BILLS PAYABLE.

On motion the reports of the Treasurer and Statistical Secretary were ordered printed for distribution.

The finance committee reported as follows: Your finance committee would respectfully submit the following:

The efforts of the committee, during the blennium, have been devoted largely to the carrying out of the resolution adopted at Buffalo and reaffirmed at Canton, Chicago and Pittsburgh, requesting each local society to contribute ten cents per capita annually for the support of our General Secretary's salary fund.

The total receipts for the two years, from the various local societies in response to this request, were $2,281.60; an average of about 23% cents per member annually. With the receipts from the other sources as shown by the treasurer's report, the total income for the two years was $2,850.10.

This total of receipts includes $127.55, which was received in response to an appeal to individuals, au. thorized by the executive committee in October, 1911, in an effort to place the national organization upon. firm financial basis.

Despite an increase in receipts during the biennium. of $574.30, and owing to the fact that during the previous biennium the General Secretary was upon an extended furlough-doing, however, Luther League work at no expense to the Luther League-we are confronted today with a deficit of $74.92.

About 60 per cent. of the various local societies have failed to respond in any way to the request made in the resolution providing for the support of our national work.

A few societies have failed, either through neglect or otherwise, to meet in full the pledges made to our committee for this work. The total amount due and unpaid is $196.70.

Your committee wishes to again record its appreciation of the financial aid rendered by THE LUTHER LEAGUE REVIEW; the amount received from THE REVIEW was $150, all of which has been applied upo the General Secretary's salary fund.

Further, we urge that the officers of our local societies shall see to it that their financial obligations to the Luther League of America be discharged as a first obligation to the support of our work, and this prior to the making of any contributions for other purposes.

After a solo by Miss Florence Degen, "Hold Thou My Hand," Rev. David A. Davy, of Chicago, delivered an address entitled "Serving the State, Serving God":

Serving the State, Serving God.

God's

It is true government is by divine sanction. word declares it. Human experience confirms it. Whoever helps to realize and maintain just government "Serving the State is Serving God." Our subject rightly makes the service of God the paramount consideration. Who is the real ruler of the nations? Not President William Howard Taft, or President-elect Woodrow Wilson; not the Governor General of Canada, not King George of Britain. God is our King. King George, the Governor General of Canada, President William Howard Taft and President-elect Woodrow Wilson, as chief magistrates, if truly they are serving the people, are but subjects and servants of the King of Kings. The oath of office required of and taken by those called to responsible positions in the State is based upon a recognition of the fact that the ruler of the State should administer his office as the servant of God, realizing his ultimate responsibility to God the ultimate ruler.

Abraham Lincoln realized this when in his first inaugural speech he said: "You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the Government, while 1 shall have a most solemn one to preserve, protect and defend it." We do not wonder that "calling God to witness in all he did or said he was the servant, not simply of human law, but also of divine justice." He went forth as one who was set apart to the service of God.

Not always has there been, nor everywhere today is there this conception, "That the individual serving the State serves God.'

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There are those who look upon all human forms of government as essentially bad and unworthy of the Christian's support. Their attitude is that of nonparticipation or passive resistance. Only a theocracy would seem to them deserving of their active support and service. They do not understand that a theocracy is, age by age, being established on this continent and that it will be a reality when the mass of the people will have been so molded and moved by the Word of God that "Vox Dei" becomes "Vox Populi." The time was, and in parts of the earth may even be today, that rulers regarded neither God nor the natural and inalienable rights of their subjects. Christian men rightly questioned "as to whether they might consistently with their faith, be obedient to despots and be the law abiding subjects of godless monarchs.'

Luther and Melancthon in drafting article sixteen of our peerless Lutheran Confession gave utterance to the fundamental teachings of scripture and expressed that right attitude of Christians toward their governments and governors, which is universal in its application and which is a true guide for the Christian citizens of these United States of America and of the Dominion of Canada; yes, and for Christian citizens everywhere today and throughout all time.

Society today is so organized and man has become so associated with his fellow man in the industrial and social organism that today we must evangelize the social organism before many can be brought to consider their individual and personal relations with God.

To save many we must eradicate protected vice and licensed evil, which make sections of our cities and many homes miniature hells, and which make many men and many women veritable devils. God's purpose

is the regeneration of the race by the regeneration of the individuals of the race. God is ready to do His part, but He is hindered by our delay to redeem the city, the state, the nation. There is a social regeneration which must precede the individual salvation. Through the State Christian men and women must enact laws which will aim to give to each an equal opportunity and a fair chance to be saved. What think you? Does the child born in a brothel and reared in ignorance and poverty and vice, have

half a chance? Think of the multitude of children who are without a fair chance to be saved, are growing up to a Godless life and going down to a Christless grave. Will not the Christian men and women

of this nation, with something of the compassion of the Son of God, who became son of man, rise up in their might and serving God through the enactment and the enforcement of just laws make possible the salvation of the individual through the redemption of the city; that to those who are "down and out" morally, socially, spiritually, there may be given an equal opportunity to know and receive and live for Jesus Christ and be saved.

He who, with the love of God toward man in his heart, with the fire of God's spirit in his soul, with the mark of Christ upon his forehead, goes forth to the political arena and battles against the wild beasts of greed and graft and lust and vice and crime, which seek to rend the body politic; he who enters legislative halls or occupies the judge's bench, who accepts public office and as a real servant of God, becomes the true servant of the people, resisting and bating the forces of injustice; he who, as a statesman, wisely directs the destinies of the nation and through the nation influences the world for God, is no less a servant of God than the minister who from the sacred desk proclaims the unsearchable riches of Jesus Christ.

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The church cannot do without the state. The state cannot do without the church. Each is necessary to the other and both to the well being and highest life of man. The church must provide the moral dynamic necessary in order to just government. The state must afford protection to the church. The state should not and must not dominate the church. By legislation and the compulsions of law, men cannot be made truly religious and Christian. The church should not dominate the state. History proclaims that suh domination has been disastrous alike to true liberty and to true religion. The American church and the American state must be kept separate. But if the nation is to long endure, the morality and honest, and equal justice and righteousness and love, which are the inevitable outward expression of the inner life and spirit of the true church, must become so incarnated in the lives of the men and women who constitute church and state that these qualities shall permeate the American state.

Given a great people, with a free church and a free state each exercising its proper functions and neither infringing upon the rights and prerogatives of the other; the state providing true liberty under law, the external condition amid which the church may do her perfect work.

The church as the conscience of the state, providing the moral dynamic without which a just government and equal opportunity are impossible.

And you have the ideal nation. To this we in America have in a measure and more and more must approximate.

Young Lutherans and old Lutherans and all Lutherans and all Christians, as true servants of God must enter into the activities of the state, infusing into the state and its workings the love and justice and righteousness of God. Too often the grafter and the corrupt politician are dominant in the state while church men mistakenly stand aside and have naught to do with practical politics, lest they soil their holy hands. Guided by the word of God, inspired by the spirit of God, church men must, under God, dominate the state in order that the state may fulfill her Godgiven mission.

Here on this continent where civil and religious liberty, made possible by the signal service for God and for humanity, rendered by Dr. Martin Luther, has reached the largest fruition, here on this continent it has seemed that true religion and just govern ment are to have highest expression in law and in life. Young people of the Dominion of Canada and of these United States, what a blessed heritage you have in this remarkable American freedom. What a sacred trust. What reasons you have for gratitude to Almighty God and to the men and women, who, in the bygone days on this continent and across the seas, serving God, transformed the state and made possible this precious American freedom, political and ligious. But even here in free America there is danger that unpatriotic and godless men shall by unholy means prostitute this freedom in order to gain their selfish ends. Our form of government is ideal. however ideal the form of it may be, prostituted by

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unscrupulous men to unholy uses, the danger to our free institutions is that a crafty and grasping hierarchy or the unscrupulous politician, the bribe giver, the bribe taker, the corrupt boss and an unscrupulous trust, will exercise a power which will deprive the mass of the people of their just rights and preroga. tives. So that even in this free land and more especially in this free land it is necessary that the honest citizen and the genuinely patriotic and the truly Christian shall be concerned about matters of government and shall see that every man enjoys true liberty under law. Preeminently is it true that in a republic like ours whoever would truly serve God must sincerely and self sacrificingly serve the state.

Today our American state is face to face with new and profound problems which are calling for solution. There is the influx of a vast foreign population, unfamiliar with our democratic institutions and bringing with them the habits and customs of continental southern Europe. The congestion of this foreign population in our cities adds greatly to the awful city problem. The very ends of the earth seem to be coming hither. America has been well called "the melting pot of the nations." Seemingly in the providence of God these United States of America and the Dominion of Canada are to be the training school of the nations in self government for God.

There is the industrial problem resulting from the growth of trusts and trade unions. There is the race problem, with the freedman as the chief factor, as yet unsolved. There are the corrupt politicians and the corrupt capitalists. There is the godless socialist with his disregard of private rights and personal preroga tives. There is the anarchist with his red flag and his hatred of all government. Problems and foes from within and from without threaten the perpetuity of our free institutions. Tremendous issues are involved. Government of the people, by the people, for God on this continent, is on trial. The need of the hour is for God quickened men who, serving the state shall serve God.

The church has not been providing sufficient of moral dynamic. As a result in the state there has been injustice and misrule with technical evasions of just laws. Many church members have not counted service for the state as service for God. Selfish motives too often have dominated. Many having feigned religion in the church have manifested none in the state. Many church men have shirked their political duties.

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But the conscience of the nation is being aroused The quickening power of the gospel is at work. new day is dawning when men shall "do justly, love mercy and walk humbly before the Lord," a new day in which the true church man, impelled by dynamic of the indwelling Holy Spirit, through the Word of God, with love to God and to his fellow man shall go forth to be the true statesman and servant of the people.

The greatest statesman, other things being equal, is the man, who, recognizing that he is a God commissioned man, becomes the greatest servant of the people. The old idea was that "to the victor belongs the spoils." The new idea is that the victor belongs, not the spoils, but a great responsibility, a sacred and a holy obligation to God and to all people. To America, "the land of the free and the home of the brave," the nations of the earth are looking. America seemingly is to be God's instrument to bring the world to the foot of the cross.

"As goes America so goes the world." "Our Country, God's Country," and "the World for Christ" must be the slogan of the Lutheran young people ot America.

The future of America rests with her young people. Young people of the Church of Luther, you who have received the heritage of this priceless civil and religious freedom, you who should hold your citizenship in free America, as a sacred trust; serving the state, serve God. Serving the state serve God as private citizens at the polls. Serving the state serve God by the acceptance and administration of public office as a public trust. Serving the state, serve God by the enactment of just laws. Serving the state, serve God by the enforcement of just laws.

A paper was then read by Robbin B. Wolf, Esq., Pittsburgh, entitled "Lutheranism Vindicated in American Liberty."

Lutheranism Vindicated in American

Liberty.

We are led to believe by friend and fo: alike and we do believe that it was Martin Luther's brave resistance even at the risk of excommunication and of death, that forced the issue and made the Reformation possible in his day. This fact was at least conceded by his enemies who called all Protestants Lutherans as an epithet of reproach.

The Reformation did succeed and has endured. The Protestant churches grew by leaps and bounds and the mother church was forever shorn of its glorious unity.

As to whether or not, from a doctrinal point of view, Luther was justified in making this attack on the established church, I am not at this time concerned, but I am here to discuss whether this Reformation, this Lutheranism has been vindicated in American liberty, or, as to what is the relation of the inalienable rights which we enjoy under our Constition, to the Reformation of Martin Luther.

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First: The Reformation gave to the individual the right of autonomy. Prior to the Reformation the despotic power of the Pope was absolute. Men were kept in subjugation to the chu:ch by the fear of punishments, which the church imposed in life and threatened to impose even beyond the grave, and as a result the believer was the suppliant of the church. Luther's brave spirit could not and would not endure this surrender of self to any earthly power. zealous resistance led others to follow and self respect grew apace. Minds once loosed from their accustomed yoke, developed as never before, deve.onea inventive capacity and energy of character which gave rise to marvelous achievements in science, plitical action and in every work where self reliance and personal force are called for. This idea of autonomy rapidly spread over the continent of Europe and the explorers brought it with them across the Atlantic.

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Second: Lutheranism favors universal education and education insures liberty. Prior to the Reformation learning was confined to the clergy and even to them was permitted only such learning as had passed the papal censorship. Original research into fields of learning was inconsistent with the church's previous holdings of infallibility. The bitter persecution of Galileo, persecution which followed even beyond the grave, shows how the mother church stifled independent thought. But Luther soon saw to it that through the timely invention of the printing press the Bible was published abroad through the land and the German peasants thus got their first taste of good literature and the naturally resultant thirst for more. The growth of learning was phenomenal and today Lutheran Germany leads the world in education and in both Germany and Scandinavia we have no i literates. When these German and Scandinavian Lutherans and their offspring came to America they invariably provided that the school house should go up side by side with the church.

Third: Lutheranism, while primarily intended to obtain religious liberty, eventually brought civil liberty. Kings and emperors had long yielded to the supremacy of the Pope, in both ecclesiastical and civil affairs, but when they saw the absolutism of the Pope broken in the church, they began to desire independence in matters of state and to yearn for the rights and prerogatives which had long been denied. Luther inspired in his followers the love of personal rights and the consequent high regard for the rights of others. And having learned to know these rights all Protestants alike saw to it that these rights were secured to them in their forms of government and in legislation. The Catholic church, on the other hand, has always seemed willing to endure any form of government, however popular, so long as that government remained servile to the church, but as a fact, in most cases we find Rome the ally of arbitrary forms of government.

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Fourth: Lutheranism in this country has always stood for religious toleration. Many sects that came to colonize in America brought with them their religious bigotry and intolerance. The early Dutch Lutherans on Manhattan Island were for a long time denied the right to maintain public worship according to their own forms. It remained for Gusta us Adolphus to give the first order for religious tolerance toward their neighbors to the Swedish Lutherans on the banks of the Delaware. Thus was inaugurated that most precious of American liberties-the right to

worship God according to the dictates of one's own

conscience.

Finally, the Reformation of Luther demonstrated that a bloodless revolution is the most effective and its results most permanent. Whatever may be gained for a season by the victories of war, liberty that endures is obtained only by appeal to the hearts and consciences of men. Legislatures may enact laws without limit, commanding what is right and forbidding what is wrong; czars and emperors may issue decrees backed up by the power of standing armies, and perhaps avail nothing permanent, but when by Christian education men are taught to know the right and do the right, and when to love thy neighbor as thyself" is indelibly written in the hearts of men and made the governing principle of men's daily lives, then, and then only, do men learn to live and let live.

Would that time would permit me to call to your attention in grand array the long list of Lutheran champions who have contributed to the cause of freedom in the United States-of soldiers in both the Revolutionary War and in the Civil War who fought well because they loved their cause; of teachers who were well informed and had the power to impart; of judges who showed mercy and who could not be corrupted; of governors who ruled righteously; of bankers who by their rugged honesty built up business confidence and established a stable system of finance, and of the men of God who have given the full measure of their devotion to the uplift of the downtrodden and to the perpetuation of civil liberty by preaching the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. Lutheranism stands in history as the upholder and guardian of civil order and as the inspirer of those political ideas which secure human rights. It took the government of the church from the control of the clergy and put it in the hands of the laity, where it rightly belongs, and this plan of popular government, as created in and by the Protestant churches, served a powerful guide and example to the framers of the American Constitution and is embodied therein. It began by the education of the masses and has ever since advocated universal Christian education. Having overcome the intolerance of the papal authority, it displayed its broad mindedness by showing a spirit of Christian toleration to those of other creeds, and finally, it did not work by slaughter and bloodshed, but by the power of ideas.

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As I intimated before, the discovery of America just nine years after the birth of Luther was not a mere coincidence, but part of the divine plan; the newly discovered country belonged by right of discovery and conquest to Roman Catholic Spain, but it was not ordained that the Government of Spain should long endure in the free soil of America. The Lutherans, with their love of liberty, came over soon after the discovery of America and a mighty host of Lutherans and of other Protestants, nearly all of whom now acknowledge their debt to Luther, have been coming ever since. They had neither the means nor the might to win control at once by the power of arms, but while conservative they were doggedly persistent and their ideas of liberty of speech, liberty of conscience, freedom of the press and the abolition of tyranny eventually prevailed.

And when, in 1776, the yoke of England was shaken off, the very watchword of the new republic was "Liberty." That liberty, as I endeavored to show, was the direct offspring of the Protestant Reformation. We may decry that the church of Christ has been rent in twain, we may bemoan the blood that has been shed in the establishment of a new faith, but we are compelled to own our debt immense of endless gratitude to Martin Luther for a great measure of the liberty which we Americans today enjoy. That liberty, the fathers have willed to us as their richest legacy; to preserve it and most important of all, to deserve it, is the solemn duty and bounden obligation of us who remain.

A baritone solo from "Stabat Mater" was rendered by Mr. John Dreslein.

The President appointed the following committees:

Resolutions-Rev. M. J. Bieber, Canada; Hon. Lewis Larson, South Dakota; Rev. G. H. Bechtold, New Jersey; Miss Annette

Kaehler, New York; Charles W. Fuhr, Pennsylvania; Miss Jennie Outman, Wisconsin; Otto C. Rohde, Ohio.

Auditing-Rev. E. D. S. Boyer, Indiana; K. J. F. Wilharm, Pennsylvania; Charles A. Drefs, New York.

Credentials-Paul B. Mattice, New York; Rev. E. Boeckelman, Canada; L. G. Rechnagel, Connecticut; C. E. Carlson, Illinois; J. F. Laughner, Indiana; J. H. Lehman, Massachusetts; Miss B. Fraser, Ohio; C. F. Koch, Oregon; F. C. Leupold, Pennsylvania; Lewis Larson, South Dakota; Miss Sena Jensen, Wisconsin; S. J. Marion, Virginia.

Third Session

The third session of the convention was opened at 2 o'clock with devotions conducted by Rev. M. J. Bieber, of Canada. The hymns, "Jesus, I My Cross Have Taken," and "The Lord My Shepherd Is," were sung. Rev. Dr. C. Armand Miller, of Philadelphia, delivered an address on "Citizenship a Doctrine of the Church":

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Citizenship a Doctrine of the Church. The theme is significant of the way a Lutheran approaches any question. When Faith and Practice. Creed and Flag. speak of the flag we are speaking of the men under the flag; of their actions, of their duties, of their conduct. The test of our bearing toward the flag, the test by which is measured our citizenship, is the Word of God. Citizenship is a doctrine of the Church. Not citizenship from the standard of the welfare of the country, but behind that is the thought of citizenship a doctrine of the Church.

Let us first state what the principle involved is. God has established the state. God has established the Church. God has established the state for the sake of the Church.

Let us hold fast to these two or three fundamental principles: The state is of God. The authority of the state, that is, of our civil government, is God's authority. The powers that be are ordained of God. All power is of God. The power of the state is God's power. The authority of the state is God's authority. The spirit of Christ taking possession of man's life must control and influence and act throughout that man's life.

You remember the lessons last Sunday. The Doctrine of Christian Citizenship. Our citizenship is in Heaven. There is a supreme citizenship which is a citizenship of Heaven and citizenship of the Kingdom of God. In the first lesson Christ laid down the principle of good citizenship. Is it lawful to give tribute to Cæsar? and Christ answered, "Render unto Cæsar the things that are Cæsar's and unto God the things that are of God.' Cæsar belong to God, the President belongs to God. The king belongs to God. The governmental territories of the United States and Dominion of Canada, and the empire of the island of Great Britain belong to God.

See how the doctrine of citizenship involves subjection to every loyal power so long as that power acts within the bounds of its privilege. The relation of the state to the Church is the relation of the spirit to the body. The Church has nothing to do with the civil organization, the performance of civil duties as a church. The state is a law making body. The Church has one commission: to preach the Gospel and administer the sacraments and thereby to make men; to make spiritual lives that will conduct the state along the lines of righteousness. It is only righteous men who hate and oppose sin who can make the right Let us laws or enforce the right laws for any state. get it clearly in our minds that the Church has noth

ing to do with legal and civil matters, fundamentally The Church because the Church is a life, not a law. is to develop a love in the heart of every citizen. There are errors that oppose that doctrine of citizenship. There used to be and still is to some extent the doctrine that a Christian must have nothing whatever to do with the state or any of the institutions of the state. That a spiritually minded man would not hold office in the state. There are men today who have very strange ideas.

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There is another conception of the state as preme. That the state has a perfect right (such has been the theory in many territories and lands) to determine and govern the ideas of their people. In Japan up to fifteen or twenty years ago there were, all over Japan, at the parting of the ways, tablets bearing the inscription that if any Christian or the Great God of the Christians himself, shall set fcot upon the soil of Japan, he shall be seized and his head taken off. That stood there until many years after our missionaries from America and England were doing their work in Japan.

There is another doctrine that the Church must be supreme, that the state must be subject to the state. The That the head of the Church has three crowns. You and I can Church of Rome claims that today. give an answer to that doctrine in the words of Christ, "My kingdom is not of this world."

There is another idea of the relation of Church and state in which the state maintains and appoints the leaders of the Church, pays the salaries of those who are employed in the Church, collects taxes to support the Church and to give the Church freedom to determine its doctrine and forms of worship. Against all this we have that which the Lutheran Church from the beginning put into practice-the state and the Church to be absolutely separate. us thank God that in this land of Church are entirely separate. And let us watch lest there be any encroachment upon the freedom of the Church from the state. We have one of God's greatest blessings that permits the true princip.e, the coctrine of true citizenship, to be exercised among us.

Let state and

There is only one possible contiict between loyalty to God and loyalty to state and that is if the state steps outside of its authority given by God and demands of a Christian what is contrary to God's will.

How I would love to make application of these principles to us. First of all, we as citizens must pray for the state. Pray for the President, for all rulers and other people in authority. A man who does not He is not vote cannot claim to be a good Christian.

a Christian citizen who is trying to help by his citizenship. The man who seeks to avoid the payment of his taxes "Tribute to whom tribute is due." A ChrisThe law is the tian prays, has respect for the law. decree of the government which is the authority and We must stand for the law and do power of God." We must take our best to develop and strengthen it. an active part in the awakening of public sentiment for the labor question, the child labor question, the question of tenement houses, the gambling dens, liquor traffic.

The Church as a church has nothing to do with this. But the Christian into whose heart the Church has put the ideals of God has everything to do with it. If he does not have something to do with it he is shirking his duty. No man can truly sing "I Love Thy Zion, Lord," whose heart does not pour its yearning into the hymn, "God Bless Our Native Land."

Rev. George H. Schnur submitted the report of the Topics committee, which was ordered referred to the resolutions committee:

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Our convention theme, "Creed and Flag," reminds us that we have a glorious heritage. With our feet upon the firm foundation of the Word of God, and the Unaltered Augsburg Confession, we are enthusiastic supporters of our beloved country. Our emblem is the rose and the within the heart, its very colors clasping in loving embrace Columbia's three, Black-Red, White and Blue-and Gold. Let us set our eyes toward that future, so bright with promisestand for the truth, rejoice in our history and work for the salvation of men. The Luther League move ment has come to stay. The Church must use her young people in her organized work. The Luther

League's seventeen years of work in developing itself as an organized activity, the eighteen years of growth and improvement of the Luther League Topics, the twenty-five years that THE LUTHER LEAGUE REVIEW has been holding up the banners of opportunity be fore our Lutheran young people all this labor of love has not been in vain. The basic principles of the Luther League are the living foundation, not only of the Luther League of America, but also of other organizations of Lutheran young people.

To us it is a source of gratification that some of these other organizations are using our Topics; and even those who are not doing so are following the same generai lines which they have learned of the Luther League of America. Hence we can be grateful that our work is bearing fruit and that gradually we are developing our Lutheran young people intellectually and spiritually. Let our aim ever be toward perfection even though that ideal ever seems to be just beyond our grasp.

Our fifteen years of work as editor of the Luthei League Topics has convinced us more and more that in the weekly meeting for the study of the Topics in a truly devotional spirit is found the central motive force of the whole movement. And the Topics must therefore be selected, written and edited with care. A speaker at one of our national conventions said, "The Topics presuppose a weekly devotional meeting." I would rather put it the other way; the weekly devotional meeting, which is the key to true success as a League organization, demands the right kind of Topics.

All Topics should be practical in their effect and result. If it is doctrinal, it is to point us to something fundamental in our thinking which is to grow into true Christian life. If it is historical, it should draw from the glorious past of our Church some lessons for the present. For history repeats itself. Ii it is missionary, or along the lines of beneficence, or education, or patriotism, or sociology, or temperance, any of the various other practical lines of church life and work, it is still easier to make the study of the topic of practical use to the individual Leaguers. through it all, we must keep in view the fact that through, these Topics we are training Lutheran Christians, and that therefore every topic must be soundly and distinctly Lutheran. We want our Luther Leaguers never to be ashamed of that which is posi tively Lutheran, be it the teaching, the story of the past, or the study of the ever-widening work of the present.

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That our work is still far short of the ideal we freely admit, while we claim that so far it has pro duced the best literature for Lutheran young people's societies. It must be remembered that the great bulk of all our Luther League work is done by busy men who must do this as a side line, giving many hours that are taken away from sleep and recreation. Hence, it will easily appear that all our Luther League work cannot be given that time and labor that it ought to have could there be found the money to secure an ed itor who could give to the literary work of the League his whole time and energy. But we thank God that He has given all of us health and strength and the opportunity to lay the foundations of this great Luther League movement and develop the beginnings of her literature.

The themes for the years 1914 and 1915 are arranged in the first place topically, and then are thrown into the regular schedule as they are to be studied week after week.

The resolution of the Lancaster District of the Luther League of Pennsylvania requesting the Topics committee to arrange a monthly missionary service was referred to the resolutions committee.

On behalf of the Junior Topics committee, Rev. A. T. Michler submitted the report, which was referred to the resolutions committee. Mr. Fuhr, of Pittsburgh, presented a resolution providing for a nominating committee of one representative from each State League and the Luther League of Canada,

said representative to be chosen by the delegates present from the Leagues mentioned. This was adopted. Mr. Fuhr presented a second resolution instructing the nominating committee to present not less than two names for each office. After full and free discus