Evening star., 1933-06-25
BY MARK SULLIVAN.

TINE regime upon which American
business entered last Monday
can be looked upon in either
i of two Ways. 1t can be con-
sidered a temporary adaptation
to an emergency, to be ended when the
emergency is over-or it can be regard
ed as a permanent entrance of gov
ernment upon regulation of business.
For support of the first point of
view, there is proof land comfort for
those suspicious of the innovation) in
the fact that the industrial control bill,
by provision written into 1t at the
beginning, comes to an end on June
IS, 1885, two years from the date of
it's enactment. This time limitation is
shortened and accentuated by further
provision written into the bill while in
the Senate. The most drastic detail
of the bill Is that which authorizes the
President or his agents to require a
business to take out a license and en-
powers the President to revoke the
license-which means, of course. power
Of business life or death. In the SEN
ate, the time limit of this particular
provision was reduced to one year, and
this stands in the measure as finally
enacted.
Time Limitation Important.
Ills tlIllG AullltdIlOll 10 A1lROL LdlL
The licensing feature comes to an end
in one year, and the whole of the ma
chinery for industrial control in two
years. The end comes by automatic
limitation. If the President wishes the
system continued he must ask Con-
gress to re-enact it. The Congress
which will pass upon the request will
be not the present one but new
one-the whole of the House and one
third of the Senate, 80, will be chosen
in congressional elections next year,
1884.
Whether the President or any one
else will wish renewal Of the bill in
June, 1885, and whether Congress will
be willing to renew it, depends on how
the country feels at that time. Two
years will have brought changes that
no one can guess. Presumably the
country should be well into new up
ward spiral of business If this is true,
and If it is thought the revival is in
part due to operation of this law, there
may be disposition to renew it. The
present state of mind of the admin
istrators of the bill is suggested BY
a remark one of them made to the
writer of this article: II don't know
it is just possible we may learn some
thing from the operation of this bill
which the country may want to keep,
but don't know. What we want the
bill for now is recovery"
Varied Views of Policy.
One Would say, as a summary of the
state Of mind of those most impor-
tantly associated with the measure,
that they conceive it wholly as an
emergency device for recovery. It
should be added that some associated
rrrifh h rfI t1ir nf hn hill he
other slant They believe in either
the cartel form of organization of
industry familiar in some European
countries, or they believe in one de-
gree or another Of state collectivism,
and they wish this present American
experiment might become permanent.
If the new regime be regarded as
temporary, there Is analogy to it (and
again, comfort for the uneasy and sus-
piciouS) in the control which the Gov
ernment exercised over industry dur
ing the war. The present control bill
was in part modelled after the wartime
drastic. The chief administrator Of
the present bill, Gen. Hugh S. John
son Gan Army officer with business ex-
perience), was one of the principal
administrators of the wartime control
Of industry. During the war, the dras-
tic power to require individual business
to conform was exercised only twice.
At the close of the war the whole
mechanism of control was ended and
scrapped. Probably it is the safest
assumption that the same step will be
taken at the end of the present war
against depression.
New Theory for America.
A complete record of current thought
must add that there are some who
feel that something new and revolu-
tionary has come into the world with
this depression; that a new social
order, or at least a modified one, is
on the way; that this Government
control Of industry Is a part of it; and
that it, or some of it, or even an am
plif1cation of it, will remain after the
statutory limitation June Is, 1885. AS
to this we can only wait and see. 1t
Is a fact that the administrators of
this or any other mechanism can so
manage it as to promote either end
ing of 1t in two years or permanent
retention of it. So far as Gen. john
son is concerned, one would infer from
everything about him that he would
direct the mechanism with thought
only for the emergency.
The preponderant evidence about the
government control of industry which
began last week, and the shrewdest
judgment from all the circumstances,
is that it is meant to be emergency
only; that it is meant to come to an
end, and will end, at the time of the
statutory limitation set out in the bill,
June Is, 1885. Indeed it may end
earlier, for the time limitation reads:
Shall cease to be in effect, and any
agencies established hereunder shall