The Dominion SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1919. THE NEW GERMAN PARLIAMENT

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 109, 1 February 1919, Page 6

The Dominion SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1919. THE NEW GERMAN PARLIAMENT

.. The statement of .a vcccnt cable message that the new German parliament will abandon Berlin and will likely riicet in Weimar' is one that may mean very' much more than lies on the surface of the message. It is almost an unhearcl-of thing.-for. a capital not threatened by ,in-cnemy to be abandoned as a seat of Parliament. . In .1870 and during the present war the Parliament of France met at Bordeaux, hut this was because, Paris was in peril at the-hands of the ' Huns. There arc no doubt insurrectionary •forces in Berlin, and Something like civil war has .waged there, but it is very improbable that a Parliament representing the people would change its place of_ meeting for fear of disorder—disorder, that the presence of Parliament supported by Berlin's garrison of 26,000 would easily sub/jfue.-(..There is, of course, another of the situation. The German Empire set \ip in IS7O wjs simply a confederation of . separate States, duchies, and free cities, and in this confederation there were a score or so of capitals', and the German people.outside of Prussia- had no sentimental regard ■ for Berlin as the capital of tho Empire, But apart from sentiment,., there .arc natural' and utilitarian reasons why Berlin (should be the capital and th'e seat of Government. It had a population of 2,000,000 before the var, and it is pre-eminently the largest , and most influential city in It possesses also imiitftn'se Parliamentary Buildings, erected at the cost of over £1,000,000, with all the conveniences for members,. Such as a magnificent auditorium, library, reading and re-freshment-rooms, etc. But the mood of. Germany to-day is leading it to abandon Berlin, for the time being at least, as the seat of Government. This mood may be an evidence of the-German penitence desired . by President Wilson. Berlin has one ugly, repelling feature. It.is largely a Hohenzollern creation, and ■monuments'- of Hohenzollerns are in every open space. Bismarck and members of the Potsdam gang are glorified: everywhere in the city and in "its surroundings. The Reichstag palace, built out of the indemnity wrung from. Franco in 1870, 'is smeared all over with Kaiserism, and its, walls commemorate in. pic? turcs despots and'warriors. Contiguous to this building are the colossal statue of Bismarck and the Ri'eat Column of Victory, each in .its own-way testifying to the excellency .of empire expansion by "blood and iron." Schiebbhand in his Germany. 'J'lic Welding of a World, Power, says, "Nowhere in this building is there made the slightest .attempt to recognise the virtues, the sacrifices, the deeds or rights of the people, of its representatives, champions, or spokesmen." The abandonment of Berlin, the refusal to meet in the old temple of Hohenzollernism, might be taken to be an open .and visible sign mi the 'part of-Germany's new Parliament that it has cleansed its mind from the evil political ideals and methods'of the Prussian war lords.

Thc'Gxpectation.that the new German National Assembly will meet at Weimar may also be claimcd as an open and visible sign of a penitent. Germany. The duchy of Saxe-Weimar-Eiscnaeh, of which the city of Wcilnar is its capital, before it bccamc part of the recent German Empire and tints bound to Prussia by clamps of Prussian steel, gloried in ideals which Bismarck and the Hohenzollcrns scorned. A hundred years .ago the Prince of the duchy .gave, his land a liberal Constitution and granted freedom to the Press. It was the pioneer State in political reform in Germany, and it'was thus separated.by a great gulf from despotic Prussia, ..In the eighteenth, century, when Fkedekick callcd "the Great"-was seeking glory by "blood and iron," the Princo of Saxc-Wcimar sought to make his little kingdom great by the arts of peace. The Encyclopaedia Britannica sums tip a long story of welldoing in a sentence, thus: "An intelligent patron of literature and art, lie attracted to. his. Court the. leading , scholars in Germany. Goethe, Schiller, and Herder were members of this illustrious band, and the little State, hitherto obscure, attracted the eyes of all. Europe." The heroes of this little. State are not men of' war, but. champions of peace. The German poets of the middle ages had their contests here, and here also Princess Elizabeth lived her life of sacrifice, as told by Charles Ivin'gslev .in his Saints' T raped tj. This was also the country of Martin Luther at his best—as a boy singing hymns on the streets of Eisenach and as a man in the Castle of the Wertburg, "flinging ink at the Devil" by writing against despotism. Nearer our time in its capital Goethe reigned almost as a king m literature, and Weimar, became known in Europe.as the "German Athens." Goethe was led to visit the Court of Frederick the Cheat in Berlin, and what he saw only evoked his contempt, and he wrote: "1 have got quite close to 'old Fritz,' having seen his way. of life, his gold,, his silver, his statues, his apes, his parrots, and heard his own curs twaddle after hiui." In history Weimar 'stands' for ideals that >vould make the world, better. The German National Assembly meeting in this quaint old, town would have an environment which should help it to a better state of mind.

It is- to be hoped that the near future will justify these charitable surmisings regarding the mood of Germany's new representatives. AVe cannot, however, forget that up till now Germany has been an artist in C'liiioujlatje, and when we hear of a war criminal like Ektiimann-Holi,-weg avowing his impenitence, and' ■of German troops marching to Poland, a curb is put on our charitable surmisings. Meanwhile the moral situation, is clear. _ Germany must rcaliso her criminalitjy must repent, must make reparation. For four years and more she violated all lasv, human and Divine, in a war she herself made. A, gulf separates her from . the • Allies' as real as the gulf that separates the Judge on the Bench from the guilty criminal in the dock, and' it is right that Judge and criminal should have their true positions recognised. Justice, national and international, is not to vanish from the earth because .a'political Pecksniff may remind us that we all are sinners! Me. Benjamin

Kidd, tho author of Social livolution, at the outset of the war in the Daily if ail Year Book for 1915 stressed the unique criminality of Germany and the absolute tightness of our cause. He said: "It is a war in which Britain .may look the nations of the earth in tlie face and with steady eyes say to them, as no nation has ever before been able to,say to the world: 'I have drawn the sword in the cause of the world. Whosoever is not with me in this struggle is against mc.'" This judgment was true' in 1915 and it is truer to-day, and it is the verdict of the civilised-world. It is a judgment to be studied by Germany's new Parliament, so that by repentance Germany may do justicc to herself and to the civilised world she has wronged.