Evening star., 1921-02-13
SEE AN END TO RULE
BY EXECUTIVE ORDER
Members of Congress Think the Harding
Administration Will Enforce the
Laws as Intended.

, IN the service after reaching the age OF
retirement. The Postmaster General is
SIZED a blanket order that all were to be
let out on reaching the retirement age.
The committee on reform in the civil
service mas reported out new measures
to correct this executive misinterpreta-
tion of the act
One of the most striking acts of eXecu-
| tive defiance was in the case of the late
Col. Roosevelt, when he wanted to re-
cruit a force of volunteers for partici-
patton in the world war. There was a
heated controversy in the House and
Senate and a provision was written INTO
the Selective service act designed to
cover his case, on which a record vote
was taken. Congress expressed its au-
thorization for Roosevent to go to
France. and the War Department turned
him down with scant courtesy.
X X X X
Although this disposition to be law
unto itself has been most conspicuous
during the regime of the outgoing
executive branch of the government. the
laws as passed by Congress have been
practically set aside by other Presidents.
Theodore Roosevelt in his autobiography
gives notable illustration. The Sher-
man tnti-trust act in 1890 was designed
to restrain combinations in restraint of
one democrat and the other a repub-
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS it. as Roosevelt
says:
The administration of Mr. Harrison
and Mr.. Cleveland evidently construed
this law as prohibiting such combina-
tons in the future, not as condemnlng
those which had been formed prior to it's
enactment
H.points out that in Harrison's time
out OF eight opinions rendered by the
federal court under the antitrust act
seven were against the government and
not a single Indictment filed reached a
trial of facts. Mr.. Roosevelt shows how
by his persistency he put real teeth in
the antitrust act, when in the Northern
Securities case he forced the Supreme
Court to reverse itself as it had previosu-
ly ruled in the famous knight case.
X X X X
One of the great dangers of de-
partmental usurpation of congress
sional authority is that when an
agencies quite frequently proceed
just as though it had been allowed
and then when the money is spent
come to Congress for it under a
deficiency" SO that at the end of
the year they really got just about
what they asked for at the begin
ming. Chairman Good of the appro-
priations committee has recently
spoken vigorously in denunciation of
this practice. Congress is seriously
considering the necessity of specifi-
ally writing limitation into the law.
Congress has to be protected in it's
lawmaking rights, and particularly
preparation. The close cooperation
promised between Harding. fresh
from legislative experience. and Con-
gress is most encouraging. Mr.. Hard
ing's administration will begin more
auspiciously with this general recog-
any previous administration in recent
years. because it is a reversal to the
doctrine of the fathers from which
We have been slipping away by easy
stages until under the stress Of war
it became a dead letter. with officials
and officers of high and low degree
interpreting the law without regard
OF Congress in enacting the law.
The officials in the executive offices
are beginning to realize that Harding
intends to see that the law as en-
acted by Congress is in reality the
law Of the And. to be interpreted
by Congress. There are evidences
that while they have previously over
looked the fact that the tendency to
executive Interpretation has been
dangerous to the government, they
are quick to see that they may be-
gerous to the officials who Temporarily
assume such prerogatives. A Presi-
dent pledged to enforce the law as
enacted could not be expected to
tolerate officials. however permanent
their tenure. who assumed to be
above the law.
****
The Navy department gives a good
illustration of this change of heart
Last July IT set aside an act of Con-
gress, that had not been prepared in
the department., specifically intend
ing and saying that midshipmen at
Annapolis who failed in their exam
nations were to be given special
instruction and after a fixed period
should be again examined. Last week
the same law was put into effect as
an executive order.
Both the War and Navy depart
ments are slowly becoming cognizant
of the fact that the new President
won his place at the head of the ex-
ecutive department of the govern
ment as a senator and has expressed
his confidence in the Senate as well
as his determination to enforce the
law as written.
Those who will guide the mill
tary policy say it is well for the
Army and Navy officers to revive
their early training and remember
that no man is fit to command who
is not capable of obedience to supe-
rior authority. Some of them had
forgotten this old adage and accepted
a monopoly on the rule of self-de-
termination, that they were judges Of
what laws they should enforce and
what they would ignore, interpret or
change.
Harding is coming in pledged as
no President before him to a govern
ment- by laws rather than a govern