ALL

Prior to March 4, 1933, when a statesman solemnly announced that he favored upholding the Constitution, U. S. citizens quietly turned to their sports pages and forgot him. If he asserted that the Government ought to protect property rights, ought to encourage men to earn, save, acquire and keep property, he could not stir even a flutter of interest. But last week when six eminent gentlemen propounded these propositions they made front-page news. Finally it seemed as if the New Deal were to meet something more potent than the disorganized opposition of Herbert Hoover's well-beaten henchmen.

A strange political nosegay were the six gentlemen:

John William Davis, Democratic nominee for President in 1924, Morgan attorney, a high-minded and thoroughly conservative Democrat.

Jouett Shouse, active head of the Democratic National Committee during the Raskob regime, who, upon his ousting at Chicago, consolidated the Wets for the final drive upon the 18th Amendment.

Alfred Emanuel Smith, most famed Democratic liberal until the New Deal shoved back the liberal frontier and moved out on the Santa Fe trail of experiment.

James Wolcott Wadsworth, well-born Republican conservative who opposed Al Smith in the New York Legislature, served twelve years as a U. S. Senator, started his political career all over again in the House last year and is today probably the most notable member of his party in that chamber.

Nathan Lewis Miller, onetime (1921-23) Republican Governor of New York, who now serves U. S. Steel Corp. as its chief counsel.

Irenee du Pont, of the Delaware du Fonts, Republican in days gone by, but a supporter of Smith in 1928, of Roosevelt in 1932; a generous donor to what he considers worthy causes.

This mixed sextet announced the formation of the American Liberty League, which, following the custom of the day, promptly became known as ALL. The purpose of this "nonpartisan organization" was "to defend and uphold the Constitution of the United States, and to gather and disseminate information that 1) will teach the necessity of respect for the rights of persons and property as fundamental to every successful form of government, and 2) will teach the duty of government to encourage and protect individual and group initiative and enterprise, to foster the right to work, earn, save and acquire property, and to preserve the ownership and lawful use of property when acquired."

Incitement. Political enmity and selfish pique were two motives which New Dealers quickly read into ALL. They justly pointed out that Messrs. Davis, Shouse and Smith had opposed the nomination of Franklin Roosevelt at Chicago, that Mr. Wadsworth hopes to win the Republican presidential nomination in 1936. What some New Dealers did not point out was that no ordinary political cause could bring such diverse gentlemen together.

No thwarted ambitions had a committee of the American Bar Association which last week pointed out in Chicago: ". . . Federal administrative agencies exercising judicial in combination with legislative and executive powers are substituting a labyrinth in which the rights of individuals, while preserved in form, can easily be nullified in practice. It is estimated that one Federal administrative agency alone, the NIRA, has been responsible for 10,000 or more pages of pronouncements, supposedly having the effect of law, in the period of one year, a total which greatly exceeds the volume of all Federal statutes now in effect. . . .* Under these circumstances even lawyers are unable to ascertain the law applicable to a given state of facts, and the presumption that every citizen knows the law becomes, to term it mildly, more than violent."

And no political ambitions has Kansas' oldtime editor Ed Howe, now 81, who last week broke silence in an interview published in Country Home: "I never liked the Roosevelt type of man. They're too much for show, too quick on the trigger for safety, too cozy with idealistic leadership. The antics of the present Administration are the craziest I've ever seen. As a man who has had to run a business, I'll admit that you have to experiment a little, take a little risk; but I do object to a lot of new thought politicians up in Washington taking wild, unnecessary risks in my name, sending me the bill, and demanding that I be 'idealistic' and constructive about it. The way they're wasting our money up there is the greatest crime in the history of this nation! . . ."

Strong objections such as Ed Howe's were certainly necessary to make bedfellows of the founders of ALL, and no commonplace, ready-made bed would hold them. The nature of ALL, as its president Jouett Shouse announced it, was to parallel the Association Against the Prohibition Amendment: to take a definite stand on particular issues, to take no direct part in elections, to organize and represent before Congress the interests of homeowners, farmers, labor, savings depositors, bondholders and stockholders.

First question newshawks popped at ALL's president was: "Is the League against the New Deal?" The obvious and truthful, if not wholly accurate, answer would have been "yes." But Mr. Shouse hedged. He gave another answer which was probably also true: "The League is not anti-Roosevelt. ... If a tendency to extreme radicalism developed which the President wishes to check, we might be most helpful. . . ."

Welcome. Three days before ALL rang in New Deal ears, Secretary of Agriculture Wallace wrote in the New York Times: "We badly need a new alignment: conservatives versus liberals; those who yearn for a return of the dead past versus those who feel that human intelligence can lead us to a far more general abundance and peace between warring groups. With the old crowd whimpering the same old incantations, the faster the show-down comes and the more definite the division between the Old Dealers and the New Dealers of both present parties, the better."

When the news was out, Secretary of the Interior Ickes, an oldtime Republican insurgent, chuckled: "That's fine! I've been hoping ever since 1912 that we'd have political parties divided on real issues. It looks like it's working out that way at last. . . . I'd like to see all the progressives together and all the conservatives together. . . ."

Sensitive to charges that the New Deal flouts the Constitution and regiments all U. S. economic life, some New Dealers were certain that the U. S. would promptly see through and repudiate ALL as a tool of selfish Old Dealers. Senator Elmer Thomas of Oklahoma used his utmost term of contempt to tag ALL's members -- "gold dollar men." Said Relief Administrator Hopkins: "The League may be composed of right-thinking people but they are so far Right that no one will ever find them."

Entering into the spirit of the jest, the Democratic National Committee rushed around to tell five conservative Democratic Senators--Glass and Byrd of Virginia, Tydings of Maryland, Gore of Oklahoma, Bailey of North Carolina--that they were accused of being in league with the League, an accusation which no one had made. Promptly all five issued ringing denials which were so much good grist for the Democratic Committee mill.

But the greatest amusement of all was at the White House. Jouett Shouse had told the President in advance about plans for ALL, had asked him whether he had any objections. None whatever, the President had replied; the League's aims could be subscribed to by every good citizen. But when newshawks walked into his press conference, after ALL had appeared in headlines, Franklin Roosevelt was roaring with laughter. He told how that morning, while he sat in bed looking over the newspapers, he had seen that Wall Street was reported to regard the League as "the answer to a prayer" and he had laughed for ten minutes.

"Are you for the Constitution?" asked a grinning newshawk of the President.

Yes, indeed, he still was for it. In fact, he was actively for it. But the League reminded him of an organization formed to support two of the Ten Commandments and ignore the rest. Correspondents guffawed at that one. Chuckling, the President went on to relate how an irreverent friend of his had remarked that the League's two commandments were "love thy God and forget thy neighbor" -- "God" being interpreted by the League as "property." Jovian laughter echoed through the Blue Room. New Party? The President might laugh long and loud about ALL but there were other New Dealers who soberly realized that it was not healthy for an Administration to be as little criticized as the New Deal has been to date. So friends and foes of the New Deal were almost equally pleased to see an organization launched to provide the kind of opposition which makes two-party Government effective.

But the suggestion that ALL was intended as the nucleus for a new political party, uniting conservative Democrats and Republicans, was more the hope of its enemies than the purpose of its sponsors. Staunch partymen all are Messrs. Smith, Shouse, Wadsworth. Staunch partymen, too, are such conservative Democrats as Glass, Gore, Tydings, Byrd, who, though they had no part in forming the League, can be expected to side more often with its doctrine than with those of the Brain Trust.

Washington observers who know their politics were sure last week that if ALL becomes a new party, New Dealers will make it so. Secretaries Wallace and Ickes have called for a new alignment. Democrat Roosevelt himself has lent his support--across party lines--to Republican Hiram Johnson in California, to Progressive La Follette in Wisconsin. On his trip across the continent, the President hobnobbed with Republican Nye of North Dakota. Farmer-Laborite Shipstead of Minnesota got an invitation to visit the Presidential special, but his Democratic opponent in the autumn election, Einar Hoidale, had to go to the train uninvited. Pundit Frank R. Kent pointed to the significant fact that in his whole trip across the continent Mr. Roosevelt did not once, in public speech, use the word "Democrat." Many a politician asked privately whether in 1936 Candidate Roosevelt may not lead to the ballot box a new party of Democrats and Republicans who find their old political surroundings uncomfortable. If he does, "Liberty League" might be the other party's name.

*Number of pages in the Federal Code: 2,735.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.