bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
“The Bearing of Myers v. United States upon the Independence of Federal Administrative Tribunals”—A Criticism
Authors: Langeluttig Albert
Published: May 2006

In a recent issue of the Review, Professor James Hart, of Johns Hopkins University, has advocated a limitation upon the doctrine announced in the Myers case so that Congress may prescribe the terms of office of the members of the various quasi-judicial administrative tribunals, and incidentally that of the Comptroller-General.

The present writer's views on the status of the Comptroller-General are expressed elsewhere. He also dissents from Professor Hart's views on the expediency of granting to the various administrative tribunals any different terms of office from those which the Chief Justice indicated in the Myers case that they already have. This dissent is not a little supported by the practical suggestion of Dr. Hart. He indicates that “constitutional mores” are alone not enough to regulate the President's actions in exercising his power to remove, but that a definite term and formula should be prescribed and “constitutional mores” then depended upon to keep the President within the bounds of the formula. The limited experience of the present writer indicates that it is easier to satisfy a formula which is presumed to prescribe justice than to satisfy the dictates of justice on the facts of each case.

Expediency, however, is a matter of opinion. One who attempts to criticize the logic and technique of another must accept the other's views of expediency.
State Constitutional Development in 1935
Authors: Benson George C. S.
Published: May 2006

The year 1935—being one of the alternate years during which state politicians exert their persuasive talents in the capitols and not on the hustings—witnessed 44 regular and 21 special sessions of state legislatures. And only the Virginians entirely eschewed both regular and special legislating for the twelve-month period. But despite the 7,400 zealous legislators busily law-bent, and the thousands of new statutes now ornamenting the statute-books for better or for worse, only 40 constitutional amendments successfully emerged from preliminary contests and qualified for the final test match with the electorate. Of these, 25 were victorious. Most votes on constitutional amendments are reserved for the year of regular elections.
Organization of the Executive Branch of the National Government of the United States; Changes between March 15 and June 30, 1934
Authors: Schmeckebier L. F.
Published: May 2006

In the December, 1933, issue of the REVIEW, pp. 942–955, appeared a tabular review of the changes in major units of the national government between March 4 and November 1, 1933. In the April, 1934, issue, pp. 250–254, appeared a supplementary list showing the changes between November 1, 1933, and March 1, 1934. The present list indicates the reorganization effected and new units created between March 15 and June 30,1934. As in previous lists, mention is made of units only specifically authorized by law or established by the President under general authority vested in him.
Planning Agencies in America
Authors: Merriam Charles E.
Published: May 2006

An important and clearly marked recent trend in American government is that in the direction of systematic planning—local, state, and national. City planning has developed for the last twenty years, and there are now some 700 city planning agencies. The activities of these boards have been halted somewhat during the depression, although some 9,000 workers under the C.W.A. aided in the development of city plans in 1934. On the whole, the cities have fallen behind in the movement they started.

The most significant single event in the urban field is the establishment of a new type of planning agency in Cincinnati, known as the department of economic security, an office through which the employment and reëmployment problems of that community are made the subject of governmental study and action, in cooperation with industry. The director is a man of wide experience and broad social vision in the person of Colonel Waite, one time city manager of Dayton and recently deputy administrator of public works
The Social Security Program of the United States
Authors: Harris Joseph P.
Published: May 2006

The Federal Social Security Act, which may be regarded as the central core of the social security program, is an omnibus act, containing the following features: (1) a national, compulsory oldage insurance plan, covering all employees except certain exempted groups; (2) two measures designed to stimulate the states to enact state unemployment compensation laws, namely, (a) a uniform nation-wide tax upon employers, against which a credit is allowable for contributions made to approved state unemployment compensation plans, and (b) subsidies to the states to cover the administrative costs of unemployment compensation; and (3) grants-in-aid to the states for old-age assistance, pensions for the blind, aid to dependent children, child welfare, maternal and child health, vocational rehabilitation, and public health activities. It is estimated that each of the two forms of social insurance will apply to about 25,000,000 wage-earners, and, when the maximum rates become effective in 1949, will involve annual contributions of nearly $3,000,000,000. This amount is approximately equal to the normal annual expenditure of the federal government prior to 1930. In addition, the grants-in-aid to the states were estimated by the actuaries of the President's Committee on Economic Security to reach a total of a half-billion dollars annually within a few years.

History of the Federal Act

When, in a message to Congress on June 8, 1934, the President indicated that he would submit a program of social insurance for consideration at the following session, the Wagner-Lewis unemployment insurance bill and the Dill-Connery old-age assistance bill were pending. Shortly afterwards, the President, by executive order, created the Committee on Economic Security, consisting of the Secretaries of Labor (chairman), Treasury, and Agriculture, the Attorney-General, and the Federal Emergency Relief Administrator. This committee appointed Professor Edwin E. Witte, of the University of Wisconsin, as executive director, and proceeded to build up a staff of actuaries and experts to study the whole problem of economic insecurity, and to prepare recommendations.
Party Organization in Philadelphia: The Ward Committeeman
Authors: Salter John T.
Published: May 2006

“They asked me my party; I told them Republican. That's Sam Lit's party, ain't it?” The speaker was a small, dark-visaged young man. He had addressed his question to Mr. Lit's partner on the ward committee in the first ward. It was the night of registration day, and the young Italian had just registered. Not only were the genius of the Republican party, its traditional issues, and the great leaders from Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt to Herbert Hoover obliterated, or non-existent, to him, but the important local issues of the impending (1931) mayoralty and councilmanic campaigns as well. The one thing in the party process that mattered was the personality of Sam Lit, the ward committeeman. This potential voter is one of the thousands in America's third city that illustrate the general statement: “We cannot be much interested in, or moved by, the things we do not see. Of public affairs, each of us sees very little, and therefore they remain dull and unappetizing until somebody with the makings of an artist has translated them into a moving picture. …Being flesh and blood, we will not feed on words and names and grey theory.”
The Administration of Mandates by the British Dominions
Authors: Ilsley Lucretia L.
Published: May 2006

The former German colonies occupied by the Dominions in 1914 were entrusted to them, as mandatories under the League of Nations, at the Peace Conference of 1919. Of these territories, administered as C mandates since December, 1920, three are located in the South Seas. Western Samoa, now a mandate1 of New Zealand, is the larger part of a small group of islands; New Guinea, a mandate of Australia, consists of the northwestern portion of the large island of New Guinea and numerous smaller islands; while Nauru, a British Empire mandate administered by Australia, is a tiny phosphate island. The fourth Dominion mandate, South-West Africa, is a large and somewhat arid territory adjoining the Union of South Africa, which acts as mandatory.
Law and Sovereignty
Authors: Pennock J. Roland
Published: May 2006

Political theorists have spilt much ink in controversies over “sovereignty,” while probably even more effort has been devoted to discussion of the nature of law. It cannot be said that the result of all this activity has been to produce a body of generally accepted doctrine, or even that it has greatly clarified the field of discussion. On the contrary, misunderstandings and the abuse of terms have contributed greatly to a general fog.

The real issue raised by the pluralists is much more than a question of logic. They challenge the premises of their opponents. They deal largely with the question of the limits of political obligation. With that we are not here concerned. The primary purpose of this article is to search for a meaning of “law” that will at once contribute to the clarification of the question as to the nature of law and aid in the determination of the most helpful legal signification of the term “sovereignty.” The accomplishment of this purpose should aid in settling the incidental questions of the nature of “constitutional law,” the possibility of “nullifying” law, and the status of “international law.”

The two subjects—law and sovereignty—are frequently treated independently, but they are so inter-related as to render such treatment inadequate. A brief examination of the controversy over “sovereignty” will demonstrate how it ultimately resolves itself into a question of the definition of law.
An Approach to a Science of Administration
Authors: Stene Edwin O.
Published: May 2006

Writers on public administration place much emphasis upon the possibilities and importance of discovering and applying scientific principles in their field of study. But very few of them have ventured to state the basic premises upon which they seek to build that science. Many of those whose writings imply that major principles have been discovered announce, not premises, but conclusions, which, regardless of their practical merits, can hardly be called anything but opinions. On the other hand, several scholars seek to escape from errors of commission by avoiding the use of such scientific terms as “principles” or “efficiency.” If they go beyond descriptive analyses to advocate particular plans of organization or methods of procedure, they use terms which denote value judgments, thereby admitting by implication that they are expressing mere opinions. In a few published discourses, basic premises are stated and reasoning is developed therefrom. However, most of those premises—or “principles”—are referred to by name only, such as “the principle of leadership”; they are not stated in terms of precise causal relations which can be verified or which can serve adequately as bases for further reasoning.

It may be regarded as unwise to venture a statement of what one considers the basic premises upon which a science of administration may be built. But every body of theory is built upon fundamental assumptions, either expressed or implied. Moreover, a body of theory is complete, and has scientific value, only when the premises are sufficiently clear to permit objective scrutiny and verification. Erroneous hypotheses, stated precisely, may be more scientific than vague or unexpressed assumptions; for only the former will lend themselves to verification. In other words, trial and error is an essential part of scientific method.
Organization of the Executive Branch of the National Government of the United States: Changes between June 1 and November 30, 1937
Authors: Schmeckebier L. F.
Published: May 2006

As in previous lists, mention is here confined generally to units specifically authorized by law or established by the President by executive order under general authority vested in him. Changes in units created by heads of departments or independent establishments are excluded unless of major importance.

Advisory Board for Bonneville Project. Created by Public Act No. 329, 75th Congress, approved August 20, 1937, to furnish advice to the administrator of the Bonneville project. It is composed of four members representative of the Secretary of War, the Secretary of the Interior, the Federal Power Commission, and the Secretary of Agriculture, and designated by them respectively.
Small States and a New League—From the Viewpoint of Norway
Authors: Hambro Edvard
Published: May 2006

It is right that post-war planning should be made the subject of popular discussion. It is, on the whole, a healthy sign that so many books and articles are devoted to the winning of the peace, although some of them indubitably create a smoke screen of confusion. The same applies to committees and other organizations for the same purpose. These committees and their statements have two things in common: innumerable and inconclusive quotations from democratic leaders and illustrations drawn from the “success” of, or “failure” of, the League of Nations.

The “Four Freedoms,” the “Atlantic Charter,” the “Declaration of the United Nations,” as well as other speeches, articles, and statements of all sorts are vague and all-comprising. They give ample scope for divergent interpretations. It should also be remembered that President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill, important though their utterances are, speak for themselves. They cannot bind Congress or Parliament, although it is true that the British Parliament feels a strong loyalty to the leader of the nation.

These two characteristics of the declarations of program give great scope to the professors, diplomats, politicians, journalists, and other prophets who dream of the future. Those of the soberer cast of mind try not to indulge in the luxury of day dreams. They realize that the future must be built on the experience of the past. They ask searching questions about the League.
Constitutional Law in 1941–1942: The Constitutional Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States in the October Term, 1941
Authors: Cushman Robert E.
Published: May 2006

The vacancies on the Supreme Court caused by the retirement of Mr. Justice McReynolds and Chief Justice Hughes were filled by President Roosevelt during the summer of 1941. When the Court convened in October, Mr. Justice Stone, originally appointed by President Coolidge, became Chief Justice. Chief Justice White was the only other associate justice to be promoted to the Chief Justiceship. Senator James F. Byrnes of South Carolina, and Attorney General Robert H. Jackson of New York took their seats as associate justices. Thus seven justices have been placed on the Court by President Roosevelt. Any idea, however, that these Roosevelt appointees conform to any uniform pattern of thought is belied by the fact that in the 75 cases in the 1941 term turning on important questions of either constitutional law or federal statutory construction, there were dissents in 36, and 23 of these dissents were by either three or four justices. No act of Congress has been declared unconstitutional since May, 1936, when the Municipal Bankruptcy Act was held invalid. Since 1937, the Court has overruled 20 previous decisions, mentioning them by name, while it has modified or qualified a number of others.
An Areal Study of the German Electorate, 1930–1933
Authors: Pollock James K.
Published: May 2006

A great deal has been said as to whether Hitler is really representative of the German people. Books have been written to show that he is merely the latest in a long line of German romanticists, racialists, and Pan-Germans. In most of these studies, the German people are lumped together in one mass without much differentiation. In analyzing public attitudes, however, it is desirable to be as particular and specific as possible, and to break up opinion groups into all their component parts. Therefore, without desiring to minimize the emphasis already placed on the evil influences which have had such a strong and continuing effect upon the generality of Germans and the course of their history, it is proposed here to study German political opinions district by district during a critical period. It is the purpose of this investigation to ascertain whether German voters reacted uniformly as a mass when they were presented with a crucial decision. Did the reawakening of German nationalism and Pan-Germanism by Hitler evoke a uniformly strong response throughout the length and breadth of the country, or were the German people genuinely divided in their attitude toward Nazism—the latest version of rampant German nationalism?
The Illinois Congressional Redistricting Case
Authors: Burdette Franklin L.
Published: May 2006

Unsuccessful as plaintiffs and appellees in a prayer for relief under the Federal Declaratory Judgment Act of 1934, as amended, from the effects of the inequitable and outmoded act of Illinois of 1901 creating the present Congressional districts, Kenneth W. Colegrove (who in other capacities is chairman of the department of political science at Northwestern University and secretary-treasurer of the American Political Science Association), Peter J. Chamales, attorney, and Kenneth C. Sears, professor of law at the University of Chicago, have nevertheless received from the District Court and from the Supreme Court encouraging dicta and dissent which foreshadow new developments in election law.

The legislature of Illinois has repeatedly refused to redistrict the state for Congressional representation, despite grave and increasing population shifts. A new but inequitable Congressional redistricting act, passed by the General Assembly in 1931, was declared unconstitutional by the state supreme court because it violated federal law and the provision of the Illinois constitution requiring that “all elections shall be free and equal.” Ten years later, when a similar attack was made on the long-standing and much more discriminatory act of 1901, the Illinois supreme court took an opposite view, declaring that the constitutional section is addressed primarily to the legislature and that to argue for a requirement, in all cases, that districts be equal in population “is to assert a millennium which cannot be reached.”
Military Occupation and German Revolution
Authors: Sollmann William F.
Published: May 2006

In discussing the problems of military government, some writers have recalled critically the fact that in 1918 the armies of occupation did not coöperate with the workers' and soldiers' councils in Germany. Did this really mean that the commanding officers hampered Germany's transition from a half-absolutist monarchy to a democratic republic? What was the position of the workers' and soldiers' councils in the total population? How did the occupation armies act toward the democratic movements in Germany? As one of the leaders of the revolution against the Emperor, and as a close observer of the foreign armies in my home province, the Rhineland, I may be justified in presenting some facts and experiences.

When on November 11 I read in Paragraph V of the armistice agreement that “the left bank of the Rhine shall be administered by the local authorities under the control of the troops of occupation,” I informed my friends in the Cologne workers' and soldiers' council that this undoubtedly meant the end of that council on the day of the arrival of the foreign troops. It was clear that we were no “local authorities.” Nowhere had the councils replaced the civil servant administration of the former régime. Why not? Simply because the social-democratic labor movement, which alone backed the councils, was in most places, on the left bank of the Rhine, a small minority. Only by using terror against a large majority of the population could we have eliminated the existing civil servant administration. Such terror was against the democratic principles and traditions of our movement. Incidentally, even the wildest radicals knew in those days of threatening chaos that a sudden break-up of a centuries-old civil servant administration would mean grave disaster, especially in shipping the necessary supplies to the exhausted population.
II. Technical Requirements
Authors: Colm Gerhard
Published: May 2006

Maintaining high-level production and employment is widely recognized today as a desirable objective of government policy. Those who oppose the government's accepting express responsibility for the achievement of this objective insist that government in a free-enterprise economy is not equipped to live up to such a responsibility. Criticism comes from two sides. Protagonists of a laissez-faire economy fear that a government pledged to assure full employment will be driven into more and more planning and regimentation. Protagonists of a planned economy, on the other hand, insist that any attempt to solve the problem of full employment within the framework of free enterprise will be futile. They fear that such an effort will only delay the transition to a planned economy, which they believe is the only final solution of our economic and social problems. Both kinds of critics maintain that the technical requirements of a policy designed to maintain full employment are incompatible with a free-enterprise economy.

What, then, are the technical requirements of a policy of full employment? Is the government equipped, or can it be equipped, to do the job without paying the price of adopting a regimented economy? Perhaps those who speak of full employment in a free-enterprise economy are driven into the same dilemma in which the oldster found himself when telling his grandchild about the alligator chasing the frog. The frog jumped from the log into the river, swam through the river, hopped on land—the alligator coming closer and closer. When the alligator finally cornered the frog under a tree and opened his mouth to swallow him, things were getting desperate for both frog and story-teller. The old man knew only one solution: “The frog looked up and Baw the tree and just as the ‘gator's jaws were closing down, the frog flew up into the tree.” “But Grandpa,” said the little boy, “frogs can't fly.” “‘Deed they cain't, Son, ‘deed they cain't,” was the answer, “but this frog flew … he had to.”
V. Organizing Government Staff Services for Full Employment
Authors: Corson John J.
Published: May 2006

Since the time of Adam Smith, we have more or less passively accepted the type of economy which tossed us from boom to depression and back again. The adoption by Congress of current proposals for “full employment” legislation would constitute a substantial divergence from this passive course. The representatives of the American people would declare, essentially, that they propose to do whatever is necessary to make the national economy provide employment for all men and women who wish to work. Acceptance of this policy implies simultaneous acceptance of the responsibility for devising plans for influencing the economy and creating governmental machinery for carrying them out. Hence, our purpose here is twofold: first, to suggest the tasks to be performed by the federal government in maintaining full employment; and second, to raise the foreseeable questions about the organizational arrangements within the federal government that may be required to accomplish this end. At the present stage in the evolution of the rôle of government in the maintenance of full employment, much that will be said must necessarily be speculative.

But political scientists have as much right—and obligation—to speculate as do economists. The economists have speculated effectively as to the pleasant state of affairs that will obtain when there are jobs for all who want to work. They have speculated fruitfully as to ways of achieving full employment. It is high time, now, that the political scientists contribute the results of their own speculation. What, for example, are to be the responsibilities of government in the “full-employment age”? How will government discharge these responsibilities? How will the federal government formulate an annual employment and production budget and the complex integrated network of national policies essential to the achievement of full employment? The political scientists may also be expected to consider how the collaboration between the federal, state, and local governments and each sector of private enterprise essential to this objective will be obtained. They, too, are obligated to evolve a prescription for the planned, harmonious administration of these integrated policies by a considerable number of agencies of the federal government. When they essay such speculation, they will conclude that the “Full Employment Act” focuses attention on the need for effective governmental staff services as no previous legislation has done.
The Utility of the Proposed Trial and Punishment of Enemy Leaders
Authors: Anderson C. Arnold
Published: May 2006

The present war has now reached the stage when definite plans are being announced for the control and punishment of the enemy nations when they shall have been defeated. There is a strong and apparently growing sentiment among the citizens and officials of the United Nations for prosecution of the “Axis criminals” and quarantine of Axis nations. Committees of eminent scholars, some of them presumably acting under instruction from their governments, are now drawing up plans for these trials. Many individuals, however, doubt whether it will prove feasible to carry out these proposals. Others reject the whole idea of retribution or reparation against a defeated nation or its leaders as unethical and destructive of the ends for which we say we are fighting.

We wish to be neither vindictive nor gullible. Hence the popularity of suggestions that we must be prepared to give food and medicine to the people of the Axis nations during the early postwar months. But there is widespread support also for the belief that we must be ready to administer German economic and political life for some years if we wish to be sure that war will not come again from the same quarter. This balancing of generosity against sternness means, as Walter Lippmann puts it, that “our apparently contradictory war aims can be reconciled.”
The Postwar World Map: New States and Boundary Changes
Authors: Fifield Russell H.
Published: May 2006

A comparison of the postwar worlds of 1919 and 1948 indicates that the process of nation-building has moved from Europe to Asia. In the peace settlement after the First World War, the new states of the world appeared for the most part in Europe, but in the aftermath of the Second World War the new members of the family of nations come almost entirely from Asia.

In Europe, three of the states that emerged from the First World War—Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—have lost their national existence and are now numbered among the sixteen republics of the Soviet Union. The only new state from a practical viewpoint to appear in the European firmament is Iceland, which dissolved the personal union of a common king with Denmark dating from November 30, 1918, and became a sovereign republic on June 17, 1944. An even exchange may be noted in the incorporation by Poland of the Free City of Danzig, once under the protection of the League of Nations and in the creation of the Free Territory of Trieste under the protection of the Security Council of the United Nations.

Although classification is difficult, the new states or near states of Asia fall roughly into a fourfold pattern: independence with partition, independence without partition, de facto or promised independence, and emergence from isolation into the family of nations.
The Universities and the Public Service
Authors: Walker Robert A.
Published: May 2006

The current slump in the number of university students taking courses in public administration suggests that this is a good time to reflect on what form education for the public service should take after the war. It is highly probable that many university students will again undertake to prepare themselves for jobs and careers in government, despite an inevitable reduction in the number of federal employees. Educational assistance to veterans may, in fact, cause a large and sudden increase in the numbers attending colleges and universities with an eye to a government job after graduation. I should like to discuss the kind of education which should be offered such students after the war, whether or not they are veterans. My comments are directed primarily toward undergraduate instruction. The advanced work on administrative theory and problems carried on by graduate faculties and candidates for the Ph.D. is a separate subject.

Basically, the problem of education for the public service involves two questions. First, what are the most important demands which the public service makes upon the individual? Second, how can the universities contribute most to developing the qualities needed to meet these demands?

The demands which the public service makes upon the individual are many and varied. They cannot all be anticipated in advance; and if they could be, there would not be time in the university to give specific training for meeting all of them. Thus some determination must be made as to the kind of demands that are most important. Such a determination was, in fact, being made before the war by university faculties teaching public administration and political science. Students preparing for the public service were being asked to spend an increasing amount of time in the study of techniques, procedures, and skills currently in use in governmental practice. Most prominent among these were personnel management, budgetary and fiscal administration, accounting, statistics, government procurement practice, office management, and similar subjects.
Absolutism and Relativism in Philosophy and Politics
Authors: Kelsen Hans
Published: May 2006

Since there exists philosophy, there exists the attempt to bring it in relation with politics; and this attempt has succeeded in so far as it is today recognized to the degree of a truism that political theory and that part of philosophy we call ethics are closely connected with each other. But it seems strange to assume—and this essay tries to verify this assumption—that there exists an external parallelism, and perhaps also an inner relationship, between politics and other parts of philosophy such as epistemology, that is, theory of knowledge, and theory of values. It is just within these two theories that the antagonism between philosophical absolutism and relativism has its seat; and this antagonism seems to be in many respects analogous to the fundamental opposition between autocracy and democracy as the representatives of political absolutism on the one hand and political relativism on the other.

I

Philosophical absolutism is the metaphysical view that there is an absolute reality, i.e., a reality that exists independently of human knowledge. Hence its existence is objective and unlimited in, or beyond, space and time, to which human knowledge is restricted. Philosophical relativism, on the other hand, advocates the empirical doctrine that reality exists only within human knowledge, and that, as the object of knowledge, reality is relative to the knowing subject. The absolute, the thing in itself, is beyond human experience; it is inaccessible to human knowledge and therefore unknowable.

To the assumption of absolute existence corresponds the possibility of absolute truth and absolute values, denied by philosophical relativism, which recognizes only relative truth and relative values.
Federal Revenue Legislation, 1943–1944
Authors: Blakey Roy G. , Blakey Gladys C.
Published: May 2006

The Revenue Act of 1943 will be remembered not only as the first one in history to be vetoed by the President, but also as the cause of an outburst in Congress against the executive capable of affecting the fortunes of the Democratic party in the 1944 elections. The significance of this last act in the drama (to date) may be clarified if we review the fiscal situation of the United States at the time, the Administration's tax proposals, and the revenue legislation actually resulting.

In January, 1943, the President's budget message estimated expenditures of $100 billion for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1944. Tax revenues for the same period were estimated at $35 billion. The President made three recommendations: (1) raise $16 billion in new tax revenue, or savings, or both, (2) simplify the income tax, and (3) put taxes on a pay-as-you-go basis. In the summer and fall of 1943, Congress enacted legislation to carry out certain parts of the last two proposals. Public discussion had forced on it some consideration of collecting taxes currently.
Worker's Control of Industry and the British Labor Party
Authors: Dahl Robert A.
Published: May 2006

Socialist thought has long contained two potentially contradictory doctrines concerning the control or management of productive enterprises under a socialist régime. One of these is the idea of workers' control: the concept that under socialism workers will no longer be merely passive victims of the productive process, but, direct participants in the control of productive enterprises. The other is the idea of central control on behalf of the entire community: the concept that socialism will replace “the anarchy of production” under capitalism with a central determination of the appropriate goals of economic activity. That there is possibiUty of conflict between these two objectives is self-evident. The decentralization of economic administration implied by workers' control may easily contradict the desire for centralization of certain kinds of economic decisions. Conceivably, one goal or the other might have to be abandoned, or at least seriously modified.

Today, for the first time in any major industrial nation, a socialist party pledged to the maintenance of democratic institutions is undertaking the task of building socialism. The achievements of the British Labor party may well determine the future goals and techniques of democratic socialists elsewhere. It is not inconceivable that success or failure of the British experiment will determine the path that Western Europe will follow. It is noteworthy, then, that during the last decade the Labor party has abandoned the goal of workers' control; in its current program of nationalization, it is making no provision for direct control of production by workers. This modification of socialist objectives, representing a swing away from the syndicalist content of socialist thinking in the direction of Fabian ideas, was achieved only after the entire socialist movement and the Labor party itself underwent the test of a protracted internal struggle, both of an intellectual and of a practical kind.
Natural Law: A Functional Interpretation
Authors: Inlow Burke
Published: May 2006

This study represents a preliminary inquiry into certain of the functional aspects of the natural law doctrine, particularly as it applies to American constitutional development. Throughout, the conceptual considerations, as such, will be ignored. Instead, the basic consideration will be one of usage. How does natural law work? What does it do? If this distinction seems arbitrary, the writer can only point out that law and politics are not theoretical studies; that they are the bone and sinew of society; that if the social order is to serve humanity with the greatest possible direction, it should know the proper functioning of its constituent elements. Natural law, like atomic energy, is important because it works, not because it was invented. And by the same token, it is best understood by a respectable familiarity with its usage, not by memorizing the symbols of its essence.

The easy identification of natural law with the constitutional development of this country is apparent from even a cursory examination of the great body of constitutional doctrine. We have, for example, the whole concept of property relationships as they have come to us from the eighteenth century. We have a similar form-pattern in the development of certain processes of the law itself. We talk of the “reasonable man,” or we invoke the “rule of reason.” But the decisive characteristic of American constitutional development has been none of these. Rather it has been the acceptance of the working principle of negation. To avoid an enactment or a statute is considered, in this country at least, a valid exercise of authority. While it might be difficult to seek the legitimate derivation of such an action, or even to justify it, it is possible to consider its assumptions.
A New Approach to Federal Executive Reorganization
Authors: Heady Ferrel
Published: May 2006

The recurring problem of executive reorganization once again has become a major issue. One reason is the recognition in all quarters of the desirability of a thorough overhauling of the vast federal administrative structure which mushroomed necessarily under pressure of the war emergency, and of the necessity for a reconversion of the executive organization to a peacetime basis. Another incentive to renewed concern is the urgency of assuring organizational efficiency for the translation into effective action of national policies undertaken as the result of our enlarged domestic and international responsibilities in the postwar period. Furthermore, the particular interest shown by the present Congress in the reduction of governmental expenditures has helped focus attention on the question of economy in governmental operations. The fact that a decade has passed since the last frontal attack on the problem lends support to the demand for a new drive toward reform.

Unfortunately, the revival of interest in a comprehensive reorganization movement comes at a time when the prospect for success in such an undertaking seems, on the surface at least, to be unusually dim. Even under the most favorable circumstances, large-scale executive reorganization involves formidable difficulties. However initiated, a reorganization program must be sanctioned by the enactment of authorizing legislation. This is a hazardous task, demanding mutual confidence and an acceptable working relationship between the legislature and the executive.
County and Township Government in 1946
Authors: Snider Clyde F. , Garvey Neil F.
Published: May 2006

The first postwar year found rural local government facing problems of readjustment. As the rural units had felt the impact of war less forcefully than the states and cities, so their reconstruction problems were less acute; but they were none the less genuine and significant. To mention but a few, these included the construction of deferred public-works projects, the provision of housing and various forms of assistance for returned veterans, the modernization and expansion of public-welfare services, the securing of additional revenues adequate to finance an expanded program of local activities, and the reorganization of local areas and machinery with a view to fostering economy and efficiency in a period of mounting governmental costs. Though less than a dozen state legislatures held regular sessions, the year's enactments served both to initiate reconstruction programs begun a year earlier in many states and to indicate the nature of other measures likely to be more generally adopted in the future. Statutes of previous years formed the basis of various improvements in local government which were effected in 1946.

The school-consolidation programs begun in the preceding year in Illinois and Kansas continued to make progress. At the beginning of October, 174 consolidations involving 897 districts had been effected in Illinois. In Kansas, some 2,000 districts have already been eliminated, and it has been estimated that the program in that state, as revised early in 1947, may ultimately reduce the number of districts, originally well over 8,000, to only 3,000.
I. Federalism
Authors: Fellman David
Published: May 2006

The net result of ten years of extraordinary activity is that the Supreme Court has gone a long way toward squaring the legal concept of American federalism with the intent—and, it is tempting to add, the plain language—of the Constitution. The most important thing that has happened is that the Court has snuffed out the heresy of “dual federalism.” This subtle weapon of laissez-faire economics was utilized at a fairly early date, notably in the two child labor cases, to strike down federal reform legislation, but it achieved great weight, which comes with reiteration in important cases, during 1935 and 1936, when the Court was grimly determined to save the country from the horrors of the New Deal. Briefly, the doctrine holds that the mere existence of states constitutes an independent limitation on the exercise of national powers. Thus, Justice Day asserted in the first child labor case: “The grant of authority over a purely federal matter was not intended to destroy the local power always existing and carefully reserved to the States in the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution.” This theory is inconsistent with the principle of federal supremacy, a principle which the present Court has restored to its proper place in American constitutional law. But, in sustaining a sweeping exercise of national power, the Court has by no means been unmindful of the proper status of the states in the Union. Furthermore, it is a mistake to assume that every growth of national power is at the expense of state power. While it is true that we have more government at the federal level today than ever before, we also have much more state government. A fuller exploitation by Congress of the powers committed to it by the Constitution has been matched by a fuller exploitation of the authority reserved to the states. The laments of losing litigants should not be taken as a correct assessment of the present position of the American states.
III. The Power to Regulate Commerce
Authors: Barnett Vincent M.
Published: May 2006

The commerce clause has been a double-edged tool of constitutional interpretation from the earliest days of judicial review of state and federal legislative activity. It is at once a positive source of federal power and, in the absence of federal exercise of that power, a source of implied limitations on state legislation. Any consideration of trends of interpretation of the clause in the past decade must treat both aspects of the matter. In general, it may be said that expansive implications of the Wagner Act decisions in the spring of 1937 have been elaborated and broadened until the commerce clause is today an ample source of federal legislative authority to deal with a wide range of problems arising out of or having any substantial effect upon interstate commerce. No such clear generalization may be made with respect to the nature of the limitations which the unexercised commerce power imposes on state police power and tax legislation. But the tendency, not yet consistently dominant, seems to be in the direction of upholding much state legislation that would formerly have been ruled a burden on interstate commerce. It is, of course, unnecessary to labor the fact that state legislation incompatible with a valid federal exercise of the commerce power is unconstitutional.

Both the above generalizations require some further examination. The first can perhaps best be looked at in terms of (1) changing definitions of interstate commerce, (2) the reshaping of familiar formulæ for determining the reach of the power to regulate, (3) the abandonment of the “dual federalism” concept, and (4) the broad application of federal statutes to businesses alleged not to be in interstate commerce. Discussion of the second general problem may perhaps best be considered in terms of the gradual, and still wavering, emergence of what may be called the “leaveit-to-Congress trend” in the review of state legislation alleged to burden interstate commerce.
Toward a More Integrated Political Science Curriculum
Authors: Rockwell Landon G.
Published: May 2006

Recent concern with the liberal arts curriculum as evinced by the report of the Harvard committee on General Education in a Free Society, Colgate's adoption of a core curriculum, and a thorough reëxamination of their entire educational program by scores of other institutions sharpens the recurrent problem of attempting better integration within the constituent parts of the curriculum. Whenever political scientists, talking shop, lapse into general principles, there is inevitable discussion concerning the nature and focus of political science itself. Much hard thinking has been done on the subject. There is, however, as in every profession where individual specialties are earnestly pursued, a tendency toward intellectual myopia, a tendency to miss, by default rather than consciously, a synoptic view of the subject. This has resulted in a lack of integration, of comprehensive design, of sense of balanced purpose, in many political science curricula.

The miscellany of unrelated, overlapping courses which one sometimes encounters in college or university catalogues, to say nothing of the neglect of important aspects of government, indicates that the political science curriculum has received inadequate analysis. Political scientists who teach are educators as well, and thereby have a dual professional responsibility to present their field of inquiry as an integrated, comprehensive whole, elucidated by specific course offerings. Only thus can political science realize its richest contribution to liberal education as well as to an understanding of the political process within and beyond academic halls.
Recent Political Thought in the South
Authors: Irish Marian D.
Published: May 2006

In a study of recent political thought in the South, it is necessary to delimit the area called “The South.” Howard Odum included fourteen states in his practical design for the “southern regions.” The President's Committee which reported in 1938 on economic conditions in the South covered thirteen states. The southern governors of fifteen states joined in the regional educational compact. The Manufacturers' Record, published in Baltimore as the industrial organ of the South, reaches out to sixteen states. V. O. Key limits his study, Southern Politics, to those eleven states which have consistently stayed with the national Democratic party. This author in the main refers to the eleven states which once seceded to form the Confederacy; coincidentally, these are the same eleven states that Key found to be “solid” in national politics.
State Legislatures and Communism: The Current Scene
Authors: Prendergast William B.
Published: May 2006

The prosecution of the cold war on the domestic front was a major concern of the state legislatures which convened in 1949. Quantitatively, last year's output of state laws against subversive movements surpassed that of any other year in our history except 1919. It was a rare hopper which did not receive at least a sprinkling of bills of this sort. And the fact that no more than fifteen states enacted anti-Communist laws can be attributed in large part to the inability of lawmakers to think of restrictive measures which an earlier legislature had not already placed on the statute books.

As 1950 began, Maine alone among the states was without a law designed specifically to repress or combat subversive organizations or individuals. Thirty-eight states at that date had criminal statutes prohibiting acts of violence and utterances urging violence for the purpose of effecting political or economic change. Although Tennessee's Sedition Act goes back to 1715 and two other states enacted similar statutes in the nineteenth century, these laws are for the most part products of the present century.