“EMPIRE BOUND BY SPIRITUAL SENTIMENT”

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 261, 25 January 1928, Page 9

“EMPIRE BOUND BY SPIRITUAL SENTIMENT”

EFFECT OF EQUAL STATUS SIR ROBERT HORNE’S VIEWS BV Cable.—Press Association. — copyright. Reed. 10.7 a.m. MELBOURNE, To-day. Sir Robert Horne, M.P. for Glasgow, addressing the Constitutional Club, expressed the conviction that conferring equal status on the Dominions would foster the growth of the national spirit, which would materially benefit the Empire. He said that the Empire was bound by spiritual sentiment more than anything else, although they had to recognise that that spirit might be greatly invigorated and strengthened. He said that some wiseacres seemed to think that the granting of equal status might lead to a feeling of greater detachment as between one portion of the Empire and others, or to the growth of a national spirit in Australia, New Zealand or Canada, which would make the Dominions stand more aloof in their relationship to the Mother Country. Sir Robert said that he did not share this apprehension at all, nor did he anticipate any such difficulty. Instead of deprecating any growth of national spirit in British communities he would welcome it. He ventured to predict that it would be all to the good and in the interests of the Empire. He reviewed economic problems showing how greatly industry had been affected by strikes, and how the prosperity of the United States had followed the recognition of the economic fact that the interests of capital and labour were identical.