The New Republic AUGUST 24, 1942 219 Epitaph on a System A Report from England This commentary by the distinguished British tion but committees to examine the problems about scholar and Socialist leader on the lingering Tory paral- which decisions must be made. That is why reconstruc- ysis in England appeared in a recent number of The tion is not the task of a minister of first-rate status, but New Statesman and Nation and has already aroused rather of a kind of superior undersecretary who initi- wide discussion. The New York Times, in an editorial ates inquiries about which decisions may one day be of August 9 patronizingly entitled "Counsel from the made. Sir Stafford Cripps is the only outsider who has Left," sneered at Professor Laski's analysis of the managed to "gate-crash" into an important diplomatic British setback in Libya and called it nonsense. We do post. Not a single person outside the ranks of the pro- not find it nonsense; nor, we believe, will those many fessionals has (so differently from the last war) at- men and women of good will in the world today who tained the status of a brigadier. The appointments to know that the cause of the United Nations is lagging colonial governorships and similar posts all follow the and have good reason to suspect why.- THE EDITORS classic model. The traditional civil servants have re- tained or obtained all the pivotal administrative posi- ONE DOUBTED that Mr. Churchill would get N tions. Save for some minor exceptions, the historic an overwhelming majority in last week's cen- governing class of Britain is in full directive control of sure debate; but no one is likely to argue seri- the war effort. Even its charities (including the fund ously that the government emerged with credit from to aid the Soviet Union) remain under the wonted it. Mr. Lyttelton told a dismal story of production aristocratic patronage. muddle. Mr. Churchill, in one of those Pitt-like ora- It is this, I suggest, that must be set in the context tions in which he turns defeat on the field of battle of our reverse in Libya if its meaning is to be fully into a rhetorical triumph, combined congratulation to understood. For this war is in its essence a stage merely the House on its maintenance of free discussion with in an immense revolution in which the war of 1914, fierce attack upon his critics for encouraging our ene- the Russian Revolution and the counter-revolutions on mies; his main revelation was that neither he nor the Continent are earlier phases. It is terminating the General Auchinleck expected the fall of Tobruk. The epoch of liberal democracy which received its letters of ablest speech in the discussion was made by Mr. Aneu- credit in the last quarter of the eighteenth century and, rin Bevan, who pointed out that had Rommel been in almost everywhere, brought the middle class to power. the British army he would, in all probability, be a Liberal democracy has broken down because its moti- sergeant, like that member of the International Brigade vating principles make it unable to explore the full who planned the victory of the Ebro in the Spanish possibilities of the productive capacity at our disposal. civil war. All the classic symptoms of a revolution have been No one who reads the debate as a whole can avoid present among us now for many years. The traditional the suspicion that what is really at stake in these dis- values are on the defensive. The historic ruling class cussions is the purpose for which this war is being has lost faith in itself. Reason and tolerance are both fought, which is, in its turn, the outcome of Mr. of them at a discount. The wonted securities are gone Churchill's conception of the nature of the war. Much and, with them, the traditional optimism which marks as William Pitt fought to preserve the system then in a system in its period of expansion. There is a growth being against a revolutionary idea which Napoleon of mysticism and of escape into esoteric cults. Doctrines symbolized, so Mr. Churchill is fighting to preserve no longer search for the basis of compromise but arm the system now in being against the counter-revolution- themselves for battle. There is a gulf between youth ary idea embodied in Hitlerism. His anxiety is to win and age which no common faith is able to bridge. We it with men and measures which do not touch the are watching the erosion of a whole culture. A way of foundations of our society. If he can hold Hitler at life is dying, and the character of its successor has not bay until all the resources of America are fully mobi- yet been determined. lized, he can count on a victory which will make it To meet the challenge of that counter-revolution unnecessary, during the war, to raise any of those con- which is Hitlerism the Churchill government needed, troversial issues discussion of which might disturb the above all, to define the new way of life for the next status quo. That is why all the main war-controls are age. But by the very conception of the war that it has staffed as they are. That is why the railway and mining formed it cannot attempt that task. Its constitutional industries are not made to confront their future. That status-the election of 1935-inhibits it from any is why we have not decisions about the future of educa- fundamental innovation. It is therefore timid of new