Representatives

3967

Reproduction

domestic and foreign affairs, from the crown !
to the Parliament. The governments of the
United States, Canada, Australia, and Brit-
ish South Africa have almost from the very
first adopted thoroughly representative
schemes of government.

UNITED STATES.—Representation in some
form was recognized in the governments of
the English colonies in America, the first
colony to obtain a representative legislature
being Virginia, the General Assembly of
which commenced to meet in 1619. The
others obtained in course of time similar
privileges. Yet in all but a very few cases
the executive was entirely independent of
the people, and responsible to the crown or
proprietary alone. This was one of the main
causes of the friction that prevailed during
the rSth century. At present, in each State
of the United States districts are marked
out by the legislature for the election of State
senators and representatives respectively.

The members of the U. S. House of Repre-
sentatives are apportioned among the differ-
ent States after the completion of each cen-
sus according to population. They are either
chosen by the State electors at large, or, as
is generally the case, districts are marked out
by the State legislature. Each State is en-
titled to two representatives in the U. S.
Senate, who hold office for six years, and
who until 1913 were chosen by the votes of
the members of the State legislature. In that
year the Seventeenth Amendment was added
to the Constitution, making provision for the
direct election of Senators.

The President is appointed by a body of
independent electors, each State contributing
a number equivalent to that of the Senators
and Representatives whom it sends to Con-
gress. As these electors are chosen by the
people, however, the President is in all but
name elected directly by the popular vote.

PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION is an elec-
toral system devised for the rectification of
a manifest injustice in the ordinary methods
of political election. In countries where
these methods prevail a substantial minority
of voters may obtain only a small minority
of members, and may have practically little
or no representation. A number of plans
have been suggested for remedying this evil.

Sec ELECTIONS; ELECTORATE; LOCAL GOV-
ERNMENT; PARTY GOVERNMENT. Consult
Commons* Proportional Representation;
Curtis' Proportional Representation; King
and Raffety's Our Electoral System.

Representatives. U. S. House of, the

Lower House of Congress. See UNITED
STATES, Government.

Reprieve is an act of the executive or of
a criminal court by which the carrying out
of a capital sentence is temporarily delayed.
When granted by the executive the object
generally is to allow time in order that the
advisability of a pardon may be considered.

Reprisal. Formerly when an individual
suffered injury from a foreign state, he was
given a letter of reprisal, in virtue of which
he could seize or confiscate the property be-
longing to that state or its subjects by way
of securing compensation. The idea of re-
prisals is that they should be a means of
redress short of war, and they are only to
be used when compensation cannot be got
by amicable methods. The following acts
of reprisal without the declaration or exist-
ence of war are recognized by the sanction of
usage and authority: (i) the sequestration
of property belonging to the offending state;
(2) the sequestration of the property of its
citizens; (3) the partial or complete suspen-
sion of commercial and other intercourse be-
tween the two nations; (4) suspension or
annulment of treaties in part or in whole; (5)
withdrawal of all privileges and rights to
domiciled citizens of the offending state; (6)
a pacific blockade.

Reproduction is the term applied to the
whole process whereby life is continued from
generation to generation. Reproduction is
one of the prime functions of protoplasm, and
is intimately related to growth, of which

Reproduction by Fission: Four

Stages in the Reproduction of

Amoeba.

it may indeed be regarded as a special case.
The phenomenon occurs in its simplest form
in many Protozoa, as in amoeba, for example,
which grows until it reaches the limit of ad-
vantageous size, and then reproduces by di-
viding into two parts (fission). Comparing
multicellular forms with the Protozoa, we
find that, generally speaking, these, in place
of simply dividing, give of! two kinds of spe-