CHAPTER VI. THE JUDICIARY.

Art. 44. The judicial power shall be administered by the Judiciary formed by the judicial officials appointed by the President.

The organization of the Judiciary and the qualifications of the judicial officials shall be fixed by law.

Art. 47. The trial of law suits in the judicial courts should be open to the public; but when they are deemed to be harmful to peace and order or good custom, they may be held in camera.

CHAPTER VIII. FINANCES.

Art. 50. Levying of new taxes and dues and change of tariff shall be decided by law.

The taxes and dues which are now in existence shall continue to be collected as of old except as changed by law.

Art. 53. To prepare for any deficiency of the budget and expenses needed outside of the estimates in the budget, a special reserve fund must be provided in the budget.

Art. 56. When a new Budget cannot be established, the Budget of the previous year will be used. The same procedure will be adopted when the Budget fails to pass at the time when the fiscal year has begun.

Art. 57. When the closed accounts of the receipts and expenditures of the nation have been audited by the House of Audit, they shall be submitted by the President to the Li Fa Yuan for approval.

Art. 58. The organization of the House of Audit shall be fixed by the Provisional Constitution Conference.

Art. 66. This Provisional Constitution may be amended at the request of two-thirds of the members of the Li Fa Yuan, or the proposal of the President, by a three-fourths majority of a quorum consisting of four-fifths or more of the whole membership of the House. The Provisional Constitution Conference will then be convoked by the President to undertake the amendment.

JAPAN.

"Beginning in 1880 a vigorous political propaganda was conducted in favor of the establishment of a representative assembly; an imperial edict of October 12, 1881, announced that the first Imperial Diet would be convened in 1890. Between 1881 and 1889 important reforms were made in the organization of the

government. The constitution was promulgated on February 11, 1889, and at the same time were issued the Imperial House Law, the ordinance concerning the House of Peers, the Law of Houses, the election law for members of the House of Representatives, and the law of finance. The first Diet was formally opened on November 29, 1890."

EXTRACTS FROM THE CONSTITUTION OF JAPAN.

(February 11, 1889).

"This text has been adopted almost without change from the English translation issued from Tokyo 1889; the difficulty of obtaining revision makes it necessary to give this constiution in the untechnical language in which it appears."-Walter Fairleigh Dodd.

CHAPTER I.

THE EMPEROR.

Article 1. The Empire of Japan shall be reigned over and governed by a line of emperors unbroken for ages eternal.

CHAPTER II.

RIGHTS AND DUTIES OF SUBJECTS.

Art. 18. The conditions necessary for being a Japanese subject shall be determined by law.

Art. 19. Japanese subjects may, according to qualifications determined in laws or ordinances, be appointed to civil or military offices equally, and may fill any other public offices.

CHAPTER III.

THE IMPERIAL DIET.

Art. 33. The Imperial Diet shall consist of two houses, a House of Peers and a House of Representatives.

Art. 34. The House of Peers shall, in accordance with the ordinance concerning the House of Peers, be composed of the

members of the imperial family of the order of nobility, and of those persons who have been nominated thereto by the emperor. Art. 35. The House of Representatives shall be composed of members elected by the people according to the provisions of the election law.

Art. 36. No one shall at one and the same time be a member of both houses.

CHAPTER IV.

MINISTERS OF STATE AND THE PRIVY COUNCIL.

Art. 55. The respective ministers of state shall give their advice to the emperor and be responsible for it.

All laws, imperial ordinances and imperial rescripts of whatever kind, that relate to the affairs of state require the counter signature of the minister of state.

Art. 56. The Privy Council shall, in accordance with the provisions of the organization of the Privy Council, deliberate upon important matters of state when they have been consulted by the

emperor.

CHAPTER V.

THE JUDICIAL POWER.

Art. 57. The judicial power shall be exercised by the courts of law according to law, in the name of the emperor.

IMPERIAL ORDINANCE CONCERNING THE HOUSE OF PEERS.

Article I. The House of Peers shall be composed of the following members:

1. The members of the Imperial family;

2. Princes and Marquises, etc.;

3. Counts, viscounts, barons who have been elected thereto by the members of their respective orders;

4. Persons who have been specially nominated by the emperor on account meritorious services to the state or of erudition; 5. Persons who have been elected, one member each Fu (city) and Ken (prefecture), by and from among tax payers of the highest amount of direct taxes on land, industry, or trade therein, and who have afterwards been appointed thereto by the emperor.

GERMAN GOVERNMENT.

The construction of the North German Bund, and the subsequent German Empire in its present shape, was the work of Bismarck more than any other man. Like the architect of a great, complicated edifice, he planned and directed how the empire should be built from foundation to dome.

By uniting the North German States, the first step was taken to place Prussia in control. Then, after the Franco-Prussian war, the formation of the German Empire, containing in all twentyfive states, completed the scheme of German unity.

By the selection of the King of Prussia, which state comprised three-fifths of the entire twenty-five states, as president, with the title of "the German Emperor," and the giving to him of the right to select the chancellor, one man won a degree of arbitrary power now almost impossible to control.

REICHSTAG IS LIMITED.

The legislative body elected by the qualified voters of the entire nation is the reichstag, but this body is so hedged about with restrictions that it has very little real authority. It can be dissolved by the bundesrath. Its members receive no pay, which restricts them to those who are rich enough to pay their own expenses while in Berlin.

Bismarck had very little use for universal suffrage, and saw that elections were held on working days instead of Sundays, as in France. This kept the poorer people from voting.

The bundesrath is formed of members who are not elected by the people, but are delegates chosen by the different states or monarchies, controlled by the princes, dukes or owners of large estates, and form an imperial cabinet. This rule, however, does not apply to the three free cities, which elect their own delegates. Prussia has twenty votes in the bundesrath, and three-fifths of the votes in the reichstag, and the King of Prussia controls these votes thru his autocratic power under the Prussian constitution. He also has supreme command of the army, and the contingents or troops of all the states are turned over to him.

MONARCHIES IN MAJORITY.

The Empire of Germany is composed of twenty-five states. All of these, except the three free cities, are monarchies. "The ministers are nowhere responsible," says A. Lawrence Lowell, "to

the legislative body in the parliamentary sense, and hence the princes exercise, personally, a great deal of power. Thruout Germany, therefore, the monarchical principle retains its vigor, and while the representatives of the people have obtained a share in the direction of public affairs, in no state have they drawn the whole conduct of the government into their own hands."

Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Mecklenburg-Strelitz are little archaic monarchies that do not have even one representative body chosen by the people, but the legislative branch is controlled directly by the grand dukes thru the landtag and langschaft.

The government of the House cities is placed in the senate and the bürgerschaft. The executive power is vested in the senate, which consists in Hamburg of eighteen members chosen for life and paid. The senators are elected by the senate and the bürgerschaft, but members anf the bürgerschaft are elected by direct popular vote and secret ballot. The House cities each send one representative to the bundesrath. There is no grand duke or prince to rule over either of the three cities.

ENGLISH SYSTEM BETTER.

The difference between the German Empire and the English government is that the former concentrates all real power in the hands of the emperor, who is also King of Prussia, the controlling state of the confederation and in the bundesrath, or herren house, composed of the sovereigns or their representatives in the several monarchical states composing the empire, and, as stated, delegates from the three free cities.

In England, however, the real power is in the house of commons, which is elected by the people thru universal suffrage, and the ministry is accountable to the house of commons and not to the king.

A change is necessary in the structure of the German nation as an entirety. The present organization is based on a monarchical system which is not adapted to the present advanced state of society in Germany and the competency of the German people.

Either the English constitutional method should be substituted, where the lower house should control and be elected by universal unrestricted suffrage, the chancellor being selected as in England and accountable to the reichstag and not to the emperor, or the Swiss constitution should be followed and each state elect delegates by universal unrestricted suffrage to the two houses, whose members should jointly choose the members of the federal council. This would do away with the entire monarchical system. Prussia should be divided into a number of states, so as not to have a preponderance of power in one state.