Leidsch Dagblad
- Bazaar of the Association for Combating Tuberculosis in Leiden.
- The Resurgence of Rome in the Netherlands.
- Total Abstinence among Railway and Tramway Personnel.
The Leidsch Dagblad of 26 October 1926 reported the opening of a bazaar run by Leiden's Association for Combating Tuberculosis: the board, the organising ladies' committee and invited dignitaries attended, and chairman Dr. J. Bruining welcomed them in a speech the paper printed at length. A report on a lecture titled "The Resurgence of Rome in the Netherlands" followed the speaker's account of the restoration of the Catholic bishoprics without consulting parliament, the protests that failed partly because of Thorbecke, and Thorbecke's description of the nation as Dutch rather than Protestant or Catholic. A third report described a temperance evening for railway and tram staff, where a cocoa and chocolate advertising film was shown and promotional packets were handed out.
Translation
Bazaar of the Association for Combating Tuberculosis in Leiden.
Nor is there any lack of attractions. Everyone will find something to his or her liking. This afternoon at half past two the bazaar was officially opened in the presence of the board, the ladies' committee for the organisation and numerous invited guests, among them several authorities. On that occasion the chairman, Dr. J. Bruining, gave a speech, of which we print a detailed report below. It was a pleasure for him, as chairman of the Association for Combating Tuberculosis in Leiden, to bid everyone a hearty welcome.
The Resurgence of Rome in the Netherlands.
The speaker then discusses the restoration of the bishoprics, and how this took place without the States General being consulted. Fierce protests were raised against it, but, partly owing to the liberal minister Thorbecke, these had no result. Thorbecke called the Nation neither a Protestant nor a Roman Catholic one, but a Dutch Nation.
Total Abstinence among Railway and Tramway Personnel.
after which the meeting proceeded to the showing of the well-known advertising film of the firm of Van [?] about cocoa and chocolate, of which we have already given a detailed description earlier. We therefore confine ourselves now to mentioning that the pictures held everyone's attention and that afterwards the firm's representative handed those present a promotional packet.
Context
Why "Rome" was a live political issue in autumn 1926
The lecture on the "resurgence of Rome" came at the end of a year in which relations with the Holy See had brought down a Dutch government. A legation to the Pope, abolished in 1871, had been reopened as a temporary post in 1915 and was made permanent in 1920, to the displeasure of many Protestants. In November 1925 the orthodox Protestant SGP put forward an amendment, carried in the Second Chamber, that removed the legation's funding; the first Colijn cabinet fell when its four Catholic ministers resigned. The extraparliamentary De Geer cabinet that followed proposed keeping the legation again in March 1926, but the Second Chamber rejected the proposal, and for the time being the Netherlands had no envoy at the Vatican. The speaker's history, running from the bishoprics restored without parliament's consent to Thorbecke's "Dutch Nation", was told to an audience that had just lived through this fight over how much official standing Catholicism should have.
The Hervormd-Gereformeerde Staatspartij and its view of Dutch history
The lecture was given at the invitation of the Leiden branch of the Hervormd-Gereformeerde Staatspartij (HGSP), an orthodox Protestant party founded in 1921 that wanted a Protestant Netherlands governed by biblical norms. It sat in the Second Chamber as a one-seat opposition party from 1925 to 1937, so in October 1926 it was a newly arrived parliamentary voice. Its founders deliberately looked back to the nineteenth century: their protest movement called itself the June Movement, in reference to the April movement of 1853. The article quoted here reports the speaker recounting the same period, when the bishoprics were restored and Protestant protests came to nothing. The newspaper's report gives the lecture's argument; the claim that the States General was bypassed and the account of Thorbecke's role are the speaker's version as the paper reported it.
C. A. Lingbeek, the HGSP's voice against Catholic influence
The HGSP's single member of parliament in 1926 was its leader, the Hervormd minister Casper Andries Lingbeek, who took the seat the party won in the 1925 election. He was known as an orthodox preacher who railed against what he saw as the excessive influence of "Rome" on Dutch politics, and he was unpopular even with the other parties of the right, especially the CHU. In the Chamber he opposed exempting priests from military service and state support for teachers who belonged to religious orders. The Leiden lecture on the "resurgence of Rome", which the page reports Lingbeek himself gave, carried to a public audience the complaint he was pressing in parliament: that the Catholic minority was steadily gaining public position in a nation he regarded as Protestant at heart.
How tuberculosis control was organised in the 1920s Netherlands
The Leiden bazaar reflects the way the Dutch fought tuberculosis between the wars. Before 1940 the work of the tuberculosis movement, including the spread of X-ray diagnosis, ran mainly through private organisations divided along religious and political lines, and only partly through direct involvement of the national government. The national structure combined voluntary bodies such as the Nederlandse Centrale Vereniging ter bestrijding der Tuberculose, district nursing associations and sanatoria with public health services and industrial firms. Among the state's regulations were subsidies for medical aid organisations such as tuberculosis consultation clinics. In such a system a local association relied heavily on private initiative, which helps explain why a charity bazaar opened in the presence of the board, a ladies' organising committee and local authorities was newsworthy in Leiden.
Original
BAZAAR VAN DE VEREENIGING TOT BESTRIJDING DER TUBERCULOSE TE LEIDEN.
Aan attracties is er ook geen gebrek. Ieder vindt er iets van zijn of haar gading. Hedenmiddag te halfdrie werd de bazaar officieel geopend in tegenwoordigheid van het bestuur, het dames-comité voor de organisatie en tal van genoodigden waaronder eenige autoriteiten. De voorzitter dr. J. Bruining hield daarbij een rede. waarvan wij hier onder een uitvoerig verslag laten volgen. Het was hem een genoegen als voorzitter der Ver. t. b. d. t. b. c. te Leiden, allen van harte welkom te heeten.
DE WEDEROPKOMST VAN ROME IN NEDERLAND.
Spr. bespreekt vervolgens het herstel der bisdommen, hoe dit, zonder de Staten-Generaal hierin te kennen, is geschied. Hevige protesten heeft men hiertegen geuit, doch hadden deze, mede door den liberalen minister Thorbecke, géén resultaat. Thorbecke noemde de Natie noch een protestantsche, noch een roomsche, doch een Nederl. Natie.
GEHEELONTHOUDING ONDER SPOOR- EN TRAMWEGPERSONEEL.
waarna overgegaan werd tot de vertooning van de bekende reclame-film der firma Van [?], over cacao en chocolade, waarvan wij reeds eerder een uitvoerige beschrijving hebben gegeven. Wij volstaan daarom thans met de vermelding, dat de plaatjes aller aandacht wisten te trekken en dat na afloop aan de aanwezigen door den vertegenwoordiger der firma een reclame-pakketje werd verstrekt.
Source: Source: Erfgoed Leiden en Omstreken (leiden.courant.nu)