Gabriel Over the White House Page #6

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Mr Diamond.

The most inexpensive way

to get rid of you...

would be for you

to eliminate yourself.

Return to your own country.

Why?

I am what I am today

by public approval...

If people want something,

I give it to them.

We're in the same boat.

I too exist only

by the will of the people.

Exactly... So why should I give up

a good business, until I have to?

May I ask, just what

you had in mind...

when you asked me to come here.

I thought we'd talk over

this bootleg situation.

When it's on my trucks,

it's bootleg.

On a silver tray in Park Avenue,

it's hospitality.

Mr Diamond, we are two of the most

notorious men in America.

For notoriously different reasons.

I had hoped we might

make a bargain...

but you seem to

have different ideas.

The bootlegging business involves

yearly a sum of money...

aggregating several

hundred millions of dollars

American people need that money.

I warn you, Diamond...

The government is going

to muscle in on your racket.

I thought I was guaranteed

there'd be no frame-up.

Diamond, I don't think

you're quite ready for framing.

Gentlemen, you'll see that Mr Diamond

is escorted safely to his car.

Would you mind standing there

just a moment, Miss Malloy?

- And why, Sir?

- I just want to look at you.

Mr Beekman, you're a fool.

I'm a fool about you.

Beekman, can I speak to you

a moment, please.

Yes, Mr President.

One hour after our first

federal liquor store was opened...

It was wiped out by the most dastardly

demonstration of gangster defiance...

in the history of this country

Nick Diamond has declared war

on the United States.

Big shot!

- Still here Beek?

- Still here.

You must be tired.

I'll never rest, till you get well.

You love me a lot, don't you?

- Beek...

- What?

I didn't feel any pain at all.

Just...

a delicious sense of lassitude

and peacefulness.

I'm glad, Pendy.

And then...

I had a terrific feeling of loneliness.

Of being terribly,

completely alone.

Yes, I know.

I wanted you, Beek.

I think I feel well enough

to be kissed.

Beekman, you're fired!

I've got a better job for you.

It's only a temporary one.

I'm forming a mobile unit of the United States

army to be known as the Federal Police...

to eliminate gangsters.

I want you head that unit.

Yessir.

I need a man who has suffered

a terrible personal hurt...

A man whose energy and efficiency

will be at white heat.

A man ruthless and merciless.

That is of course if you're willing

to postpone your wedding for a while.

You don't mind about us?

With no Congress to interfere...

we might be able to arrange

a wedding at The White House.

Diamond... In the name of the United States

of America, I call on you to surrender!

- Boss, this is the army.

- This is just another pinch.

My lawyer will habeas our corpus out of that

district attorney's office, in 10 minutes.

Boys, let's give them a round

to show them we're hard to get.

Diamond, you're in a bad way.

Discharging firearms at the federal police

doesn't help, either.

I believe I'm still entitled

to have a lawyer.

Sure... You can have

any lawyer you want...

Uncle Sam will pay the bill.

But don't forget...

This isn't going to be a court trial..

It's going to be a court-martial.

Nick Diamond...

Racketeer... murderer... kidnapper.

It is the finding of this court-martial

that you and your men are guilty.

This court is convinced

that you have...

as part of your

racketeering and extortion...

committed some 23 homicides.

Murders, with your own hands.

You have instigated dozens more.

Yet by bribery, by technicalities of the

law, you have escaped all punishment.

You're the last of the racketeers,

Diamond, and why?

Because we have

in The White House a man...

who's enabled us to cut the red tape

of legal procedures...

and get back to first principles.

An eye for an eye, Nick Diamond.

A tooth for a tooth.

A life for a life.

Fire!

Gentlemen, from the newspapers, I gather,

there is quite some sentiment...

to the effect that the president is to be

out-generalled by craftier European politicians.

That once again, America will walk out

of conference rooms with empty pockets.

You may allay those fears.

America is through with conferences

in rooms.

The International Debt Conference, scheduled

to be held tomorrow at The White House...

will be held instead

on a private yacht.

The delegates at that conference will

first be my guests at a naval parade...

which, quite by coincidence,

I assure you...

will consist of the largest concentration of

naval strength in the history of this nation.

Are we to infer that the debt conference

will end in America's favour?

Those debts have got to be paid.

The president intends

to collect by force?

Those debts have got to be paid!

Is the United States prepared to wage war

against 15 leading nations.

Those debts have got to be paid.

That's all, gentlemen.

Wait a minute, Beekman...

The president doesn't intend to go to war?!

You heard what he had to say.

The USA won't stand for war...

even from Judd Hammond.

Gentlemen, you will bear with me a moment

while the radio is being connected.

But Mr President...

we did not understand that

this conference would be broadcast.

We will speak more advisedly, if we know

the people of the world are listening in.

One of the reasons we entered the Great War,

was to secure the end to secret diplomacy.

To establish throughout the world

a fixed policy of open covenants...

openly arrives at.

Gentlemen, we are at least today

fulfilling this great purpose.

We are taking the world

into our confidence.

I will open the conference

on the question of war-debt...

with a brief statement of America's side

of the controversy.

These debts were incurred to save

the debtor nations from destruction.

The money they received,

they pledged their honour to repay.

Then the debtor pleaded poverty.

The United States compromised

the debts by half.

This remaining half, debtor-nations

solemnly signed agreements to pay.

Gentlemen... are you prepared

to pay those debts?

For Germany to pay her debts, means

more taxes on the half-starved people.

They may burst into

open revolution.

You think, Belgium, neutral,

inoffensive little Belgium...

could suffer the ravages

of invasion again?

For ten times the money

she owes you?

We helped the little American colonies

when they fought for their freedom.

Helped them with money.

That's right, you helped us.

And America has shown

an affection for France, ever since.

But, we paid you back.

And rightly, too.

A cosmopolitan nation

like the United States...

has reason to cherish affection

for all nations of the world...

whom she properly considers

her forebears.

Yet, the inescapable consequences

of the debt, are...

Someone must pay it.

And if your nations cannot

pay a debt you contracted...

to save yourselves

from destruction...

it will have to be paid

by the American taxpayer himself.

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