SIR JAMES ALLEN
Sir James Allen’s . extraordinary statement having, of course, produced a request for specific information from him, ho has made the following extraordinary explanation:
X referred to the altered status of the Dominions, the possibility of the separation question cropping up, but not in Now Zealand, which, I said, was tho most loyal of all the Dominions, and less disposed than any other to chafe at any real or imagined limitation of its freedom. Go-operation and good understanding between the. United Kingdom and the various Dominions on a basis of self-interest, sentiment, and race would be sufficient to bind the Umpire together. This is the explanation of his now notorious “reminder” to x - Imperial statesmen. It is to the effect that some Oversea Dominions arc disposed to . chafe at any real or imaginary limitation of freedom, even to the extent of separation, but that New Zealand, the most loyal of them all, is less so disposed than any..,. Now, Sir James Allen has no right to speak about any other Dominion, than the one ho represents. On the contrary, it is his business to be silent about all the others, as he himself admits in his statement of the necessity for “co-operation and, good understanding between the United Kingdom and the various Dominions.” To vaunt the superior loyalty of his own Dominion is certainly not conducive to co-opera-tion and good understanding, especially when the vaunting is followed by the statement that his own is leas disposed to go to the extreme represented by “separation”—a word he does not deny having used. Even as to his own Dominion, ho qualified its loyalty by saying that it is “leas disposed” than others, in a certain event, to proceed to extremes, when it was his duty to deny omphaticalliy that it is so disposed at all. '' Tho explanation flouting the other Dominions, while placing a limit to the loyalty of his own, makes tho matter actually womC for Sir James Allen. It strengthens the conclusion that his reminder to Ipipcrial statesmen has proved his 'utter unfitness for the high position he holds as representative of tho Dominion of New Zealand. *
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Bibliographic details
New Zealand Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 10631, 2 July 1920, Page 4
Word Count
359SIR JAMES ALLEN New Zealand Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 10631, 2 July 1920, Page 4
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