The Birmingham age-herald., 1910-11-05
ROOSEVELT WRITES
 ANOTHER LETTER  Judge Baldwin's Decision Is
 Again Criticised RIGHTS OF EMPLOYEES Roosevelt Argues That Judge Baldwin Hns No Regard for the oonstitu- tion in Rendering Cer-
 tain Decision
RIGHTS OF EMPLOYEES

New York, November 4--Another let ter, the third written by Theodore Roose- welt in reply to similar communications from Judge Simeon F. Baldwin, demo- cratic candidate for governor of Con nectic,t. In the recent controversy con- corning Judge Baldwins attitude toward labor, was given out here tonight. It is dated November 2, and says in part; <
 Tn your answer to my letter you en- tirely miss the point of the criticisms. l am not interested in your opinion as law writer; am interested in your opin-. ion as a judge My criticism of you asl q. reactionary was based not upon what. you may have said as a law. writer, but on what you did as a judge. Your cita-, tions from decisions in courts of Connec-i ticut are entirely irrelevant and beside the point. I know as every layman knows that 1t is not the function of judge to make new laws. When there Is no statute enacted by the aw-making bodies of the people, the courts are no doubt bound to follow precedent.
 .'The question between us does not in- volve any such principle. In the Hoxie case you had before you definite statute enacted by the Congress of the United States declaring the responsibility or railroads to their employees for their neg ligence. Section of that act provided that any contract, rule, regulation or device whatsoever, the purpose or intent of which shall be to enable any common | carrier to exempt itself from any liahil- ity created by this action, shall to that extent be void.
 Tn placing this clause In the act Con- gress was no doubt influenced by the well-known fact that in England an em- ployers' liability act enacted many years
 ago was made dead letter by employers insisting that their employees should sign contracts agreeing to waive the benents of the statute. Congress doubtless 1n- tended that the beneficial value of this federal employers liability act should not be destroyed by any such process. "In the case decided by you which have criticised you declared that this clause was unconstitutional, as being in violation of the fifth amendment or the constitution of the United States, as the finding to deprive the parties to such contract of liberty and property With out due process of law. You say spe- cifically as to railway employees:
 "It denies them and allathat liberty ot ccStract which the constitution of the United States secures to every person within its Jurisdiction. Your declaration speaks for itself , in substance 1t amounts to indicating that the employees right to give up their rights under the law Is a thing to be protected and not their right to receive their benefits; that the right to contract to get killed Is property of which they cannot be. deprived; that the right to get killed comes under the head of life, liberty and property, which the fifth amendment to the Unit ed States constitution says cannot be taken away without due process of law Congress aimed at giving the railroad employe a .substance. You construed the act as giving him a shadow by solemnly declaring that to give him the substance is to take away his prop erty in the shadow.
 T criticised your decision because It Is to me an incredible perversion of the constitution of the United States
 "I criticised it because 1t is not only reactionary but revolutionary. I criti- cised it because I am against social ism and this decision and every de- cision like it makes for socialism or something worse. Every strained con struction of the constitution which de- clares that the nation is powerful to remedy industrial conditions, which cry for law, gives aid to those enemies of our American system of government who wish to furnish in It's place some new, vague and foolish substitute. "The result which you attempted to accomplish in this decision would pro- duce, am told, a strang anomaly. The United States supreme court has held that public policy will not premit railroad company to make contracts
 with shippers of freight; that the rail- road company shall not be responsible for its own negligence in transporting that freight. You say that the rail- road cannot be forbidden to contract with its employees that 1t shall not be responsible for maiming or killing them by negligence. I protest there is no public policy which makes freight more important than human lives and criti- cised your decision because you say that the constitution will not permit protection of the lives of railway en- pIoyes to the same extent to which, without a statute, freight in the Unit ed States fs protected now My criti- cism Is not as some of your supporters endeavor to have the people believe, criticism of~the Judiciary in general. It is simply and solely a criticism of 1t for having given an extraordinary and unprecedented construction to the fifth amendment of the constitution of the United States so as to pervert its pur- pose and by so doing to nullify and destroy an essential part of most im-