482 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION GI. 



Judging b}' the records of crime there has been a distinct 

 moral advancement during the last fifty years, and in spite of many 

 mistakes, social and economic conditions have wonderfully im- 

 proved. The birth rate has undoubtedly declined, but how much 

 of that decline is due to moral wickedness, how much to a decline in 

 fertility or the operation of a natural law cannot be determined. 

 If it is due to moral wickedness, at all events it is not reflected in the 

 criminal returns. On general considerations I am inclined to think 

 that the problem is largely eugenic, and it needs the genius of a 

 Karl Pearson to accurately state it, let alone propound the solution. 



2.— OBSERVATIONS ON THE FEDERAL SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT. 



By T. R. BAVIN, B.A., LL.B. 



In these days it is a little difficult to write on the subject I have 

 chosen without straying into the forbidden region of party 

 politics. I should like to say at the outset, however, that 

 nothing is further from my intention than to enter upon any 

 such adventure. I propose to do nothing more than to offer some 

 humble criticisms, illustrated, so far as may be, by reference to our 

 own experience of the federal system as a system of government — 

 to discuss it solely from the point of view of its efficiency as a piece 

 of governmental machinery. 



One cannot, of course, discuss the merits or demerits of any 

 given form of government without formulating some sort of criterion 

 by which it is to be judged. If any form of government is good, it 

 is because it serves, better than other forms, certain purposes which 

 are accepted at any rate for the purposes of the discussion as 

 necessary and appropriate purposes of all forms of government ; if it is 

 bad it is because it fails to serve those purposes. It is quite oijtside 

 the modest purposes of this essay to discuss with any attempt at com- 

 pleteness what are the proper objects of government. I shall content 

 myself with selecting one or two objects which it will be generally 

 admitted that any form of government, if it is to be reasonably 

 efficient, must serve with some degree of success. And in making 

 the selection, I do not propose to venture on any novel or original 

 lines. I shall merely accept, and ask you to accept, the criterion 

 of a good form of government formulated generally by John Stuart 

 Mill in his book on " Representative Government "—a work which, 

 making every allowance for the rapid movement of political specula- 

 tion since its appearance, still remains a mine of wealth to the 

 political student. I know of no better general statement of the test 

 of a good form of government for practical purposes than the one 

 which appears in the second chapter of the book mentioned. He 

 says :--" We have now, therefore, obtained a foundation for a 

 twofold division of the merit which any set of political institutions 

 can possess. It consists partly of the degree in which they promote 

 the general mental advancement of the community, including under 



