FROM: National Broadcasting Company.
Trans Lux Building, Washington, D. C.
October 16, 1939.
FOR RELEASE AFTER 10:30 P.M., EST, OCTOBER 16th.
Address of Honorable Warren R. Austin, United States Senator from Vermont,
broadcast over a National Broadcasting Company network, made during the National
Radio Forum, arranged by the Washington Star, Monday night, October 16th. 1939.
CHANGING EMBARGOES FOR NATIONAL DEFENSE
THE UNITED STATES INTENDS NOT TO GO TO WAR, NOT TO INTERVENE,
AND NOT TO BECOME A BELLIGERENT.
In the pending war, the nationals of the United States will be nindered and
impeded by their Government in their commerce on the seas with belligerents. They
will not have the aid of their Government in that commerce. They will not have even
the immunity from interference by their Government which has been the common right
of the nationals of all neutrals during all times.
It is absurd to say that the United States intervenes when, by statute, it
embargoes its nationals, its vessels on the high seas, and everything it produces.
The scare talk that lifting the embargo means war beclouds rational con-
sideration of the facts and policy. It should be given little weight. It seems to
me to be illogical. We cannot become a belligerent and go to war unless some foreign
State attacks us, or unless we attack some other State.
On the first alternative, I point to the fact that the Congress is in
Extraordinary Session for the express purpose of enacting additional defense legis-
lation calculated to build up our strength so that no foreign State will choose to
attack us.
On the second alternative, you are conscious that the determination of the
people of this Country to remain at peace is such that we will not become an aggressor
and declare war on any State, save as a last defense of our security and the princi-
ples which constitute the life of the Republic.
During the course of my discussion, I hope to make clear that the legisla¬
tion which Congress now debates is designed to avoid causes for war, and to remove,
as far as possible, from the United States even the chance events which might irri-
tate our own people into warlike fervor. Without an act of Congress, we cannot be-
come a belligerent, we cannot intervene in a military way, we cannot go to war.
We consider the pending question in the light of the settled purpose of
Congress to not send our sons and daughters over-seas to engage in foreign wars.
The last act, even of national defense, is the mobilizing of the youth of America
to engage in mortal combat. So let us settle back and calmly consider the choice
that we have to make between Embargoes.
We start with a true premise, namely: the pending legislation constitutes
a substitution of a broad Embargo for the narrow Embargo which now exists.
The erroneous impression, implicit in the popular slogan "Lift the Embargo,
and Substitute Cash and Carry", is corrected through the debate which is proceeding
in the Senate.
Now that a state of war has been proclaimed, we are not to choose between
Embargo and No Embargo. We are to choose between two Embargoes. The present one
prohibits export of "arms, ammunition, or implements of war". The contemplated sub-
stitute Embargo would bar from the seas American vessels, American men, and American
articles and materials. If it should become law, nothing American whatever could be
in commerce on the high seas between the United States and a belligerent port, be-
tween the United States and a neutral port, where the commerce enters or passes
through combat areas to be prescribed by the President, because title must change
to the purchaser before it leaves the United States. This would avoid the hazard of
inflammatory reaction on us from sinking of property.
- 2 -
The deprivation of freedom of our citizens to travel would be extensive,
for it would be unlawful, except under rules prescribed by the President, for any
citizen of the United States to proceed into or through combat areas, or to travel
on any vessel of such belligerents. This would render remote the provocation from
loss of life exception is created favoring Canada. Passengers and articles or ma-
terials could be lawfully carried by American vessels on lakes, rivers, and inland
waters as well as by aircraft over lands, bordering the United States, though such
transportation would be subject to such restrictions, rules, and regulations as the
President shall prescribe.
The unfortified line, three thousand miles long, between Canada and the
United States, mores us to favor the cause of Canada as a protection of our tran-
quility.
Moreover, this accords with our ancient friendship, and the homogenity
of principles and ideals of our two countries.
The harsh restrictions on vessels include loss of established transporta-
tion routes and connections gained in a competitive battle at great cost to our
Government and its citizens through twenty years of struggle. In parlance of the
sea "we would not keep the berth warm".
Also included would be the loss to our producers of fruit, cotton, wheat,
and other agricultural products, of a delicately balanced refrigerating, storage,
transportation and marketing organism, the repercussions of which must be cushioned
with taxpayers' money; the deprivation of neutrals and belligerents, who are de-
pendent upon our natural resources brought to them through American commerce, of
diet, clothing and other necessities of life; the making difficult of procurement
for America of strategic and essential materials because our ships could not afford
to go out empty of cargo for the sole purpose of bringing back these materials.
These materials are essential to our national defense. They include manganese,
aluminum, antimony seed, chromium, cocoanut shell char, manila fibre, mica, nickel,
wool, optical glass, quartz crystal, quick-silver, quinine, rubber, silk, tin, and
tungsten. In addition to these, we must lose freedom of access to twenty-two
critical commodities such as coffee, cadmium, cork, cryolite, graphite, opium, etc.
Most serious of all the injuries suffered through the severity of the
restrictions upon American vessels is the injury to our national defense.
Mercantile Marine Act of 1936, under which we are building up our merchant fleet,
was based on its auxiliary service to the United States Navy. A fleet must have
fuel: it must, therefore, have tankers, with competent speed. A fleet must have
feeding, and housing also. It must have vessels for hospitalization, for shelter
of personnel of small vessels, such as submarine, aircraft, and destroyers. It
must have access to basic materials and to supplies. Without a merchant marine, a
navy could not serve.
Therefore, it is to be hoped that the restrictive Embargoes on American
shipping may be reasonably relaxed by amendment of the pending bill.
But dealing with the proposed legislation as it stands tonight, I favor
its adoption for the following reasons:
It would promote our national defense;
It would make more remote our getting into war;
It would increase the probability of victory of the Allies:
It would tend to shorten the war;
It would keep the battle front far away from America;
It would help to keep the ocean the protection for us that it
has been while our vis-a-vis navy was under the British flag.
The United States has been on the defensive throughout the Seventy-sixth
Congress. While the Military Affairs Committees of the House and Senate developed
a military, naval, and aerial plan for national defense; the Committees of both
houses having jurisdiction of our foreign relations were at work, trying to promote
such governmental action as would keep us at peace, and at the same time protect
including this special session
- 3.
our free institutions and our territory from aggression. The evidence showed, at
the beginning of the Session, an environment of danger; wars proceeding, all the
great treaty powers of the world armed and getting ready for mobilization, even the
Western hamisphere penetrated covertly, and in peaceful disguise, by the dynamic
foreign policy of National Socialism, having the implications of an effort to set
up a world empire. Within striking distance of the Panama Canal, namely, in
Colombia, an airways system, of which the crews were at least 95% German; a system of
of airlines being established around Latin America with adequate bases and stations
with
and
stocks of convertible parts adaptable to military planes as well as commercial
planes, so that if Germany wanted to fly military versions of the Folke-Wulf planes
to Latin America, they would there have all ready adequate supplies for military
use. The parts of the commercial ships all ready in Latin America are interchange-
able with parts for bombers and for other military planes. If Germany should wish
to send a large number of bombing planes through Latin America to our Southern
boundaries she would have the facilities to do so, she would have the fuel supplies
in large reserves, she would have the parts, she would have the replacements, and
the personnel, if they were needed.
Such a picture clearly given to the Committee on Military Affairs could
not be ignored with prudence. It appeared from the evidence that Germany was send-
ing able technicians to Latin America who had recently been trained in special
courses in the economic theories, and the political philosophies of their own
country, in technique, in diplomacy, and in the language of the country where they
were going.
Moreover, the trend of exportation of aircraft was significant. Whereas
our Latin American exports of aeronautical products in 1938 increased 19.7 percent
over 1937, Latin American sales of totalitarian aircraft gained about 300% in those
two years. This tremendous gain in totalitarian exports of aeronautical products
in Latin America was consistent with the foreign policy of Germany recently asso-
ciated with claims of pressure of population, the so-called natural right to room
to live", the search for raw materials, and, with geographic and political ambitions
of world extent. New world contours had already been etched on the globe by the
bayonet of totalitarian powers.
The present war had not yet begun. It was anticipated by some. Never-
theless, the Military Affairs Committee of the Senate was informed that if Germany
should get control of Spain and Portugal, established bases in the Azores, in the
Cape Verde Islands, and in the Spanish and Portuguese colonies in West Africa, she
would have complete control, so far as the air is concerned, of the Eastern half of
the Atlantic Ocean. Seventeen hundred of the aeroplanes that Germany then had were
capable of flying from the West Coast of Africa to the East Coast of South America.
Prudence dictated that Congress contemplate the possibility of such progress that
she would be able to fly in the near future from the Cape Verde Islands to the
United States.
The possibility, even though remote, of Germany conquering England and
France, obtaining control of their navies and investing Canada and nearby islands,
made national defense a paramount concern of this Session of Congress.
The cold facts which confronted us demanded prompt measures to strengthen
our military establishment. With relatively little debate Congress appropriated
approximately two billions of dollars to effectuate the President's plan for this
purpose.
Indirectly involved in this study was our
National
attitude toward the possible
belligerents in the anticipated war. This attitude also primarily concerned our
national defense. The crash of a bomber being tested on our west coast, in which
a French officer perished, precipitated the foreign policy issue. The identical
differences arose over sales of planes to Britain and France already contracted for
as we are now debating on the so-called Neutrality Act of 1939. It became clear to
us that the sale and exportation of military planes to Great Britain and France was
a proper element of our national defense because it stepped up production in this
country of such defensive weapons, and it did not interfere with procurement, for
ourselves; it developed the special knowledge and skill of our scientists and work-
men, so that we could move forward with the progress of those who learn by experience
in their use of the technical improvements which so soon render obsolete the
munitions of current days.
Here let me indicate something which I regard as a natural fallacy. Dis-
tinguished debaters who oppose the pending resolution argue that we should keep the
munitions which we manufacture for our own defense, and that we should not ship
them abroad. The answer is: we do not want these particular munitions. If we
should ever need munitions we would want the most modern product of the experience
we are now gaining at the expense of the foreign purchasers. If we should ever
need munitions we would want the capacity to reproduce and keep the line comi
We would not want to be dependent on stores of obsolete planes, for example. There¬
fore, sale to the Allies then and now is an important element of our defensive plan.
I discuss Neutrality only briefly, because the law of self-defense trans-
cends other rules of international conduct.
Montesquieu, speaking to us with venerable accent and profound wisdom,
says -
"Reason is the spirit of the law; if
there be no reason there is no law.
We are familiar with the rule of self-defense, which extends to whatever
limit of action may be necessary.
The reason for this in domestic law is the same for international law,
namely, imperative necessity.
If we were neutral the obligations on us as a Government would not re¬
quire us to do what we propose to do in the way of embargoing the intercourse of
our nationals with other neutrals and belligerents. Even though international law
forbids the supplying in any manner, directly or indirectly, by a neutral power to
a belligerent power, of arms, ammunition and implements of warfare, or of war
material of any kind whatever, nevertheless, a neutral power is not bound to pre¬
vent the export or transit, by its nationals, for, the use of either belligerents,
of arms, ammunition, or in general, of anything which could be of use to an army
or fleet.
The rights of a neutral government are thus less than those of its
nationals.
In 1935 and 1937, in connection with the Neutrality legislation, and dur-
ing the campaign of 1938, as well as in this 76th Congress, I have stated my po¬
sition publicly, that it would have been better for this Government to repeal the
Embargo Acts and return to international law. The foregoing is the essential part
thereof affecting the pending issue. The record would have been clearer for
posterity. The attitude of America would have accorded with her tradition, namely:
an attitude of independence, though not isolation. She would have been free to
adapt her action to the changing circumstances. Since it has become apparent that
this cannot be done, and that the Government, as such, is about to adhere to re¬
strictive action which it is not bound by international law to take, we are not
concerned with the neutrality or unneutrality of the Resolution. We are concerned
only with the fact that it is in our interest as a sovereignty and for the peace
and security of our nationals, that we adopt it.
By the Embargo Act of 1937, our attitude, as a Government, has the effect
of partiality to Germany. It is as offective in interferring with acquisition of
arms, ammunition, and implements of war by the Allies as a blockade successfully
maintained by Germany. Pro tanto, it is as effective as a fleet of submarines
operating against the Allies.
The folly in the Act of 1937, which caused a few of us to vote against it,
is now more widely recognized. It undertook to bind the United States in advance
of the event to a course of action, the need and the consequence of which we could
not foresee.
Now, needing the defense value of speedy victory by the Allies, we observe
our embargo of 1937 operating against the Allies, and in favor of the aggressor.
We now see that we deprive the Allies of rights belonging to them by virtue
of their geographical position. As we have pointed out, the exercise of these rights
by them would tend to protect our institutions and our peace. The early success of
the Allies is vitally necessary to keep the unplumbed depths of ocean between the
aggressor and us.
To the extent that the proposed Resolution binds us to Embargoes in some
other future war, it is subject to a similar criticism: that we cannot foretell
what our interest may be or what position we should take.
5
It is my opinion that the Resolution ought to be amended to provide for its
expiration as soon as the state of war has ceased to exist.
Our present grave concern about the preservation of Republican liberty in
this Country dictates adherence to the exclusive prerogative of this Government
to decide as each case arises what character of international conduct this Government
will adopt.
Chief Justice Hughes, when Secretary of State, within a few years after
the World War, characterized this policy in an address to the American Bar Associa-
tion, thus:
"Our people are still intent upon abstaining from participation
in the political strife of Europe. They are not disposed to commit
this government in advance to the use of its power in unknown con¬
tingencies, preferring to reserve freedom of action in the confidence
of our ability and readiness to respond to every future call of duty.
They have no desire to put their power in pledge, but they do not
shirk cooperation with other nations whenever there is a sound basis
for it and a consciousness of community of interest and aim. Coop¬
eration is not dictatorship and it is not partisanship. On our part
it must be the cooperation of a free people drawing their strength
from many racial stocks, and a cooperation that is made possible by
a preponderant sentiment permitting governmental action under a system
which denies all exercise, of autocratic power. It will be the coop¬
eration of a people of liberal ideals, deeply concerned with the
maintenance of peace and interested in all measures which find sup-
port in the common sense of the country as being practical and well
designed to foster common interests.
As a people, we would like to have our Government on friendly terms with
all States, totalitarian, as well as democratic. We would not interfere with the
right of every nation to conform to its own beliefs without trespassing upon us, but
in both peace and war, this Republic must defend itself against dominance by others,
and against insidious sapping of the battlements of its freedom.
Isolation
I credit the distinguished opponents of the pending Resolution with recog
nition of the dangers of isolation. I think that it is inaccurate to label them
"isolationists". However, there are worthy citizens who have communicated to me the
belief that we should adopt an attitude of withdrawal commercially to our continental
area for the duration of the war. I believe that it is the general opinion of all
Senators now debating the issue that such action would require nationalizing of all
production and industry, and further centralizing all Government in Washington. We
are aware of the difficulties of enforcement of that type of Embargo, exemplified,
as they were, by even bloody resistance during the Jefferson Embargo.
As the historian, Bancroft, has so well put it:
"Commerce defies every wind, outrides every
tempest, invades every zone.
Moreover, the danger of establishing non-participation in the trade and
finance of the world is that such action would require a vast financing scheme to
further organize control of all business and commercial activities, to cushion the
fall of industfal employment, agricultural marketing, and the lack of necessary
materials not obtainable here. The dictatorship perfected thereby would insure to
us and to our posterity a curse of unhappiness.
Isolation would be almost as dangerous to our institutions as war. By
either Isolation or War, we would lose much that our forefathers sacrificed to gain
and to transmit to us.
To choose the type of Embargo provided for by the pending Resolution, in-
stead of the existing Embargo, would aid in our national defense, and would tend
to prevent both Isolation and War.
It would help this Generation of Americans to discharge their high obli-
gation to preserve the Republic and to maintain peace.