Vol. 22, No. 6
Industry Brushed Aside T H E Senate, noted for its disinclination to support the policies of the President, chose H.R. 8574, known as the Williamson bill, “to transfer to the Attorney General certain functions in the administration of the National Prohibition Act, to create a Bureau of Prohibition in the Department of Justice, and for other purposes,” as an occasion to reverse its attitude toward the administration. The bill, as reported from the Committee on the Judiciary, was that received from the House of Representatives with but few slight amendments and was passed without a record vote. The House accepted the amendments without conference arid the bill is expected to become law, effective July 1, 1930. It is now more than a year since certain authorized representatives of science and industry sought an interview with the President of the United States for the purpose of submitting their views as to what might be done in the interests of enforcement of prohibition without undue interference with legitimate industry along lines which had been enunciated in the inaugural address. The President was seemingIy unwilling to meet this small committee. Since that, time consistent efforts have been made to lay before the Attorney General and congressional committees that side of the question particularly involving science and industry. The socalled Williamson bill, while regarded by some as legislation desired by the departments, particularly the Department of Justice, is nevertheless well known to be strictly an administration measure. It has had the support of those who have believed that enforcement has been difficult because of alleged poor administration in the Treasury Department and of those who feel that whatever is wanted to perfect enforcement should be granted, in the belief that such efforts will only lead to earlier modification or repeal. Some “drys” have opposed it, holding that progress has been made and that too frequent changes in the plan of enforcement are bad The features which have been interpreted by industry as leading to dual control and the requirement for legitimate industry to deal in large measure with a department whose chief function it is to prosecute law violators, have been opposed by industry. Following the statements made by the Attorney General before the committees in the House, the representatives of science and industry offered amendments before a considerate subcommittee of the Judiciary in the Senate designed to give the Department of Justice clearly what its head had said he sought. However, as the Senator from New York, Mr. Copeland, remarked in the Senate debate: “hfr. President, like old Sisyphus trying to roll the stone to the top of the mountain, to attempt to modify the bill is a useless undertaking. It cannot be done. We might just as well sit down and accept what is turned out to us in capsules given to us and we are told to take.” The effort to have the points made by industry thoroughly considered resulted in one or two advantages. Whereas originally no permit would be granted, renewed, or amended within ten days after the application had been filed with the
June 1, 1930 Attorney General, this basic delay was modified by the House committee to apply only to renewals and amendments to extend for more than ninety days. A certain amount of educational work has been accomplished, and the debate in the Senate put into the record repeatedly the interpretation and intent of the bill which, though not expressed in the law, will be exceedingly valuable should any of these matters find themselves eventually in the courts. Those in charge of the measure indicated that it is the intent to leave the control and issuance of permits in the Treasury Department and not to have the Attorney General interfere in any way with lawful operations. It is expected that he shall only exercise his power of discretion regarding permits, their renewal and amendment, when he has facts indicating violations or other legitimate grounds which should lead to withholding the permit or the institution of revocation proceedings. It is difficult to understand why the friends of the measure declined to use perfectly clear language in this regard. Again quoting the Senator from New York, “To me it is passing strange that men who are willing to read into the law a definite meaning should be unwilling to write that meaning into the law that all who read in the future may know exactly what the law means.” While it has no part in the matter under discussion, nevertheless there was interjected into the debate, and then offered as an amendment, language substantially identical with that used when the Sirovich bill, providing for the discontinuance of toxic denaturants, came before the Senate. It will be recalled that Congressman Sirovich wished to define denaturing materials to mean only pyridine, malachite green, or diethyl phthalate, which as is well known offer no bar whatever to criminal manipulation and consequently increased diversion of industrial alcohol, which could only lead to serious embarrassment to the legitimate industry. This measure had been defeated in the House by a vote of 5 to 1, and the amendment was lost in the Senate, but it indicates how necessary it is for technical men familiar with the situation to continue their work of education. As is well known, research persists in an effort to find satisfactory non-toxic denaturants, and progress has been recorded. But if the permissive features of the law are to be equally enforced with the prohibitive provisions, nothing must be done to weaken the position of denatured alcohol. While industrial alcohol denatured under governmental formulas is frequently charged with having been diverted to beverage purposes, with resultant injury to lawless drinkers, it is worthy of note that official investigations have shown the product involved in many such casualties to have bean either natural or synthetic methanol. The production, distribution, and use of these solvents are not subject to any control whatsoever under the National Prohibition Act. We believe that the interests of industry have been sacrificed in the present situation for well-known political reasons. We very much hope we are wrong in our views with respect to the increasing difficulties which industry must learn to live with under the new arrangement. Industry always must
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INDUSTRIAL AND ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
live with the conditions created for it, and fortunately its adaptability so far has carried it through many a perplexing situation. After July 1 enforcement will be centered in the Department of Justice exactly as the President and the Attorney General have wished. Surely there can be no alibis and excuses. Since the Attorney General and Secretary of the Treasury are jointly to prescribe the regulations, we feel that industry through its representatives must be more active than ever in lending a genuinely helpful hand and a t the same time thinking through all proposals both from the viewpoint of enforcement and of the permissive features of the law. Regardless of how hampered or restricted legitimate industry may find itself, it must go on, and we predict that there will be no sulking, no lack of cooperation, but an earnest effort to make the best of what is presented, leaving others to interpret the results.
Trained Personnel
Vol. 22, No. 6
good will for themselves, can aid in the advancement of our knowledge, and can take steps to insure a t least an increased number of well-trained men. Student loan funds are also reaching fair proportions in our country, but undoubtedly should be increased. Then there is the choice between employing men who have taken their advanced degree and, those who have completed only the requirements for the bachelor’s degree. Some organizations prefer to employ bachelors and, after having ascertained what they can do t o best advantage, make it possible for them to return to school, paying them their full salary and tuition under a n agreement to return to the works after two years at the college or university. Some firms, fortunately located in university communities, have developed other plans of part time for further training while employed, and make this advantage available only to those who have definitely proved themselves worthy. We are not urging one plan as preferable to another. Our effort is only again to call attention to the situation and urge its more profound study by those-namely, the industries-who are so vitally concerned, not only today, but tomorrow, and the next day. There still remains the task of attracting to chemistry as a profession an increasing number of promising and outstanding students. The public is growing more science minded, and we should look forward to the early day when parents will be as proud of their promising sons in chemistry as they mould be to find them in law>the ministry, medicine, engineering, or any of the other long-recognized activities of distinction. We believe the Prize Essay Contest, the A. c. S. News Service, and the several attractive volumes available for the non-technical public, are helping us to accomplish this. We know that there will be those who are disappointed in their choice of a profession, but the old saying that there is always room a t the top continues to apply, and so far as we can see, there is less crowding a t the top of the chemical profession today than ever before.
N FORMER occasions we have endeavored to emphasize the growing scarcity of thoroughly trained personnel. There has been no diminution in this well-defined demand. One institution informs us that but twenty men are available this year, whereas seventy requests for recent doctors have been received. A large class graduating with the bachelor’s degree in engineering in another institution had more than two hundred offers distributed among one hundred and seventy individuals. Even the directors of research in educational institutions have difficulty in finding qualified graduate assistants. This demand leads to competitive bidding, which we do not believe is best for all concerned; what is far worse, it leads to taking from educational institutions the men upon whom we should depend for those yet to be trained, and also those imperfectly equipped for, as the demand increases or is sustained, the inclination is to cut deeper into the upper strata. How are satisfactorily trained personnel to be supplied in sufficient numbers? EID HUNT, in his presidential address before the 1930 The stock-breeder specializing in thoroughbred animals United States Pharmacopeial Convention, forcefully would soon be forced out of his field if he continually dispresented the difference between the approach of the chemist tributed his best breeding stock. Industry will ultimately suffer if it does not take steps to retain, in our universities and that of the physician to new drugs and chemical comand colleges, the men capable of developing under their pounds. While one can appreciate the extreme caution which guidance the personnel wanted for various industrial occupa- must characterize the use of an unfamiliar reagent in the tions. I n this the universities can assist by making it hands of the physician, nevertheless he is appalled by what possible for certain men to accept retainers from industry. humanity has lost through failure to utilize materials at This will tend to give them maximum academic freedom, hand. To illustrate the point, we need but recall that three close contact with industrial problems, and a total income hundred years elapsed between the discovery of ether and sufficient to make out and out industrial offers unattractive. its application as an anesthetic, and “how it was possible It seems to us the first task is to insure such a competent to obtain with an ancient drug results which science and reprofessorial staff, retained and promoted, however, solely ligion alike had taught to be impossible.” Doctor Hunt’s address, which will appear in the Transon the basis of results as measured by the success of their actions of the Pharmacopeial Convention, is very useful in students. A school can run on almost indefinitely with a staff of lower quality than might be desired and without im- bringing together numerous examples of failures to utilize mediate detriment to itself. It is only when its product be- what we have had “because the physicians of those days gins to find its place in industry that we can really differen- were convinced that they knew enough to state positively tiate between those places where satisfactory training is be- that such results as were caused by ether would never be ing given and those which are distinctly below par. Soon obtained with any drug and because they had not yet learned these differences can be noted by the length of time it takes to appreciate the value of experiments on animals.” While to place those graduating. The best training centers may such days are largely past, we are now confronted with two find their June graduates all employed as early as January of great opportunities and responsibilities. To quote from the that year, whereas the less efficient institutions may not see address: their graduates placed until late autumn. But what are the possibilities of adding to the list of valuable What about the young men themselves? Several avenues drugs? Never in the history of the world have the possibilities so great. When ether, chloroform, chloral hydrate, amyl are open. The fellowship plan for graduate students has been nitrite, phenol, etc., were introduced into medicine, the number produced good results. Far too few industries appreciate of synthetic organic chemicals was very few; they were numhow, with a relatively small outlay, they can thus promote bered in hundreds, or a t most in a very few thousands. A year
Multiply Useful Drugs
