Evening star., 1940-06-04
Presidential Power

AS has been the case with so many
other phases of this Nations belated
and still inadequate effort to safe
guard its vital interests in war
crazed world, teapot tempest is
being whipped up around President
Roosevelt's request for authority, in
the absence of Congress, to call a
portion of the National Guard into
,active service.
To Senator Taft, Republican, of
Ohio, the steps which have been
taken in the defense program consist
primarily of a demand for more
power for the Executive, without any
detailed explanation as to why that
power is necessary or whether it is
really going to be used" With that
point of view, The Star is in complete
disagreement.
The question of the extent to which
Congress should go at this time in
delegating unusual powers to the
President Is one which should be
considered dispassionately and i'm
partially. The Star, as the readers
of its columns we'll know, has not and
does not approve many of the Presi-
dents internal economic policies and
experiments. But it holds, in the
light of existing conditions which
menace the entirety of our national
concept of life, that it is blind folly
to withhold that full and unified
national backing which the present
critical emergency demands merely
because the President himself has
been guilty in the past of actions
which tend to impair that concept.
Dissent from and opposition to
extravagant, unsound and poten-
TALLY ruinous policies in the field Of
domestic economy is one thing. But
failure at this time to subordinate
such opposition to the man who, for
good or i'll, must lead the Nation
during at least the next seven months
of crisis, is to imperil the defense of
the country.
There is nothing unnatural or
ominous in the fact that prepara-
tions to defend this country should
result in the granting of increased
powers to the President. And the
scope of his powers necessarily will
be broadened as each step is taken
in the direction of adequate prepara-
ton for the possibility of war. Yet
it must be realized that failure to
delegate these powers to the Execu-
tive, as events have shown, results
in an inadequacy of preparedness
which, in turn, leads to war and
dictatorship. That has been the
tragic experience of England and
France-nations which now are pay
ing terrible penalty because they
refused to intrust any individual
with the power to perfect their de-
fenses until they stood in the shadow
of destruction.
What objections are there, after
all, to empowering the President, in
the absence of Congress, to call the
National Guard into active service?
Are not the fears of the critics Of
this proposal more imaginary than
real?
The Guard is the traditional sup
Elementary body upon which America
depends for her land defenses. In
event of war the Guardsmen would
Immediately be called upon. But
unless they receive intensive and
effective training before the calamity
comes-if come it muss-they will
be ineffective, unhardened and inept
for many months after they are
called to arms If Congress is un-
willing to authorize the President to
determine when the members of the
Guard should be called out for this
essential intensive training, particu-
larly in the tactical use of the
modern weapons of land warfare,
or for any other purpose for which
the Guard is intended then Congress
should proceed promptly on it's own
responsibility to call this reserve
force to active duty
If the time comes when the un-
trained man power of this Nation
as whole must be summoned to
defend our country and the con-
tinent we will need a trained National
Guard, one ready to go into oction
at once There will be no time for
training in this era of undeclared
wars if we wait until an aggressor
decides to strike.
To approve the expenditure of bill
lions of dollars for the mobilization
of our national industry to produce
the cannon, planes, tanks and other
arms we need would be useless and
foolish unless simultaneously we
train and toughen an army of at
least the size of our combined full
strength Regular forces plus our full
strength National Guard. And the
prompt approval of such a course
would do more to impress upon this
Nation and the rest of the world our
realistic and uncompromising deter
mination to prepare ourselves effec-