lowers, instead of losing sight of the truth by an attempt to re-establish the impossible mercantile system.
And again it must be recalled that of the many considerations involved, the present value of our currency approximates only thirty-five per cent. of its former value. Therefore, a dealer, to obtain for himself an "exchangeable value" that will enable him "to replace his commodities" or obtain other commodities in equal quantity must, without regard to all the other complications and difficulties, receive above three hundred per cent. of his former prices. For the Act to punish him for doing so, is to penalize him for trying to safeguard against the ruin of his business.
Something should be said of the opinion of Judge Hazel in the Weed case,[1] for it may well be used as a basis for summarizing the conclusions already stated. Although he says: "Candor compels the admission that the objection of uncertainty is not altogether free from doubt," he, like the other Judges of the lower Courts, makes no examination at all as to the real meaning of the Act, or as to the serious Constitutional questions that are raised by interpreting it to mean that all the prior doctrines of our common and statute law are swept away by his assumed interpretation. He supports his decision that the Act is constitutional upon the basis of legal principles which abrogate the Constitution itself, and so far as commodities are concerned, upon principles which will establish Communism in this country. It is submitted that if his contentions be correct, Mr. Justice Brewer's classical opinion in the Monongahela Case,[2] so constantly followed and
