Evening star., 1948-01-19
Government Evasion
OF Constitution Held
Key 10 DisfiIIers' Suit
Agriculture Department
Challenged on Curling
Grain for Industry
By David laurence

Anybody who Is interested in how
to overthrow the Constitution of the
United States by legal subterfuge
is invited to listen to the arguments
being made this week by staff of
lawyers from the Department of
Justice before three-judge Federal
Court on the subject Of ALLEGATION
grain.
The case happens to challenge the
right Of the Department of Agricul-
ture under a recently passed law of
Congress to regulate the amount of
grain that the distillers shall use in
making whisky. But the principle
involved, if upheld by the courts,
could be used to strike down the
freedom of the press or any other
constitutional guarantees.
Without prohibiting or allocating
the use of grain among the large
users In other businesses, Congress
specifically named the distilling in
dustry-a minor user of grain-and
gave the Secretary of Agriculture
the power to shut down or curtail
distillery operations.
Subject Long Debated.
Prior to the adoption of the
Eighteenth Amendment to the Con-
stitution, there had been long
wrangles in the courts over the
power of the Federal Government
to prohibit or control the making
of alcoholic beverages. With the
enactment Of the 18th Amendment,
the people gave Congress unquali-
fed and complete power to prohibit
the manufacture and sale of these
beverages.
After the prohibition" era with
its bootleggers and difficulties of
national enforcement, the 21st
Amendment was adopted whereby
the people took away that same
prohibitory power from Congress.
BY the votes of more than three
fourths of the States, the people
lodged in the States the power to
control the manufacture and sale of
alcoholic beverages and gave Con-
gress powers only to enforce the
will of the States in respect to inter-
state transportation. Today II States
are themselves engaged in the ex-
elusive sale or distribution Of such
beverages within their borders.
The power to regulate the liquor
industry was a delegated power
under the 18th Amendment. It was
subtracted from the Constitution
under the 21st Amendment. This
means that the power to control the
manufacture and sale of alcoholic
beverages now is truly classified
under the 10th Amendment which
says:
"The powers not delegated to the
United States by the Constitution,
nor prohibited by it to the States,
are reserved to the States respec-
lively, or to the people"
Refer to Federal Power.
When the words United States"
are used in the Constitution they
refer to the Federal Government as
distinguished from the States.
For Congress now to reassert a
power which the people had spe-
cif1cally taken away from the Fed
eral Government and to hinge the
use of that power on the alleged
right to allocate grain products in
one industry is to introduce q novel
method of circumventing a particu-
lar amendment to the Constitution
itself which deals with that very
industry.
1t would be a parallel case if the
Congress under its right to allocate
the use of forest products decided
some day to allocate the amount
Of wood pulp that could be used in
the making Of newsprint and took
no other action to allocate the uses
of wood pulp in paper for boxes,
containers and the like.
Clearly there would be vehe-
ment protest and 1t would be
averred that Congress was indi-
rectly seeking to abridge the
freedom of the press, which is
specifically forbidden by the 1st
Amendment to the Constitution.
If Congress, however, is upheld
by the courts in asserting its power
to withhold grain from the distill-
ing industry while it does not with
hold grain from other industries by
law, then the way is opened to at
tack by indirection and subterfuge
any constitutional guarantee. The
power to allocate raw materials
could then be utilized to kill any
industry regardless of the protec-
tions specifically granted by the
Constitution.
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