Rebuilding Britain - A Survey Of Problems Of Reconstruction After The World War by Alfred Hopkinson
page 32 of 186 (17%)
page 32 of 186 (17%)
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peace, no penalty attaching to those who disregard those rules or are
guilty of breaking that peace. As already stated, the economic boycott, every member of the League agreeing to treat an aggressor as an outlaw, and without actually going to war ceasing to have any dealings with him, and forbidding all intercourse of its subjects with the peace-breaker, is likely to be really effective. Lord Shaw, whose interest in the subject is no new thing, and who has devoted long and careful consideration to it, later in the debate gave the weight of his authority as to the efficacy of such measures. "Let it," he said, "be known once and for all that from the moment a nation becomes a traitor to the League it becomes, _ipso facto_, an economic outlaw, then the motive both for being included within and for remaining within the League will be increased a hundredfold, and wholly for the benefit of mankind." Of course, logically many of the objections which can be urged against an agreement to make war might also be urged against an agreement for a boycott of this kind, but in practice the risks in the case of the boycott would be far less serious. Members of a club might well agree to expel and to cut a member who assaults another, but it would be a different matter to agree that, they should be able to order the strongest man in the club to go to his house and thrash the offender until he makes such compensation as may seem satisfactory to them. A man who objected to be put on a "schedule" of members liable to be deputed for such a mission would not necessarily be a coward. He might possibly think that the member assaulted did in fact deserve a horse-whipping, though he might deprecate such a proceeding, and consider that the affair, or the dispute between the parties, ought to have been dealt with by the club committee as a case for expulsion. A hatred of injustice, resentment against wrong, if it really exists in nations and |
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