| Show 1 irr GENERAL i p I 1 HUGH S 14 1 4 JOHNSON 9 aa I 1 0 wd nac binting KING washington this column hns has been so busy ki bitzing about the conscription ol of men under the selective service bill that it had much space for ki bitzing about the so called conscription of industry or I 1 wealth tho the commandeering power added to tho the burke wadsworth bill of course the whole idea of tacking this provision on a selective service bill Is pure political hokum it was put there to enable congressional candidates for election reelection re rc to say to their constituents 1 I voto vote for conscripting mens lives until I 1 had insisted on voting to conscript mens dollars the power to tako take over private property for public use la Is as old as english law it was called the law of eminent domain it Is practiced almost every day in peace time and la in called tho the process of condemnation tho the only real difference in war Is that it Is called commandeering de cring any important difference in the proposed legislation Is only in the method for determining whether the need Is for public use in both cases a court must determine what must bo be paid the owner for his property that must be sc because tho the constitution itself provides that private property may never bo be taken for public uso use without just compensation pensa tion 11 in peacetime condemnation the court must rd judge both that the proposed uso use la Is public and what the compensation shall be in this proposed legislation whether tho the property Is to bo be taken on a rental or ownership basis the secretaries of war or navy can determine whether the use Is public but it Is as it must be left to tho the courts to determine just compensation in time of war or times like these where nearly every use tn in connection with armament Is public there much to that distinction the law Is faulty however in vesting the commandeering power in the two secretaries it should bo be in the president that Is another lesson of 1018 both war and navy departments frequently commandeered the same supplies president wilson finally straightened that out by requiring all commandeering orders to bo be signed by the chairman of the war industries board 6 apart from that the smith or senate version of the commandeering amendment Is good the objectionable circumstance is the nature of tho the debate there Is no measure of just compensation m n for a human ufa life deliberately drafted into military service is not the donation of anything to tho the public it is the performance of an obligation to tho the public just compensation as required by the constitution for a del dollar is a dollar on no sustainable theory do tho the two relationships stand on tho samo e ground neither condemnation dem nation nor commandeering are as the politicos like to say conscription of wealth it is electioneering electioneer ing buncombe 0 finally as our world war experience proved while commandeering of some facilities like land docks warehouses and supplies generally will frequently be necessary ns as a convenient method of determining price the taking of manufacturing fac turing plants for government operation very rarely happens only once by y the army at least in 1918 tho the power to do so is useful for what president wilson called a club behind the door in negotiation the practice of doing so on a rental or fee simple basis is useless and unnecessary the government has neither tho the personnel nor the ability to move in and operate a private plant the war department for example has all it can handle in fighting a war if government has as it did have in 1918 1018 priority powers over power fuel supply and trans por port atlon tation it has no need to take over a mans plant if ho he behave it can choke his operation to death in two weeks time as ws we threatened to do a few times in the old war wa industries board the threat was always we never took over any plants no matter how you slice it this controversy tr tro versy is sull still boloney f i 0 0 DRAFT LOTTERY the next big news story on the domestic front will be the great national draft lottery in the civil war draft names of young men in each county were written on separate slips of paper and put in a jury u wheel at the courthouse our tho the order in which mens names came out was the order of their going there was so much chance for graft and fixing in this method that in 1917 we invented a new way registration cards in each local board district were given a serial number after they had been thoroughly shuffled usually there were less than cards in each district the first plan was to have from 1 to written on slips of paper and each put into a gelatin capsule in the presence of a crowded and distinguished audience the secretary of war drew out the first capsule it contained the number that meant that in each of the odd local districts the man whose number was was the first who would be called for examination 1 I 1 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