In spite of repeated promises to the contrary, conscription is to become the law of this country during peace time. It is the first occasion that such a drastic denial of democracy will have been brought into operation here when war was not in progress. Already we are warned of the kind of scenes we shall witness—the prosecution of unwilling conscripts, the charges of shirking and the encouragement of tale-bearing by those who suspect their friends and neighbours of avoiding conscription. A Staff Reporter of the Daily Express writes:

“Those who are personally summoned and fail to answer will probably be treated as deserters. As in the great war, the authorities are relying on ‘the next-door neighbour with a son in the Army’ to denounce a shirker” (Daily Express, 28^th April, 1939).

It is worthy of note that conscription has promptly received the support of a leader of the Church, the Bishop of St. Albans.