BRITISH COMMONWEALTH.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 19818, 4 January 1930, Page 13

BRITISH COMMONWEALTH.

FREEDOM FOR SMALL NATIONALITIES. (VKIIEO PRSS3 ASSOCIATION -BT ELECTP.IC TELEGSAPH —COFTRIGHT.) OTTAWA, January 2. Picturing the Empire as a Commonwealth in which the smaller nationalities, such as the Dutch in South Africa and the French-Canadians in Canada had full sway toward development of their cultures and national aspirations, General Jan Smuts, addressing the Canadian Club on Thur&day, contrasted the British system with the United States "melting pot system, where the ideal of Government institutions was to turn out Americans on the same standards, and with tne French idea of colonial development, where, as in Africa, the idea was to create French Moors, French Negroes, and French Berbers. This development of free peoples with a common link, binding but not shackling them, meant that a fourth oi the human race lived in harmony. He felt that this example was sufficient reason to believe in the future of the League of Nations. If one-fourth oi the peoples of the world, different m culture, colour, and religion, and inhabiting all the continents of the world, could live without armies and navies against each other, surely there was hope for the other three-quarters. The British peoples should pee that m sentiment, loyalty, and -all otner ti«?, the peoples of the Empire were more closely bound together.