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The Spike or Victoria University College Review October 1915

Editorial

Editorial.

demon hammering nail through mortarboard

AAt the present time it may seem to many to be inopportune to discuss any questions not directly affecting the war. Nevertheless, in the short time that has elapsed since the dawn of Armageddon, two facts have been thrown into such full relief through the outbreak of hostilities, that, though they have no material bearing on the progress of the war, we cannot resist the temptation to discuss them. Let us refer to them briefly as "the political lessons of the war."

Our attention has been called to the subject through the publication, by the energetic agency of "The Round Table" in New Zealand, of a booklet entitled "Empire Problems." This consists of a number of reprints from "The Round Table," and its object is to draw attention to, and to arouse popular interest in the question of the future government of the Empire. Given a triumph for the Entente Powers (and, for us, failure is unthinkable) is it expedient to perpetuate the system of Empire governance by the dominant political party of Great Britain, page 6 or is the time ripe for the substitution of a system, which shall be based upon the principle that every section of the Empire must be represented upon the Executive body controlling the Empire's destines?

In discussing the political lessons of the war, we do not suggest that we are supplying an answer to this question, but we do suggest that the flood of light that has been thrown by the war upon the fundamental weakness of our political system has revealed the need for a great and definite reform, and that that reform is indicative of the lines of progress along which the Empire may develop.

The political lessons of the war are chiefly two:—
(1)The impossibility that the Empire should ever again submit the unfettered control of its fate to the dominant political party in Great Britain.
(2)The inherent weakness, the ill products and the thoroughly evil nature of the Party System of Government render constitutional reform imperative.

Let us consider these in turn. Doubtless we shall be accused of gross political bias m suggesting that English Liberalism has proved itself incapable of governing the Empire. Yes, with a full knowledge of all it conveys, we make that charge. The most casual student of English politics must be struck with the change in the foreign policy of England in the last ten years. In 1905 the Liberal Party assumed office. One year earlier the Conservative Ministry had concluded the famous "Entente Cordiale" with France. The Entente was the perfectly natural outcome of a natural movement in European politics. The series of brilliant and victorious wars waged by Germany from 1866 onwards made her the dominant power in Europe. These victories combined with her open and widely proclaimed declaration that she must have her "place in the sun" made it manifest to all European nations that a rearrangement of the Balance of Power was necessary in order to secure that there should be thrown into the scale a weight to counterbalance the weight of Germany. Hence arose the curiously vague, but very real agreement between France and Great Britain known as the "Entente." Later Russia, threatened on page 7 her Western Front by Germany, and her equally ambitious ally—Austria—still weak from her conflict with Japan, became a third party to the Entente. England's position must be made perfectly clear. She did not become a partner in the Entente from a disinterested philanthropic desire to strengthen France against her powerful neighbour. She had in mind no purely moral considerations, such as the preservation of small states. She entered upon the agreement with France because the very existence of the British Empire was threatened. The conquest of France was but a stepping stone, and never anything but a stepping stone, in the German scheme of conquest. What Germany aimed at was world power. Long ago she realised that her last and greatest task was the destruction of the British Emipre. This feeling made itself felt at least seventeen years ago in the writings of von Treitschke. German ambition made itself so manifest that England was obliged in self-defence to abandon her position of "splendid isolation," and to ally herself for defensive purposes with that nation, with which she had the common interest of self-preservation—France. France then, since the advent upon the scene of Germany and the Germanic scheme for world conquest, has been the buffer between England and Germany. First France, then England; these were the first two mile posts in the German plan of progress. This fact was realised by two of England's greatest diplomatists—King Edward VII. and Lord Landowne—and it was this fact that was the inspiration of the Entente. It were well that this should be realised by those nincompoops, who prate openly to-day of how nobly England has stood by her agreement with France. England has not stood nobly by her agreement with France. In the final week of July, 1914, when a firm attitude was needed the Liberal Ministry, with the exception of its Foreign Secretary, was despicably weak ; when the German plan was approaching fruition, when an open and bold announcement by England, that she would not look on while France was attacked, might have prevented the war, the Liberal Ministry (again, with the exception of Sir Edward Grey) basely and ignominiously shelved the Entente and based its attitude page 8 in the crisis upon the question of the neutrality of Belgium.

However, let us hark back to our argument from which we have made a necessary divergence in order to explain the nature of the common interest allying France and England.

A year after the completion of the Entente, as we have said, the Liberal Party assumed office, and it remained in office until the formation of the Coalition Cabinet in 1915. We base our charge against the Liberal Party in England upon the following grounds. In the first place the whole tendency of the Liberal Ministry since 1905 has been to weaken the Entente. The movement culminated in, as we have said, the shelving of the Entente in July, 1914. That England owed a definite duty to France was clearly recognised by Sir Edward Grey in a despatch of the 28th July, 1914. That the Liberal Party would not have obeyed its duty, had it not been for the violation of the neutrality of Belgium, we know from the open and shameless statement by Mr. Lloyd George in the March number of Pearson's Magazine. Here then is the first matter in which the Liberal Ministry has proved itself blameworthy. The Entente, which was far and away the strongest diplomatic move made by England for many years was first neglected and finally entirely disregarded by the Asquith Ministry.

In the second place, led by a number of men of German sympathies, of whom Lord Haldane is a typical example, the late Liberal Minstry, with a suicidal disregard for the facts, cultivated, at the expense of her friendship with France, a friendship with the very nation, which was daily increasing its preparations to fly at the throat of England. Not only this, but the Liberal Ministry for many years used to invite suggestions from Germany as to the English Army and Navy, with the result that the Estimates for the Army and Navy were lowered every year, while the members of the General Staff in Berlin grinned up their sleeves at the success of their scheme, and at the gullibility of Lord Haldane and of the other members of, what has been not inappropriately termed, the English "Potsdam Party."

page 9

In the third place, the Liberal Ministry proved from the beginning of its career, that it was fanatically pacific. The little Englander Liberals had sneered at the South African War. Pacificism was the creed of the bulk of the Liberal Party. This produced its inevitable effect. No sooner had the Party assumed office than the reduction in armaments began. In 1908 Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman reduced the naval programme, with the immediate result that Germany redoubled her construction of battleships. But the Ministry was not warned even by this. Disarmament became the order of the day. A short time ago the partner in a great munitions factory narrated how he went to the Liberal Ministry and informed it that his company must dismantle its huge and irreplaceable plant unless it received some encouragement from the Government. It received none. The plant was dismantled, and thousands of British lives are being sacrificed to-day through that lack of provision and foresight upon the part of the Liberal Ministry, of which this is a typical example. The truth is the Liberal Ministry was in the position of a trustee, under a moral obligation to show due care in the affairs of his cestuis que trustent. But so far from carrying out this obligation to show every care in safeguarding the interests of the Empire, the Liberal Ministry has been distinguished by nothing so much as an entire and reckless disregard of its responsibilities. The final blow has been dealt by that amazing man, Mr. Lloyd George, who has openly gloried in the fact that England was utterly unprepared for war.

The moral, of course, is that in the case of a vast and far-reaching organisation such as the British Empire, which has under its control huge tracts of unpopulated land, which administers justice and offers the boons of civilisation to great numbers of uncivilized peoples, pacificism is not practicable. To place a small directorate of same fifteen men, the bulk of whom are determinedly pacific, at the head of such an organisation is suicidal. It is quite possible that the dominant party in England might at any time in the future be again imbued with pacificism. Therefore such a contingency must be guarded against. It is most improbable that a director page 10 ate drawn from every portion of the Empire should be largely pacific. Circumstances seem to point to the fact that in the future the outlying portions of the Empire must be given some form of representation upon the body that is to govern the Empire. English Liberalism has proved the first fact that we set out to establish, viz., that the Empire must never again submit the unfettered control of its fate to the dominant political party in Great Britain. Probably this is the greatest service ever rendered to the Empire by the Liberal Party in England. But there is another service which it has rendered—it has made mnifest to all but the most bigoted the thoroughly evil nature of the Party System of Government.

And that brings us to the second fact upon which the process of the war has thrown light—the evils and weaknesses of Party Government, and the need for constitutional reform. We do not propose to embark upon a lengthy discussion of the origin, nature, and history of Party Government. Its evils have been so widely recognised already in New Zealand that different schemes have been brought forward to supply a remedy. None of these has been received favourably, because of the popular, conservative distrust of reforms ; but, so far as the politicians have been concerned, the opposition has mainly arisen out of the chief weakness of Party Government itself. It is a commonplace that Party Government offers the maximum of delay, inconvenience, and difficulty to any legislative measures, but for any reformative measures, as to which there is determined opposition, success is practically impossible under the Party system. Friction—the playing off of one party against another—is the "very breath and finer spirit" of Party Government. It is clear that under such a system of government by contest only a minimum of progress can be made. That such a system should continue while the Empire was engaged in a life and death struggle, when every day disclosed the need for the reform of some existing grievance, or the hasty passage of necessary legislation, soon became clearly impossible. Nominally, only two portions of the Empire have abandoned the Party system in favour of national government ; but in reality every self governing page 11 British State has done so. On 25th May the foundation of a National Cabinet in Great Britain was announced. The immediate cause has been usually attributed to the unfortunate controversy in the Admiralty, which led to the resignation of Sir John Fisher. As a matter of fact, however, it had become more and more apparent as the months rolled by that it was impossible for one party, unaided to carry on the government of the country and the direction of the war. The admission of the Unionist Party to a share in the government must have come sooner or later. Probably, if the Asquith Ministry had been strong and able, and not supine and incompetent, the coalition would have been delayed for some little time, but that it would have come in the end there does not now seem to be any reasonable ground for doubt.

Much is being written to-day of the effect of the war upon the Empire, upon the position of women, upon British customs and institutions, upon the problem of Home Rule, but surely all these considerations sink into insignificance beside the consideration of the effect that the war has had upon that peculiarly British institution by which we are governed, or to put it more truthfully—by which we are abjectly misgoverned. Future generations will have cause gratefully to remember the present world-wide conflict, if it has, as we trust, dealt a quietus to the Party system in all its evil, in all its viciousness, in all its corruption.

We do not know whether reform should lie in the direction suggested by the late Sir William Steward, namely, by the adoption of the Swiss system—the Elective Executive. We are inclined to think that the most suitable and convenient method would be to adopt a modification of the present makeshift system. We should like to see every Party represented on the Executive in proportion to its numbers. But whatever remedy is found, we can heartily express one hope—that we have witnessed the final departure from the Empire of the Party System.

So far, then, we suggest that the war has revealed the need for two great reforms—the Empire must not run the risk of being governed again by a pacific Ministry, and there must be reform of our Party system. Now we be page 12 gan by suggesting that the reform rendered necessary by the war would indicate the lines of progress along which the Empire might successfully develop ; and, indeed, it seems to us that the abolition of the Party system would be the first step towards the solution of the problem of Empire government. What that solution may prove to be, we do not presume to suggest. The finest intellects within the Empire have paused aghast at the number and complexity of the questions involved. Nevertheless the wisdom of admitting the self-governing colonies to a share in the government of the Empire would seem to be manifest. So also, it seems to us, the abolition of Party Government would prove to be a measure fruitful of good results for the solution of the problem—what is the best method of governing the Empire?