The Sun.
London, England, 1864-01-22 00:00:00

ZZALoW-17.--87,1r"r,..," -
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question will be examined by tho Diet, undet ily- ..-- w -"- is-
co.operation." ''''' \ .' 'c-,:
.. ----1-7 '
._:..,,._ ,
The Minister-President replied : -... -,--- .1, ~.-_,...
f 1 :
"His Majesty spoke of an examination, not of a - r,l -
decision. The position of Prussia as a great Power
required that she should independently examine
every resolution of the Diet, but not submit herself
to every decision—a view which, under other cir-
cumstances, would be approved by the majority of
the Committee."
Referring to the words immediately following
the above passage in the Royal speech," and I can-
Inot anticipate the results of that examination," the
Minister continued :

" The competence of the Diet to decide the suc-
cession question was by no means admitted. If the
Confederation was a union of sovereign States, the
full sovereignty of each State continued in all things,
where not expressly limited by the Federal treatks.
Federal treaties cor,tairicd no stipulations from
which this competence was to be deduced. Unques-
tionably the Federal Thet Was entitled to decide,
after examining the legitimation ot a representative,
whether it would admit him or rot; but from that
point to sovereign decision ot the right of succession
in a Federal country was a wide leap. Let any one
mention a precedent in which the Diet bud decided
upon the rights of claimants of a succession, and in
which it had undertaken to remove one and instal
another. Nobody could wish to controvert the
competence of the Diet to examine the right of
succession in a disputed case; but it wculd have to
conduct that examination with the utmost caution,
that its results mightbe tenable before the European
forum. Lastly, he could assure them, as upon a for-
mer occasion, that mistrust between himself and the
Chamber of Deputies should not be mutual. It was
his wish to enter into the matter with the means

legally granted by the house. If these should be
refused, he should take them wherever he could."
Thereupon the report of the Committee observes
that expressions of this character require no com-
ment, but that it was their duty to state the in-
fluence which these declarations ought to exercise
upon the vote of the house. According to the views
of the Government, the house would run the danger
" that the supplies granted today for the fulfilment
of Federal duties would be to•morrow applied by
the Government to obstruct the resolutions of the
Diet." The declarations of the Minister-President
east aside German nationality and common inte-
rests equally with regard to right. He considers
the binding force of a treaty not to depend upon its
contents or upon the good faith of its contractors,
but upon the question how many bayonets will be
set in motion for it. From this point of view it
would be just as consistent for the Ministry to dis-
regard even the justest resolution of the Diet on
account of the military weakness of its originators,
as when it patiently accepts illegal measures of the
great Powers on account of the superiority of their
armies.

r.
The report goes on to refute the arguments of
Herr von Bismark seriatim, commenting severely
upon each, and recommends, by the nnamimoue vote
of the Committee, the refusal of the loan.