TARIFF BARRIERS OF EUROPE

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 84, 3 January 1930, Page 12

TARIFF BARRIERS OF EUROPE

PROF. GILBERT MURRAY ON THEIR DANGER “ECONOMIC ANARCHY” Speaking at a League of Nations Union meeting at Manchester Professor Gilbert Murray said that to-day, after ten years, people wanted to read books and see plays about the war. But there was something worse than the worst things that could be put into our books and plays. It was simply madness for anj*body now to maintain that there was something moral in war which imade it worth while; and even if there had been it had become clear that civilisation could not afford war. (Heai\ hear.) If war were to continue civilisation would crash. Civilisation and war could not exist longer in the same world. Our economic condition would not stand it. Many nations fell into absolute starvation at the end of the last war. Only two or three maintained themselves. Our social order would not stand it. Another Avar must produce revolution—and not a revolution that was aiming at some transformation of society into something better, but the revolution of despair and destruction, of people so miserable that they would want to destroy the world that had made them so. Men’s consciences would not stand it. War as a settlement of the disputes between nations was too wicked, too stupid, too futile. (Hear, hear.) The Forces of Public Opinion. . After discussing in some detail the terms of the Covenant of the League, Professor Murray said they could take it that all of the great Powers had now signed the optional clause, and had accepted the reign of law in the sphere of the law. That was an enormous advance. As for the sanctions we had discovered that all the time there was one sanction that had not been realised or suspected —the real force of public opinion. No nation dare stand up against the public opinion of the civilised world as expressed in the League. He thought, perhaps, that the advance in the actual framework and meaning of the Covenant had been extraordinary during the last ten years. (Hear, hear.) What more did we want? In what sort of direction did we want to see the Covenant or similar international treaties developed? He would mention two points on which he did not wish to say anything dogmatic, but merely to suggest ideas. In the first place, in all the realm of politics, of political relations between one nation and another, there used to be, before the League, what had been well called an international anarchy. Every sovereign independent State was free to make war upon another and to do exactly what it liked without reference to its neighbours. That anarchy had been, he thought, corrected. But there was one very important sphere in which there still was anarchy between nation and nation—the sphere of economics. Every sovereign independent State was still perfectly free, as far as treaties went, to pursue its own interests by trying to ruin its neighbour. And anyone who. looked at the map of Europe with the .tariff walls drawn round the various little States would see that a good many were taking full advantage of that liberty. What he wanted to suggest was that that anarchy was fraught with very considerable danger in the future. International competition was almost certainly becoming keener, and if not somehow regulated and somehow made subject to law might be dangerous in the extreme. The League had done exactly Avhat he thought ought to have been done. It collected in 1926 the best economists nominated from 50 nations. Bather more than 150 specialist economists recommended by their Governments, but not binding their Governments, met at Geneva, and, although it seemed a miracle, all agreed. (Cheers.) They put forward their recommendations, and he thought we could look forward now to some sort of progress in the sphere of economics. (Cheers. A Changing Society. In the second place, although the Government provided us ivith a reign of law and order, human things did not always stay the same. Populations moved or increased and social conditions changed. Humanity could not be shut into a rigid frame, and the ,Le a g ue present did not : make quite sufficient provision for the changing needs of the future. There must be some povver of change. It must not be hurried. There were three ways in which the League could bring about tho necessary changes for meeting with a changing society. In the first place by the ordinary action of the Council in what ivas called conciliation. Then the International Court had power not merely to administer the law where a definite law existed, but could also be called upon, if nations wished it, to decide some obscuro problem, where the law was not clear, according to what Sbemed to be fair and good. Lastly, article 19 specially provided for the reconsideration of treaties,' sucli as those in China, which became inapplicable or threatened the peace of the world, and he hoped that this article would begin to be put into force next year.'(Cheers.)