The Timaru Herald MONDAY, JUNE 25, 1934. WHITHER GERMANY?

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19834, 25 June 1934, Page 8

The Timaru Herald MONDAY, JUNE 25, 1934. WHITHER GERMANY?

Notwithstanding tlie bombast, arrogance and bluff, associated with tlie ascendancy of Hitlerism in Germany, the failure of the National Socialists to restore Germany’s economic and financial stability threatens the very existence of the new regime. Some months ago, General Hermann Goering, one of the leaders of the Nazis in his arresting book, “Germany Re-Born,” said: To be true, we are fanatics, for nothing big can be achieved without fanaticism. Where would Christianity have been without its zealots? Yes, we are white hot with a fanatical love for our people. But we are fanatical, too, in our hatred of those who are destroying it. All principles which tend to further the recovery and the position of Germany we alone recognise as point in our programme; all other things, which may be damaging to our country, we condemn and they are to be destroyed. Fanaticism, it seems, is once more rending Germany asunder. Today, news is filtering through London to the outer world, of a bitter struggle being waged between the old bureaucracy of leading generals and big industrialists on the one hand, and Herr Hitler, the Minister of Propaganda (Dr. Goebbels), and the Nazi Chief of Staff, Captain Roehm, on the other. The issue, significantly enough, in view of General Goering’s recent sinister reference to his “simple and gallant” storm troopers, is the disbandment of the Brown Shirts, who have recently shown symptoms of disillusionment and restlessness. Plainly enough, this move is full of significance in view of the growing ascendancy of the military caste, as revealed in tlie outspoken attack launched on the policy of the Nazis, by Captain von Papen, the obvious mouthpiece of the old regime. Faced with the demands for the disbandment of the Brown Shirts, several members of the Government are said to have offered their resignations, which Herr Hitler refused. The Nazi Cabinet only gave way finally to the persistent demands of General von Fritsch, who insisted that the Storm Troops should be disbanded and disarmed. That, in brief, is the secret behind their enforced holiday, which everybody expects will be extended indefinitely. Captain Roehm is said to have gone on sick leave, and Dr. Goebbels alone remains to fight what appears to be a losing battle against oldfashioned Prussianism. For it is the “old gang” which will again hold the reins of power. It is not difficult to discern the resurgence of the military spirit of Prussia in the trend of events in Germany. Only a few weeks ago, General Goering made this somewhat arresting pronouncement;

Threatened from all sides, Germany had the sword thrust into her hand. The German people, guiltless of the outbreak of this greatest of wars, had to fight in order to defend their life and honour. The most precious possession that a people can have, “its freedom and honour,” was threatened, and the German people did their duty. The Germany army, in order that it should not itself be overthrown and destroyed, marched through Belgium. It was self-defence in the highest sense of the word.

Some time ago The Morning Post remarked that it was the constant complaint of Nazi apologists that foreign opinion has been grossly misled by the lying propaganda of Jews, Marxists, emigres and other declared enemies of the third Reich. . .” More damaging propaganda, the paper added, against Nazism could scarcely have come from its worst enemy than has fallen from lips and pen of General Goering, its fountain head. When asked what is the constructive policy of the Nazi regime, General Goering merely pointed to his “simple and gallant” storm troopers, and added the sinister generalisation that “all principles which tend to further the recovery and the position of Germany, we alone recognise as points in our programme; all other things, which may be damaging to our country we condemn, and they are to be destroyed.” Here we see that the spirit of Prussia still survives, for in the heart of the Nazi Cabinet, as revealed in General Goering’s observations, is the same military madness. It was this pillar of Nazism that contended that the invasion of the territory of a friendly and comparatively defenceless neighbour, “is defence in the highest sense of the word.” It is not surprising then to learn that well-informed circles in London believe that Germany is on the eve of a fresh economic and political crisis, involving a virtual military dictatorship and the ascendancy of powerful leaders associated with the old regime.

EDUCATION BOARD PROTEST. “It is not fair that higher graded teachers should have to stand aside in favour of teachers who have to be found positions because they are on transfer,” declared a member of the Canterbury Education Board on Friday, in voicing criticism of the instructions issued to the Board. Manifestly the Education Board has itself to blame if it meekly consents to be “instructed” by the bureaucracy in Wellington. For years, members of education boards and school

committees have almost vehemently condemned the existing system of appointing teachers. But the Minister of Education, the high officials of the Department of Education, and the organisation voicing the policy of the teachers have demanded that the grading system must stand. The local authorities, on their part, however, have insisted that tlie grading system is fundamentally unsound, while some of the more courageous of the teachers have not hesitated to say that a Dominion system of grading is geographically impossible of equitable application. Tlie Department of Education, however, lias declined to listen to the most persistent protests, and having entrenched itself behind statute-law has given the Dominion grading system something like statutory application. It will therefore come as a surprise alike to local authorities interested in education, as well as to teachers, to learn that the Department is trying to sidestep the legislation that has been placed on the statute-book at its instigation in relation to the appointment of teachers. Education Boards, on their part, ought not to content themselves with mere verbal protests. The laws which enforce upon primary education in New Zealand a system of appointment of teachers which is fundamentally unsound, impose upon the Department of Education the same obligation. The Boards on their part should make an attempt to counter the Departmental attempt to disguise, in some slight measure, the chaotic state into which the primary school system is drifting, because of the “general post” going on in the continuous changing of staffs. In a measure, the remedy is in tlie hands of the Boards themselves, if they have the courage to challenge the Department by insisting on the customary course being followed where vacancies occur, namely, by calling for applications for all vacant positions. Then the provisions of relative legislation must operate and the highest graded application could not help but secure the position, save only in cases when the appointing board and the senior inspector are in agreement to depart from the grading list. Education Boards have here an opportunity to show their strength and independence, if they are prepared to run the risk of incurring the displeasure of the powers that be, by insisting that the legal enactments that impose obligations upon boards must also be obeyed by the high authorities in educational quarters, who are manifestly becoming somewhat alarmed because of the chaotic conditions that are being created in the primary schools by the all too frequent changes in the personnel of the teaching staffs.

SUPPLIES FROM WAITAKI. Although the hydro-electricity authorities in Christchurch in an announcement on Saturday, discounted the impression that current will be available from the Waitaki hydro-electric works within a few weeks, it is clear that before the end of the year, the Hydro-Electrical Division of the Public Works Department, will have an over-supply of current available for municipal, industrial, rural, and domestic use. Doubtless, it will be said that authorities will find it advisable to move with the utmost caution in determining the schedule of charges that will be drawn up. But it must be apparent to all who have watched the constrilction of the gigantic dam that spans the mighty Waitaki river, from the initial stages to the final harnessing of one of the largest sources .of the supply of electrical energy in the Dominion, now developing energy, that for some years, on the most favourable conditions of the development of the load, the Waitaki station will have a very large surplus of energy available for sale and use. Advantage should be taken, as was suggested at a recent meeting of the South Canterbury Power Board, to fix a scale of charges that would encourage the freer use of hydroelectric current both in town and country. At tlie moment, before the Waitaki scheme is coupledup, a considerable surplus of electrical energy is available at certain hours of the night at Lake Coleridge station. The peak load never comes in the night, it comes, we understand, before the industrial load has gone off. Hence it is clear that very large supplies of hydro electrical energy will be available when the three stations—Coleridge, Waitaki and Waipori—are linked up into one gigantic undertaking. It ought therefore to be possible for the hydro-electrical authorities to evolve a plan under which very cheap electrical energy would be made available during certain restricted hours of the night, for heating and power purposes. Something would be radically amiss in tlie scheme of things if thousands of homes throuhout the districts served by the hydro-elec-trical undertakings in Canterbury and Otago, shivered in low temperatures during the night, while almost inexhaustible supplies of electrical energy were running to waste along the vast network of supply lines traversing many hundreds of miles of city and town streets, as well as the expansive countryside.

In Davao, a province of Mindanao, one of the Philippine Islands, the ancient sport of horse-fighting—in which two fiery stallions are pitted against each other—is still continued, but more or less surreptitiously, by the Mohammedan princes.