The general fund contains all forms of specie and currency held by the government other than the sums included in the above reserve and trust funds. A separate item is made of the varying amounts on deposit with the national banks. Among the cash liabilities is given first the sum of the claims upon the above trust fund, namely the amount of outstanding gold, silver and currency certificates, as well as of outstanding treasury notes of 1890, but not of greenbacks—which, by appearing in the statement as a cash liability, would wipe out any cash balance. To Το this item is added the liability on account of the 5 per cent. redemption fund of the national banks held in trust by the government, and on account of sums due to disbursing officers. If the difference between the cash assets and the cash liabilities exceeds $150,000,000-the reserve fund-its amount figures as the "cash balance exclusive of reserve and trust funds," a new item in the government accounts. A general acquaintance with its meaning and derivation may lighten the task of completing the monetary and banking reform just begun.

The framers of the Constitution intended the President of the United States to be, like Bolingbroke's "Patriot King," above party and without party ties or obligations. To accomplish this they devised a plan which combined within itself nomination and election. The electoral colleges of the several States meeting separately and without any previous agreement as to concerted action were to discuss the men eligible for the position and to transmit to the seat of government the result of their deliberations in form of the vote of their State for the two best men in the country for the office. The man who received the majority of the votes of the several electoral colleges as disclosed at the formal counting was to be President, and the next in order was to be the Vice-President. In this plan there was no place for party action, and consequently, as soon as the political parties took on a sufficient degree of coherence, the system gave way at two points. First, a self-constituted body, the congressional caucus, selected a party candidate, depriving the electoral colleges of that vital function, and transforming

them from bodies chosen to select a candidate for the Presidency into dummies to record in a certain way the result of the election in the several States. Second, the tendency to uniformity of party action on formal nominations made it inevitable that normally there would always be an equal vote for two men, as in 1800, which would throw the election into Congress. In other words, as soon as there were party candidates for President and Vice-President respectively, the electoral colleges must vote for one man for President and another for VicePresident, or they would have no function at all, but would regularly be displaced by the House of Representatives. This alternative method, however, which ignores parties and party candidates even more than the original electoral colleges since the vote is by States, each State counting equally, was totally unacceptable and hence the twelfth amendment was absolutely imperative.

As nominating machinery the congressional caucus worked satisfactorily until the spread of democracy, gradually effacing the Federal party, brought the vast majority of the people into the ranks of the Republicans. Under these conditions nominations by congressional caucus was equivalent to election by Congress. Against this the new democratic spirit naturally revolted, and in the unique contest in 1824, when there were five candidates for the Presidency from the sole party in the field, four of them were presented to the people by factions which bolted the action of the caucus. Popular conventions suited the spirit of the times and nomination by national party convention soon became a conspicuous and accepted feature of our political life, arousing an interest and excitement second only to the final election itself in a close campaign.

This brief historical retrospect paves the way for the query whether the national nominating convention has lived its life and, like the original electoral colleges, is sinking into a machine which registers decisions made elsewhere, or like the congressional nominating caucus, will disappear before some new method. The last Republican convention, as regarded the candidate, merely registered a foregone conclusion, and the next will be even more mechanical in its operations. The last Democratic

convention exhibited the institution in its strength and in its weakness, but the next will function like a machine. Struggles over platforms may still impart a transient interest to these gatherings, but it may be that we have seen the last of the old conventions, those thrilling courses where so many times indecisive contests between the people's favorites lasted on till exhaustion or despair opened the way for the dark horse.

It is perhaps too early to forecast the outcome of this evolution, and to indicate the coming agency which will determine the candidates for the Presidency after the convention has become a form like the electoral colleges, but at present the real struggle seems to be transferred to the State and local conventions, and in consequence, "organization," as Senator Hanna preaches, becomes more than ever the secret of success. This cannot fail to reinforce the importance of the machine all along the line and with it of patronage. Possibly we may live to see a President elected as smoothly as the senators from New York State. The crucial question for our democracy will then be whether it can throw off this yoke as it did that of the congressional caucus seventy-five years ago.

No political issue in recent years has aroused more interest or been more earnestly discussed than the Porto Rican tariff. The revolt of the people against it and the opposition of so many of the party newspapers was a reassuring evidence that, despite the glamour of imperialism, the masses of the people are not ready wholly to renounce the principles of the American Revolution, and by the homage of imitation to confess that Grenville, North, Townshend, and George III, were right and the fathers of the Republic were wrong.

Yet what renunciation could be more complete than for the leaders of a party which won its first victory forty years ago on a platform incorporating the preamble of the Declaration of Independence, to close the century with legislation almost the exact counterpart of the Acts of the British Government which brought forth the American Revolution? It was the light taxation of four or five selected articles of import from England by

the Townshend Revenue Acts that exasperated our forefathers against the mother country beyond reconciliation. The Porto Rican Bill taxes commerce in both directions. In both cases the assertion of a principle was quite as important a factor as the collection of revenue, and the principle was the same, that the immunities of the constitution did not extend to the dependency. Not only in principles, but in details do the policies resemble each other. The advocates of the Porto Rican Bill still expatiate on the singular and unprecedented generosity which provides that all the revenue collected shall be devoted to the needs of the Island. Unfortunately for their complacency, that feature of the bill is not without precedent, as can be seen in the following comparison:

TOWNSHEND Revenue Act, 1767.

"All the monies that shall arise by the said duties . . . shall be applied . . . in making a more certain and adequate provision for the charge of the administration of justice and in the support of civil government, in such of the said colonies and plantations where it shall be found necessary; . . . the residue of such duties shall be paid into the receipt of his majesties exchequer, and shall be entered separate and apart from all other monies paid or payable to his Majesty ...; and shall be there reserved, to be from time to time disposed of by parliament towards defraying the necessary expenses of defending, protecting, and securing the British Colonies in America.”

PORTO RICAN BILL, 1900.

"The duties and taxes collected in Porto Rico in pursuance of this Act, . . . and the gross amount of all collections of duties and taxes in the United States upon articles of merchandise coming from Porto Rico, shall not be covered into the general fund of the Treasury, but shall be held as a separate fund and shall be placed at the disposal of the President to be used for the government and benefit of Porto Rico until the government of Porto Rico herein provided shall have been organized."

In the eyes of the fathers, nothing was more dangerous to liberty than the "union of the purse and the sword," but the Porto Rican Bill not only exceeds the Townshend Acts in the range and burden of taxation, but places the receipts at the arbitrary disposal of the President, while the Townshend Act placed them under the control of Parliament.

Again, the Upper House or "Executive Council" of the Porto Rico Bill finds its exact counterpart in "the council or court of

assistants" of the hated Massachusetts Government Act of 1774, and not in the standard form of our traditonal territorial legislatures. And, finally, the best commentary upon the reiterated assertion that Porto Rico must not look forward to full rights as a territory or to ultimate Statehood, is one of Franklin's "Rules for Reducing a Great Empire to a Small One," written in 1773. "Take especial care the provinces are never incorporated with the mother country; that they do not enjoy the same rights, the same privileges in commerce; and that they are governed by severe laws, all of your own enacting, without allowing them any share in the choice of legislators."

The signs of the times point to an extensive revision of our traditional historical judgments.