FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.
governed, could not be permanent if the Empire was to remain united. It urged that the resources of the whole Empire ought to be combined for the common defence, and that all those parts which bore their share of Imperial burdens must have a voice in the control of Imperial expenditure and Imperial policy. At the time when the Imperial Federation League was formed this idea of a common citizenship and of common responsibilities was but imperfectly realised, either in the mother country or in the Colonies; and though the League never took up Lord Salisbury's challenge, and was wise enough to abstain from formulating any scheme of Federal government, yet the work which it carried on after Mr. Forster's death under the presidency of Lord Rosebery, and, on his taking office in 1892, under the presidency of the late Mr. Edward Stanhope, had the effect of dispelling the doctrine of the Manchester School, that the Colonies were a burden to the mother country, and would cut themselves adrift as soon as they were able to stand by themselves. Statesmen such as the Duke of Devonshire and Mr. Chamberlain, who took no part in the pioneer work of the Federation League, have been recently amongst the foremost champions of the idea of Imperial unity, which, thanks to the Jubilee celebrations, the centralising influence of the Monarchy, and, above all, to the spontaneous assistance rendered by the Colonies in the South African War, has indelibly impressed itself in the minds of the people of this country.
The feeling of the Colonies on Imperial unity.AustraliaIn the Colonies the growth of the sentiment of Imperial unity has been no less remarkable. Fourteen years ago, when I first visited Australia, there was great irritation in all the Australasian Colonies, but
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