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PERTH,WEDNESDAY ,JULY 11, 1946.
NO. 9,188.
PRICE THREEPENCE.
"Better and Better Democracy
SEVENTYSECOND YEAR.
Pius X11
Disillusioned Europe Looks to British Institutions Broadening Freedom to Cover Economic Anomalies .4 Exalted Claims on Moral Maturity of Citizens By MICHAEL KELLY.
4 (Continued from last week.) fit one of his great war speeches, Winston Churchill laid stress upon the part played by the popular democratic institutions of England in upholding British greatness and in carrying it through to victory. It is upon the stability of national institutions that the inner strength of a nation depends; and Britain was fortunate indeed that she emerged from centuries of civil anct political strife with her traditional institutions intact. France, on the tither hand, failed to develop stability and continuity of Govermnent after the overthrow of the institutions with whose aid she was nurtured and grew to maturity and greatness. The democratic political structure of England, which developed gradually out of the old monarchic and oligarcharic structure, was achieved by a method of method it can be called) of trial and error, in the words of Tennyson, " Freedom slowly broadened down from precedent to precedent." The old institutions were broadened and given a more popular basis by a process of gradual change. The moving spirit in this change was the enlightener) will of the people, with enlightenment percolating down through the successive strata, so that with each change it could be said with truth that a larger proportion of the people was represented in the Government. in later years some distinguished upholders of the rights of the people have 1-.een in the habit of making nerry at the contrast between the flamboyant dreams of the optimists and the reality of wage-slavery. T re. member in particular a hrilliant pagsage in one of G K. Chesterton's ecsays, in which he drew a marked contrast between the dream of gradual libera. tion so gaily painted by Tennyson, and the brutal reality of the cndavenlent of the masses in economic chains. it is true that, even as the people began to cast off the shackles of political
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domination, shades of another prisonhouse began to descend. The fetters of economic domination threatened to grip even more firmly than their political counterpart. At this stage, however, there came into evidence once more that capacity for saving themselves which has made the British the envy of all other peoples. The Trades Unions and the political tabour parties, long suppressed as illegal, gradually emerged, and developed until they noui• form an integral part of the national life of Britain and the Dominions. Instead of the workers degen. crating into a shapeless mass of wageslaves, they have elected their leaders, formed their- own institutions, and exercised a voice in the direction of na. tional affairs. The process of evolution has by no means come to a halt, and everyone must agree that more steps must be taken before the worker can he regarded as free from the threat of economic domination. As productivity increases by means of better organisation and improved mechanical procedures, the worker will rightfully demand a fair proportion of the inrreased wealth which is being produced by his efforts. Freedom will find it necessary to broaden down through one or two more precedents; and, aq the worker becomes more enlightened, we can expect to see him, through his representatives, taking a more active part in the actual direction of production. This can be achieved only by active co-operation and good- will between employer and employee, supporter( and maintained by strong public opinion. in the words of Pope Pius SIT, we w•aut " democmry and better democracy" The General Longing for Democracy. After each great European war. the tortured peoples have turned to Britain• their preserver against tyranny, nerd sought stability and safety by ropying her political institutions. After the Napoleonic wars, constitutional monarchies became the order of the clay: and after the first World War sev.
rity without which a democratic Government would find it hard to command the respect and support of the better section of the people. " And, since the centre of gravity of a democracy normally set up resides in the popular assembly from which political currents radiate into every field of public life, the question of the high moral standards, practical ability and intellectual capacity of parliamentary deputies is for every people living under a democratic regime a question of life and death, of prosperity and decadence, of soundness or perpetual unrest...." "In periods of transition, generally stormy and disturbed by passion, by divergent opinions and opposing programmes, the democratic leaders should feel themselves doubly under the obligation to send circulating through the veins of the people and of the State, burning with a thousand fevers, the spiritual antidote of clear views, kindly interest, a justice equally sympathetic to all, and a bias towards national unity and concord in a sincere spirit of brotherhood. People whose spiritual and moral temperament is sufficiently sound and fecund find it in themselves and can produce the heralds and implements of democracy, who live in such dispositions and know how effectively t., out them into practice. But, where Sinn "These multitudes, uneasy, stirred men are lacking, others come to take by the war to their innermost depths, their places in order to make politics arc to-dav firmly convinced that, had serve their ambition, and he a quick there heen the possibility of censuring road to profit for themselves, their and correcting the actions of public caste and their class, while the race authority, the world would not have after private interests makes them been dragged into the vortex of a discompletely lose sight of and jeopardise astrous war, and that to avoid for the the true common good." future the repetition of such a catas"We were anxious to take the occa'.rophe we must vest efficient guaransion of Christmastide to point out tees in the people itself. In such a along what lines a democracy befitnsvehological atmosphere, is it to be ting human dignity can, in harmony wondered at if the tendency towards with the law of nature and the design Iemocraev is capturing the peoples of God, secure happy results. In•tn ,I winning a large measure of condeed, we are deeply convinced of the scnt and support from those who hope supreme importance of this problem to play a more efficient part in the for the peaceful progress of mankind. lestinies of individuals and of sociBut we also realise the exalted claims otv ", which this form of government makes The Pope points out that the demoon the moral maturity of the indivicratic State may have a monarchical dual citizen; a moral maturity which or a republican form. After discushe could never hope to attain fully sing the nature of authority in the and securely if the light from the Cave State, he shows that the dignity of of Bethlehem did not illuminate the political authority is the dignity dedark path along which the peoples are riving from its sharing in the authnritv ruing forward through the stormy preif God. Those in power, while exertsent towards a future which they hope ing effective authority, should avoid will be more serene." that specious appearance of a purely The Importance of Politics. formal democracy which often serves The antidote for the poison which as amark for all that iq in reality least threatens us can therefore be summa democratic. The obligations of a deup in the words of the Pope, "better macratic leader, he says, should be and better democracy." Better confulfilled with that obiectivity, impar(Continued on Page 4.) tiality, loyalty, generosity and integ-
tral parliamentary republics emerged from the ruins. But, alas! their hopes were void, and the States so carefully fashioned (lid not survive. They had no chance, because of the recrudescence of Germany, which swallowed them up. Now, once more we see the European peoples, who looked to Britain for their preservation, looking to Britain's democratic Government as a model for their political safety. " If we consider," said His Holiness in his recent broadcast, " the extent and nature of the sacrifices demanded of all the citizens, especially in our day, when the activity of the State is so vast and decisive, thd' democratic form of government appears to many as a postulate of nature imposed by reason itself."'. " Beneath. the sinister lightning of the war that encompasses them," he goes on, " in the blazing heart of the furnace that imprisoned them, the peoples have, as it were, awakener( from a long torpor. They have assumed, in relation to the State, a new attitude—one that questions, criticises, distrusts. Taught by their hitter experience, they are more aggressive in opposing the concentration of dictatorial power that cannot be censured or toucher(, and call for a system of government more in keeping with the dignity and liberty of the citizens.
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