POLITICAL POINTS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 122, 23 May 1908, Page 12

POLITICAL POINTS.

In a memorial on tho ne\v Colonial Law adopted by the Belgian Pailiamentary Committee, Iho Congo Reform Association sets forth that tho terms of tho transfer' are such as to perpetuate tho root evil of the existing system. It expresses satisfaction that the new law introduces some undoubted improvements, of which it regards the submission of the Budget to tho Legislature, the regulations regarding the administration of justice, and the curtailment of the powers of the Congo Government in the matter of loans, as the' most valuable. It maintains, however, that the Law vests executive control in the present authorities unchecked by any safeguard, and argues that "the written public laws' of the Conge/ State are without reproach ; but this ' fact has not prevented tho enslavement of the population and the perpetuation of daily outrages. No legislation, however humanely conceived or worded, can influence for good an executive system based upon the appropriation of the land, produce, and labour of the native community."

Replying to an interpellation in tho Lower House of the Hungarian Parliament, on Bth April, regarding the TransBalkan railway, Dr. Wekerle, the Premier, said that the Hungarian Government supported tho railway scheme, which would simultaneously serve an economic and a civilising purpose. Regarding the railway through tho Balkans to tho Adriatic, Dr. Wekerlo said the Hungarian Government was in no way antagonistic ; indeed, provided that this railway did no injury to AustroHurigarian traffic interests, tho Government would be rather inclined to promote tho project. ■

A denial (says The Times) is given in official circles in Berlin to the newspaper report circulated from Copenhagen regarding tho settlement of the Baltic question. Neither on the* Baltic question nor on the North Sea question has an agreement been concluded. In the case of the former, statements are still being exchanged. In tho case of tho latter, negotiations concern tho form it shall take, but material difficulties no longer stand in the way of the necessary signature, which is expected shortly.

At the annual Congress of Het Yolk on Bth April, General Botha . dwelt on. the significance of the Orange River Colony and Cape Colony electoral victories in relation to the Transyaal. He also/ paid a tribute to Sir Henry Camp-faell-Bannerman's manly efforts and conduct with reference to the granting to th© Transvaal of self-government. Transvaalers, he said, had no warmer friend than Sir Henry, and he hoped the Congress would pass a resolution of sympathy with him.

A Times correspondent writes from Cairo on 9th April: — It has' been decided to send twenty-four oi\the less important Dervish prisoners confined at .Damietta to Wady Haifa. It is believed that the question of their release is under discussion' and that they will eventually bo liberated after a period of partial freedom under supervision. There is no question at present of the release of Osman Digna or other leaders of\ importance. Their lives woujd not be worth a moment's purchase m the districts of the Sudan which formerly suffered from their tyranny. [Recent cable massages reported' that Osman Digna had becomo insane.]

The Paris correspondent of The Times writing on ' Bth April, says: — M. de Lanessan' criticises in the Siecle the 1 advice given by #ie Temps to Russia that she should build as soon ai possible a fleet of battleships in the Baltic. The former Minister of Marine is of opinion that France has no interest in Russia'^ spending money on a fleet which she, could not send out of the Baltic even if- ehe were strong, and which would be destroyed in ' the Baltic if it were not at least equal to the German fleet. His conclusion is that ifc would be a mistake to 1 urge Russia to build ships which would be absolutely useless to her. Evidently both M. de Lanessan and the writer in the Temps take it for granted that if Russia did build ships ifc would be eventually >to use thorn, against Germany. t '

A joint meeting convened by 'the British committees of the Indian National Congress and the London Indian Society was held on 9th April at Caxton Hall, Westminster, to welcome Mr. Keir Hardie, M.l*., and Mr. H. W. Neyinson on their return from India. in his address •Mr., Hardie said that there was no sedition in India, and. the wonder was that there was none. It was remarkable about the situation there that the responsible leaders of, the reform movement still remained patient and lawabiding. They would win in the end through their patience and ' their lawabiding policy. It had been a great strain to put upon human nature for them to remain loyal during the last two years of persecution, abuse, and misrepresentation. There was a very hopeful movement in India — educational, industrial and political. He suggested for India moVe responsible government. At present tho country was governed by a military autocracy, somewhat tempered by a civil bureaucracy, but without any popular control. That was an unhealthy, dangerous' state of affairs. The condition of things in India would necessarily go from bad to worse until some effective check was put on the way Indian affairs were administered. That check could not be applied from the House of Commons or from the India Office — it must cqme from the people of India themselves. He suggested that the next Indian National Congress should be held in London, where it would command the attention vof the whole worW. There were difficulties in regard to caste, but the claims of casto must give way to the claims of country.

Mil© End (says St. James's Budget) is the last, if not, the least, of those Local Government Board enquiries which have made the public so fully aware of the degradation of municipal life. Practically the same story is told here as was related in the other cases into which investigation waß made. Dishonesty of every sort by contractors and guardians has been ruthlessly exposed, and a "sorry scheme of things entire" the conduct of local government has been in Mile End. The disquieting symptom of these inquiries is the similarity of the methods and malpractices thus brought to light and the suspicion inevitably aroused that these boroughs of which example has been made are by no means so exceptional in their corruption as we should like to believe them. There is a general fear that the whole principles of local government aro thus impeached, and that its foundations are lotten. Of course it is both ci^sy and proper to descend with a heavy hand on the deliiiquelits, men of no character and of little substance. But the ratepayer who cares s>o little for the authority to which he is subject, that he elects or allows the election to go by default of representatives so absolutely unfit for responsibility, has himself chiefly to btoin© for scandals which sent the rates up and the cieditof national character down. There must' be some reform of the-, System, and .everything puiuii t0 * diuvjueb&d tie-