The Government and India Signs of the organization in the
House and the country of some vocal support for the Government's India policy are to be welcomed. It is a serious misfortune that while Mr. Churchill and others are embarking on a campaign of attack the most competent spokesmen for the defence are largely silenced by their membership of the Select Committee. An impression may be too easily created that most of the arguments tell against the White Paper plan, simply because these are the arguments that gain most publicity and widest currency. The truth in fact is just the opposite, and it is perfectly simple, if a few competent speakers will set themselves to do it, to demon- strate that the whole ground for the Simon Commission's caution regarding responsibility at the centre was cut away, as Sir John Simon himself has made unmistakably clear, by the decision of the princes to come into a federated India. That decision makes responsibility at the centre inevitable, for the princes, as virtually independent sovereigns, would certainly never take their share in a government in which the last word on every subject was to be said by a Viceroy carrying out the decisions of Whitehall. Publication of daily reports of the Select Committee's discussions will be of value, even though the sittings are not public, but something much simpler and comprehensive than day-to-day arguments about details is needed, for it is of the first importance not merely that the Bill establishing the new constitution - should be carried through both Houses, but that it should be carried by convincing majorities, and with full popular support behind it.
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