Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1912-03-28
.My remedy Is not the result Of {


library study Of constitutional law, but
of actual and long-continued expert
ence in the use Of governmental power,
to redress social and Industrial evils
Again and again earnest workers for
social justice have said to me that the
most serious obstacles that they have
encountered during the many years
that they have been trying to save
American women and children from
destruction in American industry have!
been the courts. That is the judg,
ment of almost all the social workers
h / know and Of dozens of parish
priests and clergymen and Of every
executive and legislator who has been
seriously attempting to use govern.
ment as an agency for social and in-
dustrial betterment. What is the re-
suit Of this system Of judicial nullifl-
cation? 1t was accurately stated by
the court of appeals of New York in
the employees liability case, where ii
\ was calmly and judicially declared
that the people under our republican
government are less free to correct
the evils that Cypress them than are
the people OF the monarchies of Eu-
rope To any man with vision, to any
man with broad and real social sympa-
| thies to any man who believes with
all his heart in this great democratic
republic of ours, such condition is
intolerable. 1t is not government by
the people, but mere sham govern.
ment, in which the will of the people
is constantly defeated. 1t is out Of
this experience that my remedy has
come, and let it be tried in this field.
When as the result of his education
and debate majority of the people
have decided upon a remedy for an
evil from which they suffer and have
chosen a legislature and executive
pledged to embody that remedy in law
and the law has been finally passed
and approved, regard it as mon.
strous that bench of judges shall
then say to the people: You must
begin all over again First, amend
| your constitution (Which will take four
years.; second, secure the passage of
new law (Which will take two years
more); third, carry that new law
over the weary course of litigation
(Which will take no human being
knows how long); fourth, submit the
whole matter over again to the very
same judges who have rendered the
decision to which you object. Then,
II your patience holds out and you
finally prevail, the will of the major.
ity of the people may have its way
Such system is not popular govern.
ment, but mere mockery of popular
government. 1t is a system framed
to maintain and perpetuate social
injustice, and it can be defended only
by those who disbelieve in the people.
Now Have Different Meanings.
THE decisions of which we COM
plain are, as a rule, based upon the
constitutional provision that no per-
son shall be deprived of life, liberty
or property without due process of
law. The terms life, liberty and
property have been used in the con.
stitutions of the English speaking peo-
pies since Magma Charta.
Until within the last sixty years
they We're treated as having specific
meanings: property meant tangible
property; liberty meant freedom
| from personal restraint, or, in other
words, from imprisonment in it's larg-
est definition About 1870 our court
began to attach to these terms new
meanings; now property has come to
mean every right of value which a
| person could enjoy, and liberty has
been made to include the rest to make
| contracts. AS result, when a state
| limits the hours for which women may
labor, it is told by the courts that this
law deprives them of their liberty
| and when it restricts the manufacture
OF tobacco in a tenement, it is told
that the law deprives the landlord of
his property Now, do not believe
that any people and especially our
free American people, will long con-
sent that the term liberty shall be de-
fined for them by bench of judges.
| Every people has defined that term
for itself in the course of its develop
ment. Friends, our task as Ameri-
cans, is to strive for social and indus
trial justice, achieved through the
genuine rule of the people. This Is
our end, our purpose. The methods
for achieving the end are merely ex-
pedients to be finally accepted or re-
Jected according as actual experience
shows that they work we'll or i'll.
Is But an instrument.
"The leader for the time being, who
ever he may be, is but an instrument
to be used until broken and then to
be cast aside, and if he is worth his
! salt he will care no more when he is
broken than soldier cares when he
is sent where his life is forfeit in Or
der that the victory may be won. In
the long fight for righteousness the
watchword for all of us is spend and
be spent 1t is of little matter wheth.
er any one man fails or succeeds, but
| the cause shall not fail, for it is the
| cause of mankind We. here in Amer