a sufficiency of that metal to preserve and maintain a single gold redemption, has had the effect of very greatly enhancing the value of gold. The large purchases of silver authorized, by which 4,500,000 ounces are purchased every month, have not tended to bring the two metals nearer together, for the very plain reason that the notes issued in the purchase of this bullion are treated by law and the Treas ury Department as gold notes. The coinage of silver dollars is sus pended. This new strain put upon gold redemption, aggregating about $54,000,000 annually, has caused a semi-panic in the gold market and sent gold up as compared to silver. This result was predicted by the writer in a report protesting against the passage of the Bullion Bill in the last Congress, as follows:1 "So, as before pointed out, our three hundred and fifty-five millions of silver dollars had taken the place of so much gold, and to that extent relieved gold of its work and cheapened it the world over. But for the silver we have coined, silver bullion and all other commodities would have been lower as compared to gold than they are now; so that the moment we suspend the coinage of this competing dollar and make gold the sole valuator for all redemptions, as the bill proposes, then gold must of necessity continue more rapidly to rise than heretofore. The divergence in value of the two metals as compared to each other will increase instead of diminish. It is impossible that the warehousing of silver may increase its value as compared to other commodities, but gold of necessity would go up at a greater ratio than silver. So that the promoters of the bill will find themselves cheated in the main objects sought-that is, the increase of the value of the silver as compared to gold.” Should the secretary of the treasury attempt to sell bonds to procure more gold, as he has threatened to do, he would find that he had precipitated a very general feeling of panic, if not the real thing itself. He can easily produce a panic, but he will find it difficult to get the gold. It cannot be had. It is nowhere to be found. No country can spare it without financial disaster. The gold craze has gone to the last extremity. Another strain and the end of this conspiracy will come. The blanket is too short and too narrow; it will not go round. Free coinage will give an increased use for silver and a proportionate decreased demand for gold. This will cause the one per ceptibly to rise and the other to fall, until the parity is practically restored. R. P. BLAND. 'See Report of House of Representatives, No. 1,086, first session of 51st Congress, page 8. A CASE OF GOOD CITY GOVERNMENT. AT the close of an article in THE FORUM for October, 1891, President Eliot remarks, " Before municipal government can be set right in the United States, municipal service must be made a life career for intelligent and self-respecting young Americans," and he refers in general to the administration of European cities as illustrating this principle. I wish to follow the same subject a little further by way of concrete illustration, and to describe in detail the method of governing a large German town. I am not one of those who find the governmental paternalism of Germany always working for good. On the contrary, the impression which the country at large gives, as one returns to it after a dozen years, seems to me that of being over-governed. The governmental control which is omnipresent, not only does not do everything well-as the few and creeping express-trains of the country sufficiently testify-but it has also tended to weaken the self-confi dence and self-respect of the people. The Germans have been drilled into perfect order, but they are in danger of losing the power of individual initiative. The first instinct of an American citizen is to act; the first instinct of a German citizen is to obey. The weight of the national government, with its compulsory army-service, its compulsory insurance-system, and its interference at every turn, presses heavily and is provoking in these last years a strong reaction. But, on the other hand, in the smaller field of municipal administration, the German is at his best. The city works of Germany are not so magnificent as those of France, nor are the police so imposing or so considerate as those of England, but so far as concerns the essentials of good city government-the security of health, the precautions concerning life, food, drink, poverty, and crime, and the provisions for popular pleasure which make a town good to dwell in-one feels that in the best German cities one has the most substantial administration of the world. Of the thousands of Americans who visit the city of Dresden every year and the hundreds who each year spend the winter months there, hardly one can fail to be impressed by its municipal affairs. Its streets are so clean and so smooth that one walks in the roadway as freely as on the sidewalks; its police regulations are so enforced that one may traverse the streets for months by day and night without seeing a sign of disorder; its water supply is excellent, its penalties for the adulteration of food and the falsification of weights and measures are severe; its inspection of all forms of business, of buildings and of markets is scrupulous, and the condition of the public health which is the result of these precautions gives a death rate just five per thousand less than in the rest of Saxony. How, then, I go on to inquire, is such a city practically governed, and what lessons has its administration to teach to the citizens of a free estate? Dresden, the capital of Saxony, and the residence of the King, with 276,522 inhabitants on December 1, 1890, has, in common with all the larger Saxon towns, the basis of its local government in the Saxon law of April 24, 1873 (Revised Statutes for town affairs). This general law prescribes the method of city government by two chambers, provides for separate and joint sessions of the two, and for procedure in case of difference, regulates citizenship and principles of taxation, and defines the relation of town to the national government. In addition to and in accordance with this state law, Dresden, like all other towns, has its own local statutes (Ortsstatuten, April 4, 1882, with some amendments). The local statutes must be approved by the minister of the interior and deal with all administrative details. Under these two statutes the city government is regulated as follows: 1. Citizenship: Any inhabitant can become a citizen if (a) he is a Saxon, (b) is over 25, (c) has received no public poor relief for two years, (d) is not under conviction for crime, (e) has paid his taxes for two years, and (f) either owns real-estate in the town or for two years has lived there for the greater part of each year. To this permissive statute there is added a second and more exceptional one. All males conforming in other respects to the first statute and who in addition (a) have had their residence in Dresden for three years and (b) paid $2.25 (9 marks) or more in state taxes, not only may become citizens, 'All this, it should be added, occurs in a country of very moderate general prosperity. Saxony is now one of the most thickly populated regions in Europe, and the great proportion of its people are distinctly poor. The state statistics for 1890 give the following four classes of incomes and the proportion of citizens receiving each : Less than $200.... Less than $825... Less than $2,400. 76.33% ..20.94% 2.24% .49% as under the first statute, but must. This compulsory citizenship, so strange to American ears, is intended to secure to the town the support of the more permanent and responsible class. Each person on claiming citizenship pays a poll-tax of 75 cents, but pays it only once. It may thus be said in general, that a nearer approach to universal suffrage is reached in Germany than under the annual poll-tax system in the United States. Any male citizen who has not become either a pauper or a criminal or a bankrupt may vote for town officers and is qualified to be chosen himself. A citizen if elected cannot refuse to serve unless, (a) he is over sixty years of age, (b) holds other town office, or (c) has serious illness. 2. City government: The city government of Dresden is made up of two chambers, (a) the City Council (Stadtverordnete), (b) the Board of Aldermen (Stadtrat). The City Council consists of seventy-two members, each elected for three years, and twenty-four retiring each year. Members usually are re-elected. One-half must be owners of realestate in the city, and one-half must be representatives of that large class of persons who, as in all European cities, live in rented flats and are not householders. This large City Council has but slight initiative power. It acts as intermediary between the Board of Aldermen and the people, it confirms acts of the upper board, and it elects the members of that board. It is a town parliament, a popular assembly. The positive administration of city affairs lies with the Board of Aldermen, and it is in the composition of this board that we meet the radical contrast with American methods. The Dresden Stadtrat consists of thirty members. Of these, sixteen, a majority, hold office without pay and their duties are largely advisory and honorary. The remaining fourteen aldermen, however, are salaried officials, giving their whole time to departmental business and dividing the important departments between them. All the aldermen, with two exceptions, are elected by the City Council for terms of three years, it being prescribed that of the fourteen salaried aldermen two-thirds must have had a professional training in the law and have passed the state examination for that calling. The honorary aldermen retire at the end of their terms, unless re-elected for a second term of three years. The salaried officials, on the other hand, may be and as a rule are re-elected during their first term either for a second series of years or for life. The two exceptions as to election by the City Council are the officials whom we should call the mayor (Ober-Bürgermeister) and the vicemayor (Bürgermeister). These chief officials are elected by the Coun. cil and the Board of Aldermen in joint session, it being by no means necessary that the persons thus elected should be, or should have been, in the city government, or should even be citizens of Dresden. The men sought for these high offices are persons who have distinguished themselves either in the same city or in some other town in the profession of city administration. Thus, the present Bürgermeister of Berlin was, when elected, holding the same office in Breslau, the second city of Prussia, and was called to be mayor of Berlin precisely as a successful professor in the University of Breslau might be called to the larger university at Berlin. The salaried members of the Board of Aldermen of Dresden receive from $1,500 to $2,000 each per annum, the mayor $3,000, and the vice-mayor $2,400-salaries which according to German standards are honorable, and which should be a little more than doubled to give them the same meaning to Americans. The incomes of the mayor and vice-mayor, it should be added, are considerably supplemented by two special funds bequeathed for the peculiar expenses of these offices. There is also a high degree of dignity and social importance attached to these positions; and still further, when a salaried official is no longer able to serve he gets a pension amounting to from 30% to 80% of his former income, having during his service contributed to the pension fund 1% to 2% of his salary. Finally, any salaried alderman may be removed from office for any criminal act, under the Saxon law of June 2, 1876. Such, in brief, is the method of administration in this typical German city. The contrast it presents with city government in the United States need not be emphasized. It is the contrast between government for the sake of the city and government for the sake of the officials. With us, municipal offices are the spoils of successful politicians; in Germany they are the prizes of successful experts. It seems to a German as incredible to hear of a city governed by men who are just pausing on their way to some higher place as it would be to hear of a railroad or of a cotton-mill thus superintended. Good city administration with us is an accident. It occurs because the man with the appointing power happens to appoint a good agent. In Germany, city work is a science as far from politics as is the science of engineering or architecture. Each salaried alderman is responsible for a single department, or for several closely allied parts of the public business. He does not serve, as do our aldermen, on three or four scattered committees-schools, licenses, and sewers-about none of which he has any scientific knowledge. He is elected to his office |