The New Zealand Labor party came into being after years of indecision and disunity, and many false starts. The history of this movement lies outside the scope of this article, but a brief discussion of the basic cleavages which divided labor before 1916, and of the circumstances under which the party was organized, may help to clarify some of the points in the analysis of its present-day structure and problems which is attempted in the pages ahead.

The geography and economy of New Zealand encouraged small, widely scattered productive units and decentralized unions relatively weak in bargaining power. The economy is dependent largely upon agriculture and the earlier industries were concerned chiefly with the processing of primary products such as butter, cheese, and meat. The thinly scattered population, the remoteness of the “four main centers” (Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, and Dunedin) and many of the provincial towns, the variations in conditions from locality to locality, and the absence of mass production industries discouraged the development of a cohesive labor movement ready to support its demands by unified industrial action. Among those groups of workers who were thrown together on the job, such as the “watersiders” (dockworkers) and the miners, there was greater solidarity than among others and these were more inclined to press their claims by direct action. The trades and labor councils that developed in the various centers and met in Dominion-wide annual congresses after 1891 were the stronghold of the more moderate unions. Periodically their tactics were challenged by the militant groups, and differences crystallized in the formation of rival organizations.

Study of the governmental and party leaders of Italy may contribute to our understanding of the Fascist state, whether we are concerned with public law, comparative government, or comparative politics. The application of the rules of law by any public law agency is affected by the characteristics of those who constitute the agency. Agencies of comparable legal authority exercise their discretion differently when they are differently related to the social context in which they operate. Whatever affects the relative strength of the groups with which an agency is affiliated affects the relative strength of the agency. Hence it is important to ascertain the class, skill, personality, and attitude characteristics of officials in relation to the composition of the community as a whole.

The emergence of political parties performing important functions in the political system has characterized the recent history of much of the African continent. The new party systems have taken various forms, including single parties with a narrow ruling elite, as in Liberia, or with mass support, as in Guinea; two-party systems where one mass party is dominant, as is the case in Kenya; and multi-party systems, as in Nigeria and Somalia. In two states, Libya and Sudan, once-flourishing political parties have been banned. Only in Ethiopia (Etritrea excluded) have there never been political parties. The Empire of the Conquering Lion of Judah can well be termed a no-party state. In Ethiopia today no organization exists that would or could describe itself as a political party.

In No. 78 of The Federalist, Alexander Hamilton wrote: “To avoid an arbitrary discretion in the courts, it is indispensable that they should be bound down by strict rules and precedents, which serve to define and point out their duty in every particular case that comes before them…” Whatever acceptance this view of the judge as automaton and of the judicial process as a ministerial function may once have had, little trace remains of it today, after ten years of experience with the “reorganized” Supreme Court. The Roosevelt Court was not, of course, the first on which judicial decisions were influenced by the personal values of its justices. Throughout the history of the Court, the autobiographical element in its output has been as important as when Justice Holmes bluntly told his colleagues in 1905 that “this case is decided upon an economic theory which a large part of the country does not entertain.” But the prevailing theory was that judges did not make law, they merely found it.

The constitutional revolution of 1935–37 changed all that. The public, as Max Lerner says, “began to see that judicial decisions are not babies brought by constitutional storks, but are born out of the travail of economic circumstance.” For two terms, the Constitution meant what Justice Roberts said it meant. After the consummation of the revolution, the forces which had been most ardent in picturing earlier conservative courts as demonstrating the workings of a government of law could only explain the strange phenomenon of a liberal court as the triumph of a government of men. Additional recent factors serving to underline the personal basis of judicial decisions have been the tossing of barbed phrases on the bench, Justice Jackson's ill-tempered public attack on one of his colleagues, and the mounting tide of dissenting opinions.

The Sub-committee on Personnel of the Committee on Policy of the American Political Science Association has the function of considering and reporting on problems relating to the selection, training, and employment of men and women whose training is primarily in the field of political science, and the study of political science in the education of those to whom it should be an essential part of a training program. The fields of possible employment would seem to be the following:

1. Teaching political science in (a) universities, (b) four-year colleges, (c) junior colleges, (d) normal schools and teachers colleges separate from universities, (e) secondary schools, and (f) other institutions.

2. Research work in connection with (a) universities and other institutions of learning, (b) government departments, (c) institutes and bureaus of government research outside universities, (d) political parties, farmers organizations, trade unions, chambers of commerce, taxpayers' associations, and similar interest groups.

3. Public service such as (a) general public administration, (b) technical staff services (personnel, finance, etc.), (c) professional line services (foreign service, engineering, etc.), (d) legislative drafting and reference service.

Representative government, as every student of political science well knows, is now under fire. While it is not necessary to take too seriously the statements made by delirious purveyors of new remedies for old discontents, we cannot fail to take note of the fact that a strong tide of opinion has set in against this famous institution of democracy. On the continent of Europe, dictators either reject it entirely or seek to reduce it to purely advisory functions. In England, rumblings are heard to the effect that the Mother of Parliaments is not well herself; propositions for drastic changes come from members of the House of Commons; and if economic depression and unemployment continue for another ten years it is highly probable that some radical experiments will be made in the direction of concentrating economic powers. The United States is not without its troubles. When in the summer of 1931, with the deepening of the industrial crisis, it was urged that a special session of Congress be called to deal with national distress, President Hoover rather tartly rejected the petition and indicated that our great representative body was more likely to retard than to help “the process of recovery.”

In the juristic sphere, the Interstate Commerce Commission is charged with enforcing and interpreting certain statutes, hearing and weighing evidence, and rendering formal judgment when the facts have been ascertained. But the recognized judicial character of this work does not render the Commission immune from efforts to influence its judgments. The struggles of contending economic groups and political influences give rise to actions intolerable in a court of law and to repeated efforts to obtain favorable decisions through the use of propaganda. The Commission performs its duties in surroundings far from neutral, and must cope with pressures too powerful to be exorcised by simple exhortation or condemnation. The problem is one of canalizing influences which cannot be eliminated, to the end that they may increase rather than decrease the efficiency of the administrative process and that the public interest may not be submerged in the undertow of sectional and political cross-currents.

The prime voting dynamic in the critical presidential election of 1896 was, according to the literature, the conversion of Democrats to the Republican banner. Unfortunately, mobilization of new voters has not been given much attention. To assess the role of mobilization, the vote shift possibilities from 1892 to 1896 were formalized, and all possible scenarios conforming to the aggregate data that characterized the electoral shift were analyzed by computer. Solutions to the tables representing the changes in voting from 1892 to 1896 show that in the Midwest more voters were mobilized in the 1896 election than were converted. In the Northeast, the conventional wisdom was not challenged. The findings illustrate the importance of mobilization as an explanation of large-scale electoral change.

In their search for nationhood since World War II, many peoples of Asia and Africa have discovered that independence from western rule is only the first and perhaps the easiest step. Once the foreigner has gone, the larger problem looms of creating a viable political society. Divisions and competitive strivings held in check when outsiders controlled affairs are suddenly released. Ethnic, religious and regional differences, that seemed less important so long as colonial administrators ruled, boil up after independence and more often than not come to dominate the loyalties and inspire the ambitions that move men in politics. To their dismay, responsible leaders find themselves heading not the homogeneous, modern nation state they dreamed of before independence, but a congeries of separate groups. The simple, unifying purpose of the independence struggle fades away, leaving a host of contradictions and cleavages.

Indonesia is wracked by repeated resistance to Jakarta. Burma has been beset by periodic insurrection, supported in part by regional and ethnic hostility to Rangoon. The nightmare of India's Nehru is the growth of regional and linguistic differences. Imminent disintegration of the ex-Belgan Congo dramatizes the extreme case.

The 1936 term of the Supreme Court will probably be rated a notable one. This is due both to the Court's own work, and to certain extraneous occurrences which could hardly fail to have some impact upon it. In any attempt to evaluate the work of this term, one should bear in mind the following facts: First, a month after the Court convened President Roosevelt was reëlected by one of the most impressive popular and electoral majorities in our political history. Second, in February the President submitted to Congress his proposal for the reorganization of the Supreme Court, including the enlargement of its membership by the addition, up to fifteen, of a new justice for every one remaining on the Court beyond the age of seventy. This proposal aroused violent opposition, the debates on it continued for many months, and ultimately the plan was defeated largely through the efforts of the President's own party. The discussions on this proposal were going on during much of the time in which the Court was sitting. Third, in every case in which New Deal laws were attacked, they were held valid. These results were accomplished in many instances by five-to-four margins, and in the Minimum Wage Case by a five-to-four reversal of a previous five-to-three decision.

In the World War period and after, the use of extraordinary powers by the executive for legislative purposes became so widespread in Europe that constitutional theorists began to find it convenient to give up the doctrine of legislative supremacy. The constitutional basis for these extraordinary powers has been found in one of two ways: either the parliament may authorize the government to exercise certain legislative functions by way of delegation, or certain provisions in the constitution may be interpreted as giving the executive the right under certain circumstances not only to take specific administrative steps, but also to issue rules of a more general character. In either case, the question invariably arises as to how far the delegation of power may go, or as to the degree to which alleged constitutional emergency provisions may be used to supersede parliamentary legislation.

In France, no constitutional emergency power is provided in the “organic” laws of 1875 which could give a starting point for independent rule-making activity. A law of April 3, 1878, defined very closely the conditions under which a state of siege may be declared and surrounded such a declaration with elaborate provisions for parliamentary supervision. It is apparent that this statute does not allow the government to decree rules of a general character.

The problem of authority has a practical and a theoretical side. Practically, the decline of authority contributes to the crisis of legitimacy in contemporary governments and to difficulties in the practice of morality. Theoretically, authority is often confused with power, force, or coercion. Thus, it is viewed with suspicion. The thesis of this paper is that authority is not a form of power; rather, it transforms power. Like power, force, and coercion, authority is directive, but it is so in quite a different way. An examination of the concept of authority in three very different theorists – Carl Friedrich, Yves R. Simon, and Michael Polanyi – reveals that a sound concept of authority must be rooted in community as a system of shared beliefs, experiences, and traditions and in transcendent standards referred to by such beliefs, experiences, and traditions. Authority is that which directs a community to its proper end.

In response to requests for information concerning recent developments in political science in Great Britain and France, the following accounts were received from Professor Harold J. Laski, of the London School of Economics and Political Science, and M. Maurice Caudel, of L'École Libre des Sciences Politiques and editor of the Revue des Sciences Politiques:

Great Britain. It will be well-known to American students of political science, especially since Professor Fairlie's very careful survey in a previous number of the Political Science Review, that there is practically no organized study of political science in Great Britain.

Students of congressional-executive relations have long recognized the weakness of legislative oversight of the Executive, and in few areas of public policy has this weakness been more pronounced than in national defense. A recent and significant change in this relationship was made when the 86th Congress in 1959 imposed upon a reluctant executive and military establishment a major innovation in the established processes of making defense policy. The innovation was deliberately intended to alter the balance in executive-congressional controls over some strategic decisions, and was in the form of a new requirement for legislative authorization of the principal weapons programs of the military services.

The Hoover Commission Reports were not written for the educator and his students. The audience was broader and the objective was immediate reform. Nevertheless, the educator must pause at this milepost and take stock. The reports are thrust upon him as inescapable materials for analysis in class and seminar rooms; they record in considerable measure the state of achievement in the development of administrative science; they challenge an examination now of the directions and scope of educational motive forces in the next phase of university education in public administration.

Most teachers of public administration probably found the reports of the President's Committee on Administrative Management and of the Attorney General's Committee on Administrative Procedure to be very valuable aids in teaching. The publication of the Report with Special Studies and the Final Report provided a considerable body of material in convenient form for teacher and student use, and the over-all summary of the Committee on Administrative Management even provided material which could be used in introductory courses in American government. Also, these earlier reports dealt with problems at the growing points in the study of public administration and offered basic points of view around which discussion could be centered.

Plato's Meno deserves careful examination today because it highlights two facets of the concern for virtue neglected or obscured by the current revival of virtue among liberal theorists: the devotion to a good that cannot simply be reduced either to individual flourishing or to communal well-being—what Plato calls “nobility” or “the noble”; and the complex relation of virtue so understood to the concern for religion or piety. If the sought-for incorporation of virtue into liberal thought and practice today fails to grapple with these profound human concerns, in the first place by recognizing their existence, the language of virtue and its attendant moral sentiments will remain a matter more of scholarly debate than of lived practice.