Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

Mrs. BOLTON. That does not give any kind of detail of what you mean by the "citizens equally sovereign.'

Mr. STREIT. There are several other provisions that come after that. Mr. BOLTON. I remember that paragraph but it did not give me anything definite as I read the paragraph itself. It did not give me the answer to my questions, as I read it.

Mr. STREIT. Well, if you prefer, then, you can take the United States Government as a model federal union. It was the earliest. You can take the Swiss Federal Union, which differs in certain respects.

Mrs. BOLTON. But I wanted to know what your idea was in the

matter.

Mr. STREIT. My own idea I put here in the Union Now, in an illustrative constitution for a federal union. It is a combination of the basic principles of the United States federal system with that of the Swiss and the British parliamentary system. It brings in the Swiss executive system to a degree and brings in also to a degree the parliamentary executive system. It is a combination of the three systems. We cannot estimate these things in percentages, but the great bulk and basic part of my illustrative constitution is taken textually from our own Constitution.

Mrs. BOLTON. Thank you very much.

Mr. VORYS (presiding). Mr. Judd.

Mr. JUDD. Mr. Streit, your main plea is that we should act boldly at least to explore the possibilities of federation with the nations which you have enumerated, which you rate as nearest to us in experience in democratic self-government?

Mr. STREIT. Yes, sir; to act boldly and to put our faith and take our risks on the side of freedom, rather than on the side of numbers; that we take our risks on the side of strength rather than on the side of inviting everybody in.

I heard the question you posed to a previous witness. Would you like for me to discuss that point?

Mr. JUDD. Yes. I want to get your view on that particular point. Mr. STREIT. Well, if we are going on the basis of inviting everybody in, that is, everybody willing to be taken in, then we run a very grave risk. We do not know what people are coming. We must face the facts that very few people have worked out a free system of government that has stood up over any length of time, and that this is a very difficult thing to do. We have no idea who will come when we launch an invitation broadcast like that. We have to put our risks in coming out with a very weak constitution, or we run the risk of breakdown in our conference. Whether Soviet Russia comes, or others, whether China comes, or others, if you are really going to apply these free Federal principles you come into a head-on collision right in the conference, across the table. From what I have seen in Geneva in these matters, people then begin to water down their principles because they want to be nice, and so forth, and they come out in the end with some very ineffective framework or organization, resolution, what you will, or they split up. When the Nazis withdrew from the Disarmament Conference, the world headed for war.

It seems to me less risky not to force the issue by bringing in people that are not going to get together on this free basis we want, not to

force them into a position where you have to argue that point out right with them, but to go ahead, just as I propose, with those with whom we can reasonably hope to agree.

Take it this way: In a law firm you bring in other partners. You start a law firm with a few partners. You do not invite even all the lawyers to join your firm. Now, that does not mean that you have no other relations with your fellow citizens in that city. You have all sorts of relations. You may have hurt somebody's feelings if you did not bring him in your partnership, or whatever you may want to call it, but your standing in the community will be determined in the end by what your firm does.

We Americans have at the present time any number of universal associations. We have proved a hundred times over that we are willing to do business with anybody. We have got the United Nations, we have got all these other international organizations of which we are members, but we have never tried in any of these things to do what I suggest, to associate, federate on the basis of individual freedom, where we would take the responsibility of deciding who our partners would be. I know it is convenient for us to invite all nations to a conference in a way that would cause some of them to blackball themselves, that would put the responsibility of deciding on somebody else, free us of the responsibility of deciding whether they were free enough for federation with us. But I think it would be more courageous and wiser for us to take that responsibility ourselves, and take our chances on the success of free principles, applied by the most experienced democracies, then leading others to follow in that line, adopt these principles too.

Mr. JUDD. You think there is less danger in doing it this way than the other way?

Mr. STREIT. By my calculation of risks, there is less danger.

Mr. JUDD. If you succeeded and got the union, there probably would be less danger. But if your convention failed would you not have antagonized the others without any compensating increase in strength on your own side?

Mr. STREIT. Examine that closely-that if we fail. Suppose we got those 15 countries together in a federation convention. I believe they would certainly come out, or at least some of them would come out with a constitution that they would agree on. All of them might not ratify it. It took some time for certain of our States to ratify our United States Constitution. But you would have come out of the proposed convention with something that I think some of the democracies would ratify. I cannot conceive really that all these countries, under the pressure of necessity they face now, and with the statesmanship I think they have, would come out with nothing at all. Mr. JUDD. Are you reasonably confident the United States would ratify it?

Mr. STREIT. I am, yes.

Mr. JUDD. What if it should not?

Mr. STREIT. That is such a big "iffy" question one cannot possibly decide on that at this moment because, (a) we do not know what the constitution is going to be and (b) in making a constitution, if this committee took even the step that I suggest here of convoking a convention, people all over the country would be considering this whole problem as they do not now. They would be educating themselves

in it. There would not be the public opinion at the end of the convention that you at the present time are able to see. We must imagine things in a dynamic way. Things are moving along. In this matter, by the time your convention came to its end, with all the newspaper reports of it, you would have educated public opinion up to principles of government, such as they do not grasp at the present time. Mr. VORYS. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. JUDD. Yes.

Mr. VORYS. Right on that point, in your original statement, and here again you said we would have the choice of whether this would be ratified or not. I am sure I do not think, and I do not believe you do, that that is correct. Once this thing starts, if we convoke such constitutional assembly, of course we have got to ratify what comes out of it. We have had experiences here where we find now that we are committed by actions of our representatives up at the United Nations. I do not think you believe for a minute that if we convoke a constitutional convention, and under the proceedings of that convention a federal union constitution came out that there is any question but that we would have no choice but to ratify it. It would be unthinkable, impossible, a catastrophe and world tragedy. If we did anything else everybody would realize it.

Mr. STREIT. I am sorry to disagree with you on that. I do not believe honestly that it is. I think that what you said would be one of the most powerful arguments on the side of those wanting to ratify the constitution. It would be an extremely strong argument. But take myself, for example: Suppose I were delegate to this convention. If it came out with a constitution that I thought was inadequate, and if I thought that in the light of the situation then, that another conference would produce a better constitution, I might very well, if the constitution was not big enough to do the job, take the same stand as I pointed out earlier George Mason, of Virginia did. He was one of the greatest inventors of our Constitution, but because it did not contain certain things he deemed essential, he did not sign it, and went back to Virginia and fought it, as did several other delegates. It got through the greatest of the 13 States, Virginia, but it just squeezed through the Convention there. In New York State, Alexander Hamilton began with a two-thirds majority against ratification. It took 6 weeks of argument, and it was only when he finally persuaded the leader of the opposition that the Constitution was ratified by New York State by, I think, 27 to 24 votes.

I would predict this new constitution will be ratified-this is just my guess. It will be infinitely better than any constitution we could devise here among ourselves, yet I predict it will face a terrific fight for ratification in the United States, and in Britain, and in France, in the larger democracies; the smaller ones probably will adopt it relatively rapidly, if our own history is any criterion. But in Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts, and New York, every one of them, and also North Carolina, which was one of the larger States at that time-in every one of them they had a big fight on before they ratified the United States Constitution. So I do not believe, or I certainly will not consider that this new constitution is out of the woods by any means, Mr. Vorys, until we have ratified it. That I foresee is going to be a terrific battle.

Mr. VORYS. I did not mean to interrupt you.

Mr. JUDD. Another place that makes me fearful that the nations might be suspicious is where you say Congress must agree to admit to the union those who best practice freedom. Here is Hawaii practicing freedom as well as any part of the United States, and yet we do not admit her to our present Union.

Mr. STREIT. That is true; we do not apply all of our principles. The choice is not between perfection and no application of our principles, but a relatively better or worse application of them. I think one of the wiser things in our Constitution is it set up no specific rules for the admission of States. It said simply that the Congress may admit new States in the Union, period, and left it to the Congress to decide each case on its merits. There have been, in the period before the Civil War, as you know, there was a big issue as to what States would come in. There are all sorts of factors that come in such questions. Mr. JUDD. I was thinking when you were talking to Mr. Jonkman about the balance sheet of the difficulties now, as compared to the difficulties when our own Constitution was adopted. Certainly one of the greatest difficulties or differences then was the fact that they had Abolitionists and slaveholders who were almost as far apart in economic views as capitalists and Communists are today. The Abolitionists were determined to destroy the system on which the South had built its whole life, and one of the great miracles to me is that with two such divergent economic and social philosophies they could still get together in a federal union. There are differences today among the nations you mentioned but none greater than that was.

Mr. STREIT. That is true. I think the differences among nations I mentioned are certainly not so great as they were then. I would not go quite as far as you in comparing communism and capitalism. Mr. JUDD. That was merely for illustrative purposes.

Mr. STREIT. The concept of the State as a democratic republic was the same in the South and North.

Mr. JUDD. Their economic philosophies were different. Their political philosophies were not so different.

Mr. STREIT. Yes.

Mr. JUDD. Thank you very much.

Mr. STREIT. May I make, on the question you raised concerning Asia, a few remarks?

Mr. JUDD. The undeveloped areas and their potentialities?

Mr. STREIT. It related to throwing them all away from us. I know an official in an Asiatic government. I am not at liberty to give his name, but he purchases things for them over here. I will show you how the union I propose affects things in different ways one would hardly imagine.

His country recently regained its liberty, and they have promised the people a great rise in the standard of living. To bring that rise about in the standard of living they have to build dams to irrigate fields and to get power. They want to get generators over here. They had their eye on some generators that were in our surplus stocks. When they went to get them they were unable to get them because we had then reserved them as stand-bys for a possible coming war. They cannot get them in the open market now, and, if they could, they would have to pay a much higher price to get the generators. That is just one little concrete example of how the present system is working to destroy their own hopes.

Now, this particular man I happen to know would much prefer to see us form a federal union in the West that would not need to reserve so many generators for a looming war, that would be producing plenty of generators, and things like that, that they could get cheaply, and they could be then buying them and carrying out their promises to raise the standards of living for their own people. I think the ramifications of union in these and many other ways would do much for democracy and for friendship with the people of Asia, much more than the other solutions proposed.

Mr. JUDD. I cannot agree with you on that.

Mr. STREIT. It would take some discussion, I agree.
Mr. VORYS (presiding). Mr. Lodge.

Mr. LODGE. Mr. Streit, you have given us a very interesting and provocative statement. I am sure that in this eloquent statement of yours you expressed the hopes and aspirations of a great many people. You know in our Department of National Defense they have two plans: One is what they call a long-range plan and the other is a short-range plon.

I realize that the word "now" is in your plan.

We are, however, confronted with the imminent problems, urgent problems which we must meet in order to have more time in which to work out some such world as you envision. I would point out, for instance, that the Italian people on April 18 gave quite a dramatic and extremely helpful and expressive display of popular government. Mr. STREIT. I will agree.

Mr. LODGE. It was a display of how an enlightened electorate can behave. Ninety-four percent of the electorate voted. In our last Presidential elections 65 percent voted, and yet you would exclude the Italian people?

Mr. STREIT. I think it would be wiser at this stage.

Mr. LODGE. What effect do you think it would have if you were to call this conference tomorrow and not invite Italy? What effect do you think that would have on the De Gasperi government?

Mr. STREIT. It would depend on the way we put it forward, and the way we talked, as to what it was about. I said in my statement that you can invite partial or immature democracies to the convention but you must face the risks that you are involved in by taking that course. It may be that we had better compromise our principles, shall we say, in that Italian case, or in some other cases that might be brought up. All I would have one do is to consider clearly whether it is wiser in the long run to water down our principles and no longer identify this union so much with freedom. When you open up the door, you have to open it to the next, and the next, and the next, and where are you in the end?

I have put forward in the June issue of Freedom and Union an idea as to how it could be done in the best manner, if it was thought wisest to make any modification in principle to bring in the Italian Republic. I can see great advantages in bringing Italy in now, and I can see great disadvantages. I would be willing to go along with the wisdom of the majority on that. I have a great deal of respect for the Italian people.

Mr. LODGE. You have no South American nations listed here at all. Mr. STREIT. No; I have not. There is another great problem. Again I apply this same principle here. I can see three different

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »