is required to serve his party rather than his State. With the advent of the Labour party to office the Senate, as a legislative body, becomes a mere nullity. The pledge which each member of the party is required to take before election runs thus:

I hereby pledge myself not to oppose the candidate selected by the recognized political Labour organizations and, if elected, to do my utmost to carry out the principles embodied in the Australian Labour Party's platform, and on all questions affecting the platform to vote as a majority of the Parliamentary Party may decide at a duly constituted caucus meeting.

Seeing that Labour members belonging to both Houses sit and vote together at all caucus meetings, and that the number required to constitute a bare majority in the House of Representatives exceeds by more than 50 per cent. the entire number of Senators, all important questions of policy are practically dictated by the Labour members in the House of Representatives, and the other Chamber is reduced to impotence. As before mentioned, too, the "principles embodied in the Australian Labour Party's platform " include the entire abolition of the Senate.

The Federal Legislature, indeed, has throughout consisted of deux têtes sous le même bonnet, and the cap has occasionally assumed a distinctly reddish tinge. The Senate, nominally supposed to be a Chamber for revision, has been throughout solely one for affirmation, and has only served the not very useful purpose of providing well-paid positions for thirty-six superfluous politicians. Throughout the whole period since it came into existence the Senate has never once taken up an independent position on any question seriously affecting the interests of the tax-payers or the rights of the weaker States. It cannot protect property and established interests from legislative spoliation, because it is elected chiefly by those who own little or nothing. It cannot defend the rights of the States, because it is wholly subject to the control of the party machine, and no independent candidate has a chance of election. It does not represent, like the Senate of ancient Rome, the mature judgment of the people, because juvenility is no bar to membership and many of its electors are persons who have not reached the age of maturity. The weakness of the Senate constitutes a real danger to the Commonwealth; and its reform, with a view to an improvement of its personnel and an increase of its authority, is now an

urgent necessity, if the union of the Australian States is to be maintained.

Mr. Bruce has just expressed the intention of the Government to hold a special session of Parliament early next year to consider proposals for the alteration of the Federal constitution. Undoubtedly drastic changes are much needed, but it would be idle to expect that the members of the present Senate will consent to any proposal for raising the qualifications for membership of that body.

The question as to how so desirable a change is to be effected is one that is far too extensive for discussion in this article. Reasonable property and age qualifications, which would ensure both a sense of responsibility and the careful exercise of judgment on the part of each elector, would no doubt greatly raise the character and legislative capacity of the Senate; but since, under the régime of democracy, the political rights of property are in abeyance, it may be suggested that the raising of the age of eligibility for membership to 40, and for voting to 30, and the adoption of the rule that elections for the Senate should never synchronize, as they do now, with those for the House of Representatives (an arrangement more convenient for party managers than beneficial to the public interest), would do much towards enabling the Federal Parliament to fulfil the duty prescribed for it in the Constitution Act of "making laws for the peace, order and good government of the Commonwealth." The rigidity of the terms of the Act, which require that no change shall be made in the Constitution unless approved, firstly, by a majority of the members of Parliament, then by a majority of the electors voting in a majority of the States, and finally, by a majority of all the electors who voted, makes the task of effecting any important alteration of the constitution a most difficult one. But the only alternative to revision seems to be dissolution. No instrument of government which lends itself to the designs of predatory classes and parties can long be tolerated by those who are its victims. The noble old maxim, justitia fundamentum regni, not only expresses an historical truth, but also conveys a solemn warning.

F. A. W. GISBORNE

AIR PROBLEMS OF THE EMPIRE

T is unfortunate that certain official and press statements regarding the renewed consideration to be given by the Imperial Conference to the question of Imperial Air Communications fail to distinguish between the essentially different aspects of the military and civil branches of the problem. In 1918, when military air-power was in its zenith, and commercial air traffic a matter only of imagination, the Imperial War Cabinet rightly recognised the two subjects, though closely inter-related, to be distinct. Succeeding Imperial Conferences have taken the same view. They have supported the development of both military air power and of civil aerial communications, not as a single objective, but as two distinct needs in the organism of the Empire, each to be assessed on its own merits.

The military case-the ability of air force "to move quickly and safely from one end of the Empire to another "-is the necessity for ensuring the utmost mobility in the defence of the Empire to this already remarkably mobile war weapon. On the other hand, the case for the development of civil air communication has been accepted and urged by the Imperial Conferences on grounds distinct from its potential military value. While there has been a general acceptance of the military need of established mercantile air strength, constructive and operative, as a reserve, and a recognition of the two-fold utility, military and civil, of the ground organization upon which air communications depend, the Imperial Conferences have also supported aerial communication by reason of its value in reducing the distances which handicap alike imperial commerce, the consultations of the Imperial Governments, and the interchange of thought and knowledge amongst the peoples of the Empire. Nor has this separate consideration been given merely because the purposes of military and civil communication are distinct. The requirements in effecting those purposes are also dissimilar. Military communication, in which peace operation is preparation for war utility, requires speed, subject to security against attack. Air commerce, which during war will be an incident of exceptional occurrence, requires speed, consistent with economy of operation and utility in traffic.

Now the speediest route, both for military and civil communication, is, of course, (subject to such divergencies as are dictated by geographical and meteorological conditions) the shortest route, or the straight line between points of departure and arrival. Speed in military communication may have to be sacrificed to obtain security from hostile attack, and this may involve the use of routes different to those imposed on civil communications by the presence of traffic-providing centres adjacent to the direct line of service between given points.

There must also be considered in both the military and civil problems the question of the right to fly over any given territories. Whilst, in the event of war with (say) a hypothetical Southern Pacific State, our military aircraft might traverse any European country with security against enemy attack, they could only do so by a breach of neutrality involving those States either in war against us in defence of their sovereign rights, as Belgium was involved in war with Germany; or in hostility to our enemy, as Turkey might well have been drawn into war with us, had she not herself chosen war by taking definitely hostile action against Great Britain.

The very novelty of long-distance controlled flight makes international law in the matter itself novel. Naval units by international agreement possessed before the war, and still possess, the right, with limitations, of presence and refitting in neutral waters; on the other hand, the presence of military personnel or units in neutral territory was (and is) a breach of neutrality. The question of national rights in regard to the presence of air units on or above neutral territory awaited the event of the war. The practice of neutrals as regards naval aircraft, seaplanes and flying-boats, showed the variations of uncertainty as to whether these new instruments were to be treated as naval or military units. On land, however, with one single exception, all belligerent aircraft landing in or passing over the territory of neutral States were held to have committed a breach of neutrality; they were fired on if passing over territory, and if they landed were interned with their military crews. This practice has since been confirmed by an International Conference held at the Hague to draw up rules governing air warfare, and the responsibility of neutrals to take similar action against belligerent aircraft is now embodied in the rules of war.

There is, it is true, a method under which this handicap could, under certain conditions, be avoided. Where convention or agreement permitted the international flight of civil aircraft-a subject to be dealt with later-flight over neutral territory could be employed for the reinforcement of overseas air-forces if it were carried out by civilian aircraft not in the ownership of the State, and manned by personnel not enrolled in the armed forces of the Crown. These machines could be subsequently converted to military uses and deleted from the civil register. But this assistance could be given only with new machines which were still the property of the manufacturer; all military fitments usually embodied during the course of manufacture would have to be effected after the machines had passed out of neutral jurisdiction, and their personnel could not be subject to military discipline when outside British sovereignty. Only, therefore, in very exceptional circumstances would such a service be of practical value.

There remains, in the military problem, consideration of the international position in peace. The rules governing belligerent aircraft do not, of course, in themselves prohibit the flight of nonbelligerent military aircraft over the territories of another State; but no convention exists which gives a general authority for such flight. Nor, indeed, would such general authority be consonant with national sovereignty. The specific authority of the government of the country flown over is therefore necessary for every individual flight of a visiting or passing military machine. Such permission has been given for visits of ceremony, for demonstrational flights and for operations carried out to test navigational apparatus. But it is a privilege which would not be granted as an assistance to routine military operations. If, indeed, it were desirable to employ it under the existing technical position of aeronautical performance for regular peace-time communication between the Home Air Forces and those of the Near or Middle East, it would necessitate the authority of France, Italy and Greece; or, alternatively, of France, Germany and some four or five of the Mid-European and Balkan States. But even if these permissions were obtainable, it cannot be desirable to employ in peace-time a routine practice which would be debarred in any war in which the countries flown over were not our declared allies. For, clearly, the movement of our military aircraft in peace should