February 6, 1941. Previews and Maneuvers. Hitler issues Directive 23 and courts Franco. Italians retreat in, and Germans embark for, Libya. Will Bill visits Jerusalem. Boy Scouts listen to radio.

Wild Bill Donovan, envoy of FDR and future head of the OSS, in Jerusalem on this day in 1941.

A lot of behind the scenes and preview of coming attractions type events were going on, on this day in 1941.  

Wild Bill Donovan, the future head of the OSS, was in British occupied Palestine.  No doubt something sort of behind the scenes was going on if Wild Bill was there.

In North Africa, Operation Compass, the British Commonwealth advance in Italian Libya, continued with the Battle of Beda Fomm commencing.

The British also took Benghazi on this day.

The British had committed some tactical errors in their campaign in North Africa, but the Italians were sucking it up everywhere in Africa. They were going down in defeat in Libya and they were suffering the same fate in Eritrea.  They were in big trouble.

And big trouble not only in North Africa, but also in a war against their near neighbor, Greece.  

No, things were not going well for Mussolini at all. At this rate, he was going to see his new Roman Empire pushed out of Africa in short order and likely have to enter into a negotiated settlement with Greece.

And this is something to really consider.  

We're so used to the concept of England holding on by it knuckles at this point in the war that we fail to appreciate that, just about a year after the UK had been pushed out of France and France itself had surrendered to the Germans, the British were more than holding their own.  They were winning in North Africa and Greece, an ally by default, was winning in its war with Italy.  The Germans were engaged in a full scale air and naval war against the United Kingdom, but that war had shifted to being one on economic targets, in essence.  A fact that was reflected by a new directive issued on this day Hitler, which read:

Directive No. 23 -- Directions For Operations Against The English War Economy

1. The Effect Of Our Operations Against England To Date:

(a) Contrary to our former view, the heaviest effect of our operations against the English war economy has lain in the high losses in merchant shipping inflicted by sea and air warfare. This effect has been increased by the destruction of port installations, the elimination of large quantities of supplies, and by the diminished use of ships when compelled to sail in convoy. 

A further considerable increase is to be expected in the course of this year by the wider employment of submarines, and this can bring about the collapse of English resistance within the foreseeable future.

(b) The effect of direct air attacks against the English armaments industry is difficult to estimate. But the destruction of many factories and the consequent disorganisation of the armaments industry must lead to a considerable fall in production.

(c) The least effect of all (as far as we can see) has been made upon the morale and will to resist of the English people.

2. Consequences For Our Own Future Operations:

In the course of the next few months, the effectiveness of our naval operations against enemy merchant shipping may be expected to increase thanks to the wider use of submarines and surface ships. On the other hand, we are unable to maintain the scope of our air attacks, as the demands of other theatres of war compel us to withdraw increasingly large air forces from operations against the British Isles.

It will therefore be desirable in future to concentrate air attacks more closely and to deliver them chiefly against targets whose destruction supplements our naval war. Only by these means can we expect a decisive end to the war within the foreseeable future.

3. It must therefore be the aim of our further operations against the English homeland to concentrate all weapons of air and sea warfare against enemy imports, as well as to hold down the English aircraft industry and, where possible, to inflict still further damage on it.

For this purpose it will be necessary:

(a) To destroy the most important English harbours for imports, particularly port installations, and ships lying in them or being built.

(b) To attack shipping, especially when homeward bound, by all methods.

(c) Systematically to destroy the key points of the aircraft industry, including factories producing antiaircraft equipment and explosives.

These duties must still be carried out by such forces as remain available for operations against England, even should a large proportion of the Airforce and a smaller proportion of naval forces be withdrawn in the course of the year for employment in other theatres.

4. For the execution of these tasks, it should be noted:

(a) The sinking of merchantmen is more important than attack on enemy warships.

The same is true of the use of aerial torpedoes.

By reducing the available enemy tonnage, not only will the blockade, which is decisive to the war, be intensified, but enemy operations in Europe or Africa will be impeded.

(b) When attacks against ports or aircraft factories have obviously been successful, they will be repeated again and again.

(c) By continuous laying of minefields the enemy's feelings of uncertainty and loses will be increased.

(d) After attacking the large import harbors, efforts will be made, as far as the range of aircraft allows, to prevent the transfer of supplies to smaller ports.

Only when the weather or other conditions prevent attack on the targets designated in paragraph 3 will attacks be made on other armaments plants, towns of particular importance to the war economy, and dumps in the interior of the country, and transport centers.

No decisive success can be expected from terror attacks on residential areas or from attacks on coastal defenses.

5. Until the beginning of the regrouping of forces for Barbarossa, efforts will be made to intensify the effect of air and sea warfare, not only in order to inflict the heaviest possible losses on England, but also in order to give the impression that an attack on the British Isles is planned for this year.

6. Special orders will be issued for cooperation between naval and air forces in reconnaissance over the sea.

7. Directive Number 9 of 26th May, 1940, and Directive Number 17 of 1st August, 1940, are no longer valid.

Hitler's orders basically acknowledged what was already a fact.  The Germans knew at this point in the war that the British were not going to give up and the concept was to stare the island, literally and materially, out of the war.  

That strategy had been tried in 1914-18, of course, and failed.  

And that had also brought the US into the war in 1917.

Also on this day, the Germans commenced Operation Sonnenblume, their relief mission to the Italians in North Africa in the form of troops.  They were now diverting, therefore, men and material that would have soon been pointed east to a region of the globe that they'd shown no interest in since 1918.  Indeed, in 1914-18 Africa had been a men and material drain of no benefit to the Reich as well, and now they were doing it again.  This reflected a sense of desperation regarding the Italian cause.  If Italy lost to the UK and Greece, which it was now warning it might, that would mean that the German concept of having a secure southern flank when it invaded the USSR would have been defeated.  So Hitler was committing Erwin Rommel, and German men and material, to Libya.

On the same day, Hitler wrote Francisco Franco.

Dear Caudillo!

If I write this letter it is done in order to determine once again with extreme clarity the individual phases of the development of a situation which is not only important for Germany and Italy but could have been of decisive importance to Spain.

When we had our meeting, it was my aim to convince you, Caudillo, of the necessity of common action of those states whose interests in the final analysis are certainly tied up indissolubly with each other. For centuries, Spain has been persecuted by the same enemies against whom today Germany and Italy are forced to fight. In addition to the earlier imperial strivings inimical to our three nations there now arose, moreover, antitheses conditioned by world-outlook: The Jewish-international democracy, which reigns in these states, will not excuse any of us for having followed a course which seeks to secure the future of our peoples in accordance with fundamental principles determined by the people and not those imposed by capital. As concerns the German determination to follow this fight through to the final consequence, I need waste no word. The Duce thinks no differently. On the basis of this analysis, the Japanese people as well will not in the long run get by, unless it be by a submission sacrificing the future of the Japanese people. I am now convinced that Spain faces the same fate. Caudillo, if your struggle against the elements of destruction in Spain was successful, it was only because of the democratic opponents forced to be cautious by attitude of Germany and Italy. You will be forgiven, Caudillo, but never for this victory! Just as little does England think of letting you remain for a long period in North Africa opposite Gibraltar-as soon as she is once again in a position of power. The Spanish seizure of the Tangier zone would in such a case-and this is my deepest conviction, Caudillo-only be a passing intermezzo. England, and probably America too, will do everything, to render this entry into the Mediterranean in the future even more secure under their dominion than up to now. It is my most heartfelt conviction that the battle which Germany and Italy are now fighting out is thus determining the future destiny of Spain as well. Only in the case of our victory will the present regime continue to exist. Should Germany and Italy lose this war, however, then any future for a really national and independent Spain would be impossible.

I have thus been striving to convince you, Caudillo, of the necessity in the interests of your own country and the future of the Spanish people, of uniting yourself with those countries who formerly sent soldiers to support you, and who today of necessity, are also battling not only for their own existence, but indirectly for the national future of Spain as well.

Now at our meeting we agreed that Spain declare its readiness to sign the Three-Power Pact and to enter the war. In setting the date, periods in the far future were never considered or even mentioned, but instead the conversation always was concerned with a very short time-limit within which you, Caudillo, still believed that you could carry out various economic measures favorable for your country.

I personally have been skeptical from the beginning about the hope of receiving very soon more real economic benefits for Spain.

1. England indeed has no thought at all of really helping Spain! England is only endeavoring to postpone the Spanish entry into the war, to put it off in order in this way continually to increase her distress and thus to be able finally to overthrow the Spanish Government of that time.

2. But even if England were about to think otherwise, in an impulse toward some kind of sentimentality never present in British history up to now, she could not really help Spain under any conditions. She is absolutely not in the condition even in transportation alone to aid another country in a time in which she herself has already been forced to the most rigorous retrenchments in her standard of living. And the need for transport space will as the months go by not decrease but instead will get more and more serious.

In spite of the fact that I, therefore-as stated-have been thoroughly skeptical about this from the beginning, I nonetheless brought to bear every bit of appreciation for your efforts in at least trying, even before entering the war, to get shipments of foodstuffs into Spain from countries overseas as well.

Germany, however, has for her part, declared herself ready to deliver to Spain, immediately after undertaking entrance into the war, food, that is-grain-to as great an extent as possible! Furthermore, Germany has declared herself prepared to replace the 100,000 tons of grain which was waiting in Portugal destined for Switzerland in order that it might benefit Spain immediately. This of course remains contingent upon the final decision for Spain's entry into the war. For about one thing, Caudillo, there must be clarity: We are fighting a battle of life and death and cannot al this time make any gifts. If it should later be asserted that Spain could not enter the war because she received no supplies, that would not be true! For immediately after settling the entry into the war, a fixed date of which there has as yet been no outward indication at all, Spain would receive the first supplies, that is, 100,000 tons of grain. I doubt whether 100,000 tons of grain could really have reached Spain from abroad within the same period of time, even if such an inclination had existed. Thus, I also doubt that this is going to happen. The assertion, however, that-if our grain had been delivered immediately-the Spanish people could thus by propaganda have been prepared for entry into the war is self-contradictory for another reason.

You, yourself, Caudillo, have indeed personally indicated to me the importance of not yet consummating publicly the entrance into the Three-Power Pact, because you feared that this would have hurt your other efforts, for example in obtaining more grain, indeed would perhaps have wrecked them. How much less possible would it then have been to carry on open propaganda for entering the war? No, I am taking the liberty once more to confirm that:

1. During our conversation, it was never considered that Spain's entry into the war would perchance not take place until autumn or the coming winter, and that-

2. Germany was ready to furnish supplies to the Spanish Government at the moment when the final date for entering the war was determined.

When I had the request made to you, Caudillo, with the impression of urgency to bring relief to the Italian ally and to set this date in the middle or the end of January, that is, to permit the German march against Gibraltar to begin on or after January 10, in order to start attacking at the end of January, then for the first time our negotiators were unequivocally informed that such an early date could absolutely not be considered and this was again motivated by economic factors. However, when I thereupon let it be known again that Germany was indeed ready to begin at once with deliveries of grain, Admiral Canaris received the conclusive information that this delivery of grain would not be decisive at all, for via railway, it certainly could accomplish no practical effect. It was now further declared that since we had already made available batteries for the Canary Islands and moreover intended also to provide dive-bombers for additional security-even that was not decisive, since the Canary Islands from the point of view of food could no longer be held after six months.

That it is absolutely not a matter of economic factors but rather of others is apparent from the last statement in which it is stated that for climatic reasons to march in this season could not succeed, but on the contrary should only be considered at the earliest in the autumn or winter.

Under these conditions, of course, I do not understand why one should first want to declare an event impossible on economic grounds, which is now said to be impossible simply for climatic reasons. Now I do not believe that the German Army would be disturbed during its march in January by a climate which in itself is nothing out of the ordinary for us. In any case, we solved our problems in the Norwegian campaign under varied conditions and with severe climatic hindrances in the form of snow and ice, not to mention the fact that, from the participation of German soldiers and officers in your campaign, Caudillo, the climatic conditions of Spain are nothing unfamiliar to us. I regret most profoundly, Caudillo, this your opinion and your stand since:

1. I feel it my duty to bring relief to my Italian friend and ally and thus be of help to him indeed be of help at the moment when he experienced an unfortunate mishap. The attack on Gibraltar and the closing of the Straits would have changed the Mediterranean situation in one stroke.

2. I am of the conviction that in war, time is one of the most important factors. Months which one lets slip by are often never regained again!

3. Finally however it is clear that, on January 10 if we had been able to cross the Spanish border with the first formations, Gibraltar would today be in our hands. That means: Two months have been lost, which otherwise would have helped to decide world history.

4. I am further of the convictions that Spain's economic condition would have improved and not become worse because of what would in any case have come to Spain through us and that on the other hand the deliveries which since then actually came to Spain from abroad during this time can only amount to a fraction compared to that which would in any case have been delivered at once by us.

But quite aside from this, Caudillo, I should like now to mention the following:

The entrance of Spain into this struggle has certainly not been conceived of as exclusively to the benefit of the interests of Germany and Italy. Spain herself has advanced very great territorial claims for the fulfilment of which the Duce and I had declared ourselves ready in every degree which could at all be reconciled with an acceptable new arrangement of the African colonial possession for Europe and its countries. And I may point out in this regard that in this struggle up to now first Germany and then Italy, have suffered the most prodigious blood sacrifice, and that both, in spite of this, themselves made very modest claims.

In any case, however, the moment of military operations above all can only be proposed by the one who therewith assumes the main burden of the struggle and who must therefore calculate it into the total program of a military analysis which is after all of world-wide extent. That I myself have no other goal in mind than the common success is certainly understandable. Indeed in this case, Caudillo, my urging in and of itself only proves the strength of my consciousness of responsibility toward my ally as well. For wheresoever in the course of this war difficulties should arise, it will be my unbending will to help out with them; and my decision to make good in the final settlement whatever during one or another stage of this war can perhaps at first have miscarried. This affects Spain as well. Spain will never get other friends than those given [her] in the Germany and Italy of today, unless it becomes a different Spain. This different Spain however would only be the Spain of decline and of final collapse. Even for this reason alone, Caudillo, I believe that we three men, the Duce, you, and I, are bound to one another by the most rigorous compulsion of history that is possible, and that thus we in this historical analysis ought to obey as the supreme commandment the realization that in such difficult times, not so much an apparently wise caution as the bold heart, rather, can save nations.

Moreover, Caudillo, this war is decided regardless of what ephemeral successes the British believe they can achieve anywhere on the periphery. For independently thereof, the fact remains that the British power in Europe is broken and that the mightiest military machine in the world stands ready for every additional task which may be put to it to solve. And how good and reliable this instrument is, the future will prove.

Accept my cordial and comradely greetings.

Your ADOLF HITLER

Hitler was renewing his request of Franco to join the war, something Franco had refused to do on the basis that the country had not recovered from its civil war. The German thought was that Spain could seize Gibraltar, which it likely could have, and pinch of the Mediterranean.  It was a simple solution to a problem that, in their view, was now requiring them to commit troops to North Africa.

Franco has always been an enigma.  A strong man, a caudillo as Hitler termed it, he actually wasn't a fascist like Mussolini and Hitler, although he certainly wasn't a democrat.  A conservative monarchist at heart, he was better able to read the winds than his strong man contemporaries and was leery of entering into the war full scale, choosing instead to provide Germany with material support and submarine bases (and air bases early on).  Just enough to be doing something, but not more than that.

Franco's reluctance to join the Germans also can be attributed, in this instance, to what he conceived of Spain's territorial interests.  There was, at this time, a French Morocco and a Spanish Morocco.  Franco had actually crossed from Spanish Morocco into Spain when the Spanish army, or rather most of the Spanish army, went to war with the Spanish reds when the Spanish parliament had collapsed.  French Morocco, had it been offered to him, would likely have proved a sufficient inducement to cause him to throw in with Germany.  But that would have pitted Spanish interest against that of Vichy France, which would likely have attempted to fight Spain over it, and which would have ended the problematic cooperation of Vichy France with Germany.  That was an offer Hitler couldn't make.

All of which should have caused the Germans to pause.  They hadn't beaten the UK and the British Commonwealth forces were now in better shape than they had been some months prior.  Italy was proving to be of no value as an ally, and actually a net deficit, and Spain wasn't up for cooperating.

And yet they went on planning for Operation Barbarossa anyway.

The Germans captured a RAF Wellington on this day:

Wellington bomber captured on Boulogne raid

Convoy SC-20 suffered its third and final loss:

Ships hit from convoy SC-20

Boy Scouts were learning about radio:

Scouts Listening to the Radio, 1941

February 6, 1921. William Jennings Bryan in Florida.

'Neath palms and sunshine; William Jennings Bryan's Presbyterian Tourist Bible Class, Miami, Fla., Feb. 6th, 1921.

 

Not getting a break.

 How to tell when you are the President:

Joe Biden, Watch Geek in Chief

You can't get a break on anything.

So, Biden is probably well to do (but not as well to do as his predecessor, maybe) and has a really good watch. So what?  I see very nice watches on the wrists of lawyers, and others, including some not so wealthy, all the time.

Watches are cool.  Nice watches are very cool, even though a really nice watch isn't what it once was.  Biden has one or more?  So be it.  I'll bet Trump had several.

Oh, and one more thing Governor Gordon. . .

On this topic:  

Lex Anteinternet: Weld County, Wyoming? No thanks.: 

The degree to which boosters completely fail to think out the things that they boost is one of the stories that repeats itself continually t...

Weld County, Wyoming? No thanks.

The degree to which boosters completely fail to think out the things that they boost is one of the stories that repeats itself continually throughout history.

The law of unintended consequences.

I really want an additional 320,000 people eligible for instate hunting licenses.

I haven't been able to draw an antelope license two years running.  I really, really want to add 320,000 people from Weld County to the rolls.  After all, down there, there aren't any antelope to hunt and then they could travel up to my county and make sure that I never drew a tag as they drew them.

Yeah. . . that's something we want alright.

Message to Nebraska GOP State Central Committee

Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse on being censured.

You are welcome to censure me again.  But let's be clear about why this is happening. It's because I still believe, as you used to, that politics isn't about the weird worship of one dude.

Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse.

 

Data And Storytelling Inform Food Insecurity Research On The Wind River Indian Reservation

February 4, 1941. The United Service Organization founded.

See here:

Today in World War II History—February 4, 1941

The USO was formed on this day in 1941.  It still exists.

The organization came into being  to provide, for a lack of a better way to put it, aid and comfort to American servicemen.  A non profit organization, it's services are highly diverse and difficult to categorize.

We're so used to the thought of their being a USO that its difficult to realize that during World War One, no such organization existed, and the same roles were instead provided by a variety of pre existing organizations such as the Red Cross, the YMCA and the Knights of Columbus.  The evolution away from such organizations to a centralized, larger, one with a singular focus is interesting in terms of what it meant in social development.  In no prior war had the US had an organization dedicated just to the needs of servicemen, broad needs at that.  It has ever since.

On the same day the Canadian SS Empire Engineer, a refrigerated ship, was torpedoed and went down in the Atlantic with all 39 hands.  It was one of ten cargo ships that went down that day, seven of which belonged to Allied nations, two of which belonged to the neutral United States, and one of which was German.

Commonwealth forces continued to advance in Libya, taking Msus.

More on the war on this day:

Day 523 February 4, 1941

The misery of war:

The cold wet misery of the Greek front line

February 4, 2021. Death of Eugene Burnand

 A Swiss painter and illustrator, who painted heavily agrarian scenes.

Op eds. Two to draw from.

The Tribune ran a couple of interesting op eds regarding recent stories involving or surrounding Representative Cheney.

The first was by a former head of the Wyoming Republican Party, Ron Micheli.  Micheli is highly conservative but of the traditional Republican type.  He's on record lamenting the alt right drift of the GOP in Wyoming.

He now writes opinion pieces, and his on recent events can be found here:

Micheli: We have seen gadflies like Gaetz before

Of note, Gaetz in not only portrayed as a gadfly by Micheli, the headline says Gaetz is.  Backing this up, Gaetz stated yesterday he was willing to resign from the House to defend Donald Trump in the upcoming impeachment trial, if Trump were to ask.

Trump's not going to ask.

Trump's legal problems have really created an odd sideshow for politicians who want to try to advance their careers in odd legal ways by associating themselves with him.  Ted Cruz, for example, earlier offered to argue one of Trump's election challenge cases in front of the Supreme Court, as if having Ted Cruz argue that case does anything much more than to advance the career of Ted Cruz.  Really silly.

The other was by Christine Hillegass, a psychologist living in Livingston Montana.

Hillegass: Voting her conscience is a positive

Micheli's opinions can't be discounted, given his relationship to the GOP.  Hillegass' probably can be by some, as she lives in Montana, not Wyoming, but they're interesting nonetheless.

February 3, 1941. Fair Labor Standards Act upheld, Rommel appointed, Ships sunk, Fleets created.

 On this day in 1941, the Supreme Court upheld the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938.

Worker on lumber stack, 1941.

312 U.S. 100 (1941)

UNITED STATES

v.

DARBY.

No. 82.

Supreme Court of United States.

Argued December 19, 20, 1940.

Decided February 3, 1941.

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF GEORGIA.

Solicitor General Biddle, with whom Assistant Attorney General Arnold and Messrs. Robert L. Stern, Hugh B. Cox, Warner W. Gardner, J. Saxton Daniel, Gerard D. Reilly, and Irving J. Levy were on the brief, for the United States.

Mr. Archibald B. Lovett for appellee.

 MR. JUSTICE STONE delivered the opinion of the Court.

The two principal questions raised by the record in this case are, first, whether Congress has constitutional power to prohibit the shipment in interstate commerce of lumber manufactured by employees whose wages are less than a prescribed minimum or whose weekly hours of labor at that wage are greater than a prescribed maximum, and, second, whether it has power to prohibit the employment of workmen in the production of goods "for interstate commerce" at other than prescribed wages and hours. A subsidiary question is whether in connection with such prohibitions Congress can require the employer subject to them to keep records showing the hours worked each day and week by each of his employees including those engaged "in the production and manufacture of goods to-wit, lumber, for `interstate commerce.'"

Appellee demurred to an indictment found in the district court for southern Georgia charging him with violation of § 15 (a) (1) (2) and (5) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938; 52 Stat. 1060, 29 U.S.C. § 201, et seq. The district court sustained the demurrer and quashed the indictment and the case comes here on direct appeal under § 238 of the Judicial Code as amended, 28 U.S.C. § 345, and § 682, Title 18 U.S.C., 34 Stat. 1246, which authorizes an appeal to this Court when the judgment sustaining the demurrer "is based upon the invalidity or construction of the statute upon which the indictment is founded."

The Fair Labor Standards Act set up a comprehensive legislative scheme for preventing the shipment in interstate commerce of certain products and commodities produced in the United States under labor conditions as respects wages and hours which fail to conform to standards set up by the Act. Its purpose, as we judicially know from the declaration of policy in § 2 (a) of the Act,^[1] and the reports of Congressional committees proposing the legislation, S. Rept. No. 884, 75th Cong. 1st Sess.; H. Rept. No. 1452, 75th Cong. 1st Sess.; H. Rept. No. 2182, 75th Cong. 3d Sess., Conference Report, H. Rept. No. 2738, 75th Cong. 3d Sess., is to exclude from interstate commerce goods produced for the commerce and to prevent their production for interstate commerce, under conditions detrimental to the maintenance of the minimum standards of living necessary for health and general well-being; and to prevent the use of interstate commerce as the means of competition in the distribution of goods so produced, and as the means of spreading and perpetuating such substandard labor conditions among the workers of the several states. The Act also sets up an administrative procedure whereby those standards may from time to time be modified generally as to industries subject to the Act or within an industry in accordance with specified standards, by an administrator acting in collaboration with "Industry Committees" appointed by him.

Section 15 of the statute prohibits certain specified acts and § 16 (a) punishes willful violation of it by a fine of not more than $10,000 and punishes each conviction after the first by imprisonment of not more than six months or by the specified fine or both. Section 15 (1) makes unlawful the shipment in interstate commerce of any goods "in the production of which any employee was employed in violation of section 6 or section 7," which provide, among other things, that during the first year of operation of the Act a minimum wage of 25 cents per hour shall be paid to employees "engaged in [interstate] commerce or the production of goods for [interstate] commerce," § 6, and that the maximum hours of employment for employees "engaged in commerce or the production of goods for commerce" without increased compensation for overtime, shall be forty-four hours a week. § 7.

Section 15 (a) (2) makes it unlawful to violate the provisions of §§ 6 and 7 including the minimum wage and maximum hour requirements just mentioned for employees engaged in production of goods for commerce. Section 15 (a) (5) makes it unlawful for an employer subject to the Act to violate § 11 (c) which requires him to keep such records of the persons employed by him and of their wages and hours of employment as the administrator shall prescribe by regulation or order.

The indictment charges that appellee is engaged, in the State of Georgia, in the business of acquiring raw materials, which he manufactures into finished lumber with the intent, when manufactured, to ship it in interstate commerce to customers outside the state, and that he does in fact so ship a large part of the lumber so produced. There are numerous counts charging appellee with the shipment in interstate commerce from Georgia to points outside the state of lumber in the production of which, for interstate commerce, appellee has employed workmen at less than the prescribed minimum wage or more than the prescribed maximum hours without payment to them of any wage for overtime. Other counts charge the employment by appellee of workmen in the production of lumber for interstate commerce at wages at less than 25 cents an hour or for more than the maximum hours per week without payment to them of the prescribed overtime wage. Still another count charges appellee with failure to keep records showing the hours worked each day a week by each of his employees as required by § 11 (c) and the regulation of the administrator, Title 29, Ch. 5, Code of Federal Regulations, Part 516, and also that appellee unlawfully failed to keep such records of employees engaged "in the production and manufacture of goods, to-wit lumber, for interstate commerce."

The demurrer, so far as now relevant to the appeal, challenged the validity of the Fair Labor Standards Act under the Commerce Clause and the Fifth and Tenth Amendments. The district court quashed the indictment in its entirety upon the broad grounds that the Act, which it interpreted as a regulation of manufacture within the states, is unconstitutional. It declared that manufacture is not interstate commerce and that the regulation by the Fair Labor Standards Act of wages and hours of employment of those engaged in the manufacture of goods which it is intended at the time of production "may or will be" after production "sold in interstate commerce in part or in whole" is not within the congressional power to regulate interstate commerce.

The effect of the court's decision and judgment is thus to deny the power of Congress to prohibit shipment in interstate commerce of lumber produced for interstate commerce under the proscribed substandard labor conditions of wages and hours, its power to penalize the employer for his failure to conform to the wage and hour provisions in the case of employees engaged in the production of lumber which he intends thereafter to ship in interstate commerce in part or in whole according to the normal course of his business and its power to compel him to keep records of hours of employment as required by the statute and the regulations of the administrator.

The case comes here on assignments by the Government that the district court erred insofar as it held that Congress was without constitutional power to penalize the acts set forth in the indictment, and appellee seeks to sustain the decision below on the grounds that the prohibition by Congress of those Acts is unauthorized by the Commerce Clause and is prohibited by the Fifth Amendment. The appeal statute limits our jurisdiction on this appeal to a review of the determination of the district court so far only as it is based on the validity or construction of the statute. United States v. Borden Co., 308 U.S. 188, 193-195, and cases cited. Hence we accept the district court's interpretation of the indictment and confine our decision to the validity and construction of the statute.

The prohibition of shipment of the proscribed goods in interstate commerce. Section 15 (a) (1) prohibits, and the indictment charges, the shipment in interstate commerce, of goods produced for interstate commerce by employees whose wages and hours of employment do not 113*113 conform to the requirements of the Act. Since this section is not violated unless the commodity shipped has been produced under labor conditions prohibited by § 6 and § 7, the only question arising under the commerce clause with respect to such shipments is whether Congress has the constitutional power to prohibit them.

While manufacture is not of itself interstate commerce, the shipment of manufactured goods interstate is such commerce and the prohibition of such shipment by Congress is indubitably a regulation of the commerce. The power to regulate commerce is the power "to prescribe the rule by which commerce is governed." Gibbons v. Ogden, 9 Wheat. 1, 196. It extends not only to those regulations which aid, foster and protect the commerce, but embraces those which prohibit it. Reid v. Colorado, 187 U.S. 137; Lottery Case, 188 U.S. 321; United States v. Delaware & Hudson Co., 213 U.S. 366; Hoke v. United States, 227 U.S. 308; Clark Distilling Co. v. Western Maryland Ry. Co., 242 U.S. 311; United States v. Hill, 248 U.S. 420; McCormick & Co. v. Brown, 286 U.S. 131. It is conceded that the power of Congress to prohibit transportation in interstate commerce includes noxious articles, Lottery Case, supra; Hipolite Egg Co. v. United States, 220 U.S. 45; cf. Hoke v. United States, supra; stolen articles, Brooks v. United States, 267 U.S. 432; kidnapped persons, Gooch v. United States, 297 U.S. 124, and articles such as intoxicating liquor or convict made goods, traffic in which is forbidden or restricted by the laws of the state of destination. Kentucky Whip & Collar Co. v. Illinois Central R. Co., 299 U.S. 334.

But it is said that the present prohibition falls within the scope of none of these categories; that while the prohibition is nominally a regulation of the commerce its motive or purpose is regulation of wages and hours of persons engaged in manufacture, the control of which has been reserved to the states and upon which Georgia and some of the states of destination have placed no restriction; that the effect of the present statute is not to exclude the proscribed articles from interstate commerce in aid of state regulation as in Kentucky Whip & Collar Co. v. Illinois Central R. Co., supra, but instead, under the guise of a regulation of interstate commerce, it undertakes to regulate wages and hours within the state contrary to the policy of the state which has elected to leave them unregulated.

The power of Congress over interstate commerce "is complete in itself, may be exercised to its utmost extent, and acknowledges no limitations other than are prescribed in the Constitution." Gibbons v. Ogden, supra, 196. That power can neither be enlarged nor diminished by the exercise or non-exercise of state power. Kentucky Whip & Collar Co. v. Illinois Central R. Co., supra. Congress, following its own conception of public policy concerning the restrictions which may appropriately be imposed on interstate commerce, is free to exclude from the commerce articles whose use in the states for which they are destined it may conceive to be injurious to the public health, morals or welfare, even though the state has not sought to regulate their use. Reid v. Colorado, supra; Lottery Case, supra; Hipolite Egg Co. v. United States, supra; Hoke v. United States, supra.

Such regulation is not a forbidden invasion of state power merely because either its motive or its consequence is to restrict the use of articles of commerce within the states of destination; and is not prohibited unless by other Constitutional provisions. It is no objection to the assertion of the power to regulate interstate commerce that its exercise is attended by the same incidents which attend the exercise of the police power of the states. Seven Cases v. United States, 239 U.S. 510, 514; Hamilton v. Kentucky Distilleries & Warehouse Co., 251 U.S. 146, 156; United States v. Carolene Products Co., 304 U.S. 144, 147; United States v. Appalachian Electric Power Co., 311 U.S. 377.

The motive and purpose of the present regulation are plainly to make effective the Congressional conception of public policy that interstate commerce should not be made the instrument of competition in the distribution of goods produced under substandard labor conditions, which competition is injurious to the commerce and to the states from and to which the commerce flows. The motive and purpose of a regulation of interstate commerce are matters for the legislative judgment upon the exercise of which the Constitution places no restriction and over which the courts are given no control. McCray v. United States, 195 U.S. 27; Sonzinsky v. United States, 300 U.S. 506, 513 and cases cited. "The judicial cannot prescribe to the legislative department of the government limitations upon the exercise of its acknowledged power." Veazie Bank v. Fenno, 8 Wall. 533. Whatever their motive and purpose, regulations of commerce which do not infringe some constitutional prohibition are within the plenary power conferred on Congress by the Commerce Clause. Subject only to that limitation, presently to be considered, we conclude that the prohibition of the shipment interstate of goods produced under the forbidden substandard labor conditions is within the constitutional authority of Congress.

In the more than a century which has elapsed since the decision of Gibbons v. Ogden, these principles of constitutional interpretation have been so long and repeatedly recognized by this Court as applicable to the Commerce Clause, that there would be little occasion for repeating them now were it not for the decision of this Court twenty-two years ago in Hammer v. Dagenhart, 247 U.S. 251. In that case it was held by a bare majority of the Court over the powerful and now classic dissent of Mr. Justice Holmes setting forth the fundamental issues involved,  that Congress was without power to exclude the products of child labor from interstate commerce. The reasoning and conclusion of the Court's opinion there cannot be reconciled with the conclusion which we have reached, that the power of Congress under the Commerce Clause is plenary to exclude any article from interstate commerce subject only to the specific prohibitions of the Constitution.

Hammer v. Dagenhart has not been followed. The distinction on which the decision was rested that Congressional power to prohibit interstate commerce is limited to articles which in themselves have some harmful or deleterious property — a distinction which was novel when made and unsupported by any provision of the Constitution — has long since been abandoned. Brooks v. United States, supra; Kentucky Whip & Collar Co. v. Illinois Central R. Co., supra; Electric Bond & Share Co. v. Securities & Exchange Comm'n, 303 U.S. 419; Mulford v. Smith, 307 U.S. 38. The thesis of the opinion that the motive of the prohibition or its effect to control in some measure the use or production within the states of the article thus excluded from the commerce can operate to deprive the regulation of its constitutional authority has long since ceased to have force. Reid v. Colorado, supra; Lottery Case, supra; Hipolite Egg Co. v. United States, supra; Seven Cases v. United States, supra, 514; Hamilton v. Kentucky Distilleries & Warehouse Co., supra, 156; United States v. Carolene Products Co., supra, 147. And finally we have declared "The authority of the federal government over interstate commerce does not differ in extent or character from that retained by the states over intrastate commerce." United States v. Rock Royal Co-operative, 307 U.S. 533, 569.

The conclusion is inescapable that Hammer v. Dagenhart, was a departure from the principles which have prevailed in the interpretation of the Commerce Clause both before and since the decision and that such vitality, as a precedent, as it then had has long since been exhausted. It should be and now is overruled.

Validity of the wage and hour requirements. Section 15 (a) (2) and §§ 6 and 7 require employers to conform to the wage and hour provisions with respect to all employees engaged in the production of goods for interstate commerce. As appellee's employees are not alleged to be "engaged in interstate commerce" the validity of the prohibition turns on the question whether the employment, under other than the prescribed labor standards, of employees engaged in the production of goods for interstate commerce is so related to the commerce and so affects it as to be within the reach of the power of Congress to regulate it.

To answer this question we must at the outset determine whether the particular acts charged in the counts which are laid under § 15 (a) (2) as they were construed below, constitute "production for commerce" within the meaning of the statute. As the Government seeks to apply the statute in the indictment, and as the court below construed the phrase "produced for interstate commerce," it embraces at least the case where an employer engaged, as is appellee, in the manufacture and shipment of goods in filling orders of extrastate customers, manufactures his product with the intent or expectation that according to the normal course of his business all or some part of it will be selected for shipment to those customers.

Without attempting to define the precise limits of the phrase, we think the acts alleged in the indictment are within the sweep of the statute. The obvious purpose of the Act was not only to prevent the interstate transportation of the proscribed product, but to stop the initial step toward transportation, production with the purpose of so transporting it. Congress was not unaware that 118*118 most manufacturing businesses shipping their product in interstate commerce make it in their shops without reference to its ultimate destination and then after manufacture select some of it for shipment interstate and some intrastate according to the daily demands of their business, and that it would be practically impossible, without disrupting manufacturing businesses, to restrict the prohibited kind of production to the particular pieces of lumber, cloth, furniture or the like which later move in interstate rather than intrastate commerce. Cf. United States v. New York Central R. Co., 272 U.S. 457, 464.

The recognized need of drafting a workable statute and the well known circumstances in which it was to be applied are persuasive of the conclusion, which the legislative history supports, S. Rept. No. 884, 75th Cong. 1st Sess., pp. 7 and 8; H. Rept. No. 2738, 75th Cong. 3d Sess., p. 17, that the "production for commerce" intended includes at least production of goods, which, at the time of production, the employer, according to the normal course of his business, intends or expects to move in interstate commerce although, through the exigencies of the business, all of the goods may not thereafter actually enter interstate commerce.^[2]

There remains the question whether such restriction on the production of goods for commerce is a permissible exercise of the commerce power. The power of Congress over interstate commerce is not confined to the regulation of commerce among the states. It extends to those activities intrastate which so affect interstate commerce or the exercise of the power of Congress over it as to make regulation of them appropriate means to the attainment of a legitimate end, the exercise of the granted power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce. See McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 421. Cf. United States v. Ferger, 250 U.S. 199.

While this Court has many times found state regulation of interstate commerce, when uniformity of its regulation is of national concern, to be incompatible with the Commerce Clause even though Congress has not legislated on the subject, the Court has never implied such restraint on state control over matters intrastate not deemed to be regulations of interstate commerce or its instrumentalities even though they affect the commerce. Minnesota Rate Cases, 230 U.S. 352, 398 et seq., and case cited; 410 et seq., and cases cited. In the absence of Congressional legislation on the subject state laws which are not regulations of the commerce itself or its instrumentalities are not forbidden even though they affect interstate commerce. Kidd v. Pearson, 128 U.S. 1; Bacon v. Illinois, 227 U.S. 504; Heisler v. Thomas Colliery Co., 260 U.S. 245; Oliver Iron Co. v. Lord, 262 U.S. 172.

But it does not follow that Congress may not by appropriate legislation regulate intrastate activities where they have a substantial effect on interstate commerce. See Santa Cruz Fruit Packing Co. v. National Labor Relations Board, 303 U.S. 453, 466. A recent example is the National Labor Relations Act for the regulation of employer and employee relations in industries in which strikes, induced by unfair labor practices named in the Act, tend to disturb or obstruct interstate commerce. See National Labor Relations Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp., 301 U.S. 1, 38, 40; National Labor Relations Board v. Fainblatt, 306 U.S. 601, 604, and cases cited. But long before the adoption of the National Labor Relations Act this Court had many times held that the power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce extends to the regulation through legislative action of activities intrastate 120*120 which have a substantial effect on the commerce or the exercise of the Congressional power over it.^[3]

In such legislation Congress has sometimes left it to the courts to determine whether the intrastate activities have the prohibited effect on the commerce, as in the Sherman Act. It has sometimes left it to an administrative board or agency to determine whether the activities sought to be regulated or prohibited have such effect, as in the case of the Interstate Commerce Act, and the National Labor Relations Act, or whether they come within the statutory definition of the prohibited Act, as in the Federal Trade Commission Act. And sometimes Congress itself has said that a particular activity affects the commerce, as it did in the present Act, the Safety Appliance Act and the Railway Labor Act. In passing on the validity of legislation of the class last mentioned the only function of courts is to determine whether the particular activity regulated or prohibited is within the reach of the federal power. See United States v. Ferger, supra; Virginian Ry. Co. v. Federation, 300 U.S. 515, 553.

Congress, having by the present Act adopted the policy of excluding from interstate commerce all goods produced for the commerce which do not conform to the specified labor standards, it may choose the means reasonably adapted to the attainment of the permitted end, even though they involve control of intrastate activities. Such legislation has often been sustained with respect to powers, other than the commerce power granted to the national government, when the means chosen, although not themselves within the granted power, were nevertheless deemed appropriate aids to the accomplishment of some purpose within an admitted power of the national government. See Jacob Ruppert, Inc. v. Caffey, 251 U.S. 264; Everard's Breweries v. Day, 265 U.S. 545, 560; Westfall v. United States, 274 U.S. 256, 259. As to state power under the Fourteenth Amendment, compare Otis v. Parker, 187 U.S. 606, 609; St. John v. New York, 201 U.S. 633; Purity Extract & Tonic Co. v. Lynch, 226 U.S. 192, 201-202. A familiar like exercise of power is the regulation of intrastate transactions which are so commingled with or related to interstate commerce that all must be regulated if the interstate commerce is to be effectively controlled. Shreveport Case, 234 U.S. 342; Railroad Commission of Wisconsin v. Chicago, B. & Q.R. Co., 257 U.S. 563; United States v. New York Central R. Co., supra, 464; Currin v. Wallace, 306 U.S. 1; Mulford v. Smith, supra. Similarly Congress may require inspection and preventive treatment of all cattle in a disease infected area in order to prevent shipment in interstate commerce of some of the cattle without the treatment. Thornton v. United States, 271 U.S. 414. It may prohibit the removal, at destination, of labels required by the Pure Food & Drugs Act to be affixed to articles transported in interstate commerce. McDermott v. Wisconsin, 228 U.S. 115. And we have recently held that Congress in the exercise of its power to require inspection and grading of tobacco shipped in interstate commerce may compel such inspection and grading of all tobacco sold at local auction rooms from which a substantial part but not all of the tobacco sold is shipped in interstate commerce. Currin v. Wallace, supra, 11, and see to the like effect United States v. Rock Royal Co-op., supra, 568, note 37.

We think also that § 15 (a) (2), now under consideration, is sustainable independently of § 15 (a) (1), which prohibits shipment or transportation of the proscribed goods. As we have said the evils aimed at by the Act are the spread of substandard labor conditions through the use of the facilities of interstate commerce for competition by the goods so produced with those produced under the prescribed or better labor conditions; and the consequent dislocation of the commerce itself caused by the impairment or destruction of local businesses by competition made effective through interstate commerce. The Act is thus directed at the suppression of a method or kind of competition in interstate commerce which it has in effect condemned as "unfair," as the Clayton Act has condemned other "unfair methods of competition" made effective through interstate commerce. See Van Camp & Sons Co. v. American Can Co., 278 U.S. 245; Federal Trade Comm'n v. Keppel & Bro., 291 U.S. 304.

The Sherman Act and the National Labor Relations Act are familiar examples of the exertion of the commerce power to prohibit or control activities wholly intrastate because of their effect on interstate commerce. See as to the Sherman Act, Northern Securities Co. v. United States, 193 U.S. 197; Swift & Co. v. United States, 196 U.S. 375; United States v. Patten, 226 U.S. 525; United Mine Workers v. Coronado Coal Co., 259 U.S. 344; Local  No. 167 v. United States, 291 U.S. 293; Stevens Co. v. Foster & Kleiser Co., 311 U.S. 255. As to the National Labor Relations Act, see National Labor Relations Board v. Fainblatt, supra, and cases cited.

The means adopted by § 15 (a) (2) for the protection of interstate commerce by the suppression of the production of the condemned goods for interstate commerce is so related to the commerce and so affects it as to be within the reach of the commerce power. See Currin v. Wallace, supra, 11. Congress, to attain its objective in the suppression of nationwide competition in interstate commerce by goods produced under substandard labor conditions, has made no distinction as to the volume or amount of shipments in the commerce or of production for commerce by any particular shipper or producer. It recognized that in present day industry, competition by a small part may affect the whole and that the total effect of the competition of many small producers may be great. See H. Rept. No. 2182, 75th Cong. 1st Sess., p. 7. The legislation aimed at a whole embraces all its parts. Cf. National Labor Relations Board v. Fainblatt, supra, 606.

So far as Carter v. Carter Coal Co., 298 U.S. 238, is inconsistent with this conclusion, its doctrine is limited in principle by the decisions under the Sherman Act and the National Labor Relations Act, which we have cited and which we follow. See also Sunshine Anthracite Coal Co. v. Adkins, 310 U.S. 381; Currin v. Wallace, supra; Mulford v. Smith, supra; United States v. Rock Royal Co-op., supra; Clover Fork Coal Co. v. National Labor Relations Board, 97 F.2d 331; National Labor Relations Board v. Crowe Coal Co., 104 F.2d 633; National Labor Relations Board v. Good Coal Co., 110 F.2d 501.

Our conclusion is unaffected by the Tenth Amendment which provides: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." The amendment states but a truism that all is retained which has not been surrendered. There is nothing in the history of its adoption to suggest that it was more than declaratory of the relationship between the national and state governments as it had been established by the Constitution before the amendment or that its purpose was other than to allay fears that the new national government might seek to exercise powers not granted, and that the states might not be able to exercise fully their reserved powers. See e.g., II Elliot's Debates, 123, 131; III id. 450, 464, 600; IV id. 140, 149; I Annals of Congress, 432, 761, 767-768; Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, §§ 1907-1908.

From the beginning and for many years the amendment has been construed as not depriving the national government of authority to resort to all means for the exercise of a granted power which are appropriate and plainly adapted to the permitted end. Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, 1 Wheat. 304, 324, 325; McCulloch v. Maryland, supra, 405, 406; Gordon v. United States, 117 U.S. 697, 705; Lottery Case, supra; Northern Securities Co. v. United States, supra, 344-345; Everard's Breweries v. Day, supra, 558; United States v. Sprague, 282 U.S. 716, 733; see United States v. The Brigantine William, 28 Fed. Cas. No. 16,700, p. 622. Whatever doubts may have arisen of the soundness of that conclusion, they have been put at rest by the decisions under the Sherman Act and the National Labor Relations Act which we have cited. See also, Ashwander v. Tennessee Valley Authority, 297 U.S. 288, 330-331; Wright v. Union Central Ins. Co., 304 U.S. 502, 516.

Validity of the requirement of records of wages and hours. § 15 (a) (5) and § 11 (c). These requirements are incidental to those for the prescribed wages and hours, and hence validity of the former turns on validity of the latter. Since, as we have held, Congress may require production for interstate commerce to conform to those conditions, it may require the employer, as a means of enforcing the valid law, to keep a record showing whether he has in fact complied with it. The requirement for records even of the intrastate transaction is an appropriate means to the legitimate end. See Baltimore & Ohio R. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Comm'n, 221 U.S. 612; Interstate Commerce Comm'n v. Goodrich Transit Co., 224 U.S. 194; Chicago Board of Trade v. Olsen, 262 U.S. 1, 42.

Validity of the wage and hour provisions under the Fifth Amendment. Both provisions are minimum wage requirements compelling the payment of a minimum standard wage with a prescribed increased wage for overtime of "not less than one and one-half times the regular rate" at which the worker is employed. Since our decision in West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, 300 U.S. 379, it is no longer open to question that the fixing of a minimum wage is within the legislative power and that the bare fact of its exercise is not a denial of due process under the Fifth more than under the Fourteenth Amendment. Nor is it any longer open to question that it is within the legislative power to fix maximum hours. Holden v. Hardy, 169 U.S. 366; Muller v. Oregon, 208 U.S. 412; Bunting v. Oregon, 243 U.S. 426; Baltimore & Ohio R. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Comm'n, supra. Similarly the statute is not objectionable because applied alike to both men and women. Cf. Bunting v. Oregon, 243 U.S. 426.

The Act is sufficiently definite to meet constitutional demands. One who employs persons, without conforming to the prescribed wage and hour conditions, to work on goods which he ships or expects to ship across state lines, is warned that he may be subject to the criminal penalties of the Act. No more is required. Nash v. United States, 229 U.S. 373, 377.

We have considered, but find it unnecessary to discuss other contentions.

Reversed.

[1] Sec. 2. (a) The Congress hereby finds that the existence, in industries engaged in commerce or in the production of goods for commerce, of labor conditions detrimental to the maintenance of the minimum standard of living necessary for health, efficiency, and general well-being of workers (1) causes commerce and the channels and instrumentalities of commerce to be used to spread and perpetuate such labor conditions among the workers of the several States; (2) burdens commerce and the free flow of goods in commerce; (3) constitutes an unfair method of competition in commerce; (4) leads to labor disputes burdening and obstructing commerce and the free flow of goods in commerce; and (5) interferes with the orderly and fair marketing of goods in commerce.

Section 3 (b) defines "commerce" as "trade, commerce, transportation, transmission, or communication among the several States or from any State to any place outside thereof."

[2] Cf. Administrator's Opinion, Interpretative Bulletin No. 5, 1940 Wage and Hour Manual. p. 131 et seq.

[3] It may prohibit wholly intrastate activities which, if permitted, would result in restraint of interstate commerce. Coronado Coal Co. v. United Mine Workers, 268 U.S. 295, 310; Local 167 v. United States, 291 U.S. 293, 297. It may regulate the activities of a local grain exchange shown to have an injurious effect on interstate commerce. Chicago Board of Trade v. Olsen, 262 U.S. 1. It may regulate intrastate rates of interstate carriers where the effect of the rates is to burden interstate commerce. Houston, E. & W. Texas Ry. Co. v. United States, 234 U.S. 342; Railroad Commission of Wisconsin v. Chicago, B. & Q.R. Co., 257 U.S. 563; United States v. Louisiana, 290 U.S. 70, 74; Florida v. United States, 292 U.S. 1. It may compel the adoption of safety appliances on rolling stock moving intrastate because of the relation to and effect of such appliances upon interstate traffic moving over the same railroad. Southern Ry. Co. v. United States, 222 U.S. 20. It may prescribe maximum hours for employees engaged in intrastate activity connected with the movement of any train, such as train dispatchers and telegraphers. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co. v. Interstate Commerce Comm'n, 221 U.S. 612, 619.

 

World War Two raged on, of course.

By some accounts, it was on this day in 1941 when Adolf Hitler appointed Erwin Rommel to lead the German military mission to North Africa in aid of the Italians, who were getting the stuffing beat out of them by the British Commonwealth forces.  Hans von Funck was already in Libya organizing the effort but was judged to lack enthusiasm for the project.  Von Manstein was considered, but Rommel was chosen.  Other accounts place the appointment on July 6.

Rommel would obtain fame there, but it's fame that outmatched his real record in many ways.  Considered in a "good Nazi" by fans of the Wehrmacht, there's not real reason to excuse him for going along with Nazism as he did up until mid 1944, when he seems to have become a supporter of the July 1944 plot, even though he was not one of the direct actors in it.  His real association with it, however remains unknown.

Rommel did prove to be a very effective commander in North Africa, commanding, as is sometimes forgotten, German and Italian forces by the end.  Much of his success was due to the difficulties and delay in communications with Berlin, which allowed him to ignore instructions and act on his own.  His success there did lead to his appointment in France as the general primarily responsible for the defense against the impending Allied landing.  He was wounded while a passenger in a vehicle during an Allied strafing run, however, on July 17, so he was out of action soon after Operation Overlord, although the Germans were already in severe trouble in countering it by that time.

Rommel had been in the German military since age 18,  having first been a cadet in a military school at that age in 1910 and having been commissioned the following year.  He met his wife while a cadet, she was 17 years old at the time.  She was perhaps uniquely, for what was to follow, of Polish and Italian descent.  In spite of being engaged early, he formed a relationship with Walburga Stemmer, who was of working class background. That relationship ended up in producing a daughter, Gertrude.  Because Stemmer was of working class background, and because he was already engaged to Lucia Maria Mollin, he did not marry Stemmer but carried on and married Mollin.  Stemmer later lived in the Rommel household with Gertrude passed off as Rommel's niece, a story that was widely believed.  Stemmer committed suicide in 1928 when Lucia was pregnant with the couple's first child, apparently being unable to accept that she and Rommel would never marry.

Rommel's record in regards to the Nazis is mixed.  He clearly objected to some of their actions but he supported their early rise and his actions as a commander in some instances, in that context, are mixed.  For whatever reason he seems to have come around to supporting, if not participating in, the July 20, 1944 plot against Hitler, although he was recovering from his wounds at the time and could not have been an active participant if he wanted to be.  He none the less was implicated based on the belief that he was a fellow traveler with the plot, which he may have been.  He committed suicide in October rather than suffer arrest, a peculiar option given to members of the German officer corps in some instances but which in this one cuts against the claims by some that his late actions were motivated by religious beliefs, suicide being contrary to Christian tenants.

This, and, other things going on in the war on this day may be read here:

Day 522 February 3, 1941

In anticipation of entering the war, the United States split its fleet into three, the Atlantic, Pacific and Asiatic Fleets.  It's odd to think of the Navy being one big fleet, but up until then, it was.

You can read more on what was going on with that here:

Today in World War II History—February 3, 1941

The war on the Atlantic was already on, of course, even if the U.S. was not yet in the war.

‘Q-ship’ torpedoed in the Atlantic

And, on Malta:

3 February 1941: New Bomb Disposal Officer Embarks for Malta

Weld County, Wyoming? No thanks.

The degree to which boosters completely fail to think out the things that they boost is one of the stories that repeats itself continually throughout history.

The law of unintended consequences.

Weld County, courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.

Weld County, Colorado, is unhappy with the direction the State of Colorado has taken in recent years, with those recent years probably stretching back into the 1990s.

For those who aren't familiar with it, Weld County is a big blocky county in northeastern Colorado which includes Greeley, that city being its county seat.  The county has a lot of oil and gas, being part of the oil and gas province stretching up into Laramie County, Wyoming and down nearly into Denver and it borders Fort Collins.  Oil and gas makes up its bread and butter.

The state flag of Colorado at the time of my grandmother's birth in Leadville, Colorado.

It's unhappy for the following reasons.

Colorado has always had divides between its regions. The east slope of the Rockies doesn't get along very well with the west slope.  The southwestern regions, first settled by New Mexicans, doesn't get along with anyone else (in my view, they may most closely resemble Wyomingites from Wyoming).  And the rural areas don't get along with Denver.

All of which leads you to wonder why Colorado was so hip on boosting the Big Blight, Denver.  

Denver, the Queen City of the Plains, was a giant version of Casper, Wyoming up into the 1980s.  A large city even then, its economy was based on agriculture and petroleum.  My father was born in Denver in 1929 when his father, originally from Dyersville, Iowa, was working there in the office of a meat packing company.  He's later move from there to another meat packing company in Scottsbluff, Nebraska and then own his own in Casper.  The point there is that he was from a heavily agricultural state, Iowa, and worked in the production end of agriculture first in Denver.

The oddly simple minded flag of Colorado from 1911 to 1964.  After 1964 the "C" grew enormously in size, but the flag is basically the same and still oddly simple minded.

The oil crash of the 1980s made downtown Denver like a ghost town.  I can well recall waking around in Denver as a college student.  Lots of businesses where shuttered.  The windows of the Episcopal cathedral had been busted out.  It was bad.

So Colorado rose to the occasion.  It boosted different reason to visit Denver, a lot of those rural entertainment themed.  

And then came dope.

Colorado attracted a lot of west coasters who were fleeing the blight of California to come to Denver to make Denver west coast blighty.  They were politically far to the left of the Coloradoans who had acted to attract them.  They gained in the legislature, legalized weed, and Denver became the stupefied capital of the Rockies.  That solidified political control in the left and in recent years the legislature has been acting like Democratic legislatures due, seeking to regulate oil and gas and restricting all things firearm.

D'uh.

Old building in downtown Greeley.

All of this was predictable.

Now some of the rural counties of Colorado want out of Colorado.  Some years ago there was an effort to take five of them out and form a new state.  Presumably the proposed name of the new state was going to be Delusional, as that was never going to happen.

Now there's a petition in Weld County to have it leave Colorado and join Wyoming.

Weld County Courthouse.

And Governor Gordon, on Fox News, gave it support.

Weld County has a population of 320,000, nearly the same as Wyoming itself.  If it was part of Wyoming, it would control the House completely.

Moreover, Wyoming would now border weedy Denver, which is basically expanding into Weld County, and we couldn't begin to control what that might mean.  Oil and gas might be temporarily safe in Weld County, and there'd be no significant firearms restrictions, but soon the Hippy Dippy Denverites would be electing representatives to the Wyoming House itself.  

Our increased population might mean we'd get another Congressman, but between Weld County, Albany County, Fremont County and Teton County, there's be no guaranty at all that said Congressman would be a Republican.

Railroad station in Greeley.

Wyomingites would hate Weld County.

Truth be known, there's a lot of division in Wyoming already.  Most of the state isn't happy with Teton County most of the time, but is unwilling to do the simple things that would address that, such as a real estate sales importation tax, or high income, income tax.  That'd drive out the jet set, but we're not there yet, and by the time we will be, it'll be too late.  Additionally, the entire state is suspicious of the southeastern farm counties to some degree, which Weld County would be another of, as they keep producing the radical anti public lands legislators.  There is no public land there, we've noticed.

This proposal is, of course, not going anywhere.  Colorado isn't going to let Weld County go and in short order the political forces that are boosting this will be subsumed by the expansion of Denver into Weld County.  But the Governor boosting this secessionist movement is really ill advised.

Indeed, what Wyoming ought to do is sit back and consider the example of Weld County. The state is perpetually boosting "come on in" efforts, even though most Wyomingites have a "stay out" view.  Colorado had that same attitude and people came on in.  Now the areas of Colorado that remain what Colorado was before that want out of the state.

And, hence, a person must be careful what they wish for.