from justice. He is also the custodian of the treaties made with foreign nations. He grants and issues passports; and all exequaturs to foreign consuls in the United States are issued from his office. He receives ministers and ambassadors from foreign countries and presents them to the President. He is the official through whom the President conducts all official correspondence with the governors of the various states of the Union.

He is regarded as first in rank among the members of the cabinet, and is the first named in the order of succession in case of death or disability of both the President and Vice President. He is frequently spoken of as the "premier" of the cabinet, but there is no such title or designation known to our laws.

There is now an Under Secretary and three Assistant Secretaries of State, one authorized by law in 1855, one in 1866 and the third in 1874. The Under Secretary was provided for in 1923. The Assistant Secretaries have charge over the detail work of the department. The next in rank to the Secretary is the Under Secretary. In case of the absence or inability of the Secretary he becomes the Acting Secretary.

As originally organized the department had charge and supervision of the mint, of the issue of patents and copyrights, taking the census, of the affairs of the territories, and of the issue of pardons. Patents are now under the charge of the Secretary of the Interior, and copyrights under the librarian of Congress. Affairs of the territories are also now under the Department of the Interior, and taking the census under the Department of Commerce, and supervision of the mint is under the Treasury Department. In 1893 by executive order President Cleveland transferred the matter of pardons to the Department of Justice. After the war with Spain a new bureau, known as the Bureau of Foreign Trade Advisors, was added to the department.

Each of the executive departments has a distinctive seal by which matters originating in the department are authenticated. That of the State Department has the spread eagle with the national shield upon its breast, and the arrows of war, and the olive branch of peace in its talons. Over it are the words "DEPARTMENT OF STATE."

The salary of the Secretary of State, as fixed by the law of 1789, was $3,500; in 1799 it was made $5,000; in 1819, $6,000; in 1853, $8,000; in 1873, $10,000; in 1874 it was reduced to $8,000, and in 1909 was made $12,000.

Many times since the organization of the State Department our diplomatic relations with other countries have required the most delicate and wisest handling. At the very start treaties of friendship and commerce had to be made with foreign governments, and as we were still in our national swaddling clothes rare skill was needed on the part of our authorities to secure ample recognition. We had hardly got our constitutional machinery in fair running order when the revolution in

France threw all Europe into a blaze of war, which lasted for twenty years. The demands of France and England were especially antagonistic, and both countries treated us with contempt. We made a treaty with Great Britain which angered France to such an extent that the government there refused to receive our ministers, and finally forced us into a quasi war with that country. Later we were forced to go to war with Great Britain.

Under Napoleon we purchased Louisiana, which almost embroiled us with Spain, and a little later the Barbary Powers defied us to an extent which called for the despatch to the Mediterranean of a powerful fleet. The northeast fisheries, the boundary line between the United States and Canada, conditions in Central America, and later the Bering Sea seal fisheries have each in turn called for the highest diplomatic skill to keep peace between this country and England.

With other countries our relations have sometimes been strained. For instance, with Austria over what is known as the Kosta affair, when Mr. Marcy was at the head of the State Department; the opening of Japan, and later what has been called the "yellow peril" with that country and with China; the Ostend Manifesto, the abolition of the Danish Sound dues, the repeated revolutions in Cuba, and our own Civil War have each called forth the wisdom of our Presidents and of the State Department.

The chief officers of the department now are: Counselor, Assistant Secretary, Second Assistant Secretary, Third Assistant Secretary, Director of Consular Service, chief clerk, solicitor, chief of foreign trade advisors, advisor on commercial treaties.

The detail work is divided among the following bureaus and divisions: Accounts, appointments, citizenship, consular, diplomatic, archives and library.

There are now American diplomatic missions in fifty-one countries. Twelve of these are headed by ambassadors at the major capitals of the world. That is the highest diplomatic rank. Besides these there are thirty-four ministers.

There are more than five hundred American professional consular officers scattered over the world, and working with them are about twenty-two hundred vice consuls, consular agents, clerks, interpreters and other American office personnel. To outline the general instructions under which they work requires more than three thousand paragraphs in the consular regulations, and there is an endless variety of forms and reports pouring back to the United States from every consulate. There are more than four hundred consular offices located in foreign trade centers and some in very remote places.

Probably the most inaccessible is that at Chung King, far back in the interior of China, almost on the frontier of Tibet. To reach it requires six weeks' travel from Shanghai by river. Much of the distance

is traversed in a small river boat, pulled by a hundred Chinese coolies, who are paid a cent a day each. So deep are some of the gorges in this water route that at times the towing ropes seem to stand straight up in the air.

In some parts of the world the consuls also have judicial functions. Usually they manage to settle out of court difficulties involving American citizens.

In speaking of the extension of the activities of the department, and its growth in importance, Secretary Hughes said: "Nevertheless, the foundation of the department remains the same as that which was laid down in the laws passed by the first Congress under the Constitution of 1789. Many statutes affecting the department have been enacted since then, but the organic acts are still in force, having governed for one hundred and thirty-five years."

One of the most important of the legal functions of the department is that of issuing warrants of extradition. Extradition is the delivering up by one government of an individual charged with a crime in some other jurisdiction. In the United States this matter is wholly under the control of the Department of State. The first treaty of this country providing for mutual surrender of criminals was that of 1794 with Great Britain. Since then the practice has become general.

In 1922 Secretary Hughes had prepared and issued a small pamphlet regarding the activities of the Department of State in which occurs the following paragraph defining the functions of consuls:

A diplomat is the agent of his government to a foreign government, but a consul is his government's agent only in the district in which his consulate is situated. It is the special function of consuls to promote American commerce and watch over commercial interests. But, besides this, they take charge of the estates of American citizens who die abroad without legal representatives; care for stranded American seamen; certify to the correctness of the values of merchandise exported to the United States; aid in the enforcement of the immigration laws, and give advice and protection to American citizens. Their duties are so varied and multifarious that it is impossible to describe them briefiy. The consular regulations which prescribe a consul's duties comprise upward of three thousand paragraphs. There are about three hundred principal consular officers, and altogether the service is composed, including vice consuls, clerks, interpreters, etc., of more than sixteen hundred men. Wherever there are American interests in foreign countries there are American consular officers-that is to say, they may be found in all the four quarters of the globe.

In recent years it was found necessary to form divisions having charge of the correspondence with diplomatic and consular offices in particular countries or groups of countries. They deal with our political and commercial relations with different sections of the world. The Division of Far Eastern Affairs was the first established, in 1908. It has general supervision of our relations with China, Japan, Siam, the far eastern possessions of European states, and Siberia. In 1909 the Division of Latin-American Affairs, with similar functions for Central

and South America, was created; also in that year the Division of Western European Affairs and Near Eastern Affairs; in 1915 the Division of Mexican Affairs, and in 1919 the Division of Russian Affairs. By this organization correspondence with and concerning different groups of countries passes into the hands of officials assigned for duty in the department who have in all cases personal knowledge and experience of the affairs of the countries to which the correspondence pertains.

Since the department was organized it has managed our foreign affairs through five wars-the War of 1812 with Great Britain; the Civil War of 1861-65; the War with Spain in 1898, and the World War, of which we were a part from 1917 to 1919 and which put a burden of additional work upon the department from the time that it broke out in August, 1914. In each of these wars the regular organization of the department has been greatly enlarged and a number of vital temporary functions have been added to its normal duties.

Arbitration is at this time one of the questions agitating the statesmen of all countries, and is, in part, one of the functions of the League of Nations. It is no new thing in the United States. In 1797 the question between this country and Great Britain as to the boundary line between the United States and Canada was settled by arbitration. Between that time and the organization of a permanent court of arbitration in 1899, the government of the United States had resorted to arbitration to settle disputes more than forty times. In the two years of 1908 and 1909 twenty-five treaties with foreign nations providing for arbitration were negotiated. In 1914 thirty arbitration treaties were signed.

The Department of State is in close co-operation with all the departments. It furnishes much information to the other departments: To the Treasury Department it sends for the use of the Bureau of Public Health Service information concerning the outbreak in foreign countries of contagious diseases; for the customs service, information. concerning importations, false valuations and possible smuggling; to the Interior Department, information regarding patents in foreign countries and foreign patents in the United States covered by treaties; to the Department of Agriculture, information concerning foreign. crops and plant and animal diseases. With the Department of Commerce the relations are very close, the Department of State sending to the Department of Commerce reports made by consuls as to trade conditions and opportunities for American citizens to widen trade.

ROSTER OF SECRETARIES OF STATE

JOHN JAY, of New York.

Secretary of Foreign Affairs under the Confederation, continued at the head of the Department by President Washington until the arrival of Mr. Jefferson in New York, March 21, 1790.

THOMAS JEFFERSON, of Virginia.

From March 22, 1790, to December 31, 1793.

EDMUND RANDOLPH, of Virginia.

From January 2, 1790, to August 20, 1795.

TIMOTHY PICKERING, of Pennsylvania.

From December 10, 1795, to May 12, 1800.

JOHN MARSHALL, of Virginia.

From June 6, 1800, to March 3, 1801.

JAMES MADISON, of Virginia.

From May 2, 1801, to March 3, 1809.

ROBERT SMITH, of Maryland.

From March 6, 1809, to March 31, 1811 (see Department of the Navy).

JAMES MONROE, of Virginia.

From April 6, 1811, to September 30, 1814, and from February 28, 1815, to March 3, 1817.

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS, of Massachusetts.

From September 22, 1817, to March 3, 1825.

HENRY CLAY, of Kentucky.

From March 7, 1825, to March 3, 1829.

MARTIN VAN BUREN, of New York.

From March 28, 1829, to May 23, 1831.

EDWARD LIVINGSTON, of Louisiana.

From May 24, 1831, to May 29, 1833.

LOUIS MCLANE, of Delaware.

From May 29, 1833, to June 30, 1834 (see Department of the Treasury).

JOHN FORSYTH, of Georgia.

From July 1, 1834, to March 3, 1841.

DANIEL WEBSTER, of Massachusetts.

From March 6, 1841, to May 8, 1843, and from July 23, 1850, to October 24, 1852.