Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer · ¶238

Some six months before Pearl Harbor, a dispute at a single aviation plant at Inglewood, California, interrupted a segment of the production of military aircraft. In spite of the comparative insignificance of this work stoppage to total defense production as contrasted with the complete paralysis now theatened by a shutdown of the entire basic steel industry, and even though our armed forces were not then engaged in combat, President Roosevelt ordered the seizure of the plant “pursuant to the powers vested in [him] by the Constitution and laws of the United States, as President of the United States of America and Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States.” The Attorney General (Jackson) vigorously proclaimed that the President had the moral duty to keep this Nation’s defense effort a “going concern.” His ringing moral justification was coupled with a legal…

U. S. Reports, bound volume
U. S. Reports, volume 343, at 579 (Library of Congress) · transcription: Caselaw Access Project
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