Three weeks before the League was constituted, the first Navy Bill had already received the Emperor's signature, and the order of these events is a plain demonstration that even then the measure was intended to be merely the thin end of the wedge. It is an interesting and significant fact that almost all the ruling houses of Germany have been induced to identify themselves with the League, though it is nominally an absolutely independent and unofficial organization. The Emperor's brother, Prince Henry of Prussia, has assumed the general protectorate, and among the protectors of the affiliated State federations are Prince George of Bavaria, the Kings of Saxony and Württemberg, the Grand Dukes of Baden, Hesse, the two Mecklenburgs, Oldenburg, and Saxe-Weimar, the Dukes of Anhalt, Saxe-Altenburg, and Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the Princes of the two Lippes, Waldeck-Pyrmont, and the two Reusses, the Statthalter of Alsace-Lorraine, the Regent of Brunswick, and the Burgomasters of Hamburg and Bremen. Thus the State governments have a direct interest in the League, are under a moral obligation to promote its work, and, it may be added, bear a certain amount of responsibility for the manner in which its agitation is carried on. The purposes of the organization are defined in the statutes as follows:
"The German Navy League regards a strong German Fleet as necessary—principally in order to ensure the sea frontiers of Germany against the danger of war, to maintain the position of Germany among the Great Powers of the world, and to support the general interests and commercial communications of Germany as well as the safety of her citizens at work in oversea countries. Accordingly, it is the aim of the German Navy League to awaken, cultivate, and strengthen the interest of the German people for the importance and functions of the fleet."
The members of the League are divided into two classes—"individual" and "corporative." The latter are members of branches of other societies which enrol themselves in the League en masse. The most fruitful sources of support of this kind are those kindred bodies, the Pangerman Federation and the Colonial Association. On December 31st, 1911, the corporative members numbered 756,000, the individual members 298,000. The qualifications for individual membership are the attainment of the sixteenth year and a money contribution, which, if not fixed by the branch, is left for the member to determine for him or herself. The pecuniary contribution of a corporation joining the League is fixed by special arrangement in each case. From the accounts published it would appear that the average annual member's subscription falls a good deal short of sixpence. A considerable number of the members are young persons of both sexes who send in their names because it is a cheap and easy method of gratifying the association instinct, so strong in Germans, or for the sake of the dances and other purely social entertainments which are arranged by the branches.
A monthly paper, Die Flotte, which is published in an edition of 350,000 copies, is the League's chief organ in the Press, but the Central Office also issues immense quantities of pamphlets and leaflets. These are largely distributed with newspapers owned or controlled by the iron and steel and shipbuilding industries—what the Socialists call the "armour-plate Press"—but naturally find their way to all quarters to which Government influence can give them access. Under the name of "Communications," items of naval news and controversial paragraphs are sent out about once a week to all the papers, and though little notice is taken of them in the metropolitan Press, struggling provincial journals are very glad to have their columns filled up with topical matter by expert and authoritative pens. The League also publishes a profusely illustrated Naval Album, of which the Emperor every year buys 600 copies for distribution as prizes in the schools of Prussia—a typical example of the inter-action of the wheels of the naval agitation and the Government machine. Lecturing, too, occupies a prominent place in the League's activity, and the Central Office keeps a stock of magic-lanterns and slides, which it lends out free of charge to the local branches. It also supplies uniforms, badges, and bunting for local festivities.
By far the most effective department of the League's activity is, however, the excursions to the German naval ports, which it arranges for the benefit of schoolmasters and their classes. The participants in these outings are, as far as possible, selected from the inland states and districts, in which it is most difficult to arouse enthusiasm for the sea and the fleet. They are taken to Kiel or Wilhelmshaven, received with effusive courtesy by the naval officers delegated to look after them, and escorted through the streets by a ship's band to the dockyards of war vessels, over which they are conducted by amiable guides, who supply them with all the information likely to stimulate their interest in what they have seen. If the distance they have travelled makes it impossible for them to return home the same day, naval barracks or storehouses which happen for the moment to be vacant are placed at their disposal as night quarters. So much official complaisance and amenity, especially in a country where neither of these qualities is particularly common in the public services, arouses in those on whom it is expended a flattering sense of their own and their national importance, and schoolmasters thus captivated naturally, in due time, convey their impressions to their pupils. Though the numbers of persons thus dealt with are inevitably somewhat limited, the League unquestionably gains more ground in this way than it can hope to win by pamphlets which are read and lectures which are listened to mainly by the already convinced.
The Emperor is the real director of the Navy League, and it puts forward no demand that has not already received his approval, in principle if not in detail. The League is, in short, little more than a Government department, the function of which is to carry on an agitation for more warships. It must, however, always be remembered that the League's demands represent not what the Government desires or expects to get, but what it wants to be asked for. In order that it may keep up the pretence that it is an unofficial and independent organization, the League must naturally avoid too close a correspondence between its own programme and that of the Ministry of Marine, and it is also guided by the principle that it is necessary to ask much in order to get little. Occasionally it makes a show of hurrying and worrying the Naval Minister, and of being positively objectionable to the Government, but no one suffers less than Admiral von Tirpitz from these "attacks" upon him.
Germany's Naval Policy