The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE TUESDAY, APRIL I0, 1917. GERMANY AND REVOLUTION

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 220, 10 April 1917, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 1917. GERMANY AND REVOLUTION

(With which is incorporated The Taihape Post and Waimarino News).

Several New Zealand journals are discussing the possibilities and probabilities of the Gerrnan people revolting against their Kaiser and his comilitary government, in a way similar to that which proved so amazingly successful in Russia. To understand the pros and cons of this question it is necessary to hark back to pre-war days and note the methods of government and the various political elements of which the Reichatflf'; was composed. For upwards of a Quarter of a century there had been a political party known as Socialists, unci it is not infrequently the case that German elections .have been fought in a most bitter spirit.' The Roman Catholics, usually termed "The Centre,'' have been for very many years the greatest force, then follow in about thy order given, Conservatives, Social Democrats, National Liberals, Radical Party, Imperial Conservatives, Poles, Economic Unionists, Radical Union, People's Party, and the Reform Pnrty. The positions of the various parries given above do not help much towards an accurate understanding of the real strength of German political parties.

It is a well-known fact that numeric-

ally the Social Democrats are much the most powerful in the country. This party, before the war, was made up of at least four millions of the population, and probably five millions would be a more approximate estimate, and if constituencies were based upon British methods they would undoubtedly have a controlling, majority in th e legislature., Indeed, the Social Democrats have had under their banner a majority of the German people for upwards of a decade. We may therefore see how irritating it must have been, and is, to a majority that in ten years has grown to an overwhelming degree, to be governed by the agrarians, who are traditionally the governing party, and whose ranks are recruited from the very richest landed proprietors. Only a year or two before war commenced small farmers and landowners broke away from the wealthy section, their interests being no more identical with those of their rich neighbours than the relationships are in Nev Zealand or in any other country. Her e is a nation in which by far the strongest political element is Socialistic, yet the form of Government debars it from that representation in Parliament that it would certainly be entitled to in any English-speaking country. Socialists have endeavoured to correct this inequality, but the traditional governors, augmented almost to an overwhelming extent by a military caste, has invariably blocked "all efforts of reform in that direction. -Therefore, it is a logical assumption that at the first real opportunity the German people will throw off the yoke of bureaucracy and absolutism and strike for that freedom they .have for a quarter of a century been constitutionally striving. . German domestic politics are little more free to-day from that chaotic state which made them so uninteresting to every nation ten years ago. Industries in Germany bear the greater taxation burdens, which tends to keep up long hours and poor remuneration for working-men. Prices of the necessaries of life have risen out, of all proportion to the earning power of the. people and a!though the" fact may have been side-tracked and fprgQtteg .^through.. .the , outbreak of war, no country in the world; : was more ripe , for revolution than Germany, war. was precipitated. When, all the circumstances in Germany are considered it seems that it must be admitted that the Military Party decided upon war for dual supreme reasons. Taxation for war equipment, had created an unbearable condition, for the masses, and it was , already in the 'air then that the Kaiser had distressing fears of a revolt, and t ! ra.t 7 war was welcomed' by him, not so :tnuch .to acquire German hegemony of. the world as to stave off a revolution that was growingly imminent. Having these pre-war conditions in mind, it is not difficult to realise that th e German people may at any moment rebel against their milita.r.y.;l;9rds,..tand',.with Russia's example, wipe the slate clean of the Kaiser's cant and humbug. I£ increasing taxation, long working-hours) and inadequate remuneration were making aquisition of the means of living so accentuated as to evoke a fear of revolution before the war, what may not the present condition of the German people bring about? We do not say that a revolution will eventuate, but, with conditions obtaining in prewar times and the almost daily reports of food riots in large German j cities, together with startling deser- | tions from the Kaiser's glorious army, and the readiness with which men surrender to the French and British, to say nothing of the moral effect the success of the Russian revolution, the retreat from Prance, and America's war declaration must exercise on the German mind, there seems the utmost probability that the ominous rumblings of discontent may rapidly develop into an internal conflict which will bring peace nearer.