418 



GERMANY. 



duplicity and cruelty of his detective devices, 

 not only to the Anarchists, but to all the Lib- 

 eral parties. A great number of persons were 

 arrested without results, until a man was taken 

 near Mannheim with false papers, who de- 

 fended himself with a revolver. He was dis- 

 covered to be Julius Lieske, a shoemaker, 

 twenty-two years old, who had associated 

 with Anarchists in Switzerland. He was 

 tried in July and convicted of the murder, 

 chiefly on the evidence of a woman who rec- 

 ognized him as having been in Frankfort at 

 the time of the murder. The altered position 

 of the Social Democrats since their electoral 

 success in 1884 is illustrated in a remark made 

 by the judge to the jury that they have noth- 

 ing in common with Anarchists. The Reichs- 

 tag has bestowed on their arguments atten- 

 tion and consideration that they could not 

 formerly command. The official press praises 

 their debating powers, and treats their legisla- 

 tive schemes as being in the line of the aims of 

 the Government and the tendency of the time, 

 but too radical and advanced. The effect on 

 the parliamentary representatives is to lead 

 them to address themselves to practical legis- 

 lative objects, instead of using the Reich>tag 

 as a rostrum from which to appeal to the 

 constituencies in language forbidden outside. 

 Among the rank and file of the party, smart- 

 ing under police repression and persecution, 

 and cherishing revolutionary aims, dissatisfac- 

 tion is felt at the more correct parliamentary 

 attitude of their leaders. 



At the burial of a Social Democrat named 

 Hiller in Frankfort, on July 22, red sashes were 

 worn, and an attempt was made to hold ora- 

 tions, though demonstrations had been forbid- 

 den. The police ordered the assembly to dis- 

 perse and then dashed into the crowd, and with 

 the edge of their sabers wounded many people, 

 some of them women and children. 



By the decision of the Federal Council the 

 minor state of siege was prolonged in Berlin, 

 Leipsic, and Hamburg. Herr Liebknecht, the 

 Social Democratic deputy, was sentenced to a 

 month's imprisonment. Six other prominent 

 members of the party, all of them deputies in 

 the Reichstag, were brought to trial in Octo- 

 ber for attending the conferences at Copen- 

 hagen in 1883 and at Wyden in 1880, on the 

 charge of belonging to a secret international 

 revolutionary organization; but they were all 

 acquitted. In the annual report to the Reichs- 

 tag on the working of the anti-Socialist law, 

 made November 24, the Government deplored 

 the spread of Social Democracy, notwithstand- 

 ing repressive measures, due partly to the im- 

 portation of revolutionary literature from other 

 countries, and especially of John Most's " Frei- 

 heit," of which 5,000 copies are printed in New 

 York, and all but 500 sent abroad, mostly to 

 Germany and Austria, without any chance of 

 their ever being paid for. In recent numbers 

 this sheet has discussed theoretically the forma- 

 tion of battalions of working-men, and has de- 



scribed in minute and scientific detail how ex- 

 plosives may be chemically prepared, stored, 

 and employed for the destruction of life and 

 property. The " Social Demokrat," the organ 

 of the party, is smuggled into the country as 

 extensively as ever. In Berlin meetings were 

 dissolved and interdicts issued in 175 cases dur- 

 ing the year. The strikes in the capital are as- 

 cribed to the influence of Social Democrats. In 

 Hamburg and Leipsic the Social Democratic 

 movement is directed by an organization that 

 defies the detective skill of the police. 



The Brunswick Succession. Prussia introduced 

 a resolution, carried by a majority vote of the 

 states in the Federal Council, that the rule of 

 the Duke of Cumberland in Brunswick would 

 not be conducive to the internal peace and se- 

 curity of the empire. The form of the reso- 

 lution was changed by the judicial committee 

 into a declaration that the rule of the Duke of 

 Cumberland over Brunswick would be incom- 

 patible with the Constitution of the empire. 

 In a secret session of the Brunswick Diet on 

 June 30 he was declared to be practically dis- 

 qualified by a unanimous vote. Though Bruns- 

 wick at first refrained from voting on the ques- 

 tion in the Bundesrath, the disclosure of f 

 letter addressed by the Duke to the Queen ol 

 England on Jan. 14, 1879, inclosed in one ol 

 different import sent to the Duke of Bruns 

 wick, impelled the ministry and legislature t( 

 concur in the decision of the Bundesrath, or 

 which the final vote was taken July 2. In thi 

 letter the Duke of Cumberland affirmed tht 

 he could fulfill the duties of Duke of Brunswic 

 without prejudice to his rights to the Hano 

 verian throne. The claim of the Duke of Cam 

 bridge next came up. He expressed a willing 

 ness, in case the claims of the legitimate princ 

 were disallowed, to accept the regency of Bruns 

 wick, or eventually, as next in the order of sue 

 cession, the throne itself, but without givin 

 up his residence in London and his position a 

 commander-in-chief of the British army. No 

 only was this proposal rejected, but the Prus 

 sian ministry prepared a measure for the Bun 

 desrath to exclude non-German princes fror 

 succession to the throne of any of the state 

 of the empire, which would shut out the Duk 

 of Edinburgh from the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg 

 Gotha, of which he is the heir- apparent. Th 

 Brunswick regency law provided that if th 

 rightful heir is incapacitated, the Langtag sha 

 select a regent. The Landtag referred th 

 Duke of Cambridge's request to the Germa 

 Emperor, and it was decided by the Bunder 

 rath. A regent was finally selected in tb 

 person of Prince Albert of Prussia, nephew . 

 the Emperor, who was elected in due form b 

 the Diet, Oct. 21. The entry of the Prince R< 

 gent into Brunswick took place on Nov. 2. 



Expulsion of Russian Poles. In the summer < 

 1885 the Prussian Government, on the authc 

 ity of a simple royal decree, began the wnol< 

 sale expulsion of foreigners from the I 

 provinces and neighboring districts of Prussi 



