TU E T A B L E T , S tp tem bar.M th , 1952

THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW

PRO ECCLESIA DEI, PRO REGINA ET PATRIA

VOL. 200, No. 5861

LONDON, SEPTEMBER 20th, 1952

NINEPENCE

FOUNDED IN 1840

PUBLISHED AS A NEWSPAPER

TWO CENTENARIES Wellington and Asquith as Representative Public Men GLORIA AND CONFITEOR IN VIENNA The First Austrian Katholikentag Since 1933. By Douglas Woodruff

BEVANISM VERSUS A BLUE BOOK Mr. Harold Wilson’s “ Tribune” Pamphlet. By Paul Crane, S .J .

AGRARIAN REFORM IN EGYPT The Conclusions o f Lord Kitchener. By Charles P . Brown THE FAITH AND THE FAMILY PAX CHRISTI AT ASSISI

By Henry Waterhouse, S .J .

By John M . Todd

MR. MUMFORD’S RELIGION

By Dorn Illtyd Trethowan

THE COUNCIL OF EUROPE C ARD IN A L T ISSERANT, Dean o f the College o f Cardinals, was present in Strasbourg on Monday at the opening session o f the Consultative Assembly o f the Council o f Europe. He was in his native France in any case, to receive the insignia o f a G rand Officer o f the Legion of Honour, and also, it is understood, to visit Gunzback in order to call on D r. A lbert Schweitzer. Cardinal Tisserant himself is well-known to be interested personally in the European Movement, and is an associate member o f the Institute for European Studies, whose D irector, Dr. Albert Jaeger, is giving a dinner for His Eminence. But the C a rd inal’s presence also underlined the interest o f the Holy See, and of Pope Pius X II ; o f which, indeed, he spoke in a broadcast a t the weekend. The Holy Father, for his part, perhaps remembered his listeners in Strasbourg when he addressed the Pax Christi pilgrim s on Saturday, for he spoke o f the unification o f Europe as both economically and politically essential. The day o f the old nationalism s is past, said the Pope ; and he went on to speak also o f the unification o f other continents as well as Europe.

development with favourable eyes. The ratification o f the EDC treaty may be facilitated in the Paris Assembly, since the Socialist leader, M. Mollet, has repeatedly said that military collaboration with a rearmed Germany depends on Germany first becoming a member o f a European federation. The election o f the Socialist, M. Spaak, is therefore welcomed by the French Socialists, while it will, o f course, increase the bitterness of the Belgian PSC. As Combat points out, M. Spaak is their Enemy Number One in internal matters, and the Belgian Socialists actually abstained in the Senate when the ratification o f the Schuman Plan was decided.

These difficulties enhance the importance o f Mr. Eden’s proposals to save the European Council from extinction. The looseness o f his idea to associate the Schuman Plan and th e European Defence Community with the European Council has caused many in S trasbourg to give their approval merely because they believe th a t this association will in fact be no more than formal. In any case it will be difficult to deflect interest from the special ad hoc assembly in its legislative work to the Council, however closely the two are working together. The Problem of the Saar

The transform ation into a political instrum ent o f federation o f the Schuman Plan Assembly, with M. Spaak as its president—he resigned from the presidency o f the European Council Assembly last year in o rder to protest against the slow progress o f a federated Europe—threatens the tasks for which the Schuman Plan was created. The six member States came together in order to bring about a unified European Pool for coal and steel. They will now be tempted to forget this prim ary object in th e excitement over political questions such as has already bogged down the debates in the Assembly o f the European Council in Strasbourg.

M. Spaak’s election was due to the seven votes o f the German SPD delegation, who, rather than see a German Christian Democrat President o f the Schuman Plan Assembly, supported the Belgian Socialist. I t was a significant demons tra tio n o f how selective the German Socialists can be in their use o f nationalist arguments. The Socialist opposition to the CDU will no doubt launch their next a t tack against th e Federal Chancellor when the Saar question comes up for debate in the European Council.

The decision to federate is regarded with much suspicion by the Benelux countries. The Belgian Foreign Minister, M. van Zeeland, would have preferred to let the Assembly o f the Schuman Plan carry out its own tasks and leave the establishm ent o f a constitution to a special commission. It will be difficult now to avoid clashes over the exact role o f the Assembly in its present form as a hastily assembled constituent body, and those members a t Strasbourg who are not members o f the Schuman Plan may easily feel that they have become outsiders.

The French and German Socialists look upon the new

The F rench-Germ an discussions on the Saar which have been going on in Paris do not seem to have made much progress. Europeanization, as the French understand it, means th a t the Saar will give up its own foreign policy, now conducted by France, and will come under in te rnational control. The French insist on retaining their customs, currency and economic union, but they are willing to grant facilities for German imports and exports. These proposals have some resemblance to the provisions o f th e Tangier statute. But there are no illusions in France that they will