LLOYD GEORGE AMONG THE PROPHETS.

Evening Star, Issue 18257, 23 April 1923, Page 4

LLOYD GEORGE AMONG THE PROPHETS.

It is no ■now appearance for him which Mr Lloyd George makes, in his latest syndicated Press article, of a Cassandra warning his countrymen against the menace of tho growing power of Socialism. It is true that he preferred a different role in his Limebouso days, when his rancorous denunciations of “ old cheese ’ and 11 the first of the litter” made the bitterest incitement to class hostility, and were bailed with most joy by tho extremists of that party which he now condemns. But those were excesses which the cx-Premier has forgotten since. For years now he has been concerned to represent Socialism as the chief danger threatening tho nation, a danger from which it is his special mission to preserve it. Fear of this growing menace, as ho depicted it, was tho chief motive on which he worked in his attempt to savo his Government before the Inst election, and more recently it has proved tho basis of his plea for a reuniting of the broken Liberal Party. Now tho danger is conjured up again for tho purpose of a newspaper article which will make his readers’ flesh creep. Modern journalism is nothing if it is not exciting, and no ono knows better than Mr Lloyd George! who is writing these, articles, by bis own avowal, to ‘‘make the pot boil," as well as for a nation’s enlightenment, how to write articles which will bo read with avidity. As the Norse seer saw tho black horses, presaging slaughter, he sees the waves of British politics roughening for a storm, a whole season of storms, it may bo of hurricanes. “ Fundamental issues have been raised of such moment to millions that they cannot be settled without n struggle that will rock society.” A challenge has been given to the rights and privileges of powerful classes of the community, and vital to the interests of all classes. Capitalism is to be arraigned before the supreme court of the nation, and its judges may soon bo tho opponents of capitalism. That, with more to the same effect, is certainly arresting journalism. It may bo a correct divination of what tho times hold in store, or, again, it may bo an exaggeration. A natural impression will bo that Mr Lloydl George makes quite too much of the motion in favor of Socialism submitted by

Mr Snowden to tho House of Commons, which ho takes as the latest omen of impending storms. Socialism can be discussed still without violence; the majority of socialists lose no chance of discussing it anywhere, without any hope of an immediate practical outcome for their eloquence, and what rostrum could bo so inviting for the purpose as that of the House 61 Commons?

"The prophet is on firmer ground when ho points to the new strength of a Socialistic Labor Party in the Mother of Parliaments as an evidence of the increasing hold which impracticable theories have gained upon the nation; but even here conclusions can be easily overdrawn. Labor owed its triumph at the last British elections in no small degree to the divided

and disorganised state of tho great Liberal Party, and it has yet to bo seen it it can enlarge its success when those circumstances shall have been altered for it. There is no doubt also that it obtained thousands of votes from those who have no faith in Socialism as a system. British Labor members, as well as their leaders, may believe in nationalisation “by easy stapes,” but Labor parties in most other countries, when they have come into power, have learned much from experience. Tho majority of British workingmen electors, even those who have boon most newly enfranchised, are shrewd enough to know that if a condition could ever exist in which all men would be workers for the Slate, instead of for themselves or a private employer, it is only a fraction of tho present amount of work that would ho done by the community. Such faith as they have in Socialism might bo safely expected to wane as they found what the impracticable system was costing ‘hern. Tho workers of Switzerland, tho best educated political community in the world, would not tolerate'a capital levy when it was offered them; and it is not for that tho leaders of tho British Labor Party, who are of all Socialists tho most moderate and practical, would be likely to go with that destructive proposal if they had tho power. TRe wise policy of the modem State must bo not to abolish capitalism, but to curb and control it for tho advantage of the nation as a whole, whioh should not bo too hard’a task to perform when a majority of electors and a potential majority of Parliament is composed of workers. For a hundred years the British electorate has been extending its franchise, and the disasters which were prophesied at every stage of tho process have not happened yet. Man, whoso lot is “to bo hurled from change to change unceasingly,” knows that his politics can never bo long calm, sinco that would mean stagnation. The capitalist system, as wo know it, will not last for ever any ir.oro than other systems that have preceded it; but human nature itself will have to undergo tho profoundest change before it is ripe for Socialism as a .successor. There can be no doubt of (lie wisdom of the methods which Mr Lloyd George recommends to prevent the Socialistic menace from becoming greater than it is. They aro the systematic inculcation of economic truths, as distinct from fancies, into tho minds of workers, and tho rooting out of social evils which give its chief force to the revolutionary’s preaching when lie calls for the destruction of tho capitalist system.