The Commonwealth, created by the 1931 Statute of Westminster, had been intended by its framers to obviate the need for rapid moves to colonial independence, offering instead a framework for autonomous and semi-autonomous territories to remain bound by allegiance and obedience to the British Crown, while relieving them of the objectionable trappings of Imperial domination. But it was now to become instead a holding club for former colonies, independent states whose membership in the British Commonwealth constrained them only to the extent of their own interests and sentiments.
