Parliament has today perhaps less supervision over foreign policy than over any other field of governmental activity. Such has been the case for over a generation, and such is still the case in spite of the Labor party's efforts to democratize the control of foreign affairs. That such a situation should exist is particularly strange, since the generally accepted theory of the English constitution assumes that foreign affairs are under the strict control of Parliament. Indeed, the governmental practice of the last forty years has largely violated theories formulated somewhat earlier. How this situation originated, and what its significance is, can best be understood after some examination of the theory and practice of foreign policy control.

What may be called the classical theories of the English constitution are largely the product of the writings of Bagehot and J. S. Mill working on the imagination of the generation which Gladstone dominated, and given emphasis by the Liberals of the seventies. Somewhat unthinkingly, perhaps, these theories won acceptance by Liberals and Conservatives alike. Authoritative statements of the constitutional theory of the control of foreign policy will be found, for instance, in Anson's Law and Custom of the Constitution and Halsbury’s Laws of England. Both of these works express a Liberal conception of foreign policy control; yet both ate the works of Tories.

The growth of the democratic element in Japanese government has not been without effect on the Privy Council. In the early years of its history, the Council and the ministry were institutions serving the same classes and seeing eye to eye. This was true not only under the presidency of Ito, Oki, and Yamagata (1889-94), but also even during a considerable part of the period when party government was struggling for supremacy. In those days, political parties in the House of Representatives were balked by the bureaucrats, clansmen, and militarists entrenched in the administrative branch, while the seats in the Council were occupied by the great leaders of these controlling classes. But the doctrine of ministerial responsibility had begun to take root. In 1895, the Ito ministry abandoned the principle of executive independence of political parties and accepted an alliance with the Jiyuto, or Liberal party. In 1898, the Kenseito, or Constitutional party, under the leadership of Okuma and Itagaki, was given the opportunity of forming the first party cabinet in the history of Japan. Upon its fall, caused by internal dissension, the succeeding ministry under Yamagata (1898-1900) contained no party men, although the premier condescended to an alliance with the Kenseito. In 1900, Ito himself formed the Seiyukai, and brought the second party cabinet into office. But it was not until the first Kenseikai ministry, under Okuma and Kato (1914-16), and the fifth Seiyukai ministry under Hara (1918-21), that well-grounded ministerial parties controlled the lower house.

Although a naïve economist, I am quite conscious of the way in which the forces of inertia, self-interest, and sentiment combine to give persistent vitality to those two old parties which, so far as ideas are concerned, are so perfect an example of the embalmer's art. Not only do these parties have the network of precinct and local organization upon which effective political work must rest, but they also furnish to ambitious men and women the sole avenues to immediate political power. Perhaps most important of all is the fact that their trade-marks and totemistic deities tap large wellsprings of genuine, if benighted, sentiment in the hearts of millions of humble and undistinguished men and women. To the farmers of the Middle West, the Republican party is still a glorious fellowship of the consecrated Knights of the Grail, who, in times past, prevented slavery from creeping up the Mississippi Valley, gave homesteads to the people, fought the Civil War, and bequeathed Abraham Lincoln to the ages. Similarly, nostalgic Southerners regard the Democratic party as an integral part in that vista of the glorious days before the Civil War when cotton was king and their statesmen dominated Capitol Hill, and also as the corporate representative of that chivalrous group of men in white armor who finally overthrew carpet-bag government and negro domination, and who by their efforts finally made Southern Caucasian civilization free at last.

Such being the assets of the old parties as going concerns, it is not surprising that progressively minded leaders like Senators Norris and Borah should wish to stay inside the party breastworks and utilize the accumulated resources of organization and sentiment for their own purposes, rather than to surrender the good-will value of the party label to their opponents.

Professional students of American politics, like other members of the governed classes, have their private reasons for discontent with the present administration at Washington. The business depression, to be sure, has not injured the educational interests of the country to the same extent as most others. Decreased income from tuition and endowments has reduced somewhat the demand for young Ph.D.'s in colleges and universities, and the American Association of University Professors has received an extraordinary number of calls for help from older teachers who have been laid off for more or less obscure reasons on the plea of lack of funds. But in general, education seems to be one of the public services for which the public will not readily reduce its effective demand. Boys and girls continue to grow up in bad times as in good, and the increasing difficulty of finding remunerative employment only stimulates the desire for further education. Professorial salaries, once fixed, are not easily reduced, and the fall in the general level of prices leaves most professors better off than before. Hence the private reasons of professors of political science for discontent with the present administration, though no less exigent than those of other members of the governed classes, are of a peculiar nature.

In the first place, the present administration has not fulfilled the high hopes of many political scientists for improvement in the methods of legislation at the national capital. It was hoped, for example, that the executive would take a vigorous initiative in recommending measures to the Congress and would make greater use of technical experts in the preparation of administration measures.

It is an old axiom, replete with common sense, that there is no more uncertain field for prophecy than that of practical politics. This is especially true when any forecast must be made fourteen months ahead of time. All that the observer of contemporary American politics may do is to sum up, as far as possible, the existing state of affairs, and then make a series of guesses as to what may eventuate. This present article is written with these conditions in mind, and should be read in the same spirit.

The present political situation would appear to be as follows. Normally, there are at least five million more Republicans than Democrats in the country. This is in large part due to the secession from the Democratic party in 1896 of large numbers of young men, just entering upon adult life or experiencing their first taste of business and finance, who were hostile to the late William J. Bryan and his “free silver” theories. These young men later were added to in large number by the strong, dominant, and attractive personality of Theodore Roosevelt, who typified to them the American spirit. Also the great, underlying influence of economic expansion, the financial and business domination of much of our national life, and the frank acceptance of these conditions by the Republican leaders of the first decade of this century strengthened and accelerated this movement in favor of the “Grand Old Party.” The young men of that time, now grown to middle age and national leadership in many walks of life, are the backbone of the financial support of the party today. And they have brought up their children to the same political allegiance.

The almost shamed hush that fell in the Senate at noon on March 4 was more fitting than the jubilation in the House. Certainly there was no ground for congratulations in any corner of the Capitol, and least of all among the group in the President's room.

Membership and Organization. When the session began, the Republicans in the House numbered 266, the Democrats 165, with one Farmer Labor member and three vacancies. The two party shifts involved in the seating of thirteen new members reflected Democratic victories in by-elections in the 6th Wisconsin and 24th Illinois districts. In the Senate, inter-sessional gains on the minority side were more pronounced; there were 42 Democrats instead of 39, leaving 53 Republicans and 1 Farmer Labor member.

The uncertainty that attends the regulation of campaign expenditures by exclusion was illustrated in the seating of James J. Davis, lately Secretary of Labor, as junior senator from Pennsylvania. Mr. Davis stood aside at the opening of the session, in order to permit the chairman of the special committee investigating senatorial campaign expenditures, Gerald Nye, to offer a resolution by which his right to a seat was referred to the select committee. The resolution was rejected on December 2 by a vote of 27 (9 Republicans, 17 Democrats, 1 Farmer Labor) to 58 (39 Republicans, 19 Democrats). The committee on privileges and elections, acting through subcommittees, took up the dusty task of recounts in Alabama and North Carolina.

The uncertainties of party control in the next Congress cast a sharp but wavering shadow over the proceedings of the session.

In public discussions of the proposed Norris “lame duck” amendment, and in demands by members of Congress for special sessions to meet temporary emergencies, the fact is often overlooked that Congress itself has the power to regulate the time of its meeting. The fourth section of Article IV of the Constitution provides: “The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting shall be on the first Monday in December, unless they shall by law appoint a different day.” Under this provision, the much-criticized rush of bills in the short session could easily be averted by an act convening Congress at an earlier date than the first Monday in December. So, too, a Congress whose final session was coming to a close could provide that its successor should meet immediately, instead of waiting until the following December. A Congress desirous of a special session on a problem like unemployment could call such a session irrespective of lack of action by the President, provided it could command a majority sufficient to over-ride a possible presidential veto. Of course such action could be taken only while Congress was in session, because, under the provisions of the Constitution, the President is the only person who, between sessions, is empowered to call special sessions.

These statements are not the result of theoretical speculation, but rest firmly on the facts of our legislative history. Prior to 1821, no fewer than eighteen acts were passed by Congress appointing a different day for its meetings from that stipulated in the Constitution. Before referring to these acts more in detail, it would perhaps clarify matters somewhat to recall to mind how March 4 was decided upon as a limit of presidential and congressional terms. Article VII of the Constitution provided that the instrument should go into effect when ratified by nine states. This was accomplished on June 21, 1788.

Introduction. The apportionment for this decade has now been made by Congress, and a bill has been passed which will automatically provide for reapportionment in all subsequent decades. Under this law, the size of the House will remain 435, and the method of computation will remain the method of major fractions as used in 1911 unless Congress takes the initiative in making a change. It may, however, be a matter of interest to put on record a brief description of the principal “methods” which were under discussion in the recent congressional debates. No knowledge of mathematics is required in order to understand the purpose and result of each of these methods.

The constitutional requirement. The constitutional requirement reads as follows: “Representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed; …. but each state shall have at least one representative.” Hence, in a theoretically perfect apportionment, the ratio of representation in any state would be exactly equal to the ratio of representation in every other state. In practice, however, perfect equality cannot be secured, on account of fractions. Hence, in the practical problem of apportioning any given number of representatives among the several states, the only way in which the constitutional requirement can be met is by making the unavoidable inequalities between the states as small as possible.

It is common observation that progress in social sciences has not kept pace with mastery of natural sciences; that ability to deal effectively with modern industrial life offers a very poor parallel to the expertness with which scientific questions are considered. There are perhaps two explanations.

First, research in mechanical, chemical, and electrical science has yielded, as by-products, a vast crop of new problems in human affairs. While invention and discovery created the possibility of releasing men and women from the thralldom of drudgery, new dangers to liberty appeared with the introduction of the factory system and the development of the business corporation. Large publicly owned corporations replaced small privately owned concerns; ownership of the instruments of production passed from the workman to the employer; personal relations between the proprietor and his help ceased. The individual contract of service lost its character because of inequality between employer and employee. Group relation of employee to employer, with collective bargaining, became common; indeed it was, in the opinion of some, absolutely essential to the worker's protection. These changes, in turn, called for ever-increasing governmental regulation. One result has been to emphasize anew the essential unity of economics, politics, and law.

Second, progress in dealing with social matters has not kept pace simply because few men of talent and ability have bent their efforts to this field. It would be difficult indeed to point to any contributions to social research that begin to compare with those made by Steinmetz, Michelson, Millikan, Pasteur, and many others in the scientific field. Even seemingly elementary questions are still calling for solution. Is machine production, which tends more and more to exceed the possibilities of reasonable consumption, and to flood the world with goods for which there is not sufficient demand, to be restricted ? If so, how ? Why is our economic and political machinery so clumsy and inefficient that men are permitted to go hungry in the cities while wheat is being fed to hogs in the West? Why are factories closed when so large a percentage of the human race is undernourished, underclothed, and clamoring for jobs? Should unemployment be left to the hard settlement of supply and demand, or are unemployment insurance and the dole to be recognized and established by law as necessary features of the new world economy? Why, in the midst of so many labor-saving devices, is there so little leisure for the workers? How, in short, can men be taught to think more about human welfare and less about property and vested interests? How can the economics of production and distribution be reorganized so that everybody will have more of the good things of life and less of poverty, misery, and distress? It is certainly an extraordinary and challenging fact that our parents, with comparatively few of the conveniences and labor-saving devices that are ours, were nevertheless more contented, peaceful, and secure.

Recent crime surveys have shown that the majority of contested felony cases are never tried in open court, being settled instead by the striking of a “bargain” between the defendant and the prosecuting officer. Administrative discretion has thus largely supplanted judge and jury alike. The practice has been severely criticized by Professor Moley, who characterizes it as “ psychologically more akin to a game of poker than to a process of justice,” being “an attempt to get as much as possible from an unwilling giver” rather than “a search for truth.” In view of the technicalities and delay that were permitted to develop in connection with jury trials, the utilization of some such avenue of escape would seem to have been inevitable. The practice may be expected to develop still further unless judicial procedure is improved to a point where a trial becomes an efficient means of disposing of contested criminal cases.

In most jurisdictions, the only alternative to such a compromise agreement has been a jury trial. Trial by a judge alone, the right to a jury being waived, has been regarded as of doubtful constitutionality. Recent decisions of the federal Supreme Court and of the supreme court of Illinois, sustaining such non-jury trials even in the absence of statutory authorization, have gone far toward dispelling this doubt, and warrant an examination of the practical working of the waiver plan in those jurisdictions where it has been given a trial.

In recent years, two pronounced tendencies have been manifest in the relation of the states to the local governments. One has been increased state aid for the support of functions which have hitherto been recognized as local functions, particularly roads and schools. These enlarged state grants have been made partly to relieve the burden of local taxation, partly in recognition of a larger responsibility on the part of the state, and partly to stimulate a higher quality of service. In order to insure the realization of the last-mentioned purpose, the aid has usually been conditioned on the fulfillment of certain minimum requirements.

The second tendency has been for the state to assume closer supervision over the finances of local government. This greater solicitude on the part of the state in respect to local finances has sprung from a number of reasons, two of which are the tremendous increase in the size of local funds since the beginning of the road-building era and the frequent misuse of the debt-incurring privilege.

One of the achievements of the brilliant administration of Harry F. Byrd was the segregation of the sources of revenue. The governor was quite sincere and enthusiastic in his support of this principle, believing, it seemed, that it was the panacea for a great many of our tax troubles. His exuberant enthusiasm caused him to make an error, many believe, when he had written into the rather inflexible constitution of the commonwealth the provision that no state tax shall be levied on real estate and tangible personal property. The state, therefore, no longer has any interest in this kind of property, and its supervision over local fiscal officers extends only so far as they are agents of the state, assessing and collecting the state's revenue.

Each county and city has a local commissioner of the revenue, elected by the people, who assesses for the state intangible personal property, individual incomes, and money and capital, and who assesses for the local government tangible personal property, machinery and tools, and merchants' capital. The state tax commissioner has forms printed and sent to each local commissioner on which all the items mentioned above are supposed to be listed at their fair market value by the taxpayer. Mr. Morrissett, the present state tax commissioner, has inaugurated a plan of holding annual conventions of commissioners of the revenue where the problem of assessment and the complications of the state tax code are discussed.

During recent years, the county manager plan has been growing steadily in popularity. This is shown by the literature on the subject, and, to a lesser degree, by the adoption of the system in a number of counties. Where the plan has been tried, the duties of manager have generally been conferred upon some existing county officer. In North Carolina and Virginia, for instance, different counties have experimented with (1) a member of the county board, generally the chairman, as manager, (2) a financial clerk, auditor, or accountant as manager, and (3) an engineer-manager. While the duties of the office have varied somewhat in the different types, each conforms in certain essential principles to the plan as outlined in the “model county manager law.”

In Missouri, the presiding judge of the county court, the county clerk, and the highway engineer correspond to the above officers; and should the state adopt a county-manager law, the duties of manager would probably be conferred upon one of these three officials. In fact, first-hand information secured in 1929 by interviewing county officials in thirty-three of the 114 counties, attending sessions of the county court, and studying official records shows that the county clerk and highway engineer have already, in some instances, developed general executive powers of some importance. This is true, for example, in awarding contracts, purchasing supplies, auditing claims, reports, and settlements, and determining the county tax rate. Before discussing these functions, the legal status of the county clerk and the engineer should be explained.

The regular session of the Texas legislature which began in January of this year had before it a proposal for a constitutional amendment to permit counties to adopt the county manager plan of government. The resolution providing for submitting the question to the voters at the regular election in 1932 passed the House by the required two-thirds majority, but failed in the Senate by a single vote.

The amendment would have empowered counties having a population of over 60,000, on a favorable vote of their qualified voters, to draw up home-rule charters for themselves. On a two-thirds vote of each house of the legislature, all other counties were to have the same privilege. The amendment also carried a grant of power to cities and counties to consolidate the two governments. To carry out the latter provision, the rural and urban votes were to be counted separately; and a majority of the urban and a two-thirds majority of the rural votes were required. The larger majority required in the rural sections was a concession to the natural antipathy to a “one-man government” found among rural voters.

The National People's Convention held in May, 1931, and the provisional constitution adopted by it, mark a stage in the development of modern political institutions in China. But it is as yet too early to determine how successful these will be in establishing a permanently stable government.

Calling the Convention was itself an indication that a relative degree of stability had been attained, following the agreement between the Nanking government and Marshal Chang Hsueh-liang in Manchuria and the defeat of the northern opposition under Generals Feng and Yen. But the decision to call the Convention developed internal differences in Nanking, leading to the retirement of Hu Han-min, head of the Legislative Yuan, who has been kept under guard. This in turn aroused distrust in Canton, which led to the open revolt of several southern provinces on the eve of the Convention's meeting. This movement has come about by one of the curious realignments of political leaders and generals, bringing together the more conservative and more radical elements in the Kuomintang, with suggestions of possible combinations with the recently defeated northern generals and other opposition elements in the interior.

Before British India can ever be given complete home rule, the knotty problem of the relation of the native states to such a dominion must be considered. Nationalists in British India maintain that whenever complete dominion status is offered to their country, it will assume in respect to the states the same position that the crown holds toward them; meanwhile, spokesmen for the princes insist that such a step can and should never be taken without their consent. Whatever viewpoint prevails, before India can function as an independent, self-sufficient unit, some arrangement, presumably of a federal character, must certainly be effected.

An analysis of the numerous views held concerning the legal relation of the native states to the British Empire enables one to discern three principal theories: first, that held by most crown officials and Indian nationalists, which maintains the sovereignty of the crown; second, the view of the Indian princes, which attempts to prove the retention by them of the “residuary” sovereignty; and, third, the intermediate opinion of many publicists, both of Europe and of India, which asserts the existence of a divided sovereignty.

Desiring to ascertain the location of the legal sovereign in the political tangle presented by the apparently anomalous position of the princes, one is obliged to discard the theory of a divided sovereignty. Speaking in juridical terms, it is necessary to posit in some agency the source of legal sovereignty, even though its political exercise may be vested in more than one entity. There thus remains but two diametrically opposed theories, one that predicates the existence of supreme legal authority in the crown, and the other which confers it upon the rulers of the Indian states.

The territory under Japanese mandate comprises the former German colonial possessions in the Pacific Ocean lying north of the equator. This region is made up of three main groups of islands, the Marshall, the Mariana, and the Caroline, having a total estimated land area of approximately 800 square miles. Included in these groups are more than 1,400 islets, reefs, and atolls stretching across the Pacific from 130 longitude east to 175 longitude east, and from the equator to 22 latitude north. Lying west of Hawaii, east of the Philippines, and south of Japan, many of these islands are near the steamship lanes running from the Hawaiian Islands to Guam and to the Philippines.

A recent census shows that there are more than 60,000 inhabitants in the territory under Japanese mandate, about four-fifths being natives. More than 12,000 Japanese have gone to the islands, as well as a few Europeans and Americans. The Japanese, for the most part, are engaged in agricultural or commercial pursuits or are government officials, while the Occidental population is made up mostly of missionaries. Racially, it is believed that the natives come within the Micronesian or Polynesian classification, although in many instances the racial strain is not pure.

Prior to 1914, the Japanese had few interests of importance in these islands. Occasional tramp steamers, trading vessels, or fishing boats from. Japan sometimes visited them, but no regular trade relations existed. When, however, the World War broke out, Japan lost no time in sending a naval squadron to the islands, and, with comparative ease, she obtained control of them in October, 1914. At the time, the Tokio government explained that the seizure of the islands was only temporary, for military purposes, and that Japan had no desire to keep them. Later events indicate, however, that these mere dots in the Pacific took on an increased value in Japanese eyes; certainly, once having secured control of them, the conqueror was loath to give them up.

Shall the International Settlement of Shanghai be returned to China to become the prey of Chinese politics and civil disruption, or shall it be held in trust through a plan of Sino-foreign partnership until such time as China shall be able to preserve and protect its wealth and trade? This is the question now brought to the attention of Chinese and foreigners by the recently published report of Judge Richard Feetham, of South Africa, after eighteen months of intensive study of the problem. The report represents the most significant step yet taken toward solving the question of the future status of the International Settlement, the most important of all foreign concessions and settlements in China. For the first time in the history of the Settlement, China and the foreign powers have before them an adequate study of its development, and a definite plan upon which to base an agreement for future action.

The International Settlement is a foreign controlled and governed area on Chinese soil, located on the Whangpoo River and serving as the chief center for the vast trade and commerce of the Yangtze valley. Together with the French Settlement and the Chinese Municipality, it forms a part of the modern city of Shanghai. The International Settlement is an outgrowth of the British Settlement established in 1843 when Shanghai was first opened to foreign trade. Other foreigners were admitted to the original British area, and in 1863 the British and Americans pooled their interests after the French had set up a separate settlement of their own. The amalgamated British and American Settlement, extended in 1899, became the International Settlement of today, containing some eight and three-fourths square miles of land on which reside over one million people. In population, the Settlement is truly international. Although the Chinese comprise over ninety-five per cent of the total, more than forty different nationalities are to be found among the foreign residents. For seventy-three years, however, the Settlement was governed wholly by foreigners in spite of its over-whelming majority of Chinese residents, and it is only since 1928 that the Chinese have had any official voice in Settlement affairs.