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incompatible with a Federal form of Government. It must be borne in mind that as a nation may be found in being, so also a nation, may be brought into being. In a Federal Government there may be at the start no nation, it may be a collection of heterogeneous communities. But it is possible to have in the end a nation even under a Federal Government. The most striking case is that of the United States of America. Mr. Bryce relates a story which is both interesting as well as instructive. This is the story and I give it in his own words. “Some years ago the American Protestant Episcopal Church was occupied at its triennial Convention in revising its liturgy. It was thought desirable to introduce among the short sentence a prayer for the whole people; and an eminent New England Divine proposed the words, ‘O Lord, bless our nation’. Accepted one afternoon on the spur of the moment, the sentence was brought up next day for reconsideration, when so many objections were raised by the laity to the word ‘nation’, as importing too definite a recognition of national unity, that it was dropped, and instead there were adopted the words, ‘O Lord, bless these United States.’ Notwithstanding this prayer to the Lord, notwithstanding the reluctance to encourage the idea of a nation over against the idea of the states and notwithstanding the federal form oi Government the United States is a nation. That it is a nation in the social sense of the word is incontrovertible.”
How has this happened in the United States ? Can we hope to see this happen in India under the Federal Scheme ? Bryce explains how this happened in America. He points out that in America “The Central or National Government is not a mere league, for it does not wholly depend on the component Communities which we call the States. It is itself a Commonwealth as well as a Union of Commonwealths, because it claims directly the obedience of every citizen, and acts immediately upon him through its Courts and executive officers”. It can tax him, make law for him and judge him. In short it is the process of Government which is responsible largely if not wholly for moulding the Americans into a nation and that this was possible because in the Federal Form of Government of the United States there is a direct contact between the National Government and the individual.
Is this possible under the Indian Federal Scheme ? My answer is that such a thing is not possible. The people in the Indian States remain the subjects of the States. The Federal Government cannot deal with them directly. Everything has to be done through the State. There is no contact between the two, not even for purposes of taxation. How can a feeling that they belong to the national Government grow in the subject of the Indian States if they are excluded from any and every influence and are not even made to feel the existence of the National Government ? I am afraid this United States of India will not be more than a mere body