The Press WEDNESDAY, JUNE 14, 1933. The Opening of the Conference.

Press, Volume LXIX, Issue 20881, 14 June 1933, Page 8

The Press WEDNESDAY, JUNE 14, 1933. The Opening of the Conference.

It was not to be expected that the opening session of the World Economic Conference would be remarkable for the character of the speeches which directed it to its labours. What was remarkable was the occasion itself, an assembly of the world's representative statesmen to consider nothing less than escape from world catastrophe.. But the speeches of his Majesty the King and Mr Ramsay Mac Donald, though they could not deepen the impressiveness of the hour, were worthy of it and illustrated and emphasised it. The King's speech held firmly to the level of common sense and yet found on it the idealism without which no economic or financial measures will be agreed upon or succeed. He dwelt on the universal distress, on the terrible incongruity" between this and the world's ample resources and its extended power to control them, on the emergent conviction that this power calls for co-operative use, and on the opportunity now presented in London "to harness this new consciousness of common interests to " the service of mankind." And it is possible, perhaps, to read behind this clear statement of essential truth something more, the note of which is anxious and warning. The task of the conference, his Majesty said, was heavy; but it represented "the "hope and wishes of the entire "world," which awaited the result " with impatience." It is an important phrase. The ordinary man sees the problem drawn in simple lines, though he guesses the complexity behind them, and he is sure that a little more generosity, a little more reason, a little more faith and imagination will be enough to convert into prosperity the present misery in the midst of abundance. He will not readily forgive or justify statesmen who disappoint him now. Their failure must mean not only that economic paralysis will creep on; it would threaten also with turbulence, confusion, and even war a world which is already, in the King's word, " unquiet." It was for the second of these reasons as well as the first, no doubt, that Mr MacDonald said again and again that the conference must not fail. That its success will be immediate and complete is of course too much to hope. If it succeeds in some respects and points the way to further success it will have accomplished as much as it is wise to count upon and enough to restore the confidence for want of which every wheel is slow. The scope of the conference is limited, and therefore its possible achiievement, by the exclusion of war debts. It would have been a misfortune if this had not been frankly said at once; and Mr MacDonald's declaration that war debts "must be dealt with before every " obstacle to world recovery" can be removed is to be welcomed because it will check rash optimism but still more because it challenges the fears, inconsistency, and ignorance which are obstructing progress. I Whether the surprises which Mr Cordell Hull says the United States delegation has to spring include a war debts announcement and offer remains to be seen; but no surprise could promise so much or ensure so much, as another of Mr Roosevelt's dramatic interventions in world affairs, leading to a reasonable settlement between war debtors and creditors.