Evening star., 1934-04-16
CHILD LABOR BILL
FOES ORGANIZED
EIihu Root and DR.. Nicholas
Murray Butler Head
Association.
Ry the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
NEW YORK, April 16.-Formation
Of a Statewide committee which sub
scribes to the belief that the proposed
child labor amendment is much
more Objectionable and dangerous
than the eighteenth amendment" was
announced yesterday.
The committee, organized to oppose
ratification of the amendment, is
headed by Elihu Root as honorary
chairman and DR.. Nicholas Murray
Butler as executive chairman.
William D. Guthrie. vice chairman,
has prepared a 45-page brochure out
lining the committees opposition to
the amendment and predicting any
attempt to exercise Federal control
over the Nations children would re-
suit in as great and disgraceful fail
ure as the attempt to enforce the
Volstead act"
The brochure, which is in the form
of reply to a group of lawyers who
urged ratification, will be submitted
to the Legislature tomorrow.
AL Smith Makes Reply.
Iii d ulSeSt Ol NlCC
Guthrie's reply, former Gov. Alfred
E. Smith, a member of the committee,
is quoted as saying:
We are told that Congress will
never DO anything extreme or unde-
sirable under this amendment That
is just what the Wheelers and the
Cannons told us about the eighteenth
amendment"
Discussing the lawyers stand point
by point Guthrie's reply declares that
where the eighteenth amendment was
limited to a prohibition of intoxicat-
ing liquors for beverage purposes and
granted to Congress only a concur
rent power of enforcement, the pro-
posed child labor amendment would
give Congress AN unlimited govern
mental power to limit regulate and
prohibit the labor OF persons under
l8 years of age"
Continuing, the digest says:
The reply undertakes to refute the
claim that the administration of a
Federal child labor law would be COM
paratively simple and would not re-
quire setting up a huge bureaucratic
enforcing agency 1t cites the in
efficiency. eXpenSiveness and futility
Of enforcement of the eighteenth
amendment by the Washington bu-
reauS
Aim to Regulate Competition.
1T is argued that any attempt to
enforce limitations, regulations or pro-
hibitions of the labor of children and
youths under 18 years of age through
out the United States, its territories
and insular possessions would require
not only an army of Federal officers,
but the expenditure of vast amounts
of public funds. as was demonstrated
in the case of the eighteenth amend
ment."
The real motive and true impetus"
behind the agitation for the amend
ment, says the digest. lis not the well
fare of children but to regulate COM
petition and introduce uniform con-
ditions in industry throughout the
United States"
Guthrie says the real question to
be considered is whether an IN
limited and supreme power of the chill
dren and youths of the entire coun-
try should be granted when conceded
to be unprecedented. unnecessary and
not intended to be exercised"
Other members of the committee
include: Former Chief Judge Frank H.
Hiscock and Judge William S. An
drews of the Court of Appeals, former
Gov. Nathan L. Miller. James w
Wadsworth, James Byrne, chancellor
of the New York State University;
former Judge Daniel J. Kenefick.
president Of the New York State Bar
Association. and eight ex-presidents,
Thomas D. Thacher. George w
Wickersham, Henry W. Taft. Mrs
Charles H. Sabin, Miss Anne Morgan,
Mrs. John S. Sheppard. Mrs. Court
landt Nicoll. Miss Ruth M. Minor.
Jerome D. Arnum, Syracuse publisher
ROLAND B. Marvin and George H
Bond of Syracuse.