840 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVIII. No. i 



our employees; the situation does demand 

 relief; but, however much we should desire all 

 this, it is impossible if we are to continue in 

 this business. We are met with a cold eco- 

 nomic fact. Our strongest competitor against 

 whom we can just hold our own [and every 

 industry has such] lives in the state of X, 

 which state is even now more lenient in its 

 factory laws. If you accomplish this reform, 

 you will ruin us. We could not compete under 

 such unfavorable conditions. If you can force 

 the state of X to pass similar laws, we 

 heartily favor these very necessary reforms." 

 And in state after state, year after year, has 

 this type of argument defeated reforms that 

 all felt were reasonable and desirable from 

 every other standpoint. Some of our most 

 progressive states will not listen to such argu- 

 ment, but eventually they must. What again 

 is the result? The public is looking for a 

 national child labor law, a national law for 

 women, hoping to accomplish these reforms by 

 an unwarranted interpretation of the interstate 

 commerce clause. A constitutional amendment 

 is necessary. 



In this way the reader could be taken 

 through a host of subjects in which a national 

 law would solve the situation. Yet in each 

 case such a law is either clearly unconstitu- 

 tional, or constitutional only through some re- 

 markable jugglery which the public to-day 

 expects of the court, in view of the difficulty 

 of amendment. To-day the commissioners on 

 uniform state laws are considering or are 

 urging- uniformity in such questions as part- 

 nership, negotiable instruments, bills of 

 lading, warehouse receipts, sales, stock trans- 

 fer, workmen's compensation, taxation, insur- 

 ance, carriers, conveyancing, acknowledging 

 of instruments, the making and proof of wills 

 as well as many other subjects. One might 

 speak of the evils of double taxation or of the 

 tangling question of situs in taxation; one 

 might recall the insurance scandal in Wew 

 York some years ago, the reforms put through 

 in some of the states, and the agitation for a 

 national insurance act ; but the instances 

 quoted show that quite a delicate situation 

 exists. And in every case it is very unlikely 



that anything like real uniformity can be ac- 

 complished and permanently so by the volun- 

 tary action of the states. So that in each case 

 a constitutional amendment would seem to be 

 the only remedy, providing of course that the 

 original and long-accepted thesis is true, 

 namely that Congress possesses only conferred 

 powers or powers implied from them. 



Suddenly and almost unnoticed we have pre- 

 sented to us what looks like a solution of the 

 whole difficulty. It is the theory lying back of 

 the national bird law recently passed by Con- 

 gress, and just being put into effect by the 

 agricultural department, the so-called McLean 

 Bird Act, regulating the killing of migratory 

 and insectivorous birds. On what theory can 

 such a law be constitutional? We shall see. 



Almost daily we hear of the ravages of this 

 or that insect. Now it is the San Jose scale, 

 at another time the locust, sometimes the green 

 leaf louse, and at another the potato bug. 

 Nature has blessed us with an almost countless 

 horde of insects which each year are causing 

 tremendous damage to our crops. Experts 

 have estimated this damage at various 

 amounts. Dr. C. L. Marlatt, basing his esti- 

 mate on statistics from the Department of 

 Agriculture, concludes that an annual damage 

 of 800 million dollars results. Mr. Forbush 

 in his book, " Useful Birds," reaches the same 

 conclusion. Whatever the damage may be is 

 unimportant here; sufficient for our purpose 

 that it is enormous. Likewise the experts have 

 demonstrated that each of these ruthless in- 

 sects has a natural enemy in the form of this 

 or that bird. The claim very naturally follows 

 that much of this damage can be avoided by 

 encouraging the existence of the type of bird 

 that feeds on the ravaging insects. The advo- 

 cates of the national law declare that some 

 states have failed to pass laws protecting such 

 birds. For example one state protects robins 

 and blackbirds, while another prefers to give 

 to its inhabitants this source of food. These 

 birds are migratory. What is the result? 

 Protected in one state, and slaughtered in an- 

 other. Any state that protects birds does so 

 only to the advantage of another state, depriv- 

 ing its own citizens of this same source of food. 



