One single fact will throw much light on the considerable burdens of which the county communities will be relieved when the care of their poor will pass, according to this bill, to the community of the State.  I have been unable to ascertain the number of persons to whom assistance is given in the empire or in the kingdom of Prussia, and even less to discover the amount of money spent for this purpose.  In the country, and elsewhere, private charity and public help are so intermingled that it is impossible to separate them, or to keep accurate accounts.  The one hundred and seventy cities, however, which have more than ten thousand inhabitants expend on the average four marks per capita for the care of their poor.  This item varies between 0.63 mark and 12.84 marks—­a great variation as you see.  The most remarkable results are found where the majority of laborers are banded together in unions or similar associations.  It would be natural to think that places like Oberneunkirchen and Duttweiler with large factory populations would have a very large budget for the poor; and that Berlin, which is only in part an industrial centre, would be an average locality, for our purposes, if its finances were well managed.  As a matter of fact it pays far more than the average for the care of its poor without doing this exceptionally well.  Anyone who is interested in private charities, and cares to visit the poor of Berlin, will be convinced of their pitiful condition.

Nevertheless, the Berlin budget for the poor amounts to 5,000,000 marks—­these are the latest figures—­and for the care of the sick poor to 1,900,000 marks.  Why these two items should be separated I do not know.  Together, therefore, they amount to about 7,000,000 marks, or 7 marks per capita, while the average of the large cities is 4 marks.  If such a poor-tax of 7 marks per capita were extended to the whole empire, it would yield 300,000,000 marks; and if the direct taxes of Berlin, amounting to 23 marks per capita, were levied on the empire, we should receive more than one milliard marks in direct taxes, including those on rents and incomes.  Fortunately not all the people of the empire are living under a liberal ring, and least of all the inhabitants of cities where the majority of the workingmen have joined unions or similar associations.  We have discovered the remarkable fact that Oberneunkirchen with its large factory population pays only 0.58 mark, and Duttweiler 0.72 mark per capita for the care of their poor.

These are instances which throw light on the relief of the communities if a system similar to that of the unions would be introduced.  I do not at all intend to make so expensive a proposition to you, and I have already said that we shall have to work on this legislation for at least a generation.  But look at the glaring examples of Duttweiler and Oberneunkirchen.  Without their unions their budgets for the poor would perhaps not rise to the Berlin figure, but they would