TRADE UNIONS AND THE WAR.
[To me EDITOR OP THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—In your valuable article upon "Trade Unions and the War" (Spectator, August 29th) I have been particularly struck by the following sentences : "In view of the letters which have been written to the Press by certain University Pro- fessors, it would be more appropriate if the working men of South Wales and Lancashire were to select one or two repre- sentative speakers to give lectures in Cambridge on the duty of professorial persons when their country is engaged in a life-and-death struggle with an aggressive enemy. The working men of England understand their duty in a national crisis without the instruction of any University lecturers." A few days ago I ventured to write a letter to the Times against the assumption, which had been made by some corre- spondents, that the working men of the North must, in the present national crisis, be lectured into patriotism. Since then I have received some interesting comments upon my letter, and from one of them I will make a brief quotation. The writer, who says that "in the interest of Lancashire men of all classes " he "protests against lecturers coming here," indulges, a little unfairly I think, in a contrast between " stay-at-home Professors who are patriotically willing to talk —if paid " and "living working men who are bearing the heat and burden of the day, and who know what they are talking about." But his point is that the working men of Lancashire do not need instruction upon their duty during the war. He adds : "The letter in Saturday's Times from Professor Marshall was enough to rise [sic] the gorge of the dead, to say nothing of the living."
It is not my wish to deprecate public speeches upon the war or upon any other topic; but I hope that, if lecturers are sent into Lancashire, they will be carefully chosen, and will not be sent without some reference to the feeling of the localities in which their lectures will be given. The working men are generally intelligent and conscientious ; they read the newspapers ; they attend public meetings ; they are well informed as to the causes of the war. Upon many of them the burden of the war will fall far more heavily than upon Professors in the Universities. Yet they are the last persons who would willingly become the slaves of military despotism. They are prepared to serve their country, and to serve it to the end ; they are responding, and will more fully respond, to Lord Kitchener's demand for recruits ; but they are a little impatient of anybody who tries, from the standpoint of intellectual or moral superiority, to preach them the gospel of patriotism, as if they were less disposed than any other class of the community to make sacrifices for the public good. I cannot help thinking that the best lecturers upon the war in Lancashire, if, indeed, lectures are necessary there at all, would be the leaders of industry, and especially of the cotton trade, who are known and trusted by the opera- tives in all parts of the county.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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