Imperial Federation: The Problem of National Unity

by George R. Parkin

'As time passes it rather appears that we are in the hands of a Providence which is greater than all statesmanship, that this fabric so blindly piled up has a chance of becoming a part of the permanent edifice of civilization, and that the Indian achievement of England, as it is the strangest, may after all turn out to be the greatest; of all her achievements.'—Prof. J. R. Seeley.

'BUT above all, what is to be done with India'? With this question Mr. Goldwin Smith makes the relation of India to the Empire the crux of the Federation problem. To him the difficulty presented seems insoluble, chiefly because he believes that it would be impossible for a federation of democratic communities scattered over the globe to hold India, about which they know little, as a dependency. He even doubts, in his customary vein of pessimism, whether the fate of the Indian Empire is not already 'sealed by the progress of democracy in Britain.' So far from this last being the case it looks as if the English working man, who has annually more than £60,000,000 of trade staked on our hold on India, will be the last to weaken by his vote our position in the country or our grip on the waterways which lead to the East. Every second or third day's work of the Lancashire cotton-spinner is done for the Indian market, or for other Eastern {244} markets which we control on account of our position in India. In some large districts, such as that of Oldham, the proportion is three days' work out of four. And the Lancashire spinner is a keen political thinker, especially where his bread and butter are concerned.

The industry of the city of Dundee depends almost entirely upon the supply of a single fibre from the valley of the Ganges. The Dundee jute-worker is a Radical, but he is not likely for that reason to forget that his daily wage depends on the hold which the Empire keeps upon Bengal. The purely trade relation of India to the United Kingdom was clearly put by Lord Dufferin in his address to the London Chamber of Commerce three years ago. He said:—

'During the past year our trade with our Indian Empire was larger than our trade with any other country in the world, with the exception of the United States, amounting to no less a sum than £64,000,000. If, again, we merely confine our attention to a comparison of our exports to India with our exports to other countries, we shall find that the same statement holds good, namely, that the exports of Great Britain to India are greater than those to any other country in the world except the United States, amounting as they do to £34,000,000, whereas our exports to France do not exceed £24,000,000, and to Germany £27,000,000. In fact, India's trade with the United Kingdom is nearly one-tenth of the value of the total British trade with the whole world. … In 1888 she took £21,250,000 worth of our cotton goods {245} and yarns, out of a total of £72,000,000 worth exported to all countries, whereas China only took £6,500,000 worth, Germany £2,500,000 worth and the United States £2,000,000 worth. Again, if we take another great section of British exports, such as hardware, machinery and metals, we find that out of a total export of £36,000,000 to all countries India in 1888 took £5,750,000 worth, whereas we only sent £3,000,000 worth to France, £1,750,000 worth to Russia, and £750,000 worth to China.

'These figures, I think, should be enough to convince the least receptive understanding what a fatal blow it would be to our commercial prosperity were circumstances ever to close, either completely or partially, the Indian ports to the trade of Great Britain, and how deeply the manufacturing population of Lancashire, and not only of Lancashire, but of every centre of industry in Great Britain and Ireland, is interested in the well-being and expanding prosperity of our Indian fellow-subjects. Indeed it would not be too much to say that if any serious disaster ever overtook our Indian Empire, or if our political relations with the Peninsula of Hindostan were to be even partially disturbed, there is not a cottage in Great Britain, at all events in the manufacturing districts, which would not be made to feel the disastrous consequences of such an intolerable calamity.'

There is another point to consider. The rapid growth of our vast Indian commerce has been largely due to the application on an immense scale of British capital {246} for the opening up of the country by railways and canals, and for the conservation and distribution of water by systems of irrigation. It is estimated that £350,000,000 are thus invested, to which must be added other large sums employed in various forms of industrial enterprise; the profits and interest of all this capital flowing back steadily to the United Kingdom, and evidently secured only by British dominance.

When to all this we connect the fact that from 75,000 to 100,000 British people find well paid employment in carrying on the government, defence and industrial development of the country we begin to understand the vast range of national interests involved in our retaining possession of India. The estimate that the people of the United Kingdom draw from India sixty or seventy millions sterling every year in direct income is probably a moderate one. Directly then Britain's stake in India is enormous. Indirectly our possession of the country would probably determine the drift of the commerce of the vast regions still further East.

Nor is it the United Kingdom alone which is concerned.

The present and prospective interest of the Australasian colonies in India are also great, not only for the military reasons which have been mentioned, but in view of the growing trade relations. India reduced to anarchy by the withdrawal of British rule, or India governed by Russia, would mean a serious blow {247} to Australasian trade, present and prospective. It might easily mean exclusion from all the markets of the East.

South Africa, which owed its earliest development to the fact that it was the stopping place on the road to India, still owes much of its importance to the same cause. The interest of Canada in India is more remote, but now that Canadian steamship lines are on the Pacific, with their terminus at Hong Kong, Britain's position in the East has a new interest for the Dominion.