s
Tidningar", has given great satisfaction to us and certainly also to
other friends of the Union, to whom the relation arisen between the
sister countries after the failure of the consular negotiations, has
caused a great deal of anxiety. That new negotiations if brought about,
will have a decisive influence on the future of the Union, is obvious.
The worth of the Union, as well as the prospect of maintaining it for a
considerable time to come, depend upon the two peoples voluntary
adherence to it in the conviction that the Union involves advantages well
worth of those restrictions in each peoples absolute right of self
determination as are necessarily conditioned by it. Again, the failure of
the negotiations would evidently produce among the two peoples a general
and settled opinion that an arrangement satisfactory to both cannot be
found within the Union, and such a conviction is sure to undermine its
existence.

Because of this, it proves to be of importance for the Riksdag not to
pass in silence the suggestion of negotiations given in the
above-mentioned declaration, but to second it, if found satisfactory.

It seems to us that the Riksdag should not hesitate to take the latter
alternative, since the declaration, while holding in wiew the necessary
communion in the management of Foreign affairs and in the two peoples'
control of it, at the same time in consideration of its latter portion,
has the bearing that it should not preclude the possibility to attain a
solution satisfactory to both peoples.

On that account we beg leave to move:

that the Riksdag, in an address to His Majesty, may announce its
support of the declaration made by the Crown-Prince Regent in Joint
Swedish and Norwegian Cabinet Council on April 5th this year with a
view to bring about negotiations between the Swedish and Norwegian
Governments concerning a new arrangement of the Union affairs.

Stockholm, April 12, 1905.

_Carl Persson._ _Hans Andersson._ _Sixten von Friesen._
_Ernst Lindblad._ _D. Persson i Taellberg._ _K. H. Gez. von Scheele._
_T. Zetterstrand._

15.

The Norwegian Governments' report of April 17th 1905.

His Excellency Michelsen, Prime Minister, and Chief of the
Justice-Department, has in all humility made the following statement:

In making this matter the subject of a humble report the Department
desires to state: As is well known the Nor