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Hokitika Guardian, 22 August 1933, Page 4

Discussing modern revolutionary usurpation an Italian professor says the initial stage is always a violent perturbation of an old legal order. Sometimes ia man, sometimes a group } is at a certain moment driven, by circumstances or by ambition, to seize the power by a coup de force which violates the principle of the legality or the pre-existing power. The man or group responsible for this coup de force always believes that such violation of legality will be only exceptional and temporary; that once lie is at the helm'Le will have no difficulty in legitimising his rule. But that is a common e-ror. The fact that this position is illegal provokes opposition, distrust, criticism, which alarm the usurper precisely because his authority is not founded on solid law. In his alarm, he defends himself by stengthening the element of force and by having recourse to corruption. But lie aggravates the unlawfulness of his position; his volence and corruption breed opposition, hatred, violence, which in turn urge him still further along the road to violence and corruption, that’is of illegality. Despalr-

in" of ever being able to legitimise his position, the usurper finally attempts to justify it by results; he endeavours to do, and still more to have it believed that bo is doing, great things, things which no other government could do; that lie is averting <;i great danger, conquering a great empire, creating a new civilisation. This is what the Russians would have us believe. The result of a policy is, however, always open to discussion, while a principle of law consolidates a government in so far as it is indisputaby recognised by the whole world. From the moment when a government endeavours to legitimise itself by the results of its policy, criticism becomes insupportable to it. To doubt its policy is to question its right to govern, to declare it illegal and a usurper, to nrcjudice the safety of the StateHence the necessity for a. usurping government to lay down the principle of its infallibilitv as a dogma, to stifle all independent criticism. Rut such violence superimposed upon otlmr acts of violence exasperates the spirit of opposition, therefore, the government must intensify and prolong violence, must do, or let it be assumed that it is doin", more and more extraordinary and difficult tilings.