Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 8, 1936. TWO KINDS OF BALLOT

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 84, 8 April 1936, Page 10

Evening Post. WEDNESDAY, APRIL 8, 1936. TWO KINDS OF BALLOT

Democracy, said Herr Hitler not long ago, is on its death-bed. Why? What is the evidence? In answer Herr Hitler would have no difficulty in pointing to the German and the French General Elections. Herr Hitler went before his constituency with the knowledge that he would receive at least a 90 per cent. Ja vote; he easily achieved 97 per cent, (some reports say 99). But France, ac* cording to yesterday's cablegrams, faces a General Election the result of which ia "more obscure than for many years." Herr Hitler would have no difficulty in translating this dictator-certainty and this demo-_ crat-uncertainty into terms of rela-' tive power, for obviously any Government that depends on an obscure election contest is weaker, in the power to do, than a Government which, in a one-party country^ has certainty of tenure. Power diplomacy is pivoted not only on armaments but "*on ,'■ continuity of rule. Herr Hitler has grasped the latter, he is .quickly acquiring the former, so he easily prophesies the decease of. democracy. Had he been able to actually direct the course of events in March and April, he could not have conjured up'any set of facts that appears to illustrate his case more clearly than does the conjunction, in this crisis period, of the German and the French General Elections, Each country has a domestic economic crisis as well as one in its foreign affairs. In France, lines of domestic cleavage cut across lines of foreign policy, and the latter may be sacrificed to the former in the confusion of free voting. But in Germany voting proceeds calmly to an ordained unanimity-that is democratically impossible. No German public or Press opinion troubles Herr Hitler. The public opinion that he is interested in is that _ of Britain and France; and its reaction upon democratic leadership; Priot to the. German elections it was cabled: ,

There is only one ballot paper, which does not provide for a negative vote against the list of Nazi candidates,, but merely bears circles in which voters are expected to place * .crosses in ap* proval of Nazi candidates and of Herr Hitler's policy,. .. . Nevertheless, Socialists and Communists, at the risk of their liberty and possibly of their lives, are distributing subterraneously millions of anti-Nazi pamphlets urging the people to vote No, though the methods of recording a negative vote, short of invalidating the ballot papers, is not explained.

Since the election it has been stated by the Berlin correspondent of the "Manchester Guardian" that spoiled papers, often 30 to 40. per cent, of the total, were counted as Ja votes. If so, to vote No save by the permission of the supervising persons seems to have been impossible. But in any case a 97 per cent, vote speaks for itself, and its dishonesty ■ heeds no pointing out. To tune up the "electors" Dr. Goebbels held a publicity carnival with all the usual Nazi "boosts," including illuminated river barges and aeroplanes;-and this glorious display will be remembered in history chiefly because of a 'great passive resister, Dr. Eckener. Because he did not cheerfully place the new Atlantic-con-quering Zeppelin in the carnival circus he is under a ban, and will nt least suffer that eclipse which all along has been a powerful Nazi weapon—non-mention in publicity. While Herr Hitler and Dr. Goebbels control newspapers and all avenues iof publicity an offending person ! may become publicly dead.-He will be lucky if he escapes other punishment, but at least he finds that on i his public existence the Nazi sun has set, and Nazis everywhere appear not to have heard of him. This is one of the ways, but only one, by which the Nazi censorship can close the gates to and from the public mind. Most democratic voters, if left fully free to act, will vote against dictatorship. If a country's foreign policy is directed against dictatorship (example, the British National Government's sanctions campaign in November) even, the Labour and Left sections will not oppose it. Hence the, British National Government's election victory on an anti-dictator-ship issue. But that victory was won by a Government which is not itself suspected of dictatorship or Fascism. Had- there been not merely an external dictatorship issue,; but an internal Fascist issue, things might have been different. In France, however, there is an internal Fascist issue as well as an external one; and a General Election on the British November model, reacting directly land simply to the foreign situation,

cannot be expected in France, where both sides and all groups will be likely to treat the foreign situation not purely on its merits, but as a means to influencing the internal one. In the "Contemporary Review" Mr. Sisley Huddleslon argues that while British anti-Fascists found their Fascist in Signor Mussolini, French anti-Fascists found him in M. Laval. Do not let us deceive ourselves. The opposition in France, whether it be described as pro-Russian or antiItalian, as pro-British or antiFascist, as for the ■ Negus or against Mussolini, is essentially political and political only. The fight is on the doctrinal battlefield of politics..

In Germany any confessed doctrinaire is under restraint. Does not Mi. Huddleston's diagnosis demonstrate the tremendous gap between the German and the French elections; the contrast and conflict between democracy and dictatprship; and the responsibility resting on democrats to thwart the Hitler prophecy.