Imperial Conference

During the past week the Imperial Conference (which is a meeting at London of the Prime Ministers of the British Dominions, the representative of India and the members of the Home Government) discussed the following business. No definite decisions were arrived at.

Imperial Preference. Imperial Preference is (roughly) the granting of a preferential tariff on imports within the Empire. Sir Philip Lloyd Graeme, President of the Board of Trade, said that if the Dominions and the mother country worked together they would be able to realize a development throughout the Empire comparable to that which had taken place in America. Subsidiary subjects to Imperial Preference discussed: settlement and adjustment of the population, industrially and agriculturally, financial cooperation within the Empire. General Jan Smuts, Premier of the Union of South Africa, basing his speech on the necessity of providing for the American debt, urged that Africa be developed, stating that it was capable of supplying all the raw materials necessary to the Empire.

Twelve Mile Limit. U. S. Secretary of State Hughes' proposal to extend the three miles of territorial waters to twelve miles came up for discussion. Dominion Premiers were favorably disposed to the project and it seemed likely to receive endorsement by the Conference.

Foreign Policy. The greatest event in the week was the three-hour detailed report by Lord Curzon, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, on foreign policy, part of which was not published by order of Premier Baldwin. The published part of his speech concerned mainly a review of the Ruhr problem and of the Treaty of Lausanne (TIME, Aug. 6). He doubted that Germany would be able to pull through her present chronic ailment and said that "the internal disruption of Germany which we had all along feared, but which we had consistently been told to regard as a bogy ... is not merely an ominous political symptom; it has pretentious economic significance, for it means the ultimate disappearance of the debtor himself." The tenor of his speech was distinctly anti-French, a fact which caused Lloyd George's heart to rejoice and M. Poincare's hair to rise in anger. He said that Britain awaited French proposals relative to a common policy to be pursued against Germany, because Britain cannot be ignored on a future settlement of reparations. Concerning the late Turkish troubles he complained bitterly of the French attitude to British policy. Fuller debate of all these questions was scheduled to take place later.