FEDERAL UNION EXAMINED I
By WILSON HARRIS
THERE is no question about the hold the idea of federal union has taken on certain sections of opinion in this country, particularly that all-important section, youth. That is not surprising. The disease of the world is so desperate that any remedy for which colourable claims can be made will inevitably attract support. It was the same thing in the last war. Then the remedy was a League of Nations. Today it is Federal Union. That minds should be concen- trated on the one or the other, or both, is clearly all to the good. Youth, especially, to whom it will largely fall to build and maintain whatever new world emerges from this turmoil, should be canvassing, as it is canvassing, any plan to give promise of saving the next generation from the disasters that are falling on this. Federal Union may meet the need completely or in part, or not at all. That will only be discovered if the intelligence, rather than the emotions, is brought to bear on it. So far a good deal of the advocacy of it has been marked by more enthusiasm than insight, just as some of the criticism of it has been marked by more acerbity than acumen. The case for and against Federal Union needs more dispassionate examination.
The first question to ask is, What is Federal Union? That is not so easily answered as might appear, for the various proposals figuring under that general title differ considerably. But since it was to the publication of Mr. Clarence Streit's Union Now last autumn that the existing Federal Union movement mainly owed its inception an outline of the plan presented in that work is the necessary starting-point, even though many British supporters of Federal Union are at some pains to explain that they do not mean by it what Mr. Streit Means.
Mr. Streit proposes a " union " of fifteen democratic States, with a total population of some 300,000,000. The word union must be emphasised. By contrast with a " League " of nations, which indicates a society of sovereign States co-operating for certain defined purposes, a union is an integral body in which the several States merge their independence within a specified field, definitely and deliberately sacrificing their national sovereignty to that extent. The Assembly or Council, or whatever the bodies that govern the union may be, will be elected by the 300 million inhabitants of the fifteen constituent States (or such of them as have the required qualifications) by direct individual vote, not arpoint:-.'d by the Governments of the several States. That is fundamental to the plan. The voters will elect a central Union government, to which, so far as the subjects entrusted to it are concerned, the individual Governments will be definitely subordinate, or have no status at all. Such subjects, foreign affairs, armaments, currency and the rest, pass out of their hands.
What are the constituent States to be, and what powers are to be entrusted to the Union? The first question is not of capital importance, for there is nothing at all sacrosanct about Mr. Streit's particular list. One inclusion, indeed. that of the United States, obviously represents hope very much more than faith. The fourteen other members of Mr. Streit's union are Great Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Ireland, France, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland. These States—or rather the individual citizens of each—are to elect a legislature of two chambers, the House of Deputies and a Senate, on the basis of population. To the House of Deputies, out of a total of 540 members, the United States would send 252 members, and New Zealand three, the other States coming intermediately according to their size, Great Britain, for example, having 93 members, France 84, and Canada (the next largest) 21. In the Senate each State would have two members as basis, plus a certain number more determined by population. Thus, out of a Senate of 4o, the United States would have eight members, Britain and France four each, and everyone else two.
Both the constitution of the whole Union and the compo- sition and election of its legislature are highly debatable questions, and Mr. Streit's scheme is unlikely to find many defenders as it stands. More important, because the essen- tial feature of all schemes, is the extent of the powers to be surrendered by the constituent States and transferred to the Union Government. According to Mr. Streit the Union will have its own military, naval and air forces, and the con- stituent States none apart from local police, its own common currency, full power to regulate trade and all communica- tions, including postal service, between its constituent States, and a Supreme Court, to decide all questions arising under the Constitution and the laws made by it. These laws, it is to be noted, are to be directly binding on the individual citizens of the constituent States, not on their Governments.
Mr. Streit's plan includes more than this, but there is no need to pursue it further, since it is clearly more important to lix attention on the proposals being advocated by responsible supporters of Federal Union in this country. Chief of these is the body known simply (and a little confusingly) as Federal Union, which has done a considerable service by stating its aims in language that is both clear and concise. Federal Union, according to " Federal Union," stands for a great commonwealth of free nations who are prepared to transfer to a common Government the management of foreign policy, arms and armed forces, international trade and finance and colonies, with guarantees for the native inhabitants. " Any nation could join, including, for instance, the U.S.A. and the U.S.S.R., and each could keep its own form of government, provided it guaranteed civil liberties and transferred its right to make laws on the subjects men- tioned above to the commonwealth Government." (The clause mentioning the U.S.S.R. was presumably drafted before the attack on Finland.) This must be regarded as the most authoritative exposi- tion of Federal Union current in this country, in so far as it emanates from the one body created to advocate the Federal Union principle. Modifications in detail have been advanced, and will no doubt continue to be advanced, by various indi- viduals and societies. Of these only one calls at all impera- tively for mention here. That is derived from a collation of two pamphlets, one by Sir John Fischer Williams and one by Sir William Beveridge, recently prepared (together with two others criticising the whole idea of federal union as• a practical proposition) under the auspices of Chatham House. The value of the two studies is that between them they considerably limit the scope of the proposed Federal Union, which might commend it to some at least of those who think anything like Mr. Streit's scheme altogether too ambitious to be practicable.
Sir John Fischer Williams limits Federal Union in scope ; Sir William Beveridge limits it in area. Sir John, indeed, writing as a jurist, is concerned chiefly to explain how Federal Union could work if it were decided to make the experiment at all. His plan will conciliate many sympathies that would otherwise be alienated, in that it makes provision for the retention of individual membership of the League of Nations by the States comprising the Union, not for one corporate membership. As to the scope of the Union itself " foreign policy, armed forces and the finance necessary for those two departments of State must be under federal control. This is the irreducible minimum of those common affairs which must be directed and managed by the federal authority if the unity of the Union is to be a reality." (Sir John, it should be emphasised, does not urge that Federal Union should necessarily be confined to this minimum.) Sir William Beveridge limits his scheme territorially. He rules out decisively the idea of a world-federation, and insists (unlike " Federal Union ") that the desired Union must consist of effective democracies. His constituent States are Britain, France, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland and Eire, together with the four British Dominions, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa. These have a total population of 235,000,000. The question of the inclusion of Poland and Czecho-Slovakia must be deferred till after the war. The inclusion of Germany depends ex hypothesi on her reverting to a democratic form of government. A combination of Sir William's limitations with Sir John's is on the face of it per- fectly practicable.
This summarisation of existing federal schemes may seem tedious, but if Federal Union is to be discussed to any purpose it is necessary to start with some concrete idea of the form or forms Federal Union may take. The ground is now clear for examination of the arguments for and against Federal Union generally. To that I hope to proceed next week.
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