Best in 25 years –
U.S. to launch 27 ships today
Maritime Day observed throughout nation
…
Congressmen weigh salary checkoff tax
Treasury plan designed to sugarcoat increase in income levies
…
Jap cruiser, 2 cargo ships sunk by Allied submarine
MacArthur’s fliers use bad weather as screen for ferocious raid on base north of Australia
By Don Caswell, United Press staff writer
…
U.S. increases payroll
Washington –
Civilian employees in the executive branch of the federal government increased to 1,926,074 in March, a 6.7% rise over February, the Civil Service Commission reported today.
Fifth columnists blamed for sinking of U.S. ship
Submarine failed to appear after torpedoing boat in Gulf of Mexico, skipper says
By the United Press
…
Postage-free letters used by physicians
Doctors in services end monthly bills under postal ruling
By Fred W. Perkins, Press Washington correspondent
…
Ireland convoy escort attack on sub aired
Depth bombs keep U-boats from biggest fleet of AEF transports
By Leo H. Disher, United Press staff writer
…
AVG’s chief tells how U.S. can wipe out Jap air fleet
2,000 more planes in Far East will do the trick, Chennault says, predicting big aerial drive
By Karl Eskelund, United Press staff writer
…
‘X’ fuel cards given to tenth of car owners
Four times as many ‘B-3’ gas rations granted as expected
…
Pacific War may be lost if Australia falls to Japs
That is view of leaders as they intensify pleas for aid while dragon breathes on their necks
By Edward Angly
…
Background of news –
Forced billeting
By Editorial Research Reports
Thousands of householders in cities of the Atlantic and Pacific seaboards have listed their spare rooms and sleeping facilities with civilian defense authorities for shelter of emergency guests who may be made homeless by air bombings. Now it has been proposed from Washington that persons in these and other cities with living quarters in excess of their needs be required to accept war-industry workers as tenants for the duration of the war. Housing shortages, and the inability of contractors to obtain materials to turn their attention to plans for forced billeting.
During the last year some 350,000 war workers have been placed in private homes in which rooms were voluntarily offered. Sullivan W. Jones, housing priorities director of the War Production Board, has suggested that home-owners in crowded war-goods centers be given further opportunity to offer spare rooms voluntarily before compulsion is used. However, Howard Strong, director of the homes registration division of the National Housing Agency, said “I believe we should have the mailed fist of compulsion within the velvet glove of persuasion.”
The billeting of British troops in private homes gave rise to one of the chief complaints of the colonists prior to the American Revolution. In the Declaration of Independence, King George III was condemned, among other things, “for quartering large bodies of armed troops among us.”
The third article of the Bill of Rights, which came into force as a part of the Constitution in December 1791, specifically forbids the quartering of troops in private homes, without the consent of the owner, in time of peace, but allows Congress to provide for billeting of soldiers in time of war. If Congress can provide for billeting of troops in time of war, presumably it can also provide for billeting of munitions workers.
About the closest the United States Supreme Court has ever come to ruling on this issue was in connection with the 1919 Rents Act for the District of Columbia. Under this law, a commission was set up to cope with rent problems growing out of the housing emergency in Washington after the First World War. The commission was granted power not only to fix rents after hearing but also to require landlords to retain tenants after the expiration of leases, so long as the tenants continued to pay the prescribed rents.
It was contended that the latter provision deprived owners of the free use of their property. The Supreme Court held, however (in Block v. Hirsh, 1921), that the public interest required some degree of control, and that such control did not violate that part of the Fifth Amendment which prohibits deprivation of “life, liberty, or property without due process of law.”
The right of the government to seize property, with payment of “just compensation” is clearly defined in the Constitution. This governmental power has been frequently exercised in peace as well as in time of war. Specific authority to acquire any real property, “temporary use thereof, or other interest therein” is granted to the President in the first War Powers Bill. This executive power could conceivably be used as a weapon to compel billeting under a threat that an individual’s home would be seized and operated by the government as a rooming house during the term of the war emergency.