Woman Suffrage. Report. Committee on woman suffrage. House report no. 234. 65th Cong. 2d sess.

3 p.

6 p.

Minority Views. House report no. 234, Pt. 2. 65th Cong. 2d sess.

FOREIGN

AUSTRALIA

Emergency Legislation, Manual of. Comprising all acts of parliament in consequence of the war. 540 p.

GREAT BRITAIN

Agricultural wage board (England and Wales). Draft regulations with respect to the constitution and proceedings of the. 1917. 4 p.

Board of Trade. Memorandum with respect to the reorganization of. Bd. of Trade. 1918. 7 p. [Cd. 8912.]

Commissions and Committees. A list of

set up to deal with questions

which will arise at the close of the war. Revised to December 8, 1 17. (918.) 34 p. fol. [Cd. 8916.] Ministry of Reconstruction.

Correspondence with the Netherlands Government respecting defensively armed British merchant vessels. 1917. 28 p. fol. Misc. No. 14. (1917.) [Cd. 8690.]

Food Journal. The National Food Journal. No. 1, September 12, 1917. Ministry of Munitions.

Published on the second and fourth Wednesday of each month.

Industrial Councils. The Whitley Report together with the letter of the ministry of labour explaining the government's view of its proposals. Ministry of Labour. Industrial Reports. No. 1. 1917. 19 p. [Cd. 8606.]

Military Service. Agreement between the United Kingdom and Italy respecting the liability to of British subjects in Italy and Italian subjects in

Great Britain. 1917. 4 p. fol. Misc. No. 1 (1917). [Cd. 8694.] Military Supplies. Further correspondence respecting the transit traffic across Holland of materials susceptible of employment as military supplies. 1918. 168 p. fol. Misc. No. 2 (1918). [Cd. 8915.]

The Nitrogen Problem and the work of the nitrogen products committee. November, 1917. 14 p. Ministry of Munitions of War.

Pensions Appeal Tribunal, Memorandum on the functions and powers of. 1917. 1 p. fol. [Cd. 8826.] Ministry of Pensions.

.

Policy in China. Text of notes exchanged between the United States and Japanese governments regarding their and declaration of the Chinese government on the subject. China. 4 p. fol. Poor Law Authorities in England and Wales, of. 1918. 26 p. fol. [Cd. 8917.] Soldiers and Sailors Disabled. Report on the Inter-Allied Conference for the study of professional reeducation, and other questions of interest to soldiers and sailors disabled by the war, held at Paris, 8th to 12th May, 1917. By Lieut.

No. 1 (1918). [Cd. 8895.] Report on transfer of functions Ministry of Reconstruction.

Col. Sir A. Griffith Boscawen, M. P., Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Munitions. 1917. p. 47.

Reports upon openings in industry suitable for.

No. 8. Gold, silver, jewellery, and watch and clock jobbing. 1917. 9 p.

No. 9. Dental Mechanics. 1917. 8 p.

No. 10. Aircraft manufacture, 1917. 12 p.

HONDURAS

Mensajo dirigido al Congreso nacionale en sus sesiones ordinarias de 1918 por el Dr. Don Francisco Bertrand, presidente constitucional de la Républica de Honduras. 1918. 26 p. 4°.

MEXICO

Constitucion politica del Estado de Sinaloa. Expedida el dia 25 de Agosto de 1917. Reformando la de 22 de Septiembre de 1894. Se firmó a las 6.30 de la tarde. Edition official. 1917. 42 p. 12°.

NETHERLANDS

Workmen's Budgets. Arbeidersbudgets gedurende de crisis. Uitgegeven voor rekening van het Departement van Landbouw, Nijverheid en Handel. Directie van den Arbeid. 1917. 142 p. Diagrams.

SWEDEN

Livsmedelsförbruckningen inom mindre bemedlande hushåll åren 1914 och 1916 av K. Socialstyrelsen. Stockholm (1917). 77 p.

A summary of the investigation is given in French, pp 50-55.

Any attempt impartially to analyze the issues involved in the controversy between President Wilson and Senator Chamberlain, which culminated in a victory for the former in the passage of the Overman bill, will meet with serious difficulties. An error, too common to much current journalism, and not entirely absent from the more technical and highly specialized articles when they deal with political subjects, is that of attributing a certain result to one factor when it is brought about by a plexus of causes. Most important political controversies, especially those of national import, involve numerous currents of cause and effect, which, to be understood clearly and appraised impartially, demand of the conscientious publicist careful consideration in their true relationship. Because the fight over coördination involved many prominent men, much diversity of opinion, issues both national and international, and though indirectly-the question of universal military service, its treatment in an adequate manner is by no means easy.

What is meant by coördination? The noun is defined in the Century dictionary as "the act of arranging in due order or proper relation, or in a system; the state of being so ordered." The verb "to coördinate" is defined: "to place, arrange, or set in

due order or proper relative position; bring into harmony or proper connection and arrangement." The meaning of coördination as applied to the problem of putting the executive machinery of the government on the best possible war footing is the making of necessary shifts or changes so as to produce the maximum of efficiency with the minimum of friction, while at the same time preserving as far as possible the spirit of republican institutions. For the executive departments and agencies of government properly to function, coördination is necessary. To function perfectly-and this no governmental machinery, executive, legislative, or judicial can ever do-there must be perfect coördination. The larger the problems of government, the greater the amount of business handled, the more abnormal the conditions under which the governmental machinery operates, the more difficult the matter of coördination becomes. The degree of smoothness with which the governmental machinery operates is measured by the amount of coordination between the executive, legislative and judicial branches. The degree of smoothness with which the executive branch of the government functions is measured by the amount of coordination of its various departments and agencies.

The entrance of the United States into the world war threw a heavy load upon the executive. Not only were the regular departments heavily burdened, but new agencies were created and new parts added to the executive machinery. To meet the strain thrown upon the regular executive departments by war conditions; to secure coöperation between the various executive agencies, new and old; to increase speed and efficiency without engendering unnecessary friction-these things called for executive coördination. What had happened in the executive branch of the government is analogous to what we see in a motor. When the cylinders are properly timed so that each fires in proper relationship to the others the motor runs smoothly and, all other things being equal, attains its maximum of efficiency. This we ordinarily speak of as "smoothness" in the motor's operation. The entrance of America into the war has affected our executive machinery very much as the climb up a long and steep

hill would affect a motor car. It has displayed weaknesses, lack of coördination, and friction, not so apparent under normal conditions, just as the stress of hill-climbing would indicate any slight imperfection or lack of smoothness in the motor not so apparent on a level road.

An organ for securing executive coöperation and coördination had indeed been provided in the council of national defense, created by the National Defense Act of 1916. Moreover this council, made up of the heads of executive departments, was clearly linked to the previously existing organs of government, although some important departments were omitted. But while much had been accomplished through the agencies of this council, the elaborate organization of boards and committees had not furnished the most efficient machinery; and the very number of these agencies had further complicated the problem of adjustment, not only between themselves but also between the new bodies and the older official authorities.

The importance of coördination had been already impressed on the administration and much work had been done along this line in a quiet and unobtrusive way before a series of violent attacks on the war department, and on Mr. Baker, the secretary of war, made coördination the subject of bitter controversy. The attacks did not create the movement for coördination. They did, however, serve to focus public attention upon the problem. Not whether there should be coördination of the various executive departments and agencies for greater efficiency in the conduct of the war, but the method by which such coordination could best be secured, became the important question. This question of method has been decided, the writer believes in the wisest possible manner, by the passage of the administration measure the Overman bill. The conflict over this measure involved a battle royal between the administration and its critics and opponents. Should Congress give the President the blanket authority to coördinate or should it attempt to force on him a program other than his own?

It is only fair to Congress, and especially is this true of the house of representatives, to state what seems an easily demon