IDEALS OF FREEDOM

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 August 1939, Page 7

IDEALS OF FREEDOM

ADDRESS BV EARL BALDWIN DEMOCRACY A GREAT ADVENTURE. NEED OF RAISING HUMAN STANDARDS. By Telegraph—Press Association —Copying i (Received This Day. 9.20 a.m.) MONTREAL. August 16. Earl Baldwin, speaking’ before a congress on ediica- ' lion for democracy called by Columbia I'niversily here, outlined common ideals lliat inspire Britain and America and differences of environment and circumstances.

He then launched into a consideration of international affairs of the moment saying: "As the world is today, great events in one continent have repercussions in another. None can live out his life in a walled garden . . . . Democracy itself and government have become 'a great adventure' .... No student of history can have any doubt but that democracy is far the most difficult form of government. In a totalitarian State, the citizen has only to do as he is told .... The success of democracy depends upon every onerealising his or her responsibility to to it.”

"A democrat.' - Earl Baldwin continued. "should work for and be prepared to die for his democratic ideals, as the Nazis and Communists are for theirs . . . . Every free human institution, if it is to be preserved, needs its watchdogs and institutions—-none more than democratic government. There are some politicians. as there are some newspaper men, who have a contempt for the ordinary man and think that any garbage is good enough for him. Politicians may draw cheers, a newspaper man may make money. but power and influence they will never get by such means.” Earl Baldwin then took up the discussion of “ideas so loaded with dynamite that they may blow systems that appear to be founded on rock into fragments,” mentioning Bolshevism and Fascism specifically, and stressing that whatever good things may be achievable under those systems should also be achievable under democracy. He reviewed the history of the general strike in England and expressed the conclusion that the worst danger from Communism is over in England. He then said that England had nothing to fear from Fascism and Nazism save if great social suffering occurred and insisted that “it is when a totalitarian country tries to impose its system on a people outside its borders that their action becomes the concern of free men.” In concluding. Earl Baldwin said: "We have to show the world that we have ideals no less than the ruleis of totalitarian states, that our ideals are harder of accomplishment because they are far higher—they involve the co-operation of men of their own free will, endeavouring to work with God Himself in the raising of mankind. In a totalitarian State will must be surrendered to the will of one fallible man. and none is fitted for absolute power over the wills of his fellow men.” ■