In regard to this argument s we cannot forbear a word
of protest. The defenders of the Government scheme have all through taken the extraordinary line that because, as they say, the Militia would not do what the Government *anted it to do, they have a right, as it were, to punish it for its recalcitrancy by abolition. Surely if the Govern- ment, as apparently is the case, hold that the Militia could have supplied drafts for the Regulars, they should have insisted on it supplying those drafts, and not have pro- posed to abolish it in a pet. The Militia is no imperizon in imperio which can, while it lasts, do as it likes. Again, even accepting the Government's suggestion that the Militia proved unreasonable, there were plenty of ways of meeting that unreasonableness short of abolition. For example, as we have pointed out repeatedly, it would have been quite safe to rely upon the Volunteers in a national emergency supplying twenty-five thousand men for drafts in service companies. Next, if proper arrangements had been made for increasing the personnel of the Militia and for creating a new form of Militia Reserve, the residue of the men needed for drafts might very well have been obtained through the Militia. In any case, to abolish the Militia because it would not agree to do what it was asked to do is a most on- statesmanlike proceeding. The Government, from their own point of view, should surely have taken the line with the Militia "You shall do what we tell you to do, and what we hold that you can do, and not what you say you think you ought to do."
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