Evening Post.

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 73, 28 March 1933, Page 6

Evening Post.

TUESDAY, MAECH 28, 1933

HITLER AND CROMWELL

President von Hindenburg was naturally reminded of "the old Prussia" when he spoke beside the tomb of Frederick' the Great at the inauguration ceremony of the new Reichstag, and he invoked its-help.

May the spirit of the glorious scene inspire the present generation, he said, to unite usjin the > c6nsciousness of moral regeneration for a united, free, and proud Germany.

Speaking in the Reichstag immediately afterwards, Captain Goering treated the . de'sire'd inspiration as assured.,..

"Wo shall be inspired, he said, by the spirit of Potsdam, which enabled us to hold the .world at bay for four years. It moans cleanliness, discipline, and work. "It is not the spirit of the barrack-room, as is-" , sometimes' imagined.' " *

From an "incident in the, day's' proceedings it may be inferred that there was some excuse for the confusion which Gaptain Goering deprecated between the spirit of Potsdam" as displayed by the Nazis and the spirit of the barrack-room, and that the distinction on which, he had insisted had, been blurred,' i£ not obliterated, by his own action.

The remarkable scene at the opening of the .Reichstag-, Said the Berlm correspondent of "The Times/' whon business was instantly settled by the Speaker, . Captain;-Goering, ordering Deputies to signify assent or dissent by vising or remaining seated, is compared -by the newspapers with drill exerfiise with Captain. Goering as' drill sergeant. The uniformed Nazi Deputies numbering 298 actually marched to the House in military formation.

In form, though not in spirit, this innovation in Parliamentary procedure, which was reported' to 'us on Friday last, had been anticipated b f y r exactly a year in the United" States.On March 24,1932, President Hoover and the country were placed in a very awkward, position when the House of Representatives,'-defying the'leaders','on both sides, made a cut of £460,000,000 in the' "Billion Dollar Revenue Bill" by rejecting the sales tax and brought the gross shortage up to the appalling total of 1,096,000,000. dollars. But: Mr. John Garner, who since March 4 has been Vice-President of the United States, and would have been | President if the bullet which killed ! the Mayor of Chicago had not missed its mark, was then Speaker/, of the House of Representatives, and in the hour of his country's need he "strode forth to take the spotlight" with- a remarkable appeal.

It was' rather a primitive performance, wrote Mr.' Prank R. JEent in the "Baltimore Sun"—that .Garner speech— with a strong camp-meeting flavour, ending with ■a , well-timed ; arms-out-stretched, truly JTexan appeal to "every member ■•who wants' to balance^ the Budget please- rise," religiously reminiscent of the well-known revivalist call to the sinners, "All those who want to bo saved, stand up.". There Wits some slight amusement at this among th<J sceptics in the gallery, but no amusement at all on the floor. Every last man and woman there arose, most of them with thpir souls in their eyes.

Though, as Mr. Kent says, it was a rather primitive performance, it was irresistible. Every member felt that "a non-balancing^Congress man or woman was1 likely to be in a very hot spot indeed," and the result was "as fine a balancing act as has been seen in years.''

There is certainly no suspicion of camp-meeting revivalism^ in Speaker Goering's appeal, nor would his hearers have any fear of the kind of "very hot spot" that Mr. Garner,'s eloquence may Mve suggested. -But even before this terrible saturnalia of .post-election crime the Nazis had shown some familiarity with the Chicago method of putting people "on the spot," and the Nazi Deputy who broke the party ranks to rise when the order vas to sit, or vice versa, would be put on the political spot without a doubt. It i^ not, however,-to.American but to British models that both the friends and the enemies of Germaii democracy have mostly looked for their models. Like every other free constitution, and not least of all the American Constitution itself, the German Republic is> under immeasurable obligations to the British model, but by way of compensation the. enemies of the. Republic are also able to point to a precedent in Britain. The most obvious parallel to Hitler is Mussolini, and it was actually for "the same' position that Mussolini received after his march on Rome" that V Hitler asked in .his. negotiations with thes President in August last; But there are points, as Hitler himselfvhas noted,, on 'which the' case of Cromwell presents a closer parallel, and both,comparison and contrast;;;are.: suggested, by the military, atmosphere in which ; the; he^w Reichstag ha| met,1 ..the"' military ■: unV forms" and the military forniatibn in which the Nazi Deputies.marched" to the.House, "and the drill-sergeant methxjds of the Speaker. ■'•'• It was on April 20, 1653, when the Long Parliament had already been more than twelve years.in existence and was debating on a Bill for the further extension of its term, that Cromwell decided that it ■was lime to make a change. He took a company of musketeers wjlh him to the House.{hat morning, but left them outside while he went in, "clad in plain grey clothes and grey worsted stockings," and, taking his usual nlace, listened to the debate

for some time\in silencer But at the question "That this Bill do pass," Cromwell rose, and proceeded to accuse the House of "injustice, delays of justice, self-interest, and other faults." When the words

Your hour is come; the Lord hath done with you •

brought a number of the 50 members' present to their feet in angry protest, he added,

It is not fit' that you should sit here any longer! You should give place to' better men! You are no Parliament.

After this, t according to an account, preserved in the Sydney papers, he said to Colonel Harrison (who was a member of the House), "Call them in."

Then Harrison went out, and presently brought in Lieutenant Colonel Wortley (who commanded the General's own s regiment of foot) with fivo, or six files of musqueteers, about 20 or 30, with their musquets. Then the General, pointing to the Speaker in his chair, said jto Harrison, "Fetch him down:" Harrison went to the Speaker, and c spoke to him to come down, but the Speaker sat' still, and said nothing. "Take him down," said the General; then Harrison went and pulled the Speaker by the gown, and he camo down. It happened that day that Algernon Sydney sat nest to the Speaker on the right hand; the General said to Harrison, "Put Kim out." Harrison spoke to Sydney to go out, but he said ho would not go out and sat st-j.ll. The General said again, "Put him out." Then Harrison, and Wortley put. their hands upon Sydney's shoulders, as if they would force'him to go out; then he rose and went towards the door. Then the General .went to; the table where the mace lay, wjiieh used to be carried,before the'Speakcr, and"said "Take away these baubles." So the soldiers took away the mace, and all the House went out. It* sounds quite a simple business, jet" it was really, as Harrison had told Cromwell, "a dangerous work." But for Herr Hitler, with his 298 military Deputies, with his complete command of the police arid the army, and with the President and every otHer authority -in his pocket there is no risk at all.* He has merely to say, "Take away these baubles," and both mace and Reichstag will disappear to make way. for die return of the Hohenzollerns and the golden age of .Frederick's Prussia.