. 4 Free for All Are We Ready to Reform ? PERM ERMIT me to thank you for your editorial on Mr. Seitz's article "Crime: A Chronic Complaint." Not only do we forget the menace of the criminal, but prison wardens who are far from the scene and circumstances of the crime are often too absorbed in reforming the criminal by mer 1 ciful methods to gauge properly the heinousness of the crime. It is true that I know a case where a prisoner was released on parole in accordance with requests from the community where the crime was committed. But these letters were not from those against whom the crime was committed. Revenge is no object, of course, but those who have been wronged are, it would seem, in a better position to judge whether the offender should be turned loose upon them again than is the rar-away warden, however mercifully inclined. We surely are not ready to substitute life sentence for capital punishment when so large a number of life sentences are terminated by pardon. Of course, the man meditating a crime considers this condition. But, regardless of the nature of the penalty inflicted, I believe that it would help matters if the whole court procedure were so changed as to make everything indefinite in a grave sort of way until the sentence is pronounced. Every teacher knows the value of this method in dealing with offending pupils. A man haled into court ought to disappear from the public eye like one who suddenly falls into a bottomless pit. Only those immediately concerned in the trial ought to be allowed to attend; no newspaper reports should be permitted; the public should know nothing till the sentence or acquittal is announced. Any jury, it would seem, could serve just as fairly and effectively under these conditions as under the present régime. Is this suggestion also something for which we are not ready? God knows! But, if it is, it must be admitted, I fear, that we as a people think more of newspaper sensationalism than we do of the administration of justice. C J. C. NICHOLSON. Support from a Poet N view of the discussion you stirred up over your recent article on education, I wonder if you would be interested in the following bit of humor: A PARENT'S PLEA My little boy is eight years old; He doesn't mind the tasks they set, He heads his class in raffia work, In making dinky paper boats- They teach him physiology, They teach him things botanical, With him are quite a fad. They tell me he's a clever boy- Elizabeth, New Jersey. The Wiring System in your new home should be planned with great care In writing to the above advertiser please mention The Outlook Published weekly by The Outlook Company, 120 East 16th Street, New York. Copyright, 1926, by The Outlook Company. By subscription $5.00 a year for the United States and Canada. Single copies 15 cents each. Foreign subscription to countries in the postal Union, $6.56. HAROLD T. PULSIFER, President and Managing Editor ERNEST HAMLIN ABBOTT, Editor-in-Chief and Secretary Volume 143 Borah on Prohibition A SPEECH which may materially affect the Presidential election of 1928 was delivered at Balimore at a popular meeting of the 5 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church by Senator William E. Borah. t has made the Senator from Idaho, for he time being at least, the most conpicuous leader of those who are loosely known as the drys. Yet his speech was not so much a defense of prohibition as t was a defense of the Constitution. More particularly it was an attack upon those who, in their attempt to do away with prohibition, are advocating measures which have no Constitutional warrant and are contrary to the spirit of American political institutions. By far the most formidable attacks which have been made upon prohibition are those which have had their base upon the theory that a prohibitory law as such in the Constitution is out of place. Essentially the Constitution is, or ought to be, a framework of government. Arguments against the Eighteenth Amendment which are based on this conception of the Constitution are not answered by a mere recital of the evils of drink and the drink traffic. But such International June 9, 1926 The New Nullification Senator William E. Borah arguments are met on their own ground N his speech Senator Borah did not by such a speech as that of Senator Borah's. Indeed, since the Amendment is adopted and is a part of the Constitution, such a speech as that of Senator Borah's is more than a defense; it is an assault. It puts those who heretofore have posed as defenders of Constitutional principles and Constitutional liberties into the position of sappers and miners who are digging under the very foundations of the Constitution itself. evade the prohibition issue as a question of public policy. He began, in fact, by a vigorous attack upon the liquor traffic as a curse to humanity, and in particular as an enemy of the modern industrial world. He put his indictment against the liquor traffic in these specific forms: The man in the automobile may be opposed to the Eighteenth Amendment, but he will instantly discharge a drinking chauffeur. The train may be crowded with delegates to the antiprohibition convention, but they would mob the engineer who would take a drink while drawing his precious freight. The industrial magnate may talk critically of sumptuary laws, but he will apply them like a despot to the man who watches over the driving power of his vast establish ment. When safety is involved, we are all drys. But brutal and ruthless as the drink. Number 6 traffic is, Senator Borah expressed himself not so much concerned about it as about "the right of the people to write. and unwrite its Constitution and its law. To disregard our Constitution," he added, "to evade it, to nullify it, while still refusing to change it, is to plant the seeds of destruction in the heart of the Nation is to confess before the world that we have neither the moral courage nor the intellectual sturdiness for selfgovernment." That the people of America will ultimately pursue any such course Senator Borah does not believe. "They may be willing to repeal this Amendment, but they are not nullificationists." And it is nullification, not repeal, not any Constitutional method of changing the Constitution, but an unconstitutional method of evading the Constitution that, Senator Borah points out, is what is proposed in such a referendum as that provided for by the Legislature of New York. If the scheme proposed The part of the boundary between the Spanish and French zones regarding which Spain and France do not agree is indicated by a broken line in that referendum were to be put into effect, the Federal Government, which is the defender and interpreter of the Federal Constitution, would be called upon to surrender its functions; for "if this referendum interrogatory has any meaning at all, it is that every State shall determine for itself its own construction of, and obligation to, the Constitution of the United States, and that construction is to bind the Federal Government. That doctrine," comments Mr. Borah, "was shot to death at the Battle of the Wilderness." As Mr. Borah points out, the question before the American people is simply this: Shall we enforce the Eighteenth Amendment, repeal it, or nullify it? Senator Borah has rendered his country a great service by making clear that we are again facing a question that was once settled, it was supposed, for good and all the question of nullification. We have no doubt that the outcome this time will be as it has been before-that compromise will be found impossible, and that nullification, whether open or in disguise, will be found to be as impracticable as it is dangerous. France and Spain in North Africa received him, not in disgrace as a re- view of French colonial policy. They The Riff tribesmen are reported now The end of the rebellion leaves an important boundary issue to be settled between the allies, France and Spain. They have an agreement regarding the division of North African territory. But the failure of Spain even to police-much failure of Spain even to police-much less to administer-a considerable part of the region allotted to her is notorious. This failure has involved France in a costly colonial war; and she is not likely to overlook her losses and experience. There always has been some dispute regarding the definite delimitation of the French-Spanish frontier in North Africa; and now it is reported that France is seeking some new arrangement by which she will be guaranteed against a recurrence of trouble. She appears as the conqueror of the Riff, while Spain has a poor record on which to assert her title. France is rightly realistic and hardheaded in driving international bargains. It is to be expected that one result of the outcome of the North African war will be territorial or administrative readjustments in her favor which will extend the sphere of French authority. The Barring Out of Mr. Russell T is not likely that the refusal of the British Government to allow Charles Edward Russell to land at an English port unless he would promise not to pro ceed thence to Ireland will precipitate an international altercation. Mr. Russell, a pronounced anti-Bolsh evist, resigned from the Socialist Party (he was its candidate for the Presidency in 1916) because of the party's anti-war attitude. He was held up, not be cause he was a Socialist, but because the Irish Free State, recalling perhaps an address by Mr. Russell in which he predicted that Ireland would free herself from English shackles, surmised that he might make speeches in Ireland opposed to the Free State and favorable to the non-existent Irish Republic. There is an agreement, it seems, between the Free State and the British Government under which either will, on request, bar entrance of persons objectionable to the other. It is always an open question whether gagging undesirable orators helps or hurts the causes they advocate. The United States, having gone rather far in excluding aliens regarded as undesirables, is-as Senator Borah, though protesting, has acknowledged-in no position to complain. The First American SIX thousand guardians and sentinels of health lately gathered in Atlantic City in the first American Health Congress ever held in this country. They represented sixteen different organizations, which fell rather loosely into three groups: Public health officials; specialists in the field of child health protection and of disease prevention; and nurses, who formed the largest single group. Dr. Lee K. Frankel, the Chairman of the National Health Council, and a strong advocate of co-operation, was moved to ask in his address at the opening general session: "Are we ripe in the United States for an attempt to unite the various National voluntary health associations in one compact body" for "a concerted unified attack on all diseases?" An important member of the Congress remarked: "Science may reveal the hitherto unknown, but unless this knowledge is translated into terms of common understanding its benefits may not be |