themselves to the law as it is and not as it ought to be. We Americans, in the words of Tennyson, have "Some reverence for the laws ourselves have made; The possession of the spirit speaking in these lines has no doubt saved the American people at critical junctures. It is not that we withhold our protest against the policy, and perhaps against the wisdom and justice, of existing laws, for more frequently and more freely than most peoples of the world we denounce them and seek their repeal. But we are attached to the idea that in the long run order will be better preserved, a larger measure of justice will prevail, and the stability of our institutions will more certainly be perpetuated, if we accustom ourselves to accept for the time being the existing law as our guiding force. It is this genius of the American people which has enabled them to accept as a rule of action a constitution which was itself a compromise, and which has worked only through accommodations suggested by the common sense of the people. We may with some pride of race compare this experience with that of the South and Central American republics, and even of France, which have from time to time adopted constitutions, sometimes on the model of ours and no less perfect in form, but which in many cases have proved to be little more than an exhibition of the imitative faculty or an expression of lofty aspiration. With knowledge and experience in self-government, however, the American people have known that no system could be devised which would be perfect to meet every exigency, and they have realized that laws, and even constitutions, must be made to bend to meet practical ย situations; but they have also known that if they did not give a certain deferential adherence to the law because it is the law, they would encounter risks, the effect of which could not be predicted. They have believed that a part of the self-restraint required for the successful working of a democratic form of government was to obey an unfit law so long as it was the law, to demonstrate its unfitness by its enforcement, and then to repeal it. We are now witnessing a protest on the part of many people who assert that the prohibition amendment is not the expression of the will of the people. But whether they be right or not, the American habit of respecting the law will ultimately prevail. I am not unmindful of some of the great crises of our history, where there have been fundamental differences concerning vital questions, such, for instance, as those which arose in connection with slavery. No greater strain could have been placed upon the patriotism of any citizen than that which weighed upon Abraham Lincoln when the Supreme Court decided the Dred Scott case. With all the fervor of his moral nature he condemned the principle underlying the law, if it was as the Supreme Court interpreted it to be. With all the force of his intellectual nature he believed it to be an unsound interpretation of the Constitution. So far as he was at liberty to disregard it as a political rule, he adopted every proper method to see to it that it should be corrected. But he never denied the binding effect of the decision. He met it by asserting that new views of the question should be presented to the Supreme Court, in order that that tribunal might be induced to put a different interpretation upon the Constitution, or he urged that the Constitution be amended, saying that by so doing "I disturb no rights of prop erty; create no disorder; excite no mobs." And he added: "We believe . . . in obedience to and respect for the judicial department of the government. We think its decisions on constitutional questions when fully settled should control not only the particular cases decided but the general policy of the country, subject to be disturbed only by amendments of the Constitution as provided in that instrument itself. More than this would be revolution." THE BAR IN THE WAR-ITS WAR COMMITTEES AND ITS PARTICIPATION IN THE ENFORCEMENT OF THE SELECTIVE SERVICE LAW AND REGULATIONS |