the purpose of relocating and rehabilitating families dispossesssed by the war program.

The problems toward which the limitations of sections 23 (a) and 43 were addressed, moreover, were not the same as, or even similar to, the problems with which we are concerned here. Section 43 authorizes the completion and administration by the Secretary of Agriculture "of those resettlement projects, rural rehabilitation projects and resettlement purposes, and land development and land utilization projects, for which funds have been allotted by the President" under certain prior acts and Executive orders. By section 23 (a) the balance of the funds available pursuant to the Executive orders set forth in section 43 are authorized to be appropriated to carry out the purposes of title II. These sections were apparently designed to prohibit the initiation of certain types of resettlement projects, undertaken in an earlier period of the relief program, and to permit the continuation and winding up of the 193 such projects in existence at the time the Bankhead-Jones Act was passed. House Committee on Agriculture, Report to accompany H. R. 7562, H. Rept. No. 1065, 75th Cong., 1st sess., June 18, 1937, p. 9. The projects which were restricted are of several types, generally involving ownership by the United States of the land involved. and raising questions of taxes, incident to Government ownership of the land, and of social policy, presented by the special resettlement program then being pursued.

The emergency defense relocation program of the Farm Security Administration, on the other hand, has none of these characteristics. The program described in your letter undertakes to assure the prompt sale of land to individual farmers, and looks to the individual conduct by farmers of their own farming operations. It does not involve any withdrawal of land from State taxes. Quite clearly, the program was. undertaken in order to meet a specific emergency issue created by the war, and not to experiment in new methods of solving the problem of farm poverty. See Hearings before the Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, H. Rept. 77th Congress, 2d sess., Agriculture Department Appropriation Bill for 1943, pt. 2, pages 222-268; Hearings before the Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, H. Rept.

77th Cong., 1st sess., Agriculture Department Appropriation Bill for 1942, Part II, pp. 107-125.

2. Procedure adopted by the Farm Security Administration. A further question is presented as to the legality of the procedure adopted by the Farm Security Administration in implementing its relocation program, through loans to defense relocation corporations organized by its employees. Such corporations have occasionally been employed, in exceptional circumstances, in carrying out programs of assistance, and their organization has been held lawful despite the lack of express congressional authorization. See opinion of the Attorney General, dated October 4, 1933, 37 Op. 288, and opinion of the Comptroller General, No. A-82015, dated December 23, 1936, 16 Comp. Gen. 613. I do not find the procedure adopted to be inappropriate or objectionable, especially in view of the stated policy of the Farm Security Administration to effect the transformation of these corporations into farmer-owned cooperatives as rapidly as practicable.

3. Application of Rev. Stat. 3736. For the reasons set forth in the foregoing paragraph and in the earlier parts of this opinion, it is my opinion that the procedure adopted by the Farm Security Administration is not an unauthorized purchase of land by the Government of the United States within the prohibition contained in R. S. 3736. That section prohibits purchases of land "on account of the United States, except under a law authorizing such purchase." The laws referred to above authorize the purchases made herein. In addition, none of the land has been purchased "on account of the United States," for all of the farms acquired by the defense relocation corporations are acquired for the account of the farmers who will operate and eventually own them.

The first and second questions raised by the facts stated in your letter are therefore answered in the affirmative, while the third question is answered in the negative.

Respectfully,

FRANCIS BIDDLE.

PROCUREMENT OF WAR MATERIALS FROM FEDERAL AND STATE PRISONS

There is no provision of Federal law which prohibits the purchase by the Federal Government of either State or Federal prison-made goods.

State statutes which might be thought to restrict the type of products that can be made in State prisons for the Federal Government may be found upon examination in the light of the present war conditions and the present Federal necessities not to prevent procurement of war materials by the Federal Government from this source.

The PRESIDENT.

MAY 6, 1942.

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT. I have your request for my opinion on whether the industrial facilities at the prisons in the United States can be utilized in the production of essential war materials. In my opinion there is no impediment in Federal law to the procurement of war materials by the Federal Government either from Federal or from State prisons.

* * *

I

Production in Federal prisons of articles "for sale to the Federal Government" is specifically authorized by the act of May 27, 1930, 46 Stat. 391 (U. S. C., title 18, sec. 744a-744h), and the act of June 23, 1934, 48 Stat. 1211 (U. S. C., title 18, sec. 744i-744n). Indeed, the various branches of the Government are specifically directed to purchase from that source such material and supplies as are produced by Federal prison labor. Act of May 27, 1930, sec. 7, 46 Stat. 392 (U. S. C., title 18, sec. 744g). The limitations on the types of commodities which may be produced by these prisons do not prevent them from turning out the many different materials needed for the prosecution of the present war. These various limitations are that: (1) The production must be "for sale to the departments and independent establishments of the Federal Government and not for sale to the public in competition with private enterprise" (sec. 3 of the act of May 27, 1930); (2) the products shall be sufficiently diversified so as to reduce to a minimum competition with private industry and free labor (sec. 1 of the act of May 27, 1930, and sec. 3 of the act of June 23, 1934); (3) and they shall not be of such a character as "to curtail the produc

tion within its present limits, of any existing arsenal, navy yard, or other Government workshop" (sec. 3 of the act of May 27, 1930).

These restrictions, of considerable effect and importance in peacetime, do not present any barrier to the full utilization of productive capacity of the prisons in the war effort. In fact, the conditions are such today that both the major purposes of the statute and the restrictions can be fully satisfied. War matériel or defense articles produced in Federal prisons will obviously be produced for sale to the Federal Government for its own direct use or for lend-lease purposes. The other two restrictions likewise present no barrier. The production of war matériel in short supply will clearly not result in excessive competition with private industry and free labor engaged to full-or more than full-capacity in producing the same or similar matériel. Nor could it serve to curtail the work at Federal arsenals, navy yards, or workshops since they already have more work than they can possibly do with all-out production. Neither free labor, private industry, nor other Government enterprises will suffer by the enlistment of prison labor in the struggle for ever-increasing production of those essential war matériel which we do not have in sufficient quantity.

II

With regard to the products of State prisons, I am of the opinion that there is no provision of Federal law preventing their purchase by the Federal Government. Section 602 (b) of the act of June 30, 1932, 47 Stat. 418 (U. S. C., title 31, sec. 686 b (b)) does not prohibit Federal procurement from State prison industries. This provision was derived from title VI of the Legislative Appropriation Act of 1933 (47 Stat. 382, 417), which provided for purchases of supplies, equipment, or services by the various branches of the Federal Government from each other; the section states that the title shall not be construed to authorize the placing of orders for convict labor or for supplies and equipment made by convict labor, "except as otherwise provided by existing law." This section merely provides that the procurement by Federal officials of convict-made goods from Federal prison industries shall be governed by the act of May 27,

1930 (referred to above) which deals specifically with that subject rather than by the legislation which deals generally with interdepartmental purchases (act of March 4, 1915, 38 Stat. 1084, as amended; U. S. C., title 31, sec. 686).

The Federal law prohibiting the movement in interstate commerce of convict-made goods likewise does not prevent the interstate movement of State prison-made products which have been purchased by the Federal Government. Act of October 14, 1940, 54 Stat. 1134 (U. S. C., title 18, sec. 396 a). The statute, it is true, is by its terms made inapplicable only to Federal prison-made goods being transported for Federal use or to goods made in the prisons of one State transported for use by any one of the other 47 States or their political subdivisions. The specific mention of these two exceptions, however, does not necessarily imply that the act covers all other possible cases, where the general purpose and history of the act point to a different conclusion. Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U. S. 1, 15 (1890). The purpose which dictated these exceptions, being clear and unmistakable, must control; the reason of a statute in clear cases prevails over its literal wording. Johnson v. United States, 163 Fed. 30, 32 (1908); Securities Comm'n v. U. S. Realty Co., 310 U. S. 434 (1940); Holy Trinity Church v. United States, 143 U. S. 457 (1892). The legislative history of the bill shows clearly that the purpose of the Congress was to prevent the transportation of prison-made goods which would unfairly compete with free labor and free industry. The Senate report (76th Cong., S. Rept. No. 1389) states: "The purpose of the bill is to protect free labor and free industry against the unfair competition of prison-made goods."

It is apparent, therefore, that the act was designed to prevent the entrance into the open market of convict-made goods in such a way that injurious competition with free labor or free industry would result. The provisions excepting from the operation of the act goods which are to be used by the Government-Federal, State, or municipal-indicate that, even in normal times, or when industry was not engaged to full capacity, governmental use was not deemed sufficiently injurious to free industry or free labor to warrant forbidding transportation therefor. The reason behind the