The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-03-23

II
- ache. and the hair of Excellence
Won valentni, chief of his secret civil
cabinet. is turning white. 1t is all over
the jubilee, which comes around next
June. when Kaiser Wilhelm will be a
quarter of-a-century emperor. The fact
is hundreds of deserving-and undeserv-
ing-persons want orders, decorations, IT,
ties and distinctions while hundreds of
other persons equally deserving-and un-
deserving-think that no orders, decora-
tiors, titles or distinctions should be Civ
eli at all. They say that lavish Wilhelm
has already given enough, and that he
depreciates badly their value by giving
more.
Kaiser Wilhelm's civil cabinet and the
kingly Prussian college of heralds are
up to their necks in this momentous prob
lem, and neither gets any further Will
holm II is democratic, and he shows this
by levelling up by trying to give every
German something that will make him
feel better than everyone else His pres
ent highly desirable aim is to give titled
nobility to some of the great men who
are spreading German finance, commerce
and cigars all over the earth. In this he
does not succeed. He gives them the
unnoble rank of Kommerzienrat," which
is Commercial COUNCILLOR. and means
that the recipients will be laughed at in
the 'Lustige Batter" Ele gives them
more rarely the particle of nobility
''von." That makes them equivalent to
Frenchmen who put de before their
names, and to untitled English squires
There are few Mendelssohns, Schwa-
bachs, Friedlander-F Fuld's,. and other
financial magnates who have got thus
high But to COVE them a noble title is
beyond Wilhelm's power. And this in
tensely oHends the German merchant
millionaire, who in England or Austria
would have the rank of baronet, peer or
baron.
1t is known that Wilhelm does not ap-
prove of this state of affairs. He does
not see why there should not be as
easily Count Mendelssohn in Germany
as there was a Baron Hirsch in Austria.
But the herald's office is higher than
Kaiser Wilhelm. Kaiser Wilhelm. in
1905, proposed that men who had rem
dered great services to Germany in busi-
ness spheres should have the possibility
to rise to the rank of baron tFreiherr),
or count (graf). His civil cabinet elab-
Grated the spheres. But there the her
AIDS office stepped in, and made trouble
1t pointed out politely that it exists not
by virtue of royal favor, but as repre-
sentatives of the nobility titled and un-
titled, of Prussia. And il declared to
Kaiser Wilhelm that while he has a. right
to choose what individuals he will give
titles to, he has no right to bring in a
new class of men without consulting the
existing nobility.
The heralds office theory, which is put
forward in a pamphlet by Herr ZiIn-
nermann, is that the titled nobility
should be increased only from the ranks
of the untitled nobility. man already
won might be made a baron, count or
prince. but a mere business man without
the won had no claims. The heralds'
office here raises the contention of ''the
historical pact, This pact it says is an
understanding of past monarchs with the
titled Prussisn nobility that the nobility
we're members of a limited class wnch
should be increased only slowly and judi
ciously. If this rule is violated every
new baron or count decreases the value
of existing titles. IF the king of Prus-
sia makes titlas without end then the
old titled Prussan nobility will be tempt
ed to repudiate their own titles With
merchant and financial counts and even
princes. it will be great distinction
not to have a title.'
Other German classes that have any
distinction are in the same nervous APP
pfehension as Is the titled mobility. II
Kaiser Wilhelm presents some palace
door-opener with the fifth class OF the
EIohenzollern house order then all who
already have that fifth class growl that