TOPICS OF THE DAY.
MR. ROOSEVELT ON EGYPT.
MR. ROOSEVELT has made exactly the kind of speech which we expected him to make,—a speech strong, clear, fearless. He has told us some- thing useful and practical, and has not lost himself in abstractions and platitudes. In doing so he played the part of a true friend and an honest admirer of the British Empire. If he has been " to our virtues very kind," he has not been blind to our faults. What his speech comes to is this Wherever I travelled under the British flag, in East Africa and Uganda, in the Soudan and in Egypt, I found the English doing splendid work for civilisation and for the natives; but I found in Egypt that there is a danger of the great sacrifices and great work accomplished by Englishmen being undone owing to an exaggeration of the desire to satisfy Egyptian opinion. There you are in danger of forget- ting that of all broken reeds, sentimentality is the weakest on which righteousness can rest.' In a word, Mr. Roosevelt has told. the people of this country, though in much more picturesque and trenchant language than we can command, what we told them the other day a propos of the condition of Egypt. The business of a trustee is not to do what the subject of the trust likes or thinks he likes, but to do, however much he may grumble, what is in his truest and best interests. Unless a trustee is willing to do that, and does not trouble about abuse, ingratitude, and accusations of selfishness, he had better give up his trust altogether. We are not in Egypt to do what the Egyptians, or rather that section of them who usurp the name-of the whole, bid us, but to govern Egypt in the true interests of its inhabitants.
We do not think there is any real cause for Mr. Roosevelt to worry as to what we shall ultimately do in Egypt, for, take it in bulk, British public opinion is per- fectly sound on that question. Our people have not the slightest intention of letting the splendid work done by Lord Cromer be wasted. At the same time, Mr. Roosevelt's reminder, even though it may appear a little galling to a certain section of the community, was most useful, and we can say with perfect sincerity that we are very grateful to him for speaking out. It is much pleasanter and easier for a man who comes as the nation's guest to say nothing but smooth things, to declare that everything is perfect in his host's establishment, and generally to take the line that it is not his business to point out defects, but merely to give and receive congratulations. That is a part which, we are glad to say, Mr. Roosevelt is by nature absolutely incapable of playing. Whether he could say nothing but smooth things to the people of a country with whom he was out of sympathy and whose character- istics he despised we need not consider, but in the case of a people like the British, with whom he is in warm sympathy, he would, we are convinced, speak out even if the result should be to make him for the time the most unpopular man in our half of the Engish-speaking world. He is the sort of man who if as he drove up to a country house where he was going to stay he noticed one of the walls was " out of true," and that the foundations were giving in that spot, would mention the fact in pointed language even before he had shaken hands with his host and °hostess. We honour him for this, and so we are sure do the vast majority of the British people. They are not angels in trousers, and there are a good many people from whom they would not take criticism kindly ; but they take it from Mr. Roosevelt with real satisfaction, for they know its motive.
Mr. Roosevelt's speech was so original and so character- istic that we despair of making a précis that will do it justice. The only satisfactory way is to quote verbatim the words with which it closed :- " The attitude of the so-called Egyptian Nationalist Party in connexion with this murder [i.e., the murder of Bontros Pasha, the Coptic Prime Minister] has shown that they were neither desirous nor capable of guaranteeing even that primary justice the failure to supply which makes self-government not merely an empty but a noxious farce. Such are the conditions; and where the effort made by your officials to help the Egyptians towards self-government is taken advantage of by them, not to make things better, not to help their country, but to try to bring murderous chaos upon the land, then it becomes the primary duty of whoever is responsible for the
government in Egypt to establish order, and to take whatever measures are necessary to that end. It was with this primary object of establishing order that you went into Egypt twenty-eight years ago; and the chief and ample justification for your presence in Egypt was this absolute necessity of order being established from without, coupled with your ability and willingness to estab- lish it. Now, either you have the right to be in Egypt or you have not; either it is or it is not your duty to establish and keep order. If you feel that you have not the right to be in Egypt, if you do not wish to establish and to keep order there, why, then, by all means get out of Egypt. If, as I hope, you feel that your duty to civilised mankind and your fealty to your own great traditions alike bid you to stay, then make the fact and the name agree and show that you are ready to meet in very deed the responsibility which is yours. It is the thing, not the form, which is vital; if the present forms of government in Egypt, established by you in the hope that they would help the Egyptians upward, merely serve to provoke and permit disorder, then it is for you to alter the forms; fer if you stay in Egypt it is your first duty to keep order, and, above all things, also to punish murder and to bring to justice all who directly or indirectly incite others to commit murder or condone the crime when it is committed. When a people treats assassination as the corner-stone of self- government, it forfeits all right to be treated as worthy of self- government. You are in Egypt for several purposes, and among them one of the greatest is the benefit of the Egyptian people. You saved them from ruin by coming in, and at the present moment, if they are not governed from outside, they will again sink into a welter of chaos. Some nation must govern Egypt. I hope and believe that you will decide that it is your duty to be that nation."
That these words contain the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth in regard to the present position in Egypt we have no doubt whatsoever. It remains for the British people to insist that the advice which is thus tendered them from an independent source shall be carried out with vigour and sincerity.
We must never forget that, whatever may be the appear- ances, we shall, in truth, have the sympathy of the best part of the Egyptian population, whether Moslem or Christian, in making it clear that we are not going to flinch in prosecuting our task, and that we do not intend to listen to the sophists who find excuses for murder and apologise for- it as a proof of the ardent desire for self- government entertained by the Egyptians. No population ever really approves of private murder, and though a nation may be terrorised into apparent sympathy with assassins, public opinion can always be relied on to support a Government which shows its determination to deal sternly with the greatest of crimes. A Government which gives the impression that in the existing state of things it hardly feels justified in taking a strong line against homicide will never gain anything but hatred, ridicule, and contempt. On the other hand, a Government which makes the punishment of assassination its prime duty, and insists on reaching and punishing the murderer, no matter what technical obstacles may seem to be inter- posed, and no matter what threats are used, will always win not only respect but support. We do not of course suggest that the present Government has any other intention than that which we have just postulated ; but though we do not think there is the slightest danger of its really erring here or of showing weakness in the last resort, we do think there is a very real danger of its maintaining an attitude which may by an Eastern people be interpreted as a want of firm- ness. We hold that at the present time the duty of the British Government is to make it quite clear to the Egyptian people by direct utterance that we do not consider them fit for self-government, and that they must not imagine that we are going to take any steps to endow them with self-government. Unless we do this, we are very much afraid that the nonsense which has been talked and written here of late will give the Egyptian Nationalists a very false idea as to what can be accomplished by a policy of worry and intimidation. No one who really knows the people believes that Egypt, within any period which it is worth while to contemplate for purposes of practical politics, will be capable of any form of self-government. That being so, we are not playing an honest part if we use words or maintain a silence which can be represented. as con- veying a contrary impression. We must guard against misunderstanding at all costs. When we say that the people of Egypt are not, and as far as we can tell will not become, capable of self-govern- ment, we do not of course mean that the Egyptian natives are not to be associated with the work of government and administration. We would give them their amplest share in such work, and would carry out to the full Lord Cromer's excellent principle of using Egyptian hands to execute the policy determined by English heads. By self- government we mean true self-government—the saying of the final word in matters of rule and of law, the shaping of the ultimate policy of the State, and the acceptance of complete Governmental responsibility by the people them- selves. Of self-government in this sense the people of Egypt are wholly incapable, and it is most misleading to suggest that there is any prospect of our being able to train them to carry out such responsibilities. By pretending that they can be so trained we are deluding them, and feeding them with shams and sophistries. To train them to do most important work as instruments of government is quite another matter. If, however, Egypt is to have justice, good government, peace, and civilisation, the final word must be said for many centuries by some strong, just, and external Power. Not only have we no objection to seeing the natives of Egypt trained to do the work of Judges, civilian administrators, irrigation officers, and of assisting in all the varied functions of government, but we hold it an imperative duty to provide such training. To talk, however, as if by doing this we shall fit the Egyptians to govern themselves without external control, just as we govern ourselves or the people of the United States govern themselves, may sound pleasant to the ear, but is in fact cruel and hypocritical. We are not going to leave Egypt, but shall continue to rule it in the interests of the Egyptians ; and it is our duty to make that fact perfectly clear to them no matter what amount of annoyance and indignation the announcement may cause to the Nationalists. We thank Mr. Roosevelt once again for giving us so useful a reminder of our duty in this respect.
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