Welsh Journals

A CONSTRUCTIVE POLICY FOR WALES by T. P. Ellis §40. 1DO not propose to dwell on the story of the xvth century in Wales. It is writ large, for those who would read it, in the contempo- rary land-surveys and enacted laws. It was just a continuance, on a harsher scale, of what had preceded the rising of Glyndwr; and, as illustra- tive of what the land was reduced to, there is Sir John Wynne of Gwydir to tell us. He is often referred to as indicative of the inherent disorder- liness of the Welsh people of the day. Is it not far more accurate to say that that disorder was the inevitable outcome of the lack of any system of government in the country? The condemna- tion for the state of things, which then existed, lies not upon the Welsh people, but on those who had destroyed indigenous rule, and given nothing in its place. Let us pass on to the days of the Tudors. The attitude of the Tudors to their own land is often referred to as the "bradwriaeth y Tuduriaid." That is utterly wrong and grossly unfair to the great Welsh house. They made mistakes, serious mistakes, but they did much that was of inestim- able value to Wales. Let us consider, very briefly, what they did do, and let us remember, too, that what they did do was on their own responsibility, and in direct defiance of what they were often advised to do. First of all they recreated Wales. They abolished all the conflicting jurisdictions and lordships. They consolidated Wales into one unmistakable entity. They drew a line, not alto- gether satisfactory, perhaps, and said that on the one side of that line is Wales, on the other side is England. The demarcation of that line gave to the word Wales a definite local meaning; and it recognized, for all time to come, that there was a distinct entity, a national entity, called Wales. It was a recognition of extreme importance to us, and it was, in area, a wider Wales than that over which Llywelyn Fawr even had ruled. The Tudors gave us, for the first time, a clear geo- graphical homogeneitv. and when we speak to- day of Wales, we mean, in the main, that which the Tudors said was Wales. Then the Tudors called upon their countrymen to take their part and share in the common- wealth of Britain. They insisted, and insisted sharply, on the fundamental truth, which has always underlain Welsh political philosophy, that the Island of Britain is one and indivisible. They gave to Wales what it had never had before, representation in Parliament, and a means, small no doubt and insufficiently worked out, but still some sort of means, of voicing some of the nation's needs. All restraints upon Welshmen, as such, in the common-wealth were abolished. They were no longer excluded from commerce or from office, subject to one qualification only, to which we shall refer later. The Tudor monarchs were open, as no one had been open since the days of Edward III, to hear the complaints of their countrymen; and, unlike Edward III, they saw that remedies were applied in regard to those complaints. One has only to read some of the petitions sent to the King from Wales, and the orders passed upon them, to realize how pro- foundly sympathetic towards Wales the Tudor house was. Signs and symbols are, perhaps, small things in themselves; but they were, and still are to a greater extent than Welsh people themselves are aware, of intense sentimental importance to the people of Wales. The Tudors knew it, and knew too that their whole fortunes were founded on the Red Dragon which had floated at Bosworth Field, and they took care that the Red Dragon appeared as one of the two supporters of the royal arms, while Henry VII, in building his chapel at West- minster, built it as an apotheosis of his own national symbol. Small, perhaps, of no apparent value to the outward eye, but the Tudors knew better, and in Welsh loyalty to them reaped a rich reward. Further, they resurrected and reorganized the Eisteddfod, and, though they created no Univer- sity for Wales, they did create a college in Oxford to serve some of the special needs of Wales They were rigorous, extremely rigorous, in restoring order; but the hand which fell heavily on those that provoked and indulged in disorder fell heavilv on all, Welsh and English alike, in full impartiality. They restored what the land had long lacked, a system of law, and they saw that that law was administered. Thev had a theory of government, an art of politics, not altogether, perhaps, to our taste, but for the first time in Welsh history, since the days of Hywel Dda, or shall we say since the days of Llywelyn Fawr, there was a theory of govern- ment, which had some regard to the interests of the people governed. To that theory there was a magnificent response from Wales, so great that the great poets of England could write of the "Honour of Wales," make a hero of Glyndwr, and delve, for the first time, into the beauties of Welsh story and legend. To describe that response I am not going to give the long list of Welshmen of distinction who, in those days, crossed over the border, and helped to make of Britain a strong and consolidated realm. There were men like Burleigh, the great-