ber to call its own sessions and control its own affairs. Abolition of the Senate. Universal suffrage, equal and direct, for every citizen, without sex discrimination. Election by scrutin de liste, on a large basis and with proportional representation. Right for the people of initiative, referendum, and veto. Unlimited freedom of reunion, organization, strike, and propaganda. Suppression of the political police. (2) Foreign policy taken off the hands of the executive power and placed exclusively in the hands of the deliberating Parliament. This will automatically do away with diplomatic intrigue, with pressure brought on parliamentary vote under the illegitimate coaction of accomplished facts, and with the possibility and validity of underhand dealings and secret treaties between governments.

Publicity will restore the elementary honesty in international relations. It will also put an end to the possibility, for the press, placed at the service of the great parasitical industrial and commercial interests, to corrupt public opinion and the sentiment of the masses, by an inspired publicity.

(3) Development of regional and municipal autonomy. Decentralization of administrative power and control, which now hinder and corrupt parliamentary action. Reform of Bureaucracy - which has become a State within a State so as to make it efficient, by the extension of elective principle to the higher offices, together with the fuller direct personal responsibility for the officials, and a simplified organization of executive departments, according to the industrial type. Free justice and judges elected.

(4) A labor policy intended to develop the potential forces and wealth of the country, to repair soon impoverishment and devastation caused by the war; to stop, without coercion, emigration - this hemorrhage which is the necessary effect of desperate misery nationalization and judicial utilization of water power and natural wealth, giving preference in all grants to local organizations. Agricultural and industrial reforms, by compulsory association, with the support of the State, of owners' public entities, and labor organizations.

(5) An internal policy for the defense of the consumer, in accordance, whenever possible, with the control of products, and intended to make stable and to develop with a new spirit, and for ampler social purposes, such institutions as have arisen although unsystematically, and in the interests of the bourgeoisie who initiated them under the necessity created by the war, against private speculators.

(6) Real recognition given to every workman of his right to a more dignified and human living. Consequently, establishment of a general system of insurance against unemployment, accident, illness, old age, etc. Change of charity into assistance and social prevision. Intense diffusion of compulsory school, popular and professional, until the age of eighteen, with all supplementary educational institutions. Promotion of coöperative agriculture and industry. A more strict labor inspection. Legislation on individual and collective labor contracts. Regulation of hours, giving a maximum of eight hours to adult male workers. Legal minimum wages in relation to the fundamental necessities of life. Equal privileges for men and women. An ampler recognition of the action and intervention of labor organization in everything belonging to the protection of labor and labor contracts.

(7) Solution of the agricultural problem according to the following lines:

In reference to the lands: Socialization of lands, by the organization of a vast collective domain the first nucleus of which will be formed by lands belonging to the Government, to charitable institutions, and uncultivated or poorly cultivated lands.

In reference to agriculture and agricultural production: Land to be given or granted only to people who directly cultivate it. Compulsory association of farmers. Technical control and direction of agricultural production, in order to obtain a maximum production at a minimum cost.

(8) A system of taxes founded mainly on the direct and progressive tax, with exact valuation. Reduction of interest of the public debt. Extension of State monopoly, both for

the use of industrial production in the benefit of the community, and for the control of the great transportation services, communications, and provisioning. Heavy taxes on

legacies, and limitations of the rights of heirs. Compulsory national loans for works undertaken in the interest of peace, on the same basis as loans are made for the destructive purposes of war.

Enforcement of these measures, with the modifications and additions as may be suggested by the special conditions inherent to each country, cannot be attained except by conscious effort of the proletariat in each individual State, it is pointed out, but such effort will be favored and made more valuable by the international coöperation of the laboring class. The Italian Socialist party intends, as the main purpose of its action, to work for the prompt and efficient reorganization of the International, and to give it such strong organization as to avoid in the future the delusions that marked the last period of its life, and to promote the cooperation of the different nations for the direction and making of the new history of the world.

[New York Evening Post, July 17,1917.]

STATEMENT OF THE FINNISH SOCIALIST

DELEGATION

[In reply to the Dutch-Scandinavian Socialist Committee's Questionnaire.]

The representatives of the Finnish Party Committee and Finnish Social-Democratic Group in Parliament have presented their report in regard to how best to arrange the legal status of Finland. In their opinion this view is shared by the politically mature elements among the Finns. According to this view this question must be considered as of an international character and therefore to be treated of where international questions in general are to be considered, that is at the coming Peace Conference.

This claim is based upon the defenseless condition in which Finland would find herself if, in the future, a nationalistic or even perhaps an imperialistic tendency should get the upper hand in Russia. The gratitude which the Finns owe to the revolutionary elements in Russia, as those by which Finland also has been freed from Czardom and the reactionary elements of the Russian democracy, by no means releases the Finns from the duty of securing their own future upon the firmest basis. The position of Finland must be established upon a foundation which would guarantee to her full possibility of free development, and the Finnish people cherish the heartfelt hope that the Russian democracy will recognize this claim and be able to carry it into execution, so that the realization of the Finnish demand may meet with no hindrance from the side of Russia. The autonomous position of Finland has in the past in spite of all defects made possible a considerable cultural development of the country. The greatest of these defects lay in the fact that decisions in regard to Finnish affairs were made at Petrograd.

It was thus the case that interests opposed to those of the Finns influence the decision of Finnish questions. This led from time to time to ruthless disregard of the interest of the Finnish people and must in any case be felt by the national consciousness as a humiliation. The striving of Finland for a greater degree of self direction was based on the whole historical development of Finland which had never been similar to that of Russia. The social constitution of Finland, her form of culture, language, etc., were also unlike those of the Russian people. Consequently the Finnish people strove for the attainment of the fullest possible independence. The bearers of the Russian revolution had written upon their banners, the freedom of the peoples. This fact had strengthened in the people of Finland the conviction that the time had now arrived to realize the wish of the people of Finland for full independence, which was regarded as the only sure way to promote the national claims of the Finns and to avoid the conflicts which might spring from a permanent union with Russia. The Socialists of Finland base themselves entirely upon the right of self-direction of all peoples laid down as a principle by International Social Democracy and they demand that the Finnish people also be allowed to decide their own status. They appeal to the Comrades of other countries and hope that the efforts of the Finnish proletariat for whom they have so often expressed their sympathy will now too receive their full support.

With regard to remaining political questions the Delegation, not having as yet received a mandate, confined itself to expressing its personal opinion. It will later make known either in writing or orally the position of the Party. The Social Democracy of Finland has of course declared itself in favor of a general conference.

[Quoted in the Holland News, June 20, 1917, from the Frankfurter Zeitung, May 27, 1917. Translated.]