Like other neutral nations of Europe, Spain has been tremendously affected by the war. Though she has not been brought into such close contact with the great struggle as have Holland and the Scandinavian countries, because of her distance from the battlefields and the comparative insignificance of her commercial interests, she has nevertheless felt and is still feeling a great strain, the chief characteristics of which are economic. The cost of living in Spain has increased several fold. This is due in part to the difficulty in obtaining both manfactured articles and coal for her own industries and in part to the great scarcity of agricultural products: the result of the short-sighted policy followed up to the present of exporting food products which should have been retained at home. Though possessed of a greater arable area in proportion to her population than any other country in Europe except Russia, the methods of agricultural production in Spain are wofully deficient. As a result of her own backwardness and her failure to develop either her industrial or her agricultural resources, Spain is now suffering, to a lesser degree possibly, the same inconveniences which are disturbing Germany, France and England: namely, a scarcity of food; and she does not possess the artificial stimulus which those countries have to aid in overcoming it.

During the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when absolute monarchy was the prevailing governmental type in Europe, the principle was very generally held by the rulers, and not infrequently acted upon, that the people of a state, together with their lands and other goods and chattels, were, in a very real sense, the property of their king and constituted his patrimonium. That this view should have prevailed, is historically explainable. The entire feudal system, out of which the modern monarchy had evolved, was founded upon the idea that the ownership of land carried with it, as one of its incidents, the right of political rulership. When, then, by a process of development, the king had obtained a supremacy over his feudal lords, when his “peace” had become higher than theirs, and had extended over the whole country, and when these lords and those who in turn held of them were forced to concede that they held their lands by a conditional grant from the king, their liege lord, the idea that the monarch was the owner of the entire realm was complete. In him lay the final legal title to all land. All other persons had “tenures” rather than rights of ownership. And, as for the people themselves, the idea that one person might be another person's “man” or “woman” was universal. The influence of these ideas on recent political conceptions may be indicated by recalling that serfdom did not disappear from Germany until well into the nineteenth century.

This patrimonial conception of monarchy explains the accepted idea that the throne might be inherited, or willed away by testament, like a piece of property, and that it might be bought and sold, and acquired by marriage. It explains also the recognized right of the king to requisition, upon occasion, the goods of his subjects, and even to sell those subjects themselves to foreign powers, as, for example, was done when the Hessian soldiers were sold by their ruler to England for use against the Americans in the Revolutionary War.

A complete and thorough study of the question should embrace the following points:

A. The Pan-American idea: its inception, and its development up to the present time.

B. The need of an international Pan-American understanding that shall create the desire for Pan-American conciliation.

C. The promotion of Pan-American conciliation leading to the promulgation of an international Pan-American policy of coöperation in all affairs of the Americas.

Under “A” we have to consider: The movement for political emancipation in the Americas; the early and subsequent attempts to establish unions, leagues and federations among the republics; the attitude of the political leaders in America toward closer relations; the conditions obtaining in the several sections of America, and their influence for or against the realization of the ideals upon which the commonwealths were established; the congresses, conferences, and meetings of every nature, held in the Americas to promote Pan-American policies; the evolution of the Pan-American idea since Bolivar and Henry Clay, through Blaine up to the present day.

Comparison between the methods prevailing in science and in politics began as early as the presidential campaign of 1872. Already there was a distinctly recognized scientific world which was demanding recognition in colleges and universities. The terms scientific spirit and scientific method were becoming clearly defined. The men who were at the time responsible for the conduct of public affairs were in a better position to appreciate the change involved than any after generation can be. To those abreast with the times, Darwin's Origin of Species came as a great revelation. They themselves actually experienced the transition from dogmatism and authority to experiment and demonstration. For the first time in history men had planted their feet firmly upon the solid earth; and they refused to be moved. Scientific devotees became informally pledged to each other to use their utmost endeavor to know all that man may know in the realm of nature, regardless of any moral, religious or extraneous influence of any sort. In this limited field they made truth, or actuality, their single goal. All liars, all blunderers, and all who had a disposition to believe a false report, disappeared from the ranks of the promoters of science.

The Monroe Doctrine has been the subject of much discussion by American and European publicists, and their estimates have been widely different, ranging from those who consider it the principle which has maintained the territorial integrity of this continent for nearly a century to those who deny to it any real influence in the preservation of the nations which emerged into independent life during the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Both concepts are, in my judgment, exaggerated. To accept the first judgment would be to ignore and to forget the failure of the United States to assert the doctrine on three different occasions when it was flagrantly violated: the occupation of the Falkland Islands by Great Britain in 1843, islands which were regarded by the Argentine Republic as national property; the military intervention of France in the Republics of the River Platte in 1838, an intervention repeated in conjunction with Great Britain in 1845; and the occupation of the Chincha Islands by Spain in 1865. The attitude of the government of the United States is readily explained when one recalls the fact that the Monroe Doctrine had not become a real factor in world politics until the naval and military strength of the United States had given to that country the position of a great power. Before that time the doctrine was nothing more than a happy formulation of an aspiration deeply felt by the American nations which had on several occasions prior to the celebrated message of 1823 proclaimed the same idea.

In a previous paper foreign relations as a phase of governmental activity were considered chiefly as an international phenomenon. Such relations were there discussed largely in their political bearing and some attempt was made to deduce from practice the considerations which affect foreign offices and the conditions encountered by diplomatic personnel. The problems of secrecy in negotiations and of secret treaties were examined and an effort made to indicate how much knowledge of both may be justifiably concealed. The present paper is a study of legislative control over foreign relations.

Systems of legislative handling of foreign relations may be distinguished as of three types, which we may designate as the continental, the executive, and the American. The American type is characterized by an imposed agreement between the executive and legislative departments of government before treaties can become binding upon the state. The continental type is characterized by a less complete dependence of the executive upon the legislative department in respect to treaty ratification. The executive type is characterized by an almost complete independence of the executive respecting treaty ratification.

All systems recognize definitely that the conduct of foreign relations is an executive function. None denies the patent facts that it is the place of the executive to speak and act for the state, and that, in all matters not definable as legislation, the minister can definitely bind the state. Innumerable decisions under all systems are reached by the department of foreign affairs without any but the executive branch of the government knowing anything of them until they are recorded facts.

In practical politics the vital thing is not what men really are, but what they think they are. This simple truth, so often overlooked, is actually of tremendous import. It gives the key to many a riddle otherwise insoluble.

The European war is a striking case in point. That war is very generally regarded as being one of “race.” The idea certainly lends to the struggle much of its bitterness and uncompromising fury. And yet, from the genuine racial standpoint, it is nothing of the kind. Ethnologists have proved conclusively that, apart from certain palaeolithic survivals and a few historically recent Asiatic intruders, Europe is inhabited by only three stocks: (1) the blond, long-headed “Nordic” race, (2) the brown, round-headed “Alpine” race, (3) the brunet, long-headed “Mediterranean” race. These races are so dispersed and intermingled that every European nation is built on atleast two of these stocks, while most are compounded of all three. Strictly speaking, therefore, the present European war is not a race-war at all, but a domestic struggle between closely knit blood-relatives.

Local self-government has so long prevailed in English constitutional practice, and in recent times has been so generously extended to colonies and dominions, that it might seem an anomaly for Home Rule to be ardently desired in Ireland, yet bitterly contested and thus far withheld. Many favorable generally to the idea of autonomy without special reference to the condition of Ireland have believed this to result from a stubborn obstinacy and blind perverseness, perpetuating in tragic fashion a tragedy of olden times. But it might be suspected that such reluctance arose in part from circumstances of a great while ago, which continue or have bequeathed consequences not to be neglected; and an examination of the controversial literature which appeared just before the war reveals many objections which, in so far as they were actual and honestly held, were undoubtedly valid and potent. Certainly a great many people believed that Home Rule was not only unnecessary for the interests of Ireland, and really to the detriment of the Irish people, but that whatever might be the results with respect to that country, without doubt self-government, so far as it tended to separation and the erecting of an independent or hostile government, would be fatal to some of the largest interests of England and the British Empire.

There is criticism of the conduct of foreign policy and the methods of diplomacy. Some of it is definite, some nebulous. It is either in very general terms, or else directed at isolated and specific diplomatic decisions. The feeling of dissatisfaction is widespread, and it is apparently safe to conclude that where there is a great deal of smoke there must be some fire. A people, like a physician's patient, may be certain there is something wrong without knowing what or where it is; or they may be misinformed, or badly informed.

It has been very popular in some quarters to make the diplomat the scapegoat of the European war, to characterize him simply as an intriguer pulling wires neither wisely nor too well. Especially is it urged that the diplomat as a trustee of the people's welfare has been recreant to his trust, and that things can be righted by the simple process of having legislative bodies take diplomatic decisions. The suggested remedy is apparently attractive to parliamentarians, some sociologists and those living in states where parliamentary action on treaties is required.

According to popular parlance, we elect a President and vice-president, on the Tuesday following the first Monday of November of each fourth year, by vote of the people. It is well known however that, technically speaking, we do not choose these officers on that day or at any time by popular suffrage. Instead of that, we choose in each state a committee that is called the electoral college; and these electors meet on the second Monday of January and elect the President and vice-president by ballot. The theory of the Constitution is that these electors are not to be pledged or obligated to vote for any particular person, but that they and not the people shall really make the choice.

But, practically from the start, and contrary to the expectation of those who framed the Constitution, the choice of President and vice-president was seized by state legislatures and afterwards transferred to the people, through the device of appointing electors that were virtually pledged to designated candidates. So the electoral colleges have failed of their purpose and become a useless complication. And not only are they useless, but objectionable also and dangerous in many and serious ways.

This paper will endeavor to show that our present system of presidential election is bad in every step of the process, viz. in a. the appointment of the electors, b. the membership and proceedings of the electoral colleges, c. the count of the vote in congress, d. the interval between the election and the time when the President takes office, and e. the election by the house of representatives in case the electors fail to give a majority vote to any candidate.

In the history of every country, the transitional period between two stages of economic development has been marked by new problems and intricate readjustments of the economic life and machinery. The United States is now passing through the transitional period from a nation whose interests have been largely centered within its own borders to one stepping out into the arena of world competition. For the past twenty years, practically every business change has been a change toward greater and greater production totals. The nation must muster its trained thinkers to reorganize the financial and industrial machinery, as well as to remold the thought of the people in order that the rapid growth of commerce and the necessary readjustments may be facilitated. The development of foreign markets makes imperative a vastly-expanded financial machinery, not alone to offer all possible trade and banking facilities to the international merchants, but to present stable channels through which investment capital may flow to borrowing countries.

There is no question of national policy so firmly established as the merit system, and on it must finally rest our political and administrative fabric. The system is fundamental, as it underlies all other political reforms. Its processes, therefore, should be adequate and be made to ensure results which will keep pace with the ever increasing functions of government. These processes are especially important in supplying the needs of appointment to the higher technical and administrative positions. The extension of the merit system to higher positions is a logical development of its application to lower positions. The same reasons which require tests of fitness in the latter apply even more strongly to such of the higher positions as have nothing to do with the policies of the administration. Such an extension would have the additional and great advantage that the more important the office affected the more effective must the extension necessarily be in divorcing the office from politics. Character and capacity are being secured in the great body of public employment, and it only remains to take the higher officials whose duties are purely administrative, federal, state and municipal, out of politics, to establish finally in the minds of the people the fundamental truth that positions under a democratic government belong to the people and not to the political party temporarily in power. The higher subordinates in the government employ have administrative control of the work on which our economic structure and our industrial success largely depend; and it must follow that their selection should be made upon proved merit, if that degree of administrative success is to be obtained which the people of this country have a right to expect. It is through the highest officials down to the humblest employees that the government serves the people.

In the United States, the department of the navy is the constituted organ of the government for administering the navy. Its sole reason for existence is the possibility of war. The most important office in the navy department, after that of the secretary of the navy, is the office of naval operations. All the other offices in the navy are merely accessory to that one particular office the function of which is the preparation of the navy for war.

The method of naval administration now in force in the United States is the outcome of a gradual development. When the Constitution went into effect in 1789, it contained several references to the navy. Congress was given power to “provide and maintain a navy.” The President was made the “commander-in-chief of the navy” and there was a clause which forbade the States from owning ships of war in time of peace. When, during Washington's administration, the executive departments were organized, there was no navy, and there was no pressing need for one. Congress, therefore, vested the control of the navy in the secretary of war. The frigate Constitution and her sister ships were thus built under the direction of the war department. But the imminent hostilities with France in 1798 revealed the need of a separate executive department for the proper administration of our sea force, and, on April 30, 1798, the bill creating the navy department became a law.

The term “veto” has been traced from the power of the tribune of the plebs in ancient Rome to annul or suspend the acts of other public authorities. From the establishment of the Roman tribune, that official had the right of intercession (intercessio), to cancel any command of a consul which infringed the liberties of a citizen; and this was gradually extended to other administrative acts and even to decrees of the senate. The word veto (I forbid) was at least occasionally used by the tribune in such cases.

But historically what is called the veto power of American executives is derived from the legislative power of the British Crown. Until the fifteenth century statutes in England were enacted by the king on his own initiative or in response to petitions. From that time parliament presented bills in place of petitions; and statutes were enacted by the king “by and with the advice and consent of the lords …. and the commons …. and by the authority of the same.” The king's assent was still necessary; and without this assent a bill was not law. For two hundred years the Crown continued to exercise the negative power of declining to accept bills, not by any formal act of disapproval, but by the polite response in old Norman French, “le roy s'avisera.” Since the beginning of the eighteenth century no bill which has passed parliament has failed to receive the royal assent; but the old form of enacting laws is still in use.

When the sixty-third congress was called in extraordinary session on April 7, 1913, it was the first time since 1895 that both branches of congress and the executive had been under Democratic control. For nearly two decades the policies of the nation had been shaped and directed by the Republicans. Now after many years the minority had become the majority, and a Democratic President sat in the White House. In the congressional elections of 1910, dissatisfaction with the Payne-Aldrich tariff and the growing friction between the conservative and progressive wings of the Republican party had given the Democrats a net gain of 56 seats in the house of representatives, and control of that body by a majority of 66 votes. The senate during the sixty-second congress, however, still remained Republican by a majority of 10 votes. In 1912 the three-cornered presidential contest had resulted in the election of Wilson by an unprecedented electoral vote, although he did not have a majority of the popular vote cast. The schism in the ranks of the Republican party and the drift that had set in toward the Democratic ticket had increased the Democratic representation in the lower branch of congress to 290, while the Republican representation had fallen to 145, including 18 Progressives who did not go into the Republican caucus and who could not always be counted on to vote with the minority. In the senate the Democrats had gained enough seats to give them a majority of 6, a net gain of 16 seats over their membership in the sixty-second congress.

Governor Hughes first made the direct primary a state-wide issue in New York. It was in no gentle terms that his speeches and annual messages arraigned the nominating system then in vogue. His message to the legislature in 1909 gave wide publicity to the flagrant evils of the primaries and added a constructive plan of reform. Apart from his suggestions for important changes in the methods of administering the primaries, his plan included a system of direct nominations which combined responsibility in the party machine and initiative in the party membership. Designations were to be made by elected party representatives meeting as a party committee for this purpose; but if their designations proved unsatisfactory to the members of the party, ample opportunity was to be afforded the latter for nominating contesting designations by petition. The final choice of the party nominee was to be decided by a direct vote of the members of the party.

The woman suffrage movement in Great Britain has rendered a service for political science of which even its adherents are often unaware. It has brought to a most searching test the prevailing constitutional theory.

In these days of psycho-analysis of the individual there should be also some psycho-analysis of political institutions. Political theory, like the pious formulas with which we drape the nudity of our real desires and aspirations, is often at bottom what might be called a highly intellectualized excuse. Political theory is an afterthought: a justification or explanation of the desires and aspirations of the dominant economic and social group. The “divine right of kings” is now a hollow pretension to us. But it was as much a reality to the aristocracy, whose power is explained and excused, as are our own instinctive personal excuses. The “natural rights of man” have proven hardly more substantial,—the great excuse in which the rising commercial classes have ever covered their designs against the aristocracy. And now, at last, in the theory that “labor creates all wealth,” we find the embryo excuse for a growing threat of the working class.

The strange divergence between what city dwellers know and what they do collectively, must bewilder even the student of politics. Common sense and public conduct still seem rather distant acquaintances. That haughty baron, municipal practice, even now often fails to recognize municipal science when they meet. Great public works continue to be located and constructed, costly and inconvenient systems of collection and distribution persist, almost as if city planning related to the moon. We know that smoke is both unnecessary and wasteful, but it continues to darken our days and corrode our lungs. We shut our eyes to fetid slums, bad housing, and over-crowding, but lavish millions on new hospitals, asylums, and prisons in which to store their obvious product. Axioms of administration, universally accepted, are applied everywhere except to cities. There the citizen generously permits partisan considerations to determine rewards and punishment for the municipal personnel, at the same time grumbling bitterly about inefficiency. Indeed the sacrifice of cities in general to the national parties is still the rule rather than the exception, in spite of all the preaching and the shouting. A thousand strange futilities and follies continue to irritate and puzzle us, a multitude of unnecessary evils to reduce our enjoyment of life.