The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1936-05-18
GUFFEY COAL CONTROL ACT
KILLED BY SUPREME COURT:
S. DECISION HANDED DOWN
Opinion Hits Labor, Tax and Price-Fixing
Provisions; Ruling Is Seen IS Serious
Defeat for Administration


with personal liberty and private
property" the court said.
The words seemed definitely to
dispose of any Federal attempt of
industrial control under present in
terpretations of the Constitution, a
matter gaining huge significance in
view of suggestions of finding sub
stitute for NRA.
THE delegation" the opinion
added on this point, "is so clearly
arbitrary and so clearly denial
of right safeguarded by the due
process clause of the fifth amend
ment that it is unnecessary to do
more than refer to the decisions of
this court which foreclose the ques-
ton"
See Price Fixing Inseparable
The price fixing provisions of the
act we're stricken down primarily
because the court held that Con-
gress would not pass the law If the
labor provisions had been emascu-
lated. 1t held that for this reason
the price-fxing was inseparable
from the labor provisions.
In concluding its opinion, how
ever, the court insisted that it was
not indicating that it approved the
price-fixing provisions If they were
brought to 1t separately.
THE primary contemplation of
the act is sterilization of the indus
try through the regulation OF labor
and the regulation of prices; for,
since both were adopted, we must
conclude that both we're thought
essential. The regulation Of labor
on the one hand and prices on the
other furnished mutual aid and sup
port; and their associated force
not one or the other, but both COM
bined-was deemed by Congress to
be necessary to achieve the ends
sought. The statutory mandate for
a code upheld by two legs at once
suggests the improbability that
Congress would have assented to a
code supported by only one"
Ocldy k1ciBHtcicu 1HtcTcSt
The Guffey act opinion had been
awaited with highest expectancy,
both for its effect on the great BIZ
luminous coal mining industry and
for further revelation of the courts
attitude toward the possibility of
any broad-scale industrial control
on Federal basis.
The expectancy had heen height
ened by delay in the handing down
of the courts opinion. May 10
marked the sixty eighth day since
the case had been argued before the
court.
Upon the decision. too, hinged this
years congressional adjournment
date.
Plans for similar control in the
anthracite and textile industries had
been prepared for action in case of
a favorable ruling while torebodingS
of an unfavorable decision caused
mine leaders to prepare substitute
legislation.
55O,OOOO Miners Affected
Directly affected were the $4,000
soft coal miners employed in the
industry which in normal times has
had billion dollar annual output.
Regarding the price fixing pro-
visions of the coal code Under the
act, the court said:
Neither this disposition of the
matter, nor anything we have said.
is to be taken as indicating that the
court is of the opinion that these
provisions if separately enacted,
could be sustained.
If there be in the act provisions,
other than those we have consid-
cred, that may stand independent
ly, the question of their validity is
left for future determination,
when, if ever, that question shall be
presented for consideration.
Without repeating the long and
involved provisions with regard to
the fixing of minimum prices, it is
enough to say that the act confers
the power to fix the minimum price
of coal at each and every coal mine
in the United States with such price
variations as the board may deem
necessary and proper.
There is also a provision author
izing the commission, when deemed
necessary in the public interest, to
establish maximum prices in order
to protect the consumer against I'M
reasonably high prices"
Sought by Both Sides
The Guffey Coal Control Act was
passed by Congress at the insistence
of President Roosevelt soon after
the Supreme Court held NRA un-
constitutional year ago.
With talk of new strike in the
bituminous coal fields sounding on
all sides, Congress adopted the law
with degree &C debate unusual for
such a measure.
The legislation was being drafted
VIXEN the NRA case was decided
and it was hastily revised in an
effort to overcome the courts OH
lection to the former law. For this
reason many considered the case
before the court presented an i'm
portant development in determining
the power of government over in
dustrial conditions generally.
Pressure for the act came from
both operators and miners.
Industry Long Depressed
Changing conditions in the in
dustry following the war had start