NOT EMPIRE FLAG.

Wairarapa Daily Times, 8 September 1926, Page 5

NOT EMPIRE FLAG.

THE UNION JACK.' HERTZOG’S ia SOI (CAPETOWN, Tuesday. The Prime Minister, General Hertzog, in a statement, admitted the ,relationship -of the British Commonwealth of Nations, and sincerely -hoped it would continue indefinitely in the future, but that such a thing did not justify j the incorporation of the Union Jacl? in the Union flag.''-"'” • -• “fhe Union Jack,” he said, “is not an Empire flag. It is the flag of Britain, land is connected with the Dominionsl,; and, therefore,with what' is known, as the British Empire, merely by historical implications. The Government at . all times isiprepared to have the relationship of South Africa to the 'Empire symbolised through the medium of the Union Jack, though not by its Incorporation in their flag.”

„ He and the Government were for .maintaining the present relation's with the British Empire,- but for maintaining it with the full integrity of the Union’s independent national status. ■The Union flag is to be symbolic of -that independent national status which South Africa as a nation had already achieved. Any suggestion emphasising -the relationship of the British Commonwealth through some emblens or design upon the' Union flag would be favourably considered. If the Flag 'Committee were to recommend the insertion of the Crown upon the Union flag he was confident not only that it would meet with the approval of the Government, -but- that it would offer every satisfaction to both reason and sentiment. - :

General Hertzog denied that he intended to ask the Imperial Conference for a written Dominion Constitution, but he-will urge that the necessary steps* ibe taken to ensure South Africa’s status being equal to that of Britain and any other Dominion entitled t-o international recognition, and to have it published to the world. “I shall proceed to the Conference,” he added, “in the full conviction .that in the relation's of; Britain and the other Dominions as- a Commonwealth of free nations’ lies the surest guarantee.”