THE PEACE CONGRESS
NEW ZEALAND DELEGATION ' ( i ALLOTMENT OF REPRESENTATION : (From R. Riley, Official Journalist.) , [No. 11.1 Paris, January 30. The allotment to New Zealand, of di- ; vect representation at the Peace Conference by one delegate only had been de- , cided, dosed, and 6ealod a week before Mr. Massey, Prime Minister, and Sit Joseph Ward, Minister of Finance, arrived in Paris on January 22. They were thus deprived of the opportunity given , to, and fully exploited by, all the other delegations to make and support claims for the fullest direct representation possible at the conference table. •■■ It has been contended, of course, that the unavoidable absence of the New Zealand Ministers from the important preliminary Inter-Allied Conferences, or conversations (to use the official term), did not really affect tho decision of tho council of the great Allied and' Associated Powers. It is impossible in the circumstances to challenge that contention, but it is at least right and proper to place on record the fact that the New Zealand representatives were not consulted on the question of allotment of representation at the Peace Conference, and had no opportunity of placing before the council the Dominion's claims and reasons for their olaims for the same measure of representation as was allotted to States whose war-services on behalf __ of the Allies is not equal to that of New. Zealand. ' ~ ,• c It may be stated that the question of representation generally was discussed thoroughly at several sessions of the preliminary Inter-Allied Conference. Many protests were submitted and numerous amendments made befor.e the council, consisting of the President of the United States of America, and the Prime and Foreign Ministers of the great Allied and Associated Powers, reached their final decision. At one stage, indeed, it seemed as though the representation question would never be.closed. Need it be said that even after it was closed the council's decision had failed to give anything like general satisfaction. The allotment of international representation at the Peace Conference is a? follows:—British Empire, United States of America, France, Italy, and Japan, five delegates each; Brazil, three delegates; British Dominions (except New Zealand) and India (including the native States), two delegates; Belgium, China, Greece, Rumania, Serbia. Poland, and the Czechoslovak Ropublio, two delegates each; New Zealand, Portugal, Siam, Cuba, Guatamala, Hayti, Honduras, . Liberia, Nicaragua, and Panama, one delegate each. Montenegro was also allotted, one delegate, but the rules concerning the designation were deferred until the political situation of this country shall have been cleared up. i The representation of Russia was also necessarily deferred. As a result'of further cons'ideration, Belgium and Serbia were allotted three representatives apiece. It was understood, rather than resolved, at the preliminary sessions of. the Inter-Allied Conference that the panel system should apply to all the great Powers, and also that any Power could chango its representatives from time to time- •
As far as one could learn from the free talk at the headquarters of the British Delegation about ,the allotment of representation, the aim of the Allied Council had been an honest and a very patient attempt to exercise justice to all States. There appeared, however, to bo. a strong feeling among-many delegates that the allocation of threo representatives to Brazil was at least preposterous, if not outrageous, while other coantries which had rendered substantial. service and niado great sacrifices on behalf of tho emancipation of the world from Prussian militarism had been classed, as regards representation at the Peaco Conference, with Siani, Liberia, and Panama. ■ The exceptional position given _ to Brazil was apparently justified by diplomatic reasons. Perhaps the main reason was a laudable aim at convincing her Latin-American, people that, the, interests of the free! nations' are more acceptable than those of the defeated Central Powers. But it is for the Supreme Council of the Allied and associated Powers to justify their diplomatic generosity to Brazil. Such was the position and such the comments in respect of representation at the Peace Conference, when the New,
Zealaud delegation arrived in this great rendezvous' of the world's peacemakers. •And it was at onco obvious that there was no chance at alt of having New Zealand's' claims reconsidered by the council of the Powers. No attempt was
made to appeal to the council. But it was deemed reasonable and proper, having regard to all the circumstances, to place tho question of New Zealand's re-, presentation before tho British delegation. To begin with, South Africa had, for the first time, been given precedence over New Zealand in the order of what may be termed the relative importance of the British dominions, as determined, apparently on the basis of white population. Then it was admitted that due consideration had been given to the war. service of each dominion and State, ex-, cepting, of course, Brazil, and also to the necessity of recognising the right of nationhood as now claimed by all the Dominions. Further, there was the natural desire to secure that the case of
each dominion should be presented with the best possible effect. After careful consideration of all these points and phases of representation of the dominions and other small States, the New Zealand delegation decided to bring the matter up at the earliest opportunity. Mr. Massev called on Mr. Lloyd George the morning after the New Zealand delegation's arrival in Paris, and the British Prime Minister immediately and without any hesitation or reservation agreed to have the question of New Zealand's representation considered at a meeting of the British Delegation— practically the British Imperial Cabinet—that day. Both of our Ministers attended the session of the British Delegation, and received a hearty welcome. The conference was private, so it is not permissible to report tho discussion, but it can at least be said that there was no attempt on the part of the New Zealand Ministers to lecture the British Government or to gain political publicity on the strength of New Zealand's war service, as has apparently been inferred erroneously in Now Zealand. The Ministers were invited to recount the Dominion's service in tho war, end their simple recital of the facts, which require no declamatory embellishment, or "political emphasis," was certainly appreciated by all the British and other dominions' delegates. The result was on immediate "agreement to include Sir Joseph Ward as a member of Britain's Delegation, and the Minister of Finance attended, as a British delegate, the second plenary session of the Peace Congress, at. which the idealistic League of Nations was born to wonderful parents.
Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/DOM19190329.2.85
Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka
Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 158, 29 March 1919, Page 9
Word count
Tapeke kupu
1,082THE PEACE CONGRESS Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 158, 29 March 1919, Page 9
Using this item
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
Stuff Ltd is the copyright owner for the Dominion. You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of Stuff Ltd. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.