THE GERMAN ELECTOR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 14924, 23 February 1912, Page 4

THE GERMAN ELECTOR.

PHILOSOPHY AND POLITICS.

SCENE FROM THE CAMPAIGN.

A MOST SERIOUS BUSINESS. [from oun own correspondent.] Berlin", January 12. Is this German general election, the Reichstagswalil, really a contest in which the German people shall decide for peace or war? • Undoubtedly not.., The hope of seeing these people soberly come to that decision is blasted as soon as one becomes in the slightest degree acquainted with the machinery of election and the method of government. The German Reichstag represents "the people of Germany much less than the House of Commons that of the United Kingdom. Even if the Social Democrats wiped out completely tho balance of parties which is maintained by tho separate blocks of Clericals, Free Conservatives, National Liberals, and what not—each has a sumptuous suite of rooms in the Reichstag building—the German Government and tho Kaiser would still hold the power of veto on the question of peace and war. Therefore let us not talk of war. It is vain. Lot us talk of men. " Deutscher Michel." I .use this expression because it is not the right one, therefore appropriate for election time.. " Deutscher Michel" is a financial individual, representing here a sort of composite of John Bull and Farmer Hodge. He is the German analogy of the individual called "the British public," and, as far as I can see, he is strikingly like the B.P. in his virtues. His faults are. apparently shy and unobtrusive, for I have seen none of.them yet. Oh. yes ! In the Unter den Linton today f»ur men were stretched wounded and bleeding in the snow from a rather hefty traffic collision. The British public would have rushed in with help and sympathy; blundered, perhaps, but still not lucked heaps of humanity. The German stood off, not less sympathetic, I am sure, but evidently waiting for the interposition oi the proper uniformed authority. They were soldiers who rushed in and laid the. sufferers in a more comfortable position, 'that little incident illustrates what 1 have most noticed in the German character— the deference to authority, the secondary position of tho civilian. And it walks, somewhat strangely, side by side with a distinct tendency to collectivism. There you have the social life of Germany. But to return to Deutscher Michel, as we see him engaged to-day. One cannot say truly that thefo is anv great excitement over tho elections. " Somehow the political activity of the nation seems to reside in tho camps of the Social Demokratischen partei. They are the people who are doing the work. They claim to have registered, in previous elections, more than half the votes of the nation of the fruits of which they have been cheated by an archaic electoral system. Entrenched behind this system "the "parties of reaction"— old name, of worldwide relish!— rest secure. There is no need for them to work at the hustings lhe Kaiser and the Government have already damned the Sozial Demokraten, the former in genera! terms, the latter to the tune of tho British peril. So why bother to. do more? The Konservative is frankly as to the campaign, and his meetings draw tens where those of the Socialists draw hundreds. An Election Meeting. The first election meeting which I attended in Germany was organised by tho Centrum, or Clerical party, at Osnabruck, a rather important town and railway junction in the west, not far from the" Dutch frontier. Osnabruck is a stronghold of the Clericals-, and four priests sat close to myself on the stage, where the committee and*the more Important members of the party locally were displayed, drinking coffee, light Pilsener and dark Munich —equally harmless beverages— and smoking German cigars. " They were chiefly professional and business men of the town, and dour, bearded farmers from the vicinity, and they numbered quite 100. The hall itself, though a large one, was filled to overflowing. All the audience sat at small tables, and throughout the meeting waiters bustled in and out with beer and coffee. Despite all this flow of beer, those who understand these people will easily believe that there was no merriment, noise or interruption. It was a quiet, orderly gathering, requiring no chairman at all. It .'food en masse when that superfluous individual named the Kriser, and relieved itself of three full, hoarse "hochsj" then subsided quiet contentedly to hear the speech. The speaker—they call 1 them disingenuously "agitators" if they do not happen to be candidates themselves—was a Dr. Niedor, a young, dark, clean-shaven man, with a self-confidence that was- .the evident growth of experience. He wore a frock coat, opened a book of notes on the rostrum and commenced his address. " Ladies and Gentlemen." There were a few ladies Jul the hall, and I was struck to notice that, he addressed this ' partly unenfranchised audience " Damen and Herren, just as I have been struck in England by the frequent omission of the ladies, even when there were many of them in the room. I cannot say, "of course, whether this elision of courtesy in England was the result of recent years of troublesome meetings, in which ladies have not always deserved better. It is curious,, though, to find the courtesy so common where ladies not only have no votes but are not demanding them. Dr. Niedor laid bare the German character for me. For •'< solid hour—l yawn now at the recolieCTj'ou- 'Tie spoke sheer, cold philosophy—the family and the State. For a solid hour none said yea oi nay, or uttered a word. Not a German turned a hair. All remained motionless and pensive, staring fixedly at the speaker, and evidently taking it all in. I have never seen an English-speaking audience, that would have endured so much. It was a study in the pMlisophic temperament of the German people, and I thanked heaven for the sight. Such a people could not go to war in or light-heartedly. For one hour more Dr. Niedor maintained die assault At the end of the first hour and a-iia'u came the first exclamation of feeling. "Sella reehtig" (very true): and "Pfui, pfui" ("fie," but sounding more like " Oui oui") when the speaker read, in pleasantly, disdainful tones, from a book 6T Herr Belial. The meeting was quite cut and dried, like an annual meeting of shareholders when the dividend exceeds I2i per cent. It was a decent, well-to-do. middle-class audience, for all the world like a Masonic Lodge, English in appearance and manners, essentially normal, but quieter than any similar gathei'Mg i Have seen either in England or New Zealand. Amongst the Socialists. P.remen. the old Hansa town, the headquarters of such maritime enterprises as the Nord Duetscher, Lloyd, is one of those large commercial centres of Germany which belong politically to the Socialists. I attended one of their meetings in the company of a leading business Turin of this ancient fraternity, his wife and daughter. They are not socialists, but they wore perfectly willing to venture- out in trie snow to attend"the meeting. It was held in the Cafe Concordia, a pleasant room fitted with trees and trellises like a winter garden. Banners of cosmopolitan colour and non-com-mittal pattern decorated the gallery. The red and white stripes of Sozial Demokraten were prominent, but the only national banners, I noticed with pleasure, were two British red ensigns.