LEVER OF SECESSION

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20276, 10 April 1934, Page 1

LEVER OF SECESSION

Statute of Westminster Attacked. LONDON, March 27. That the Statute cf Westminster is not a source of strength to the Empire has just been demonstrated in South Africa and the Irish Free State, says the Scotsman,” in a leading article. The three Bills introduced in South Africa that the King shall act on the advice of South African Ministers, it says, apparently leave the King no residue of power and only a courtesy voice in the appointment cf the Gover-nor-General. The Free State, it goes on, has already reached this position. Thus an instrument of secession is forged, and it would clearly be possible for the South African Union to secede by securing the Governor-General’s assent to a Bill severing the bend of Empire. Mr de Valera’s latest enterprise is his attempt to abolish the Senate. in which he is likely to succeed. The articles of agreement for the Treaty do not insist on a Senate, though, probably, the Free State Parliament was envisaged as similar to those cf the other Dominions. Mr de Valera has dissevered the Treaty and the Free State Constitution. He does not intend to recognise a higher authority than his own, but he can hardly override the existing rights of the Senate and must wait until its legal powers of resistance are exhausted.