THE GERMAN ELECTIONS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10530, 17 January 1912, Page 4

THE GERMAN ELECTIONS.

The issues at stake in the German ©lections, the first 'ballot in which was taken this week, are tremendous. Th© complaint on which <all three Opposition parties are united is that Beth-maaim-Hlollweg and the "Blu©-Bla©k BUock" are responsible for th© financial reform of 1909, .whidh: put unduly heavy burdens on' industry and commerce, land and invested capital. Another complaint isthat Bethmann-Holhveg. thus re-established the "yoke" of the Catholic Centre <m the Lutheran majority. A third is that the promise to broaden tlie .reactionary Prussian franchise has inot been fuMied. A . fourth i.s that the Conservatives continue to monopolise all patronage and power. Finally comes the protectionist issue. A fierce agitation has .been raging for 6ix months on the subject of the pa-ice of food. The Government, und!er Conservative-Agrariail mastery, refused to reduce the import duties. Nearly all German municipalities have in vain demanded .that it do so. Bethflnann-Hollweg in October made a Reichstag speech in which he declared that the Government would stand or fall with the battlecry: " Protection for the Nation's Work." "Protection for the Nation's Workers" is the battle-cry of the anti-protectionists.