THE NATIONAL SERVICE LEAGUE AND THE WORKING CLASSES
INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
I here insert a letter on the political situation, which I wrote to the
_Times_ a year ago. This letter, I hope, will serve to show that the
National Service League has at least considered the effects which
National Service in Arms would have upon the working men of this
country.
The assertion advanced by Mr. Blatchford in criticizing my Manchester
speech, that the working men of Great Britain will never hear of
compulsory service because they distrust the ruling classes, rests upon
a misconception of the English Constitution almost too obvious to
require exposure. This subject has already been dealt with in Part
III. of "Fallacies and Facts" (pp. 208-217), and to that work I must
refer the reader. I shall only observe in this place that in a
democratic nation the working classes are themselves the ruling
classes, and that the interests of England and of the Empire are their
interests. Does Mr. Blatchford really imagine that the working men are
so blind that, rather than defend those interests like men, they will
prefer tamely to hand them over to Germany or to any other foreign
Power? For this, and this only, is the logical consequence of his
assertion, that he and his fellow-workers prefer invasion to universal
compulsory service.
In former times, when the ruling classes of this nation consisted in
very deed of the men of birth and property, that class considered it as
its sacred right and inalienable privilege to serve the nation in war.
Now, in the twentieth century, when the working men of this country
have by the gradual extension of the franchise succeeded to the
political influence and supremacy of the old aristocratic class, is it
too much to hope that, as their condition of life improves, they will
seek in the same spirit to secure that right and that inalienable
privilege--service in war? For such service is the only mark of the
true and perfect citizenship.
Surely that were a greater path and to a nobler goal than the path and
the goal prescribed to the workers of this nation by the criticism in
the _Clarion_, to which I have just referred.
NATIONAL SERVICE AND SOCIAL REFORM.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE "TIMES."
SIR,
The notification in the _Times_ that Lord Selborne will shortly address
a meeting in London on Imperial unity has caused me to reflect very
seriously on what Imperial unity means to us, and on the disastrous
effects that must follow any diminution on the part of the oversea
Dominions in the splendid feeling of loyalty to the Mother Country of
which we have quite recently had such a convincing example.
Personally, I have had sufficient proof of the strength and practical
value of that loyalty to make me feel that we should do all in our
power to strengthen and foster it; and to this end, and in order that
we may retain undiminished the confidence of our distant
fellow-subjects, we must begin to put our own house in order, and show
the peoples of the oversea Dominions that we are determined to grapple
with the several problems with which we are confronted and with which
they are immediately concerned--that our Government, for instance, is
established on a firm and constitutional basis; that our fiscal policy
is sound; and that our Navy and Army are strong enough to defend our
own interests, and to give the Dominions such help as they may require
in time of trouble.
Yet, what is the present condition of affairs in this country? We have
just passed under the domination of a Single Chamber. Tariff Reform,
which occupies the chief place in the Unionist programme, is supported
only in a half-hearted manner by the leaders of the party, and is
opposed by some of its most powerful members. Our Navy is being
rapidly approached by other navies in the number, speed, and power of
their warships. Our Army is quite unfitted to meet the demands that
may at any moment be made upon it.
How and by whom is this all to be changed? It can hardly be changed by
the party now in power. That party has declared openly enough its
policy, alike in regard to a Second Chamber, to Tariff Reform, to the
Army and Navy, and therefore also in regard to our position as a
first-rate European Power. The men to whom, on account of their high
public character and culture, the nation looked for a steadying
influence on the ultra-Radical and Socialistic sections of the party,
have not fulfilled those expectations, and seem prepared to make any
concessions that their most advanced supporters may demand.
On the other hand, is the Unionist party in a condition to bring about
the changes that are absolutely necessary before we can take up the
question of Imperial unity in any practical manner? Has that party
placed before the country a definite policy upon those primary and
all-important problems to which I have referred? Is it doing anything
to make clearer to the people of this country what these mean to them?
Or is it endeavouring to deal with them in a business-like way? I
confess I can detect no indications of such a policy, and am not
surprised, therefore, that a large number of the most earnest and most
thoughtful Unionists have become disheartened and discontented.
It seems to me that the only way the desired end can be attained is for
the prominent members of the Unionist party at once to place before the
country a constructive policy; above all, as to the two problems that
are the most pressing and the most vital--Social Reform and National
Defence. These two problems are intimately connected, and a
satisfactory solution of them must precede any real strengthening of
Imperial bonds.
The question of Social Reform has been very fully discussed in the
public papers during the last few months, and one of the writers on
this subject has happily explained it as meaning "securing for the
slum-dwellers good air, good housing, good food, good clothes, and good
education." The conditions amid which millions of our people are
living appear to me to make it natural that they should not care a
straw under what rule they may be called upon to dwell, and I can quite
understand their want of patriotic feeling.
Again, by Social Reform I mean a reform which includes essential
changes in our primary schools. No other civilized nation leaves its
young boys and girls to shift for themselves, as we leave ours when
they are thirteen or fourteen years of age. Nor is the education they
receive an education calculated to make them lovers of their country.
They are never told anything of its history, or taught to be proud of
their country and its past. They are not given any idea of what their
duty is to their country or what they owe to it. In some schools,
indeed, it is even forbidden to hoist the Union Jack. Much of the
teaching has no bearing upon actual life, and it comes to an end at the
very age at which boys are most receptive of tuition, be it good or
evil, and most require to be under some kind of control. Our oversea
Dominions are wiser in this respect than we are. By means of Cadet
Corps the boys are looked after until they reach the age of manhood,
and the ground is thus prepared for the formation of a reliable Citizen
Army.
The same excellent results are obtained to some small extent in this
country by training-ships, homes such as the Gordon Boys' Home, schools
like the Duke of York's and the Royal Hibernian Military Schools, and
societies like the Church Lads' and Boys' Brigades. Why are the
failures in after-life amongst the lads brought up in these
institutions so remarkably few? It is simply owing to the habits of
order, obedience, and discipline they have been taught in their youth.
And the Scout movement has already produced remarkable results. But
such organizations are too limited in scope and too few in number, and,
with the exception of the two Royal schools, they depend almost
entirely upon private enterprise, and to a serious Government or a
serious nation they are only signposts to the true policy. They should
be an integral part of our national education.
Social Reform is a preliminary to any thorough system of national
defence. "My country right or wrong; and right or wrong my country!"
is the sentiment most treasured in the breast of anyone worthy of the
name of man. Nevertheless, with how much more confidence should we be
able to appeal to the young men of this nation and the Empire to do
their duty as citizen soldiers if we had the certainty that they
regarded England, not as a harsh stepmother, but as a true motherland,
sedulously nurturing its youth, and not indifferent to their welfare in
manhood or in age, and if we could further appeal to them to defend the
nation and the Empire, because within its bounds they can live nobler
and fuller lives than on any other spot on earth! Yet recent
unimpeachable evidence makes it clear that, to tens of thousands of
Englishmen engaged in daily toil, the call to "sacrifice" themselves
for their country must seem an insult to their reason; for those
conditions amid which they live make their lives already an unending
sacrifice.
Will the Unionist party realize the gravity of this state of affairs?
The Liberal party, by the Act for Payment of Members, has fulfilled to
the letter the trust committed to it by the rising democracies of the
'forties. That Act, the last of the five points of the Charter, ends
an epoch of which I can remember the beginnings more than sixty years
ago. But the Radical-Liberal party has no longer a policy of
construction; it seems only to have given the democracy enfranchisement
in order to lead it to the disintegration of a time-honoured
Constitution and the gradual dismemberment of a great Empire.
Is it too late to hope that the Unionist party will come forward to
lead the millions that wait for a leader?
No party can long continue in power which relies for its prestige
solely upon fomenting class hatreds--that is, by dividing the State
against itself. But before a great national sacrifice to patriotism
can fitly be demanded, a great act of national justice must be
performed. The Unionist party missed its opportunity with respect to
granting old-age pensions on a contributory basis. Now in 1911 it is
confronted by larger issues; by problems affecting the industrial life
of the entire nation, and touching, so to speak, the very fountain-head
of the Empire's life.
Is it too late?
I am, Sir, your obedient servant,
ROBERTS, F.M.