DENMARK. 



285 



confiding the chief executive authority under 

 the King to a governor resident there. The 

 proposed revision of the Constitution also pro- 

 vided for the separation of the Althing into 

 two distinct chambers, and for an extension of 

 the electoral franchise. The Danish Govern- 

 ment declared that it could not concur in the 

 amendments, but dissolved the Althing, in or- 

 der to allow the people to express their sense 

 of the proposals, as it was required to do by 

 the Constitution. In the newly elected Althing 

 the proposed constitutional changes obtained 

 an overwhelming majority, the reformers 

 numbering 7 to 1 in the upper and 18 to 4 in 

 the lower division of the Legislature. The 

 Althing was closed on Sept. 8, 1886, a few 

 days after assembling, having firmly insisted 

 on the constitutional revision. 



The colony of Greenland had a population 

 of 9,780 souls in 1884. The possessions in the 

 West Indies comprise the islands of St. Croix, 

 17 square miles in extent, with 18,430 inhab- 

 itants; St. Thomas, with an area of 23 square 

 miles, and 14,389 inhabitants ; and St. John, 

 with 21 square miles of area, and 944 inhab- 

 itants. They are peopled mainly with free 

 negroes, engaged in the cultivation of the 

 sugar-cane, and export from 12,000,000 to 

 16,000,000 pounds of unrefined sugar and 

 about 1,000,000 gallons of rum annually. 



Repressive Measures. The attempt to assassi- 

 nate the prime minister on Oct. 21, 1885, gave 

 the Government a pretext to resort to meas- 

 ures of repression and intimidation for the 

 purpose of checking the radical tendencies of 

 popular thought. The Chambers were at once 

 prorogued to the 18th of December. On Oc- 

 tober 27 a gendarmerie law was enacted by 

 executive decree. On November 2 the rights 

 of freedom of speech and of the press were 

 curtailed, and a control of the trade in weap- 

 ons was instituted. The rifle-bands, which had 

 begun to form after the infraction of the Con- 

 stitution by the Government in the matter of 

 the financial law, were rigorously suppressed 

 by virtue of a decree promulgated on May 5. 

 The gendarmerie, or political police, estab- 

 lished in this wise, was particularly obnoxious 

 to the country people, who are the strength of 

 the Radical party in Denmark. The corps 

 consists of four divisions of about one hundred 

 and twenty-five men each, distributed over 

 the country in detachments of about twenty- 

 five men. They are under the direction of the 

 Minister of War. Under the provisional press- 

 law, the circulation of an American newspa- 

 per, the "Danish Pioneer," published in Oma- 

 ha, Nebr., was forbidden in September, 1886. 

 In August, 1886, a new provisional enactment 

 was decreed, holding the actual editor of a 

 newspaper responsible for its publications, and 

 providing that the property can be levied upon 

 if a fine is not paid. In October, 1886, the 

 editor of the Socialistic organ was convicted 

 under the provisional law of the previous No- 

 vember, though it had been rejected by Par- 



liament, of exciting one class against another, 

 a description of crime that was borrowed from 

 German jurisprudence. 



The Trial of Berg. During the agitation that 

 followed the unconstitutional promulgation of 

 the budget law in the spring of 1885, the Gov- 

 ernment ordered police officers to attend po- 

 litical meetings. The officers presented them- 

 selves at the assemblages of the Opposition 

 party in uniform and took their places on the 

 platform. When Herr Berg, President of the 

 Folkething and leader of the United Left, came 

 before a meeting at Holstebro, a small town in 

 Jutland, in June, 1885, he refused to speak un- 

 less the chief of police retired from the plat- 

 form. The latter refused to step down at the 

 request of the committee, and finally two of 

 them removed him by force. Berg in his ad- 

 dress affirmed that this act was perfectly legal. 

 He was arraigned with the two committee-men 

 in October before the judicial commission, un- 

 der a clause in the penal code making it crim- 

 inal to obstruct a public officer in the execu- 

 tion of his duty. All three were condemned 

 to six months' imprisonment, with common 

 prison - fare. When the Folkething reassem- 

 bled a few days later, Berg was again demon- 

 stratively voted into the chair. He had plead- 

 ed that he had not incited nor taken any part 

 in the act; yet when the case was finally de- 

 cided on appeal by the Supreme Court on the 

 llth of January, 1886, the sentence was con- 

 firmed in the case of all three of the accused. 

 The conviction of Berg was decided by the 

 casting vote of the presiding judge, the other 

 twelve being evenly divided. On January 13 

 lie announced that he would be compelled to 

 vacate his office in order to serve the criminal 

 sentence, but was re-elected by the vote of 71 

 out of the 86 deputies; yet while the Rigsdag 

 was in session he was taken to prison. Herr 

 Horup, the Vice-President, took his place as 

 Speaker, and not many days afterward was 

 himself tried for insulting the King in his 

 newspaper, and condemned to pay the costs 

 of the trial. On February 8 the Rigsdag was 

 closed, and a provisional budget for 1886-'87 

 decreed. 



Tlie Constitutional Conflict. The clause in the 

 charter empowering the Government to enact 

 provisional laws in urgent cases, when the 

 Rigsdag is not sitting, requires such laws to be 

 submitted for ratification at the next session 

 of the Legislature. The provisional money 

 bill that was promulgated by royal decree on 

 April 1, 1885, the same day on which the Rigs- 

 dag was closed by the Government, differed 

 from previous provisional finance laws in au- 

 thorizing expenditures that the Folkething had 

 objected to. In compliance with the constitu- 

 tional requirement, the ministry submitted the 

 provisional finance law of April, 1885, to the 

 Folkething, where it was rejected on Jan. 25, 

 1886. The Government then determined to 

 usurp the legislative powers, and refused to 

 recognize further acts of the Folkething. A 



