PAYING AMERICA

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 2305, 25 November 1925, Page 14

PAYING AMERICA

WHS - ENGLAND IS DOING ED. PARTLY "FINANCIAL SWANK." Mr. H, D. Henderson, editor of the "Nation,” recently addressed members of the summer school at St. Hilda’s Hall, Oxford, organised by the National Union of Societies for Equal Citizenship, reports the "Manchester Guardian." Mr. Henderson spoke on "International Debts." International Indebtedness had, said Mr. Henderson, done a great deal since the war to poison International, relations. It was a problem which had no parallel in past history. There was nothing comparable to the conditions which existed to-day and under which various Governments owed other Governments enormous sues of money, sums so huge that no one know whether the Governments would be able to repay each other. The Dawes Report marked the first step towards getting the problem of International indebtedness upon a reasonable and practicable footing. On the economic side ho believed it was now generally agreed that extraordinary illusions were held by many as to the abilities of the different Governments to make enormous payments. It would seem that the reason for such fantastic expectations was that people likened the problem to that which existed between indivldals when one had to make the other a large payment. That, however, was not an accurate basis of comparison, for no nation was rich in the way that individuals are. Vast numbers of any nation’s people were comparatively poor, and ono could not take largo sums from a nation without seriously depressing the standard of the living of even the very rich people.

In practice attempts to exact very large sums of money from any particular country actually injured the countries to whom the payments were made. In demanding large sums of money from Germany, supposing she could raise such sums, the difficulties of transferring such money to the Allies without upsetting the whole of the exchanges of the world were very real and great ’This and many other difficulties by the Dawes Scheme had overcome by making Germany contribute to a reparations account, from which arrangements were made for transfers of money by a committee composed of members of each of tho Allied countries entitled to payment. It was their duty to see that such payments were made without causing any disturbance to the exchanges or trade relations of the world. In this way tho difficulty of apportioning the payments had been placed on tho shoulders of the Allies, and not upon Germany. Having regard to the difficulties of the time, the Dawes Scheme was an excellent way out of a very awkward position, but whether successive generations in Germany would go on carrying the burdens of reparations was a matter upon which no opinion could be given. Just as he regarded It as an impossible business to exact huge payments for reparation from Germany, so also did he regard an attempt to demand the repayment of Inter-Allied debts as contrary to all decency. Although we would not think of demanding payment for the armies we had sent into France, we now demanded payment for munitions we had sent. The attitude which demanded payment for these munitions was, he thought, quite illogical. The right way would have been for on all-round cancellation of debts, but America Insisted on regarding them as, ordinary debts, and had persuaded herself that she was rendering a very great service to morality by demanding payment for them. Britain, on her side, out of a confusion of ideas, some of them very virtuous, no doubt, but also duo to that of financial swank, had accepted the American position, and agreed to pay sums ranging up to thirty millions a year in repayment. That having been done, it was not practical politics that we should cancel the French debt to us. We should rather in the circumstances get as much from France as we could in repayment of her debt to us.

Possibly, the best way out of the difficulty would be for German reparations to pass through the hands of France and go to America, By that arrangement Britain would be very much down financially on the war, Prance not very much out, while America would be the only country to draw something like sixty millions or seventy millions from Germany. As long as the debt problem remained there was always a possibility of its giving rise to strained relations between countries, while It was also likely to cause ill-feeling as between America and Europe.