Isaacs Week

Two things of the first magnitude were done last week by Rufus Daniel Isaacs, Marquess of Reading, whilom Lord Chief Justice of England (1913-21) and Viceroy of India (1921-26).

First. Lord Reading succeeded the late Alfred Moritz Mond, Baron Melchett, as Board Chairman of Imperial Chemical Industries, Ltd., thus becoming the Empire's No. 1 tycoon.

As the Jewish Telegraphic Agency at once pointed out, Rufus Daniel Isaacs' son & heir Gerald Rufus Isaacs, Viscount Erleigh, is the husband of Alfred Moritz Mond's daughter Eva Violet. The son & heir of this No. 1 Jewish couple is Master Michael Alfred Rufus Isaacs, 14.

Aged 14, Grandfather Rufus Daniel Isaacs ran away from the comfortable home of his merchant father, saw India first as a "cabin boy. After two years before the mast he tried the stock exchange, presently became reconciled with his parents, studied for the bar and in 1887 married Miss Alice Cohen.

In 1910 he became Attorney General, in 1913 Lord Chief Justice and a baron, in 1915 president of the Anglo-French Loan Commission to the U.S., the next year a viscount, in 1917 High Commissioner and special envoy at Washington, and an earl.

After the War Lord Reading returned to the India of his cabin boy days as viceroy. Events obliged him to detain both the "Ali Brothers" (Mohammedans) and Mahatma Gandhi in jail, also to impose the hated salt tax against the will of the Indian Assembly, but his "judicial fairness" is remembered. In 1926 he attained the marquessate, may die a duke.

Second,. Lord Reading as leader of the British Liberal Party's delegation to the Indian Round Table Conference, dramatically reversed last week his earlier stand against granting India "dominion status."

The consequence of this act may well alter the entire course of Anglo-Indian history. In effect Lord Reading pledged the Liberal Party to stand and vote with the Labor Party in extending to India that large measure of self-government under the Crown which Prime Minister James Ramsay MacDonald has long been eager to grant. Standing together, Laborites and Liberals could, of course, outvote the Conservatives in the House of Commons, could cut the Gordian knot of India--wisely or unwisely.

Reading's About Face. After three years labor as Chairman of the Indian Statutory Commission, Sir John Simon-- a great & good Liberal friend of Lord Reading--reported that India's states were not yet ready to become a federated union, and that the power of His Majesty's Viceroy must remain unhampered and supreme. The only important concessions recommended by the Simon Report had to do with granting a mite more freedom to the provincial governments in British India (TIME, June 30).

Believing firmly that Sir John Simon must be right, Lord Reading entered the Round Table Conference with a prepared speech in his pocket (TIME, Dec. 1). Excerpt: "You will forgive me if I use a strong expression. ... I say that it is idle to say that at this moment there could be anything like equality of status-- constitutional status, that is--in India with the Dominions."

When he uttered these words Lord Reading had heard virtually all the Indian Princes at the Conference deliver their astounding, unanimous plea for federation and self-government of India under the Crown--but Lord Reading had not grasped what he had heard. Last week, having boldly grasped the facts and still more boldly rejected the Simon Report, Lord Reading said:

"The declarations of the princes revolutionized the whole matter. . . Speaking in behalf of the Liberal delegates to this Conference ... I do not hesitate to say now that our recommendation to the Liberal Party in Parliament will be for Great Britain to go to the full length of granting to India a government responsible to its own elected Legislature, except in the matters of defense and foreign relations, which must for the time being be left as Crown subjects, and with certain reservations in financial affairs."

Commented one of the leading Hindu delegates from British India, Mukund Ramrao Jayakar who conferred with Mahatma Gandhi a short time before leaving India:

"Even the Mahatma himself would be satisfied with the form of government described by the Marquess of Reading."

This "form" remained nameless last week, might be called "reserved dominion status."

Conservative Counterblast. The die-hard British Conservatives, led by famed Winston Churchill, privately consider all schemes for granting any kind of dominion status to India treasonable. In the U. S. last week Mr. Churchill's hotheaded, loose-lipped, lecture-touring son publicly called Scot MacDonald "a traitor to his country."

Not all Conservatives, however, are embittered, fire-eating diehards. Smoothly, seductively Sir Samuel Hoare, spokesman for the Conservative delegation, addressed the Round Table last week thus:

"I have no fear of transferring power to India. I do not think for a moment that Indian cabinet ministers would be inferior to Englishmen. But I doubt very much the wisdom of India adopting the British constitutional system with its Cabinet form of government and House of Commons ... a system which even in this country depends for its success on the conditions of the 19th Century and which now, even for England, is arousing skepticism and misgiving as to its adequacy.

"Do the Indians really want to try this experiment? I do riot wish to commit myself further until we have more details to fill in the picture."

In 19th Century Britain "the country and the lower classes" were ruled by an oligarchical two-party Parliament. Queen Victoria was the outstanding institution of the age, and the few "extremist" M. P.'s were squelched when they advocated what is today the sworn doctrine of every member of Britain's ruling Labor Party: Socialism.

Significance. Lord Reading's about-face produced a profound-effect in India last week, led to general expressions of hope that a new Indian Constitution drafted by the Conference will be adopted by the British Parliament, focused world attention on James Ramsay MacDonald. He announced that before this month is out he will publicly outline the future policy of the British Government with respect to India.

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