;, ^ . r , '. 
 
 HE German 
 Workman 
 
 WILLIAM HARBUTT 
 DAWSON 
 
\ 
 
 N eminent British statesman said some years ago, " 
 all socialists now." That was before the day of 
 pensions and the national insurance law, with whicl 
 
 the leadership of Lloyd-George, Great 
 
 has made such a striking advance in tl 
 tion of state socialism. In general tt 
 British health insurance bill may be th 
 marized as to its provisions : 
 
 V Great 
 Experiment in 
 sociology 
 
 The insurance bill requires that a man shall pay 8 cents, t 
 ploycr 6 cents and the state 4 cents. In return the insured i 
 free medical attendance by a doctor of his own selection from 
 of doctors, and free medicines; sick pay at the rate of $2.50 a w 
 first three month v, $1.25 for the next three months and for life 
 of permanent invalidism. For women the payments and bene 
 lower and include maternity benefits. It is estimated that 9 
 men and 3.900.000 women come within the compulsory class a 
 of the total annual fund of $118,000,000 the state will contribu 
 $27,000,000. 
 
 In certain highly skilled trades like that of ship building a 
 ning is also made in insurance against unemployment, except 
 of strikes, on further payments by the three parties. Nation? 
 toriums are also to be established for the treatment of tuhercuk 
 
 Innovations of such magnitude could not, of cotSrse, 
 ,ted without encountering serious opposition of the ci 
 )litical sort, designed to mislead the ignorant or make a 
 ejudice. Oddly enough, the bill was opposed by the social! 
 )th in and out of parliament. Their ground of objection 
 ;ey did not favor any plan of which the beneficiaries are ; 
 ibutories. It is an odd fact that the tories took the sam< 
 id appealed to voters to beat the bill on the ground that 
 leir wages. 
 
 It is a great undertaking to insure the health of a n 
 ell as a notable departure in statesmanship, and the wc 
 ic experiment will supply an interesting study in sociolos 
 
THE GERMAN WORKMAN, 
 
WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 " German Socialism and Ferdinand Lassalle." 
 
 A Biographical History of German Socialistic Movements 
 during the igth Century. 
 
 " Prince Bismarck and State Socialism." 
 
 An Exposition of the Social and Economic Legislation 
 of Germany under the New Empire. (Also Editions in 
 German and Italian.) 
 
 " Germany and the Germans." (2 vols.). 
 "German Life in Town and Country. ' 
 
 "Protection in Germany." 
 
 A History of German Fiscal Policy during the 19th 
 Century. 
 
 " Social Switzerland.' 
 
 Studies of Present-day Social Movements and Legislation 
 in the Swiss Republic. 
 
 " Matthew Arnold and his Relation to the 
 Thought of our Time.' 
 An Appreciation and a Criticism. 
 
THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 A STUDY IN NATIONAL 
 EFFICIENCY 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM HARBUTT JDAWSON 
 
 Author of " Germany and the Germans," 
 
 " German Socialism and Ferdinand Lassalle," 
 
 "Prince Bismarck and State Socialism," 
 
 " Social Switzerland," Etc. 
 
 "IFlew ^OXk: 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS. 
 
 ILonDon : p. s. kino & son. 
 
 1906 
 
BRADBURV, AGNRW, & CO. LD., FRINTKRS 
 LONDON AN-n TONBRIDOE. 
 

 CONTENTS 
 
 
 I. LABOUR REGISTRIES .... I 
 
 II. MUNICH LABOUR BUREAU . . . l8 
 
 III. INSURANCE AGAINST WORKLESSNESS . 2g 
 
 IV. THE RELIEF OF WANDERING WORKERS . 37 
 V. LABOUR COLONIES 48 
 
 VI. RELIEF WORKS FOR THE UNEMPLOYED . 79 
 
 VII. HOUSING OF THE WORKING CLASSES . jS 
 
 VIII. MUNICIPAL HOUSE BUREAUX . . . 120 
 
 IX. SHELTERS FOR THE HOMELESS . . I25 
 
 X. THE ANTI-CONSUMPTION CRUSADE . . I35 
 
 XI. THE BERLIN CONVALESCENT HOMES . I47 
 
 XII. THE DOCTOR IN THE SCHOOL . . • I56 
 
 XIII. MUNICIPAL PAWNSHOPS .... 168 
 
 XIV. INDUSTRIAL COURTS OF ARBITRATION . 176 
 XV. THE INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. . I94 
 
 •.imMry 
 
vi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. PAG» 
 
 XVI. workmen's secretariates . . . 2l6 
 
 XVII. MUNICIPAL INFORMATION BUREAUX . . 242 
 
 XVIII. THE GERMAN POOR LAW . . . 246 
 
 XIX. THE ELBERFELD POOR RELIEF SYSTEM . 260 
 
 XX. THE TREATMENT OF INDUSTRIAL MALIN- 
 GERING 275 
 
 XXI, THE BERLIN WORKHOUSE . . . 283 
 
 XXII. DRESDEN MUNICIPAL WORKHOUSE . . 293 
 
INTRODUCTION, 
 
 Speaking in the Reichstag on February 6, 1906, 
 Count Posadowsky, the Imperial Minister of the 
 Interior, said : — 
 
 " If Germany has just experienced a vast indus- 
 trial expansion equalled by no other country in the 
 world during the same time, it is chiefly due to the 
 efficiency of its workers. But this efficiency must 
 inevitably have suffered had we not secured to our 
 working classes, by the social legislation of recent 
 years, a tolerable standard of life, and had we not, 
 so far as was possible, guaranteed their physical 
 health. Quite recently a representative of the 
 chemical industry assured me of this in eloquent 
 words." 
 
 In truth eloquence is not needed to enforce a 
 truth which cannot have escaped the attention of 
 any careful student of German social legislation 
 and social reform institutions. Nevertheless, 
 Count Posadowsky's words may aptly serve as a 
 motto for the present volume, since they exactly 
 define the standpoint from which the writer 
 approached his task That task was to show how 
 
viii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 at every turn German statesmen and philan- 
 thropists have endeavoured — and with unabated 
 zeal are still endeavouring — to ensure and to safe- 
 guard the conditions of physical efficiency, leaving 
 as little as possible to chance, covering as far as 
 may be the whole range of life and action, and 
 doing it with the thoroughness and system which 
 are so characteristic of the German mind, and 
 which, if English people would but believe and 
 understand, are the key to all Germany's progress 
 in those practical and material concerns which 
 nowadays increasingly engross the attention of 
 nations. 
 
 Is the workman without employment ? All that 
 municipal and associated effort, skilfully co-ordi- 
 nated and efficiently directed, can do to find him 
 work is promptly done. For the workless man who 
 thinks he can better his prospects in a new home 
 the Herberge and the Relief Station exist, and they 
 offer the traveller hospitable lodging and food by 
 the way. To the needs of the miscellaneous crowd 
 of unemplo3^ed whose love of steady industry is not 
 always above suspicion, Labour Colonies, conducted 
 both on industrial and agricultural lines, minister 
 in their special way. In the towns exceptional 
 seasonal distress is more and more met by the 
 provision of public works. To encourage the 
 provident a method of insurance against workless- 
 ness has been introduced in some towns. 
 
 Does the workman wish to change his dwelling ? 
 The municipality has a house agency of its own. 
 
INTRODUCTION. ix 
 
 at which all desired information and help can be 
 obtained without charge. Does he wish to buy 
 or to build a house for himself? Public funds of 
 various kinds — State, municipal, insurance, phil- 
 anthropic — are available, and many millions of 
 pounds have alread}' been advanced in this way. 
 
 Is money wanted on loan ? The municipality 
 acts as pawnbroker, and offers prompt relief, with 
 absolute assurance of fair dealing. 
 
 Is the workman in difficulty from want of friendly 
 advice ? There is no subject under the sun upon 
 which the Municipal Information Bureau is not 
 prepared to counsel him. 
 
 Have capital and labour fallen out ? In the 
 Industrial Courts are offered facilities for settling 
 their disagreements expeditiously and without 
 cost. 
 
 Or, again, does sickness throw its shadow over 
 the worker's home ? The gloom is relieved owing 
 to the fact that the needs of wife and children are 
 supplied by the insurance fund to which he has 
 contributed during health. So, too, in the event 
 of accident, liberal allowances come from the 
 same source, however long the incapacity may 
 last. In addition, there are well-ordered public 
 hospitals and convalescent homes, to which every 
 ratepaying citizen may go for nursing and rest ; 
 and, better still, there is the wonderful system of 
 heahng agencies which has been set up by the 
 insurance authorities, and which is at the disposal 
 of all insured workers, of any age and of either sex. 
 
X INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Has the last scene of all in life's strange event- 
 ful history come — the age of decay and helpless- 
 ness ? A pension awaits the weary time-expired 
 soldier of industry, a pension not large, nor yet 
 as large as it might be, but a welcome supplement 
 to his own savings or to the sacrifice of children 
 or relatives. 
 
 And so one might go through the whole 
 ■ catalogue of Germany's practical experiments in 
 the science of social government. Some of these 
 experiments are remarkable for their originality, 
 for Germany has in this domain of legislation 
 shown an initiative and a boldness which, whether 
 the results always give satisfaction or not, compel 
 admiration and respect. For details, however, 
 the reader must turn to the chapters which 
 follow. 
 
 The influence upon social life and individual 
 character of these strong tendencies towards a 
 practical collectivism is a question the due dis- 
 cussion of which would require a book to itself. 
 No one will, however, pass judgment upon this 
 question without taking into account the prin- 
 ciples of government which are traditional in 
 Germany, for with those principles the modern 
 " policy of social welfare " which is expounded in 
 these pages is perfectly consistent. Moreover, to 
 the possible plea that such a polic\' is incom- 
 patible with the spirit of self-reliance and the 
 cultivation of strong individualities, the best 
 answer is that, by the consent of all of us, 
 
INTRODUCTION. xi 
 
 Germany is doing its own work in the world — 
 and, as we are apt to think, some of ours as well 
 — and is doing it exceedingly well. 
 
 Purposely I have refrained from discussing 
 industrial conditions in their narrower and more 
 personal aspects, partly from a disinclination to 
 complicate my subject with controversial issues, 
 but also from a conviction that the story as it 
 stands is complete and self-contained. What- 
 ever may be the German worker's standard of 
 wages and of life, whatever his hours of labour 
 and the conditions of his employment, the Imperial 
 social legislation of the past quarter of a century 
 and the enlightened reforms which during the 
 same period have been adopted for his benefit by 
 municipality and private philanthropy, working 
 singly or together, form a distinct chapter of 
 national life, and this chapter may properly be 
 written without any reference whatever to 
 polemical questions. 
 
 Immediate purposes apart, such a survey as 
 this of another country's methods and measures 
 of social reform can hardly fail to throw light 
 upon questions urgent amongst ourselves. In 
 the conception of social problems and the for- 
 mulation of ameliorative measures, every nation 
 follows more or less distinctive traditions of 
 thought, and it would be fallacious to assume 
 that what is good for one land would necessarily 
 be beneficial for another. And yet, after all 
 needful reservations have been made, it is still 
 
xii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 true that much may be learned from Germany's 
 example, even though the example may at times 
 be deterrent rather than encouraging. Where 
 we can do so with advantage, we shall be wise in 
 paying Germany the flattery of imitation ; where 
 not, we shall be equally wise in accepting the 
 warning of its experience. 
 
THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 LABOUR REGISTRIES. 
 
 Of all the social problems of the times, that 
 created by the existence of a large and apparently 
 never diminishing class of unemployed is perhaps 
 the most tragic and most melancholy. How deal 
 with these people ? In the past the policy of 
 legislative and administrative inaction, tempered 
 by public and private charity, has held the field. 
 More and more, however, society, and after society 
 the statesman and the politician, who should lead 
 public opinion, yet in fact do so little in the domain 
 of social reform that is original and constructive, 
 are recognising that the attitude of passivity is 
 neither politic nor safe. At the moment there are 
 signs of a rather violent reaction. *' Practical 
 measures " are now the order of the day, for we 
 are at last all agreed that something must be done. 
 Doubtless also we shall do that something, though 
 whether it will prove to be a wise and well-con- 
 sidered thing is at least an uncertain point, and 
 the justification for incredulity is found in our 
 
 G.W B 
 
a THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 inveterate national habit of refusing to think out 
 our problems in quiet, and of experimenting in the 
 dark, trusting with a quite superstitious confidence 
 that our proverbial common-sense will be justified 
 of its offspring. 
 
 Germany enjoys no immunity from unemploy- 
 ment, yet on behalf of the Germans it may at any 
 rate be claimed that they have approached the pro- 
 ' blem of worklessness in a logical and orderly spirit, 
 and have tried to deal with it step by step, stage by 
 stage, by measures which enlarge and supplement 
 each other, and which together cover the whole 
 ground, so far as a complete and systematic treat- 
 ment of the problem is humanly practicable. 
 
 And granting the necessary existence of a con- 
 stant amount of unemployed labour, the German's 
 first idea is to facilitate employment as speedily 
 // as possible, by placing the men who want work in 
 communication with the men who want workers. 
 Thus has come into existence the German system 
 of labour registration, the largest and most efficient 
 known to an industrial State. 
 
 Germany had public labour bureaux long before 
 the practical utility of these institutions became 
 generally recognised. More than sixty years ago 
 the Saxon town of Leipzig established such an 
 agency, and down to the present day it has con- 
 tinued to negotiate work for the unemployed of all 
 classes without charge. Of private agencies, the 
 oldest in Germany is that at Stuttgart, which was 
 established so long ago as 1865. While, thus, 
 
LABOUR REGISTRIES. 3 
 
 labour bureaux, variously named, had existed long 
 before, a social congress held in Berlin in the year 
 1893 gave the impetus which has led to the present 
 multiplicity of these institutions, and it is note- 
 worthy that the movement has throughout had 
 the general support of the labouring classes, whose 
 initiative, in not a few places, stirred the municipal 
 authorities to action. At the present time hardly 
 a German town of any industrial importance can 
 be named which has not in regular operation an 
 efficient labour registry. The executives are 
 chosen in different ways — in some cases by the 
 municipal councils, in others by the industrial 
 associations and trade unions, and in others by 
 the courts of industry — but employers and work- 
 people are generally given a place and a voice 
 upon them. In the great majority of cases the 
 bureaux are independent departments of municipal 
 government, with separate officials and offices, 
 though here and there they are — very disadvan- 
 tageously, it is maintained — associated with other 
 branches of work. In most cases the seekers of 
 work, like the seekers of workers, are simply 
 registered in lists, classified according to occupa- 
 tion, and at stated times they are invited to call 
 and inquire whether their needs can be supplied. 
 It is becoming very common, however, to provide 
 convenient waiting rooms in which the registered 
 unemployed can be sheltered during the day. 
 Where this is done a vacancy list is usually read 
 out in hearing of the assembled applicants at 
 
 B 2 
 
4 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 regular intervals. Several towns have devoted, 
 and have even specially built, large and convenient 
 buildings for this important branch of work. As a 
 rule the bureaux are open all day on weekdays, 
 though in many cases for a few hours on Sunday 
 as well. Free service is now the almost universal 
 rule, whether the applicant be a workman or an 
 employer, the costs of the institution all falling on 
 the municipality. Here and there, however, an 
 exception is made in the case of employers seeking 
 domestic servants or in the case of employers and 
 workpeople who are non-resident, but even here 
 the fees charged are nominal, and the tendency is 
 to abolish them altogether. The labour bureaux 
 under private management, not having the re- 
 sources at control which are enjoyed by the 
 municipal bureaux, do not so generally offer 
 gratuitous registration, and in Berlin no less a 
 sum than £650 is received annually from fees, 
 which are said to be willingly paid. Both free 
 and fee-paying bureaux have their advocates, 
 though it cannot be denied that to the extent that 
 fees prevent the registration of unemployed labour 
 they cause the bureaux to defeat their own object. 
 The question is, however, generally viewed as one 
 rather of financial policy than of principle. 
 
 The period for which applicants are registered 
 varies from a fortnight to several months, but at the 
 end of the time registration may be renewed should 
 work not have been found. Some bureaux issue 
 formal tickets admitting registered applicants to 
 
LABOUR REGISTRIES, 5 
 
 the waiting-rooms at all or certain hours of the 
 day for a fixed period ; thus the Berlin employ- 
 ment bureau has from the first charged twenty 
 pfennige. Yet the utility of these certificates of 
 employment is largely questioned, and in practice 
 they have been much abused, for not unseldom 
 they find their way into the hands of vagabonds 
 who desire work least of all things, yet who, 
 equipped with official declarations that they have 
 sought employment and have not found it, are 
 able, temporarily at least, to bid defiance to the 
 police when charged with common vagrancy. 
 Hence some bureaux have discontinued the issue 
 of documents of any kind. 
 
 No uniform rule is followed in the considera- 
 tion of applications for employment. Nominally, 
 indeed, such applications are taken in the order of 
 priority in the case of unskilled workmen, though 
 the head of a household will not uncommonly be 
 given preference before a single man. In dealing 
 with skilled labour a man's capacity and his fitness 
 for the special task offered are considered, even 
 where the employer does not make express stipula- 
 tions on the point. Here the public labour bureau 
 departs from the principle followed by the labour 
 registries of the trade unions and guilds, which 
 strictly allot work in the order of priority of 
 application. It is still less usual for the labour 
 bureau to inquire into the personal character of 
 the applicants; here master and man are left to 
 the test of experience. It is, however, an almost 
 
6 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 invariable rule to require an applicant for work to 
 legitimise himself by the production of some such 
 official document as a labour book (if under age), 
 army discharge certificate, or insurance paper, 
 which not infrequently has to be deposited until 
 he either finds work or is discharged from the 
 register. There is no rule debarring men in work 
 from seeking new employment through the labour 
 bureau, but it is seldom that questions are asked 
 on the point. 
 
 A common source of difficulty in connexion 
 with the working of labour bureaux, whether on 
 municipal or private lines, is the attitude which 
 they should assume in the by no means rare 
 eventuality of industrial disputes. Originally it 
 was customary to suspend operations entirely in 
 respect of the trade or industry affected by either 
 strike or lock-out. It was argued on behalf of 
 employers, however, that to cease to offer work to 
 unemployed persons on the occurrence of a strike, 
 far from being a neutral act, was one specially 
 and directly favourable to organised labour, and 
 that to continue open implied no partisanship, 
 inasmuch as it was optional for labourers to use 
 the bureaux and accept work or not as they would. 
 Nowadays the plan most in favour is simply to 
 preserve a neutral attitude, informing applicants 
 for employment when a dispute exists and leav- 
 ing them to act at their discretion. Naturally the 
 organised workers and their leaders see to it in 
 these cases that such advice and persuasion as 
 
LABOUR REGISTRIES. 7 
 
 the law permits are not wanting on their part. 
 Nevertheless, some bureaux continue to suspend 
 operations for the trade affected in the event of a 
 dispute occurring. In yet others, no uniform 
 principle is followed, but the managing body acts 
 in every case as the special circumstances may 
 suggest. The rules of one of the Saxon bureaux 
 provide that in the event of strike or lock-out the 
 committee of management shall immediately be 
 called together, for the purpose of fixing a term 
 within which the disputing parties shall be invited 
 to seek the services of the standing Board of Con- 
 ciliation. Should they not do so, or should 
 neither conciliation nor arbitration take place, it 
 is left to the committee to decide whether the 
 bureau shall continue to mediate employment for 
 the industry or trade concerned. It is obvious, 
 however, that where labour is able to act with 
 unanimity this question of the closing or otherwise 
 of the bureaux in strike times creates no very 
 serious difficulty. 
 
 One of the most noteworthy features of the 
 labour bureau movement is the growing tendency 
 and willingness of the independent trade union 
 and guild registries to amalgamate with the public 
 registries, thus bringing the entire work of employ- 
 ment mediation in a town under one organisation 
 and roof. Thus the Berlin Labour Registry 
 embraces, besides its general department, no 
 fewer than twelve guild registries — for the book- 
 binders, butchers, bakers, painters, locksmiths, 
 
8 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 paperhangers, stucco-workers, roofers, and others; 
 and in Munich the registries of the bookbinders, 
 bakers, butchers, cabmen, coppersmiths, potters, 
 painters and varnishers, shoemakers, and wig- 
 makers are similarly affiliated to the Municipal 
 Labour Bureau. The Karlsruhe Bureau has even 
 been successful in bringing together the Protestant 
 and Roman Catholic Workers' Associations as 
 well as the trade unions in the common interest 
 of labour mediation. 
 
 For perfection of arrangements the Labour 
 Bureau of Munich probably takes the first place 
 in Germany as a municipal institution, insomuch 
 that it well deserves separate description. On the 
 other hand, Berlin offers an example of thoroughly 
 efficient and successful work in the domain of 
 labour registration conducted on non-municipal 
 lines. The Central Labour Bureau there {Central 
 Arbeitsnachweis) , which is carried on by a society 
 known as the Central Association for Labour 
 Registration, is, as to buildings and their equip- 
 ment, the most elaborate, as it is certainly the 
 most costly, in the whole country. Organised 
 over twenty years ago on what is known as the 
 " paritative " principle — implying management by 
 a body representative equally of employers and 
 employed — it has continued on that basis until 
 the present time, and there appears to be neither 
 intention nor need to resort to any other basis of 
 organisation. For many years the Labour Bureau 
 was carried on in rented rooms, but, helped by 
 
 1 
 
LABOUR REGISTRIES. 9 
 
 a timely loan of ^TsOjOoo advanced by the 
 Insurance Board for Berlin at the moderate 
 interest of 2 J per cent., and the promise of a 
 yearly subsidy of ;^r,ooo (since increased to 
 ;f 1,500) from the city council, the society erected 
 a home of its own in Gormannstrasse, and here 
 the bureau has been settled since 1902. It is a 
 magnificent block of buildings, impressive even 
 more as a concrete sign of the serious and sym- 
 pathetic spirit in which the work of public labour 
 registration is undertaken in Germany than 
 because of its unique proportions and the com- 
 pleteness of its arrangements. To say that the 
 ambitious project owed its successful realisation 
 to the fertile mind and abundant energy of Dr. 
 Freund, the president at once of the bureau's 
 executive and of the Invalidity Insurance Board, 
 is but to give praise where it is chiefly due. 
 
 There are two separate buildings — one for 
 unskilled workpeople, the other for female em- 
 ployees and the trade guilds which are affiliated 
 to the bureau. To the former building belong, 
 besides the formal registration offices and resi- 
 dential quarters for the attendants, a large 
 assembly-hall, to which work-seekers are able to 
 resort during the day, with galleries which alone 
 seat 1,400 persons, a reading room supplied with 
 books and newspapers, a canteen, workrooms for 
 tailors and shoemakers, in which repairs are made 
 at the all-round charge of just over a penny, a 
 miniature hospital, with a series of bathrooms 
 
lo THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 below in which hot, cold, and shower baths can 
 be had at all hours of the day for a halfpenny. 
 
 In the large assembly-hall, the vacant situations 
 are called out at fixed intervals in the hearing of 
 the assembled work-seekers, and from the number 
 of those who offer themselves the Director chooses 
 the most suitable, though, other things equal, he 
 gives the preference to married men or men who 
 have waited the longest time for work. At the 
 canteen nutritious food is served in return for 
 coupons issued by the guild registries as well as 
 for direct payment. Over 100,000 portions of 
 food are sold during the year. There are separate 
 departments for workmen over sixteen years and 
 for juveniles, so that contact between the 
 two is unnecessary. The accommodation for 
 female work-seekers and for the trade guilds is in 
 its way no less complete. For the former a large 
 room, capable of holding 375 persons comfortably, 
 and having its own entrance from the outside, is 
 set apart, while to each of the guilds a separate 
 set of rooms is allotted — offices, waiting-rooms, 
 etc. — with a canteen for common use. The guild 
 registries have thriven from the beginning, and 
 their number tends to increase. They are largely 
 used by employers of labour in preference to 
 advertising in the public journals or relying on 
 casual callers ; and some make it a rule only to 
 employ workpeople who, after inquiry, have been 
 directed to them by the association. The entire 
 accommodation of the registry is for 4,000 per- 
 
LABOUR REGISTRIES. ii 
 
 sons. Registration is not free : a fee of twenty 
 pfennige (twopence-halfpenny) is charged now as 
 ever, and the certificate given in return is valid 
 for three months, though many applicants are 
 admitted gratuitously to the benefits of the 
 bureau both in the general and the guild section. 
 
 At the time of my last visit to the Berlin labour 
 registry (1905) its work was grouped as follows : 
 registers for unskilled male workers (day labourers, 
 cabmen, porters, etc.), for juvenile workers, for 
 apprentices, for female workers, for municipal 
 workmen, for tinners, for glace and white leather 
 workers ; with registries for the following guilds — 
 for painters and whitewashers, for locksmiths, 
 for laundry workers, for paperhangers, for the 
 linen trade, for bookbinders and allied trades, for 
 stucco-workers, for roofers and scaffold builders, 
 for butchers, for machinists and stokers, for 
 glaziers, for bakers ; and in addition there were 
 branch registries in two of the industrial suburbs. 
 The year's work comprised 74,511 applications 
 from work-seekers, 6o,6gi applications from 
 employers, and 46,616 vacancies filled. The latest 
 addition to the bureau contemplated is a registry 
 for domestic servants, to be conducted at the expense 
 of Berlin mistresses, who are to pay a yearly sub- 
 scription of four marks as well as a fee of a mark 
 on using the bureau's services. 
 
 The entire arrangements of the institution are, 
 indeed, superb and evince a desire to minister in 
 the most efficient manner possible to the con- 
 
12 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 venience and welfare of the city's unemployed. 
 Where equal resources are available the Berlin 
 Central Labour Bureau may well be studied and 
 followed as a model. 
 
 For the labour bureaux of Germany as a whole, 
 both public and private, agreat measure of success 
 can be claimed. They are, without exception, 
 readily used by workpeople, though less willingly 
 by the employers of labour. It is complained in 
 some towns that the latter are either indifferent or 
 positively hostile to the bureaux ; yet, on the other 
 hand, a very cordial relationship exists in many 
 cases, and where indifference or prejudice 
 continues it is gradually being overcome. Never- 
 theless, it is a common experience that the factory 
 industry uses the labour bureaux, whether muni- 
 cipal or philanthropic, far less than the trades and 
 handicrafts, though gradually the disparity is 
 decreasing ; and for the past reluctance of many 
 large industrial employers to seek the services of 
 labour agencies of any kind there has been an 
 explanation in the strained relationships between 
 capital and labour so common in large towns. It 
 may be noted that in many places the regis- 
 tration of domestic servants now-a-days forms 
 a very important branch of the labour bureau's 
 work, and in some towns the public bureau has 
 entirely superseded private servants' agencies. So 
 firmly established has the institution become in the 
 Grand Duchy of Baden, that the police in some 
 parts of the State forbid itinerant work-seeking and 
 
LABOUR REGISTRIES. 13 
 
 direct the unemployed to communicate with the 
 labour registries. 
 
 Exact figures for the whole of the Empire are 
 not available, but Prussia alone had in 1903 no 
 fewer than 276 labour registries, either communal 
 in management or aided by communal subsidies, 
 and they received 545,622 applications for work 
 and 382,711 applications for workers, and filled 
 272,524 vacancies. The public labour registries 
 of the whole Empire are estimated to have 
 negociated work for no fewer than 600,000 persons 
 during the year ending March, 1904. 
 
 Those who are conscious of the gravity of the' 
 rural migration problem in England will be 
 interested to know that the same problem presses 
 on Germany with at least equal weight. It is a 
 common complaint of the labour bureaux in the 
 larger towns that they have inquiries for labourers 
 for the land which cannot be met. Let the dearth 
 of labour be never so great in the country, and its 
 abundance never so great in the towns, the 
 unemployed cannot readily be induced to turn 
 their backs on the urban surroundings to which 
 they have become accustomed, but hold to the view 
 that it were better to starve in idleness in the town 
 than return to the dreariness of the land. This 
 has particularly been the experience of Hamburg, 
 where there is a perpetual surplusage of dock 
 labour, while at the same time an increasing cry 
 for more workers comes from the inland rural 
 districts. Though, however, it has hitherto proved 
 
14 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 impossible to persuade the superfluous dockers to 
 abandon a hopeless quest after work in Hamburg, 
 hope of success has not been abandoned. On the 
 other hand, the Munich Labour Bureau amongst 
 others is able to show a good record in the 
 mediation of rural employment, a department of 
 ts work to which very serious attention is given. 
 
 Germany has brought to a great degree of 
 efficiency the co-ordination of labour registration, 
 a movement in which the States of Wurtemberg 
 (where it originated), Baden, and Bavaria and 
 several provinces and government districts of 
 Prussia have particularly distinguished themselves. 
 The method of action is for the labour bureaux of 
 contiguous towns or districts to combine in an 
 association or union which mediates between them : 
 thus the Wurtemberg Association is formed of 
 fifteen bureaux, that of Bavaria of sixty-eight, 
 grouped in eight central exchanges, that of the 
 Dusseldorf district of twenty-three, that of Baden 
 thirteen, and so on. Indeed, the co-ordination 
 which has been arranged in Wurtemberg, Bavaria, 
 Baden, and Alsace-Lorraine virtually establishes 
 intercommunication between the whole of the 
 labour bureaux of South Germany. The co-opera- 
 tion followed varies both in form and degree. In its 
 most rudimentary and tentative form it may go no 
 farther than the exchange of advice by correspon- 
 dence and periodical conference ; the more 
 developed form takes the form of a central exchange 
 which serves as a sort of clearing-house for the 
 
LABOUR REGISTRIES. 15 
 
 vacancies which the affiliated bureaux are unable to 
 deal with. Thus in Wurtemberg the whole of the 
 labour bureaux are in constant telephonic, tele- 
 graphic, and postal communication, and in addition 
 they exchange vacancy lists three times a week 
 (Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday) in summer 
 and twice a week (Tuesday and Friday) in winter 
 through the mediating central exchange at 
 Stuttgart. In the small towns and villages with- 
 out labour bureaux employment is negotiated 
 where possible by the communal authorities by 
 means of special registration forms, the State 
 bearing the cost of postage. State help is a 
 prominent feature of the Wurtemberg system of 
 co-ordination, for the cost of the entire machinery 
 has from the first been made a public charge, 
 including the free use of the telephonic, telegraphic, 
 and postal service, and the cost of the periodical 
 conferences between the directors of labour 
 bureaux ; a reduction of one-half in fares is also 
 allowed to work-seekers who use the railways 
 under the direction of the bureaux. The vacancy 
 lists, as collated at headquarters, are sent not 
 merely to the labour bureaux of the kingdom and 
 of adjacent districts, but to the administrative 
 authorities of all communes in Wurtemberg with 
 a population exceeding 2,000, and to such 
 smaller communes as may wish to receive 
 them. 
 
 The Wurtemberg methods have in the main been 
 imitated by Baden, for which State the Karlsruhe 
 
i6 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Labour Bureau acts as " Central." On the other 
 hand, Bavaria has a system of central exchanges, 
 eif^ht in number, each serving for a convenient 
 area. The exchange at Munich serves for Upper 
 Bavaria, and it both issues a weekly vacancy list 
 to the associated bureaux and acts as a medium of 
 communication between them. In the interest of 
 a speedier negotiation of employment the Munich 
 Exchange is promptly notified of all vacancies or 
 offers of work which the bureaux are unable to 
 deal with, and these it endeavours to negotiate 
 pending the pubhcation of the weekly circulating 
 lists. 
 
 The co-ordination of the functions of labour 
 mediation on the Wurtemberg or Bavarian lines is 
 making steady progress in Germany, andthe results, 
 on the whole, have proved distinctly encouraging. 
 It is true that the actual number of engagements 
 arranged in this way is not very large, but on the 
 other hand the work-seekers who are helped by 
 the several exchanges are just those whose con- 
 dition is most unfortunate : they are the men for 
 whom their own local bureaux can do nothing and 
 who, but for the wider facilities for employment 
 which the exchange system brings within reach, 
 would remain in the ranks of the unemployed. 
 An objection originally taken to the exchange 
 of vacancy lists was that it would encourage 
 the indiscriminate migration of workpeople, 
 but this does not appear to have been the case. 
 Now as before the vast majority of the registered 
 
LABOUR REGISTRIES. 17 
 
 vacancies are filled by local labour, and work- 
 seekers are urgently dissuaded from travelling to 
 places from which vacancies have been notified 
 unless they have received from the local bureaux an 
 assurance that the work is still available. More- 
 over, the principle is rigidly followed of refusing 
 employment in Munich to agricultural labourers ; 
 these are only given an opportunity of going back 
 to the land, and if they decline it the bureau has 
 no more to say to them. In this way something 
 is done to restrict the immigration to the city of 
 the rural population. 
 
 G.w. 
 
i8 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE MUNICH LABOUR BUREAU. 
 
 As an example of a labour bureau conducted by 
 a municipality that of Munich is not excelled, pro- 
 bably is not equalled, in Germany either in efficiency 
 of management or in the sum of the work done. Its 
 services are virtually offered free to all comers, for 
 the city council is behind it, and from the first 
 the Ministry of the Interior has warmly supported 
 it, as a Bavarian Ministry of State is so well able to 
 help an institution established in the capital, by the 
 grant of yearly subsidies and contributions for 
 special purposes, while other Ministries, like that 
 of Education, have co-operated in sundry ways 
 which have been found effectual. Apart from the 
 subvention from the State, the entire cost of the in- 
 stitution, withits extensive andcommodioussuiteof 
 rooms, and its large staff of officials, is borne, to the 
 extent of some ;^i, 400 yearly, by the municipality, 
 which also exercises control over its operations. 
 The bureau mediates employment for industrial 
 workpeople of every class. Moreover, on request 
 it affords information upon matters of interest 
 to its clients ; and at the commission of the 
 municipality it prepares reports and statistics 
 upon labour questions. 
 
MUNICH LABOUR BUREAU. 19 
 
 For the purpose of registration employers and 
 employed are divided into occupation classes, and 
 applicants are at once inscribed with a minimum 
 of formality (yet with due record of needful informa- 
 tion) in the class lists to which they belong. In 
 filling vacancies applicants are usually taken in 
 the order of arrival, though preference is given, so 
 far as unskilled labour is concerned, to heads of 
 families and persons who have been resident for 
 some time in the city. Should a suitable offer 
 of employment exist, the applicant chosen is 
 despatched to the employer with a postcard as 
 legitimation, and whether he be retained or not the 
 employer is expected to fill up the card and return 
 it to the bureau. In the event of a strike or other 
 labour dispute occurring the bureau endeavours to 
 keep free from complicity with either side, but it is 
 left with the committee of management to deter- 
 mine whether operations shall temporarily be sus- 
 pended or not. No payment is asked of either 
 employer or employed, and the utmost confidence 
 is felt by both alike in the fairness and impartiality 
 of the officials, in proof of which the number of 
 persons using the bureau increases year by year. 
 
 The Munich Bureau is managed by a committee 
 consisting of a permanent member of the city 
 council as president and six elected members, 
 three employers and three employees, all elected 
 for three years by their peers. Above this com- 
 mittee, however, is an executive of two, both 
 permanent members of the city council. There 
 
 c 2 
 
20 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 is also a ladies' committee, which is nominated, 
 and discharges only such functions as are deter- 
 mined by the statutory committee. As showing 
 the interest taken in labour registration work by 
 all classes of society it is worth noting that the 
 members of the ladies' committees last appointed, 
 with their deputies, comprised five members of 
 the nobility, the daughter of a chief forester, the 
 daughter of an officer, a doctor's wife, a doctor's 
 widow, the wife of a rabbi, a teacher, and a lady 
 in business. The paid staff of the bureau comprises 
 an inspector, a chief clerk, and five assistants 
 for the male department, an overseer and six 
 assistants for the female department, with two 
 porters for the waiting rooms. 
 
 That the success of so large an institution as 
 this must depend mainly upon its efficient conduct 
 is obvious, and here the Munich Labour Bureau is 
 fortunate. The fact that the managing committee 
 only finds it necessary to meet from three to five 
 times a year may be accepted as a proof of their 
 confidence in the practical dictator of the bureau 
 and of the justification of that confidence. Equal 
 testimony in the same sense is afforded by the fact 
 that a number of Munich trade guilds have entirely 
 transferred their registries to the public labour 
 bureau. The twenty rooms of the bureau are 
 conveniently arranged for the transaction of 
 business in the several departments. There are 
 separate offices, with waiting rooms adjoining, for 
 industrial workmen, for hotel and restaurant 
 
MUNICH LABOUR BUREAU. 21 
 
 employees, for industrial and unskilled work- 
 women, for apprentices, for agricultural labourers, 
 for day labourers and unskilled workmen, and for 
 employers. A special room houses the archives 
 of the bureau, including the multitudinous forms 
 required in its operations, and also a considerable 
 library of legal, political, and industrial works, 
 which has lately attained to the dignity of a 
 catalogue. Six different parts of the bureau are 
 connected with the State telephone, whose ramifi- 
 cations cover the whole monarchy. The office 
 hours are from eight to twelve and from three to six 
 on week-days only, for on Sundays and festivals 
 work is entirely suspended. 
 
 It is creditable to the common-sense of those 
 who conduct the bureau that they do not hide 
 their light beneath a bushel. Every possible 
 method is adopted of making known to employers 
 and employed of every class the existence, the 
 objects, and the methods of the bureau, as by 
 conferences, the use of the Press, announcements 
 in the schools, and meetings of workpeople and of 
 farmers ; and the help of the factory inspectors 
 and other officials who come in contact with 
 employers and the working class is also sought 
 and to some extent obtained. 
 
 For some time the bureau has had a special 
 department for reservists. By notification to 
 time-expired soldiers before their discharge from 
 the army, and by invitation to employers, 
 especially landowners and farmers in the corn- 
 
22 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 growing and grazing districts, to make known 
 their wants, a good deal is done for this deserving 
 and rather helpless class of men. By decree of the 
 Minister for War, it is required that officers in 
 command of regiments shall take steps to acquaint 
 time-expired soldiers, both by placard and verbally, 
 with the existence of the Munich and other labour 
 bureaux, to recommend them to use the free services 
 of these institutions rather than place themselves 
 in the hands of private registries, and to advise 
 them where possible to seek employment on the 
 land instead of increasing the existing congestion 
 in urban occupations. 
 
 Another special and increasingly important 
 branch of the bureau's work is that done on behalf 
 of the apprentices and young persons who become 
 exempt from school attendance. This work has 
 assumed greater proportions and has vastly gained 
 in utility since the Government and the municipality 
 gave their direct help, and since the teachers, acting 
 on formal directions from above, took the matter up 
 on systematic lines. The idea of bringing the 
 schools into close association with the labour 
 bureau could only have originated in a country in 
 which the problem of unemployment is approached 
 in a rational spirit. Addressing a conference of 
 Munich teachers which had been held in 1903 to 
 discuss the question, the President of the Executive 
 Committee said : — 
 
 " Experience shows that leaving school is one of the 
 most dangerous epochs for the character-development 
 
MUNICH LABOUR BUREAU. 23 
 
 of youth. Unless the school is to see its educative 
 work now undone, it must co-operate in the task of 
 at once directing the young into an orderly career. 
 For as a training agency it is not merely the duty of 
 the school to teach the children certain knowledge ; it 
 must qualify them for their future vocations, it must 
 take an interest in the occupations to which the 
 scholars turn, and show this interest in helping them 
 to make their choice by advice and practical help. 
 The chief value of their co-operation will be to submit 
 the wishes and the inclinations of the scholars to a 
 thoughtful criticism, but to this is necessary a compre- 
 hensive knowledge of the labour market, which can 
 best be given to them by the communal, centralised 
 labour bureaux. To these bureaux, therefore, the 
 schools should direct their scholars, emphasising be- 
 times the importance of a choice of occupation. " 
 
 The Ministries for Home Affairs, Education, 
 Public Worship, and Justice all cordially supported 
 this attempt to bring young workers and appren- 
 tices within the influence and operations of the 
 labour bureaux by the issue of decrees and in- 
 structions to the administrative officials and 
 departments within their province. The education 
 authority of Munich also addressed a circular 
 letter to all the head teachers of the primary 
 schools under its control requesting them to make it 
 their business before the close of each school year 
 to inquire into the plans of all scholars about to 
 leave school (a printed schedule of questions being 
 circulated for that purpose), with a view to advising 
 them as to the choice of vocation and urging them 
 
24 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 to put themselves in communication with the 
 municipal labour bureau ; and the municipality 
 in the same way enlisted the interest of the trade 
 guilds and other labour societies in the city. The 
 first thorough interrogation of the schools took 
 place in 1904, and as a result a large number of 
 children about to leave school sought the offices 
 of the labour bureau. Here the young person in 
 search of a position as apprentice comes with a 
 form of application which he has already filled up, 
 and which is attested by his teacher. When the 
 bureau is able to offer the place desired the appli- 
 cant is notified by postcard where and when he 
 must present himself for examination, and whether 
 engaged or not he is required to report the result 
 of the interview to the bureau in the same way 
 without delay. So far the experience gained in 
 this department has been very encouraging, and the 
 conductors of the bureau are convinced that they 
 have here a work of unlimited usefulness in store 
 for them. 
 
 The latest undertaking of the labour bureau in 
 this association is the preparation, with the help of 
 expert employers and medical men, of a handbook 
 to all the industrial occupations open to youth, 
 explaining the work itself, the qualifications neces- 
 sary, the prospects, the health conditions, the 
 dangers and difficulties, the cost of training, in 
 short all the facts which should weigh with parents 
 and children in the choice of a career. Even now 
 the labour bureau takes care, so far as is possible. 
 
MUNICH LABOUR BUREAU. 25 
 
 that the young people who seek service through 
 its instrumentality are not put to employments 
 unsuited to their physical capacity. 
 
 One result of the co-operation of the ladies' 
 committee has been the growth of an important 
 work in the mediation of service for domestic 
 servants and girl apprentices following various 
 trades and occupations. Some of the guilds which 
 had occupied themselves with the employment of 
 apprentices protested for a time against what they 
 regarded as an invasion of their peculiar province. 
 The matter came before the Chamber of Handi- 
 crafts for Upper Bavaria, and after a conference 
 with the committee of the labour bureau the view 
 of the latter institution prevailed that the mediation 
 of such employment should be regarded rather as 
 a public than a private concern. 
 
 So large, indeed, has been the work of the bureau 
 that in order to decentralise its operations to some 
 extent, and at the same time to meet the con- 
 venience of the public, branches have been 
 established, after the example of Vienna, in several 
 quarters of the city. 
 
 But the great feature of the Munich Labour 
 Bureau is the communication which it constantly 
 holds with the other bureaux scattered over Bavaria, 
 the result being a co-operation and a unity of 
 action which tend greatly to the efficiency of all 
 institutions alike. A constant telephonic communi- 
 cation and the weekly exchange of complete lists 
 of vacancies greatly facilitate the negotiation of 
 
26 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 employment. One of the latest departures is the 
 establishment of a fund out of which help is afforded 
 to work-seekers who have to be sent some distance 
 by road or rail. 
 
 To speak of figurative results — and here the 
 work of the Munich Bureau is unique — during the 
 year 1903 there were in the male department 37,072 
 offers of work against 49,656 offers of service, and 
 31,601 positions were filled by the bureau. In the 
 female department there were 30,357 offers of 
 work and 29,849 offers of service, and engagements 
 were arranged in 20,063 cases. The totals for the 
 two departments were 67,429 offers of positions, 
 79,505 offers of service, and 51,664 engagements. 
 There were 117*9 offers of service for every 100 
 offers of work, and 74*5 per cent, of the vacancies 
 were filled (84'2 in the male department and 66'i 
 per cent, in the female department). It was found 
 that 19*3 per cent, of the offers of service and 13*5 of 
 the offers of work came from outside Munich, while 
 i8*6 per cent, of the places filled were also outside. 
 In the agricultural department 3,529 positions were 
 offered in 1903, and of these 2,553 were filled ; of 
 the 2,858 persons who sought work, 2,275 received 
 it ; over three-quarters of both offers of work and 
 applications for it came from outside Munich. 
 During the same year 225 discharged soldiers 
 sought work, and for 166 of them suitable positions 
 were found, 113 in Munich and 53 in other 
 parts of Bavaria. In the male apprentice depart- 
 ment 2,381 positions were reported to the bureau 
 
MUNICH LABOUR BUREAU. 27 
 
 in 1903, 2,610 youths applied for positions, and 
 engagements were arranged in 1,493 cases. This 
 branch of work has enormously increased during 
 the last five years ; in 1892 but 658 positions were 
 offered to apprentices, 252 youths registered them- 
 selves, and only 172 vacancies were filled. In the 
 female department 440 vacancies were reported, 
 309 applications for work were received, and 191 
 engagements were arranged. 
 
 Comparing the entire work of the bureau since 
 its establishment in 1895, the figures for 1903, 
 independently of the registration work done for 
 the trade guilds, for which no special credit can 
 be taken, show an increase of from 30,057 offers 
 of work, in the first complete year, to 56,610; the 
 offers of service increased from 47,000 to 65,448 ; and 
 the engagements arranged increased from 25,588 
 to 42,172. The trade guilds and other labour 
 societies whose registration the bureau has taken 
 over are those of the hairdressers and wigmakers, 
 bakers, bookbinders, potters, coppersmiths, cab- 
 drivers, butchers, painters and polishers, and 
 shoemakers, and on their behalf 14,057 offers of 
 service with 10,819 offers of work were received in 
 1903, while 9,492 engagements were arranged. 
 
 Where in the general department applicants 
 for work were referred to other towns, they were, 
 if necessary, helped to buy tickets or were con- 
 veyed free. Often, however, employers advanced 
 the fare. Where travelling money is advanced on 
 loan by the bureau, repayment through the 
 
a8 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 employer is required, and until then the borrower's 
 papers of legitimation are detained. The bureau's 
 postal communications during the same year 
 reached the high total of 15,000. A few work- 
 seekers were given relief, but at the commission 
 of the guilds, by which the money was refunded. 
 The net expenditure of the year was 32,817 marks, 
 or £1,640, of which 25,777 marks (£'1,288) fell to 
 the salaries and wages of the staff, and 2,86g 
 marks {£143} to general administrative charges. 
 Towards this expenditure the Bavarian Govern- 
 ment contributed 4,500 marks (;£225) by way of 
 subsidy, independently of 1,000 marks (;^5o) 
 towards the cost of structural alterations. 
 
 Lest the conclusion should be drawn that the 
 foregoing figures are not imposing for a city of 
 half a million inhabitants, it is necessary to add 
 that the municipal labour bureau does not even 
 yet possess a monopoly of the work of employ- 
 ment registration. Registries are still conducted 
 by some of the trade societies on their own 
 account ; there are the registries of philanthropic 
 societies, for the most part carried on by women 
 on behalf of their sex ; there are registries kept by 
 employers ; and there are many private agencies. 
 Yet the municipal labour bureau has the lion's 
 share of the work, and the time may come when 
 it will have it all. 
 
INSURANCE AGAINST WORKLESSNESS. 29 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 INSURANCE AGAINST WORKLESSNESS. 
 
 The institution of insurance against workless- 
 ness is, in reality, an offshoot of tlie labour bureau. 
 Not only is it a product of the experience gained 
 in the work of labour registration, but, where 
 introduced, it has generally been directly asso- 
 ciated with that work, if not under the same 
 officials, at least as an integral part of the policy 
 of labour protection. Switzerland here led the 
 way, but Germany has made not a few experi- 
 ments on its own account, beginning with that at 
 Cologne, which dates from 1894. 
 
 It was the example of Berne which encouraged 
 some of the enterprising municipal workers of 
 Cologne to supplement their existing admirable 
 labour bureau in this way. Then, as now, Herr 
 Friedrich Schmalbein was the moving force. The 
 first thing was to raise an endowment fund by 
 which to afford the insuring workers a certain 
 security for their contributions and benefit in 
 return for them. A philanthropic manufacturer, 
 Herr Gruneberg, interested himself in the project, 
 but died before committing himself to any finan- 
 cial Hability. But Cologne is noted for the 
 generous spirit of its merchant princes, and the 
 
30 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 goodwill of Herr Gruneberg was translated into 
 action by his widow's gift of ^^i.ooo. The city 
 council followed with ;^i,25o, other gifts came 
 readily, and before long a fund of £"5,000 had been 
 raised wherewith to start the work of insurance. 
 The municipality now took over administrative 
 responsibility, and since then an energetic com- 
 mittee of trusted citizens, with Herr Schmalbein 
 as chairman, has carried the work forward. One 
 of the best things the committee ever did was to 
 invite the Social Democrats to join them. Before 
 that the Socialists had looked suspiciously upon 
 the project, and had even tried to obstruct it. 
 No sooner were they given a hand in its practical 
 working, than the criticism changed in spirit and 
 intent ; from being distrustful and hostile, it 
 became commendatory and helpful, and some of 
 the wisest modifications of the original scheme 
 have proceeded from this source. The presence 
 of workpeople on the governing body has also the 
 convenient effect that they control each other: 
 the working man on the committee knows the 
 workless man on the street, and he takes care that 
 there is no malingering, than which nothing is 
 more obnoxious to the honest labourer. At the 
 time of my first visit to the Cologne Unemploy- 
 ment Bureau, one of the workers' representatives 
 on the committee was an Englishman. The 
 executive now consists of the Chief Mayor of 
 Cologne, or a deputy nominated by him, the 
 chairman of the municipal labour bureau, and 
 
INSURANCE AGAINST WORKLESSNESS. 31 
 
 twenty-four elected members, twelve being insured 
 workpeople, and twelve patrons or honorary 
 members, of whom six must be employers, and 
 the other six neither employers nor employees. 
 In addition the twelve insured members of the 
 executive form, together with the director, a 
 committee for special affairs. 
 
 The institution confines insurance and its benefits 
 to worklessness occurring during winter. In 
 this way it greatly narrows its liabilities, while yet 
 protecting its members against want and suffering 
 in the most trying season of the year. Workless- 
 ness must also be unavoidable and free from 
 culpability. The insurance fund is open to inde- 
 pendent male workpeople at least eighteen years 
 old who have had domicile at Cologne for at least 
 a year and are not permanently incapable of 
 working. Artisans who cannot prove regular 
 employment and occasional labourers are dis- 
 qualified from being members. The right is 
 reserved to the executive and the director to 
 reject proposals for insurance which do not accord 
 with the purpose of the fund, or are otherwise 
 unsuitable. The business year is held to begin 
 with the first day of April, and, in order to qualify 
 for membership during the current year, contribu- 
 tions must either begin with that date or, if pro- 
 posals for membership are made later, must cover 
 the interval from that date. No member is 
 accepted after the first Sunday in June for the 
 current business year. Every member must pay 
 
32 THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 thirty-four weekly contributions in order to be 
 entitled to out-of-work benefit. The premiums are 
 thirty-five pfennige (a little over fourpence) per 
 week for unskilled labour and forty-five pfennige 
 (fivepence-halfpenny) for skilled workmen. There 
 are, however, three other sources of income : the 
 contributions of patrons (who become such for 
 hfe by giving at least fifteen pounds in one sum) 
 and honorary members (who pay at least five 
 shillings a year), contributions from societies, em- 
 ployers, and others, and a liberal subvention from 
 the town. 
 
 In return for their contributions the insured 
 have a claim to support from the funds, in the 
 event of inculpable worklessness occurring during 
 the period December ist to March ist, for so long 
 a time as such a condition continues and work 
 cannot be found for them. Such unemployed 
 persons are required to present themselves at the 
 bureau twice a day, at hours to be determined 
 by the director. Should work be offered suitable 
 as to character and remuneration, it must be 
 accepted on pain of forfeiting the out-of-work 
 benefit, but an insured workman may not be 
 required to take a position which has become 
 vacant owing to a strike. Unmarried men who 
 have not to support relatives in Cologne may be 
 required to take work in other towns. Here will 
 be seen the practical advantage of having the 
 insurance fund connected with the labour bureau. 
 It is usual to give to members of the fund prior 
 
INSURANCE AGAINST WORKLESSNESS. 33 
 
 consideration in the filling of vacancies, by way 
 of encouraging in them a provident spirit. 
 
 The benefit given is two marks per day (begin- 
 ning with the third day of worklessness) for the 
 first twenty days, and one mark per day for the 
 rest of the time ; but in the case of persons who 
 in the two preceding business years have drawn 
 relief to the extent of at least three-quarters of 
 the maximum amount payable, two marks per day 
 are paid for the first twenty days, and one mark 
 for an additional fourteen days only. There is no 
 payment on account of Sundays and festivals. 
 Where worklessness occurs repeatedly during the 
 three benefit months it is regarded as continuous 
 for the calculation of the relief payable, so that 
 twenty days is the maximum time under any cir- 
 cumstances that two marks a day can be claimed 
 in any one year. No relief is paid when work- 
 lessness is the result of sickness or inability to 
 work — since such contingencies are liberally met 
 by the State insurance laws, — nor yet when 
 worklessness is the result of the insured workman's 
 fault or of a labour dispute. The claim to benefit 
 is also forfeited when the insured leaves Cologne, 
 or when it is found that he has made false declara- 
 tions. Whether in any of these cases the work- 
 man's contributions are refunded depends upon 
 the decision of the standing committee of the 
 insured. 
 
 The Cologne unemployment insurance fund is 
 now in its tenth year and though its growth has 
 
 G.W. D 
 
34 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 been continuous it has not yet reached large 
 proportions. During the business year 1904-5, 
 1,804 proposals of insurance were received and 
 1,717 were accepted — 488 coming from skilled and 
 1,229 from unskilled workpeople. The number 
 of insured who fully qualified for the receipt of 
 relief in the event of worklessness occurring was 
 1,596, and of these 1,271 actually reported them- 
 selves as unemployed. The labour bureau was able 
 to find permanent work for 59 of their number, and 
 temporary work (varying from one to forty-seven 
 days) for 1,078 others, so reducing the relief 
 payable. The total amount of this relief was 
 42,832 marks, or 3^2,141 12s., representing 25,034 
 days of worklessness — 17,798 at two marks per 
 day, and 7,236 at one mark. Towards the relief 
 thus paid the whole of the insured contributed 
 21,000 marks (£"1,050), or 48*5 per cent., in 
 premiums ; the municipality gave a subsidy of 
 £1,000, and the rest of the deficiency was covered 
 by honorary contributions and interest on invested 
 funds. By way of placing the institution on a 
 more independent and more business-like basis, it 
 has been decided to increase the workmen's con- 
 tributions five pfennige per week. It is instructive 
 to notice the duration of worklessness — a point 
 so important for the stability of benefit funds of 
 this kind. Thus 124 men received relief for i to 
 5 days, 178 for 6 to 10 days, 212 for 11 to 15 days, 
 197 for 16 to 20 days, 112 for 21 to 25 days, 108 
 for 26 to 30 days, 63 for 31 to 35 days, 41 for 36 
 
INSURANCE AGAINST WORKLESSNESS. 35 
 
 to 40 days, 51 for 41 to 45 days, 26 for 46 or 47 
 days, and gi for 48 days. 
 
 As to the benefit which the institution offers 
 to insured members there can be no doubt. Its 
 weak points are that it covers so small a fraction 
 even of the seasonal working class, and that 
 it is to a large extent a philanthropic agency, 
 which helps those who help themselves, and to 
 that extent does well, but offers neither help nor 
 hope to the much larger class of people who cannot 
 help themselves. The number of the insured has, 
 with the exception of a single year, increased 
 every year since the fund was established, yet its 
 present maximum membership of 1,717 — implying 
 so many persons protected against the severer 
 hardships caused by compulsory idleness — 
 obviously only touches the fringe of the unem- 
 ployed problem. The institution is at best, in 
 fact, a palliative, though in fairness it should be 
 added that this is all that its promoters claim. 
 At the same time, the insured workpeople would 
 appear to be satisfied with the fund, and I was 
 assured that even those who do not draw relief 
 never grudge their contributions, recognising that 
 they form a profitable business risk and, even if they 
 are sacrificed, benefit their less favoured comrades. 
 
 With varying regulations and conditions of 
 membership the same institution has been intro- 
 duced in several other German towns. Thus at 
 Leipzig members may be as young as seventeen 
 but not older than sixty years. There the insured 
 
 D 2 
 
36 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 arc divided into four classes, according to the 
 risk of worklessness ; the premiums payable are 
 thirty, forty, fifty, and sixty pfennige respectively; 
 and these premiums must be paid for forty-two 
 weeks to establish a claim to benefit, which is 
 1.20 marks (is. 2^d.) per week-day. The pre- 
 miums are reduced when the insured make no 
 claim upon the funds for three periods of forty- 
 two weeks. Provision is also made for the insur- 
 ance of whole societies at the reduced all round 
 rate of ten pfennige per week, with claim to a 
 benefit of only seventy-five pfennige, though this 
 amount is increased where no call is made upon 
 the funds for a certain length of time. At Leipzig 
 the premiums are paid by means of stamps affixed 
 to cards of membership, which are issued annually. 
 There, however, the relief is not limited to a certain 
 period of the year, though, as at Cologne, an unem- 
 ployed member is required to accept such suitable 
 work as the labour bureau may be able to offer him. 
 Munich is the latest town to move in the 
 matter. There the municipality has decided to 
 vote 35,000 marks a year for three years towards 
 the carrying on of an unemployment insurance 
 fund, which is to be started by the Trade Unions 
 and the Employers' Associations. It will be 
 managed by a committee of forty members, 
 these belonging to the associated organisations, 
 and the benefit is to be one shilling a day for 
 eight weeks of six days during the year. It will 
 work in close association with the Labour Registry. 
 
RELIEF OF WANDERING WORKERS. 37 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE RELIEF OF WANDERING WORKERS. 
 
 Perhaps in no country is the bond-fide seeker 
 of work treated on the whole more sympathetically 
 than in Germany. Switzerland, indeed, is the 
 only other country which at all enters into com- 
 parison. The system of public and private 
 lodging-houses, in which travelling workmen are 
 hospitably entertained night by night, presents a 
 picture lesson in practical philanthropy which is 
 deserving of serious attention in England, where 
 the casual ward at present represents the measure 
 of society's interest in the migrant unemployed. 
 By the help of these lodging-houses every German 
 labourer whose purpose can be presumed to be 
 honest is able to travel from place to place in 
 search of work without expenditure of money, 
 earning the cost of bed and board by the efforts of 
 his hands, or receiving his entertainment as a free 
 
 gift. 
 
 These labour houses of call are of two kinds. 
 First there are the Herbergen ziir Heimath, or 
 "home lodging-houses," conducted by associa- 
 tions of philanthropic persons, and there are also 
 the relief stations {Verpflegungsstationen), estab- 
 lished and supported by the local administrative 
 
 .H54lir> 
 
38 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 authorities and commonly conducted in associa- 
 tion with the Herbergen. The essential difference 
 between the two institutions is that the Herbergen 
 are private, the relief stations public or semi- 
 public in character ; the first are maintained by 
 voluntary funds, the second are maintained at the 
 public charge. 
 
 For the Herbergen priority of origin may be 
 claimed. The first was established at Bonn in 
 1854 and its founder was Clemens Theodor 
 Perthes, a professor at the university there. In 
 order that a lodging-house may be recognised as 
 a Herberge it is required (i) that it shall meet 
 the needs of decent workmen and other travellers 
 of restricted means in regard to orderliness, cleanli- 
 ness, and good and cheap entertainment ; (2) that 
 it shall be conducted on a religious basis, culti- 
 vating a spirit of piety as well as good manners, 
 holding daily worship, discouraging the abuse of 
 alcoholic beverages, and prohibiting card games, 
 all gambling, and all practices morally harmful ; 
 and finally, (3) that the observance of these con- 
 ditions shall be controlled by responsible com- 
 mittees of management, whose members shall 
 include the local clergy whenever possible. 
 
 The Herbergen have a strong family likeness in 
 whatever part of the country they are found. 
 Some are more pretentious as to structure and 
 internal arrangement, but the prevailing marks 
 are homely comfort and a strict cultivation of 
 cleanly habits. Without a passport no one is 
 
RELIEF OF WANDERING WORKERS. 39 
 
 admitted to the benefits of these institutions. 
 LXhe regulations applying to Westphalia, which 
 has an admirable system of travelling homes for 
 working men, allow the passport of the Herberge 
 Association to be supplied only to male applicants 
 of sixteen years and upwards who are able to 
 produce satisfactory evidence of bond fides, and 
 especially evidence that they have recently been 
 working. Relief in return for work is only given 
 to persons possessed of one mark (a shilling) or 
 less. To such persons the passport is supplied in 
 return for half a mark or four hours' work in the 
 relief station adjoining. Thus the Bielefeld 
 Herberge Association receives from the circuit 
 government gd. per head for every wandering 
 workman whom it entertains. On arriving at the 
 lodging-house the passport and other papers the 
 traveller may have with him are given up, and 
 they are only returned to him the next day after he 
 has completed his task. The rule of the associa- 
 tion is " Forenoon work, afternoon walk," and a 
 man is generally able to get away by twelve 
 o'clock. ] Where the distance to be travelled 
 exceeds 'a four hours' tramp, and especially during 
 the winter months, he may be released earlier 
 and be given an extra meal into the bargain ; or 
 otherwise he may receive food to take with him 
 or a ticket to a transit- or by-station on the way. 
 Jt^ stipulated that the work set must not be too 
 menial or too exhausting in character, though it 
 must, on the other hand, entail genuine exertion ; 
 
40 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 wood-chopping is the commonest, because the 
 easiest, occupation chosen. In the hall of one of 
 these lodging-houses you will generally find a 
 large road map of the entire province in which it 
 is situated — perhaps of the entire State. Upon 
 this map are set out all the main highways and 
 the more important by-roads, with marks to 
 denote the towns at or near which Hcrbergen, 
 relief stations, and labour colonies are located. By 
 the help of this chart of the country the * house 
 father ' is enabled to show the wanderer how he 
 may most speedily reach his desired destination. 
 
 A labour registry of some kind is frequently 
 attached to the Herberge, or is in close association 
 with it, and it is possible to find employment for 
 many of the callers. 
 
 The Herberge at Bielefeld in Westphalia, which 
 may be regarded as the centre of the Herberge 
 movement, as it is of so much other practical 
 philanthropy, receives three kinds of guests — the 
 travelling workmen who wish to buy lodging and 
 food in return for work, paying callers, and resident 
 lodgers. The tariff brings the home within reach 
 of the slenderest means. A bed may be had for 
 25, 30, or 40 pfennige (3^., 3^^. or 5^.) ; a simple 
 breakfast of coffee and bread costs just over a 
 penny, a dinner of meat and potato twice as much, 
 and soup or potato and herring for supper costs 
 i^^. or 2^d. The passing guests are lodged in 
 open dormitories, while the resident lodgers are 
 provided with separate rooms at a very low charge. 
 
RELIEF OF WANDERING WORKERS. 41 
 
 Their section of the establishment is known as the 
 Hospice, and in it beds may be had for is. or is. 6cL 
 a night, with food at an equally moderate charge — 
 breakfast from 4^. to 6d., dinner from 6d. to is., 
 and supper from 6d. to y^d. The meals are also 
 shared by many people of small means who prefer 
 the Hospice to the public inn or restaurant. On 
 Sunday due place is given in these institutions to 
 religious employments. A pastor or candidate for 
 the pastoral office is always found ready to conduct 
 service, to which the lodgers and residents are in- 
 vited. The destitute callers discharge their work- 
 tasks on the following morning and leave as usual 
 at noon. 
 
 In connexion with 262 of the Herbergen savings 
 banks are conducted. These are used for the most 
 part by resident lodgers, and deposits take the 
 form of stamps. The turnover in 1903 was 64,660 
 marks, or £3,2^^, for the savings are naturally made 
 up of small sums and often they need to be quickly 
 recalled. Only 11 branches had deposits during 
 the year exceeding 1,000 marks (£50), 19 had 
 from 500 to 1,000 marks, and 86 from 100 to 
 500 marks. 
 
 The increase of the Herbergen has been continuous 
 since 1854. In 1863 there were 19, but in 1873 
 there were loi ; in 1886, 252 ; in 1890, 370 ; in 1900, 
 457; and in 1904, 462, with over 20,000 beds. In 
 igo^ the Herbergen of the country lodged 1,966,357 
 paying guests (1,937,636 nightly and 28,721 resident 
 lodgers), and 683,586 free guests, the latter at a cost 
 
42 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 of ;£"i8,430, or about sixpence a head per day. 
 The total number of nights' lodging given by the 
 Herbergen in igo2 was 4,256,588. The work of 
 this large system of poor men's lodging houses is 
 controlled by the German Herberge Association, 
 which was founded in 1886 and has now branches 
 throughout the entire country, though for more 
 efficient administration the Herbergen are united 
 in " unions," of which there are 15, each represent- 
 ing either a group of States, a single State, or, where 
 the Herbergen are numerous, a province of a State. 
 
 The Herbergen spoken of owe their existence to 
 the philanthropic and religious spirit of the 
 Protestant clergy and laity, but the Roman 
 Catholic Church is not behindhand in the care 
 it takes of the wandering workers belonging to 
 its fold. In all the large towns excellent lodging- 
 houses of a similar kind exist for Roman Catholics, 
 and they are largely frequented. 
 
 The relief station is a very different type of 
 lodging-house. Here public philanthropy takes 
 the place of private, and the solicitude offered is 
 paternal rather than maternal. Where the station 
 is detached from a Herberge the accommodation is 
 much less domestic, though sufficient for the pur- 
 pose, but the special difference lies in the fact that 
 the relief station exists solely in the interest of 
 destitute wanderers, to whom it offers lodging and 
 food only in return for work done. These institu- 
 tions, with necessary modifications, are much more 
 likely than the private Herbergen to supply the lack 
 
RELIEF OF WANDERING WORKERS. 43 
 
 which will be created in England when we abolish 
 the pernicious casual ward — an institution which 
 does far too little for the honest workman and far 
 too much for the idle tramp. 
 
 Before he is allowed to use one of these relief 
 stations a workman must be able to legitimise 
 himself. This he can do by presenting some 
 official document — a labour book,^ a certificate of 
 past employment, military papers, and the like. 
 (^ The man's passport is examined on arrival, and 
 is duly stamped and retained until he has com- 
 pleted his allotted task the following morning and 
 is ready to continue his journey. As in the Her- 
 bergen, a simple supper of a value of 20 pfennige, or 
 2^d., is given at seven o'clock. In the morning 
 the lodgers are expected to be up and dressed by 
 seven o'clock, and, breakfast over, at work by eight. 
 Here, too, the work lasts about four hours and con- 
 sists as a rule in the sawing and chopping of two 
 large boxes of wood — no exhausting effort for a man 
 of even average strength. Then a plate of food is 
 given, the passport issigned and stamped again, and 
 the man is sent on his way. It does not follow, 
 however, that the traveller must pass the rest of the 
 
 * The labour book must by statute be possessed by 
 every worker under age, and he may not be employed 
 without it. It contains his name, his permanent residence, 
 the year and day of his birth, and his signature. The 
 booi< is given to the worker by the police authority in the 
 first place, and is filled up by his parent or guardian. The 
 employer must make the entry of service, when begun and 
 discontinued, and the workman can require, in addition, a 
 certificate of his work and conduct on leaving. 
 
44 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 day until evening foodless, in the event of his 
 pocket being empty. He may either be given 
 bread to eat on the way or he may be referred to 
 a by-station (Nebenstation) at which in return for a 
 ticket a simple meal will be supplied to him. These 
 by-stations are not special buildings, but are as a 
 rule private lodging-houses or inns recognised by 
 the authorities as suitable for the purpose. The 
 following is a sample agreement with the keeper 
 of one of these places : — 
 
 " X. undertakes from date given to lodge and feed 
 destitute wanderers passing from A. to B., or vice versa, 
 who may bring cards from the relief stations in either 
 of those places. The food shall consist of half a litre 
 of coffee, with milk, and half a pound of brown bread 
 or three white rolls. Other food or drinks, and 
 especially brandy or beer, may not be given to the 
 wanderers. The food may only be given to those 
 wanderers who reach the house of X. within the time 
 specified on the card. The cards brouglit by the 
 wanderers must be taken from them and retained, and 
 returned to the district committee once in three months. 
 For each of the cards so sent in X. will receive 20 
 pfennige from the district funds. The district com- 
 mittee is authorised to appoint some one resident in 
 
 (town) to exercise supervision over the station 
 
 and over the execution of this instruction. Pastor 
 is appointed for the purpose." 
 
 The cost of housing and feeding the frequenters 
 of the relief stations is about Sd. per head per 
 night, this figure including, of course, maintenance 
 and management charges. 
 
 For the relief stations it is claimed that entirely 
 satisfactory results have followed wherever the 
 
RELIEF OF WANDERING WORKERS. 45 
 
 system has been developed efficiently and on an 
 adequate scale. Obviously a few stations located 
 here and there over a wide area cannot meet the 
 needs of the itinerant working class. Where, 
 however, as in Westphalia and several other large 
 administrative districts, a complete network of 
 relief stations and Herbergen exists, the bond-fide 
 workman can travel in search of employment with 
 a facility which greatly helps him in the attain- 
 ment of his goal. The stations have also removed 
 to a large extent the last excuse for mendicity. 
 For example, the first relief station in the Herford 
 Circuit was established in 1882, and speaking of 
 its results a high administrative official of that 
 circuit stated some years ago : " Itinerant mendicity 
 was formerly a plague of the country-side, but 
 since the regulation of the system of wandering and 
 of housing the wanderers the many crimes caused 
 by the vagrants and beggars have almost entirely 
 ceased." The same result has been experienced 
 in other parts of the country. Thus in the Grand 
 Duchy of Baden it is found that where the relief 
 stations were established the convictions for vaga- 
 bondage and begging greatly decreased, while 
 these offences increased where relief stations were 
 lacking. Indeed, in some districts in which the 
 relief stations have been established police ordin- 
 ances have been issued threatening with a fine 
 persons who give alms to beggars. 
 
 Excellent, however, as is the work done by 
 the relief stations, it is still partial and inadequate, 
 
46 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 and the philanthropists who interest themselves in 
 this branch of social reform have set their minds 
 on several improvements. In the first place it is 
 urged that the number of the stations should be 
 greatly increased, until the whole country is amply 
 supplied, and no bond -fide work-seeker need have 
 any excuse either for begging or for going to the 
 police for shelter. To this end Imperial legislation 
 is sought, throwing upon the circuits the obligation 
 to establish stations wherever needed solely at the 
 public cost, the distance between two stations in 
 every direction being near enough to allow of the 
 principle of * work in the morning and walk in the 
 afternoon ' being followed wherever expedient. 
 Another reform largely advocated is the conversion 
 of some of these relief stations into systematic 
 wanderers' workshops,^ at which men who have 
 no prospect of finding work may temporarily be 
 employed. 
 
 It may be of advantage, in view of the recom- 
 mendations of the Committee on Vagrancy, to add 
 a statement of the main principles which in 
 Germany are held to govern an ideal system of 
 relief stations. The following rules have been 
 
 1 In the Prussian Lower House, Pastor von Bodelschwingh 
 periodically introduces a favourite motion, which runs : 
 " The House of Deputies calls upon the Government to 
 lay before the Diet without delay a Bill by which provision 
 for work-seeking destitute wanderers may be made, by the 
 establishment of temporary workshops in connexion with 
 labour bureaux ; such a Bill to be enforced only in those 
 provinces whose representatives so determine." The 
 motion has so far been defeated on each occasion. 
 
RELIEF OF WANDERING WORKERS. 47 
 
 laid down as indispensable : The stations should 
 aim at affording relief to all destitute wanderers. 
 In order to ensure this end they should be estab- 
 lished throughout the whole country and be 
 administered on uniform principles. Relief stations 
 should if possible be established by communal 
 unions, not too small in area, or the circuits 
 (Krdse), and be maintained at the public cost. 
 The stations should be fixed at such distances that 
 destitute wanderers may be under no obligation to 
 beg, yet at the same time be unable to misuse the 
 stations; they must be able to do their task and 
 walk on to the next station the same day. Relief 
 must be adequate, so that the wanderers may 
 be physically capable of working and walking. 
 Wherever possible relief should be given in return 
 for work. No one should be relieved who possesses 
 money wherewith to defray his wants. No work 
 should be required of a wanderer on Sunday, but 
 more on a Saturday or a Monday instead, if that 
 be desirable. As far as possible no relief station 
 should be located at an inn, and under no circum- 
 stances should spirits be given to the wanderer. 
 The existing Herbergen and similar institutions, 
 both Protestant and Roman Catholic, should as 
 far as possible be used. A labour registry should 
 be attached to a relief station. Finally, every 
 station should be conducted by responsible persons 
 who undertake to supervise its work and to pro- 
 vide for the moral and religous welfare of its 
 frequenters. 
 
48 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 LABOUR COLONIES. 
 
 At a time when the air is full of talk of labour 
 colonies, it is especially interesting to recall the 
 fact that just a quarter of a century has passed 
 away since the first colony came into active exist- 
 ence in Germany.^ To-day thirty-three of these 
 colonies are spread over the German Empire, five 
 being exclusively Roman Catholic and managed 
 by Brothers of the Orders, and they have found 
 imitators in several Continental countries, Switzer- 
 land, Holland and Austria. Last year io,oog home- 
 less wanderers were received as inmates of the 
 colonies, and since the movement began no fewer 
 than 170,115 have entered their ever-open portals. 
 Together the colonies have 4,170 places, though on 
 occasion they accommodate a far larger number of 
 men. Every German and nearly every European 
 State — England included — contributes to the year's 
 total ; the colonists belong to all trades and even 
 to most professions ; they profess all religions and 
 no religion at all, since want and worklessness 
 are the only conditions of admission ; for, as with 
 every great and true movement for the upraising 
 
 1 A portion of this chapter appeared in the pages of 
 " The World's Work." 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 49 
 
 of human kind, the distinctive mark of the labour 
 colony movement is its catholicity. 
 
 Merely to mention the foregoing bald figures is 
 to prove the importance of the epoch-making 
 movement which Friedrich von Bodelschwingh, a 
 pastor of the Prussian Protestant Church, inaugu- 
 rated, when, in 1881, he trekked at the head of 
 a small band of epileptic proteges from Bielefeld, 
 in Westphalia, to a barren spot situated eight or 
 ten miles away on the open moorland near the 
 Teutoburg Forest, there to establish, in the midst 
 of a wilderness of sand and scrub, a home for the 
 reception of the workless frequenters of the highway 
 and the street. Of this large-hearted author and 
 prompter of so much that is noble and nobly 
 munificent in the philanthropies of Western 
 Germany, let me only say in passing, as one who 
 has experienced his never-failing courtesy, that 
 Pastor von Bodelschwingh still lives to-day in a 
 suburb of Bielefeld, a hale and hearty man of 
 seventy-three, in the midst of the wonderful 
 "colony of mercy" which his efforts, example, 
 and inspiration have created, as full as ever of 
 schemes for the benefit of suffering humanity, as 
 ardent as ever in his enthusiasms, as undaunted 
 in his faith that for good works goods ways and 
 means will always be found. 
 
 Few modern experiments in social reform have 
 attracted greater interest or have been more fruitful 
 in good results than the labour colonies. The first 
 colony was really a product of economic factors 
 
 G.W. E 
 
50 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 peculiar to the time. Partly owing to new legisla- 
 tion which enacted for all Germany free choice of 
 occupations, but also owing in no small degree to 
 the change from hand to machine power which 
 was revolutionising a large number of industries, 
 and destroying others, there sprang up throughout 
 the country, and especially in the industrial dis- 
 tricts, an exceptionally large number of unem- 
 ployed. It has been estimated that, in the early 
 eighties, no fewer than 200,000 persons were wander- 
 ing upon the highways of Germany in search of 
 work. Bielefeld, being situated on the great high- 
 way from Cologne to Berlin, had more than its 
 share of penurious visitors, and before he founded 
 a colony for the employment of surplus labour 
 Pastor von Bodelschwingh did much to cope 
 with an incessant claim upon the philanthropic 
 resources of the town. Believing charity, how- 
 ever, to be an objectionable substitute for honest 
 work, he purchased a farm, with buildings, a few 
 miles out of Bielefeld, with the object of working 
 it with the labour of the wayfarers who had hitherto 
 thrown themselves on the public rate and the 
 private dole. In the purchase of this farm, which, 
 with later additions, approximates 1,000 English 
 acres. Pastor von Bodelschwingh received finan- 
 cial help from a number of public authorities. 
 Placing at the head of the colony an experienced 
 farmer, trained in his own ideas, he at once practi- 
 cally opened its gates to all the unemployed who 
 passed that way, the only condition of entrance 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 51 
 
 being adhesion to the regulations of the estabHsh- 
 ment. Thus it came about that there was founded 
 the first of a large series of colonies which have 
 together done much to alleviate the problem of 
 the unemployed in Germany. The Wilhelmsdorf 
 colony soon found imitators. Within a year 
 Hanover had followed the example of Westphalia, 
 the colony of Kastorf being founded there for the 
 reception of 150 workmen. Before two years had 
 passed colonies had been formed in eleven parts 
 of Germany, and since then the movement has 
 spread to other countries. 
 
 With two exceptions — Berlin and Magdeburg — 
 the labour colonies of Germany are agricultural. 
 Each of them has acquired a sufficient area of land 
 upon which grain of various kinds, potatoes, and 
 roots are successfully cultivated. As a rule the 
 colonies have been generously supported by the 
 Provincial and District Governments, as well 
 as by corporations and private philanthropists. 
 They are not self-sustaining, yet the produce of a 
 colony invariably meets about half the cost of 
 maintenance. In many cases the land has been 
 acquired in rough condition, without building ol 
 any kind, and not a few of the colonies have been 
 settled on wild moorland and sandy waste, far 
 from town and village, and often from human 
 habitations of any kind. 
 
 It might be supposed that the task of maintaining 
 discipline amongst a large band of labourers so pro- 
 miscuous in character would be a difficult if not an 
 
 E2 
 
52 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 impossible one. And yet the order which rules in 
 the labour colonies is wonderful. Insubordination 
 is not, of course, tolerated, and when it occurs the 
 offender at once receives a present of his freedom. 
 But the directors of the colonies make little com- 
 plaint on this score. With few exeptions the 
 colonists show themselves readily amenable to 
 the kindly yet restraining influences which sur- 
 round them, and serious disaffection is a thing 
 unheard of. A return taken at random shows 
 that out of 2,727 men under training only 28 had 
 to be discharged in one month owing to miscon- 
 duct. When it is remembered that the colonists 
 are in the main drawn from the morally distorted 
 strata of the population, and include a considerable 
 proportion of criminals, it must be admitted that the 
 moral influence of colony life is very great. Facts 
 and figures concerning the personnel of the colonists 
 leave no room for doubt as to the success of the 
 disciplinary methods employed and of the influence 
 exerted. Of the inmates of one colony (Friedrichs- 
 ville) at a certain date 84 per cent, had been 
 imprisoned, and of these gaol birds 13*5 per cent, 
 had been punished from six to ten times, 6*6 per 
 cent, from eleven to fifteen times, i per cent, 
 sixteen to twenty times, 0'8 per cent, twenty-one 
 to twenty-five times, and o*6 per cent, twenty-six 
 times. Yet of 188 colonists in domicile during 
 one month, only one had to be sent away by 
 reason of misconduct. The secret of the order 
 which is maintained so successfully in the colonies 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 53 
 
 is beyond question the moral basis upon which 
 discipline and indeed the entire arrangements of 
 the institutions rest. The superintendent of a 
 colony is chosen not alone for his technical ability 
 or his organising capacity; moral qualifications 
 are also looked for. Naturally it is a matter of no 
 small difficulty to find a sufficiency of men who 
 are at once skilful agriculturists, reliable adminis- 
 trators, and moral guides, and the lament that it 
 is easier to find money to float colonies than 
 eligible men to manage them was for a long time 
 well founded. Then a special Deacons' Home 
 was established at Bielefeld for the training of 
 directors and other workers, and the difficulty 
 was solved. 
 
 It is a strange medley of mankind which finds its 
 way into the labour colonies. Not only labourers, 
 but decayed tradesmen, members of the professions, 
 even clergymen, students, and teachers are relieved 
 at times, for there is no respect of persons either 
 on the up or the down grade of human frailty. 
 " What a mixture of occupations you meet here," 
 wrote to me some time ago a German friend who 
 is acquainted as few men are, or can be, with the 
 inner life of the colonies ; " side by side with the 
 ordinary labourer works one who was formerly an 
 official, and who, having been imprisoned for mis- 
 conduct, was unable on release to find employment. 
 A tradesmen rubs shoulders with an artisan, a 
 clerk with a former military officer. There are 
 farmers, even teachers, and studied men. And 
 
54 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 yet no one knows the past life of another, though 
 the director of the colony has accurate informa- 
 tion regarding all. Here comes a new candidate 
 and applies for admission. His tattered clothes, 
 his bloated face, with its wild look, and the brandy 
 bottle which is just visible in his pocket, tell plainly 
 the degree of moral perfection to which he has 
 attained. After a long career of vagabondage there 
 remained no other hope for him but to knock at 
 the door of the labour colony and beg for entrance. 
 As soon as he has promised to obey the regulations 
 he is bathed, his ragged clothes are disinfected, 
 and either mended or burned, and he leaves the 
 bathroom dressed in clean linen and new attire. 
 Hunger and thirst are next quenched (the latter 
 with coffee or light beer without alcohol), and he 
 then joins the ranks of the colonists, grateful 
 that he has been rescued from the depths of 
 vagabondage." 
 
 The colonies are not, however, intended to be 
 permanent homes, though the length of residence 
 is variable. As a rule the maximum is from three 
 to four months, and only in exceptional cases do 
 the colonists remain much longer. When a man 
 makes himself indispensable in certain branches 
 of work, b)' the exhibition of natural or acquired 
 capacity, he is sometimes persuaded to stay as a 
 paid employee. Gardeners, farmers, and artisans 
 have often risen to this position of independence. 
 If possible work is found for the colonists before 
 they are discharged, though this is not practicable 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 55 
 
 in a large percentage of cases. In any event the 
 colonist leaves his place of sojourn a far wiser, 
 happier, and better man than when he came. His 
 surroundings, his enforced industry, and the 
 healthy moral atmosphere he has breathed have 
 elevated him, and again and again the vagabond 
 of many years' standing becomes a self-respecting 
 citizen. It is a high testimony to the reputation 
 which the colonies bear that it often happens that 
 men discharged from the penal workhouse, after 
 serving their time for serious misdemeanour, 
 are advised to seek admission to the nearest of 
 them as a sort of half-way house towards regular 
 employment. Furthermore, it is contended that 
 a very perceptible influence has been exerted upon 
 vagabondage and mendicity, and to this extent 
 public order and private philanthropy have bene- 
 fited. It is not too much to claim, too, that by 
 so training a large amount of labour which was 
 going to wreck and ruin, and which now is con- 
 tributing to the wealth of the State, the colonies 
 have done an economic work of great value, and 
 that by clearing the highways to some extent of an 
 objectionable class of people they have proved a 
 great deterrent of crime. To sum up, the mission 
 of the labour colonies is industrial and religious. 
 They offer the unemployed not money, but work, 
 and that work is associated with a moral discipline 
 of a helpful and elevating character. Among 
 Silesian enthusiasts in the cause the story is told of 
 how a dilapidated vagabond passed a colony in 
 
55 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 that part of Prussia, and observing the motto above 
 the door " Ora et Labora," knocked and asked for 
 "Mr. Ora." But it was Mr. " Labora "—the 
 vigilant director — who answered the call, and no 
 sooner had the explanation been given than the 
 beggar expeditiously went his way. This is not 
 only histor}', but parable. 
 
 There is one colony which is known as the Home 
 Colony {Heimathcolonie). It is the colony of 
 Friedrich-Wilhelmsdorf, near Bremerhaven, where 
 a large tract of land has been purchased with 
 the object of allowing men of good character to 
 settle down for life in separate dwellings and on 
 their own patches of ground. Supplementary 
 colonies of a new type are nowadays advocated in 
 the form of Distress Colonies (Notstandskolonien), 
 to be used for the reception of work-seekers in 
 time of special distress. They are not to be 
 open to the normal highway population at all, 
 and it is contended that they should be estab- 
 lished and conducted entirely at the expense of the 
 provinces. 
 
 The whole of the labour colonies of Germany 
 received during the year 1905 10,009 men. The 
 smallest number of admissions per month was 
 693 (July), and the largest 1,141 (November) ; 
 the average number was 834 a month. Of the 
 aggregate number admitted 4,113, or 41*0 per 
 cent., entered for the first time. As to age, 25 
 were 15 or 16 years, 486 were 17 to 20, 1,838 were 
 21 to 30, 5,264 (over one half) were 31 to 50, 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 57 
 
 1,864 were 51 to 60, 493 were 61 to 70, and 39 
 were over 70 years old. The average cost was 
 3^10 per head, of which the colonists were able 
 to earn over £^. The cost per colonist per day 
 was between bd, and yd. 
 
 THE AGRICULTURAL COLONY OF 
 WILHELMSDORF. 
 
 But the character and work of the German 
 Labour Colonies can best be explained by the help 
 of concrete instances, and the following pages 
 describe colonies which I have at various times 
 visited. Wilhelmsdorf (so named after the first 
 German Emperor) was, as we have seen, the 
 colony first called into existence, and for many 
 reasons it may wisely be chosen as an illustration 
 of the agricultural type. For being still under 
 Pastor von Bodelschwingh's direct superinten- 
 dence, it may be said to embody most faithfully 
 the ideas which underlie the labour colony move- 
 ment ; its experience is also the ripest, and it is 
 still the largest establishment of the kind. The 
 Wilhelmsdorf estate extends to some 1,500 
 Prussian, or nearly 1,000 English acres, and when 
 purchased by the Westphalian Labour Colony 
 Association it consisted of bleak, sterile moorland, 
 covered for the most part with stunted wood, 
 which had to be laboriously cleared piece by piece 
 as the land was needed. The surface soil is a fine 
 white sand, at the sight of which the visitor is 
 
58 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 apt to think that the ground is covered with hail- 
 stones. The land is very barren in its primitive 
 condition, yet fairly productive when worked up 
 and well manured. Wilhelmsdorf is purely an 
 outdoor working colony ; arable and dairy farm- 
 ing and pig breeding are its almost exclusive 
 sources of employment and of wealth. Last year 
 the following land was cropped : Oats, fifty acres 
 (Prussian) ; rye, fifty acres ; potatoes, fifty-eight 
 acres ; turnips, thirty-five acres ; clover, thirty 
 acres ; besides which two hundred acres were in 
 grass, and the wood, of which a large part must 
 always remain by way of protection from the wind, 
 still covers eight hundred acres. This also is the 
 rotation of crops followed : Mangolds, oats and 
 clover together ; two years in clover (the first 
 year green for cattle and the second dry for 
 winter); rye; potatoes; oats; rye; and mangolds 
 again. The live stock consisted at the time of my 
 last visit often horses for draught purposes, six oxen 
 for the same, forty-eight milk cows, twenty-seven 
 young cows, one hundred and thirty pigs, one 
 hundred and twenty hens, fourteen ducks, and an 
 unnumbered stock of pigeons. No sheep are kept. 
 The cattle are a fine lot of animals, which do credit 
 to their guardians. They are housed in one 
 huge shippon, and, German and Swiss fashion, each 
 has her name, which is painted in bold letters 
 upon a metal plate fixed at the head of her stall. 
 Whether in field, yard, or stall, the cows promptly 
 respond to their names, and to the call of Olga, 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 59 
 
 Venus, Clara, Fulda, Herz, Laura, or the inevitable 
 Gretchen, the animal addressed will come or go as 
 desired. Not only so, but the whole forty-eight 
 file to their right places in the shippon with a 
 precision quite pedantic. 
 
 Important as it is, emphasis is not laid on the 
 dairy as a money-getting branch of the colony, 
 partly because the produce is largely needed for 
 home consumption. Nevertheless, three hundred 
 litres of milk are sold daily at the price of three- 
 halfpence a litre (about sevenpence a gallon), and 
 half a hundredweight of butter a week at is. 2d. a 
 pound. As far as possible the colony tries to be self- 
 supporting. All the bread consumed — and the 
 hungry appetites of one hundred and fifty outdoor 
 workers make a huge aggregate — is bought, for 
 though rye, the food grain eaten, is produced in 
 abundance, it is found expedient to sell all that is 
 not needed in the corn, instead of having it ground 
 into flour. On the other hand, all the vegetables 
 and all the meat used are produced on the spot, 
 and the colony can also sell into the bargain. 
 In 1904, for example, the potato crop was so 
 heavy that 1,700 cwts. could be turned into money; 
 the colony also sold 450 cwts. of hay, 60 cwts. of 
 dessert apples (for which only a pitiable ^^iS was 
 received), and j^ro worth of asparagus ; while a very 
 substantial sum is earned every year by the sale of 
 calves, pigs, and fowls. It may be noted that even 
 in winter outdoor work is freely engaged in, for the 
 frost as a rule only touches the surface. 
 
6o THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 It is expressly laid down in the rules of the 
 Labour Colony Association that the colony is a 
 philanthropic institution, and every resident ad- 
 mitted is required to acknowledge this fact as a 
 part of the labour contract which he must sign 
 on entrance. At the same time, though private 
 benevolence — subscriptions, church collections, 
 and the like — contributes largely to the cost of 
 maintenance, material help is received from public 
 authorities, and especially those charged with the 
 relief of the poor, since their responsibilities are 
 greatly lessened where labour colonies exist. 
 Entrance to the colony is extended by a minimum 
 of formality. The wayfarer is invited into the 
 office and is there bidden to read the " House 
 Order," and if he is wishful to enter on the con- 
 ditions therein imposed, he is referred to the 
 director, Pastor Veerhoff, who acquaints himself 
 with his history, and after due admonition asks 
 him to sign the labour contract. As a rule it is 
 stipulated that a man shall remain a certain length 
 of time, though there is no hard and fast rule, 
 and even if he breaks his promise there is neither 
 attempt nor power to bring him back. For all 
 through he is regarded as a free man, and he is 
 treated as such. In practice the average stay is 
 several months, though some are allowed to stay 
 for a year or so, and one colonist was pointed out 
 to me who had already stayed eight years and 
 would be glad to remain as long again. He was 
 a man of seventy-three years — a drainer of such 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 6i 
 
 exceptional skill that he had made himself almost 
 indispensable. The " House Order " referred to 
 binds the colonist to render obedience to all 
 officials and to the regulations which govern the 
 institution, to observe all prescribed hours, to con- 
 duct himself in an orderly and respectful manner, 
 to take his turn at domestic work, and finally to 
 attend church regularly unless prevented by a valid 
 reason. But loyalty to this ordinance depends 
 entirely upon a man's goodwill and his willingness 
 to keep his pledged word, and it is right to say 
 that cases of insubordination and misconduct are 
 very rare. And yet, though the colony is a 
 charitable institution, the opportunity is offered 
 the inmates of saving money wherewith to make a 
 new start in life when discharged. The word 
 "wages" is not used, yet a reward of from two- 
 pence to threepence a day may be earned after the 
 lapse of a fortnight, and this is placed to each man's 
 account, to be handed to him or some friendly 
 adviser on his behalf when he takes his discharge, 
 after deduction for new clothes and luxuries (like 
 tobacco) supplied during his stay. 
 
 The work is hard but not exhausting. The 
 summer hours are : rise at 5 a.m. ; 5.30, coffee, 
 followed by prayers ; 6, work begins ; 9, a 
 breakfast pause of a quarter of an hour ; 12, 
 dinner, with a rest until 1.30, offering the 
 opportunity for a quiet smoke ; 3.30 to 3.45, a 
 pause for coffee (" Vesper "); 7, stop work; 7.30, 
 supper, followed by prayers ; until 9 the colonists 
 
62 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 are free to amuse themselves, and at that hour all 
 must turn into bed. The only important difference 
 in winter is that 6.0 is the hour of rising and 7.0 
 the hour for beginning work ; only an hour's pause 
 is allowed at noon ; and work stops at dusk, supper 
 following at 6 o'clock. The food supplied is simple 
 but sufficient. For " early" and "second" break- 
 fast coffee and buttered rye-bread are served ; for 
 dinner sausage and a mixture of potatoes, 
 vegetables, and meat (the vegetables being chosen 
 from a rotation which includes cabbage, peas, 
 lentils, and barley) ; coffee and bread come on 
 again in the afternoon, and the last meal is a 
 rehash of dinner remnants, with milk soup in 
 addition. Sunday brings, by way of delicacy, 
 appetising dishes like potatoes and sauce, preserved 
 cucumbers, and stewed fruit. On the whole 
 vegetarianism is at a premium at Wilhelmsdorf. 
 " Extras " are given out twice a week in the 
 form of smoking or chewing tobacco — four ounces 
 at a time — the cost of which is placed to each 
 man's account, to be deducted from his earnings 
 when he leaves. The appearance of the crowd of 
 colonists gathered before the door of the adminis- 
 trative building for the semi-weekly distribution, 
 which fell on the day of my visit, was a study. 
 There were faces of all types — the fair Saxon and 
 the dark French or Slav, faces deflowered by 
 intemperance and those upon which want and 
 disease had set a deep impress ; there was the 
 gnarled and wrinkled face of the inveterate 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 63 
 
 vagabond, with a long life of sloth and indulgence 
 behind him, and the smooth face of trampdom's 
 latest recruit, in this case a mere lad of eighteen, 
 who had arrived that morning ; there were cheery 
 faces of which it would have been unkind, in the 
 absence of evidence, to think wrongly, and sinister, 
 scowling faces, whose owners no doubt knew far 
 more of the seamy side of life than they would 
 have cared to own. The colonists, too, are drawn 
 out of all sorts of conditions of society. Naturally 
 unskilled labourers predominate, but representa- 
 tives of scores of handicrafts and trades, and not a 
 few professions, are always to be found amongst 
 the motley fraternity. At that time there were two 
 teachers — one able to speak several languages — 
 and the most miserable figure I saw was that of a 
 former pastor, who had held clerical office after 
 due study and examination. 
 
 It might be supposed that neither threat nor 
 blandishment would get good work out of bad 
 material like this, but the truth is the very 
 reverse. Many of the colonists never adapt 
 themselves to the serious spirit which reigns 
 within this hive of industry, but the majority fall 
 in at once with their surroundings, and prove 
 amenable to instruction and the encouragement 
 and example of their superiors. 
 
 The chief director of the colony, Pastor Veer- 
 hoff, lives on the estate, and besides acting as 
 general administrator, he exercises the incumbency 
 of the church which serves both for the colony 
 
64 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 and the neighbouring population. Beneath him, 
 and directly responsible for the practical oversight 
 of the colony in all its branches, is the " house 
 father," a capable agriculturist, who was trained 
 in Pastor von Bodelschwingh's Deacons' Home 
 already spoken of. Naturally he has the help of 
 a few overseers and hinds, but the work of the 
 colony, both agricultural and domestic, is done 
 by the men themselves. The colony is to a 
 large extent, indeed, a self-contained community, 
 and its entire economy follows very up-to-date 
 methods. Even the electric light is universally 
 used in the various buildings. The power is 
 produced upon the estate, though here skilled 
 labour has for the most part to be employed. 
 
 We worship results in England. What has 
 Wilhelmsdorf to say for itself in this respect ? 
 First let me repeat that while the labour colony 
 is not intended to settle the unemployed problem, 
 it does profess to ameliorate it. Its main purpose 
 is to remove the necessity for aimless wandering, to 
 take away the excuse for begging ; it is a standing 
 invitation to every man with idle hands to get 
 those hands occupied, to every man with empty 
 stomach to come and be fed according to nature's 
 good law, whereby the duty to labour and the 
 right to eat go together. It would, of course, be 
 idle to pretend that all the men who seek the 
 colony do so for the sake of employment. Prob- 
 ably it is sheer need and the wish to avoid the 
 police which drive the majority of them to the 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 65 
 
 institution's door. The " house father " will tell 
 you with a chuckle (if harvest be well over) that 
 one of the most trying times of the year for him is 
 the early autumn, when the crops have to be 
 gathered in. Just when the oats, the rye, the 
 potatoes, the mangolds have to be housed, an 
 unwonted restlessness is visible and a wholesale 
 leave-taking takes place. Everybody seems to 
 have urgent business elsewhere. "They don't 
 like getting the potatoes up. They go a fortnight 
 beforehand, and outside they even warn their 
 comrades to ' wait a little — the work will be over 
 in a fortnight or so.'" "Sometimes," adds the 
 cunning "house father," "we can keep a little 
 work of the kind standing, so they get it after 
 all." And yet not all nor even a majority of the 
 colonists are shirkers. As an evidence of what 
 these men are capable under proper oversight I 
 was shown a new stone building which they 
 had just completed — a substantial, well-found 
 dormitory to accommodate fifty beds. 
 
 The permanent influence of the colony's life 
 and discipline upon the character and habits of 
 the men who enter under pressure of need is a 
 question which it is quite impossible to decide by 
 the common method of statistics. That many 
 of the men are helped to secure regular employ- 
 ment by means of the labour registry which is a 
 feature of every colony is a result which may 
 properly be reduced to figures, but of moral 
 influence it says nothing at all. Besides, how 
 
 G.W. F 
 
66 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 decide if the wastrel of a year ago has been 
 reformed or not ? For what is reformation ? 
 And if the highest standard of regularity, not to 
 say probity, of life be applied here, how many 
 people even outside the labour colonies shall 
 stand ? Remember that the people who enter 
 these social refuges are for the most part human 
 breakages, men who are physically and morally 
 " unfit," — "worm-eaten," as the *' house father " of 
 a Swiss labour colony once expressively put it 
 to me. It would be strange if of such material a 
 high proportion could at once be lifted to the 
 level of industry and virtue which would satisfy a 
 severe standard of rectitude. I admit it : the per- 
 centage of men who are "reformed" is very small 
 indeed ; the percentage even of those who bring 
 forth visible fruit of betterment is probably not 
 higher than twenty-five or thirty. Men go out 
 with the best intentions and with an honest 
 resolve to do credit to the institution which has 
 lifted them out of the ditch ; yet often enough 
 the ditch claims them again only too soon. The 
 old associations gather round them ; the old 
 habits are found to persist ; the old instincts 
 prove not to have died but only to have slumbered 
 during their life in the colony ; and again and 
 again men whose conduct and demeanour had 
 been exemplary fall back as low as ever, and 
 come back broken in character, shattered in 
 health, moral wrecks. 
 
 By way of contrast let me relate the story of a 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 67 
 
 genuine case of reformation as it was told to me. 
 A teacher who had fallen a victim to drink came 
 to the colony, and, after several months' residence, 
 left convinced that he had overcome the old 
 craving. He did not get beyond Bielefeld, how- 
 ever, before he broke out again. He drank 
 himself penniless, and then walked straight back 
 to the colony. ** Now you must make me work 
 hard" (stramni), he said to the sympathetic "house 
 father." "Only work will cure me." For twelve 
 months this teacher toiled on the land like a helot, 
 winning the admiration of his overseers and his 
 comrades alike. Then he took his discharge again, 
 and such was the stimulating effect of discipline 
 that this time there was no relapse. He had 
 regained mastery over himself, and he was soon 
 filling a responsible position in a public institu- 
 tion, which position he retains to-day. His story 
 has a curious sequel. The reclaimed drunkard 
 had a friend, likewise a teacher, who was a 
 victim of his old weakness. He sent him to 
 the colony, and after working nearly a year as 
 a labourer he passed out similarly cured and 
 rehabilitated. He, too, is to-day filling a respon- 
 sible post in a public institution of the province 
 of Westphalia. 
 
 The Wilhelmsdorf Colony is at present in the 
 interesting though hardly enviable position of a 
 colony which has got to the end of its pioneer 
 work. For more than twenty years the colonists 
 have been employed in winning the sterile 
 
 F 2 
 
68 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 moorland to cultivability and productiveness, and 
 now but little remains to be redeemed and deve- 
 loped. The land can be, and is, put yearly under 
 remunerative crops in the ordinary way of agricul- 
 ture, but systematic farming is not the sort of 
 work desired or suitable for workers of this kind. 
 Several years ago this contingency was foreseen, 
 and steps were taken to meet it. Land near 
 Wilhelmsdorf had become too dear to buy, so an 
 entirely new estate was acquired in the province of 
 Hanover, at one-tenth its price, an estate even more 
 sterile and unpromising than Wilhelmsdorf in its 
 early days ; and this has been made the centre of a 
 branch settlement, to which all the stronger and 
 more capable men are sent, while the hundred or 
 so acres of land which have not yet been brought 
 under the plough and spade at Wilhelmsdorf are 
 being reserved for the physical incapables, the 
 epileptics, and so forth. The new colony, 
 Freistatt, near Varsel, on the Weiting Moor, is 
 intended to combine both agriculture and industry. 
 It has an area of between 5,000 and 6,000 Prussian 
 acres, and is a treeless expanse of moorland situated 
 at no great altitude, yet exposed to all the winds 
 of heaven, and calling for the work of men of stern 
 endurance and weather-proof constitutions. Not 
 the least of its advantages is its isolation, for it 
 lies miles away from anywhere, and nobody is 
 likely for a long time to come to intrude upon its 
 privacy who has not serious business on hand. 
 The moor has a deep layer of peat, extending from 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 69 
 
 a foot to a couple of fathoms, and at present 
 attention is being directed to the preparation 
 of turf for faggots and the stall. Already 
 Freistatt has a population of between 120 and 
 140, so that it nearly equals the parent colony 
 in numbers. 
 
 Several institutions on a smaller scale are carried 
 on as appendages of the Wilhelmsdorf Colony. 
 One of them is the lodgers' department, called 
 Ararat, formerly a peasant's house, where men are 
 received for a payment of is. or is. 6d. a day. 
 They must work like the rest, though separately. 
 They have also their own table in the dining-room. 
 Other branches are the Home for Inebriates, 
 Tekoa, with beds for thirty inmates, who are like- 
 wise required to work, and Friedrichshiitte, a 
 similar home for paying residents. But, useful as 
 these institutions are, the great, predominant, 
 characteristic feature of Wilhelmsdorf is still the 
 splendid work it is doing for the reformation of the 
 highway population, of all sections of society the 
 most wretched and the most neglected, and it is a 
 work whose social and moral value cannot easily 
 be overestimated. At the same time it is admitted 
 that, but for these collateral works, there would be 
 a strong inducement to sell the Wilhelmsdorf 
 estate outright and transfer the whole colony 
 elsewhere. So much, however, has been expended 
 on buildings of one kind and another that 
 such a course could only be attended by serious 
 loss. 
 
70 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 THE BERLIN INDUSTRIAL COLONY. 
 
 At the time of my last visit to the parent labour 
 colony of Wilhelmsdorf its founder was away in 
 Berlin stimulating interest in the project of an 
 agricultural colony for the workless there upon 
 which he had set his heart. That colony has 
 since become a fact — as Pastor von Bodelschwingh's 
 projects have a remarkable way of doing — and 
 '■' Hoffnungstal," or the Valley of Hope, as it is 
 called, is now well on the way to organised and 
 successful life. But " Hoffnungstal " is only 
 intended to supplement the good work of the 
 industrial colony already in existence in a suburb 
 of the city, and of this earlier colony, the first of 
 the industrial type known to Germany, I propose 
 to speak. The colony is carried on by an associa- 
 tion of philanthropists formed in 1883, and avowing 
 as its object the supplying of " work, food, and 
 lodging, in times of extremity, to healthy, unem- 
 ployed single men of every position and religious 
 confession, who are both able and willing to work." 
 The colony is situated in the Reinikendorferstrasse, 
 which lies to the north of the city, beyond the 
 principal industrial quarter. The buildings are 
 plain and substantial, and well suited to their 
 purpose, though they were not erected to order. 
 They comprise houses for the director and other 
 officials, rooms for the colonists — dormitories, 
 dining, reading, and bath rooms, several workshops, 
 storerooms, etc. — while adjoining is a large piece 
 of land which is used as a kitchen ga,rden. The 
 
 J 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 71 
 
 majority of the colonists are procured by much the 
 same method that sends appHcants for help to the 
 offices of the Charity Organisation Society. A 
 destitute man begs bread or alms at the door of a 
 member of the association ; instead of receiving 
 what he wants, a ticket for the labour colony is 
 offered him, and he is invited to better his fortunes 
 there. This ticket is a severe test of the genuine- 
 ness of the common beggar's profession that he 
 has no work to do, and — unkindest cut of all — 
 cannot find any. The number of knocks at the 
 door of the colony in the Reinikendorferstrasse is 
 quite out of proportion to the number of directions 
 thither bestowed by the members. It is the old 
 story : Many are called, few chosen. Not a few 
 destitute persons, of course, find their way to the 
 colony without the advice of members — owing to 
 their knowledge of it, may be, to comrades on the 
 road, to the benevolent policeman, or to common 
 report — but in the main the colony is fed by its 
 own friends. This right to recommend admission 
 is acquired by the payment of a yearly subscription 
 of 2S., though most subscriptions far exceed this 
 minimum. 
 
 When an applicant is formally admitted, he 
 binds himself to remain at least four weeks. His 
 sojourn may be curtailed if circumstances should 
 make that necessary, for here, again, expulsion is 
 the only remedy at the command of the authorities ; 
 but as a rule he stays much longer, and, within 
 limits, an extension of time is desired in the interest 
 
72 THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 of a more effective moral cure. At the head of 
 the colony are a director and a " house father " of 
 practical aptitudes, both of whom are responsible 
 to an executive of 17 members, who meet once a 
 month to receive reports and transact financial 
 business. 
 
 The weekly routine, as fixed by the regulations, 
 is carefully enforced. Between the times of rising, 
 •4.30 a.m., and of retiring to bed, 9.30 p.m., the 
 colonists work eleven hours, six days a week, 
 during the greater part of the year, for in winter 
 the order is somewhat relaxed. There are four 
 regular meals, at 6 a.m., 9.30 a.m., 12 a.m., 
 and 7 p.m., besides a coffee pause at 4 p.m. 
 The work day ends at 7, and before bed-time is 
 called an hour and a half is allowed for recreation 
 and reading, for games, books, and periodicals are 
 supplied in sufficiency. Singing, too, is cultivated, 
 when, as at times happens, decadent vocalists, 
 happily for themselves, find their way to the colony. 
 Great attention is paid to religious ministrations. 
 The day is begun and ended with common worship, 
 and on Sundays and church festivals, which are 
 observed as holidays, there is regular divine 
 service, with celebrations of Holy Communion at 
 intervals during the year. It sounds odd, though 
 the friends of the labour colony movement might 
 not admit it, to hear of 186 inmates of the Berlin 
 Labour Colony — more than one-fourth of the 
 total number admitted — having taken part in this 
 solemn ordinance in the course of a year. Then, 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 73 
 
 too, week-day visits are paid by metropolitan 
 clergymen, and departing colonists who can read 
 take with them Bibles or New Testaments. 
 Thanks largely to the moral tone which is 
 cultivated, the order preserved in the colony is 
 remarkably good. Violent insubordination occurs 
 rarely or never, though it happens almost monthly 
 that men have to be sent away on account either 
 of disobedience or insuperable idleness. 
 
 In the employment of the colonists three plans 
 are followed : — (i) They are set to trades and 
 occupations on the premises, under the general 
 oversight of the "house father," by unofficial over- 
 seers chosen from their own number by the test of 
 capacity and steadiness. (2) Their labour is "let " 
 to outside employers, who provide raw materials 
 and in some cases tools, and pay a fixed rate per 
 head and hour or per output, the work being here 
 also done on the premises. (3) There is also employ- 
 ment outside the colony, either on the farming 
 principle or at the direct instance of the institution 
 itself. This is a plan for which every season of the 
 year in turn affords abundant scope, though a serious 
 disadvantage is the absence of proper control, 
 which is found at times to lead to irregular conduct. 
 The outside occupations to which the colonists are 
 most commonly allotted are agriculture, horticul- 
 ture, forest and street work, and domestic work, 
 such as coal-carrying, wood-cutting, carpet- 
 beating, snow-clearing, furniture removing, etc. 
 
 The principal source of work and also of revenue 
 
74 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 is the first of these classes. The handicrafts 
 followed are naturally such as require as small an 
 investment of capital as possible, together with a 
 minimum amount of training and skill in the work- 
 men, though in the interest of variety these 
 conditions have to some degree to be departed 
 from. The productive department of the colony 
 trades largely in brushes and besoms, which are 
 ■sold to dealers, manufactories, breweries, inns, 
 hospitals, and other wholesale consumers; in 
 simple carpentry, including packing-boxes for 
 cheese, chocolate, chicory, and other bulky goods ; 
 the same for wine dealers, painters, for furniture, 
 etc. ; straw cases for bottles, and other straw 
 work ; and firewood of all sorts and sizes, which 
 is retailed at the house doors in the town. In 
 addition, there is a department for letter and 
 circular writing and envelope addressing, and for 
 the delivery in all parts of Berlin of prospectuses, 
 trade addresses, and letters. 
 
 A colonist's bare keep costs the association from 
 4^. to 5^. per day, and this he is expected to earn. 
 As a rule he earns more, and a certain part of the 
 proceeds of his labour is put to his credit in a home 
 savings bank. He may draw upon his savings for 
 extras, in the form of clothes — which are also 
 supplied on the weekly instalment system — or, if 
 these are not needed, he may allow the whole to 
 accumulate. In this way industrious and thrifty 
 colonists are able after a few months to go out 
 into the world again well-dressed and possessed 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 75 
 
 of a small reserve of money wherewith to meet 
 emergencies. I was told of one who had left with 
 over £10 in his pocket — a dangerously large fortune 
 had the possessor not learned the value of money. 
 Let me here say that of the colonists who were 
 discharged in a recent year 7 per cent, went to 
 regular work which had been found for them by 
 the officers, 16 per cent, to work which they had 
 found for themselves, and i per cent, returned to 
 his own home ; while 48 per cent., though having 
 no immediate prospect of work, went in search of 
 it well clad and provided with means that 
 would keep them respectable for some time to 
 come. 
 
 Financial success, as I have said, is not the only 
 or first aim of the labour colonies, and the 
 deficiency which has to be made up at Berlin, as 
 elsewhere, is considerable, but it must be remem- 
 bered that the labour colonies cannot be worked on 
 any hard and fast principle of economy. Were 
 that so, many a proper case for help, experiment, 
 and discipline would have to be rejected. While, 
 however, no colony pays its own way, it is clearly 
 better for a community to contribute to the 
 support of its destitute unemployed through the 
 agency of institutions like this, which have a dis- 
 tinctly educative and moral tendency, than through 
 the agency of the Poor Law. 
 
 The composition of the Berlin Colony shows how 
 faithful it is to its urban character, for the majority 
 are alwavs handicraftsmen of some kind or other — 
 
76 THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 joiners, locksmiths, painters, cabinet makers, 
 shoe-makers, masons, tailors, bakers, smiths, 
 paperhangers, and the like. 
 
 It may be added that this colony possesses 
 peculiar interest, inasmuch as it is an example 
 of sytematic co-operation between private and 
 public enterprise in this domain of social reform. 
 Some years ago an arrangement was made 
 between the association and the district authorities 
 of Nieder Barnim, by virtue of which the latter 
 were allowed, in consideration of a certain annual 
 vote of money, to refer to the colony wandering 
 workmen whom they were unable to deal with at 
 the relief stations. A branch was accordingly 
 established for the especial treatment of these 
 cases at Tegel (the birthplace and burial place of 
 the renowned Humboldts), where the colonists are 
 put to agriculture and forestry in summer. One 
 result was not anticipated. The number of 
 vagrants posing as bond fide working men who pass 
 through the Nieder Barnim district has greatly 
 decreased and the district poor funds have been 
 proportionately relieved. 
 
 LABOUR COLONIES FOR WOMEN. 
 
 Of late years labour colonies have been 
 established for women in eight places. They are 
 in the nature of the case different in respect of the 
 occupations offered, but the main lines on which 
 they are worked are the same. To Pastor Isermeyer 
 belongs the credit of having started this important 
 
LABOUR COLONIES. 77 
 
 complementary movement. His home for women 
 {Fraiienheim) at the village of Himmelsthiir, near 
 Hildesheim, has now a sixteen years' history behind 
 it, and it has done a wonderful work of reformation 
 amongst abandoned women of all ages. The 
 whole estate, with farm building and full equip- 
 ment, has cost over 3^7,500, and the yearly expendi- 
 ture on the home amounts to about £"i,ooo. From 
 100 to 120 women, ranging in age from 16 or 17 
 to 80 and upwards, are continually subjected here 
 to a regime which combines the freedom and the 
 amenities of home life with the stimulating and 
 restraining influences of a disciplinary institution. 
 Here, too, the whole atmosphere is religious, and 
 its effect upon the women is, as might be expected, 
 more perceptible and lasting than in the case of 
 men. The women are divided into families of 20, 
 and each family is placed under a superintendent 
 and a helper — officers who, in many cases, have 
 themselves passed through the home, and are 
 thus practical evidences of its beneficial influences. 
 The women are placed to the work best suited to 
 their age, strength, and past employment. A large 
 number of them are sempstresses, and for these 
 work is found in commissions for clothing which 
 come from the prison authorities and elsewhere ; 
 others are engaged in the wash-house and in laundry 
 work ; while others are systematically trained to 
 general domestic work, with a view to future em- 
 ployment when fit to be discharged ; and yet others 
 are engaged in garden work, and so forth. As a 
 
78 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 proof of the practical lines on which the home is 
 carried on, it may be stated that the revenue from 
 the productive labour of the residents as a rule 
 nearly covers the cost of their maintenance. As 
 in the labour colonies for men, premiums are offered 
 to the diligent, the maximum rate being 3^?. per day. 
 The average term of residence in the home is from 
 three to four years, though many inmates — the 
 younger ones especially — can safely be discharged 
 in a few months. Some go into service, but the 
 majority return to their parents. Already over 
 600 women and girls have passed through the 
 Himmelsthiir Home for Women, and a large part 
 of these have been reclaimed to a moral life. The 
 example set by Pastor Isermeyer has borne ex- 
 cellent fruit, for already seven other homes have 
 been established on a precisely similar basis. His 
 ideal goes further, however, for it is nothing less 
 than the presence of a Home for Women at the 
 doorsof every large town and every penitentiary in 
 which women are received. 
 
 J 
 
RELIEF WORKS FOR UNEMPLOYED. 79 
 
 (i 
 
 CHAPTER VL 
 
 RELIEF WORKS FOR THE UN- 
 EMPLOYED. 
 
 Enough has been said about the labour colonies 
 to make it clear that these institutions, admirable 
 though their purpose and valuable though the 
 place they fill, do not in the least meet the case of 
 the urban unemployed. It must also be said that 
 they are not meant to do so. For the average urban 
 workmen who are temporarily thrown idle have 
 homes of their own, with dependents to support, 
 with social ties to cultivate and social obligations 
 to fulfil as members of class and other organisa- 
 tions : so that their removal to more or less distant 
 labour colonies on the moor or the heath would 
 only aggravate the misfortune from which they and 
 their families suffer. Nor does the Poor Law pro- 
 perly face the difficulty. Under it task work may 
 be offered in such cases, but with it come pauper 
 associations and attendant civil disqualifications, 
 which are as obnoxious to independent German as 
 to independent English working men. 
 
 Hence it is that in an increasing degree the 
 German municipalities are recognising here the 
 opportunity, if not so readily the duty, of offering 
 a helping hand to the labouring class in time of 
 
8o THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 need. In most of the large towns the undertaking 
 of " distress works " {N otstandsarbeiten) in times of 
 exceptional unemployment is now part of a well- 
 devised scheme, and is regulated in every detail 
 by elaborate municipal statutes or by-laws. As a 
 rule such works are carried out during the winter 
 months only, from the beginning of December to 
 the end of February or the middle of March. And 
 yet the fact should be emphasised that the 
 municipalities are averse to any formal recogni- 
 tion of the principle of public responsibility for the 
 employment of the workless amongst their citizens. 
 Even in towns where the provision of distress works 
 is systematic and recurs unerringly with the revo- 
 lution of the year, the authorities, in self-protection, 
 generally take care to disown any direct social 
 obligation. They act of grace and not of moral com- 
 pulsion. The Town Council of Frankfort, for ex- 
 ample, while it has taken an intelligent lead in this 
 question, expressly repudiates the notion that it 
 ought to provide work indiscriminately during the 
 bad seasons, and says that its guiding principle 
 must always be to " prevent any extensive call 
 upon public relief owing to extraordinary workless- 
 ness." Frankfort is like some other German towns 
 in that the practice has there grown up of seasonal 
 workers looking to the municipality for employ- 
 ment when their normal occupation fails them, 
 and this fact may account for the vigilant attitude 
 of the public authority. A short time ago the Chief 
 Mayor of the town explained the position as follows: 
 
RELIEF WORKS FOR UNEMPLOYED. 8i 
 
 " It was formerly the general custom that seasonal 
 workers, both here and elsewhere, endeavoured to earn 
 a livelihood in winter by other means than their own 
 occupation. Of late, however, partly in consequence 
 of the fact that, owing to favourable weather, building 
 works have been continued later in the year than 
 formerly, and partly in consequence of the growing 
 dislike of urban workmen to rural occupations (like 
 forest work), an indisposition to seek special winter em- 
 ployment has shown itself. The plea is commonly put 
 forward that the municipal authority ought to find 
 employment for those who are thrown out of work 
 owing to the suspension of the seasonal trades. But 
 this demand must be resolutely opposed, since the 
 municipality is not in a position to provide sufficient 
 work of the kind, and under the existing economic 
 order the principle must unconditionally be maintained 
 that, apart from relief works undertaken in quite 
 exceptional circumstances, every man must be left to 
 seek work for himself ... In any event any measures 
 of the municipality which attracted or settled seas- 
 onal workers here would be directly antagonistic to 
 the interests of the working classes themselves. " 
 
 Apart, however, from special considerations of 
 this kind which operate in Frankfort and elsewhere, 
 sound reasons of general application point to the 
 desirability of a policy of prudence. On the one 
 hand there is the practical objection that the con- 
 cession of the principle of a "right to work," 
 which to Prince Bismarck, with his impatience of 
 all theories, was self-evident and presented no 
 difficulty whatever, involves a responsibility which, 
 whether justifiable or not, is one of immense 
 significance. Moreover, if a municipality is morally 
 bound to provide its members with employment, 
 it is obvious that such a responsibility cannot be 
 
 G.W. G 
 
82 . THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 extended to the outsiders whom roaming ways, 
 encouraged by an adventurous spirit or even a 
 genuine desire for work, may have brought to the 
 town. If a universal right to work be admitted, 
 the question becomes a national one, and the 
 State must in that event intervene. The munici- 
 palities plead with justification that the right of 
 migration has greatly increased the evil of unem- 
 ployment by diverting population from the country 
 to the towns, and that it would be unfair to expect 
 a town to find work for every stray visitor who 
 chose to look in while on his endless pilgrimage 
 to nowhere in particular. 
 
 At the same time it is recognised that it is wise 
 public policy to keep deserving people off the Poor 
 Law, so helping them to retain the spirit of 
 independence and self-reliance, and not less to 
 protect them from the idleness which is so fruitful 
 a cause of demoralisation in every class of society. 
 It is the recognition of this fact more than any 
 other consideration that has led so many munici- 
 palities in Germany to override objections and diffi- 
 culties and, under proper safeguards, to create 
 facilities for work in times of special scarcity. 
 
 There are two ways of doing this. Where 
 possible work of an ordinary kind — work, that is, 
 which can with advantage be put in hand at once 
 without any departure from plan — is offered on nor- 
 mal conditions as to wages, either by the muni- 
 cipality engaging direct from the labour bureau such 
 of the unemployed as can be accommodated, or by 
 
RELIEF WORKS FOR UNEMPLOYED. 83 
 
 its requiring its contractors to cover their labour 
 requirements from the local supplies. Where such 
 normal work cannot be offered, distress or relief 
 works of a temporary character are carried on 
 under special conditions. The works of the latter 
 kind most commonly undertaken are — besides 
 scavenging, the removal of snow, and other street 
 work — excavation, the laying out of parks and 
 gardens, the construction of roads and streets, 
 forest work, sewerage work, paving, sand quarrying, 
 stone breaking, wood chopping, mat making, and 
 more rarely writing and copying. In doing this 
 the municipalities endeavour to restrict their action 
 as far as possible. In most towns distress work 
 is only offered to persons selected by various tests 
 — a residential qualification, responsibility for the 
 maintenance of others, inculpable worklessness, 
 and so forth. It is a common practice only to 
 give work to married men, or men who have 
 dependents to support. In Strassburg young men 
 under eighteen years who apply for work are 
 required to go to continuation schools, which is a 
 good way of protecting them against worklessness 
 by the time they are twenty-eight. In Frankfort 
 the conditions are laid down that the successful 
 applicants must be resident in the town and have 
 their legal settlement there, that they must be 
 heads of families, that they must during the pre- 
 ceding summer have been permanently employed 
 in the town, and that they must not be in receipt 
 of poor relief. In some places an applicant is 
 
 G 2 
 
84 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 even expected to furnish evidence that he has 
 been provident. For example, in Breslau, workmen 
 like masons, who, though earning high wages in 
 summer, have failed to save for the inevitable 
 rainy day, are passed over in favour of others who 
 have not had equal chances. Never is employ- 
 ment offered when worklessness is the result of 
 an industrial dispute, nor is it as a rule offered to 
 recipients of poor relief; some towns go so far as 
 to refuse work to all people who have received 
 relief during the preceding twelve months. Here 
 and there it is required that requests for employ- 
 ment on municipal distress works shall come 
 through the Poor Bureau (Armenant), which first 
 sifts the applicants and rejects those who have no 
 local settlement, who are incapable, or who are 
 otherwise unacceptable. 
 
 Regular conduct and respectful behaviour are 
 required in these distress workers, on pain of dis- 
 missal; and in some places the observance of 
 "Blue Monday," as the German phrase runs, is 
 visited by the same penalty. Formal notice is 
 not required or given, for this casual employment is 
 not recognised as constituting a legal wages con- 
 tract ; hence the workman can leave any day, and 
 he may be discharged just as summarily. As far 
 as possible care is taken to discourage workers 
 from settling down to this exceptional work as a 
 regular source of livelihood. They are required 
 to look out for permanent employment, even 
 though it may not suit their wishes, and a man 
 
RELIEF WORKS FOR UNEMPLOYED. 85 
 
 who refuses an offer of such employment is at 
 once discharged. 
 
 The wages paid to adults for outdoor work are 
 as a rule from 2 to 2^ marks per day of eight or 
 nine hours, or where payment is by the hour 
 twenty-five to thirty pfennige (:id. to 3|(f.) per 
 hour. In a few cases 3 marks per day are paid. 
 The wages of juvenile workers (under sixteen 
 years), who are seldom engaged, are from i to ij 
 marks per day. Piece work is the exception. 
 Recognising the inevitable unevenness of the work 
 done, and the fact that the whole system of 
 distress works is a makeshift, a palliative of 
 abnormal conditions, into which a strong element 
 of philanthropy necessarily enters, the muni- 
 cipalities prefer to pay a fixed sum for a day's 
 employment, and are prepared to find the arrange- 
 ment a bad bargain from the purely financial 
 standpoint. Some towns in addition pay the 
 insurance premiums for sickness, accident, and 
 old age where the workers are still on the registers 
 of their societies. In exceptional cases also food 
 is supplied to the workers under cost price at 
 midday. 
 
 As to the economic efficiency of the work done 
 there is little or no difference of opinion ; the work 
 is inferior in quality to that of free workers in the 
 same occupations, and it is also dearer. It is 
 characteristic of undertakings of this kind almost 
 universally that they cost far more than they are 
 worth ; even when care is taken to restrict 
 
86 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 expenditure to works of practical utility, and most 
 municipalities bothanticipate lossand experienceit. 
 Here and there, where by happy luck the class of 
 labour at disposal is fairly suited to its tasks, no 
 excess of expense is shown ; but in most cases the 
 excess is lo, 20, 30, and even 50 per cent. Yet 
 this will not excite surprise when the character of 
 the workers is considered, for they are as a rule 
 unfit for heavy work, while the inclement season 
 of the year to which the distress works generally 
 fall is also against them. But in judging the 
 distress works a strictly business, debtor and 
 credit standard is not applied. These works 
 are, in fact, regarded as a necessary evil, a pis- 
 aller, or at best as a social experiment for which 
 a negative virtue only can be claimed. 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 87 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 HOUSING OF THE WORKING CLASSES. 
 
 In October of the year 1904 a German National 
 Congress on the housing question met in Frank- 
 fort-on-Main, and its proceedings, which lasted 
 several days, were attended by 800 delegates from 
 all parts of the empire, and representative of 
 every section of the community. The Imperial 
 Ministry for the Interior and other Imperial 
 Departments (like those of Health and Insurance), 
 and various Ministries of half a dozen German 
 States (Prussia, Bavaria, and Wurtemberg among 
 them) sent highly-stationed representatives to 
 hear and report on what they heard. Presidents 
 of provinces and other administrative officials 
 took active part in the discussions ; and the general 
 crowd of delegates included professors from the 
 great universities, spokesmen of the better-known 
 political, religious, and social reform organisa- 
 tions, ecclesiastical dignitaries, deputies from 
 Reichstag and Diet, provincial mayors and other 
 municipal officials, members of the learned pro- 
 fessions, and not least, a sprinkling of the Socialist 
 Labour party. In short, as the newspapers 
 bluntly said at the time, " a more mixed com- 
 pany could not well have been imagined." Yet 
 
88 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 the very catholicity of the gathering was the 
 really impressive mark of the first " General 
 German Housing Congress," for it explained 
 the fact that the housing problem is regarded 
 in Germany as a national problem to whose 
 solution the best elements of the nation owe their 
 best counsels and efforts. The practical results 
 of the Congress were not perhaps very solid, yet 
 the papers read and the discussions to which they 
 led threw much searching light upon this dark 
 place in German social life, and established 
 the urgent need for ameliorative measures in 
 the interest at once of public health and of 
 public morality. For let German municipal 
 government be as admirable as it may, the 
 best and wisest local government in the world 
 cannot prevent land values and house rents 
 from advancing pari passu with the growth of 
 population and the expenditure on municipal 
 improvements. 
 
 The housing of the working classes has long 
 been regarded as one of the most vital of the 
 problems which social reformers have to face in 
 Germany ; and while earnest efforts have already 
 been made in various ways, and in all parts of the 
 country, to alleviate its pressure, it is questionable 
 whether its magnitude was really known before 
 practical measures followed theoretical discus- 
 sions. How serious the question is in the metro- 
 polis is proved by the terrible over-crowding of 
 the workers and the poor, the exorbitancy of the 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 89 
 
 rents they pay, and the woful insufficiency of the 
 accommodation with which they must perforce 
 be satisfied. Grouping the larger towns of 
 Germany together, it has been estimated that 
 80 per cent, of their resident workpeople live in 
 houses inadequate either in size or arrange- 
 ments, or both (which is generally the case), to 
 the maintenance of a respectable, moral family 
 life, though on an average the rent paid is fully 
 a quarter of their earnings. In the smaller towns 
 matters are only slightly better, for while the 
 rents paid are not so high there, the accommoda- 
 tion is very inferior. Dwellings of one bedroom 
 and a kitchen are very common, and three rooms 
 represent a relatively satisfactory state of things. 
 
 The question of housing reform has been 
 " officially " taken up in Prussia since its impor- 
 tance was emphasised in a Speech from the 
 Throne on January 8, igoi. _ The attention of 
 local sanitary authorities was promptly directed 
 to the subject by decrees issued on March 19 
 following by the Ministers for Trade and Industry, 
 for Home Affairs, for Public Worship and Educa- 
 tion, and for Agriculture. Many of these autho- 
 rities were, however, already active, and had 
 accumulated valuable statistical and other mate- 
 rial, as a result of special inquiries conducted 
 simultaneously with the quinquennial census of 
 December i, igoo. To this material came the 
 Statistical Bureau's report on the housing ques- 
 tion in Prussia for igoo, published two years 
 
90 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 later. The result of these and other investiga- 
 tions was to show the existence of intolerable 
 defects in the condition of the housing of the 
 masses, and that not exclusively in the large 
 towns, as had been supposed, but in the smaller 
 places and in the rural districts. 
 
 The following comparison of yearly rents pay- 
 able in 1900 in towns of various size shows how 
 widespread is the cry of dear dwellings : — 
 
 
 
 Dwelling with 
 
 
 One beatable 
 
 Two beatable 
 
 
 room 
 
 
 rooms. 
 
 
 £ s. 
 
 d. 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 Berlin 
 
 II 12 
 
 .. 
 
 18 19 
 
 Breslau... 
 
 ... 7 6 
 
 .. 
 
 12 10 
 
 Charlottenburg 
 
 ... 10 18 
 
 .. 
 
 17 8 
 
 Altona 
 
 7 H 
 
 .. 
 
 14 18 
 
 Posen ... 
 
 5 10 
 
 .. 
 
 13 9 
 
 Schoneberg ... 
 
 ... 12 4 
 
 .. 
 
 18 15 
 
 Rixdorf 
 
 10 
 
 .. 
 
 15 4 
 
 Wilmersdorf ... 
 
 10 14 
 
 .. 
 
 17 
 
 Schmargendorf 
 
 ... 8 3 
 
 .. 
 
 12 18 
 
 In Berlin a beatable room cost on an average 
 ^9 i6s. in the cellar, .^lo 6s. in the fourth story, 
 and £() 15s. in the fifth or higher stories or in the 
 attic. The equivalent figures for Breslau were 
 ^5 los., £6 I2S., and ^5 17s. ; for Charlottenburg, 
 £6 13s., £() 14s., and ;^8 us. ; for Posen, 3^6 12s., 
 £'j IS., and ^^5 19s. ; for Schoneberg, £'j 12s., 
 ■£"10 4s., and £() 8s. ; for Rixdorf, £6 5s., ^^8 3s., 
 and £y 9s. ; and for Wilmersdorf £6 8s., £'j 5s., 
 and £^ los. It was found that rent, as a rule, 
 ran away with from a fifth to a quarter, and 
 even more, of the workman's total earnings, the 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 91 
 
 proportion being in Konigsberg 25 per cent, and 
 in Stettin 28 per cent., and a steady rise in rents 
 was reported all over the country, the increase 
 in the case of small dwellings in Halle being in 
 the year igoo from £6 to £(^ and even ;£*I2. 
 The effect was to cause working men to crowd 
 their families into ever smaller houses, in which 
 considerations of health, convenience, and even 
 morality had to go by the board. It was found 
 that in many towns from 10 to 20 per cent, of 
 the dwellings with either no beatable room or 
 only one lodged on an average six or more 
 persons, the largest average being at Halle 
 (20*20 per cent.). Barmen (22'35), and Posen 
 (24'07). The conclusion come to was that 
 "almost universally in the larger towns and 
 largely in the smaller ones, the provision of small 
 healthy dwellings does not keep up with the 
 demand, while at the same time old houses in 
 which families of small means have hitherto found 
 indifferent housing at moderate price are being 
 demolished, and that in consequence of the inade- 
 quate supply of small houses, and especially of 
 the inordinately increased price of land caused by 
 unhealthy speculation, the rents of these houses 
 are quite out of proportion to the income of the 
 poorer classes." 
 
 The experience of other States tells the same 
 tale. Herr Gretschel, the State Inspector of 
 Dwellings for the Grand Duchy of Hesse, found 
 on investigation a short time ago that the following 
 
92 
 
 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 yearly rents were paid in Hessian towns for small 
 houses : — 
 
 
 
 A. 
 
 
 
 B. 
 
 c. 
 
 
 
 One Room. 
 
 
 Two 
 
 Rooms. 
 
 Three Rooms. 
 
 Darmstadt ... 
 
 New Old 
 Quarter. Quarter. 
 
 i ^- i ^■ 
 3 o ... 4 i6 
 
 New 
 Quarter. 
 
 i ^■ 
 6 12 
 
 Old 
 
 Quarter. 
 
 ..Is 
 
 New Old 
 Quarter. Quarter. 
 
 £ ^- £ ^^ 
 
 9 ... 12 
 
 Mayence 
 
 6 
 
 ... 6 IO 
 
 9 
 
 
 
 ..10 
 
 1 12 10... 16 
 1 15 ... 18 
 
 Worms ... j 
 
 5 
 6 
 
 ... 7 o 
 ... 8 o 
 
 8 
 9 
 
 
 
 
 
 .. 9 10 
 ..10 
 
 1 12 10 ... 16 
 1 15 ... 19 
 
 Giessen 
 
 3 
 
 2 ... 4 14 
 
 5 
 
 4 
 
 - 7 13 
 
 7 16 ... 12 2 
 
 Bmgen 
 
 Offenbach ... 
 
 6 
 3 
 
 ... 6 
 10 ... 4 10 
 
 9 
 
 7 
 
 
 
 
 ..90 
 ..90 
 
 12 ... 12 
 12 ... 16 
 
 1 
 
 After pointing out that the minimum accommo- 
 dation required by health and decency is three 
 rooms (C), viz., sitting-room (also used as bed- 
 room), bedroom and kitchen (as a rule a miniature 
 apartment generally used for sleeping), Herr 
 Gretschel showed what the foregoing rents meant 
 to working people of small income by the following 
 classification of incomes, based on the official 
 income tax returns. The persons liable to this 
 tax had incomes as follows in 1902-3 : — 
 
 Percentage of the whole. 
 
 £■25 to £45. £45 to ;C65. £65 to £85. £25 to £85 
 
 Darmstadt ' 
 
 320 
 
 235 
 
 Mayence ' 
 
 Offenbach (1901-2) 
 Giessen 
 
 330 
 25-3 
 34 '6 
 
 30-5 
 47-5 
 195 
 
 IO-8 
 
 io'4 
 
 8-2 
 
 10*9 
 
 633 
 73 9 
 80-9 
 65-0 
 
 2 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 93 
 
 It was the Inspector's conclusion that few of 
 the families here enumerated can really afford the 
 least accommodation which health requires. 
 
 At the same time it is questionable whether 
 the housing question is any less urgent in the 
 rural districts than in the towns. Investigations 
 made into the housing conditions of villages of 
 Hesse by the same Inspector of Dwellings 
 brought to light a grievous condition of things. 
 Over-crowding, damp floors and walls, broken- 
 down roofs, insanitary arrangements of the most 
 flagrant kind, disease-inviting lack of ventilation, 
 lightless rooms, promiscuous herding of the sexes, 
 absence of the most elementary conveniences of 
 civilized life — these were among the more painful 
 characteristics of rural dwellings. The rents were 
 lower than in the towns, it is true, but the wages 
 were lower also. 
 
 Happily Germany is bestirring herself, and is 
 now making quiet but steady progress in the 
 legislative, and still more in the administrative 
 and philanthropic, treatment of this burning 
 question. In the matter of house inspection by 
 the municipal authorities, German towns have, 
 in general, long remained behind, but the lost 
 ground is being made up with excellent results. 
 In the Grand Duchy of Hesse the State has taken 
 the work of house inspection and even house pro- 
 vision into its own hands. It began in 1893 with 
 a law introducing a system of police inspection 
 in the case of small dwellings and lodging- 
 
94 THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 houses. Such inspection was made obligatory in 
 towns of over 5,000 inhabitants, and permissive 
 elsewhere. Under it a good remedial work was 
 at once done, though perhaps its most valuable 
 result was to discover evils which were beyond the 
 power of municipal bodies, however zealous, and 
 of house inspectors, however loyal and conscien- 
 tious. Ten years later the State itself stepped in 
 and by a law of 1903 propounded a scheme for 
 providing small and healthy houses, at reasonable 
 rents, for persons of limited means. The State 
 advances to the communes and to building socie- 
 ties conducted on a philanthropic basis loans at 
 a low rate of interest for the erection of such 
 dwellings. A State House Inspection Bureau has 
 also been established at Darmstadt, to which all 
 public and private bodies interested in the housing 
 question can be affiliated, and from which they 
 may obtain information and guidance. At the 
 head is an Inspector of Dwellings, to whom all the 
 local inspectors of town and country are subordi- 
 nate. This official has already done much to 
 stimulate public interest in the question by perio- 
 dical statements in the Press of all parties, by 
 lectures and conferences, and by correspondence 
 with municipal bodies and trade unionist organi- 
 sations. Gradually he is enlisting the co-opera- 
 tion of many officials and authorities capable 
 of elucidating the question, and of influenc- 
 ing public opinion and municipal action — the 
 factory inspectors, the sickness and accident 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 95 
 
 insurance boards, the labour organisations, and 
 so forth. 
 
 In their treatment of this problem, the German 
 communes have one advantage in their favour 
 which is denied to most English towns. I refer 
 to the landed estate which commonly forms an 
 important part of a German town's assets. English 
 municipal workers who have not studied the 
 question would be surprised to know how large 
 and valuable this estate often is. It is for the most 
 part land unbuilt upon and not always within 
 the present municipal area, yet its eligibility 
 for public and for residential purposes increases 
 every year as the means of locomotion are im- 
 proved. Berlin, Cologne, Munich, Dresden, and 
 Frankfort, among the larger German cities, are 
 especially rich in this respect, thanks largely to 
 the foresight and intelligence of their local rulers 
 in the past, and few places of any consequence 
 are entirely without. An inquiry made in regard 
 to fifty-one communes of larger size in the Grand 
 Duchy of Hesse alone showed that only twenty- 
 one were without a large reserve of building land 
 of their own. Nineteen owned such land to 
 the extent of two and a half acres per 1,000 
 inhabitants ; six had from two and a half to 
 twelve and a half acres per 1,000 inhabitants; 
 and five had more than twelve and a half acres 
 per 1 ,000 inhabitants. These figures were received 
 with a certain disappointment that the amount 
 of communal property was not larger. But what 
 
96 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 tale would an equal number of English towns 
 tell? 
 
 There are also few towns of any consequence 
 which do not entrust to their Statistical Bureaux, 
 which form so important and so instructive a 
 department of municipal government, the perio- 
 dical enumeration of houses, with details as to 
 character, proportions, number of rooms and of 
 inhabitants, rents, etc., so full and exact as to 
 give to the published reports a high social value. 
 
 Leipzig is one of the towns — and there are many 
 of them — which have recently devoted a portion 
 of their real estate to the housing of the working 
 classes. In igo2 the municipality leased for lOO 
 years to a philanthropic building society {Gemein- 
 niitsige Baugesellschaft) there a large piece of com- 
 munal land in the environs for the erection of 
 cheap houses. The majority of the houses have 
 to contain three, and none of them more than four, 
 rooms (including kitchen). The area at present 
 set apart for this purpose is 82,334 square metres, 
 or nearly twenty acres. The society cannot 
 transfer its leasehold rights to third parties with- 
 out the consent of the municipality, and in the 
 event of its doing so, both the offending contract 
 and the lease itself may be cancelled. The muni- 
 cipality undertakes the initial construction of all 
 squares, roads, and footpaths, but the society 
 pays 4 per cent, on the capital expenditure. The 
 cost of these works is estimated at 3^23,500. The 
 interest to be paid by the society for the land is 
 
 I 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 97 
 
 0"i2 mark or i^d. per square metre of the land 
 leased, exclusive of the area used for streets and 
 squares, but the Municipal Council is empowered 
 to increase this interest after twenty-five years to 
 c 14 mark (if i.), after fifty years too* 16 mark (2^.), 
 and after seventy-five years to o*i8 mark {2^d.) 
 Thus the rent will begin at £^94, and may even- 
 tually increase to £741 ', in addition to which the 
 society will pay £9^3 a year in interest on street 
 works. Should the society fail to fulfil its obliga- 
 tions, the municipality reserves power to cancel 
 the lease. 
 
 The municipality goes further, however, for it 
 undertakes to advance money on mortgage for 
 building purposes should the building society's 
 revenues prove indequate, with the provision that 
 the society must refund the loan by regular repay- 
 ments in such a manner that on the termination 
 of the lease the mortgages will be redeemed. The 
 municipahty will then take over the land and the 
 dwellings built upon it without compensation. 
 
 It should be stated that the society itself is 
 being financed by the Insurance Board of the 
 State of Saxony, which has agreed to advance 
 £60,000 as it may be needed at an interest of 
 4 per cent, (with from 3 to 3*9 per cent, by way 
 of redemption), but in the society's contract with 
 the municipality the latter agrees under certain 
 conditions to become surety for the due payment 
 of the interest. In consideration of this arrange- 
 ment it is stipulated that the houses shall by 
 
 G.w. H 
 
98 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 preference be offered to working men or other 
 persons insured with or receiving pensions from 
 the State Insurance Board under the Imperial 
 Insurance Laws. There is no stipulation as to 
 the amount of the rent except that it shall not 
 exceed the rent locally customary for similar 
 houses. 
 
 This is only one illustration out of many 
 which might be cited of insurance boards 
 making loans for the erection of working-men's 
 dwellings. The profitable employment of the 
 enormous accumulations of insurance contribu- 
 tions had a few years ago become a question of 
 acute difficulty, until the happy idea was devised 
 of making advances from them to public and 
 philanthropic societies formed for the establish- 
 ment of agencies directly concerned with the 
 welfare of the working classes. Amongst such 
 agencies working men's dwellings, together with 
 sanatoria and convalescent homes, take a leading 
 place. Towards the erection of houses for the 
 working classes no less than ^^5, 476,600 had been 
 lent up to the end of 1903. The rate of interest 
 is as a rule, 3 or 3^ per cent., the maximum being 
 4!^ per cent, and the minimum 2 per cent. The 
 conditions upon which loans are made vary 
 greatly, but in every case the utmost care is taken 
 that the money cannot be employed for private 
 benefit, and that ample security exists for its 
 repayment. It would probably be correct to say 
 that nearly all the large boards established under 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 99 
 
 the Old Age and Invalidity Insurance Laws have 
 freely invested their funds in this way. 
 
 The Hanover Insurance Board is a striking case 
 in point. During the three years 1900 to 1902 the 
 number of separate houses (that is, blocks) built 
 by the help of funds lent by the authority to 
 societies, consumers, employers, and private 
 individuals increased from 1,367 to 2,827 ; the 
 number of dwellings increased from 3,467 to 
 6,300 ; the number of persons housed increased 
 from 17,200 to 31,000 ; and the value of the 
 property built increased from 3^670,000 to 
 1,190,000; while the amount advanced on mort- 
 gages from the Hanover Insurance Fund increased 
 from ^^415,000 to ;^720,ooo. At the beginning 
 of 1903, 1,041 societies, corporations, or indivi- 
 duals had received loans from this source, or 
 twice as many as three years before, and o 
 these loans thirty were advanced to building 
 societies, twelve to factories, commercial com- 
 panies, and associations, four to communes, 
 five to employers, fourteen to savings banks, 
 and nine hundred and seventy-six to insured 
 persons. 
 
 The houses in respect of which loans are thus 
 advanced are of two kinds : (a) houses which are 
 meant to be permanently rented to workpeople, 
 and to remain in the possession of the cor- 
 porations which build them, and {b) houses 
 which may be acquired by their occupants on a 
 system of payment by instalments. Of the 6,300 
 
 H 2 
 
loo THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 dwellings already erected, i,6oi belong to the 
 former class and 4,699 to the latter. The houses 
 have on an average either three or four rooms, 
 and the average number of persons living in each 
 is five. The houses are built on the flat system, 
 each block consisting of either two or three 
 dwellings. The average rent per dwelling for the 
 .houses erected by building societies is £S 10s. 
 annually in the case of rented houses, and £y in 
 the case of houses acquired by their occupants, 
 though in the latter case taxes and fire insurance 
 premiums to the extent of ^^^i 5s. or so have to 
 be added, so that the effective rent is about the 
 same in both cases. The rent ranges between a 
 minimum of £s and a maximum of ;^I2. The 
 conditions under which the Hanover Insurance 
 Authority employs its accumulated funds in this 
 manner have lately been revised, and in their 
 present form they embody the results of ten 
 years' valuable experience. 
 
 In the case of loans to employers and 
 workpeople, it is stipulated that the advance 
 shall in no case exceed two-thirds of the value 
 of the site and the building to be erected thereon. 
 The houses must be intended exclusively for 
 working people, and, save in special cases, each 
 house must contain dwellings for two families. 
 Loans are only advanced on new buildings 
 free from mortgage ; no advance whatever is 
 made upon old houses or new ones which 
 are already mortgaged. The rate of interest is 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. loi 
 
 3^ per cent. Where the loan exceeds one-half 
 the value, an additional if per cent, must be paid 
 until it has been reduced to this proportion. 
 Where the loan does not exceed one-half the 
 value, no repayment is required, but the advance 
 may remain as a standing mortgage, though it is 
 open to the lender to repay at his option and 
 convenience. Interest is payable at the end of 
 each quarter. Either side is free to terminate 
 the loan on giving six months' notice, with the 
 reservation that the insurance authority binds 
 itself not to disturb a loan for a minimum 
 period of ten years so long as the interest is duly 
 paid, no change takes place in the ownership of 
 the mortgaged houses, the property is kept in 
 good order, and the other conditions, subject 
 to which the loan was granted are fulfilled. 
 Where the loan is made to an employer or specu- 
 lator, it is required that the houses in respect of 
 which it is granted shall only be let to workpeople 
 belonging to the Hanover Insurance Fund, and 
 that an occupant of such a house shall have a 
 right to purchase it and take it over as soon as he 
 can pay one-third of the purchase price as fixed 
 by the owner, the occupant, and the insurance 
 authority. In this case the latter agrees to 
 accept the new owner in the place of the old 
 one on the same terms and conditions. It is stipu- 
 lated, however, that no workman can own more 
 than one house containing two dwellings. 
 
 The conditions which apply to loans granted to 
 
102 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 landowners for the building of houses for agricul- 
 tural labourers do not materially differ from those 
 which apply to industrial dwellings, though here 
 it is stipulated that, when a loan has been reduced 
 to half the value of the property, the interest pay- 
 able shall be either that usual in the locality or a 
 minimum of 4 per cent., and that, where houses 
 ,pass into the hands of labourers by purchase from 
 their employers, the rate of interest payable to 
 the insurance authority shall be 3J per cent, 
 up to two-thirds of the entire value, with 
 if per cent, by way of repayment. The spirited 
 example set by Hanover has proved a valu- 
 able object lesson in the manner in which the 
 enormous sums of money which have been 
 accumulated under the Industrial Insurance 
 Laws can be used with special advantage to 
 the working classes by whose contributions they 
 are so largely created. _ 
 
 With the object of directing national attention 
 to this vital question, and of stimulating public 
 bodies and philanthropic persons to ameliorative 
 efforts, a noteworthy society bearing the title 
 *' Verein Arheiterheim" (Working Men's Home 
 Association) was established in 1884, though it is 
 only in recent years that it has received the 
 recognition which it deserves. Its seat is Biele- 
 feld, in Westphalia, and to say that is as much as 
 to suggest that it is a part of that wonderful con- 
 geries of humanitarian institutions and agencies 
 which is connected with the honoured name of 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 103 
 
 Dr. von Bodelschwingh and which makes the 
 Westphalian town of his adoption the goal of so 
 many pilgrimages of observation and inquiry. The 
 object sought by the Association, as set forth by its 
 statutes, is to ** provide German working men 
 with houses of their own," and the means of 
 effecting this end are {a) by " endeavouring to 
 convince the proprietors and conductors of factories 
 that they cannot better serve their own interests 
 than by actively supporting the purposes of the 
 Association, but also by independent action in the 
 same direction, in that by this means they assure 
 themselves of a stock of reliable working men 
 without running any danger of losing their 
 capital " ; (6) by " petitioning the Government 
 to confer the same boon upon all married working 
 men in the service of fiscal factories, railways, and 
 mines " ; and (c) by " endeavouring so to influence 
 legislation that in the establishment of new fac- 
 tories the requirement shall be made that the 
 housing of the workers shall have particular 
 care, so that the large towns may no longer 
 aggregate the labourers in masses, but the fac- 
 tories themselves, so far as their several circum- 
 stances admit of it, may be more and more located 
 in rural districts." 
 
 Bielefeld is more, however, than the administra- 
 tive seat of the Association. It is its "experimental 
 station," for while it is no part of the Association's 
 mission to build working men's houses all over 
 the country, it has erected a large number here. 
 
I04 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 both in testimony of faith in its own principles 
 and for the instruction and encouragement of 
 other towns whose interest may be gained for the 
 " Arbeiterheim " idea. These houses are all occu- 
 pied by working men and artisans either as tenants 
 or owners. Nearly 120 houses have been so built 
 at Bielefeld, and built on such a basis that the 
 Association is able to let or sell them to the proper 
 people on strictly commercial principles ; that is, 
 every house pays for itself, while the Association 
 is able at the same time to sell on terms very 
 advantageous to the buyer as compared with traffic 
 in the ordinary property market. 
 
 As a rule houses are built in pairs, the average 
 accommodation consisting of four rooms on the 
 ground floor and five above, with ample cellaring 
 and also stallage and necessary buildings outside. 
 They are substantially constructed of brick faced 
 with stucco, which is the style of building common 
 to the locality. It is a fixed principle that each 
 house shall have an ample piece of land for use as 
 a garden — the savings bank of the "small man " 
 — and for the keeping of either pigs, goats, a horse, 
 or a cow, and this land varies in size from a 
 quarter to half an acre. That this arrangement 
 promotes thrift and encourages in the tenant or 
 owner settled habits will readily be believed, and 
 these are the ends in view. So important does 
 Dr. Bodelschwingh regard the attachment of land 
 to each house that even when the deeds of owner- 
 ship have been handed over it is not permissible 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 105 
 
 to alienate any portion of the ground. The cost 
 of a house with land varies from ^^280 to 3^500 
 and £600, though even the latter sum is exceeded 
 in several cases. The cost of the land varies from 
 one sixth to one quarter of that of the building, but 
 the price of land has substantially increased since 
 the first houses were built, and the result is seen 
 in a tendency to curtail somewhat the plot which 
 goes with the smaller houses. The price is now 
 about IS. per square yard, while formerly it was 
 only from 6^. to gd. 
 
 In deciding on tenants — for there are are always 
 more applicants than houses — preference is given 
 to men with large families, and no question is asked 
 either as to politics or religion. A tenant is given 
 four and a half years in which to decide whether 
 he will purchase. Should he elect to become 
 owner he is expected to pay a deposit of from 300 
 to 500 marks (^^15 to £2$), which may not be 
 borrowed money, and this bears interest at 3^ per 
 cent, from the day of payment. He must then 
 pay yearly 3^ per cent, of the purchase price as 
 rent and 2 per cent, by way of redemption (both of 
 which sums also bear interest at the rate of 3^ per 
 cent.), with 5 per cent, of the rent to a reserve 
 fund, payments being made monthly. When the 
 purchaser has paid a third of the cost price he 
 receives the title of the house, with the reservation 
 that in the event of a desire to sell out, the 
 Association may exercise the right of pre-emption at 
 the original price, with addition for improvements 
 
io6 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 and deductions for wear and tear. This right 
 of pre-emption was not originally contemplated, 
 but it happened that in the early years of 
 the Association's existence sales were effected 
 which brought undesirable tenants ; hence the 
 stipulation. It is held, viewing the matter broadly, 
 to be in the interest of the working classes them- 
 selves that this right should be reserved by the 
 Association. In the first place, the whole object 
 of the Association would be defeated if the houses 
 built under its auspices became objects of specula- 
 tion, for every resale at a higher figure would 
 mean a higher rent. But, further, it is contended 
 that it may often prove very advantageous to an 
 owner to be able to dispose of his house without 
 resort to the usual processes. A displacement of 
 industry might render it necessary for him to 
 " follow the flag " at short notice, and the dis- 
 posal of his property would probably be a matter 
 of urgency. But the very cause of his removal 
 might under ordinary circumstances depreciate 
 the value of his house were he compelled to sell. 
 It is true that the Association, in claiming the 
 right to buy back at the original price, has a 
 chance of benefiting by the transaction, but on 
 the other hand it is exposed to an equal chance of 
 loss; for it makes itself responsible for the full 
 price paid, whether the value of house property 
 has declined or not. In the ordinary course a 
 house is only freed from debt after a long term of 
 years — about thirty — though it is open to the 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 107 
 
 buyer to pay off his loan sooner if he be so 
 minded. 
 
 To show how the instalment system works I 
 give the payments made on two houses which I 
 inspected when last at Bielefeld. 
 
 House A. — This house was built in 1888 and had 
 1,500 square yards of land. Its accommodation 
 is : downstairs — a small shop (for the owner was a 
 master baker), with tiled vestibule, the living room, 
 the kitchen, and two bedrooms : upstairs — three 
 bedrooms ; cellar — bakery and various storage 
 room ; outside — stalls for horse, etc. 
 
 Marks. 
 
 Cost of land i,i50"53 
 
 „ building 8,172-54 
 
 „ street 674-98 
 
 Total ... 9,998-05 (say ^500). 
 
 Marks. 
 
 Paid yearly as rent 3J per cent, of cost price 349-93 
 
 „ redemption 2 per cent. 199-96 
 
 „ reserve fund 5 per cent, of rent ... 17-49 
 
 Total annual payment 567-38 
 
 (or about ;^28). 
 
 Home B. — This house was likewise built in il 
 and it had 930 square yards of land. The accom- 
 modation was four rooms below and five above, 
 with cellaring and wood house. 
 
 Marks. 
 
 Cost of land 688-69 
 
 „ building 5.357'83 
 
 „ street 544"8o 
 
 Total 6,591-32 (say £329). 
 
io8 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Marks. 
 
 Paid yearly as rent 31 per cent, on above price 23070 
 
 ,, redemption 2 per cent i3i"83 
 
 ,, sinliing fund 5 per cent, of rent ii'54 
 
 Total 374-38 
 
 (or £ii 14-y)- 
 
 The purchaser of this house was very dissatisfied 
 with the pre-emption clause, and intended to make 
 a strong effort to get it cancelled. 
 
 Various requirements, such as are generally 
 found in a lease, are made as to the up-keep of a 
 house, and there are reasonable regulations as to 
 the uses to which the houses may be put (sub- 
 letting is allowed subject to approval), with other 
 conditions intended to serve moral and sanitary 
 interests. At the time of my visit twenty of the 
 houses were in full possession of the owners and 
 not a single house was simply rented. Since then 
 200 more houses, lodging 2,000 persons, have been 
 built. 
 
 The Working Men's Home Association has 
 expended some tens of thousands of pounds in 
 the building of cheap houses, and it may be asked 
 — Where does it procure the necessary funds ? They 
 are raised by loans, (i) Partly from the State funds 
 available under the Prussian Peasant Proprietary 
 Act {Rentengiitergesetz) of July 7, 1891. This Act 
 has been interpreted as permitting the advance of 
 money for the purchase of houses and land not alone 
 to agriculturists, but to artisans and working men 
 of all kinds who, though following trade or industry, 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 109 
 
 may be able and wishful to cultivate a piece of 
 land ; and the Westphalian Commission for the 
 carrying out of the law has agreed to experiment 
 in this direction in concert with the Arbeiterheim- 
 verein. The State bank established under the Act 
 holds a mortgage to the extent of three-fourths of 
 the value, and the Association a second mortgage to 
 the extent of one-fifth of the remainder in considera- 
 tion of its advances. (2) Loans are received from 
 the funds which have accumulated under the Insur- 
 ance Law, as already explained. (3) Other money 
 is obtained on loan from private sources. 
 
 Not only has the Association done a good work 
 in Bielefeld, but it has carried on a successful 
 propaganda in various States of Germany, chiefly 
 through the efforts of Dr. Bodelschwingh and the 
 zealous General Secretary, Herr Lieber (to both 
 of whom I am indebted for the information, freely 
 and courteously given at my visit, which is con- 
 tained in these notes). It has also enlisted high 
 and influential support for its views and endeavours, 
 and its members at the present time include the 
 Emperor William II. (who continues the patronage 
 given by his father and grandfather), and n neteen 
 heads of princely houses. Dr. von Bodelsch- 
 wingh, however, goes further upon this question 
 than the Association of his founding. He advances 
 the demand that legislative measures should be 
 taken to afford urban workmen the opportunity of 
 living outside the towns in which they are employed, 
 special and convenient railway conveyance being 
 
no THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 established for the purpose, so that they may be 
 able to obtain housing suited in extent and 
 character to the cultivation of a healthy family 
 life, with land added as a matter of course for 
 gardening and agricultural purposes. His ideal is 
 an independent house for every married working 
 man — no barrack system of so-called " model- 
 dwellings," — and this house owned by its occupant. 
 Let this man, he holds, be made his own landlord, 
 and a good deal will have been done to make him a 
 contented citizen, so far asthat is humanly possible. 
 Need it be said, the Social Democratic party does 
 not view this experiment with any favour ? The 
 Socialist leaders desire social discontent ; the cause 
 lives upon it ; it is the most important element in 
 the party's " material." I was assured that many 
 of the working men owners of the Bielefeld colony 
 were formerly active Social Democrats, but they 
 are such no longer. 
 
 But while the municipalityand the philanthropist 
 are thus moving, the State itself has by no means 
 been inactive. Two years ago the Reichstag 
 asked the Government to institute an inquiry into 
 the statutory and adminstrative measures which 
 have been adopted by the Empire and the indivi- 
 dual States to regulate the housing question and 
 to encourage the provision of dwellings for the 
 poorer classes, and to present a report upon the 
 operation and effect of these measures. The 
 Government agreed to undertake this inquiry, and 
 even extended it to all measures applying to the 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES, iii 
 
 erection of houses, and the systematic inspection 
 of the same by police and health authorities, the 
 taxation of house property, and the activity of 
 State, municipal, and other public bodies in the 
 building of dwellings, either as employers of labour 
 or from philanthropic motives. The Imperial 
 Government has for many years, in fact, through 
 its various departments, endeavoured to provide 
 smaller officials and workpeople in the service of 
 the State with dwellings of suitable character at 
 low rentals. While some administrative depart- 
 ments have built dwellings out of public funds 
 placed at their disposal, others have been content 
 to rent suitable buildings from private persons and 
 sublet them at moderate rents, and others, again, 
 have advanced money to building societies formed 
 for the purpose of meeting the same want. Funds 
 are advanced for building purposes only to societies 
 which do not work for a profit but are content 
 with not more than 4 per cent, return upon capital, 
 and even then only where there is an obvious lack 
 of houses provided by private enterprise. Societies 
 which retain in their own hands the houses built 
 and only let them to small tenants are given a 
 preference, and where houses are sold to the tenants 
 certain conditions, intended to prevent future 
 speculation, are insisted upon. It is required that 
 the houses shall be satisfactory in size, arrange- 
 ments, and sanitary condition, and that the rents 
 shall come within the incomes of the people for 
 whom they are intended, and, in any case, shall be 
 
112 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 lower than the rents of houses offered in the open 
 market. The advance, as a rule, goes as far as 80 
 or 90 per cent, of the value of the house, inclusive 
 of the land, or to the full value of the house with- 
 out the land. Loans are lent on mortgage at an 
 interest of 3 per cent, with i to i^ per cent, in 
 addition yearly by way of repay ment. A borrowing 
 society may terminate the loan by giving three 
 months' notice, but this right can only be exercised 
 by the Empire after ten years have passed. As yet 
 no case of unpunctuality in the payment of the 
 interest has occurred, nor has the capital lent been 
 in any single case endangered. The Empire loses 
 J per cent, by the transaction, but the loss is held 
 to be insignificant when compared with the value 
 of the objects secured. During the three years 
 1901 to 1903, advances to the aggregate of 
 3^418,000 were made to 38 building societies, and 
 the Reichstag has since allotted a larger fund for 
 this purpose. 
 
 The Empire also follows the plan of conveying 
 fiscal land for the erection of small dwellings, and 
 here ample guarantees against the diversion of 
 these dwellings from their original purpose and 
 against speculation exist in the fact that the 
 Empire only grants building sites on lease. A 
 lease, as a rule, runs from 65 to 80 years, after 
 which the whole of the buildings upon the 
 land will revert to the State. In order to 
 encourage the lessees to keep the buildings in 
 good condition a fourth of their value, as declared 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 113 
 
 by an expert, will be returned to a lessee on the 
 expiration of a lease. By the terms of a lease it 
 is required that the land conveyed shall only be 
 used for the erection of small houses suitable and 
 intended for workpeople, minor officials with 
 moderate means, or other persons similar to them 
 in social position, or for philanthropic institutions 
 established for the welfare of persons belonging to 
 these classes. The rents may not exceed such a 
 sum as is necessary to cover interest and repayment 
 of capital, the costs of administration, and to keep 
 up a moderate reserve fund against contingencies. 
 In regard to both these provisions the Secretary 
 of State for the Interior has a right of control. 
 At the last return 215 English acres of land had 
 been leased by the State to building societies in 
 eight places at a price of 5^104,425, or an average of 
 3^483 per acre. 
 
 In the individual States of the Empire the hous- 
 ing question has been treated with different degrees 
 of urgency and enterprise, and through some of 
 the smaller States have shown a creditable spirit 
 of emulation, it is the experience of Prussia that 
 carries most value. Since 1895 six special laws 
 have been passed authorising and regulating the 
 employment of State funds in the provision of 
 dwellings for workpeople and minor officials in 
 the employment of the State, and the amount 
 employed directly in the erection of such dwellings 
 by the State or in financing building societies 
 and private individuals now exceeds ;^2, 200,000. 
 
 G.w. I 
 
114 THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 [ Thus the Department of Mines gives what are 
 ^-called " building premiums " or lends money with- 
 out interest to employes in the mines and smelting 
 works desirous of building houses for their own 
 use near to their work. Up to the year 1902 
 no less than £225,100 had been given in premiums 
 and 5^389,000 had been advanced on loans in this 
 way, and 5,790 dwellings had been built. The 
 ' State had also itself acquired a large number of 
 houses — 424 blocks containing 1,234 separate dwell- 
 ings — which it lets to its employes at rents always 
 below the current rates and often to the amount of 
 30 per cent. The State Railway Department be- 
 tween the years 1895-1903 employed from its own 
 revenues £913,200 in the erection of 3,660 dwell- 
 ings for minor officials and workpeople (2,423 of the 
 former and 1,237 of the latter), as well as £1,671,018 
 in virtue of the general laws already referred to, 
 £1,094,150 being used in the erection by the 
 State itself of 5,400 rented dwellings and £576,868 
 in loans to building societies. Counting other 
 resources used in the same way, the State had up 
 to March 31, 1903, acquired no fewer than 36,260 
 dwellings for the use of its employes. The War 
 Department has also done good work in the same 
 direction on behalf of employes in the arsenals. 
 
 Apart from these special laws, dealing particu- 
 larly with the provision of funds for the building of 
 houses, several general laws, also touching the 
 financial aspect of the question, have been passed in 
 Prussia. Thus a law of May 21, 1861, provided 
 
 J 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 115 
 
 that the building tax which it enacted should be 
 reduced on the houses of small artisans, factory 
 operatives, etc., in such rural communes where 
 the assessment of buildings was not conditioned 
 by the rents. The Income Tax Act of June 24, 
 1891, exempts from this tax all registered building 
 (and other) companies whose business dealings do 
 not extend beyond their own members. The 
 Industrial Tax Act of June 24, 1891, similarly 
 exempts building societies formed for the purpose 
 of supplying cheap and healthy dwellings for their 
 members. The Stamp Tax Act of July 31, 1895, 
 exemptsfrom this tax also, under certain conditions, 
 companies whose exclusive purpose is the provision 
 of good houses at low rents for the poor, whether 
 these houses are built by the society concerned or 
 are purchased and rented to suitable persons. 
 By a law of September 20, 1899, building societies 
 also of the same kind are exempted from certain 
 court fees in legal proceedings. So, too, the 
 administrative authorities have for many years 
 shown special favour to housing projects for the 
 benefit of the working and the poorer classes, as, 
 for example, by the alleviation of local rates and 
 official dues and fees. Moreover, in many places 
 the building regulations are specially framed so as 
 to check speculation in land suitable for workmen's 
 dwellings, especially in the periphery of towns, 
 and to keep the price of this land as moderate as 
 possible. 
 
 With a view to remedy the evils which have thus 
 
ii6 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 come to light a bill has recently been promulgated 
 by the Prussian Government amending the law of 
 July 2, 1875, relating to the laying out and altera- 
 tion of streets and places in towns and rural com- 
 munes. The bill seeks to safeguard the citizen's 
 right to fresh air and light more rigorously, by the 
 requirement of broad and spacious streets, to 
 encourage the provision of open spaces, to prevent 
 overcrowding, and to insist on the provision of 
 more hygienic internal arrangements. It modifies 
 certain local taxes in favour of working men's 
 dwellings provided by societies which do not 
 exist for gain. It requires all communes and 
 manorial districts with more than 10,000 inhabi- 
 tants to adopt and issue regulations respecting the 
 use ofbuildings for dwelling and sleeping purposes, 
 while it empowers smaller places to do the same at 
 will. Moreover, where at present the functions of 
 the building police are at present divided, it pro- 
 vides that the Minister of the Interior shall deter- 
 mine where authority shall for the future reside. 
 Various "minimum requirements" (Mindestan- 
 fordenmgen) are laid down as the basis of these 
 regulations, as, for example, that no rooms may 
 be used for habitation which are in a dilapidated 
 state or are so damp as to be injurious to health ; 
 houses intended for family use must be provided 
 with kitchens ; rooms used for living, cooking, or 
 sleeping must allow at least ten cubic metres air 
 space and four square metres superficial space per 
 person. A dwelling must be so large that (apart 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 117 
 
 from married couples) persons above 14 years 
 may sleep in separate rooms according to sex. 
 Special (and very needful) regulations are imposed 
 in the interests of domestic servants, who must be 
 lodged in healthy rooms with doors that can be 
 locked, with the minimum air space and superficial 
 space required for their employers. There are also 
 provisions for the regulation of apartments let to 
 lodgers in the interest both of health and morality, 
 and these provisions are held to apply equally to 
 public inns, night shelters, and pensions. The 
 police are, further, empowered to issue regulations 
 imposing " ininimum requirements " in the case of 
 housing accommodation for working people other 
 than private dwellings. 
 
 The duty of house inspection is imposed upon 
 the local administrative authorities, subject to 
 the regulations that may be issued by the police 
 authorities, and in this regard it is required that 
 special care shall be taken to watch the interests 
 of the poorer classes. Every town with more than 
 100,000 inhabitants is required to establish a 
 housing bureau (Wohmrngsamt) for the carrying out 
 of this work, and very significantly the bill adds 
 that a bureau shall be "provided with the requisite 
 staff trained beforehand in suitable manner," and 
 shall in particular have a sufficient number of house 
 inspectors, while it is permissible for private 
 citizens to be members of the bureau in an honorary 
 capacity. Smaller towns may establish similar 
 bureaux at the direction of the Minister of the 
 
ii8 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Interior, or they may be required simply to engage 
 inspectors, and several towns may join to main- 
 tain a bureau between them at the common cost. 
 A house inspector may present himself without 
 notice at any dwelling which he may desire to enter, 
 and he must be admitted to every apartment " used 
 for the permanent residence of human beings," 
 . together with all appurtenances, though the house- 
 holder may require his visitor to legitimise him- 
 self. In the case of ordinary dwellings, inspection 
 must take place between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m., and 
 in the case of lodging-houses between 6 a.m. and 
 9 p.m. "Where ground of complaint exists remedy 
 is to be applied as the result of " advice, instruction, 
 or warning," as the case may be, but where this 
 proves ineffectual police intervention will follow. 
 Here Prussia is improving on the example of 
 Bavaria, in which State there exist, as a part of 
 the system of local government, 819 housing com- 
 mittees {Wohmmgs-Kommissionen), while in 39 
 communes house inspectors are already engaged 
 for the special purpose of supervising the homes of 
 the people. In this State, too, as in Prussia, the 
 several Government Departments have done much 
 towards helping their smaller officials and work- 
 people to obtain healthy homes at reasonable rents 
 — the Railway Administration alone owned 8,860 
 houses at the end of 1902 — while loans of public 
 money to the amount of 3^270,110 have been 
 granted to building societies, which in this way 
 have provided i,266^dwellings for working people. 
 
HOUSING OF WORKING CLASSES. 119 
 
 Germany has done much by legislation for the 
 material welfare of the working classes, yet many 
 of its most earnest social reformers contend that 
 until the housing question has received far more 
 serious attention than is even now given to it the 
 statesmanlike task of devising adequate " legis- 
 lative protection for the worker " which the 
 Imperial Government took upon its shoulders on 
 Prince Bismarck's initiative in 1881 will not have 
 been fairly and fully discharged. 
 
I20 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 MUNICIPAL HOUSE BUREAUX. 
 
 The pressure of the housing question has led the 
 governing authorities of several German towns to 
 undertake the function of the house agent, in the 
 interest particularly of the working classes and 
 people of small means. Cologne set the example 
 with the " Free House Registry for workers and 
 small employes," which, it established ten years ago, 
 and the institution has been copied by Bonn, Bar- 
 men, Elberfeld, Strassburg, Essen, and Miilheim, 
 on the Rhine. Many other German towns have 
 studied Cologne's methods without as yet adopting 
 practical measures, and several towns have even 
 had their house directors trained there. 
 
 The house seeker pays neither fee nor deposit : 
 he simply registers his name and wants, and the 
 House Bureau does the rest. The owner is 
 required to deposit a shilling, but only by way of 
 guarantee that he will report to the Bureau within 
 twenty-four hours of letting his house, a condition 
 which is imposed in order to protect house-hunters 
 against futile wandering. 
 
 The questions which a house owner is required 
 to answer cover the necessary ground very fairly ; 
 the chief ones are these (it will be understood that 
 
MUNICIPAL HOUSE BUREAUX. 121 
 
 Cologne, like all German towns, lives on the flat 
 system) : 
 
 (i) Position of house (street, number, front or 
 back, which story, etc.). 
 
 (2) Number of rooms and number beatable. 
 
 (3) Rent and how paid. 
 
 (4) Water dues. 
 
 (5) Has the house been occupied, and if so, 
 until when ? 
 
 (6) When can the house be entered ? 
 
 (7) Is the house detached ? 
 
 (8) Has it cellaring ? 
 
 (9) Has it water supply ? 
 
 (10) Do business rooms belong to the house ? 
 Where, and for what purpose ? 
 
 (11) Is the use of a garden, courtyard, wash- 
 house, and attic allowed ? 
 
 (12) For how many families is the entire house 
 arranged ? 
 
 (13) Is handicraft or business carried on in the 
 house ? What kinds, and on which stories ? 
 
 (14) Will the house be let to families with 
 children ? 
 
 (15) Will it be let to an artisan who carries on 
 a business there ? (for example, shoemaker, tailor, 
 etc.) 
 
 (16) Is sub-letting allowed ? 
 
 But with the owner's ex parte statement the 
 Bureau is not satisfied ; it makes an independent 
 investigation, to which purpose a portion of the 
 director's time is set apart every day of the week 
 
122 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 save Sunday, when the Bureau closes its doors. 
 During the hours 9 to 11 in the forenoon the 
 director receives offers of dwellings ; from 5 to 
 8 o'clock he receives applications from house 
 seekers ; and in the interval he is expected to visit 
 all the houses newly registered as to let. It is a 
 long day, and, when the distances to be covered 
 are wide, an arduous one ; but Cologne is a hard- 
 working town, and eleven hours a day, with a 
 pause at noon, make up no uncommon task. As a 
 rule, the director, helped by his cycle in favourable 
 seasons and by his free tramway pass all the year 
 round, is able to visit fifteen houses a day. At the 
 same time the examination is, as a rule, made once 
 for all, for when a house is re-registered it is only 
 necessary to refer to its dossier. This examination 
 is very thorough, and the details of its situation, 
 structure, and condition are recorded on a con- 
 venient form, and a miniature ground plan is 
 added. The houses are classified in the office 
 books according as they have one, two, three, four, 
 five, or more rooms. 
 
 The information asked of the house-seeker 
 comprises name, occupation, and residence, the 
 number of rooms desired, the rent per month he 
 wishes to pay, and the locality in which he wishes 
 to live, with special conditions, if such exist. As 
 a rule the Bureau has a selection ready to hand, 
 and it is only the work of a few minutes to con- 
 vince the inquirer, by means of street map and 
 house plan, whether it is necessary to go farther. 
 
 I 
 
MUNICIPAL HOUSE BUREAUX. 123 
 
 If he is satisfied with the information given him 
 and desires to inspect a house offered, he is given 
 a card of introduction, and this he leaves with the 
 landlord, whether he becomes a tenant or not. 
 When it is impossible to furnish an applicant with 
 the dwelling he wants, he receives a certificate to 
 that effect, and this certificate he is expected to 
 bring with him when he renews his inquiries. 
 
 Obviously the utility of such an institution is 
 greater in large than in small towns, though it 
 may be questioned whether in towns of the largest 
 size it can be possible altogether to overcome 
 the practical difficulties in the way of the Muni- 
 cipal House Bureau. Where these Bureaux have 
 been established, however, they appear to have 
 won a considerable measure of public approbation 
 and confidence. The general householder finds 
 the Bureau very convenient, but to the working 
 man it is an invaluable boon. Engaged as he is 
 all day, it is to him of great advantage that he 
 can, without expense or loss of time, go to an 
 agency which he can implicitly trust — since it has 
 no interest in offering him what he does not want 
 — and commission it to find for him the dwelling 
 which, in point of size, of situation, and of rent, is 
 suited to his needs. And yet, though the House 
 Bureau was originally intended for what are known 
 as the " small people," in practice it is more and 
 more being used by all classes, and at Cologne the 
 policy of the open door has been adopted to the 
 full. The Elberfeld Bureau began by restricting 
 
124 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 itself to dwellings with a rent not exceeding 500 
 marks (^^25), but this limitation was soon aban- 
 doned, though a fee was imposed on owners of houses 
 of higher value who used the Bureau's services. It 
 is noteworthy that this serious competitor to the 
 private house agency and the newspaper does not 
 appear to have encountered any serious hostility 
 on the part of threatened interests. At Cologne 
 the newspapers are reported to be so far tolerant 
 that, far from resenting the Municipal House 
 Bureau as an unwarrantable interference with 
 their immemorial monopoly, they offer it specially 
 generous terms whenever it is found needful to use 
 their advertising columns. 
 
 I 
 
SHELTERS FOR THE HOMELESS 125 
 
 CHAPTER LX. 
 SHELTERS FOR THE HOMELESS. 
 
 There is one provision in the German Imperial 
 Criminal Law (May 15, 1871) which English 
 poor-law workers are apt to regard with special 
 disfavour — the provision which exposes to im- 
 prisonment, first in a gaol and then in a work- 
 house, " any person who, after losing his past 
 lodging, fails to procure another within the time 
 allotted to him by the competent authority, and 
 who cannot prove that in spite of his best endea- 
 vours he has been unable so to do." For the 
 maintenance of these and other offenders in work- 
 houses the Poor Law Unions for larger rural areas 
 (Landarmenverbdnde), which deals with paupers 
 without legal settlement, are responsible. The 
 only English statutory provision which at all 
 approximates this drastic procedure is that which 
 brands and punishes as " rogues and vagabonds " 
 " such persons wandering abroad and lodging in 
 any barn or outhouse or in any deserted or unoccu- 
 pied building or in the open air or under a tent 
 or in any cart or waggon, not having any visible 
 means of subsistence and not giving a good 
 account of himself or herself." But the laws 
 are not on all fours, and if it should be contended 
 
126 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 that the English treatment of the vagabond is too 
 indulgent, as it undoubtedly is, on the other hand 
 the fate to which the homeless waifs of German 
 towns are exposed, in the absence of a very discri- 
 minating reading of the law, certainly cannot be 
 said to err in the same way. No doubt the law is 
 enforced on the whole with discretion, yet it is a 
 fact that an enormous number of people whose 
 fault or misfortune is lack of a roof find their 
 way into the disciplinary workhouses of Germany, 
 where in England they receive treatment in the 
 ordinary poorhouses. Of 1,948 persons sent to 
 the Berlin workhouse at Rummelsburg in the year 
 1903, no fewer than 733 had only been guilty of 
 " homelessness " (Obdachlosigkeit) — culpably, no 
 doubt, in the eyes of the law and the police, yet 
 " homelessness " all the same. 
 
 Nevertheless, there are few German towns of large 
 size which do not offer to the homeless a purgatorial 
 state in the form of shelter or refuge. In some 
 cases the municipality, as in Paris and most Swiss 
 towns, maintains these institutions, but in others 
 they are left to private philanthropy. The Ger- 
 man shelters for the homeless do not in general 
 combine workshops, as do the similar shelters in 
 Paris. The latter are seven in number — three 
 for men and four for women. The principal 
 shelter for men is the Asile Nicolas F/amel, which 
 is situated, by a curious irony of terminology, in 
 the Rue du Chateau des Rentiers. In a workshop 
 connected with the establishment employment 
 
SHELTERS FOR THE HOMELESS. 127 
 
 is offered to capable inmates at a moderate 
 rate of pay {is. gd. to 2s. 6d. per day) over and 
 above the board and lodging found. In the winter 
 months the least skilled of the applicants for 
 admission are put to the making of resinous 
 faggots for use in various institutions and services 
 of the municipality. A workman's earnings are 
 retained until he leaves the refuge, by which time 
 from ;^i to ^i 4s. has, as a rule, accumulated in 
 his favour. Other kinds of employment are, 
 however, offered ; for, from motives of economy, 
 the municipality of Paris contrives, as far as 
 possible, to have such works of joinery, lock- 
 smithry, masonry, painting, etc., as are required 
 in connexion with its sanitary and charitable 
 institutions done by the inmates of the refuges, 
 who are assorted daily and allotted to the tasks 
 best suited to them. Nevertheless, these indus- 
 trial operations are carried on at a loss, and the 
 municipality has to vote several thousands of 
 pounds yearly towards this experiment in the 
 relief of the homeless unemployed. Most note- 
 worthy of the refuges for women is the Pauline 
 Roland Workshop Refuge (Asile oiivrier), in the 
 Rue Fessart. Here homeless and unemployed 
 women are well sheltered and fed, and at the 
 same time suitably employed at wages until they 
 can look out for fixed occupation outside. In 
 this they are aided by the directress, whose duty 
 it is to endeavour to procure situations for as 
 many deserving inmates as possible, preference 
 
128 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 being naturally given to those who most recom- 
 mend themselves by industry and honesty. The 
 women are engaged in laundry work and in 
 sewing and mending for public and philanthropic 
 institutions. 
 
 Berlin combines the municipal and the private 
 principle, though the shelters there {Asyle fiir 
 Obdachlose) do not go beyond their name, and so 
 lack one high recommendation of the Paris insti- 
 tutions. The Berlin municipality provides for the 
 homeless in two sections — complete families and 
 homeless individuals needing shelter for the night, 
 and the provision is a part of the work of the 
 poor-law department. The first and superior 
 class of accommodation is reserved for people who 
 have had homes of their own but have been 
 ejected by legal process or have otherwise lost 
 their regular lodging and are too poor to obtain 
 housing elsewhere. Here shelter and food are 
 offered for a maximum period of four weeks, 
 and the authorities may thereafter at discretion 
 make a grant of 15s. or more towards the rent of 
 a new home when found, by way of helping the 
 unfortunates on the way to a regular life. There 
 are separate rooms for men and women, and such 
 is Berlin's zeal in the cause of education that this 
 rude disturbance of domestic life is not allowed 
 to interfere with the instruction of the children 
 concerned, for school is held within the shelter. 
 There are 244 beds for men and boys, and 240 
 beds for women and girls, and in the course of a 
 
SHELTERS FOR THE HOMELESS. 129 
 
 year 5,610 persons in the aggregate are housed, 
 an average of fifteen per day. 
 
 The Municipal Night Shelter is a simpler and 
 less domestic menage. Here admission is less dis- 
 criminating. Between the hours 3 and 11 p.m. 
 any penniless person who has no other resting 
 place may be received on five successive days for 
 a maximum of five times in the course of three 
 months. Soup and bread is given out at coming 
 and going. At 7 o'clock in the morning the halls 
 pour out their contents to the number of 3,000 or 
 even 3,500, it may be, and they remain deserted for 
 the next eight hours. In exceptional cases articles 
 of clothing may be given, and even small sums of 
 money where there is a certainty that it will be 
 well used, but the source of this charity is private 
 and not municipal, for various bequests and gifts 
 have been made for this purpose. Baths are here 
 at disposal — the patrons are not as a rule pressing 
 — and there is a very necessary apparatus for dis- 
 infecting clothes. The night shelter houses more 
 than half a million persons during the year. 
 
 The private shelters are maintained by an 
 association (the Asyl-Vereinfiir Obdachlose), which 
 has now carried on its useful work for some thirty- 
 six years. It is questionable whether anywhere 
 else in the world the heterogeneous homeless poor 
 have at command such excellent accommodation 
 as exists in the large and costly buildings which 
 have been erected for this purpose in the 
 Wiesenstrasse for men and the Fiisilierstrasse for 
 
 G.W. K 
 
I30 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 women, and which form a very noteworthy feature 
 of the city's philanthropic activity. The men's 
 shelter affords nightly housing for 700 persons, 
 while the women's shelter accommodates 150. 
 The entire cost of the men's shelter, with the 
 ample ground adjoining, was about a million 
 marks, or £50,000, and was defrayed to the extent 
 of nearly three-quarters from a munificent legacy 
 left by a Berlin citizen. It is a remarkable 
 building, or group of buildings, outwardly more 
 like a suite of private residences than the abode of 
 poverty, and the equipment is as perfectly adapted 
 to purpose and end as any contrivance that I 
 have ever seen. The conditions of entrance are 
 very easy. No charge whatever is made, no 
 names are taken, and very few questions are 
 asked of those who seek shelter. The doors are 
 opened in winter at 3 p.m. and in summer at 5, 
 and the sojourners are turned out at 7 a.m. in 
 winter, and at 6 in summer. In the interval 
 they enjoy all the comfort of a simple home — 
 plenty of food, a good bed, friendly counsel, 
 warmth in the cold months, and perfect cleanliness. 
 But these good things cannot be offered to every- 
 body daily; and no one is admitted more than 
 three times in the same month. 
 
 Let us, however, for better elucidation, follow the 
 routine. Suppose it is winter. In the middle of 
 the short afternoon the front doors are thrown 
 open, but long before then a crowd has gathered 
 outside in readiness for the welcome moment — a 
 
SHELTERS FOR THE HOMELESS. 131 
 
 motley array of the poor and ragged and forsaken 
 of Berlin's residual population. The first thing 
 done is to cause the incomers to muster before the 
 officials of the establishment in the waiting-hall, a 
 large and lofty room, seated with plain benches. 
 Here stock is taken of the night's material. Then 
 bathing and washing begin — wholesale, fifty at 
 once. Every inmate of the shelter is bound by 
 rule to submit — it is the proper word — to either a 
 "full" or a "half" bath before supper is served. 
 A " full " bath consists of an ordinary warm or hot 
 bath or a shower bath ; a " half" bath is a wash 
 from the head down to the waist. Hence they are 
 first divided into groups, the hydrophiles and the 
 hydrophobes, those who really wish to be clean, 
 and those who do not, but, because they cannot 
 help making the acquaintance of water, elect to 
 see and feel as little of it as possible. And so they 
 file off — the sheep to the right, where baths and 
 showers are found in abundance, and the goats to 
 the left, where the less obnoxious wash-bowls are 
 kept. Meanwhile, all suspicious clothes are being 
 disinfected by machinery, and by the time the 
 lodgers emerge from the water they receive back 
 their own garments, if they still hang together, or 
 new ones if they are too worn out to bear further 
 handling. 
 
 The ablutions over, and the great family of want 
 being again clothed and in their right minds, they 
 are passed through a check-ofiice into the dining 
 hall, receiving food (strong soup and bread) on the 
 
 K2 
 
132 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 way. In the dining-room 300 persons can be 
 seated at once, and here, too, besides eating supper 
 they may mend their clothes, for which purpose 
 the requisite material is given on request. Then 
 follows a quiet hour, in which, if so minded, the 
 inmates may read, for a small library of over 500 
 volumes is attached to the shelter. It is an 
 interesting fact, theorise on it or not as we will, 
 that on an average one in seven of the wretched 
 creatures who seek temporary shelter here uses 
 the library — that is, one hundred out of the seven 
 hundred who are admitted nightly. At 9 or 10 
 all go to bed, sleeping on plain mattresses with 
 rug coverlets, and a formal patrol sees to the 
 preservation of quiet and order during the night. 
 There are 14 bedrooms, each containing 50 beds. 
 At 6 o'clock in the morning (5 in summer) ^'reveille " 
 is sounded, and a breakfast of coffee and bread is 
 served, after which the inmates are turned out, 
 to try their luck on the streets once more. 
 
 One very striking feature of the administration 
 is the absence of any inquisition on the part 
 either of the officials or the police, and this, too, 
 in a country and a city where police surveillance is 
 exercised to an extraordinary degree, over good and 
 bad, just and unjust alike. In the rules adopted 
 when the first shelter was established in 1868, it 
 was laid down : " In the shelter of the association 
 misery must come and go unknown and unnamed. 
 The police may not cross the threshold of this 
 asylum." The President of Police of that day 
 
SHELTERS FOR THE HOMELESS. 133 
 
 voluntarily renounced the right of entrance, and 
 his example has by prescription become by lapse of 
 time a law of the institution. Within the walls of 
 the shelter the agents of the law may not even 
 enter. Here no inquisition is conducted into the 
 past, present, or future of the sojourner. No ques- 
 tion at all, save the age and the number of visits pre- 
 viously paid in the current month, is asked. Who, 
 why, whence, and whither — these are words utterly 
 unknown in the vocabulary of the superintendents 
 and the assistant officials. Every man and women 
 stranded upon the streets of Berlin may, to the 
 maximum number of 850 every evening in the year, 
 present themselves at the doors of the two shelters 
 and (provided they are not systematic " cadgers ") 
 enter without let or hindrance, literally asserting a 
 right to lodging and food which nothing but bad 
 conduct can disqualify them from claiming. 
 
 It may be asked. How do the officials, in the 
 absence of any record of names, prevent abuse of 
 the hospitality of the shelters ? On the whole, 
 fairly well. The faces of old friends are, of 
 course, easily remembered ; and if now and then 
 a luckless being gets more than his due, what 
 matter ? Benevolence is never hurt for being too 
 benevolent, and want never suffers by a little extra 
 attention. 
 
 Need it be said that it seldom happens that the 
 men's shelter fails to receive its full complement of 
 700 ? Generally its capacity does not equal the 
 demand for lodging. On the day of my visit exactly 
 
134 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 700 were received, and of these, be it noted in 
 passing, 95 (the moral elite surely !) underwent the 
 ordeal of a " full bath," 272 compromised matters 
 by enduring a shower, and the rest only washed 
 themselves down to the waist. That night, also, 
 50 books were given out to the inmates. 
 
 The general appointments of the place are 
 excellent. Electric light is laid all throughout the 
 buildings. Machinery is used for almost every 
 operation to which it can be applied, washing, dis- 
 infecting, heating, clothes-drying, ventilation, etc. 
 There are well-furnished committee rooms, an 
 apothecary's lair, a sick room with suitable appli- 
 ances ; and from beginning to end the shelter is a 
 model establishment. Finally, a labour registry is 
 conducted in connexion with each of the shelters, 
 and rn this way employment is obtained for many 
 of their frequenters. One learns without surprise 
 after inspecting it that the jurors of the Brussels 
 Exhibition bestowed upon it a gold medal by way 
 of commendation. 
 
 These shelters for men and women entertain 
 more than 300,000 persons during the year, making 
 a total of over 800,000 persons housed and fed by 
 public and private shelters together. 
 
ANTI-CONSUMPTION CRUSADE 135 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 THE ANTI-CONSUMPTION CRUSADE. 
 
 Several years ago a popular nobleman who, 
 whether as orator or as writer, touches no subject 
 without adorning it, said that as the result of 
 reflection he had come to the conclusion that the 
 principal difference between the rich and the 
 poor, the difference which really counts, is that in 
 the time of illness the rich have at command all 
 the resources of healing, while the poor often die 
 the direct victims of their poverty. There is 
 tragic truth in Lord Rosebery's remark, and 
 statesmanship and philanthropy will only justify 
 themselves at the bar of civilisation when 
 infinitely more has been done than is visible 
 to-day to restore the balance between classes in 
 this respect. Here Germany, like many other 
 countries, is doing a work the importance of 
 which it would not be easy to exaggerate. Not 
 only are the entire mass of the workers in that 
 country embraced, as we shall see, within an 
 efficient and liberal system of insurance against 
 sickness, accident, and old age and invalidity, one 
 effect of which is to secure for them in time of 
 need the best treatment which science and skill 
 can suggest, but on their behalf there is being 
 
136 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 prosecuted a crusade against consumption the 
 extent and results of which compel admiration. At 
 the beginning of the year 1904 there were in full 
 activity in Germany seventy-one public sanatoria 
 for tuberculous patients (with fifteen in course of 
 construction), twenty-seven institutions under 
 private management, about sixty children's homes 
 and hospitals, twenty-seven institutions for the 
 reception of convalescents during the daytime, 
 twenty-six polyclinics, two rural colonies for dis- 
 charged patients, and eight refuges for incurables, 
 making an aggregate of two hundred and thirty-six 
 institutions all engaged in combating tuberculosis 
 in one way or another. The Red Cross Associa- 
 tion and the Patriotic Women's Association have 
 especially distinguished themselves by the energy 
 and zeal with which they have taken up this 
 work. The Red Cross Association alone has 
 established half a dozen sanatoria in different 
 parts of the Empire, and it also works in the 
 homes of the people, advising and helping where 
 necessary. Agencies giving advice and informa- 
 tion with respect to the prevention of tuberculosis 
 are also numerous. At Mannheim, in Baden, 
 there is a committee having a paid lady secretary 
 who spends two hours each day in receiving the 
 questions of sick people or their friends, and these 
 questions, after being taken down on special 
 forms, are answered by medical men. The com- 
 mittee also employs a nursing sister to visit the 
 homes of the tuberculous poor. To such homes 
 
ANTI-CONSUMPTION CRUSADE. 137 
 
 bedding and other necessaries are supplied in case 
 of need, and food, such as milk, eggs, and meat, is 
 also distributed. On this committee there are 
 representatives of all the women's philanthropic 
 agencies in the town, and it has been liberally 
 helped with funds by both the municipality of 
 Mannheim and the State. Another excellent 
 organisation of the same kind is the " Agency for 
 information, advice, and help for sufferers from 
 lung diseases " which has been established at 
 Charlottenburg, near Berlin, by the Patriotic 
 Women's Association. 
 
 The municipalities are likewise making syste- 
 matic endeavours to cope with the disease. Berlin, 
 Dresden, Munich, Leipzig, Aix-la-Chapelle, and 
 some other large towns have established sanatoria 
 and isolation homes, whilst other municipalities 
 have provided existing hospitals with special 
 departments for the treatment of tuberculous 
 patients. At Coblenz, Essen, Duisburg, Miil- 
 heim, Ruhrort, and Rees a special district tax 
 is levied for the support of sanatoria for tuber- 
 culosis. Where the ground has already been 
 efficiently covered by philanthropic enterprise 
 local authorities are willing to pay liberally for the 
 right to share in the benefits offered. For 
 example, the municipality of Konigsberg, in 
 Prussia, has made a ten years' compact with the 
 Hohenstein Sanatorium by which it acquires the 
 right of filling five beds in return for a yearly 
 subsidy of £200, and the option of sending 
 
138 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 additional patients at the rate of -^45 each. The 
 poor-law authorities have not in general shown 
 the same readiness to co-operate in the movement, 
 the reason given being that as their funds are 
 levied over small areas the cost has been found 
 to be an obstacle. Nevertheless, the Federa 
 Department, which acts in the place of the 
 English Local Government Board in poor-law 
 matters, has ruled in one case of appeal that the 
 treatment of tuberculous patients in sanatoria 
 may be regarded as falling within the province 
 of the poor-law authorities, so long as these act 
 on the advice of their medical officers. On the 
 strength of this decision the city of Hamburg now 
 hands over its tuberculous poor to suitable 
 sanatoria wherever such treatment offers a reason- 
 able chance of success. Berlin follows the same 
 plan, and also places at the disposal of persons of 
 small means funds (in the aggregate 3^500 a year) 
 to assist them to undergo treatment in sanatoria 
 without the aid of poor-law relief. Special funds 
 of the same kind have been formed at Munich, 
 Essen, Darmstadt, and many smaller places, 
 while a number of towns perform the same service 
 at the public charge. 
 
 Among the means adopted in this national 
 campaign against disease is the dissemination of 
 popular literature amongst the working classes, 
 both in their homes and through the instru- 
 mentality of the elementary schools. The 
 Prussian Ministers of Public Works, of Worship, 
 
ANTI-CONSUMPTION CRUSADE. 139 
 
 and of the Interior have even joined in the issue 
 of an ordinance to local authorities urging them to 
 resort widely to this method of propaganda. Of 
 one brochure alone several hundred thousand 
 copies have been circulated in the public schools. 
 Conferences of teachers are also held on the 
 subject with a view to enHsting their support ; 
 public lectures with lantern illustrations are 
 arranged during the winter months ; and last 
 winter the central committee of the sick funds 
 of Berlin held seven courses, each of five lectures, 
 in different parts of the city, questions and 
 discussions forming a regular part of the pro- 
 ceedings. In the metropolis, too, a Tuberculosis 
 Museum has been established, to which end the 
 Imperial Home Ministry has provided rooms in the 
 "Permanent Exhibition for Workmen's Welfare" 
 (Standtge Ausstellwig fiir Arbeiterwohlfahrt) in 
 Charlottenburg. 
 
 It is too soon to judge of the success of this 
 crusade, though the results already achieved are 
 extremely gratifying. According to returns pub- 
 lished by the Imperial Statistical Bureau, based 
 on the work of Dr. Mayet, the mortality per 10,000 
 living caused by tuberculosis of the lungs in towns 
 of 15,000 inhabitants and over has decreased at the 
 following rates : 1877-81, 3577 ; 1882-86, 342*2 ; 
 1887-91, 304*0; 1892-96, 255*5; ^ii<i 1897-1901, 
 218*7. 
 
 On the whole, the main portion of the working 
 classes in Germany may now be said to be fairly 
 
I40 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 well provided with hospitals, sanatoria, and shelters 
 for tuberculous patients, thanks more especially to 
 the enterprise shown by the insurance authorities ; 
 and the needs urgently felt at the present time are 
 (i) a greater number of institutions for the recep- 
 tion of women, who hitherto have not had their 
 fair share of attention, and (2) the provision of 
 institutions to which, in return for moderate 
 payment, patients belonging to the middle classes 
 may resort. It is complained that between the 
 14,000,000 persons of the working class for whom 
 the various insurance funds provide free treatment, 
 and the well-to-do class of people who can afford 
 to pay for independent treatment at special 
 institutions, there is the large lower-middle class 
 of people of restricted means, to be numbered by 
 the million, who have to a great extent been over- 
 looked by this modern crusade against disease. It 
 has been suggested that, following the example of 
 the industrial insurance organisations, the private 
 insurance companies and corporations might enter 
 this field of philanthropy, if only from purely 
 commercial and interested motives. Another 
 lack is a sufficiency of institutions for the reception 
 of the hopeless cases which, when allowed to 
 remain at large, act as centres of infection. 
 
 One of the measures to which the Central Com- 
 mittee is now devoting attention is legislation to 
 ensure the compulsory notification of tuberculous 
 disease. Already several States, Saxony, Baden, 
 and Hesse, have enacted this precaution, and, while 
 
ANTI-CONSUMPTION CRUSADE. 141 
 
 Prussia has so far held back, a practically similar 
 result has been obtained in many parts of the 
 country by means of police regulations. For 
 example, at Wiesbaden a police edict requires 
 medical men to report every case of tuberculosis 
 of which they hear in the course of their pro- 
 fessional work when there exists any danger of 
 infection. The same provision exists at Frankfort- 
 on-Main. In Berlin medical practitioners who 
 attend cases of tuberculosis in hotels and lodging- 
 houses must notify them within twenty-four hours. 
 The Central Committee, however, aims at having 
 notification made universal throughout the Empire, 
 and to this end it is agitating for an Imperial 
 statute. At present the committee will be satisfied 
 with notification in case of death from tuber- 
 culosis and in case of sickness only where there is 
 change of dwelling. 
 
 Special interest attaches to the efforts which are 
 being made by the insurance authorities to com- 
 bat consumption, since this is a work undertaken 
 exclusively in the interest of the working classes — 
 in part by the aid of their own funds — and, more- 
 over, its success can be followed from year to year. 
 The funds which are being used in this way are 
 those which have been levied under the Old Age 
 and Invalidity Insurance Law. For many years 
 these funds were allowed to grow until the large 
 accumulations, in spiteof all withdrawals in the form 
 of pensions and allowances, presented a serious 
 problem to those who were responsible for their 
 
142 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 advantageous investment. Nowadays, instead of 
 being invested in consols, they are more and more 
 being invested in buildings for the good housing of 
 the workers and in hospitals and convalescent 
 homes wherein to heal them when sick and 
 diseased. The most interesting part of the cura- 
 tive work is that which deals with consumption 
 in its various forms. Of the many sanatoria and 
 .other institutions established by the insurance 
 authorities in furtherance of this work the largest 
 and in every way the most perfect in plan and 
 equipment is that at Beelitz, near Berlin, whose 
 president and founder is Dr. Freund, the head of 
 the Insurance Board of that city. 
 
 The work has now been going on for eight 
 years, so that it is possible to form a reliable idea 
 as to its success. During the years 1897 to 1904 
 inclusive the insurance funds expended in one way 
 and another no less a sum than 35,532,883 marks, 
 or roughly £i,yy6,6oo, in the remedial treatment of 
 workpeople of both sexes suffering from tuber- 
 culosis. Almost the whole of this large expendi- 
 ture, one of the most remarkable illustrations on 
 record of confidence in scientific methods and 
 enterprise in placing this confidence to the test 
 of practice, has been incurred in the establishment 
 and maintenance of hospitals, convalescent homes, 
 sanatoria, and medical baths. Beginning in 1897 
 with 3,334 patients (2,598 men and 736 women) 
 the number increased almost regularly at the rate 
 of some three thousand a year until it was 23,477 
 
ANTI-CONSUMPTION CRUSADE. 143 
 
 (16,957 men and 6,520 women) in 1904. While in 
 1897 these tuberculous patients were treated in the 
 ^gg^^S^^^ 252,896 days, or an average of 75 days 
 per patient, the number of days' treatment given 
 in 1904 was 1,785,934, giving the same individual 
 average. Taking the eight years together, it was 
 found necessary to treat men on an average 72 to 
 75 days, and women 79 to 87 days. It is notice- 
 able, however, that while the cost of treating men 
 has greatly increased, that of treating women has 
 decreased. The average in the first case was 295*25 
 marks, or £14 15s., in 1897, and 373*91 marks, or 
 ;;^i8 13s., in 1904 (this being the highest figure 
 reached), while the average for women was 
 349*83 marks, or £iy gs., in 1897, and 327*28 
 marks, or ^^16 7s., in 1904 (the highest figure 
 being 350*30 marks, or £iy los.). The cost per 
 day of treatment increased from 4*05 marks in 1897 
 to 5*01 marks last year in the case of men, and 
 from 4*04 to 4.10 marks in the case of women. 
 
 Has this expenditure justified itself by results ? 
 That is the test by which the crusade must be 
 judged, and according to the success with which 
 the test is borne will be the readiness of other 
 countries to follow in the same path. In order to 
 determine this question with the utmost possible 
 degree of precision, the Imperial Insurance Bureau 
 instituted a careful supervision, covering five years, 
 of all persons treated. In the first place an enu- 
 meration was made of those patients who were 
 originally treated successfully, and to make the 
 
144 THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 selection the more exacting all consumptives dis- 
 charged from the sanatoria or other institutions as 
 unsuitable for treatment were summarily regarded 
 as failures. In the next place an actual examina- 
 tion or an inquiry was made each year in every 
 single " successful " case as to whether the patient 
 had since become ill again or had died. Where 
 information on this point was not procurable, the 
 case was disregarded. Moreover, where discharged 
 patients underwent treatment a second time, their 
 first treatment was counted amongst the failures. 
 In short, everything in reason was done, not 
 merely to prevent any misrepresentation of results, 
 however unintentional, but to make the test of 
 success severe and searching. As the investigation 
 has now covered eight years, it has included four 
 quinquennial periods of observation — in other 
 words, four generations of patients — so that the 
 results possess substantial value. Analysing these 
 results it is found that of every loo men and 
 women treated in 1897, twenty-seven remained in 
 1901 capable of earning their livelihood in the 
 sense understood by the Invalidity Insurance Law ; 
 in other words, the circumstances did not in their 
 case warrant the grant of pensions. Of the 
 patients observed from 1898 to 1902, 31 per 
 cent, were in the latter year still capable of 
 earning; of those observed from 1897 to 1903, 
 32 per cent. ; and of those observed from 1900 
 to 1904, 31 per cent. It is noticeable that the 
 results were not so favourable with men as with 
 
ANTI-CONSUMPTION CRUSADE. 145 
 
 women, the percentage of lasting successes in the 
 former case averaging 28*2 and in the latter 37'2. 
 If it be pointed out that these percentages of 
 permanent cures seem relatively small, the Impe- 
 rial Insurance Bureau's answer is that they are as 
 large as in most other diseases of a serious and 
 chronic character. 
 
 Not only so, but a growing improvement in 
 results has been noted in every year of treatment. 
 Thus while the percentage of first-year malepatients 
 who were capable of following their livelihood at 
 the end of the year 1897 was 61, it was 67 in 1898 
 and 1899,66 in 1900, 70 in 1901, 72 in 1902, 93 in 
 1903, and 74 in 1904. The same percentages for 
 women were 64, 69, 67, 67, 72,76, "]"], and "jj. The 
 percentage of continued cures amongst men at the 
 end of two years rose from 42 in 1898 to 44 in 
 1899, 48 in 1900 and 1901, 53 in 1902, 57 in 1903, 
 and 59 in 1904; and the percentages amongst 
 women were 50,49, 51, 52, 60, 62, and 65. The per- 
 centage of continued cures at the end of three 
 years rose, in the case of men, from 29 in 1899 to 
 48 in 1904, and in the case of women from 36 to 
 54 ; and the percentage at the end of four years 
 rose from 28 in 1900 to 38 in 1904 in the case of 
 men, and from 36 to 45 in the case of women. 
 
 The 23,477 tuberculous patients to whom these 
 returns relate were treated in all sorts of ways. 
 To consumptive hospitals of various kinds (clinics, 
 " nature healing " institutions, cold water cures, 
 medico-mechanical and orthopaedic institutions, 
 
 G.W. L 
 
146 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 etc.), were sent 309 men and 312 women ; to 
 sanatoria and open-air cures, 15,229 men and 5,386 
 women ; to convalescent homes, 596 men and 375 
 women ; to baths (sea, mineral, sulphur, river, etc.), 
 816 men and 447 women ; and 7 men were 
 placed in private care, chiefly in homes in the 
 country. During the past seven years no fewer 
 than 88,000 persons have been treated in these 
 various ways. And as the official recorder of this 
 great work of the Insurance Fund says: "These 
 figures are the more impressive when it is remem- 
 bered that in nearly every case it is a matter of a 
 long and costly cure, such as in other countries is 
 open, as a rule, only to the well-to-do classes." 
 
 This is, however, only one branch of the cura- 
 tive work of the insurance organisations. What- 
 ever the disease may be, an endeavour is made to 
 cope with it, as much (it must be confessed) in 
 the interest of the funds as of the victims them- 
 selves, since it has been found by experience that 
 from the merely material and selfish standpoint, it 
 " pays " to cure and heal a sick man, even at a great 
 cost, if thereby he can be got back to work, since 
 in this way he is prevented from falling perma- 
 nently upon the funds in the form of an annuitant, 
 while by taking his place again amongst the earners 
 and the spenders of the community he, in some 
 measure, directly increases the productive and dis- 
 tributive activities of the country. 
 
BERLIN CONVALESCENT HOMES. 147 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 THE BERLIN CONVALESCENT HOMES. 
 
 While the English hospital system is rightly 
 regarded as an impressive illustration of the 
 success of the voluntary principle in the work of 
 healing, the Germans, equally convinced, point to 
 their hospitals as incontrovertible proof of the 
 efficiency of municipal effort in the same domain. 
 They claim, too, rather inconsistently, that the 
 municipal hospital — supported by rates levied 
 upon every class of the community — protects the 
 independence and self-pride of the working classes 
 in a way that the English philanthropic hospital 
 does not ; forgetting, perhaps, on the one hand, 
 that this respect for the spirit of self-help is by 
 no means a conspicuous or even a characteristic 
 principle of German social legislation, and on the 
 other hand that there are few English voluntary 
 hospitals which do not, in one way or another, 
 receive liberal financial help from the working 
 classes — the people by whom they are most used. 
 In truth the German and English hospital systems 
 have both their distinctive excellences, and com- 
 parison of the methods by which they are provi- 
 ded and maintained would hardly prove a useful 
 exercise. 
 
 L2 
 
148 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Yet at least Germany affords us helpful experience 
 in the way in which the municipal hospital is 
 supplemented by the municipal convalescent home, 
 whose work follows much the same lines as that 
 of the many institutions in which the great 
 insurance organisations treat their incapacitated 
 members. 
 
 Of such homes the city of Berlin possesses six. 
 They were originally established for the one 
 purpose of relieving the hospitals, so restricting 
 these as much as possible to irremovable, bedridden 
 cases. In course of time, however, it was found 
 impossible to work them longer on these narrow 
 lines, and they gradually came to be regarded as 
 asylums to which persons who needed rest and 
 careful nursing might be removed, there to regain 
 strength and vigour. Hence the majority of the 
 inmates of the homes are neurotic, rheumatic, 
 anaemic, and above all tuberculous patients, who 
 are not suitable cases for the ordinary hospitals, 
 yet who have no chance of recuperating in their 
 own homes, and have not means enough to allow 
 of their undergoing any of the modern "cures" 
 in costly private institutions. For tuberculous 
 persons of both sexes separate homes exist ; but 
 from all the homes are excluded epileptics, 
 syphilitics, and inebriates. 
 
 The whole of Berlin's six convalescent homes 
 are situated within easy distance of the city by 
 rail or road. Two are for convalescents pure and 
 simple, one for women and one for men, and 
 
BERLIN CONVALESCENT HOMES. 149 
 
 four are for persons suffering from lung disease — 
 two for each sex. The convalescent homes are at 
 Blankenburg (for women) with seventy beds, and 
 at Heinersdorf, Teltow, (for men) with seventy-two 
 beds. In the homes for women are systematically 
 received women who wish to recruit after child- 
 birth, and here the homes work hand in hand 
 with the insurance funds, which make special 
 payments to married women on this account. On 
 principle, however, women are excluded who have 
 given birth to illegitimate children or who are 
 under police control. 
 
 The homes for tuberculous patients are at Blan- 
 kenfelde (seventy-eight beds) and Malchow (one hun- 
 dred and four beds), for women ; and Giitergotz 
 (ninety-eight beds) and Buch (one hundred and fifty 
 beds), for men. All the homes save the one at Buch 
 were adapted (certainly at very considerable cost) 
 from existing buildings. Thus the home at Giiter- 
 gotz was formerly an old ruined chateau, and its 
 spacious park alone was the making of an institution 
 of this kind. The equipment of this home proved 
 the most economical of all. The cost came to 
 1,230 marks (;^6i los.) per bed, against 2,548 marks 
 {£i2y 8s.) and 2,469 marks (£123 gs.) in the case of 
 Malchow and Blankenfelde. The home at Buch has 
 cost the municipality no less than 1,115,000 marks, 
 or £SS,7So, for building and land, and 131,000 
 marks, or £6,550, for furnishing. In general the 
 interior arrangements are simple yet complete ; 
 every tendency to superfluous ornamentation has 
 
I50 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 been suppressed, yet utility and taste go hand in 
 hand, and above all hygienic considerations have 
 been carefully studied. The aim has been, in short, 
 to provide buildings thoroughly efficient for their 
 purpose at a minimum of expenditure. 
 
 Above each of the convalescent homes is placed, 
 as responsible administrator, a sister of the Victoria 
 Home for Sick Nursing {Hausfiir Kratikenpflege) , 
 who is assisted by a staff of nurses, with the 
 usual domestic servants, male attendants, and 
 gardeners, the last two under an estate bailiff. 
 There is also a visiting doctor, and under him an 
 apothecary. In the case of the homes for con- 
 sumptives, however, a resident doctor and a sister 
 share the responsibilities of management between 
 them, the former exercising all directorial functions 
 and determining the entire treatment of the 
 patients, though in the domestic domain his 
 colleague is autocratic. 
 
 The homes are without exception open to appli- 
 cants of every class and condition, on the principle 
 of equality of municipal right, but in practice they 
 are for the most part used by the artisan and 
 higher working class, with a sprinkling of repre- 
 sentatives of the small official class and the less 
 regarded professions. No inquiry is made, how- 
 ever, into the means of those who seek admission, 
 and for a good reason. For the homes are not 
 free institutions. A uniform payment ot 2'20 
 marks, or 2S. 2^d., per day is required, and as a rule 
 it must be paid in advance. Where, however, 
 
BERLIN CONVALESCENT HOMES. 151 
 
 patients are sent by a sickness or accident insur- 
 ance organisation, by the Metropolitan Poor Law 
 Administration, or some other pubHc authority, its 
 certificate admitting liability is accepted in lieu of 
 payment, and the bill is collected at the quarter's 
 end. At the same time persons are not necessarily 
 refused who can prove inability to pay, still less 
 when they offer, as they often do, to pay by instal- 
 ments on recovery of health and work. All such 
 cases as these are decided on their merits and in a 
 spirit of indulgence, and this is done the more 
 readily since a sum of about ^^500 is set apart by 
 the Municipal Council each year for free places, 
 which are allotted to deserving people who can 
 neither pay themselves nor have a claim on 
 others. 
 
 The municipality maintains a Central Bureau 
 in Berlin which acts as a sort of clearing-house 
 for the whole of the homes. With this bureau the 
 homes every day exchange lists of discharges and 
 vacancies, and on its instructions they send for new 
 patients in their own conveyances where needful 
 and convenient. 
 
 Every applicant for admission must be accredited 
 by a doctor, who is required to answer a schedule 
 of questions on his or her behalf, questions for 
 the most part referring to the convalescent's health 
 and the benefit to be expected from rest and 
 nursing in the home ; while the patient also signs 
 an undertaking to conform to the house regulations, 
 the tenor of which is communicated verbally 
 
152 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 where possible. Only in the case of applicants 
 suffering from lung disease is an independent 
 medical examination made in order to determine 
 whether they are suitable for admission, since the 
 homes are not intended for the treatment of 
 incurables. 
 
 The duration of a patient's stay in a convalescent 
 home is fixed in advance as near as practicable, 
 the normal period being three weeks, but the 
 doctor may at discretion curtail this time, for it is 
 expected that no patient shall remain longer than 
 is necessary to his restoration to working capacity. 
 Where, on the other hand, the doctor thinks that 
 the three weeks might with advantage be prolonged 
 he asks the permission of the supervisory com- 
 mittee in Berlin before the time has expired, and 
 it is invariably given. In the homes for consump- 
 tives the normal stay is two months, subject again 
 to the doctor's discretion. 
 
 Within the homes, whatever their character, 
 the convalescent is allowed a large degree of liberty. 
 Ample facilities are offered for reading and relax- 
 ation, nor is the former exclusively of the convict- 
 cell type. Exercise in moderation is encouraged 
 and provided for. For the more active and robust 
 there is, besides walking, the inevitable skittle 
 alley, which is the bourgeois German's idea of 
 heavenly bliss in this poor carnal state. Mild 
 billiards of the French sort may also be played. 
 The surrounding grounds are laid out conveniently 
 for the inmates' use, and shelters enable them to 
 
BERLIN CONVALESCENT HOMES. 153 
 
 evade inclement weather. Provision for their 
 religious needs is not forgotten. The convales- 
 cents go to the local churches, while for the patients 
 in the homes for consumptives service is held on 
 the premises by duly appointed clergymen. 
 
 The life and routine in the two classes of homes 
 are pretty much the same, allowance being made 
 for the different physical condition of the two 
 classes of patients. All rise at seven o'clock in 
 summer and at eight in winter, and go to bed at 
 ten and nine respectively. Light duty, such as the 
 making of beds and the laying and clearing of 
 tables for meals, is imposed on those convalescents 
 whose health permits of it. Leave out is given 
 at the sister's discretion in special cases, but even 
 then as a rule only during the day-time, and any 
 infraction of the regulations in this matter may 
 entail immediate discharge. The inmates may, 
 however, be visited on three afternoons in the 
 week. Only in the matter of dress is a difference 
 made in the treatment of the two types of inmates. 
 The convalescents wear their own clothes, which 
 are expected to be clean and neat, but for hygienic 
 reasons the consumptives wear dress supplied to 
 them. In general the most careful sanitary regu- 
 lations are imposed, particularly in regard to 
 possible means of tuberculous infection. 
 
 A strong and varied dietary is supplied to all 
 inmates alike. In this meat, milk, and eggs play 
 a prominent part. The regulations state : " As 
 much milk shall be served to the inmates as they 
 
154 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 can take," but alcoholic drinks are only supplied 
 on medical orders. Yet even with liberal treat- 
 ment the food does not exceed on an average of 
 the whole homes is. y^d. per head per day. The 
 other expenditure of every kind makes a total cost 
 3s. 5j^. per day, against 2s. 2hd. charged all round 
 to the patients. 
 
 In all its six homes the municipality of Berlin 
 has accommodation for 572 patients, and it says 
 much for the popularity of these places and for 
 the confidence reposed in their administrators that 
 the available places are nearly always filled. In 
 the five older homes (Buch being excluded) 3,162 
 new patients were admitted during last year, a 
 larger number than ever before, and 3,535 persons 
 altogether were treated. So much in demand, 
 indeed, are the homes that in most of them it is 
 seldom possible to obtain admission without 
 waiting weeks or months, in the case of the homes 
 for consumptives, even in the winter season. 
 Hence it was long ago found necessary to add 
 wooden ** barracks " for use during the summer, 
 when the applications are naturally most numerous, 
 though at one home the " barracks" are open all 
 the year round. 
 
 The entire expenditure on the homes during 
 1905 was estimated at 502,450 marks (or £25,122), 
 of which 329,800 marks fell to food, clothing, etc., 
 51,100 marks to domestic charges, 44,080 marks 
 to administration, 41,670 marks to rents, rates, and 
 taxes, and 23,600 marks to doctors' salaries and 
 
BERLIN CONVALESCENT HOMES. 155 
 
 medical appliances. Against this expenditure 
 came a revenue of 406,300 marks (;^20,3i5), nearly 
 all the contributions of patients or of societies on 
 their behalf. Thus the cost to the municipahty 
 was 96,150 marks, or £4,8oy. In this statement of 
 cost, interest on capital and costs of administration, 
 both local and central, are reckoned, so that the 
 figures represent the cost of the homes on a per- 
 fectly actuarial footing. The cost to the public 
 funds is so slight as compared with the excellent 
 work done that no one grudges the deficit for 
 which the municipality annually provides in its 
 estimates and annually defrays. 
 
156 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE DOCTOR IN THE SCHOOL. 
 
 While much is done in Germany to cope with 
 disease amongst adult workers, it is in the schools 
 of the people that the best work of this kind, both 
 preventive and curative, is going on. The School 
 Doctor is now a recognised institution in all parts 
 of the country, and his place and mission receive 
 every year increasing recognition. Germany is, in 
 fact, taking seriously to heart, as probably no 
 other country, the fact that the child is the father 
 of the man, and that physical and mental 
 efficiency and fitness, upon which industrial 
 efficiency and fitness almost wholly depend, can 
 only be ensured with certainty when care is taken 
 to guard the health of childhood and youth. That 
 is the meaning of the crusade against disease and 
 debility, both of body and mind, which is now 
 being carried on in the primary schools, and of the 
 passion for what is called "School Hygiene" 
 which has taken possession quite as much of lay 
 as of professional educationists. If the State — 
 so the argument runs — requires the uninter- 
 mittent attendance at school of children from 
 tender age onward for a period of six, seven, and 
 eight years, it incurs a large measure of direct 
 
THE DOCTOR IN THE SCHOOL. 157 
 
 responsibility for their physical welfare, and at 
 least it is morally bound to take due precautions 
 that injury to health shall not befall those whom 
 it may be said, to some extent, to withdraw from 
 perental care and oversight. And not only is this 
 responsibility held to apply to the surroundings in 
 which the child passes so many of its years — the 
 buildings, the class-rooms, the play-grounds, the 
 right ordering of which involves questions of 
 sanitation, ventilation, lighting, heating, and the 
 like — but it is held to embrace no less the patho- 
 logical aspect of the question, as implied by the 
 influence of school life and discipline upon the 
 health of body and mind. Looking back, it is easy 
 to see how naturally the School Doctor has been 
 evolved. It was always regarded as self-evident 
 that school buildings and their surroundings should 
 be maintained in a proper hygienic condition, and 
 the teaching itself be as far as possible adapted to 
 the strength and the capacity of the children. 
 Teaching was even to some extent individualised 
 according to the observed physical peculiarities of 
 the scholars, chiefly, however, by the exemption 
 of the unfit from certain portions of the curriculum, 
 as bathing, singing, and particularly gymnastic 
 exercises, in cases of heart or lung weakness. 
 More or less systematic attention was paid to 
 children of weak intellect, and children suffering 
 from defective eyesight were not uncommonly 
 provided with spectacles where parental need was 
 suspected. 
 
158 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 The higher, however, the standard of education 
 was raised, the more was the fact of unequal capa- 
 city recognised. The very efficiency of school 
 work required differentiation to be made between 
 the normal scholar and the abnormal — the child 
 who progressed regularly from standard to stan- 
 dard, and the child who failed to take the place 
 proportionate to his age and years of school life. 
 From the observation of this disparity to the 
 investigation of its causes was an obvious step, 
 but it was the step that counted. For, this step 
 being taken, it was recognised that the school 
 authority and the community whose will and 
 power and conscience the school authority repre- 
 sents had a high interest as well as a high respon- 
 sibility in the preservation of a child in the best 
 possible condition of physical efficiency. Hence 
 it came to pass that pedagogy and pathology — 
 the schoolmaster and the doctor — found them- 
 selves for the first time working side by side in 
 the cause of education. 
 
 In the larger schools "auxiliary" classes (Neben- 
 und Hillfsklassen) of various kinds, and in the 
 large towns even special schools, were formed for 
 the instruction of children who from defect of 
 mind or of the senses were unable to work together 
 with the normal and the fit. But that was only 
 one aspect of the difficulty. It was found that a 
 large number of backward children suffered from 
 no constitutional deficiencies which justified their 
 segregation from the rest of their fellows in so 
 
THE DOCTOR IN THE SCHOOL. 159 
 
 wholesale a fashion. The backwardness of these 
 children was due solely to remediable defects — 
 to maladies often slight in themselves if taken 
 betimes, yet when disregarded serious enough to 
 exert a depressing influence upon the general 
 health, and to interfere with the natural develop- 
 ment of the mind, and so to retard the entire work 
 and process of education. To detect these mala- 
 dies, often so evasive and so insidious, and to 
 direct the requisite measures for their removal 
 where possible, is the business of the School 
 Doctor of the modern type. To-day school hygiene 
 embraces the thorough medical oversight of every 
 scholar from the first day of school life to the 
 last — an oversight following him up class by class 
 until the time comes for the choice of a career, 
 when the School Doctor is finally called in to 
 pronounce upon his capabilities and limitations, 
 and to say for what occupation, in the light of 
 these, he is fit and for what unfit. 
 
 School hygiene in this wide sense has been 
 regarded in Germany as an important part of educa- 
 tional policy for nearly forty years, but it was not 
 until lately that the School Doctor of the thorough- 
 going kind made his appearance. Leipzig took 
 the lead, and its example was soon followed by 
 other large towns in Saxony and the rest of the 
 States, until to-day the number of School Doctors 
 in active work cannot be far short of six hundred. 
 Meantime, the school authority of Wiesbaden 
 took up the question with great energy as well 
 
i6o THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 as intelligence, and did not rest until it had pro- 
 duced for its own guidance a series of regulations 
 so comprehensive, so circumspect, and so efficient, 
 that they represent the best theoretical work of 
 the kind which has so far been done, and serve as 
 models which other towns, not only in Germany 
 but in other countries, readily copy. The key to 
 the Wiesbaden system of medical oversight is 
 contained in a school regulation which states : 
 " The School Doctors have to examine the newly 
 admitted scholars thoroughly in regard to their 
 physical condition and their state of health, in 
 order to determine whether they need permanent 
 medical oversight or special consideration in the 
 imparting of instruction (for example, exemption 
 from special branches of instruction, such as 
 gymnastics and singing, or restriction in the 
 instruction given to them, the allotment to them 
 of special seats on account of defective sight or 
 hearing, etc.)." This examination extends to the 
 heart, lungs, the higher air passages, the spinal 
 cord, the skin, eyes, ear, mouth, nose, and the 
 abdomen, and the results are recorded in a certifi- 
 cate, which is kept posted up year by year as the 
 child advances in the school, supplementary obser- 
 vations as to its physical development or defects 
 being entered as often as necessary. The health 
 certificate is a very severe test of fitness, and 
 recognises three degrees of physical and three of 
 mental efficiency. A child's *' general constitu- 
 tion " is recorded as "good," "medium," or 
 
THE DOCTOR IN THE SCHOOL. i6i 
 
 "bad" — good when the condition of health is 
 absolutely perfect, bad when chronic weakness 
 or evident disposition to illness exists. The 
 classification of a child's " mental condition " 
 is into normal, backward, and defective. More- 
 over, twice a year the height and the weight 
 of each child are taken by the teachers, with 
 measurement of the chest by the School Doctor 
 whenever desirable. The health certificates of 
 children who need regular oversight are endorsed 
 to that effect, and these children must be 
 presented for special observation whenever the 
 School Doctor visits the classes to which they 
 belong. Further, a thorough re-examination of all 
 children is made in their third, fifth, and eighth 
 school years. In accordance with the observations 
 made the School Doctor advises the head teacher 
 as to physical peculiarities which need to be 
 considered in school work. Where maladies are 
 found which require medical attention, the parents 
 are advised direct, but a School Doctor may not 
 professionally attend children upon whom he 
 reports at school. 
 
 It might be thought that the attentions of the 
 School Doctors, though so well meaning, are 
 regarded as inquisitorial and intrusive. Never- 
 theless, thanks to the discretion with which the 
 school authorities and the School Doctors go about 
 their work, parental opposition has seldom to be 
 encountered, and even initial prejudice is rare. 
 Almost universally parents welcome the School 
 
 G.w. M 
 
i62 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Doctor's advice and help, and not merely 
 facilitate the periodical examinations, but carry 
 out faithfully the directions given. This is the 
 more noteworthy since in no German State do 
 the education authorities possess legal powers to 
 compel examinations or to inflict penalties in the 
 case of refusal to undergo them. The whole 
 system rests on a voluntary basis, yet it acts with 
 remarkable efficiency, for tact and suasion have 
 done what coercion would probably have failed to 
 do. Parents are encouraged to regard the School 
 Doctors as friends whose only interest is their 
 children's welfare, and the School Doctors for 
 their part take diligent care to cultivate confidence 
 by enlisting the co-operation and the presence of 
 parents at every examination and all through their 
 work as the guardians of the children's health. 
 On the other hand, if a parent prefers that 
 examinations shall be made by the family doctor, 
 no objection whatever is raised ; all that is asked 
 is that the same careful and exhaustive investiga- 
 tion shall take place, an investigation embracing 
 the same questions and following the same prin- 
 ciples, so that uniformity of procedure and of 
 results may be secured, to which end special 
 forms have to be used. 
 
 It is, of course, impossible to set forth the 
 success of this system of school hygiene in the 
 form of a bald set of figures, though figures may 
 none the less be cited, eloquent and conclusive in 
 their testimony to invaluable results. In the first 
 
THE DOCTOR IN THE SCHOOL. 163 
 
 place young children are delayed from entering 
 school whenever their physical or mental condition 
 is such that school life, work, and discipline would 
 be harmful to them. In the second place every 
 detectable weakness of every child is dragged to 
 light and carefully placed on record. Where 
 medical treatment can be resorted to with hope of 
 recovery, directions to that effect are given, and 
 the School Doctor, while he does not himself give 
 professional attention, takes care that his advice is 
 duly followed. Where, on the other hand, a child 
 needs exceptional treatment in school, the required 
 attention is noted on the health certificate, and it 
 is the duty of the teacher to see that it is faithfully 
 observed. But the most important part of a 
 School Doctor's work is the detection of maladies 
 and weaknesses which, but for his scrutiny, would 
 probably have continued to evade the eye both of 
 parents and teachers, and m.ight have been the 
 source of permanent injury to the children con- 
 cerned. To cite the case of Berlin. There School 
 Doctors were first employed in the year 1902, and 
 of the children notified in that year for primary 
 admission to school 12 '3 per cent, had to be put 
 back for varying terms. In 26 per cent, of the cases 
 the reason was general physical weakness, in 16 
 per cent, it was recent serious illness, in 16 per 
 cent, dehcate constitution, in 10 per cent, 
 insufficient development, in 5 per cent, tuber- 
 culosis of the lungs. Last year the number of 
 newly-registered children examined was 34,562, 
 
 M 2 
 
i64 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 and of these 2,927, or 8*5 per cent., were put back, 
 while 7,041, or 237 per cent., were placed under 
 oversight, making the total number under over- 
 sight in that year 24,225. The reason for over- 
 sight was defective sight in 22*4 per cent, of the 
 cases and general weakness in 13 per cent. The 
 School Doctors' joint report for the year contained 
 the significant remark : " Most of the children in 
 the incipient stages of tuberculosis attend school 
 without either parent or teacher having, any 
 suspicion that they ail anything." But at 
 medical oversight in the narrower sense the more 
 progressive German towns do not stop, for here 
 and there specialists are employed for the treat- 
 ment of eye, ear, and throat maladies, and in 
 several towns systematic attention is also given to 
 the teeth of all children in the elementary schools. 
 At the present time the Socialist members of the 
 Berlin Municipal Council are pressing upon their 
 uncollectivist colleagues a scheme for the establish- 
 ment of clinics in various parts of the city, in which 
 the whole of the primary scholars of Berlin — some 
 300,000 in number — will be entitled to claim free 
 dental attendance. Hamburg and Strassburg are 
 among the towns which have already moved in 
 this direction. 
 
 In addition to their strictly supervisory work 
 many School Doctors give instruction in hygiene. 
 In Hungary, where School Doctors are appointed 
 for the higher schools only, such instruction is regu- 
 larly given to the scholars. In Germany the same 
 
THE DOCTOR IN THE SCHOOL. 165 
 
 thing is done on a small scale, though opinions 
 differ as to the expediency of so employing the 
 School Doctor, especially as he would cover ground 
 which in some form has been recognised as falling 
 to the ordinary teacher's province. The medical 
 faculty contend that capacity to give instruction 
 presupposes greater qualifications than now belong 
 to the average teacher, but that contention would 
 seem to point only to the advisability of the School 
 Doctors equipping the teachers for the task, and 
 not to the necessity of superseding them. Already, 
 indeed, in a few towns it is usual for the 
 doctors to give periodical lectures to teachers 
 on hygienic questions, from the standpoint of 
 education, either at meetings of the teachers' 
 associations or at special conferences called for 
 the purpose. In Berlin there is a notable varia- 
 tion of this usage. There mixed gatherings of 
 teachers and parents are occasionally held during 
 the winter at which health questions among others 
 are discussed after lectures or papers by School 
 Doctors. In the larger towns the School Doctors 
 hold conferences among themselves, and in some 
 places the District Medical Officer is invited to be 
 present. 
 
 Nor can it be objected that the cost of this 
 system of school oversight is excessive. The 
 methods of payment are various. In some towns 
 the School Doctors are paid fixed stipends, in 
 others they are paid according to the work done ; 
 in others, again, a fixed stipend is supplemented 
 
i66 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 by extra payments for special work. On the 
 whole, whatever the basis chosen, the payment 
 made is roughly proportionate to the number of 
 classes attended, and a class as a rule comprises 
 fifty children. In the majority of towns the pay- 
 ment ranges between los. and ,^1 5s. per class 
 per year, but at the two ends of the scale are rates 
 as low as 5s., 4s, and 3s. per class, and rates as 
 -high as £1 13s,, and in one case 3^3 6s. The 
 town of Mannheim employs a single School 
 Doctor, who devotes the whole of his time to the 
 work and receives ;;^5oo a year. Taking typical or 
 well-known towns, Berlin heads the list for gene- 
 rosity, paying ;^ioo a year for its thirty (soon to 
 be increased to forty-four) School Doctors ; Frank- 
 fort-on-the-Main, Strassburg, and Giessen pay 
 £50 ; Cassel and Gottingen pay ^40 ; and Bonn, 
 Wiesbaden, Halle, Worms, Dresden and Darm- 
 stadt pay from ^^40 to £2^. 
 
 Naturally the larger towns have been readiest 
 to adopt the institution of the School Doctor and 
 to value his services, though not a few small 
 towns, even places of several thousand inhabi- 
 tants, have had the wisdom and foresight to 
 welcome this new department in educational 
 policy. While, however, the number of School 
 Doctors in practice in Germany is still small 
 relatively to the population, the movement is 
 progressing rapidly, and the 600 doctors already 
 at work are probably the earnest of a universal 
 system of medical inspection covering every part 
 
THE DOCTOR IN THE SCHOOL. 167 
 
 of the country and every grade of school. Mean- 
 time, with few exceptions the School Doctors are 
 attached to the elementary schools only. The 
 Duchy of Meiningen is the most notable excep- 
 tion, for there, alone amongst German States, the 
 Government has taken the question into its own 
 hands, and thirty-six School Doctors are employed 
 in the regular visitation of all the schools — 
 elementary, secondary, and private. For the rest, 
 the municipalities have been left to act at their 
 discretion, without any other pressure from above 
 beyond that contained in occasional circulars 
 setting forth the importance of school hygiene on 
 Wiesbaden lines and the best way of introducing 
 it. German educationists maintain that in this 
 encouragement of local initiative lies the secret of 
 the enthusiasm with which the School Doctor 
 movement has been taken up and of the success by 
 which it has been attended. Certainly the State's 
 abstention from undue interference has allowed 
 the movement to advance on healthy and natural 
 lines, and in its very spontaneity lies the truest 
 guarantee of strength and permanence. 
 
i68 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER Xni. 
 
 MUNICIPAL PAWNSHOPS. 
 
 The idea of municipalising the pawnshop, or 
 rather — as that would imply a monopoly, a thing 
 which the average Englishman views with sus- 
 picion — of establishing municipal pawnshops in 
 competition with private institutions, is no new 
 one with us. In France and Germany, however, 
 the idea exists in fact, and their experience has by 
 universal testimony been attended with the most 
 satisfactory results. While, however, municipal 
 pawnshops have never yet been introduced in our 
 midst, indirect and far-going protection is afforded 
 by statute to their frequenters, and it is interesting 
 to compare English and German methods of doing 
 this. The British Legislature has hemmed in the 
 pawnbroker's vocation by very important restric- 
 tions, alike as to the things he may do and those 
 he may not do ; and in the event of misdemeanour 
 serious penalties are held before his eyes. Thus 
 the rate of interest is expressly laid down by law 
 and varies according to the value of the pledge. 
 In the case of advances of los. and under, ^d. may 
 be charged for the pawn ticket and ^d. per month 
 as interest for each 2S. (or fraction of 2s.) advanced, 
 which is equal to 25 per cent, per annum. In the 
 
MUNICIPAL PAWNSHOPS. 169 
 
 case of advances of between los. and £2. one penny 
 may be charged for the ticket, and the interest is 
 at the same rate. On advances of betw^een £2 
 and ;^io (the maximum) one penny is charged for 
 the ticket and the interest is one halfpenny per 
 month for every 2S. ^d. or fraction of 2s 6rf., 
 advanced, which is equal to a rate of 20 per cent, per 
 annum. If pledges are not redeemed within a year 
 and seven days from the date of pledge, they become 
 the property of the broker, who may at once sell 
 them. It is provided, however, that a pawner or 
 holder of a pawn ticket may in the case of renounced 
 pledges exceeding los. in value call upon the broker 
 any time within three years after sale to show the 
 result of such sale, and may demand any surplus 
 received beyond the sum originally advanced. 
 
 All the protection here secured to the private 
 pawnshop's patrons in England is secured to the 
 municipal pawnshop's patrons in Germany, with 
 important additions and a more moderate rate of 
 interest on larger amounts, while in German}^ the 
 scope of the pawnshop is greatly widened. Possibly 
 one of the best German experiences of the muni- 
 cipal pawnshop is that which stands to the credit of 
 Munich. In Bavaria, indeed, the public pawn- 
 shop {Leihansialt) is an institution of ancient 
 origin, and a Bavarian town, Nuremberg, claims 
 to have introduced it into Germany so long ago 
 as 1498. The privilege of carrying on pawnshops 
 was conferred upon several other Bavarian towns 
 by the Crown as far back as the eighteenth century, 
 
lyo THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 and in the case of Munich in 1754. Munich has four 
 of these institutions, under the direct control of 
 the municipahty, which provides the buildings, 
 appoints the officials, and finances the under- 
 takings. In general, the articles that are taken 
 in pawn comprise all movables which may be 
 stored easily and without danger, and also State 
 and municipal bonds, mortgages, and other securi- 
 ties. There are, however, important exclusions. 
 Thus no articles of furniture are received, partly 
 because of the large amount of warehouse room 
 that would be required, but also because it is a 
 fixed principle to discourage the pawning of 
 articles which belong to the primary comforts of 
 the home. Documents relating to debts (pro- 
 missory notes, etc.), wages and pension certifi- 
 cates, orders and medals, and furriery are also 
 refused. Advances are made on securities to the 
 extent of 75 per cent, of the market value the 
 previous day, but the face value of any single 
 paper may not exceed ^^50. In the case of all 
 other pledges the value is fixed by the stationed 
 official valuers, whose word is final. It is stipu- 
 lated, however, that gold, silver, and other 
 valuables upon which ^20 or over is advanced 
 must be valued by two valuers separately, and 
 the lower of the two valuations is adopted, though 
 both the valuers are jointly held responsible to 
 the institution for the realisation of the sum 
 advanced in the event of a sale. 
 
 The amount of the valuation is paid over 
 
MUNICIPAL PAWNSHOPS. 171 
 
 without any of the deductions which are often 
 made by private pawnbrokers, and with the 
 money is given a numbered pawn note. This 
 note corresponds with an entry in the pawn 
 register, and contains a description of the article 
 to which it refers, the time and place of pawn, 
 the name of the depositor, the amount of the 
 advance, the rate of interest, with all requisite 
 information as to the regulations of the pawnshop 
 affecting reclamation, the sale of forfeited goods, 
 and the like. Articles pawned must be reclaimed 
 or re-deposited within the exact term appointed, 
 in default of which they are sold by auction, 
 though it is permitted to pledge-holders to buy 
 them in at any time before they are offered, on 
 payment of the money advanced with interest and 
 auction fees. 
 
 The smallest sum advanced on an article is 
 2 marks (2s.), and advances may go as far as 
 3,000 marks (;^i5o). The interest charged on 
 all advances alike is one pfennig (one-eighth of a 
 penny) per mark per month, which is equal to 
 12 per cent., and this interest is always reckoned 
 from the beginning of the month in which the 
 advance is made. A fee of 5 pfennige (five-eighths 
 of a penny) is also levied for the pawn ticket for 
 advances of from 2s. to 5s., and one of 10 pfennig 
 (a penny and a fifth) for advances of 6s. and 
 upwards. 
 
 In regard to the release of pawned articles, the 
 somewhat lax regulation exists that anyone who 
 
172 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 presents a pawn note to the institution is allowed 
 to claim the deposit to which it refers without 
 establishing his bond fides, and the municipality 
 recognises no further responsibility in the matter. 
 On the other hand, should a borrower lose a ticket, 
 every effort is made by the institution, on informa- 
 tion of the fact being lodged, to prevent fraud; 
 and on the rightful owner identifying the pawned 
 article he is allowed to release it on payment of a 
 small fee. Should articles which have been found 
 or have been illegally obtained be offered for pawn, 
 on the fact coming to the knowledge of the officials, 
 they are at once handed to the police ; but if an 
 advance has already been made in such cases, 
 the amount with interest must be paid by the 
 claimant before they can be released. Nor does 
 the municipality hold itself responsible for loss 
 occasioned to goods by robbery or fire, or for 
 ordinary damage incidental to the warehousing of 
 the goods, so far as culpable negligence cannot be 
 imputed. 
 
 For the better security of the municipality 
 whose credit is employed the appraiser who values 
 the articles received on pawn is held personally 
 responsible for each sum advanced being realised 
 in the event of a sale. Should the amount then 
 realised fall below that advanced, he may either 
 take the article himself and pay the institution the 
 sum advanced, together with interest and pawn- 
 ticket fee, but without the auction fee, or, as in 
 Paris, he must pay the deficiency. The effect of 
 
MUNICIPAL PAWNSHOPS. 173 
 
 this arrangement is that the valuations are kept 
 fairly low ; but this is not regarded as an unmixed 
 evil, if an evil at all, for it encourages the owner 
 to reclaim the goods pawned. On the other 
 hand, should an article sold receive more than 
 was advanced upon it (plus interest to the day of 
 sale and auction fees), the excess may be claimed 
 by the late owner within a year of the day of 
 sale, after which date it becomes the property 
 of the institution, which hands it towards the 
 maintenance of the municipal poorhouse. In the 
 great majority of cases the articles pawned are 
 allowed by their owners to remain five or six 
 weeks, and in any case all are retained by the 
 institution for seven or eight months before being 
 offered for sale. Each of the four institutions 
 requires for its management a staff of cashiers, 
 book - keepers, actuaries, warehousemen, and 
 appraisers (for jewellery and clothing respec- 
 tively) ranging from nine to sixteen, and the 
 aggregate turnover amounts to some ^15,000 
 a year. The institutions are allowed to retain 
 cash in hand to the extent of ^^300 at one time 
 in three cases and ;^400 in the other, and bonds 
 are naturally required of the responsible officials. 
 
 The Cologne Municipal Pawnshop is conducted 
 upon much the same principles as are the pawn- 
 shops of Munich. It is open every day of the week 
 except Sunday and on festivals, but it advances 
 money on a smaller variety of articles : books and 
 engravings, bulky articles and those easily broken 
 
174 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 and spoiled, church decorations and valuables of 
 
 all kinds, weapons, and orders are refused. The 
 
 advance may be up to four-jfifths of the taxed value 
 
 in the case of valuables and precious metals, but 
 
 in other cases only two-thirds, and the minimum 
 
 sum advanced is 2 marks. The interest charged 
 
 is 2 pfennige or ^d. per mark and per month on 
 
 articles up to 15 marks in value, and i^ pfennige 
 
 between 15 and 30 marks ; on advances between 
 
 30 and 300 marks (;^I5) the interest is i pfennig 
 
 per mark and month, between 300 and 1,000 
 
 marks (;^5o) it is f pfennig, and above 1,000 
 
 marks it is ^ pfennig. These rates of interest 
 
 work out as follows per year : — 
 
 Up to 15 marks, 24 per cent. 
 15 to 30 „ 18 
 
 30 to 300 ,, 12 „ 
 
 300 to 1,000 ,, q „ 
 over 1,000 „ 6 ,, 
 
 Advances are made to all persons free from 
 suspicion, but it is open to the officials to require a 
 documentary legitimation if they think it desir- 
 able. Articles unredeemed after a year's interval 
 may be continued in pawn provided the interest 
 due to date be first paid. When goods are sold the 
 appraiser who has valued them may bid for them 
 up to the sum of the advance, interest, and the 
 sale expenses, which are reckoned at 3 per cent. 
 of the proceeds of sale, but when this sum has 
 been reached he may not intervene further. One 
 half of the surplus accruing from every periodical 
 sale goes to the poor fund of the municipality and 
 
MUNICIPAL PAWNSHOPS. 175 
 
 the other half to a reserve fund, though when this 
 fund exceeds a certain amount the poor fund 
 claims the entire profits. 
 
 In Berlin the State fulfils the same service for 
 needy persons, and during the year 1904-5 no less 
 a sum than ^^245, 000 was advanced by the Royal 
 Pawn Bureau. This institution would appear, how- 
 ever, to be used in a decreasing degree by the 
 poorer class and increasingly by the lower-middle 
 class. Hence the number of articles pawned last 
 year was less by 28 per cent, than ten years before 
 (151, 297against 209,435), while the average advance 
 increased from 21 marks to 32 marks. In Berlin, 
 however, the private pawnshops, to the number of 
 176, do a large business amongst the working class 
 and the poor. 
 
 It may be asked, What has been the effect of the 
 municipal pawnshops upon private pawnshops in 
 Munich and elsewhere ? It is true that the latter 
 have not been superseded, yet the existence of 
 municipal institutions is held to have decidedly 
 raised their level, while the police also exercise a 
 more careful supervision than might be the case 
 were there no official rivalry. Even so, the muni- 
 cipal pawnshops are far more popular than the 
 private ones, and the reasons given to me were that 
 they enjoy greater confidence, and are regarded as 
 more respectable, while those who use them are as- 
 sured of receiving more generoustreatment, alike in 
 the advances made and the interest charged, than 
 could be relied upon in the ordinary pawnshop. 
 
176/ THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 INDUSTRIAL COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 
 
 Proportionately to the extent of its industries 
 and the number of its manual workers, Germany is 
 probably no freer from strikes than any other 
 mercantile country. Considering the comparative 
 lowness of wages and the arduous conditions of 
 work, industrial disputes might indeed seem to be 
 inevitable. Yet at any rate legislation has been 
 wisely passed which offers abundant scope for 
 arbitration and conciliation, and which makes it 
 possible to determine with facility and expedition, 
 where the desire to do so exists, the hundred and one 
 misunderstandings which are everywhere insepar- 
 able from contracts of service. Not only so, but 
 this legislation has been very largely used with the 
 most beneficial results. 
 
 There are two distinct tribunals of arbitration — 
 those which exist in connexion with the Trade 
 Guilds {Innimgen) formed for the handicrafts, and 
 those which exist for industrial workpeople in the 
 sense of the English Factory Acts. The former 
 are known as Courts of Arbitration proper {Schieds- 
 gerichte) and the latter as Industrial Courts [Gewer- 
 begertchte). A Guild Board of Arbitration must 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 177 
 
 consist of at least a president and two assessors, 
 the latter as well as their deputies being elected in 
 moieties from among the employing members of 
 the guild and the journeymen and workmen in 
 their service. The president is nominated by the 
 supervising authority (the superior administrative 
 organ of the district) and need not belong to the 
 guild. A court must come together within eight 
 days of a request for its mediation, failing which 
 the petitioner may resort to the industrial courts 
 or the ordinary civil courts. Decisions of these 
 guild courts, as of the guild itself, acquire force 
 of law {Rechtskraft) unless within a month one 
 of the parties concerned should appeal to the 
 "ordinary court." In certain disputes and where 
 the judgment does not exceed 100 marks (£5) 
 the decision may be enforced at once unless it 
 can be shown that the debtor would be seriously 
 injured, though it maybe suspended when security 
 is given. 
 
 Far more important are the industrial courts, 
 alike in their number and the service which they 
 are able to render to the cause of social peace. 
 These courts owe their own existence to the 
 laws of July 29, 1890, and June 30, 1901 {Gezetsc 
 betreffend die Gewerbegerichte), and they now form 
 an invaluable part of the machinery of industry, 
 facilitating harmonious relationships in many 
 ways where formerly the only medium of adjust- 
 ment was the judicial court. At the beginning 
 of January, 1906, there existed in the whole of 
 
 G.W. M 
 
178 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 the Empire no fewer than 413 of these courts, 
 of which 241 were in Prussia, yj in Bavaria, 
 33 in Saxony, 23 in Wurtemberg, 12 in Baden, 
 12 in Hesse, and 55 in the rest of the Federal 
 States. 
 
 Yet these courts did not mark an entirely new 
 departure in industrial legislation ; they were an 
 organic development of earlier organisations. The 
 Industrial Code in its original form — that of 
 June 21, 1869 — empowered the local authorities 
 to create tribunals for the settlement of disputes 
 between employers and their workpeople, and 
 many more or less rudimentary agencies were 
 called into existence long before the law of 1890 
 placed the entire question of industrial arbitration 
 upon a wider and sounder, because an Imperial, 
 basis. , 
 
 Th^ determinative feature of the law is its 
 permissive character. Courts of arbitration may 
 or may not be formed by the competent authori- 
 ties, as they prefer. " For the settlement of 
 industrial disputes between workpeople and 
 employers, as between workpeople of the same 
 employer, industrial courts may be established." 
 So runs the first clause of the Act, and this optional 
 provision commended itself to all parties in the 
 Reichstag when the measure was under discus- 
 sion. But this permissive clause is modified. 
 The courts may be formed either by the communes 
 (Genieinden), or the communal unions (Konwuinal- 
 verbiinde), for the districts under their jurisdiction, 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 179 
 
 but where a court is not established on communal 
 initiative employers and workpeople, either or 
 both, may set the law in operation by requisition 
 to the constitutive organs ; failing action then, the 
 higher administrative organs of the State may step 
 in and compel the application of the law. In 
 practice all the large towns have their own inde- 
 pendent courts, with regulations duly approved by 
 the president of the district. 
 
 In one other important respect the law lacks 
 finality, for it expressly excludes from its benefits 
 many large categories of workpeople. " As work- 
 people in the sense of this law," says section 2, 
 " are to be understood those journeymen, assistants, 
 factory operatives, and apprentices to whom 
 Division 7 of the Industrial Code apphes." This 
 division categorises " industrial workpeople " in 
 the several groups of " journeymen, assistants, 
 apprentices, works' officials, overseers, and tech- 
 nical employes (whose wages do not exceed 1,000 
 marks), and factory operatives," and hence the 
 Act excludes all labourers engaged in agriculture, 
 forestry, and gardening, most employes on rail- 
 ways, canals, and systems of transport, domestic 
 servants, and shop assistants and apprentices ; for 
 the last there are Trades Courts. Exempted, too, 
 are all military and naval works belonging to 
 the State, though other fiscal undertakings rank 
 with private concerns. Employers and workpeople 
 associated in the guilds are, of course, excluded, 
 since, as we have seen, they have their own 
 
i8o THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 courts of arbitration. Mines, salt works, and 
 underground works generally come under the Act, 
 but special courts operate for these industries 
 exclusively. 
 
 The tribunals are empowered to deal with dis- 
 putes between employers and employed, inde- 
 pendently of the amount at stake, in respect of 
 (a) wages contracts and other wages questions, 
 (6) deductions and fines by reason of defective 
 work, (c) terms of notice on both sides, (d) the 
 giving of testimonials, {e) the determination and 
 retention of the sick money payable by work- 
 people, and (/) disputes which may arise amongst 
 workpeople in regard to work done in common for 
 the same employer. Where the industry is a 
 " house industry," the scope of action is restricted, 
 though in the main the same provisions hold 
 good. 
 
 An Industrial Court possesses three distinct 
 functions — (i) it acts first through preliminary 
 tribunals (Courts of First Instance) conducted by 
 permanent officials with juristic training, whose 
 object it is to endeavour to adjust disputes without 
 resort being had to a formal argument of the 
 matter by the aid of witnesses and experts, no 
 fees being here charged ; (2) it acts through 
 Courts of Second Instance, composed of a judicial 
 president and assessors representative of both 
 employers and employed, who hear evidence on 
 oath, and whose decision is final unless the dispute 
 relates to a sum exceeding 100 marks (£5) ; and 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. i8i 
 
 finally (3) on request the court may constitute 
 itself a Board of Conciliation to negotiate between 
 contending parties. 
 
 It will be observed that the ground of appeal, 
 where allowable, is purely financial, although im- 
 portant questions of law — such as the legality of 
 contracts, usages of trade, etc. — are frequently 
 involved in cases where the amount of money in 
 dispute is small. The law, however, contains no 
 clause which can with certainty ensure to a court 
 the desirable legal advice. Indeed, the Act deals 
 very summarily with the legal profession. So 
 clearly was it the intention of the legislature to 
 place industrial peace before legal formality, that 
 advocates are not allowed to plead before them. 
 
 The constitution of a Court of Industry is the 
 simplest possible. It must consist of a president, 
 a deputy, and a certain number of assessors, the 
 latter chosen by secret voting in equal numbers by 
 employers and employed out of their midst, while 
 the presidents — who may be neither employers nor 
 workpeople — are chosen by the local authority, 
 though the elections require ratification by the dis- 
 trict president. The members of a court cannot 
 be chosen for a shorter term than one year, nor 
 for a longer than six years. The qualifications 
 for membership are the completion of the thirtieth 
 year, prior residence or industrial occupation in 
 the district of the court for at least two years, 
 and non-receipt of public relief during the year 
 preceding the election of the court. The voters 
 
1 82 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 must be twenty-five years of a^e and must reside 
 or work in the district. Members of a trade guild 
 for which a Court of Arbitration exists are inehgible 
 for election or for voting. In a town or district 
 with several large industries it is usual to have a 
 separate chamber for each industry. 
 
 A great recommendation of the courts is the 
 cheapness of procedure. There is but one fee as 
 follows : — For claims of 20 marks and under, 
 I mark ; for claims of 20 to 50 marks, 1*50 
 marks; for claims of 50 to 100 marks, 3 marks; 
 and afterwards 3 marks per 100 marks up to 
 a maximum of 30 marks. It is, however, within 
 the power of local authorities to make the courts 
 free, and in any case deficits are to be made up 
 out of the local rates, except in the case of the 
 mining courts, whose deficits fall on the State. 
 Fees and costs of both sides fall on the losing 
 party, though where judgment goes by default 
 only half fees are charged. Membership of a 
 court is honorary, and only travelling expenses 
 and simple compensation for loss of time are 
 returned to the assessors. xA.n important pro- 
 vision (section 70) is introduced for the purpose 
 of meeting the needs of districts in which courts 
 do not exist. In such cases disputes of certain 
 kinds may, by consent of both sides, be referred 
 to the president of the parish (Gemeindevorsteher) , 
 whose decisions have legal force unless appeal is 
 made to the ordinary courts of law within ten 
 days of promulgation. 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 183 
 
 A further function of the Industrial Court is 
 that of a Board of Concihation {Einigiingsamt) , 
 mediating between employers and workpeople in 
 the event of strikes or threatened strikes. The 
 only condition is that the reference shall come 
 from both parties to the dispute. The constitu- 
 tion of a Board of Conciliation is the same as 
 that of the ordinary court — the president and four 
 or six assessors, half employers and workpeople 
 respectively, but parties privy to a dispute are 
 ineligible for election. When either side appeals 
 to the court to arbitrate the other side can be 
 compelled to appear, but not to negotiate, and 
 the court only gives a decision when both sides 
 agree to accept its mediation. 
 
 Yet another function is that of Consultative 
 Board or Board of Reference, and this function is 
 compulsorily imposed upon the Industrial Courts. 
 Section 70 says: — "The Industrial Court is 
 obliged, on the requisition of State authorities, or 
 of the President of the Communal Union for which 
 it is established, to give its ' opinion ' {Gutachten) 
 upon industrial questions. For the preparation 
 or pronouncement of such ' opinion ' committees 
 may be formed by the court from its own 
 members. These committees, when they have 
 to deal with questions affecting the interests of 
 both sides, must be composed half of employers 
 and half of workpeople. In the same way the 
 court is, in industrial questions affecting the 
 concerns under its jurisdiction, competent to 
 
184 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 make recommendations to local authorities and 
 to communal governing bodies." The assistance 
 of the courts is not often sought in this last 
 capacity. During last year not a single request 
 for advice was made to the Industrial Court of 
 Berlin, though it issued voluntarily several 
 recommendations. 
 
 It will be rightly concluded, from the simplicity 
 of the constitution of these tribunals, and the 
 care that is taken by the law to secure cheapness of 
 procedure, that no very large burden falls upon 
 the communes. Sometimes the deficit left after 
 the deduction of fees is made a common charge 
 on the local funds, but more usually it is covered 
 by a slight addition to the tax on occupations, 
 which forms an important source of revenue in 
 most German towns. 
 
 Naturally the great majority of disputes come 
 before the industrial courts in their preliminary 
 capacity, and the mode of procedure may well be 
 described here. The Berlin Industrial Court is 
 divided into eight chambers, dealing with as many 
 groups of trades and industries, and by the 
 courtesy of the chief president of the court I 
 was invited to attend sittings of several of the 
 chambers, an experience which was as interesting 
 as it was instructive. 
 
 The first court which I attended dealt with 
 disputes which had arisen in the building group 
 of trades — a broad category, embracing masons at 
 one end of the industrial scale and chimney-sweeps 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 185 
 
 at the other. The court being that of first in- 
 stance, its function was the prehminary one of 
 settlement by mutual agreement and concession. 
 A young jurist sat as president, and the only 
 other official was a secretary who took note 
 of the proceedings. A touch of the electric bell 
 upon the president's desk informed the police- 
 constable in charge of the door that the court 
 was ready. Outside one heard two names called, 
 and a moment later their owners entered the 
 room, and with a respectful bow and a " Good- 
 morning" to the president each took his appointed 
 place as plaintiff or respondent before the rail- 
 ing which divided the court from the rest of the 
 room. 
 
 In this instance an employer came with a small 
 claim for damage. He was a quiet, deliberate 
 man, who knew what he was about, while his 
 workman soon fell into the mood of noisy 
 argumentativeness, and punctuated the statement 
 of the case against him, which was one of alleged 
 bad work, with energetic comments like " Untrue ! " 
 and " That's not the case ! " which the president 
 good-humouredly excused. The quieter of the 
 two litigants had the better of the duel. In the 
 second case a mason took the complainant's place. 
 In this case the employer had offered 24s. for a 
 certain piece of work and the man demanded 28s. 
 as being quite little enough. But he had 
 unfortunately done the work before he complained 
 of the price. 
 
i86 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 " You should not have done the work," said the 
 president, 
 
 " I told him to take it or leave it," interrupted 
 the employer. 
 
 The law being evidently against the man, the 
 president urged the withdrawal of the claim, and 
 advised -the exercise of greater care next time. 
 With a grumble the workman accepted the 
 'suggestion, and the case was over in two minutes. 
 Had lawyers been engaged in it as many hours 
 would have been consumed. Besides, no fees 
 of any kind are here paid. Naturally the evidence 
 was all given without the administration of the 
 judicial oath. 
 
 In the next case an employer (A.) had allowed 
 a man (B.) doing piece work for him to call in 
 another man (C.) to help him ; then he him- 
 self gave a helping hand, and at the end of 
 the task he wished to set his own contribution 
 of work against that of C, and made a deduc- 
 tion from B.'s wages accordingly. To this B. 
 demurred, demanding the whole of the sum bar- 
 gained for. 
 
 " Halve it," suggested the president, appealing 
 to the disputants together. 
 
 " But I shall still be the loser !" exclaimed the 
 employer. 
 
 " Oh, you can bear it, you know," said the 
 president coaxingly. 
 
 There was just a moment's pause; then the 
 employer agreed, though one noticed that he paid 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 187 
 
 over the sum with the air of one who would go 
 away sorrowful. 
 
 In an interval the president informed me that 
 at least 50 per cent, of the cases are in this 
 way arranged by the methods of conciliation. 
 As a rule there is wrong as well as right on 
 both sides, and substantial justice is usually done 
 by the rough expedient known as "sphtting the 
 difference." 
 
 In the succeeding case a workman had been 
 absent nine or ten days — owing to illness, as it 
 proved — but had not communicated with his em- 
 ployer, who engaged some one in his place. On 
 learning this he claimed wages in lieu of notice. 
 The president advised the withdrawal of the 
 claim as useless, informing the complainant that 
 expense would thus be saved, and the advice was 
 wisely taken. 
 
 The next couple of litigants included a pictur- 
 esque figure — a resolute-looking working man, 
 with restless eyes and hair dishevelled, a man 
 with plenty of character of the primitive sort, 
 and with a strong sense of his own rights. He 
 was the complainant, but the president at once 
 pointed out the legal weakness and indeed un- 
 tenableness of his claim, upon which signs of 
 acute dissatisfaction appeared upon the stern and 
 lowering face. 
 
 " But you can appeal, if you like," said the 
 president reassuringly, for he saw the sort of man 
 he had to deal with. 
 
i88 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 ** No, I won't. That man is wrong in his head ! " 
 (This with a dramatic and disdainful levelling of 
 the finger at the victorious employer.) 
 
 With a stamp of the foot and a wave of his hat 
 in the air the disappointed suitor left the room 
 reflecting doubtless that the " law was an ass," 
 and more than ever convinced that Socialism was 
 the only remedy against unjust employers and 
 'corrupt Courts of Arbitration. 
 
 It was the only time that morning that the 
 president had had to ring his bell to assert the 
 authority and dignity of the court. 
 
 Again a workman came in to lodge a claim 
 against an employer. He was a joiner and claimed 
 36 marks i£iji 6s.) for a certain commission. But 
 the employer objected that the work was not 
 done according to sample. They were both hard 
 subjects, and for a time neither would listen to the 
 bare mention of compromise. 
 
 " Will you take half?" asked the president of 
 the complainant. 
 
 " Never ! never ! " was the indignant rejoinder. 
 
 One should not say never — it is a word 
 responsible for more mendacity than any other. 
 The president reflected a moment, then tried 
 again : 
 
 " I think it would be better to agree." 
 
 " But the wood was bad, and the price was low 
 to begin with, and I did the best work I could." 
 
 To this the respondent quite as warmly objected. 
 
 " Then take 20 marks," said the president. 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 189 
 
 "I'll give that, and no more," put in the 
 respondent. 
 
 For an instant the plaintiff seemed undecided, 
 then he gave in, " to save expense," he said. And 
 so the matter was decided. 
 
 The next ring of the bell brought but one suitor. 
 The other failed to appear, and judgment went by 
 default. But the case was not necessarily decided. 
 Should either a complainant or a respondent fail 
 to appear, decision is entered in favour of the 
 one who answers to the summons, but on the 
 prompt petition of the absentee the case may 
 be heard again, though in the event of a second 
 non-appearance judgment goes definitively by 
 default. 
 
 Directly the succeeding case was opened, the 
 president found that it had come before the 
 wrong court, but in dismissing the parties he 
 urged them to use the respite thus gained in 
 coming to terms. 
 
 I had been assured by a very competent 
 authority, whose name must be withheld, that 
 the building trades of Berlin furnish most of the 
 worse cases with which the courts have to deal, 
 inasmuch as the smaller speculative contractors 
 " number many rascals who plunder men right 
 and left when they have a chance." Now I was 
 to have evidence of such a case. The next claim 
 was advanced by a small independent artisan, 
 who had done a large amount of work for an 
 unscrupulous client. He had long and vainly 
 
igo THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 appealed to the latter for payment, but at last the 
 debtor, a thickly-built, coarse-looking, oily-faced 
 man of middle age, sent a messenger with a receipt 
 made out for only a portion of the amount due, 
 and promised payment of the sum stated directly 
 the receipt was signed. The unwary artisan 
 signed the receipt and received the money. But 
 the balance had not since been paid, and now he 
 claimed it. He stated his case fairly and tem- 
 perately, and awaited the result with evident con- 
 fidence. Without saying a word, the debtor 
 whipped out of his pocket a receipt and handed 
 it to the president, who read aloud: *' Received 
 in full discharge of my debt," etc. 
 
 " But you have already given a receipt for the 
 whole debt," said the president to the surprised 
 plaintiff, who now learned the deception for the 
 first time, for he had never read the full terms of 
 the receipt. He protested and declaimed, while 
 the respondent smiled. 
 
 *' I can't go beyond this receipt," said the 
 president. " The moral is never to sign any docu- 
 ment before reading it." 
 
 So the claim had to be withdrawn, and the rogue 
 who had won took himself off with an odious salute 
 to the court. I confess to having experienced a 
 strong temptation so far to abuse hospitality as to 
 kick the fellow downstairs. 
 
 And so the cases proceeded, new points arising 
 at every turn and new phases of human nature 
 constantly displaying themselves. Throughout, 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 191 
 
 the proceedings ofthe court were orderly, business- 
 like, expeditious. The president acted like a 
 man who had a perfect grasp of his work. He 
 kept both plaintiff and respondent to the point, 
 checking irrelevant speech with firm yet pacific 
 and good-natured interposition. Yet everybody 
 had a fair and ample opportunity of stating his 
 case, and if in difficulty a helping hand into the 
 bargain. Considerable tact, a sympathetic bearing, 
 and quiet decision in meeting the legal aspects of 
 issues involved enabled him to adjust nearly all the 
 disputes which came before him. The parties 
 were not always satisfied with the terms which 
 they accepted at his suggestion, but at any rate 
 they were almost invariably assured that they 
 could expect no better by carrying the pro- 
 ceedings to a further court, with the attendant 
 expense and waste of time. 
 
 But this is to realise the real object of the 
 court. This is peace and conciliation — not the 
 rancorous legal thrashing out of disputes, but the 
 supersession of the ordinary court of law ; not the 
 weighing out on an apothecary's scale of every 
 pound of flesh which Antonio may owe to Shylock, 
 but the striking of a broad compromise neither 
 exactly fair nor grossly unfair to either side. The 
 practical working of the institution left upon my 
 mind a most favourable impression. Without the 
 interposition of legal advocates, without the setting 
 in operation of legal machinery at all, without a 
 farthing of expense to clients, and with a minimum 
 
192 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 of time, expenditure and inconvenience, hundreds 
 and thousands of disputes between employers and 
 workpeople are settled yearly, and settled in such 
 a satisfactory manner that the number of the 
 suitors who seek the help of the courts increases 
 from year to year. 
 
 Upon this point let me give a few figures, which 
 were placed at my disposal by one of the permanent 
 officials of the Berlin Court of Industry. During 
 twelve months 12,872 cases came before the several 
 chambers, and of this number 6,123 (almost one- 
 halt) were settled by conciliation, while of the rest 
 2,742 were withdrawn. As to the amounts in 
 dispute, no fewer than 6,054 cases related to sums 
 not exceeding 20s., and one was but 6d., while 
 4,525 sums were between ,^1 and £2 los. ; 1,847 
 between £2 los. and ^^5 ; 434 between £$ and 
 £10; 115 between j^io and ;i^i5 ; 121 exceeded 
 £15, and the highest was ;^i85. The great 
 majority of the claims related to retained wages or 
 to compensation for dismissal without notice, but 
 others had to do with the imposition of fines, 
 damage to goods and tools, etc. Note, too, the 
 expedition with which claims are disposed of. In 
 18 per cent, of the total cases less than a week 
 was necessary, in 51 per cent, of the cases less 
 than a fortnight, and in only 5 per cent, did the 
 time required exceed a month. Further, during a 
 recent year the Berlin Court acted 37 times as a 
 Board of Conciliation, and in about half of these 
 cases with satisfactory results. The court was 
 
COURTS OF ARBITRATION. 193 
 
 appealed to by the workpeople in 17 disputes, 
 though nearly always the employers declined its 
 mediation ; it was appealed to in ten cases by 
 both parties, and in nine of these cases an agree- 
 ment was arrived at. 
 
 G.W. 
 
194 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 
 
 ( The German Socialist or Labour party has 
 liTtle that is favourable to say of the laws which 
 have been passed for the protection of the working 
 classes, and it is not in the habit of spoiling with 
 praise or compliment the statesmen and Govern- 
 ments by whom these laws have been originated. 
 On the other hand, the industrial insurance 
 legislation is genuinely appreciated, if not openly 
 commended. Much criticism is passed upon 
 matters of administration, but there can be no 
 denying the popularity of the laws under which the 
 great majority of the wage-earning classes of 
 Germany are insured against loss of earning power 
 ^ in four several ways — by sickness, by accident, by 
 \:Ad age, and by permanent invalidity. 
 
 INSURANCE AGAINST SICKNESS. 
 
 The law of 1883 on sickness insurance came 
 into force as from December i, 1884, though it 
 only took its present form by the amending statute 
 of May 25, 1903, which took effect on January i, 
 1904. The law requires insurance against sick- 
 ness in the case of all persons who are regularly 
 employed for wages or salary in factories, mines,/ 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 195 
 
 salt works, ore-dressing works, quarries and pits, 
 smelting works, on railways, internal waterways 
 and dredging operations, wharves, and other 
 industrial concerns, as well as on all operations in 
 which power is used ; also the employes in the 
 postal and telegraphic service, and the technical 
 works of the navy and army ; also works' managers, 
 overseers, engineers, shop assistants and appren- 
 tices, the employes of lawyers, notaries, and 
 bailiffs, and of sick funds and of insurance 
 institutions, so long as they are in regular 
 employment and do not earn more than 6| 
 marks daily or 2,000 marks (£100) yearly. 
 
 As a general rule employes who only worlr inter- 
 mittentlyarenot liable to be insured, nor are persons 
 in independent position, however restricted their 
 resources. Other specific exemptions are soldiers 
 and sailors, persons in the service of the Empire, 
 States, or communal unions who have claims 
 upon their employers to the continued payment of 
 salary or wages and to free medical attendance in 
 the event of illness ; with assistants and apprentices 
 of apothecaries, and servants in general, save when 
 in addition to house work they do industrial work 
 for their employers. Persons liable may also be 
 exempted when they are protected in other ways. 
 It is, however, left to the communes and communal 
 unions to extend the liability to insure at will to 
 intermittent labourers ; to all persons in communal 
 service, so long as they do not receive more than 
 2,000 marks yearly ; to members of an employer's 
 
 o 2 
 
196 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 family (for example, wife and children) who work 
 for him without a formal service contract ; to 
 independent workers in the house industry ; and 
 to workmen and officials in agriculture and 
 forestry, but the former only if their salaries 
 do not exceed 2,000 marks. It is, however, 
 competent for domestic servants, intermittent 
 workpeople, communal employes, and members 
 of an employer's family to insure themselves 
 voluntarily with a communal insurance fund, 
 paying the whole premium, though the disquali- 
 fication of a 2,000 marks income still applies. It 
 is also provided that when a person is once insured 
 he may continue the insurance even though his 
 income should exceed the exclusion limit (2,000 
 marks), though should an insured person be again 
 compulsorily insured in another fund owing to 
 change of occupation, the first insurance must 
 lapse, for no one may be insured in two funds 
 simultaneously. The continuance of an insurance 
 in a communal sick fund is conditional on the 
 insured person residing in the commune in which 
 he has hitherto lived or was last occupied. 
 
 Where insurance is compulsory it begins with 
 the employment of the worker, and is indepen- 
 dent of age or sex. Thus children who are still 
 of school age yet who regularly work for wages 
 during a portion of the day must be insured. The 
 insurance is broken, however, when the employ- 
 ment ceases, to be resumed when employment 
 begins again. ^ There are six groups of insurance 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 197 
 
 societies or agencies — the local sick funds estab- 
 lished by parishes for the trades within their 
 limits ; the industrial or factory sick funds, con- 
 ducted in connexion with the large undertakings ; 
 the building trades sick funds ; the guild sick 
 funds ; and the miners' (KnappschafL) sick funds ; 
 while persons insured in none of these funds yet 
 still liable are gathered into "omnibus" funds 
 established for the purpose by the parishes. The 
 regulations of the guild funds, the miners' funds, 
 and the voluntary benefit funds differ in many 
 details from those otherwise applicable, but the 
 general basis of insurance is the same. Special 
 conditions apply to the workers in the home 
 industries, in which the system of employment is 
 very various, some working independently, some 
 independently on commission, and some as direct 
 wage earners. 
 
 The law provides for a minimum benefit, which 
 consists of free medical attendance and medicine, 
 with spectacles, bandages, and surgical aids as 
 needed, from the beginning of sickness ; and in 
 the event of incapacity for work sick pay from the 
 third day of sickness to the extent of half the 
 daily wages on which the contributions have been 
 based. The first two " waiting " days of sickness, 
 during which no pay is given, are called the 
 " Wartezeit." This waiting time may, however, be 
 disregarded if the members of a fund are so minded. 
 The longest period for which sick pay is granted is 
 26 weeks, after which, should incapacity continue. 
 
igS THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 the liability is transferred to the Accident Insur- 
 ance Fund, though medical attendance may 
 continue for a year. A higher percentage of the 
 wages earned may be paid in sick money under 
 certain circumstances. The sick pay is as a rule 
 for work days only, but it may be claimed for 
 Sundays and festivals when employes are liable 
 to work on those days. A commune may also by 
 resolution decide to pay sick pay for every day in 
 the week.^ 
 
 Whiie^in the case of a local sick fund the basis 
 of contribution and of benefit is the wages of 
 local day labour, in the case of the other funds 
 the basis is the average wages of the industry or 
 trade to which the insured person belongs, with a 
 maximum of 4 marks per day, so that the sick pay 
 cannot exceed 2 marks, unless the insured are 
 divided into classes according to their earnings, 
 when the actual mean wages of each class are 
 taken and a maximum of 5 marks is accepted as 
 the basis and one of 2*50 marks as the benefit 
 which may be claimed. Special benefits are 
 secured to women in childbirth, and funeral benefit 
 to the amount of 40 times the sum of the daily 
 sick pay is also paid, but in case of accident the 
 sick fund receives this sum back from the Accident 
 Insurance Fund where the relatives have an equal 
 claim upon that fund. 
 
 To take an illustration of the working of this 
 law, a workman earning £1 4s. per week pays a 
 weekly premium of <^^d. and receives during 26 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 199 
 
 weeks of sickness 12s. a week and 5s. ^d. in medical 
 attendance and medicine, while ^^4 is payable as 
 funeral money. Similarly, a workwoman earning 
 16s. pays a weekly premium of 5fi. and receives 
 during 26 weeks' sickness 8s. a week, with medical 
 attendance and medicine to the value of 5s. ^d. a 
 week ; she has a claim to ^2 8s. at childbirth, 
 and there is funeral pay of £2 13s. 4d. 
 
 Instead, however, of insured persons receiving 
 free medical attendance at home they may be 
 treated in hospital — (i) with their consent in the 
 case of married people, people having homes of 
 their own, or members of families living together ; 
 and (2) without their consent when to their cure 
 are necessary such attendance and nursing as 
 cannot be efficiently given in their own homes, also 
 in the case of infectious disease, and where the 
 insured have no households of their own. Where a 
 person upon whom others depend for support is 
 attended in a hospital, half the sick pay to which 
 he would otherwise have had a claim is paid to 
 him. 
 
 In general, power is retained to reduce or even 
 to withhold the benefit in case of sickness due to 
 culpable causes or to drunkenness. Where an 
 insured person has received twenty-six weeks* sick 
 pay within twelve months, the benefit and the free 
 attendance may be restricted to thirteen weeks 
 should he be incapacitated again during the next 
 twelve months in respect of the same sickness, but 
 it is a condition precedent that the liability must 
 
aoo THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 fall upon the same fund. In the case of agricul- 
 tural andforest labourers a curtailment of premiums 
 and also of benefits may, on the employers' requisi- 
 tion, be enforced where wages in part take the 
 form of payment in kind. The communes may 
 also introduce family insurance, the head of a 
 family paying the special premiums, but in this 
 case only medical attendance with medicine or 
 treatment in hospital is granted — there is no sick 
 pay. It is within the power of most of the funds 
 to extend the sick relief to a maximum of one year, 
 toincreasethe benefit tothree-quarters of the wages, 
 to increase the relief given to the families of per- 
 sons treated in hospital to half their wages, to give 
 to such persons who have no dependents a quarter 
 of their wages, to grant relief to convalescents, to 
 grant relief during six weeks preceding confine- 
 ment, as well as six weeks after, and to double the 
 funeral money. Relief to convalescents may take 
 the form of maintenance in a suitable home for a 
 full year after the cessation of actual sickness. 
 
 The contributions are paid to the extent of two- 
 thirds by the insured and to the extent of one-third 
 by their employers. In the case of communal funds 
 the premium may not as a rule exceed i^ per cent, 
 of the local wages of day labour (not the wages 
 of the individual insured), but an increase to 3 per 
 cent, is permitted where the unsatisfactory con- 
 dition of the insurance funds requires it. In the 
 case of the organised compulsory funds the 
 premiums of the workpeople may not as a rule 
 
 I 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 201 
 
 exceed 3 per cent, of the wages — that is, the 
 wages of the individual or of the class to which the 
 workman may belong, according to the basis of 
 insurance adopted — so long as the relief granted is 
 the minimum. When a higher scale of relief is 
 given, 4 per cent, of the wages may be levied on 
 the workman. In every case the employer pays 
 half as much as his employes. By permission of 
 the higher administrative authority the contribu- 
 tions may also be graduated according to " danger 
 classes," save in communal insurance. Small 
 artisans not using steam or other elementary 
 power and not employing more than two persons 
 may be exempted from contributing to the cost of 
 their workpeople's insurance, and in this case the 
 workpeople may be assessed up to from 3 to 4 
 per cent, of their wages. No premiums are pay- 
 able so long as sick relief is received. An employer 
 must in every case report to the competent fund 
 those of his workpeople who are liable to insurance, 
 and on their registration he must deduct their legal 
 contributions from their wages and pay them to 
 the fund with his own contributions in the way 
 prescribed by the statutes. 
 
 ^1 The workpeople have a large share in the 
 management of the sick funds, except in the case 
 of communal insurance, where the local adminis- 
 trative body takes entire charge and entire respon- 
 sibility. In the case of the organised compulsory 
 funds the managing body is elected by the em- 
 ployers and employed. Each fund has either 
 
202 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 a ** general meeting," to which all members of 
 the fund twenty-one years of age, and in pos- 
 session of civil rights, belong, or a delegation of 
 the members, the latter being the rule when the 
 members number 500. Yet the employers' repre- 
 sentatives may never number more than half of 
 the workers' representatives, whether the adminis- 
 trative power be direct or delegated. In the 
 election to the delegated assemblies the principle 
 of secret voting applies. The general meeting 
 elects the executive (Vorsiand), each section 
 choosing its own representatives, and membership 
 is honorary unless the statutes of the fund order 
 otherwise. 
 
 INSURANCE AGAINST ACCIDENT. 
 
 ^ The Accident Insurance Laws, dating from July 
 6th, 1884, to June 30th, 1900, embrace employes 
 in factories, workshops, and mines, the transport 
 industries (both land and water), agriculture and 
 forestry, building works, the State and public 
 services (railway, post, telegraph, etc.), prisoners 
 engaged in work which would require free work- 
 men to be insured ; in general, all the kinds of 
 employment to which sickness insurance applies, 
 and some others. Here, not only wage-earners, 
 but managing officials and overseers with salaries 
 not exceeding 3,000 marks (£"150), are liable to 
 insurance. Insurance may also be extended to 
 independient employers whose yearly earnings 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 203 
 
 do not exceed 3,000 marks and who do not regu- 
 larly employ more than two paid workmen, to 
 workers in the home industries, and in excep- 
 tional cases to managing officials whose earnings 
 exceed 3,000 marks. The insuring organs are (i) in 
 the case of industrial undertakings the employers, 
 who for this purpose form themselves into trade 
 associations {Berufsgenossenschaften) ; (2) in the case 
 of Imperial or State undertakings, the Empire or 
 State respectively ; and (3) in the case of prisoners, 
 the State in which the prison or other place of 
 detention is situated. The trade associations 
 cover, as far as possible, separate industries or 
 trades, parity of risk being thus aimed at. They 
 are self-governing, the members of each associa- 
 tion — that is, the whole of the consorted em- 
 ployers — electing their own executive, membership 
 of which is honorary. An association may be 
 divided into local sections, and confidential agents 
 (Vertratiensmdnner) may be appointed for these. 
 The Imperial Insurance Board and the State 
 Insurance Boards exercise supreme control and 
 oversight over the whole of the trade associations, 
 yet only with a view to the full observance of the 
 law. 
 
 An employer becomes ipso facto a member of the 
 trade association of his trade and district from the 
 first day of his establishing an industrial under- 
 taking, and his liability to insure his workpeople 
 and to pay contributions on their behalf neces- 
 sarily follows. The whole of the emplo}ers are 
 
204 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 divided into " danger classes," and the premiums 
 levied are fixed accordingly in a " danger tariff." 
 The workmen make no contribution : the em- 
 ployers bear the whole liability. A trade associa- 
 tion does not, however, confine its attention to 
 paying compensation for accident : it possesses 
 and exercises the right to require the provision of 
 measures and contrivances for the prevention of 
 accident, and where a trade association does not 
 act voluntarily in this matter it must act of neces- 
 sity should the board of control require it. These 
 precautionary measures may apply either to local- 
 ities, to special industries, or to branches of a 
 special concern. Where an employer neglects to 
 comply with the requirements made upon him, he 
 may be fined up to i,ooo marks and be assessed in 
 a higher " danger class," or be called on to pay 
 supplementary contributions. The employes have 
 representatives on the organ of government, and 
 these representatives must be consulted in the 
 adoption of preventive regulations, in the investi- 
 gation of cases of accident, and in the proceedings 
 taken before the Arbitration Courts and the 
 Imperial Insurance Board. 
 
 Compensation is paid even though there be 
 negligence on the workman's part, though none 
 where a workman has intentionally caused the 
 accident ; where the accident has been caused by 
 a criminal act there is discretionary power to 
 curtail the normal compensation or to allow none 
 at all. The compensation payable in case of 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 20^ 
 
 injury begins only at the expiration of thirteen 
 weeks after the occurrence of the accident, the 
 sick fund or the individual employer being res- 
 ponsible in the interval ; after that time the trade 
 association provides all requisite medical attend- 
 ance, medicine, and other curative treatment, and 
 also pays a weekly pension (Rente) so longs as 
 incapacity lasts. 
 
 CThe amount of the pension depends on the 
 yearly earnings of the injured person and on the 
 degree to which his earning power is depreciated, 
 though it is provided that where the earnings 
 exceed 1,500 marks only one-third of the excess 
 may be reckoned. The year's earnings are 
 taken at 300 times the average daily wage, though 
 where from the nature of his occupation a man 
 works either more or less than 300 days this 
 number is increased or decreased accordingly. 
 The minimum basis is, however, 300 times the 
 local wages of adult day labour. What is called 
 a full pension (Vollrente) amounts to two-thirds of 
 the yearly wages so arrived at, and this is given in 
 case of complete incapacity to work ; while a 
 smaller percentage is given where the earning 
 capacity is only partially destroyed; thus where 
 the earning capacity is diminished to the extent of 
 one-half, 50 per cent, of the full pension, or one- 
 third of the yearly earnings, is given. Where an 
 insured person was incapable of earning at the 
 time of the accident no pension is given, but only 
 free medical treatment, though should the effect of 
 
2o6 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 the accident be to make him dependent upon 
 others for nursing, half the full pension must be 
 paid so long as this condition of helplessness 
 continues. Under the same circumstances a full 
 pension may be increased to full wages in the case 
 of persons who were capable of earning, while it is 
 discretionary to increase a partial to a full pension 
 in any case temporarily. Where the partial pen- 
 sion is fixed at not more than 15 per cent, of the 
 full pension it may, on the application of the 
 insured, be commuted for a capital payment, in 
 which case there can be no further claim how- 
 ever the case may turn, but care must be taken 
 that the recipient understands this. 
 
 In place of free attendance and a pension an 
 injured person may be given gratuitous treatment 
 in a hospital, but his consent is required when he 
 is married, when he has a household of his own, 
 or lives with the household of a member of his 
 family, though not when he cannot be efficiently 
 treated at home. During treatment in hospital 
 the nearest relatives of an injured person receive 
 the pension to which they would have a claim in 
 the event of his death, but the trade associations 
 may at their discretion grant even more than this. 
 On his own request a pensioner may surrender 
 his pension and instead be received into a curative 
 institution and there be treated at the cost of the 
 trade association. 
 
 Should an accident have fatal result death 
 money to the extent of one-fifteenth of the yearly 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 207 
 
 earnings, with a minimum of 50 marks, is paid, 
 with pensions to the relatives as follows : — (i) To 
 the widow until her death or re-marriage and to 
 every child until the end of the fifteenth year, 
 20 per cent, of the yearly earnings, but not more 
 than 60 per cent, in the aggregate, though should 
 the marriage have taken place since the accident 
 no pension can be claimed. In the event of re- 
 marriage the widow receives 60 per cent, of the 
 year's earnings as a final payment. (2) The 
 children of a widow receive each 20 per cent, of 
 her yearly earnings, but 60 per cent, in the aggre- 
 gate equally divided. (3) The husband and each 
 child of a woman who dies through accident, and 
 who has wholly or partially kept the family owing 
 to the incapacity of the husband, each 20 per cent, 
 of her yearly earnings, with a maximum of 60 per 
 cent., though only in the event of need and in the 
 case of children until the end of the fifteenth year. 
 (4) Parents and grand-parents dependent upon a 
 deceased person, 20 per cent, together, so far as 
 the pensions of the husband or wife and children 
 do not reach the maximum of 60 per cent., parents 
 coming first. (5) Grand-children where similarly 
 dependent, 20 per cent, together until the com- 
 pletion of the fifteenth year, if 60 per cent, is not 
 already given as above. 
 
 To take, again, a concrete illustration of how 
 this law operates, a workman with earnings of 
 £"69 I IS. a year who was crushed and lost both arms 
 received during ninety days medical treatment 
 
2o8 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 to the value of ^15 6s., and his family received 
 £10 4s. in relief, while, being completely incapa- 
 citated from following his occupation, he was 
 able afterwards to claim an annuity of £46 8s., 
 with ;£'23 3s. additional annually during complete 
 helplessness, and his relatives were able to claim 
 an annuity of £41 15s. in the event of his death 
 and funeral money of ^^4 12s. Similarly an 
 agricultural labourer earning £2^ a year received 
 medical attendance during 105 days to the value 
 of £'j 17J., and his family received relief simulta- 
 neously to the amount of ;^4i 3i'., while owing to 
 his injuries taking away 90 per cent, of his earning 
 capacity he was assured an annuity of ^16 4^., 
 and at his death his relatives would be entitled to 
 receive nearly the same amount, with funeral pay 
 
 of £2 lOJ". 
 
 In general where accident insurance money is 
 paid there is no further claim upon the employer 
 individually. The insurance of industrial workers, 
 agricultural labourers, workers in the building 
 trades, workers in navigation, prisoners, and 
 officials and soldiers is effected under separate 
 laws, each of which has features peculiar to 
 itself, and for a technical knowledge of the 
 question reference must be made to the statutes 
 themselves. The handicrafts, the home industry, 
 the small employers working independently, and 
 many commercial occupations, embracing in the 
 aggregate some two millions of employes, remain 
 as yet outside the scope of the accident insurance 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 209 
 
 laws, but their inclusion is only a matter of 
 time. 
 
 INSURANCE AGAINST OLD AGE AND 
 INVALIDITY. 
 
 Liability to insurance against old age and 
 invalidity falls on workers who have completed 
 their sixteenth year and work for wages or salary, 
 and no fixed period of employment is necessary 
 as a prior condition. The employes universally 
 liable are (i) industrial workmen, assistants, 
 journeymen, apprentices, domestic servants, and 
 sailors (both marine and internal navigation), and 
 (2), where the earnings do not exceed 2,000 marks 
 yearly, managing officials, overseers, and technical 
 employes, shop assistants and apprentices, private 
 officials, the higher class of domestic and hotel 
 employes, teachers and tutors, ships' officers ; 
 and also, by decision of the Federal Council, 
 tradesmen and other employers who do not 
 regularly employ more than one workman, and 
 workers in the home industry. The exemptions 
 from insurance are soldiers who are employed in 
 military service as labourers, apothecaries' assis- 
 tants, persons to whom an invalidity pension has 
 already been granted or whose earning power has 
 been diminished by age, sickness, or weakness in 
 such a way that they are unable to earn a third 
 of the wages which would fall to normal work- 
 people of the class to which they belong ; officials 
 
 G.w. p 
 
210 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 in the Imperial, State, and communal service, 
 officers of insurance institutions and funds, so far 
 as they have expectation of a pension equal to 
 the minimum amount given under this law accord- 
 ing to the rates of the first wages class; teachers 
 and tutors in public schools so long as they are 
 in training or have expectation of a pension as 
 above; and foreigners (on the resolution of the 
 Federal Council) whose residence in the country 
 is only permitted for a definite time. The follow- 
 ing may also be exempted on their own request : 
 (i) persons who have completed their seventieth 
 year ; (2) persons who undertake work in definite 
 seasons for not more than twelve weeks in the 
 course of a calendar year or who do not work 
 more than fifty days during the whole year, and 
 for the rest are independent and receive neither 
 wages nor salary, yet only when contributions 
 have not been levied from them for 100 weeks ; 
 (3) persons in receipt of an accident pension 
 which is not less than an invalidity pension 
 reckoned according to the rates of the first wages 
 class ; and (4) persons who, because of their 
 earlier employment in the service of Empire, State, 
 or commune, or of insurance institutions and 
 funds, or as teachers in public schools, already 
 receive pensions to the minimum amount above 
 stated. Voluntary insurance is open to the 
 following classes of people who have not com- 
 pleted their fortieth year : (i) employes with 
 regular earnings of from 2,000 to 3,000 marks ; 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 211 
 
 (2) persons who are not liable because they are 
 employed entirely in return for free maintenance ; 
 
 (3) persons who are exempt because they follow 
 a temporary occupation which has been declared 
 by the Federal Council not to be liable to 
 insurance ; (4) tradespeople and employers who 
 do not regularly employ more than two paid 
 workpeople liable to insurance ; and (5) home 
 workers in so far as they have not been declared 
 liable to insurance by the Federal Council. 
 Persons who have left an employment which 
 required them to be insured may continue the 
 insurance voluntarily. 
 
 The work of insurance is carried on by insurance 
 societies in co-operation with State administrative 
 bodies subject to the control of the insurance 
 boards of the Empire and States. These societies 
 (Anstalten) are formed for single or combined 
 communal unions, for portions of a State, for a 
 whole State, or for several States together. The 
 " mutual " principle is followed in the incidence of 
 the expenditure, a portion of this being distributed 
 amongst all the institutions and the rest falling 
 on individual agencies. The representatives of the 
 employers and employed upon the several organs 
 of management — the pension agency {Renienstelle), 
 the executive, and the committee (Ausschuss) are 
 honorary officers and have only a claim to out-of- 
 pocket expenses, these covering in the case of 
 workpeople loss of time and earnings. Employers 
 or their representatives must serve when elected, 
 
 p 2 
 
212 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 but workpeople are under no such compulsion. 
 Where employers and employed are represented 
 on managing bodies they must be elected in equal 
 numbers. Only men of full age may be elected, 
 and election is for five years. 
 
 The receipt of an invalidity or old age annuity 
 depends on three conditions — the payment of the 
 prescribed statutory contributions ; the observance 
 of the prescribed " waiting time " of 200 weeks in 
 the case of invalidity and 1,200 weeks in the case 
 of old age ; and the occurrence either of inability 
 to earn a livelihood or the prescribed age of quali- 
 fication, viz., the completed seventieth year. There 
 are three contributions — equal payments by the 
 employers and their insured workpeople and a 
 subsidy by the Empire of 50 marks towards every 
 pension granted. The premiums are payable for 
 every week of -v^rk, and the insured are divided 
 into five wages classes, for which the weekly pre- 
 miums, payable half b}^ the worker and half by the 
 employer, are 14, 20, 24, 30, and 36 pfennige 
 respectively. Thus the obligation of each is as 
 follows : — 
 
 
 Marks. 
 
 Wages class. 
 
 £ 5- d. 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 Premium paid both by w 
 man and employer. 
 
 I. 
 
 2. 
 
 3- 
 
 4- 
 
 5- 
 
 Up to 350 
 350 to 550 
 550 to 850 
 850 to 1 150 
 over 1150 
 
 or 17 10 
 ,, 17 10 to 
 ,, 27 10 to 
 ,, 42 10 to 
 „ 57 10 
 
 27 10 
 42 10 
 57 10 
 
 7 pfennige or Id. 
 10 ,, ,, i\d. 
 12 „ ,, i\d 
 15 II II Ib'^. 
 18 „ „ ■2id. 
 
 The class to which a man belongs does not 
 depend on his full yearly earnings, but is deter- 
 mined in various ways ; though the usual wages 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 213 
 
 basis is 300 times the daily wages of the class of 
 worker insured. Teachers and tutors who do not 
 receive more than 1,150 marks of income are all 
 placed in the fourth class. The premiums are 
 levied in the form of stamps which are issued by 
 the various insurance institutions for the several 
 wages classes and are sold at the post offices 
 and special agencies. These stamps are affixed to 
 receipt cards, which the insured are bound under 
 penalty to use. The cards have places for 52 or 
 more stamps, and must be exchanged for new ones 
 when filled up. The employer deducts a work- 
 man's premiums from his wages, and when the 
 wages are paid stamps must as a rule be affixed 
 for the time covered by them. It is permissible, 
 however, for the premiums due for a whole body of 
 employesto be paid in one sum, as in the case of mem- 
 bers of trade societies, municipal workpeople, etc. 
 While a " waiting time " antecedent to the claim 
 to pension is imposed (200 contributory weeks for 
 invalidity pensions and 1,200 weeks for old age 
 pensions) periods of illness and of military or 
 naval service for the country are reckoned as part 
 of the qualifying time. 
 
 The invalidity pension is an initial {" Gnmd") 
 sum of 60 marks for the first wages class, 70 marks 
 for the second, 80 marks for the third, 90 marks 
 for the fourth, and 100 marks for the fifth ; with 
 an Imperial subsidy of 50 marks in each case, 
 making no, 120, 130, 140, and 150 marks respec- 
 tively. This is the minimum, however, and the 
 
214 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 pensions may be increased, according to the 
 duration of the contribution, until they reach 
 maxima (after fifty years) of 185 marks, 270 
 marks, 330 marks, 390 marks, and 450 marks in 
 the five classes. In return for these maximum 
 pensions the workpeople will have contributed 
 175* 250, 300, 375, and 450 marks respectively. 
 When an insured person is sick, so that inability 
 to work is apprehended, the insurance institution 
 may incur on his behalf the cost of curative treat- 
 ment, and may with his consent treat him in a 
 sanatorium or convalescent home, and while he is 
 under treatment sick pay may be granted to the 
 amount of half the benefit to which he would have 
 been entitled if insured under the Sickness Insur- 
 ance Law, or, if not insured, to the amount of one 
 quarter of the local day wages of a day labourer. 
 There is no claim to an invalidity annuity, how- 
 ever, when the invalidity has been intentionally 
 caused. 
 
 An old age pension may be claimed on the com- 
 pletion of the seventieth year so long as the other 
 conditions have been fulfilled. It consists of the 
 Imperial subsidy of 50 marks plus 60 marks in the 
 first wages class, plus go marks in the second, 
 120 marks in the third, 150 marks in the fourth, 
 and 180 marks in the fifth, making together 
 no, 140, 170, 200, and 230 marks respectively. 
 The pensions are paid through the local post 
 offices where the recipients live. Finally, to meet 
 the case of those who, after contributing to the 
 
INDUSTRIAL INSURANCE LAWS. 215 
 
 funds, do not live to enjoy the promised benefits 
 or otherwise forfeit them, it is provided that half 
 of the premiums paid by insured persons shall be 
 returned in the event of death before the receipt 
 of an annuity, in the event of incapacity occurring 
 ov^^ing to an accident which is compensated out of 
 the accident insurance funds, and in the event of 
 an insured woman marrying. 
 / How gigantic is this triple system of insurance 
 may best be shown by figures. In 1903 the number 
 of persons insured against sickness was 10,914,433, 
 the number of persons insured against accident 
 was 17,965,000, and the number insured against 
 old age and invalidity was 13,567,000. The entire 
 receipts of the sickness insurance fund in 1903 
 were ;£'io, 300,000 ; those of the accident insurance 
 fund, 3^7,300,000 ; and those of the invalidity and 
 old age fund, 5^9,100,000 — a total of ^^26,700,000. 
 The expenditurefor the same year was 3^21,820,000, 
 ^9,990,000 being paid in sick relief, 3^6,800,000 
 in compensation for accidents, and 3^5,030,000 
 in old age and invalidity pensions. The accumu- 
 lated funds at the end of the year exceeded 
 3^72,000,000. 
 
2i6 THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 WORKMAN'S SECRETARIATES. 
 
 Nothing is more interesting to the social 
 student than to observe how in every country the 
 modern labour movement follows lines peculiar to 
 land and people and evolves, even in the use of 
 institutions whose fundamental principles and 
 purposes are common to all countries alike, 
 important differentiations called forth by national 
 circumstances and by inherited traditions. This 
 tendency is strikingly illustrated by the Work- 
 men's Secretariates {Arbeitersekretariate) which 
 have during late years sprung up throughout 
 the whole German Empire, agencies which are 
 doing a great work whose value and utility for 
 the industrial classes it would be difficult to over- 
 estimate. In some respects the German Work- 
 men's Secretariates correspond to the Swiss insti- 
 tution bearing the same name, which has existed 
 since 1887, and it is fair to conclude that the 
 suggestion was taken from the novel conception 
 of the Swiss Working Men's Federation.-^ 
 
 Yet the German working classes have not been 
 servile imitators, and in several vital characteristics 
 
 1 Fully described in my book " Social Switzerland " 
 (London, 1897). 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 217 
 
 the two institutions are quite dissimilar. For 
 example, the Swiss Working Men's Secretariate, 
 which serves for the entire Confederation, is 
 maintained by the State, while the German 
 Secretariates, which are purely urban, have been 
 created and are entirely supported by the allied 
 trade unions. A more important difference is 
 in the work which they are intended to do, the 
 single Swiss Secretariate dealing with the broader 
 industrial issues, while the seventy or so Socialist 
 Secretariates already established in Germany seek 
 to protect and to assert the rights of the working 
 classes, not in the mass but as single individuals, 
 in every department of industrial and civil life. 
 
 What, then, is the Workmen's Secretariate, 
 why does it exist, and what does it do ? Perhaps 
 the Secretariate can be best described as con- 
 sisting of chamber of labour, intelligence 
 bureau, and poor man's lawyer combined. The 
 original idea was that the Workmen's Secretariate 
 should be a sort of '* Inquire Within " for the 
 working man, a mere agency for answering ques- 
 tions, and, though that idea has been greatly 
 enlarged, information and advice are still its 
 principal concern. There are but few countries 
 which do not, owing to the legislation which 
 industrial conditions have called into being, afford 
 scope for informatory agencies of this kind, and in 
 Germany, where political agitation has notoriously 
 gone far ahead of political education, the lack is 
 all the greater inasmuch as the working classes are 
 
2i8 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 there hedged round by a number of laws original 
 in conception and complicated in design, for the 
 comprehension of which they have had no special 
 training, "To the disadvantage of faulty codifica- 
 tion," writes Herr August Miiller in his little 
 monograph upon the Workmen's Secretariates, 
 which I have consulted with advantage, "must be 
 added the clumsy language in which the laws are 
 expressed, which makes it difficult and often 
 almost impossible for a workman — who has 
 acquired not the slightest legal knowledge at 
 school — to find his way without help through 
 the socio-political legislation of his country." 
 
 Hence it is the primary object of the Workmen's 
 Secretariates to give advice upon all the laws 
 which specially concern the working classes, and 
 above all the Insurance Laws (Sickness, Accident, 
 and Old Age and Invalidity), the Factory Laws, 
 the Sanitary Laws, the laws governing the 
 relations of landlord and tenant, of debtor and 
 creditor, the laws on poor relief and maintenance, 
 the Industrial Occupation 'L^.w^Gewerbeordnung), 
 the Commercial Law, the Conciliation and 
 Arbitration Laws, not to speak of administra- 
 tive regulations and ordinances of every kind 
 enforced by Empire, State, province, and munici- 
 pality. With some of these laws the working 
 man is continually brought into palpable contact, 
 and oftentimes he is neither aware of his responsi- 
 bilities to them nor of their obligations to him. 
 Questions as to the bearing of these and other 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 2ig 
 
 laws are answered, guidance as to the right way 
 of securing the due operation of their provisions is 
 furnished, complaints are heard, investigated, and 
 advised upon in a judicial spirit ; as far as is 
 humanly possible the law is stripped of its per- 
 plexity and the path of the working man who 
 would do right by society and have society do 
 right by him is made easy. 
 
 But here the competence of the Workmen's 
 Secretariates is not exhausted. They prepare 
 "opinions" on points of industrial law and custom 
 submitted to them. They draw up memorials 
 and formulate complaints at the instance of the 
 trade unions or their federations. They make 
 arrangements for the elections of Boards of Con- 
 ciliation and of the Courts of Industry. More 
 important still, they mediate in wages disputes, 
 and represent workpeople before industrial and 
 legal tribunals. Some Workmen's Secretariates 
 act as direct organisers of the trade unions. In 
 South Germany, where the existence of more 
 liberal franchise conditions than prevail in the 
 North encourages the working classes to partake 
 actively in the election of the State Diets, the 
 Workmen's Secretariates undertake some of the 
 functions which the political registration associa- 
 tions voluntarily impose upon themselves in this 
 country ; they see that the workers are duly 
 entered upon the registers and are not, owing to 
 their own ignorance or the indifference of officials, 
 deprived of the vote. In another respect some of 
 
220 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 the Workmen's Secretariates offer an example 
 which the trade unions of England might widely 
 follow with advantage, in that they do a really valu- 
 able work of investigation into labour and social 
 questions, such as the questions of wages, hours of 
 work, housing, health and vital statistics, family 
 enumerations and household budgets. 
 
 Intelligence and advice agencies of various kinds 
 had existed before. The trade unions and the 
 political societies of the workers especially advised 
 their members as well as they could on disputed 
 points of industrial and civil law. This kind of help 
 originated in the eighties with some of the Social 
 Democratic journals, which conducted — as they do 
 still — legal " corners," supplemented by personal 
 advice given by their conductors on certain 
 evenings, when readers were invited to bring their 
 difficulties to the editorial room. Then commit- 
 tees were chosen to interest themselves more 
 particularly in this work. Intelligent " comrades " 
 who were engaged during the day in manual work 
 made a special study of the Insurance and Factory 
 Laws, and met at stated times and places during 
 the week to hear complaints and to give advice. 
 Even so long ago, however, it was found that 
 voluntary lay assistance was inadequate to the 
 task. In the words of the Workmen's Secretary 
 at Frankfort-on-Main, Herr Kampffmeyer: — 
 
 " The socio-political committees of workpeople are 
 composed almost exclusively of men whose days are 
 passed in the hustling and nerve-exhausting world 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 221 
 
 of labour. They must rob several hours of their well- 
 earned leisure in order to do justice to the duties 
 which rest upon them. Naturally, the bulk of the 
 work falls upon the shoulders of one man, the pre- 
 sident of the committee, who soon recognises that it 
 is impossible both to follow his daily work and to 
 discharge satisfactorily the responsibilities which are 
 entrusted to him. As he must entrench upon hours 
 and days of his professional work, he can with perfect 
 right claim to be compensated for the wages he has 
 sacrificed. Hence the conditions of life themselves 
 pointed to two principles of fundamental importance — 
 the transference of definite duties exclusively to one 
 person and the payment of this person for his 
 services." 
 
 The religious organisations of the workers — 
 between which and the Social Democratic party 
 the deadliest hostility has always existed — had 
 done work of the same kind. From 1890 forward 
 the Roman Catholics established agencies of advice 
 and help in legal matters in many of the larger 
 industrial towns ; and to-day such agencies exist 
 under the name " Volksbureaux'' in a multitude 
 of towns. Yet they never took any powerful 
 hold of the working classes generally, nor did 
 they go deeply into the matters of prime impor- 
 tance to labour. For prudential reasons they 
 kept off thin ice, and seldom identified them- 
 selves with the workers' interests in any [uncom- 
 promising way. Hence for the most part their 
 clients were not working men at all but artisans 
 and small shopkeepers. 
 
 The conductors of the Protestant workmen's 
 societies followed the example of the Roman 
 
222 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Catholics in a rather half-hearted way, and here 
 and there also information agencies were carried 
 on by municipalities. Added to these were the 
 poor people's lawyers, who carried on a restricted, 
 yet within its narrow limits a beneficial, work in 
 some of the larger towns ; while a very unphilan- 
 thropic counterpart existed in the persons of a host 
 of pettifogging solicitors down in the heels, who 
 eked out a niggardly livelihood by trading on the 
 ignorance and need of their perplexed working- 
 class clients. But these various agencies, differently 
 named and differently operating, rather sympto- 
 mised the workers' need than supplied it, and one 
 characteristic common to all stamped them as 
 inadequate and unsatisfactory, — the fact that they 
 did not emanate from the ranks of the workers 
 themselves, were not a spontaneous product of 
 labour aspiration, and hence were unable to gain 
 the confidence and regard of those whom they 
 were designed to help. 
 
 With the abrogation of the Socialist Law the 
 way was paved for more systematic action. The 
 effect of the great emancipation of the workers in 
 i8go was to give a greater impetus to the organisa- 
 tion of labour. The trade societies rapidly 
 multiplied, and, no longer compelled to meet and 
 agitate in secret, they carried on their propa- 
 gandism with a vigour which was stimulated by 
 the memory of years of repression. The isolated 
 societies combined in larger unions after the 
 fashion of the trades and labour councils in 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 223 
 
 England, and in the end it fell to these composite 
 bodies to take the initiative in the inauguration of 
 a great network of Workmen's Secretariates. 
 
 The first tentative steps were taken in Nurem- 
 berg. Nearly twenty years ago the design 
 of establishing a workmen's labour agency was 
 conceived by the trade unionists of that town, the 
 idea then being to confine attention to disputes 
 over wages and conditions of labour and to claims 
 and difficulties arising out of the Insurance Laws. 
 The scheme was born out of due time and it fell 
 to the ground. In 1891 the local Metal Workers' 
 Union again took up the matter, and after pre- 
 lim.inary obstacles of various kinds had been 
 overcome, a committee of investigation was 
 appointed three years later to carry the project 
 through. Their aims were not then very ambitious ; 
 all they desired to do was to give free advice and 
 informatioB on legal and other points affecting the 
 interests of the workers, to institute systematic 
 inquiries into industrial questions, wages, con- 
 ditions of work, housmg and rents, and food prices, 
 to act as an employment bureau, and to raise funds 
 for assisting unemployed persons to travel in 
 search of work. Every organised workman was 
 to pay 2 pfennige, or {d. a week, and it was 
 expected in this way to raise ;£'i25 a year, which 
 it was hoped the Municipal Council would 
 supplement by a grant out of sympathy with 
 the objects in view. This, however, the Council 
 declined to do, and it was clear that the workers 
 
224 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 would have to depend upon their own resources. 
 While the promoters of the scheme were compelled 
 for the time being to restrict their programme, 
 they lived to be grateful that by being denied 
 municipal help they escaped municipal control, 
 that by losing a subsidy they reserved freedom. The 
 secretariate was duly formed, and was opened on 
 November i, 1894, with Marten Segitz, a metal 
 worker, a capable and devoted advocate of labour, 
 as its first adviser. It opened its doors with a 
 general offer, not only to the organised working 
 classes, but to the townsfolk at large, to impart 
 information gratuitously upon all questions of 
 labour law, of civil and political right, in a word, 
 upon every relationship in which citizens stand 
 towards each other, towards society, and towards 
 the State. During the first year 6,839 inquirers 
 sought advice or help, but by the year 1902 the 
 number had increased to 17,707. So, too, the 
 number of officers increased from one to three, 
 and the expenditure (which means also the 
 voluntary contributions) from 3^214 to 3^515. 
 
 The experiment was, indeed, from the beginning 
 a great success, and it naturally attracted the 
 attention of labour organisations in other towns 
 as well as social students in many lands. The 
 Workmen's Secretariate was not expressly a Social 
 Democratic institution, yet the political societies 
 of the working classes, not less than their 
 trade unions, viewed its work with interest and 
 sympathy. Imitation soon followed. Stuttgart 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 225 
 
 established a Workmen's Secretariate in 1897, and 
 Munich, Hanover, Mannheim, Halle, Breslau, 
 Bremen, Hamburg, Frankfort, Cologne, Dort- 
 mund, Magdeburg, and other large towns soon 
 followed ; while an information bureau established 
 in Berlin in i8gg was converted into a formal 
 Workman's Secretariate and so named. By way 
 of compliment to the Social Democratic Trade 
 Unions the religious organisations of working 
 men — both Protestant and Roman Catholic — 
 have since created for their members agencies on 
 the same lines at Berlin, Cologne, Essen, Munich, 
 Mannheim, Stuttgart, and other places, while the 
 Hirsch-Duncker Trade Unions have established 
 rival Workmen's Secretariates at Diisseldorf and 
 elsewhere. These are all, however, sectional in 
 constitution and pursue sectional aims. 
 
 The Workmen's Secretariates proper are main- 
 tained by the combined trade societies of a town 
 or district. Secretariates for special industries or 
 trades have not yet been formed, though they may 
 well be a development of the movement. The 
 nearest approach are the secretariates of the Coal 
 Miners' Union, though the reason is that the 
 colliery districts are as a rule given up to a single 
 industry. The desirability of specialisation has 
 nevertheless been felt in some cases, where peculi- 
 arities of employment call for exceptional know- 
 ledge and experience in the officiating secretary. 
 
 In general the basis of the workmen's Secre- 
 tariates is still a very broad one. In some statutes 
 
 G.w. Q 
 
226 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 their benefits are expressly offered to " workpeople 
 who adopt the basis of the modern labour move- 
 ment," which implies at least that they must be 
 organised trade unionists, and may also imply a 
 tacit sympathy with the Social Democratic theory 
 and programme. In practice, however, the Work- 
 men's Secretariates do not as a rule err on the 
 side of narrowness. Some of them are entirely 
 free from exclusiveness, and others expressly lay 
 themselves out to meet the needs of both organised 
 workpeople — the *' Peculiar People " of labour — and 
 the aliens without the gates. Thus the Frankfort 
 constitution recognises two distinct departments : 
 (i) "The first department has to supply gratui- 
 tously legal information, and as far as possible 
 legal protection, to all persons, without distinction 
 of age, sex, calling (Beruf), party, and place of 
 residence, as well as prepare documents relating 
 to all branches of legislation, particularly the so- 
 called * social legislation.' (2) The second de- 
 partment has to give all workpeople organised 
 in trade unions advice and help in questions of 
 organisation, wages, and similar matters." 
 
 At the same time, there is evidence of a distinct 
 tendency hostile to the old policy of the " open 
 door," though women, apprentices, and orphans 
 are given advice under all circumstances, whether 
 organised or not. Thus, one of the latest secre- 
 tariates formed, that at Barmen, adopted from 
 the first the narrower policy. "The right to 
 claim the services of the secretariate," runs one of 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 227 
 
 its rules, "belongs to (i) the members of all the 
 trade unions affiliated to the trade union execu- 
 tive, so far as they discharge their statutory 
 obligations to the latter, particularly in regard to 
 contributions ; (2) the members of the Social 
 Democratic Association of Barmen ; and (3) per- 
 sons incapable of organisation, viz., women, 
 widows, orphans, domestic servants, and appren- 
 tices." 
 
 As the Workmen's Secretariates are democratic 
 institutions, democratic, too, are the method of 
 election and the system of government. Whether 
 chosen by open meeting of workers, by open 
 meeting of trade unionists, or by delegates of 
 the local trade unions, after the manner of an 
 English Trade Union Congress, the secretary 
 owes his office and his emoluments — which are 
 never excessive — to the will of his past comrades 
 of the mill, the forge, the workshop, and the mine. 
 I say " former comrades " purposely, since most 
 of the secretaries have been manual toilers, who 
 first studied the social and industrial laws as 
 voluntary workers in the councils of their political 
 societies, as members of insurance committees, as 
 officials of trade unions, or as contributors to the 
 Labour and Social Democratic Press, and who 
 thus graduated through the school of experience. 
 Often these men know more about the statutes 
 aifecting labour than the skilled lawyers with 
 whom they are from time to time brought into 
 contact. Every German has in him the making 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 of an advocate : his passion for theory, his dialec- 
 tical subtlety, his gift of speech, his fondness for 
 turning every subject inside out, and that 
 tendency to pedantry which Goethe saw in 
 the English character, and was himself just 
 pedantic enough to ignore in his own people — 
 all these things are part of a natural equipment, 
 and they make it easy for men whose training has 
 been far from judicial to fall into the life of the 
 amateur judge. Nevertheless, so important and 
 far reaching has the work of the secretariates 
 become, that of late candidates for these offices 
 have been required to qualify by study as well as 
 practical work. After his thesis has been approved, 
 a candidate must serve as a probationer at an 
 approved secretariate to learn the " methodology" 
 of his work, and he is only fully recognised after 
 he has given proof of capacity. In time it is 
 probable that legal training will be insisted on 
 as well. 
 
 A Workmen's Secretary is subject to an executive 
 or supervisory board {Aufsichts-Comniission) , con- 
 sisting of from five to eleven members, and beyond 
 this his duties and his action are regulated by 
 the local statutes which every federation of trade 
 societies adopts for itself. To his executive a 
 secretary is required at the end of each year 
 to present an exhaustive report. The annual 
 reports are not merely formal chronicles of calls 
 received and subject advised upon ; they are in- 
 tended to illustrate the working and application 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 229 
 
 of the Industrial Laws, and by a profuse reference 
 to leading cases to afford the working classes a 
 key by means of which to comprehend these laws 
 for themselves. In some cases the report is 
 accompanied by studies upon special subjects of 
 direct interest to the working classes. Thus 
 the Frankfort secretary has found time to 
 write on the operation of the Accident Insurance 
 Law, on the relation of the guild workman to 
 the modern labour movement, on the rights of 
 illegitimate children, and on the poor-law system. 
 The funds are as a rule raised by a weekly or 
 monthly levy on the members of trade unions 
 affiliated in the local Kartell, this levy amounting 
 in general to is. a year. In some cases contribu- 
 tions are also made by political and other societies, 
 and from the profits of the party newspapers. 
 In the Radical Duchy of Gotha alone does the 
 State vote a subsidy of £110. Then there are 
 casual fees, small voluntary gifts, and other 
 irregular receipts, insignificant in amount. The 
 least expenditure necessary to the carrying on of a 
 Workman's Secretariate has been found to be £'i-2^ 
 a year if the work is to be done even fairly well, 
 which means is. per head for 2,500 organised 
 workers, but the German working classes have 
 never pampered their secretaries and organisers. 
 Thus five Workmen's Secretariates have a total 
 revenue of under ;^ioo, ten have a revenue ranging 
 from ;^ioo to ;£"25o, six one of from ;£"25o to ;^5oo, 
 and only six one of over £s^'^' Oi^^ Workmen's 
 
230 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Secretariate in a town is the rule, but in some of 
 the larger industrial centres there are two (Altona, 
 Berlin, Bremen, Hanover, Stuttgart), and even 
 three (Frankfort, Hamburg, Nuremberg). Their 
 consultation hours vary from 7 to 10 daily on week- 
 days, with in many cases a couple of hours on Sunday. 
 The names and addresses of the whole of the 
 Workmen's Secretariates in the Empire appear 
 periodically in the Socialist and Labour news- 
 papers, which loyally help on their work. 
 
 It may be asked, Who are the actual clients of 
 these busy functionaries, who thus offer advice 
 and help without money and without price ? As 
 the Workmen's Secretariates are maintained by 
 the allied trade unions, it follows that their chief 
 work must lie amongst the working classes. Yet 
 no favouritism is shown. A secretary, it is true, is 
 specially at the call and service of labour societies 
 and of all their members equally, and must promote 
 the collective and individual interests of labour 
 without distinction. But their usefulness is not 
 limited to the wage-earning classes. Many of the 
 inquirers are artisans, tradesmen, clerks, and petty 
 officials, while the heterogeneous list of callers 
 who cannot be reckoned to the German category 
 of " the small people " (die kleine Leute) include 
 doctors, editors, merchants, engineers, officials 
 of all kinds, artists, actors, clergymen, and 
 even mayors. Of the 14,824 inquiries which 
 reached the Cologne Secretariate in 1904, 10,583 
 were from active working people of all classes. 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 231 
 
 and the rest were from corporate bodies (52), 
 invalided workers (651), master craftsmen (659), 
 other persons engaged in trade (388), State and 
 municipal officials (139), with 2,352 inquiries from 
 people of miscellaneous calling. Probably if 
 investigation were made it would be found that 
 of the 207 professions recognised by the German 
 occupation census none would be found wanting. 
 It must be confessed, however, that not a few 
 members of the middle class consult the Work- 
 men's Secretariate from no worthier motive than 
 to cheat the professional lawyer. 
 
 It might be supposed that institutions like these, 
 established in the interests of the working classes, 
 would encourage a litigious spirit and even tend to 
 weaken the respect of the law by espousing the 
 cause of labour without due regard for considera- 
 tions of right and wrong. Such an assumption is 
 entirely unwarranted. The Workmen's Secretary 
 has no interest whatever in legal actions. On the 
 contrary, he dislikes them : he knows them to be 
 costly and uncertain, and even where necessary to 
 be productive of bad blood. His business is to 
 help defenceless men to their rights, and he natu- 
 rally endeavours to do so by following the line of 
 least resistance. " In all cases in which legal 
 measures are hopeless," writes a Munich secretary, 
 " the inquirers are urgently advised to refrain from 
 going to law." Where, however, a man insists, in 
 spite of warning, on appealing to the courts, he is 
 advised where and how to begin proceedings, and 
 
232 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 there the Workmen's Secretariate stops. Further- 
 more, it is a general principle, which is compulsorily 
 followed, to resolutely refuse advice or help of any 
 kind where there is reason to suspect that an appli- 
 cant wishes to evade legal or moral obligations, 
 whether towards relatives (as in the case of parental 
 maintenance or illegitimacy), towards creditors, or 
 towards society at large in civil matters. Refer- 
 ring to cases of the first kind a Bremen Workmen's 
 Secretary writes : — " We have had to impress 
 upon no small number of young men — organised 
 workmen among them — what are the moral and 
 legal obligations which rest upon them in this 
 regard. In every case we refused information 
 where the applicant sought to evade his responsi- 
 bilities." It is noteworthy that many of the 
 secretariates pay special attention to the welfare 
 of illegitimate children, and make it their earnest 
 business to see that they are secured their full 
 legal rights at the hands of those responsible. 
 Again a Frankfort secretary writes : — " Informa- 
 tion was frequently asked concerning the invalidity 
 of debts under the Civil Code. Where necessary 
 we advised the inquirers to plead the Statute of 
 Limitations so that they might not be brought 
 into distress owing to arbitrary distraint, but we 
 earnestly pointed out to them their moral duty, 
 nevertheless, to pay the debt by instalments, 
 inasmuch as it would be despicable to use a legal 
 right merely for the purpose of enriching them- 
 selves." 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 233 
 
 It is a motley company that flocks to the con- 
 sulting room of the Workmen's Secretariate, as I 
 myself recently visited it at Cologne. Workmen 
 bring their disputes over wages, service, and 
 insurance, and householders their grievances with 
 landlord and neighbour ; conciliation is generally 
 urged as the safest policy and the best sense, and 
 the inquirers go away promising to do as they are 
 advised. Choleric individuals, whose honour has 
 been wounded by opprobrious epithet or un- 
 charitable innuendo, ask to be told the speediest, 
 direst, deadliest retribution provided by law. 
 Grievances of this kind are, as a rule, but newly 
 born. So the Workmen's Secretary waits until the 
 hot blood has cooled down, and only then pro- 
 ceeds to admonish, as the elicited facts of the 
 case may suggest. So, too, the hard-pressed 
 debtor comes with the usurious moneylender 
 literally at his heels. The poor man is willing to 
 pay, if time be but granted ; but Shylock says the 
 debt is overdue and insists on having his pound 
 of flesh. The Workmen's Secretary hears the 
 story patiently, satisfies himself that he has been 
 told not only the truth but the whole truth, and if 
 convinced that the creditor is unduly straining his 
 legal rights, he warns him that there exists a law of 
 usury for the special benefit of his kind. As a rule the 
 warning is enough and a reasonable arrangement 
 is come to, though it has happened that a Work- 
 man's Secretary has taken an extortionate money- 
 lender into the court, has secured his conviction, 
 
234 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 and has been complimented by the judge upon 
 the performance of a valuable public service. So, 
 too, where a mortgage is about to foreclose on a 
 workman's house it is often possible to stay the 
 threatening hand and so tide the little house- 
 holder over his temporary distress. But romance 
 as well as tragedy enters into the Workmen's 
 Secretary's daily duty. Servant girls bring their 
 affairs of the heart, and their confidence is never 
 abused ; betrothed young couples who cannot get 
 their parents' consent to marriage come to implore 
 the kind secretary's powerful influence ; and on one 
 occasion it was the happy lot of the Frankfort 
 secretary to convince a bank official that in 
 allowing his daughter to become the wife of a 
 lithographer his name and family would not fall 
 into irretrievable disgrace. There is justification 
 for the note of confidence and pride which is struck 
 by the Bremen Workmen's Secretary when he 
 boasts : — ' ' The Workmen's Secretariate has proved 
 itself a social relief station (Hilfsstation) in the 
 widest sense of the words. Not only in legal 
 disputes, but in all the untoward vicissitudes of 
 daily life, the people come to us in confidence. 
 We are not able to help in every instance, but 
 whenever the possibility exists of aiding the needy 
 we regard it as our earnest duty to intervene, and 
 whatever we are able to do with our weak powers 
 we do it in the cause of the class-conscious Bremen 
 working-class." 
 
 An analysis of the returns of 32 Workmen's 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 235 
 
 Secretariates for a recent year showed that 195,679 
 visitors were given advice on 197,927 subjects, 
 distributed as follows : — 
 
 Subjects Nc 
 
 . of times 
 
 Percentage 
 
 of interrogation. advice 
 
 was given. 
 
 of the whole. 
 
 Civil Law 
 
 Industrial Insurance 
 
 •• 57,595 
 •• 56,571 
 
 29'I 
 28-6 
 
 Labour and service contract 
 
 • • 32,722 
 
 i6-5 
 
 Communal and civil affairs 
 
 .. 18,190 
 
 9-2 
 
 Penal Law 
 
 Industrial matters 
 
 ... 14,448 
 3,191 
 
 7-3 
 1-6 
 
 Labour movement 
 
 .. 6,167 
 
 3'i 
 
 Miscellaneous 
 
 .. 9,043 
 
 4-6 
 
 These figures give an average of 6,185 inquiries 
 to every secretariate, which is equal to 20 for 
 every weekday throughout the whole year. 
 
 While the working classes entirely trust and 
 profoundly esteem their secretariates, the reception 
 which these institutions have had at other hands 
 has in general been at least friendly. Many people 
 who view with misgiving the industrial movement 
 because of the Socialism which is behind, below, 
 and around it do not refuse to acknowledge the 
 value of this effort of labour to assert and realise 
 itself, and above all to applaud the spirit of self- 
 help and self-reliance which has inspired it. 
 Perhaps the best proof of success is the fact that 
 since April i, 1903, there has been established in 
 Berlin a Central Workmen's Secretariate, a repre- 
 sentative organ both of the entire body of trades 
 unions in the Empire and of all the local secre - 
 tariates. It is maintained and controlled by the 
 
236 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 general committe of the trade unions and its 
 services are at the disposal not only of the affiliated 
 secretariates, but of all organised workers without 
 restriction. Its primary function is to *' prepare 
 the appeals which the trade unions have served 
 upon the Imperial Insurance Bureau and to provide 
 for the verbal representation of these appeals in 
 the proceedings before the Bureau," a function 
 the importance of which will be understood when 
 it is remembered that the respondents are always 
 represented by professional advocates, chosen for 
 their ability to darken counsel and throw obstacles 
 in the way of sick and injured workpeople receiving 
 the compensation to which they believe themselves 
 to be entitled. Other functions of the Central 
 Secretariate are to help the trade unions in all 
 elections to all courts and committees upon 
 which the workers have representation under the 
 Insurance Laws, and to watch the decisions of 
 the various courts and codify them alike for the 
 guidance of the provincial secretariates, and for 
 the prevention of unnecessary litigation. The 
 annual expenditure upon the central agency was 
 originally fixed at £750, raised by the trade 
 unions by means of a levy of from i^d. to 2d. per 
 member per annum, but there can be no finality 
 in a matter of this kind, and it has already been 
 found that as work increases so also must expense. 
 Though nominally the Central Secretariate is 
 intended to benefit the organised workers it 
 has not hitherto declined to serve the interests 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 237 
 
 of unorganised workers when appealed to by 
 secretariates whose operations extend to the 
 working classes generally without restriction, 
 though it is unlikely that this policy of offering 
 indiscriminate help will be long continued. It is 
 significant that both the Protestant and the Roman 
 Catholic working men's (non-Socialistic) unions 
 here have again imitated the adherents of the 
 " modern labour movement " by establishing rival 
 central organisations. 
 
 Nevertheless, the secretariates have had to 
 contend with obstacles which would hardly be 
 experienced in any other country. Most of these 
 obstacles are a result of the ineradicable suspicion 
 of the labour movement which fills the official 
 breast, whether the official be a State bureaucrat or 
 a mere municipal Bumble. When the promoters 
 of the first Workmen's Secretariate, that at Nurem- 
 berg, proposed in their innocence to call it the 
 " Workmen's Secretariate of the town of Nurem- 
 berg," the mayor detected in the words the 
 assumption of a title which reflected upon the 
 dignity of the municipality, and, backed by law, 
 police, and pains and penalties endless, he sum- 
 marily forbade their use. On the whole the 
 municipal authorities have been least sympathetic. 
 Here and there the secretariates' relationships 
 with them have been completely satisfactory, but 
 their common attitude has been one of cold aloof- 
 ness, where not of supercilious hostility. Yet 
 while good feeling is mostly found in South 
 
238 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Germany, the unfriendliness is found in the North, 
 a circumstance not without bearing upon the 
 poHtical conditions prevalent in the two parts 
 of the Empire. In some places the police 
 authorities have been as obstinate as possible, 
 to the extent of making it almost hopeless to 
 carry on the work at all on practical lines. In 
 one town the curious spectacle was for a long time 
 witnessed of the local legal tribunal and the police 
 officials persisting in prosecuting the Workmen's 
 Secretary for "illegitimately following his calling," 
 after representatives of the Government had twice 
 declared in the Reichstag that their proceeding 
 was entirely illegal. On the other hand, the 
 Workmen's Secretaries are in some places allowed 
 to plead before the legal courts, and judges have 
 been known to compliment them when by their 
 instrumentality the interests of justice have 
 been clearly served. The attitude of the factory 
 inspectors is various. In Prussia it is in general 
 one of reserve, possibly because of the unsym- 
 pathetic attitude of the higher State authorities 
 and functionaries toward the labour movement in 
 general which has already been indicated. In the 
 South it is decidedly friendly. There the factory 
 inspectors willingly maintain systematic communi- 
 cation with the Workmen's Secretaries of the large 
 towns, welcoming their suggestions and receiving 
 and investigating their complaints. In Baden 
 the relationship is so cordial that the rooms of 
 the Mannheim Workmen's Secretar}- are used by 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 239 
 
 the district factory inspector for consultations 
 with workpeople. So far the legal profession has 
 not taken much notice of the secretariates, prob- 
 ably because their work has not seriously interfered 
 with the calling of the paid advocate. At any rate, 
 while the secretariates are certainly instrumental 
 in disposing of a multitude of disputes which 
 otherwise would have found their way needlessly 
 and often hopelessly to the law courts, the legal 
 profession has as yet shown no symptom of a 
 tendency to swell the ranks of the unemployed. 
 
 As to the future of these remarkable institutions, 
 all that can be said with safety is that they are 
 still on the threshold of a career of untold useful- 
 ness. For the Workmen's Secretariate does not 
 compete with the trade unions. It rather under- 
 takes duties which are beyond the province of 
 these. Where the trade union stops the Work- 
 men's Secretariate steps in and continues the work 
 of watching and defending the interests of labour. 
 To the trade union belongs now, as before, the 
 task of organising labour, of agitation, of carrying 
 on the struggle for improved conditions of employ- 
 ment, of conducting strikes, of supporting the 
 victims of worklessness, and the like. The Work- 
 men's Secretariate, on the other hand, looks after 
 the broader legal rights of labour, recognising that 
 the more laws the State creates the greater becomes 
 the necessity of securing their easy and effective 
 operation. The Workmen's Secretariates are in 
 fact a practical step in the direction of that " free 
 
240 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 administration of justice and free legal help " 
 which was long ago desiderated in the programme 
 of the German Social Democratic party. And 
 yet it would be wrong to assume that the secre- 
 tariates have as yet taken their final form. As 
 the number of these institutions extends, so also 
 does their utility. The wider their scope the 
 greater the needs multiply. Work creates work ; 
 without search for them, new openings constantly 
 present themselves, new opportunities come to 
 light ; and it may well prove that the Workmen's 
 Secretariates of a score years hence will take a 
 place in the life of civil society the importance and 
 value of which are anticipated by only the most 
 sanguine leaders of this new labour movement. 
 
 The Roman Catholic People's Bureaux and 
 Workmen's Secretariates take the second place, 
 after the Socialist secretariates, among institutions 
 of this kind. Their number at the beginning of 
 1905 was 62, and while several of these (Berlin, 
 Aix-la-Chapelle, Bochum, Essen, Munich, and 
 Diisseldorf, for example) compare in point of use- 
 fulness with the best of the Socialist secretariates, 
 the majority do a very restricted work. The idea in 
 establishing these agencies is that working-men of 
 the Roman Catholic confession shall be able to 
 obtain all the guidance and help they need from 
 advisers of their own faith. 
 
 The Protestant People's Bureaux and Legal 
 Information Agencies are of more recent origin and 
 clearly arose in imitation of the effort made bythe 
 
WORKMEN'S SECRETARIATES. 241 
 
 Roman Catholic Church. Their number is not 
 large, and their work is in the main restricted to 
 advice upon difficulties arising out of the various 
 labour laws. The Berlin Bureau is the largest 
 institution of the kind ; it has branches in three 
 parts of the city, but the number of inquirers falls 
 far below that to which the Socialist secretariates 
 are accustomed. 
 
 G.W, 
 
242 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER XVn 
 MUNICIPAL INFORMATION BUREAUX. 
 
 There is known to German Imperial Law a 
 franchise, bearing the name " Right of the Poor" 
 {Armenrecht) , which secures free legal advice and 
 representation before the civil courts to persons 
 whose narrow means do not allow of their engaging 
 paid advocacy. In order that this right may be 
 used, written declaration of straitened circum- 
 stances must be made before the proper court, 
 and the acceptance of this declaration absolves 
 the applicant from all costs of hearing, and 
 obtains for him, if necessary, the free services of a 
 qualified pleader, who is nominated by the court. 
 Herein German law is not singular ; nor was this 
 "Right of the Poor" enacted by way of conces- 
 sion to the Socialist demand of free administration 
 of justice in every department of civil life, for it 
 existed before the earliest of the Socialist pro- 
 grammes. 
 
 A more decided step towards the Socialist ideal 
 has been taken of late years by the establishment 
 in a number of towns of free legal advice and 
 information agencies, conducted by the municipal 
 authorities by trained officials, which all citizens 
 are entitled to consult without formality of any 
 
MUNICIPAL INFORMATION BUREAUX. 243 
 
 kind when in any doubt or difficulty. These 
 agencies are variously named People's Bureaux, 
 Labour Bureaux {A rbeitsiimter) , 3.nd Legal Agencies 
 (Rechtsstellen) , but their purpose is in the main 
 identical. The oldest institutions of the kind are 
 that of Hamm, in Westphalia, which dates from 
 1896, and that of Ulm (1899), while one of the 
 latest is that of Magdeburg. These public advice 
 agencies differ from the Workmen's Secretariates 
 of the trade union type in that they cover wider 
 ground, and do not exist for the special purpose 
 of elucidating industrial laws or helping working 
 people to the rights which these laws promise 
 them. 
 
 Naturally questions of tenancy and civil disputes 
 of a minor character furnish the agencies with a 
 large part of their clients. Other questions upon 
 which advice is frequently sought relate to indus- 
 trial insurance, disputes with employers (industrial 
 and domestic), marriage relationships, testamen- 
 tary difficulties, and in a less degree taxation and 
 military service. In short, the usefulness of these 
 agencies is only limited by the needs of those for 
 whom they exist and who in general show great 
 readiness to use their opportunities. Thus the 
 Municipal Information Bureau at Miilhausen, in 
 Alsace, gave advice to 32,090 inquirers during the 
 year 1904-5, the Municipal Workmen's Secre- 
 tariate at Kaiserslautern gave advice to 8,411 
 persons during 1903, and the Elberfeld Municipal 
 Legal Bureau to 4,320 persons during 1904. 
 
 R 2 
 
244 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 The last named agency^ is conducted in a room 
 set apart for the purpose in the Town Hall by an 
 official who is connected with the Court of Industry 
 {Gewerbegericht), and who discharges this function 
 as a subsidiary part of his duty (im Nebenamt, as 
 the technical phrase goes). All sorts of people 
 seek advice in all sorts of difficulties. There is 
 the merest indication of formality about the asking 
 and answering of questions. The door is open for 
 anyone to enter. There are no formidable forms 
 to fill up, there is no searching preliminary investi- 
 gation to undergo, by way of exhibiting the bond 
 fides of the petitioner and the reasonableness of his 
 claim to be saved the lawyer's charges. A few 
 minutes' conversation suffices to enable the muni- 
 cipal adviser to grasp the difficulty which has to 
 be resolved, and as a rule it takes even shorter 
 time to give his answer. Of course, there is no 
 assumption of judicial authority. The Municipal 
 Legal Bureau does not presume to take the place 
 of the law and its tribunals. What it tries to do 
 is to diminish the need for litigation, by making 
 the law clear, by pointing out where right and 
 wrong lie in any given dispute, and by discouraging 
 legal proceedings where the chances of success do 
 not make the game of law worth while. One 
 derived the impression that if free justice is not 
 here brought to everybody's door in the approved 
 Socialistic fashion, justice herself is represented in a 
 particularly hospitable and benevolent frame of mind. 
 
 '■ When visited by nie in June, 1905. 
 
MUNICIPAL INFORMATION BUREAUX. 245 
 
 The Elberfeld experiment is typical of many 
 others following the same purpose and achieving 
 the same valuable results. Only last year the 
 municipality of Cologne decided to enter this 
 comparatively new sphere of social service. There 
 the Socialist and Confessional (Protestant and 
 Roman Catholic) Workmen's Secretariates have 
 hitherto had the field to themselves, and the 
 Socialists specially have taken the threatened 
 competition of the municipal authority unkindly 
 to heart. They will no doubt do their best to 
 keep the organised labouring classes away from 
 the public advice agency when it is started ; but 
 the Cologne workman is not enamoured of Social- 
 ism to the extent that his brother of Berlin or 
 Leipzig is, and like the rest of Cologne's schemes 
 of municipal philanthropy, this new one will 
 unquestionably justify the faith of its authors. 
 Meanwhile, the movement is extending to South 
 Germany, where the Bavarian Government has 
 formally appealed to the municipalities to establish 
 institutions of the kind. 
 
246 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER XVni. 
 
 THE GERMAN POOR LAW. 
 
 In order the better to understand the German 
 Poor Law, it will be well to bear in mind the 
 administrative division of the several States and the 
 obligation which the lawof each State imposes upon 
 its various self-governing authorities in regard to 
 the care of the destitute. Prussia may be taken as 
 an example. The first division is into provinces, 
 at the head of which are the chief presidents. The 
 provinces are divided into government districts 
 {Regiertingshezirke) , each again with its president 
 or prefect. Below the government districts come 
 the circuits {Kreise), each under a sub-prefect 
 {Landrath). Below the circuits come finally the 
 local government areas, either urban or rural, as 
 the case may be. For poor-law purposes there 
 are two kinds of unions — the local unions (Ortsar- 
 inenverhdnde), for single communes or parishes as 
 a rule, and the district unions (Landarmenver- 
 bdnde), which are responsible for the maintenance 
 of paupers without legal settlement. The unions 
 provide poorhouses, variously named, according to 
 need, and this "indoor" maintenance is known 
 technically as " closed " (geschlossen) relief, as dis- 
 tinguished from "open " {offen) or "outdoor" relief. 
 
GERMAN POOR LAW. 247 
 
 Special institutions for orphans, for lunatics, and 
 for other helpless persons whose maintenance in 
 the ordinary poorhouses is not desirable, exist as 
 in this country. Further, each province is expected 
 to establish and maintain a workhouse or house 
 of correction in which vagrants and people of dis- 
 orderly life are disciplined, and many circuits 
 support relief stations, in which itinerant work- 
 seekers are lodged and fed, for the casual ward 
 of the English pattern is unknown. 
 
 The question of the Poor Law is in Germany 
 closely bound up with the wider questions of 
 settlement and migration, which have played an 
 important, though consistently an obstructive, 
 part in the history of German unity. The political 
 particularism which of old characterised the indi- 
 vidual States was faithfully reflected in provincial, 
 district, and parochial government. No city 
 republics of Italy were more jealous of their privi- 
 leges, more exclusive in their citizenship, than 
 were the petty German States, and the towns 
 within these States, prior to the maturity of the 
 great national movement towards unification. 
 The right of settlement was conferred only under 
 severe restrictions. Equal civil privileges were 
 refused to the stranger, who was yet called upon 
 to pay dearly for his incomplete citizenship. 
 Admission dues were levied, that in Berlin 
 amounting to £'i ; preferential taxes were im- 
 posed; and the rights of freemen had to be 
 purchased at a very heavy price. Some of the 
 
248 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 reasons for withholding the privileges attaching 
 to settlement sound strange to the modern ear. 
 In many parts they were made dependent upon 
 religion, and generally the applicant was required 
 to be in possession of a certain solid property, so 
 that in no likely contingency could there be a 
 fear that he or his immediate descendants would 
 fall upon the rates. The shrewd peasants on 
 different banks of the Spree, near Berlin, who, a 
 few years ago, like modern Charons, rowed the 
 body of a suicide across and across and again across 
 the river for the length of a summer's day, in order 
 to avoid the expense of a coroner's inquest and 
 burial, since the luckless man had obolus in 
 neither lips nor pocket, were only perpetuating 
 the inhospitable traditions of their forefathers. 
 
 It is the merit of Prussia to have led the way 
 in poor law as in many other enlightened reforms 
 which not only accelerated German political unity 
 but made it practicable. The enactment of 
 industrial freedom (Gewerbefreiheit) , involving the 
 right of every individual to follow the calling of his 
 choice, went hand in hand in Prussia with the 
 removal of irrational restrictions upon the right of 
 settlement in that monarchy. Prussia's example 
 was not at once followed, for sluggish reluctance 
 and the political troubles incidental to the middle 
 of the nineteenth century held the smaller States 
 back. The establishment of the North German 
 Confederation, however, did what reason unaided 
 could not do, since it made uniformity in civil 
 
GERMAN POOR LAW. 249 
 
 right a logical and political necessity, and thus 
 from 1867 dated the full recognition of the 
 unqualified right of migration and settlement in 
 the greater part of Germany. The law adopted 
 on the subject, which was afterwards incorporated 
 in the Constitution under which the German 
 Empire is now governed, was, to all intents and 
 purposes, the earlier law of Prussia. 
 
 Article 3 of the Imperial Constitution of 1871 
 sets forth : — 
 
 " A uniform citizenship (Indigenat) applies to 
 the whole of Germany, with the consequence that 
 the citizen or subject of each Federal State is to 
 be treated in every other Federal State as a native, 
 and is, accordingly, to be allowed to take up 
 permanent residence, to carry on trade, to enter 
 public offices, to acquire land, to acquire the rights 
 of citizenship, and to enjoy all other civil privileges 
 under the same conditions as subjects of the said 
 State, and is to be similarly treated in regard to 
 legal usage and protection. No German may be 
 restricted in the exercise of this privilege by the 
 authorities of his own State, or by the authorities 
 of any other Federal State. 
 
 " The regulations regarding poor relief and 
 admission to local parochial unions are not 
 affected by the principle laid down in the first 
 paragraph. In the same manner the treaties 
 concluded between the individual States of the 
 Confederation in regard to the custody of persons 
 to be expelled, the care of the sick, and the burial 
 
250 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 of deceased citizens continue in force until further 
 notice." 
 
 As the law of the Empire now stands, a parish 
 may refuse domicile in one contingency only, viz., 
 when there is a certainty that the new-comer, 
 from lack of personal means, will at once become 
 chargeable to the public funds. On the other 
 hand, the mere apprehension of such chargeability 
 in the future is no valid reason for refusing admis- 
 sion to the parish.-^ No capitation due may be 
 levied on new settlers, but they may at once be 
 assessed to parochial taxation, with the proviso 
 that should they not remain longer than three 
 months in the parish no such local taxes can be 
 demanded. At the same time local regulations 
 regarding the acquisition of communal rights 
 {Gemeindebiirgerrechte) and participation in special 
 communal privileges and franchises are not affected. 
 To the enjoyment of these, qualifications varying in 
 different States and towns are necessary. 
 
 In regard to the Poor Law, too, a distinction is 
 drawn between general principles and their appli- 
 cation, the former being matter of Imperial and 
 the latter of State legislation. The Imperial Law 
 lays down the principle that in regard to the mode 
 
 ' Such is the law, though in practice the law is not faith- 
 fully observed. Count Posadowsky, Imperial Minister for 
 the Interior, said in the Reichstag on February 7th, 1906, 
 that in some rural districts it was no uncommon thing for 
 labourers to be refused a dwelling where the fear was 
 entertained that thej' might at some remote time fall on 
 the poor funds. Several instances of this have come to 
 the writer's knowledge. 
 
GERMAN POOR LAW. 251 
 
 and measure of public relief to be granted in case 
 of necessity, and in regard to the acquisition and 
 loss of right to relief, every German in every 
 German State shall be regarded as a native. It 
 also provides that poor relief shall be administered 
 through local and district poor-law unions. The 
 two differ in several particulars. A local poor-law 
 union may consist of one parish or manor, or 
 several, or of parishes and manors combined. A 
 district poor-law union may be identical in area 
 with an entire State, or may be composed of a 
 group of parishes organised for this special pur- 
 pose. A local union is bound to afford relief to 
 needy persons resident at any time within its 
 bounds, with the proviso that such union may 
 reclaim the costs from the union permanently 
 liable (owing to the relieved person having his 
 domicile there), and may transfer him to that 
 union. As to which the Federal Settlement Court ^ 
 {Bundesamt fi'ir das Heimatwesen) has ruled that 
 " An able-bodied man is temporarily in need of 
 help if without work and without property that he 
 can dispose of in order to satisfy urgently necessary 
 (dringend notwendig) wants of life, as, for example, 
 food and shelter." Thus relief maybe claimed by 
 a person who possesses real property or other effects, 
 even capital, yet cannot at once turn them into 
 money, also by a person capable of working yet 
 unable to find work ; even when a man's want is 
 entirely culpable he must be relieved. In the case 
 ' For the " Amt " is a judicial and not an administrative body. 
 
252 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 of domestic servants, apprentices, journeymen, and 
 trade assistants, the law provides that should they 
 be overtaken by illness while in service the local 
 poor-law union is liable to bear the cost of medical 
 attendance for six weeks, and only when illness 
 has exceeded that time can the repayment of the 
 costs incurred be claimed from the relief domicile. 
 In the event of a destitute person not possessing a 
 relief domicile in the parish where he falls upon 
 the poor rate, e.g., vagrants, the liability is 
 incurred by the district union in which he lives at 
 the time ; and in case he has been discharged in a 
 destitute condition from a prison or a hospital, the 
 district union from which he entered such an in- 
 stitution becomes liable. In the case of destitute 
 foreigners the local poor-law union in which 
 destitution sets in is liable, with a re-claim on the 
 Federal State in which the union is situated, though 
 the State may by legislation transfer this liability 
 to the district poor-law union. 
 
 The acquirement of settlement (Unterstilt^ungs- 
 wohnsits) is dependent on — (i) Residence, the qualifi- 
 cation here being two years' uninterrupted residence 
 after the eighteenth year of age in a local union ; ^ 
 (2) Marriage, the husband's domicile being shared 
 by the wife. A widow or a judicially separated 
 wife retains the husband's relief domicile unless it 
 be forfeited by two years' absence or another 
 
 ^ A Bill before the Reichstag while this book is passing 
 through the press proposes to reduce the term of residence 
 to one year, and the age of qualification to sixteen years ; 
 the age was reduced from twenty-four to eighteen in 1894. 
 
GERMAN POOR LAW. 253 
 
 domicile be obtained. (3) Descent, legitimate 
 children sharing the domicile of the father and 
 illegitimate children that of the mother. As 
 settlement is acquired by two years' residence 
 (though the period may not begin with admission to 
 a hospital or other sick institution) so it is forfeited 
 after two years' uninterrupted absence. Disputes 
 between unions as to liability are settled according 
 to State law where the unions are in the same 
 State, and according to Imperial law (of June 6, 
 1870) where the unions belong to different States. 
 In the latter case appeal is allowed to the Federal 
 Settlement Court, whose judgment is final. This 
 Board has no jurisdiction over Bavaria and Alsace- 
 Lorraine, however, since the Imperial laws on settle- 
 ment do not apply to these parts of the Empire. 
 
 In Bavariathe so-called political parishes or com- 
 munes are responsible for the maintenance of their 
 own poor, though here, too, the right exists of reclaim- 
 ing from a pauper's relief domicile the cost incurred 
 in his maintenance. Besides the authorities of the 
 political parishes there are higher organs for the 
 districts and circuits (Kreise), in whose care are 
 placed the large public institutions required by the 
 poor-law system of the country. Alsace still con- 
 tinues under the French law, which does not 
 recognise a formal claim to relief, whether against 
 State or parish. Nevertheless, a system of poor 
 relief {Armenbureaux) exists in over a third of the 
 parishes into which the province is divided. 
 
 It is left to the Legislatures of the various 
 
254 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 States to determine the constitution of the local 
 and district unions, and also, as already stated, 
 the mode and measure of the public relief afforded. 
 This is done by the Supplementary Laws. The 
 Prussian Law (March 8, 1871) enjoins that every 
 parish shall be constituted a local poor-law 
 union, unless it be expedient to unite two or more 
 parishes in one union, and the administration of 
 poor relief falls to the parochial authority, though 
 in the case of urban districts it may, by resolution 
 of the parish, be transferred to distinct committees 
 (Deputatiotien), composed of members of the local 
 government bodies. 
 
 And here a word in passing as to the important 
 part in parochial government which is played by 
 the Poor Law Administration. The work of poor 
 relief does not, as is so often the case in England, 
 fall into the hands of men without special quali- 
 fications, and who join boards of guardians 
 for the mere pleasure of over-assessing their 
 neighbours' property and under-assessing their 
 own, but is usually — and in large towns invariably 
 — the special business of citizens chosen for their 
 intelligence and practical sense, and by them is 
 regarded as amongst the most responsible branches 
 of civic duty. Nor may this duty be shirked at 
 will. The Prussian Supplementary Law respect- 
 ing relief domicile (section 4) says explicitly : 
 " Every parishioner entitled to take part in 
 parochial elections is liable to discharge unpaid 
 duties in the poor-law administration of the 
 
GERMAN POOR LAW. 255 
 
 parish during a period of three years, or longer, as 
 may be provided by the statutes of the parish. 
 Exemption from this obligation is only granted on 
 the following grounds : (i) Permanent illness ; 
 (2) business affairs which necessitate frequent or 
 long absence ; (3) the attainment of the age of 
 60 or more years ; (4) the occupation of a public 
 office ; (5) other special circumstances, constitut- 
 ing a valid reason for exemption, as to whose 
 existence — so far as the parochial statutes make 
 no provision to the contrary — the parochial 
 authority shall decide. A person who has 
 occupied such honorary position during the pre- 
 scribed time shall be exempted from re-appoint- 
 ment during a similar period next following." 
 
 Again, section 5 says : " Any eligible person 
 who without legal justification shall refuse to 
 accept, or to continue, voluntary duties in the 
 poor-law administration may be deprived for a 
 period of from three to six years of the right to 
 take part in parochial elections or to occupy 
 honorary civic positions, and may be assessed to 
 the extent of an eighth to a quarter more to the 
 direct parochial rates. Decision upon this point, 
 so far as the parochial statutes say nothing to the 
 contrary, rests with the parochial authority, but 
 such decision requires the sanction of the revisory 
 authorities." 
 
 It deserves remark that the filling of some other 
 unpaid parochial office does not absolve a citizen 
 from serving in the poor-law administration of 
 
256 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 his parish. Nor are medical men — exempted 
 though they are from other civic duties — allowed 
 immunity from this branch of public service. 
 
 As to the character of the relief afforded, the 
 Prussian Law provides that ever}^ destitute German 
 resident in the State shall have a claim upon the 
 poor-law union liable to (i) shelter, (2) necessary 
 subsistence, (3) the requisite treatment and care 
 in case of sickness, and (4) seemly burial in case 
 of death. The person seeking relief may be 
 maintained in a poor house (Armenhaus) or 
 hospital (Krankenhaus), or the relief may be given 
 in return for work, such work being suited to the 
 person's capacities. This work test of poverty is 
 in man}^ poor-law unions rigidly insisted on. 
 
 Another institution remains to be considered 
 in connexion with poor law administration in 
 Germany, though in reality it belongs more 
 to the penal system of the country. This is the 
 correctional workhouse (Arbeitshaus). In the 
 penal regulations of some of the States prior to 
 Imperial unification — Prussia and Bavaria being, 
 however, exceptions — the workhouse did duty as 
 a medium between the ordinary house of correc- 
 tion and the convict prison. In the Imperial 
 Penal Code it is recognised as a penitentiary in 
 which certain offences against social order, con- 
 nected for the most part with inveterate laziness 
 and vagabondage, may be atoned for by hard 
 work. Its methods and economy will be more 
 particularly described in a later chapter. 
 
GERMAN POOR LAW. 257 
 
 The poor-law system of Germany is a field which 
 the statistician can hardly be said to have seriously 
 entered. Important and, indeed, essential as are 
 accurate numerical data upon the many phases of 
 the poverty question, no attempt has been made 
 to collect them since the publication of the 
 1885 statistics. Bavaria is the only State which 
 publishes regular data of value. 
 
 It remains only to state the directions in which 
 a modification of the Poor Law system of Germany 
 is advocated. Political parties are divided into 
 camps on the question of settlement. On the one 
 hand the Socialists ask that poor relief may be 
 simplified by abolishing the last trace of the 
 particularism which was in the past so formidable 
 an obstacle to Poor Law reform, viz., the trans- 
 ference of paupers from the unions in which they 
 fall upon the rates to the unions in which they 
 possess relief domicile. They argue that, as the 
 claim to poor relief is regulated by Imperial 
 statute as being the natural right of a citizen, 
 paupers should be maintained where their inde- 
 pendence fails them, whether or not it be their 
 native place or their relief domicile. It is evident, 
 however, that such an arrangement might bear 
 harshly upon small or poor areas, especially in the 
 absence of any attempt at uniformity of poor- 
 relief methods. Unions which adopt the principle 
 of "the poorhouse or nothing" would enjoy a 
 welcome immunity from costly pauperism, while 
 unions in which out-relief is the custom would 
 
 G.w. s 
 
258 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 often have more than their proper share of paupers 
 to maintain. On the other hand, the Conserva- 
 tives endeavour with growing success to transfer 
 the burden of poor reHef from the rural to the 
 urban districts, and they persistently agitate for 
 the restriction, and many demand the repeal, of 
 the right of free migration and settlement. 
 
 It is also claimed that the more niggardly Poor 
 Law Unions should be levelled up to an all-round 
 standard of tolerable liberality, and here the 
 English Poor Law reformer will be inclined to 
 comfort himself with the reflection that other 
 countries are even as his own. At the same time 
 it is allowed that paucity of means is often the 
 cause of inadequate relief; hence the further 
 demand that in such cases larger administrative 
 areas should be formed. One other reform much 
 advocated is the transference of some of the func- 
 tions of the Poor Law authority from the domain 
 of public charity to that of social right, so that in 
 such cases civil disqualification and the stigma of 
 pauperism may be removed. For example, it is 
 held that the relief of widows and orphans should 
 be a charge on some form of Insurance Fund and 
 not on the rates. 
 
 A measure, however, as to whose wisdom and 
 necessity everybody is agreed is the better organisa- 
 tion of the Poor Law system. Greater uniformity 
 of action is desirable, and to this end a new 
 Central Authority, corresponding to our own 
 Local Government Board, and possessing statutory 
 
GERMAN POOR LAW. 259 
 
 powers of control, seems to be necessary. Such 
 an authority is now lacking, with the worst results 
 for the relief system of the country, and not less 
 for the paupers themselves. At present each 
 State, and, within certain limits, each union, is 
 allowed to go its own way, and efficient control is 
 not exerted. Amongst the results which may be 
 expected to follow the introduction of efficient 
 Imperial supervision on a systematic basis are 
 greater economy, or at least better results for an 
 equal expenditure, the preserving of a just balance 
 between the out-relief and in-relief systems, and 
 generally a greater degree of uniformity in methods 
 and administration. 
 
 s 2 
 
26o THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 ELBERFELD POOR-RELIEF SYSTEM. 
 
 The system of poor relief which was first iden- 
 tified with the town of Elberfeld, in Rhenish 
 Prussia, and which, though now introduced into 
 many large German towns, is still called after the 
 place of its origin, excels exactly where the 
 English system is specially defective. Even the 
 most determined apologist of the English Poor 
 Laws must admit that their history is for the most 
 part a history of legislative folly and administrative 
 incapacity. We have by turn gone from the 
 extreme of treating the destitute as criminals born 
 for the gallows to the other extreme of making 
 their existence so free from care, and of extinguish- 
 ing so effectually the last trace of independence 
 in them, as to give them no other desire save to 
 live and die in the receipt of parish doles. As to 
 administration — though there are bright exceptions 
 of success — its results are on the whole disappoint- 
 ing, for the machinery of the law is bad, and to 
 make matters worse it often happens that the 
 working of this bad machinery falls into the most 
 unsuitable hands possible. Where we err in 
 England in dealing with the poverty question is, 
 as in so many other directions, in our failure to 
 
 I 
 
ELBERFELD POOR RELIEF. 261 
 
 apply to it scientific methods. The whole constitu- 
 tion of the organs of poor relief is based on the 
 principle of benevolence. Instead of endeavouring 
 to prevent pauperism, we relieve the poverty of 
 the moment and tacitly encourage the habits 
 which so often induce it. Guardians of the poor 
 exist for the purpose of giving money, and seldom 
 give, what is of at least equal importance, their 
 moral influence, advice, and help. "That is not 
 charity which the hand can hold," says James 
 Russell Lowell. At least it is not the only kind of 
 charity, and it seldom proves the most permanent 
 kind of help. 
 
 Here are seen the pre-eminent virtues of 
 the Elberfeld system. Instead of being purely 
 charitable — and what is easier than to vote public 
 money? — it is also disciplinary and educational. 
 Amongst the duties expressly imposed on the Poor 
 Administration is "investigation into the con- 
 ditions of the poorer class of the population and 
 the causes of their poverty, and the adoption of 
 effectual preventive and remedial measures, or 
 the recommendation of these to the municipal 
 administrative authority." 
 
 Practically the Elberfeld system dates from a 
 hundred years ago, though it was only placed 
 upon its present footing in 1853. Up to the end 
 of the eighteenth century the relief of the poor 
 in Elberfeld rested entirely in the hands of the 
 churches, which for this purpose received volun- 
 tary donations even beyond sufficiency. Indeed, 
 
262 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 the freedom with which charity was distributed 
 fostered the growth of a great mendicant class, 
 which became so numerous as to threaten the 
 security of property and endanger pubHc morality 
 and order. When it was so easy to live by 
 benevolence, the labouring class largely rebelled 
 against work, and high wages were often incapable 
 of inducing strong, able-bodied men to leave their 
 life of idleness. The basis of an orderly system of 
 poor relief was laid in 1800, when a public 
 authority consisting of six citizens was established 
 and the following principles were adopted for its 
 guidance : (i) Only really destitute persons should 
 be relieved ; (2) in order to establish the condition 
 of the recipients of relief, they should be frequently 
 visited ; (3) relief should not exceed the neces- 
 saries of life ; and (4) every pauper should be 
 obliged to do work suited to his capacity in return 
 for the help given. In other words, the principle 
 adopted was that the purpose of relief should not 
 be simply to provide for the physical necessities 
 of the hour, but also, and even primarily, to 
 encourage the recipients to habits of independence 
 and self-respect. Between that time and the 
 middle of the century, the Poor Law Adminis- 
 tration of Elberfeld passed through various vicis- 
 situdes, but the modifications which have been 
 rendered necessary by the centralisation of poor 
 relief in public hands, by the growth of the town, 
 and by the introduction of new legislation, both 
 of the State and the Empire, on the subject of 
 
ELBERFELD POOR RELIEF. 263 
 
 poor relief, have not changed the foundation 
 principles so long ago laid down. 
 
 The system followed to-day owes its existence 
 mainly to the foresight and rare sagacity of three 
 men — Daniel von der Heydt, David Peters, and 
 Gustav Schlieper — and the immediate cause of its 
 introduction was the intolerable burden of poor 
 relief in 1852, a burden created by the terrible 
 legacy of poverty and mendicity which had been 
 left by a period of - industrial and commercial 
 depression, whose evil results had been intensified 
 by a visitation of cholera. The plan was devised 
 of dividing work and responsibility to the utmost 
 possible extent. Herr von der Heydt so organised 
 the poor relief of the town, that for every four 
 recipients of assistance there was an almoner whose 
 duty it was not only to keep the central authority 
 acquainted with the circumstances of his charges, 
 but also to afford to these the help of his personal 
 influence and advice, often more valuable and 
 more needed than mere money. This system has 
 come down to the present day, and the experience 
 of over half a century has served only to enhance 
 it in the estimation of the citizens of Elberfeld, 
 while other German towns — Berlin, Cologne, 
 Crefeld, Dresden, Stuttgart, etc. — have adopted 
 the system with such modifications as local circum- 
 stances and traditions have made necessary. 
 
 The Elberfeld system recognises two kinds of 
 poor-law subjects — the destitute incapacitated and 
 the destitute able-bodied. The former have an 
 
264 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 unconditional claim to relief in so far as others who 
 are liable cannot provide for their needs; the latter, 
 however, may be put to work suited to their powers. 
 The " Instructions " say : 
 
 " The needy but capable person, if he, or another 
 on his behalf, applies for aid, and if he can prove that 
 he has honestly, but in vain, endeavoured to obtain 
 work and support himself, may be temporarily sup- 
 ported until he can earn a sufficient income in so 
 far as others are not liable and able to maintain him, 
 or voluntary charity does not supply his needs, but 
 he is bound to do such work, suited to his capacity, 
 as may be allotted to him." 
 
 There are two kinds of poor relief — " open " 
 {offene) or outdoor relief, and *' closed " (gesch- 
 lossene) relief, i.e., maintenance in public institu- 
 tions for the poor. Outdoor relief is given in 
 money (generally for a week at once), food, 
 clothing, furniture, medical assistance, or working 
 apparatus (as tools, sewing machines, etc.) ; while 
 indoor relief is given in some one of the town's 
 institutions for the purpose — the poor house, the 
 orphanage, the home for deserted children, and the 
 shelter for the homeless. These are under special 
 committees, composed of town councillors and 
 qualified citizens, elected for three years, one-third 
 retiring annually with eligibility to re-election, but 
 as this department of poor relief offers no distinc- 
 tive features it need not detain us. 
 
 The general work of the Poor-law Administration 
 is entrusted primarily to a body of nine men 
 appointed by the Muncipal Council, and consisting 
 
elberfp:ld poor relief. 265 
 
 of the president (who is the Mayor for the time 
 being or his deputy), four members of the Council, 
 and four private citizens chosen by the Council, 
 each for a period of three years. The administra- 
 tion, however, follows a plan of devolution of duty. 
 The town is divided into thirty-nine districts 
 (Bezirke), and these districts are again sub-divided 
 each into fourteen circuits (Kreise). Each district 
 has a superintendent {Bezirksvorsteher) , and there is 
 an almoner (Arinenpfleger) for each circuit, making 
 546 almoners in all. Service in this department 
 of public work is obligatory on every duly quali- 
 fied citizen who may be nominated to it. So far, 
 indeed, does this obligation go that in the event 
 of illness an almoner is required himself to provide 
 an efficient substitute, whom he must beforehand 
 have thoroughly acquainted with his duties, and 
 must notify the superintendent of his district that 
 he has done so. The spirit in which the work is 
 undertaken may be judged from one of the prin- 
 ciples laid down in the Instructions : — 
 
 " The offices of district superintendent and 
 almoner belong to the most important honorary 
 municipal offices, and their worthy discharge 
 requires a large measure of active philanthropy 
 and an earnest sense for justice : a love that will 
 hear the petition of the poor with benevolent 
 heart and with friendliness ; an earnestness that 
 will reject unjustifiable demands, find the right 
 measure of necessary relief by conscientious ex- 
 amination, and take care that the granting of 
 
266 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 alms does not encourage sloth and irregularity 
 of life." 
 
 The duty of relief is held to be restricted to the 
 " granting or supplementing of the means abso- 
 lutely essential to the support of the poor. Desir- 
 able though it is that the district meetings should 
 be permeated by a spirit of practical philanthropy, 
 they must dutifully restrict official relief to the 
 measure of what is necessary." 
 
 The money needed for relief is paid to the 
 district superintendents at the periodical sittings 
 of the Poor Administration, and they allot it as 
 required ; while food, clothing, and other articles 
 needed by necessitous persons are procured from 
 the poorhouse. There are no orders on the local 
 tradesmen. 
 
 Every application for relief, whether made by 
 the person desiring it or by some one else on his 
 behalf, is handed on to the almoner for the locality 
 in which the case is situated for immediate investi- 
 gation. Each almoner has charge of a certain 
 number of houses, and he is responsible for the 
 care of the poor who may reside therein. The 
 secret of the success of the system consists, indeed, 
 in personal acquaintance with the poor and with 
 their conditions of life. The result is, on the one 
 hand, to prevent malingering and consequent fraud 
 on the public, and, on the other, to prevent the 
 neglect of deserving cases of want. If the almoner 
 is satisfied with the result of his inquiries he may 
 himself give temporary relief forthwith, should the 
 
ELBERFELD POOR RELIEF. 267 
 
 case be urgent ; otherwise the case is held over for 
 decision by the full district meeting, for the visitors 
 of each district meet as a committee, under the 
 presidency of their superintendent, every fortnight, 
 and report upon the relief given and the applica- 
 tions received. No application is considered which 
 does not come through the almoner of the district 
 to which it relates. The fortnightly meetings of 
 the Poor Administration itself are also attended 
 by the various superintendents, who give informa- 
 tion upon the state of poverty in their districts. 
 As a rule an almoner must not have more than 
 four cases to look after at once. He must also 
 visit the poor at least once a fortnight in their own 
 homes, in order to acquaint himself with their 
 condition and with the changes which may have 
 taken place in their prospects. Part of this work 
 of investigation is to check the amount of earnings 
 going to the family, to inquire into the payments 
 made by insurance and other benefit funds, and to 
 make certain that the clothing, bedding, and other 
 articles which have been granted are in constant 
 use. As with us, a special form is sent to the 
 employer in order to learn earnings. Beyond this 
 the almoner must collect all the information which 
 belongs to what is known as the "case paper" 
 system in England ; and especially learn whether 
 legal liability to maintain exists on the part of 
 relatives, with ability to discharge this liability. 
 Each case paper is kept posted up for two years, 
 when it is superseded, but an old paper must be 
 
268 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 preserved for another two years before being 
 destroyed. In the case of a removal to a different 
 district, the local almoner notifies the change of 
 address to the almoner of the new district and 
 acquaints him also with the history of the case. 
 Where in a district distress is specially prevalent, 
 part of the work of supervision and visitation is 
 allotted to the almoners of other districts, and 
 where a destitute person has his settlement else- 
 where he is relieved provisionally, and the Poor 
 Administration takes up the question of liability 
 with the poor-law union interested. 
 
 The superintendents likewise are expected to 
 pay periodical visits to the poor of their districts, 
 either alone or with their almoners, in order to 
 acquaint themselves with the condition of affairs 
 and to satisfy themselves that the poor relief is 
 being wisely distributed. Relief is only granted 
 (in weekly payments) for fourteen days at a time, 
 and before it can be renewed there must be a 
 re-investigation of the case. Where there is reason 
 to fear that money would not be well spent, soup, 
 clothing, bedding and other articles may be sup- 
 plied from the poor house instead. 
 
 The Elberfeld system differs from a common 
 practice of poor-law administration in England in 
 that willingness to receive indoor relief is not 
 adopted as a test of destitution. In any case, 
 relief is only given where the applicant's existing 
 incomings fail to provide the absolute necessaries 
 of life. For the carrying out of this condition a 
 
ELBERFELD POOR RELIEF. 269 
 
 "standard of income" is laid down. Thus a 
 
 family is supposed to require income weekly as 
 
 follows, to provide for food, clothing, house rent, 
 
 and furniture, and if this amount be not received, 
 
 a claim for relief to the extent of the deficiency 
 
 may be established, though it rests with the 
 
 almoners of the district concerned to give less or 
 
 more : — 
 
 s. d. 
 
 The head of the family 30 
 
 A wife living with her husband .... 2 6 
 A child of 14 years and over in work and 
 
 earning 30 
 
 A child of 14 years and over not working 
 
 A child of 10 to 14 years 20 
 
 A child of 5 to 10 years 17 
 
 A child of I to 5 years 15 
 
 A child under i year 10 
 
 Total for a family of 8 persons consisting 
 
 as above 16 8| 
 
 For a single person living alone .... 3 6 
 It is stipulated that "the existence of this weekly 
 income, either at the time of the application for 
 assistance, or as the average of recent weeks, as a 
 rule excludes any claim to relief from the public 
 poor funds." Where the income is less it may be 
 brought up to this maximum, though it is not 
 assumed that it will be done as a matter of course, 
 the exact amount of relief depending upon the 
 circumstances of every individual case. The in- 
 crease of this relief basis is only allowable when 
 "the most unfavourable conditions conceivable 
 exist, and the reasons for such departure must be 
 entered fully in the district book." 
 
270 THE GERMAN WORKMAN.. 
 
 Several other notable principles of relief 
 observed at Elberfeld may be mentioned. Thus 
 relief is only given to a deserted wife when she 
 can furnish a certificate to the effect that the 
 police have failed to persuade the husband to 
 return to his home. There are no special regula- 
 tions refusing relief to persons living in insanitary 
 dwellings, but the almoners are requested to 
 notify the police authority of such dwellings 
 where they exist, and that authority takes sum- 
 mary measures to abate the evil. The costs of 
 burial are only paid by the poor-law authority 
 when it bears the whole charge for coffin, cortege, 
 etc. Where tuberculous persons are in receipt of 
 relief, the poor-law authority is always ready to 
 provide beds so that they may sleep alone, so 
 safeguarding to some extent the healthy members 
 of the household. Should a larger dwelling be 
 necessary in the interests of health, the authority 
 may increase the weekly relief so as to cover the 
 increased rent. 
 
 The value of women's co-operation in the work 
 of poor relief has been but tardily recognised 
 by the Elberfeld Municipal Council, progressive 
 though it has shown itself on the general ques- 
 tion of poor-law administration. Resolutions 
 and regulations adopted in October, igo2, and 
 amended in November, 1904, give an important, 
 though still a subsidiary, place to women in this 
 sphere of benevolent enterprise. On the request 
 of a meeting of district almoners, women (married 
 
ELBERFELD POOR RELIEF. 271 
 
 and unmarried) may be added to the district 
 committees, though not more than three to a 
 district, and their presence does not reduce the 
 statutory number of fourteen men. The lady 
 almoners are not, however, given special rounds, 
 but are commissioned to visit anywhere in the 
 district where, in the judgment of the men, 
 " female activity is specially appropriate, as in 
 cases of single women, large families, and foster 
 children," also in cases where " the influence of a 
 woman on the female household manager in receipt 
 of relief is calculated to promote the sense for 
 order and cleanliness, and in particular to exert 
 a moral stimulus." It appears, however, that 
 at the beginning of 1905 only one district had 
 been courageous enough to adopt this optional 
 right to invite the help of women. Against 583 
 men there were still only two women in the 
 Elberfeld poor relief service. Otherwise the 
 ladies of the town, through their Frauenverein, 
 do excellent work in connexion with crhches, the 
 kitchens for the poor, the country outings for sick 
 children, and the vagrants' shelters. 
 
 It is impossible to make a useful comparison 
 between the cost of relief in Elberfeld and that 
 in an English town of the same size and character. 
 Questions like the standard of life, the local cost 
 of living, rent, and the relative amount of out and 
 indoor relief complicate such a comparison and 
 make helpful deductions impossible in the absence 
 of an infinity of detail. Thus the following 
 
272 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 figures can pretend to no absolute value, and are 
 only added for the sake of information. The 
 amount granted in outdoor relief in money during 
 the administrative year 1903-4 (March 31) was 
 5^10,394 ; in payments to foster parents, 5^495 ; 
 in kind and otherwise, ,^1,084 ; while ^1,114 was 
 granted to non-municipal institutions maintaining 
 adult or juvenile poor, making a total grant of out- 
 door relief of ^^13,089. This represented a pay- 
 ment of I "61 marks or is. y§d. per head of the 
 population of 162,700, which is about the average 
 of the past twelve years. Taking the poor-law 
 system in its entirety, outdoor and indoor relief 
 of every kind (including the poorhouse, orphan- 
 age, and home for deserted children), and ad- 
 ministrative expenses, the net cost to the town 
 was ^^28,706, representing a charge of 3s. 6ld. 
 per head of the population, which was also the 
 average of the four years 1900- 1903. During the 
 year 7,689 persons received permanent or tem- 
 porary relief in one way or another, representing 
 4*73 per cent, of the population. The percentage 
 for the five years 1899 to 1903 was 4*84; for the 
 five years 1894 to 1898, 4*48; for the five years 
 1887 to 1893, 4*92 ; and for the five years 1884 
 to 1888, 4*88. Going back to 1880, however, the 
 percentage was 6'62. 
 
 But the financial aspect of the question is not the 
 one by which the people of Elberfeld would desire 
 their system of poor relief to be judged. The 
 peculiar value of the Elberfeld system is that it 
 
ELBERFELD POOR RELIEF, 273 
 
 brings the administrators of poor relief face to 
 face with the people whom it is their duty to 
 relieve. The average English guardian of the 
 poor is a guardian only of the public pocket ; of 
 the poor he knows as a rule very little ; even his 
 relief he usually grants vicariously through an 
 official. Upon the financial aspect of the ques- 
 tion, therefore, I am not concerned to dwell. 
 Tried by its moral fruits, however, the Elberfeld 
 system must be allowed to have achieved signal 
 success. In the first place, it is contended that 
 begging has been brought to the "irreducible 
 minimum," and the amount of pauperism has 
 been greatly diminished. Provident habits have 
 been encouraged amongst a thriftless class, love 
 of work has been promoted where it did not exist 
 before, and the social and moral status of the 
 lowest grades of the inhabitants has been ele- 
 vated. For, thanks to the visits of the almoner, 
 both the manners and the morals of the poor are 
 fostered, the domestic and personal virtues are 
 encouraged, parents are advised on their duties 
 towards their children, children on the reverence 
 and obedience due to parents. 
 
 An idea of the magnitude of this voluntary 
 work may be gained from the fact that some 
 600 citizens are engaged in it, independently of 
 the ladies' auxiliary association. One of these 
 had last year been in office forty-nine years, 19 
 had been in office over thirty years, 81 over 
 twenty, and 268 over ten years. In this 
 
 G.w. T 
 
274 -THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 honourable body of public servants there were 243 
 business men and manufacturers ; 169 architects, 
 engineers, contractors, and master craftsmen ; 
 150 civil officials, teachers, doctors, lawyers, 
 chemists and apothecaries ; 9 were farmers and 
 landowners ; and only 22 were persons in private 
 life. The figures are significant. The town, in 
 fact, gives its best men to the work of poor relief, 
 and there are always more offers of voluntary 
 service than there are positions to fill. 
 
INDUSTRIAL MALINGERING. 275 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 TREATMENT OF INDUSTRIAL 
 
 MALINGERING. 
 
 If in many respects the Germans set us an 
 example in the rational care which they take to 
 keep labour in an efficient condition and to encour- 
 age the worker to follow the ways of providence, 
 so unattractive to the *' economic man " of 
 common experience, they are no less our exemplars 
 in the treatment of the industrial malingerer, the 
 drone of the social hive. 
 
 In speaking of Germany's methods of combating 
 vagrancy, mendicancy, and loafing generally it is 
 satisfactory to know that one need no longer 
 strain at the irksome labour of breaking fallow 
 ground ; better still, that the old prejudice against 
 disciplinary measures has itself largely disappeared. 
 Hence in treating this question my present pur- 
 pose will be exposition rather than advocacy. It 
 is well, however, to remember that what is said of 
 Germany holds good equally of Holland, of Belgium, 
 of Switzerland, of Norway, and other Continental 
 countries ; for in her irrational, happy-go-lucky 
 method of forcing the honest but penniless work- 
 seeker into the company of the idle vagabond and 
 giving both the same treatment, England stands 
 almost alone amongst civilised States. We have 
 
 2 T 
 
276 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 seen how in Germany the former is helped on his 
 way. For the latter there exists a special institu- 
 tion of proved efficacy — the workhouse. But the 
 Continental workhouse has nothing in common 
 with the agency so named known to the English 
 Poor Law. The A rbeitshaus is a workhouse indeed. 
 It is not intended for the reception of the depen- 
 dent poor at all ; it is essentially a penal establish- 
 ment, and those who enter its portals must first 
 have committed repeated offences entailing magis- 
 terial conviction and punishment.^ The Imperial 
 Penal Code thus describes the people for whom the 
 workhouse exists : 
 
 " Whoever wanders about as a vagabond. 
 
 " Whoever begs or causes children to beg orneglects 
 to restrain from begging such persons as are under his 
 control and oversight and belong to his household. 
 
 " Whoever is so addicted to gambling, drunken- 
 ness, or idleness, that he falls into such a condition as 
 to be compelled to seek public help himself, or for 
 those for whose maintenance he is responsible. 
 
 " Any female who is placed under police control 
 
 * In the German prison system there are rising grades 
 of severity. First comes Haft, which is simple detention 
 or ward, which may last from one to six weeks. It is a light 
 penalty intended to satisfy justice in trivial cases. Fes- 
 tuugsstrafe, Festungshaft, or Festungsaryesi follows. This 
 is detention in a fortress from one day to fifteen years. 
 GefiiHgnissstrafe is imprisonment in gaol, which may last 
 from one day to five years. Arbeitshaus detention is a 
 punishment supplementary to the latter by way of discip- 
 line and may extend to two years. Zuchthausstrafe is penal 
 servitude and applies to the worst crimes — it may be for life 
 or from one to fifteen years. Eight months of Zuchthaiis 
 and one year of Ge/dngniss are regarded as equivalent, as are 
 eight months of Gefdngniss and one year of Festungsarrest. 
 
INDUSTRIAL MALINGERING. 277 
 
 owing to professional immorality when she acts con- 
 trary to the police regulations issued in the interest 
 of health, public order, and public decency, or who, 
 .without being under such control, is guilty of pro- 
 fesssional immorality." [Also, by a recent amendment 
 of the law, procurers and bawds.] 
 
 (As to this class of offender an important modifi- 
 cation of the law was introduced by an amendment 
 of June 24, 1900, providing that women who are 
 handed over to the State police may be sent to a 
 reformatory, or a refuge for fallen girls, instead 
 of to the workhouse ; while a female sentenced for 
 immoral life who has not completed her eighteenth 
 year may not in any case be sent to a workhouse. 
 The State bears the cost of maintenance in a 
 reformatory or refuge.) 
 
 " Any person who, while in receipt of public relief, 
 refuses out of sloth to do such work suited to his 
 strength as the authorities may offer him. 
 
 " Any person who, after losing his past lodging, fails 
 to procure another within the time allotted to him by 
 the competent authority, and who cannot prove that 
 in spite of his best endeavours he has been unable so 
 to do." 
 
 The statute provides that offenders of the 
 foregoing classes and several others may be put 
 to work suited to their capacities and condition 
 either within prisons or outside, provided they are 
 kept from mixing with free workpeople, and that 
 after the period of detention has been served they 
 may be handed over to the State (as distinguished 
 from the communal) police authority, which may 
 sentence them to be detained for any period up to 
 
278 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 two years in a workhouse, or to be employed 
 under police control upon useful public works 
 during the same period. This maximum term 
 seems long, but it is not too long, for it gives the 
 institution a tolerable chance of making some 
 moral impression upon an offender, while the virtual 
 minimum of three months is in most cases as 
 useless for disciplinary and reformative purposes 
 as three days. Between these terms punishment 
 varies according to the frequency of criminality. 
 
 Reserving for a separate chapter a description 
 of typical institutions of this kind, certain features 
 common to the whole of the Prussian workhouses 
 and the general character of their inmates may 
 be noted here. As to administration they are 
 directly under the chief presidents of the provinces, 
 though in the last resort they belong to the 
 domain of the Ministry of the Interior and the 
 Ministry of Justice. Prussia has twenty-four 
 workhouses of all kinds. The rule is one at least 
 for every province, though the larger and more 
 populous provinces have more. The workhouses, 
 with their accommodation, are : — 
 
 Provinces. Males. Females. Total. 
 
 Brandenburg (4). 
 Rummelsburg 
 Strausberg 
 Prenzlau 
 Landsberg 
 
 POMERANIA (4). 
 
 Neustettin 
 ijckermunde . 
 Stralsund 
 Greifswald 
 
 625 
 
 375 
 
 1,000 
 
 520 
 
 — 
 
 520 
 
 480 
 
 26 
 
 506 
 
 200 
 
 70 
 
 270 
 
 190 
 
 30 
 
 220 
 
 = 340 
 
 = 
 
 340 
 
 120 
 
 25 
 
 145 
 
 no 
 
 — 
 
 no 
 
INDUSTRIAL MALINGERING. 279 
 
 Provinces. 
 
 Males. 
 
 Females. 
 
 T0t£ 
 
 Hanover (3). 
 
 
 
 
 Moringen 
 
 800 
 
 — 
 
 800 
 
 Wuntstorf 
 
 8x8 
 
 — 
 
 8t8 
 
 Himmelsthur . 
 
 — 
 
 315 
 
 315 
 
 POSEN (2). 
 
 
 
 
 Bojanowo 
 
 450 
 
 — 
 
 450 
 
 Fraustadt 
 
 
 130 
 
 130 
 
 Saxony (2). 
 
 
 
 
 Gross-Salze 
 
 453 
 
 82 
 
 535 
 
 Moritzburg 
 
 558 
 
 79 
 
 637 
 
 ScHLEswiG (2 as l). 
 
 
 
 
 Gliickstadt and Bockel- 
 
 
 
 
 holm .... 
 
 1,020 
 
 50 
 
 1,070 
 
 Hesse Nassau (2). 
 
 
 
 
 Breitenau 
 
 330 
 
 40 
 
 370 
 
 Hadamar 
 
 248 
 
 86 
 
 334 
 
 Silesia (2). 
 
 
 
 
 Schweidnitz . 
 
 1,400 
 
 300 
 
 1,700 
 
 Breslau .... 
 
 600 
 
 300 
 
 goo 
 
 East Prussia (i). 
 
 
 
 
 Tapiau .... 
 
 392 
 
 80 
 
 472 
 
 West Prussia (i). 
 
 
 
 
 Konitz .... 
 
 520 
 
 180 
 
 700 
 
 Rhine Province (i). 
 
 
 
 
 Brauweiler 
 
 1,000 
 
 250 
 
 1,250 
 
 Westphalia (i). 
 
 
 
 
 Benninghausen 
 
 350 
 
 60 
 
 410 
 
 Totals 
 
 
 
 14,836 
 
 In the whole of these workhouses there were 
 detained at the end of March, 1904, 8,g8i men and 
 1,067 women, a total of 10,048 persons. It is a 
 noteworthy fact that the commitments during the 
 year 1903-4 to the twenty-four workhouses of 
 Prussia were fewer by 50 per cent, than twenty years 
 before. In the interval the number had varied 
 between a maximum of 15,839 and a minimum 
 
28o THE GERMAN WORKMAN 
 
 of 7,800, though meantime the population of 
 Prussia had increased from 28,318,000 (1885) to 
 34,472,000 (1900), equal to nearly 22 per cent. 
 
 The movement of this workhouse population 
 will appear from the following figures. On 
 April ist, 1903, there were in all the twenty-four 
 workhouses: — 
 
 
 Men. 
 
 Women. 
 
 Total. 
 
 (A) 
 
 There entered during the 
 
 8,833 
 
 1,131 
 
 9,964 
 
 year 1903-4. (B). 
 
 9,218 
 
 1. 145 
 2,276 
 
 10,363 
 
 There were discharged 
 
 18,051 
 
 20,327 
 
 during the year . 
 
 9,070 
 
 1,209 
 
 10,279 
 
 There remained on March 
 
 
 
 31st, 1904 
 
 8,981 
 
 1,067 
 
 10,048 
 
 The total number of 
 
 days' detention (A 
 
 and B) was . . 3,225,613 393.237 3.618,850 
 and the daily average 
 
 of prisoners . . 8,813 1,074 9,887 
 
 Of the 9,218 men admitted into the Prussian 
 workhouses during the year 1903-4, 326 were 
 committed for vagabondage, 5,983 for begging, 
 1,059 for vagabondage and begging, 93 for sloth, 
 179 for immorality, 12 for refusal to work, and 
 1,151 for being without homes. The duration of 
 the primary sentences was as follows : — 3 months 
 and under, 27 ; 3 to 6 months, 2,857 ; 6 months to 
 2 years, 3,997 ; 2 years, 1,920. The causes of 
 imprisonment in the case of women were : — 
 Vagabondage 50, begging 79, vagabondage and 
 
INDUSTRIAL MALINGERING 281 
 
 begging 51, sloth 6, immorality 851, refusal to 
 work 2, no home 82. The duration of the 
 sentences was : — 3 months and under, 2 ; 3 to 6 
 months, 457 ; 6 months and under 2 years, 522 ; 
 2 years, 140. 
 
 The prominent characteristic of the life of these 
 institutions is severe work of a useful and as far 
 as possible of a remunerative kind. This is not 
 merely a fundamental part of the curative dis- 
 cipline which the prisoners are here to undergo ; 
 it also has a practical side, for in this way a con- 
 siderable portion of the costs of maintenance is 
 borne by the prisoners themselves. Thus the 
 maximum cost per head in Prussian workhouses 
 shown by the returns for 1903-4 was ^^28 5s. at 
 Hadamar, against which went earnings of 3^15 igs. 
 per head ; and the minimum was ;^I2 13s. at 
 Schweidnitz, against which had to be set earnings 
 of £S 16s. per head. The maximum earnings 
 per head were £16 3s. at Greifswald, the minimum 
 £4 3s. at Rummelsburg. The maximum subsidy 
 needed from the public funds was ;^ig 5s. at 
 Fraustadt and the minimum £2 ys. at Gross- 
 Salze, which had earnings of £11 los. per head 
 arising out of industrial employments. Other 
 workhouses which needed small subsidies were 
 Moritzburg, which earned £g i6s. 10^. per head 
 and cost the community £^ 12s. gd. per head, 
 and Bockelholm, which earned ;^ii los. 8d. and 
 cost the community only £2 i8s. 6d. per head. 
 The deficiencies are covered by the provincial 
 
282 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 funds, for in Germany the common Swiss rule 
 does not hold good that the maintenance (Kostgeld) 
 of the prisoners in the workhouses falls on the 
 communes in which they have legal settlement. 
 
 As to the efficacy of workhouse treatment in the 
 repression of sloth and vagabondage something 
 will be said later. Pastor von Bodelschwingh, 
 the founder of the Labour Colony, who is no lover 
 of the workhouses, whose inmates he would prefer 
 to deal with in the Labour Colony way, contends 
 that the society in these houses ofcorrectionistoo 
 bad to allow of the prisoners' reformation. The 
 society may be bad, but the conclusion based upon 
 this fact is not consistent with the universal 
 regulation which strictly prohibits intercourse 
 between prisoners. That the discipline is healthy 
 and productive of good results is the testimony of 
 all officials whom I have consulted, though their 
 opinion is also unanimous that longer sentences 
 are desirable. 
 
 As a rule the workhouses follow a mixed 
 economy of agriculture and industry. In some 
 cases agriculture is the only possible means of 
 occupation, though on the other hand several of 
 the workhouses are exclusively industrial. My 
 own opinion is that the ideal type is a workhouse 
 established upon a distinctly industrial basis and 
 located as near as is convenient to a town, with a 
 view to the easier disposal of the prisoners' labour 
 and of its products. 
 
BERLIN WORKHOUSE. 283 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 THE BERLIN WORKHOUSE. 
 
 The workhouse of Rummelsburg, near Berlin, 
 is an example of the house of correction which 
 is conducted more on an industrial than an 
 agricultural basis. It is by no means the best 
 example of the kind ; it is on so large a scale, 
 and owing to the sources and character of its 
 material it does not possess the possibilities of 
 financial success which lie within reach of 
 smaller and simpler institutions. As a fact it is 
 the least independent workhouse in Prussia. The 
 total cost of the prisoners at Rummelsburg during 
 the year 1903-4 was 3^19 12s. per head, of which 
 ■^4 6s. only was covered by the proceeds of their 
 labour, leaving a deficit to be made up out of the 
 public funds of £is 6s. Nevertheless, its con- 
 junction with metropolitan life gives to it special 
 features of interest. For the Rummelsburg work- 
 house serves as a receptacle for those elements of 
 Berlin's population which get beyond the control 
 of the street police — the moral residuum which 
 lacks the will or power to keep its evil propensities 
 under rein and curb. As a building it is a master- 
 piece of structural ingenuity, and is singularly well 
 fitted for its manifold purposes. 
 
284 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 The workhouse, with its annexes, covers many 
 acres of ground at the outskirts of an industrial 
 village a few miles out of the city, and abutting 
 an one side upon the river Spree, and its extent 
 may be judged from the fact that the director has 
 every day of the year more than 2,500 persons in 
 his custody. These, however, are not all physically 
 capable men and women. For to the workhouse 
 is attached a large hospital for the reception of 
 persons who have come to Rummelsburg owing 
 to misdemeanour but are incapable of work, are 
 decrepit, or suffer from chronic disease. Such 
 prisoners, according to their condition, are ad- 
 mitted to the hospital either on their arrival or 
 on the expiration of the period of detention. The 
 workhouse itself has accommodation for 400 men, 
 300 women, 224 foster-boys and 75 girls (young 
 people who are taken in hand for reformative 
 purposes), a total of 1,000. During the year 
 1903-4 there entered the workhouse alone (apart 
 from foster-children) 2,036 males and 160 females, 
 a total of 2,196 prisoners ; there were in deten- 
 tion at the beginning of the year 1,596 persons 
 (1,479 males and 117 females), and there were 
 discharged during the year 1,934 (1,794 males 
 and 140 females), so that there remained at the 
 year's end 1,858 prisoners (1,721 males and 137 
 females). Of the male offenders admitted during 
 the year 1,039 were imprisoned for mendicancy, 
 49 for refusing to work, and 703 for having no 
 home. 
 
BERLIN WORKHOUSE. 285 
 
 Of the female offenders 112 were imprisoned 
 for immorality, 14 for begging, 30 for not having 
 a home, and one for sloth. The sentence of deten- 
 tion in the case of men was from three to six months 
 in 542 cases, from six months to two years in 770 
 cases, and the full two years in 479 cases ; in the 
 case of women the proportions were 67, 6g, and 21 
 respectively. 
 
 The actual workers, both male and female, 
 number about 1,800. It is a first principle of 
 management at the workhouse that all men of 
 healthy body and mind sent thither shall be em- 
 ployed on the great irrigation works which are the 
 culmination of the metropolitan "canalisation" 
 or sewerage system, and as a rule over a thousand 
 men are located there. The irrigation works are 
 situated several miles away, and for the sake equally 
 of convenience, economj'' of time, and better over- 
 sight, the men are lodged on the spot in barracks 
 (50 to 100 in each) instead of being led to and fro 
 daily, and as a rule the whole of the term of 
 detention is spent in situ. The life is unquestion- 
 ably hard, yet considering the conduct which has 
 brought the majority of the men within the clutches 
 of the workhouse — vagabondage, incurable idle- 
 ness, and intemperance — it is bound to be stimula- 
 ing and educative. From five in the morning until 
 eight in the evening during the summer they are 
 kept steadily at their outdoor tasks, working in 
 bands, each under the control of overseers, armed 
 with sabre and revolver, and by the time their sen- 
 
286 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 tence is served these past parasites of society have 
 either learned to tolerate work or they hate it with 
 a deeper hatred than ever before. If the former, 
 both they and society are the gainers ; it the latter, 
 they will in all probability come back again before 
 long and undergo a second experience of the same 
 kind. These barrack colonies are self-contained and 
 self-managed; for while the great majority of men 
 are kept at agricultural work of various kinds a 
 certain number are told off for culinary and general 
 domestic service. 
 
 The system of employing the more capable 
 workhouse denizens upon the irrigation works not 
 only saves the municipality of Berlin a large 
 expenditure, but it places the Corporation in a 
 very favourable position in the event of labour 
 troubles occurring in connexion with the sewerage 
 and scavenging of the city, for there is here a 
 reserve of forced labour, beyond the reach of the 
 trade union and the labour organiser, which can 
 at any time be called in to tide over a temporary 
 deficiency of free paid service. 
 
 All outdoor work in connexion with the estab- 
 lishment — in garden, yard, and stable — is done by 
 the inmates, and that with but the slightest over- 
 sight, so readily do they fall in with the accepted 
 code of the workhouse, which is contained in the 
 one simple but all-sufficient word "obedience." 
 
 The less robust and the older men, who are 
 unfit for the arduous outdoor work of the sewage 
 farm, are employed variously in and about the 
 
. BERLIN WORKHOUSE. 287 
 
 house. There is shoemending or tailoring or car- 
 pentry or locksmithry in abundance for such as 
 have a knowledge of these crafts or can be taught 
 them. For example, a certain number are 
 engaged exclusively in sewing for the great muni- 
 cipal orphanage, which is situated not far away. 
 Bread-baking is also done on a wholesale scale 
 for municipal institutions, and even chimney- 
 sweeping is one source of occupation and also of 
 income. One of the most remunerative works, 
 however, is wood-cutting: some 9,000 cubic yards 
 of wood are yearly chopped into faggots, which 
 are used in the various official buildings and 
 schools belonging to the municipality. The very 
 old men are put to lighter employments, like 
 coffee-bean sorting and feather sorting for beds. 
 The entire list of trades and handicrafts followed 
 embraces tailors, shoemakers and doggers, 
 coopers, turners, joiners and cabinet makers, 
 basket makers, painters and glaziers, brush makers, 
 locksmiths, tinners, paperhangers, bookbinders, 
 straw plaiters, masons, and potters. 
 
 Nor are the women allowed to be idle, for that 
 were to disregard the essentially educative pur- 
 pose of their detention. Most of the domestic 
 work of the workhouse is done by them, besides 
 which the}^ do sewing and washing for other 
 public institutions in Berhn, such as the muni- 
 cipal offices, hospitals, shelters for the homeless, 
 the great cattle market, the cemetery administra- 
 tion, the police force, and the like. 
 
288 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 Summarising recent returns, I find that of a 
 daily average of 1,758 workers in 1903-4, 421 were 
 engaged in work of various kinds on behalf of the 
 workhouse, 1,046 were employed in the irrigation 
 fields, 149 were employed on behalf of public 
 institutions, 144 on behalf of outside employers 
 who farmed their labour, and the rest were 
 variously engaged in remunerative work. 
 
 The discipline enforced in the workhouse is 
 rigid, and in certain eventualities rigorous. The 
 code of the day is as follows in summer : At 
 5-5.45 a.m. all inmates must be up, dressed, and 
 ready to receive orders ; at 6 what is called " first 
 breakfast " is taken ; from 6.15 to 9 there is work ; 
 from 9 to 9.30 there is " second breakfast " ; from 
 9.30 to 12 work; from 12 to 1.30 dinner and rest ; 
 from 1.30 to 5 work; from 5 to 5.30 tea; from 
 5.30 to 6.45 work ; from 6.45 to 7 preparation 
 for bed, and at 7 all retire. On Sundays and 
 festivals no work is done, but the routine is other- 
 wise pretty much the same. On Saturdays and 
 the evenings preceding festivals, work ceases 
 at 4 p.m. No smoking is allowed, but in its 
 place chewing is suffered ; and beer is supplied in 
 not illiberal measure, to each inmate a litre 
 (weak) one day and half a litre the next. But though 
 as a rule the hours of work are the same for all 
 work is not measured by time, but according 
 to the capacity of the individual inmate ; and 
 where the tasks imposed are unfulfilled at the 
 close of the day, owing to sloth or insubordina- 
 
BERLIN WORKHOUSE. 289 
 
 tion, punishment follows. Where the inmates 
 work for other than estabhshment needs and con- 
 sumption, a very small payment — at the most a 
 few coppers a week — is offered to the industrious, 
 and these earnings are divided into two equal 
 parts, of which one is expended on additions to 
 the regulation food rations and on other extras, 
 while the other half is put away as " savings," 
 and given to the owner on his discharge. 
 
 And yet there is no mechanical treatment of 
 the inmates. Each one is treated individually 
 and according to his or her distinctive character- 
 istics. " I study each case that comes before 
 me," the director said to me during our two 
 hours' wandering over the establishment, " and 
 act accordingly. You cannot deal," he added, 
 " with such people in the mass if you wish to do 
 them any good. Every one has his peculiarities, 
 and these must be studied and taken account 
 of. But all are treated alike in this — they can 
 always count on friendliness, with firmness 
 behind it." 
 
 And here one of the rules for the observance of 
 the inmates deserves to be quoted : " The inmates 
 should live together in peace and quiet, none 
 interrupting another in his work, but rather by 
 industry, order, and decent moral behaviour 
 encouraging each other to reformation of life and 
 setting each other a good example. Conversation 
 upon past misdemeanours may under no circum- 
 stances take place ; nor may one inmate reproach 
 
 G.w. u 
 
290 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 another with any crime which he may have 
 committed during his career." 
 
 Moreover, no communication is allowed between 
 the older and younger of either sex, not, however, 
 the director said, from fear that the old would 
 contaminate the young, " for the young (he 
 assured me) are far worse than the old." 
 
 From what has been said it will have been 
 gathered that though punitive the institution is 
 also, and in a far greater degree, educative, and 
 in practice it is found that a genuine moral 
 influence is really exerted. The idle learn how 
 to work, and often to endure work patiently, if 
 not exactly to recognise its right or needful place 
 in the economy of human society ; the filthy learn 
 cleanliness ; the unruly obedience, as day after 
 day they pass the laborious hours under a critical 
 taskmaster's eye ; and the immoral are purged 
 both physically and morally under a healthy 
 restraint against which it were futile to rebel. 
 
 The discipline in general leaves little to be 
 desired, and the director spoke very contentedly 
 of the conduct of his heterogeneous family, though 
 correction for minor offences has frequently to be 
 resorted to. There are many degrees of punition, 
 and the director has an absolutely free hand. 
 Where formal warning has no effect, permission 
 to receive visits is withheld for a time ; next per- 
 mission to write or receive letters ; then the right 
 to supplement the workhouse diet out of the 
 reward of industry is cancelled ; the next punish- 
 
BERLIN WORKHOUSE. 291 
 
 ment is the forfeit of these earnings themselves ; 
 then, as a further measure, should one be needful, 
 open-air exercise is disallowed ; next rations are 
 curtailed ; then comes simple cell incarceration 
 (Arrest), and finally imprisonment on hard fare 
 {strenger Arrest). There are, however, extra- 
 ordinary measures, which very seldom have to 
 be resorted to, such as the straight-jacket ; while 
 in cases of continuous bad behaviour it is com- 
 petent for the director to propose to the police 
 authorities (without further judicial proceedings) 
 the prolongation of the sentence of detention. 
 Of the 3,792 prisoners who were passed through 
 the workhouse director's hands during the year 
 1903-4 (the daily average being 1,777), 358 had 
 to be punished with cell incarceration, and in 
 every case the cause was misdemeanour at work. 
 
 The religious and mental needs of the inmates 
 are duly regarded. There are three stationed 
 clergymen, and teachers attend to the deficiencies 
 of the educationally backward. Not only so, but 
 religious scruples are not ignored, for it is per- 
 mitted to Jewish inmates to be absolved from 
 work on their Sabbath and on the high religious 
 festivals of their race, but in compensation they 
 may be required to engage in " noiseless employ- 
 ments " on the Christian Sundays and festivals. 
 Nor is the hair or beard of an inmate cut close, 
 as the rule is, if religious considerations are 
 against it. 
 
 Working hand in hand with the authorities of 
 
 u 2 
 
292 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 the workhouse is a Discharged Prisoners' Aid 
 Association, following pretty much the same aims, 
 by the pursuance of the same methods, as the 
 English associations so called, and every time- 
 served offender is given the chance before leaving 
 of placing himself under its protection. For men 
 work is sought by the aid of the Metropolitan 
 Labour Registry, and an endeavour is made to 
 get women and girls into refuges or to return them 
 to their relatives, but in no cases does the work- 
 house director or the association procure situations 
 for them, for 90 per cent, of the females are under 
 the control of the police des moeiirs. 
 
 The director mentioned the odd fact that among 
 the German criminal class there are, so to speak, 
 social grades, and the sojourner in the workhouse 
 belongs to the lowest of these. He ranks, in fact, 
 as a mere plebeian ; while the criminal who has 
 served time in an ordinary gaol (Gefcingniss) is 
 known as a " baron," and he who has risen to 
 the dignity of imprisonment in a penitentiary 
 (Zuchthaus) is known as a "count." The reason 
 why the workhouse is despised is that there the 
 inmates are trained to methodical work, which is 
 a degradation in the eyes of the criminal popula- 
 tion. Perhaps no greater praise or justification 
 could be claimed for it than is afforded by the 
 unconscious testimony of those for whose benefit — 
 if they would but believe it — this institution has 
 been devised. 
 
DRESDEN MUNICIPAL WORKHOUSE. 293 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 DRESDEN MUNICIPAL WORKHOUSE. 
 
 The Saxon capital has established for its own 
 exclusive use a workhouse which presents points 
 of special interest, inasmuch as it is conducted in 
 close association with the Poor Law and by the 
 Poor-law Authority, and is intended to meet the 
 needs of the more or less stationary population of 
 a large tow-n. Dresden has separate institutions 
 for the reception of the destitute poor who are 
 suitable subjects for indoor relief and for the 
 idle, loafing, and dissolute class whose indiscrimi- 
 nate association with the more or less deserving 
 pauper gives a sting to the slander that " the poor 
 in the lump is bad." For the former there exists 
 the Versorgimgshaus, or House of Relief, for the 
 latter the Arbeitshaus. Prisoners admitted to the 
 former cannot, as in England, take their discharge 
 when they will, while discharge from the latter is 
 — within the limits of the original period of com- 
 mitment — entirely conditional upon good conduct. 
 The poorhouse proper also serves the purpose of 
 housing homeless families in temporary difficulty, 
 though in these cases food is not given free. 
 Should the heads of such a family fail to find 
 
294 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 lodging within the time allotted, or become a 
 source of annoyance to others, they may be trans- 
 ferred to the workhouse. 
 
 The workhouse is managed by a special com- 
 mittee of the Poor-law Administration, which, as 
 in other German towns, is a department of the 
 municipal service, and commitment can only 
 follow upon an order to that effect issued by the 
 Poor Bureau (Armenamt). The special feature of 
 the Dresden Workhouse is that the police authority 
 cannot commit independently of the municipal 
 power. Before the issue of an admission order 
 a document is drawn up describing the person 
 concerned, and noting all necessary facts about 
 him, and this document is preserved in the insti- 
 tution. On admission notification is sent to the 
 Poor Bureau and to the Police Authority. 
 
 The purpose of the workhouse is clearly defined 
 by the regulations adopted at its establishment in 
 1878, and revised eleven years later, and is stated 
 as follows : — 
 
 " The workhouse is a closed institution with 
 compulsion to work, whose purpose is (a) to 
 accustom persons whose conduct has necessitated 
 the granting of public relief either to themselves or 
 to those for whose support they are responsible to a 
 mode of life which will make them capable and 
 disposed, on regaining their freedom, to maintain 
 themselves and their dependents by independent 
 work ; (6) to influence educatively degenerate young 
 persons by stringent discipline, order, and work, so as 
 to induce them to follow a regular and honourable 
 life." 
 
DRESDEN MUNICIPAL WORKHOUSE. 295 
 
 Eight classes of people, broadly grouped, are 
 admitted into the workhouse : — 
 
 (a) " Persons who have become workless or home- 
 less owing to laziness, disorderliness, or drunken and 
 quarrelsome habits, and who either seek for admis- 
 sion themselves or are recommended to the Poor 
 Bureau for admission by the police who are charged 
 with the public welfare and security ; 
 
 (6) " Disorderly, drunken, and lazy persons who, 
 though capable of work and of earning their liveli- 
 hood, fall upon the public funds, amongst whom are 
 numbered such persons who incur disease owing to 
 drunkenness or sexual excess, and are as a conse- 
 quence maintained in hospitals at the expense of the 
 Dresden Poor-law Union without the cost of healing 
 being paid by themselves, by their relatives, or by 
 third parties ; 
 
 (c) " Those fathers and mothers who, on account of 
 disorderliness, drunkenness, bad behaviour to their 
 children, or any other culpability, are deprived by 
 the police of the children for whose support they are 
 legally responsible, so that these must be brought up 
 at the public expense ; 
 
 (d) " Those fathers and mothers who either refuse 
 or neglect to provide for the maintenance and train- 
 ing of their children, although their means or earning 
 powers are even partially adequate, in so far as their 
 children have as a consequence to be maintained and 
 brought up at the public cost ; 
 
 (e) " Those natural fathers who neglect to pay the 
 cost of the maintenance of children illegitimately 
 born to them which legally rests on them and is 
 determined by court of law or by arrangement with 
 them, although their means or earning powers are 
 adequate, in so far as the children have as a conse- 
 quence to be maintained and brought up at the 
 public expense ; 
 
 (J) " Married people who, although they are in 
 possession of means or are capable of working, refuse 
 
296 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 or neglect to provide for the maintenance of wife or 
 husband respectively, whether these are without 
 means and yet partially capable of earning a liveli- 
 hood or entirely incapable, so that they fall upon the 
 public funds ; 
 
 (g) " There are also received into the institution up 
 to the completed eighteenth year — on the request or 
 recommendation of parents, legal guardians, other 
 guardians, or, so far as concerns children liable to 
 attend continuation schools, the school committee — 
 such young persons, being exempt from attending 
 the elementary school, who, because of their demorali- 
 sation, brutalisation, neglected condition, or dislike 
 of work, cause continual annoyance or threaten to 
 become morally corrupt and to be an injury to the 
 community." 
 
 Finally there are sent to the workhouse a certain 
 number of paupers whose maintenance in such an 
 institution is for special reasons deemed desirable 
 by the Poor-law Authority. On the other hand, 
 the workhouse does not admit children under 
 fourteen years, sick persons, women nearing con- 
 finement, and mothers with unweaned infants. 
 
 Both the male and female departments of the 
 workhouse are grouped into three divisions accord- 
 ing to age, though special stress is laid upon the 
 disassociation from their elders of young people 
 between fourteen and eighteen years. Neither at 
 work, at meals, nor in sleeping is there contact 
 between old and young. The allotment of the 
 inmates to the several divisions is left to the 
 director, who is guided by their moral qualities 
 and personal peculiarities as well as by their 
 age. Within each division there are also three 
 
DRESDEN MUNICIPAL WORKHOUSE. 297 
 
 "conduct" classes, and the inmates are placed in 
 and withdrawn from these classes according to 
 their deserts. The result of this grading has been 
 found to be distinctly conducive to order and good 
 behaviour. 
 
 The period of detention varies with the offence 
 which has occasioned it. In the case of adults, 
 where one of the offences enumerated in {a) and (b) 
 is the cause, the minimum period is three months, 
 and in case of repeated commitment six months, 
 with a maximum of two years. Within the maxi- 
 mum period an inmate may be detained until the 
 objects of the workhouse treatment have been 
 attained. Young people committed for offences 
 enumerated under (g) are detained for a minimum 
 period of one month on a first committal, and two 
 months on a repetition, but the maximum period 
 is here also two years. 
 
 The Poor-law Authority strongly believes in 
 the disciplinary influence of work, and " Blessed 
 be drudgery" might be the motto of the work- 
 house. The regulations state : — " The inmates are 
 to be employed in accordance with their physical 
 and mental condition, either for the institution or 
 for private persons in return for payment to the 
 workhouse." Each inmate's daily task is deter- 
 mined by the director, though a minimum output 
 is not required until he has acquired facility 
 in the work given him. When the task is not 
 completed owing to idleness or carelessness, 
 punishment is awarded. The work done for the 
 
298 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 workhouse includes the making of boots and shoes, 
 linen for personal wear and for bedding, kitchen 
 utensils, and tools and instruments. The miscel- 
 laneous work that was being done, for sale and 
 otherwise, by various groups of inmates at the time 
 of my visit included wood-splitting, coffin making, 
 besom making (the besoms are sent all over 
 Germany), mat knitting, mattress making for the 
 Navy, writing and manifolding, the making of 
 cocoanut matting (which is sold to dealers and 
 not to the public direct), paper bags, boots and 
 clogs, tobacco-leaf preparations, joinery, paper- 
 hanging, locksmithry, bookbinding, etc. This was 
 besides the ordinary domestic, culinary, and other 
 general work of the establishment. 
 
 The women also wash for municipal institutions 
 and even for private persons, and a large amount of 
 female labour is expended over all kinds of sewing. 
 The outside work, which is done by contract, 
 consists for the most part of earth, field, garden, 
 forest, and brickwork labour, and there is also a 
 gang of furniture removers. The proceeds of this 
 work go into the workhouse treasury, with the 
 exception of a modest premium offered for the 
 encouragement of diligence and skill. As a rule 
 this money is saved for the inmates until the time 
 of discharge (subject to deductions for *' extras " 
 in the way of food which may be indulged in and 
 for breakages), and is then used as far as may 
 be needful in the purchase of tools and clothing, 
 though in special cases it may be diverted to the 
 
DRESDEN MUNICIPAL WORKHOUSE. 299 
 
 support of relatives outside the workhouse. Where 
 a balance remains it is either paid to the owner 
 direct, in one sum or in instalments, or is given 
 into the custody of a trustworthy person on his 
 behalf. 
 
 There is no draconic treatment of the inmates, 
 though most of them are prisoners guilty of serious 
 offences against society. The regulations require 
 that they shall be given food sufficient, in quality and 
 quantity, to preserve them healthy and capable of 
 work, though an element of administrative egotism 
 may lurk here. The spiritual needs of the inmates 
 are ministered to by Protestant and Roman 
 Catholic visiting clergymen, and a religious service 
 is held within the walls of the institution every 
 Sunday, Christian festival, and Penance Day, 
 attendance at which is obligatory. Nor are the 
 inmates entirely cut off from the outside world. 
 Visits from relatives may be received by inmates 
 in the first and second conduct classes once a 
 month, and by inmates of the third class once 
 every eight weeks; the director deciding when, 
 where, and whether or not in the presence of an 
 official. Visits from people other than relatives 
 are only allowed by favour. An inmate may not 
 himself, however, save in exceptional domestic 
 circumstances, leave the workhouse during the 
 period of his sentence, though when the time for 
 his discharge approaches he is allowed to go in 
 search of work and a home. 
 
 Naturally strict regulations are imposed as to 
 
300 THE GERMAN WORKMAN. 
 
 order, regularity of conduct, obedience, and 
 industry, and these the inmates are required to 
 observe on threat of punishment. On the other 
 hand, the officers are forbidden to insult an 
 inmate or to use physical force against him, and 
 complaint is allowed to the Poor Bureau. There 
 are nine degrees of correction and punishment — 
 (i) Warning ; (2) temporary withdrawal of the 
 privilege of buying food " extras " out of earnings ; 
 
 (3) temporary forfeiture of the labour reward ; 
 
 (4) reduction of rations ; (5) the wooden bed ; 
 (6) simple confinement ; (7) severer confinement 
 with (a) wooden bed, (6) withdrawal of warm 
 food, and (c) dark cell ; (8) a very questionable 
 form of correction known as " strict imprison- 
 ment" (which means confinement for fourteen 
 hours a day in a square cage in which the 
 prisoner may sit or stand upright but may not lie 
 down, subject, however, to an hour's rest at 
 noon and a whole day's respite every three days) ; 
 (9) corporal punishment, which is rare and cannot 
 be administered to women or to men over sixty 
 years of age. Within wide limits these penalties 
 are awarded at the discretion of the director, but 
 before confinement in a dark cell or corporal 
 punishment the resident doctor must be con- 
 sulted. Prisoners are discharged on an order of 
 the Poor Bureau, and the director must notify 
 both the bureau and the police when anyone 
 leaves the workhouse. If a prisoner is without 
 decent clothing he receives it, and should he lack 
 
DRESDEN MUNICIPAL WORKHOUSE. 301 
 
 means he may be given help to the extent of three 
 marks. But every endeavour is made beforehand 
 to procure work for him. 
 
 The Poor-law Administration of Dresden is 
 thoroughly satisfied with the workhouse and with 
 the results of its discipline. The power to make 
 all crooked natures straight is not claimed for it, 
 but of its reformative influence there can be no 
 doubt. Its chief value, however, lies in the fact 
 that it secures to the Poor-law Authority the 
 opportunity of dealing directly with several of the 
 most difficult sections of the pauper class, people 
 who will for ever sponge and prey on the com- 
 munity, rather than lead orderly lives, so long as 
 the community is willing to tolerate and support 
 them. The community neither tolerates nor sup- 
 ports these people in Dresden. So far as their 
 physical capabilities go they are compelled to 
 support themselves, and that under a restraint 
 which by all accounts is at once corrective and 
 invigorating. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Accident, Insurance atjainst, 
 202 — 209 
 
 Altona, Housing Question, 90 
 
 Arbitration, Courts of, 176 — 
 193 
 
 Barmen, Housing Question, 
 91, 120 
 
 Begging Evil, tlie, 45 
 
 Berlin Labour Bureaux, 3, 7 — 
 12; Labour Colony, 51, 70 — 
 76 ; Housing Question, 90 ; 
 Shelters for the Homeless, 128 
 — 134; Workhouse, 126,282 
 — 292 ; Convalescent Homes, 
 147 — 155 ; Royal I'awnsliop, 
 
 .175 
 Bieleteld Herberge, 39, 40 ; 
 
 Labour Colony, 49 — 69 : 
 
 Housing Reform, 102 — no 
 Biiigen, Rents r.t, 92 
 Bismarck, Prince, and the 
 
 "Right to Work," Si 
 Bodelschwingh, Pastor von, 49, 
 
 50, 70, 103, 109 
 Bonn, Housing Question, 120 
 Breslau and the Unemployed, 
 
 84 ; Housing Question, 90 
 Building Societies, 96 — 115 
 Bureaux, Labour, i — 28 
 
 Charlottenburg, Housing 
 
 Question, 90 
 Cologne, Insurance against 
 
 Worklessness at, 29 — 35 ; 
 
 House Bureau, 120 — 124 ; 
 
 Municipal Pawnshop, 173 
 Colonies, Labour, 48 — 78 
 Consumption Crusade, the Anti-, 
 
 135—146 
 Convalescent Homes, the Berlin, 
 
 147—155 
 Courts of Arbitration, Industrial, 
 176 — 19^ 
 
 Darmstadt, Rents at, 92 
 Doctor in the School, the, 155 
 
 — 167 
 Dresden Workhouse, the, 293 — 
 
 301 
 
 Elberfeld, Housing Question, 
 120, 124; Information 
 Bureau, 243 ; Poor Relief 
 System, 259—273 
 
 Essen, Housing Question, 120 
 
 Frankfort and the Unem- 
 ployed, 80 — S3 
 Friestatt Labour Colony, 68 
 
 GiESSEN, Rents at, 92 
 
 Halle, Rents at, 91 
 Hamburg Labour Bureau, 13 
 Hanim Information Bureau, 243 
 Hanover Insurance Fund and 
 the Housing Question, 99 — 102 
 Hanover Labour Colony, 51 
 Herbergeii, the, 37 — 45 
 Htsse, Housing Question in, 91 
 
 —94 
 llimmelsthiJr Labour Colony 
 
 77,78 
 Homeless, Shelters for the, 125 
 
 —134 
 Housing Bureaux, Municipal, 
 
 120 — 124 
 Housing Question, the, 87 — 119 
 
 Industrial Courts of Arbi- 
 tration, 176—193 
 Industrial Malingering, 274 — 301 
 Information Offices, Public, 242 
 
 -245 
 Insurance against \\ orklessness, 
 
 29 — 36 ; Sickness, 194 — 202 ; 
 
 Accident, 202 — 209 ; Old Age 
 
 and Invalidity, 209 — 215 
 Invalidity, Insurance ;igainst, 
 
 209 - 2 1 5 
 
304 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Kaiserslautern Informa- 
 tion Bureau, 243 
 Karlsruhe Labour Bureau, 8, 15 
 Kastorf Laliour Colony, 51 
 Konigsberg, Rents, 91 
 
 Labour Registries, 1—28; 
 Colonie-;, 48 — 78 
 
 Leipzig Laliour Bureau, 4 ; Un- 
 employment Insurance, 35, 
 36 ; Housing of the Working 
 Classes, 96 — 98 
 
 Magdeburg Labour Colony, 
 52 ; Information Bureau, 243 
 
 Mayence, Rents at, 92 
 
 Mendicancy, Punishment of, 
 274—301 
 
 Miilhausen Information Bureau. 
 243 
 
 Miilheim. Housing Question. 
 120 
 
 Munich Labour Bureau, 8, 14 — 
 28 
 
 Municipal Estate. 95, 96 ; Hous- 
 ing Bureaux, 120 — 124 ; Pawn- 
 shops, 168 — 175 
 
 Municipal Pawnshops, 169—173 
 
 Offenbach, Rents at, 92 
 Old Age Insurance, 209 — 215 
 
 Pawnshops, Municipal, 168— 
 
 J7S 
 
 Poor Law and the Unemployed, 
 
 79, 82, 84 
 Poor Law, German, 246 — 258 : 
 
 Elberfeld System, 259 — 273 
 Posadowsky, Count, 250 
 Posen, Housing Question, 90, 91 
 
 Registries, Labour, i — 28 
 Relief of Wandering Workers, 
 
 37—47 
 Relief Stations, 37. 42 — 47 
 Relief Works for the Unem- 
 ployed, 79 — 86 
 Rents in Towns, 90 — 95 
 Rents of Working-class Dwell- 
 ings, 90 — 92 
 Rixdorf, Housing Question, 90 
 
 Schmargendorf, Rents, 91 
 Schoneberg, Housing Question, 
 
 90 
 School Doctor, the, 155 — 167 
 Schools, Labour Bureau and tlie, 
 
 22—24 
 Secretariates, Workmen's, 216 — 
 
 241 
 Shelters for the Homeless, 125— 
 
 .134 
 Sickness, Insurance against, 194 
 
 — 202 
 Stettin, Rents, 91 
 Strassburgand the Unemployed, 
 
 83 : Housing Question, 120 
 Stuttgart Labour Bureau, 2 
 
 Towns, Rents in German, 90 — 
 95 
 
 Ulm Information Bureau, 
 
 243 
 Unemployed, Problem of the, 
 
 I — 86 : Relief Works for, 79 
 
 —86 
 Unemployment Insurance, 29 — 
 
 36 
 
 Vagrancy Question, the, 45, 
 46, 274—301 
 
 Wandering Workers, Relief 
 
 of, 37—47 
 AViesbaden School Doctors, ico 
 
 -158 
 Wilhelmsdorf Labour Colony, 
 
 49-69 
 Wilmersdorf, Rents, 90 
 Women, Labour Colonies for, 
 
 76-78 
 Workhouses, the, 256, 274 — 
 
 Working Classes, Housing of 
 
 the, 87—119 
 Worklessness, Insurance against. 
 
 29-36 
 Workmen's Secretariates, 216 — 
 
 241 
 Worms, Rents at, 92 
 
 BKAUBURY, AGHEW, & CO. LD., HKINTEKS, I.O^■UO^ ANO TONBRinCiB. 
 
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