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A celebrated historian has said it is the very ardor of their sincerity that warms them into persecution. It is the holy zeal by which they are fired that quickens their fanaticism into a deadly activity. I humbly pray Heaven, in its mercy, may mitigate his zeal and weaken his sincerity, for whenever that takes place, then, perhaps, Hebrew villages will no longer be consigned to the torch of the marauder, and the home of the heretic and the honor of his fireside will no longer be considered the lawful prey of the Russian soldiery.

It is also said that there is an easy escape from all these hardships if the victim of this persecution will only embrace the established religion of the Empire, as provided for by law. This proposition is absolutely true. In reference to the suggestion, I desire to say that if the Emperor of Russia, who is at the head of the ecclesiastical church of the realm, by some supreme act of inhumanity directed against these prostrate victims of his intolerance will offer them the alternative of either accepting the faith of their persecutors or the imposition of an additional servitude, I think I know what the result will be they will never abandon the altars of their fathers. For centuries their ancestors spurned the fagot and the flame, and these people, emulating their heroic fortitude, will bear up under affliction, will submit to the sundering of domestic ties and to the agonies of separation. They will defy imprisonment, and they will proceed to the inhospitable shores of exile rather than compromise with their tormentors or abandon one article of that immortal creed which during all the generations "in pastoral tents of the shepherd, in the sumptuous palaces of the kings, and among the broken pillars and arches of the temple has always maintained its inviolable simplicity."

Senators, take this as you will, it is nothing but religious persecution directed against citizens of the United States. You ask for other methods of relief. There is no other method of

relief. Tell me what other methods there are. Do we propose to keep treaties and allow other governments with whom we have made them to break them at their will? No other civilized nation on this earth would assume such a humiliating position. This treaty has been broken in its organic and most vital part. The heart of this compact has been pierced, and raising as it does with us the question of religious freedom, its most sensitive feature has been mutilated and trampled upon. We deserve the contempt of mankind if we reel at the blow and submit to this degrading indignity. There is no way out of it except the termination, the rescission, or the abrogation of this treaty. Call it what you will. I care not what a man's religious belief may be, if he is an American citizen he is entitled, under an American passport, to the privileges of the world. These helpless victims of religious intolerance are American citizens. For 40 years their pleading voice has gone across the water asking for their rights. It has all been in vain. Now this Government is behind them, the land of their adoption and their choice. To us they look, as their ancestors in 40 years in the wilderness looked to the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night-to lead them to their deliverance.

Senators, in the name of justice, in the name of humanity, and, above all, in the name of religious freedom, I ask, whatever form it may assume, for the speedy passage of this joint resolution.

GENERAL-WELFARE CLAUSE OF THE CONSTITUTION.

During the debate in the Senate on January 30, 1912, upon a bill creating Children's Bureau, Senator Rayner rejected the idea that the constitutionality of any beneficent measure may be established under the general-welfare clause.

I am in favor of the bill, but I did not intend until this morning to make any remarks upon it at all. I would not submit

my views if it were not for a little dialogue that was carried on during a debate upon the measure between the Senator from Texas, Mr. BAILEY, and the senior Senator from Montana, Mr. DIXON. I will read a few words of that colloquy, which, I hope, will justify my observations.

MR. BAILEY-But under what provision of the Constitution is this measure proposed?

MR. DIXON-The general-welfare clause.

MR. BAILEY-I knew it would come to this. This bill really undertakes to excuse itself on that ground because it is entited "A bill to collect statistics for the 'welfare' of the children."

MR. DIXON-I had not intended to raise any constitutional question in what I had to say, but as long as the Senator from Texas has raised the constitutional feature of the matter, I will say that we certainly have the power under the general-welfare clause of the Constitution, which has accommodated itself to thousands of enactments by Congress. The opening clause of the Constitution certainly covers the bill under consideration.

Mr. President, I can not stand that. I propose to vote for the bill, but if I could not put it under any other clause of the Constitution except the general-welfare clause and the preamble of the Constitution itself, I would not vote for it, no matter how beneficent and excellent a measure it may turn out to be.

I thought, Mr. President, that we had settled this question long ago in the Senate by agreeing that there is no general-welfare clause in the Constitution of the United States. I challenge contradiction upon that point.

All the authorities and all the text-writers agree, without one discordant voice, that there is no substantive general-welfare clause in the Constitution of the United States, and the Senator from Texas is perfectly right upon that proposition. We have taken an oath here to support the Constitution of the United States. How can we support the Constitution of the United States if we vote for a bill that comes under an alleged general

welfare provision if there is not any general-welfare clause at all?

The text writers, with unanimity, admit that there is no such substantive provision as the general-welfare clause. Here is what Hamilton says in his celebrated report upon manufactures in 1791, which was the first interpretation of this clause:

Common defense and general welfare are not to be construed as a distinct grant of power, but are qualifications of the objects of the taxing power.

Judge Story, upon page 661 of his first volume upon the Constitution, uses this strong language with reference to this clause:

* Do the words "to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises," constitute a distinctly substantial power; and the words "to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States," constitute another distinct and substantial power? Or are the latter words connected with the former so as to constitute a qualification upon them? This has been a topic of political controversy, and has furnished abundant material for popular declamation and alarm. If the former be the true interpretation, then it is obvious that under color of the generality of the words to "provide for the common defense and general welfare," the Government of the United States is, in reality, a government of general and unlimited powers, notwithstanding the subsequent enumerations of specific powers; if the latter be the true construction, then the power of taxation only is given by the clause, and it is limited to objects of a national character, "to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and the general welfare."

*** The reading, therefore, which will be maintained in these commentaries is that which makes the latter words a qualification of the former; and this will be best illustrated by supplying the words which are necessarily to be understood in this interpretation. It will then stand thus: "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises in order to pay the debts and to provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States;" that is, for the purpose of paying the public debts and providing for the common defense and general welfare of the United States.

A school of commentators arose after the adoption of the Constitution, who had taken a recess for a hundred years until the Senator from Montana rang the bell and assembled them

again in convention, who claimed that this was a distinct clause; that we could not only lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises to pay the debts, but that we could provide for the common defense and general welfare as a separate proposition. When Story comments upon that provision, he says that it means that we can lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises in order to pay the debts and to provide for the common defense and general welfare.

I want to quote a few lines now from Pomeroy. These are all gentlemen who belong to a different school of constitutional construction from the one I do, but I am willing to take their interpretation. I will read what Pomeroy says upon the subject. It is a very plain and explicit statement. Pomeroy

states:

Congress has power "to lay and collect taxes, etc., to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States." Do these two clauses contain two separate and distinct powers, or is the latter a limitation upon the other? In other words, does the Constitution, by this language, confer upon the Legislature a general faculty of taxation, and also another general capacity to pay public debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare; or does it confer a limited power of taxation by restricting the purposes for which taxes may be laid and confining them to the payments of debts and provisions for the common defense and general welfare? * If

the construction should be adopted which regards the second clause as an independent grant of power, it would in effect be making our General Government unlimited. Providing for the common defense and general welfare includes everything which any government could possibly do; and a grant of power in these broad terms would be the same as making Congress omnipotent, equal in the extent of its functions to the British Parliament.

Now, I will read one decision and I will ask leave of the Senate to print a few other decisions upon the matter. This is a decision in the western district of Missouri, by Judge Rogers, whom I knew to be a very able man:

The "general-welfare" clause “contains no grant of power whatsoever, but it is a mere expression of the ends and purposes to be effected by the preceding power of taxation." I content myself with the fact that

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