Mr. Stanley and Mr. Crossman Ste,—Your contributor Janus, describing last
week's House of Commons debate, states that Mr. Stanley's best casual thrust was " at the expense of Mr. R. H. S. Crossman, who, in an article in a Sunday paper on the very day devaluation was announced, had explained conclusively why it could never happen."
This destroys some of the point of Mr. Stanley's admirable jibe, and totally misrepresents what I actually wrote in the Sunday Pictorial: namely, that a long-drawn-out battle for the pound had begun last May, when Sir Stafford Cripps said "No" to American proposals that we should devalue ; that devaluation has some very obvious disadvantages and dangers for this country ; that the American Treasury started a whisper campaign, predicting devaluation on September 18th ; that the whispers, which increased throughout the summer, had a disastrous effect on British trade and confidence in the pound ; that it was far too early to say that the battle had been won in Washington, since " a lot of very wealthy men are going to lose a lot of money if the pound is not devalued at once"; and, finally, that what Sir Stafford and Mr. Bevin had achieved was to win time—six or perhaps twelve months—and, most important, to gain the support of Mr. Truman.
Mr. Stanley was fair enough in laughing at me for still fighting in a last ditch which had been secretly evacuated three weeks earlier by the Chancellor. On that I would only remark that, as a choice of evils, I would rather be used unwittingly for purposes of strategic deception than help in campaign against the pound by predicting its devaluation. But janus's comment can only be excused by the explanation that he attacked the article without troubling to read it. Since you, Sir, are a fellow Member of Parliament and journalist, I feel sure I can rely on you to tell your anonymous diarist to be a little more accurate in future.—Yours [Janus writes: I am sorry if Mr. Crossman thinks I have in any way misinterpreted him. I was not, in fact, writing about his article at all, except incidentally—much less attacking it—but about Mr. Oliver Stanley's speech. To leave the thing completely clear here, textually, is the relevant passage from Mr. Stanley's speech: "He [Mr. Crossman], writing on 18th September, only a few hours before the Chancellor made his broadcast said this: 'Devaluation would increase the price we paid for our foodstuffs and raw materials from across the Atlantic and so create unemployment and put up the cost of living. So Sir Stafford Cripps said, No.' The Hon.. Gentleman is very unfortunate. Heir was one of the rare occasions when he is toeing the party line, and then he found that the line had changed. I only hope that the abject apology which he made the next Sunday will acquit him of any intention of deviationism."
I really don't think my paraphrase misrepresented the passage which Mr. Stanley quoted. If anyone thinks otherwise I am sorry about it]
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