sible, from the joint revenues, especially the customs,
and that all common outlays in excess of these revenues should be
borne by the states in a proportion to be fixed at decennial intervals
by the Reichsrath and the Hungarian Parliament. Other joint interests
of an economic nature--trade, customs, the debt, and railway
policy--were left likewise to be readjusted at ten-year intervals. In
respect to contributions, the arrangement hit upon originally was that
all common deficits should be made up by quotas proportioned to the
tax returns of the two countries, namely, Austria 70 per cent and
Hungary 30 per cent. As has been pointed out, the periodic overhauling
of the economic relationships of the two states has been productive of
frequent and disastrous controversy. The task was accomplished
successfully in the law of June 27, 1878, and again in that of May 21,
1887. But the readjustment due in 1897 had the curious fortune not to
be completed until the year in which another readjustment was due, i.e.,
1907. To the parliamentary contests, at both Vienna and Budapest,
by which the decade 1897--1907 was filled some allusion has been
made.[713] They involved distinctly the most critical test of
stability to which the Ausgleich has been subjected since its
establishment. During the period various features of the pre-existing
arrangements were continued in force by royal decree or by provisional
parliamentary vote, but not until October, 1907, were the economic
relation of the two states put once more upon a normal basis.
Throughout the decade the Emperor-King exercised repeatedly the
authority with which he is invested by law of 1867 to fix the ratio of
contributions for one year at a time, when action cannot be had on the
part of the legislative bodies. The ratio prevailing during the period
was Austria 66-46/49 per cent and Hungary 33-3/49 per cent.

[Footnote 713: See pp. 479-481, 502-504.]

By the agreement of 1907, concluded for the usual ten-year period, the
Hungarian quota was raised from the figure mentioned to 36.4 per cent.
The customs alliance, established in 1867 and renewed in 1878 and
1887, was superseded by a customs and commercial treaty, in accordance
with which each state maintains what is technically a separate customs
system, although until the expiration of existing conventions with
foreign powers in 1917 the tariff arrangements of the two states must
remain identical. Under the cond