Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 01.djvu/182

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ADVERTISEMENTS OF ELIZABETH.
138
ADVOCATE.

High Church party, ably represented by James Parker, considered them as merely archiepiscopal injunctions intended to enforce n minimum of ritual. Consult: Strype, Life and Acts of Matthew Parker (Oxford, 1821).


AD'VERTIS'ING (Lat. advertere, to turn [the mind] to, to notice). The method by which the producer of commodities disseminates information regarding them. For the producer it has the value of an automatic process, since it makes it possible to reach thousands of people through printed words, where formerly the seller was limited to his vocal organs. For the consumer it has the value of a system of education, since it keeps him in touch with the invention of new commodities, the improvement of old, and the constant advance in industry.

In tracing back the history of advertising, signs and criers are found in Palestine, Greece, and Rome, where they were used for public announcements and a few private purposes. Pompeii has furnished us with many wall inscriptions in red and black, as well as the familiar Roman signs, the amphora and two slaves for a wine shop, a goat for a dairy, or a boy being whipped for a school. Quaint signs prevailed throughout the Middle Ages, and the public crier was an important institution in towns. It was, however, the advent of printing and later of the newspaper which provided an adequate medium for advertising, although it was not until the industrial changes of the nineteenth century had revolutionized production, creating innumerable new commodities and stimulating new wants, that advertising could become an important feature of commercial life. In the seventeenth century small advertisements appear in the newspapers for books, tea, coffee, or medicine. The chief advertisements for a hundred years or more are curiously illustrative of the crude social customs. A heavy stamp tax hampered the growth of newspapers and advertising in England until 1855.

America is par excellence the country of the advertiser. In the colonial papers, advertisements furnish material for history. Brief notices tell of new goods just imported from England, coffee, slave sales, runaway slaves and servants, or lost cattle. Advertising has grown with the newspapers. In 1795 there were 200 newspapers in the United States; in 1850, 2526; and in 1895, 20,217. Newspaper advertising on a large scale dates from the establishment of the New York Sun in 1833, followed shortly by the New York Herald, the Philadelphia Public Ledger, and the New York Tribune. Estimates of the amount annually spent on advertising in the United States are as high as $500,000,000. The mediums for advertising are as follows: (1) The newspapers, magazines, and trade journals, which carry about 75% of the business; (2) occasional literature, such as catalogues, booklets, circulars, almanacs, calendars, or handbills; (3) street advertising, including billboards (see Poster), stereopticons, signs, and street-cars; (4) salesmen; and (5) personal advertising. The past twenty years have so increased the importance of advertising that specialization has become imperative. Agencies with large capital provide the mediums and suggest the methods, talented writers are in demand, effective illustration is being developed, and advertising magazines discuss the theory and practice of advertising. Business men now begin to appreciate that advertising is no mere incident of competition, but frequently the most important department, upon whose skillful management the growth and success of the business depends.

Efforts to Prevent Abuses in Advertising. The choice of farmers' barns and fences, and more especially of rocks and prominent scenic effects for the placing of advertisements, has led to various efforts to stop such abuses. A number of London societies interested in preserving historical sites or beautiful places incidentally make efforts in this direction. The Society for Checking Abuses in Public Advertising — now generally known as "Scapa" (q.v.) — is the leader in this work. It publishes circulars and asks for parliamentary action. Dr. G. Alder Blumer, Superintendent of the State Asylum at Utica, N. Y., started a crusade in 1898 to preserve the rural scenery in that vicinity. He obtained farmers' addresses from the Good Roads League and sent them Scapa circulars. The New York Central Railroad has made an effort to get rid of unsightly advertising along its line. The nuisance of circulars has been met in some cities, as in Philadelphia, by ordinances forbidding their distribution.

Bibliography. Quarterly publications of American Statistical Association, VII., New Series, No. 52 (Boston, 1900); files of advertising journals (list given in above, page 30); files of commercial journals (occasional articles); Journal of Political Economy, IX., 218 (Chicago); Chauncey M. Depew, One Hundred Years of American Commerce, Volume I. (New York, 1891).


ADVICE'. See Bill of Exchange.


AD'VOCATE (Lat. advocatus, one called to aid, from ad, to + vocare, to call). In the time of Cicero the term advocatus was not applied to the patron or orator who pleaded in public, but rather, in strict accordance with the etymology of the word, to any one who in any piece of business was called in to assist another. Ulpian defined an advocate to be any person who aids another in the conduct of a suit or action (Digest 50, title 13), and in other parts of the Digest it is used as equivalent to an orator (see also Tacit., Annal., x. 6), so that the word would seem gradually to have assumed its modern meaning. The office of the advocate or barrister who conducted the cause in public was, in Rome, altogether distinct from that of the procurator, or attorney, or agent who represented the person of the client in the litigation, and furnished the advocate with information regarding the facts of the case. The distinction between these two occupations is still observed in Great Britain, but in many of the states of Germany, in Geneva, in the United States, and in some of the British colonies, as, for example, in Canada, they are united in the same person. In England and Ireland advocates are called barristers, under which title will be found a statement of the duties and responsibilities which the advocate undertakes to his client, and of the state of the profession in these countries. In Scotland, as in France, the more ancient name has been retained. In France the avocat and avoué correspond very nearly to the barrister and attorney in England. The French advocate is simply a free man who has graduated in law and possesses the privilege of addressing the tribunals. The advocates who practice in each court form a separate col-