Kenyon added, "I want to say that if the price of holding my seat in the Senate is to vote for bills of this kind, the seat may go."

The Eight-Hour Law. While many friends of the eight-hour day are glad that Congress has sanctioned it in such a quasi-public industry as transportation, they resent the fact that action was taken under duress, believing that it does not represent the real sentiments of many Congressmen who voted for it. It decides by legislation questions of wages and hours in a single industry which ought to have been decided by a commission after investigation. Perhaps the most vicious thing about it is that it does not include provisions for making future general railway strikes impossible.

MIXED GOOD AND BAD ACTS

The Army Reorganization Law, generally known as the Hay Bill. Its good features are its provisions for enlistment and transference, for the payment of the expenses of the citizens' training camps, and for the creation of an officers' reserve corps. A questionable feature is the appropriation of $20,000,000 to establish a Government nitrate plant in the interest of war munitions. The bad features are, first, an insufficient increase of the regular army; and, second, the Federalizing of the militia, which makes the militia officers professional soldiers without subjecting them to the restrictions which apply to the regular army, gives them a financial interest in Federal politics because of their Federal pay, and encumbers the regular army with civilian interference. Finally, the bill wholly fails to provide for the country's greatest need, universal military training and universal military service.

The Naval Appropriation Law, carrying an appropriation of no less than $313,000,000, the largest ever made. The law provides for the construction of sixteen capital ships and a proportionate number of other necessary craft in three years; and it increases the navy's enlisted strength. It is a pity, however, that so splendid a measure should be marred by the appropriation of $11,000.000 for an unnecessary Government armor plant. The Revenue Law. Its good features are the incidental establishment of a Tariff Commission and the imposition of a duty on dyestuffs. Its questionable features are the retaliatory provisions for the unwise blacklists and the mail hold-ups by Great Britain, provisions which lodge unprecedented power in

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the President's hands. Its bad features are the doubling of the personal income tax (thus emphasizing the evils both of class legislation. and a tax on industry, not property); a Federal inheritance tax, involving conflict with the States and double taxation; and, finally, a tax on war munitions, thus discriminating against single industries. The whole bill represents an unscientific way of raising money.

The Philippines Law is commendable in spirit, but has, we think, the tendency to weaken the authority of the United States without any proportionate lessening of our responsibility.

INACTION

We commend certain inaction by Congress; for instance :

The Colombian Treaty has not been and ought never to be ratified.

The Immigration Bill has not become and ought never to become law if it contains the literacy clause which has caused President Taft and President Wilson to veto previous immigration bills.

But we disapprove certain inaction at this session; for instance:

The Corrupt Practices Bill, prohibiting the buying of votes by direct or indirect means and the contribution by corporations for political purposes, and limiting individual and campaign committee contributions.

The Conservation Bills, providing for the use of water power on public lands and on navigable streams anywhere; and for the exploration and disposition of coal, oil, gas, and phosphate lands.

The Labor Bills, particularly the Canadian Industrial Disputes Act, recommended by the President. It is to be regretted that the session could not have legislated concerning such matters as the enlargement of the Inter-State Commerce Commission, increase of freight rates, and the lodgment in the hands of the Executive of the power, in case of military necessity, to take control of such portions and rolling stock of the railways as may be required and to operate them for military purposes.

The Vocational Education Bill, giving expert advice to the States by Federal specialists in vocational, agricultural, industrial, and commercial education, and in home economics.

The Waterway Commission Bill, establishing a National River and Harbor Commission to be as responsible and effective a body as is the Inter-State Commerce Commission.