Untitled

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19584, 14 September 1925, Page 6

The action which the representatives of Great Britain have taken in submitting to the Council of the League of Nations proposals for the eventual abolition of slavery conforms to the fairest traditions of the nation. A century ago Britons led the world in a crusade against the wholesale trafficking in, ar.d bartering of, men and women. In the partial abolition of this hideous trade none took a greater part than William Wilberforce, amongst others, whose names will ever be indissolubly associated with the emancipation of coloured and backward races. The popular conception of slavery is that of a vicious system which died with the American Civil War and with the culmination of the labours of British statesmen in the early part, of the 19th century. But the practice of slavery has not been banished from the w’orld, and the proposals which Viscount Cecil of Chelwood, on behalf of the British Government, has submitted at Geneva are directed to the ultimate completion of a humanitarian work that was commenced more than 100 years ago. Although no serious objections were made to the proposals, the unanimity which might have been expected in support of them from present-day civilisation and 1 enlightenment was not shown, for the Portuguese delegates and others demurred and deprecated what they regarded as undue haste. Portugal, France, and Belgium, in common with Great Britain, hold tropical possessions in Africa and Asia peopled by backward native races, and there may be an indisposition on the part of some of them to commit themselves to measures calculated to hinder in any way the exploitation and to hamper the administration of colonies in which tlie climatic conditions necessitate the almost general employment of coloured native labour. The classification of slave traffic as an international crime on the same level as piracy would involve them in the need for the institution of far-reaching reforms in order that they might escape the stigma which would rest upon them if they were to countenance the evil. , No court or convention is better qualified to deal with the question of slavery than the Council of the League of Nations; and the matter is one that comes directly within its province. Any definite action by the League that will lead to the abolition of slavery in its various forms will he welcomed by the civilised world which will discern in it a fresh proof of the value of the service that may be rendered to humanity by an organisation widely representative of international thought that includes among its objects the extinction of remediable abuses of the kind that is now being attacked.