FARMERS AND DEMOCRACY

Evening Star, Issue 21750, 19 June 1934, Page 12

FARMERS AND DEMOCRACY

BRITISH SYSTEM THE SAFEST PRDFESBBR LAWSON ADDRESSES COUNTRY VISITORS A great deal of interesting ground bearing on world affairs was covered this morning by Professor R. Lawson (professor .of education at the University of Otago) in the course of an address Lo the visiting young fanners. Taking as his subject ‘ Relations of Fanners to Democracy,’ Professor Lawson outlined the position of farmers today, and went on to say, inter alia “ The present political and social changes threaten a complete break with our past. It is of this particularly that I would speak, of this past, and of democracy to-day. ■ TV hat are the essential features of our institutions? 1 put first growth. Magna Charta and our first Parliament date from 1215 and 1263, , but the parliamentary tree has its roots back, in earlier' centuries still.its,taproot; is in the English soul. In Ihc Cromwellian period—say, 10-iO-lbW) —were, fought out the major issues of democracy-versus hereditary privilege. The'germ of modern politics can bo found in this seminal period. Later British history . has, with few exceptions, ■ seen • a steady application of.the principles of liberty, as freedom slowly passed down from the few to the many. freedom and justice. “ With growth I couple freedom. The Britisher has always wanted, even if he did not achieve it without a struggle, the right to self-government, to free criticism of the State, to treedom of belief and opinion. We regard the State not. as an object of idolatrous worship, not as some mythical superentity eternally brooding over us and demanding our individual lives to he sacrificed to it as of no worth in themselves. The State to us is a necessary and appropriate growth from the mam trunk of our communal life. A Japanese is said to regard himself as belonging to the State; we regard the State as belonging to , us. Yet . in times of need Britishers know where their duty lies. • They give the willing service of; freemen.' Look around you at the present moment, and ask, “ Where is life safer,, happier, and, on the whole, more prosperous than in the British Empire? ‘This, too, despite the unsolved problems of race and colour, and the necessity of withholding self-government from politically undeveloped races in their own interest. “I put justice third. It is easy to pick out in our history, instances of injustice, as even a healthy man lias his attack of indigestion and influenza. But on the whole, and graft have never debased our courts. A private man has always had a chance even against the State. This has frequently moved the admiration of foreigners. LAW-ABIDING NATION.

“A further quality I find is lawabidinguess. The great strike in England in 1926 passed off with a minimum of violence —this, too, in a time of great excitement and unrest, throughout the world. I would remind you that in Sydney, when in a time'of great tension Mr Lang was deposed, there was not a fatal blow struck. This, lawabidingness if partly habit and partly innate disposition. It depends on the steadiness of the people, their confidence in the good humour and goodwill and the honesty even of rival classes, on their confidence in their institutions, and on the sub-conscious realisation that it is better to seek peaceable means of redress, even if slow, than to proceed ■to revolutionary acts of violence 'and-bloodshed. Our people are not assassins ; they do not throw bombs or hatch deadly conspiracies. “ I put next individuality. Someone lias said: 1 Every Britisher is an island.’ That is true. ’He is self-reliant. He wants to live his own life in his own way, with a minimum of State interference. His unit of value is the man in himself. The rank is but the guinea stamp. In the world of cricket plain Jack Hobbs is as honoured a name as that of Lord Sheffield or Lord Hawke. No system of social arrangements can possibly succeed in a British community that. does not leave free play for individuality. By this I do not mean that every man is to be a law unto himself. But we believe that the surest principle of public safety is the maximum of individuality that is consistent with the common weal. TVe do not attempt to define that rigidly, or to bring in a State system that limits it to things that are trivial. We work on a principle of practical logic, with constant adjustments to meet new needs or to remedy abuses. .

DEMOCRACY IN OTHER COUNTRIES.

“ Democracy in France has been in a state of unstable equilibrium ever since its emergence in the French Revolution. In that country defeat of the' Ministry does not mean another election. There the Ministry is' not in such close contact with the electors as amongst ns. But there is a system .of committees at work during the four years’ currency of the Chamber of Deputies, which helps to give continuity to the legislation, keeps alive the sense of individual responsibility in members, actively helps in directing Ministerial policy, but at the same time lessens Ministerial responsibility. But in France there are certain relations of the courts of law to politics, certain Press influences which we would think to be undeniable in a British commonitv. '“ In the United States the President chooses his own Cabinet, but these may not participate in Congress—which creates a certain difficulty in practical working, particularly in critical times like those of the present. “ Now there is no doubt that democracy is in danger of collapse. France has gone close to dictatorship—at least in the method of appointing the present Premier. Again the enormous Stavisky frauds, with their ramifications amongst politicians and police, _ have shaken the confidence of patriots in the present system. In France democracy came in with a flood in 1789 in the revolution. That event influenced all civilisation. From it arose what is known as “ the liberal State,” such as the nineteenth century saw in England. America, France, and some other countries. The liberal State was a great advance democratically' speaking—upon the feudal or ‘ privilege ’ State. It brought a large freedom and offered every man a field to do the best for himself. In England in the nineteenth century the policy of laissez-faire predominated—let each man do the best he can for himself —he will thus at the same time render the greatest benefit to his fellow-men. But the results of an unchecked liberal State were ruthless capitalism, profiteering, combines, unequal distribution of money. “ England saw the danger and began the transformation of the ‘Liberal State ’ into the ‘ social service ’ State as we find it iix New Zealand io-day.

There could bo liberty of contract where there is not equality in bargaining power. In America, as in I'ranee, we hear the cry ‘democracy is played out.’ America had the laugh on British democracy till the depression smote her. There - was in America a great Socialism movement, because under the unrestrained individualistic system any or every man found he had a chance of rising to any position. • “ The various American States could not legislate successfully against - the will of capital. The Governors of cities found themselves powerless, and so in the storm of the depression the Americans find that their form of democracy, the completely individualistic one, has failed them. ‘'They have no State tradition of social services as understood in England; private enter)rise and capital cannot meet the national emergency. The President is invested with dictatorial powers, and the cry goes up democracy' is played out.’ Meanwhile Ford and other business magnates resist the President’s efforts to restore prosperity—because necessarily his erforts involve interference with the unrestricted ' system of * make all the money you can in the quickest possible way.’ ‘ . , “ At present the Americans are being led towards Federal planning and dictatorial power. The State, as we know it, has hardly existed there. Ut course, in that country, as here, there is an invisible government that is so everywhere. No Government in England could pass legislation that was resisted by capital as a whole. INVISIBLE INFLUENCE. “Mr Bernard Shaw, when in New Zealand, said that the country could not be governed under present parliameutary conditions —it was by men outside Parliament. W ell, that is inevitable, and is harmless where the head of the people is sound. You farmers exert an invisible influence on Parliament, so do the manufacturers, so do the trade unions. The only people who seem to exert no influence on Parliament are professors. (Laughter.) But the, invisible influence should be made visible. We meet a group of committees elected by woolgrowers, dairy farmers, manufacturers, and so on, permanently working in harmony with the official Governmental departments, and having their work co-ordinated with the Ministry by a Minister acting as chairman over their united meeting, and so providing a liaison with Parliament. , “ You will have noticed in the cables that America has just given the President power to create boards to arbitrate in industrial disputes. This shows how.backward in industrial legislation America lias been and still is. The ‘New Deal,’ as they call it in America, was made last year, when the Federal Government assumed powers never contemplated by Americans before, and, further, this power was centred in the President and his few advisers. The ‘ New Deal ’ is attempting to do what British communities have long been . attempting. But, for America a period of semi-diotatox - ship is necessary, as the New Deal is seeking to remove from private individuals from localities, and from States, and concentrate at Washington the power of national planning, the control of exploitation and competition, and the management of huge corporations with a view to a juster distribution of wealth. , ' t i “ In what is called ‘ the hundred days ’ (after the 100 days of the Waterloo campaign) under the Reorganisation Act, the National Economy Act, the Relief Act. the Farm Act, the National Industrial Recovery Act, and so on, seventy-seven powers were transferred to the executive; power to control nil business and_ industry, to govern production, prices, profits, competition, wages, hours of labour; to' reapportion private wealth and income throughout the nation; to debase money on behalf of the debtor class, and 1 the power specifically to reduce the gold value of the dollar onehalf, or, that is to say, simply by proclamation, to double the price of everything that is priced in dollars, and to halve the value of every obligation payable in dollars, and in debts, bonds, mortgages, insurance and policies, and bank'deposits.’ This is Fascism —a necessary rebound from slack individualism. FASCISM. “Me have the beginnings of Fascism, but our existing bodies are advisory only. In Italy and Germany their powers go further. At present even in a little place like New Zealand the problems of Government are beyond the power of politicians. The complicated world of tariffs, exchange, currency, education, and a thousand other things demands specialist knowledge, and this can be drawn only from the ‘special industries and professions. Put briefly, we need an economic Parliament" as well as the present Parliament. ! “ Wo have now Italy and Russia to consider. In Italy the theory is a ‘ corporative State ’ —every man in the country must necessarily be a patriot, and therefore must wish what the Government wishes him to wish. An opposition in Parliament is therefore an obstacle. Mussolini calls our form of government ‘ negative democracy,’ and ro it is, representing the minimum of encroachment on personal liberty; but i take it he is criticising the

‘liberal State’ rather than the social service State. Where we merely license a moving picture for public display Mussolini would take it over for the State and actively use it as propaganda if suitable for bis wheat, drainage, or military projects. But I' know this: The Government that is to succeed in any country must bo in accordance with the traditions, aspirations, and psychology of that country. Fascism has its roots deep in Italian character and history. Italy has been accustomed to thinly-veiled dictatorship, if not of one'man) of a few. Italy was disorganised, inefficient, 30 per cent, illiterate, a prey to tho Black Hand and brigands Jn the mountains and worse brigands in the Public Service. In other words, Italy, both by her tradition, her psychology, and her desperate condition, needed a Caesar, and ho has given her order, confidence, unity. ' “ But at what a price! Such a talk as 1 am giving you now would be dangerous in Italy; for the professor there has to take an oath to the Government and may be dismissed ‘ if he puts himself ’ (so the formula inns) \ into a position of incompatibility with the general political tendencies of tho Government.’ No doubt the muzzling of professors does not alarm the public, because professors have nothing to recommend them to the general public or the politician; but in Italy the Fascist movement has gone in tor •wholesale suppression, a muzzled Press, a rationalistic education—a whole country ‘ tuned in ’ to the Fascist keynote. But wait—when Cffisar goes, whence comes such another? The Fascist movement is a middle class movement, with contacts above with Capitalism, and below with Socialism. It Mussolini went, what would happen? “ Are vou farmers prepared, in order to get the outward unity and the temporary efficiency that Fascism would undoubtedly bring, to have a muzzled Press, a muzzled pulpit, to have dictation at every side, and freedom at none? If 1 know your class at all, you will choose rather less of efficiency and more liberty; you will chopse the way of steady growth rather than that of hot-honse forcing. Besides, we are not illiterate, inefficient, a pirey to banditti; not corrupt, or hopeless, not in need of a Caesar. There is, I am sure, not a man in this room who is not on one or more responsible committees. All of us are thus used to governing; indeed, a large part of every British community runs its own affairs and never troubles the State at all except to say ‘ Damn the State ’ when some over-zealous official is too inquisitive in matters that do not concern him.

WHAT OF COMMUNISM?

“But ‘Democracy is played' out’! Wo must, forsooth, have ‘Mussolini or Bolshevism. We respect Mussolini—wo always respect a resolute fighter who does*not seek his own ends. A great man, and just the touch of theatricality about him that his people demand—but lie is not for us. .So we must have Bolshevism ! . “ Communism, as Trotsky says m his recent book, was first applied by a proletariat people. Exactly; it is fit for such. The Russian was a serf for a thousand years and more. In the end he awoke. The dirty, vermin-in-fested Moujik, slumbering or steaming on his stove in his insanitary mud hilt, heard a voice of hope. Ho awoke, came forth, and assailed the tyrants of a thousand years—Czar, aristocrats, and church. There is a great outcry against Russian antipathy to the church. There is no reason why the Russian should not abolish an institution which has drugged him so long. The Monjik then came forth, and Lenin offered him bread, work, education, and a measure of justice, which to him was as Paradise to Hell compared with what ho had before. “ Every reason which made Communism acceptable to the Russian discredits it for ns. Age-long serfdom, illiteracy on a scrflc far worse than that of Italy, backwardness in every department of life, unorganised, helpless, hopeless! He will one day turn from his Communism, when he catches a sight of the true o-odoss of liberty, instead of the mere phantasm that dazzles his half-opened eyes at present. BRITAIN NOT OPPRESSED. “ We are not inefficient, or drugged hv the church, or oppressed by Czar and nobles —we are efficient, awake, and resolute. We do not expect more from any government than it can give. We cannot get rid of troubles, but we can raise our ideals. In industrialism we have looked only to profits, but this is not enough. Our industrialism, like the nascent' one in Russia, has need of experts, and experts h ( avc scientific ideals, and scientific ideals are never those of profits only. In spite.of itself modern society creates the scientific ideal. Russia in another generation will have a body of technical experts wliose ideas will rise above Communism, as ours arc vising above profits. GERMANY. “ A word on Germany, latere, again, a dictator —Herr Hitler, The Germans, despite their eminence in war, science, philosophy, and music, are political children. They do not understand freedom as we understand it. The German Stales never reached unity till 1870. The Germans need a military dictator. Frederick the Great in 1713-SG drilled

Prussia in war and all the arts of peace with all the nithlessness of a drill sergeant, and they,worshipped him almost as an incarnate Thor or Odin. A century later Bismarck united them in his mighty fist. After the war again a collapse—and now again the national mind is hankering after ‘ blood and evil’—i.c., the Teutonic race and its q]d traditions gives birth, as it were, miraculously to Hitler,. “ Once again war preparations, drilling. unity, and the muzzling of Press, pulpit, and professors. In Berlin University 100 of'the staff have been dismissed—the number of students in universities has been limited to 15,000, and only those are being admitted who come from' Storm Troops. “ Again, every argument that supports the Nazis and their creed in Germany discredits it for ns. Wo are not disunited; we-are not squeezed between France and Russia; we are not threatened by Jews, and, above all, we are not political children. THE RUSSIAN ATTITUDE. “ I have not sought to glorify our democracy as the best, though 1 think it is. 1 do not wish to disparage any of the countries I have mentioned. Tf Russians can live happily under Communism, then obviously Communism is a good thing for thein, but they must learn not to try to corrupt other peoples —though 1 suppose what I. call corruption they would call liberation. To make good my case there is no need for me to parade before you the well-worn enormities of Russia or rite suppression of freedom in. Italy. I am prepared to admit even that the Russian vengeance on the church was thoroughly natural. A man who iinds ho has been habitually deceived by a smooth-spoken friend may be pardoned for becoming violent. “ My case—and your case—is not to be negatively supported by the intolerance and injustice inherent iu other systems—though’ that is of great moment too. Our case owes its strength to its own merits. What are these? They are growth, justice, law-abidiugness, freedom, individuality, equal services by the State, and one other I missed, an important one—the recognition of class distinctions as primarily Nature’s work. We have emerged from a thousand years of struggle strong, free, and full of hope, despite tho depression. The -democracy the ages have yearned for is attained. Shall we throw it away, because on close inspection it has not proved as valuable as we dreamed? No! we have inherited a good thing, but it is as yet crude, uninformed, with a spirit above money. Our great . ago of demorcacy is yet to be, if we rest true to it. We have passed through feudalism, personal tyranny, privilege, elementary democracy, the liberal State, and are now in the social service state. Both Feudalism and Bolshevism are confessions of failure in the long struggle for freedom. They both return to a more primitive condition. Fascism is that of a compact body following a chief, Communism is merely a recrudescence of primitive man, agreed on a few food-getting facts. They are both tyrannies. THE MONARCHIC SYSTEM. “I see no reason why we cannot go on developing the social service State, and so secure all the advantages of Socialism without its disadvantages, and without abandoning tire principle or growth. This means taxation, of course, but taxation of all for the sake of all is better than revolution. A common cry is that the present social system cannot last. Of course it can’t. It never has lasted. . It is always changing, even in a period of outward stagnation. But in British communities the more it changes the more it is the same. Luckily for us we have a kind of bo vim- complacency about us which, though It may render us unreceptive to new ideas, gives a stability to our social life and a continuity to our institutions. Outwardly wo live under a hereditary .Monarchic system. Nothing could be more illogical, but it works, it maintains sanity, rational equilibrium, social distinctions without economic barriers. Inwardly we live ip a socialised slate—-when I say ‘ we ’ I mean the British Commonwealth of Nations. “We are charged "with believing in the policy of 1 muddling through.’ This is only partially true. Wo dislike regimentation, State control, machine politics'. We believe in practical logic—that is. in making adjustments which ’will keep alive the spirit of old institutions, even while it alters their forms. Wo thus have a combination of the past and the present, of ancient and modern, in our institutions. We do not think that education began last week, nor, on the contrary, do we think that an institution is good merely because it is old. The charge of muddling through arises from the attempt at conservation of the best in the old, with adaptation of the new. Monarchy and socialisation arc apparent contradictories, yet they coexist in England—they -even flourish there. Well did Tennyson describe the British Constitution as , The one true seed of freedom sown Between a people and its ancient throne. “ IT WORKS.” “ Where else in the world will you find a Government at present, despite all the new varieties of democracy—a Government that is prepared to enact laws giving effect to arrangements made between employers and workers?

Yet in England only a few months ago tho Minister of Labour said that ' ‘ if employers and workers in the cotton industry desired it the Government was prepared to give legal effect to voluntary agreements on wages and conditions of work.’ Our institutions, like onr language, have an inherent vitality that flows directly from the racial character. The English language did not disappear, as did the old languages of Spain and France—it continued on its way of muddling through, of keeping the old Saxon alive while taking in the Franco-Latin elements. So with our institutions. No one can define the British Constitution—it cannot be reduced to a formula or compressed into a document. “ Its supreme merit is that it works ‘—it has worked, and will work. I would urge on you, as representatives of the most stable class in the community, to discountenance with all your might the doleful litany ‘ democracy is j played out,’ and to take to your hearts more consciously than ever that democracy, as we know it, the monarchic, socialised democracy, suits our mentality, has served us well, and will continue to serve us well if we are true to it. But we must not expect too much. Alan himself is rapacious and unjust, and he knows he is. Wo know our faults. We do not expect a millennial world to dawn upon us overnight by Divine Providence. A good world is never attained—it shows itself only in the effort to attain it. It is like tho horizon—always beyond our grasp and yet always existent'. “ PRIVILEGED GRUMBLERS.” “ You belong to a class of privileged grumblers. Well, I beg of you not to blame the Government' for all your woes. ,Your class is immediately affected by conditions that no Government can control—the world spirit is at work, and no human power can resist that spirit. It is easy, of course, for me, a townie, a white collar man, to give you armchair advice; yet what I say is tho sober voice of truth. And finally, don’t stake all your happiness on wool, wheat, butter, meat. It is possible to be very miserable though wealthy, and very happy though poor. May I advise you young farmers to live for your higher selves, for the embryo higher man in yon all—put that first and all other things will be added unto you. You have liard days ahead—steer by the higher self; it is-the permanent light in the gloom. You will then see that markets, trade, money, commerce are not the essentials in democracy, important as they are, but that the essential now, as of yore, is and will be 'the good life.’ And in the good life the greatest thing is freedom.”

On the motion of Mr Andrew Fannett (Clydevale) a hearty vote of . thanks was accorded Professor Lawson for his address.