THE AGENDA CLUB.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] STR,—Some years ago there was a good deal of correspondence in the Spectator about the "Agenda Club." As a very young subaltern I was interested in it, and met one of the founders of the club, whose name I cannot remember, and was very much impressed with all his proposals and ideas. I was anxious to learn more, and if possible to help, but absence abroad and other reasons caused me to lose touch with the movement. I have been thinking that if the movement is dead, now would be the time to establish a sound working organization on the lines of the old Agenda Club. The whole world is in the melting-pot, and ideas have changed more in two years than they would, normally, in twenty. To a great extent prejudices and jealousies seem to have disappeared. For the first time in history unemployment is unknown. Workers in factories are better cared for, because on their efforts national prosperity and victory depend—instead of merely dividends. Men will come back from the war broader-minded, less insular, and clearer thinkers. But it seems as if we were overstocked with committees and societies each with a different name, all working for the betterment of civilization, but possibly on the wrong lines. Could not one large central organization replace all these, and bring ideals nearer realization ? This organization could deal with such things as sweating, saving of child life, prevention of consumption, venereal disease, prostitution, he., far more effectively than a number of small societies. There would be no difficulty in obtaining workers—propagandists. Men who have given up everything to help to rid the world of its greatest evil will (surely) be glad to help to remedy lesser evils. For the first time in our history we find the whole nation thinking as one man and working as one man for its country's glory. Men who three years ago were looking at Mr. Lloyd George with suspicion now are wondering if his great skill at organizing, controlling, and leading men will not be of as great use after as it has been during the war. The subject is so large that it needs a readier pen than mine to deal with it Men of all sorts and conditions have been thinking these last two years as they never knew they could think. A view of a sandbag wall and the sky above you conduces to a new form of thought. The idea expressed in Kipling's " Chant Pagan " comes into your head : " Me that have been where I've been—me that have seen what I've seen—how can I over take on with awful old England again ? " Can we not set about creating a new England which is not "awful" ? The Agenda Club published a pamphlet—An Open Letter to the Gentlemen of England, I think it was called. My copy is at home, but I remember how it appealed to other men besides myself, who had never been appealed to before to help in the betterment of social conditions. I believe this is the time for a revival of the Agenda Club if it is dead or only dying. Can you not, Sir, with your great influence, help to revive it, so that before we come back to our old political bickerings and Strafe we can " get a move on," with better organization, clearer ideas, fresh ideals ? If you can spare room for this letter, I shall be a proud man. If any good should come of it, I shall be still prouder. In either case, I hope you will excuse the liberty I take in trying to meddle with things about which I am so ignorant.—I am, Sir, ho.,
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