The Social Crediter, Saturday, August 17, 1940..

;THE SOCIAL CREDITERFOR POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC REALISM

Vol. 4. No. 23. 6d. Weekly.Registered at G.P.O. as a NewspaperPostage (home and abroad) Id, SATURDAY, AUGUST 17, 1940.

THIS "AMERICAN':' BUSINESSBy C. H. DOUGLAS.

JOHN KENNETH HYATTCounselor at Law

30 Rockefeller PlazaNew York

16 'july, 1940.

./

Major C. H. Douglas,The Social Crediter,12, Lord Street, Liverpool.My dear Major Douglas,

I have been receiving for somemonths The Social Crediter, thru thecourtesy no doubt of some kind friend.In these tiines it is of importance as wellas interest to read the views of those inother parts of the world. However thereis so much that is constructive and worthwhile that one can not permit oneselfindefinitely to waste time on that whichis not. Therefore I ask that you dis-continue sending me your publication.

It indeed seems deeply regretableat a time when English speaking peoplein all parts of the world should be unitedin thought at least in the common causethat you and your associates should befostering feelings of antagonism by yourunwarranted defamations of The UnitedStates which you have the poor taste tomail to us in this country. Your refer-ence in the June 29th issue to theGerman- Jew-American Crooks is dis-gusting and your remark that in threemonths (of the last war) Germany wasdecisively defeated is stupid. If it weretrue, what depths of degradation andimpotence these two great nations havesunk to in twenty-five years!

Very truly yours,John Kenneth Hyatt.

The letter which is reproducedabove seems to me to afford an oppor-tunity to deal faithfully with a matterwhich I believe to be perhaps moreimportant than any other at the moment.As it was not marked "Private" and, inspite of the form of address, I am notaware of having met Mr. John KennethHyatt, I feel sure he will not object to

the publicity thus given to it. I hopethat his, to me, unknown benefactor willcontinue to send him this journal untilhe has had an opportunity to considerwhat I am about to say.

In the first place, I quite understandthat Mr. Hyatt is annoyed. Regardinghim as a typical decent American (ofwhom I know, and like, hundreds) Ishould expect him to be annoyed.Obviously I intended him to be annoyed.

Because the point I am endeavour-ing to make to him, not, it would seem,without success, is that, writing as I amdoing at this moment within sound offaIling bombs, and only a few miles fromwhere the flower of Europe, and in my.opinion, of the World, is engaged inmutual extermination, it does not reallyinterest me that "English speaking peoplein all parts of the world should be unitedin thought at least in the common cause".I don't think the common cause (bywhich I mean his, and mine, not that ofthe U.S. or other Government) is goingto be' furthered by that kind of thought.

Because I think that certain power-ful influences in the United States withconfederates in Europe, and particularlyin Germany, but not excluding England,are directly responsible for this war,I am equally convinced that it isthe business of Mr. Hyatt and thoseAmericans like him, to realise that, whileas individuals they would repudiate thataccusation, they are responsible for thepolicy of their Government, and must bejudged by it, even if it is inspired fromnon-representative sources. And mypractical objective is to see, to the extentof any small influence I might have, thateither the Mr. Hyatts of . Americashoulder t.he responsibility for theirGovernment's policy,' and modify it, orthat as many people as possible in Great .Britain and the British Empire shouldknow exactly where - that unmodifiedpolicy will lead them.

Although it is not the beginning, itis quite convenient to start from Mr.Hyatt's statement that "your remark thatin three months (of the last war)Germany was decisively defeated, isstupid". Passing over the fact thatthis is the opinion of all competent milit-ary critics, of whom, of course, I cannotclaim to be one, I do not think Mr. Hyattunderstands what was meant by thestatement. Perhaps I may explain itto him.

All German strategy for dealingwith a War on two fronts was based onthe "Theory of Interior Lines", that,being inside a circle, you can get to agiven point on the circumference quickerthan if you are outside.

In August, 1914, Germany con-fidently relied on this factor to smashFrance, and Great Britain's Expedition-ary Force, to a time-table which wouldenable her to detach her Western Armyto deal with the formidable force ofRussia on her Eastern Front. When VonKluck swung right at the Marne, Ger-many's major stategy collapsed. It wasimpossible for her to release sufficientmen to face a Russian Army of even halfthe number of men of whom Russiadisposed. What really happened inRussia will probally never be fully known.She was most certainly not beaten byGerman arms. Tannenberg was a

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Page 2 THE SOCIAL CREDITER Saturday, August 17, 1940..

massacre, not a battle.What we do know is

(a) That Mr. Walter Hines Page,American Ambassador in London,cabled to President Wilson at theoutbreak of War "The BritishEmpire is delivered into ourhands ", which it certainly wouldnot have been if Germany hadbeen defeated in six months.

(b) That the German Embassy in theUnited States banked with Kuhn,Loeb & Co., of New York, andthat Kuhn, Loeb did everythingin their power to secure thesuccess of Germany by the dis-ruption of Russia. We haveJacob Schiff's own authority forthis. We know that Germanyquite naturally collaborated inSchiff's plans.

(c) We have the authority of Sir CecilSpring-Rice, British Ambassadorto Washington, for the belief thatPresident Wilson, during 1914-15-16 was almost completelycontrolled by Kuhn, Loeb,(i.e., the Schiffs and Warburgs).Unfortunately, Sir Cecil Spring-Rice died suddenly-on his 'wayto England to report further onthe matter.

(d) We know that Great Britain andFrance poured munitions andequipment into Russia, none ofwhich was allowed to reach theArmies, and that the scandalbecame so flagrant that LordKitchener and a specialist staffwere deputed to go to Russia toendeavour to straighten mattersout, and. that the "Hampshire"on which this Mission travelled,was sunk under highly suspiciouscircumstances.

(e) We know that as a result of allthis, Germany was relieved of thewar on two fronts, not by forceof arms, but by treachery and the"Dark Forces", a condition ofaffairs curiously similar to thecollapse of Belgium and France inthe present war. Germany thenbegan what was, in effect, a newwar, which cost millions of Frenchand British lives.

(f) We know that, when Britain,France, and Germany, now bal-anced so that a quick and decisivevictory was impossible, had fought

themselves to a standstill, certainterms, by which inter alia GreatBritain alone underwrote the costof the war in gold and, we stronglysuspect, mortgaged control of theso-called Bank of England assecurity for a payment which nevercould be made, and which theUnited States Government knewcould never be made, were agreed,and the United States entered, andwon the war with comparativelynegligible loss, Kuhn, Loeb co-operating. The Balfour Declara-tion on the Jewish Home producedthe well-known American "wisecrack": "We may'nt be a Mon-archy, but we made Balfour anEarl, anyway".

(g) We know that the Warburg familywas represented at the PeaceConference both on the side ofGermany and on the side of hermilitary opponents.

(h) We know that the only sanemethod (i.e. method of war-avoidance) of dealing withGermany at the Peace Conferencewas to insist that the artificialBismarckian Reich.c--shculd be--broken up, and that Germanyshould revert to the largely inde-pendent states of which she isnaturally and culturally composed.But that the whole weight of theUnited States was thrown againstthis policy, and the League of Na-tions, the misbegotten child ofJewish centralisation, was foistedon an unwilling and exhaustedEurope, disowned by its progen-itors, and left to be a convenientcentre for financial and politicalintrigue.

(i) We know that, in association withthe "Bank of England", Britishpolicy has been dragged at the tailof Wall and Pine Street since1917 with catastrophic results.Every attempt at rational reform,or even normal progress, has beenblocked by reactionary Finance.The attempted return to the GoldStandard in 1925 under transat-lantic pressure, was one instance,and the cool transfer of a loss of£42,000,000, advanced by the"Bank of England" to the CreditAnstalt et al., to the ExchangeEqualisation Account (i.e., the

British taxpayer) was another. Thegrinding and unnecessary taxation 0on a scale unequalled outside GreatBritain is another. ~I

Had we been allowed to use t.heartificial depression of 1928-33 tobuild up our air strength, therewould have been no war.

(j) We have fairly good authority forthe statement that Hitler wasfinanced both from the UnitedStates and the "Bank of England"because he attacked "Reparations",i.e. payments to France and Eng-land on Public Account; and thusmade possible the payment toKuhn, Loeb & Co. of the very .large post-war loans they had madeboth to Germany and Germanindustrialists.

(k) We know that Russia, having beenreduced to scrap value, has been"reconstructed" (and how! ) largelyto the advantage of the German-American - Jew interests whichcaused her wreck.

(1) We noticed the storm=ef -abuse __which swept the Press of the 1-

United States when; in September, \wi.)1938, it appeared barely possible'that another Great War might beaverted, the speeches of UnitedStates Senators, such as SenatorPittman, exhorting us that it wasbetter to die than to live disgraced,and we have not failed to remarkthe assumption that the BritishIslands and their population don'treally matter very much if theBritish Fleet is available to protectthe American Atlantic seaboard,and so forth. We don't attachundue importance to these thingsbut we observe them, meditatively.

Now I feel sure Mr. Hyatt willagree that there is a repetitivepattern running through the necessarilysketchy picture I have endeavoured todraw in answer to his letter. And Ihasten to assure him once again that Idon't imagine he, or Americans like him,are engaged in schemes of internationalexploitation. Nor do I suggest for onemoment that the United States has amonopoly of crooks. On the contrary,we have a very flourishing Branch Officeover here, many of whom, like his localbrand, profess the most exalted principles. v)

What I am suggesting, with all theseriousness of which I am capable, is \......1/

Saturday, August 17, 1940. THE SOCIAL CREDITER Page 3

•~ that the artless assumption that all thevirtues reside in the Governm~nt of Lhe

i.J United States for the time being, andthat European Governments are some-thing quite different, simply will not do.On the whole all Governments arerather worse in 1940 than they were in1914, because they have become morepowerful tools of "interests", and so taras Governments go, there is absolutelyno ground for assuming that there isany deviation from the pattern to whichI have referred, or that the chaos of thetwenty years armistice would deter the

"interests" from preparing the groundfor more disasters.

As Mr. Chamberlain, who is sounpopular in Washington, has said, "Weare fighting evil things". These evil thingswould be comparatively powerless ifpeople like Mr. Hyatt and myself werenot organised into increasingly powerfulmasses capable of being used. for pur-poses of which we disapprove.

Let there be no misapprehensionabout it. We, in Great Britain, intendto win this war, which in my opinion,has been thrust upon us, and we shallbe really and truly grateful for assistance

to that end. But I think that oJ amspeaking for all but an infinitesimalminority of the population. of thiscountry when I say that we would rathergo down fighting than "win" and havethe terms of "Peace" imposed byAgencies, acting through Governments,which plotted the war in order to im-pose them, alike on the "Victors" andthe Vanquished. Therefore, we intendto win the Peace, also, this time.

NEWS &"Yes, we have some Bahamas!"

It would be kind of U. S. A.To let some succour come our way.To let us have some obsoleteAdditions to the British Fleet .But what they'd ask us in returnIs something we have yet to learn.

- Excalibur.• • e

In January, 1921 the ScottishLabour Advisory Committee, after strongopposition by Mr Emmanuel Shinwell,who is a Jew, born in London and nowa Scottish "Labour" Front Bench M.P.,·asked the Miners' Federation (not the"Labour" Party) to investigate the SocialCredit Mining Scheme, with a strongrecommendation in favour of it.

In some mysterious manner, the"Labour" Party side-tracked the Miners'Federation; and appointed a Committeeof its own. Sixteen months afterwardsa report so preposterous that none ofthe Committee would sign it, althoughthey sponsored it, appeared, condemningthe Scheme. The Committee consistedof: C. D. Burns, F. C. Clegg, G. D.H. Cole, Hugh Dalton, Arthur Green-wood, F. Hodges, C. M. Lloyd, Sir LeoChiozza Money, R. H. Tawney, SydneyWebb. .

We don't know what happened toMessrs. Burns, Clegg, and Lloyd. Mr.Hodges (Miners' Federation) was almostimmediately after the issue of the Reportmade a Director of the Bank of England,Messrs. Cole and Tawney becameFellows of Oxford Colleges, Dr. HughDalton (Sir Ernest Cassel Reader inCommerce, London School of Econom-

VIEWSics) is a Cabinet Minister, so is Mr.Arthur Greenwood, Sydney Webb(Chairman of the Statesman PublishingCompany whose paper The New States-man, attacked the scheme before thereport was published) is a Peer, Sir LeoChiozza Money-er-hem.

The Labour Party? Oh, yeah.e. • e

While his father was Prime Minis-ter, Mr Oliver Baldwin published a seriesof articles on Machiavelli, with a crypticwarning to the British Public. Odd,wasn't it?

• e· e

Roosevelt has ordered Mr. JohnCudahy, the Uuited States Ambassadorin Brussels, to return home, which Mr.Cudahy is said to be doing posthaste,from London, after giving an interview-the cause of the American President'sorder-to a representative of the PressAssociation.

The affair has points of interest,not the smallest of which is the Ambass-ador's assertion that he thought thefeeling of Belgians was one of attach-ment to the British, "and they knewthat the British cause was their cause."

• e eThe Ambassador's offense is that he"talked". His views--or 'certain ofthem'-are "not to be construed asrepresenting the views" of the Amer-ican Government. By implication, theunpopular 'view' held by Mr. Cudahyis a view favourable to King Leopold,who, he says, informed-"and fullyinformed" -the Allies three days beforehe acted upon his decision to surrender.

Mr. Cudahy denied he had heard of"one authentic case of atrocity since theGermans went in." He also advocatedUnited States co-operation with theGermans in feeding the Belgians.Whether this suggestion or what amountsto an accusation of lying against M.Reynaud appears the more heinousoffense to American eyes is not madeclear. It is fairly clear that Mr.Sumner Welles and the Ambassador arein disagreement.

The important' letter from MajorDouglas published in The Social Crediterfor August 3 defined a plane of cleavagecommon to England and America. "Thereal Britain, and the real America, havesustained one defeat after another. Butthe final battle is yet to come." IfCommander Sir Archibald Southby'splea that the Ministry of Informationshould supply information instead ofmanufacturing the raw materials ofInformation is attended to (and whynot?) we may hear more of both thereal England and the real America, andbe able more dearly to identify theirexponents. Meantime an eye should bekept on anyone who appears promising:people who both know and talk (par-ticularly when not desired by the Whigsto do so) always seem promising.

ULSTER AND EIRENewspapers sent abroad, including

The Social Crediter must be submittedto censorship. This occasions some delayin delivery of the 'paper to subscribers.Ulster and Eire are subject to censor-ship regulations. Subscribers shouldnote that any delay' that is occurring' isthe result of this censorship and cannotbe remedied by: us.

Page 4 THE SOCIAL CREDITER Saturday, August 17, 1940.

PLAIN Mr. JO,HNSON (II)By B. M. PALMER

.;,; .

A conversation with a friend lastweek recalled to my memory" the"Autobiography of Anthony Trollope"

He was not a man of letters, buta gentleman who wrote books. Con-cerning them Nathaniel Hawthorne said:"They precisely suit my taste,--solidand substantial, written on the strengthand through the inspiration of ale,and just as real as if some gianthad hewn a great lump out of the earthand put it under a glass case, with allits inhabitants going about their dailybusiness, and not suspecting that theywere being made a show of. And thesebooks are just as English as a beef steak."

Anthony Trollope would haveknown exactly what was meant by"plain Mr. Johnson", for he was "plainMr. Trollope".

So I took a copy of his autobi-ography from the library, and onre-reading Michael Sadleir's prefacerecalled that when the first edition hadbeen sold out in "1883 the book -wasunobtainable until it was reprinted in1922. It "extinguished its author's goodname for a quarter of a century, andvanished." Where; other writers foundneglect, "he found' -contempt, in somequarters hatred."

I:", .AriJi'th,is was a man who duringhis ~lifetime had made over £70,000 bythe sale o( his books, not because he wasa mere "best seller" who had to tellstories, but because he had stories to tell.

The reasons for the suddendisappearance of certain books are fre-quently extremely interesting. MichaelSadleir suggests that it was the"aggressive horse-sense of his views onlife," which killed Trollope's reputationin the 80's.

Trollope was a civil servant untilthe age of fifty-two. He viewed withmisgiving the introduction of the com-petitive examination system into theService, because it was based on. the ideaof equality. There are places in life,he says, which can hardly be well filledexcept by gentlemen, though no onenow dares to say so in print. The sonof the butcher may be as well qualifiedas the parson's son, but the chances aregreatly in favour of the parson's. Thegates of one class must, of course, be

\

open.w the other, budio &ood whatevercan be done by declaring' that there isno difference between them.

"Privilege produces ten winners-genuine winners-to one produced bywork, unprivileged"("Whose Service is Perfect Freedom,"January 13.)

A man who indulged a life-longpassion for cross country riding mightbe expected to understand what is meantby breeding. Trollope kept a stableuntil he was an old man.

He entirely failed "to reach thealtitude of those who think that a mandevoted to letters should be indifferentto the pecuniary results for which workis usually done. An easy income hasalways been regarded by me as a greatblessing. Not to have to think of six-pences, or very much of shillings; notto be unhappy because the coals haveburned too quickly, and the house linenwants .re-newing; not .ro-be-debarred bythe rigour of necessity from openingone's hands, perhaps foolishly, to one'sfriends, all this to me has been essentialto the comfort of life."

He became Chairman of the "Fort-nightly" revit;w with the determinationthat the periodical should provide someincrease in literary honesty-i-vwe wouldlet any man who had a thing to say, andknew how to say it, speak freely. Buthe should always speak with theresponsibility of his name attached."Unfortunately he did not include purelypolitical articles in this ruling. Partypolitics seems the one subject in regardto which his sound common sense stoodhim in small stead-though we mustremember that the party politics of lastcentury, conducted. by men of independ-ent incomes; was very different from theparty politics of to-day ~ "When it isnecessary to affect the judgement of onlya small number of comparatively well-educated people, constantly in touch witheach other, and familiar with the practiceand technique of governmental action,a change of policy is easy and can becomparatively rapid. But such is notthe case to-day."

At the last general election (1936)the wife of a member for a large townin the Midlands indiscreetly remarked

that she did not know how they wouldlive if her husband lost his seat. Thiscreated quite a sensation among thesentimental idealists of the place; butit also helps to explain why it is nowunheard of for a government to beturned out by its own supporters,although before the middle of thenineteenth century this not infrequentlyhappened. Party politics, Trollope wouldsurely have said, can only be wellconducted by gentlemen.

The unrecognised dishonesty ofmuch literary criticism, the bribery andcorruption and back-stairs influenceexerted to obtain favourable pressnotices, Trollope considered to bea marked evil in English literature. Itwas a few words from this portion ofhis biography which first drew myattention to his way of looking at things;and I think that, few as those words are,they hold the key to the service whichis perfect freedom.

'IDemands for praise are, he says,

disgraceful in every walk of life, and ~adds:-

"As censure should beget no anger,so should praise beget no gratitude .Praise let the author try to obtain bywholesome effort; censure let him avoid,·trpossible by care and industry. But'when they' come, let him take them ascoming from some·' source which hecannot influence, and with which heshould not meddle."

There speaks plain Mr. Johnson.It is he alone who knows, among thepeoples of this world, that as a personalsoul he has a right to an existence whichneeds no justification from his fellowbeings. The Kingdom of Heaven iswithin him. What need has he of praise?

Perhaps this is the last and mostdifficult lesson which we have to learn,and when we have learned. it we arefree indeed. Without it, I do notbelieve ·that the material freedom forwhich we are fighting on so many fronts,can exist. There is no freedom for anation of specialists whose only right toexistence is as state functionaries. PlainMr. Johnson is above criticism.

This must never be forgotten. ~Read his life. You will smile at 1

his Victorianism; but you will lament "-what we have lost, even since 1870.

Saturday, August 17, 1940. THE SOCIAL CREDITER Page 5

"Look to the Land" by Lord Northbourne.7/6. J. M. Dent & Sons Limited.

It is a peculiar thing that a manwho, like Lord Northbourne, can giveexpression to so much sound thoughtcan still mistake a symptom for a cause,In his view the cause of the social andeconomic troubles which beset theworld is neglect of the land, anda defective distributive system, such asour present money system, is an effectof it. Thus we read:

"There can be no real solution ofthe problem of distribution other thana rebuilding of society on a soundorganic basis, which must involve a.better distribution of the population,both within most countries and in theworld as a whole. To attempt tolook at· the problem of distributionin isolation is to be led into thesnare of 'planned economy'--equallya snare whether the planning be doneby the State, or by private interestsholding quasi-monopolistic powers.The only possible foundation for a.sound organic life within any com-munity is a close association of thepeople with the land."

Yet in the next paragraph we aretold: .

" ..... ,Such conditions are not im-possible of attainment, and. .willprobably come about of themselves ifthe main obstacles to the evolutionof a free and natural economy areremoved, and if circumstances forceupon people a clearer realization ofwhere their true interests lie "

and we have been told earlier in thebook that:

"The true economy of farming haslargely been obscured by the obtru-siveness of a superimposed financialeconomy "

But, having recognised this, LordNorthbourne runs away from it:-

"The real situation is one of povertyin essentials amid plenty of non-essentials. Expressed in financial termsonly, poverty has been greatly reducedin the past few decades..... That is thereal question. We have plenty of man-ufactured goods and more if we wantthem. We can have plenty of moneyas soon as we care to allow money tobe equated to production; .

TO THE_'.

"Industry was made for man; yet1Jl.en,are .now looked on as being crea-tures useful to industry--either as'machine .minders, 'salesmen, or; mostimportant to-day, as buyers of theproducts of industry. This outlookprevails among many modern reform-ers, especially monetary reformers,whose main idea seems. to be to makemen more efficient purchasers, so asto relieve the machine of its presentchronic constipation "

Faulty reasoning, however, is defin-itely the exception and not the rule inthis book. The author sees things theright way up and expresses a wisdomwhich this country is in dire need ofto-day, for he has the organic conceptionof life:

"The spiritual value of contactwith reality, of feeling oneself part ofnature, like all the most valuablethings, is not statistically measurable,but is no less real for that. Closecontact with living things brings akind of wisdom not always appreciated

~by those to whom such things are un-familiar, to whom in fact it .oftenappears as a kind of slowness. .Thiswisdom comes through a gradualabsorbtion, usually unaccompanied byconscious realization or power to putinto words,. of the principles whichgovern the behaviour of living things,of which man is but ,<)b.~:" . :

"Farmers have a reputation forindividualism and independence. Theseare sound qualities, but they are notappreciated . in modern. large scalebusiness. (But then that is a debasedform of organization.) They are notincompatible with the highest forms ofsocial organization-indeed they grveit value; for they improve the qualityof the smallest units, from which anysuch organization must grow. Nothingcan grow downwards- .from the top.'The master's foot fats the soil' is atrue saying. The farmer must bemaster of his plot, however small.He then really cares personally for it,more than for what he can get out ofit, which is the first condition for thebuilding up of a sound biologicalunit .

"It is one of the consequences ofthe obscure and uncomnrehended stateof helplessness to which the individual

LANDhas been reduced by prevalent con-ditions that most people, when theythink about putting into practice anyidealistic conception, think of theproblem in terms of organization.People even speak seriously of the'organization of prosperity,' as ifprosperity were something reducibleto formula, and as if all would bewell if only the right organizationcould be brought about. That is badenough, but it becomes worse whenthe bringing about of the right organ-ization is not distinguished from theimposition by some kind of authorityof a sufficient degree of organization.The worship of organization has gainedsuch strength that it has amongits adherents a large number ofcomparatively intelligent or at leastintellectual people. Its chief advocatesoften exhibit a conscious intellectualsuperiority which is evidence of noth-ing more than their own lack ofhumility.

"Organization and planning meancontrol, either by the State, or, in the

'. minds of people who dislike Statecontrol, by 'captains of. industry.'Political parties differ chiefly in thekind of control they desire to impose:'

Whilst, apart from the importantreservation of mistaking cause for effect,the author has a very fair appreciation ofthe falsities in our present financial andeconomic situation, he evidences such. adespair that anything might be remediedby means of political action that politicsare virtually ignored by him.

"It is in fact difficult to see howmuch real improvement can comeabout until people cease to expectanything whatever of the Government,and consider instead how they canmake themselves, and then their neigh-bourhood, most independent of it .

"We can only hope that the Britishgenius for adaption may. be allowedto effect all necessary changes .as itwere imperceptibly, and without

. hurry."There are however several passages

in the book which demonstrate a reali-sation of some of the factors whichrealists in politics must take account ofif they are not to pursue planned actionin place of organic politics.

J.M.

Page 6 THE SOCIAL CR:EDITER Saturday, August 17, 1940.

for such a crisis. Capital must protectitself in every possible manner throughcombination and legislation.' ~.

"The courts must be called to ouraid. Debts must be collected, bondsand mortgages foreclosed as rapidly aspossible.

"Where, through a process of law,*the comon people have lost their homes,they will be more tractable and easilygoverned through the influence of thestrong arm of government applied bycentral power of imperial wealth underthe control of leading financiers.

"The truth is well known amongour principal men now engaged in form-ing an imperialism of capital to governthe world. While they are doing this,the people must be kept in a conditionof political antagonism.

"The question of tariff reformmust be urged through the organizationknown as the Democratic Party, and thequestion of protection and reciprocitymust be forced to view through theRepublican Party.

"By thus dividing the voters, wewe can get them to expend their ener-gies in fighting over questions of noimportance to us except as teachers tolead the common herd. Thus by ~discreet actions we can secure all thathas been so generously planned andsuccessfully accomplished."

THE SOCIAL CREDITERThis journal expresses and supports the policy of the Social CreditSecretariat, which is a non-party, non-class organisation neither connectedwith nor supporting any political party, Social Credit or otherwise.

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Saturday, August 17, 1940.

In an issue (August 10) which con-tains, so far as we can discover, no wordof news about the Riom trials, TheTimes presumes that 'no further report'of the tribunal will be published for along time to come. 'Heterogeneous' isthe word chosen to describe the accusedand the charges against them. Theformer are 'scapegoats', and their namesand the sentences passed upon them willbe known 'probably many weeks' hence.

So far as any evidence to the con-trary may be forthcoming in thiscountry, The Times, which after all, has· a good deal of 'say' in what reaches theknowledge of Englishmen, may prove tobe right (or prove its-If to be right);but one .wonders whether The Times isalways safe to presume on much more

· than the notorious shortness of memoryof the public, A method. of 'checking-up' of The. Times which provided· illumination concerning that newspaper'streatment of the Alberta Experiment wasthe simple expedient of pasting upcuttings from its pages from day to day.Concerning the Riom Trials, someinteresting cuttings concerning the move-ments of M. Mandel (and somecontradictory news of the movements ofcertain other persons) are already avail-able, from which it appears that theanxiety shown by The Times concerningevents which at all events it deems to

· be 'many weeks distant' is not entirelyexplained by the conventionally-phrasedcharges disposed of, in advance, by itsleader-writer. On one point The Timesmay be commended: - .

There should be no disposition inEngland to prejudge the issue of thesetrials. Especially if •the tribunal canbe induced, or is allowed, to publishthe facts that it establishes, they mayin the long run do good.

Mr. Robert Nichols intervenes in

TRIAL,Sthe debate. Why must we have thecomment- before the facts-particularlysince the facts are admittedly not publicproperty? And isn't it curious howconvinced 'reputable' news agencies inthis country are that to obtain (muchmore to sell) a report of the proceedingswould amount almost to high treason?We shall have to try the Ministry ofInformation.

• • •Through a Process of Law

Described as the "full text" of anotorious and often quoted article whichappeared in the United States iBankers'Magazine of 1892, the following is re-produced by the New Era, with thesuggestion that it should be filed forreference:

"We must proceed with caution,and guard well, every move made, forthe lower orders of people are alreadyshowing signs of restless commotion.

"Prudence will, therefore, dictate apolicy of apparently yielding to thepopular will until all of our plans. areso far consummated that we can declareour designs without fear of any organisedresistance.

"The Farmers' Alliance, and theKnights of Labor, organizations in theUnited States should be carefullywatched by our trusted men, and wemust .take immediate steps to controlthese organizations in our interests ordisrupt them.

"The coming .Omaha convention,to be held July 4th, our men must attendand direct its movements,' or else therewill be set on foot such antagonism toour designs as may require force toovercome.',

"This, at the present time, wouldbe premature. We are not yet ready

* "Through a process of law"-Englishreaders may recall, as a characteristic ex-ample, the determination displayed topreserve quite gratuitously offensive features(e.g. compulsion, stigmatised by Mr. Mal-colm Macdonald as 'impossible') of thebilleting scheme, which Lady Reading andothers advocated so strenuously. Bye the bye,could any reader who specialises in analysisof literary styles suggest the Banker-stylist'sidentity-or, alternatively, a twin productionof the same hand?

Mr. LOFTUS'S SPEECHTo the Editor.Dear Sir,

In connection with my letter of July31, published in your issue of August 10,I should like, at the earliest moment tosay that I have received a courteousexplanation from Mr. Loftus in regardto the paragraph in his speech of July25, to which I took exception, whichmakes it. dear that the paragraph inquestion was misreported in Hansard.

.Yours, etc., ~C. H. DOUGLAS. "

Saturday, August 17, 1940. THE SOCIAL OltEDITER Page 7

BACKING B,OTH SIDESBy JOHN MITCHELL

The policy to which the British Government is givingeffect follows so closely that which has been and is beingpreached week by week by The Economist that two leadingarticles which have recently appeared in its pages, one onJuly 20 and the other on August 3, would deserve seriousattention even if one did not know who controls the policyof that journal. One of these articles was entitled "England'sExample" and the other "Dynamic Democracy".

The first article begins by repeating the words of Pitt:"England will save herself by her exertions and Europeby her example". It is with the "example" by which weare to "save" Europe that The Economist is concerned mthese articles, and it takes as its text: "we must answerthe Nazi dynamic with one of our own. We must imposeon others our own conviction that our system is not onlyphysically stronger than Hitler's, but morally preferable andemotionally more attractive".

The discerning will be suspicious of the phrasing ofthose sentences, for whilst they carry superficially asuggestion that we are fighting "Hitler" because we arefundamentally opposed to all for which he stands, we donot have to read much more before discovering that in theview of The Economist we are fighting this war to establishEnglish "Hitlerism" in the place of German "Hitlerism",exoterically stated by The Economist as the "EnglishDynamic" in place of the "Nazi Dynamic". We read:

"I "We have avoided the doctrinal excesses with whichnew ideas have forced themselves on our Continentalneighbours. But we have never avoided the new ideasthemselves. On the contrary, the English tradition hasbeen to welcome them with eager curiosity and to graftthem on to the continuing growth of the nation. Wefought the French Revolution and its heirs for a quarterof a century-and emerged not only as the most liberalnation in Europe but as the avowed champion of Liber-alism. The secret formula of England is to be at onceconservative and progressive, to press forward with newideas just as fast as the mass of the people can becarried along, but no faster."

" The English tradition is not to bow the head tothe East, whether it be to Mecca, to Munich or to Moscow,but to see what can be taken from each new fanaticismto enrich our own heritage."

In the opinion of The Economist we can absorb the"careful, far-sighted planning and cohesive organisation" ofthe "Nazi-Fascist heresy" and the "joy with which the in-dividual citizen ~gives his service to the community". Itwould seem that The Economist is determined that althoughwe resist the German armed forces' we should not resistthe Nazi-Fascist ideas. Let us adopt them under the guisethe eclecticism and by calling things by different names!How? When we come to the article "Dynamic Democracy"we find that "All that is necessary is to see what is underour noses, to take some temporary expedient that is forcedupon us by war and, with such adjustments as' are necessary,

I build it into the permanent structure of our growingdemocracy [sic] ... '... "

"There are here the makings of a new Social Contract

between the citizen and the State. By the gradual additionof one temporary expedient to another, we are, in actualpractice (though we may not realise it) drawing up a modernBill of Rights "

The Economist would have the Bill of Rights of our"growing democracy" include: "freedom of speech, writingand religion, the right to a fair trial, the subordination ofall government to the rule of law." The ease with whichThe Economist can talk about democracy (which can betruly described as government in accordance with the willof the people) as being in conformity with the subordinationof all government to the rule of law is typical of thechicanery which permeates almost every line of both articles.Admittedly "rule of law" is not defined, but everythinggoes to show that the term is not intended to refer to theonly natural law to which government can be subordinated-the will of the people.

It is further proposed that the Bill of Rights shouldhave its counterpart in a Bill of Duties.

" In a modern community there. are a thousandways in which the citizen can give his personal serviceto the State, and the minimum of Rights will be morecherished if it is paid for by a minimum of Duties. Fortoo long have we thought and talked of the State, animpersonal dispenser of free doles; we must now think ofthe community, the common-wealth, to which we give,from which we receive, of which we are all members. Thisis the democratic answer to one of the great problems ofthe age, the proper relations between the citizen and theState. We are fighting Hitler because we detest thesolution that he has imposed. Here is a means by which,while the war is still in progress, we can establish 'ourown solution and proclaim the faith by which we liveand die."

There is no fundamental distinction between the"solution" urged by The Economist and that being imposedby Hitler. Both of them are for the subordination of theindividual to the institution, and the institution to inter-national law; this international law being administered bythe same group of people who financed the Bolshevikrevolution and the Nazi revolution and who are behindThe Economist. "Feudal levies of private monopolies,"The Economist calls them: - . .

"Within the last generation, the British national econ-omy has been converted from one based on competitivefree enterprise into one whose strategic centres. arecontrolled. But the occupying forces are not those ,ofthe State, still less do they fly the flag of the. publicinterest; they are the feudal levies of private monopolies.The effect of combining a policy of Protection with adeliberate encouragement to monopoly has been to putthe country in thrall to the ring, the combine and thecartel. Even before the outbreak of the war there .washardly an important price in the whole country that wasnot rigged by those who charged it; The irony of thematter is that this system was frequently referred to ascontrol by the producers; but the emergency of war hasshown that to produce is the one thing our costive neo-

Page 8 THE SOCIAL OREDITER Saturday, August 17, 1940.

feudalism finds the utmost difficulty in doing."The Economist however appears to have reached the

conclusion that the "State" should now relieve the "occu-pying forces", the "feudal levies of private monopolies",because, in a further leading article entitled "Governmentby Exhortation", it is said:

"We have got beyond the stage where the Governmentcan regard industry as something external to itself, fromwhich it purchases what it wants and takes .no respon-sibility for the rest. We have reached the stage wherethe Government must assume responsibility for the totalorganisation of industry. Manufacturers and merchantswould be, in effect, the Government's agents, guaranteeda restricted profit, insured against loss by Governmentaid and mutual arrangements, and prevented by the rigidrationing of materials from diverting their resources toneedless work. Workers would be the Government's

servants, and they would be prevented from withholdingtheir labour or wasting it in unnecessary employment.Every life and every piece of property are now at theGovernment's disposal; the counterpart is that the Gov-ernment should find a useful task for every machine andevery pair of hands."

It is pointed out !l!!er in the same article that "A fewweeks ago" The Economist put forward the maxim "IfHitler can do it, we can." To this The Economist thinksmight be added the further precept "If it is necessary towin the war, it can be done."

These outbursts from The Economist came shortly afterit began to appear that Hitler's plans to invade Britain werenot working out as it was anticipated they would do. TheBritish people are making it necessary to win the war.Perhaps they will soon recognise the necessity of dealingwith the Real Enemy who is backing both sides.

-,\,

EYE ON PARLIAMENTThe following passages are taken from the House of Commons Official Report (Editor, P. Cornelius), known

as 'Hansard'. The date and occasion of the words are given above each section, and the speakers' names bythe side. The number of columns occupied by the printed report of each section cited is also given. Lackof space imposes a severe limitation on the selection of matter for reproduction.

July 30. Oral answers: to questions.(42 columns)

Mr. G. Strauss asked the PrimeMinister whether the Swinton Committeeis attached to any special GovernmentDepartment?

The Prime Minister (Mr. Churchill):I have already told the House in answerto a Question last week by the hon. Mem-ber that it is not in the public interestto give information about this committeeor other committees connected with Sec-ret Service, counteracting Fifth Columnactivities and the like. I take full re-sponsibility for the control, character andcomposition of the committee, whichcontains among others a prominentttrade union leader.

Mr Strauss: Can the Prime Ministersay how long the trade union leader hasbeen a member of this Committee;whether this Committee is in any wayresponsible for the police searches whichare going to many parts of the coun-try in homes of Labour and trades unionofficials, and does he approve of theprohibition-

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Membermust confine his Supplementary Ques-tions to the subject of the Question on thePaper and the answer. I cannot allowall these Questions to be asked.

Mr. Strauss: May I ask this Ques-tion, which, I submit, arises directly out

'\\

"'\

of the answer given by the PrimeMinister, who went into some detail?May I ask him whether he approves ofthe prohibition which has gone out thatno newspaper may mention thisCommittee without special permission?

The Prime Minister : Yes, Sir, andI am rather surprised that the hon.Gentleman persists in asking thisQuestion, The Government have statedon their own responsibility that they donot think that it is in the public interestthat this should be discussed.

Mr. Strauss: Is the Prime Ministeraware that there is very considerablepublic uneasiness about this matter?

• •Written answers (241 columns)

SUBSIDIES (COST OF LIVING).

Sir G. Mitcheson asked the Chan-cellor of the Exchequer the estimatedcost to the Treasury per annum of thepresent subsidies designed to preventincreases in the cost of living?

Sir K. Wood: At the present timesubsidies on articles of food enteringinto the Cost-of-Living Index are at therate of approximately £53,000,000 ayear. This figure does not include any-thing in respect of losses which may beincurred by the Ministry of Food as aresult of the increases in price of homeagricultural products recently announced.

August 1.Emergency ·J;>owers (Defence)

(No.2) Bill.(11 columns)

Lords Amendment consideredCLAUSE l.-(Power to provide for trial

of offences by special courts incertain areas.)

"so, however, that provision shall be madefor such proceedings being reviewed by notless than three persons who hold or haveheld high judicial office, in all cases in whichsentence of death is passed, and in suchother circumstances as may be provided bythe Regulations.

Lords Amendment: In page 2, line22, at the end, to insert:

Mr. Shinwell (Seaham): I think wemay, without reserve, extend our con-gratulations to the right hon. Gentlemanon the- wisdom which he has displayedin formulating this Amendment. At thesame time we may congratulate ourselveson our part in having brought about thisdesirable state of affairs'. It is largelydue to the activities of hon. Membersthat we have reached the favourable con-clusion represented by this Amendment,and I am bound to say that, listening tothe right hon. Gentleman's speech thisafternoon, one hardly recognised him asthe Minister who spoke in our discussiona few days ago. This afternoon he spokewith a breadth of vision and humanitywhich was certainly foreign to his con- \,

Saturday, August 17~1940. THE SOCIAL CREDITER Page 9

tributions to our previous Debate. How-ever, it is not for us to complain andwe would rather see the right hon. Gen-tleman in his present guise than in therobes which he wore when we weredebating this matter last week.

• • •

,I

Adjournment-War- Time SocialSurvey. (42 Columns)

Commander Sir Archibald Southby(Epson) : I cannot think that nowis a proper time, whatever the scientificvalue of these investigations may be, toinstitute them when the ordinary house-wife and householder, if living at home,are much more exercised in their mindson many more matters.

Whether this a good scientific in-vestigation or not is surely a matter ofopinion, but collectors of statistics, somemedical men and every sort of crans,never cease trying to harry and use asspecimens members of the community, inthe interests of what the investigators arepleased to call science. I suggest that,so far as one can, the time has come toleave in peace the ordinary law-abidingcitizen of this country. Leave these'people reasonable freedom, and do nottreat them as a sort of scientific cannonfodder to be used as a ground on whichscientific investigators, whether. unleashedby the Ministry or any other organisa-tion, may work their wicked will .

......It does not seem to be anypart of the Ministry's duty, which thisHouse set the Ministry up to do, to gosnooping and spying round the homesof the ordinary citizens, who are alreadysufficiently harassed and perturbed.These people are exceedingly courageous,and are not in need of being told bythe B.B.C. to be courageous and to standup to the situation. Whatever may bewrong with the Ministry of Information,this country has not got the jitters, andis perfectly happy. There is a sort offeeling among investigators that you haveto stir up the people of this country.Leave the people of this country alone.They are not apathetic. They areworried, as everybody must be worriedby reason of the war, at this time, butthey are not jittery or worried in a waywhich makes it necessary for people tobe going round to find out exactly whatthey are thinking. These investigationsseem to me to be stupid and. unecessary.

There is something much more im-portant than that. The Ministry ofInformation is a Ministry to provideinformation. It is no part of its dutythat it should become a propagandaorganisation. Propaganda must of neces-

sity be tainted and tinged by the personalviews of the investigators who go round.under the segis of the right hon. Gentle-man. I am afraid that these people must,of necessity, in asking their questions,put over some form of propaganda. Onecannot imagine that the Noble Lady .heMember for the Sutton Division ofPlymouth (Viscountess Astor), if she hadbeen told to go round and find out thereaction of the ordinary individual of thiscountry to beer, would be able to ask herquestion on the subject of beer beingbad for people without conveying herown views .

...... That propaganda must ob-viously tinge the questions of theseinvestigators with their views is borneout by a most interesting criticismor critique which appeared in the"Daily Telegraph ". last February,written by the present ParliamentarySecretary to the Ministry of Information.He was reviewing a book called "Warbegins at home," by Mass Observation,compiled apparently by two gentlemen,Mr. Harrison and Mr. Madge. Theirorganisation would appear to be domgwhat the Ministry of Information hassent out these investigators to do. Whatthe connection may be between the twoorganisations I do not know. It _may beclose or it may not; . .

. ..... The most illuminating thingin this excellent critique is -and ofcourse, the Ministry of Information andothers should be most grateful for thisinformation-

"Interesting examples are provided of theunthinking optimism of the masses"-It is thereby obvious that the Ministerwould smile upon the activities of thismass-informed organisation. I amglad that the masses are optimistic. Itsometimes requires some effort to be ap-timistic. I said just now that I believedthat the masses were optimistic, exceed-ingly courageous and quite unworried.He went on to say:"of their indulgence in rumour, and of thebewilderment which assails them, owing tothe absence of news."The Ministry of Information has beenset up to provide the unthinking andbewildered masses with news. Perhapsthe masses would not be so overwhelmedif they had some news from the Ministryfor a change.. ........... I would like to give the House twoexamples of what is going on in regardto the activities of the Ministry ofInformation. Recently at Bournemouth,acting under the aegis of the Ministry,members of the Information Bureau were

instructed quietly to spread it around, asI am informed; that those who couldevacuate Bournemouth should do so.Nobody said a word to the town clerkabout this; he was not consulted. Herang up the Ministry of Information andgot on to somebody in a subordinatecapacity who confirmed that the instruc-tion had been given. The Regional Com-missioner was then communicated withand apparently knew nothing about it all.When he was asked, he said that suchinstructions were entirely contrary to thepresent policy of the Government andthat he considered that the spreading ofsuch information was wrong. I am in-formed that the town clerk got in touchwith a > high official of the Ministry of _Information who admitted that a mistakehad been made in sending out these in-structions. When it was pointed out thatthe least that could be done was totry to undo the harm that had beencaused the Ministry flatly refused to takeany steps in the matter. If that sort ofinstruction is going out, if the RegionalCommissioner is not being told, if thetown clerk who, after all, has someresponsibility for the town in which helives, is not allowed to know what isgoing on; if something is done contraryto the suggestion. "Stay where you areuntil invasion begins and only leave whenthe military authorities tell you to'-which seems to be the policy at themoment-and if the Ministry say, "Getout if you can," one can imagine thealarm and excitement which will beoccasioned, even in a place so quiet asBournemouth .

. ..... It is as wrong for a personwho holds views of which I approveto gointo a constituency of an hon. Memberopposite and propagate those views fromdoor to door, just as it is for somebodyelse holding views with which I disagreeto go into my constituency and pass thoseviews round.

Mr. Hubert Beaumont (Batley andMorley): Is it the hon. Member's view.therefore, that propaganda is not part ofthe work of the Ministry of Information?

Sir A. Southby: I think the work ofthe Ministry of Information is to give in-formation and not to create public opinionby going round the houses. With regardto this organisation called Mass Observa-tion, a book of which was reviewed bythe hon. Gentleman the ParliamentarySecretary, I have just seen its .latestbulletin. This organisation works inmuch the same way, presumably, as theseinvestigators. As I have said, I do notknow how much they are in liason. They

Page 10 THE SOCIAL CREDITER

may not be in liason at all, or they maybe in what is known as "close cahoots.'Anyway, this is going on and going onpari pasu with the work of the right hon.Gentleman's organisation.. Here is aninvestigator who is reporting something.which is happening in Worktown:

"War talk is down almost to nil again."Viscountess Astor (Plymouth, Sutton

Division: Thank heavens!, Sir A. Southby: The scien-tific investigator says that they aregetting in the crops and not talkingabout the war. That is what we wantthem' to do, to stop talking of the warandto get on with business of makingmunitions and getting the crops in, andwhen they do that, let us not call itapathy. There was once somebody who.said that he wanted to stir the natives ofIndia out of their "pathetic conten-ment." That is their apathy. I say:Leave the people of this country alone-

.Mr. Kenneth Lindsay (Kilmarnock):And not let them think?

Sir A. Southby: No, let them thinkin their own way. Do not try to be a sortof super-nursemaid. Let people haveviews of their own. Let them have alittle individual expression of opinion anddo not go snooping around and makingthem think in your particular way. ThisMass Observation document refers to thePress. It seems to me that we are stand-:jngin a position of some difficulty. Hereis a reference by the Mass Observationbulletin to the "Sunday Pictorial." Itquotes that paper as saying that there wasa week towards the end of July whichwould find a place of honour in thehistory of the fight for freedom. Itproceeds as follows:

"The editor then goes on to list 'the casefor jubilation,' i.e. (1) end of the silentcolumn, (2) review of alien internments andconsequent defeat for Sir John Anderson,.(3) defeat of Sir John Anderson over courts-martial and indeed from the point of veiwof defeating or retreating Governmentpolicies, the past few days have been terrific."They' complain that this newspapershould have expressed this view. Whathas happened in the last week has notbeen something wrong. It has been an•expression in this House of the opinionsof the Members of this House. ThisHouse has performed its proper duty; ithas expressed the views of its con-stituents. If the Government have had

.to alter or amend certain of their pro-posals, it is because the House has ex-pressed the view of the people outside.The hon, Member for Seaham (Mr.Shinwell) remarked to-day that if thisHouse had not debated' the Emergency

Powers Bill, but had let it be pushedthrough in five minutes, on the plea thatwe must have speed, the Amendmentwhich the House passed, in the interestsof the country, would not have been putinto the Statute. That is true. Ifinvestigators are going round and tellingpeople this as their view of what is beingdone in this House-"the case for jubil-ation," "end of the Silent Column,"etc.-these people are doing a disserviceto the State. They say:

"The retreat on overseas evacuation, theretreat on press censorship, the retreat ontaking away A.R.P. wardens' uniforms, theretreat of the Burma road, all these andothers reflect a bewildering lack of determina-tion or co-ordination in the Government. Forthe first time since Churchill became PrimeMinister, we have had a picture of Ministerialconfusion and obvious lack of foresight,exactly comparable to the Chamberlian winterperiod of chaotic legislation, which wedescribed and listed in 'War Begins atHome' (Chapter 13).

It cannot be right for investigators to tryto find out public opinion by putting sucha false construction on what has beendone in this House by the electedrepresentatives of the people.

Mr. Lindsay rose-Sir A. Southby: Let me finish this

point.Mr. Lindsay: I just wantedto put

this question.Sir A. Southby: Since the hon.

Member left his Ministerial job, in which,of course, he was silent on every subjectexcept his own, he has not been preparedto let any other hon. Member express aview.

Mr. A. P. Herbert (Oxford Univers-ity): Is the "Mass Observation" body, forwhich I share the hon. and gallant Mem-ber's detestation, now a part, or is theleader of that body now a part, of theorganisation of the Ministry of Informa-tion? If so, I am entirely with the hon.and gallant Member. It is important thatwe should know whether that is the case.

Sir A. Southby: One of thechannels whereby public opinion andcriticism may be expressed is this Houseof Commons--up to the present, at anyrate. Let us see to it that that channelis kept inviolate and intact. The otherchannel whereby reasonable criticismmay be levelled at Ministers or govern-ment or at policy is the Press of thiscountry. I venture to suggest that thisHouse has many shortcomings and manyfailures. The Press certainly havemany shortcomings and many failures.We are the best people to remedy. ourshortcomings, and it has always seemed

Saturday, August 17, 1940.

to me that the best people to remedy the \",shortcomings of the Press are the Pressthemselves. But the two things go to- 'gether-a free House of Commons ~9 afree Press. If you lose a free .•~youlose a free House of G0rr;J.riions,and ifyou lose a free House of' Commons youlose a free Press. At a time when we aretrying' to maintain freedom and libertyand are making every conceivable sacri-fice to that end, I suggest to my fellowMembers in the House of Commons thatwe should do everything we can not onlyto maintain our own freedom and thefreedom of the Press, but the freedom, asfar as we can, of the individual. .

...... I hope and trust that the right.hon. Gentleman, for whom I personallyhave the greatest regard, will do some-thing to meet a question which, howeverbadly I have expressed it, does arousea very real public resentment and appre-hension .

...... This is a demand which comesfrom people of all sorts and in all walksof life in this country, and I believe it isone to which he would do very well topay attention. There is no question ofattacking him personally, and, as somepeople are saying, of the Press attacking "-the Ministry of Information. I do notbelieve that that is true. I believe thatthey have a great apprehension that theirliberties were being jeopardised. I donot believe that he has meant to put themin jeopardy, but there are people in theMinistry of Information who would beonly too glad to smother the Press andto smother criticism in this House, andif this Debate has achieved no other use-ful purpose, it will at least have drawnattention to the feeling in the country inregard to the operation of these peoplewhich is causing a great deal of resent-ment throughout the land.

Viscountess Astor; I havewatched what has happened in this Housein regard to the Home Secretary. Therecould have been nothing more unfair thanthe universal outcry against the HomeSecretary. It should not have been done.

Mr Herbert: On a point of order.Is the Noble Lady entitled to refer toattacks on the Home Secretary?

... Mr. Speaker: The Noble Lady isquite in order on the Motion for theAdjournment.

Mr. Herbert: May I ask the Noble -,Lady why, if the nation is so united, asshe so truly says, it is necessary to have \,this canvass?

Saturday, August 17, 1940. THE SOCIAL CREDITER Page 11

European Background

I

(..(VI) THE MEDIEVAL CHURCH

-.By NORMAN F. WEBB

Even before the Emperor Constantine founded Constan-tinople and the Eastern Roman Empire in A.D. 330, theRoman State was beginning to break up, and lose unity andpurpose. From this time forward all vitality and concen-tration were in the East. Italy and Rome were largelyneglected and became a prey to all those forces that maketheir appearance on the removal of a highly centralizeddespotism. The setting up of a second line of Emperorsin Rome did nothing towards arresting this movement orchecking the barbaric invaders from North and North-Eastern Europe, who began to overrun and occupy almostthe whole of Italy.

The last Roman Emperor died in A.D. 572 and Italy,though still nominally under the rule of Constantinople,drifted further and further away under a process almost ofabsorbtion by successive Germanic occupations. It was reallyimpossible to rule or defend Italy from Constantinople andthe effort was early abandoned, and the Eastern Empire,fortunate in her natural impregnity, left Rome to her fate.The truth was that the Classical Age was dead, and with itImperial Rome. The Eastern Empire was something intrin-sidy different, Christian instead of Pagan. Christianity,that is, the theory that the spirit is supreme, was in control;what is known as the Middle Ages had been inaugurated,and was to last for over eleven centuries.

Christianity emerged from Palestine a rebel from thatwhich produced it, Judaism- the Judaic Experiment as wehave called it. It refused allegiance to the Roman God-Emperor; and ultimately Rome found herself forced toabandon him and embrace the Christian God, and we findthe Bishop of Rome in his place, and with very little officialbacking from Constantinople, facing the barbarian foes ofthe Roman State. The outstanding fact of the first half ofthis period under consideration, that is to the middle of 10thCentury, is the subjugation of these Germanic tribes toChristianity, accompanied by the disintegration of the ":material Roman system. The process was prolonged andpossibly painful, as the break-up of any great organisationmust of necessity be-for at least four centuries there wasnothing approaching peace or stability in Western Europe-but as to whether it altogether deserves the specific appell-ation of the Dark Ages, which modern historians have givenit, is a matter of opinion and a question of values. It is afact that some of the most beautiful pictorial and archi-tectural art in the world stands to its credit.

In the East, for exactly the whole eleven hundred yearsof the Middle Ages stood Constantinople and the Christian-Byzantine Empire. Successfully defending herself frominvasion, and keeping alive and developing in her ownunique manner all the Arts and Graces of civilization. Inthe West, however, had it not been for the sheer power ofinspiration derived from Palestine, there seems little doubtthat the entire civilization would have broken down underthe weight of barbarism, and the city of Rome itself becomeno more than a name.

The truth was that the Roman Empire when she came

to die had not a great deal to bequeath; her genius was apersonal and material one, and to a large extent died withher. Roman prestige and Roman arms alone had kept theGoths at bay; but little had been done to solve the problemof barbarian hordes on the frontier. Now, themselvespressed by Asiatic invaders in their rear, they descendedon Italy in successive waves against which there was nomilitary defence. But in a very peculiar sense, and justbecause human systems in the shape of the Roman State,had failed, the age seems to have been held together bythe Christ-idea and the invaders, while militarily successful,succumbed one after another to the superior faith.

The spiritual energy represented by this result wasterrific, and there is no doubt it was a great victory forChristianity. The outward sign .of what had taken placewas the crowning of the Frankish King Charlemagne by thePope in A.D. 800, over what was to be known as theHoly Roman Empire, which persisted in substance fornearly two hundred years, and as a shadow to the presentday.

The second period, from the 9th Century onwards,was one of comparative calm, and the true pattern of whatwe may call Medievalism began to emerge. Its predominantcharacteristic was the community-spirit-the natural outcomeof Feudalism, Its organisation therefore. tended to be local,and to' some extent functional, in the Guilds of craftsmen.

It has been usual to assert that material standards seri-ously declined in the Middle Ages, but really this is amatter of opinion and view-point, since such standards arenot absolute, but relative. With the breakdown of thewonderful Roman system of communication, there is nodoubt that much of what may be termed the luxuries oflife disappeared, but with a picture of Rome in her de-cadence before us this might not appear such an irreparableloss: - It is' inevitable.' that standards' would be - lesssophisticated and refined, but they were ample and generous,and leisure, that coveted boon, under a Church that decreedsomething like ninety holidays in the year, was enjoyed toan extent that is difficult for us even to imagine in thesemechanised times. .

Coming between the highly centralized rule of Romeand the more or less ordered monarchical systems of modernEurope, this age gives the impression of being wholly un-organised, in our modern sense of the term. Possibly thisis more in appearance than in fact-decentralized might bea better term. It lacked political focus, such as Constan-tinople supplied in the East; medieval Italy, herself, regardedfrom one angle, seems just a chaos of warring city communesand principalities. None-the-less there was a very definiteunity prevailing-far more actual than anything that thelast four centuries can show,-and that unity centred in,and spread out from the city of Rome and her bishop,and notwithstanding that politically she was perhaps themost impotent and distracted community of the lot.

(To be continued)

Page 12 THE SOCIAL CREDITER Saturday, August 17, 1940..

to ReadBooksBy C. H. Douglas:-

Economic Democracy ......••....(edition exhaustelf)

Social Credit .....•......•............ 3/6Credit Power and Democracy ... 3/6The Monopoly of Credit ..•.....• 3/6Warning Democracy •..............

(edition exhawtelf)The Tragedy of Human Effort ... 6d.The Use of Money •. ...•.. ..•.. 6d.Approach to Reality 3ti.Money and the Price System 3d.Nature of Democracy 2d.Social Credit Principles Id.Tyranny .........•..........•......... id.

By L. D. Byrne:-

1- .Alternative to Di~ster .~ 4d.The Nature of Social Credit 4d.

. Debt ami Taxation ...•..•...•..... 2d.

All fromK.R.P. PuBLICATIONS LTD.•

12, LORD STREET, LIVERPOOL. 2.

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND MEETINGSWill advertisers please note thatthe latest time for accepting. copyfor this column is 12 noon Mondayfor Saturdays issue.

MISCELLANEOUSTO LET-Proportion of rent to

Expansion Fund. Two very sunny andcomfortable furnished cottages in NorthI?evon, glorious views. (I)-has electriclight, bath and h. & c., indoor san. oilcooker, large living room, kitchen-di~ingroom, 3 bedrooms (sleep 3-4). Garageavailable. (2):-has 2 sitting, 3 bed., (sleep5), kitchen, 011 cooker, lamps and radiator;

.CARDIFF Social Credit Association: garage. Also a large one-room hut,Enquiries to Hon. Sec. at 73, Romilly completely furnished for two. Elsan sani-Crescent, Cardiff. tation. Water, 011 cooker. On the North

Devon Coast.ALso DERBY and District-THE SOcrAL -. -----=:..:..:::.:..::..----------

Th DIM I CREDITER is obtainable from Morley's WANTED. Has anyone a spare copy ofe oug as. a~~ S/- Newsagents and Tobacconists, Market "Economic Democracy" and of "Warning

The Econonuc Crisis ; Hall. Democracy"? Please reply to Advertiser,Southampton Chamber of c/o The Social Crediter, quoting conditionCommerce Report 6d. LIVERPOOL. Social Cr~dit As~ociation: and price for either or both books.

'f Weekly meetings of social crediters and ----..---------The Bankers 0_. London. .. .' ~ . -.~n<l!'1i·~el.'~-will-~!l't-irm.e/ __l:!ut.:._:a1_~y-'13;I3'j;~:~~L . 'S·::-·'· '1' C diteby Percy Arnold ............• ; ..•.. 476 '-'. ad.ifres~.:_.;:s:·~{kt ....n touch wIt~~~~Hon:' - - Ue OCla re I erEconomics for Everybody Secretary, a~ "Greengates", Hillside Drive, If you are not a subscriber to THEby EIles Dee : : 3d. Woolton, Liverpool. . . SOCIAL CREDITER, send this order

LONDON LIAISON GROUP. Next without delay.meeting, Friday,. August 23rd, 7 p.m. at K.R.P. Publication~ Ltd.,4, Mecklenburgh Street, W.e. 1. 12, Lord Street, Liverpool, 2.

Please send THE SOCIALNE~CAST':-E. and GATE~J:lEAD S?cial CREDITER to meCredit ASSOCiation are compiling a registerof Social Crediters on the Tyneside. Reg-ister now and keep informed of localactivities. What are YOU doing? Let

BELFAST D.S.C. Group. Monthly GroupMeeting on First Tuesday in each month,in the Lombard Cafe, Lombard Street, at8 p.m. Open to the public. Correspondenceto the Hon. Sec., 17, Cregagh Rd. Belfast.

BIRMINGHAM and District SocialCrediters will find friends over tea andlight refreshments at Prince's Cafe,Temple Street, on Friday evenings, from6 p.m., in the King's Room.

BLACKBURN Social Credit Association:Weekly meetings every Tuesday eveningat 7-30 p.m. at the Friends Meeting House,King Street, Blackburn. All enquiries to168, Shear Brow, Blackburn.

BRADFORD United· Democrats. En..;quiries to R. J. Northin, 11, Centre Street,Bradford.

Name ....••••.•.••.•••.••••...•.•.•••••...•....•••..•.•......•..•.••.••••••.••••••••••••••••

Address ••••.••••••••••••••••••••••.••••••••••••••••••.••..••••••••••.••••••••.•••••••••••••••

TO THE DIRECTOR OF REVENUE,THE SOCIAL CREDIT SECRETARIAT,12, LORD STREET, LIVERPOOL, 2-

[ wish to support Social Credit Policy as defined in the terms .of association ofand pursued by The Social Credit Secretariat under the Advisory Chairmanship ofMajor C. H. Douglas.

[ will, until further notice, contribute

{per month,

-£ : : , per quarter,per year,

towards the funds of the Social Credit Secretariat.

Sig-nature •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••.•[ herewith enclose the sum of £ : : , as a donation towards

the above mentioned funds.·

Sig-nature ••••••.••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••(Cheques and Postal Orders should be crossed and made payable to the SOCIALCREDIT SECRETAIUAT.) -

us know, we shall be glad of suggestions.Write W. Dunsmore, Hon. Secretary, 27,.Lawton Street, Newcastle-on-Tyne.

PORTSMOUTH D.S.C. Group: Enquiries.to 115, Essex Road, Milton; 16, St. UrsulaGrove, South sea ; or 50 Ripley Grove,Copnor.

SOUTHAMPTON Group: Secretary e.Daish, 19, Merridale Road, Bitterne,Southampton.

WOLVERHAMPTON: Will all socialcrediters, old and new, keep in contact bywriting E. EVANS, 7, Oxbarn Avenue,Bradmore, Wolverhampton.

Name ..................•....••.•.............••Address •....•............•.•..•.....••••...••••

For Twelve Months-I enclose 30/-"Six " ,,15/-"Three" ,,7/6

(Cheques and Postal Orders should be crossedand made payable to K.R.P. PublicationsLtd.)

EXPANSION FUNDTo the Treasurer,Social Credit Expansion Fund,c/o The Social Credit Secretariat,12, Lord Street, Liverpool. 2.I enclose the sum of ~ : . ,as a donation towards the Social CreditExpansion Fund, to be expended bythe Administrators at the Sole Discretionof Major C. H. Douglas.Name ....................................•.•.••Address ••....•..••••....••.•..•.....•••••••••••(Cheques and Postal Orders should be "crossed and made payable to the SOCIcAI:CREDIT EXPANSION FUND.)

Published by the proprietors, K.R.P. Publicauon.;Ltd.. at 12, Lord Street. Liverpool, 2. .......

Printed by J. Hayes & Co•• Woolton, Liverpool.