It will be noted that the Articles of Confederation make no provision as to patents, bankruptcies, naturalization, or of immigration. And, of course, the articles carried no power of direct taxation or authority to regulate commerce between the States, and so forth. The order of succession of the above items employed follows the order found in the Articles of Confederation.

The CHAIRMAN. We will adjourn until to-morrow at 10 o'clock.

(At 12.15 o'clock p. m. the hearing was adjourned to 10 o'clock a. m. to-morrow, Saturday, February 4, 1933.)

THIRTY-HOUR WEEK

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1933

UNITED STATES SENATE,

SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY,

Washington, D. C. The hearing was resumed at 10 o'clock a. m., pursuant to adjournment, in the committee room, Capitol, Senator George W. Norris (chairman) presiding.

Present: Senators Norris (chairman), Walsh of Montana, and Black.

The CHAIRMAN. The committee will be in order.

STATEMENT OF MARY G. KILBRETH, SOUTHAMPTON, LONG ISLAND

The CHAIRMAN. Please give your name.

Miss KILBRETH. Mary G. Kilbreth, Southampton, Long Island. I am speaking in opposition to the bill on behalf of the Woman Patriot Corporation.

The CHAIRMAN. Tell us briefly what the Woman Patriot Corporation is.

Miss KILBRETH. We are working in congressional legislation largely, with a view to upholding the Constitution, and we are opposed to any further enlargement of the Federal Government's power over the States, or any further encroachment, not because we have any dogmatic feeling about States' rights. We have no particular sectional bias, but because as a practical expedient the States must be preserved, as it keeps the whole country more flexible. The country is so enormous, its interests so diversified, unless we preserve this flexibility through the States being allowed to have different. opinions and practices our size is a danger.

The CHAIRMAN. Your organization is national in scope?

Miss KILBRETH. It is not an organization. We are merely a group of women who publish a paper once a month. We have an educational incorporation. Nobody makes any money from the work but the professional editor of our paper.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you have a membership over the United States? Miss KILBRETH. No; we have no members. We have subscribers, I think, in nearly every State, but chiefly in Massachusetts. The board of directors of our corporation controls its policy. There are 10 women. I will leave you their names if you wish.

The CHAIRMAN. I do not think it is necessary to leave their names. The thing I wanted for the record was to convey to anyone who might read this record an accurate idea as to what your organization is.

Miss KILBRETH. We have no numerical strength. I do not claim that.

Senator BLACK. May I ask you before you get off that subject how many members have you besides the 10 ladies?

When we get into a controversial

Miss KILBRETH. We have no members at all, only subscribers. Senator BLACK. How many subscribers? Miss KILBRETH. It fluctuates. issue we lose a great many, and when we take up an issue that is popular we get them back again. But we do not change our policy

for that. We have less than 3,000 now.

Senator BLACK. How many do you have here in your headquarters? Do you have headquarters in Washington?

Miss KILBRETH. Yes; at 710 Jackson Place.

Senator BLACK. How many?

Miss KILBRETH. There are only two in our headquarters.

Senator BLACK. How many employees do you have with your organization?

Miss KILBRETH. We only have one salaried employee, the editor of our paper. The other work is all volunteer. When we need documentation, and so forth, sometimes outsiders help us. I do a good deal of that myself. It is on a small scale. We present facts or a few specific issues only.

Senator BLACK. Your association has not been involved in these controversies over the admission of Einstein?

Miss KILBRETH. Yes. We filed the charges against the admission of Professor Einstein. We wanted the immigration law enforced, and we oppose the admission of communists into the United States. The charges are specific and documented.

The CHAIRMAN. Go ahead.

Miss KILBRETH. Mr. Chairman, the reason we venture to appear before your committee is as members of the general public. I think of the testimony before your committee and the House testimony on the Connery bill was altogether by experts on both sides of this question, those immediately concerned in it. But, of course, the general public is concerned in every issue. We feel the repercussions from them all. As members of the general public we appear before you and appeal to you not to report this bill favorably. We oppose it on constitutional and practical grounds.

The chief practical ground is that we believe the best hope of recovery at present is to leave society in general, and all conditions, flexible and elastic, to readjustments, as opportunities may arise. This bill would place production in a Federal strait-jacket, which which would make adjustments more difficult. Without disrespect, we do not believe you can find, or that anybody can find a cure for these conditions. So far most of the cures that Congress has, with the best intentions, applied, have proved nostrums. We ask you not to destroy the conditions which make recovery possible.

Senator BLACK. What conditions?

Miss KILBRETH. Conditions that can be adjusted. For instance, we are faced with very difficult foreign competition. With all the most patriotic intention to "Buy American" with which I agree heartily (I had been doing that long before there was agitation for it) there is going to be difficulty in meeting the dumping condition in the

long run, and other competition of forced or voluntary foreign labor determined to capture our markets.

Senator BLACK. I understood you to say that you believe in leaving business alone.

Miss KILBRETH. Yes; both sides of business; I mean keeping all conditions in the country adjustable.

Senator BLACK. You mean so that the Government will not interfere with the law of supply and demand?

Miss KILBRETH. So that the Federal Government will not have its heavy hand on business in any way.

Senator BLACK. You mean the effect of supply and demand and trade and commerce; you do not believe in the Government having anything to do with that?

Miss KILBRETH. I do not believe in Government taking part in private business.

Senator BLACK. You are opposed to the tariff?

Miss KILBRETH. It seems to me the tariff is a different proposition. We certainly need protection now from dumping. I am not qualified to express an opinion in general on the tariff, but surely we must have protection from foreign, especially forced, labor.

In what I have to present, Mr. Chairman, I will buttress my little opinion with the opinions of eminent men on this subject, on both the practical and constitutional sides. On the practical side, in agreement with our contention, to keep conditions adjustable and capable of change, I ask leave to quote the predecessors of both the chief advocates of this bill.

The late Senator Underwood, of Alabama, was opposed to this kind of Federal control. He foresaw exactly this type of bill. I have here his last book, Drifting Sands of Party Politics, published by Mrs. Underwood after his death. May I insert a few passages?

The CHAIRMAN. You may insert them or read them, if they are not long. Give the reporter the page number.

Miss KILBRETH. Drifting Sands of Party Politics.

The CHAIRMAN. Being by the late Senator Oscar Underwood?
Miss KILBRETH. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Now give the page.

Miss KILBRETH. Page 335.

The CHAIRMAN. All right.

Miss KILBRETH. The chapter is entitled "Child Labor Federal Law." [Reading:]

There are not many men with the responsibility of making the laws who look beyond the intent and direct purpose of the legislative proposal to determine their attitude in regard to the matter. A few, very few, are influenced by the general principles of government involved and refuse to take a false legislative step, even though they approve the first fruits of the intended legislation. On the other hand, the outside influences in favor of any measure come surcharged with arguments for its passage, never presenting to the legislator its possible conflicts with governmental principles, even if such conflicts have been considered, which is rarely the case.

My point in quoting Senator Underwood is not only that I respected greatly his opinions and clearness, but also as showing, being from Senator Black's own State, the divergence of opinion even there.

Senator BLACK. Who called your attention to that book?
Miss KILBRETH. We have had it for a long time in our office.

Senator BLACK. Who called your attention to it in connection with this bill?

Miss KILBRETH. Nobody.

Senator BLACK. Did anybody assist you in preparing your argument?

Miss KILBRETH. No; except Mr. Eichelberger, the editor of our paper. We collaborate in all the office work.

Senator BLACK. I was wondering if it was somebody who had assisted you on the constitutional feature, so that we might have them as witnesses.

are.

Miss KILBRETH. No. You will see how inexpert my arguments You will see I have had no legal help. I am not trying to make a lawyer's argument. We have had Senator Underwood's book in our office since it came out.

What I read a moment ago was the first paragraph of Senator Underwood's chapter on the first Federal Child Labor Law.

Later in the same chapter Senator Underwood shows he foresaw and feared just such a law as S. 5267, the bill before your committee. I quote again:

But there was more behind the legislative proposal than the mere regulation of the hours of labor for the children in the hearts and minds of those who advocated the measure, as was shown by subsequent events. There were some, moved entirely by kind hearts and humanitarian motives. * * * There were others who fully realized that if it was within the authority of the Constitution of the United States for the Congress to regulate the hours of labor for the children of the country, by virtue of the fact that the product of their toil entered into the domain of interstate commerce, it would be equally within the power of the Congress to pass uniform laws regulating the hours of labor and perhaps labor conditions throughout continental United States. (Ibid., p. 339.)

Of course, if the Congress had the power to prevent the shipment in interstate commerce of the products of one State into the domain of another State because rules and regulations for its production made by the Congress had not been complied with, there would not have been much left of State government that the Congress could not overthrow (p. 340).

Our greatest success and our wonderful prosperity are largely due to the fact that there is no impediment at the border line of the States to trade and commerce in other States, set up either by the Federal Government or the States themselves. The child-labor legislation was the first movement in this direction. Fortunately, the Supreme Court took cognizance of the facts and declared the legislation in violation of the Constitution of the United States. (Ibid., p. 341.)

Senator Underwood, at that point, quoted from the decision of the Supreme Court in Hammer v. Dagenhart.

It is a striking fact that the concluding paragraph of that decision would apply exactly to this bill, if only two words, "of children" were omitted, following the words, "to regulate the hours of labor." May I insert that closing paragraph?

In our view the necessary effect of this act is, by means of a prohibition against the movement in interstate commerce of ordinary commercial commodities, to regulate the hours of children in factories and mines within the States, a purely State authority. Thus the act in a twofold sense is repugnant to the Constitution. It not only transcends the authority delegated to Congress over commerce but also exerts a power as to a purely local matter to which the Federal authority does not extend. The far-reaching result of upholding the act can not be more plainly indicated than by pointing out that if Congress can thus regulate matters entrusted to local authority by prohibition of the movement of commodities in interstate commerce, all freedom of commerce will be at an end, and the power of the States over local matters may be eliminated, and thus our system of Government be practically destroyed. (Hammer v. Dagenhart, 247 U, S. 251.)

The other eminent authority I wish to quote in support of my plea against Federal control and for flexible conditions is the late