sation was defeated by a large majority, and the nationalisation of the land was thereupon added to the nationalisation of the mines as the second main item of Labour policy.

The tactics of the Front Opposition Bench were the subject of some outspoken criticism at one of the closing debates of the Conference, when various delegates expressed impatience with the strict observance of constitutional methods and parliamentary procedure insisted upon by the leader of the Party. Mr. MacDonald in reply belittled the criticisms that had been offered as factious and as coming from only a small section; and the reception accorded to him on this occasion, as throughout the Conference, left no doubt that the bulk of the party still supported him loyally, though a not unimportant section was in open revolt against his authority.

The dissensions within the Labour Party were the signs of vitality; those of the Liberal Party exhausted the little vigour it still retained. On October 5, in accordance with the resolution taken in the previous June, a deputation from the Liberal and Radical Candidates' Association waited on Lord Oxford, who had now recovered from his illness, and placed before him the desire of the Association for "the restoration of complete unity in the party under his leadership." Lord Oxford's reply put an end once for all to such hopes. On October 14 he addressed a letter to Mr. Spender, the Chairman of the National Liberal Association, announcing his resignation of the leadership of the Liberal Party. The dissensions in the party, he said, made the strain of leading it too great for his advancing years. He again censured Mr. Lloyd George indirectly for his conduct during the general strike-which he described as "the gravest domestic event of my lifetime "-and maintained that the attitude which he himself and most of his colleagues had taken up during the emergency was the only one consistent with the true principles of Liberalism. Addressing a public meeting at Greenock the next evening, he called attention to the fact that Lord Rosebery thirty years previously had also made his farewell speech as leader of the Liberal Party at a public meeting in Scotland. He reaffirmed his conviction that a Liberal Party was necessary to save the country from Protection on one side and Socialism on the other, and warned the party against forming a coalition with any other party.

Lord Oxford's resignation left the Liberal Party completely derelict. No successor was found to fill his place, and the" Shadow Cabinet" which was held in readiness to form a Liberal Government, should the opportunity arise, ceased to exist. Sir Godfrey Collins resigned the position of Chief Liberal Whip, and Mr. Lloyd George obtained possession of the Whip's room with one of his own nominees, but his following included only a fraction of the party. A few days later Commander Kenworthy, a

staunch Radical, went over to the Labour Party; and although for the time being no other defections of members took place, yet the bulk of Liberals, both in and out of Parliament, stood shivering on the brink of either the Unionist or the Labour Party, according to their political affinities, hoping against hope that something would turn up in time to save them from the necessity of taking the plunge.

On October 14 the voting of the miners on the question laid before them by the Delegate Conference on October 7 was announced as being 460,150 in favour and 284,336 against-a majority of 175,814 in favour. This meant that the Miners' Federation Executive was commissioned to call out the safety men and take other steps for intensifying the struggle. Armed with these instructions, the Executive organised itself into what it called a "Council of War" for the purpose of nerving the miners to continue the struggle. Its first step in this capacity was to mobilise its oratorical forces as represented by its own officials and the miners' members of Parliament (with the exception of Mr. Spencer), whom it despatched to the "black" areas in the coal-fields to dissuade the men from returning to work. The decision to call out the safety men was tacitly shelved, as it was known by the Executive to be both inadvisable in itself and impracticable on account of the attitude of the safety men.

During the next few days members of the Executive carried on a strenuous oratorical campaign in Nottinghamshire and Lancashire. As a result of their efforts the number of men at work in the whole of the coal-fields showed a slight decrease over a few days, due chiefly to a great drop in the Notts district. This was the utmost that the Executive could achieve by its new policy; by the end of the week, owing to the steady drift back in other districts, especially Northumberland, the number of men at work was again slightly in excess of the highest previously recorded.

In accordance with an announcement made by the Prime Minister early in the summer, an Imperial Conference was again held this autumn in London after an interval of three years. The Premiers of all the Dominions were present, as also the President of the Irish Free State. The proceedings opened on October 19 with an address of greeting to the King and Queen, and Mr. Baldwin, in welcoming the delegates, laid stress on the part which Imperial Conferences had played in enabling the Empire to adapt its internal structure to the developments and changes which had taken place in its constituent parts in the past forty years. It was largely through such Conferences that methods. had been devised for securing united action in the field of foreign policy, for co-ordinating defence, and for fostering inter-imperial trade. The business of the present Conference, he said, would be to take stock of their situation as a whole, and to locate their weak places and try to strengthen them. In foreign affairs the

most important question that arose was the necessity for improvement in the present system of communication and consultation between the Governments of the Empire; although great progress had been made of late years in the direction of keeping the Dominion Prime Ministers informed by mail and telegraph from London on all matters of world politics, there was still room for improvement, and there was great need for increasing, if possible, the opportunities for personal discussion on matters of major importance in foreign affairs. In the sphere of Empire trade and settlement also, though all of them had gone far, they could, he hoped, go further towards securing effective co-operation for making the best of their resources.

On the second day Sir A. Chamberlain gave the Conference, in camera, a long report on foreign relations. On the next day it was the turn of the President of the Board of Trade and of the Colonial Secretary to address the delegates on problems of interimperial trade. Sir P. Cunliffe-Lister reported that Empire trade had been constantly on the increase since the war, and now formed a considerably larger portion of the total trade of the country than in 1913. He was able to assure the Conference that, as a result partly of the "Buy British Goods campaign and Empire Shopping Weeks," the buying of British goods was becoming a national habit. He complained that the Empire had almost neglected the cinema as a vehicle of propaganda, and hoped that the Conference would be able to agree on some common policy for utilising this important instrument for the benefit of imperial trade. Mr. Amery supplemented his colleague's remarks with an account of the work done by the Imperial Economic Committee, set up in March, 1925, and the Empire Marketing Board, which had been set up in the current year. He said he had found the four reports so far presented by the Committee exceedingly valuable, and suggested that its investigations might include the marketing of raw materials as well as food-stuffs. In the afternoon sitting of the same day Mr. Amery, as Secretary of State for the Colonies, surveyed the position of the Colonics, Protectorates and Mandated areas, declaring that the work of administration and development in them was regarded by Great Britain as a piece of trusteeship, and that, on account of its economic importance, it was well worthy of consideration by every part of the Empire.

On October 28 the Secretary for Air, Sir S. Hoare, addressed the Conference on the subject of imperial air communications for civil purposes. He commenced by laying down two propositions that the Empire was in urgent need of better communications, and that if communications were to be improved, a sustained and united effort would be needed. He pointed to the constant progress which was being made in the matter of air transport, and expressed the conviction that there was no longer any technical

or operational reason why the journey from London to Canada should not be reduced to 2 days and to the other Dominions in proportion. He announced that it was proposed to substitute for the present military air service between Cairo and Baghdad a civilian service between Cairo and Karachi, which he hoped would prove to be the first section of the great Empire air route to the Far East. Similarly the beginning of an air route to South and West Africa would be made by the opening within the next few months of a private service, assisted by the Governments of Kenya, Uganda, and the Sudan, from Khartum to Kimusu. No single Government could in the present state of things undertake the expense of either of these routes in their entirety, but if each bore a share, they might by co-operation achieve their object. Besides the aeroplane, they would in a year or two have a couple of giant airships ready for long-distance flights, and in regard to these also he asked the Dominions to help by providing mooring masts and meteorological stations. All the Dominion representatives in turn expressed their interest in and sympathy with the suggestions of the Air Minister, and promised carefully to consider them with a view to giving the desired co-operation.

After the plenary sittings of the first few days, the Conference transacted its business chiefly by means of committees dealing with special questions. Of these the most important was the Committee on Inter-Imperial Relations, of which Lord Balfour acted as Chairman. The report of this Committee (see under Public Documents) which was accepted by the Imperial Conference on November 19, established the relations of the Dominions to the Mother Country and to one another on a basis consonant both with actual practice and with the nationalist aspirations of the Dominions. The Committee expressed the view that nothing would be gained by attempting to lay down a Constitution for the British Empire, but it defined the Dominions as "autonomous Communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate to one another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown, and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations." It was admitted that existing administrative, legislative, and judicial forms were not entirely in accord with this definition, as they had been left over from a period anterior to the present stage of constitutional development, and a number of significant recommendations were made for bringing them up to date. The first, which had special reference to Ireland, was that the words "United Kingdom" should be omitted from the King's title. A second was that GovernorsGeneral of the Dominions should be regarded as being purely representatives of the Crown and not in any way as representatives or agents of the Home Government, and that consequently Governments of the Dominions should communicate with the

Home Government and with one another direct, and not through the agency of the Governors. In regard to legislation, the Committee proposed that it should be recognised as the right of the Government of each Dominion to advise the Crown in all matters relating to its own affairs, and that the Home Government should not interfere. In the field of foreign policy, as in the sphere of defence, it was recognised that the major share of responsibility still rested, and would for some time continue to rest on Great Britain; but it was laid down as a general principle governing foreign relations that neither Great Britain nor the Dominions should be committed to the acceptance of active obligations without the definite assent of their own Governments. The desirability of personal contact to supplement the present system of inter-communication between the various Governments was emphasised; and on the particular matter of the Locarno Conference, satisfaction was expressed with the statement of the Secretary for Foreign Affairs and congratulations were offered to the British Government on its share in this contribution to promoting the peace of the world.

Of the other recommendations of the Conference, which sat altogether for five weeks, the most important were that an Imperial Air Conference should be held in 1928 or 1929, and that further Imperial Bureaux should be created for research like those which already existed for entomology and tropical medicine. On the subject of defence, the Conference reaffirmed the resolutions of the Conference of 1923, laying special emphasis on the necessity of creating and maintaining an adequate chain of air bases and refuelling stations; while in regard to films no definite recommendations were made, but attention was called to the necessity of producing high quality films inside the Empire before Government action was taken.

On October 22 the Executive Committee of the Miners' Federation, in accordance with the policy determined on a week previously, waited on the General Council of the Trades Union Congress to lay before it a request that it should summon a special Congress to consider the questions of imposing a levy on all trade unions for the assistance of the miners, and of placing an embargo on the transport of foreign coal. The Council, as in fact the public generally, had been not a little impressed by the courage of the Miners' Federation in making a renewed stand in what seemed to be a desperate situation, and though it had already on more than one occasion declared the proposals submitted by the Federation to be impracticable, it now willingly acceded to the request of the Executive, and undertook to summon a special Congress on November 3 to consider the question of a general levy. Having once more got into touch with the Miners' Executive, the Trade Union Council again began to intervene actively in the coal dispute. On October 26, acting on its