You have found an item located in the Kentuckiana Digital Library.
No. 72 "Dangerous Experimentation: A Discussion of Policies and Performances Apparently Based upon the Belief that Perpetual Motion Is Progress and Involving the Squandering of Public Money upon Socialistic Undertakings of Doubtful Constitutionality," October 28, 1935. American Liberty League. 400dpi TIFF G4 page images Digital Library Services, University of Kentucky Libraries Lexington, Kentucky Am_Lib_Leag_72 These pages may freely searched and displayed. Permission must be received for subsequent distribution in print or electronically. No. 72 "Dangerous Experimentation: A Discussion of Policies and Performances Apparently Based upon the Belief that Perpetual Motion Is Progress and Involving the Squandering of Public Money upon Socialistic Undertakings of Doubtful Constitutionality," October 28, 1935. American Liberty League. American Liberty League. Washington, D.C. 1935. This electronic text file was created by Optical Character Recognition (OCR). No corrections have been made to the OCR-ed text and no editing has been done to the content of the original document. Encoding has been done through an automated process using the recommendations for Level 1 of the TEI in Libraries Guidelines. Digital page images are linked to the text file. Pamphlets Available ★ Copies of the following pamphlets and other League literature may be obtained upon application to the League's national headquarters: Statement of Principles and Purposes American Liberty League Its Platform An Analysis of the President's Budget Message Economic Security Inflation The Thirty Hour Week The Holding Company Bill Price Control The Labor Relations Bill Extension of the NRA The Farmers' Home Bill The TV A Amendments The New Deal, Its Unsound Theories and Irreconcilable Policies Speech by Ralph M. Shaw How to Meet the Issue Speech by W. E. Borah The Supreme Court and the New Deal An Open Letter to the President By Dr. Neil Car others The Revised AAA Amendments The President's Tax Program The American Bar The Trustee of American Institutions Speech by Albert C. Ritchie Two Amazing Years Speech by Nicholas Roosevelt Fabian Socialism in the New Deal Speech by Demarest Lloyd The People's Money Speech by Dr. W. E. Spahr Which Road to Take? Speech by J. H. Pew The Blessings of Stability Speech by James W. Wadsworth Legislation By Coercion or Constitution Speech by Jouett Shouse Recovery by Statute Speech by Dr. Neil Carothers Expanding Bureaucracy The Impediment of Democracy Speech by Fitzgerald Hall Lawmaking by Executive Order The Test of Citizenship Speech by Dean Carl W. Ackerman Today's Lessons for Tomorrow Speech by Captain William H. Stayton New Deal Laws in Federal Courts Potato Control "Breathing Spells" Speech by Jouett Shouse The National Labor Relations Act Summary of Conclusions from report of the National Lawyers Committee Consumers and the AAA Straws Which Tell The Duty of the Lawyer in the Present Crisis Speech by James M. Beck The Constitution and the Supreme Court Speech by Borden Burr Budget Prospects AMERICAN LIBERTY LEAGUE NATIONAL PRESS BUILDING WASHINGTON, D. C. DANGEROUS EXPERIMENTATION ★ ★ ★ A Discussion of Policies and Performances Apparently Based upon the Belief that Perpetual Motion Is Progress and Involving the Squan-dering of Public Money upon Socialistic Undertakings of Doubtful Constitutionality AMERICAN LIBERTY LEAGUE T^titional Headquarters NATIONAL PRESS BUILDING WASHINGTON, D. C. Document No. 7a October, 1935 Dangerous Experimentation ★ The present administration avowedly is one of experimentation. If action is the criterion by which to measure achievement, much has been done. From the standpoint of attainment of objectives the results have been disappointing and demonstrate the unsoundness of the theories underlying the experimentation. Too often actual accomplishments not only have fallen far short of the goal but have involved a waste of public funds, infringed upon liberties of citizens and weakened their independence and initiative. The public has become confused in a fog of roseate prophecies. Even social ideals which have actuated some of the experiments have proved misleading. It must be clear to the American people that many actions taken in the guise of social reform have not constituted progress. In carrying out the New Deal program the Constitution has been ignored. The Constitution carefully specifies and limits the purposes for which the Federal Government may spend the money of the taxpayer. But the New Deal is squandering money for many purposes and on many socialistic experiments wholly unauthorized by the Constitution. Even when the Supreme Court declares these New Deal acts unconstitutional, spending of tax money and borrowed funds defiantly continues. Who will pay the bill? Mr. Roosevelt has himself answered that: "Taxes are paid in the sweat of every man who labors." What follows is a recital of the facts with respect to a few of the projects and policies involved in the dangerous experimentation of the administration: i. Rural Resettlement In a burst of enthusiasm for one of the more recent enterprises with social objectives, the President, addressing regional directors of the Rural Resettlement Administration on June 20, 1935, assigned to them "the duty of bringing not only new hope but a new program into the lives of a great many thousands of families." Among early projects to be announced by the Rural Resettlement Administration is the expenditure of $31,000,000 for four "greenbelt" suburban developments to provide low-cost housing for 5,000 low-income families and to serve as models for future American communities. The 2 first of the four is located at Berwyn Heights, Maryland, a few miles from the National Capital. Dubbed "Tugwelltown" by citizens of the area who joined in protests, this project, designed to provide housing and complete community facilities for 1,000 families drawn from low-income groups, is being constructed by labor recruited from transients on relief in the City of Washington. The Washington Post on October 13, 1935, offered the following comments in an editorial entitled "Tugwell's Folly": "Because Washington has been confronting a serious shortage of modern low-cost dwellings, the announcement that the Resettlement Administration will spend $5,500,000 on a housing project at Berwyn Heights, Maryland, may cause some shortsighted enthusiasm. When that project is analyzed, however, it not only must be excluded from the low-cost housing category, but it also stands out as one of the most questionable of all the dubious undertakings for which the New Deal is responsible. "From every angle of consideration this venture in 'resettlement' is undesirable or worse. In the first place it is outrageous that Administrator Tugwell should on his own responsibility distort schemes for the transplantation of families in desolate drought areas into the construction of a residential suburb for the National Capital. Officially Congress knows nothing of this experiment. Worse than that, Congress appropriated the money which Mr. Tugwell is about to spend at Berwyn under the impression that it would be used for very different purposes in the Dakotas, Nebraska and neighboring states. This is the very negation of responsible government. "On the administrative side the botchery of this project is even more apparent. . . . "Scrutiny of the project from the economic viewpoint clinches the impression of its futility. According to Assistant Administrator Alexander the proposed dwellings at Berwyn are intended for 'the very low income groups.' Yet the investment will represent $5,500 for each family to be housed. Homes of this type are customarily sold to families with annual incomes in the neighborhood of $2,000. Since approximately 75 per cent of the Government's own employees earn less than that, it is patently absurd to talk of housing the 'very low income groups' at Berwyn, unless the Government is prepared to offer them permanent rental subsidies. "In the replacement of slums and the provision of houses for destitute families in large cities Government subsidies may be essential. By no feat of reasoning, however, can the Resettlement Administration justify the housing of relief families in dwellings representing an investment of $5,500 apiece. . . . "The Berwyn folly is placed in its proper light by Commissioner Allen's observation that it will afford ideal employment for 2,000 transients accumulated in Washington. . . . When a project of such tremendous implications is defended by saying that it will give work to an assortment of habitual drifters, the time is ripe to sweep away the whole mess and start afresh." 2,. Alaskan Colonisation The Alaskan colonization experiment, launched as part of the movement for the "more abundant life," might be considered comic if it were not so tragic in the lives of many people. This project was initiated early in 1935 by the Rural Rehabilitation Division of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. Subsequently this division was absorbed by the Rural Resettlement Administration. According to the plans as announced, 200 families, including about 1,000 persons taken from the relief rolls of northern Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin, were to be given an opportunity to rehabilitate themselves as homesteaders in the Matanuska Valley in Alaska. The 200 families, some of whom had little or no experience on farms, were shipped to Alaska where they found confusion, poor planning, inefficient management, hardships, discomforts and discouraging prospects. About 40 of the families have returned to the United States. The management has failed to provide ample housing to insure a reasonable degree of comfort during the winter when the temperature at times drops as low as 40 degrees below zero. The Matanuska Valley is a fertile area, but the climate is not suitable for many crops and a market is lacking. Rex Beach, after a personal investigation, presented his observations in an article syndicated by the North American Newspaper Alliance, Inc. "Alaska as a whole would like to see the colonists establish themselves, but its opinion of Government wisdom and its respect for Government-sponsored relief measures have fallen pretty low," said Mr. Beach. "It thinks Uncle Sam has made an ass of himself." Mr. Beach reported that the total cost probably would be $5,000,000 instead of an estimated $1,250,000 and "the most optimistic forecast I have heard is that 50 families will stick and dig their toes in." "In that event," commented Mr. Beach, "those hardy frontier families will have cost us taxpayers $100,000 apiece." Mr. Beach quoted a Juneau citizen as saying that many of the colonists "don't know which 4 end of a horse to put a collar on or the part of a cow that gives milk, and by another year two-thirds of them will have quit" and that the project was being "managed to death" with 17 department heads, or more than one for every 10 families remaining. Just why the "new Pilgrim Fathers" should have been sent to remote Alaska when there is an abundance of idle farm land nearer at hand where climatic conditions are more favorable is one of the mysteries of "economic planning." 3. Subsistence Homesteads In the early days of the present administration considerable emphasis was placed upon subsistence homesteads as one of the important means of promoting social ends. According to a prospectus issued in April, 1934, the aim was a "combination of part-time industrial employment with part-time agriculture, as well as a combination of the best elements of both city and country living." The prime problem of the subsistence homesteads program, it was stated, was "to demonstrate how such settlements may be made possible through the- extension of credit facilities and by guiding homesteaders in various economic and social factors contributing to the fullest realization of their opportunities." Recently, since the former Subsistence Homesteads Division of the Interior Department was absorbed by the Rural Resettlement Administration, the subsistence homesteads have been pushed into the background. The elaborate plans failed to work out as expected. It became apparent that the taxpayers would not get their money's worth and that social objectives would not be achieved. The "Experimental Community" at Reedsville, West Virginia, first to be established of 62 projects originally planned, remains as an example of what happens when misguided zealots obtain access to the public treasury. The first announcements, when subsistence homesteads were under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of the Interior, indicated that Reedsville was to be used as "a testing ground for experiments in community management and education, and in methods of farming and other activities connected with subsistence homestead-ing." An initial allotment of $900,000 was increased to $1,500,000. The homesteads have from three to five acres of ground. Schools were built with pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, elementary and high school classrooms, a combined 5 auditorium and gymnasium, school offices, a lunch room and a health center with offices for a doctor and a nurse. Barns built on homesteads are equipped with fancy gadgets for farm livestock and city motor cars. The progress of the Reedsville "Experimental Community" has been marked by errors of judgment which have proved expensive to the taxpayers. Ready-made houses were purchased which proved unsuitable to the climate of the region and had to be rebuilt. According to a statement attributed to Charles E. Pynchon, General Manager of the Subsistence Homesteads Corporation, the Government will lose about $3,000 each on 190 houses in the project. Houses costing nearly $8,000 are being sold to homesteaders for an average of $4,900 with payments over a thirty-year period and interest at only three per cent. The difference between the sale price and the cost is charged up as a Government subsidy to the homesteaders, and will have to be paid in the last analysis by the rank and file of the people of the whole country. Originally, it was proposed to establish a factory at Reedsville- to manufacture supplies for the Post Office Department, now furnished by private industry. When the Congress prohibited that particular activity, those in charge of the project entered into a contract for the construction of a factory of a different sort, thereby defying the Congress and acting without proper authority. After a considerable part of the contract price had been paid, the transaction was held up by the Comptroller General as illegal. 4. The National Youth Administration A purpose to promote education has been stressed in connection with the creation of the National Youth Administration for which $50,-000,000 originally was allotted by the President out of the $4,000,000,000 appropriation supposed to be spent for work relief. According to a White House statement it is intended not only to provide employment for the younger generation but to make possible continued attendance at high school for about 100,000 boys and girls, continued attendance at college for about 120,000 and post-graduate educational work for a selected group of several thousand. For a great many years there has been agitation for the establishment of a Department of Education with a Cabinet Secretary of Educa- tion. The Congress repeatedly has refused to endorse the plan on the ground that it would constitute serious infringement on states' rights. Education is essentially the function of the individual states. The Federal Government has no proper power of administration over it. Through the National Youth Administration there is the danger that the Federal Government may attempt by indirection the jurisdiction over education which has been repeatedly denied it by the Congress. It would seem to be axiomatic that if the Federal Government could properly and constitutionally take control of education, the work should be conducted in close cooperation with the recognized educational authorities. The comments of educators make it evident that politics has taken precedence over education or even social reform. The program for the National Youth Administration was worked out by the Office of Education of the Interior Department, which office is nothing more or less than a fact-finding bureau and has no jurisdiction over education as such. The program was placed under the joint control of the Treasury Department and the Works Progress Administration. The Administration has loudly proclaimed that youth is to receive a gift of $50,000,000. But the fact that these same youths and the balance of their generation are to be burdened with a debt of perhaps thirty billions has been persistently soft-pedaled. Willard E. Givens, Executive Secretary of the National Education Association, in an article entitled "New Deal a Raw Deal for Public Schools" in the September issue of the Journal of the Asociation, says: "But the extravagance of the program is not its worst fault. It is being built around a staff of Federal and State workers who are politically appointed. Their responsibility to the people is so indirect as to be almost negligible. The long-established politically-free methods of school administration are being circumvented by the New Deal." Protest against the methods being used in the National Youth Administration was voiced by Mrs. Eugene Meyer of Washington, D. C, in an address before the National Recreation Congress at Chicago on October 4. "The administration's purposes may be of the purest, but its methods in assigning the youth funds justify us in suspecting the worst," said 7 Mrs. Meyer. "The indications are already clear that this plan to help education, though intended as a feather in the administration's cap, will eventually become another feather in its nest. "Let us not forget that Federal control of education and recreation is one of the most important steps toward Fascism or Communism." 5. Public Schools The school authorities of the country are greatly disturbed over tendencies of the administration in connection with many phases of education. Money has been spent lavishly for projects of a supposedly educational character under various emergency agencies at the same time that the established public schools have had difficulty in securing sufficient funds to carry on their regular work. The Federal Emergency Relief Administration organized new schools, including nurseries, adult classes, vocational training, parent education and rehabilitation centers instead of coming to the aid of states in which schools were being forced to close because of lack of funds. The Works Progress Administration has embarked upon an educational program in which one of the regulations prohibits the use of unemployed public school teachers and stipulates that persons employed in connection with it need not have teaching certificates. As stated by Mr. Givens in his article on "New Deal a Raw Deal for Public Schools," "the New Dealers invented plain and fancy schooling, managed in a way to give the jitters to educators whose policy is to shun waste. While a few youngsters were being taught harmonica playing, fancy lariat throwing, and boondoggling, some hundreds of thousands of less fortunate ones throughout the United States were being denied a decent health program or were doing without a full year's work in arithmetic, reading and history." Mr. Givens thus states the position of the National Education Association: "The National Education Association believes in Federal aid to education without Federal control. It asks that financial assistance be given to already-established schools. It believes that in the preparation of young people for the duties of citizenship, reading, writing, and arithmetic should take precedence over harmonica blowing, lariat throwing, and boondoggling. It would keep education in the hands of educators and formal educational opportunity in the schools. It is unalterably opposed to politics in education. The experience of certain for- eign countries shows plainly that political domination of the schools and political administration of youth are inimical to democracy. They are dangerous steps to be taken by a people devoted to popular government." One of the criticisms offered by the National Education Association against educational tendencies of the present administration relates to the funds for child welfare provided in the Social Security Act. Under this act the responsibilities for the care and development of handicapped children are placed in the Department of Labor rather than in the Office of Education of the Interior Department. According to the educational authorities, the millions of dollars appropriated should have been allocated to the states through the Office of Education to strengthen work already engaged in by the public schools. Their contention is that the methods adopted tend toward bureaucratic control of education after the manner of a Fascist or Communist state. In the last analysis, when all is said and done, education is a state function and there is no warrant in the Constitution for the establishment of any Federal body to administer a public school. 6. Civil Service Hand in hand with any program stressing social objectives should go regard for the integrity of the Government Civil Service. Except in comparatively rare instances where political considerations have entered into the employment or retention of the rank and file of Government workers, there has been gratifying progress heretofore toward a permanent Civil Service based upon merit. In recent letters from Luther C. Steward, President of the National Federation of Federal Employees, and H. Eliot Kaplan, Secretary of the National Civil Service Reform League, to President Roosevelt, it was charged that the professions of loyalty to the Civil Service by this administration have proved insincere. The letters were written after the President in reply to previous communications had informed them that "the merit system has been and will continue to be extended during my administration." Mr. Steward in a letter to the President under date of September 25, 1935, said: "We feel strongly, on the basis of incontrovertible factual evidence, that the merit system has been dangerously disregarded not only by Congressional enactment but by administrators and supervisory officials who apparently have been unchecked in their return to an outright spoils policy. "As we have stated, the wholesale disregarding of the merit system complained of is not confined to Congressional enactments. We respectfully call to your attention that in Washington and in the field administrators have handed out literally thousands of positions on the basis of but a single yardstick namely, party affiliation and loyalty. We submit earnestly that commendable though party loyalty may be, it is not in the public interest that it be made the sole or the determining factor in Federal employment." Mr. Kaplan in a letter to the President asserted that "it is obvious from the debates in the Senate and House that there was and still is a persistent and concerted effort to exploit the recovery agencies for patronage purposes." A report of the Civil Service Commission at the close of the last fiscal year stated that all positions in certain Government establishments, which employ a total of 106,627 persons, were exempt from Civil Service laws. For the most part these establishments were created under the present administration. 7. NRA Jobs The present NRA organization stands as a costly monument to.experimentation in the field of industry. Although the regulation of industry under the NRA was discontinued when the Supreme Court on May 27,1935, held the code section of the law to be unconstitutional, information given only when demanded by Senator William H. King of Utah showed that on September 7 there were still 2760 employees with aggregate annual salaries of $7,025,220. Under authority of the joint resolution of the Congress extending the sections of the National Industrial Recovery Act which were not involved in the case before the Supreme Court, it is apparently the intention of the administration to continue most of the employees on the payroll until April 1, 1936. The information obtained by Senator King, which is of a character not ordinarily made public, showed that among the 2072 persons employed in the City of Washington, 473 were receiving salaries of $4,000 or more. Among them were about a dozen executives with salaries of from $8,000 to $8,500, about 30 Deputy Administrators and others with salaries of $6,800 and 10 numerous others with salaries of $6,000, $5,200, $4,500 and $4,000. The salaries for lawyers alone aggregate nearly half a million dollars annually. Of the 688 employees outside of Washington, 68 were receiving salaries of $4,000 or more. The facts brought to light by Senator King included a disclosure of one of the methods by which the administration without authority of the Congress continues to carry on its questionable experiments. The NRA organization was set up by executive order under general authority vested in the President to appoint such officers and employees as might be necessary to carry out the purposes of the National Industrial Recovery Act. Funds to meet the payrolls were obtained by allotment from the public works fund. It is now disclosed through Senator King's demand for information that 11 employees on the NRA payroll are actually working for the White House and that 77 employees are assigned to the Federal Trade Commission. If they conform to the law, the White House, the Federal Trade Commission and all other regular establishments must obtain specific authority for all employees. 8. Unemployment In his inaugural address on March 4, 1933, the President said that "our greatest primary task is to put people to work." Much of the experimentation of the administration has been projected with the avowed intention to solve the unemployment problem. The promises made when the administration embarked upon such experiments as those involved in the NRA, the public works program and the work-relief program have not been fulfilled. The October, 1935, Monthly Survey of Business of the American Federation of Labor estimates industrial unemployment at 11,000,000, or more than in 1934 and about the same as in the fall of 1933. The Survey of the Federation says: "While unemployment in Germany, England and Italy has declined and the jobless army in Europe has shrunk from 8,400,000 to 7,400,000 in the last year, American industry has not succeeded in putting the unemployed to work. There are 50 per cent more out of work in America today than in all Europe." The NRA was an experiment with a theory which proved to be unsound. It was maintained that industry would be stimulated by an increased purchasing power resulting from higher wages and shorter hours. What actually happened was that the added costs imposed upon industry retarded recovery and the higher prices wiped out any gains in incomes of wage earners. The business recovery which has taken place since the Supreme Court decision in the NRA case has demonstrated that the release from restrictions has been beneficial to industry. This means that the NRA experiment actually retarded business recovery. The $3,300,000,000 public works fund incorporated in the National Industrial Recovery Act of June, 1933, was expected by the administration to provide a large amount of employment and to prime the industrial pump sufficiently to insure speedy recovery. Even yet, after nearly two and one-half years not more than a few hundred thousand persons have been employed from this fund. As a pump primer the plan was a dismal failure. The $4,000,000,000 work-relief fund was intended to remove 3,500,000 persons from the relief rolls. Moreover, it was promised that the work-relief projects would be such as to be of permanent economic benefit. The President, in January, 1935, told the Congress that all the work should be useful "in the sense that it affords permanent improvements in living conditions or that it creates future new wealth for the Nation." When the huge appropriation first was sought, the impression was conveyed that a complete program had been worked out both as to the allotment of the money and as to the administrative details. It developed that even such outlines of the plan as existed had to be changed in almost every respect. As late as August 2 the President gave assurance that from 90 to 95 per cent of the employable idle would be put to work by November 1, but nothing like this has been accomplished. The experimentation in connection with this proposal has passed through several stages. It has proved impossible to create jobs as rapidly as was planned. In order to come anywhere near the fulfillment of the schedule arranged by the administration, it has been necessary to turn to workers who were not on relief rolls. The inauguration of work-relief projects thus has not been accompanied by a corresponding reduction in relief costs. Official statistics made public October 18 showed only 1,310,733 persons at 12 work under governmental emergency projects. Included in this total were many who had not been on relief rolls. Projects which offered some hope of economic advantage were for the most part abandoned after administration officials disagreed among themselves on policies. Public funds are being poured out for projects which cannot possibly be justified by any standard except that of creating payrolls. The shift from direct relief to work relief was supposed to be desirable from a social standpoint in that it would improve the morale of people in distress by reason of the depression. The work-relief program has not been so managed as to produce any such result. 9. The AAA When the President sought the enactment of the Agricultural Adjustment Act in the spring of 1933, he told the Congress that the program was of an experimental character. "I tell you frankly," said the President, "that it is a new and untrod path but I tell you with equal frankness that an unprecedented condition calls for the trial of new means to rescue agriculture. If a fair administrative trial of it is made and it does not produce the hoped-for results, I shall be the first to acknowledge it and advise you." After nearly two and one-half years of experimentation under the AAA, a rising tide of protest against high prices is evident among consumers. The curtailment of production has only helped to aggravate price advances due chiefly to the drought. The different methods employed with respect to different commodities have disrupted normal relationships with a consequent injury to many producers. Farmers have been regimented in a manner alien to American traditions. The restrictions imposed upon domestic production have encouraged imports of agricultural commodities. Export markets, particularly for cotton, have been destroyed. In the South tenant farmers and farm workers have been impoverished. The cotton textile industry has been injured by the high prices of raw cotton and by the processing tax. The milling, meat packing, tobacco manufacturing and other industries from which processing taxes are collected have been affected adversely, and the whole people made to suffer as a result of higher prices for the necessities of life. Despite the many injurious effects of the AAA 13 program, the administration has not only refused to acknowledge its failure, but by recent amendments is endeavoring to prolong its life regardless of a possible adverse decision by the Supreme Court on the original act. 10. MonetaryJPolicies Monetary policies have been the subject of radical experimentation. In a radio speech on May 7, 1933, the President said that "the administration has the definite objective of raising commodity prices to such an extent that those who have borrowed money will, on the average, be able to repay that money in the same kind of dollar which they borrowed." It was proposed by monetary means to raise the price level. Prices have gone up without question. Except in the case of a few commodities in international trade, the price increases have been due to other factors, including the drought, AAA control of agriculture, and NRA regulation of industry. High prices have been a burden to all classes of citizens. It would have been sounder policy to center attention on proper price relationships. The theory that prices can be controlled by manipulation of the value of gold has been repudiated by monetary authorities of eminent standing throughout the world. Even high administration officials have admitted that the experiment with this theory has proved it to be fallacious. The President in his inaugural message said that he would "spare no effort to restore world trade by international economic readjustment." His monetary experimentation, however, has nullified all efforts in this direction and has been a major factor in the continuance of uncertainties which prevent a revival of world trade. The monetary experimentation has extended to silver. In the face of an overwhelming opinion by recognized economic and financial experts in opposition to a more extensive use of silver in the monetary system, the administration adopted policies put forward by groups whose political support was advantageous. Instead of helping trade with the Orient, the policies adopted have proved ruinous to silver-using countries and have led to retaliation against the United States. The large stocks of silver accumulated by the Treasury have added to monetary uncertainties and have provided no economic benefit. Costly as Well as Dangerous The experimentations of various kinds pursued by the administration have shown results vastly different from those promised. Fantastic theories have failed to stand the test of trial. Manipulation of economic factors has produced complications leading to a new assortment of evils. Projects coated with the sanctity of social reform have failed to bestow benefits except of a paternalistic character which weaken the fiber of the people. Through many of the experiments runs a purpose to change the institutions which have grown up under the Constitution. The failure of experiments might be tolerated for a short period in an acute emergency or for a longer time if involving no substantial drain upon the Treasury. Not only have the administration's half-baked theories proved misguided but the cost of experimentation has been tremendous. Annual expenditures of the Federal Government have been double those of the period before the depression. The continuance of an unbalanced budget threatens difficulties more alarming than anything that heretofore has occurred. There is increasing recognition of the fact, as demonstrated in the case of the NRA, that recovery is proceeding in spite of, rather than because of, experimentation. The present situation demands an end of experimentation and not merely a breathing spell. Such a course will facilitate a return to sound fiscal policies and to principles consistent with the Constitution, as well as assure a marked improvement in business conditions. 14 IS