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The early appointment of a committee to investigate the causes of the law's delays in India soon afforded an indication of Lord Reading's determination to strike, if possible, at an unenviable characteristic of Indian legal processes to which the judgments of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council have frequently adverted. The causes of the delays are often more deep-seated than Lord Reading at first realised, but slowly and surely the recommendations of the Civil Justice Committee are bearing fruit both in administrative and legislative shape.

The Racial Distinctions Committee, appointed in December, 1921, supplied yet another early proof of Lord Reading's determination to insist that justice must be rigorously impartial. The tendency of the legislation resulting from that committee's report was in the direction of removing the exclusive character of the special jury privileges which had been enjoyed by European British subjects in the Indian courts since the date of the Ilbert Bill. While concessions were made to Indian sensibilities by the withdrawal of privileges qua privileges, the position of the European accused was safeguarded by means whereof the Indian accused can avail himself no less than the European, if he so desires.

Two other examples of Lord Reading's insistence upon the equality of justice may be quoted, both affecting the highest sphere to which the competence of the Governor-General of India extends, namely, the enforced abdication of the Maharaja of Nabha and, at a later date, that of the Maharaja Holkar of Indore. Both were interpreted in India as salutary indications of the reality of the assertion made by Lord Reading in Bombay in 1921, that a British Viceroy of India can be no respecter of persons.

Lord Reading's term of office has been prolific of inquiries into problems affecting the welfare of the people of India. At the suggestion of the Assembly an enquiry was ordered into the working of the Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms soon after they had been three years in operation. The status of the North-West Frontier Province, an excepted area in the constitutional settlement of 1919, was similarly examined. The function and available scope for the utilisation of foreign capital in India came under examination by a committee. A preliminary inquiry into the bases of the system of Indian taxation was yet another

subject of investigation. At the present moment an inquiry is in progress regarding the sources of supply of Indian lads competent to be invested with the King's Commission. A Royal Commission on Agriculture is shortly to attempt an investigation of the agricultural problems of the great subcontinent of India, which is as large as Europe without Russia, and contains some 250 million acres under cultivation or fallow.

In every case these inquiries were the suggestion of Indian sponsors; in assenting to the enquiries Lord Reading showed his desire to govern, as far as possible, in full accordance with advanced Indian opinion. Many examples are available of Indian demands which had long been resisted on the score of economy, or of their conflict with British standards and conceptions, but which were conceded during Lord Reading's régime on the principle of respect for the will of the governed. Possibly in some instances this principle was carried too far. In not a few cases both the personal judgment of the Viceroy and the interests of the once governing race were disregarded, in order to make concessions to the supposed interests of India as put forward by the only vocal exponents of her public opinion. Of this the most striking instance was supplied by the setting-up of a permanent Indian Tariff Board at the suggestion of the Indian Tariff Commission, and the subsequent enactment, on its advice, of a tariff of heavy protective duties against all classes of steel imports calculated to compete with the products of the Tata Iron and Steel Company in their iron and steel works developed at Jamshedpur since the years immediately preceding the War. The duties were accompanied originally by bounties on the production of steel rails and on railway waggons assembled in India. Those bounties have since been supplemented by large cash bounties on steel ingot production, and it is calculated that the gross annual sacrifice involved for the Indian consumer runs into seven figures. The economic creed of Lord Reading and his British advisers has perhaps been subjected by this experiment to a strain not less severe than that sustained by their patriotic instincts, as they have observed the progressive exclusion from the Indian markets of the products of British industries, much harassed by post-war taxation charges. A canon of non-interference by the British Parliament with new economic departures favoured by both Indian Government and Assembly was formulated by the Joint

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Select Committee on the Government of India Bill, 1919. That canon bears a new aspect when agreement by the Indian Government with the majority of the Indian Assembly is dictated, less by considerations of economic justification, than by the doctrine of a charity which hopeth all things and believeth all things.

In the economic sphere, Lord Reading's acceptance of Indian ideas has been further illustrated by new stores rules facilitating the freer purchase of Government stores from Indian-held stocks; by consent given to the abolition of the Cotton Excise duty and by recognition of the Indian Assembly's preference for State management of State-owned railway lines over company management. The legislative achievement of his Viceroyalty includes the enactment of new factory, mines, workmen's compensation and trade union laws, which seek to place India in or near the main stream of social legislation in Western Europe.

In the same spirit Lord Reading consented, with the approval of Lord Rawlinson, to a restricted, but very definite, experiment in the Indianisation of a selected group of cavalry and infantry units. More recently the promotion of the Royal Indian Marine to the rank of an Indian Navy has been announced. Consideration has been promised for the compunction felt by the political class of Indians towards the continuance of the Indian opium trade, even in its present restricted shape. Lord Reading has warmly supported the campaign for the elimination of the scourge of leprosy from India by the new curative methods.

In the face of such a record it is impossible to deny the sincerity of Lord Reading's belief in the invariable efficacy of justice and sympathy. There is, indeed, in India no one who questions his belief. He has evoked the respect and affection of a larger number of Indians than any preceding Viceroy. He has made no single enemy in the ranks of the European community to whose needs, qualities and achievements he has accorded a recognition not always vouchsafed them by his predecessors. He has left India immeasurably happier, calmer and more prosperous than he found her. That is a great achievement under modern conditions. Lord Reading and his countrymen may rest content with it.

GEORGE PILCHER

I.

2.

THE "GREAT NETHERLANDS" IDEA

De Groot-Nederlandsche Gedachte. By Dr. P. GEYL. Haarlem: Tjeenk Willink.

1925.

Holland and Belgium: their Common History and Relations. By Dr.
P. GEYL. Leiden: Sijthoff. 1920.

3.

Histoire de Belgique.

Lamertin. 1909-20.

By H. PIRENNE. Vols. I-V. Brussels:

4. Histoire Politique et Littéraire du Mouvement Flamand. By P. HAMELIUS. Brussels: Rozez. 1894.

LITTLE has been heard in Great Britain of the Flemish

question in Belgium, for the British public knows practically nothing of the internal history of Belgium since the end of the war. Few of the students of foreign affairs, who are supposed to be abundant nowadays, take any interest in it. It is scarcely mentioned in the newspapers, and the books of reference available in English are inadequate if not misleading. There is nothing surprising in this. Before the war, Belgium was equally unknown here, except as tourists or business men may know a country. In recent years it has not attracted as much attention to its politics as some smaller, more distant and less important countries. The King of the Belgians is indeed known and admired, but in the special way in which royal persons can be the objects of admiration, and this does not imply any knowledge of his country's politics. Its most serious affairs have been those in which it has been overshadowed by greater partners: the names of Belgian ministers! have appeared in connection with war-debts, with reparations, with the Ruhr, but they have been dwarfed by those of Frenchmen, Englishmen and Germans. There have been crises in Belgium. There has been a fear of civil war ; there have been ugly incidents, political murders; but even for Belgians these have seemed small beside the great things outside, while in other countries they have not taken away a moment's attention from the more desperate dramas of Russia or Italy or Germany, of Turkey or Egypt or China. What is more, the Belgian Government and the politically or economically influential elements in Belgium naturally do not wish to advertise their domestic difficulties. It is against their interests to have them talked about. Their side of the case is

that the Flemish question is not a question of any great interest or importance. Those who take the other side write chiefly in Flemish, a language which is practically unknown in the British Isles. Yet there are reasons why the matter deserves more serious attention here.

Englishmen wish the Belgians well. We all know the ties by which our sympathies are bound to them for many of us, and amongst others for the present writer, they are ties of personal gratitude and obligation. If there are differences among the Belgians, our point of view is that of friendly neighbours. We have neither excuse nor motive for interference in their concerns. It is not our business to give encouragement or warnings or advice. We have enough to do in trying to establish the principles of order and freedom in our own commonwealth and, until we invite the criticism of our foreign friends on our work, we must not lecture them on theirs. But for our own instruction it is well to observe what goes on amongst them. We shall find that they are faced by a difficulty which, in other forms and places, still confronts our own policy. We may also find that their handling of it will touch our interests and make it necessary for our government to exercise an influence on the development of the Belgian situation. At any rate there are already people in Belgium who are appealing for the sympathy of the British peoples for one side or the other, on the ground that the fate of the Flemish movement, whatever it may be, must at some time in the future cease to be merely an internal question for Belgium, as it has been in the past -except for one interval-and must become a question of general European concern. If that is so, it will be our duty, both to ourselves and to our friends in Belgium, to understand it well.

From our point of view the Belgians, without distinction, are our friends. It is true that there were some Belgian subjects who took the side of the Germans during the war. They were adherents of the Flemish movement, and they took this step in order to further that movement. They betrayed Belgium in what they thought were the interests of Flanders. But they failed and they have had their punishment. There are still Activists in exile, and one of their leaders, Dr. Borms, is still in prison; but it is generally agreed that the time for an amnesty has come, and, though it is uncertain whether the amnesty will be acceptable to the exiles, it will be a step towards ending their punishment. It VOL. 243. NO. 496.

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