February 16, 1933 (2)

The Senate resumed the consideration of Mr. BLAINE's motion that the Senate proceed to consider the joint resolution (S. J. Res. 211) proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

Mr. ROBINSON of Indiana. Mr. President, in all that has been said by the eminent Senator from Arkansas [Mr. RoBINSON] and my good friend the distinguished Senator from West Virginia [Mr. HATFIELD] I am in hearty accord. The incident at Miami was deplorable; the entire country is shocked and grieved.

Mr. FESS. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a. moment?

Mr. ROBINSON of Indiana. I yield.

Mr. FESS. I wanted to ask the Senator, who is a good lawyer, whether, in his judgment, there could not be some additional protection accorded to the man who occupies the Presidency of the country by the imposition of a more drastic penalty upon those who undertake to do a dastardly deed and yet fail, and by the fact of failure are relieved of the penalty that otherwise would be administered?

Mr. ROBINSON of Indiana. The Senator means the death penalty?

Mr. FESS. Yes; whether it is not feasible to undertake some additional protection to the high office of the Presidency.

Mr. ROBINSON of Indiana. I do not know what theresult would be, Mr. President, but, so far as I am personally concerned, I believe that anybody who attempts to assassinate the President of the United States or the President elect of the United States ought to suffer the death penI desire now, Mr. President, to discuss the joint resolution which is pending before the Senate. I The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The unfinished business is before the Senate.

Mr, ROBINSON of Indiana. - Mr. - President, for the past three days we have been discussing the question of whether or not intoxicating alcoholic beverages should be permitted to return legally. Three valuable days, three days during every one of the 24 hours of each of which untold thousands of people in America have been crying for bread, have been wasted in an academic discussion of a resolution that can have no effect possibly for the next 2, 3, 4, or 5 years. While measures are before this body that, if enacted into law, would provide relief for suffering humanity in America and alleviate agricultural conditions that are wellnigh intolerable, we continue to discuss the question of booze and the American saloon and whether or not they shall be tolerated in the future. We fiddle while the Nation burns, discussing a resolution which, if adopted, can only bring more misery to the country, and fail to consider measures that would unquestionably bring relief to millions of people under the American flag.

Mr. President, let nobody be deceived. This resolution is not for submission. Any one voting for the adoption of this resolution votes for the return of the American saloon with all its evils.

I have heard that some legislators occasionally believe that when they vote to submit an amendment of this kind somehow or other they are relieved of any responsibility either way. They take a neutral position. As a matter of fact, Mr. President, whoever votes for the joint resolution now before the Senate votes directly and deliberately for the return of the saloon. No other interpretation can be placed upon any vote in the affirmative. Not only that, but whoever votes for the adoption of this joint resolution requests the people in the State from which he comes to support that vote when the question comes up for decision by the various Commonwealths.

:Mr. President, I understand perfectly well that anything I may say on this subject will doubtless have little effect. I assume it will influence no votes in this body; but I should feel myself derelict in duty did I not present to the Senate and to the country some observations that suggest my own line of reasoning with reference to this problem.

For years it has been a usual thing to see men, and women, too, going up and down the country insisting on the repeal of the eighteenth amendment, but also insisting equally as emphatically that they were against the return of the saloon. Evidently most of these advocates of repeal had their four. tongues in their cheeks when they made those pious statements. "Oh, no," said they; "we must never have the saloon again. We are opposed to the saloon." Even the Association Against the Eighteenth Amendment continuously stated their opposition to the saloon or its return; but, Mr. President, here we have the saloon back again.

This measure provides for the return of the saloon, pure and unadorned; and evidently the organized interests who have been advocating the repeal of the eighteenth amendment have used the lash and, notwithstanding their protestations to the contrary, have insisted that the saloon must come back. Out must go the eighteenth amendment. In must come the American saloon; and by a vote yesterday of 33 to 32 the Members of this body voted for its return. No other interpretation can be placed on that vote; and section 3 was stricken from the joint resolution.

"Happy days are coming back"; there is no doubt about it, Mr. President. One campaign pledge will be redeemed. We will have the American saloon back, and, presumably, happy days; but the "happy days" we sing about will be only a · smoke screen, for back of that screen will be misery, human misery, far worse than it is to-day.

The question of the saloon has been with us always. It is nothing new. From the beginning of the Government we have had the liquor question and the saloon problem.

Mr. President, the first difficulty we had, in the way of revolt, after the Government was organized, was the saloon rebellion, the Whisky Rebellion, at the very beginning of Washington's administration; and we have bad a whisky I rebellion from then until now. This question has been in politics throughout all those years; and let no one here to-[ day think for a second that this joint resolution will take it out of politics. There is a right side and a wrong side, and in the end the right side will prevail.

For 133 years the American people tried to live with the saloon. I go further: For 133 years the American people did everything in their power to tolerate the liquor traffic. Local option was tried; license, State control, and every method the genius of man could invent was undertaken to find ways and means for living with the saloon, but all to no avail. It besotted manhood everywhere; destroyed homes; befouled womanhood and childhood; it controlled politics and corrupted government. Throughout those years State after State went dry, and the breweries and distilleries shipped their wares from wet States into dry States with impunity. They positively would not obey the law. There was no question about it. Finally the American people, dis­ . covering that the American saloon refused to be law-abiding, that it refused to yield to legal control, rose in their might and wrote prohibition into the basic law of the land in the form of the eighteenth amendment, and there it has remained until this day.

Now we propose--and I assume the votes are here to do it---we propose at 3 o'clock this afternoon to repeal that amendment as far as this body can do so. Ah, but, Mr. President, we go further. We not only propose to repeal the amendment but we propose to restore the saloon-the same saloon that all the liquor apologists during the past 12 years have insisted should never return; and we find a majority in this body for the restoration of that very saloon. Mr. President, as soon as we bring back the saloon we shall have 48 State boundaries to police and patrol. One of the favorite arguments of the apologists for the liquor traffic during the past few years has been that the eighteenth amendment could not be enforced because we had the great Canadian boundary up there to the north, Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico on the south, the Atlantic Ocean on the east, and the Pacific on the west. It was impossible, they said, to enforce the law; and so rational, so reasonable are they, apparently so logical, that now they propose to add 48 more boundaries to those 4. and expect the American people to believe that in some manner or other it will be easier now to enforce the law and to patrol all of those additional boundaries than it was originally to patrol the Mr. President, I am bound to say that the revenue will be disappointing. I do not think anybody expects any considerable revenue to come from this measure. I think the incoming administration will be utterly disheartened when they find how pitifully little money they get out of this traffic. The controlling reason is not revenue. It is twofold: First, to bring it back so that the thirsty may be supplied with little effort and, second, to transfer the income taxes from organized wealth to the backs of the beer drinkers of the country, those who have little means. That is the purpose. That means that more of the stuff will have to be drunk than is being consumed now, of course; and where is the money coming from to buy it, with 12,000 , 000 men walking the streets looking for work, with nothing to do, with no bread for themselves and their families? How are they going to get money to buy booze?

No; the revenue will be disappointing; but one result will come, Mr. President, and come immediately. As soon as this measure goes on the books, if ever, and if it requires some time for its ratification, if ever, I assume the beer bill will come before us and be promptly passed by the incoming Congress. That will mean that a saloon will be established within six months on every street corner throughout the country in all the cities, as they were before the eighteenth amendment; and then America will go on a sp r ee the like of which was never heard of before. Everybody who can get the money with which to purchase, will drinkthe young, the old, the rich, and the poor. This thing called prohibition has been so widely advertised and publicized that everybody will seek out liquor to learn more about it. It will not be safe to go on the streets, and everybody knows it, with 32,000,000 automobile drivers in the land. It will not be safe to ride on the railways, to say nothing of the air and aviation. That will be one of the inevitable results, Mr. President. Then the pendulum will swing back, back, beyond any question of a doubt, toward decency.

Of course, the American people will be disgusted with the saloon, as they were for 133 years. There never was a period when they were not; and, of course, as soon as they become thoroughly disgusted with it, the sentiment will change; the people will rise again in their wrath, and out the saloon will go. There is no question about that.

This legislation will not take the saloon out of politics; it will put it back into politics. Bootleggers will continue to bootleg; illicit distillers will continue to distill illicitly; and illicit brewers will continue to ply their trade. Nothing will be bettered. . Mr. President, I do not criticize any of my colleagues in the slightest degree. They have as much right to their views as I have to mine. But I am wondering whether it does not make them dizzy sometimes dodging from one side of the street to the other every time the wind changes. It would give me the " jitters " if I had to change my position on this great moral question every time it looked as if there were a little flurry in public sentiment.

Mr. President, I should prefer to find the right side, a position which my conscience would assure me was correct, and then take my stand there regardless of politics, understanding full well that if the winds of public sentiment blew away from me sooner or later they would be bound to come back, and if they never did, then it would be no tragedy to anybody but myself, and that would amount to little.

Mr. President, I want to observe also, while I am on my feet, that the nineteenth amendment is the next in order. Let the good women of America take warning. There is no question in the world but that the warfare now will begin against the nineteenth amendment.

Mr. President, I went through the lobby committee's investigation three years ago with my distinguished friend the late Senator Caraway, of Arkansas, who was the honored chairman of that committee. We had before the committee the so-called wet leaders. We had before us those who were leading the movement against the eighteenth amendment. We interrogated them all, and with frankness that practically amounted to effrontery they charged that the nineteenth amendment enfranchising the women of the country was a mistake, that it ought to be repealed, and that if they could bring it about they would have it repealed. It is all in the record of the hearings for any Senator who desires to see for himself. Let the women of America beware!

There are other amendments in the Constitution which safeguard the liberties of our people; which make it impossible for men to be sent to their death without fair trial, which gives every citizen the right to be tried for any offense by 12 of his peers, his neighbors, by a jury. All of the rights of the American people are safeguarded in that document known as the Constitution of the United States. It is not safe to tinker with the Constitution. We never have done so. In 144 years of glorious history we have never yet repealed an amendment which went into the Constitution after the people had sanctioned it, and I submit that it is dangerous to tamper with the basic law. If the eighteenth amendment should be repealed, the nineteenth would be next in order. Then some one would want another amendment out, and the first thing we knew, the safeguards of freedom for the American people would be destroyed. Mr. President, before the lobby committee to which I have referred correspondence was read; it is all in the RECORD, one letter from !renee du Pont, as I remember-it was one of the du Ponts, and I think it was !renee-to one of his friends stated in substance that the reason why he was so actively against the eighteenth amendment was that he wanted to restore beer, and that if beer could be restored, it would save one of his corporations alone $10,000,000 annually in income taxes, because the tax would be transferred to the beer drinkers of America.

Who are the people who have brought this thing about? resolution. I say that it is a group of not to exceed 75 millionaires in America. They have furnished all the money for poisoning American public opinion on this question, and it is all in the record, if any of my friends desire to see it, as a result of the disclosures before the lobby committee in 1930.

Mr. President, regardless of politics, I purpose to take my stand. I refuse to dodge around back and forth on this question. My own opinion is that the American saloon is an evil second to none that might be conjured up in one's imagination. Therefore I shall certainly do everything in my power to prevent its return, and, of course, vote against the pending joint resolution.

May I not, before resuming my seat, read a few excerpts from a statement published by the Country Editor Publishing Co. (Inc.) under the heading " The Poor Man Pays the Bill." I read:

In considering present conditions there may be some comfort in the reflection that probably no social system can be so devised as to render it immune to attacks from its predatory elements. The whole mass, as a matter of fact, is inherently selfish and, therefore, cohesive; otherwise it would disintegrate, every separate unit would strike out for itself, and anarchy would ensue. So, however idealistic the original conception may be, the scheme must be worked out practically by reconciling the idealism toward which the race is eternally striving with those other provisions which are indispensable to the physical existence of each individual.

There ought not, of course, to be any material subversion of the aspirations toward higher moral levels such as we are at present experiencing. There ought not to be in the political field any complete surrender by the legislative branch to the least desirable constituents of the population such as seems to be impending as soon as the new Congress can be brought into action.

This surrender, it can be plainly seen, is infectious. The politician in local as well as in national affairs is misled by the talkativeness of the almighty dollar. The still, small voice of the moral sense of the Nation is drowned by the lusty-lunged mouthpieces of organized wealth.

And organized wealth is not concerned with the moralities of the situation. It traffics in what it considers more tangible merchandise; it carries out its purpose by playing upon the weaknesses of human nature, and it thrives best, therefore, when the moral sense of the Nation is in suspension.

The most disturbing feature, however, will be its (the new Congress) subservience to the crowd that temporarily has the whip handle and is using the lash mercilessly on everyone who dares to oppose it. This crowd is meeting with surprising success mainly because for the time being the political influence of those who have sought to guide the Nation into a cleaner moral atmosphere is at a low ebb. In reality their following represents by far the majority of the population, but they have been rendered inarticulate, and therefore demoralized, by the power of huge aggregations of wealth in the hands of a few men, functioning first in the national conventions and now at the Capitol in Washington.

These men have made no secret of their intentions. Indeed, their chief spokesman, testifying before a congressional committee, boasted that his financial backers represented more than $10,000 , - 000,000 of corporate and individual wealth. In the face of such an offensive it is not strange that the voice of the churches has been silenced. It is not strange that the big dailies have the effrontery to refer to these religious organizations as a collection of bigots and hypocrites. The almighty dollar does not believe in mincing words while it drives its chariot exultantly through the " common herd " on the road to its objective. It is not afilicted with a troublesome conscience. Those who will not get out of the way it destroys.

It would seem so. The megaphone of the rich and powerful is calling loudly for liquor, and more liquor, so that the Budget may be balanced by making the poor man pay through the nose as he gulps down his schooner of lager and stands, maudlin drunk, at the bar, sumptuously furnished for him by the manipulators of $10,000,000,000 worth of the country's wealth.

Balance the Budget with the nickels of the poor! That is the rich man's cry to-day. The billions lent to Europe were money poured into a rat hole. Therefore, let the poor man foot the bill as the saloon keeper rings up on h.is cash register the money that should have gone into shoes and stockings for the youngsters, and warm clothing, nourishing food, and wholesome amusements.

The power of money, the saloon, unbridled greed, distillery, and brewery profits on the one hand, and, on the other, the country parsonage, the little red school house, the institution of the family, the protection of the children, the ideals of virtuous womanhood. Surely, it is an unequal struggle, a humiliating spectacle, a denial of inspiration and of leadership, a perversion of the destiny of a great people.

Mr. President, as far as I am concerned I shall stand on the side I believe to be the right side. Others, of course, will make their own decisions. I shall vote against the repeal

Mr. GLASS obtained the floor.

Mr. BULKLEY. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. FEss in the chair). Does the Senator from Virginia yield for that purpose?

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll. The Chief Clerk called the roll, and the following Senators answered to their names: Ashurt Cutting Kendrick Russell Austin Dale Keyes Schuyler Bailey DaVis King Sheppard Bankhead Dickinson La Follette Shipstead Barbour Dill Lewis Shortridge Barkley Fess Logan Smith Bingham Fletcher McGill Smoot Black Frazier McKellar Steiwer Blaine George McNary Stephens Borah Glass Metcalf Swanson Bratton Goldsborough Moses Thomas, Idaho Brookhart Gore Neely Thomas, Okla. Bulkley Grammer Norbeck Townsend Bulow Hale Norris Trammell Byrnes Harrison Nye Tydings Capper Hastings Oddie Vandenberg caraway Hatfield Patterson Wagner Clark Hayden Pittman Walcott Connally Hebert Reed Walsh, Mass. coolidge Hull Reynolds Walsh, Mont. costigan Johnson Robinson, Ark. Watson Couzens Kean Robinson, Ind. White

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Eighty-eight Senators having answered to their names, a quorum is present.

Mr. GLASS. Mr. President, on last July 16 the Senate voted on Senate Joint Resolution 202 offered by me and by a recorded vote of 37 yeas to 21 nays decided to make it the order of business. Subsequently it was displaced by an appropriation bill. I have now offered it as a substitute for the pending Senate Joint Resolution 211.

I had hoped, Mr. President, to discuss the question in a practical way. I have never in either House of Congress in a service of 30 years felt it desirable to speak only for home consumption. If the Senate has no desire to hear these grave matters discussed I am not going to exhaust my reserve strength or that of the Senate either by undertaking a discussion of the question. Therefore, with a meager attendance of Senators. I shall accordingly abbreviate as much as possible my intended exposition of Senate Joint Resolution Mr. President, I have never voted anything but the prohibition ticket in my life when the issue was live and practical. I am not a zealot on the subject, but whenever opportunity has afforded I have invariably voted to banish intoxicating drinks. However, I realize, as other observant States. persons must realize, that the experiment of national prohibition seems to have proven an utter failure. What the causes may be, no man may accurately say. There are a multiplicity of them and they are of a varied nature. One of them in my considered judgment is the fact that moral lepers and statutory criminals have had the effrontery to assume leadership of the moral forces in the country. I think that fact has made a tremendous contribution to the reaction throughout the United States against prohibition as a national problem. There are some few things worse than liquor. But in any event, whatever the causes are, whatever their nature, every observant person must know that there has been this reaction.

There has been a tremendous demand for a resubmission of the question to the States for further determination. It has always been my view that there is just as much reason and equity in the general demand for resubmission of the prohibition problem as there was in the demand in the first instance for the submission of the eighteenth amendment to the States for ratification or rejection. Therefore, reluctantly I have joined the forces which are demanding a resubmission of the question.

I was on the platform committee of the national Democratic convention at Chicago, and there was no difference of judgment as to the desirability of submitting the question to the States for further consideration. The Democratic convention of my own State, to which I owe primary allegiance and of which I am their representative here in the Senate and not of any national convention, declared for a resubmission of the question. But concurrently with that declaration the Virginia Democratic State platform denounced the return of the saloon and by implication advocated a submission in the form of a proclamation against the return of the saloon.

The Democratic National Convention at Chicago denounced the return of the saloon. It may be said that by implication at least it advocated action by the States against the return of the saloon and that is granted. But that declaration, I contend, did not necessarily preclude a constitutional reservation against the return of the saloon. On the other hand, the Republican National Convention at Chicago textually and in terms demanded a constitutional reservation against the return of the saloon.

In all the last campaign, so far as I was able to observebecause I was not permitted on account of physical disability to participate actively in the campaign-it was urgently insisted by candidates and the press that there should not be a return of the saloon. So that, far from naked repeal of the eighteenth amendment being the commanding issue of the campaign, it was not an issue of the campaign, the differences between the two parties being so indistinguishable that the widespread contention was that the liquor question was utterly subordinated and the economic issues of the campaign were predominant.

For myself I have said, and now repeat, that I do not attach any great degree of sanctity to platform declarations as contradistinguished from a Senator's obligation under oath to follow his own judgment and his conscience in matters of this kind. I note that the Judiciary Committee of the Senate attached no sanctity to convention declarations, either the Democrats or the Republicans on that committee, for they utterly rejected and disregarded the textual declaration of both the Republican and the Democratic national platforms, in that Senate Joint Resolution 211, as reported by the Judiciary Committee, provides not for the submission to conventions called solely for the purpose of deciding this question but rather to legislatures, as has been the invariable practice. Therefore, if the distinguished lawyers composing the Judiciary Committee of this body may thus lightly brush aside party platform declarations, the laymen among us may as readily and as safely disregard those declarations in other respects. However, it is not my purpose to disregard them materially. On the contrary, it is my considered view that unless we shall regard the declarations of both major parties it will prove impossible to submit this question at all to the Let us consider that phase of the subject for a moment. Some of us on this side have stressed party declarations. Let us assume that there is a certain sanctity about such declarations. Why should the Democrats assume that the Republicans owe less allegiance to the declarations of their party platforms than we presume to avow for the declarations of the Democratic National Convention?

Mr. BULKLEY. Mr. President, will the Senator from Virginia yield to me?

The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Virginia yield to the Senator from Ohio?

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

Mr. BULKLEY. The Republican platform expressly declares that as to this particular subject no one may be bound by the platform pronouncement.

Mr. GLASS. The Republican platform expressly declares that while in dealing " with the evils inherent in the liquor traffic," the States shall be allowed " to deal with the problem as their citizens may determine," such dealing shall always be subject" to the power of the Federal Government to protect those States where prohibition may exist and safeguard our citizens everywhere from the return of the saloon and attendant abuses."

Mr. BULKLEY. But the platform goes on to declare-­

Mr. GLASS. Oh, I know.

Mr. BULKLEY. The platform goes on to declare that no Republican need be bound by its declaration on this sub- ject, - and that it shall not come in conflict with anybody's conscience.

Mr. GLASS. I do not intend that my party platform shall ever come in conflict with either tny judgment or my conscience, if the Senator from Ohio wants my view on the subject.

However, to return to the point: I say if submission be desired, it is my view that we can never get it except by regarding the platforms of both major parties, for the simple reason that the Republicans have now but one majority in the Senate, the Democrats being in the minority, and, if the Republicans observe their party platform, where are we going to get the necessary two-thirds to submit the question? We shall not have it in the next Senate. Where are we going to get it?

Something has been said on the other side of the Chamber about keeping faith with party declarations. The distinguished Senator from Connecticut [Mr. BINGHAM], now absent, I regret to say, undertook to charge the Democrats in the Senate with violation of their party platform, and yet he himself has violated his own party platform in his action and his votes here. I am a genuine submissionist; I believe that the American people in the respective 48 States are entitled to the privilege of voting on this question again; and it is because I do believe in submission that I want to have passed a resolution that has some prospect and hope of obtaining the required two-thirds vote in each House of the Congress.

Mr. FLETCHER. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Virginia yield to the Senator from Florida?

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

Mr. FLETCHER. I am wondering if the Senator would be willing to change his amendment, in the nature of a substitute, beginning in line 7, page 2, where it reads:

The Congress and the several States, Territories, and possessions shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

In other words, I do not like the " concurrent power provision.

Mr. GLASS. I will say to the Senator when the proper time arrives I will be glad to make any reasonable concession that will assure us the prospect of submitting this question to the States.

Mr. FLETCHER. Very well. I should like, however, to have the Senator devote a little thought to this phase of the question. I recognize, of course, that the Congress has power to regulate interstate commerce and to prohibit the movement of wet goods into dry States and that sort of thing. That is in the law now; we do not need to express that in a new amendment to the Constitution.

Mr. GLASS. Oh, I understand that, Mr. President.

Mr. FLETCHER. But as to the control of the saloon and the provision of the proposal the Senator offers with reference to the sale on the premises, it seems to me that that might well be left entirely to the States and not have the power concurrently vested in the Federal Government and the States.

Mr. WALSH of Montana. Mr. President--.

The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Virginia yield to the Senator from Montana?

Mr. GLASS. Yes; I yield to the Senator from Montana.

Mr. WALSH of Montana. I wish to say a word, in view of what has just been stated - by the Senator from Florida in relation to the second paragraph of the joint resolution as tendered by the committee.

It is true that the original Constitution authorizes Congress to prohibit the transfer of intoxicating liquors in interstate commerce. It is held, however, that that authority simply indicates the intention to have commerce free except as Congress may otherwise direct. It has been held that under the existing Constitution the right obtains on the part of any citizen to pass his goods into another State, and they remain under the protection of the Federal Constitution until they actually reach the hands of the consignee; so that they can not be stopped at the State line nor there fall under the jurisdiction of the State authorities, but the goods will not fall under the jurisdiction of the State authorities until they actually get into the possession of the consignee who may live in the center of the State. Meanwhile all manner of opportunity is afforded for the diversion of the intoxicating liquors from the consignee to whom they are addressed. Likewise, even then, the intoxicating liquor is protected by the commerce clause; if it remains on the siding in the car of the transportation company, it still remains under that protection, and if it goes into a warehouse belonging to the transportation company it remains under the protection of the Federal statute, and is immune from any control by State statutes until it actually reaches the possession of the consignee. The purpose of the provision in the resolution reported by the committee was to make the intoxicating liquor subject to the laws of the State once it passed the State line and before it gets into the hands of the consignee as well as thereafter. It was so decided in a case reported in One hundred and seventieth United States Reports, with which, I think, the profession generally is not particularly familiar.

Mr. GLASS. Mr. President, in my own interpretation of the resolution as I have presented it, there can be no consignee of intoxicating liquors in a dry State. Liquors may be shipped across a State in interstate commerce from one wet State to another wet State, but the resolution as I have drafted it prohibits the shipment of intoxicating liquors into a State whose laws prohibit the manufacture, sale, or transportation of liquors. So I have met the objection that we are undertaking to interfere with interstate commerce as between States which authorize the manufacture, transportation, and sale of liquors; but there can be no consignee in dry territory under the terms of my proposed amendment to the Constitution.

Mr. President, at every point in the presidential campaign when submission of this question was discussed, and whenever the objection was raised as to the return of the saloon, assurances were given that both parties, with unexampled unanimity, were opposed to the return of the saloon. The Democratic national platform, in spirit and by suggestionindeed, by denunciation-objected to the return of the saloon. The Republican platform in text insisted upon a constitutional guaranty against the return of the saloon. So my joint resolution complies with both the Democratic and the Republican platforms; and that is the only way you are ever going to get the question submitted at all, as it requires a two-thirds vote. Moreover, not only is it the only way you are ever going to get it submitted but it is the only way you are ever going to get it ratified by 36 States of the Union. The Anti-Saloon Leagueites rode to a precipitate downfall because of their spirit of intolerance and tyranny, manifested in various offensive ways on every occasion. Now some of these gentlemen who want to repeal the eighteenth amendment would better beware lest they find themselves riding to a downfall. They are manifesting a spirit that is calculated to arrest the reaction that we have had against the eighteenth amendment, and that will make it impossible to get 36 States to ratify the proposed repeal of the eighteenth amendment. It is my considered judgment that they will never get it on earth unless we make a constitutional reservation against the return of the saloon.

Yesterday there was stricken out of Senate Joint Resolution 211 the almost attenuated constitutional guaranty against the return of the saloon. If that policy is to be pursued, I predict now and here that you will never get twothirds of both Houses of Congress even to submit the question, and much less is the likelihood that you will ever prevail upon 36 States of this Union to vote for a proposition that involves the return of the vile institution called the liquor saloon.

The intemperance of the saloon was the least objection to it. It was the breeding place of crime and immorality and vulgarity and profanity of every description. It was the rendezvous of the immoral and criminal elements. Its effrontery was unparalleled, because it sought to control and for a time succeeded in controlling the politics of the community, of the State, and largely of the Nation, so that any man who had a worthy aspiration to serve his people must first kotow to the liquor league in his State. Not only that, but if you submit this question without a constitutional guaranty against the return of this vile institution you will witness in this country a campaign such as we have never had, not even in 1928, when the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party over and over again proclaimed himself in antagonism to the return of the liquor saloon.

Ask the extreme Anti-Saloon Leaguers in what form they would prefer to have this question submitted, and those who are honest among them-and God knows there are enough of them who are not-will tell you that they would rather have it submitted for naked repeal, without the remotest constitutional guaranty against the return of the saloon; and why? Because it would enable them to stir the pas­ where. sions, to appeal to the emotions, rather than to the minds, of their people. It would enable them to organize all of the churches of this country again; and Heaven knows that their actions have already done harm enough to the churches of the country, and to religion itself. · But, thus enabling them to appeal to the emotions of the church people, nobody can convince me that you will ever be able to get threefourths of the States to ratify this amendment.

Mr. REED. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a question?

The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Virginia yield to the Senator from Pennsylvania?

Mr. GLASS. I do.

Mr. REED. May I preface the question by saying that I am in sympathy with every word the Senator has thus far uttered on this subject.

A good many Senators are obviously bothered by the continuance of Federal control in this matter; and while they are anxious to see the saloon outlawed, they would like to see it done by prohibition on S t ate action rather than continuing this unsuccessful Federal effort to carry its police power into the States. I am wondering whether the Senator feels that the last sentence in section 1 of his amendment is essential. That is the one which gives concurrent power to Congress.

Mr. GLASS. No; I do not think it is essential. If I could be brought to believe that the joint resolution stands a better chance of passage by the elimination of that sentence, I should be glad to eliminate it, because the balance of the joint resolution gives us a constitutional prohibition against the return of the saloon.

Mr. REED. That is just what I want to see; and the question of the Senator from Florida [Mr. FLETCHER] a little while ago seemed to be animated by the same thought I had-that there are many votes that would be secured for the joint resolution if that grant of concurrent power to Congress were eliminated.

Mr. GLASS. That being so, I should be perfectly willing to eliminate that one sentence from the measure. All I want is a constitutional guaranty against the return of this abominable saloon system of dispensing intoxicating liquors-that is all-and if we write it into the Constitution I assume that no State would ever even undertake to violate the text of the Constitution by licensing a saloon.

Mr. REED. Obviously, if it did, its licensing law would be invalid.

Mr. GLASS. Why, absolutely so.

Let me recall the fact that it was Mr. Woodrow Wilson's idea that the administration of any law that we might have on the subject--it was his idea that the administration of the Volstead Act except as to interstate shipments of liquor and the importations of liquor should be confided to the respective States, with their varying habits, with their tempers and their facilities for knowing the habits of their own people , and with their greater ability to enforce the law. Less than three months before he died Mr. Wilson wrote a proposed declaration on this very subject for incorporation in the platform of his party at the succeeding convention, in which he declared that it would require all of the power and resources and ingenuity available to the Federal Government to do the one thing of preventing interstate traffic in intoxicating liqu-ors and the importation of intoxicating liquors, and that the States themselves could more effectively and certainly enforce the letter of the Volstead Act than the Federal Government could.

Mr. BARKLEY. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Sena t or from Virginia yield to the Senator from Kentucky?

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

Mr. BARKLEY. The Senator may recall that when the eighteenth amendm e nt was originally passed through this body it did not contain any provision for concurrent power to enforce its provisions, and that language was added in the House as a concession to the spirit of State rights, which prevailed probably more dominantly there than elseI have always felt myself that probably it was a mistake to put in the original amendment the provision for concurrent power, and for that reason I am somewhat impressed with the suggestion of the Senator from Pennsylvania that that language is not only not necessary but probably unwise.

Mr. GLASS. It is entirely agreeable to me to omit that language.

Mr. REED. Mr. President--

The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Virginia yield to the Senator from Pennsylvania?

Mr. GLASS. I do.

Mr. REED. Then, passing that point, if the Senator will permit another question, it seems to me that it was made clear by the Senator from Montana [Mr. WALSH] and other previous speakers that the phraseology of section 2 of the joint resolution as it came from the committee is more satisfactory than the language in the amendment of the Senator from Virginia. I am wondering if, in the long run, we would not do best by inserting the prohibition against the saloon in section 3, to be added to what the committee has already put in regarding transportation into the dry States.

Mr. GLASS. That has been brought to my attention, and I am unable to see that that course would be any more effective than tha"t proposed in my joint resolution. The language is simple. It is a layman's language. The lawyers find distinctions which I have not comprehension enough to follow and to understand.

Mr. REED. We can not help doing it when the Supreme Court puts those distinctions down as part of the law of the land. ·

Mr. GLASS. Not even the Supreme Court can help doing it, because on important matters its decisions are generally 4 to 5. But I am not willing to make the alteration suggested. Of course, it is for the Senate to say. I think the resolution as prepared, with the modification first suggested by the Senator from Pennsylvania, meets the issue in every respect.

Mr. BULKLEY. Mr. President--

The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Senator from Virginia yield to the Senator from Ohio?

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

Mr. BULKLEY. Does the Senator conceive that, by the modification suggested by the Senator from Pennsylvania, the Congress would be deprived of jurisdiction to enforce the provision carried in the section above?

Mr. GLASS. I want the Federal Government to have as little to do with the matter as possible. I never relished the idea; and, as I stated a while ago, President Wilson never relished the idea, of sending Federal employees into the States, without any understanding of the habits and temperaments of the people of the several States, to enforce a law, and I want to exclude the Federal Government, as far as it is practicable to do so, from having anything to do with this matter. But I do insist upon a constitutional guaranty against the return of the saloon.

The candidates for the Presidency either meant what they said or they did not mean what they said when they stated that they were opposed to the saloon. The political parties, in State convention and in national convention, either meant what they said or were merely thundering in the index to deceive the people when they stated they were opposed to the return of the saloon. If everybody is, as has been suggested, opposed to the return of the saloon, what possible objection can there be to asserting it in the Constitution of the United States and letting the States govern themselves accordingly?

Mr. REED. Mr. President, will the Senator yield to me for one more statement?

Mr. GLASS. I believe the Senator from Ohio rose first.

Mr. BULKLEY. I was only going to suggest that I do not think that even by the acceptance of the modification proposed by the Senator from Pennsylvania the Senator would avoid the problem of Federal enforcement in the respective states.

Mr. GLASS. I do not intend to avoid it completely. I intend that there shall be a constitutional prohibition against a return of the saloon, and a Federal court might invalidate a State law which undertook to disregard the Constitution.

Mr. REED. Absolutely, and it would be binding both on the States regarding action in their territory, and binding on us in Congress regarding the District of Columbia, Alaska, Hawaii, and the other Territories.

Will the Senator permit me to say one more word?

Mr. GLASS. Certainly.

Mr . REED. When the session opened to-day I entered a motion to reconsider the vote by which section 3 was striken out last night. In view of the decision of the Senator from Virginia to omit that last sentence in section 1 of his amendment, while I would like now to make the motion, I will not ask that it be acted upon until after the disposition of the Senator's amendment.

Mr. GLASS. That is very good of the Senator.

Mr. BARKLEY. Mr. President, will the Senator yield to

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

Mr. BARKLEY. I merely desire to suggest to the Senator that the elimination of this concurrent provision in the Senator's resolution would leave his resolution entirely analogous to the provision of the Constitution which now forbids any State to pass a law impairing the obligation of a contract. While there is no jurisdiction in the instrument giving Congress concurrent power to enforce that provision, Congress could enforce it, and would do so in this case.

Mr. GLASS. Mr. President, I want to get back to the vital point of this whole controversy; that is, does Congress want submission, or does it not want submission? That is the whole point. I have been unable to see how it is possible even to get submission, much less ratification, unless we regard the declarations of both of the major parties. How can any Senator on the other side vote against this Senate joint resolution I have proposed? It meets textually the Republican Party platform. How is any Senator on this side able to vote against it, when they overwhelmingly voted on July 16 last to take this resolution up and make it the order of the day, when there is nothing in the resolution which contravenes anything that is in the Democratic national platform, not a thing? It proposes to submit, and to submit, as I conceive, in the only way we can get submission. It meets the spirit of the declaration and the denunciation against the return of the saloon. We are not precluded from doing it simply because the declaration proceeded no further than to say, "We urge the States to enact laws against the return of the saloon."

Mr. BULKLEY. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

Mr. BULKLEY. I am one of those who voted to take up the Senator's resolution last July; but, of course, the resolution was subject to amendment.

Mr. GLASS. Oh, yes.

Mr. BULKLEY. I respectfully differ from the Senator as to this resolution being in adequate compliance with the Democratic platform.

Mr. GLASS. I imagine that there are other Senators who disagree with me; but that does not cause me to relinquish my own view of the matter.

Mr. BULKLEY. I did not want it to appear that I thought the Senator's resolution was a compliance with the Democratic platform merely because many of us voted to take it up last July. Of course, we voted to take it up.

Mr. GLASS. Oh, no; it was not" of course" at all. I had the greatest difficulty in prevailing upon the Senate to take it up.

Mr. BULKLEY. I am speaking of those who want to get the amendment repealed. Naturally we voted to take up the Senator's resolution for consideration, but it was open to amendment, and to the offering of a substitute.

Mr. GLASS. I have great respect for the opinion of my colleague from Ohio, and always have had, in this body and in the other House, but I have not altered my own opinion that a mere harmless and ineffective declaration of a party platform which promises to urge the respective States to do something does not preclude us from doing something in a more effective way, and giving the people of this country a constitutional guaranty against the return of an evil institution which we all say everybody is opposed to.

Mr. CLARK. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

Mr. CLARK. Does not the Senator think there is a very essential difference, as a matter of party declaration, between the declaration of a platform in which the Democratic Party urges the States to take some particular action in dealing with this situation, and writing it into the Constitution of the United Staes?

Mr. GLASS. I say there is a difference, because I think the party-platform declaration was not worth the paper it was written on, and I think the amendment would be worth everything it says.

Mr. STEIWER. Mr. President--

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. FESs in the chair). Does the Senator from Virginia yield to the Senator from Oregon?

Mr. GLASS. I yield.

Mr. STEIWER. Just a moment ago the Senator from Virginia asked the question how the Senators upon the Republican side of the aisle could vote against the Senator's proposal. Speaking only for myself, I want to say that I do not propose to vote against his proposal; on the contrary, unless the Senator's proposal, or some other like reservation, shall be contained in the joint resolution, I shall be obliged to vote against submission at all.

Mr. GLASS. Yes; and many Senators on the other side, and many on this side, occupy the same position.

I do not owe any supreme allegiance to a party declaration that had nothing on earth to do with my presence in the Senate. I was here as the representative of a sovereign State before a few people conspired in a national convention to get a declaration which suited themselves, and which is impossible of being effectuated, either in the Congress, in my judgment, or through an appeal to the States for ratification.

Submit the question of naked appeal to the American people, with the inevitable consequence-let Senators say what they will-that there will be a liquor saloon on every corner of every community, and in every filling station on every highway, and see whether 36 States can be persuaded to ratify any such proposal. .

It is that sort of tyranny of spirit, that sort of mistaken feeling of domination, that almost literally destroyed the Anti-Saloon League, and wrought a damage to the churches and to religion that will not be repaired in the next half a century by the fervent prayers of people who are worthy to wear God's robes in his visible church. It is that sort of thing that destroyed those people, and you had better beware but that it is that sort of thing that will completely upset your plans for the repeal or modification of the eighteenth amendment.

Mr. President, I think I can say no more than I have said, as I feel that I could say. no less than I have said, and I submit the matter to the Senate.

Mr. GORE. Mr. President, the purpose · of the substitute offered by the Senator from Virginia is to prevent the return of the saloon. I share his views upon that subject. I do not wish to see the saloon resurrected. I have often said that the saloon was as dead as human slavery. I have often said that it had no more chance to rise from the dead than human slavery. I can not vote to falsify my own words. I can not help to roll the stone from its grave. I shall, therefore, vote for the Senator's substitute. But I feel obliged to say that, whether his substitute is adopted or rejected, owing to an obligation imposed upon me by the organized Democracy of Oklahoma, I can not vote for either of the resolutions.

Mr. President, I will now have read for the RECORD, rather than for Senators, a plank from the Democratic platform adopted in 1930 in Oklahoma, upon which I made my race for the Senate, and upon which I obtained my commission and the seat which I now hold.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will read.

The Chief Clerk read as follows:

We pledge the people of Oklahoma. that 1f the Democratic candidates for United States Senator and Congress are elected to Congress they will oppose the repeal of the eighteenth amendment or any effort to weaken the Volstead law, unless and until the people themselves, by their expressed will, shall have otherwise directed.

Mr. GORE. Mr. President, the last phrase, " unless and until the people themselves, by their expressed will, shall have otherwise directed," was inserted at my instance and upon my own insistence. Otherwise this declaration, more or less iron-bound, as Senators see, would have been perpetual. Even had the people of Oklahoma in a referendum voted against national prohibition, this pledge as originally drawn would still have bound me. Had the Democracy of Oklahoma in convention assembled adopted a contrary declaration, this pledge would have bound me but for the addition of that phrase. But I interpreted it, and I think the people of Oklahoma interpreted it, to mean some action on the part of the State. I construed it that way, and I do not feel at liberty to disregard that sort of instruction.

I was not bound to accept the nomination on that platform, but I did. I could have renounced it and could have taken my chances, and if elected would not have been bound by this declaration. But I stated during the campaign that I would stand on this platform and carry out this pledge in good faith so long as it stood as the expressed will of the organized Democracy in Oklahoma. I therefore feel bound by this declaration. But for that declaration I would have been in a different situation; in view of the platform adopted at Chicago and in view of the ratification of that platform by the people of my State, I would have been at liberty to act otherwise; but in the circumstances I feel in conscience and in duty bound to obey such explicit instructions so solemnly laid upon me by the Democracy of my State.

Mr. CAPPER. Mr. President, I am opposed to repeal of the eighteenth amendment. So is the State of Kansas, which I represent.

Mr. President, our first duty is to the hungry, the unemployed, the tax-ridden, the impoverished farmers, and other victims of this terrible depression.

I am opposed to the repeal of the eighteenth amendment because I am opposed to the return of the saloon. The wets claim they do not want saloons, but they have not yet told us how they will resume the traffic in liquor without saloons. In the old times the saloon brought untold misery and suffering in its wake, particularly to innocent women and children who had to pay the price for the appetites of husbands and fathers.

The presence of the saloon is a constant temptation to many men. It is a constant menace to the home and to the economic welfare of the women and children. I am unalterably opposed to its return.

Right at this time, in spit,e of the hue and cry, the tumult and the shouting, this Congress has more important things to consider than the proposed legalization of the liquor traffic.

Legalization of the · liquor traffic will not make the liquor traffic law abiding. Whether legal or illegal, those who deal in the manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquor will be lawless. The liquor traffic always has been essentially lawless, whether the traffic is recognized as legal and under regulation, or has been banned as illegal. It always has been lawless, always will be lawless.

Mr. President, the wets tell us that when liquor comes back it will end unemployment, produce prosperity, balance the Budget, make everybody happy; but it will not. We are constantly told that the country gave this Congress a mandate at the November election which directed the Congress to submit this repeal question to the States. Nothing took place in Kansas which could possibly be construed as a declaration for repeal. Every candidate on the State and congressional tickets in Kansas, Republican and Democrat, with one exception, ran on a prohibition platform. The one wet candidate was overwhelmingly defeated.

Right now I think bread is more important than beer. I have received a telegram from the executive board of the Rawlins County Farm Bureau. Rawlins County is in northwest Kansas. The telegram symbolizes the sentiment not only of Kansas but of practically the entire agricultural section of the great West. That telegram says:

We ask that you use your influence in insisting that a farm relief bill be given first consideration in this session of Congress and over any legislation affecting the eighteenth amendment.

That is exactly the stand I propose to take.

Understand, I am speaking from my viewpoint as a Kansan born and bred and as an American citizen who believes he holds the best interests of the people of this Nation at heart. This does not mean that I condemn those who have a different viewpoint but who equally believe they have the best interests of the people of this Nation at heart. Those persons and myself are just in disagreement, that is all. Each has a perfect right to his own convictions, his own belief, and has entire liberty of action to crystallize those convictions and beliefs into action, so far as I am concerned. I am one of those who doubt that making it easier to obtain liquor would lessen the amount of drinking in the United States. In passing, let me say that some of the wets have been making at least one claim in the past few years that on its face is hypocritical. They assert they favor temperance; that repeal of the amendment and abolition of national prohibition enforcement would mean less drinking. That is not true. They want-or most of them wantmore liquor, liquor more easily obtainable.

I doubt very much that making it easier to obtain liquor would lessen the amount of crime, for the very good reason that it never has lessened crime.

I am sure that making it easier to get liquor would increase the number of traffic accidents and all the troubles and miseries that liquor always has increased.

Mr. President, when, some 14 years ago, 46 States voted through their legislatures to place the eighteenth amendment in the Constitution it was not due to any sudden, overnight change of heart. Adoption of the eighteenth amendment was the culmination of many years of observation and experience; the result of testing many and various means for the control of liquor. It was the culmination of a long series of " noble experiments."

The States had tried, with high license, with local option, with State dispensaries, with other means, to make a lawabiding person of John Barleycorn. All these efforts had failed. The fact is John Barleycorn is not cut out for a law-abiding citizen. So the States and the people were looking for something better. They believed that with State and Federal regulation combined John could be looked after and guarded and held in restraint a little more closely in the public interest than he ever had been before.

A good start was made with prohibition. Then New York State, with a great liquor stronghold within its borders and a city government that never had obeyed any liquor law, went back on its agreement. New York early became a backslider. It repealed its State enforcement act and has insisted ever since that prohibition is a failure. A few other States in which the liquor interests and liquor politics have always been strongly intrenched followed New York's example in nullifying the Constitution. • Of course, this did not help the experiment in national prohibition, nor has it been helped by the constant stream of propaganda against the law that has come from that part of the country.

Frankly, I am for continuing the experiment nationally. We went through similar experiences in Kansas for 30 years before we had really effective prohibition enforcement. It must be admitted that national prohibition has not been entirely successful up to date; but I am satisfied, and the · most authentic statistics we have all indicate, that prohibition is doing more good than harm-if it is doing harm. The records of the Treasury and of the Department of Justice, studied calmly and dispassionately, prove the increasing efficiency of the law's enforcement.

I do not believe we should expect to wipe out an age-old curse like the liquor evil by statutory law in a dozen years nor in a score of years. If we are really making progress, as in many respects we undoubtedly are, we should be encourage by this progress, not discouraged, and should proceed to make more progress.

It is said that in spite of prohibition a man can get a drink almost anywhere in the United States. Doubtless that is more or less true. Also a man may still commit murder anywhere in the United States, and many men do, although laws against murder have been on the statute books for ages. Mr. President, if there is any ideal way of handling the liquor traffic I do not believe the world has yet discovered it. In Canada the wets told the people if they would repeal prohibition, lawlessness would decline. Statistics from the office of the Dominion's attorney general show that during the eight years, from 1923 to 1930, lawlessness in the Dominion increased from 18 to 153 per cent. Canada's jails have never been so full as they are now, nor her courts so crowded with business.

All over the world a colossal struggle is going on between right and wrong. Crime has increased everywhere. As the population of the world is larger than ever before, I doubt if it ever has witnessed so gigantic a contest between good and evil as is now taking place.

In this country the wets point to prohibition as the cause of this condition. In Great Britain it is laid to "the motor age, and to the war. In one of its reports the National Probation Commission declares that prohibition is not one of the five major causes of crime in the United States. This fl.atly contradicts the oft-repeated wet argument.

The World War had much to do with this mushroom growth of every kind of wickedness throughout the world. But conditions for its rapid development had long been rife, especially in our graft-ridden American cities.

Greed is responsible for most of our economic troubles. Greed always has been behind the liquor evil. A lifetime of observation has convinced me that we shall never get anywhere by temporizing with liquor. All our history shows we never have.

Speaking in New York City, March 29, 1919, AI Smith, then Governor of New York, said:

The liquor interests have opposed stubbornly, for as many years back as I can remember, every attempt at the regulation of their business.

I wonder if AI Smith really believes those interests would be more amenable to control and regulation now, if they should be flushed with a victory over national prohibition? If we make liquor a State rights problem, as it is proposed to do, provided three-fourths of the States agree, which is not at all certain in spite of the present hysteria on the question, would we not then have 48 prohibition problems instead of 1?

Now, Mr. President, I want to ask one other question: What have the wets to offer in place of national prohibition? So far, nothing except a return to conditions as they were before the days of national prohibition.

For years the wets have been protesting publicly and often that they are in favor of temperance; that they oppose the return of the saloon. The wets' only definite plan so far is the repeal of the eighteenth amendment. I say that means the return of the saloon, and I am opposed to the return of the saloon.

Legalize and reinstate liquor to its old position before we had prohibition, and it will be only a matter of a short time until it will be flaunting its vices openly and publicly and gutterly on every street. Experience shows that the saloon, gambling den, and brothel go hand in hand; and the three, led by the saloon, not only debauch young and old but pollute the body politic, especially in cities, and breed corruption and racketeering.

The wet leaders well know that the moment liquor is legalized, both retailers and manufacturers will form the old-time political ring in order to "liberalize" and do away with wh.atever regulations and restrictions are placed upon their business. Bootleggers-who existed long before we had prohibition-are a corrupt element in the political life of some of our communities, but the bootlegger has much to learn in moral knavery and political skullduggery from the brewers, distillers, and saloon keepers of old days.

Mr. President, the wets are making a campaign of false pretences. They even claim legalization of the liquor traffic would help raise farm prices in this country-but the brewers propose to make beer from imported hops, mixed with some domestic production.

The farm organizations know better than this, and are much opposed to the move to destroy national prohibition. They know the small amounts of farm products used would be more than offset by the loss of dairy products alone. More men would buy more beer; fewer children would get milk.

Right here let me say that I not only am opposed to repeal of the eighteenth amendment but I am opposed to and will vote against any measure proposing ~o legalize the sale of beer of an increased alcoholic content ostensibly for the purpose of raising revenue. I shall oppose it first because I consider that is an attempt at legal nullification of the eighteenth amendment. I shall never support a program which nullifies my Government's Constitution.

In the second place, I am opposed to levying a beer expense of $3,000,000,000 upon the families of the American working men even though it does increase the revenues of the Federal Government a few hundred million dollars.

It is true we must get better farm prices if we are to recover from the economic depression, but beer and whisky will not bring them. My information is that a bushel of corn will produce 4 gallons of whisky. The farmer under the old system got 25 cents for. his bushel of corn. It retailed at $16.40, of which Uncle Sam got $4.40, the manufacturer got $4, the retailer . $7, and transportation costs were $1.15.

Again I say, Mr. President, that there is no help for agriculture in repeal of the eighteenth amendment.

Mr. WATSON. Mr. President, I want to submit a unanimous-consent agreement on the pending question.

Mr. WALSH of Massachusetts. To extend the time for debate?

Mr. WATSON. Yes. I ask unanimous consent that the time for debate be extended until 4.30 o'clock, and that no Senator shall be permitted to speak more than 10 minutes at any time from now on until that hour.

Mr. WALSH of Massachusetts. Mr. President, I hope that will be agreed to.

Mr. BLAINE. Mr. President, will the Senator restate his request?

Mr. WATSON. My request is that the time for debate be extended until 4.30 o'clock this afternoon.

Mr. NORRIS. Why not put it" not later than 4.30 "?

Mr. WATSON. From the number of Senators who have · told me that they wish to speak, I think debate will run until 4.30. However, I will say not later than 4.30, and that no Senator shall speak more than once nor longer than 10 minutes until that time.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?

Mr. BLAINE. The present unanimous-consent agreement is to take a vote upon the resolution and all pending amendments or motions at 3 o'clock.

Mr. WATSON. I am now asking to set aside that agreement and substitute for it another unanimous-consent agreement, which may be done by unanimous consent.

Mr. BLAINE. But the Senator's unanimous-consent request refers only to the length of time a Senator may speak.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Indiana submits a unanimous-consent request that the order by be stated. which we were to vote to-day at 3 o'clock be vacated and that there be substituted therefor the agreement that debate shall continue until tiot later than 4.30 o'clock this afternoon, no Senator to speak more than once nor longer than 10 minutes.

Mr. WATSON. And at 4.30 o'clock a vote shall be taken.

Mr. BLAINE. A vote on the resolution and all pending ordered. amendments and motions in relation thereto?

Mr. WATSON. Yes.

Mr. LA FOLLETTE. Mr. President, may I ask the Senator from Indiana whether the senior Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE] has been consulted concerning the arrangement?

Mr. WATSON. He has not.

Mr. LA FOLLETTE. The senior Senator from Maine, if the Senator will pardon me, is very anxious to leave the city to-night at 6 o'clock because of illness in his family. This morning - he was very anxious to call up one of the appropriation bills after 3 o'clock. May I suggest to the Senator from Indiana that before the agreement is entered into he be given an opportunity to consult with the senior Senator from Maine?

Mr. ROBINSON of Arkansas. Mr. President, may I suggest to the Senator from Indiana that he limit his request at this time to the suggestion that debate be limited so that no Senator shall be permitted to speak more than once or longer than 10 minutes.

Mr. WATSON. I am entirely agreeable to do that.

Mr. ROBINSON of Arkansas. It is true, as stated by the Senator from Wisconsin, that the senior Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE] finds it necessary to leave the city on account of severe illness in his family-the very severe illness of a brother. He would like to obtain consideration of one of the appropriation bills before leaving, if it is possible to do so.

Mr. WATSON. I am in full sympathy with that suggestion, and I thank the Senator from Arkansas for making it.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Indiana asks unanimous consent to limit speeches from now until 3 o'clock to 10 minutes, no Senator to speak more than once.

Mr. WATSON. I am not willing to say that debate shall close at 3 o'clock.

Mr. ROBINSON of Arkansas. The debate has been closed at 3 o'clock by an agreement under which we are now proceeding.

Mr. WATSON. I understand that.

Mr. ROBINSON of Arkansas. I think if the Senator will modify his request so that speeches will be limited to 10 minutes, he will conserve the convenience of the Senate and the convenience of the Senator from Maine; and if that Senator. upon appearing in the Chamber, has no objection to the extension of time. I myself will not object; but this arrangement was made yesterday, and I do not feel that it ought to be changed now in the absence of the Senator from Maine.

Mr. WATSON. I would agree with the Senator, except for the fact that this is a most important question and we are all entitled to discuss it; every Senator wants to explain his views and his vote and his attitude toward his national platform and toward the situation generally.

Mr. ROBINSON of Arkansas. Mr. President, if the Senator persists in the request that he has made, I shall object to it--

Mr. WATSON. I shall not persist.

Mr. ROBINSON of Arkansas. For the reason that I have stated; but, if he will submit a request to limit debate to 10 minutes, so that no Senator may speak more than once or longer than 10 minutes, I will not object to that.

Mr. WATSON. I have submitted that request.

Mr. WillTE. Mr. President, I was going to say that un­ • less my colleague is consulted I shall object to any modification of the unanimous-consent agreement.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the request of the Senator from Indiana?

Mr. BRATTON. Mr. President. I ask that the request may

Mr. HALE. Mr. President, I have not heard the request; I have just come into the Chamber.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The request is that until 3 o'clock debate be limited to 10 minutes on the part of each Senator and that no Senator shall speak more than once. Is there objection? The Chair hears none, and it is so

Mr. DILL. Mr. President, during all my service in Congress I have always voted for prohibition and all measures in support of prohibition. To-day I shall vote for this resolution to submit the repeal of the eighteenth amendment to the States. In casting this vote I shall be entirely consistent. I have never changed my position as to voting on prohibition since . I first came to Congress in 1914, nor shall I do so to-day.

At the election in 1914 the people of the State of Washington voted in their first referendum on prohibition, and in my campaign that year for election to the National House of Representatives I stated that, while I personally favored prohibition, if elected I would be the representative of the people in Congress; that, as such representative, I considered they were greater than I possibly could be; that when they went to the polls and legislated on any public question their will would be supreme, and that I would consider the vote of the majority at the polls to be a mandate which I would obey in Congress by voting on prohibition as they directed. They voted dry. I · kept my pledge with them by voting dry here in Congress.

In 1916 the people of the State of Washington voted again on prohibition on two referendum bills designed to weaken the prohibition laws of the State. They voted overwhelmingly dry, and in every campaign in which I have been a candidate since 1916 I have made the same pledge; namely, that, if reelected, I would vote in Congress on prohibition as the majority of the people of my State voted in a referendum.