Mr. VORYS. I certainly do. This is an unprecedented situation. Secretary HULL. Then why should we not dwell on the danger a little instead of some altogether minor phase?

Mr. VORYS. I agree with you that this is an unprecedented situation. Secretary HULL. You will pardon me for bringing that to your attention, because I do not want it to be forgotten in this discussion. Mr. VORYS. I am aware of that, but I wondered whether we were proceeding to meet this danger in a way or along a pattern that had ever been used before or not.

Secretary HULL. In a case of unprecedented danger, everybody may not find precedents, because there would not naturally be precedents where there had not been a similar state of danger.

Mr. VORYS. Then so far as you know, there is no precedent for this legislation.

Secretary HULL. I am not undertaking to go into the technical side. I just know we have unprecedented danger, and I want to plead with you and your colleagues to recognize that, and not be too technical, if I may ask that, about the necessary methods of treating that danger.

Mr. VORYS. When I first asked you about precedents, you spoke about what nations do in self-defense. Is not the constitutional power which would warrant this legislation our war-making power?

Secretary HULL. I remember when they attacked President Lincoln, just as you are attacking this, they made charges against his motives and against the nature of his proposal, and against its unconstitutionality. That is a field that we could spend weeks and weeks in discussing.

Mr. VORYS. Mr. Secretary, I am not attacking this. I am not attacking its constitutionality. I am asking you, sir, for your explanation of its constitutionality, and of those words, and that is not an attack. It is an attempt to understand this measure.

Secretary HULL. Well, I am glad that you are interested in that broader phase of it. I do not think I can put the matter any more simply than I have. This is the best draft that the members of the executive department have prepared to meet a very definite state of danger. It is based on an extreme emergency situation, a situation of unprecedented danger.

Now, as to a substitute method that would serve efficiently in every way the purpose of this measure, I have not seen any such substitute introduced by anyone.

Mr. VORYS. Mr. Secretary, what is the proper phrase for us to use to express our relations with Britain if, as, and when this legislation is adopted, and we proceed with the policy you have outlined? I want to know what is the protocol? Would you say "allies," "partners"? Do we use the phrase that Mr. Shanley did? What is the proper way to refer to that relationship?

Secretary HULL. Frankly, I have not got beyond the problem of rendering all material aid possible to Great Britain short of military activities. That is all I have heard the matter called. I suppose that critics will find different names.

Mr. VORYS. Then you have no particular phrase to suggest that we might use to shorten it up rather than to use the longer phrase?

Secretary HULL. No; frankly, I have been preoccupied with the real work of trying to aid and get aid to Great Britain.

Mr. VORYS. Is there any document, any correspondence, between our country and Great Britain, or series of documents, or papers, that would state just what this status is?

Secretary HULL. None to my knowledge.

Mr. VORYS. Thank you very much. That finishes my examination, Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Stearns.

Mr. STEARNS. Mr. Secretary, I had intended to raise the question of precedent and while I might have put the question in a little different way than Mr. Vorys has done, I think perhaps the colloquy that passed between you on that has covered the question.

The remaining question I should like to ask is this. You said this morning it seemed to you that it would be possible for the Congress to work out a reasonable solution of any possible constitutional difficulty. Would the placing of a definite time limit on the powers granted to the President seem to you such a reasonable solution? Secretary HULL. I have not heard of anyone offering any particular objection to that suggestion.

Mr. STEARNS. That is all.

Mr. MUNDT. In your prepared statement this morning, Mr. Secretary, you painted a very illuminating backdrop before which this whole discussion can take place, when you gave us a calendar of events showing where nations of Europe and Asia had become aggressors and had victimized smaller countries lying close to them.

Unless I did not hear you and I will admit I was laboring under somewhat of a handicap because over on this side we sit in the studio. section of the roundtable, and it is difficult to hear-but unless I did not hear you, you neglected to include in that chronology of agression the state of Russia. I wonder if I did not hear you clearly.

Secretary HULL. Yes. I left out numbers of important events in the world situation for the reason that I was seeking to go back and build up all of the relevant facts which point to the present danger from the three nations that have been avowedly engaged in a movement of world conquest by force.

Mr. MUNDT. Now I would like to inquire a little bit as to whether or not you feel that there is a somewhat analagous danger from Russia, especially inasmuch as you stressed, and I think rightfully so, the fact that subversive groups operating within peaceful countries undermine our defense very frequently and according to the findings of the Dies committee, Russia has been longer and more actively engaged in these subversive activities in America than any other country-I wonder if Russia should not be brought into the picture, too, so that we can have a complete understanding of the whole situation.

Secretary HULL. In the first place, if you have not been around South America lately, it would be worth while to make that trip. You will see the nature of the chief subversive activities that have been and are being carried on.

I shall be only too glad to take up with you and your associates here on the committee all the other phases of international affairs when

we conclude this particular analysis of the situation as it relates primarily to the state of danger that we are in and the authors of that danger.

Mr. MUNDT. What I was trying to get to, Mr. Secretary, is this: Whether under your interpretation of the bill, Russia should decide to take another unprovoked grab out of Finland, we would be authorized and justified and legalized in extending aid to Finland under the terms of the bill.

Secretary HULL. As I say, I am not undertaking to bring in collateral matters, no matter how important, because I think it is allimportant to deal with this whole problem by itself and only in connection with the related facts. As I say, if any case of danger arises in other parts of the world, that is another proposition. I am discussing here movements of nations in aid of the present movement of the so-called tripartite countries to impose their will and domination on the world. Any movements which are a part of that relate very definitely to what I am trying to discuss.

Mr. MUNDT. That is precisely the thing I had in mind, because of the well-known collaboration between Russia and Germany abroad. and the apparent working agreement between the Communists and the bund in this country; they seem to be part of this tripartite agreement, although not definitely a signatory thereto.

Secretary HULL. I have made, I think, very explicit my attitude toward the tripartite movement of world conquest. There are other situations which may be collateral and which are important in many ways, but which I do not propose to inject into this situation, so far as I am concerned.

Mr. MUNDT. This morning, in answer to a question, I believe you said that the Johnson Act was not involved in this.

Secretary HULL. That is my understanding.

Mr. MUNDT. I think you said in answer to a further interrogation that just a few specific provisions of the Neutrality Act were involved. Secretary HULL. I read the principal ones in my statement.

Mr. MUNDT. Those were included in the paper that you read? Secretary HULL. Those were included in the supplemental paper that I read.

Mr. MUNDT. Would you have any objection, therefore, from your standpoint, to an amendment to be attached to this bill which would limit the provisions of the act insofar as it applies to the Neutrality Act, to the specific provisions which you read?

Secretary HULL. I do not know whether I understood your question. Mr. MUNDT. Whether you would have any objection insofar as you are concerned to an amendment attached to this bill which would limit its application simply to the provisions of the Neutrality Act which you mentioned, but which would not allow it to repeal any other aspects of the Neutrality Act?

Secretary HULL. I have not checked on the other provisions, but I shall be glad to give the matter attention.

Mr. MUNDT. Is there any possibility, Mr. Secretary, that if we pursue this policy of self-defense instead of a policy of following international law, we might in some way be weakening the efficacy of our own Monroe Doctrine, inasmuch as a portion of it and its pronouncement prohibits us from intervention in European affairs, just as we insist that European countries do not intervene in ours?

Secretary HULL. That is a view that some good, well-meaning, patriotic people entertain in this country, of course. That is a part of the view that we should sit static and inert so far as any resistance beyond the boundaries of this hemisphere is concerned. There is a matter of honest difference of opinion. Many of us feel constrained to the view that it would be-I will not say suicidal-but it would be disastrous for this hemisphere to offer no resistance beyond its own boundaries if and when it sees the strong probability-I say the strong probability of developments that would put our situation in a state of manifest danger.

I am not going into details here because I cannot.

Mr. MUNDT. The next question I wish to submit, Mr. Secretary, I do not know that you will wish to answer here, but it should be discussed somewhere. I would like to know whether or not there is any evidence available to you that we are in peril of actual attack in the Western Hemisphere, other than what might have been written in Mein Kampf, or included in some braggadocio speeches of some dictator; whether the Department has some documentary or perhaps more authentic evidence that we are the next victim on the calendar of aggression.

Secretary HULL. As I said, there is a long list of very solemn utterances. I do not think they were intended as braggadocio speeches; that might do an injustice to the authors of those declarations. But there is a long list of most explicit declarations along the lines we are discussing today.

Mr. MUNDT. That is correct.

Secretary HULL. And the actions so far are in harmony with them. Mr. MUNDT. These speeches possibly might not have been intended as braggadocio speeches; they were public statements. I was wondering if in addition to that the State Department had any information, not available to every Member of Congress, indicating we were definitely on the calendar of aggression.

Secretary HULL. I have always sought to use the word "possibly," even if I felt that the word "probably" would be justified, in attempting to express possible or other dangers to this or other countries. I think if any country that has a world-wide objective gets control of the seas, we will be talking much more rapidly than we are now about our future safety.

Mr. MUNDT. I have just one other question, Mr. Secretary, and I do not believe you will want to answer it, and I am not going to press the point, but I am going to ask it because it seems to me that every Member of Congress has to be asking himself these days such questions. I suspect that and, although you may not have discussed it with your associates, the question has come to you in the solitude of your considerations in these trying days; the question is this:

We are about now to depart upon a course of activity, and this will establish the precedent for saying that in the event of war, if some belligerent violates the neutral rights of some peaceful neighbor, that that authorizes us in the interest of self-defense to violate all international laws which we have heretofore held inviolate. If we are entering upon that policy, and it should be deemed necessary, I think somebody should be given an answer to the question which has been intimated a couple of times today. If we are going to furnish the

materials and aid to Great Britain, China, Greece, and perhaps other victims of other aggressors, and we come to the point that in the established policy of rendering material aid we are just not getting the job done, what then will be our policy? As I say, I am not going to press for an answer, but I want you to give some consideration to our position, when we are at the forks of the road, so to speak, and we ought to think what our responsibility as legislators is, and our responsibility to the people is to see what lies at the end of the road. I am worried about that aspect of it.

Secretary HULL. It may have been as much as 10 centuries since the world has witnessed a state of lawlessness, a state of domination over conquered people, with the result that today it is almost understandable that we are not more alarmed than we are; but it has been a long while since the world has seen a world-wide movement with the methods of the eighth or tenth century to be applied to conquered people.

We can ignore that if we desire, we can deal with technicalities about the mechanics of every step we take; we can make the same kind of assumption that the people of Paris did when they said that it was inconceivable that Germany could get over there. "Look at the Maginot Line; look at our defensive ring." And they laughed and ignored the matter until finally they saw German troops, with German uniforms, with their flags and eagles floating above, and then they said that "it was a most amazing thing."

Now we can follow that line of complacency if we want to, but we must realize and remember the possibility of this movement marching on when it gets by the obstructions which are holding it back, and marching directly in a southern direction, rather than directly toward us.

If that is not a situation that calls for precaution, then I am entirely mistaken. But as I said this morning, I would always despise myself if I took this situation lightly and even semiseriously, that we should use normal methods of dealing with what we know is an unprecedented movement, if I did not frankly, without meaning to be alarmed in any sense, if I did not bring these facts that have been built up in international relationships during past years to the attention of my fellow citizens in order that they might face the situation and take the course that would offer the most effective defense. That, I think, is the best safeguard against being drawn into war in the future.

Mr. MUNDT. I am not trying to minimize in any sense the danger. I think we all recognize that it exists; that is what brings us together at these hearings. But the Secretary has taken a look along but one fork of the road as to what might happen if we do not extend aid to England and her associates. I think that we should with equal candor look down the other fork of the road and ask ourselves and seek the answer to the question as to what will happen after we have lent material assistance to our friends, and that aid may have failed to do the job, then what?

I think we should be utterly frank and open with the people of this country and not take them beyond the fork of any road without analyzing the situation from there on.