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3d. PERTH, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1942.
NO. 3,013.
SIXTY-NINTH YEAR.
Salazar's Financial Miracles on to Coimbra to study law and obtained his doctorate there. In 1916 he was appointed professor of political economy at the age of twenty-seven. When Salazar went back to Coimbra two generals in turn tried their hands at the financial problem, but only succeeded in making matters worse. Things came to such a pass that the Government decided to apply to the League of Nations for a loan, and towards the end of 1927 the then Minister of Finance, General Sinel de Cordes, approach. ed Geneva to ask for £12,000,000. A
A Contrast in Corporative Systems Authoritarianism Not Necessarily Fascist By W. P. MacDONAGH, S.J.
We live in an age whose greatest art is the advertisement, and find it hard to appreciate men or institutions which go to work quietly without any blowing of trumpets. No wonder, therefore, that the same of Salazar, even after thirteen years, is relatively unknown or that the profound spiritual revolution he has effected is so little understood. Portugal is one of the "small nations" with a great history. Its area is only
35,500 square miles and its population 6,200,000. Its earlier history is mark-
ed by achievements which can at least equal the highest points of civilisation and culture in any other country. But this period of brilliance was succeeded by a relapse into mediocrity, and for four centuries the nation rapidly deteriorated. Her once great commerce decayed, one by one her industries disappeared, even agriculture fell so low that most of her food had to be imported. Social organisations fell to pieces, while turbulent factions converted the whole country into a field of strife and discord. The body of the nation sank into apathy and no longer seemed to care how they were governed. In 1908, King Carlos I. and the Crown Prince were 'brutally assassinated in the streets of Lisbon, an act which did much to discredit Portugal in the eyes of the world. The assassination destroyed whatever power remained to the crown, and when King Manoel came to the throne he was unable even to punish his father's murderers. The country was now in the hands of the professional politicians. But even they were powerless to rule. Divisions among them and their inability to form a common policy discredited them and accelerated the develop. ment of Republicanism. The murder of a prominent republican leader, Dr. Bombarda, in 1910, precipitated things, and on Octdber 14 a revolution broke out. After a short and fruitless struggle, King Manoel fled for safety to England, and almost immediately a full-blown liberal parliamentary republic was set up, and a constitution closely modelled on the French adopted. Portugal had become a demo-
For Value and Service
cracy; a new page in her history wa, about to be opened; the past was to be redeemed and the future provided for. But, bad as the past had been, the next sixteen years of liberal government were to be infinitely worse. One word suffices to sum up the regime, chaos. The political situation reflected the moral chaos which pervaded whole of national life. During this period there were eight presidents of the Republic, one of whom served his full term of office and one of whom, Sidonio Pais, was assassinated in 1917, and forty-three different Governments; that is, an average of two a year-actually there were nine during 1920. There were eight rebellions, and political assassinations were normal. Portuguese Liberalism had brought the country to ruin. The budget had not been balanced for over a century, for so long that a deficit seemed part of the order of things. The Government lived on a series of ruinous loans, and a clan of about 12,000 politicians battened on the unfortunate people and bled them white. Social and economic conditions were desperate; there was no money to spare for essential services, for education, for housing, for anything but to line the politicians' pockets. The country's reputation was at its lowest. Portugal was quite literally a dying nation. Characteristically enough, it was the army which put an end to the muddle. Accustomed itself to order and discipline, it could no longer stand aside and see the country dissolve in anarchy. On May 28, 1926, General Gomes da Costa selected his first Government from the soldiers around him, but stopped short when he came to the Minister of Finance. The first task of the new Government must be to clean up the Augean stables of Portuguese finance. Nothing could 'be done until financial stability was secured. But the difficulty was where to find a Finance Minister who would have the courage and the ability to attempt a task which so many had given up as impossible. Then the General was told of a certain professor at the University of Coimbra who "was supposed to be good." He had never heard of him before. But the matter was urgent. "The new
-"supposed to be good
.
.
.
electrified
the whole financial world."
Government," he said to a journalist, "is just the best we can find at a moment like this. The Minister of Finance is to be a certain Salazar from Coimbra. Do you happen to know him?" The journalist did not and neither did anyone else. But he had written a brilliant thesis on the evolution of Portuguese finance and perhaps he could do something. Word was sent to Coimbra and at first Salazar refused to leave his lecture hall. He was just a plain professor of economics, be said, and was fully aware of the vast gulf between theory and practice. But when pressed further he came to Lisbon to interview the general. When the quiet young man of thirty-seven appeared, he said he would accept the position-on one condition: he must 'be made financial dictator with a veto on all national expenditure and complete control of the finances. Quite naturally da Costa refused, and Salazar went back to his students. That was his first appearance on the political scene. It lasted exactly five days. Antonio Oliviera Salazar was born in 1889. He was the son of a small farmer in the village of Vimiero in Santa Comba. Like the other European dictators he is a man of the people. He was educated at a nearby Diocesan Seminary, which seems to suggest an intention of becoming a priest, but in 1911 he went
Financial Committee of Inquiry was sent to Portugal in 1928 and reported favourably. A loan would be granted; the League promised to balance the budget, stabilise the currency and consolidate the State's debt to the Bank of Portugal-but on certain conditions: ample guarantees would have to be made to the creditor powers and a foreign controller appointed. The offer was a generous one, but the conditions attached were considered a humiliation to the Portuguese nation, which saw in them a surrender of sovereignty. It was therefore refused and, instead, Salazar was recalled and his conditions accepted. If there had to be a financial dictator far better let it be a Pbrtuguese than a foreigner. At once the new Minister set to work. He demanded the strictest economy of the nation, cut down all superfluities, and increased taxation. Every national activity was subordinated to the urgent necessity of balancing the budget and obtaining financial stability; and, at the end of that first year 1928-9, Salazar presented an astounded nation not only with a balanced budget, but with a surplus of nearly £3,000,000. The budget electrified the whole financial world-a Portuguese budget actually balanced, with an enormous surplus, and this at a time when the world was undergoing an acute economic crisis! The thing was nothing less than a first-class financial miracle; and Salazar has produced a surplus every year since. In 1934 it amounted to £18,000,000, a record which, to quote the "Times," "is not only without parallel anywhere else in the world, but is an achievement for which history can show but few precedents." Such surpluses enabled him to liquidate the nation's floating debt. The debt amounted to £20,400,000 in 1929; by the next year it was reduced to £9,400,000, and in two more years was completely paid off. In 1931 Salazar was appointed President of the Council of Ministers. He at once collected a body of university and prominent professors, lawyers business men around him to cast a new The first Constitution for Portugal. draft was published on May 28, 1932, and the people were allowed a year to (Continued on Page 12.)
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