Germany dealt with a similar situation in very different fashion. In the autumn of 1891 there were disastrous failures of certain German banking houses, resulting from criminal misuse of bank deposits and from an undue participation in speculative transactions by the general public. The outcry that followed was no new thing in Germany, for as early as 1888 conditions that had arisen in the Berlin market and the Hamburg coffee market had led to petitions to the Reichstag demanding remedies for speculative evils. The cumulative effect of these difficulties was such that, as related by Doctor Loeb, bills directed against speculation on the Exchanges were introduced in November, 1891. “As early as February 16, 1892,” according to this authority, “the Chancellor of the Empire appointed a commission of inquiry of twenty-eight members, most of them lawyers, but with representation also of landed proprietors, economists, and merchants. The chairman was the President of the Directorate of the Reichbank, Doctor Koch. The commission began its inquiries in April, 1892, held 93 sessions, and summoned 115 witnesses, of whom the great majority were persons engaged in the transactions which it was proposed to regulate. The commission also made inquiries as to the state of legislation and trade usages in the several states of the Empire and in foreign countries. “The commission presented a majority report on November 11, 1893, recommending certain statutory and administrative changes. The principles on which these recommendations rested was that, in view of the importance of the interests which were represented at the Exchanges, modifications should be made with caution, and the existing complicated trade usages and methods should not be disregarded; while, on the other hand, there was no occasion for regarding with mistrust, still less with hostility, interference in the free working of industrial forces.”[83] Up to this point, it will be observed, the German investigators followed precisely the same lines as the English Commission of 1877 and the Hughes Commission of 1909. Mistakes are recognized, but modifications are to be made “with caution.” But it so happened that the recommendations in this respect were not followed. German politics at that time were in a state of turmoil in consequence of the Agrarian agitation, and in the various phases of political expediency that attended the uproar, first the government and then the Reichstag insisted upon more and more stringent enactments concerning legislation against the Exchange, until finally a hostile law was enacted quite out of line with the original recommendations of the committee of inquiry. In other words, the politicians ignored the labors of the committee and took matters into their own hands. The three important provisions of this law were these: (1) All exchange dealings for future delivery in grain and flour were forbidden.