THE NEED FOR CONSTRUCTIVE CONSERVATISM
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
SIR,—In 1922, feeling the inadequacy of the official pro- gramme, I wrote out for my own interest and had printed for private circulation a brief " Constructive Conservative Policy." Boner Law had declared in favour of marking time. Other political programmes were even more futile. The country still waits for a. constructive policy, and no party has produced anything likely to save the situation for our- selves and for other manufacturing nations who have followed our lead into a world of roaring machinery and Shy-lock-ridden finance.
At one time, with the inclusion of the " nationalization of the Bank of England" in its programme, it was possible that the Labour Party might. be lead into doing serious yrork, but with its consolidation into a stable party that
possibility seems to have passed. Nothing that has not the sanction of the present controlfers of the financial machine can be expected from the Liberal or Labour quarter.
Then we have the official Conservative programme. One can almost see Casabianca among the flames, the well-drilled product of our public school system going to his death, so utterly devoid is it of any realization of the real issues at stake. The boy's position is not an enviable one ; but it is infinitely better to realize that you can do nothing than to run about frantically trying to put the fire out with a pair of bellows, which is about what the Beaverbrook press is doing with its Empire Trade " stunt."
The glimpse of help on the horizon has come from Mr. Winston Churchill, who, in his Romanes lecture, puts his finger on the spot. It would be useless to attempt to consider here the possibility of an economic committee of the Housa of Commons proving a satisfactory method of control, but the suggestion contains within it the assertion of the urgent need for the money system to be placed again under the control of the Crown. If my memory serves me right Mr. Winston Churchill, in an article entitled ." Shall We Commit Suicide " let it be known some years ago that he was aware that drastic and fundamental changes are necessary if cur civilization is to be saved.
During the last five or six years the left-wing Socialists nave turned their interests towards eeonomies. The farce of democratic "government," shackled to a basically false financial system, has become apparent to them. As the interest in economies has increased, so the interest in an alien political system has waned.
Here, then, is hope of something constructive. If Mr. Winston Churchill will give the lead, his time of office would probably be short. But in that time, with the help of the constructive element in the Socialist Left, he could not only get Great Britain on to the new economic rails, but would give the lead to other nations in the direction of a prosperity which would not be dependent, as at present, on the impoverishment of other manufacturing nations.
Surely the time has come Ibr the adoption of a constructive policy. Vill Mr. Winston Churchill give the lead, or must the work be left to the next generation ?—I am, Sir, &c., THEODORE J. FAITHFULL.
Werehom tfll, nr. King's T.ynn.
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