the actual work of construction. But for the Spooner Act, which put this unprecedented discretion in the hands of the President, all this important history might not have been made. It is still true that the most effective way to construct a canal would be to leave carte blanche in the hands of the President. But Congress has now made it manifest that it will assert its usual functions and insist upon making appropriations in detail for the salary list, and upon. supervising in general most of the matters that relate to the great engineering project at the Isthmus. In making an emergency appropriation last month for current canal expenditures, various members of both houses attempted with scanty success to find scandalous extravagance in such items, for example, as the payment to engineers of the kind of salaries that first-class engineering talent everywhere commands. There will be much obstruction, but there seems to be no other way in this country to get public work done except through the haggling of committees and the bombast of parliamentary orators. There will be rough weather on Panama waters at Washington this winter, but the project will go forward nevertheless.

tained a very favorable place on the calendar of that chamber. It is true that it would be desirable to have direct steamship lines between the United States and all the South American ports, and it would be gratifying if one should find on all the seas a multitude of swift and fine merchant steamers flying the American flag. . But at present American enterprise seeks more profitable fields; and American young men are too well paid on the land to subject themselves to the hardships of a sailor's lot. Generally speaking, we hire Europeans to do our ocean freighting for us because they will do it cheaply. Instead of our losing money by not hauling our own goods to and from foreign lands, we save a great deal by getting the business done much more cheaply than we could do it ourselves. There may gradually come about a condition under which we shall build more merchant ships along our seaboard and sail more of them under the American flag. If some small and temporary encouragement can be given to aid in the starting of certain desirable lines, particularly to South American ports,-such, for example, as aid in the form of special pay for carrying the mails, there might be some benefit derived; but any large measure of pecuniary grants to steamship lines from the public treasury would be contrary to the best judgment of the country. At present the Republicans have two-thirds of the members of the House of Representatives.

If they wish to see the party proportions reversed in the elections of next November, they will leave the present Dingley tariff unmodified and add thereto a system of subsidies for steamship lines.

Reforming

The orderly and constructive mind the Consular that Secretary Root brought to bear Service. upon the immense problems that confronted him in the War Department is now shown by him in the new work of his portfolio as Secretary of State. He was immediately impressed with the fact that the State Department had no record to enlighten him as to the merits and services of the men who make up our widely scattered force of consular officers. Furthermore, he saw that no part of the public service was so subject to political pressure. Where civil service reform had prevented the use of other branches of the government service for the purpose of providing for men who wish to be supported by Uncle Sam the consular service has remained open. And so it has often happened that good consuls who would have kept their places under any proper system have been summarily removed to make room for incompetent The result men possessing political influence.

of Mr. Root's study of this subject is a bill, introduced early in December, which provides for a classification of consuls and consuls-general, seven grades being formed, with salaries ranging

members of the consular service are to be first appointed only to the lower grades, upon examination to be conducted by a special board of three members. The higher grades of the service are to be filled only by promotion. It is provided that five consular officers of high rank shall be assigned to inspection work, so that the Department of State may really know what is going on at the consulates throughout the world. An important feature of the bill requires that the clerks in the consular offices shall be Americans. The fee system is to be abolished. This measure embodies the results of the study given to the subject by Senators and others who have heretofore brought forward bills for the reform of the consular service. Mr. Root has explained and advocated the measure before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and it is greatly to be hoped that it may become a law. We have many excellent consuls already in the service to whom this measure will come as an act of recognition and justice, giving them both advancement and security.

Our

The disturbances in Russia and unImmigration easiness in other parts of eastern and Conference. southern Europe are having a marked effect upon emigration to America. For the fis cal year that ended six months ago, the number of immigrants received in this country was 1.026,499. This was the largest number ever ad

HON. FRANK P. SARGENT. (Commissioner of Immigration.)

HON. ROBERT WATCHORN.

ment of population unprecedented in the history of the world. Furthermore, the record for the past six months shows that an even larger number will probably have landed here in the year that will end on the 30th of June, 1906. By far the greatest part of last year's migration was from Austria-Hungary, Italy, and the Russian Empire. To receive into our economic and social life so large a number of aliens every year is a serious matter from many standpoints. An important national conference on the subject of immigration was held in New York last month under the auspices of the National Civic Federation. Delegates were appointed by the governors of nearly all the States, and representatives were present from various societies and organizations. All views were represented on the platform, and the conference surprised itself, at the end of its deliberations, by finding that it could agree upon a series of resolutions. It was clearly the sense of the conference that no restrictions could now feasibly be placed upon the coming here of any immigrants who could not be classified as undesirable. On the other hand, it was the strongly prevailing opinion that far more effective measures should be taken to sift the incoming hordes, so as to keep out those physically and morally unfit, and those likely, through poverty or other causes, to become public burdens. The sentiment of the conference was in general

Football and Hazing.

We publish elsewhere in this number of the REVIEW some timely contributions upon the subject of football in the colleges and other educational institutions. President Butler explains the abolition of football at Columbia. President Wheeler, of the University of California, speaks forcibly for the complete reform of the game. President Finley,' of the College of the City of New York, gives a summary of his own experiences. Dr. Sargent, the distinguished director of physical culture at Harvard University, shows how the game could be made a useful thing in a scheme of college athletics. The bad developments of football have grown chiefly out of the intensity of competition between the leading universities and colleges. The short and quick way to reform football would be to put an end for a term of years to the intercollegiate games. Spanish bullfighting is humane and refined as compared with recent American football. Even prize-fighting is conducted upon a higher plane of honor. Sensible observers have ceased to be patient with university and college authorities that have allowed their institutions to become chiefly known among large classes of the people for their success or failure in football contests. Our colleges and universities must set themselves to the complete abolition of the evils now associated with such contests as football, and of such bar

occurrences, since the opening of the present scholastic year, have shown the necessity of holding college authorities to a stricter account for their failure to check the cowardly and cruel practices that are carried on in hundreds of institutions under the generic name of hazing.

of the Insurance

Mr.

The Men The insurance investigation has made the country as familiar with the Companies. names of the leading men in the great companies as with the chief functionaries of the government at Washington. Thus, the placing of Mr. Paul Morton at the head of the Equitable was a national event. In like manner the retirement of Mr. McCurdy from the presidency of the Mutual Life becomes a household topic. His successor, previously unknown to fame, becomes at once a man of note. Charles A. Peabody, now president of the Mutual, is a New York lawyer who has been identified with large business interests. Mr. McCall is still at the head of the New York Life, but Mr. George W. Perkins, who was first vice-president and chairman of the finance committee, retired last month. He was criticised for managing the affairs of the New York Life while also a partner in the firm of J. P. Morgan & Co. He was able to show, however, that he had managed the business of the insurance company with

great success, and he retired with many compliments and the full confidence of his associates in the business world. Mr. Perkins' personal relations with some of the objectionable methods of insurance companies, such as political contributions and the like, remind one somewhat of Mr. Paul Morton's relations as a railroad man to rebates and similar objectionable practices. Both men were more or less the victims of systems for which they were not responsible, and which call for complete reform. Both men are above suspicion as respects their personal honor and integrity. Mr. Perkins remains a director in the New York Life, while his place as first vicepresident has been given to Mr. Alexander E. Orr, and the chairmanship of the finance committee to Mr. John Claflin.

ALEXANDER E. ORR. (New vice-president of the New York

Our Neighbors North

For our neighbor to the north, the year just closed has been a prosperand South. ous and important one. We present elsewhere this month a statement of Canadian progress for 1905. Agriculturally, commercially, and industrially, Canada is prospering, and her foreign commerce is increasing by leaps and bounds. To the south of us, Latin America has had, in general, a peaceful year, broken only by a few incidents like the Venezuelan difference with France, which promises to be settled amicably in the very near future; by the little flurry in Brazil over the alleged violation of international comity by the German warship Panther, in the matter of a deserter from a German vessel; and by the elections in Cuba, which passed off quietly, the withdrawal of the Liberals leaving the field clear for the Moderates, so that President Palma was reëlected by an overwhelming majority. The resignation of Mr. Herbert G. Squiers as minister to Cuba (a post to which Mr. Edwin V. Morgan, formerly our minister to Korea, was at once appointed) and the agitation of the American residents in the Isle of Pines for annexation to the United States had also been interesting features of the month in our Cuban relations.

Progress

There were a number of very sig. of the Russian nificant developments in the Russian Revolution. situation during December, which, despite the repeated rumors of a military dic tatorship and a return to the policy of repres sion, indicated, on the one hand, the awakening to a consciousness of their power on the part of the people, and on the other hand the recog nition by the governing classes of their inability to suppress Liberal Russia. The disorders at Odessa, Saratov, Kharkov, Kiev, and in Poland, serious as they have been, become comparatively insignificant when we consider the almost successful rebellion at Sevastopol and the insurrection in the Baltic provinces. As this magazine went to press the latter had progressed to such an extent that the Russian ruling classes had fled in terror and several separatist republics had been set up. Other significant events of the month were the increasing agrarian disorders ; the abrogation of martial law in Poland; several grand-ducal attempts on the life of the Czar; the assassination of former Minister of War Sakharov; the remarkable, rapid rise to power of the industrial leader who is referred to by the name of Krustalev, ending in his arrest and imprisonment by the St. Petersburg police; continued demonstration of the tremendous, well-ordered power of the Union of Unions,

frantic opposition to all labor organizations; the great strike of telegraph operators, early in December, which kept Russia isolated from the world for more than a week; the concerted campaign of the revolutionists against Russia's financial credit, the leaders advising the withdrawal of funds from savings-banks and the refusal of paper currency, resulting in the fall of Russian consols (Imperial 4's) to a point much lower than after Mukden and Tsushima, -indeed, lower than any quoted since the Russo-Turkish War; and the spread of the revolt in the army, even the Cossacks catching the fever, which spread to General Linevich's Manchurian forces, resulting in the death of forty or fifty officers and the partial destruction by fire of the city of Harbin.

Revolts at

Elsewhere.

-name

The mutiny at Sevastopol, Count Sevastopol and Witte himself admitted, must be regarded as a most serious phase of a most serious situation. It was not a violent, anarchistic outbreak, like the Odessa mutiny of several months ago, or the Kronstad outbreak of October and November. The Sevastopol mutiny was orderly and impressive. Making the same demands as every other organized body in Russia has made during the past month, ly, the realization of the reforms granted in the Czar's manifesto of October 30, the drafting of an actual constitution, and improvement in the condition of government employees, the garrison at Russia's great Crimean fortress, and the marines on the war vessels in the harbor, elected one of their most far-sighted officers, a certain Lieutenant Schmidt, to be their leader. He formulated the demands of the men, and when, at the expiration of the time limit set, the more urgent were not granted by the commandant, Schmidt opened fire on the fortress from two insurgent vessels. Some of the forts and part of the squadron, together with some of the coast artillery, returned the fire, and the mutineers finally surrendered, not until, however, they had received in their ranks a number of the officers hitherto supposed to be loyal. Schmidt's forces actually landed, maintained order, and respected the rights of others, and the whole affair indicated that the revolutionists not only have much courage, but a good deal of far-sight and brains. The disorders at Saratov and Kiev were the result, largely, either of peasant uprisings or of anti-Jewish rioting. At Odessa, many Jews were killed, while at Warsaw and at other points in the old Polish kingdom anti-Jewish demonstrations had become serious enough to make the Hebrews fear a general massacre through