Evening star., 1937-03-23
COURT PLAN HELD
AID TO PROGRESS
Wallace Tells Virginia Farm
Bureau Interests"
Fight Proposal.
BY the Associated Press.

RlCHMOND, MdTCn Z3.-A very
simple and very practical" method Of
assuring progress for national welfare
was Secretary Henry A. Wallace's de-
scription today of President Roose-
velt's proposed changes in the Su-
preme Court.
The cabinet member told the Vir-
ginia Farm Bureau Fedora tons an
nual convention here last night the
proposals were in accord with the
Democratic platform, which prom
lsed to seek amendment only if those
problems cannot be effectively solved
by legislation within the Constitu-
ton.
That legislation is now before the
Congress" he said, simple, feasible,
direct and capable of passage imme-
diately"
Accuses Interests"
He charged Interests which op-
posed the President in the last cleo
ton do not want workable solu-
tion" to current national problems
and said the present constitutional
attitude of the Supreme Court is the
last barrier between them and the
people"
These interests feel they must
keep the barrier at all costs" Wal
| lace said
He told his farm audience recent
decisions Of the Supreme Court
threatened to block attempts of the
administration to establish "neces-
sary safeguards for agriculture, labor
and industry"
He said nobody claimed the
Presidents plan was unconstitutional.
1T simply proposed to add new
blood to the Supreme Court" he said,
enough younger men who have been
out in the hurly-burly of changing
world to bring the majority opinions
| OF the court into line with the think
.ng people SO that the attitude OF the
people as expressed in the election
may be converted into action, that is
all
Farmers who were inclined to think
OF the Supreme Court and OF the
constitution as somehow the same
thlng" did not realize that the court
had gradually taken on powers not
granted by the Constitution" WAL
lace told the federation.
The men who wrote the Consitu-
ton, averaging % years younger than
the present Supreme Court, had no
| intention he said, "of fastening a
pollcy-making judiciary upon the
country.
They believe in leaving matters
OF policy to the President and Con-
| greSs"
Hits Former Connections.
Wallace said it would not make 80
much difference that the ma ajority of
| the justices formerly made their liv-
| ing out of the intricacies Of corporate
| hnance, If the Supreme Court in pass
ing on laws of Congress. passed on
them only from legal point of view. -
But farmers. laboring men and
small business men, he declared. be
/ come very greatly concerned" with the
| justices former connections If laws
are tested from the policy point of
view"
The Secretary said the justices were
doing what they believed best for the
country but that they believe hon
estly that the people, speaking through
elected Representatives, do not know
what is good for them"
| Legal Doubts" Unsettled.
| Declaring that legal doubts" sur
| round most of the congressional legis-
lation of the last four years, Wallace
said the ultimate decision of the court
| remained in doubt on such pieces of
| legislation as unemployment relief
old-age pensions, unemployment COM
pensation, soil conservation, the Sc
curities act. the holding company act
the labor relations act, the T. v. A
and dozens of others"
| The decision invalidating the agri-
cultural adjustment act, he said,
handed over" s20o,0000OO paid "in
reality by farmers and consumers
TO the professors and made court
action necessary for the Government
to recover some of this legally stolen
money"
Other Speakers.
John R. Hutcheson, director of the
! Virginia Agriculture Extension Divi-
sion, who spoke on the same program
told the Farm Bureau Virginia soil
was poorer today than it was 25 or
even 80 years ago.
The conservation program will
help remedy this situation" he said.
Edward A. O'Neal, president of the
American Farm Bureau Federation,
urged that industry and labor Join
with organized agriculture for a CO.
ordlnated program. He said stabilized
price levels were needed to head of
the threat of imitation.