WHAT WAR HAS DONE FOR BRITAIN

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3102, 5 June 1917, Page 5

WHAT WAR HAS DONE FOR BRITAIN

] A JOURNALIST'S IMPRESSIONS kE-BIRTH OP A GREAT NATION ,tW Daily Mail"), tho ."Metropolitan.' ..jAlagazino' -of New York, sent Mr. Wil- . -linw Hard, a foremost Journalistic, anft Hiunty in tlio United States on business « political and social organisation, toLon- ' t.°u ":° uu<l ' lul answer to the question: • Vihat is -oing to happen 'after the war? .In the first-of Mr. Hard's articles the i subject or. text appears to'havo boon by Lord Northcliffo at an interview, hiv gave the author. •/Been -to tho. frout-?" asked lord Aortheliffe. : ' . ■ '. .. y "Not yet," said Mr. Hard. "I'm try- ;"(? to find out what's.happening hi Enir- , !i pid itself."- ■■'-.'■-. ■. !■''Excellent;* , said ' Lord NortheKffe. . ' at it in this way.- just put down ■Tγ* Ranges that are happening in the ; bnplish. people. That's what is going .. ■tn Inst for England.' No matter what - thp details of peace may 1«, those changes in Britain awvgoin; to last—changes in '■';' <"ir institutions and even changes in'our .-' character. 'Ili»re aro'lots of • thorn. Get ibem together." * And "that is what Mr. Hard has done; .-■ ho says at tho outset that the war has mado the English, gentler and kinder. "It has made'tVem'. in a good sense of tho word, softer. T nm convinced, that

. .'one reason why the" Eujrlish haro not teen bniMised is that thoy hhve not ten militarised. To havo militarism ( lt is necessary, that the iTitilitary shall he top dog. But'the. military are no nearer .'being top clo£ in England . IoKMy ''than ' -they wevo in August. 10W.'J...T0 illustrate, this' he. describes the tribunals • .which administer tho Compulsory Service 'Acts.. Tho tribunals he. considers the jnosfc English;: institutions ho has ever iseen in England. They are ridiculous . from the standpoint of militarism. They . aro not appointed by the' ArmjL they are not -appointed even by: the nation, labour is given adequate representation; so is every other important local inter- '• est. ■ They summon the prospective soldier before them. They summon the -iAnny- representative, has no vote, tout is there simply to argue" for the •Army as a barrister in Court. The decision is made by an assemblage of local civilian interests. Ynt, as he points out, .although the English "are actually ad'ministering national' conscription on a. sort of local option basis," tho Army/; floes, ■ somehow, grt tho men. . " i ;. Industrial Re-Birth. . ' ' | J Mr. Hard has a good deal to say about .the Declaration of London. "It was the I ' climax," he says, "to the frustful period • In English international history.-The tentative signing of it by England, the final 1-ejecting of it. by England, and the present, loathing of it by England will explain much in the character of the English people. . ... If ever there was a proGerman document it was not Mr. Wilson's Peace Note—it was tho Declaration of London." But the trustfulness which was dominant in England in 1901) Jias departed. , The present indications are that never again in our lifetime will • any representatives of England put their names to any document which would . place new impediments in the way of \ the old, thoroughly humane, but genuinely effective, unabated use of English 1 sea-power." . The wnr has given England's industries a new speed—a new enthusiasm for organisation, investigation, and education, "really almost a new iife,' says Mr. Hard. "If ever there was a caso of. a Phoenix rising from its ashes it is the case of this' England, the mother of modern industry, very old and *ery tired, rising from the pvre of war again renewing its youth. , -.'I have seen a battleship of first-class Rizo and of more than first-class enginepower steaming to the Grand FleetTeady for action on the twentieth day of the twenty-first mouth from the 'day on winch tho drawings for her were received by the shipyard." The war has proVr UCe i n ',fy stem i" England which Mr. .Jlard calls the "scientific management idea.' unknown two years The industrial future of England is, he considers, an , assured success. It-had 'no chance in 191-V Now it has been "created oil-hand, almost as a sida issue, while the air is still full of shells, by an Eng- • land really «n.ergi*cd. Mi-. 'Hard believes that "the war ha* put British labour m a position in which it may take a longer and quicker stride towards industrial democracy than has'ever before been taken anywhere." It began when «s'ho points out, "the trade'unions of Croat Britain stepped up to the 'attaint, tne war and placed on it all their liard-nou rules and rights and privileges, all their 'restrictions' on , 'output' and on 'employment.' . . . In thousands nt factories all over Great Britain there was a revolution in methods of-.produc-tion." ■ - ' Model of a World-State. Hut the new revolution is in the lamb; of Labour, for Labour bus'obtained a ■piedge-from Parliament in the iliiuitiuus Act which uaimot be misunderstood or disregarded; • Th« ivoruV of the Treasury agreement made between the Prime Minister und the Labour' leprwentatives in March, 1915, are incorporated in the'tat anil they run as follow..."Aay depaHiiib ■ during the war from the practices niliu* in. our workshops, shipyard.*, ami other industries prior to tho war shall be only for the period of the .war." "In other words," as.Ur. Hard explains, "everything must be, put back just as it was before, back into the old slough of slackness, as far as.Labour is-concei-neil" if Labour, says so." * In the meantime Labour is silent and makes no proposal, and so, the lact that England, to compete must-be efficient, we aro faced with the, possibility that after the war has ended . Capital may be bound by the Governments picdgo and required to hand over to Labour, its pound of flesh'. But' Mr. Hard pictures an'ideal compromise. He conceives that Labour might say iu effect: Very well. We will modify, we will abandon old habits. We will accept new iimineenients for increased outputs; We will put our backs into our iobs.. It will bo a case of Britons all But you- will have to take us-into a genuine joint-control of wages, hours, nnd -other conditions. Trade unionists will have lo sit on boards of directors. I ' ' j And Overseas? I Ml'. Hard's last change, as He yi.t.s jt, ".■'reaches out tolioth skies of the tunator and into both hemisphere's to sive" the ■ wliolo world intimately. i\ new spectacle si new example. The war has presented, the British Empiro with the opportunity'of niakins-'the world's first Rreat exnerimeut in international kov.cj'umcnl." The: overseas soldiers of tho iimmro have made a deep imiiression on him. lie sees in (hem different peoples, 'not hostile, much friendlier than really foreign nations could ever be to ouo anothor-and yet essentially and liermanently different." He diiferenti- . ales between thu "democratic" Aiistraian, the •conservative" hud "capitalistic Unadmnsi "more like the Ameri- j cans, tho democratic but more "din-! (MPlined New Z v alanileir., Hit; South Af- ' ricans who rm th R Dutch lnn K un ß e iu ! , London and in (heir official State Joeu-, . wenls-a jlouble-languaged, double-i blooded, double-characterised nation," as I no calls them. I -The, problem, accordinj to Mr. Hard, IB that each of the five nations wishes! to bu independent. Nevertheless each ■ ,want* an imperial foreign policy for : war and peace, and that Tmneriiil for- ' eitrn policy cannot be left to Britain alone. .Iherefore, to prevent secessions Rnd a repetition of the Colonial War ■ j>E 1812 there must bo a new nnion an ' Imwnal Parliament, an International (-■overnment. "In other wonls," he wnte-s. "the thine in view misht )y> call- ' H .n ulcntch or -i model for i> finn! 'Worltl- ! Stnf.o.'" And he w.-s in this Inst i Khatiee in British life the profountlest I world-change wrought by the war." i