“TARANAKI CENTRAL PRESS.” TUESDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1936. STABILITY FOR SPAIN.

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 309, 15 December 1936, Page 4

“TARANAKI CENTRAL PRESS.” TUESDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1936. STABILITY FOR SPAIN.

i An ingenious* approach to the settlement of the civil war in Spain is reported from Paris. Britain and France, it is stated, propose an armistice for the purpose of taking a popular vote on the cessation or continuance of the war. r> 1 here is more subtlety in this than meets the eye. If Germany, Italy, Portugal and Russia could be induced to join in the demand for an armistice, it could not be resisted by either side, winning or losing, and once an armistice was agreed upon the war would be over. Not only would the. plebiscite declare for peace, but the Powers would not permit the resumption of a struggle which threatened to involve the whole of Europe in war. , The real difficulty would occur in providing the Spanish nation w 'h the means of arriving al a form of which would be an improvement* on the pre-revolutionary state. Lord Howard of Penrith, and Professor Castillejo, of the University of Madrid, have suggested that stability is most likely to be reached through a federal system after the model of Switzerland. “1 he great misfortune," he says, "of almost all European democratic institutions, has simply been that they have followed the British example of government by a bare majority, which is required for any 1 and every measure of vital importance. . Z This, for stability, necessitates what is virtually a two-party system, and . . . this leads naturally to instability, and instability equally naturally to dictatorships. Ihe Swiss system is carried out under proportional representation, which Lord Howard of Penrith has piaised unreservedly. The secretary of the Proportional Representation Society (Mr. John H. Humphreys) has also contributed to the discussion, pointing out that the electoral law of Spain created an artificial two-party system, dividing the country into two hostile political armies. Ihe moderates, imprisoned in these two hostile -groups, were deprived cf power and influence.