FREEDOM OF CONSCIENCE
Snt,—A Press report on November 29th gave this notice, which had appeared on the union board of a large works in London on the previous day: " The management have been informed that we will refuse to work with members of the staff who are not members of a trade union." It appears that a workman who belongs to a particular religious body has refused to join a trade union, " because he believes in leaving all his affairs to God." I do not belong to this workman's religious body, but, as an elder and Moderator of Presbytery in the Presbyterian Church of Wales, I shall be glad if you will allow me to call attention to this episode as a serious infringement of the legal and moral rights of the individual citizen in regard to his employment and his religious beliefs.
Though there may not be many such cases, it is by no means the first case of a man refusing to join a trade union on the grounds of con- scientious objection ; and, as provision has been made in the National Service Acts for giving relief to a person having a conscientious objection to military service on his satisfying a tribunal, I plead very strongly that similar relief should be given to the workmen and women whose conscience forbids them to join what they regard as a " worldly " organisation. In view of the growing tendency of mighty aggregations of men to impose their views on their fellows and even to claim and assert condominium with the State itself, it would seem as if we may have to fight for freedom of conscience over again as our forefathers in past generations have had to do, unless Parliament intervenes to give the necessary statutory pro-
tection in these cases.—I am, your obedient servant, JAMES EVANS. Y. Fron, Peterston-super-Ely, Glatnorgan.
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