GERMANY AND PEACE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1769, 27 December 1917, Page 1

GERMANY AND PEACE.

“The New Republic,” of New York, is publishing some very interesting articles dealing with the Pope’s plea for peace, and the reply thereto of the American President, says Stead’s Review of Reviews for November. This paper holds that it is correct to term the popularisation of the idea of peace as a new German “peace offensive.” ; It would be yfvong, it says, for the Allies to underestimate ( the explosive force of this German peace offensive. It consists essentially of a proposal for general disarmament, and a future settlement of international controversy by compulsory arbitration. - \ “It contains an express endorsement by the German Chancellor of the ‘no annexations and indemnities’ resolution of the Reichstag. It will undoubtedly be followed by an offer to evacuate Belgium and Northern France in return for the evacuation of the German colonies.” The reply to the enemy suggestion usually made is that the German Government does not really mean what it says, it only puts forward these feelers with the object of dividing its enemies into peace and war factions. This may be quite true, but, if it is, the way to defeat such an intrigue is not to denounce and repudiate it, but to find some means of exposing its perfidy. “They can answer this question by asking the German Government through the Pope to elaborate and apply its proposals, to state how far it proposes to carry disarmament, to define what guarantees would be exacted as to the reality of the process and to suggest what principles of international right the court of arbitration would be authorised to expound. The answers to such questions would not only soon show whether Germany is hypocritical or repentant, but in so far as it is repentant they would tend to bridge the gulf between the German proposals and the specific arrangements which would Have to be reached before an armistice could be considered. This is the most effective way to expose the hypocrisy of the Germans, if they are hypocritical, or to encourage their repentance, if they are repentant; and it is plainly demanded by the President’s policy of seeking to build up in Germany a liberal opposition to the Government which will in time wax stronger than the Government itself.” Mr H. N. Brallsford, writing on the question of Germany and Peace in “The Fortnightly Review,” is inclined to admit that the Reichstag has a good deal more real control over German affairs than is generally supposed. He says: — “The comparative impotence of the Reichstag during its career of nearly half a century has been due less to the survivals of autocracy in the German Constitution than to the inability of its parties to combine. It rests on manhood suffrage; and it has (what the Duma never had) unlimited rights of veto over taxation and legislation. If at any time it had resolutely used the power of the purse, it could have extracted from the Emperor and the Fedex-al Council any reforms on which it was bent. An obstructive Reichstag would have been dissolved (as happened in Prince Buelow’s time), l)(ut if the parly of protest had come back stronger from the general election (as on that occasion it did), it must have had its way. “The New Republic,” dealing with the question of political forces in Germany, is strongly of the opinion that the Liberals there are obtaining real control, and that the German Government could not have officially adopted the doeti’ine of “No Annexations, No Indemnities” had it not been forced so to do by the German people through their representatives in the Reichstag. It gives the following particulars concerning the composition of the popular Chamber in Germany:— “The present Reichstag is composed of 45 Conservatives and Agrarians, 44 National Liberals, 91 Centrists, 46 Liberals, and 100 representatives of the Social Democracy and the Labour Party. There are, further, 50 members belonging to the minor parties of diverse political creeds and national sentiments. The votes obtained by each of the leading groups in the last election were: —1,126,270 for the Conservatives and Agrarians, 1,662,670 for the National Liberals, 1,996,845 for the Center, 1,497,041 for the Liberal parties, and 4,250,399 for the Social Democrats.” From this we see that the present union between the National Liberals, the Center Party and the Social Democrats, represents 9,406,955 of the electors, and the Conservatives and Agrarians represent only 1,126,270. There is real ground, therefore, for believing that the “No Annexations” policy has been definitely adopted by