GERMANY. 



395 



the clause compelling employers to provide a 

 part of the premium, the preventive effect of 

 such a provision was urged. It would impel 

 employers, whose neglect is the frequent 

 cause of accident and sickness, to employ pre- 

 cautions for the safety and health of their 

 employes. The alternative proposal of vol- 

 untary insurance would fail altogether, be- 

 cause the working-people could not save the 

 premiums out of their wages, and the employ- 

 ers would not voluntarily contribute. By the 

 opponents of the bills it was argued that the 

 effect of the state subsidy and assessment on 

 the employers would simply be to reduce 

 wages by so much. The fate of the measures 

 depended on the course which the Center 

 party would take. With them the objections 

 against the accident -insurance bill prevailed, 

 and the subsidy provision was stricken out. 

 The bill was consequently withdrawn, to be 

 presented again in the following session. The 

 sick-insurance bill received their support, and 

 was carried by a majority rarely got together 

 in the present divided and distracted state of 

 the popular representation, showing the co- 

 gency of the various motives which actuate 

 the different parties to approve legislation for 

 the benefit of the "poor man." The vote was 

 216 to 99, the two Conservative fractions, the 

 Center, the National - Liberals, the People's 

 party, and eleven Secessionists, voting in the 

 affirmative, and the Progressists, most of the 

 members of the Liberal Union, and the Social- 

 Democrats, in the negative. The Liberals ac- 

 cuse the Chancellor of venting his antipathy 

 against the trading and manufacturing classes 

 in his legislative programme, which imposes 

 many new burdens on them, while it relieves 

 the land-owning and farming classes of a part 

 of their burdens. They made it a condition of 

 their adherence to the sick-insurance project 

 that its provisions should be extended to agri- 

 cultural laborers. An amendment to this effect 

 was added, but at the last hour it was rejected, 

 and the bill passed in almost the original shape. 

 Cabinet Changes. Surprise and a degree of 

 dissatisfaction were felt at the removals, with- 

 in a few days of each other, of the chiefs of 

 the war and naval ministries, who had held 

 their posts for ten years. The retirement of 

 Gen. von Kameke was due to a difference be- 

 tween him and the Emperor. The Progressist 

 deputies would only agree to an augmentation 

 of military pensions on the condition that offi- 

 cers should be subject to direct taxation the 

 same as civilians. The Minister of War was 

 willing to accept the compromise, but the 

 Emperor William insisted on perpetuating the 

 invidious privilege. A disagreement with the 

 Chancellor is said to have led to the resigna- 

 tion of Baron von Stosch. It was expected 

 that the place would be filled this time by a 

 naval officer, but the Emperor's predilection for 

 the military profession had again to be grati- 

 fied by the appointment of an infantry general 

 to the direction of the navy. 



Retirement of Parliamentary Leaden. During 

 the debates on the church bill Herr von Ben- 

 nigsen, leader of the National-Liberal party 

 from its foundation, discouraged by the man- 

 ner in which Prince Bismarck treated him and 

 his party after he lost their support and by 

 differences with the remnant of the great party 

 who still followed his lead, resigned his seats 

 in the Reichstag and Prussian Landtag and 

 retired from political life. Only a few months 

 before, Eduard Lasker, the other great Liberal 

 leader, had laid down his mandate and perma- 

 nently retired. 



Prossia and the Vatican. Just before the close 

 of the session the Prussian Minister of Worship, 

 Yon Gossler, introduced in the Landtag a bill 

 relaxing the May laws, which embodied the 

 concessions that the Government was willing 

 to make for the reliof of the spiritual depriva- 

 tions of the Catholic population. The bill, 

 which was passed by a majority of 224 Con- 

 servatives and Clericals to 107 Liberals and 

 Free Conservatives, fell short of the demands 

 of the Vatican, but in the minds of the Liber- 

 als imported nothing less than the penitential 

 pilgrimage to Canossa. In the negotiations 

 with the Curia since the re-establishment of 

 diplomatic relations, the fundamentally differ- 

 ent principles of the Prussian state and the 

 Papacy could not be harmonized so as to afford 

 the basis of an agreement, but a modus vivendi 

 was equally desired on both sides. On Dec. 3d, 

 1882, the Pope wrote to the Emperor William, 

 expressing his satisfaction at the reopening of 

 diplomatic intercourse by the return of the 

 Prussian legation to Rome. The Emperor's 

 reply, sent December 22d, expressed the hope 

 that such a conciliatory step would be met by 

 concessions showing a like disposition on the 

 Pope's part, and intimated that, if the Vatican 

 would agree to notify the civil authorities of 

 ecclesiastical appointments, the Government 

 would feel encouraged to move in the matter 

 of recasting the legislation which is necessary 

 to protect the rights of the state which are 

 assailed when it has to sustain a contest with 

 the Church. The Pope replied, January 30th, 

 offering a concession, viz., that the bishops 

 should thenceforward be permitted to give no- 

 tice to the Prussian Government of new ap- 

 pointments of cures, without waiting for the 

 revision of the ecclesiastical laws, imposing, 

 however, the condition that the revision should 

 be extended to the laws which impede the ex- 

 ercise of ecclesiastical duties and the training 

 of the clergy. The immediate object of the 

 negotiations was to supply pastors to the nu- 

 merous parishes which had long been bereft 

 of all cure of souls, an evil and a scandal which 

 the Government had stronger motives for reme- 

 dying than the Pope. The points in contro- 

 versy involved the three main provisions of 

 the Falk laws, which formed the subject-mat- 

 ter of the three principal acts : 1. That the ec- 

 clesiastical dignitaries should advise the pro- 

 vincial authorities of all appointments to eccle- 



