Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1907-09-15
President of Illinois University
in Daring Address at James,
town Advocates Adoption Of
New Organic Law,
PRESENT INSTRUMENT
PRONOUNCED ARCHAIC
Twentieth Century Problems
Require Twentieth Century
Means for Their SoIutioni
Statesmen Afraid of Issue,

y ~NSt tNNCaf'Nti y VI NAtNA VI lOOOOi
Norfolk, Va, Sept. 14.-A large
number of Illinoisians, headed by Gov
ernor Charles S. Deneen, participated
today in the celebration of Illinois. day
at the jamestown exposition. DR.. Ed
mund ]. James, president Of the Uni
versity Of Illinois, was the orator of
the day, Brief addresses were also
made by Governor Deneen and Gov
ernor Swanson. of Virginia. A lunch
con was rendered the party this aft
ernoon by the exposition management,
followed by parade of troops
DR. James took as his subject the
need of new federal constitution. He
spoke in part as follows
1t Is highly demoralizing for an in
dividual, state or nation to pretend
to live up to principle and make no
attempt to do so; to pretend to OBJ
serve a law and yet habitually violate
1t; to pretend to keep within the linz
its of a written constitution and yet
constantly overstep them.
1t is equally, II not more, demoral-
izing to go our way, do what we please
without regard to anything but our
own views of eXpediency and then
maintain that all these things are in
harmony with our professed princi-
ples our accepted laws and our writ
ten constitution, when IN order to JUS
tify this view, 1t be necessary to inter-
pret these principles, laws or consti-
tuition in such a way as to violate all
rules Of logic and accepted canons of
Interpretation.
This is what we are doing in the
United States today In respect of our
@ =, 4 4 4.
process of construction been carried
that the confidence of the average
man In the projections and guaran-
tees of the constitution has been pro-
foundly shaken. It is no uncommon
remark that II the constitution is the
only thing which stands in the way of
a proposed law some means can be
found of evadng that
The fact Is that we have come face
to face in our national development
with problems of such complexity and
such magnitude that they cannot be
solved without a large cooperation of
the federal government; and this CO.
operation cannot be extended within
the limits of the constitution as 1t is
unless indeed we are willing to adopt
new and enlarged principles of con-
struction which would practically null
the constitution and convert it from
an instrument delegating certain linn
tied functions, into an instrument vest
ing an unlimited and ever widening
authority In a government which. by
its very magnitude, would become eser
more Irresistible
There are not wanting signs ,tNat
our leading statesmen in both gr8at
parties are unwilling to face this is
sue. One. indeed, claims that the au-
thority Of our states Is ample to deal
with all problems which by the cons
stitution are not assigned to the red-
eral government. This Is. 1t seems to
me. such a hopeless view that It Is
hardly worth discussing. If any pO-
lltical party should try to act logically
upon this principle. Il would thrust us
back so far into the ante-bellum days
that our union would become a mere
league OF discordant belligerent states.
each trying BY the exercise of its So
called sovereign powers to extract the
utmost advantage from its fortunate
position at the expense of It's neigh
bors. eThus, Illinois might lay under
contribution the commerce of the ma
tlOn as IL passes east or west through
its territory. and Colorado charge for
the water flowing In It's rivers. each
state would try to get the utmost
profit from taxing foreign corporations
to the limit, etc In other words we
should apply most effective brakes in
every direction to the wheels of ma
tlOnal progress.
party Is logical. and the extreme
states rights advocates would recoil
from the logical consequence Of their
own ideas. Moreover. we have al
ready progressed so far in the other
direction that there would be no great
likelihood of turning back the wheels
OF progress.
This way out Of our difficulties then
Is no way at all, and we shall not be
apt to travel it--no matter how much
we talk about Il.
on the other hand, able statesmen
propose to march forever. In the di-
rection Of expanding federal power by
the process Of constructing the lnstru-
ment IN an ever more liberal spirit
Thus. one leader, and none Is more
able than he proposes TO limit the
growth OF fortunes by a federal pro-
gressive Inheritance tax. This Is a
simple proposition that the federal
government shall enter upon the field
Of social legislation and inasmuch as
no authority II given 10 Il by this con-
stltutlon to do 30. this statesman pro-
poses to use the taxing power OF the
federal government Tor this purpose.
Now. II Is difficult, OF course. 70
prove that the sole purpose for which
the taxing power was conferred upon
the federal government was to enable
Il 90 raise revenue for its needs But
this was certainly lte obvious purpose
Il has been indeed used 70 drive state
bank notes out of circulation; 10 build
up a set Of protected Industries: TO de-
stroy the manufacture Of artificial but.
ter. IN all these cases. there was al
least a nretenne Of exercising the pow
er for the purpase nf raising revenue