THE PRESENT CRISIS AND IMPERIAL FEDERA- TION AS ITS SOLUTION,
[To no Eorroa or no .8rooraroa.".1
Sea—Whilst thanking you for your courtesy in publishing my letter on this subject in your last issue, I should like to refer to your editorial note at the foot of it, and should be very glad if you would point out in what way my suggested scheme would "dissolve the bonds of Union in the United Kingdom." All my scheme proposes is, first, to separate Imperial from the local affairs of Great Britain and Ireland; and, secondly, to set up a Federal Parliament binding Great Britain and Ireland together under one Parliament, and merely extending to local Parliaments certain additional powers to those already exercised by County Councils, which would, of course, be subject, as now, to the control of the Federal Parliament. The question of finance to which you refer as the rock upon which such a scheme would be wrecked would be regulated in exactly the same way as it is now done between the Imperial Parliament and the County Councils.— [If Federalism is to mean nothing more than a slight extension of county and municipal administration, and is not to involve law-making, we have no objection to it; but this is certainly not what the Irish, the Scotch, and the Welsh Home Rulers mean by it. They want Irish terms, especially in the matter of finance. We do not desire to fight about a word, but who wants Federalism according to the new definition 7.— ED. Spectator.]
Previous page
