he intellectual freedom of Germany has done next to nothing to
bring about political or, in the realm of journalism, personal
self-control.

It is a strange state of affairs. Intelligent men and women in Germany
do not realize it. Not once, but many times, I have been told: "You
foreigners are forever commenting upon our bureaucracy, our
officialdom, but it is not as all-powerful as you think. We have
plenty of freedom!" These people are often themselves officials,
nearly always related to, or of the society, of the ruling class. The
rulers and the ruling class have naturally no sense of oppression, no
feeling that they are unduly subject to others, since the others are
themselves. I am quite willing to believe of my own and of other
people's personal opinions that they are not dogmas merely because
they are baptized in intolerance. I must leave it to the reader to
judge from the facts, whether or no the Germans have a political
autonomy, which permits the exercise and development of political
power. A glance at the political parties themselves will make this
perhaps the more clear.

The official organization of the conservative party, may be said to
date back to the founding of the Neue Preussische Zeitung in 1848, and
the organization of the party in many parts of Germany. Earlier still,
Burke was the hero of the pioneers of this party, whose first
newspaper had for editor, no less a person than Heinrich von Kleist,
and whose first endeavors were to support God and the King, and to
throw off the yoke of foreign domination.

In 1876 was formed the Deutsch-Konservativ party supporting Bismarck.
"Koenigthum von Gottes Gnaden" is still their watchword, with
opposition to Social Democracy, support of imperialism, agrarian and
industrial protection, and Christian teaching in the schools, as the
planks of their platform. They also combat Jewish influence
everywhere, particularly in the schools. Allied to this party is the
Bund der Landwirte and the Deutscher Bauernbund. In the election of
1912 they elected forty-five representatives to the Reichstag, a
serious falling off from the sixty-three seats held previous to that
election. The Free Conservative portion of the Conservative party, is
composed of the less autocratic members of the landed nobility, but
there is little difference in their point of view.

The Centrum, or Catholic party, is in theory not a religious party; in
practice it is, though it does not bar out P