Word: commonwealths
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...that India, Pakistan and Ceylon were full dominions, now that Britain's primacy in sea power and trade had departed, now that South Africa was heading down an undemocratic, anti-British road (see below), what was left of the easy trust and informal cooperation of the old Commonwealth...
...telegrams that they used to get when there were only four? And if not, is something real being sacrificed for benefits that it would be hard to define?" The Economist concluded: "The old safe world in which the 'loose connection' flourished no longer exists, and unless the Commonwealth revises the standard of conduct and cooperation which it expects from its members it will become merely a sentimental fiction. There is no virtue in mere size-'the larger the assembly of sheep, the more it appeals to the wolves.' A sprawling collection of nations with no common...
...they could not deal with the questions raised by the Economist, the delegates did make some progress on other fronts. Most important was the discussion of the relation (some Britons call it a conflict) between the Commonwealth and a Western European Union. Dominion representatives asked Chancellor of the Exchequer Sir Stafford Cripps if Britain's commitments to supply capital goods to Europe under the Marshall Plan would not interfere with the shipment of similar goods to their countries. Cripps said no. The visitors seemed impressed when he pointed out that Britain's capital goods exports to Commonwealth nations...
...also technically a Dominion, was not invited to the conference as a whole, but was asked to sit in on a special session at Chequers, Prime Minister Attlee's country home. There the delegates discussed what would happen if Eire carried out her plan to leave the Commonwealth. The delegates were agreed that such a wayward sister would lose trade preferences and the right of her people to emigrate to other Dominions...
Such considerations might hold Eire-and India-in the Commonwealth, but they would not take the place of "kingship and kinship," nor the place of the once-supreme British Navy...