CROWN AND EMPIRE.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19172, 1 December 1927, Page 7

CROWN AND EMPIRE.

SYMBOLIC CONTINUITY.

MR AMERY GUEST OF ROYAL COLONIAL INSTITUTE.

The Et. Hon. L. 8. Amery, Secretary of State for the Dominions, was the guest of honour at a dinner given by the Canterbury Branch of the Eoyal Colonial Institute, held at the United Service Hotel yesterday evening. Professor J. Macmillan Brown presided and about fifty members were present. Apologies were received from the Hon. Sir Heaton Ehodes, Colonel 6. J. Smith Messrs Chas. Wood, and B. Seth-Smith, and Dr. Stevenson. The toast of "The King" was proposed by the chairman and loyally honoured. A Unique Empire. Proposing "Our Guest —the messenger of the Unityt of the Empire"—the chairman said there never had been an Empire like the British Empire. It was unique in history and he did not think it ever would have a successor. Like Britain itself, the Empire had no written Constitution, and, hence, there never had been any violent attempt to change it. Now that they had their guest in tho saddle, statesmen of other countries would realise that the British Empire was a vital entity. It was Mr Amery, more than anyone else, who had made them feel that there existed a Bpirit throughout the Empire that would never die. He (the speaker) foresaw the realisation of Tennyson's prophecy in "Locksley Hall"— "The Parliament of Man, the Federation of the World." The toast was enthusiastically honoured. Oldest Imperial Society. Mr Amery was received with warm j applause on rising to respond. He said he wished it had been possible to have finished dinner leisurely so that they could have listened to the kind of speech the chairman could have delivered if time had permitted, and for him (the speaker) to have spoken with freedom and ease, but at his back he always heard the chariot of the arrangement that had been made for him. At that moment, according to those arrangements, he .should be in another place. (Laughter.)

"An Old-Pashioned Faith." As an old Fellow of the Eoyal Colonial Institute it gave him great pleasure to meet so strong and active a body of its members in Christchurch. Of the many bodies that dealt with inter-Imper-ial relations, none met the needs of the serious student of Empire affairs better than the Institute—the oldest and first Imperial Society. It dated back to the early 60 's, to the heyday of that doctrinaire individualism which believed that it was inevitable that the colonies would split away from the Mother Country—inevitably, and indeed, it was looked upon as desirable. In the face of the then prevalent doctrine tho Institute asserted a faith that to some seemed old-fashioned, but which was, really, a forecast of a newer and greater future for the Empire. ■ A Colonial Empire. The Institute's title contained two things characteristic of the Empire. Mr Amery then spoke of the Colonial character of the Empire, and said it had grown from the sea inwards, and not by territorial expansion across a Continent. In its development it had never abandoned its maritime connexion. Throughout all its growth it had depended on the Navy for its security and for its economic development, and the Empire would continue to depend on the Navy as long as it lasted. The British Crown. The other feature of the Empire embodied in the Institute's title was the Crown—the Boyal Colonial Instituteemphasising the fact that one of the greatest influences that hold the Empire together was the British Crown. He was thinking not only of the old, illustrious line of Sovereigns, whose high Bense of public duty endeared them to all their subjects, some of whom could conceive of no other form of loyalty than loyalty to the individual monarch, but also as a great historic institution whose ancient forms had preserved the continuity and stability of the national and Imperial life, while yet giving room for the most remarkable developments in the extensior. both of democracy and of Imperial freedom. One set of opponents succeeded another to the Government, but not to arbitrary power, but to the service of the Crown. Government maintained what a century or two ago appeared inconceivable—popular Party Government and the united eonduct of national and Imperial affairs. The unlimited freedom of the Dominions was sanctioned with the proviso that it was a freedom under a common Crown, (Applause.) Their groat society truly was well named in that its title emphasised both the oceanic character of the Empire, and the great symbolic element of continuity that bound them all together. (Applause.)