The war and the ensuing economic depression aroused divisive forces in Canadian life which only occasionally lie dormant–the forces of race, religion, occupation, and section. No patriotic speech delivered in English-speaking Canada from 1917 to 1922 was complete without a ringing declaration that the war had made Canada a nation. Actually, by the time of the conscription election of 1917, the war had made Canada two nations, one nation speaking English, the other speaking French. Nor did the English-speaking nation long remain united. The Ontario farmer had voted for conscription on the understanding that his sons would not be conscripted. His sons were conscripted, and the protests of his farm organization were met with contempt and derision. In revenge, he organized an agrarian political party. In western Canada, the causes which led the farm movement to enter politics were more deep-rooted than the mere emotionalism of Ontario, and consequently more obscure. The reciprocity campaigns of 1910 and 1911 had shown the farm movement its strength; the break of western Liberalism with Laurier in 1917 had laid the foundations of a third party; and the post-war depression provided the movement with its impetus and its objectives. The same depression strengthened, of course, the farm movement in Ontario and the nascent Labor movement in English-speaking Canada.

The Civil War in the United States was a sobering object lesson to the fathers of Canadian federation. In drafting the British North America Act of 1867, they sought to forestall the development of those problems which the experience of their neighbor to the south had shown to be incidental to the federal system of government. The division of powers between central and local governments has been the rock on which most federations, sooner or later, have foundered, and Canadians sought to escape a similar fate by three different political devices.

Contrary to expectation, widespread when the Fascists acceded to power, no notable retreat by the national government from the field of economic undertaking has been witnessed under the present Italian régime. The theoretical advocacy of public ownership of business concerns as a goal in itself has, indeed, passed entirely from the political stage with the suppression of the once powerful Socialist party, but the enterprises already operated by the Italian government have for the most part been continued under Mussolini's administration. Fascist theory concedes the private entrepreneur to be the normal and proper producer and distributor of economic goods. The Fascist attitude toward the government in business is expressed in the doctrine of state intervention. When any phase of the national economy fails to operate properly, the state has a right to intervene, even to the extent of becoming an entrepreneur itself. In the ninth declaration of the Charter of Labor, the Fascist social creed, the doctrine is expressed thus: “The intervention of the state in economic production takes place only when private initiative is lacking or is insufficient or when political interests of the state are involved. Such intervention may assume the form of control, assistance, or direct management.”

In response to public criticism of the operation of local government in Michigan, particularly in units other than cities and villages, the legislature, by Act 156 of the Public Acts of 1931, authorized the governor to appoint a commission of inquiry into county, township, and school district government. The commission was instructed to give special attention to changes that would reduce the cost of maintenance of such governmental units and increase their efficiency; and authority was given to examine the files and records of any county, township, or school district in the state. The commission's membership consisted of Clarence L. Ayres of Detroit (chairman), C. E. Bement of Lansing, Judge P. C. Gilbert of Traverse City, M. B. McPherson of Lowell, and A. E. Petermann of Calumet. A legislative appropriation of $5,000 was supplemented by financial assistance from the University of Michigan, Michigan State College, the Detroit Bureau of Governmental Research, and the Spelman Fund of New York; and Dr. Lent D. Upson was chosen director of the survey. Committees utilized in the inquiry included those on (1) social and economic trends, (2) organization and cost of county and township government, (3) rural school government, (4) local government in the metropolitan area, (5) school government in the metropolitan area, (6) debt and taxation in local government, and (7) organization and administration of the following services: public welfare, public health, public works, and justice. The report of the commission went to Governor Wilber M. Brucker late in December, 1932, and the expert studies have been transmitted to the legislature during the current session. All will be available in a series to be known as Local Government in Michigan, and will be published as separate documents.

Malaya is a peninsula in southeastern Asia, until recently of slight importance in the affairs of the world at large. During the present century, however, it has come to be of increasing significance for its output of rubber and tin, and its population has doubled since 1900. Economic and political affairs are in the main controlled by the British, but under different legal arrangements for different sections. The Straits Settlements form a British colony, comprising several islands, including Singapore and Penang, and two small mainland areas, at Malacca and Wellesley, with a total area of 1,508 square miles and a population of over a million. Rather more than half of the region is included in a federation of four Malay States, established in 1895, under a British protectorate. These have a total area of 27,500 square miles, with a population of about one and a half millions. There are also five other petty states, with a total area of 23,486 square miles and a population of 1,250,000, under special treaty arrangements with Great Britain. The total area of Malaya is 52,000 square miles, and the total population about four millions.

Within the past hundred years, the practice of asking questions of members of the ministry has grown up as a fixed part of the ordinary procedure of the House of Commons. Within a broad range of subjects, and governed only by a group of rules which are interpreted rather liberally by the Speaker as to subject-matter and form, each member is allowed to put three questions for oral answer on each parliamentary day except Friday, and as many for written answer as he desires. He must give a clear day's notice by handing his questions to the clerks for publication in the Orders of the Day. Questions may also be put by “private notice,” in which case, instead of printed notice, the member gives written notice to the minister concerned and to the Speaker. With permission of the Speaker and the indulgence of the House, inquiries on matters of current public interest are sometimes made without any formal notice.

In his famous letter to Samuel Kercheval, Jefferson wrote concerning the principle of local self-government as follows: “The organization of our county administrations may be thought more difficult. But follow principle, and the knot unties itself. Divide the counties into wards of such size as that every citizen can attend, when called on, and act in person. Ascribe to them the government of their wards in all things relating to themselves exclusively. A justice, chosen by themselves, in each, a constable, a military company, a patrol, a school, the care of their own poor, their own portion of the public roads,…” “We should, therefore,” Jefferson summarizes, “marshall our government into (1) the general federal republic for all concerns foreign and federal; (2) that of the state for what relates to our own citizens, exclusively; (3) the county republics for the duties and concerns of the county; and (4) the ward republics for the small and yet numerous and interesting concerns of the neighborhood. In government as well as in every other business of life, it is by division and subdivision of duties alone that all matters great and small can be managed to perfection. And the whole is cemented by giving to every citizen, personally, a part in the administration of public affairs.”

The justice of the peace is one of the most important public officials in Kentucky. He is an officer whose election, compensation, term, and qualifications are set forth in the constitution. He is both a judicial and an administrative officer, presiding over his own court for the trial of petty civil and criminal cases, and serving as a member of the fiscal court, or county board. County judicial, legislative, and administrative functions are rolled into one in the person of the justice of the peace. In this respect, the county system of government in Kentucky has a striking resemblance to the English county of the thirteenth century.

The Kentucky fiscal court is normally a body consisting of the justices of the peace in a county together with the county judge, and having the usual powers conferred upon boards of county commissioners or supervisors in the other states. The constitution provides that each county shall be divided into districts in such manner as the general assembly may direct, and that in each district one justice of the peace shall be elected, with the further requirement that no county shall have fewer than three nor more than eight districts. But in addition, the constitution provides that a county may have a fiscal court composed of three commissioners, elected at large from the county, and the county judge.