PROMOTING PEACE

Dominion, Volume 25, Issue 170, 14 April 1932, Page 11

PROMOTING PEACE

Britain & United States * POWER IN WORLD Effect of Friendship That continued friendship between Great Britain and the United States of America was a prime necessity for the maintenance of the peace of the world, and the progress and development of humanity at large, was the view expressed by his Excellency the Governor-General, Lord Bledisloe, when speaking last evening at a reception to himself and Lady Bledisloe given by the English-Speaking Union. “If there ever was a time when it is most essential to the peace of the world and the maintenance of civilisation for the great English-speaking units of the world to be In close friendship and sympathy, that time is now,” he declared. The reception, which was marked by a happy atmosphere of informality, was held in the Conference Hall of the Dominion Farmers’ Institute, which was tastefully decorated with flowers and foliage for the occasion. Speeches were interspersed by musical items, after which their Excellencies met and chatted with many of the members. Mr. Harold Johnston, K. 0., who presided, said that the union esteemed it a great privilege to welcome their Excellencies that evening, Mr. Johnston said that the principal object of the union was to promote the friendship between the peoples of the United States and Great Britain. The importance of that object was never greater than it was to-day. He dealt at some length with the ohanging conditions of the world to-day. Critics and observers said that there were two classes of countries in Europe who desired peace on certain conditions ;one class desired it so long as it could preserve its own “status quo,” and the other desired it if it could get rid of present treaty conditions. The only two countries in the world who desired peace without qualification were the United States and Great Britain. “We can and do express through tljis union our desire for friendship between these two nations.” Mr. Johnston said: “Perhaps that is the most we can do; but in the nature of circumstances, his Excellency has had other opportunities, both of knowing and meeting the leaders of thought, which we do not enjoy, and he perhaps can give us some assistance, or, at any rate, give us some assistance as to the lines we should proceed upon.” “The English-speaking Union has only in recent years been regarded—at any rate in the Old Country, aud I ‘believe, almost in America —as an organisation pledged to improve in every possible way the relations existing between Great Britain and the United States of America,” his Excellency said. Civilisation To-day. Civilisation to-day, his Excellency continued, appeared sometimes to be rudely threatened. The world was in a condition of restlessness. Almost every non-English-speaking country in the world was suffering from internal unrest, or was in a state of potential unrest. He wished he could speak with absolute confidence and accuracy regarding that which he had just described as the solidarity of the British Empire. Ho was sure that everyone present must have been acutely distressed, as he was himself, to learn during the last few days, of the acute difference of outlook, redolent, unfortunately, of a spirit of separatism, which had developed between the Mother Country and Ireland. Although they all hoped that these differences were of a purely transient character, it might be that the differences which arose between one part of the British Commonwealth of Nations and another would prove to be a cohesive force binding together the more loyal of the other parts of the Empire to the Mother Country from whom they had sprung. The chairman, his Excellency said, had addressed to him the question as to how the difficulties which we were now facing in different parts of the world, and the problems which we were attempting to solve, could be best dealt with. His answer, which was of a very vague character, would be: “By a greater mutual knowledge and sympathy .on the part of the British Empire and the United States of America in the determination to bo friends.” If there were ever a time when it was most essential to the peace of the world and the maintenance _ of civilisation for the two great Englishspeaking units of the world to be in close friendship and sympathy it was now, he continued. What would have happened only a few months ago if Great Britain and the United States had not acted In friendly concert in relation to the threatened hostilities in the Far East? Could anyone doubt that there would not have been to-day a violent war raging between China and Japan, spreading possibly to other parts of the world, as was the case with the Great War, and affecting the progress and development of humanity at large. Those two great nations had in common their language, their traditions, their ideals, and to a preponderating extent the same race and blood. Faith in the Nordic Race.

The Unlred States and Great Britain, his Excellency continued, had been at peace now for exactly 120 years. During that period, particularly during its early years, there were many causes which might have led to revived friction; there were many agencies at work in both countries, but had not the sound temper of the British race predominated, they would have spurred one or the other into war.

It must have been reassuring to many people to have read recently the statement of the new American Ambassador when he came to England, that never in the history of the United States was the attitude to Britain so friendly as it was to-day.

His Excellency said that he was one of those who had a profound faith in the Nordic race. One American author had said that the race possessed to a dominant extent those qualities of stability, resourcefulness and enterprise winch made for world progress. The unfortunate fact of this Nordic race was that it was very energetic, so full of suppressed vitality, that its members were tempted from time to time to light each other, with the result that its numbers were seriously decreased, and were becoming fewer in proportion to the non-Nordic sections of the world. “Therefore,” he said, “if for no other reason, let us Nordic people do our best - not to light each other.” His Excellency devoted the remainder of his speech to explaining what he considered the best qualities of the American and British races, and how each nation could benefit by observing the other intelligently,