Chapter 382: , Laws of 1889, to read as follows (6)

Having passed his eightieth year of life and the thirty-eighth
of his administration of the University of Michigan, President
James Burrill Angell was reluctantly permitted to retire from
active service to the University at the close of the academic
year in 1909. The acceptance of his resignation by the Regents
of the University was accompanied, however, by the tender to
him of the office of Chancellor, the duties to be such as "he
may be willing and able to perform; the salary for such office
to be $4000 per year, with house rent, light and fuel, so long
as he sees fit to occupy his present residence." Dean H. B.
Hutchins, of the law department was made acting President.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1902.
Founding of the Carnegie Institution of Washington,
for Original Research.

See (in this Volume)
SCIENCE AND INVENTION: CARNEGIE INSTITUTION.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1902-1909.
The General Education Board.
Its stupendous endowment by Mr. Rockefeller.
Its plans and operations.

The General Education Board, destined to become so great an
educational power in the United States, had its birth on the
27th of February, 1902, at a meeting in New York to which Mr.
John D. Rockefeller had invited the following named gentlemen:

William H. Baldwin, Jr.,
Wallace Buttrick,
Hon. J. L. M. Curry,
Frederick T. Gates,
Daniel C. Gilman,
Morris K. Jessup,
Robert C. Ogden,
Walter H. Page,
George Foster Peabody,
John D. Rockefeller, Jr., and
Albert Shaw;
with Edward M. Shepard as counsel.

A conception of the general plan and purpose of the Board had
been, it is said, in Mr. Rockefeller’s thought for some time
past, and his guests gave hearty approval to the project in
which he asked them to join him. Then and there they became
organized temporarily under the name still borne, Mr.
Rockefeller pledging $1,000,000 to the support of their work,
which should specially be directed at the outset to the study
and improvement of educational conditions in the Southern
States.
{214}
Offices of the Board were opened in New York April 1, 1902. It
was incorporated by Act of Congress on the 12th of January,
1903, at which time a considerable number of new members was
added to the Board, chosen from the heads of important
universities and colleges, North and South. The Board was now
in active cooperation with the United States Department of
Agriculture, whose work of scientific and systematic
instruction in agriculture, by demonstration farms and
otherwise, it found to be dealing with the most pressing of
Southern needs. It found another field of useful cooperation,
with Southern universities and colleges, in promotion of the
founding and maintaining of high schools. Its main operations
were on these lines until the summer of 1905, when, on the
30th of June, Mr. Rockefeller expanded its forces immensely by
adding $10,000,000 to his original gift of $1,000,000.

In _The Independent_ of August 6, 1908, Mr. Wallace
Buttrick, secretary of the Board, described the enlargement of
undertakings which followed this increase of endowment,
saying:

"The income of this large foundation for higher education
enabled the board to extend its work throughout the whole
country, as contemplated in its charter. Studies had already
been made of the colleges in the Southern States, and such
studies were at once made of the colleges in other parts of
the United States. After such comprehensive study and the
careful consideration of how best to aid in the development of
an adequate system of colleges in all of the States of the
Union, the board adopted the following principles as defining
its general policy: To co-operate sympathetically and
helpfully with the religious denominations; to choose the
centers of wealth and population as the permanent pivots of an
educational system; to mass its funds on endowments, securing
in this work the largest possible local co-operation."

Less than two years later, on the 7th of February, 1907, Mr.
Rockefeller nearly trebled his previous endowment by an
enormous addition to the fund in the possession of the Board,
announced in the following letter from his son, Mr. John D.
Rockefeller, Jr.:

"My father authorizes me to say that on or before April 1st,
1907, he will give to the General Education Board
income-bearing securities the present market value of which is
about thirty-two million dollars ($32,000,000), one-third to
be added to the permanent endowment of the board; two-thirds
to be applied to such specific objects within the corporate
purposes of the board as either he or I may from time to time
direct, any remainder not so designated at the death of the
survivor to be added also to the permanent endowment of the
board."

Of what was being done by the Board with this stupendous fund
Mr. Buttrick gave details in The Independent as follows:

"Conditional appropriations have been made to forty colleges,
in the States of Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York,
New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, South
Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee,
Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin,
Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas and Colorado.

"Twenty-five of these colleges have secured subscriptions for
the supplemental sums required and but one has failed. The
remaining fifteen colleges report satisfactory progress. The
total amount thus appropriated by the board is $2,437,500; the
supplemental sums, when completed, will aggregate $10,397,000.

"From the original $1,000,000 gift to the board by Mr.
Rockefeller appropriations have been made to schools in the
South amounting to about $700,000, one-half of which has gone
to schools for the colored people. The high school propaganda
and the agricultural demonstration work have also been
supported from this fund.

"From the foregoing it will be seen that, in the Northern
States, the board devotes itself exclusively to the promotion
of higher education, having always in view the desirability of
aiding such institutions as, taken together, will constitute
an adequate system of higher education for each of the several
States, thus seeking to correct and prevent duplication and
waste and securing the highest efficiency.

"In the Southern States its work for colleges is similar to
that done in the North, and, in addition, it seeks to promote
public high schools through the State universities and the
State Department of Education, to promote elementary education
(or common schools) by increasing the productive efficiency of
rural life, and to aid in developing schools for the training
of leaders among the colored people."

But Mr. Rockefeller was not yet at the end of his gifts to
this great Foundation. On the 9th of July, 1909, the following
announcement was published:

"John D. Rockefeller has raised the total of his
contributions to the Rockefeller foundation of the general
education board to $53,000,000 by a gift of $10,000,000 which
will be passed to the credit of the board between now and
August 1. He has gone farther than that and has intrusted to
the membership of the board—as it may be constituted at some
future day—the responsibility of distributing the principal
of the fund among the educational institutions of the land if
it shall be deemed advisable.

"Under the regulations at present obtaining, this power of
final disposition would extend only to $33,000,000, inasmuch
as the board holds the other $20,000,000 in trust with the
power to dispose of the income, while Mr. Rockefeller and his
son, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., retain the right to dispose of
the principal during their lives. It was said to-day that it
always has been Mr. Rockefeller’s intention to make such a
provision for the final disposition.

"In making the announcement to-day, Chairman Gates said that
this large addition to the permanent funds of the board was
contributed because the income of the present funds
immediately available for appropriation had been exhausted and
it was found necessary to have an additional income in order
to meet the needs of ‘present great importance.’

"He said the board made it a rule never to exceed the
immediately available income—which might amount to $80,000 or
$90,000 a month—in its awards to the colleges and
universities, that something like 300 applications had been
received by the board beyond the number which it already had
acted upon, which was large.

{215}

"Mr. Gates said that at the same meeting last Wednesday
another communication had been received from Mr. Rockefeller,
authorizing and empowering the board and its successors
‘whenever, in their discretion, it should seem wise to
distribute the principal of funds contributed by him to the
board upon the affirmative vote of two-thirds of all those who
shall at the time be members of the board.’"

EDUCATION: A. D. 1905-1908.
The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

After the founding of the Carnegie Institution, of Washington,
Mr. Carnegie’s next great gift to Education, made in 1905, was
in the sum of $10,000, 000, placed in the hands of trustees as
a fund the income of which may be applied "to provide retiring
pensions, without respect to race, sex, creed, or color, for
the teachers of universities, colleges, and technical schools
in the United States, the Dominion of Canada, and
Newfoundland," and "to provide for the care and maintenance of
the widows and families of the said teachers." The board of
trustees chosen by Mr. Carnegie for the administration of the
fund is made up of eminent educators from different parts of
America, with Dr. Henry S. Pritchett called from the
Presidency of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to
become its executive head. The board was organized in
November, 1905, and in the following April it adopted a plan
of administration which had been formulated meantime by a
committee from its membership. It had then, by an Act of
Congress, approved by the President, March 10, 1906, been
incorporated under the title of "The Carnegie Foundation for
the Advancement of Teaching." Besides using the words quoted
above, in description of the authorized purpose of the
Foundation, the Act of Incorporation adds furthermore that it
is "in general, to do and perform all things necessary to
encourage, uphold, and dignify the profession of the teacher
and the cause of higher education." It is a further provision
of the Act that "retiring pensions shall be paid to such
teachers only as are or have been connected with institutions
not under control of a sect, or which do not require their
trustees, their officers, faculties, or students (or a
majority thereof), to belong to any specified sect, and which
do not impose any theological test as a condition of entrance
therein or of connection therewith."

As explained by President Pritchett in an article published
soon after the organization of their board, the Trustees had
three fundamental questions to determine: "First, What is a
college? second, What constitutes denominational control? and,
third, Should a private agency step in between the State and
one of its institutions and establish a system of retiring
allowances for university professors who are officers of the
State?" "The term college is used to designate, in the United
States, Canada, and Newfoundland, institutions varying so
widely in entrance requirements, standards of instruction, and
facilities for work that the term is no description of the
character of the institution. Of the seven hundred and more
institutions calling themselves colleges or universities, many
are such in name only." To rule their present action the
Trustees adopted the definition that is "now in use under the
revised ordinances of the State of New York, and which reads
as follows: ‘An institution to be ranked as a college must
have at least six professors giving their entire time to
college and university work, a course of four full years in
liberal arts and sciences, and should require for admission
not less than the usual four years of academic or high school
preparation, or its equivalent, in addition to the
pre-academic or grammar school studies.’ The trustees will
also require that an institution, to be ranked as a college
and to be dealt with as a college officially, must have a
productive endowment of not less than $200,000."

As for the institutions to be excluded from the benefits of
the retiring pension fund because of a sectarian connection
the Trustees were confronted with a still more difficult
question, since "a large majority of all the colleges of the
country have a connection more or less strong with
denominations." In the circumstances, no hard and fast rule of
exclusion could be formulated; but, said President Pritchett,
"it is evident that in many cases colleges must choose between
the advantages of this gift and the benefits of a
denominational connection."

So far as concerned State institutions, it was the original
conclusion of the Board that "the States may fairly be
expected to provide a retiring pension system for their own
professors, and it is certainly questionable whether such
wholesale action on the part of a private agency in the
endowment of State institutions might not do them an injury
rather than a kindness." Trustees and officers of the State
Universities appealed from this view, and submitted to the
Trustees cogent reasons why these institutions should
participate in the distribution of the Fund. The Trustees
replied that the Fund was not large enough for such an
extension of its use. That objection, however, was soon
removed by Mr. Carnegie, who made it known, in April, 1908,
that he would have pleasure in adding $5,000,000 to his
original gift in order to furnish retiring allowances for all
State Universities that may apply for them. The Carnegie
Foundation is now being administered accordingly.

Retiring allowances are determined by the following rules of
the Board:

"I. In reckoning the amount of the retiring allowance, the
average salary for the last five years of active service shall
be considered the active pay.

" II. Any person sixty-five years of age, and who has had not
less than fifteen years of service as a professor, and who is
at the same time a professor in an accepted institution, shall
be entitled to an annual retiring allowance computed as
follows:

(_a_) For an active pay of sixteen hundred dollars or
less, an allowance of one thousand dollars, provided no
retiring allowance shall exceed ninety per cent. of the
active pay.

(_b_) For an active pay greater than sixteen hundred
dollars the retiring allowance shall equal one thousand
dollars, increased by fifty dollars for each one hundred
dollars of active pay in excess of sixteen hundred dollars,

(_c_) No retiring allowance shall exceed three
thousand dollars.

"III. Any person who has had a service of twenty-five years as
a professor, and who is at the time a professor in an accepted
institution, shall be entitled to a retiring allowance,
computed as follows:

(_a_) For an active pay of sixteen hundred dollars or
less, a retiring allowance of eight hundred dollars,
provided that no retiring allowance shall exceed eighty per
cent. of the active pay.

{216}

(_b_) For an active pay greater than sixteen hundred
dollars the retiring allowance shall equal eight hundred
dollars, increased by forty dollars for each one hundred
dollars of active pay in excess of sixteen hundred dollars,

(_c_) For each additional year of service above
twenty-five, the retiring allowance shall be increased by
one per cent. of the active pay.

(_d_) No retiring allowance shall exceed three
thousand dollars.

"IV. Any person who has been for ten years the wife of a
professor in actual service may receive during her widowhood
one-half of the allowance to which her husband would have been
entitled."

EDUCATION: A. D. 1906.
Change in the Headship of the Bureau of Education.

Dr. William Torrey Harris, after seventeen years of
distinguished service as United States Commissioner of
Education, accepted the first designation of a retirement
pension that was made by the trustees of the Carnegie
Foundation. Professor Elmer Ellsworth Brown, professor of the
Theory and Practice of Teaching in the University of
California, was appointed by the President to succeed him.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1906.
Celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding
of Tuskegee Institute.

The twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of Tuskegee
Normal and Industrial Institute, at Tuskegee, Alabama, by
Booker T. Washington, was celebrated in April, 1906, and made
the occasion of a notable gathering at Tuskegee of strong
friends of the institution and its founder from all parts of
the country. In _The North American Review_ of that month
Mr. Washington gave an interesting account of the rise of the
Institute from insignificant beginnings, of the aims pursued
in it and of the extent of their realization. It had sought to
promote among the negroes of the South an education which, as
he expressed it, "not only did not educate them out of
sympathy with the masses of their people, but made them
actively and practically interested in constructive methods
and work among their people." Its students "are expected to be
able to show the farmers how to buy land, to assist them by
advice in getting out of debt, and to encourage them to cease
mortgaging their crops and to take active interest in the
economic development of their community."

This wise leader and true statesman of his race has devoted
his life to the solving of the race-problem in the South on
the principle stated by him in these words: "There is nothing
for the negro to do but to remain where he is and struggle on
and up. The whole philosophy of the negro question can be
written in three words,—patience, persistence, virtue. The
really helpful thing about the situation is that on the whole
the negro has done, under the circumstances, the best he
could."

Of the planting and growth of Tuskegee Institute he wrote:
‘Starting in a shanty and a hen-house, with almost no property
beyond a hoe and a blind mule, the school has grown up
gradually, much as a town grows. We needed food for our
tables; farming, therefore, was our first industry, started to
meet this need. With the need for shelter for our students,
courses in house-building and carpentry were added. Out of
these, brick-making and brick masonry naturally grew. The
increasing demand for buildings made further specialization in
the industries necessary. Soon we found ourselves teaching
tinsmithing, plastering, and painting. Classes in cooking were
added, because we needed competent persons to prepare the
food. Courses in laundering, sewing, dining-room work, and
nurse-training have been added to meet the actual needs of the
school community. This process of specialization has continued
as the school increased in numbers, and as the more varied
wants of a larger community created a demand, and instruction
is now given in thirty-seven industries."

At the end of its first twenty-five years of existence, the
Institute has 1500 students; 156 officers, teachers, and
employees; 86 buildings; and various ramifications for
extensive work.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1906.
Segregation of Oriental children in the San Francisco schools.

See (in this Volume)
RACE PROBLEMS: UNITED STATES: A. D. 1904-1909.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1907.
Large gift for Rudimentary Schools for Southern Negroes.

A fund of $1,000,000 was created in the spring of 1907, by
gift from Miss Anna T. Jeanes, to be devoted to rudimentary
schools for Southern negroes. The fund is to be administered
by Principals Frissell, of Hampton, and Booker T. Washington,
of Tuskegee.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1907.
Re-dedication of the enlarged Carnegie Institute, at Pittsburg.

An account of the founding of the richly housed and equipped
Carnegie Library at Pittsburg, opened in 1895, is given in
Volume VI. of this work (see Libraries). To that fundamental
institution Mr. Carnegie began soon to add auxiliaries, in
technical schools, lecture hall, music hall, art galleries,
and museum of science, until a great Institute, on which no
less than $18,000,000 had been expended and bestowed by the
founder was complete. A rededication of this splendid Carnegie
Institute, in 1907, was made an impressive event by the
presence of a remarkable number of distinguished guests,
invited from Great Britain, Germany, France, Holland, Belgium,
and the United States. The interesting exercises of the
occasion were opened on the 10th of April and continued
through three days.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1909.
Wanted, in Massachusetts:
The right leader for an Educational Revolution.

The State Board of Education in Massachusetts is said to have
arrived, as a body, at the conviction, which has been taking
possession of many minds in late years, that in the whole
educational work of the present day, from primary school to
university, "there is much time wasted in learning things of
little help in after life, and failure to get the essential
character-building"; that conditions are changed so greatly
from what they were when the last great educational revolution
was led in Massachusetts by Horace Mann, and others, that a
new revolution is the imperative need of the day. Hence the
State Board of Education is reported to be searching anxiously
for a man to fill the lately created office of State
Commissioner of Education, who is equal to a revolutionary
undertaking. "He must be," says a recent Boston letter, "a
broad man, of the right sort to realize the unusual
opportunity open to-day." "There is no limit to the salary
which the board may offer." "There has been no politics in the
board, and there shall be none.
{217}
All that the Commissioner wants in the way of coöperation to
carry out his views he will have." "The board feels that this
is a crisis. If the right man can be found, the State’s system
will take a step forward toward a better practice, which shall
remove the present dissatisfaction and the feeling that the
public schools are not fitting children to be good producers
or citizens." This opening seems a great one for the right
man, if he can be found.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1909.
Election of a woman to the Superintendency of
the Chicago schools.

Mrs. Ella Flagg Young, elected Superintendent of the public
schools of Chicago by the City’s Board of Education, in July,
1909, is the first of her sex to occupy so important an
administrative position. Her election is said to have been due
entirely to her manifest superiority in qualification over
other suggested candidates. The school system she will
administer is second only in magnitude to that of the City of
New York.

EDUCATION: A. D. 1910.
Gift to Yale University by Mrs. Sage.

The following is announced from New Haven on the 10th of
January, 1910:

"The recent gift of $650,000 by Mrs. Russell Sage of New York
city for the purchase of the Hillhouse property and its
transfer free of encumbrance to Yale University releases a
corresponding amount without restriction for the use of the
university corporation. Important meetings will be held this
week, one by the board of Sheffield Scientific School trustees
and the other a special meeting of the Yale Corporation to act
upon the disposition of the funds released by the Sage gift.
It is generally understood that the plan proposed is the
erection upon the Hillhouse property of a large biological
laboratory, and perhaps the appointment in connection with it
of a university professor in biology upon a new foundation."

----------EDUCATION: End--------

EDWARD VII., King of Great Britain, &c.:
Proclamation of additional titles.

See (in this Volume)
ENGLAND: A. D. 1901 (NOVEMBER).

EDWARD VII., King of Great Britain, &c.:
His illness and deferred Coronation.

See (in this Volume)
ENGLAND: A. D. 1902 (JUNE-AUGUST).

EDWARD VII., King of Great Britain, &c.:
His agency in bringing about the Entente Cordiale between
Great Britain and France.

See (in this Volume)
EUROPE: A. D. 1904 (APRIL).

EDWARD VII., King of Great Britain, &c.:
His influence as a diplomatist.

See (in this Volume)
ENGLAND: A. D. 1908.

EDWARD VII., King of Great Britain, &c.:
His Death after a brief illness.
Succession of his son, George V.

See (in this Volume)
ENGLAND: A. D. 1910 (MAY).

EGYPT: A. D. 1901-1905.
The founding of schools for girls.
Training of native teachers.

See (in this Volume )
EDUCATION: EGYPT.

EGYPT: A. D. 1902 (DECEMBER).
Completion of the Assuan Dam.

The great Assuan Dam, to control the waters of the Nile, was
opened with formal ceremony on the 10th of December, 1902, in
the presence of the Duke and Duchess of Connaught, the
Khedive, Lord and Lady Cromer, and other distinguished
personages. Earlier in the year the value of this important
work of engineering had been enhanced by a treaty with the
Emperor of Abyssinia or Ethiopia, which forbids constructions
on the upper waters of the Nile, within the Abyssinian
territory, which would arrest the flow of their waters.

See (in this Volume)
ABYSSINIA: A. D. 1902.

EGYPT: A. D. 1904.
Declarations of England and France concerning Egypt
in the Agreements of the Entente of 1904.
Explanatory despatch.

See (in this Volume)
EUROPE: A. D. 1904 (APRIL).

EGYPT: A. D. 1905-1906.
Pan-Islamic preaching.
Pro-Turkish movement.
Turkish encroachments on the Sinai frontier.
The Tabah incident.
British fleet at Phalerum.
British garrisons reinforced.

"Whether ordered by the Sultan or the result of an instinctive
religious wave, anew and definite crusade began to affect
Egypt in the summer of 1905. Preachers appeared mysteriously
in Cairo and spread rapidly through the country, giving a new
and stricter interpretation to texts from the Koran, and
preaching in strong terms the wickedness of obeying the
infidel. These preachers mixed with the people in their houses
and cafes, and in the infinite leisure of a prosperous
Oriental country doubtless found no lack of occasion for
instilling their new doctrines. Then the Arabic native Press
began to preach the same lesson, applying it specially to the
Macedonian crisis and the piteous plight of the harassed
Sultan. A new spirit came suddenly into political controversy.
Any native defender of British rule was marked as a ‘bad
Moslem,’ or ‘a traitor to Egypt.’ Argument was impossible; for
any doubt of the Sultan was simply impiety. So the work went
on bravely through the summer and autumn of 1905, while the
British authorities looked on in surprise and perplexity.
Lonely residents up country began to notice a change in the
tone of the people. They felt the under-swell of a new and
mysterious movement of religious feeling. Europeans who
understood Arabic heard insolent remarks in the cafes as they
passed by, and doctors in charge of invalids in lonely hotels
noticed with alarm the sullen looks of their Arab servants,
and their keen excitement over the Sultan’s struggle. A spirit
of nervous apprehension began to spread abroad among
Europeans.

"Then in January, 1906, the Sultan suddenly showed his hand;
and the smouldering fire burst out into the flame of the
famous Tabah incident. The events that followed became
conspicuous to the whole world—the seizure by Turkish troops
of villages on the Egyptian side of the Sinai frontier, the
threat to fire on an Egyptian cruiser, the defiant resistance
to the English successor, the peremptory order to Egypt to
evacuate Faroun Island, and, finally, the claim of Mouktar
Pasha to a frontier-line west of Suez. The behaviour of Turkey
seemed to bear out Rudyard Kipling's description of the
ethical atmosphere that lies east of that port. Even where
‘there ain’t no ten commandments,’ indeed, the little villages
that sparkle like a grain of salt in the empty desert of the
wanderings of Israel might be thought tempting to no man. But
the line of the frontier had been drawn east of Tabah by the
treaty which established Mehemet Ali in the Khedivate in 1840
[see in Volume I. of this work, Egypt: A. D. 1840-1869], and
the claim to this limit had been prudently re-asserted by Lord
Cromer in 1892, when the present Khedive ascended the throne.
Any tampering with these written arrangements, even to the
extent of a single village, would have been the end of our
authority in Egypt. There was, therefore, no room for
compromise. If Sir Edward Grey had hesitated to force a
surrender from Turkey in May by the only possible method of
moving the fleet to Phalerum [and demanding the immediate
evacuation of Tabah], we might just as well have left the
Nile.

{218}

"For the real significance of these events lay in what was
going on in the mosques and newspapers of Egypt itself. As the
crisis grew, these voices grew more and more daring. The
preachers were as tempestuous as those who fulminated at St.
Paul’s Cross in our own Reformation times. Every move of the
Sultan in those tortuous negotiations was accompanied by an
obligato of sympathy from the Pan-Islamic Press. The native
journals in Egypt are small sheets, cheaply produced. During
the last eighteen months they multiplied exceedingly, fed by
mysterious channels. The new journals preached the new
doctrine—the doctrine of Pan-Islamism. …

"A Turkish raid on the Suez Canal or Nekl might have caused an
outburst of fanaticism in Egypt and seriously divided and
embarrassed the Army of Occupation. It was impossible to be
sure that the Egyptian army of 16,000 men, though officered by
Englishmen, could be trusted to fight against the Turks. Hence
the reinforcement of the British garrison, reduced to some
2000 men, by an addition of some 3000. These began to arrive
in May, and the agitation calmed quickly after their arrival.
They are now to stay on at the expense of Egypt. Thus the
first effect of the Sultan’s interference has been a
deplorable setback from Lord Cromer’s ideal of governing Egypt
by means of British-officered native policemen."

_Harold Spender,
England, Egypt and Turkey
(Contemporary Review, October, 1906)._

EGYPT: A. D. 1907 (January).
State of the country.
General satisfaction of the people.
The disaffected a minority.
Transformation effected by English rule.
Testimony of a French writer.

Those who know the real situation in Egypt can easily
understand how almost the whole population, with the exception
of an insignificant minority, are satisfied and desire no
change. It is enough to compare the present state of the
country—even rapidly and superficially—with that existing in
1882, to perceive the perfect satisfaction of all classes and
the greatness of the work achieved by England; and the more
profoundly this question is studied, the greater the
admiration that must be accorded to Lord Cromer and to all
those who during the past twenty-five years have worked under
his orders at the regeneration of Egypt. The situation of that
country in 1882 may be briefly summed up in the following
manner:

"The Government was then in the hands of a band of rebels at
the head of whom was the cowardly and worthless colonel,
Arabi. The exchequer was empty; Egypt owed (almost entirely to
Europe) nearly five millions sterling. The revenue was
insufficient to pay the interest on her debts, or even to meet
the expenses of government. The public works were all in such
a state of neglect and disuse as to be no longer of any
service. Commerce was paralysed and industry at the last gasp.
The fellaheen, to whose labour Egypt owes her agricultural
wealth, had stopped working, for, left at the mercy of the
Pashas, who extorted from them everything possible down to the
last farthing, they died of hunger, whether they worked or
not. If we add that their leaders told the unfortunate people
that their suffering all these privations was solely the fault
of the Christian devils who were exacting mountains of gold
from Egypt, it is easy to see that fanaticism and poverty
combined were helping to make the situation a critical one for
Europeans. It was into this fiery furnace that England entered
and France refused to follow her. …

"This is now a tale of the past, and on the curtain being
raised we behold a transformation so marvellous, so grand,
that it is almost incredible. We find Egypt rich and
prosperous; a great portion of her debt paid, an admirably
adjusted budget; her revenues increasing enormously, regularly
every year—and that in the face of large and important public
works, works which daily augment the wealth of the country.
Agriculture is advancing by leaps and bounds, while commerce
and industry develop and increase with a rapidity unparalleled
in the history of the world. A well-organised network of
railroads, steam navigation, telegraphs, telephones, and
excellently maintained canals, spreads over the country.
Schools of every kind have been opened—primary, secondary, and
higher schools, technical, commercial, and medical schools.
The fellah works quietly and happily on his land, and the
townsman is growing rich, while business prospers increasingly
from one end of the country to the other. From the mouths of
the Nile, from Alexandria to the great lakes of Central
Africa, all across Egypt, Nubia, and the Soudan, peace and
quiet reign everywhere. And—strange as it may seem—all these
results have been obtained, not by increasing the taxes, but,
on the contrary, by reducing and even in some cases abolishing
them altogether.

"In less than twenty-five years England has accomplished all
this and much more still. She has effected the marvellous
achievement of remaining in Egypt with the unanimous consent
of the Powers of Europe, to the great satisfaction of the
Egyptians themselves and the foreigners dwelling in Egypt, and
finally of living there as a friend, almost as an ally of
France! …

"The honesty of the Government in all its branches, the
impartiality with which all abuses have been punished, and
finally the honourable example which during five-and-twenty
years the English have set before the Egyptians, have
certainly borne good fruit. To be ‘honest’ is no longer an
empty expression on the banks of the Nile, and the entire
population understands to-day what that word signifies. I
think of how absolutely unknown it was in 1882! To sum up,
Egypt and the Egyptians have now become _clean_, both
physically and morally. We may say that England has cleansed
and disinfected them, externally and internally."

_A. B. de Guerville,
The Situation in Egypt
(Fortnightly Review, February, 1907)._

In his work on "Modern Egypt," published since his retirement
from the British administration in Egypt, Lord Cromer speaks
as follows of the change which has come over Egypt since the
British occupation took place. Though an interested witness,
Lord Cromer is one well trusted by the general opinion of the
world: "A new spirit," he wrote, "has been instilled into the
population of Egypt. Even the peasant has learnt to scan his
rights. Even the Pasha has learnt that others besides himself
have rights which must be respected. The courbash may hang on
the walls of the Moudirieh, but the Moudir no longer dares to
employ it on the backs of the fellaheen.
{219}
For all practical purposes, it may be said that the hateful
corvee system has disappeared. Slavery has virtually ceased to
exist. The halcyon days of the adventurer and the usurer are
past. Fiscal burthens have been greatly relieved. Everywhere
law reigns supreme. Justice is no longer bought and sold.
Nature, instead of being spurned and neglected, has been wooed
to bestow her gifts on mankind. She has responded to the
appeal. The waters of the Nile are now utilized in an
intelligent manner. Means of locomotion have been improved and
extended. The soldier has acquired some pride in the uniform
which he wears. He has fought as he never fought before. The
sick man can be nursed in a well-managed hospital. The lunatic
is no longer treated like a wild beast. The punishment awarded
to the worst criminal is no longer barbarous. Lastly, the
schoolmaster is abroad, with results which are as yet
uncertain, but which cannot fail to be important."

EGYPT: A. D. 1908.
Gordon Memorial College at Khartoum.

See (in this Volume)
EDUCATION: EGYPT.

EGYPT: A. D. 1909.
Completion of the Esneh Barrage.

See (in this Volume)
CONSERVATION OF NATURAL RESOURCES: EGYPT.

EGYPT: A. D. 1909 (May).
The Nationalist agitation, excited by the Turkish Revolution.

A correspondent of the New York _Evening Post_, writing
from London of the agitation for national independence in
Egypt, under date of May 8, 1909, remarks that it has been
affected in two ways by the recent revolutionary movements in
the East. They have "weakened as well as strengthened the
cause. For a number of half-educated native thinkers to see
Turkey with a Parliament is to make them feel they should have
one, too. The British agent points out that the youth of
Egypt, upon whom must rest all hopes of eventual autonomy, are
becoming demoralized by such propaganda. They have been
clamoring on every occasion for a Constitution." They have
been incited by a virulent press. "When, a few months ago, Mr.
Haldane announced that the British army of occupation was to
be increased to the same strength as the force in South
Africa, disgusting diatribes were indulged in against the
British army. Officers were described as monsters of low
breeding, ill manners, cowardice, and multifarious vice. As a
result of this kind of thing, and also through the pressure of
the moderate native press, the old Press law of 1881 was
revived—a law providing that after three warnings a paper may
be suspended by the Council of Ministers by an administrative
order, and not through the courts of law.

"Since then the Nationalists have arranged frequent
demonstrations, some of them resulting in encounters with the
police, which have been magnified by part of the English press
into serious riots. Serious riots are not got up by
schoolboys, who, according to the best information, seem to
have been entirely responsible for the physical part of these
demonstrations in Cairo and elsewhere. They have now been
strictly forbidden to take part in any public political
discussion."

EGYPT: A. D. 1909 (September).
Young Egypt Congress.

The party of Young Egyptians, so called, held a Congress at
Geneva in September—the second of such assemblies—which was
attended by several sympathetic members of the British
Parliament, Mr. Keir Hardie and others, representing the Labor
and Irish parties. A telegram was sent from the Congress to
the House of Commons in England, stating that the
representatives of the intellectual elements of organized
Egyptian political parties gathered in congress at Geneva on
the occasion of the anniversary of the entry of the English
troops into Cairo saluted very respectfully the
representatives of Great Britain, recalled the reiterated
promise of the British Government to evacuate Egyptian
territory, and inasmuch as the reasons given by Mr. Gladstone
for the occupation no longer existed, asked the House for the
honour of the English nation to secure the withdrawal of the
troops from Egyptian territory. A similar telegram was
despatched to the Grand Vizier, Hilmi Pasha, asking him to use
his influence with England to secure the withdrawal of the
troops.

This was sent on the 14th of September, the 27th anniversary
of the British occupation of Egypt, and on the same day the
Prime Minister of Great Britain, Mr. Asquith, received the
following telegram from Cairo:

"A meeting of 6,000 Egyptians assembled here to-day desires to
convey to your high personage the unanimous and energetic
protest of the Egyptian people against the occupation, and
from to-day demands the evacuation, relying upon the
engagements and solemn oaths of the Queen’s Governments.
Moreover, to gain our friendship is more preferable for
English honour than to lose our hearts and support."

The protest was also sent to the Grand Vizier in
Constantinople and to the Young Egypt Congress in Geneva.

EHRLICH, Paul.

See (in this Volume)
NOBEL PRIZES.

EHR-LUNG-SHAN FORT, Capture of.

See (in this Volume)
JAPAN: A. D. 1904-1905 (MAY-JANUARY).

EIGHT HOUR LABOR DAY.

See(in this Volume)
LABOR PROTECTION: HOURS OF LABOR.

ELECTIONS, Political:
Contributions from Corporations prohibited.

See (in this Volume)
UNITED STATES: A. D. 1907 (JANUARY).

----------ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Start--------

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: A. D. 1906.
Universal Suffrage adopted in Austria.

See (in this Volume)
AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: A. D. 1905-1906, and 1907.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Belgium: A. D. 1902.
Opposition to the Plural Suffrage defeated.

See (in this Volume)
BELGIUM: A. D. 1902, and 1904.

See in Volume I. of this work,
CONSTITUTION OF BELGIUM.

See in Volume VI. of this work,
BELGIUM: A. D. 1894-1895.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: China: A. D. 1908.
The Constitutional Promise.

See (in this Volume)
CHINA: A. D. 1905-1908.

{220}

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: England: A. D. 1909.
Second reading of the Representation of the People Bill,
extending the Suffrage to Women and others.

See (in this Volume)
ENGLAND: A. D. 1909 (MARCH).

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Germany: A. D. 1906.
Extensions of popular rights in some parts of the Empire.
A comedy of election reform in Prussia.

"The agitation for the extension of popular rights is vigorous
in many parts of the Empire. The Kingdom of Würtemberg has
just reformed its antique constitution by eliminating from the
Lower House the privileged members, ‘knights’ and clergymen,
and substituting members elected by popular vote. Baden has
introduced universal suffrage, and Bavaria has changed from
indirect to direct voting. In the Kingdom of Saxony, which a
decade ago remodeled its election law in a plutocratic
direction, the government is now trying to retrace its steps.
The Oldenburg government has committed itself to universal
suffrage; and in Saxe-Weimar the Liberal parties and the
Socialists have formed a compact to establish it. In the midst
of this democratic movement Prussia has just carried through a
slight revision of its election laws. …

"The government [Prussian] came forward last spring with a
scheme of election reform which is nothing short of comical in
its bureaucratic narrowness. Several huge city districts were
divided, and ten new seats in the Chamber created,—not,
however as a recognition of the rights of the urban
population, but in order to facilitate the mere formalities of
balloting. The number of electors in such districts had
outgrown the capacity of any hall to hold them."

_W. C. Dreher,
The Year in Germany
(Atlantic Monthly, November, 1906)_.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: India:
Slight exercise of local self-government.

See (in this Volume)
INDIA: A. D. 1907-1909.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: India:
Introduction of popular representation in
the Legislative Councils.

See INDIA: A. D. 1908-1909.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Persia:
Under the recent Constitution.

See (in this Volume)
CONSTITUTION OF PERSIA.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Philippine Islands.
Provisions of election law.

See (in this Volume)
PHILIPPINE ISLANDS: A. D. 1907.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Porto Rico:
Change of qualifications for the suffrage.

See (in this Volume)
PORTO RICO: A. D. 1901-1905.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Proportional Representation: England:
The subject under discussion.

The practicability and desirability of proportional
representation has been under investigation in the United
Kingdom, during 1909, by a Royal Commission, which has had
frequent sessions for hearings at Whitehall. At a hearing in
October Lord Hugh Cecil, who represents Oxford in the House of
Commons, argued with great force in favor of proportional
representation, as a means of moderating the constraint
exercised over independent opinion by party ties. He said that
the present system was not satisfactory. It greatly hindered
free discussion in the House of Commons, and tended to
exaggerate there the intensity of feeling and the rigidity of
the party system. Majorities were generally large, and often
it was merely a trial of endurance. The empty condition of the
House on many occasions proved that discussion never
influenced divisions, and there was an elimination of
independent opinion. Decisions were on party issues, except
when new subjects such as the fiscal question, were brought
forward. With smaller majorities independent opinion—specific
rather than general—would have more opportunity, and that
would be a gain. There was a growing tendency to lift foreign
politics and, to a lesser degree, Colonial politics beyond
party, and to a large extent the Government could count on the
support of moderate opponents when foreign and Colonial
matters were considered. He did not think the effect of
proportional representation would be to form any more groups
than they had at present, but his desire was that there should
be members who were not absolute party men, and independent
members would have more chance of getting returned. He
considered that desirable, and did not apprehend the return of
faddists. Even now faddists were easily elected to Parliament,
where for the most part they were disregarded. He did not
agree that practically all sections of the community were
represented under the existing system. A very large and
important section between the two parties was never
represented, having always to choose between one or the other
extreme.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: South Africa:
The Principle in Practice.

The principle of proportional representation was brought into
practice in the municipal elections of the Transvaal in
October, 1909. The Constitution of the South Africa Union,
which goes into effect in the spring of 1910, applies it,
also, to the election of senators in the Union Parliament.
"The proportional method chosen is, in each case, that of the
single transferable vote, and the Johannesburg elections will
furnish an example of the use of this system on a larger scale
than any hitherto attempted, whilst the senatorial elections
will furnish examples of its application to very small
electorates. The duty of the voter, both in the senatorial and
in the municipal elections, will be the same. He must place
the figure 1 against the candidate for whom he desires to
vote, and, in addition, he may and should place the figures 2,
3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and so on against the names of the other
candidates in the order of his preference. The numbering of
additional preferences, if not so vital as that of marking the
first choice, is of extreme importance, and the elector should
continue to indicate preferences until he has exhausted his
powers of choice. The object, in marking preferences, is to
prevent the waste of voting power. For, if the elector’s first
choice has obtained more votes than are necessary to secure
his election, or if his first choice has obtained so few votes
as to be hopelessly out of the running, the returning officer
will carry forward these votes in accordance with the wishes
expressed by the electors, as indicated by the preferences
marked. … The vote is always credited to the first choice and
is not transferred save in the contingencies named. If,
however, no effective use can be made of the vote in the
return of the elector’s first choice the returning officer, in
the absence of any instructions from the voter, will be unable
to carry the vote forward, and the vote will therefore have no
influence in determining the result of the election. Electors
should therefore exercise to the full their privilege of
marking preferences."

_The State
(South African National Magazine),
October, 1909._

{221}

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Prussia: A. D. 1909.
Rejection of proposed Reforms.

The result of new proposals for reforming the intolerable
class-system of voting in Prussia (see CONSTITUTION OF PRUSSIA
in Volume VI. of this work), proposals of more sincerity than
those of 1906, described above,—was thus reported in a Press
despatch from Berlin, January 26, 1909:

"The debate upon the motions regarding reform of the Prussian
franchise was concluded in the Lower House of the Diet to-day.
After two more speeches had been delivered the Conservatives
moved and carried the closure, and the various reform
proposals were put to the vote. All the motions were rejected.
Against most of the proposals so large a hostile majority was
shown when the Deputies were invited to rise from their seats
that no counting of votes was necessary. A motion in favour of
the substitution of direct for indirect election was rejected,
upon a division, by 168 votes against 165—a majority of three.
Upon this question, and also upon the main question—the
introduction of a universal and equal franchise with secrecy
of the ballot—most of the Centre Party Deputies voted with the
Left, and the majority consisted almost entirely of
Conservatives and Free Conservatives, who under the existing
system, possess an absolute majority in the Diet."

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Prussia: A. D. 1910.

A bill brought forward by the Government in February, 1910,
professing to reform the elective franchise, gave less than no
satisfaction to the mass of the people, who resented it as an
insult to their rights. The measure was reported to make no
change in the three-class system of voting, which ensures to
wealth its political domination, and it refused the secret
ballot. It conceded nothing of reform except a direct instead
of an indirect election of representatives, and provoked
formidable demonstrations of popular indignation in Berlin and
other cities.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Russia: A. D. 1906.
The Franchise as exercised in the election of the Dumas.

See (in this Volume)
RUSSIA: A. D. 1906 and 1907.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Sweden: A. D. 1909.
Franchise Reform Law.

See (in this Volume)
SWEDEN: A. D. 1909.

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: Turkey: A. D. 1908.
Under the Constitution regained by Revolution.

See (in this Volume)
TURKEY: A. D. 1908 (JULY-DECEMBER).

ELECTIVE FRANCHISE: United States:
Direct primary nomination of candidates.

After a long and unsatisfactory experience in the United
States of the nomination of candidates for public office by
conventions of delegates, the people have been rapidly
discarding that system within the last few years, replacing it
by the institution of primary elections, at which candidates
for the subsequent _election_ are _selected_ by
direct vote. The old delegate system tended irresistibly to
give the picking of candidates (between whom the people had
finally a narrow choice) to little handfuls of men who make
manipulative party management their main business in life,
with objects of self profit, either in money or political
power. Effective revolt against this evil-working system began
in the Western States and is now strong in the East. The
following summary statement of what it had accomplished, up to
the spring of 1909, is from a pamphlet then published by the
Citizens Union of New York City, in support of a "Direct
Primary Bill" which was pending at the time in the Legislature
of the State of New York:

"The direct primary is now the most usual system of making
nominations in the United States, and in no case has a state,
a county, or a town turned back from direct nominations to the
convention system. It is no longer an experiment, having been
tried out under varying conditions in so many states that it
is possible to be guided by experience in avoiding the dangers
of an imperfect direct primary law.

"Fourteen states [Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana,
Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma,
Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, Washington, and Wisconsin], with
a total population of 25,323,039, have _mandatory_ laws
_requiring_ the use of this plan in selecting candidates
of the principal parties for practically all offices. Three
other states [Minnesota, Ohio, Pennsylvania] have mandatory
laws covering practically all except the state offices. Five
other states [Indiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey,
Tennessee] have _mandatory_ laws covering certain
localities or offices. Five states [Alabama, Florida,
Kentucky, Michigan, Tennessee], including two of the above,
have optional laws covering practically all officers, the
provisions of which laws have been largely taken advantage of.
There are direct nominations laws of a weaker sort, some of
them of little or no value, in many other states. Party rules
have established direct nominations for at least the majority
party in nearly all of the Southern states not mentioned
above.

"About one-half of the states, including those in which the
system has been established by party rules, use direct
nominations for practically all elective offices. The states
in which the system is established by mandatory law for
practically all elective offices have about thirty per cent.
of the population of the United States.

"Of the thirty-one United States senators elected last fall,
seventeen were nominated by direct primaries. Fifteen out of
thirty-two governors of states were so nominated. There is a
strong movement for direct primaries in states which do not at
present use this system to any considerable extent, namely:
Vermont, Connecticut, New Hampshire, New York, California,
Colorado, Idaho and Utah. In New Hampshire, both Republican
and Democratic parties declared for it in their party
platforms last fall, and the Republican Governor has
recommended it to the Republican Legislature. In California,
two direct nominations laws have been passed, but declared
unconstitutional. Last fall, an amendment to the constitution
of that state permitting the legislature to enact a direct
nominations law was passed by a vote of the people.

"A brief outline of how direct nominations originated and how
the system has been extended until it has been substituted for
the convention system by a majority of the American people
furnishes a strong argument in its favor. It is an American
system, and a product of the struggle of the American people
for the control of their government.

"Direct primaries originated in Crawford County, Pennsylvania,
where the so-called Crawford County System was established by
action of a Republican County Committee in 1860 and has been
in force ever since. On two occasions, the question of whether
it should be retained was put before the Republican voters and
overwhelmingly decided in the affirmative, the last of these
votes being taken after the system had been in force for
nineteen years. Its popularity led to its adoption throughout
the entire Congressional district for all nominations.

{222}

"The Minnesota direct primary law for the city of Minneapolis,
Hennepin County, was enacted in 1899. After it had been tried
in the city for two years, public sentiment, because of the
excellent results achieved under the new law in Minneapolis,
insisted upon its being extended, and other localities were
brought within its provisions. Minnesota at present has a
mandatory state-wide law applying to practically all except
state offices. The newspapers of Minneapolis all declared for
it, and no man of prominence in the state took a stand against
it after it had been tried in the city.