The First Fifteen Days_ : _The End of World War I_ (New York: Harcourt, 2003), 2–3, 5–6, 23. . This was the first and only time in U.S. history that the president had issued a formal proclamation, with the stroke of his pen, calling upon the armed forces to make war. The first was "A Proclamation Calling Up the National Guard," issued by President Abraham Lincoln on April 15, 1863, authorizing states to draft men into the Union army. Lincoln would ultimately lose the civil war to the Confederate forces in 1865. . This was one reason why Congress felt it necessary to specifically authorize a state of war against Germany in the days immediately following September 1, 1939. See Chapter 8, "The First Fifteen Days." . On August 14, Congress passed the Selective Service Act of 1940, which formally organized the Selective Service System and expanded conscription to all men and women between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-five. The act specified that men who did not register by September 15 would be ineligible to be called up for induction into the military or to be employed by the government. The Selective Service Act led to an accelerated conscription of millions of men, but not until July of 1942, when it was extended to include men between the ages of eighteen and forty-five. . On August 5, Roosevelt signed into law two bills, the Vinson-Trammell Act, which established a National Defense Mediation Board and the Bituminous Coal Conservation Act, which increased the price of coal and hence raised more money to pay for the war. . On June 19, 1937, Roosevelt asked Congress to repeal the country's prohibition on munitions exports to the Allies of World War I. The House passed a general repeal of the restriction but not until November 3, 1941, after the United States declared war against Japan and joined the Allies in its fight against that country. . The United States had already been actively involved in sending arms and aircraft to the countries fighting on the Allied side in the conflict. On July 28, 1939, Roosevelt had signed the Second Geneva Convention to govern the treatment of prisoners of war. The United States ratified the new treaty in mid-December 1939. On September 1, 1939, Congress passed and Roosevelt signed into law a statute that authorized the sale of arms and aircraft to any country at war with the Axis powers. In May 1940, FDR issued an executive order establishing the War Resources Board, charged with developing domestic short-term defense programs. In July 1940, the Roosevelt administration created a new agency to prepare a comprehensive blueprint for U.S. military and naval forces, and three months later created the National Defense Advisory Commission. These early efforts were stillborn because of the outbreak of war. In July 1940, Roosevelt directed the Secretary of Commerce to make a detailed inventory of available U.S. munitions capacity. On July 19, Roosevelt appointed a "Committee on National Defense" composed of cabinet members to coordinate and mobilize America's defense mobilization. . "Defense Plant Workers Report to Work to Aid War, Sept. 11," _New York Times_ , September 12, 1939, 1. . "Planned Economy in the United States," _New York Times_ , August 14, 1939, 1. . Roosevelt would use this formula again in another fireside chat a few days later. On the evening of September 16, the president spoke to the nation on defense production and foreign policy, reiterating his support for a national emergency program for military preparedness and promising that, by the end of the month, the United States would have an industrial mobilization program in place. "The President: National Defense—Another Day, Another Hope," _New York Times_ , September 16, 1939, 1. . "Roosevelt Seeks National Program to Aid Defense," _New York Times_ , September 14, 1939, 1. . "Roosevelt Advises Congress to Act on Defense Measures, Sept. 19," _New York Times_ , September 18, 1939, 1. . "President Asks Federal Aid for Defense Work, Sep. 22," _New York Times_ , September 23, 1939, 1. . "Roosevelt Hits Risks in Defense Plan," _New York Times_ , September 24, 1939, 4. . "Roosevelt Suggests Publicly Promised Funds to Be Paid into War Bonds," _New York Times_ , September 26, 1939, 1. . _Roosevelt and Hopkins: An Intimate History_ (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1948), 4–5. . Harry L. Hopkins was a fifty-two-year-old Chicagoan with a history of alcohol and narcotics abuse. His addiction had taken a toll on his health, and he would die of a heart attack the next year while awaiting a kidney operation. . Harry L. Hopkins and Michael R. Beschloss, _The Conquerors: Roosevelt, Truman, and the Destruction of Hitler's Germany_ (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2002), 11. . On April 1, 1936, Roosevelt had awarded Hopkins an honorary position on the Board of Economic Warfare (BEW), which was created to coordinate the procurement of strategic materials. It did not matter that Hopkins was not a qualified administrator or strategist, but in the eyes of the press, Hopkins was an astute politician and an inveterate schemer who had the president's ear. "By the spring of 1939, Hopkins had the ears of every major figure in the Democratic Party except the incumbent President. The New Deal in its final phase had made many enemies among the party's Old Guard; Hopkins represented to many people the last best hope of the New Deal. But the President was not one to allow Hopkins to operate beyond his ken, and he kept him in close check." Beschloss, _The Conquerors_ , 12. . Roosevelt had appointed Hopkins to the BEW, but Hopkins soon became frustrated with the small nature of the office and its lack of power. On March 7, 1939, he successfully lobbied the president to expand the bureau by adding four people to it. However, since Roosevelt was already overcommitted in the field of public housing and a war bond program, he decided to expand BEW even further and created a new position for Hopkins at the level of assistant secretary of war, making Hopkins a full member of the Federal Committee on Defense Appropriations (FCODA). When Congress passed the FCODA bill, the committee held that anyone connected with its work must swear that he was a "neutral in foreign affairs." After the House adopted an amendment excluding Roosevelt, they voted the bill down. A few days later, Roosevelt dismissed all four members of the BEW. In late July, Hopkins resigned from the new Department of Commerce War Organization to create the Office of the Coordinator of Information (OCI), which was charged with coordinating all information operations throughout the government. On July 26, 1939, Roosevelt gave Hopkins the presidential pardon to allow him to serve as coordinator of information without taking an oath. Hopkins was the senior appointee in the government and the only one who was not sworn in under the law. On July 26, 1939, Roosevelt made Hopkins the U.S. Lend-Lease Coordinator. On September 9, 1939, Roosevelt had Hopkins designated as the coordinator of defense production and allocation, a role in which Hopkins became deeply involved in overseeing the establishment of the wartime production and allocation bureaucracy. . Morgenthau diaries, September 24, 1939, cited in _My Story_ , 156. . This was not the first time the president had used executive privilege to circumvent Congress. At the end of 1936, a bill introduced by John Conness and Carl Hatch from California gave the California State Railroad Commission permission to inspect the books of seventeen oil and utility corporations in California to ensure compliance with a state price control order. When Roosevelt became aware of the legislation, he asked Herbert Hoover, the Secretary of Commerce, to write an opinion on whether the president had the power to stop the inspection. He had his office issue a second opinion on October 16, affirming that the president could stop it. The state sued, but FDR settled the case by entering into a contract with Standard Oil of California under which the company agreed not to raise prices before April 1, 1938. In the end, the Supreme Court of California held that even though the president could invoke his constitutional powers in matters involving interstate commerce, he could not interfere with intrastate activities through executive orders. Faced with two competing branches of government—the California courts and Congress—FDR had no choice but to acquiesce. By January of 1938, he had been forced to issue an executive order in support of a bill that restricted the states' power to require price controls. See George Q. Flynn, "The Price Control War: Conflict between State and Federal Powers," _Review of Politics_ 12 (September 1950): 388–90. . Roosevelt could not have made it clearer that he did not wish to allow the government's enforcement apparatus to interfere with the conduct of business as usual. As his press secretary, Steve Early, explained, "The president . . . thought it possible that Congress might pass a bill which the president might feel would interfere with commerce . . . in carrying out the purposes of the nation, in which case he would veto it. He felt that the action of Congress would be very close to presidential interference in the affairs of business and might be construed as such." See Early, _Spark