Evening star., 1936-02-04

and the general public. The prow-
sions Of my bin are not new or radical.
They are only fundamental Every
State has corporation law. Most
of them are wise and salutary, but
some few States have laws Of so loose
character as to permit the most
unconscionable violation Of honest
dealing. Under such laws monopoly
has prospered while the masses Of the
people have been steadily sinking into
relative poverty. AL in the world I
propose Is that when q corporation
undertakes to carry on commerce with
foreign nations or among the States,
it do so under q Federal, rather than
q State charter. The proposal Is so
simple that it's overlooked. We spend
our time setting up new Government
agencies, proposing new pensions and
bonuses, monkeying with the currency,
and trying to find all manner Of pam
acea instead Of going to the very
heart of the problem which is merely
to stop the concentration Of wealth.
Do that and you won't have to dream
about share the wealth plans, for pro-
duction and employment once released
from the grasp Of monopoly will oper.
ate under the American system to
distribute wealth among the masses
in . perfectly natural and healtful
manner.
Some persons have been frightened
because the word license" appears
in my bill, thinking that would mean
that every business man would have
to run to Washington for permission
every time he wanted to ship collar
button across a State line. That Is
not the idea at all. My bill is in
tended to apply to corporations, not to
natural persons. and the licensing pro-
vision is intended merely for the pur-
pose of affording a method Of max
Federal corporation law apply to cor
porations already In existence. These
provisions I have taken almost bodily
from a bill which was introduced by
the late Senator John Sharp williams
in 1910 and which, had it been
adopted at that time. would have pre-
vented the abuses which precipitated
the crash In 1929.
Bill Written by Wickersham.
The provisions of my bill which are
intended to establish a national in
corporation law were written originally
under the direction of former Attorney
General Wickersham, the chief legal
adviser to President William Howard
Taft. The latter was a Chief Justice
of the Supreme Court as well as a
President of the United States. and ne
transmitted the Wickersham draft to
the Congress with a special message
in January. 1910. 1t think 1t may be
reasonably assumed that under such
sponsorship the bill has at least a
chance of being called constitutional.
OF course, my measure goes further
than either the measure of Senator
Williams or the measure which was
recommended by President Taft. 1t
attempts, in some degree at least, TO
meet directly the primary problem of
our ACKNOWLEDGEMENT and the res
toration CT public purchasing power.
1t contains bill Of rights for labor. in
that it provides that every corporation
doing business among the States or
with foreign nations shall agree not to
employ child labor. not to discriminate
against female employees and to rec
ognize TIE right Of collective bargain
ing. These are three propositions
upon which there is no substantial dis
agreement All political parties in
dorse them, but they are not made ef-
fective simply because there appears
to pe no constitutional method of en-
forcing them except through q ma
tional corporation law.
Great as is the unemployment and
human distress growing out of the de-
preston. 1t Is not the whole problem
The statistics of the Federal Reserve
Board, gathered from the most relia-
BILE sources. show that industrial re-
covery has actually already been at
tanned. In December last industrial
production as l03 per cent of what Il