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"THERE MUST BE FREE DISCUSSION." —
ROBERT M. LA FOLLETTE
Free Speech in Wartime (Page 2)
It follows the full text transcript of
Robert M. La Follette's Free Speech in
Wartime address, delivered in the Senate, Washington DC —
October 6, 1917.
The subheadings in this speech
are La Follette's.
This is page 2 of 2 of this
speech.
Go to page
1.
Mr. President, while we were struggling for our
independence the Duke of Grafton, in the House
of Lords, October 26, 1775, speaking against
voting thanks to British officers and soldiers,
after the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill,
declared:
I pledge
myself to your lordships and my country that
if necessity should require it and my health
otherwise permit it, I mean to come down to
this House in a litter in order to express
my full and hearty disapproval of the
measures now pursued, and, as I understand
from the noble lords in office, meant to be
pursued.
[Augustus Henry Fitzroy (1735-1811), 3rd duke of
Grafton. He had served as prime minister from
1768-1770.]
On the same occasion, Mr. Fox
[Charles James Fox
(1749-1806)]
said:
I could not
consent to the bloody consequences of so
silly a contest, about so silly an object,
conducted in the silliest manner than
history or observation had ever furnished an
instance of, and from which we are likely to
derive poverty, misery, disgrace, defeat,
and ruin.
In the House of Commons, May 14, 1777, Mr. Burke
[Edmund Burke 1729-1797] is reported in the
parliamentary debates against the war on the
American Colonies, as saying he was, and ever
would be, ready to support a just war, whether
against subjects or alien enemies, but where
justice or color of justice was wanting he would
ever be the first to oppose it.
Lord Chatham
[William Pitt
(1708-1778), 1st earl of Chatham, known as the
"Elder Pitt."],
November 18, 1777, spoke as follows regarding
the war between England and the American
colonies:
I would sell
my shirt off my back to assist in proper
measures, properly and wisely conducted, but
I would not part with a single shilling to
the present ministers. Their plans are
founded in destruction and disgrace. It is,
my lords, a ruinous and destructive war; it
is full of danger; it teems with disgrace
and must end in ruin. [...] If I were an
American, as I am an Englishman, while a
foreign troop was landed in my country I
never would lay down my arms! Never! Never!
Never!
Mr. President, I have made these quotations from
some of the leading statesmen of England to show
that the principle of free speech was no new
doctrine born of the Constitution of the United
States. Our Constitution merely declared the
principle. It did not create it. It is a
heritage of English-speaking peoples, which has
been won by incalculable sacrifice, and which
they must preserve so long as they hope to live
as free men. I say without fear of contradiction
that there has never been a time for more than a
century and a half when the right of free speech
and free press and the right of the people to
peaceably assemble for public discussion have
been so violated among English-speaking people
as they are violated today throughout the United
States. today, in the land we have been wont to
call the free United States, governors, mayors,
and policemen are preventing or breaking up
peaceable meetings called to discuss the
questions growing out of this war, and judges
and courts, with some notable and worthy
exceptions, are failing to protect the citizens
in their rights.
It is no answer to say that when the war is over
the citizen may once more resume his rights and
feel some security in his liberty and his
person. As I have already tried to point out,
now is precisely the time when the country needs
the counsel of all its citizens. In time of war
even more than in time of peace, whether
citizens happen to agree with the ruling
administration or not, these precious
fundamental personal rights — free speech, free
press, and right of assemblage so explicitly and
emphatically guaranteed by the Constitution
should be maintained inviolable. There is no
rebellion in the land, no martial law, no courts
are closed, no legal processes suspended, and
there is no threat even of invasion.
But more than this, if every preparation for war
can be made the excuse for destroying free
speech and a free press and the right of the
people to assemble together for peaceful
discussion, then we may well despair of ever
again finding ourselves for a long period in a
state of peace. With the possessions we already
have in remote parts of the world, with the
obligations we seem almost certain to assume as
a result of the present war, a war can be made
any time overnight and the destruction of
personal rights now occurring will be pointed to
then as precedents for a still further invasion
of the rights of the citizen. This is the road
which all free governments have heretofore
traveled to their destruction, and how far we
have progressed along it is shown when we
compare the standard of liberty of Lincoln,
Clay, and Webster with the standard of the
present day.
This leads me, Mr. President, to the next
thought to which I desire to invite the
attention of the Senate, and that is the power
of Congress to declare the purpose and objects
of the war, and the failure of Congress to
exercise that power in the present crisis.
POWER OF CONGRESS TO
DECLARE OBJECTS OF WAR
For the mere
assertion of that right, in the form of a
resolution to be considered and discussed —
which I introduced August 11, 1917 — I have been
denounced throughout this broad land as a
traitor to my country.
Mr. President, we are in a war the awful
consequences of which no man can foresee, which,
in my judgment, could have been avoided if the
Congress had exercised its constitutional power
to influence and direct the foreign policy of
this country.
On the 8th day of February, 1915, I introduced
in the Senate a resolution authorizing the
President to invite the representatives of the
neutral nations of the world to assemble and
consider, among other things, whether it would
not be possible to lay out lanes of travel upon
the high seas and through proper negotiation
with the belligerent powers have those lanes
recognized as neutral territory, through which
the commerce of neutral nations might pass.
This, together with other provisions,
constituted a resolution, as I shall always
regard it, of most vital and supreme importance
in the world crisis, and one that should have
been considered and acted upon by Congress.
I believe, sir, that had some such action been
taken the history of the world would not be
written at this hour in the blood of more than
one-half of the nations of the earth, with the
remaining nations in danger of becoming
involved.
I believe that had Congress exercised the power
in this respect, which I contend it possesses,
we could and probably would have avoided the
present war.
Mr. President, I believe that if we are to
extricate ourselves from this war and restore
this country to an honorable and lasting peace,
the Congress must exercise in full the war
powers entrusted to it by the Constitution. I
have already called your attention sufficiently,
no doubt, to the opinions upon this subject
expressed by some of the greatest lawyers and
statesmen of the country, and I now venture to
ask your attention to a little closer
examination of the subject viewed in the light
of distinctly legal authorities and principles.
CONSTITUTIONAL
PROVISIONS INVOLVED
Section 8, Article
I, of the Constitution provides:
The Congress
shall have power to lay and collect taxes,
duties, imposts, and excises to pay the
debts and provide for the common defense and
general welfare of the United States.
In this first sentence we find that no war can
be prosecuted without the consent of the
Congress. No war can be prosecuted without
money. There is no power to raise the money for
war except the power of Congress. From this
provision alone it must follow absolutely and
without qualification that the duty of
determining whether a war shall be prosecuted or
not, whether the people's money shall be
expended for the purpose of war or not rests
upon the Congress, and with that power goes
necessarily the power to determine the purposes
of the war, for if the Congress does not approve
the purposes of the war, it may refuse to lay
the tax upon the people to prosecute it.
Again, section 8 further provides that Congress
shall have power —
To declare
war, grant letters of marque and reprisal,
and make rules concerning captures on land
and water;
To raise and support armies, but no
appropriation of money to that use shall be
for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a Navy;
To make rules for the government and
regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to
execute the laws of the Union, suppress
insurrection, and repel invasion;
To provide for organizing, arming, and
disciplining the militia, and for governing
such part of them as may be employed in the
service of the United States, reserving to
the States, respectively, the appointment of
the officers and the authority of training
the militia according to the discipline
prescribed by Congress.
In the foregoing grants of power, which are as
complete as language can make them, there is no
mention of the President. Nothing is omitted
from the powers conferred upon the Congress.
Even the power to make the rules for the
government and the regulation of all the
national forces, both on land and on the sea, is
vested in the Congress.
Then, not content with this, to make certain
that no question could possibly arise, the
framers of the Constitution declared that
Congress shall have power —
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.
We all know from the debates which took place in
the constitutional convention why it was that
the constitution was so framed as to vest in the
Congress the entire war-making power. The
framers of the Constitution knew that to give to
one man that power meant danger to the rights
and liberties of the people. They knew that it
mattered not whether you call the man king or
emperor, czar or president, to put into his
hands the power of making war or peace meant
despotism. It meant that the people would be
called upon to wage wars in which they had no
interest or to which they might even be opposed.
It meant secret diplomacy and secret treaties.
It meant that in those things, most vital to the
lives and welfare of the people, they would have
nothing to say. The framers of the constitution
believed that they had guarded against this in
the language I have quoted. They placed the
entire control of this subject in the hands of
the Congress. And it was assumed that debate
would be free and open, that many men
representing all the sections of the country
would freely, frankly, and calmly exchange their
views, unafraid of the power of the Executive,
uninfluenced by anything except their own
convictions, and a desire to obey the will of
the people expressed in a constitutional manner.
Another reason for giving this power to the
congress was that the Congress, particularly the
House of Representatives, was assumed to be
directly responsible to the people and would
most nearly represent their views. The term of
office for a Representative was fixed at only
two years. One-third of the Senate would be
elected each two years. It was believed that
this close relation to the people would insure a
fair representation of the popular will in the
action which the Congress might take. Moreover,
if the congress for any reason was unfaithful to
its trust and declared a war which the people
did not desire to support or to continue, they
could in two years at most retire from office
their unfaithful Representatives and return
others who would terminate the war. It is true
that within two years much harm could be done by
an unwise declaration of war, especially a war
of aggression, where men were e sent abroad. The
framers of the Constitution made no provision
for such a condition, for they apparently never
contemplated that such a condition would arise.
Moreover, under the system of voluntary
enlistment, which was the only system of raising
an army for use outside the country of which the
framers of the Constitution had any idea, the
people could force a settlement of any war to
which they were opposed by the simple means of
not volunteering to fight it.
The only power relating to war with which the
Executive was entrusted was that of acting as
Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy and of
the militia when called into actual service.
This provision is found in section 2 of Article
II, and is as follows:
The President
shall be commander in Chief of the Army and
Navy of the United States and of the militia
of the several States when called into the
actual service of the United States.
Here is found the sum total of the President's
war powers. After the Army is raised he becomes
the General in Command. His function is purely
military. He is the General in Command of the
entire Army, just as there is a general in
command of a certain field of operation. The
authority of each is confined strictly to the
field of military service. The Congress must
raise and support and equip and maintain the
Army which the President is to command. Until
the Army is raised the President has no military
authority over any of the persons that may
compose it. He can not enlist a man, or provide
a uniform, or a single gun, or pound of powder.
The country may be invaded from all sides and
except for the command of the Regular Army, the
President, as Commander in Chief of the Army, is
as powerless as any citizen to stem the tide of
the invasion. In such case his only resort would
be to the militia, as provided in the
Constitution. Thus completely did the fathers of
the Constitution strip the Executive of military
power.
It may be said that the duty of the President to
enforce the laws of the country carries with it
by implication control over the military forces
for that purpose, and that the decision as to
when the laws are violated, and the manner in
which they should be redressed, rests with the
President. This whole matter was considered in
the famous case of Ex parte Milligan (4
Wall., 2). The question of enforcing the laws of
the United States, however, does not arise in
the present discussion. The laws of the United
States have no effect outside the territory of
the United States. Our Army in France or our
Navy on the high seas may be engaged in worthy
enterprises, but they are not enforcing the laws
of the United States, and the President derives
from his constitutional obligation to enforce
the laws of the country no power to determine
the purposes of the present war.
[In Ex parte
Milligan (1866) the Supreme Court ruled that
President Lincoln had illegally tried civilians
before courts-martial in areas where the war was
not actually being fought and the civil courts
were still functioning.]
The only remaining provision of the Constitution
to be considered on the subject is that
provision of Article II, section 2, which
provides that the President —
Shall have no
power by and with the consent of the Senate
to make treaties, providing two-thirds of
the Senate present concur.
This is the same section of the Constitution
which provides that the President "Shall
nominate, and by and with the advice and consent
of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other
public ministers, consuls, judges of the Supreme
Court," and so forth.
Observe, the President under this constitutional
provision gets no authority to declare the
purposes and objects of any war in which the
country may be engaged. It is true that a treaty
of peace can not be executed except the
President and the Senate concur in its
execution. If a President should refuse to agree
to terms of peace which were proposed, for
instance, by a resolution of Congress, and
accepted by the parliament of an enemy nation
against the will, we will say, of an emperor,
the war would simply stop, if the two
parliaments agreed and exercised their powers
respectively to withhold supplies; and the
formal execution of a treaty of peace would be
postponed until the people could select another
President. It is devoutly to be hoped that such
a situation will never arise, and it is hardly
conceivable that it should arise with both an
Executive and a Senate anxious, respectively, to
discharge the constitutional duties of their
office. But if it should arise, under the
Constitution, the final authority and the power
to ultimately control is vested by the
Constitution in the Congress. The President can
no more make a treaty of peace without the
approval not only of the Senate but of
two-thirds of the Senators present than he can
appoint a judge of the Supreme Court without the
concurrence of the Senate. A decent regard for
the duties of the President, as well as the
duties of the Senators, and the consideration of
the interests of the people, whose servants both
the Senators and the President are, requires
that the negotiations which lead up to the
making of peace should be participated in
equally by the Senators and by the President.
for Senators to take any other position is to
shirk a plain duty; is to avoid an obligation
imposed upon them by the spirit and letter of
the Constitution and by the solemn oath of
office each has taken.
PRECEDENTS AND
AUTHORITIES
As might be
expected from the plain language of the
Constitution, the precedents and authorities are
all one way. I shall not attempt to present them
all here, but only refer to those which have
peculiar application to the present situation.
Watson, in his work on the Constitution, Volume
II, page 915, says:
The authority
of the President over the Army and Navy to
command and control is only subject to the
restrictions of Congress to make rules for
the government and regulation of the land
and naval forces. [...] Neither can impair
or invade the authority of the other. [...]
The powers of the President (under the war
clause) are only those which may be called
"military."
[David K.
Watson, The Constitution of the United
States, Its History Application and
Construction, 2 vol. (Chicago 1910).]
The same author on the same and succeeding page
points out that the President as Commander in
Chief of the Army may direct the military force
in such a way as to most effectively injure the
enemy. He may even direct an invasion of enemy
territory. But, says the author, this can be
done "temporarily, however, only until Congress
has defined what the permanent policy of the
country is to be."
How, then, can the President declare the
purposes of the war to be, to extend permanently
the territory of an ally or secure for an ally
damages either in the form of money or new
territory?
Mr. King:
Mr. President, will the senator yield for a
question?
[William H. King
of Utah (1863-1949) served in the Senate
1917-1941.]
Mr. La Follette:
I prefer not to yield, if the senator will
permit me to continue. I can hardly get through
within the time allotted, and I am certain to be
diverted if I begin to yield.
Mr. King: I
just wanted to ask the senator whether he thinks
the president of the United States has
contravened any constitutional powers conferred
upon him thus far in the prosecution of the war?
Mr. La Follette:
Well, sir, I am discussing the constitutional
question here, and senators must make their own
application.
Pomeroy, in his Introduction to the
Constitutional Law of the United States (9th
edition, 1886, p. 373), says:
The organic
law nowhere prescribes or limits the causes
for which hostilities may be waged against a
foreign country. The causes of war it leaves
to the discretion and judgment of the
legislature.
[John N.
Pomeroy. The first edition of this work was
published in 1868.]
In other words, it is for Congress to determine
what we are fighting for. The President, as
Commander in Chief of the Army, is to determine
the best method of carrying on the fight. But
since the purposes of the war must determine
what are the best methods of conducting it, the
primary duty at all times rests upon Congress to
declare either in the declaration of war or
subsequently what the objects are which it is
expected to accomplish by the war.
In Elliot's Debates (supplement 2d edition,
1866, p. 439, vol. 5) it is said:
There is a
material difference between the cases of
making war and making peace. It should be
more easy to get out of war than into it.
In the same volume, at page 140, we find:
Mr. Sherman
said he considered the executive magistracy
as nothing more than an institution for
carrying the will of the legislature into
effect.
[Jonathan
Elliot, ed., The Debates in the Several
States Conventions, on the Adaption of the
Federal Constitution, 1st ed., 5 vol.
(Washington, DC, 1836-1845).]
Story, in his work on the Constitution (5th
edition, 1891, p.92), says:
The history of
republics has but too fatally proved that
they are too ambitious of military fame and
conquest and too easily devoted to the
interests of demagogues, who flatter their
pride and betray their interests. It should,
therefore, be difficult in a republic to
declare war, but not to make peace. The
representatives of the people are to lay the
taxes to support a war, and therefore have
aright to be consulted as to its propriety
and necessity.
[Joseph Story,
Commentaries on the Constitution of the
United States, first published in 1833.]
I commend this language to those gentlemen, both
in and out of public office, who condemn as
treasonable all efforts, either by the people or
by their representatives in Congress, to discuss
terms of peace or who even venture to suggest
that a peace is not desirable until such time as
the President, acting solely on his own
responsibility, shall declare for peace. It is a
strange doctrine we hear these days that the
mass of the people, who pay in money, misery,
and blood all the costs of this war, out of
which a favored few profit so largely, may not
freely and publicly discuss terms of peace. I
believe that I have shown that such an odious
and tyrannical doctrine has never been held by
the men who have stood for liberty and
representative government in this country.
Ordronaux, in his work on Constitutional
Legislation, says:
This power
(the war-making power) the Constitution has
lodged in Congress, as the political
department of the Government, and more
immediate representative of the will of the
people. (P. 495).
[John
Ordronaux, Constitutional Legislation in the
United States (Philadelphia, 1891)]
On page 496, the same author points out that —
the general
power to declare war, and the consequent
right to conduct it as long as the public
interests may seem to require —
is vested in
Congress.
The right to determine when and upon what terms
the public interests require that war shall
cease must therefore necessarily vest in
Congress.
I have already referred to the fact that
Lincoln, Webster, Clay, Sumner, Corwin, and
others, all contended and declared in the midst
of war that it was the right — the
constitutional right — and the patriotic duty of
American citizens, after the declaration of war,
as well as before the declaration of war, and
while the war was in progress, to discuss the
issues of the war, to criticize the policies
employed in its prosecution, and to work for the
election of representatives pledged to carry out
the will of the people respecting the war.
Let me call your attention to what James
Madison, who became the fourth President of the
United States, said on the subject in a speech
at the constitutional convention, June 29, 1787:
A standing
military force, with an overgrown Executive,
will not long be safe companions to liberty.
The means of defense against foreign dangers
have always been the instrument of tyranny
at home. Among the Romans it was a standing
maxim to excite war whenever a revolt was
apprehended. Throughout all Europe the
armies kept up under the pretense of
defending have enslaved the people. It is
perhaps questionable whether the best
concerted system of absolute power in Europe
could maintain itself in a situation where
no alarms of external danger could tame the
people to the domestic yoke.
I now invite your attention to some of the
precedents established by Congress showing that
it has exercised almost from the time of the
first Congress substantially the powers I am
urging it should assert now.
CONGRESSIONAL
PRECEDENTS
Many of the
precedents to which I shall now briefly refer
will be found in Hinds' Precedents,
volume 2, chapter 49. My authority for the
others are the records of Congress itself as
contained in the Congressional Globe and
Congressional Record.
[Asher C. Hinds,
Hinds' Precedents of the House of
Representatives of the United States, including
references to provisions of the Constitution,
the laws, and decisions of the United States
Senate, 5 vols. (Washington, DC, 1907).]
In 1811 the House originated and the Senate
agreed to a resolution as follows:
Taking into
view the present state of the world, the
peculiar situation of Spain and of her
American Provinces, and the intimate
relations of the territory eastward of the
River Perdido, adjoining the United States,
to their security and tranquility: Therefore
Resolved,
etc., That the United States can not see
with indifference any part of the Spanish
Provinces adjoining the said States eastward
of the River Perdido pass from the hands of
Spain into those of any other foreign power.
In 1821 Mr. Clay introduced the following
resolution, which passed the House:
Resolved,
That the House of Representatives
participates with the people of the United
States in the deep interest which they feel
for the success of the Spanish Provinces of
South America, which are struggling to
establish their liberty and independence,
and that it will give its constitutional
support to the President of the United
States whenever he may deem it expedient to
recognize the sovereignty and independence
of any of the said Provinces.
In 1825 there was a long debate in the House
relating to an unconditional appropriation for
the expenses of the ministers to the Panama
Congress. According to Mr. Hinds' summary of
this debate, the opposition to the amendment,
led by Mr. Webster, was that —
While the Hose
had an undoubted right to express its
general opinion in regard to questions of
foreign policy, in this case it was proposed
to decide what should be discussed by the
particular ministers already appointed. If
such instructions might be furnished by the
House in this case they might be furnished
in all, thus usurping the power of the
Executive.
James Buchanan and John Forsythe, who argued in
favor of the amendment, "contended that it did
not amount to any instruction to diplomatic
agents, but was a proper expression of opinion
by the House. The House had always exercised the
right of expressing its opinion on great
questions, either foreign or domestic, and such
expressions were never thought to be an improper
interference with the Executive."
[James Buchanan of
Pennsylvania (1791-1868) served in the House of
Representatives 1821-1831, and in the Senate
1834-1845. He was president of the United States
1857-1861. John Forsyth of Georgia (1780-1841)
served in the House of Representatives 1813-1818
and 1823-1827, and in the Senate 1818-1819 and
1829-1834.]
In April, 1864, the House originated and passed
a resolution declaring that —
It did not
accord with the policy of the United States
to acknowledge a monarchical government
erected on the ruins of any republican
government in America under the auspices of
any European power.
On May 23 the House passed a resolution
requesting the President to communicated any
explanation given by the Government of the
United States to France respecting the sense and
bearing of the joint resolution relative to
Mexico.
The President transmitted the correspondence to
the House.
The correspondence disclosed that Secretary
Seward had transmitted a copy of the resolution
to our minister to France, with the explanation
that —
This is a
practical and purely executive question, and
the decision of its constitutionality
belongs not to the House of Representatives
or even to Congress but to the President of
the United States.
[William H. Seward of New York (1801-1872)
served in the Senate 1849-1861 and as secretary
of state 1861-1869.]
After a protracted
struggle, evidently accompanied with much
feeling, the House of Representatives adopted
the following resolution, which had been
reported by Mr. Henry Winter Davis from the
Committee on Foreign Affairs:
Resolved,
That Congress has a constitutional right to
an authoritative voice in declaring and
prescribing the foreign policy of the United
States as well in the recognition of new
powers as in other matters, and it is the
constitutional duty of the President to
respect that policy, no less in diplomatic
negotiations than in the use of the national
force when authorized by law.
[Henry Winter Davis of Maryland (1817-1865)
served in the House of Representatives 1855-1861
and 1863-1865.]
It will be
observed from the language last read that it was
assumed as a matter of course that Congress had
an authoritative voice as to the use of the
national forces to be made in time of war and
that it was the constitutional duty of the
President to respect the policy of the Congress
in that regard, and Mr. Davis in the resolution
just read argued that it was the duty of the
President to respect the authority of Congress
in diplomatic negotiations even as he must
respect it when the Congress determined the
policy of the Government in the use of the
national forces. The portion of the resolution I
have just read was adopted by a vote of 119 to
8. The balance of the resolution was adopted by
a smaller majority, and was as follows:
And the
propriety of any declaration of foreign
policy by Congress is sufficiently proved by
the vote which pronounces it, and such
proposition, while pending and undetermined,
is not a fit topic of diplomatic explanation
with any foreign power.
The joint resolution of 1898 declaring the
intervention of the United States to remedy
conditions existing in the island of Cuba is
recent history and familiar to all. This
resolution embodied a clear declaration of
foreign policy regarding Cuba as well as a
declaration of war. It passed both branches of
Congress and was signed by the president.
After reciting the abhorrent conditions existing
in Cuba it reads as follows:
Resolved,
etc., First. That the people of the
island of Cuba are, and of right ought to
be, free and independent.
Second. That it is the duty of the United
States to demand, and the government of the
United States does hereby demand, that the
government of the United States does hereby
demand, that the government of Spain at once
relinquish its authority and government in
the island of Cuba and withdraw its land and
naval forces from Cuba and Cuban waters.
Third. That the President of the United
States be, and he hereby is, directed and
empowered to use the entire land and naval
forces of the United States, and to call
into the actual service of the United States
the militia of the several States, to such
extent as my be necessary to carry these
resolutions into effect.
Fourth. That the United States hereby
disclaims any disposition or intention to
exercise sovereignty, jurisdiction, or
control over said island except for the
pacification thereof, and asserts its
determination, when that is accomplished, to
leave the government and control of the
island to its people.
On April 28, 1904, a joint resolution was passed
by both Houses of Congress in the following
terms:
That it is the
sense of the Congress of the united States
that it is desirable in the interests of
uniformity of action by maritime States in
time of war, that the President endeavor to
bring about an understanding among the
principal maritime powers, with a view to
incorporating into the permanent law of
civilized nations the principle of the
exemption of all private property at sea,
not contraband of war, from capture or
destruction by belligerents.
Here it will be observed that the Congress
proposed by resolution to direct the President
as to the policy of exempting from capture
private property at sea, no contraband of war,
in not only one war merely but in all wars,
providing that other maritime powers could be
brought to adopt the same policy. So far as I am
aware, there is an unbroken line of precedents
by Congress upon this subject down to the time
of the present administration. It is true that
in 1846 President Polk, without consulting
Congress, assumed to send the Army of the United
States into territory the title of which was in
dispute between the United States and Mexico,
thereby precipitating bloodshed and the Mexican
War. But it is also true that this act was
condemned as unconstitutional by the great
constitutional lawyers of the country, and
Abraham Lincoln, when he became a Member of the
next Congress, voted for and supported the
resolution, called the Ashmun amendment, which
passed the House of Representatives, declaring
that the Mexican War had been —
Unnecessarily
and unconstitutionally begun by the
President of the United States. (See
Schouler's History of the United States,
vol. 5, p. 83. See also Lincoln's speech in
the House of Representatives, January 12,
1848.)
[James
Schouler, History of the United States of
America, Under the Constitution, 7 vols.
(Washington, DC, 1886-1913).]
That the full significance of this resolution
was appreciated by the House of Representatives
is shown by the speech of Mr. Venable,
Representative from North Carolina, and a warm
supporter of President Polk, made in the House,
January 12, 1848, where referring to this
resolution he says:
Eighty-five
members of this House sustained that
amendment (referring to the Ashmun
amendment) and it now constitutes one of our
recorded acts. I will not here stop to
inquire as to the moral effect upon the
Mexican people and the Mexican government
which will result to us from such a vote in
the midst of a war. I suppose gentlemen have
fully weighed this matter. Neither will I
now inquire how much such a vote will
strengthen our credit or facilitate the
Government in furnishing the necessary
supply of troops. [...]
They (referring to his fellow members in the
House of Representatives) have said by their
votes that the President has violated the
Constitution in the most flagrant manner;
that every drop of blood which has been
shed, every bone which now whitens the
plains of Mexico, every heart-wringing agony
which has been produced must be placed to
his account who has so flagitiously violated
the Constitution and involved the Nation in
the horrors or war. This the majority of
this House have declared on oath. The grand
inquest of the Nation have asserted the fact
and fixed it on their records, and I here
demand of them to impeach the president.
[Abraham W.
Venable (1799-1876) served in the House of
Representatives 1847-1853.]
That Mr. Lincoln
was in no manner deterred from the discharge of
his duty as he saw it is evidenced by the fact
that on the day following the speech of
Representative Venable, Lincoln replied with one
of the ablest speeches of his career, the
opening sentences of which I desire to quote. He
said:
Some, if not
all, the gentlemen of the other side of the
House, who have addressed the committee
within the last two days, have spoken rather
complainingly, if I have rightly understood
them , if the vote given a week or 10 days
ago, declaring that the War with Mexico was
unnecessarily and unconstitutionally
commenced by the President. I admit that
such a vote should not be given in mere
party wantonness and that the one given is
justly censurable, if it have no other or
better foundation. I am one of those who
joined in that vote; and I did so under my
best impression of the truth of the case.
Lincoln then proceeded to demonstrate the truth
of the charge as he regarded it. Evidently he
did not think that patriotism in war more than
in peace required the suppression of the truth
respecting anything pertaining to the conduct of
the war.
And yet today, Mr. President, for merely
suggesting a possible disagreement with the
administration on any measure submitted, or the
offering of amendments to increase the tax upon
incomes, or on war profits, is "treason to our
country and an effort to serve the enemy."
Since the Constitution vests in Congress the
supreme power to determine when and for what
purposes the country will engage in war and the
objects to attain which the war will be
prosecuted, it seems to me to be an evasion of a
solemn duty on the part of the Congress not to
exercise that power at this critical time in the
Nation's affairs. The Congress can no more avoid
its responsibility in this matte than it can in
any other. As the Nation's purposes in
conducting this war are of supreme importance to
the country, it is the supreme duty of Congress
to exercise the function conferred upon it by
the Constitution of guiding the foreign policy
of the Nation in the present crisis.
A minor duty may be evaded by Congress, a minor
responsibility avoided without disaster
resulting, but on this momentous question there
can be no evasion, no shirking of duty of the
Congress, without subverting our form of
government. If our Constitution is to be changed
so as to give the President the power to
determine the purposes for which this Nation
will engage in war, and the conditions on which
it will make peace, then let that change be made
deliberately by an amendment to the constitution
proposed and adopted in a constitutional manner.
It would be bad enough if the Constitution
clothed the President with any such power, but
to exercise such power without constitutional
authority can not long be tolerated if even the
forms of free government are to remain. We all
know that no amendment to the constitution
giving the President the powers suggested would
be adopted by the people. We know that if such
an amendment were to be proposed it would be
overwhelmingly defeated.
The universal conviction of those who yet
believe in the rights of the people is that the
first step toward the prevention of war and the
establishment of peace, permanent peace, is to
give the people who must bear the brunt of war's
awful burden more to say about it. The masses
will understand that it was the evil of a
one-man power exercised in a half dozen nations
through the malevolent influences of a system of
secret diplomacy that plunged the helpless
peoples of Europe into the awful war that has
been raging with increasing horror and fury ever
since it began and that now threatens to engulf
the world before it stops.
No conviction is stronger with the people today
than that there should be no future wars except
in case of actual invasion, unless supported by
a referendum, a plebiscite, a vote of
ratification upon the declaration of war before
it shall become effective.
And because there is no clearness of
understanding, no unity of opinion in this
country on the part of the people as to the
conditions upon which we are prosecuting this
war or what the specific objects are upon the
attainment of which the present administration
would be willing to conclude a peace, it becomes
still more imperative each day that Congress
should assert its constitutional power to define
and declared the objects of this war which will
afford the basis for a conference and for the
establishment of permanent peace. The President
has asked the German people to speak for
themselves on this great world issue; why should
not the American people voice their convictions
through their chosen representatives in
Congress?
Ever since new Russia appeared upon the map she
has been holding out her hands to free America
to come to her support in declaring for a clear
understanding of the objects to be attained to
secure peace. Shall we let this most remarkable
revolution the world has ever witnessed appeal
to us in vain?
We have been six months at war. We have incurred
financial obligation and made expenditures of
money in amounts already so large that the human
mind can not comprehend them. The Government has
drafted from the peaceful occupations of civil
life a million of our finest young men — and
more will be taken if necessary — to be
transported 4,000 miles over the sea, with their
equipment and supplies, to the trenches of
Europe.
The first chill winds of autumn remind us that
another winter is at hand. The imagination is
paralyzed at the thought of the human misery,
the indescribable suffering, which the winter
months, with their cold and sleet and ice and
snow, must bring to the war-swept lands, not
alone to the soldiers at the front but to the
noncombatants at home.
To such excesses of cruelty has this war
descended that each nation is now, as a part of
its strategy, planning to starve the women and
children of the enemy countries. Each warring
nation is carrying out the unspeakable plan of
starving noncombatants. Each nurses the hope
that it may break the spirit of the men of the
enemy country at the front by starving the wives
and babes at home, and woe be it that we have
become partners in this awful business and are
even cutting off food shipments from neutral
countries in order to force them to help starve
women and children of the country against whom
we have declared war.
There may be some necessity overpowering enough
to justify these things, but the people of
America should demand to know what results are
expected to satisfy the sacrifice of all that
civilization holds dear upon the bloody altar of
a conflict which employs such desperate methods
of warfare.
The question is, Are we to sacrifice millions of
our young men — the very promise of the land —
and spend billions and more billions, and pile
up the cost of living until we starve — and for
what? Shall the fearfully overburdened people of
this country continue to bear the brunt of a
prolonged war for any objects not openly stated
and defined?
The answer, sir, rests, in my judgment, with the
Congress, whose duty it is to declare our
specific purposes in the present war and to
state the objects upon the attainment of which
we will make peace.
CAMPAIGN SHOULD BE MADE
ON CONSTITUTIONAL LINES
And, sir, this is
the ground on which I stand. I maintain that
Congress has the right and the duty to declare
the objects of the war and the people have the
right and the obligation to discuss it.
American citizens may hold all shades of opinion
as to the war; one citizen may glory in it,
another may deplore it, each has the same right
to voice his judgment. An American citizen may
think and say that we are not justified in
prosecuting this war for the purpose of
dictating the form of government which shall be
maintained by our enemy or our ally, and not be
subject to punishment at law. He may pray aloud
that our boys shall not be sent to fight and die
on European battle fields for the annexation of
territory or the maintenance of trade agreements
and be within his legal rights. He may express
the hope that an early peace may be secured on
the terms set forth by the new Russia and by
President Wilson in his speech of January 22,
1917, and he can not lawfully be sent to jail
for the expression of his convictions.
It is the citizen's duty to obey the law until
it is repealed or declared unconstitutional. But
he has the inalienable right to fight what he
deems an obnoxious law or a wrong policy in the
courts and at the ballot box.
It is the suppressed emotion of the masses that
breeds revolution.
If the American people are to carry on this
great war, if public opinion is to be
enlightened and intelligent, there must be free
discussion.
Congress, as well as the people of the United
States, entered the war in great confusion of
mind and under feverish excitement. The
President's leadership was followed in the faith
that he had some big, unrevealed plan by which
peace that would exalt him before all the world
would soon be achieved.
Gradually, reluctantly, Congress and the country
are beginning to perceive that we are in this
terrific world conflict, not only to right our
wrongs, not only to aid the allies, not only to
share its awful death toll and its fearful tax
burden, but, perhaps, to bear the brunt of the
war.
And so I say, if we are to forestall the danger
of being drawn into years of war, perhaps
finally to maintain imperialism and
exploitation, the people must unite in a
campaign along constitutional lines for free
discussion of the policy of the war and its
conclusion on a just basis.
Permit me, sir, this word in conclusion. It is
said by many persons for whose opinions I have
profound respect and whose motives I know to be
sincere that "we are in this war and must go
through to the end." That is true. But it is not
true that we must go through to the end to
accomplish an undisclosed purpose, or to reach
an unknown goal.
I believe that whatever there is of honest
difference of opinion concerning this war,
arises precisely at this point.
There is, and of course can be, no real
difference of opinion concerning the duty of the
citizen to discharge to the last limit whatever
obligation the war lays upon him.
Our young men are being taken by the hundreds of
thousands for the purpose of waging this war on
the Continent of Europe, possibly Asia or
Africa, or anywhere else that they may be
ordered. Nothing must be left undone for their
protection. They must have the best army,
ammunition, and equipment that money can buy.
They must have the best training and the best
officers which this great country can provide.
The dependents and relatives they leave at home
must be provided for, not meagerly, but
generously so far as money can provide for them.
I have done some of the hardest work of my life
during the last few weeks on the revenue bill to
raise the largest possible amount of money from
surplus incomes and war profits for this war and
upon other measures to provide for the
protection of the soldiers and their families.
That I was not able to accomplish more along
this line is a great disappointment to me. I did
all that I could, and I shall continue to fight
with all the power at my command until wealth is
made to bear more of the burden of this war than
has been laid upon it by the present Congress.
Concerning these matters there can be no
difference of opinion. We have not yet been able
to muster the forces to conscript wealth, as we
have conscripted men, but no one has ever been
able to advance even a plausible argument for
not doing so.
No, Mr. President; it is on the other point
suggested where honest differences of opinion
may arise. Shall we ask the people of this
country to shut their eyes and take the entire
war program on faith? There are no doubt many
honest and well-meaning persons who are willing
to answer that question in the affirmative
rather than risk the dissensions which they fear
may follow a free discussion of the issues of
this war. With that position I do not — I can
not agree. Have the people no intelligent
contribution to make to the solution of the
problems of this war? I believe that they have,
and that in this matter, as in so many others,
they may be wiser than their leaders, and that
if left free to discuss the issues of the war
they will find the correct settlement of these
issues.
But it is said that Germany will fight with
greater determination if her people believe that
we are not in perfect agreement. Mr. President,
that is the same worn-out pretext which has been
used for three years to keep the plain people of
Europe engaged in killing each other in this
war. And, sir, as applied to this country, at
least, it is a pretext with nothing to support
it.
The way to paralyze the German arm, to weaken
the German military force, in my opinion, is to
declare our objects in this war, and show by
that declaration to the German people that we
are not seeking to dictate a form of government
to Germany or to render more secure England's
domination of the seas.
A declaration of our purposes in this war, so
far from strengthening our enemy, I believe
would immeasurably weaken her, for it would no
longer be possible to misrepresent our purposes
to the German people. Such a course on our part,
so far from endangering the life of a single one
of our boys, I believe would result in saving
the lives of hundreds of thousands of them by
bringing about an earlier and more lasting peace
by intelligent negotiation, instead of securing
a peace by the complete exhaustion of one or the
other of the belligerents.
Such a course would also immeasurably, I
believe, strengthen our military force in this
country, because when the objects of this war
are clearly stated and the people approve of
those objects they will give to the war a
popular support it will never otherwise receive.
Then, again, honest dealing with the entente
allies, as well as with our own people, requires
a clear statement of our objects in this war. If
we do not expect to support the entente allies
in the dreams of conquest we know some of them
entertain, then in all fairness to them that
fact should be stated now. If we do expect to
support them in their plans for conquest and
aggrandizement, then our people are entitled to
know that vitally important fact before this war
proceeds further. Common honesty and fair
dealing with the people of this country and with
the nations by whose side we are fighting, as
well as a sound military policy at home,
requires the fullest and freest discussion
before the people of every issue involved in
this great war and that a plain and specific
declaration of our purposes in the war be
speedily made by the Congress of the United
States.
This is page 2 of 2 of this
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