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Master Document Template Copyright by Daniel Kenneth Wold 2012 The Dissertation Committee for Daniel Kenneth Wold Certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation (or treatise): Commonwealth: Imperialism and Internationalism, 1919-1939 Committee: A.G. Hopkins, Supervisor William Roger Louis Bruce Hunt James Vaughn R.J.Q. Adams Commonwealth: Imperialism and Internationalism, 1919-1939 by Daniel Kenneth Wold, BA; MA Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin December, 2012 Dedication To my parents, Anne and Steve Acknowledgements This dissertation would not be possible without the help of many people at the University of Texas. I would like to thank the Department of History at the University of Texas, which provided me with a fellowship that allowed me to conduct research in London, Oxford, and Edinburgh. A.G. Hopkins supervised my work and gave me invaluable advice on my research topic, the state of the field, and my writing. I am indebted for him for his guidance. I would also like to thank William Roger Louis for his comments, his advice on research, his assistance with writing, and for gathering a wonderful community of scholars every Friday for British studies. I greatly appreciate Bruce Hunt for the many discussions we had about my dissertation and for all of the valuable advice he has given me about pursuing history. James Vaughn and R.J.Q. Adams have also taken the time to provide insightful comments on my work, and I thank them. I would like to extend my gratitude towards Marilyn Lehman, the Graduate Coordinator in the history department for being a patient guide to the department and the university’s policies and procedures. I conducted my research at the British National Archives in London, the Bodelian Library in Oxford, the Scottish National Archives in Edinburgh, and the Harry Ransome Center at the University of Texas. I greatly appreciate the assistance from the friendly and helpful staff members who made my research easier. I also thank the current Marquess of Lothian for his permission to quote from the papers of Philip Kerr, the eleventh Marquess of Lothian. The University of Texas has a wonderful community of graduate students who have inspired, encouraged, and helped me to finish this work. In particular, I would like to thank Bob Whitaker, Michael Schmidt, Emily Brownell, Mikki Brock, and Matt Powers, who all took the time to comment on my work. Finally, I would like to thank my family. I could not have completed the dissertation without the warmth and support of my parents, Anne and Steve, my sister and brother-in-law, Elise and Scott, my grandmother, Millie, and my late grandfather, Alex. My parents in particular have given me an endless amount of encouragement, and this work is dedicated to them. v Commonwealth: Internationalism and Imperialism, 1919-1932 Daniel Kenneth Wold, Ph.D. The University of Texas at Austin, 2012 Supervisor: A.G. Hopkins The dissertation places the British Commonwealth of Nations in the context of international organizations in the 1920s and 1930s. British officials and policymakers developed a Commonwealth ideology that recast the Commonwealth as an international organization with close, informal relations. I argue that this ideology remained at the heart of British approaches to foreign relations. British writers and politicians used Commonwealth ideology as a model for international organizations such as the League of Nations. The dissertation also examines the development of the Commonwealth as an international organization. It shows how the Commonwealth became an organization of sovereign nations, but rarely lived up to the close cooperation described by the ideology. The Commonwealth became controversial as British and Dominion governments differed about its nature. The British government argued that the main link was the Crown, while some Dominion governments viewed it as an international organization held together by economic links and the will to cooperate. The dissertation differs from previous historical accounts by putting the Commonwealth in the context of internationalism. Many scholars have studied the interwar Commonwealth in terms of decolonization. They have measured the amount of independence the Dominions gained from Britain. Scholars of international organizations and globalization have tended to ignore the Commonwealth as an influential international organization. I argue that Commonwealth ideology served as an important British contribution to the development of internationalism in the 1920s and 1930s. vi Table of Contents A Note on Terminology ...........................................................................................1 Chapter I: Introduction .............................................................................................3 Chapter II: Imperial Reform ..................................................................................23 Chapter III: Internationalism and Imperialism ......................................................47 A British internationalism .............................................................................50 Imperial Reform and the League of Nations.................................................59 Internationalist Imperialism: A League within a League .............................68 The Dominions and the World ......................................................................76 Chapter IV: The Commonwealth as an Alternative to the League of Nations ......86 Objections to the League ..............................................................................88 The Dominions, the League of Nations, and Imperial Foreign Policy in the 1920s ....................................................................................................95 Remaking the Commonwealth ....................................................................111 Conclusion ..................................................................................................121 Chapter V: The Dominions Office and the Internationalization of the Commonwealth .....................................................................................................................124 The Dominions Office ................................................................................126 The 1926 Imperial Conference ...................................................................130 Channels of Communication.......................................................................144 Conclusion ..................................................................................................158 Chapter VI: The Ottawa Conference and the Commonwealth Economy ............160 The Dominions Office and the National Government ................................164 The Ottawa Negotiations ............................................................................167 Reactions to Ottawa ....................................................................................182 “Ottawa Dominions” and the Irish Free State: The Fracturing of Dominion Status ..................................................................................................191 Beyond Ottawa: Trade in the Commonwealth in the 1930s .......................203 Conclusion ..................................................................................................212 vii Chapter VII: Constitutional Crises.......................................................................215 Imperial Reformers .....................................................................................219 Nationality, Secession, and External Association.......................................232 Defense, Neutrality and War .......................................................................253 Conclusion ..................................................................................................263 Chapter VIII: Federal Union ................................................................................267 Philip Kerr and the Tyranny of Sovereign States .......................................270 Lionel Curtis and Civitas Dei .....................................................................278 Federal Union and the Commonwealth ......................................................292 Conclusion ..................................................................................................303 Chapter IX: Conclusion .......................................................................................306 Bibliography ........................................................................................................315 viii A Note on Terminology The term Commonwealth had several uses during the 1920s and 1930s. British writers on international relations often used the word to describe a popular democratic government. They made references to the American Commonwealth, the French Commonwealth and even ancient Athens, as described by Alfred Zimmern in The Greek Commonwealth. British officials in the Colonial and Dominion offices also used the word Commonwealth as shorthand for the Commonwealth of Australia (much like how often they referred to the Union of South Africa as “the Union.”) After the First World War, British writers began to refer to the Empire as the British Commonwealth of Nations. The distinction between Empire and Commonwealth remained unclear. In 1934, the imperialist Philip Kerr
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