Mr. CASTLE. I think that-do you want me to answer that?

Mr. JOHNSON. I would be glad to have an expression of opinion

from you.

Mr. CASTLE. I think that is one of the really dangerous extensions of power in the bill, especially when it is unlimited in time. We do not know in the future what some President of the United States may feel about the countries necessary for our defense.

Mr. JOHNSON. If we put the time limit in, though, that would probably obviate or eliminate the objection so far as not designating any country?

Mr. CASTLE. So far as not designating the country?

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes.

Mr. CASTLE. Yes.

Mr. JOHNSON. I believe that is all, Mr. Chairman.
The CHAIRMAN. Dr. Eaton?

Mr. EATON. Ambassador, I have just one question.

I would like to briefly lay the groundwork for that question. The situation here is that the vast majority of our people believe that the utmost aid to England with due regard to our own defense and safety is necessary. The British are running out of dollar currency. The object of this bill is to effectuate a way of meeting that situation. You mentioned something about the British governmental system indicating that the Prime Minister is on the floor of the House and could be turned out by a vote of no confidence in him. We have not got that system here. So I am asking you since this bill or something like it will probably be passed by the Congress, have you any suggestion as to perpetuating the restraint on the Executive on the part of Congress so that Congress can retain in its own hands its constitutional duties and rights?

Mr. CASTLE. Well, merely, Mr. Eaton, that I feel that Congress should retain all its rights in the question of money and not permit the Executive to make promises which the Congress is unwilling to fulfill in the money line. I do not know that I quite understood the rest of your question.

Mr. EATON. My question was, What were your suggestions as to necessary restraints which Congress must retain in its own hands when turning over this necessary power to the Chief Executive.

Mr. CASTLE. I think it must be made. Of course, I personally do not see any reason for giving the Executive extraordinary powers except in time of war or unless those powers are absolutely clearly specified. Now, I think Congress certainly, if a bill of this kind is to be passed, should make it quite clear that the President cannot use the tremendous powers given him to give away some of our Navy, to use our Navy to convoy ships through the war zone. I think Congress cannot leave it completely up in the air with safety to this country. I mean "safety to this country" merely in the sense that some of these powers might get us into the war. I am not saying by that for a moment that I think the President would knowingly do it. Mr. EATON. We have the President with great constitutional powers. at the other end of the avenue. And we have Congress with great constitutional powers here. They are supposedly coordinated branches of the Government. You have no philosophy that you can give us as to how this team can be yoked together in fellowship and understanding to avoid difficulties and loss?

Mr. CASTLE. No; I think in the course of the many years the two teams have worked together extraordinarily well, taking it all in all. I think if Congress holds on to its constitutional rights and gives the President all of his due constitutional rights, the team should continue to pull together.

Mr. EATON. Your theory is under this bill that Congress as one member of the team repairs to safe seclusion and lets the other part of the team carry the load?

Mr. CASTLE. Yes; exactly.
Mr. EATON. Thank you.

The CHAIRMAN. Judge Kee?

Mr. KEE. Mr. Castle, the President of the United States already has great powers conferred upon him by the Constitution of the United States, has he not?

Mr. CASTLE. Great powers.

Mr. KEE. And the President of the United States as Commander in Chief of the Army and of the Navy of the United States could, if he abused those powers, get us into war almost any time, could he not? Mr. CASTLE. I am afraid he could. But it would be totally contrary to at least the spirit of the Constitution, because the Constitution does say that only Congress shall declare war. Now, what that means is "make war" in the minds of the people who put it in the Constitution.

Mr. KEE. But nevertheless you admit that he could, necessarily he would have to abuse the power that has been conferred upon him, but he could at any time, and we have got to trust him not to abuse those powers?

Mr. CASTLE. We have to trust him not to abuse those powers. Mr. KEE. And we have been doing that with every President we have had?

Mr. CASTLE. We have.

Mr. KEE. We have been doing that with every President we have ever had since the country was established or the Government was established?

Mr. CASTLE. Yes.

Mr. KEE. Now, Mr. Castle, you stated in your statement "I for one am certain that the Congress of the United States is just as patriotic and works just as intelligently for the good of our country as does the Parliament of Great Britain." We, of course, will agree with that statement. But, as a matter of fact, you know the processes through which Congress works and operates. Do you think it in anywise possible for Congress consisting of two branches, one with 96 Members and the other with 435 Members, to act with the same degree of promptness and effectiveness as an individual in the case of an emergency or in any grave crisis?

Mr. CASTLE. I do not. And I think that is why such great powers have been given to the President. But I think the powers already in the hands of the President are all that any one man should have. I do not see any reason for giving extra powers.

Mr. KEE. You recognize the fact, however, that in order to implement the purposes of this bill through action of Congress it would involve the necessity of introducing separate measures for each act that we contemplate; the reference of those measures to committees; possible hearings such as we are going through now; the report of the

committee back to the Congress; the placing of the act upon the calendar; debate in the Lower House of Congress; debate in another branch of the legislature where debate is unlimited. And you realize that necessarily there would be delays in effecting the very purpose that we are trying to effect by this bill.

Mr. CASTLE. No; I am sorry to say that I do not, because I think that any action which might be taken by the President which is beyond that which he already has the right to take ought to be debated with the utmost care. Now, any act which would be an act of war such as convoying ships for example, through the war zone should be debated very carefully by the Congress. I should not want to put that in the hands of anybody to decide offhand.

Mr. KEE. You do not mean to say, Mr. Castle, that you interpret this bill as empowering the President to order ships to be convoyed by our war vessels to Great Britain, do you?

Mr. CASTLE. I cannot read the bill in any other way except to give him that power if he wants to take it.

Mr. KEE. Will you kindly refer me to the section of the bill that you consider as giving him that power?

Mr. CASTLE. I have not the bill here. But where it says, for example, "in spite of all other laws"-I think that would give him that power.

Mr. KEE. You now have a copy of the bill which has been handed to you. Will you just glance at the bill, Mr. Castle, and see?

Mr. CASTLE. Of course, I am not saying the bill specifically says that. No; but I think section 3 throughout gives him a very clear permission to do almost anything.

Mr. KEE. Will you read the paragraph, please, that you refer to? Mr. CASTLE. Well, it gives him the power to authorize the Secretary of War, the Secretary of the Navy, or the head of any other Department or agency of the Government:

(1) To manufacture in arsenals, factories, and shipyards under their jurisdiction, or otherwise procure, any defense article for the government of any country whose defense the President deems vital to the defense of the United States.

(2) To sell. transfer, exchange, lease, lend, or otherwise dispose of, to any such government any defense article.

(3) To test, inspect, prove, repair, outfit, recondition, or otherwise to place in good working order any defense article for any such government.

(4) To communicate to any such government any defense information, pertaining to any defense article furnished to such government under paragraph (2) of this subsection.

(5) To release for export any defense article to any such government.

That does not specifically say that he can do that. But you remember in his press conference the other day when the President was asked whether he might do that, he said, "No; but I think I have the authority to do it without the bill."

Mr. KEE. That may be true. But this bill does not either indirectly or directly, specifically or otherwise, confer that authority upon him by any language that you can find there. You do not find any such language?

Mr. CASTLE. I do not find that language; certainly not.

Mr. KEE. Mr. Castle, you spoke about your objection to conferring upon the President authority, we will say, to give away the American Navy. Do you think any American citizen however much authority

he might have, much less the President, would give away the American Navy?

Mr. CASTLE. The whole Navy? No; not unless it was felt it was the best way to defend the United States. And the President could do that if he felt the best defense of the United States was to turn the Navy over to Great Britain.

Mr. KEE. You have not any idea in your mind at this time that the President would at any time give away the American Navy? Mr. CASTLE. The entire Navy?

away 50 destroyers.

Mr. KEE. I differ with you there.

do you, Mr. Castle?

Certainly not. But he gave

Certainly not.

You do not quite mean that,

Mr. CASTLE. Well, we got a quid pro quo.

Mr. KEE. You thought we got pretty good consideration for the 50 destroyers?

Mr. CASTLE. We got some leases in return.

Mr. KEE. That was something we needed very badly, was it not? Mr. CASTLE. We did.

Mr. KEE. You believed in that, did you not?

Mr. CASTLE. What?

Mr. KEE. In making that trade; you agree it was a good trade? Mr. CASTLE. I do not.

Mr. KEE. You do not believe we needed those bases?

Mr. CASTLE. I think we needed those bases tremendously.

Mr. KEE. How else would we get them?

Mr. CASTLE I think it was at a time when, needing the bases and Great Britain needing our help, we might have made a very good bargain and taken over some of those British territories which would have saved them for all time.

Mr. KEE. You mean just to hold Britain up and take them?
Mr. CASTLE. No.

Mr. KEE. That is all.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Tinkham?

Mr. TINKHAM. I have two questions, Mr. Castle. Using the term or the terms "interventionist" and "noninterventionist" would you say Mr. Stimson has been known as an interventionist for a long time? Mr. CASTLE. I suppose the country has considered him such, yes; for a long time.

Mr. TINKHAM. Would you not consider, using the term, that he is now an interventionist?

Mr. CASTLE. I would consider-well, it is a term, Mr. Tinkham, that is almost impossible to define. I think Mr. Stimson would go a great deal further than I would in trying to tell other nations what they ought to do. I call that intervening in their business.

Mr. TINKHAM. I think I am correct in stating that he said he would approve of convoys of vessels to England, and I think he went further than that and he said he would object to having a clause put in the bill which would forbid the President to transfer parts of the Navy that he thought might be desirable.

Mr. CASTLE. I was told that he said that in his testimony. I did not hear it.

Mr. TINKHAM. You would call him an interventionist without limit? Mr. JOHNSON. I object to the witness being called upon to label or designate his former boss as an interventionist.

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Mr. CASTLE. Thank you, Mr. Johnson.

Mr. TINKHAM. I have one more question.

Reference has been made to the breaches of international law by certain countries. During this war has England violated any international law that you know of or that has been brought to your attention?

Mr. CASTLE. Has England violated any?

Mr. TINKHAM. Has England violated international law?

Mr. CASTLE. I do not remember any. I do not remember any violations.

Mr. TINKHAM. You do not remember any violations?

Mr. CASTLE. No.

Mr. TINKHAM. That is all.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Richards?

Mr. RICHARDS. Mr. Castle, I had a few questions that have been already asked you. I would like to follow up a question asked you by Mr. Tinkham. He asked you whether or not England had violated any international law. I understood you to say you did not recall. At this time I would like to ask you the question: Do you not think Hitler himself has violated almost every international law?

Mr. CASTLE. Well, he has certainly violated a great many.
Mr. RICHARDS. Plenty of them?

Mr. CASTLE. Yes.

Mr. RICHARDS. Mr. Castle, I am glad to have you here. As I recall, you appeared before our committee on some two or three occasions; have you not?

Mr. CASTLE. I think so.

Yes. Many years ago.

Mr. RICHARDS. You do not presume to be an authority on naval affairs?

Mr. RICHARDS. You do claim, you do assume to know something about international law and the Constitution of the country?

Mr. CASTLE. I have studied a great deal; certainly.

Mr. RICHARDS. For the last few days we have not heard much said about international law before this committee, because everybody assumed it had gone out of the window entirely. I want to ask you in view of the fact that the Pact of Paris, the Kellogg-Briand Pact, a good many nations signed that pact; did not that pact itself become a part of international law so far as the signatories of that pact were concerned?

Mr. CASTLE. Yes; it did.

Mr. RICHARDS. Now, Mr. Fish asked you, I believe, was there anything in that pact that made it obligatory upon the signatories of that pact to take affirmative action in case any one of those signers violated the terms of the pact. I believe you said you did not know of anything compelling them to take affirmative action?

Mr. CASTLE. May I state just this?

Mr. RICHARDS. Yes.

Mr. CASTLE. What Mr. Fish asked was whether there was anything in the pact that made it necessary for us to take affirmative action.