public questions, attracting the keenest interest of a whole nation, hut having no relation to financial income of voters.
The European business man does not take to politics, nor does he seem to be much wanted in the political councils. There are three hundred members of the French Senate, and only forty of these are in any way connected with commerce or industry. In the French Assembly the business man is almost a total stranger. In the Reichstag at Berlin business interests are better represented, but in the parliamentary bodies at Vienna and Budapest, where sound commercial legislation is needed as much as anywhere else in Europe, there is heard only endless wrangling of many races. The conservative, sensible voice of the experienced business man is rarely heard effectively in Vienna among those diverse tongues which will unite in no phrase unless it means legislative obstruction.
The parliaments of Europe are far less representative of the people than is the case with us. Under the unfair system of apportionment in Germany and Austria a legislature representative of the people is out of the question. Emperor Willlam’s excursions into world politics would be rudely checked were his actions controlled by a Reichstag truly representative of the will of the majority of his subjects. In France the best elements of the population seem to view politics as they would a sinful occupation. The French Chamber is made up of the most voluble and least valuable elements of the nation. It has been well said that France presents the spectacle of a tranquil nation with an agitated legislature, and that in the Chamber, members freely apply such fitting epithets to one another as irresponsible, riotous, ill-mannered and incoherent, while the great majority of the people whom these men represent are peaceful, thrifty, orderly, sober, and industrious.
No single language could produce the wealth of epithets that abound among the hysterical Czechs, Croats and the dozen other races in the Parliament at Vienna. Many of these distinguished statesmen regard as the most complete political success that action which will effectually block all legislation. Political villification in the Italian Chamber has been cultivated to such a fine art that none but the bravest or the brazenest of statesmen can there be induced to take office.
When comparisons are made between America and Continental Europe, we can find much of which to be proud. Our growth, our wealth, our industries, our resources, our energy, all make flattering comparison with average European conditions. But I believe, in making such comparisons, there is no one thing of which we have the right to be more proud than of the Congress of the United States. Better than any Continental parliament, it represents the people. The one legislative body of the world that is in any way comparable to ours, is the Parliament of Great Britain. In character, intellect, methods, dignity, and in the truthfulness with which each represents the people, the British Parliament and the United States Congress stand in a class quite apart and above any of the parliaments of Continental Europe.
The parliamentary system has nowhere on the Continent developed along lines which produce the best results. The temperament of the Continental nations is not well adapted to party discipline. In a parliamentary system working at its best there must be a party of the Government and a strongly united opposition—two parties with well-defined lines of demarcation. Nowhere on the Continent does that condition exist. Political inclination there tends to the formation of many groups rather than two parties. The lines separating these groups are usually far from clear. An American must be struck by the obvious fact that seldom is the main consideration which holds a group together a distinct commercial idea or programme.
Germany in some ways is an exception. Nowhere else in the world can be found such sharp party discipline as in the Social Democratic party of Germany. Elsewhere, however, the political groups are but loosely bound together. The bonds are usually of a sentimental or racial character, or a fleeting attachment to some political leader. Plans for sound economic legislation looking toward the development of the industrial and commercial life of the nation seem not to offer sufficiently potent reasons anywhere in Europe for holding together a political party. In England, at the moment, there is a sensational exception. Mr. Chamberlain’s fiscal policy, a