The amount

accident

The minimum indemnity against accidents comprises: (1) paid in case of in the case of wounded persons (from the commencement of the fourteenth week after the accident, that is to say, as a supplement to the sickness insurance) the expenses of medical treatment, and a payment during the period of incapacity for work up to two-thirds of the annual earnings, or free nursing in an institute until medical treatment is no longer necessary, and the same allowance to those dependent on the injured person as in case of death; (2) in case of death, funeral money to the amount of the fifteenth part of annual salary, but in any case not less than fifty marks, and for those dependent on the deceased an allowance amounting to 60 per cent of the annual wage for widow and children, and to 20 per cent of same for necessitous parents, Up to the end of 1903 more than 1,000,000,000 marks were paid in indemnities for accidents.

Insurance for

tated and aged

Insurance against disablement and old age, which was introthe incapaci- duced on the first of January, 1891, by an imperial law (revised in 1899), completes the system of workmen's insurance. The administrators of the insurance, which includes all branches of trade, are territorial insurance institutions, guaranteed by the State, whose self-administration is shared equally by the employer and employees. The insurance entitles those incapable of work to pensions without regard to age, and gives oldage pensions to septuagenarians regardless of working ability. Further it assures return of subscriptions paid by insured women who marry before receiving a pension, to widows or orphans of those insured persons who die before receiving an allowance, and to those insured who are disabled through accidents, but who do not receive a disablement allowance because of their higher accident-insurance allowance.

The funds necessary for this insurance are raised through a yearly contribution from the government of fifty marks for each pension, together with weekly contributions to an equal amount from employer and employed. The amount of the same for a definite period is so estimated in advance that the capital value of the pensions which the insurance institution must bear is covered, as well as the reimbursements of contributions and the other expenses of insurance.

The disablement-insurance scheme comprises about 13.5 million persons insured, or almost the whole of the working classes.

To the initiative of imperial social policy the blessing is therefore due that in Germany nearly all workmen are insured in case of sickness, accident, and disablement. Every day 1,250,000 marks are spent for this branch of workman's protection alone. In countries without compulsory insurance scarcely one tenth of the workmen enjoy a similar protection, and this, moreover, falls considerably short of the German workman's insurance in certainty and scope.

the amount of

In one year over five million persons in need of help received Some about 370,000,000 marks; during the whole period of seven- statistics on teen years (1885-1901) 50,000,000 persons in round numbers aid rendered (sick and injured persons, the incapacitated and their families) received indemnities amounting to 3,000,000,000 marks as a result of the legislation for the insurance of workmen, although the most far-reaching clauses of the law (insurance against disablement) only came into force on January 1, 1891. The workmen have only paid the smaller part of the contribution, and have already received about 1,000,000,000 marks more in compensation than their contributions amount to.

The significance of this insurance for German workmen Moral extends far beyond a simple financial one, for it has become benefits of working-class a social-political school for the whole nation. The importance insurance of German workmen's insurance towers far above its financial aspect. Through the mutual participation of the employer and employee in the administration and payment of contributions, the workman is himself daily reminded of the moral duty of making provision for the future from his own resources, the employers of their social duties to their employees, and both parties of their common interest in their calling. Thereby social reconciliation is effected where otherwise special organizations would array themselves against each other as antagonists. It is of great importance, moreover, that the cure of sick and disabled workmen is more rapidly effected through the erection of special institutions. Owing to the success reached through these measures, public sanitation has been directed into

Use of reserve fund for public

entirely new channels. Above everything else, the coöperati of these organizations with those of voluntary charity, esp cially with the Red Cross Society and the National Women Club, has made it possible for even the smallest and poore country parish to systematically cure the sick, and to unde take an organized campaign against that frightful nationa pestilence, tuberculosis of the lungs.

Instead of smothering the free initiative of self-helping bodies, as many had feared workmen's insurance would do it has, on the contrary, enabled them to develop to their highest powers.

The reserve capital of 1,500,000,000 marks has furnished the means for solving the most important social economical improvements questions.

Summary of advantages

Up to the end of 1902 over 400,000,000 marks had been expended from the funds of disablement-insurance institutions for the construction of workmen's dwellings, sick and convalescent houses, sanatoriums, public hospitals, homes for traveling workmen, public baths, blind asylums, kindergartens, slaughterhouses, systems of water works, sewerage and draining plants, street paving, savings banks, coöperative stores, and similar institutions for public welfare, as well as for the payment of agricultural loans (mortgages, light railroads, land and road improvement, development of cattle breeding, etc.), all measures the final aim of which is to cause the masses of the people to participate to an ever-increasing degree in the advance of civilization.

The advantages of German workmen's insurance, in distinction to other systems, is that:

1. It guarantees the support required by necessitous persons immediately, and as a well-earned right;

2. It gives both employer and employee common interests in their duties, and thereby acts in a way as an instrument of social reconciliation;

3. It awakens a feeling of social duty throughout the nation; and

4. It strengthens the working and defensive power of the nation.

Colonization

Under the newly established imperial government Germany's industry and commerce advanced with astonishing rapidity, especially after the new protective tariffs introduced in 1879.

It was not long, therefore, before the German home markets were glutted, and German merchants began to look abroad for suitable places to invest their money and develop their trade. In 1897 the murder of some German missionaries in China led the imperial government to demand that China should make reparation for the wrong, and in a speech made on the occasion of the departure of the fleet for the East, under the command of Prince Henry, the Kaiser announced that the government was ready to protect German interests in every part of the world.

on German

The voyage on which you are starting and the task you 274. Willia have to perform have nothing essentially novel about them. II's speech They are the logical consequences of the political labors of world polic my late grandfather and his great Chancellor, and of our (1897) noble father's achievements with the sword on the battlefield. They are nothing more than the first effort of the reunited and reëstablished German Empire to perform its duties across the seas. In the astonishing development of its commercial interests the empire has attained such dimensions that it is my duty to follow the new German Hansa, and to afford it the protection it has a right to demand from the empire and the emperor. Our German brethren in holy orders, who have gone out to work in peace, and who have not shrunk

from risking their lives in order to corru our religion to foreign

Rights of German traders

will be protected

Use the

necessary

and safety to these brethren, who have been repeated harassed and often hard pressed.

For this reason, the enterprise which I have intrusted to yo and which you will have to carry out conjointly with the cor rades and the ships already on the spot, is essentially of a defei sive and not of an offensive nature. Under the protecting banne of our German war flag, the rights we are justified in claimin are to be secured to German commerce, German merchants and German ships, the same rights that are accorded by foreigners to all other nations. Our commerce is not new, for the Hansa was, in old times, one of the mightiest enterprises the world has ever seen, and the German towns were able to fit out fleets such as the broad expanse of the sea had hardly ever borne before.

The Hansa decayed, however, and could not but decay, for the one condition, namely imperial protection, was wanting. Now things are altered. As the first preliminary condition, the German Empire has been created. As the second preliminary condition, German commerce is flourishing and developing, and it can develop and prosper securely only if it feels safe under the power of the empire. Imperial power means naval power, and they are so mutually dependent that the one cannot exist without the other.

As a sign of imperial and of naval power, the squadron, mailed fist if strengthened by your division, will now have to act in close intercourse and good friendship with all the comrades of the foreign fleets out there, for the protection of our home interests against everybody who tries to injure Germany. That is your vocation and your task. May it be clear to every European out there, to the German merchant, and, above all, to the foreigner whose soil we may be on, and with whom we shall have to deal, that the German Michael has planted his shield, adorned with the eagle of the empire, firmly on that soil, in order, once for all, to afford protection to those who apply to him for it. May our countrymen abroad, whether priests or merchants or of any other calling, be firmly convinced that the protection of the German Empire, as represented by the imperial ships, will be constantly afforded them.