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I. REPORT OF THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE TWENTY-FIFTH ANNUAL
MEETING OF THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION.

NEW YORK CITY, DECEMBER 27-31, 1909.

By WALDO G. LELAND,

Secretary.

PROCEEDINGS OF THE TWENTY-FIFTH ANNUAL MEETING OF THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION, NEW YORK CITY, DECEMBER 27-31, 1909.

By WALDO G. LELAND.

The American Historical Association was founded at Saratoga in September, 1884, and had, therefore, in December, 1909, completed a trifle more than a quarter century of existence. The American Economic Association was founded a year later and had completed a trifle less than a quarter of a century. An anniversary celebration was felt to be an appropriate exercise for both associations, in which joined the host of younger and more specialized societies which have grown up out of and about the two larger associations. Thus there met in New York the two older associations, together with the American Political Science Association, the American Sociological Society, the American Association for Labor Legislation, the American Statistical Association, the American Social Science Association, the American Society of Church History, and the Bibliographical Society of America; an agglomeration which rivaled the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which was meeting at the same time in Boston. The total registration of all the societies in attendance at the New York meeting was about 1,100, of which 565 should be credited to the historical association. If size is to be taken as a criterion the twenty-fifth meeting of the American Historical Association was nearly twice as successful as the most successful preceding meeting. Contributing to this success in no small measure was the long list of foreign names figuring upon the consolidated program. Thus there were the Right Hon. James Bryce; Henry Higgs, of the Royal Economic Society; Prof. H. A. L. Fisher, of Oxford; Prof. George W. Prothero, of London; Sir Horace Plunkett, of Ireland; Camille Enlart, director of the Musée de Sculpture comparée, of Paris; Prof. Eduard Meyer, of the University of Berlin;

1 For other accounts of the New York meeting see American Historical Review, XV, 475 ff.; the Survey, January 15, 1910; the Independent, January 6, 1910; and the Boston Transcript, January 1, 1910. In the present account free use has been made of these other reports.

For a most interesting historical sketch of the association see the article by Dr. J. F. Jameson in the American Historical Review, XV, 1 ff. (October, 1909).

Prof. Rafael Altamira, of Oviedo; Dr. H. T. Colenbrander, of The Hague; Maffeo Pantaleoni, of Rome; Prof. Wrong, of Toronto; Francisco J. Yánes, of the Bureau of American Republics, representing Latin America; M. Zumoto, of Tokyo; Dr. J. Takamine and Dr. K. Asakawa, Japanese residents of America; and T. L. Chao and Chang Lau Chi, of China. Internationalism was perhaps the dominating characteristic of the meeting. An entire session was devoted to the activities of the historical societies of England, France, Germany, Holland, and Spain; another to the Gladstone centenary; a third to the contributions of the Romance nations to the history of America; a fourth to the Scandinavian, Dutch, and German elements in America; the conference of archivists considered mainly the lessons to be learned from European archival practice; the conference of historical societies listened to a paper on the publications of French and German societies; and at the conference on history teaching were presented papers on German and French methods.

Another element of the meeting was the social entertainments provided by the citizens of New York through a committee of one hundred.

Monday afternoon, December 27, was occupied in committee and council meetings. In the evening there was held the citizens' meeting of welcome presided over by Mr. Joseph H. Choate, at which arrangements had been made for addresses of welcome by the President of the United States, the governor of New York, the mayor of New York City, and the president of Columbia University. The storm had made impossible the participation of the President, but the meeting was nevertheless a brilliant opening of the exercises of the week. On Tuesday morning the historical and economic associations met to listen to the annual addresses of their presidents. The address by President Hart, of the historical association, on "Imagination in History 99 1 was an arraignment of inaccuracy in which, while defending the proper use of imagination as necessary to infuse vitality and a sense of reality into historical writings, he scored severely its improper use, ranging from a careless examination of the "sources" to the deliberate manufacture of "facts." President Dewey's address on "Observations in Economics "2 dwelt especially upon the necessity for accurate facts as a basis for better economic theory and a clearer understanding of economic life.

A luncheon at Columbia University was followed by informal speaking by Mr. Bryce, Prof. Fisher, and President Lowell. In the afternoon a reception was given for the associations in Earl Hall by the Academy of Political Science in the city of New York.

1 Printed in full in the American Historical Review, XV, 227 ff. (January, 1910). Printed in the American Economic Association Quarterly, April, 1910.