THE AUSTRALIAN GOVERNORGENERAL

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22654, 20 August 1935, Page 8

THE AUSTRALIAN GOVERNORGENERAL

The appointment of Sir Alexander Hore-Ruthven, now Governor of New South Wales, to the office of GovernorGeneral of the Australian Commonwealth for the ensuing term derives special interest from the fact that it involves a reversion to a practice that was interrupted by the appointment of the present Governor-General. No reflection whatever is cast upon Sir Isaac Isaacs in the statement that a good deal of concern was excited in Australia by his appointment at the instance of the Scullin Government in 1931. It was not because it violated, or constituted a departure from, all precedent that this appointment was regarded with some misgiving. It cannot be reasonably expected that a country shall throughout its history adhere rigidly to a procedure which may not be suitably applicable to its changing and changed conditions. But the innovation that was made in the appointment of Sir Isaac Isaacs not merely snapped the link that was provided in the presence in Government House in Canberra of one who might be more truly regarded as a personal representative of the King than any Australian could be. It also opened the door to the possibility that at some future date, if the principle that Australians should be selected for the office of GovernorGeneral were accepted, appointments

might be made that would be undisguisedly political in character and that, in consequence, the prestige of the office would suffer and the respect that it commands would be diminished. The departure, therefore, from established practice that was taken when Sir. Isaac Isaacs was appointed was one of very doubtful value. The Governor-General, it is to be remembered, is no longer the representative or agent of the British Government, of which circumstance an illustration has been provided in the past few days by the announcement of the appointment of . a High Commissioner in Australia. But he is the representative of the Crown, occupying a position that corresponds to that of the King in the United Kingdom, and this fact in itself constitutes an argument in' favour of appointments that would be entirely free from the suspicion, or even the possibility of the suspicion, as might conceivably happen if they were given to Australian citizens, that they were conferred for political reasons.