamer, led the fight
in Congress for abrogation on the ground of adverse trade balance and
the need for more revenue, and the statesman we glorify tonight,
Abraham Lincoln, gave the required year's notice to abrogate. Thus
lawfully ended - as it began - the only significant reciprocity treaty
this country ever had. Under the Tariff Act of 1934 the President may
suspend the proclaimed duties and other import restriction of any
country because of acts or policies which in his opinion defeat the
purposes of the Act. The President may at any time terminate such pro¬
clamation in whole or in part, but the agreements are to last three
years, when they may be terminated on six months notice.
Thus, the power of the Executive to determine policy which
is legislation - is created without consent of the people.
A pretense of a hearing for interested citizens before change
in duties is contained in the Act, but the administration of it ex¬
cludes the citizen from any real participation and gives the foreign
government opportunity to work with the Executive Department without
countervailing evidence. There has been nobody in the State Depart-
ment with whom a Senator or a Representative could discuss any item
under negotiation. This is autocracy running true to its historical
course.
Coining Money.
It has happened here. The power to coin money and regulate
the value therof and of foreign coin has been vested in the President
by three acts: The A. A. A. Title III, the Banking Act of 1933, and
the Gold Reserve Act of 1934.
Lincoln declared the doctrine December 20, 1859:
" * * * No duty is more imperitive on that govern-
ment than the duty it owes the people of furnishing them a
sound and uniform currency."
The Democratic platform of which Mr. Roosevelt said, in his
address of acceptance to the Democratic National Convention of 1932:
"That admirable document, the platform which you
have adopted, is olear. I accept it one hundred percent."
(Applause)
That platform provided:
"We advocate a sound ourrency to be preserved at
all hazards and an international monetary conference called
-8
on the invitation of our government to consider the re¬
habilitation of silver and related questions."
You remember the evanescence of the conference, save on the
subject of Silver, let us consider how this "clear" plank floated off
on the flood of New Deal emotionalism and was pulled into the vortex
of Presidential aggrandizement.
Inflation
Although many inflationary proposals in the Convention were
rejected, Congress by the Banking Act of 1933 turned over to the
President, in any period of national emergency declared by him, control
over gold or silver coin or bullion or currency. By means therof the
Secretary of the Treasury could and did require all the gold coin,
bullion and cortificates in the United States to be turned into the
Treasury on payment of the equivalent amount of any other form of
coin or currency.
By the A. A. A. Title III, Congress transferred to the
President power to -
Deal in Government bonds in the open market,
Buy Government bills and obligations to 3 billions,
Issue notes to aggregate 3 billions, to be legal tender,
By proclamation to fix the weight of the gold dollar
and also the weight of the silver dollar "at such
amounts as he finds necessary" at a definite fixed
ratio in the relation of silver dollar to gold dollar,
and provide for the unlimited coinage of such gold and
silver at the ratio so fixed.
Other inflationary powers were also contained in that Act.
Pub. Res. No. 10, June 5, 1933 repudiated the Gold Clause
in all obligations public and private and declared all coins and
currencies of the United States to be legal tender.
The Gold Reserve Act of 1934 transferred from Congress to the
President additional control of the currency -
To issue silver certificates in lieu of silver dollars;
To issue silver certificates against silver bullion;
To reduce the weight of the standard silver dollar in the
same percentage that he reduces the weight of the gold
dollar;
To reduce and fix the weight of subsidiary coins so as to
maintain the parity of such coins, with the standard
-9-
silver dollar and with the gold dollar;
To issue gold certificates against any gold in the Treasury,
except the fund reserved for United States notes of
1890. Provided the amount should not exceed the value,
at the legal standard, of the gold so held against gold
certificates.
Debasement of Currency.
"At the legal standard"! There's the rub! The President
The Act provided (Sec. 7):
fixed that.
„In the event that the weight of the gold dollar shall
at any time be reduced, the resulting increase in
value of the gold held by the United States
shall be covered into the Treasury as a miscellaneous
receipt."
In other words, debasement of the currency means profit out
of the people.
On the next day after approval of the Gold Reserve Act of
2924, January 31, the President issued a proclamation fixing the
weight of the Gold dollar at 15 5/21 grains nine-tenths fine. At
this weight, the statutory value of gold is $35.00 per fine ounce.
Two billions of the profits of this inflation were authorized to be
sed for trading in foreign exchange „under the exclusive control
of the Secretary of the Treasury, with the approval of the President
whose decision shall be final and not be subject to review by any
other officer of the United States."
(Sec 10 (b) Gold Res. Act 1934)
To the large group of my hearers of German descent who are
characterized by honesty, thrift, industry, and responsibility, and
who realize the practical necessity of maintaining the validity and
obligation of contracts and avoiding soft money, these trends of
government must seem ominous. As you see coming the proposal to gran
him power over the sword latent in the neutrality legislation now
pending, remember the power over the purse centralized in the Presi¬
dent by the acts already referred to. You are reminded of it by the
words "NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM" on every one of the fifty-cent dollar
bills that come fresh from Washington these days.
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Neutrality or Intervention.
Judge John Bassett Moore, whose opinion on international
relations speaks with authority, denounced the administartion neutral
ity program as a "fantastic scheme spawned by so-called idealism",
saying:
"By the pending bill authority is expressly conferred upon
the President to use the embargo power for the purpose of shortening
wars. This obviously would bring us fully into any war to which it
was applied***
"The bestowal of such power should constitute the worst form
of dictatorship ever set up."
(The Washington Herald, February 3, 1936)
NEW DEAL PHILOSOPHY
I have pointed to but a few of the many Acts already passed
which contain the philosophy of the New Deal, viz.: destruction of
local self-government and checks and balances in Federal power., and
the establishment of a ruler at Washington.
Of course, the N.R.A. was most significant of the suicidal
effect of the New Deal. With swift fatality, it created the Roosevelt
depression, when the rest of the world was recovering from its dis¬
tress, and destroyed the gains we had made in 1933. Scarcely a store,
laundry, hotel, ice plant, tailor shop, packing plant, boot and shoe
manufactory, foundry, machine shop, or other industry that was not
orippled in some degree by it, with a consequent injury to workers.
The A. A. A. and the N. R. A. gave us the absolute proof
that the New Deal had invaded the States and taken charge of local
police regulation to a marked degree.
Therefore when we read the proposal to amend the Constitu¬
tion by repealing Article X. we are on notice that "it can happen
here", because it has happened before.
EXTINCTION OF LOCAL SELF GOVERNMENT
Art. X is that part of the Bill of Rights which reserved to
the States or to the people all the powers not delegated to the U. S.
nor prohibited to the States. To the States belong, not by virtue of
the Federal Constitution, but of their own sovereign power, which is
declared by Art. X., the control of municipal and local government,
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factory and labor legislation, manufacturing, mining and agricultural
legislation, the chartering of corporations, the statutory develop¬
ment and judicial administration of civil and criminal law, the su-
pervision of religious bodies and public utilities, the control of
education and the general police power over the health, safety, se-
curity and welfare of the people.
This is the very heart of the system of home rule. It is
the necessity of which Lincoln said:
" The maintenance inviolate of the right of each state
to order and control its own domestic institutions accord¬
ing to its own judgment exclusively is essential to that
balance of power on which the perfection and endurance of
our political fabric depends."
SUPREME COURT DECISIONS
In declaring invalid the A. A. A. the decision of the Su¬
reme Court holds:
"From the accepted doctrine that the United States is
a government of delegated powers, it follows that those
not expressly granted, or reasonably to be implied from
such as are conferred, are reserved to the States or to the
people. To forestall any suggestion to the contrary, the
Tenth Amendment was adopted. The same proposition, other-
wise stated, is that powers not granted are prohibited.
None to regulate agricultural production is given, and
therefore legislation by Congress for that purpose is for-
bidden."
And again -
"Congress has no power to enforce its commands to the far¬
mer to the ends sought by the Agricultural Adjustment Act."
In deciding the N. R. A. invalid, the Supreme Court held:
". * * that Congress has no power to regulate wages and
hours of labor in a local business."
Four other decisions rendered recently put brakes on the
New Deal, and one other decision nullified the illegal act of the
President in removing a commissioner from the Federal Trade Commis-
sion because his mind did not "go along together" with the President's
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mind.
These decisions aroused a bombardment of criticism from the
President and from Members of his Cabinet: "Horse and buggy days"
by the President, „Thegreatest legalized steal in American History"
by Secretary Wallace were hurled from the Olympus of the New Deal.
In his message to Congress on the „State of the Union" the President
admitted "They (économic autocrats") realize that in thirty-four months
we have built up new instruments of public power. In the hands of a
people's government this power is wholesome and proper." So did
Glendower say to Hotspur -
"At my nativity
The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes,
Of burning cressets - and at my birth
The frame and huge foundation of the earth
Shaked like a coward."
Presidential Imprimatur
He placed his imprimatur on the continuation of Federal
eggression upon local self-government by the significant generality:
"The Congress has the right and can find the
means to protect its own prerogatives."
His Attorney General, more temperatelv but not less
significantly, stated in an address to the Association of the Bar of
the City of New York December 18, 1935.
"If the Courts prove mistaken in their reading
of this ultimate bill, or if the Constitution itself in
some clearly expressed provision no longer conforms
thereto, then, by its very terms, the people are
guaranteed the right to make their desires effective
through the solemn process of amendment."
Other Amendments
Under such leadership of thought the New Dealers in Congress
have proposed, in addition to the repeal of the Tenth Amendment,
fourteen amendments of varying scope having the objective of cur¬
tailing, the power of the Courts, and increasing the authority of
Congress and the President.
"It can't happen here"?
In the last Session
It has happened to a certain degree.
of Congress a bill was passed which abridged the right of a class
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of citizens to obtain an injunction in Federal Courts from con¬
fiscatory orders of State Administrative boards. The Judicial Code
was amended to curtail the powers of District Courts of the United
States in that respect.
In the different amendments proposed and now pending we
find such vagaries as:
The prohibition of any Court of the United States or of any
State to declare unconstitutional or void any Act of Congress;
Abolition of the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court to de¬
clare an Act unconstitutional;
Requiring the Supreme Court to render advisorv opinions;
Requiring an opinion within sixty davs after presentation
before a bill becomes a law;
Requiring two-thirds vote for a decision of invalidity;
Prohibiting a judgment of unconstitutionality unless the
action therefor was commenced within six months after enactment of
the law;
Altering the power of Congress to deal with local affairs
such as - agriculture, mining, manufacturing, banking, insurance,
and social legislation, which affect everv human activity.
These amendments would change thestructure and fabric of
government. They would consolidate the "new instruments of public
power" referred to by the President. Thev would make the ship of
State a vessel that is all sails and no rudder. If there wore Nom
Dealers enough in three-fourths of the States to ratify them we
would behold
"A race that binds
Its body in chains and calls them Liberty,
And calls each fresh link Progress."
(Political Mystics. Titan and Avatar)
Concurrently with these Amendments we are pelted with a
shower of Bills to curb the courts, and to expand the jurisdiction
of Congress.
The attitude of the President toward the passage of bills
of doubtfull constitutionality was exhibited by his statement to
a chairman of a chairman of a House committee:
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"I hope your committee will not permit
doubt as to the constitutionality, however reasonable,
to block the suggested legislation."
This New Deal attitude is a factor of danger to
It is opposed to the American regard for the validity
be considered.
and binding effect of an oath as pictured by Lincoln:
"No one who has sworn to support the Constitution
can conscientiously vote for what he understands
to be an unconstitutional measure, however expe¬
dient he may think it."
Among these measures we find proposals: To increase
the number of Supreme Court Judges to fifteen;
To require concurrence of all Members of the Supreme
Court to hold an act unconstitutional;
To curtail the powers of the Courts and increasethe
powers of Congress.
We cannot forget the attitude of the President toward
the Supreme Court displayed in his speech at Baltimore on October
25, 1932, in which he charged that the Supreme Court had been under
the control of the Republican Administration. There was implicit
in that indiscretion the desire to reduce that tribunal to an instru¬
ment of party policy and political action. The fact that this could
be done if the number were increased to fifteen is a possibility
that excites vigorous defense against the New Deal.
The great and good record of the Court denies political
color. In the formative period, from behind the Supreme Court
barricade developed the ideas of the supremacy of the Nation and
the sanctity of property. In these days of unrest, from behind the
same barricade develop the ideas of individual liberty and independent
sovereignty of the several States. In general, throughout the life
of America, the Court has guarded from partisan influence the
institutions which expel autocracy and animate free government.
No issue of the coming campaign will be of more vital
importance than the issue of home rule, which is involved in the
attack on the Courts. By the New Deal philosophy, by the Acts
passed and declared unconstitutional, by the acts pending, by the
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amendments of the Constitution proposed, we are brought to close
fighting.
An endorsement of this Administration would be regarded as
approval and encouragement of an omnipotent National power centered
in the President, provided for in the pending legislation.
Let public opinion discontinue the New Deal Administration
and elect a Republican President, and its mandate on Congress would
be effective to prevent the adoption of any amendment of the
Constitution, or the passage of any bill which would destroy the
rights of the several States, curtail the powers of the Congress,
or create an omnipotent Executive and Congress.
Thus would the people govern; thus would home rule be
preserved; thus would again be saved Federalism, which represents
"the most successful reconciliation in modern history between
liberty and empire".
Abraham Lincoln still lives. His essential self was
never entombed. No flourish of trumpets, no voice crying,
"Oh Lord of Hosts, Provide a Champion for thy people!" is needed.
He is ever present in the reverent gratitude and understanding of
Americans as the Savior of a Free Government. In the present
hour of peril he leads us, as he did in 1860, saying:
„Let us have faith that right makes might;
and in that faith let us to the end, dare to
do our duty as we understand it."