For the several branches of administration a considerable number of imperial offices have been gradually created. All of them, however, either are under the immediate authority of the chancellor of the empire, or are separately managed under his responsibility. The most important are the chancery office, the foreign office and the general post and telegraph office. But the heads of these do not form a cabinet.
The Chancellor of the Empire (Reichskanzler).—The Prussian plenipotentiary to the Bundesrat is the president of that assembly; he is appointed by the emperor, and bears the title Reichskanzler. This head official can be represented by any other member of the Bundesrat named in a document of substitution. The Reichskanzler is the sole responsible official, and conducts all the affairs of the empire, with the exception of such as are of a purely military character, and is the intermediary between the emperor, the Bundesrat and the Reichstag. All imperial rescripts require the counter-signature of the chancellor before attaining validity. All measures passed by the Reichstag require the sanction of the majority of the Bundesrat, and only become binding on being proclaimed on behalf of the empire by the chancellor, which publication takes place through the Reichsgesetzblatt (the official organ of the chancellor).
Government Offices.—The following imperial offices are directly responsible to the chancellor and stand under his control:—
1. The foreign office, which is divided into three departments: (i.) the political and diplomatic; (ii.) the political and commercial; (iii.) the legal. The chief of the foreign office is a secretary of state, taking his instructions immediately from the chancellor.
2. The colonial office (under the direction of a secretary of state) is divided into (i.) a civil department; (ii.) a military department; (iii.) a disciplinary court.
3. The ministry of the interior or home office (under the conduct of a secretary of state). This office is divided into four departments, dealing with (i.) the business of the Bundesrat, the Reichstag, the elections, citizenship, passports, the press, and military and naval matters, so far as the last concern the civil authorities; (ii.) purely social matters, such as old age pensions, accident insurance, migration, settlement, poor law administration, &c.; (iii.) sanitary matters, patents, canals, steamship lines, weights and measures; and (iv.) commercial and economic relations—such as agriculture, industry, commercial treaties and statistics.
4. The imperial admiralty (Reichsmarineamt), which is the chief board for the administration of the imperial navy, its maintenance and development.
5. The imperial ministry of justice (Reichsjustizamt), presided over by a secretary of state. This office, not to be confused with the Reichsgericht (supreme legal tribunal of the empire) in Leipzig, deals principally with the drafting of legal measures to be submitted to the Reichstag.
6. The imperial treasury (Reichsschatzamt), or exchequer, is the head financial office of the empire. Presided over by a secretary of state, its functions are principally those appertaining to the control of the national debt and its administration, together with such as in the United Kingdom are delegated to the board of inland revenue.
7. The imperial railway board (Reichseisenbahnamt), the chief official of which has the title of “president,” deals exclusively with the management of the railways throughout the empire, in so far as they fall under the control of the imperial authorities in respect of laws passed for their harmonious interworking, their tariffs and the safety of passengers conveyed.
8. The imperial post office (Reichspostamt), under a secretary of state, controls the post and telegraph administration of the empire (with the exception of Bavaria and Württemberg), as also those in the colonies and dependencies.
9. The imperial office for the administration of the imperial railways in Alsace-Lorraine, the chief of which is the Prussian minister of public works.
10. The office of the accountant-general of the empire (Rechnungshof), which controls and supervises the expenditure of the sums voted by the legislative bodies, and revises the accounts of the imperial bank (Reichsbank).
11. The administration of the imperial invalid fund, i.e. of the fund set apart in 1871 for the benefit of soldiers invalided in the war of 1870-71; and
12. The imperial bank (Reichsbank), supervised by a committee of four under the presidency of the imperial chancellor, who is a fifth and permanent member of such committee.
The heads of the various departments of state do not form, as in England, the nucleus of a cabinet. In so far as they are secretaries of state, they are directly responsible to the chancellor, who represents all the offices in his person, and, as has been said, is the medium of communication between the emperor and the Bundesrat and Reichstag.
Colonies.—The following table gives some particulars of the dependencies of the empire:—
| Name. | Date of Acquisition. |
Area (estimated) sq. m. |
Pop. (estimated). |
| In Africa— | |||
| Togoland | 1884 | 33,700 | 1,000,000 |
| Cameroon | 1884 | 190,000 | 3,500,000 |
| S.W. Africa | 1884 | 322,450 | 200,000 |
| East Africa | 1885 | 364,000 | 7,000,000 |
| Total in Africa | 910,150 | 11,700,000 | |
| In the Pacific— | |||
| German New Guinea | 1884 | 70,000 | 110,000(?) |
| Bismarck Archipelago | 1884 | 20,000 | 188,000 |
| Caroline, Pelew and Mariana Islands | 1899 | 800 | 41,600 |
| Solomon Islands | 1886 | 4,200 | 45,000 |
| Marshall Islands | 1885 | 160 | 15,000 |
| Samoan Islands | 1899 | 985 | 33,000 |
| Total in Pacific | 96,145 | 432,600 | |
| In Asia— | |||
| Kiao-chow | 1897 | 117 | 60,000 |
| Total dependencies | 1884–1899 | 1,006,412 | 12,192,600 |
Except Kiao-chow, which is controlled by the admiralty, the dependencies of the empire are under the direction of the colonial office. This office, created in 1907, replaced the colonial department of the foreign office which previously had had charge of colonial affairs. The value of the trade of the colonies with Germany in 1906 was: imports into Germany, £1,028,000; exports from Germany, £2,236,000. For 1907 the total revenue from the colonies was £849,000; the expenditure of the empire on the colonies in the same year being £4,362,000. (See the articles on the various colonies.)
Local Government.—In the details of its organization local self-government differs considerably in the various states of the German empire. The general principle on which it is based, however, is that which has received its most complete expression in the Prussian system: government by experts, checked by lay criticism and the power of the purse, and effective control by the central authorities. In Prussia at least the medieval system of local self-government had succumbed completely to the centralizing policy of the monarchy, and when it was revived it was at the will and for the purposes of the central authorities, as subsidiary to the bureaucratic system. This fact determined its general characteristics. In England the powers of the local authorities are defined by act of parliament, and within the limits of these powers they have a free hand. In Germany general powers are granted by law, subject to the approval of the central authorities, with the result that it is the government departments that determine what the local elected authorities may do, and that the latter regard themselves as commissioned to carry out, not so much the will of the locality by which they are elected, as that of the central government. This attitude is, indeed, inevitable from the double relation in which they stand. A Bürgermeister, once elected, becomes a member of the bureaucracy and is responsible to the central administration; even the headman of a village commune is, within the narrow limits of his functions, a government official. Moreover, under the careful classification of affairs into local and central, many things which in England are regarded as local (e.g. education, sanitary administration, police) are regarded as falling under the sphere of the central government, which either administers them directly or by means of territorial delegations consisting either of individuals or of groups of individuals. These may be purely official (e.g. the Prussian Regierung), a mixture of officials and of elected non-official members approved by the government (e.g. the Bezirksausschuss), or may consist wholly of authorities elected for another purpose, but made to act as the agents of the central departments (e.g. the Kreisausschuss). That this system works without friction is due to the German habit of discipline; that it is, on the whole, singularly effective is a result of the
