The Washington times., 1923-07-10
Continued from First Page)

Continued from First Page9
which the railroad industry began
to be regulated.
The first power Of the Interstate
Commerce Commission over rail-
roads was to require them to make
reports. The Coal Commission pro-
poses that coal operators shall be
required to make reports to a Fed
eral agency.
The absolutely central sentence
In the whole Coal Commission re-
port is the following:
The Commission recommends
legislation providing for regular &C.
counting reports to be rendered by
all companies whose product moves
IN interstate commerce and further
recommends that the agency to
which the reports are rende>Sd shall
have the power to fix the form Of
accounts"
Conflict of Opinion.
In that sentence the Coal Com.
mission takes. two positions, both of
which are denied by the Federal
courts.
First it implies-and in fact sub
seQuently outrightly says-that coal
Is a commodity impressed with a
public use." It similarly in another
part of its report is heard to say
that the anthracite coal business
IN particular has to be treated as
IL affected by a public interest"
It has to advance that principle in
order to justify its demand for re-
ports on the costs" and on the
profits" of the business.
In the Kansas Industrial Court
case, however, the United States
way to putting the mines Of Kan
sas under the wing of public use"
or Of public interest" along with
railroads.
The coal commission wants to
give mines and railroads approx
mately the same legal color. The
Supreme Court seems to give them
two widely different legal colors.
In the second place the Coal
Commission implies that the pro-
ducing of coal is Interstate com.
merce. The Federal Court of the
District of Columbia in the May
nard case has held that the pro-
ducing OF coal is absolutely not
Interstate commerce.
Commission Enjoined.
Holding and asserting that view,
Il enioined the Federal Trade Com
mission from doing the very thing
which the Coal Commission now
specifically recommends. tt en-
Joined it from collecting reports on
"costs" and on profits" from coal
companies.
A similar decision was made by
smother Federal court in the course
Of dispute between the Navy De-
partment and the New River Col
heries Company.
Under these decisions 1t IL here
suspected that any coal company
which chose to sell its coal at the
mouth of its mine and which chose
to confine itself to its own property
within its own State, could pro-
claim itself a private business and
could equally proclaim itself to be
entirely aloof from interstate COM
merce and could thereupon defy
any Federal agency to collect any
costs and profits reports from 1t as
long as the Federal courts remained
I'm their present state of mind.
President Harding thereupon
would have to find some way Of
overcoming the Federal courts. He
b win be thrown among the attack
ers Of the principles of the Consti.
tuition as laid down by the courts.
He has committed himself to the
general idea advanced now by the
Coal Commission. In order to e.
tablish that idea he will apparent
" be obliged to go counter to the
courts and possibly to introduce a
novel principle into the Constitu-
ton.
Constitutional Test.
A conservative President, he may
have the strange radical fate of be-
ing remembered in history as the
first President who seriously under
took to stretch the Constitution in
such a way as to extend the public
power Of the Federal Government
over the mineral resources lying
within the soil Of the several sepa-
rate States.
A leading expert Of the Coal Com
mission said to this writer today:
Now is the time when we begin
to find out II this nation has a
national government with national
power over the use Of the resources
which lie at the base Of its :Ia'
tional life"
copyright. 1923, Washington Press
Service.)