ANNUAL BANQUET THE WASHINGTON HOTEL, SATURDAY EVENING, APRIL 29, 1922 TOASTMASTER DR. HARRY PRATT JUDSON President of the University of Chicago GUESTS OF HONOR CHIEF JUSTICE WILLIAM H. TAFT HONORABLE JAMES JOHN DAVIS HONORABLE HENRY W. TEMPLE Dean G. Acheson Rev. James E. Freeman Arthur Geissler C. Froelich Hanssey MEMBERS AND GUESTS Edward A. Harriman Harry B. Hawes David Jayne Hill Baroness S. A. Korff Miss M. Pearl McCall A. B. Messer Mirza Hussein Khan Alai Denys P. Myers Soterios Nicholson Admiral James H. Oliver James Brown Scott Mrs. James Brown Scott James M. Sheridan Mrs. James M. Sheridan Baron Edmund von Thermann Honorable Alexander Vouros Henry F. Woodard J. Edwin Young Dr. JAMES BROWN SCOTT. Ladies and gentlemen: I am requested, on behalf of the President of the American Society of International Law, Honorable Elihu Root, to express for him his regrets that he is unable to be with us tonight. I think I may also express on behalf of all of us who are present our keen regret that we are to be deprived this evening of the pleasure of having him with us tonight. In Mr. Root's absence, Dr. Harry Pratt Judson, President of the University of Chicago, has kindly consented to act as Toastmaster on this occasion, and I take pleasure in presenting Dr. Judson to you at this time. The TOASTMASTER (Dr. Harry Pratt Judson). Dr. Scott, ladies and gentlemen: I sincerely share with you great regret that our President is not here, and not only do I share with you that regret, but I feel that I have a larger proportion of it than you can possibly have. I wish he were here from the bottom of my heart, for many reasons that I need not enumerate. I have, before introducing the speakers, a word I would like to say on a matter connected with our Society. I have in my mind a little document given me by Dr. Scott. I want to make a plea for teaching our students in our colleges and higher schools of learning some of the fundamentals of international law. This subject is something that should be understood in its elements at least by every educated man. We know that Blackstone's Commentaries were written, by no means, as I understand it, to develop lawyers, but simply to enable young English gentlemen to know the laws of their country. And it seems to me that intelligent young Americans ought to know the laws of nations in order to understand the relations which are coming to be so vital,-the relations of one nation to another in this world. We have learned that no nation can live by itself alone; that the isolation of nations is gone. It once would do for China or Japan. It has gone even there, and it is much the same in every other part of the world. We are getting more and more clearly every day in our minds, I think, the idea that we cannot live alone, that nations belong together, and that the order of the world and the prosperity of the world are united and that, therefore, the nations must understand one another. And for that reason I do think we ought to teach in our schools and colleges of the higher grade at least, the subject of international law and international relations. Now, there has been a report made by the committee, with Dr. Scott in charge, showing some facts that I will take the liberty of reading. This report shows that in 1921, and also in 1911, that is in two reports ten years apart, there were 142 institutions teaching this subject and allied subjects; and they had in 1921, 6,785 students. This was an increase of 1,987 in that decade. In 1921 there were 83 institutions that had not been teaching it ten years before, with 2,205 students, a total of 8,990 students studying this subject in that year. Well, that sounds pretty well. There were 78 institutions which were offering these subjects in 1911, but not in 1921. There was in them a falling off of 1,474 students. It made a net increase of 2,718 students in the decade. Well, now, that as against a small number seems pretty large, a good gain. I think it is appalling. It is discouraging,the idea that these great colleges and universities do not have a larger number of young people who are being introduced into the elements at least of this subject, so vital I believe to everybody. I know of one institution that I shall not name, where something over 200 students are pursuing these subjects, 200 college students. In that institution there are nearly 5,000 students, not counting the graduates either, of whom there are 2,000 more, and out of those 5,000 undergraduate students only 200 were studying international law. I am not pleading for a requirement that every student shall take this subject, but for putting the thing in such shape in all our colleges that our intelligent young men, and young women too, should be introduced to the subject of international law. Our subject is not, I take it, initiated to remedy all the evils in the world. There are several fields in the world that we cannot touch. There are many things in other nations that we would like to change perhaps. There are some things in our nation that some folks abroad would like to change. You can not remedy everything that is wrong in the whole world. But we ought to know what international law is, how it came to be what it is, what is the relationship of the United States to this subject, and what has been the history of the United States in its development. Those things, I think, belong to every intelligent man and woman, and those things can be taught in the colleges, and those things can be taught outside of the colleges, for men who have never seen a college are often our most intelligent people. You will pardon me, ladies and gentlemen, for introducing the subject in the natural way of a pedagogue. But now, as introducing the speakers, I am taking some liberties with the program here. I find that the Chief Justice of the United States is first on our program, and at his request I am going to put him last. The reason is because he says he has nothing to say, and I want that said last of all! Therefore we begin with a speaker whose main functions are very closely akin to international law, I am sure, because if there were no labor in the world there would be no world or occasion for international law anyway, or any other kind of law. I take great pleasure in introducing first of all, the Honorable James J. Davis, an American, a thorough American, of Welsh ancestry, Secretary of Labor of the United States. ADDRESS BY THE HON. JAMES J. DAVIS Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen: When Dr. Scott asked me to come to this dinner he extended me an invitation to come and chat with my friend, Mr. Albert Bushnell Hart, of Harvard. I therefore had an ulterior motive for coming to the dinner, because I expected it would save me a trip to Illinois. Prof. Hart and I are on the Board of Governors of the school at Mooseheart that takes care of the orphan children of the members of the Loyal Order of Moose. The school is located some thirty-five miles west of Chicago. I really was anxious to meet with Mr. Hart and discuss some of our problems, but inasmuch as he is not here, I shall tell you about some of the things the Professor and I were going to discuss. This work of the Fraternity of the Moose is for the care and education of the orphan children of deceased members of the order. We have 1023 acres of ground, thirty-five miles west of Chicago, and the plant today could not be duplicated for five millions of dollars. We are probably teaching a new doctrine, of giving each child at least a high school education and teaching him a trade. We believe in the trade. After all, the law profession is just a trade, to my way of thinking. The lawyer specializes in his particular line of work as a tradesman. A craftsman specializes in his line of work. For instance, I am by trade a puddler. My work is somewhat different from the trade of a lawyer. If the lawyer wants to practice his trade in a foreign land, he must know, he must learn, another language. I can puddle in Wales, or France or Australia, or China, and the language does not make any difference to me, because I can earn my bread by the sweat of my brow without much change in life. But, seriously speaking, I believe in teaching the boys and girls of America a trade. I think that if children are taught to make a living with their hands, they are perfectly safe in the world, and a trade is surely no handicap for them if they want to seek a higher education. I believe in education, although unfortunately I have not been in a school-house since I was eleven years of age. I started to work when quite a lad. I came into the country when I was eight years of age from Wales. I arrived in April and started to work on Decoration Day. I always make Decoration Day my holiday, because it was the day I was welcomed to America and obtained my first position here. I am not learned in the law. I am learned in my trade, if I may put it that way; and that is what we are trying to do with these boys and girls at Mooseheart. We are trying to get this idea of teaching these children their trade into every school in this land. We have 1660 branches all over the country and all are now organizing to make the fight to give the children in every community an opportunity to learn a trade. A trade is an education within itself, if you will just stop to think of it. When I was about twelve, I started with my father as his third hand puddler in a rolling mill, and as I was an inquisitive sort of boy, I said to my father "Where do we get the pig metal from?" And he, being a man educated in the school of experience took me by the hand, and in his way, after our day's work was over, took me up to the blast furnaces, and he said, "Son, I want to tell you where we get the pig metal from. Here is the ore that just came from up in the northwest. They treat it by rolling, and it is dumped here out of these cars, and you see this little stone, and the coal and coke. Well, they send it in the trams to the top and dump it into the blast furnaces, and when they pick the slag from the iron, these are the impurities that come from the iron. Then they tap the iron later." He showed me the pig metal, and we went into the mill where the puddler takes the rest of the impurities from the metal and produces merchant iron or muck iron. And then in the finishing mills he showed me the bar iron, and over here the hooble iron, and here the sheet iron, and here the plate iron, and here the nail factory. In those days they used to cut nails by hand. If a workman cut out twelve kegs of four or five penny nails a day, that was a big day's work. My father demonstrated to me on that occasion, that a boy learning a trade has all of the opportunities for education lying ready to his hand. If he traces the materials and the tools that he works with, from the raw material to the finished product, on their way from field or mine or forest, to the ultimate consumer, he can lay the basis for a real education. All he needs is the desire to learn and to know. In acquiring his trade he will acquire the foundation of a liberal education, and to build upon that foundation rests with him alone. The man with a trade who seeks a higher education, who wants to be a lawyer, an international lawyer, a professional or business man of any kind, is better qualified than the man who lacks the training that comes from learning a trade. The man who is trained to work with hand and heart as well as with mind is better fitted for any position in life than the man who works with the mind alone. International law has come to mean a great deal to me in the last few days. We have a bill pending in Congress now to provide for the enrollment and education of the alien who comes to our shores seeking the benefits of |