From the Belgian Congo news was very scanty, and such fighting as occurred took place on the frontier in mid-Africa, chiefly it seems south of Tanganyika. A report from the Governor-General of Katanga Province spoke of "a complete defeat" of the Germans at Ki Senei, on the Lake. But no sufficient information is yet available to show how far the Congo was affected by the war. The Congo Estimates settled at Brussels in March disclosed a deficit of 856,000l. It was expected by M. Renkin, Minister for the Colonies, that the Central Railway would reach Lake Tanganyika in June. Touching the competition of the German line from the Lake to the east coast, he admitted that it would modify transport conditions in the Congo by attracting traffic which would otherwise flow to the west; but he deprecated exaggeration about German influence in Africa and thought it an advantage to Belgium that the Great African lines should meet in the Congo. New railway projects for the Congo, extending over 2,000 miles, were submitted to Parliament; but the war has deferred them indefinitely. Diamonds are now among the exports of the Congo, and the consignments to Brussels, on account of the Société Internationale Forestière et Minère, were reported to be of good quality. German enterprise, in Africa extended to Portuguese West Africa before the war, a powerful financial group entering upon the preliminaries of railway construction from the coast. When war was declared enterprise took the form of a military violation of Portuguese territory, a small body of Germans entering South Angola. Portuguese marines were landed and there was a frontier fight. There were engagements on two other points of the frontier and the Germans were represented to have been defeated. The addition of Portugal to the combatants in Europe was, however, prevented at the time by a formal apology through the German Consul at Loanda, and apparently the incursion over the frontier was a military error outside the limits of German war policy in Africa. It was an obscure incident of the war, especially as fighting was renewed in Angola. On December 22 Portugal resolved to take vigorous measures "for the military defence of the Colonies and also preparations for our intervention in the war in Europe on the side of Great Britain." The Labour difficulty on the coast and the islands brought trouble to a Baptist missionary, the Rev. J. S. Bowskill, who had been active in the native interest. He was arrested at San Salvador, and the Baptist Missionary Society made energetic representations to the Foreign Office. Sir Edward Grey, having received information that Mr. Bowskill was to be tried by the military authorities, telegraphed to Lisbon that it was absolutely essential that a British Consular officer should be present at the trial, and that the trial should be before a properly constituted civil tribunal; and he urged that immediate orders to this effect be sent to the local authorities. The result was that Mr. Bowskill was liberated on parole, pending inquiry.
Except for the visit of a squadron of Austrian battleships in May, and for such changes as the war may have brought, there is little to record concerning Malta. It was used as a place of internment for deportees from Egypt.
CHAPTER VIII.
AMERICA.
I. THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND ITS DEPENDENCIES.
Apart from the effects of the cataclysm in Europe, the year was marked by financial disturbances and trade depression, which combined with the apparent results of the President's policy in Mexico to react unfavourably on the position of the Administration.
At the opening of the year the President was popular in the country, and had an unusual control over Congress. The solution of the tariff and currency problems had cleared the way for anti-Trust legislation, and the effect of the Report of the Pujo Committee was seen in the voluntary resignation by the members of the great banking firm of J. P. Morgan & Co. of thirty out of their thirty-nine directorships in railroad and other companies. Those resigned by Mr. J. P. Morgan included directorships of the New York Central and other Vanderbilt lines, and of the Western Union Telegraph Company, while his partners retired, inter alia, from the United States Steel Corporation, the Guaranty and other Trust Companies, and the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company. Other members of banking firms followed the Morgan example.
Congress reassembled on January 12, and on January 20 President Wilson read to it in joint session his Message dealing with "the very difficult and intricate matter of trusts and monopolies." Disclaiming any desire "to unsettle business or anywhere seriously to break its established course athwart," he recommended (1) the effectual prohibition of interlocking directorates of banks, railroads, industrial, commercial and public service bodies; (2) a law empowering the Interstate Commerce Commission to superintend the issue of stocks and bonds of railways needing money for their development; (3) more specific definition of "restraints of trade" under the Sherman Law; (4) the creation of an Interstate Commission to aid the Courts and provide information enabling business to conform to the Sherman Law; (5) Legislation ensuring the punishment of persons responsible for unlawful business practices; (6) prohibition of "holding companies" [i.e. companies controlling others by owning large amounts of their stock]; and (7) the grant to private persons of the right to bring suits for redress based on the results of Government suits. The Message was conciliatory in tone, and its favourable reception, especially in financial circles, showed that the business world was ready to meet public opinion in attenuating the features of "big business" most resented by the public.
These recommendations were embodied in four Bills: (a) prohibiting interlocking directorates, but allowing two years for their holders to resign; (b) creating an Interstate Trade Commission of five members, with wide and inquisitorial powers of investigating the business of companies (other than railroads) engaging in interstate and foreign commerce, and designed to aid the Attorney-General in inquiries into offences against the anti-Trust law; (c) a Trade Relations Bill, prohibiting certain unfair trade practices and enabling persons injured by them to recover damages by the aid of the proofs established by Government inquiries; (d) a Bill further defining unlawful monopoly and restraint of trade as dealt with under the anti-Trust law, and imposing penalties for violation. Among other items in the programme for the session were a Rural Credits Bill facilitating advances to farmers, and a Bill for leasing the Alaska coal lands, designed to prevent the growth of a monopoly in them.
The President now turned his attention to foreign policy, which gave cause for anxiety in more than one direction. A settlement of the dispute with Colombia was already pending, but the friction with Japan was aggravated by a Japanese Exclusion Bill (shelved eventually through the influence of the Administration), by a drastic Immigration Bill, and by rumours that Japan was assisting Huerta in Mexico. The Spanish-American countries were obviously hostile to any sort of financial protectorate by the United States, Hayti and the Dominican Republic were seriously disturbed, and the Mexican problem still awaited solution. The Senate was adverse to the Arbitration Treaties (A.R., 1913, p. 459), and the Panama tolls question was pressing. On January 26 the President conferred with the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and on February 5 he stated what had already been intimated, that he would press for the suspension of the exemption of coastwise shipping in the current session. But the most serious difficulty was in Mexico. Early in the year preparations had been made for the possibility of enforced intervention by the purchase of stores of ammunition and the order that the warships, after their pending Southern cruises, should meet off the Mexican coast; and the alleged attitude both of General Huerta and of Japan gave force to the demands made for an increased Army and Fleet. But Huerta seemed likely to have to retire, and on February 4 President Wilson issued a proclamation removing the embargo on the export of arms to Mexico, on the ground that, as there was now no constitutional government, the embargo interfered with the settlement by Mexico of her own affairs—a view which overlooked the danger that the arms imported would partly go to Zapata and other leaders who were brigands rather than politicians, and so might intensify the disorder. The step, nevertheless, was favourably received by the American Press, as likely to hasten a settlement; and public attention was temporarily diverted to other matters. The new banking system was to be supported by banks representing some 99 per cent. of the banking capital in the country; and business seemed to be improving.