The Waikato Times With which is Incorporated The Waikato Argus. THURSDAY, MAY 24, 1928. EMPIRE DAY.

Waikato Times, Volume 103, Issue 17410, 24 May 1928, Page 4

The Waikato Times With which is Incorporated The Waikato Argus. THURSDAY, MAY 24, 1928. EMPIRE DAY.

Empire Day, which comes again today, perpetuates the memory of Queen Victoria, the great Sovereign whose long reign covered an era of remarkable British achievement. Kew Zealand came under British rule, through the Treaty of' Wailangi, shortly after her accession to the Throne. The federation of the Australian States was accomplished at the end of the century. Shortly before her death the Boer war started changes which a few years later led to the establishment of the South African Union. While she was Queen Canada developed the modern Gonstitulion that has assured to that Dominion the possibilities of magnificent growth. India, having survived the great crisis of the Mutiny, became a primary element in the wide range of British policy, and the successive phases by which India was incorporated in the developing Imperial community reflected the movement of political ideas and the realisation of deepening responsibilities. The story of the Grown Colonies in Asia and in Africa is associated, to a very lprgc extent, with discoveries, with accidents, with what appeared to be minor military episodes in Queen Victoria's reign. The accumulation of assets and values —at the moment often only superficially appraised—was prodigious. It demanded, In connection with the rapid industrial and commercial development of Great Britain, a constant alertness, an unceasing adaptation or improvisation of administrative method. For a long time the British people were hardly conscious of their,

achievement. Every succeeding British advance in remote regions of the earth was regarded as a matter of course, without any direct bearing on the normal life of England. It was only towards the end of the reign of Queen Victoria that the people of Great Britain realised that the upshot of all these changes was a fact of the highest significance. That fact was the existence of a world-wide Empire of a totally new kind, of which Great Britain was the centre. And, because this Empire is British, Great Britain is what she is to-day, mobile, sensitive to all political currents in every part of the world, insistent upon the maintenance of peace and the maintenance of communications, and very tolerant in the matter of political forms and political opinion. Liberty in a very profound sense is essential to the existence of the British Empire. It has fallen to the present, generation to assess, as far as it is possible, the meaning of the British Empire, and to 00-ordinate with new conditions the great and varied achievement of the Victorian era. The Empire is certainly not the poorer because some ol' the conceptions adopted to the earlier pioneer stages of expansion have now been recognised as obsolete, because populous oversea Dominions have grown up and the fact of their equal status within the Imperial community has been fully and explicitly admitted. The Victorian era was signalised by a remarkable territorial expansion beyond the seas; the political and commercial implications of this expansion were then only partially and approximately realised; administrative provisions hardly kept pace with the rush of events. The war was a turning point. It established a new sense of the unity and of the diversity of the Empire. It set the Victorian achievement in a new focus in the world of to-day. The whole conception of the Empire has undergone a change. Attempts have been made to define the change by substituting for the Empire some other name. There is no real need for that. Only the very ignorant can confuse the British Empire of to-day with the military and aggressive empires of the past. It hardly needs saying that the British Empire could not exist if it accepted their standards or followed their methods. Its vitality comes of a premonition, growing by experience to a certainty, of the inevitability of rapid change throughout the world. Flexibility and adaptability are of the essence of the polity which keeps the British Empire together. The tasks of the Empire are real and urgent. They demand constant attention, the application of a very alert intelligence. The world in which the Empire is set presents a thousand distractions. Events in the politics of the world that may mean much for the security of the Empire almost inevitably divert attention from quieter developments in the Dominions and in the relations between the. partners in the Imperial community. What may be happening at a given moment in Australia, in Canada, or in India may often appear humdrum in comparison with dramatic events in Europe or in China. Amid the turmoil the fact of the Empire persists, its significance grows, concern for its future is at the root of the preoccupations of the British people and of British statesmen. Its problems multiply. They assume new forms. They are now economic, now religious or racial. Common sense, tolerance, and administrative experience are continually directed to their solution. The local cares of the day are from time to time relieved by the sudden expansion of the spirit of great unity. The sense of unity, rooted in a common origin, the constantly renewed revelation of common interests and loyalty to the Sovereign, who is the living symbol, of the British Empire, holds the Empire together in a period of startling change. On this day the British people have cause both for gratitude and for hope.