Dec. 4.
The gravity of the issue which has arisen between King Edward) VHT and His Majesty's. Ministers has broken down the inhibitions hitherto restraining British journals from commenting on what was! hoped would be a temporary disagreement. 'The King's private affairs are of no public concern until they directly affect the high position which he holds—a position all the more onerous and' signifeant by reason of the extension of the principle of Dominion self-government throughout the Empire. Since] his accession His Majesty has re~ ceived many proofs of the sympathy and. confidence with which his subjects at Home and overseas have contemplated the task hereditarily, imposed upon him. They were justified in the belief that in assuming the place vacated by his beloved father's death, he would, In his own way and in accordance with the spirit of his generation, maintain the prestige of the Crown and vindicate its paramount once of knitting the peoples of the Empire together, Even now, it] seems unbelievable, that he can falter in the performance which he had gallantly begun. Yet it cannot be ignored that the present crisis implies the emergence of an im= passe directly due to a conflict of view between the King and His Government. Such a point would! not have been reached if the woikhtiest argunients and the most respectful solicitations of the! trusted advisers of the Crown had! not failed to prevail. The loyalty men most of whom served under the late King as Cabinet Ministers and all of whom command. the constitutional authority of the nation, cannot be called in question, Their cloop sense of the painful duty thrust upon them has invoked the ce-operation of the Press in what must be regarded as the camest hpe that the King's decisions may acquire wisdom from the revelation of strongly-stirred public opinion Nor is it without significance that! the lead has come from the provin-lal Press whose influence is some= times much underestimated, international city ike Shanghai it Is quite impossible to pretend that the news has come as a surprise, The reticence natural to British nowspepers in discussing the King's personal affairs could not be expected to find—general imitation, Sadly bewildered British nationals here and elsewhere have been buch distressed by. reports which, "in the absence of official contradiction could not be dis missed as entirely baseless, con firmed as certain aspects of their narratives seemed to be by cidental records inthe English Press. The American journals have been subjected to some eritic~ ism, but it is fair to say that—leaving out of account the volatile section of their Press which has its own technique and assessment of news values—the handling of the issues involved has been marked by restraint and no little sympathy, with the British nation, whose stitutions have a. special appeal to responsible Americans. This thought! requires expression lest there should be any misunderstanding of the self-imposed silence hitherto observed in Great Britain, It will have been noted that the Joyal representations now made to His Majesty through the columns' fof the Press have courageously limered the peculiar diMeulty of discussing the King's matrimonial plans, as suggested by the eircumstances of the disagreement between mand the Cabinet, "Through out British history the marriages of the Royal House have been of tense concern to the nation and, on several oecasions—one of them 50 long ago as 1490—Parliament has asserted its right to give it formal embodiment on the statule Poole, In the King's person rests considerable authority in that regard-and, on the principle. quis one will more deeply regret the present crisis than the Prime Minister and the Leader of His Majesty's Opposition, who is under-slood to have been taken into consultation so that the King may be fortified in his review of the issues by the knowledge that his personal well-being is the object of a united nation's solicitude. He has shown much lively appreciation of the needs and aspirations of his subjects of all classes. His fearless approach to the economic diffieulties of the humbler of them, his abiding comradeship with the men who fought beside him in the' trenches, have given him opportunities denied to his august predecessors. The difficulties of his position are widely felt and appreciated. It is, therefore, hoped that even now he will find {t possible to give the country and the Empire the assurances so respectfully, loyally and affectionately invited from him,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.