Evening Post WEDNESDAY, MAY 27, 1925. "KNOW YOUR EMPIRE"

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 122, 27 May 1925, Page 4

Evening Post WEDNESDAY, MAY 27, 1925. "KNOW YOUR EMPIRE"

Many of us doubtless needed no reminder on Sunday that it was Queen .Victoria's birthday, but even of that number quite a considerable proportion were puzzled to know why t? 4 e flags were flying on the following day. The publication in a, London cablegram of Mr. Massey's Empire Day message solved the problem for those who had not previously found out. Shortly after the death of the good Queen in whose long reign the Empire, after a period in which the gospel of disintegration -had -full play, may be said to have found itself her birthday was set apart as Empire Day. Lord Meath was the prime mover in the matter, and the celebration still plays an important part in the movement for the systematic teaching of patriotism in the British schools which he did so much to promote. In other part's of the Empire his propaganda was less successful. For a few years Empire Day was duly honoured in New Zealand, but even before the War the celebration had languished seriously, and since then the close proximity of Anzac Day with its fresher, more poignant, and more vivid memories, has naturally eclipsed it altogether. It was not to New Zealand specifically but to the whole Empire that. Mr. Massey's Empire Day message, the revision of which was one of the last of his official acts, was addressed, and it appropriately comes to us via London and the "Times."

A similar message' from the British Prime Minister, which had not appeared like Mr. Massey's in the "Times" Empire Day Supplement on the day preceding the anniversary, but was broadcasted throughout Britain on Monday, is brought to us by the cable to-day. It is described as "an eloquent appeal to encourage the sentiment of Empire, whose bonds are as light as air, yet as strong as. iron." The last words are quoted, not quite accurately, from a classical passage in Burke. There are, indeed, few occasions in the public life of to-day, whether the issue be Imperial or international, peace or war, Bolshevism or Socialism, or the "confused and scuffling bustle" of a General Election, which, something that Burke wrote or spoke more than a century ago does not. exactly fit. But on the true relations of Great Britain and her daughter States, and the reconciliation of Empire and liberty, he supplies a gold-mine of wisdom and eloquence combined. It is from one of the last, and most powerful of Burkes pleas for conciliation with the American Colonies that Mr. Baldwin's phrase is taken, and the whole passage is so apt as to deserve a fuller citation. Referring to the service that America might render Britain, Burke said:

For that service, for all service, whether of revenue, trade, or Empire, my trust, is in her. interest in the British constitution. My hold of the colonies is in the close affection which grows from common names, from kindred blood, from similar privileges, and equal protection. These are 'ties which, though light as air, are as strong as links of iron. Let Urn cnlotiies always keep the idea of their civil right associated'with your government-;' they will cling and grapple to you; and no force "under heaven will be of power to tear them trom their allegiance.' . . . The more they multiply, the more friends you will have; the more ardently they love liberty, tho move perfect'will be their obedience. Slavery limy win have anywhere.^ It is .-). weed ||,-'|(. grows in every soil. Tltpy niiiy have it. from Spain, they may have it, hum Prussia.

There m:ed hnve been no diuluptioa e< ihn JSiupira U Burks'!

counsel had been followed. The American Colonies might have in due course become the American Dominions if George 111. an d his Ministers had not asserted the technipal rights of the Crown in a manner that established the very conflict which Burke and Chatham deplored. The choice between liberty and allegiance was forced upon the American colonists, and they preferred liberty. The other colonies of Britain must have gone the same way if the truth which the rulers, of Britain refused to learn from Burke had not been taught them by this terrible object-lesson. -The Empire exists to-day by virtue of the very principles for which he pleaded in vain, and to which nobody has yet been abler to give nobler expression. Where can one find a more admirable statement of the force which holds the Empire together to-day than in the words already quoted—

tho close affection which grows from common names, from kindred blood, from similar privileges and equal pro-

Those were the invisible ties which a few years ago brought the free colonists from the ends of the earth to fight side by side with British soldiers on the battle-fields of Europe and Asia, and the occasion gives an added interest to the concluding words of our quotation. It was possible, said Burke, for the American colonists to get slavery anywhere: "They may have it from (Spain, they may have it from Prussia." Spain is now out of the reckoning, but ten years ago Prussia had developed into one of the greatest of world Powers, and the knowledge that even on this side of the' world slavery was to be had from Prussia stimulated the enthusiasm with which a world-wide and liberty-loving Empire took up her challenge. We say "Empire" without apology, for it is a term which is not . anathema in this country, and most of our late leader's fellow-countrymen share his pride in it. But Mr. Baldwin tentatively and alternatively throws in his lot with those who would like a change..

«-ii •m" at ' hs aays» ?ive tne word Empire a new meaning, or substitute the title "Commonwealth of British Nations."

New Zealand would much prefer the former alternative. . Let the Empire so discharge its trust as to live down the military and despotic associations which the term "Empire" has acquired from Assyria and Egypt, Home and Macedonia, from the Romanoffs and the Hohenzollerns, but let it not allow them a monopoly of the title. "The British Commonwealth of Nations" may b© a more correct description of our own Empire, but it is not a term to excite enthusiasm. "A great Empire and little minds go ill together," says Burke in the speech already quoted, but the British Commonwealth of Nations and faint hearts seem to fit all right.