140 UNEMPLOYMENT IN THE UNITED STATES

It has been, as the Representative here from Michigan brought out
yesterday, and it is substantially the same measure that has come
before Congress heretofore and was considered but not enacted. It
is a measure that has never been tried. N obody claims that it is
the.same kind of thing that has been tried in England or Germany,
and if it has, that it has succeeded in those countries or that there is
any particular definite benefit to be derived from it. In fact, Mr.
Green was pressed to say what good this would do and all he could
say was, in effect, that it was possibly a palliative, and that it might
accomplish something.
One thing it will accomplish, and we know that. It will put this
Congress again on record in favor of this 50-50 combination of seduction
 and compulsion on the States to do the will of the central authority
 in the United States, and I submit that if these gentlemen could
prove to you by demonstration, by a mathematical demonstration,
that this bill would cure the problem of unemployment in the United
States and would give everybody a job, it would still be not a good
argument in favor of scrapping the Constitution of the United States.
I say, referring to the speech of former President Coolidge that was
just read to you by Mr. Emery, that the Constitution is more important
 than that; that a single emergency, however severe, does not
justify its abolition; and, without a constitutional amendment, this
sort of thing is practically an abolition or a destruction of the groundwork
 of the Constitution by substituting central authority, central
responsibility, and central expenditure and taxation for the local
self-government of our fathers that we have enjoyed up to the present
time. If you do away with that, the Constitution is a shell: it is a
form of words without meaning.
Therefore I respectfully submit our organization urges upon this
committee not to enact this bill, not to recommend its enactment,
As to the other bills, we have no constitutional objection. They do
some good. Well and good. They are policies temporary in their
nature which if they turn out to be unsatisfactory in performance
may be retreated from, but, as appeared in the history of the maternity
 bill, comparatively unimportant as that may be in its broader
aspects, it has introduced a principle directly at variance with the
Constitution which is being copied in this and other measures and
will continue to be copied unless the Congress or the people put their
foot down and say, “No; we have sworn to support the Constitution,
and until you show us a better Constitution we will stand by it.”
Mr. McKeown. Do I understand you to say that even if the
Congress believed that these measures would give everv man in the
United States a job, it should not be passed?
Mr. Capwaraper. Yes; I said that.
Mr. McKeown. You think it should not be passed even if it would
do that?
Mr. Capwaraper. No, sir. I would not vote for an argument to
abolish the United States Constitution even if it would give everybody
 a job. I think it would be better that some people remain temporarily
 out of employment until times get better, without scrapping
the Constitution that has served us in good stead for nearly a hundred
and forty years.
Mr. McKeown. You would rather save the Constitution and lose
the countrv?