As it stands to-day, there are nine managers who represent the shareholders or proprietors, and thirty committeemen, who look after the administration of the Exchange and the well-being of the members. The managers are elected in threes for terms of five years by the votes of the shareholders. They fix the admission fees, appoint almost all the officials, and look after the building and the property in general, while the thirty committeemen enforce the rules and regulations, adjudicate differences, and regulate the admission of securities. They are elected every year by the members, and they choose from their number a chairman and vice-chairman. In March of each year, before retiring from office, the committee elects all the old Stock Exchange members who wish to be re-elected, membership on the London Exchange being granted for one year only. Any member may object to the re-election of any other member, but this is a very unusual incident. “The great principle upon which the committee acts,” says Mr. Francis W. Hirst, “and to which most of its regulations are directed, is the inviolability of contracts. It has power to suspend or expel any member for violating its rules, or for non-compliance with its decisions, or for dishonorable conduct. A member of the London Stock Exchange is prohibited from advertising or from sending circulars to any but his own clients. He is also forbidden to belong to any other Stock Exchange, or ‘bucket-shop,’ or other competing institution. New members are now compelled to become proprietors by acquiring at least one Stock Exchange share, paying a heavy entrance fee and an annual subscription of forty guineas. Yet the precautions against impecuniosity are inadequate. Defaults are far too common.”[104] In such a dual form of control as that of these managers and committeemen it is obvious that causes of friction must of necessity arise from time to time, and that jarring and discord are inevitable. The owners or proprietors are, of course, a minority of the members, and their decisions on matters that come before them are necessarily biased in favor of a course that will increase the dividends on their shares. Naturally they would favor a practically unlimited membership, since the dividends are largely acquired from this source.