DOMINION HOME RULE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3448, 13 April 1920, Page 22

DOMINION HOME RULE.

(By Cable.) LONDON, April 6. The Manchester Guardian, in commenting on Mr Bonar Law's speech in the House of Commons in reference to Dominion Home Rule, with special reference to the fact that the South African Republicans are now endeavouring to apply the argument in their favour, dwells on the importance of Ministers thinking carefully _ when speaking at the centre of the Empire in order to avoid misinterpretation. The Guardian contends that General Smuts is absolutely right in his contention that the dominions are not entitled to secede from-the Empire, and it quotes General Smuts as saying that the relation of the Crown to the province of the Cape or the Transvaal is precisely the same as its relation to Cornwall or Lancashire, ana declares that General Smuts is perfectly sound in maintaining that no portion of a single Sovereign State can throw off its allegiance on its own authority without an act of rebellion or revolution. "We could not do it in England," says the Guardian, " and .it cannot lawfully be done in Canada or South Africa." ' The paper attributes Mr Bonar Law's statement to the fact that we have so much good reason to rely on the goodwill of the dominions that anv attempt to force their loyalty is unthinkable. "If some day," it continues, " a dominion wished formally to be severed, then a friendly though foreign dominion would clearly be of greater support to us than an unfriendly one held down by force of arms—if that were conceivable. Then, as Mr Bonar Law says, we should certainly not attempt to force her, but that is not to say that any British dominion which might give ns, as it were, a month's notice would find that notice accepted."