Revolution law-making has become too specialized, too technical for men of mere average ability and average experience; and, secondly, the social conflict, which dominates the serious thought of the time, has escaped the control of parliaments. Mr. Belloc can see nothing of this sort; and upon the evidence which he adduces we can believe no more in the imminence of monarchy than in the approaching depression of the masses to the servile status of ancient times. UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA EDWARD MCCHESNEY SAIT Prácticas Parlamentarias; Las Asambleas Legislativas, Tomo IV, El Uso de la Palabra y la Disciplina. By VICENTE PARDO SUAREZ. Havana, Bouza y Ca., 1921.-259 pp. This is the fourth of a series of works on parliamentary practice by the Chief Clerk of the Cuban House of Representatives. The first dealt with the quorum, resolutions, and the three readings of a The second dealt with legislative immunities, organization, and duration of sessions. The third discussed the constitutional attributes of the legislature. The present volume takes up the rules of debate and the power of discipline. It follows the plan of the earlier volumes in presenting a comparative survey of the practice in regard to these matters in the leading countries of the world. In the list of countries considered all the Latin-American Republics are included, with the exception of Nicaragua and Venezuela, and in addition Germany, Austria, Belgium, Spain, France, Hungary, England, Italy, Portugal, Switzerland and the United States of America. After a summary of provisions governing the rules of debate and the disciplinary power of legislative bodies by countries, the author makes a general summary of the leading features derived from his survey, and follows this by his own conclusions as to the best regulations to be adopted for legislative assemblies with reference to these points. The limited extent of the book necessarily makes for a rather sketchy treatment both of the descriptive and of the constructive portions of the work. Nevertheless, the volume has value and interest to students of political science because of its convenient compilation of parliamentary practice, as well as because of the views of a close and first-hand student of these matters with relation to the principles involved. UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS HERMAN G. JAMES Japan and the United States, 1853-1921. By PAYSON J. TREAT. Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1921.-283 pp. This interesting and important contribution to the history of American relations with Japan consists chiefly of twelve lectures which were prepared for delivery at four Japanese universities in the autumn of 1921. The lectures are preceded by an introductory chapter, "The Heritage of New Japan", which gives the reader a brief summary of the early history of Japan so necessary to an understanding of the conditions prevailing there at the time of Commodore Perry's visit. The field of these studies is one which Professor Treat has made his own and which he has cultivated very assiduously. An earlier volume by the same author, Early Diplomatic Relations between the United States and Japan, published in 1917, deals very fully with the opening of Japan and our relations with that country during the brief period, 1853-1865. The present volume includes this period in its survey, but gives it fresh treatment as forming but a part, although a very important part, of the whole connected story of American intercourse with the empire. The volume under review, therefore, is much more than a continuation of the one which preceded it. Even where the same events are touched upon, a difference of treatment is discernible, due no doubt to a difference in the origin of the two works; one being prepared for American students in an American university, the other for Japanese students in a Japanese university. The history of our relations with Japan is one with which every American should be familiar. There is much in it of which we are justly proud, but there are also some incidents in the story that do not reflect credit upon any of the Western Powers that entered into treaty relations with the Shogunate. If it is ever comportable with justice to a weaker state to force upon its government a treaty that deprives it of tariff autonomy, then that negotiated by Townsend Harris with Japan must be admitted to be less objectionable than most of its class. It was much more favorable to Japan than that imposed at an earlier date upon China, since it provided for a maximum duty of thirty-five per cent ad valorem upon certain luxuries, while China was limited to an ad-valorem duty of only five per cent, whether upon necessaries or luxuries. This reasonable tariff arranged by Harris was soon modified, however, much to the injury. of Japan, by the selfish demands of certain powers who insisted upon the lowest rate for imports into Japan in which their subjects were interested. Thus after a few years all the important articles on the import tariff list were paying but five per cent ad valorem. Moreover, since the ad-valorem duties had been converted into specific, the change in values soon reduced the duty to much less than the five per cent allowed by treaty. Notwithstanding the provision of the treaties stipulating that the tariff might be revised in 1872, certain powers refused repeatedly to grant Japan's request for such revision unless they were given some quid pro quo. It was not until Japan had built up for herself a great military machine and demonstrated her ability to make war that her request for fair treatment in the matter of the tariff and for the abolition of the extraterritorial jurisdiction of foreign states over their nationals in Japan was given consideration. It is not to the credit of the West that it would yield only to military power what was required by simple justice. Professor Treat says truly: "It would have been better if some of the powers had thought a little more of the feelings of a whole people than of the privileges of their own merchants and residents" (p. 133). It is to be hoped that Japan's experience in these matters will dispose her to sympathy with China's request for tariff autonomy. Thus far, however, she has shown less generosity than some other states, in so far as the tariff is concerned, but her delegates at the Washington Conference supported the proposal for a special conference to be called in the near future to consider the whole subject. Since the lectures were addressed originally to Japanese audiences, one would naturally expect that the most favorable construction would be placed upon the policies and actions of the Japanese Government. Generally speaking this is true; a cordial friendship for Japan is shown on every page, but this does not lead the author to withhold blame in discussing Japan's relations with her neighbor, China. Referring to the Twenty-One Demands, he says: In many of these articles Japan showed an appalling lack of sympathy with China. The Chinese opposed strenuously the throwing open of South Manchuria and Eastern Inner Mongolia to Japanese travel and residence, with the right to own land and carry on business, because, as long as extraterritoriality prevailed, intolerable conditions would arise. The Japanese, scattered over the country, would be removed from Chinese control and subject only to their own consuls and their own laws. . . . Now Japan had suffered greatly from the abuse of extraterritoriality by Europeans, but never as grievously as China had. . . . She should have been the last of the powers to have forced a great extension of the extraterritoriality problem upon China (p. 213). In this criticism the author would find much support even in Japan. He says indeed: "It is gratifying to note that in Japan much outspoken criticism of this drastic policy was voiced. At first raised by publicists well informed in Chinese affairs, who realized the heavy price Japan was paying in the loss of Chinese friendship, it gradually gained in strength" (p. 218). He calls attention, too, to the effect of this aggressive policy upon opinion in the United States at the time of the anti-Japanese agitation in California: "It should be said in this connection, that the renewal of the anti-Japanese agitation coincided with the widespread criticism of Japan because of her actions in China, Siberia and Korea" (p. 262). In some of his lectures, however, Professor Treat shows less disposition to make unfavorable criticism where some would anticipate severe condemnation. Dealing with Japan's violation of China's neutrality during the World War, he says: It has frequently been asserted that, in advancing across Chinese territory, the Japanese acted exactly as the Germans did in invading Belgium. But certain differences at once appear. Germany had solemnly promised not only to respect but to protect the neutrality of Belgium. When she demanded that Belgium grant her a right of way, Belgium refused, and to her undying credit risked all she possessed to maintain her neutrality. China, on the other hand, promptly protected herself from later German reprisals by proclaiming a war zone. It was unfortunate that her neutrality should be disregarded, but it was a price she had to pay for having tolerated the presence of a fortified foreign leasehold on her shores (pp. 208, 209). This seems to be rather lenient treatment for such a serious offense as the violation of China's neutrality. Professor Treat, however, would disclaim, no doubt, any intention to justify that violation on the ground that no express promise had been given to respect China's neutrality, since Japan, as well as other powers, recognizes the obligations imposed by international law. Great Britain carefully avoided such violation when she participated in the attack on Tsingtao, and there was no real military necessity requiring the march across neutral territory. It must not be forgotten that the railway outside the leased territory had never been in the military occupation of Germany, and that it was in fact taken from the Chinese, who were guarding it, and not from the Germans. The author perhaps was not acquainted with the charges made by reputable missionaries in Shantung of the cruel treatment of peaceable Ch nese peasants by the Japanese military, for he would in that ca have seen a similarity to the German treatment of the Belgian The statement on page 208 that China gave her assent to this invasio of her territory, which is credited there to the Japanese Governmen appears to be entirely at variance with the facts as shown by China' repeated protests. Although China in self-defense declared a zon of belligerency, Japan ignored this also, and China several time protested against the transgression of the boundaries of the zone. There is fortunately pretty reliable evidence that Yuan Shih-ka offered to join in the attack upon Tsingtao, but was not permitted to do so. At the time of the declaration of war China was negotiating with Germany for the return of the leased territory to her. The United States at the same time was urging the neutralization of the Far East, which Great Britain and Germany were disposed to allow, but Japan, apparently afraid that her chance of getting Kiaochow would be lost, prevented the accomplishment of either project by her ultimatum to Germany. When it became evident that war was to be made on Tsingtao, it appears from statements of persons in the confidence of the Chinese cabinet ministers that President Yuan then offered to join in the attack, but yielded to pressure of Japan's ally to abstain, lest Japan should be thwarted in her designs. The reason for Japan's unwillingness to have China enter the war on the side of the Allies was not her opposition to Yuan's imperial ambitions, but, as stated by a distinguished Japanese, her unwillingness to see four hundred million Chinese arm for war. In the end Japan yielded to the requests of her Allies because she was able to enter into a secret military alliance with the military party in China, which would place China's forces outside China, that is to say, in Siberia, under Japanese command. In this connection it is not unfair to Japan to call attention to the bargain made by Japan with her Allies in return for the assistance which they needed against the undersea boat menace in the Mediterranean. The author says (p. 220): "Japan had been unwilling to have China enter the war unless her claims to the German rights were guaranteed by her allies." The rights to which reference is made were those formerly belonging to Germany in Shantung and in the islands north of the equator. In the exchanges of notes, to which the author refers, the promise to support Japan's claims at the peace conference was conditioned upon Japan's promise to support the claims of Great Britain to the islands south of the equator |