THE POSITION IN GERMANY.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1107, 19 May 1893, Page 21

THE POSITION IN GERMANY.

The peace of Europe is more seriously threatened by the dispute between the Kaiser of Germany and the Representative House of the Imperial Legislature than by anything that has happened since the peace of Versailles. The Kaiser has appealed to the people. If tho popular verdict is for the Army Bill, there will be no further danger. But if the popular verdict should be the other way, then the most probable thing is that the Kaiser will do what his grandfather did before the campaign of 1866. The Prussian Parliament refused the Army Bill drawn up by Bismarck to give effect to the reforms devised by Von Roon and. Von Moltke. The King and his Ministers took the money they wanted without the consent of Parliament, and perfected their military instrument. When that instrument struck down the power of Austria and paved the way for a united Germany under the Kaisership of the House of Brandenburg, the people of Prussia ranged itself on the side of the King; the Parliament cheerfully passed an Act of Indemnity, and the autocratic conduct of the King was condoned without any evil consequences. But had the military instrument autocratically perfected been defeated, the consequences to the Prussian dynasty would have been serious. At the outset of the epoch-making campaign of 1866 the King of Prussia went into the field to redeem the Crown he had staked. His grandson, who sits on the Imperial throne created by the success of the grandfather, is now face to face with a refusal to his request for the means required to perfect his military instrument, if his appeal to the people fails—and the excitement throughout Germany, which je described as

equal to that which was produced by the battles of 1870, leads to the conclusion that the appeal will fail—then the Kaiser will probably repeat the autocratic unconstitutional act of his grandfather, and perfeot his military instrument. He has plainly said that he will do so. If he is. as good as his word he will require an Act of Indemnity, and nothing will give him that but a successful campaign. Now, in 1866 the Prussian army was the. only perfect military instrument in Europe; whereas now all the armed Powers poasess military instruments as. perfect as the German. If, therefore, the Kaiser stakes his Crown, as his grandfather did, he will run more risk of losing it than his grandfather ran. On the other hand he will, if he flouts his Parliament, be under the same necessity of fighting to get constitutidnally whitewashed. That is the" special danger to the peace of Europe which lurks in the strained relations between the German Kaiser and his people. T: