New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-12-25
POLITICS NOT AT FAULT
England Not lettering TO Fall Becaus.
Of Party Differences.

70 the Editor of The Tribune.
Sir: / have a friend who receives throu5f
his brother frequent issues Of your paper;
he comes in for a chat to me and passes OF
the literature 7 should like TO tell you ho"
much we appreciate the editorials and the
general tone Of your paper. For ability anc
knowledge your leader writer. SO far as /
have seen the PAPER, displays qualities which
are in excess Of most OF our writer's engaged
ca similar work on ,his side. Certainly the
judicial tone is all we could desire.
Two issues Just put into my hands are
those Of October % and November 5. Both
contain letters by man who calls himself
Britanncus. n he had adopted any other
name you would not have heard from me-,
but he poses in this way as possessing
special knowledge which certainly does not
appear in his articles; further, II is ap-
parent by words such "a gotten which no
Britisher would use. that wherever he
learned 10 write English IL was not in Eng
land.
May / run through these letters with you?
THE Plague Of Party Politics" The infer
ence that England is lettering TO her fall
because of party politics is wrong all the
time. In the first place, England is quite
well. thank you In the second, all politl-
clans (outside Of Few extremists who do
not count here are prepared TO recognize
that their opponents while differing from
them in details are animated by one desire
only. the good Of their native land. have
been a party politician all my life and know
what is true. I am an official OF the Liberal
party in my district and have often taken the
chair al meetings in support of Sir John
Simon the Home Secretary. who is VI. 7. Tor
my constituency Some years ago when the
Land Question was started by Lloyd George
had q letter in the press regarding local
applications Of the principles. | received
from the secretary Of the Conservative Club
a challenge to debate the matter at the club
The meeting was arranged, our party was
given proportion OF the tickets, and
spoke on the matter in a hall seating about
500. all opponents except for small mi
nority. All through the affair ! was treated
with the utmost courtesy. and this debate
was the first of a series in which ! have
advocated Home Rule and other Liberal mea-
sures in the home OF their opponents. There
is nothing very wrong with country when
opponents can meet like this and talk over
matters on which they are bitterly opposed
in principle and detail.
srttanicus talks OF the peace Falk" OF
1898 and after # Britain was so paralyzed
by this, why did she continue to build u
navy inventinc the drcadrought type and PER-
fec,ing the submarine? 1t is true that there
were men who thought IL was possible a race
would one DAY arise who would prefer not
10 spend money In killing each other and
DESTROYING in months what has taken genera
H., hui tho C-rt mo
OF these were prepared to keen the powder
dry in the meantime. His purple rhetoric
about this is very fine writing, quite in the
stvle Of Dr. Johnson. but it has the dis
advantage Of being untrue.
But the letter i'm the issue or November
ia a masterpiece. The bluudcrs. misststc-
ments and falacics romp through every
paragraph with a glorious disregard Of fact
which would be humorous If Il we're rot
written By a man who signs himself Bri'aunl
Gus and processes 70 the great American pub
lie that he knows. Take two statements.
FIRST That the British Labor party vas
paciist and socialist TO a man. As a matter
OF fact the Labor party has never been
Socialist party In this regard il is i'm
portant to keep entirely separate the Labor
Party" which is not Socialist. and the On
dependent Labor Party which is Socialist
Only quarter OF the Labor w. P's belong
20 the latter. The second statement I want
to refer TO is that regarding the land valua-
ton. So far from th'~ being a failure it has
been = success already IN forcing much
larger payments In he way of death duties
This act OF ParliamcI. placed tho landowners
in CLEFT stick they had to either under
value their property, i1 which case they stood
to lose in the event of any public body want
ing TO buy, or they had TO put a big price on.
ia which ease they had to pay taxes on the
larger sum. The result has bern fair
valuation, which was what We could never