Bancroft Davis to The exchange of ratifications took place in Berlin, April 30, 1877

No. 114. Mr. Davis to Mr. Evarts.

Sir: My immediate predecessor, in his No. 221, dated May 6, 1871, transmitted to the Department a copy of the constitution which had been framed for Germany. This document was translated, and was printed in the “Foreign Relations” for 1871. Since that time several amendments have been made to it, which fact seems to make it advisable that a revised translation should be transmitted to the Department. This I now do.

The subjects on which the Imperial Parliament is authorized to legislate are enumerated in article 4, in sixteen divisions. I propose in this dispatch to briefly refer to the more important of the laws which have been already enacted to carry the constitutional provisions into effect, taking the subjects in their order in the instrument.

1. Under the powers conferred by the first clause many important laws have been enacted. Indeed, most of the laws regulating the relations of individuals toward each other, and toward the state (so far as they do not relate to criminal offenses or to judicial proceedings), and the laws for the regulation of trade and commerce and the employment of labor, may be said to be connected with the grants of power under this clause, although most of them flow more directly from the grants under the thirteenth clause. For convenience, and in order to show the general harmony of this class of legislation, as well as its breadth, I group together here some of the measures which should more properly be stated at a later stage among the remarks concerning clause 13.

A uniform age for majority has been prescribed throughout the empire. The contract of marriage must everywhere be made before a civil magistrate. Freedom of worship is guaranteed to all. The law of bills of exchange, of contracts, of bailments, of partnerships, general and special, of joint-stock companies, of bankruptcy, and of interest, has been unified and codified. A commercial code has been enacted, in which the title of merchant has been defined, and rules have been prescribed, in order to determine whom the law will and whom it will not regard as such. It also prescribes what commercial books are to be kept by a merchant, and defines the duties and powers of his various subordinates. The employment of labor is regulated by comprehensive laws. They require certain occupations to be licensed, regulate peddling, and public markets, and trade guilds; tell who is regarded as an assistant, who as an apprentice, who as a master workman, and who as a master, and what are the rights and duties of each; make provisions respecting factory laborers, provide for the examination of seamen on merchant ships, of physicians, of dentists, of veterinary surgeons, of apothecaries, and in fact seem to penetrate into most of the relations of society; even the newspapers do not enjoy immunity, but are subject to a severe press law.

While I have been writing this dispatch the Reichstag has discussed and disposed of a variety of proposals for amending the “Gewerbe Ordnung,” the mere enumeration of which will show how wide is the admitted jurisdiction of the imperial parliament over this class of questions.

• The conservatives propose to require each operative to have a book in which is to be inscribed the names and places of his employers from time to time, and the period of each employment, and to amend the laws relating to apprentices.
• The Centrum (ultramontanes) propose to amend by inscribing provisions for the protection of the religious life of laborers, for preserving quiet on Sundays, for the regulation of apprenticeships, for imposing restrictions on the freedom of carrying on trade, for the prevention of the employment of children, for limiting the length of a day’s work by women, for the establishment of trade-courts of arbitration, for the further regulation of trades requiring licenses, and for the regulation of kins and bar-rooms
• The National Liberals propose to amend the apprentice laws, with a view to provide for continuing the relation between master and apprentice, and also to establish trade-courts of arbitration.
• The Fortschritt or Party of Progress propose to amend the apprentice laws by providing for the moral training of apprentices, and also to establish trade-courts of arbitration.
• The Social Democrats propose extensive amendments in order to prevent the manufacture in penitentiaries of articles for sale, to establish ten hours the legal day’s work for men, and eight hours for women and youth; to prevent the employment of children; to make night and Sunday work illegal; to amend the apprentice laws, and to provide for the appointment of imperial factory inspectors, and for the formation of trade-courts of arbitration.

These various proposals have been referred by the Reichstag to a committee of twenty-one members, to report at a future session. It is certain that not all will be adopted; quite possible that none will be. The fact, however, that they are suggested from such opposite quarters shows how deeply the idea of unity and of the endowment of imperial power and functions upon the national legislature has sunk in the popular heart. No rank of life, no condition of man, whether in relation to his fellow-man or to the State, is free from the influence of such legislation.

The laws which provide for a careful inspection of emigration, and which assume to regulate and control it, are mainly founded upon the powers contained in the same clause. It has already been observed that, as in the case of our own legislation, many laws may fairly claim to be derived from more than one provision of the constitution. Thus the imperial laws relating to domicile and residence may, in one aspect, be regarded as the exercise of the powers derived from the first clause of article 4, and in another aspect as the exercise of the powers derived from the fourteenth clause. So, too, the stringent statute relating to vaccination and other sanitary laws, the despotic power conferred upon the imperial chancery for the suppression of the rinderpest and the destruction of noxious insects, the laws already referred to respecting commerce and trade; respecting physicians, surgeons, veterinary surgeons, dentists, and apothecaries, and other similar statutes, may be traced to more than one grant of authority in the constitution.

2. Customs duties and imposts are collected under imperial laws. Mr. Wheaton, in the first dispatch which he wrote from Berlin, dated June 12, 1835, thus referred, to the Zollverein then in force:

The Prussian commercial confederacy includes a population of more than twenty millions of industrious, active, and intelligent people, speaking the same language, but inhabiting countries various in their climates, soil, and productions, but nearly all richly endowed with the bounties of Providence. It is impossible not to conclude that the formation of this separate union in the bosom of the German Confederation is designed to augment, and must contribute to augment, the political power and influence of Prussia. Prussian custom-house regulations must ultimately be followed by the introduction of the Prussian monetary system, Prussian post-offices and post-roads, Prussian weights and measures. It is also difficult to believe that a power so jealously alive as Austria to its general interests would suffer her ancient rival thus to aggrandize herself in Germany, and prepare the way for the absorption of its smaller states into the Prussian monarchy on some future favorable occasion, if the Austrian cabinet had not received satisfactory assurances of being allowed to assert its supremacy in Italy.

The political causes thus assigned for the course of Austria have passed into history as completely as the causes of the crusades; but the laws and institutions which I am attempting to depict are the legitimate results of influences which attracted the statesmanlike eye of Mr. Wheaton forty years ago, and remain vigorous as ever.

Although the customs taxes are imposed under federal laws, they are collected by state officers, and the collecting state accounts to the empire for the tax. Practically Prussia is much the largest collector.

It will be seen hereafter that this administrative system runs through all German institutions. In all the measures which tend to make Berlin the center of authority for Germany, the legislation is centripetal, or, as a German would say, unifying, and the administration is centrifugal or sectional.

3. A uniform system of weights and measures has been adopted throughout Germany, and an entirely new system of coinage, based upon the old Prussian Vereins thaler and groschen system. Ten pfennigs make a groschen, which, however, as a distinct name for a coin, has disappeared, and the coin is known in the new coinage as ten pfennigs. Ten of these pieces make a mark, of about the value of a quarter of a dollar, and ten marks make a crown. The limited paper circulation which is permitted is issued by the bank of the empire, under imperial law. The executive administration of the mints, like that of the custom, is done by state officials.

4. An imperial bank has been created, which went into effect on the 1st of January, 1876. With it the Bank of Prussia disappeared. Nearly simultaneously with the law for the creation of this institution a general law (Bankgesetz) was passed for the regulation of banking, in execution of the fourth clause in article 4.

5. No patent law has yet been passed. The subject is in the hands of a commission, which is expected to make an early report.

6. The protection of copy-right—Imperial laws have been enacted, not only for the protection of literary works, but also for protecting property in works of art and imagination, of photographs, of patterns, and of models.

7. General navigation laws have been passed providing for the registration of vessels, and for the mode of proof of their nationality for the use of the flag, and with such other provisions as are usual and necessary in that class of laws. Provision has also been made for a general consular representation of the empire. The several states of the empire still maintain the right of a consular and diplomatic representation as between themselves. Thus, most of the German powers maintain ministers here, and several maintain consuls at the free ports. Some of them also have reserved the right of a diplomatic representation abroad, which right is of little value, since diplomacy without an army is a shadow without substance. The right of consular representation abroad is in the empire; but, by a singular contradiction, the assent of the local government here is held to be essential for the recognition of a consul in Germany.

8. Communication by land and water.—An imperial railway bureau has been organized, and there has been some legislation respecting traveling by rail and the protection of passengers, and the modes of remedy or compensation in case of injury or loss of life. Imperial military railways are also in the process of construction between Berlin and the French frontier. But the great power conferred by the eighth clause to acquire the roads within the empire, and to work them for its benefit, is still in abeyance.

9. The several subjects referred to in clause nine would seem to belong exclusively to imperial legislation, since, in the absence of a common legislature, they would naturally form the subject of international agreement.

10. The rates of postage and of telegrams are uniform throughout the empire, except that Bavaria and Würtemberg can each within its own limits fix the rates of internal postage. With the exception of these two states, the office is managed and the revenue collected by the postmaster-general. This office is an exception to the general rule of local state administration under imperial law.

11 and 12. Laws have been enacted for the enforcement of foreign judgments. Some provisions have also been made by regulation for the extradition of criminals. As between the different states of Germany, the matters referred to in clauses 11 and 12 are mainly regulated by internal arrangements between the respective states. With foreign states they are, in most cases, regulated by treaties.

13. The thirteenth is a sweeping clause—far more sweeping than the similar provisions in the Constitution of the United States. It authorizes the Reichstag to legislate for Germany respecting (1) the whole civil law, (2) criminal law, and (3) judicial proceedings. The first power embraces much that has already been referred to in the first subdivision in this dispatch; the second authorizes the legislature to unify the classification of offenses and their punishment throughout the empire; and the third conveys a like authority with respect to judicial proceedings of every kind.

With reference to the civil law, I have already referred to the finished codifications of commercial law. Other codes are still in course of preparation. A commission has been charged with the framing of a bill, which, as to real estate, is intended at no distant day to assimilate throughout Germany the laws concerning the tenure and transmission of that species of property. It is also contemplated to enact general provisions respecting the acquisition and distribution of personal property, so that property-holders throughout the empire will come to look upon the federal authority as the guardian of their possessions. Thus, in these important matters, unity of law and of system is already established in a large degree throughout Germany, and active measures are in progress for completing that unity.

The power to establish a uniform system of criminal legislation for the empire has been exercised. The “Strafgesetz,” like several other laws, was in fact worked up by the legislature of the North German Union, and their work was adopted by the empire. The original law has, however, been much amended. My Nos. 258, 274, and 280 refer to an extensive amendment which was made to the law about a year ago.

With this brief sketch of the legislation as to other powers conferred by paragraph 13, we come to consider the laws for the administration of justice. The present system of courts includes a system of commercial courts (Handelsgericht), and there exists at Leipzig a supreme court of this class (Oberhandelsgericht) for the empire. These courts are to be absorbed in the new courts when the new system comes in force, which is not to be later than October 1, 1879. The “Reichsjustizgesetze” include four statutes, which provide a uniform system of proceedings throughout the empire. The “Strafprozessordnung” gives a uniform system of proceedings for the punishment of crimes; the “Civilprozessordnung” a uniform system of proceedings in civil matters; and the “Konkursordnung” a uniform system of bankruptcy. The “Gerichtsverfassungsgesetz” strikes at the root of the conflicting systems of jurisprudence, and establishes throughout Germany a new system, based upon the Hanoverian.

The present mode of administering law throughout Germany is, with some exceptions which I shall notice, not very different in the different states. To explain its practical operations, I will endeavor to describe the Prussian system of administering justice which the new law displaces. It is, in most respects, unlike our own, and unlike the English system on which ours was originally framed. It also bears little resemblance to the French reflex of Roman law, which has been the model of many modifications in our original system.

When I speak of the Prussian system, I mean the one which prevails in most of what is known as Prussia. The modern Prussia is largely a creation by conquest, and there are parts of the kingdom in which the legal systems of the parent monarchy have never taken root. The laws and forms of Prussia proper obtain in the two Prussias, in Brandenburg, in Pomerania, in Posen, in Silesia, in the most of Westphalia, in a part of the Rhine country, and in the two Hohenzollerns. These are the laws and forms to which I refer as Prussian.

The courts in these provinces of Prussia are distinguished from our own courts, and from the courts of most other countries, in three ways:

• The bar is not an open bar, accessible to all who acquire the requisite learning and possess the proper moral qualities. On the contrary, it is a small and closely restricted body, much less in number than the court before which it practices. Within the Prussian territory where the system prevails, there are 3,158 judges and 1,106 lawyers.
• The bench is not fed from the bar. This would seem to follow from the figures which I have given. Each is a distinct career. Young men enter the one or the other at the commencement of their business lives, and are seldom transferred from one to the other. Official transfers are practically made more often from the bench to the bar than the reverse. This is because both positions are under government control, and the bar is much the more profitable of the two. As an offset to this the judge has a good social position, but the lawyer has no recognized social position among the ruling classes.
• The judges are paid in two ways: first, by a small and quite inadequate salary; and, second, by gratuities, which are given by the minister of justice of the day, in order to enable them to meet extraordinary expenses which they may have been obliged to incur personally, or in their families. The amount of the first is graded to the necessities of the cheapest man. The second is intended to equalize the condition of judges by enabling the man who incurs unusually heavy expenses by reason of a large family, or other meritorious cause, to meet them and to enjoy the same freedom as his colleague who does not incur such expenses. To the first sum the judge has a right in every contingency; for the second, he is dependent upon the good-will of the political minister of the day.

The course of preparation for the future judge and the future attorney in these Prussian states is identical. To fit himself for either place the candidate must attend a course of lectures as a student of law in the university, and in order to do that, he must first have graduated at a “gymnasium.” The gymnasium is a public school of the highest character maintained under general and obligatory provisions of law, and superior to many and equal to most American colleges. It takes the pupil at an age when he is fitted to enter on the classics, and it provides for him a systematic course of instruction in classics, history, and the natural sciences. If the pupil passes the rigid examination at its close, he may be fairly regarded as a Bachelor of Arts in the fittest sense of the term.

The student of law attends the university lectures for three years. He then submits himself to an examination, in order to determine whether he is qualified to act as an assistant to the courts, and if he passes the examination he receives an appointment as referendarius. This entitles him to commence practice, but not yet as an attorney. He can only act as an assistant to the courts, or as a clerk in an attorney’s office. He spends four years in this capacity before he is entitled to present himself for the second examination. This passed, he may be called to the bar or the bench. He then inscribes his name on the list of candidates for the career which he may elect, whether as a judge or as an attorney, and he awaits in patience an appointment to the desired place by the minister of justice. He will probably have to wait years for it; but, meanwhile, if he is to be called to the bar he will act as an assistant in the offices of other attorneys, or of the public prosecutors; or, if he is to sit upon the bench, he will serve an apprenticeship as an assistant in the courts. Until he is appointed to a vacancy at the bar he cannot appear in court. When once appointed he takes the title of Eeehtsanwalt, and becomes both barrister and attorney.

If he is made a judge he is first appointed to the lowest court, called, in cities of 50,000 inhabitants, the Stadtgericht, and elsewhere the Kreisgericht. Here he must serve at least four years, when he will be qualified to be promoted to the court of appeals, of which there are twenty-one in those portions of Prussia. The supreme court of Prussia is the highest judicial post. It consists of a president, five vice-presidents, and sixty-two judges, and has no original jurisdiction. To this post a judge can aspire when he has served four years either as a member of a court of appeals, or as a director in a Stadt or Kreisgerieht.

The system which thus obtains in the most of Prussia also prevails, with more or less modifications, in Saxony, Bavaria, and Baden. Würtemberg has an antique system of its own, unlike anything else in Germany. In some parts of the Rhine provinces the forms which were assumed at the time of their connection with France are still preserved. We are now in a position to appreciate the features of the system which the new code is to extend over Germany.

And first, no provision is made respecting the qualifications and mode of appointment of attorneys. For the present this remains a subject of state legislation. The Reichstag could not agree upon a system. The law-reformers, headed by Professor Gneist, wished to follow the example of England and America in an open bar; but the combined influence of the several ministers of justice of the individual states, who were averse to surrender valuable patronage, and of some lawyers in the house, who did not wish to open their close body to competition (although it would be very unjust to make this imputation against them as a class), was too much for the reformers. The subject, however, is not abandoned. The Reichsjustizant is preparing a bill, which will probably be introduced at the next session of the Reichstag. It is understood to be based upon the principle of freedom of the bar, with the exception of the Reichsgericht.

The bench, however, throughout Germany, is to be recast in the iron mold of the imperial Justizgesetz. In each state there are to be hereafter Amtsgerichte, Landesgerichte, and Oberlandesgerichte, whose grade ascends in the order thus stated, and whose functions and powers, defined and regulated by imperial law, are to be uniform in all the states. Each state in which there is more than one Oberlandesgericht, with the exception of Saxony (that is, Prussia, Bavaria, Würtemberg, and Baden), can have a supreme court. Saxony does not have this privilege, because the seat of the imperial Reichsgericht is at Leipsig. I am told that Prussia also intends to do away with its supreme court. An imperial supreme court (Reichsgericht) is established, which is to be superior to all these courts on all questions which are properly referable to it. It is also to act as a general appellate court for the states which have no supreme court; and for the great states which have supreme courts it is an appellate court in causes involving imperial rights or the construction of imperial laws, and for judgments in criminal proceedings. The judges of the state courts are to be appointed by state authority; those of the Reichsgericht by the Emperor, on the nomination of the Bundesrath. In passing the bill it was well considered where the power of this nomination should be placed, and it was thought wisest to reserve a power so essentially federal to the body representing the several state sovereignties.

The avenue to the bench under the new law resembles that already described. Few departures from it are essential. The attendance in the university preliminary to the first examination is fixed at three years, of which a year and a half may be spent at a non-German university. Before the second examination can be passed three more years must have been spent in actual service in the courts or in an attorney’s office. The original draught of the bill did not contain these provisions, but left each state free to determine for itself the standard of qualification for its own judges. The change was proposed in the Reichstag. It was resisted on the ground that the constitution does not empower the federal legislature to impose such conditions on the individual states, but the opposition was unsuccessful.

When a candidate passes his first examination in one state he may complete his course and pass his second examination in another state, if he wishes, and when once qualified he may be appointed as a judge in any state without reference to local law respecting qualifications. This overrides all conflicting provisions of Prussian law to which I have alluded.

All judges are to be appointed for life, and are to be removed only for cause. They cannot be transferred from one court to another against their will. If their services are dispensed with, without removal, their pay continues. The salary is fixed, with no contingent fees, but they are to receive gratuities, as Prussian judges do. The reformers attempted, but without success, to prevent the giving gratuities. They also tried, with equal want of success, to prevent the bestowal of decorations on judges. The decoration being an ornament much prized by a German, they reasoned that it might be made a means of influence.

The life-tenure of office and other like provisions were resisted by the advocates of states-rights. The Saxon minister of justice said:

The application and execution of imperial law, when the imperial constitution does not make an exceptional provision, belong to the several states and their officials. The latter are responsible only to their own governments, even when they execute imperial laws. The relation between the sovereign state and its official is cut to the root if the duration of their connection is to be regulated by imperial legislation. If the state is to be no longer independent in regulating the personal service of its own officers, if the state official in his relation to the state is to be severed from state law, if the wishes, the expectations, and even the complaints of an official who is dissatisfied are to be directed to a power and watched by a surveillance outside the state, the consequences of such a state of things cannot be foreseen. The first step of the imperial legislature in this direction is a great infringement of the rights of the several states, which, in the opinion of the Saxon Government, they ought not to surrender.

* * * * * * *

I am of the opinion that if the relation between the state and its judicial officers is severed, little more than the name and the glory remain.

To this Professor Gneist (who was one of the commission by whom the bill was prepared) replied:

If our unity in the German Empire is not to permit us to say to-day, as we have said for a thousand years past, that to a properly constituted court belong certain qualifications essential for the guarantee of its independence, then, gentlemen, let us spare ourselves these laws, for without this guarantee all judiciary laws are worthless.

The house concurred with Professor Gneist by a large majority.

It would be presumptuous in me to attempt to point out to a states-man of your experience the far-reaching influence of such legislation. I permit myself only to refer again to the fact that, while the legislation is centralizing, in so far as the courts are created and the functions of its officers are defined by imperial law, those officers are to be appointed and paid by the executives of the individual states.

14. The imperial army and navy.—There are many constitutional provisions on this subject. Every German, of every rank of life, is liable to perform military duty. In time of peace the army is fixed at 1 per centum of the population, as it was in 1867. The expense of the army is defrayed from the federal chest. It is under the command of the Emperor, to whom an oath of allegiance is taken.

The laws passed in accordance with the provisions of the constitution have further provided that every German, on arriving at the age of eighteen years, is deemed to be under military authority, and cannot emigrate without permission. If he has not volunteered to do military duty before the 1st of January next following the completion of his twentieth year, he must then present himself for active service, which lasts three years. Then he is three years in the reserves and five in the landwehr. His name then stands on the landsturm rolls until he is forty three years of age.

These provisions are varied by conventions prior to the constitution. The result of the conventions and of the imperial laws was stated in my No. 440, to which I beg to refer in case statements more detailed than the following are desired.

The entire army of the empire is required to be organized on the Prussian system, and to be maintained up to the Prussian standard. In order to assure this, the highest army officials have the right to test the contingents from the non-Prussian states, and to correct deviations from the Prussian standard.

The contingents from the two Mecklenburgs, Oldenburg, Hamburg, Lippe, Lübeek, Bremen, Schwarzburg Sonderhausen, Lippe-Schaum-burg, and Waldeck are incorporated in the Prussian contingent, the several sovereigns serving ordinarily as officers in the Prussian army, and reserving to themselves only the right of conferring honorary distinctions. The Thuringian duchies each raises its own contingent, which is registered and numbered in the Prussian army, but remains at home when not actually required for service. When called into imperial service it is officered by the King of Prussia, and is regarded as part of the Prussian army. The grand duchies of Baden and Hesse each maintains an army corps strictly subject to the provisions of the imperial constitution. Practically the King of Prussia, as Emperor, moves Baden officers into Prussia, and vice versa. This cannot be done with Saxony, which enjoys entire freedom in its military organization, subject only to the obligation to pay into the imperial treasury any surplus out of the proportion allowed for its contingent. Every Saxon general is obliged to send a written oath to the Emperor that he will hold his command only in conformity with the Emperor’s orders. The officers of the Würtemberg contingent swear obedience to the Emperor, but their King is not obliged to account to the Emperor for any saving there may be in maintaining his contingent. Bavaria maintains her own army, regulates its rate of expenditure, and retains her own military laws, subject to the obligation to adopt the Prussian system. The military oath of obedience to the Emperor is taken in time of war.

Under the system and regulation which existed during the war with France, 3.87 per centum of the Prussian group of states-—3.13 of that of Bavaria, 2.762 of that of Saxony and 2.356 of that of Würtemberg were called into active service. Since that time imperial legislation has increased the amount of the available force and the facility for mobilizing it, and has placed it under a central will in Berlin.

It seems hardly necessary to say that the small but efficient navy is a thing of imperial creation. It did not practically exist until the possession of Kiel gave a naval station to Prussia. Its expense is defrayed from the imperial budget, and it is under the Emperor, as Emperor, and not as King of Prussia. Prussia, indeed, attempted, in 1849, to have a navy, and decreed upon paper, in 1852, that a naval station should be made at Wilhelmshafen, but little was done on either the navy or the post until 1871.

15. Surveillance of the medical and verterinary professions; and,

16. The press, associations, &c.—I have already had occasion to refer to the laws enacted under these grants of power, and it is unnecessary to say more about them.

This dispatch would be incomplete without a reference to the executive and administrative machinery of the empire. If this machinery is crude, and to some extent undefined in its functions and purposes, and if the incumbents can scarcely yet be said to deserve the name of ministers, these facts can be fully accounted for by the anomalous position of the latter. The King of Prussia is at once King and Emperor. His Prussian ministers still hold their portfolios in Berlin, and some of them are at once Prussian and imperial officers. The Prussian minister is still, as he has ever been, the personal servant of the sovereign, responsible only to him, and having no responsibility to or for the other ministers. It is quite natural that the imperial system should partake of the nature of the parent system upon which it is formed. But though as yet no imperial ministry exists in the common acceptation of that term, there are executive officers charged with important trusts who may, in time, expand into a responsible constitutional ministry. There are the imperial chancery, with its president and its two directors, and the imperial post and telegraph office, and the imperial office of justice, and the sanitary office, and the office for the administration of the invalid funds. In view of the varied legislation above referred to, it will be seen that these offices (or departments, as we should call them) are already charged with plenty of business.

The federal legislation of Germany during the past ten years, first in the Parliament of North Germany and afterward in the Parliament of the empire, by the diligence with which it has been prosecuted, reminds one of the early legislation of the United States. But here the resemblance ceases; for the subjects with which the German legislators have dealt go far wider in extent and far deeper into the social structure than the subjects which occupied the attention of our early Congresses. I think that even the very imperfect and summary review of their work which I have made justifies me in the conviction that the learned and far-seeing statesmen who are patiently building up the structure of German unity are founding an empire which will be able to resist internal shocks and dissensions, whatever may be its fate when it has to face a military attack from without.

I have, &c.,

CONSTITUTION OF THE GERMAN EMPIRE.

We, William, by the grace of God German Emperor, King of Prussia, &c., do hereby ordain, in the name of the German Empire, with the consent of the Bundesrath (federal council) and the Reichstag (diet), as follows:

§ 1. Instead of the constitution of the Germanic Confederation, adopted by the North German Union and the Grand Duchies of Baden and Hesse (Bundesgesetzblatt for 1870, p. 627 et seq.), and instead of the treaties concluded with the kingdoms of Bavaria and Würtemberg with regard to their adoption of that constitution, said treaties bearing date November 23 and 25, 1870 (Bundesgesetzblatt of the year 1871, p. 9, et seq., and of the year 1870, p. 654, et seq.) the annexed constitution for the German Empire is adopted.

§ 2. The provisions of article 80 of the constitution of the Germanic Confederation mentioned in section 1 (Bundesgesetzblatt of the year 1870, p. 647); of part III, section 8, of the treaty with Bavaria of November 23, 1870, (Bundesgesetzblatt of the year 1871, p. 21, seq.); and of article 2, No. 6, of the treaty with Würtemberg of November 25, 1870. (Bundesgesetzblatto of the year 1870, p. 656), in relation to the adoption of the laws of the North German Union in those states, remain in force.

The laws therein referred to are laws of the Empire. Where reference is made in them to the North German Union, its constitution, territory, members, or states, citizenship, constitutional organs, citizens, officers, flag, &c., the German Empire and its respective belongings are to be understood.

The case is the same with regard to such laws of the North German Union as shall hereafter be adopted in any of the aforesaid states.

§ 3. The agreements in the protocol adopted at Versailles on the 15th of November, 1870, (Bundesgesetzblatt for 1870, p. 650); in the negotiations at Berlin, November 25, 1870, (Bundesgesetzblatt for 1870, p. 657); in the final protocol of November 25, 1870, (Bundesgesetzblatt for 1871, p.23, seq.); as well as those under IV of the treaty with Bavaria, of November 25, 1870, shall not be affected by the present law.

In witness, &c.

Done, &c.

CONSTITUTION OF THE GERMAN EMPIRE.

His Majesty the King of Prussia, in the name of the North German Union, His Majesty the King of Bavaria, His Majesty the King of Würtemberg, His Royal Highness, the Grand Duke of Baden, and His Royal Highness the Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine for those parts of the Grand Duchy of Hesse which are situated south of the Main, conclude an eternal Bund (union) for the protection of the territory of the Union, and of the laws of the same, as well as for the promotion of the welfare of the German people.

This union shall bear the name of the German Empire, and shall have the following constitution:

I.—Territory.

Article 1. The territory of the Union shall consist of the states of Prussia, with Lauenburg, Bavaria, Saxony Würtemberg, Baden, Hesse, Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Saxe-Weimar, Meeklenburg-Strelitz, Oldenburg, Brunswick, Saxe-Meiningen, Saxe-Altenburg, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Anhalt, Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt, Schwarzburg-Sonders-hausen, Waldeck, Reuss of the elder branch, Reuss of the younger branch, Schauniburg-Lippe, Lippe, Lttbeck, Bremen, and Hamburg.

II.—Legislation of the Empire.

Article 2. Within this territory the Empire shall have the right of legislation according to the provisions of this constitution, and the laws of the Empire shall take precedence of those of each individual state. The laws of the Empire Shall be rendered binding by imperial proclamation, such proclamation to be published in a journal devoted to the publication of the laws of the Empire (Reichsgesetzblatt). If no other period shall be designated in the published law for it to take effect, it shall take effect on the fourteenth day after the day of its publication in the law-journal at Berlin.

Article 3. There is one citizenship for all Germany, and the citizens or subjects of each state of the federation shall be treated in every other state thereof as natives, and shall have the right of becoming permanent residents, of carrying on business, of filling public offices, of acquiring real estate and citizenship of the several states, and may acquire all civil rights on the same conditions as those born in the state, and shall also have the same usage as regards civil prosecutions and the protection of the laws.

No German shall be limited, in the exercise of this privilege, by the authorities of his native state or by the authorities of any other state of the Union.

The regulations governing the care of paupers and their admission into the various municipal or communal organizations are not affected by the principle enunciated in the first paragraph.

In like manner those treaties shall remain in force until further provided which have been concluded between the various states of the Union in relation to the reception of persons who are to be banished, the care of sick, and the burial of deceased citizens.

With regard to the rendering of military service to the various states, the necessary imperial laws will be passed hereafter.

All Germans shall have equal claims upon the protection of the Empire against foreign countries.

Article 4. The following matters shall be under the supervision of the Empire and its legislature:

• Provisions concerning freedom of trade, domicile and residence; the right of citizenship; the issuing and examination of passports; surveillance of foreigners and of trades and occupations, including insurance, so far as these matters are not already provided for by article 3 of this constitution (in Bavaria, however, exclusive of domestic affairs and matters relating to the settlement of natives of one state in the territory of another); and likewise matters relating to colonization and emigration to foreign countries.
• Legislation concerning customs-duties and commerce, and such imposts as are to be applied to the uses of the Empire.
• Regulation of weights, measures, and coinage, together with the emission of funded and unfunded paper-money.
• Banking regulations in general.
• Patents for inventions.
• The protection of copyright.
• The organization of a general system of protection for German trade in foreign countries,for German navigation, and for the German flag on the high seas; likewise the organization of a general consular representation of the Empire.
• Railway matters (subject in Bavaria to the provisions of article 46), and the construction of means of communication by land and water for the purposes of home defense and of general commerce.
• Rafting and navigation upon those waters which are common to several states, and the condition of such waters, as likewise river and other water dues; also navigation signals (light-houses, buoys, beacons, and other day-signals).
• Postal and telegraphic affairs; but in Bavaria and Würtemberg these shall be subject to the provisions of article 52.
• Regulations concerning the execution of judicial sentences in civil matters, and the fulfillment of requisitions in general.
• The authentication of public documents.
• General legislation regarding the entire civil law, criminal law, and judicial proceedings.
• The Imperial army and navy.
• The surveillance of the medical and veterinary professions.
• The press and associations.

Article 5. The legislative power of the Empire shall be exercised by the Bundesrath and the Reichstag. A majority of the votes of both houses shall be necessary and sufficient for the passage of a law.

When a law is proposed in relation to the army or navy, or to the imposts specified in article 35, the vote of the presiding officer shall decide in case of a difference of opinion in the federal council, if said vote shall be in favor of the retention of the existing arrangements.

III.—The Bundesrath.

Article 6. The Bundesrath shall consist of the representatives of the states of the Union, among whom the votes shall be divided in such a manner that Prussia, including the former votes of Hanover, the electorate of Hesse, Holstein, Nassau, and Frankfort, shall have 17 votes; Bavaria, 6 votes; Saxony, 4 votes; Würtemberg, 4 votes; Baden, 3 votes; Hesse, 3 votes; Mecklenburg-Schwerin, 2 votes; Saxe-Weimar, 1 vote; Mecklenburg-Strelitz, 1 vote;. Oldenburg, 1 vote; Brunswick, 2 votes; Saxe-Meiningen, 1 vote; Saxe-Altenburg, 1 vote; Saxe-Coburg-Gotba, 1 vote; Anhalt, 1 vote; Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt, 1 vote; Schwarzburg-Sondershausen, 1 vote; Waldeck, 1 vote; Reuss, elder branch, 1 vote; Reuss, younger branch, 1 vote; Schaumburg-Lippe, 1 vote; Lippe, 1 vote; Lübeck, 1 vote; Bremen, 1 vote; Hamburg, 1 vote; total, 58 votes. Each member of the Union shall have a right to appoint as many delegates to the Bundesrath as it has votes; the total of the votes of each state shall, however, only be cast as a unit.

Article 7. The Bundesrath shall take action upon—

• The measures to be proposed to the Reichstag and the resolutions passed by the same.
• The general provisions and regulations necessary for the execution of the laws of the Empire, so far as no other provision is made by said laws.
• The defects which may be discovered in the execution of the laws of the Empire, or of the provisions and regulations heretofore mentioned. Each member of the Union shall have the right to introduce motions, and it shall be the duty of the presiding officer to submit them for deliberation.

Legislative action shall take place by simple majority, with the exceptions of the provisions in articles 5, 37, and 78. Votes not represented or instructed shall not be counted. In the case of a tie the vote of the presiding officer shall decide.

When legislative action is taken upon a subject which, according to the provisions of this constitution, does not affect the whole Empire, the votes of only those states of the Union shall be counted which shall be interested in the matter in question.

Article 8. The Bundesrath shall appoint from its own members permanent committees—

• On the army and the fortifications.
• On naval affairs.
• On duties and taxes.
• On commerce and trade.
• On railroads, post-offices, and telegraphs.
• On the judiciary.
• On accounts.

In each of these committees there shall be representatives of at least four states of the Union, beside the presiding officer, and each state shall be entitled to only one vote in the same.

In the committee on the army and fortifications Bavaria shall have a permanent seat; the remaining members of it, as well as the members of the committee on naval affairs, shall be appointed by the Emperor; the members of the other committees shall be elected by the Bundesrath. These committees shall be newly formed at each session of the Bundesrath, i. e., each year, when the retiring members shall again be eligible.

Besides, there shall be appointed in the Bundesrath a committee on foreign affairs, over which Bavaria shall preside, to be composed of the plenipotentiaries of the kingdoms of Bavaria, Saxony, and Würtemberg, and of two plenipotentiaries of the other states of the Empire, who shall be elected annually by the Bundesrath. Clerks shall be placed at the disposal of the committees to perform the necessary work appertaining thereto.

Article 9. Each member of the Bundesrath shall have the right to appear in the Reichstag, and shall be heard there at any time when he shall so request, to represent the views of his government, even when the same shall not have been adopted by the majority of the Bundesrath. No one shall be at the same time a member of the Bundesrath and of the Reichstag.

Article 10. The Emperor shall afford the customary diplomatic protection to the members of the Bundesrath.

IV.— The President.

Article 11. The King of Prussia shall be the President of the Union and shall have the title of German Emperor. The Emperor shall represent the Empire among nations, declare war, and conclude peace in the name of the same, enter into alliances and other conventions with foreign countries, accredit ambassadors and receive them. For a declaration of war in the name of the Empire the consent of the Bundesrath shall be required, except in case of an attack upon the territory of the confederation or its coasts.

So far as treaties with foreign countries refer to matters which, according to article 4, are to be regulated by the legislature of the Empire, the consent of the Bundesrath shall be required for their ratification, and the approval of the Reichstag shall be necessary to render them valid.

Article 12. The Emperor shall have the right to convene the Bundesrath and the Reichstag, and to open, adjourn, and close them.

Article 13. The convocation of the Bundesrath and the Reichstag shall take place annually, and the Bundesrath may be called together for the preparation of business without the Reichstag; the latter, however, shall not be convoked without the Bundesrath.

Article 14. The convocation of the Bundesrath shall take place as soon as demanded by one-third of the number of its votes.

Article 15. The chancellor of the Empire, who shall be appointed by the Emperor shall preside in the Bundesrath, and supervise the conduct of its business.

The chancellor of the Empire shall have the right to delegate in writing the power to represent him to any member of the Bundesrath.

Article 16. The necessary bills shall be laid before the Reichstag in the name of the Emperor, in accordance with the resolutions of the Bundesrath, and they shall be presented to the Reichstag by members of the Bundesrath, or by special commissioners appointed by said Bundesrath.

Article 17. To the Emperor shall belong the right to prepare and publish the laws of the Empire and the surveillance of their execution. The laws and regulations of the Empire shall be published in the name of the Emperor, and require for their validity the signature of the chancellor of the Empire, who thereby assumes the responsibility.

Article 18. The Emperor shall appoint the officers of the Empire, require them to take the oath of allegiance, and dismiss them when necessary.

Officials appointed to an office of the Empire from one of the states of the Union shall enjoy the same rights to which they were entitled in their native states by their official position, provided no other legislative provision shall have been made previously to their entrance into the service of the Empire.

Article 19. If states of the Union shall net fulfill their constitutional duties to the Union, proceedings may be instituted against them by execution. This execution shall be ordered by the Bundesrath, and enforced by the Emperor.

V.—The Reichstag.

Article 20. The members of the Reichstag shall be elected by universal suffrage, and by direct secret ballot.

Until the regulation by law reserved by section 5 of the election law of May 31, 1869, (Bundesgesetzblatt, 1869, page 145), 48 delegates shall be elected in Bavaria, 17 in Würtemberg, 14 in Baden, 6 in Hesse, south of the river Main, and the total number of delegates shall be 382.

Article 21. Officials shall not require a leave of absence in order to enter the Reichstag. When a member of the Reichstag accepts a salaried office of the Empire, or a salaried office in one of the states of the Union, or accepts any office of the Empire, or of a state, with which a higher rank or salary is connected, he shall forfeit his seat and vote in the Reichstag, but may recover his place in the same by a new election.

Article 22. The proceedings of the Reichstag shall be public. Truthful reports of the proceedings of the public sessions of the Reichstag shall subject those making them to no responsibility.

Article 23. The Reichstag shall have the right to propose laws within the jurisdiction of the Empire, and to refer petitions addressed to it to the Bundesrath or the chancellor of the Empire.

Article 24. Each legislative period of the Reichstag shall last three years. The Reichstag may be dissolved by a resolution of the Bundesrath, with the consent of the Emperor.

Article 25. In the case of a dissolution of the Reichstag, new elections shall take place within a period of sixty days, and the Reichstag shall reassemble within a period of ninety days after dissolution.

Article 26. Unless by consent of the Reichstag, an adjournment of that body shall not exceed the period of thirty days, and shall not be repeated during the same session without such consent.

Article 27. The Reichstag shall examine into the legality of the election of its members and decide thereon. It shall regulate the mode of transacting business and its own discipline by establishing rules therefor, and elect its president, vice-presidents, and secretaries.

Article 28. The Reichstag shall pass laws by absolute majority. To render the passage of laws valid, the presence of the majority of the legal number of members shall be required.

Article 29. The members of the Reichstag shall be the representatives of the entire people, and shall not be subject to orders and instructions.

Article 30. No member of the Reichstag shall at any time suffer legal or disciplinary prosecution on account of his vote, or on account of utterances made while in the performance of his functions, or be held responsible outside of the Reichstag for his actions.

Article 31. Without the consent of the Reichstag, none of its members shall be prosecuted or arrested during the session for any offense committed except when arrested in the act of committing the offense or in the course of the following day. The same rule shall apply in the case of arrests for debt.

At the request of the Reichstag all legal proceedings instituted against one of its members, and likewise imprisonment, shall be suspended during its session.

Article 32. The members of the Reichstag shall not be allowed to draw any salary or be compensated as such.

VI.— Customs and Commerce.

Article 33. Germany shall form a Customs and Commercial Union (Zollverein), having a common frontier for the collection of duties. Such territories as cannot, by reason of their situation, be suitably embraced within the said frontier, shall be excluded. It shall be lawful to introduce all articles of commerce of a state of the Union into any other state of the Union without paying any duty thereon, except so far as such articles are subject to taxation therein.

Article 34. The Hanseatic towns, Bremen and Hamburg, including a district from their own, as the surrounding territory requisite for such purpose, shall remain free posts outside of the common boundary of the Zollverein, until they shall request to be admitted into the said Union.

Article 35. The Empire shall have the exclusive power to legislate concerning everything relating to the customs, the taxation of salt and tobacco manufactured or raised in the territory of the Union, concerning the taxation of manufactured brandy and beer, and of sugar and sirup prepared from beets or other domestic productions. It shall have exclusive power to legislate concerning the mutual protection of taxes upon articles of consumption levied in the several states of the Empire; against defraudation, as well as concerning the measures which are required, in granting exemption from the payment of duties, for the security of the common customs frontier. In Bavaria, Würtemberg, and Baden, the matter of imposing duties on domestic brandy and beer is reserved for the legislature of each country. The states of the Union shall, however, endeavor to bring about uniform legislation regarding the taxation of these articles.

Article 30. The collection and administration of duties and excises on articles of consumption (article 35) is left to each state of the Union within its own territory, so far as this has been done by each state heretofore.

The Emperor shall supervise the legality of the proceeding, by officials of the Empire, whom he shall designate as adjuncts to the customs or excise offices, and boards of directors of the several states, after hearing the committee of the Bundesrath on customs and revenues.

Notices given by these officials as to defects in the execution of the laws of the Empire (article 35) shall be submitted to the Bundesrath for action.

Article 37. In taking action upon the rules and regulations for the execution of the laws of the Empire, (article 35,) the vote of the presiding officer shall decide whenever he shall pronounce for upholding the existing rule or regulation.

Article 38. The amounts accruing from customs and other revenues designated in article 35 of this constitution, so far as they are subject to legislation by the Reichstag, shall go to the treasury of the Empire. This amount is made up of the total receipts from the customs and other revenues, after deducting therefrom—

• Tax compensations and reductions in conformity with existing laws or regulations.
• Reimbursements for taxes duly imposed.
• The costs for collection and administration, viz:
  • In the department of customs, the costs which are required for the protection and collection of customs on the frontiers and in the frontier districts.
  • In the department of the duty on salt, the costs which are used for the pay of the officers charged with collecting and controlling these duties in the salt-mines.
  • In the department of duties on beet-sugar and tobacco, the compensation which is to be allowed, according to the resolutions of the Bundesrath, to the several state governments for the costs Of the administration of these duties.
  • Fifteen per cent, oft He total receipts in the departments of the other duties.

The territories situated outside of the common customs frontier shall contribute to the expenses of the Empire by paying an aversum (a sum of acquittance).

Bavaria, Würtemberg, and Baden shall not share in the revenues from duties on liquors and beer, which go into the treasury of the Empire, nor in the corresponding portion of the aforesaid aversum.

Article 39. The quarterly statements to be regularly made by the revenue officers of the several states at the end of every quarter, and the final settlements (to be made at the end of the year, and after the closing of the account-books) of the receipts from customs, which have become due in the course of the quarter, or during the fiscal year, and the revenues of the treasury of the Empire, according to article 38, shall be arranged by the boards of directors of the several states, after a previous examination in general summaries, in which every duty is to be shown separately. These summaries shall be transmitted to the committee on accounts of the Bundesrath. The latter provisionally fixes, every three months, taking as a basis these summaries, the amount due to the treasury of the Empire from the treasury of each state, and it shall inform the Bundesrath and the several states of this act; furthermore, it shall submit to the Bundesrath, annually, the final statement of these amounts, with its remarks. The Bundesrath shall act upon the fixing of these amounts.

Article 40. The terms of the customs-union (Zollverein) treaty of July 8, 1867, remain in force, so far as they have not been altered by the provisions of this constitution, and as long as they are not altered in the manner designated in articles 7 and 78.

VII.—Railways.

Article 41. Railways which are considered necessary for the defense of Germany or for purposes of general commerce may be built for the account of the Empire by a law of the Empire, even in opposition to the will of those members of the Union through whose territory the railroads run, without detracting from the rights of the sovereign of that country; or private persons may be charged with their construction and receive rights of expropriation. Every existing railway company is bound to permit new railroad lines to be connected with it at the expense of these latter. All laws granting existing railway companies the right of injunction against the building of parallel or competition lines are hereby abolished throughout the Empire, without detriment to rights already acquired. Such right of injunction can henceforth not be granted in concessions to be given hereafter.

Article 42. The governments of the several states bind themselves, in the interest of general commerce, to have the German railways managed as a uniform net-work, and for this purpose to have the lines hereafter to be built constructed and equipped according to a uniform system.

Article 43. Accordingly, as soon as possible, uniform arrangements as to management shall be made, and especially shall uniform regulations be instituted for the police of the railroads. The Empire shall take care that the administrative officers of the railway lines keep the roads always in such a condition as is required for public security, and that they be equipped with the necessary rolling-stock.

Article 44. Railway companies are bound to establish such passenger-trains of suitable velocity as may be required for ordinary travel, and for the establishment of harmonizing schedules of travel; also, to make provision for such freight-trains as may be necessary for commercial purposes, and to establish offices for the direct forwarding of passenger and freight-trains, to be transferred when necessary from one road to another at the customary remuneration.

Article 45. The Empire shall have control over the tariff of fares. The same shall endeavor to cause—

• Uniform regulations to be speedily introduced on all German railway lines.
• The tariff to be reduced and made uniform as far as possible, and particularly to cause a reduction of the tariff for the transport of coal, coke, wood, minerals, stone, salt, crude iron, manure, and similar articles for long distances, as demanded by the interests of agriculture and industry, and to introduce a one-penny tariff as soon as practicable.

Article 46. In case of distress, especially in case of an extraordinary rise in the price of provisions, it shall be the duty of the railway companies to adopt temporarily a low special tariff, to be fixed by the Emperor, on motion of the competent committee of the Bundesrath, for the forwarding of grain, flour, vegetables, and potatoes. This tariff shall, however, not be less than the lowest rate for raw produce existing on the said line.

The foregoing provisions, and those of articles 42 to 45, shall not apply to Bavaria.

The imperial government has, however, the power also with regard to Bavaria, to establish, by way of legislation, uniform rules for the construction and equipment of such railways as may be of importance for the defense of the country.

Article 47. The managers of all railways shall be required to obey, without hesitation, requisitions made by the authorities of the Empire for the use of their roads for the defense of Germany. Particularly shall the military and all material of war be forwarded at uniform reduced rates.

VIII.—Mails and Telegrams.

Article 48. The mails and telegraphs shall be organized and managed as government institutions throughout the German Empire. The legislation of the Empire in regard to postal and telegraphic affairs provided for in article 4, does not extend to those matters whose regulation is left to the managerial arrangement, according to the principles which have controlled the North German administration of mails and telegraphs.

Article 49. The receipts from mails and telegraphs are a joint affair throughout the Empire. The expenses shall be paid from the general receipts. The surplus goes into the treasury of the Empire (Section XII).

Article 50. The Emperor has the supreme supervision of the administration of mails and telegraphs. The authorities appointed by him are in duty bound and authorized to see that uniformity be established and maintained in the organization of the administration and in the transaction of business, as also in regard to the qualifications of employés.

The Emperor shall have the power to make general administrative regulations, and also exclusively to regulate the relations which are to exist between the post and telegraph offices of Germany and those of other countries.

It shall be the duty of all officers of the post-office and telegraph department to obey imperial orders. This obligation shall be included in their oath of office.

The appointment of superior officers (such as directors, counselors, and superintendents), as they shall be required for the administration of the mails and telegraphs, in the various districts, also the appointment of officers of the posts and telegraphs (such as inspectors or comptrollers), acting for the aforesaid authorities in the several districts in the capacity of supervisors, shall be made by the Emperor for the whole territory of the German Empire, and these officers shall take the oath of office to him. The governments of the several states shall be informed in due time, by means of imperial confirmation and official publication of the aforementioned appointments so far as they may relate to their territories. Other officers required by the department of mails and telegraphs, as also all officers to be employed at the various stations, and for technical purposes, and hence officiating at the actual centers of communication, &c., shall be appointed by the respective governments of the states.

Where there is no independent administration of inland mails or telegraphs, the terms of the various treaties are to be enforced.

Article 51. In assigning the surplus of the post-office department to the treasury of the Empire for general purposes (Article 49), the following proceeding is to be observed in consideration of the difference which has heretofore existed in the clear receipts of the post-office departments of the several territories, for the purpose of securing a suitable equalization during the period of transition below-named.

Of the post-office surplus which accumulated in the several mail-districts during the five years from 1861 to 1865, an average yearly surplus shall be computed, and the share which every separate mail-district has had in the surplus resulting therefrom for the whole territory of the Empire shall be fixed upon by a percentage.

In accordance with the proportion thus made, the several states shall be credited on the account of their other contributions to the expenses of the Empire with their quota accruing from the postal surplus in the Empire for a period of eight years subsequent to their entrance into the post-office department of the Empire. At the end of the said eight years this distinction shall cease, and any surplus in the post-office department shall go, without division, into the treasury of the Empire, according to the principle enunciated in article 49.

Of the quota of the post-office department surplus resulting during the aforementioned period of eight years in favor of the Hanseatic towns, one-half shall every year be placed at the disposal of the Emperor, for the purpose of providing for the establishment of uniform postal arrangements in the Hanseatic towns.

Article 52. The stipulations of the foregoing articles 48 to 51 do not apply to Bavaria and Würtemberg. In their stead the following stipulation shall be valid for these two states of the Union:

The Empire alone is authorized to legislate upon the privileges of the post-office and telegraph departments, on the legal position of both institutions toward the public, upon the franking privilege and rates of postage, and upon the establishment of rates for telegraphic correspondence, exclusive, however, of managerial arrangements, and the fixing of tariffs for internal communication within Bavaria and Würtemberg.

In the same manner the Empire shall regulate postal and telegraphic communication with foreign countries, excepting the immediate communication of Bavaria and Würtemberg, with their neighboring states, not belonging to the Empire, in regard to which regulation, the stipulation in article 49 of the postal treaty of November 23, 1867, remains in force.

Bavaria and Würtemberg shall not share in the postal and telegraphic receipts which belong to the treasury of the Empire.

IX.—Marine and Navigation.

Article 53. The navy of the Empire is a united one, under the supreme command of the Emperor. The Emperor is charged with its organization and formation, and he shall appoint the officers and officials of the navy, and in his name these and the seamen are to be sworn in. The harbor of Kiel and the harbor of the Jade are imperial war harbors. The expenditure s required for the establishment and maintenance of the navy and the institutions connected therewith shall be defrayed from the treasury of the Empire.

All sea-faring men of the Empire, including machinists and hands employed in shipbuilding, are exempt from service in the army, but obliged to serve in the imperial navy.

The apportionment of men to supply the wants of the navy shall be made according to the actual s a-faring population, and the quota furnished in accordance herewith by each state shall be credited to the army account.

Article 54. The merchant-vessels of all the states of the Union shall form a united commercial marine.

The Empire shall determine the process for ascertaining the tonnage of sea-going vessels, shall regulate the issuing of tonnage-certificates and sea-letters, and shall fix the conditions to which a permit for commanding a sea-going vessel shall be subject.

The merchant-vessels of ail the states of the Union shall be admitted on an equal footing to the harbors and to all natural and artificial water-courses of the several states of the Union, and shall receive the same usage therein.

The duties which shall be collected from sea-going vessels or levied upon their freights, for the use of naval institutions in the harbors, shall not exceed the amount required for the maintenance and ordinary repair of these institutions.

On all natural water-courses duties are only to be levied for the use of special establishments which serve for facilitating commercial intercourse. These duties, as well as the duties for navigating such artificial channels which are property of the state, are not to exceed the amount required for the maintenance and ordinary repair of the institutions and establishments. These rules apply to rafting, so far as it is carried on upon navigable water-courses.

The levying of other or higher duties upon foreign vessels or their freights than those which are paid by the vessels of the several states or their freights does not belong to the various states but to the Empire.

Article 55. The flag of the war and merchant navy shall be black, white, and red.

X.—Consular affairs.

Article 56. The Emperor shall have the supervision of all consular affairs of the German Empire, and he shall appoint consuls, after hearing the committee of the Bundesrath on commerce and traffic.

No new state consulates are to be established within the jurisdiction of the German consuls. German consuls shall perform the functions of state consuls for the states of the Union not represented in their district. All the now existing state consulates shall be abolished, as soon as the organization of the German consulates shall be completed, in such a manner that the representation of the separate interests of all the states of the Union shall be recognized by the Bundesrath as secured by the German consulates.

XI.—Military affairs of the Empire.

Article 57. Every German is subject to military duty, and in the discharge of this duty no substitute can be accepted.

Article 58. The costs and the burden of all the military affairs of the Empire are to be borne equally by all the several states and their subjects, and no privileges to, or onerous distinctions between, the several states or classes are admissible. Where an equal distribution of the burdens cannot be effected in natura without prejudice to the public welfare, affairs shall be equalized by legislation in accordance with the principles of justice.

Article 59. Every German capable of bearing arms shall serve for seven years in the standing army, ordinarily from the end of his twentieth to the beginning of his twenty-eighth year: the first three years in the army of the field, the last four years in the reserve; during the next five years he shall belong to the Landwehr. In those states of the Union in which, heretofore, a longer term of service than twelve years was required by law the gradual reduction of the required time of service shall take place in such a manner as is compatible with the interests and the war footing of the army of the Empire.

As regards the emigration of men belonging to the reserve, only those provisions shall be in force which apply to the emigration of members of the Landwehr.

Article 60. The strength of the German army in time of peace shall be, until the 31st December, 1871, one per cent, of the population of 1867, and shall be furnished by the several states of the Union in proportion to their population. In future the strength of the army in time of peace shall be fixed by legislation.

Article 61. After the publication of this constitution the entire Prussian military legislation shall be introduced without delay throughout the Empire, as well the statutes themselves as the regulations, instructions, and ordinances issued for their execution, explanation, or completion; thus, in particular, the military penal code of April 3, 1845; the military penal code of procedure of April 3, 1845; the ordinance concerning the courts of honor of July 20, 1843; the regulations with respect to recruiting, time of service, matters relating to the service and subsistence, to the quartering of troops, claims for damages, mobilizing, &c., for times of peace and war. Orders for the attendance of the military upon religious services are, however, excluded. When a uniform organization of the German army shall have been established, a comprehensive military law for the Empire shall be submitted to the Reichstag and the Bundesrath for their action in accordance with the constitution.

Article 62. For the purpose of defraying the expenses of the whole German army, and the institutions connected therewith, the sum of 225 thalers shall be placed at the disposal of the Emperor until the 31st of December, 1871, for each man in the army on the peace footing, according to article 60. (See section XII.)

After the 31st of December, 1871, the payment of these contributions of the several states to the imperial treasury must be continued. The strength of the army in time of peace, which has been temporarily fixed in article 60, shall be taken as a basis for calculating these amounts until it shall be altered by a law of the Empire. The expenditure of this sum for the whole army of the Empire and its establishments, shall be determined by a budget law.

In determining the budget of military expenditures, the lawfully-established organization of the imperial army, in accordance with this constitution, shall be taken as a basis.

Article 63. The total land-force of the Empire shall form one army, which, in war and in peace, shall be under the command of the Emperor. The regiments, &c, throughout the whole German army shall bear continuous numbers. The principal colors and the cut of the garments of the royal Prussian army shall serve as a pattern for the rest of the army. It is left to commanders of contingent forces to choose the external badges, cockades, &c.

It shall be the duty and the right of the Emperor to take care that throughout the German army all divisions be kept full and well equipped, and that unity be established and maintained in regard to organization and formation, equipment and command in the training of the men, as well as in the qualification of the officers. For this purpose the Emperor shall be authorized to satisfy himself at any time of the condition of the several contingents, and to provide remedies for existing defects.

The Emperor shall determine the strength, composition, and division of the contingents of the imperial army, and also the organization of the Landwehr, and he shall have the right to designate garrisons within the territory of the Union, as also to call any portion of the army into active service.

In order to maintain the necessary unity in the care, arming, and equipment of all troops, of the German army, all orders hereafter to be issued for the Prussian army shall be communicated in due form to the commanders of the remaining contingents, for their observance, by the committee on the army and fortifications, provided for in article 8, No. 1.

Article 64. All German troops are bound implicitly to obey the orders of the Emperor. This obligation shall be included in the military oath. The commander-in-chief of a contingent, as well as all officers commanding troops of more than one contingent, and all commanders of fortresses, shall be appointed by the Emperor. The officers appointed by the Emperor shall take the military oath to him. The appointment of generals, or of officers performing the duties of generals in a contingent force, shall be in each case subject to the approval of the Emperor. The Emperor has the right with regard to the transfer of officers, with or without promotion, to positions which are to be filled in the service of the Empire, be it in the Prussian army or in other contingents, to select from the officers of all the contingents of the army of the Empire.

Article 65. The right to build fortresses within the territory of the Empire shall belong to the Emperor, who, according to section XII, shall ask for the appropriation of the necessary means required for that purpose, if not already included in the regular appropriation.

Article 66. If not otherwise stipulated, the princes of the Empire and the senates shall appoint the officers of their respective contingents, subject to the restriction of article 64. They are the chiefs of all the troops belonging to their respective territories, and are entitled to the honors connected therewith. They shall have especially the right to hold inspections at any time, and receive, besides the regular reports and announcements of changes for publication, timely information of all promotions and appointments concerning their respective contingents. They shall also have the right to employ, for police purposes, not only their own troops but all other contingents of the army of the Empire which are stationed in their respective territories.

Article 67. The unexpended portion of the military appropriation shall, under no circumstances, fall to the share of a single government, but at all times to the treasury of the Empire.

Article 68. The Emperor shall have the power, if the public security of the Empire demands it, to declare martial law in any part thereof; until the publication of a law regulating the grounds, the form of announcement, and the effects of such a declaration, the provisions of the Prussian law of June 4, 1851, shall be substituted therefor. (Laws of 1851, page 451.)

Addition to section XI.

The provisions contained in this section shall go into effect in Bavaria as provided for in the treaty of alliance of November 23, 1870 (Bundesgesetzblatt, 1871, page 99, under III, section 5); in Würtemberg, as provided for in the military convention of November 21–25, 1870, (Bundesgesetzblatt, 1870, page 658).

XII.—Finances of the Empire.

Article 69. All receipts and expenditures of the Empire shall be estimated yearly, and included in the budget of the Empire. The latter shall be fixed by law before the beginning of the fiscal year, according to the following principles:

Article 70. In primo, the surplus of the previous year, as well as the customs duties, the common excise duties, and the revenues derived from the postal and telegraph service, shall be applied to the defrayal of all general expenditures. In so far as these expenditures are not covered by the receipts, they shall be raised, as long as no taxes of the Empire shall have been established, by assessing the several states of the Empire according to their population, the amount of the assessment to be fixed by the chancellor of the Empire in accordance with the budget agreed upon.

Article 71. The general expenditures shall be, as a rule, granted for one year; they may, however, in special cases be granted for a longer period. During the period of transition fixed in article 60, the financial estimate, properly classified, of the expenditures of the army shall be laid before the Bundesrath and the Reichstag solely for their information.

Article 72. An annual report of the expenditure of all the receipts of the Empire shall be rendered to the Bundesrath and the Reichstag, for the purpose of discharge, through the chancellor of the Empire.

Article 73. In cases of extraordinary requirements, the Empire may contract a loan or assume a guarantee by means of legislative enactment.

Addition to section XII.

Articles 69 and 71 apply to the expenditures for the Bavarian army only, according to the provisions of the addition to section XI of the treaty of November 23,1870; and article 72 only so far as is required to inform the Bundesrath and the Reichstag of the assignment to Bavaria of the required sum for the Bavarian army.

XIII.—Settlement of disputes and modes of punishment.

Article 74. Every attempt against the existence, the integrity, the security, or the constitution of the German Empire; finally, any offense committed against the Bundesrath, the Reichstag, a member of the Bundesrath or of the Reichstag, a magistrate or public official of the Empire, while in the execution of his duty or with reference to his official position, by word, writing, printing, signs, or caricatures, shall be judicially investigated, and, upon conviction, punished in the several states of the Empire according to the laws therein existing, or which shall hereafter exist in the same, according to which laws a similar offense against any one of the states of the Empire, its constitution, legislature, members of its legislature, authorities or officials is to be judged.

Article 75. For those offenses, specified in article 74, against the German Empire, which, if committed against one of the states thereof, would be deemed high treason, the superior court of appeals of the three free Hanseatic towns at Lübeck shall be the competent deciding tribunal in the first and last resort. More definite provisions as to the competency and the proceedings of the superior court of appeals shall be adopted by the legislature of the Empire. Until the passage of an imperial law the existing competency of the courts in the respective states of the Empire, and the provisions relative to the proceedings of those courts, shall remain in force.

Article 76. Disputes between the different states of the Union, so far as they are not of a private nature, and, therefore, to be decided by the competent courts, shall be settled by the Bundesrath at the request of one of the parties. Disputes relating to constitutional matters in those of the states of the Union whose constitution contains no provision for the settlement of such differences shall be adjusted by the Bundesrath at the request of one of the parties, or, if this cannot be done, they shall be settled by the legislative power of the Empire.

Article 77. If in one of the states of the Union justice shall be denied, and no sufficient relief can be procured by legal measures, it shall be the duty of the Bundesrath to receive substantiated complaints concerning denial or restriction of justice, which are to be judged according to the constitution and the existing laws of the respective states of the Union, and thereupon to obtain judicial relief from the government of the Union in the matter which shall have given rise to the complaint.

XIV.—General provisions.

Amendments to the constitution shall be made by legislative enactment. They shall be considered as rejected when fourteen votes are cast against them in the Bundesrath. The provisions of the constitution of the Empire by which fixed rights of individual states of the Union are established in their relation to the whole, shall only be altered with the consent of that state which is immediately concerned.

Appendix No. 1.

Article 80 of the constitution of the German Union, as adopted by the North German Union and the Grand Duchies of Baden and of Hesse and by Rhine.

XV.—Transitional provision.

Article 80. The laws enacted in the North German Union, which are hereafter noted, are hereby declared to be laws of the German Union, and as such are to be carried into effect from the specified dates throughout the whole territory of the Union, with the understanding that wherever in these laws of the North German Union the constitution, territory, members, or states, rights of native or naturalized citizens, constitutional organs, dependents, officers, flag, &c., are mentioned, the German Union and its corresponding functions are to be understood,—as follows:

• —From the day when the present constitution goes into effect:
  • The law concerning passports, of the 12th October, 1867.
  • The law concerning the nationality of merchant-vessels and their right to carry the flag of the Union, of the 25th October, 1867.
  • The law concerning liberty to emigrate without being taxed for so doing, of the 1st November, 1867.
  • The law concerning the organization of the consulates of the Union as well as the rights and duties of the consuls of the Union, of the 8th November, 1867.
  • The law concerning the obligation to military duty, of the 9th November, 1867.
  • The law concerning stipulated rates of interest, of the 14th November, 1837.
  • The law concerning the abolishment of police limitations to the contraction of marriage, of the 4th May, 1868.
  • The law concerning the abolishment of imprisonment for debt, of the 29th May, 1868.
  • The law concerning the granting of pensions and aid for life to officers and higher military officials of the former army of Schleswig-Holstein, as well as to their widows and orphans, of the 14th June, 1868.
  • The law concerning the position of the trades-unions and guilds under private law, of the 4th July, 1868.
  • The law concerning weights and measures for the North German Union, of the 17th August, 1868.
  • The law concerning measures against the cattle-plague, of the 7th April, 1869.
  • The election law for the Reichstag of the North German Union, of the 31st May, 1869.
  • The law concerning the bonds to be given by officials of the Union, of the 2d June, 1869.
  • The law concerning the introduction of the general ordinance of the Nuremberg Supplement respecting promissory-notes, and of the general German trade laws, as laws of the Union, of the 5th June, 1869.
  • The law concerning revenue-stamps on notes and drafts in the North German Union, of the 10th June, 1869.
  • The law concerning the establishment of a supreme court for matters of trade, of the 12th June, 1869.
  • The law concerning attachment of wages for work or service, of the 21st June, 1869.
  • The laws concerning the granting of legal assistance (aid of counsel), of the 21st June, 1869.
  • The law concerning the equality of the religious beliefs, in the relations of citizens to the town and to the state, of the 3d July, 1869.
  • The law concerning the granting of pensions and aid for life to military men of lower rank of the former army of Schleswig-Holstein, as well as to their widows and orphans, of the 3d March, 1870.
  • The law concerning ‘the abolishment of double taxes, of the 13th May, 1870.
  • The law concerning dues on rafting, of the 1st June, 1870.
  • The law concerning the attainment and loss of citizenship of the Union and of the state, of the 1st June, 1870.
  • The law concerning the copyright of literary work, pictures, musical compositions, and dramatical productions, of the 11th June, 1870.
  • The law concerning limited stock companies and ordinary stock companies, of the 11th June, 1870.
  • The law concerning the issue of paper money, of the 16th June, 1870.
  • The law concerning the right of consuls of the Union to solemnize marriages, &c, of the 4th May, 1870.
• —On and after the 1st January, 1872, without relation to their former operation in the territory of the North German Union:
  • The law concerning the issue of bank-notes, of the 27th March, 1870, except in Hesse, south of the Main.
  • The law concerning the introduction of the penal code for the North German Union, of the 31st May, 1870.
  • The penal code of the North German Union, of the 31st May, 1870; and,
  • The laws concerning the postal ordinances of the North German Union, of the 2d November, 1867; concerning the postal taxes in the territory of the North German Union, of the 4th November, 1867; concerning the introduction of telegraph-stamps, of the 16th May, 1869; and concerning the franking privileges in the territory of the North German Union of the 5th June, 1869.

In Hesse, south of the Main, shall be introduced, as laws of the Union, from the day when this constitution goes into effect:

The law concerning the closing and limiting of public gambling establishments, of the 1st July, 1868;

The law concerning the introduction of telegraph-stamps, of the 16th May, 1869;

The trade regulations of the North German Union, of the 21st June, 1869;

The law concerning the introduction of the penal code for the North German Union, of the 31st May, 1870; and,

The penal code of the North German Union, of the 31st May, 1870.

From the 1st July, 1871, the law concerning the determination of the domicile where aid may be obtained (by paupers), of the 6th June, 1870.

The law concerning the stamp-tax tax on drafts and promissory-notes of the 10th June, 1869, shall be introduced in the Hohenzollern country from the day of the adoption of this constitution.

It belongs to the legislation of the Union to declare what remaining laws enacted by the North German Union shall be laws’ of the German Union, in so far as these laws relate to functions which constitutionally belong to the legislation of the German Union.

Appendix No. 2.

Part III, § 8 of the treaty with Bavaria, concluded at Versailles Nov. 23, 1870.

§ 8.—The transitional provision of the article now numbered 79 of the constitution, which appears under Chap. II, § 26, of this treaty, is applicable to Bavaria Only as regards the electoral law of May 31, 1869, for the Reichstag of the North German Union. This is on account of the time that has elapsed, and the necessity of many changes of other laws and regulations connected with the subject of the legislation of the Union.

As to the rest, the declaration that the laws enacted in the North German Union have become laws of the Union for the Kingdom of Bavaria, so far as these laws refer to matters which, according to the constitution, are subject to the legislation of the German Union, is reserved for the legislature of that Union.

Appendix No. 3.

Art. 2, par. 6 of the treaty with Würtemberg of Nov. 25, 1870.

(6) To article 80 of the constitution.

The introduction of the following-named laws of the North German Union shall take place for Würtemberg, instead of those fixed in article 80, from the following dates:

• From July 1, 1871: (1) The law of November 14, 1867, concerning interest fixed by agreement. (2) The law of June 12, 1869, concerning the creation of a supreme court of commerce and trade.
• From January 1, 1872: (1) The law of June 21, 1869, concerning the attachment of wages due for labor or service. (2) The law of June 16, 1870, concerning the issue of paper money.

The introduction of the law of April 7, 1869, concerning measures to be adopted against the cattle-plague as a law of the Union, is reserved for the legislation of the Union as regards Würtemberg. The same is in force with the limitation implied by the above provision Under No. 4, which limitation has reference to the postal and telegraph laws mentioned in article 80, under II, No. 4.

The law of July 1, 1868, concerning the closing and limitation of the public gambling establishments, shall be introduced as a law of the Union in Würtemberg on the day. when the constitution of the Union goes into force.

Appendix No. 4.

Protocol concerning the agreement between the North German Union, Baden, and Hesse, in respect to the establishment of a German Union, and the adoption of the constitution of the Union. Done at Versailles, November 15, 1870.

After His Majesty the King of Prussia, in the name of the North German Union, His Royal Highness the Grand Duke of Baden, and His Royal Highness the Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine had agreed to enter into negotiations concerning the establishment of a German Union, and had fully empowered for this purpose the following:

His Majesty the King of Prussia, in the name of the North German Union: the chancellor of the North German Union, president of the cabinet and minister of foreign affairs, Count Otto von Bismarck-Schönhausen; the royal Saxon minister of state for the finances and of foreign affairs, Richard, Baron von Friesen; and the president of the chancery of the Union, the minister of state, Martin Frederick Rudolph Delbruck; His Royal Highness the Grand Duke of Baden: the president of the cabinet and minister of state for the interior, Dr. Julius Jolly; and the president of the ministry of the grand ducal house and of foreign affairs, Rudolf von Freydorf;

His Royal Highness the Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine: the president of the cabinet aud minister of the grand ducal house as well as of foreign affairs and of the interior, actual privy counselor, Baron Reinhard von Dalwigk zu Lichtenfels; and the envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary, privy counsellor of legation, Karl Hoffman, —

These plenipotentiaries met in Versailles; and after their respective powers had been read and recognized, agreed on the subjoined constitution of the German Union. They further agree that this constitution, together with restrictions hereinafter to be mentioned, shall go into force on the 1st January, 1871, and give mutual assurance that they shall immediately be laid before the legislative bodies of the North German Union, of Baden, and of Hesse, for their acceptance, and afterward shall be ratified during the course of the month of December. The exchange of ratifications shall take place in Berlin.

In consideration of the great difficulties interposed by the advanced period of the year and the duration of the war, together with the fact that in several states the expenditure for the military of the German Union for the year 1871 has already been fixed, it is agreed that the community of expenditure for the army shall begin with the 1st January, 1872. Up to that time, therefore, the amount of the common taxes mentioned in article 35 shall not be paid over to the treasury of the Union, but to the treasuries of Baden and Hesse, to the latter with respect to the share due to South Hesse; and the shares of these states due to the treasury of the Union shall be collected by “matriculation-dues,” (Matrikularbeiträge) the fixing of which shall be the duty of the Imperial Reichstag which is to meet next year.

The regulations of articles 49–52 of the constitution of the Union shall go into effect for Baden on the 1st January, 1872, so that time may be granted for the regulation and transfer by the state commission of the posts and telegraphs to the Union commission.

For the rest also the following declarations, made in the course of the discussion, were set down in the present protocol:

It was agreed—

• With reference to article 18 of the constitution, that in the rights belonging to an official in the sense of the second section of this article, those rights are not included which belong to his surviving family as regards pensions or assistance.
• With reference to articles 35 and 38 of the constitution, that the transitory duties to be raised in the future, in accordance with the Zolverein treaties, on brandy and beer, are to be viewed in the same light as those imposed on the manufacture of these beverages.
• With reference to article 38 of the constitution, that while the present taxation of beer continues in Hesse, only that portion of the Hesse beer-tax which corresponds to the amount of the North German brewing malt-tax shall flow into the treasury of the Union.
• With reference to Section VIII of the constitution, that the treaties by which the relations of postal and telegraphic affairs in Hesse toward the North German Union are governed are not changed by the constitution of the Union. In particular matters remain unchanged as regards payments for damage to public roads, as well as for damage to bridges and thoroughfares and other means of communication; further, with regard to compensation for the use of state and private railroads, and with regard to the right of free transmission of matter in South Hesse, as at present established, until the end of the year 1875. From January 1, 1876, the payments of tolls on turnpike-roads cease. What the status is to be as regards compensation for conveying the mails on railroads, as well as with regard to the South Hesse privileges of free transmission subsequent to January, 1, 1876, is to be the subject of later agreement. The indemnification for tolls on roads, bridges, and other ways of communication will also be paid to the grand ducal Hesse government after January 1, 1876; the latter undertakes, however, in future, to compensate those to whom compensation is due in the same manner as heretofore.
• With reference to article 52 of the constitution, the Baden representative remarked that the financial result of the management of the posts and telegraphs of the Union, as it had heretofore turned out and as estimated by the Union budget for 1871, gave no v assurance, notwithstanding the provision of article 52, that the portion of the revenues accruing to Baden from these sources would even approximately reach the revenue which it at present derives from its own management, amounting to the average sum of 130,000 reichsthalers. They therefore considered it proper that Baden should be protected by a particular agreement from a deficit that would so sensibly affect its revenues.
• Although on the part of others this anxiety of the Baden Government could not be pronounced as well founded, it was yet agreed that if in the course of the transition period the portion ascertained to be the portion of Baden according to a per cent calculation of the post surpluses accruing in the Union in one year should not reach the sum of 100,000 reichs thalers, the sum wanting to this amount should he credited to Baden against its matricular dues. Such an accounting shall, however, not be held in a year during which warlike events take place in which the Union takes part.
• With reference to article 56 of the constitution, the representatives of the North German Union, upon being questioned by the Baden representative, remarked that the President of the Union had already, after hearing the proper committee of the Bundesrath, established Union consulates, even when such establishment at a particular place was in the interest of only one of the states of the Union. In this connection, they also stated that the same course would be pursued in future.
• With reference to article 62 of the constitution, it was agreed that the payment under this article by Baden of its contributions should begin with the first day of that month which followed the return of the Baden troops from a war to a peace footing.
• With reference to article 78 of the constitution, it was pronounced on all sides to be a matter of course that those provisions of the constitution by which certain rights of particular states of the Union in their relations to the whole are established could only be altered with the consent of the state concerned.
• With reference to article 80 of the constitution, the representatives were a unit in the matter of the law concerning the establishment of a supreme tribunal for commercial affairs, of July 12 of the previous year, as regards the point that a proper augmentation should be made to the number of the members of this tribunal by a supplement to the estimate for the same for 1871.

It was further generally understood that, among the laws made in the North German Union, concerning which it is reserved to the German Union to declare them to be laws of the German Union, the law of July 21 of the current year, concerning the extraordinary demand for money on the part of the military and marine management, was not one; and also that the law of May 31, of the current year, concerning the St. Gotthard Railway, would not be declared a law of the German Union, without a change being made in its provisions.

This protocol has been read, approved, and executed by the representatives named herein in a single copy, which is to be deposited in the archives of the chancery of the Union at Berlin.

Appendix No. 5.

Agreement for the accession of Würtemberg to the constitution of the German Empire.

(Negotiated at Berlin November 25, 1870.)

In signing the treaty concluded this day, concerning the accession of Würtemberg to the constitution of the German Union, adopted by the North German Union, Baden, and Hesse, the undersigned plenipotentiaries have agreed upon the following points:

• The agreements made in the protocol dated Versailles, November 15,1870, between the plenipotentiaries of the North German Union, Baden, and Hesse, and the declarations made by the plenipotentiaries of the North German Union—
  • With regard to the time when the constitution is to go into operation;
  • With regard to the time when the cost of maintaining the army of the country-shall be shared in common;
  • To article 18 of the constitution;
  • To articles 35 and 38 of the constitution;
  • To article 56 of the constitution;
  • To article 62 of the constitution;
  • To article 78 of the constitution; and
  • To article 80 of the constitution,
• Are also applicable to Würtemberg.
• To article 45 of the constitution, it was agreed that upon the railways of Würtemberg, in matters of construction, business, and trade, not all the articles of transport mentioned in this article can be raised to the one-penny rate.
• As to article 2, No. 4, of this day’s treaty, the understanding was reached that the extension of the provisions concerning postal privileges to the internal trade of shall depend upon the consent of Würtemberg, so far as these provisions give the mails privileges which do not belong to them in Würtemberg according to existing legislation.

Read, approved, and signed.

Appendix No. 7.

Part IV of the treaty with Bavaria, concluded at Versailles Nov. 23, 1870.

Since, in view of the great difficulties which the lapse of time and the continuance of the war place in the way of preparing a budget for this year for the military expenses of the German Union for the year 1871, and also in the way of determining the amounts to be expended by Bavaria on its army, the provisions under III, § 5, of this treaty, do not take effect until January 1,1872, the amount yielded by the general taxes for the year 1871, referred to in article 35, will not go into the treasury of the Union, but remain in that of Bavaria, but Bavaria’s share of the expenses of the Union shall be raised by taxes collected for that purpose.

final protocol to the customs-union treaty.

(Negotiated at Berlin July 8, 1867.)

The undersigned have met this day in order to sign, after another joint reading, the treaty entered into with the high authority of their sovereigns relative to the continuation of the customs and commercial union, on which occasion the following additional declarations, resolutions, and explanatory remarks, prior to closing the negotiation, were adopted in a final protocol to that end.

1.—To article I of the treaty.

• The agreement which is made, in article I of the treaty in reference to the efficacy of the treaties mentioned therein, shall be also applicable to those particular stipulations and agreements which are included in the requisite protocols of those treaties, as also in general to all the agreements entered into for furthering the internal development of The Zollverein.
• By the stipulation in this article, in view of the particular situation existing in Schleswig-Holstein, no present action shall be taken with regard to the establishment therein of the proposed customs organization.

2.—To article III, § 7, of the treaty.

It has been agreed upon that as an exception to the principle hitherto, adhered to in the execution of the requirements of § 43 of the customs-law, pig-iron and old cast iron, made use of by iron-founderies, iron-mills, and rolling-mills whose manufactures are exported to foreign countries, or which are used for the construction of vessels, shall be exempted from duty, under conditions which are more definitely stated in Appendix A.

3.—To article IV of the treaty.

It is understood that the stipulation in article IV, which excludes the continuance of the prohibition of the importation of playing-cards, now existing in the several states of the Zollverein, does not impede the privilege of the administration thereof to levy a stamp-duty on imported playing-cards coming from within the state or from other states, or coming from abroad into the Zollverein. The latter shall not impose a higher tax upon foreign playing-cards than on those manufactured in the country where the duty is collected. Playing cards which are shipped from one state of the Zollverein to another, in which a stamp-duty is collected, whether they remain there or are merely intransitû, shall be subject to the requirement of a transit receipt.

4—To article V, No. 11, §§ 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7 of the treaty.

The stipulations contained in article I of the treaty of the 16th of May, 1865, under No. II, §§ 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7, respecting the tobacco internal revenue, are therefore not cited in the treaty of to-day’s date, because they will be disposed of so soon as the appropriate resolutions of article III, § 4, of the treaty of this day’s date shall be acted upon. They remain, therefore, until that time in full force.

5.—To article V, § 5, of the treaty.

An abstract of the rates which are collected in those states of the Zollverein where internal taxes are imposed upon the production and manufacture of certain products, and which receive a drawback on the re-exportation of such products to other states of the said union, will be found in Appendix B.

6.—To article VI of the treaty.

For the states hitherto belonging to the Zollverein, those regulations remain intact which relate at present to facilitating the traffic of remote parts of the country with the main parts of the union.

7.—To article VIII, § 3, of the treaty.

The amount placed at the disposal of the committees for salaries of officers shall be divided between the North German Union and the South German states in the proportion which the duties and taxes accruing to the treasury of the former hold to the shares received by the latter from the taxes to be divided equally, according to article X of the treaty.

8.—To article VIII, § 6, of the treaty.

Prussia, without detriment to her exceptional power to conclude, on behalf of the Zollverein, treaties of commerce and navigation, shall invite the adjoining states of the union to participate in treaties with Austria and Switzerland, and in the final negotiations. In the event of an agreement not being reached, it shall nevertheless remain intact, according to the provisions of § 6.

9.—To article VIII, § 6, of the treaty.

• The functions which, according to the resolutions, regulations, and agreements cited in the present protocol, of § 1, are transmitted to the general conference, shall pass over to the federal council of the Zollverein.
• It is agreed upon that the federal council of the Zollverein shall also dispose of all those matters appertaining to its sphere of business which had their origin before the 1st January of the coming year, and which could not have been acted upon, in conformity with the treaty made.

10.—To article XII of the treaty.

In order to avoid disadvantages, which, by the renewed stipulations of this date in article XII of this treaty, the reciprocal adoption of silver coin for payments at all the custom-houses might cause, by reason of the existing differences of the coin valuation, it is resolved that,

• The payments due to other states of the Zollverein for settlements of general tax receipts, and when they cannot be paid to that state in coin received by the customhouse, or in the coin of the latter having an exact valuation with that of the former, shall be paid only in thalers of the Zollverein (article 8 of the coinage treaty of the 24th January, 1857), or in whole thalers or gulden pieces, but not in fractions thereof.
• The fractional parts of thalers received in those states of the Zollverein which reckon in guldens, and on the other hand fractional parts of guldens received in those states which reckon in thalers, when the receiving state cannot dispose of them by due payments resulting from settlements, shall on demand be exchanged at the nearest treasury office of the state of the union whose stamp they bear, for whole thalers or gulden, respectively, and no expense shall accrue to the state making the exchange.

11.—To article XIII of the treaty.

The statement annexed under C contains those amounts which shall be allowed as a maximum for drawback on newly-built vessels whose iron parts cannot be specially proven.

12.—To article XIV of the treaty.

The articles enumerated in No. 6 f, 2 and 3, No. 10 c, No. 12 g, No. 19 a and b, No. 21 a 1, No. 27 b, c, d, and e, No. 31 c, No. 35 b and c, No. 38 b, c, and d, and No. 40 b and c, of the second part of the tariff of the Zollverein, which was in force until the 1st July, 1869, shall in future be exempt from the payment of duty, notwithstanding the fact that they are now taxed with lower rates according to the tariff of customs existing at present, than the minimum rates established in § 3 of the regulations of December 4, 1833, governing the Leipsig fair, and similar rules governing the fairs of other places.

13.—To article XVI of the treaty.

In respect to the particularly unfavorable proportion which exists between the length of the taxable frontier of the duchy of Oldenburg on the one hand and its area and population on the other, Oldenburg shall in future be exceptionally allowed an addition to its aggregate sum, the amount not exceeding 4,500 thalers.

14.—To article XXVIII of the treaty of April 4, 1853.

In conformity with the resolution in No. 13 of the final protocol of May 16, 1865, a special board of direction shall be established in Oldenburg.

15.—To article XX of the treaty.

• Prussia, in exercise of the power incumbent upon her according to article XX of the treaty of this day, shall admit also officers from the other states of the Zollverein, in conformity with the wishes of the respective authorities.
• As a foundation for the instruction cited in this article, which shall determine the sphere of business operation of the agents attached to the board of direction of the states of the Zollverein, it is resolved that such agent shall be entitled to exercise the following functions:
  • He can be present at all the sessions of the board of direction. Every resolution or directions passed by that body or the presiding officer in regard to the management of the general taxes, by which the subordinate authorities have to be governed, shall be submitted to him when he is present in a draught form for his consideration before it is executed, and cannot be acted upon without his approval thereof.
  • The agent cannot refuse or delay his approval of the resolutions; he is, however, allowed in granting the same, when he apprehends that the execution of the resolutions will prove disadvantageous to the Zollverein, to note down his dissenting views on the draught and to demand that the board of direction shall at least, in issuing the decree, communicate with its superior department relative to the resolution in question.
  • If the latter shall fail to procure immediate redress, or the departments and the superior revenue authorities of the respective states shall not, in the mean time, have come to an understanding through correspondence, recourse shall be taken to the federal council of the Zollverein, in order that the difference and any eventual claims of the Zollverein for damages against that government whose authorities have given rise to the same may be decided.
  • The agent has also the privilege of making inquiries into the frontier service and into, the functions of inspectors stationed along the line of the custom-houses, and into the management of the collection of duties and revenues in the territory where he is accredited, in which purpose he may be assisted by officers appointed to this end. The agent is, however, at such inspections, unauthorized to give orders to the revenue officers or to the excisemen, or to issue regulations in regard to the management of business, but shall rather make a motion to the respective board of direction for a speedy removal of the deficiencies discovered by him.
  • The special agent, as well as every member of the board of direction, has the power to inspect the documents, the books, the accounts, and the register of these officials as also of the revenue and custom-house authorities.
  • He may examine the accounts on general taxes and make remonstrances against the same, but shall not, however, stop the keeping and receiving thereof, and shall also not prevent the superior official authorities from passing a decision upon the remonstrances made by the keeper of the accounts. Should he find the decision not conducive to the interests of the Zollverein, he shall bring the subject in question to the notice of the federal council.

16.—To article XXII of the treaty.

In regard to the treaty on turnpikes in the kingdom of Saxony, and in the countries belonging to the Thüringian union, where miles are equal in length to those of Saxony, it shall remain intact, according to the agreement entered into in the final protocol of the treaties of the 30th of March and the 11th of May, 1833.

17.—To article XXVI of the treaty.

It has been also agreed that tradesmen and travelers, as specified in the third paragraph of article XXVI, shall not in future carry with them merchandise for sale, but may themselves convey the goods purchased to the place of destination.

The form which is to be used for certificates of trade-licenses is appended under D.

All the plenipotentiaries mutually give to one another assurance, that, as occurred with previous treaties of the Zollverein, their governments, in ratifying the treaty, will also consider the amendments contained in the present protocol as approved and binding, without any further official ratification of the latter. The sole original treaty shall then be signed and sealed by the plenipotentiaries, and deposited and preserved for the whole Zollverein in the royal Prussian state vaults for secret archives; and copies, after being duly certified by the Prussian authorities, shall at once be delivered to the plenipotentiaries and the various governments of the Zollverein.

It finally being shown that the ratification of the treaty for the North German Union had to be made by the President only, and that as had already occurred in preceding similar cases, such a form of ratification could be chosen by which the subject of the latter should be sufficiently designated without a complete insertion of the articles of the treaty, after the present protocol was duly read, one copy thereof was signed, and, together with the original treaty, taken charge of by the royal Prussian plenipotentiaries, on the condition that certified copies should be immediately furnished to the remaining plenipotentiaries, and the original transmitted to the royal secret state archives.

Appendix No. 9.—Continued.

A.—Annex to No. 2 of the final protocol.

• The privilege is allowed only to manufacturers who have committed no offense as regards observance of the customs laws.
• The use of a private warehouse for foreign unmanufactured iron of all kinds and old iron shall be allowed to manufacturers, and to this the authorities shall have the right of entrance. Manufacturers to whom such privilege is granted shall furnish a secure and closed place of deposit for the purpose at their own expense. The general provisions with regard to private warehouses, to which the customs authorities have access, are also applicable to this warehouse.
• The iron may also be deposited in a public warehouse.
• An account shall be kept for each manufacturer, showing the amount of foreign iron imported and warehoused, and the kinds and amount of the goods manufactured therefrom, and exported, deposited in a public warehouse, or used for domestic shipbuilding.
• When iron is to be removed from the warehouse to be manufactured for foreign countries or for ship-building, the manufacturer shall give previous notice thereof, in writing, to the proper department of customs or taxes, stating what goods are to be manufactured therefrom.
• The amount notified shall be delivered from the warehouse, and the delivery marked on the notice and registered in the account.
• A copy of the warehouse account shall be furnished when the exportation, the deposit in a public warehouse, or the use for ship-building of the articles manufactured from the iron delivered, has been certified. This shall be done according to the weight of these articles.
• At the close of each quarter the customs-duty shall be paid; this shall be equal to the difference between the weight of the quantity notified from the warehouse during the last quarter but one, and the weight of the quantity copied from the warehouse account in the course of the last quarter. If the latter quantity is greater than the former, the difference shall be reckoned at the close of the next quarter.
• Inventories of stock on hand shall be made as the customs authorities may think best, but an inventory of all the stock shall be made at least once a year.
• Manufacturers must keep their books so that it may be seen without any special difficulty what kind of goods have Been manufactured and what material has been used for that purpose. The officers whose duty it is to examine these books shall at all times be permitted to have access to them. It shall also be the duty of manufacturers to show all their books and correspondence, if this is requested by the principal officer, in order to show whose orders they are executing, and whether they are using domestic crude iron or wrought iron, and, if so, to what extent.
• The customs authorities may also, if they think proper, order supervision to be exercised in other respects, but they shall especially cause the work done by the factories to be carefully inspected. The officers charged with this duty shall be admitted to every part of the factory at all hours of the day or night, so long as work is performed in the factory.
• The customs authorities may at any time withdraw the privilege. It shall always be withdrawn when a manufacturer has incurred a fine on account of fraud, and it may also be withdrawn when a book-keeper or workman employed in the factory has been punished with a fine for offenses committed by him in the interest of the manufacturer.
• Manufacturers shall be subjected to a fine (said fine to be fixed by the controlling board), not exceeding 100 thalers, in all cases in which they shall not obey customs-ordinances issued by the proper authorities; this they shall do under penalty of the withdrawal of the privilege in the event of their continued refusal to obey.

Appendix No. 9.—Continued.

B.—Annex to No. 5 of the final protocol.

Statement of the rates of taxes which, in those stales of the Zollverein wherein internal taxes are levied upon the production or preparation of certain commodities, shall be collected upon similar commodities produced in other states of the Zollverein.

Number	States of the Zollverein in which the tax is collected.	Basis for the collection.	Rate of taxation in—	Remember on the refunding of taxes in exportation to other states of the Zollverein or to foreign countries.
Thalers	Florins
	I.—On leaf-tobacco and manufactured tobacco.			Thlr.	sgr.	pf.	Fl.	kr.
1	Prussia (not including the Hohenzollerns). Also in close union with Prussia (according to the dates of the treaties): In Schwarzburg Sondershausen: “die Unterherrschat’t.” In Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt: “die Unterherrschaft.” In the Grand-Duchy of Saxony: the districts of All-stedt and Oldisleben. Anhalt. The Principality of Lippe. In Mecklenburg-Schwerin: the towns of Rossow, Netzeband,and Schöneberg. In Saxe-Coburg-Gotha: Volkenrode. In Oldenburg: the Principality of Birkenfeld. Waldeck and Pyrmout. Schaumburg-Lippe. The zone dependent on Bremen.	}	Cwt (Zollzentner)	0	20	0	1	10	{	In Hohenzollern a tax in transitû is not collected on tobacco in leaf and manufactured tobacco.
2	Saxony.
3	Thüringian Union. Thereto belong, in addition to the Prussian portions as signed to it: The Grand-Duchy of Saxony, exclusive of the districts of Ostheim and All-stedt, with Oldisleben, but inclusive of the town of Melper, which belongs to the district of Ostheim. The Duchy of Saxe-Meiningen. The Duchy of Saxe-Altenburg. The Duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, exclusive of the districts of Königsberg and Volkenrode. The sovereign Principality of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt. The sovereign Principality of Schwarzburg-Sondershausen. The Principality of Reuss—elder line. The Principality of Reuss—younger line.
4	Brunswick.
5	Oldenburg, exclusive of the Principality of Birkenfeld and including the zone dependent on Bremen.
6	Luxemburg.
	Remark.—The transit-tax the above-mentioned states of the Zollverein to be paid on leaf-tobacco and manufactured tobacco is a general one, and is divided. Trade in tobacco is carried on free between these states.
	II.—On beer.
1a	Prussia (exclusive of the Hohenzollerns). Also the countries above mentioned with Prussia under I from a to l, and the countries in close union with Prussia.	Cwt		7	6		26¼	When 6 cwt. and upward are exported 3 sgr. per gross cwt.are refunded.
1b	Principalities of Hohenzollern	Eimer (of Wurtemberg) = 2.13915 ohms Prussian:
		(a)	Brown beer	1	4	33/7	2	0	In exportation the following amounts are refunded pereimer of Würtemberg: (a) brown summer-beer, 1 fl. 30kr.; (b) brown winter-beer, 1 fl. 12 kr.; and (c) for white beer, 54 kr.
		(b)	White beer		22	10 2/7	1	20
2	Saxony	}	Cwt		7	6		26¼	{	Saxony as at 1a. In the Prussian territories assigned to the Thüringian union, as at la. In the Duchy of Cburg, in exportation, 12 kreuzers per eimer are refunded from that part of the State tax which is devoted to communal purposes. Brunswick as at 1a.
3	Thüringian Union, (as at I 3)
4	Brunswick
5	Oldenburg, (as at I 5)
6	Luxemberg
	Remark.—The tax to be paid on beer in transitû in the states above named at 1a, 2 up to 6, is a general one, and is divided. Between these states of the union commerce in beer is free.
7	Bavaria, to the right of the Rhine, and closely connected with Bavaria: The Grand Ducal Sax on district of Ostheim, exlusive of the town of Melper. The district of Königsberg, belonging to the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg Gotha.	Eimer, (Bavarian) =0 497932 ohms Prussian.		17	1 5/7	1	0	The amount refunded on beer exported from the principal countries of Bavaria is 40 kreuzers per Bavarian eimer.
8	Würtemberg	Eimer (of Würtemberg) = 2.13915 ohms Prussian:
		(a)	Brown beer	1	21	51/7	3	0	The malt-tax collected is determined in every case, for exported beer, according to the quantity of malt used, and the amount of tax to be refunded is fixed in accordance therewith.
		(b)	White beer	1	4	33/7	2	0
9	Baden	Ohm (of Baden) = 1.091673 ohms Prussians.		22	3 3/7	1	18	In the exportation of beer produced in the Grand Duchy of Baden. 1 fl. 5 kr. per ohm of Baden are refunded.
10	Hesse	Ohm (Grand Duchy of Hesse) = 1.164451 ohms Prussian.		28	6 6/7	1	40	In the exportation of 20 maass and upward 1 fl. 5 kr. is refunded per Grand Ducal Hessian ohms.
	III.—On brandy.
1a	Prussia (exclusive of the principalities of Hohenzollern). Also the above-mentioned countries and parts of countries at I from a to l, which are closely connected with Prussia.	Ohm (Prussian with 50 per cent. Alcohol according to Tralles.)	6	0	0	10	30	In exportation 11 silberpfennigs are refunded on each quart at 50 per cent. Alcohol according to Trallers.
	In the former Electorate of Hesse (exclusive of the Kreis of Schmalkalden and the country of Schaumburg) are collected up to July 1.	do	4	0	0	7	0	Up to July 1, 1868, 8 silberpfennigs per quart at 50 per cent. Alcohol according to Tralles.
1b	Principalities of Hohenzollern, so far as they formerly belonged to Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen.	Eimer (of Würtemberg.)	1	12	10 2/7	2	30
2	Saxony	}	Ohm (Prussia), 50 per cent. alcohol, according to Tralles.	{ 6 0 0	10	30	As at 1a
3	Thüringian unions (as at I 3)
4	Brunswick
5	Oldenburg (as at I 5)
6	Luxemburg
	Remark.—The tax to be paid on brandy in transit in the above-mentioned states of the union, &c., at 1a, 2 to 6, is a general one, and is divided. Between these states the trade in brandy is free.
7	Bavaria, to the right of the Rhine. Also, the portions of country belonging to other states of the union, mentioned under II 7.	Eimer (Bavarian).	1	0	0	1	45
8	Würtemberg	Eimer (of Würtemberg), with 50 per cent, alcohol, according to Tralles.	2	8	6 6/7	4	0
9	Baden	Ohm (of Baden):
		(a)	Brandy		28	6 6/7	1	40	In the exportation of at least 50 maass of brandy 36 kr. are refunded per ohm of Baden, and on spirits of wine 1 fl 10 kr.
(b)	Spirits of wine	1	21	5 1/7	3	0
10	Hesse	Ohm (Grand Duchy of Hesse), with 50 per cent. alcohol, according to Tralles.	5	4	3 3/7	9	0	In the exportation of 20 maass and upward, 6 fl are allowed on the grand ducal Hessian ohm, at 50 per cent. alcohol, according to Tralles.
	IV.—On bruised malt.
1	Bavaria, on the right of the Rhine. Also, the above-mentioned portions of other Prussian, states of the Zollverein, mentioned with Bavaria, under II 7.	Metzen (Bavarian) = 0.674283 scheffel Prussian		14	3 3/7		50
2	Würtemberg	Simri (of Wurtemberg) = 0.403069 scheffel Prussian:
		(a)	Bruised dried malt.		6	3 3/7	0	22
(b)	Crushed undried malt.		2	6 6/7		9

Appendix No. 9—Continued.

C.—Annex to No. 11 of the final protocol.

Notice concerning the maximum amount of duties to be refunded to builders of sea-going vessels, according to their capacity, for the component parts of iron that cannot be specially shown.

Capacity of the vessels in Lasts of 4,000 pounds each.	Amount per Last.	Difference per Last.
	Thl.	Sgr.	Pf.
For a vessel of 50 lasts or less	1	11	0	20/25
For a vessel of 75 lasts	1	9	4	20/25
For a vessel of 100 lasts	1	7	8	18/25
For a vessel of 125 lasts	1	6	2	17/25
For a vessel of 150 lasts	1	4	9	5/25
For a vessel of 175 lasts	1	4	4	5/25
For a vessel of 200 lasts	1	3	11	5/25
For a vessel of 225 lasts	1	3	6	5/25
For a vessel of 250 lasts	1	3	1	5/25
For a vessel of 275 lasts	1	2	8	5/25
For a vessel of 300 lasts	1	2	3	5/25
For a vessel of 325 lasts	1	1	10	5/25
For a vessel of 350 lasts	1	1	5	5/25
For a vessel of 375 lasts	1	1	0	5/25
For a vessel of 400 lasts	1	0	7	5/25
For a vessel of 425 lasts	1	0	2	5/25
For a vessel of 450 lasts		29	9	5/25
For a vessel of 475 lasts		29	4	4/25
For a vessel of 500 lasts		29	0	4/25
For a vessel of 525 lasts		28	8	4/25
For a vessel of 550 lasts		28	4	4/25
For a vessel of 575 lasts		28	0	4/25
For a vessel of 600 lasts		27	8	4/25
For a vessel of 625 lasts		27	4	4/25
For a vessel of 650 lasts		27	0	4/25
For a vessel of 675 lasts		26	8	4/25
For a vessel of 700 lasts		26	4	4/25
For a vessel of 725 lasts		26	0	4/25
For a vessel of 750 lasts		25	8	4/25
For a vessel of 775 lasts		25	4	4/25
For a vessel of 800 lasts		25	0	4/25
For a vessel of 825 lasts		24	8	4/25
For a vessel of 850 lasts		24	4	4/25

Remarks.—1. The above rates are adopted for iron-bottomed vessels, and a deduction is made of 5 silbergroschen per last in the case of copper-bottomed vessels, when the copper used therefor has been delivered duty free.

2. For vessels whose capacity is a number of lasts coming between any two of the numbers given in the above table, the amount per last is to be calculated proportionally with the aid of the differences. For instance, since between the capacity of 125 and 150 lasts the difference per last amounts to ½ 7/5 of a pfennig, the amount to be refunded is calculated for a vessel of 132 lasts at 7 + ½ 7/5 pfennige = = 5 pfennige less per last than for one of 125 lasts, consequently at 1 thaler 5 silbergroschen 9 pfennige. In this calculation fractions of a pfennig, when the fraction exceeds are to be reckoned as whole pfennige; otherwise no account is to be made of them.

Appendix No. 9—Continued.

D.— Annex to No. 17 of the final protocol.

Business license.

Good for the year [stamp with the arms and name of the country] 1800 and sixty-eight.

N, residing in N N, who purposes to solicit orders in the territory of the Zollverein, and to purchase goods for the account of his own drug-house and of the drug-house of N N, in which he is employed as clerk, also of the houses named below, is hereby notified, for his business legitimation before the authorities of the other states of the Zollverein, that the lawful taxes must be paid for carrying on the business of the aforesaid house (houses) in this country. He can only take with him samples of the goods which he wishes to order, and can only take purchased goods for the purpose of forwarding them to their place of destination. He is also prohibited from soliciting orders or making purchases for any save the aforesaid house (houses).

In soliciting orders or in purchasing goods he must observe the regulations in force in each state of the Zollverein.

(Place, date, signature, and stamp of the issuing office.)

Personal description and signature of the traveler.

Appendix No. 10.

Article 49 of the treaty of alliance of the North German Union, of November 23, 1867.

Relations to foreign postal territories.

Article 49.

Transmission, in connection with foreign postal territories, is regulated according to postal treaties with the foreign powers concerned, and according to agreements with foreign transportation companies.

In the conclusion of postal treaties with foreign powers, when two or more of the parties to the present treaty have direct postal relations with one and the same foreign state, or desire to enter into such relations, that postal administration which proposes to conclude a new treaty shall give notice of its intention to the other postal administrations, with a view to bringing about an understanding with regard to the harmonious action to be taken towards the foreign country and to the promotion of the existing common interests of the German postal system.

In cases where such an understanding has been reached, the postal administrations concerned will endeavor to bring about the conclusion of the new treaties in common, and one of the contracting parties may, to this effect, appoint another as its plenipotentiary.

In all cases care shall be taken by the treaties, in order that the facilities afforded to the postal communication of the foreign country concerned, with the territory of the contracting German postal administration, shall be extended in the same manner and on the same conditions to the correspondence conveyed in parcels of other German postal territories with the foreign country concerned.

The acceptance of the provisions contained in the treaties with foreign countries shall be obligatory upon all the parties to the present treaty, provided that no rates of postage are fixed lower than the German postage. In case it becomes necessary to adopt lower rates, it shall be optional with the several postal administrations whether they will become parties to the provisions of the treaty in question.

Appendix No. 12.

Part III, § 5, of the treaty with Bavaria, of November 23, 1870.

§ 5.

As to articles 57 to 68 of the constitution of the (German) Union, article 57 is applicable to the kingdom of Bavaria; article 58 is likewise applicable to the kingdom of Bavaria. The latter article, however, contains the following addition for Bavaria:

“The obligation contained in this article will be fulfilled by Bavaria by defraying exclusively and alone the expenses and burdens of its military establishment, those of the fortresses within its territory, and those of other fortifications.”

Article 59 and article 60 are legally applicable to Bavaria.

Articles 61 to 68 are not applicable to Bavaria.

In their stead the following provisions shall be operative:—

“I. Bavaria shall retain its military laws, together with the instructions for their execution, ordinances, elucidations, &c, until the constitutional decision of the matters to be referred to the law-making power, and until an understanding is reached as regards the introduction of the laws and other provisions hereto relating which were enacted before Bavaria entered the Union.

“II. Bavaria pledges itself to raise, for its contingent and the arrangements thereto appertaining, an amount equal to that raised by the other parts of Germany for the army of the Union, according to the numerical force.

“This amount shall be placed in the budget of the Union in one sum for the royal Bavarian contingent. Its expenditure shall be regulated by special lists, the preparation of which shall be left to Bavaria.

“Those items shall serve as a standard for this purpose which are inserted in the several titles for the rest of the army of the Union.

“III. The Bavarian army shall form an independent constituent part of the German army of the Union, having its own management, under the military authority of His Majesty the King of Bavaria; in war and when mobilization commences, under the command of the commander-in-chief of the armies of the Union.

“As to organization, formation, improvement, dues, and mobilization, Bavaria will establish perfect harmony with the regulations existing for the army of the Union.

“As to arming and equipment, as well as indications of rank, the Royal Bavarian Government reserves to itself the establishment of entire harmony with the army of the Union.

“It shall be the duty and the right of the commander-in-chief of the armies of the Union to convince himself, by inspection, of the agreement in organization, formation, &c, and of the fullness and efficiency of the Bavarian contingent, and be shall communicate with His Majesty the King of Bavaria as to the method and result of these inspections.

“The order for the mobilization of the Bavarian contingent, or any part thereof, shall be issued by His Majety the King of Bavaria, at the instance of the commander-in-chief of the armies of the Union.

“For the sake of constant mutual information in the military relations created by this provision, the military plenipotentiaries at Berlin and Munich shall be apprised by their respective ministers of war of such orders as may be issued.

“IV. It shall be the duty of the Bavarian troops to render unconditional obedience, in time of war, to the orders of the commander-in-chief of the armies of the Union. This obligation is comprised in the oath of enlistment.

“V. The establishment of new fortresses in the territory of Bavaria, in the interest of the defense of all Germany, will be granted by Bavaria by special agreement.

“The expense of building and equipping such establishments in its territory shall be shared by Bavaria in proportion to the number of its population with the other states of the German Union; likewise extra amounts that may be allowed by the Union for other defensive establishments.

“VI. The premises on which the territory of the Union, or any part thereof, may be declared to be in a state of war by reason of the public safety being threatened, the form of the proclamation, and the effects of such a declaration, shall be determined by a law of the Union.

“VII. The foregoing provisions shall go into operation January 1, 1872.”

Peace footing of the royal army-corps of Würtemberg.

One general command.

Two division commands.

Four infantry brigade commands.

Two cavalry brigade commands.

One artillery brigade command.

Eight infantry regiments, of three battalions each.

Four cavalry regiments, of five squadrons each.

One field artillery regiment, with three unmounted companies, having four batteries each.

One garrison artillery detachment, with four garrison companies.

One pioneer battalion.

One train battalion.

Sixteen Landwehr district commands.

The administrations corresponding to the foregoing.

War footing of the royal army-corps of Würtemberg.

• Field troops:
  • Command authorities: One general command (together with field gendarmerie detachment and staff-guard); two infantry division commands; two cavalry brigade commands; one command of the reserve artillery.
  • Infantry: The regiments containing three battalions each.
  • Cavalry: The regiments containing four squadrons each.
  • Artillery: The detachment staffs existing in peace; the batteries, with six pieces; also a column detachment, consisting of the staff, four infantry columns, and four artillery ammunition trains.
  • Pioneers, three independent companies, with light field bridge-train, engineer column, and ponton column.
  • Trains: Staff of the train-battalion; five provision columns; three sanitary detachments, including companies for carrying the sick; one horse-depot; one field-bakery column; one squadron, for accompanying trains; wagon-train columns (about five, of eighty teams each).
  • Administrations.
    • The intendancies, as follows: The corps intendancy; three division intendancies (one for each of the two infantry divisions; one for a reserve artillery).
    • The war fund of the corps.
    • The field provision offices, as follows: One chief field provision office; three field provision offices (one for each of the two infantry divisions—one for the reserve artillery); one field-bakery office.
    • The directing medical personnel.
    • Twelve field-hospitals.
    • The hospital-reserve personnel.
    • One hospital-reserve depot.
    • The field-post thus: one field-post office; four field-post expeditions, of which latter two are for the two infantry divisions, one for the reserve, (cavalry and artillery); the fourth is mainly attached to the field-post, and, in case of necessity, is transferred to the advanced guard.
    • The paymasters’ department.
    • The clergy.
• Stationary authorities: one deputy general command, four deputy infantry brigade commands, one inspector of the reserve squadrons, one command of the stationary artillery, one stationary intendancy, one deputy chief corps-surgeon.
• Substitutionary troops: eight substitutionary battalions; four substitutionary squadrons; one substitutionary artillery detainment, with two batteries, having six guns each; one substitutionary pioneer company; one substitutionary train detachment.
• Garrison troops: sixteen Landwehr battalions; one or two garrison cavalry regiments; three reserve foot-batteries, with six guns each; eight fortress artillery companies, with the necessary detachment staffs; three fortress pioneer companies.
• All the troops on a war and peace footing, according to the Prussian schedule, as regards strength. Hereafter, when the number of men to be called into service in time of peace exceeds the constitutional rate per cent, of the amount of population, the necessary modifications shall be reserved for special measures.