THE TABLET November 27th, 1954 VOL. 204, No. 5975

THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER & REVIEW

Published as a Newspaper

Pro Ecclesia Dei, Pro Regina et Patria

FOUNDED IN 1840

NOVEMBER 27th, 1954

NINEPENCE

Party Discipline: The Troubles of the Socialists and the Lessons for Democracy

Wall Street and American Industry: After the Democrat Gains

Reforming the United Nations: Political Proposals : II. By David Johnson

The Chapels o f West Wales: The Change and the Challenge. By Michael P. Fogarty

England and the Immaculate Conception: i. By William Burridge, W.F.

These Things Affirmed: The Last Testimony of Cuthbert Mayne. By P. A. Boyan

Meditations in Advent: I : “I Raise up My Soul.” By Sebastian Bullough, O.P. The Grain o f Mustard Seed: Dr. Rubbra’s New Symphony. By Rosemary Hughes B o o k s R e v i e w e d : History o f Unilever, by Charles Wilson ; Cortes and Montezuma, by Maurice

Collis ; Born Catholics, assembled by F. J. Sheed ; Christ and the Sailor, by Peter F. Anson ; A Dream o f Treason, by Maurice Edelman ; Riot, by John Wyllie ; A Rare Adventure, by Bernard Fergusson ; Dawn on our Darkness, by Emmanuel Robles ; Wedding Preparations, by Franz Kafka ; and an Illustrated History o f English Literature, Volume II, by A. C. Ward. Reviewed by Colin Clark, Edward Sarmiento, Illtud Evans, O.P., Leo Gradwell, John Biggs-Davison, Hugh

Dinwiddy and Gerard Meath, O.P.

COMMITMENTS IN EUROPE S IR WINSTON, whose eightieth birthday, acclaimed with affection by all the nation and most of the world, will be celebrated with suitable circumstance in Westminster Hall on Tuesday next, marked the occasion with a meeting in his constituency on Tuesday last. He surprised his audience by telling them how, just before the end o f the war, when the Germans were surrendering by hundreds o f thousands, he sent a telegram to Field-Marshal Montgomery, “directing him to be careful, in collecting the German arms, to stack them so that they could easily be issued again to the German soldiers whom we should have to work with if the Soviet advance continued.” If the Russians calmed such apprehensions then, the present “vast reversal” o f Western policy towards Germany had only been brought about, Sir Winston went on, by Soviet Russia itself, and “above all by Stalin, the dictator, who was carried away by the triumphs o f victory and acted as if he thought he could secure for Russia and Communism the domination o f the world” : and the last thing we should wish would be to strike a critical note in a birthday season by doubting whether it was really only the excited flush of victory that nourished such ambitions in the bosom o f Stalin. Sir Winston went on to speak of the unity which Soviet designs have since forged in the free world, in which, he said, Britain “has undoubtedly played and will play a leading part,” and o f the new and better alternative to EDC, “made as the result of Sir Anthony Eden’s exertions.”

ment that the Council o f Ministers, meeting at Strasbourg, has unanimously accepted the terms of the agreement on closer co-operation with Britain is a further step in bringing Britain into Europe. The Agreement sets up at once a “permanent Committee of Association,” to take the place o f the former “Council o f Association,” which will consist of four representatives o f the High Authority and four British representatives, including a Minister. Within this new body it is hoped to work out a common policy for coal and steel, and for investments in the industries, and then to arrive at reciprocal rules of conduct.

It is a loose arrangement, with little economic substance, but it may achieve economic substance if and when there is agreement on other economic questions, such as the lowering o f tariffs, the practice o f what Mr. Peter Thorneycroft has called “fair rather than free trade,” and the avoidance of dumping and double-pricing. On this latter practice there has been some disagreement between the Community and the British steel industry, which was forced to lower its prices last year when the Brussels entente o f steel exporters in the Community was set up. On this side o f the channel the entente has been regarded as a cartel, but the High Authority has taken a different view, on the ground that the Brussels association cannot have a central sales agency or fix production quotas ; it therefore lacked the conditions o f an effective cartel. Nevertheless, there is here matter for conflict between the Coal and Steel Community and steel producers who would prefer cartel agreements to the present institutional and political association. But since the amounts o f coal and steel

The military commitment which Britain has undertaken involves an interest in seeing that the Coal and Steel Authority should grow in importance and authority, and the announce