Press Cuttings (1948)

From the January 1948 issue of the Socialist Standard

One-third of Recruits Unfit

“Field-Marshal Viscount Montgomery, C.I.G.S., yesterday said at the annual meeting of the Royal Eye Hospital, Southwark, of which he is president, that about 19 per cent. of the age group eligible for national service would be unfit for the post-war Regular Army. A further 15 per cent. would not be fit for full military duties.

” ‘There are many causes why a third of those eligible for service are suffering from such a degree of disability,’ he added. ‘They include housing, bad nutrition, and, not least, the preoccupation of the medical profession with disease rather than with the promotion of physical fitness’.” — (Daily Telegraph 10/10/47.)

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Great Men

“Here are some of the things Sylvester, for 30 years Lloyd George’s personal assistant says about his master :

“He was often peevish and childish; strangely lacking in physical courage; no greater autocrat ever lived; a most unholy muddler, and just a spoiled child.”—(News of the World, 28/9/47.)

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Labour Party and the House of Lords

“The Party stands, as heretofore . . . for the complete abolition of the House of Lords . . .”—(“Labour and the New Social Order,” Labour Party, 1918, p.12.)

“Since our last report the following have been welcomed to our ranks: Lord Citrine (Sir Walter Citrine), Lord Dukeston (Mr. Charles Dukes), Viscount Hall (Mr. George Hall, M.P.), Lord Kershaw (Mr. Fred Kershaw), Lord Lucas (Mr. G. W. Lucas), Lord Shepherd (Mr. G. R. Shepherd), Lord Simon (Sir E. D. Simon), Lord Trefgarne (Mr. G. M. Garro-Jones), Lord Uvedale (Sir Ambrose Woodall) . . . Our total strength is 46.”—(From Labour Party Report on Labour Strength in the House of Lords. Conference Report, 1947, p.65.)

Press Cuttings (1947)

From the November 1947 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Son of Matteotti

“The municipal elections due to take place next Sunday have been marked by violence towards those left-wing candidates who are insisting on a Socialist line independent of Communist policy. Signer Matteotti, son of the man who died in anti-Fascist resistance during the Mussolini regime and who still vehemently insists on a policy opposing Communism, has had two meetings this week broken up by violence, his car burned and stones thrown at platform speakers.” (Rome Correspondent of the Times, 10/10/47.)

* * *

The Labour Party and Taxation

“We hold that indirect taxation on commodities, whether by Customs or Excise, should be strictly limited to luxuries; and concentrated principally on those of which it is socially desirable that the consumption should be actually discouraged.”—(“Labour and the New Social Order,” Labour Party, 1918, p.19.)

“Mr. J. W. Belcher, £l,500-a-year Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade, said last: night: ‘When the price of cigarettes is doubled it makes far more difference to the £5-a-week man than it does, to me. The tobacco tax falls hardest on those who can least afford to pay it.'”—(Daily Express, 10/10/47.)

* * *

The United Nations Can Agree

“Lest it be thought, however, that the United Nations is incapable of making quick and lasting decisions, it should be reported that the Legal Committee yesterday settled something in five minutes that the League of Nations abandoned after ten years’ fruitless argument. It adopted a flag for the United Nations and left it to the Secretary General, Mr. Lie, to decide its dimensions and its code of courtesy. It is to be a white globe on a field of blue. And there is no truth at all in the report that the Yugoslavs have suggested it should bear the motto ‘Manners Makyth Man.”—(Manchester Guardian, 9/10/47.)

* * *

The Labour Party and the Factory Acts

“The amendment and consolidation of the Factories and Workshops Acts, with their extension to all employed persons and the restriction of the working week to not more than 48 hours, is long overdue . . .” (“Labour and the New Social Order,” Labour Party, 1918, p.6.)

“Night work in the factories for girls of 18 and youths of 16 will be legal after September 22.

“And anyone over 16 may work more than 48 hours a week—but not for two weeks running.

“These amendments to general conditions were announced last night as part of the staggered hours plan which will spread the electricity load.

“After September 22 a district inspector of factories can. permit an earlier start or later finish for day work.

“The starting and finishing hours of 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. can be extended to 6 a.m. to 11 p.m., and 6.30 a.m. to 6 p.m. for those under 16.”—(Daily Mail, 2/9/47.)

* * *

“More of Everything for Everybody”

”We have greatly increased our capacity to produce more things during this war. We must use the skill of our people and our great productive resources to make more of everything for everybody in times of peace.”—(From “Your Future—After Victory—What Then?” Published by Labour Party, June, 1944.)

”What the nation needs is undoubtedly a great bound onward in its aggregate production. But this cannot be secured merely by pressing the manual workers to more strenuous toil . . . What the Labour Party looks to is a genuinely scientific reorganisation of the nation’s industry . . . on the basis of the Common Ownership of the Means of Production; the equitable shaving of the proceeds among all who participate in any capacity and only among these . . .”—(”Labour and the New Social Order,” Labour Party, 1918, p.12-13.)

* * *

Sir John Boyd Orr on Food and Capitalism

“Warning the United Nations Economic Committee, at Lake Success yesterday, that more people will die through the food shortage in Europe and Asia in the next 12 months than were killed in any year of the war, Sir John Boyd Orr declared :

” ‘This presents an opportunity to the nations, assembled here to concentrate less on the political problems which engender misunderstanding and conflict, and concentrate more on the concrete problems on which there can be no misunderstanding.’

“He pointed out that the General Assembly agenda contained no reference to food and economic difficulties, and stressed that the food situation in Asia was just as bad as in Europe.

“Food production would need to be increased by 110 per cent, in the next 25 years to provide sufficient for the world’s population.”—(Daily Herald, 7/10/47.)

* * *

“Meanwhile, in the producer countries, the paradox of the years between the wars shows signs of being repeated. While people elsewhere face starvation, farmers tremble at the prospects of ruin—not because they cannot produce the food the hungry peoples need, but because they can produce more than the peoples can buy . . .

“At one and the same time we have these problems : How to get maximum production to salvage the world from present hunger and how to deal with unmarketable surpluses which will again bring ruin and misery to millions of land-workers and endanger the stability of the whole economic system.

“For failure will mean that the existing economic system cannot carry the burden of the material wealth which modern science can produce.”—(Sir John Boyd-Orr, News Chronicle, 1/8/47)

* * *

Labour Party and Conscription

“The Labour Party declares emphatically against any continuance of the Military Service Acts a moment longer than the imperative requirements of the war excuse.”—(“Labour and the New Social Order,” Labour Party, 1918, p.11.)

* * *

Labour Government and Wages

” ‘As a trade union official, if I were, faced with the choice of keeping the Labour Government in office or a reduction in wages, I would advocate a reduction of wages,’ said Mr. Sam Watson, general secretary of the Durham area of the National Union of Mineworkers.

“He was speaking at a week-end school of the National Council of Labour Colleges at Morecambe.

”‘Unless we can lift production, increased wages are simply a means of increasing the dangers of inflation and rising prices,’ he said.”—(Daily Herald, 6/10/47.)

* * *

Housing under the Swedish Labour Government

”Many tourists, observed Mr. Osborn, have come back believing that the Swedes have everything to tell us about standards of housing and architecture. They are misled by the cleanliness and furnishing taste everywhere displayed. Housing standards in Stockholm are, as in most other European cities, appallingly low. Of the 670,000 people within the city boundaries, 90 per cent. live in flats, and only 7 per cent, in one-family dwellings. More than half the dwellings (51.6 per cent.) have only one room and kitchen or two rooms without kitchen. Another 26.7 per cent. have two rooms and kitchen.”—(Mr. F. J. Osborn, Chairman of the Town and Country Planning Association Municipal Journal, 26/9/47.)

Press Cuttings (1941)

From the June 1941 issue of the Socialist Standard

German people bow in deep reverence to the Almighty, who has so visibly given us in this year His blessing. He knows we are waging this war for a better world, and that we are fighting for the happiness of mankind. (Dr. Goebbels to the German troops. Manchester Guardian January 1st, 1941.)

God Almighty will not desert those who, threatened by a world, are determined to help themselves with bold hearts. (Hitler, ditto.)

Millions of British hearts hold to the conviction that God will not deliver us over to the powers of evil. They remember how the National Day of Prayer last May was followed by the Miracle of Dunkirk. (Daily Mail,  January 1st, 1941.)

Press Cuttings (1941)

From the May 1941 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Men We Want More Than Millionaires

“Skilled engineers to-day are far more valuable to the country than the millionaires,” said Mr. G. Tomlinson, M.P., of the Ministry of Labour, to-day. —(Evening News, April 24th, 1941.)

* * * *

The High Cost of Killing.

It cost about 75 cents to kill a man in Caesar’s time. The price rose to about 3,000 dollars per man during the Napoleonic wars, to about 5,000 dollars in the American Civil War and then to 21,000 dollars per man in the World War. Estimates for the present war indicate that it may cost the warring countries not less than 50,000 dollars for each man killed.—Senator Homer T. Bone (Readers’ Digest, October, 1940).

Press Cuttings. (1940)

From the April 1940 issue of the Socialist Standard

They are all Socialists now—or are they?

“In his last speech Dr. Goebbels said this war was between the ‘German Socialist State and British capitalism.'” — (Manchester Guardian, March 5th, 1940.)

“Britain is being turned into a Socialist State. Not by a revolution and red flags. It’s all done by Tories.”—(Daily Express, February 9th, 1940.)

“The Socialist daring of the Red Army man and the Socialist technique of the great Soviet Union is smashing through fortifications second only to the Maginot and Siegfried lines. Their fight is our fight. The army of liberation is on the march, capitalism shudders under its blows.”—(Daily Worker, February 23rd, 1940.)

* * *

Another Way to Stop War—More Money for the Secret Service.

“An effective Intelligence service can keep a great nation out of war: for without it a government— no matter what party—is bound to make mistakes. If we had spent £1,000,000 a year on such service during the twenty years of armistice, instead of the paltry sums voted for this huge Empire, we should be saving £7,000,000 a day now.”—(From a letter in the Daily Telegraph, February 17th, 1940.)

* * *

Mr. Churchill—the Man the Communists wanted to be a Minister in the Popular Front Government.

“The sea breezes blow. The House of Commons feels the salt.

It is Mr. Churchill speaking. Mr. Churchill reviewing the Fleet.

What does he want ?

“A few men, some ships and a little money.”

What is he given ?

The men, the ships, the money, and the confidence of the nation.

The right man is at the helm.”—(Daily Express, February 28th, 1940.)

“Rome, February 25th.

The Popolo di Roma to-day describes Mr. Winston Churchill as “a survivor of that race which is dying out in Britain—the race of Marlborough and Drake, of those genial and unscrupulous men who in the past made the greatness of the Empire.

“Between an honest civilian like the umbrella-carrying Mr. Chamberlain and the ascetic lost in politics like Lord Halifax,” it adds, “Mr. Churchill stands out like the only man of iron among a dozen men of wood—like a pirate in a circle of honest and spineless gentlemen.”—Press Association War Special. —(Manchester Guardian, February 27th, 1940.)

* * *

Capitalism “having died out” !

“Is my right hon. Friend not aware that, Capitalism having died out, there cannot be any incitement to disaffection in regard to it.”— (Commander Locker-Lampson, in the House of Commons, February 29th 1940.)

* * *

The Russian Government’s interest in Finland.

“The Soviet Government will start a decisive battle to force British economic interests and influences out of Finland and out of the whole Baltic region. Soviet Russia will free Finland from all trade treaties which have been forced upon Finland by foreign imperialists. Until now Finland has been forced to import unnecessary materials from Egypt and Tunis. Now Soviet Russia will be the main source from which Finland will buy her raw materials.”—(Isvestia, March 25th, 1940. Reproduced in News-Chronicle, March 26th, from Moscow radio broadcast.)

* * *

Mr. Herbert Morrison in 1926.

In 1926 Mr. Herbert Morrison was one of those who signed the following pledge: —

“We, the undersigned, convinced that all disputes between nations are capable of settlement either by diplomatic negotiation or by some form of International Arbitration, hereby solemnly declare that we refuse to support or render war service to any government which resorts to arms.”

At the Albert Hall “Peace Letter Campaign Meeting,” on December 5th, 1926, he said: —

“We know from past and all too real experience how the declarations of parties and individuals towards wars are likely to fail when the testing time comes, and it may be that even many of those who have signed this declaration will fail, for wars have a terrible effect upon the public mind and upon the public psychology.”

(“Why We Will Not Fight,” published by the Peace Letter Campaign, 1926.)

* * *

What Dictators cannot do.

“A nation of peasants does not pass in one generation from medievalism to the machine age simply because a dictator has decreed it.” — (Daily Telegraph, January 3rd, 1940.)

* * *

Industrial Service for French Women.

“Within two months a register of women volunteer workers is to be prepared.

These women will then be drafted to various industries in which employers have asked for them. All will have to pass a medical examination before being accepted.

If the voluntary system does not yield enough female labour the Minister of Labour can order the compulsory registration of women fit for industrial work. Women will then be called up individually as they are required.” — (News-Chronicle, March 2nd, 1940.)

Press Cuttings. (1940)

From the March 1940 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Straight Issue at Southwark.

The Daily Worker (February 13th), writing of the by-election at Southwark: —

“Hitting out on Finland, he declared strongly against the sending of guns and men to Mannerheim.”

Thus the issues of the election were squarely placed. But did he, or does the Daily Worker, hit out strongly against the Russian Government sending armies, tanks and bombing planes into Finland?

The Chapels Seem to be Worse than the Churches.

“Accusations of profiteering by the churches at the expense of evacuees were made yesterday at a meeting of Brighton Education Committee, when the schedule of rentals of 80 church and other halls recommended for hiring for school purposes was disapproved.. It was stated that the rentals would total £10,000 a year.

Councillor Ingham said the council was asked to pay £9 a week for a church with hall and rooms rated at £68 per annum.

“I have never seen such highway robbery with violence in all my life,” he added, “and the chapels seem to be worse than the churches.”

Another member said it was the biggest scandal Brighton had ever heard of.”—(Daily Telegraph, February 14th, 1940.)

Certainly, General, and what are your further orders ?

Under the heading, “Spain Gives Hint to Britain,” the Daily Mail (February 12th, 1940) publishes the following extract from one of General Franco’s papers: —

“A message to-day points out that ‘the soundest section of the British Press praises France’s action in getting rid of the enemies of the State.

‘The Daily Mail is right in suggesting that Britain is not acting against Communism as honestly and energetically as France is doing.’”

But Does the Maid feel that she is like the Mistress ? Silly Stuff from the Rt. Hon. J. R. Clynes, M.P.

“Amazing improvements have taken place in the food, clothing and housing of the people.

The invention of cheap silk fabrics has made it almost impossible to distinguish the mistress from her maid.

The development of working-class flats, with electric equipment, refrigerators and bathrooms, is one of the greatest revolutions of the age; and it is only beginning.

The wireless and the motor-bus have enlarged the horizon of the workers from the parish pump to the ends of the earth. Why, when I started work, the fastest thing on the roads was the horse tram!”— (Supplement to Labour Party Press Service, December 13th, 1939.)

From Spain to Finland.

“The Swedish volunteer force in Finland includes many former soldiers of the International Brigade in Spain. The Labour delegation came across one group of four veterans of the Spanish war; three of them had fought for the Spanish Government and democracy, the fourth for Franco and against Bolshevism. In the Finnish war all four find that they can fight for their various causes on the same side.—(Manchester Guardian, February 10th, 1940.)

Fascism the Friend of the Small Shop-keeper.

A new decree has just been issued in Germany which says this—

“All small shops with less than £20 a week turnover are to be considered as incapable of providing their owners with a reasonable livelihood and must cease trading.—Exchange.”—(Evening News, January 15th, 1940.)

Workers, Be Thrifty.

Lord Mottistone, chairman of the National Savings Committee: —

“Never saved a penny in my life.”—(Speech at Southampton, January 27th. Daily Express, January 28th, 1940.)

Racialism and Classism. 

From a definition of the shoddy Nazi doctrine of superior and inferior races, by Dr. Ley, leader of the Nazi Labour Front: —

“An inferior race needs less space, less food and less culture than a superior race.”—(Daily Telegraph, February 6th, 1940.)

Press Cuttings. (1940)

From the February 1940 issue of the Socialist Standard

Biblical Injunction.

From a letter to the Daily Telegraph (January 19th, 1940), criticising the Bishop of Birmingham, who had opposed the Blockade because of the Biblical injunction, “If thine enemy hunger, feed him” : —

“Is it permissible to bomb and shell the enemy, to inflict on him death and mutilation and destruction, but not permissible to interfere with his diet? Must the enemy, like the birds in a game preserve, be fattened only for the guns?”

* * *

A Knotty Problem for the Unemployed. 

“Can a man who has a few shillings to spend (having, we may add, taken up his full allowance of certificates and bonds) buy a bottle of champagne, or some other French product in the same category, without compromising the best national economic interests?”

(From a letter to The Times, January 23rd.)

* * *

“Sir, this is Monstrous!”

‘”Now, Sir, this is a monstrous state of affairs. This man is only one of a great multitude. He is being paid at least £8 a week more than he is worth.”

(From a letter to The Times, January 22nd, about an engineer fitter, formerly earning 65s., who, on piece-work, is said to have received £12 a week, not to mention “tea brought to him twice a day.”)

* * *

Where shall we send Tommy to School? !

” . . . It costs £300 a year to send your son to a good school.”

(From an article in the Daily Mail, January 22nd, 1940.)

* * *

She will Meditate on Democracy.

“Mlle. Marie-Louise Pusset, 57-year-old teacher at a girls’ school here, has been sentenced to four months’ imprisonment for attempting to defend Soviet Russia in her classroom.

“The judge declared that the teacher, a former member of the Communist Party, had shown activity favouring the Third International.—Exchange.”

(Evening Standard, January 11th, 1940.)

* * *

“Continual raiding of Germany would provoke retaliatory measures against this country which would use up still more material, as well as strengthen the determination of our people. Raids on Germany would shake the confidence of the people of Germany in Hitler.”

(From a speech of Mr. L. S. Amery, reported in The Times, January 24th, 1940.)

* * *

Unpatriotic Cats.

From an account of Germany by a neutral correspondent (Daily Telegraph, January 19th, 1940): —

“The nation that can eat the least can win the war.”

“German physicians privately express their conviction that the post-war generation will be physically unfit as the result of to-day’s feeding. Even cats refuse to drink the skimmed milk. . . .”

* * *

From The People, January 21st, 1940:—

” Germany’s miracle peasant girl has refused her ration cards because she has no need of food. . . . For the past 12 years she has taken neither food nor drink.”

* * *

Sensitive as Prima Donnas.

What the general said : —

“You’ll soon learn, like Repington did, that we generals are as sensitive as prima donnas!”

(Sunday Express, January 14th, 1940.)

* * *

Did they Listen to Keynes?

“November 14th, 1939: ‘Mr. Keynes, in The Times, urges the Government to introduce a scheme of compulsory savings, repayable after the war.

“January 12th, 1940: Copenhagen correspondent of Daily Telegraph reveals ‘astonishing new details of the desperate plan evolved by Field-Marshal Goenng and Dr. Funk.’

” ‘A most amazing feature’ is that the worker ‘will only receive an official receipt for the confiscated money, which is not redeemable until the war is over.'”

(Daily Telegraph, January 12th.)

* * *

Good Health from H. G. Wells.

“This is war, and this is what it must come to. I would rather bomb the Germans than starve them. In the end it will be quicker, and it will leave the Germans, it may be, in a healthier state of mind.”

(Daily Mail, January 25th, 1940.)

* * *

Not Hitler but the Pacifists.

“‘It is my firm belief, based on good evidence,’ the bishop said, ‘that these people-pacifists is the name they go by—are more responsible than anybody else for the fact that we are once again involved in war.'”

(The Bishop of Grantham, Daily Telegraph,January 15th, 1940.)

* * *

Stalin, the Dancing Master.

“The old peasant woman Anfisa Taraseyeva recollects that ‘Joseph Vissiaronovitch loved to sing, and even more to dance. He was a great master of dancing and taught the young people to dance.

‘ When asked to dance he would enter the circle at jog-trot, halt for a moment, shake his head and shoulders, clap his hands and cry out, “Let go, like lightning,” dancing with such fervour that he raised a whirlwind of dust.

‘He was some master at dancing; and could not see enough of it!'”

(Daily Worker, December 23rd, 1939.)

* * *

War, the Liberator.

It is not too much to say that always every reform that has been introduced since the war is the result of discussions and preparations that started during the war and under its liberating impulse.”

(Manchester Guardian Editorial)

Press Cuttings (1947)

From the October 1947 issue of the Socialist Standard

Strikes in Nationalised Industries

"The Grimethorpe strike has raised, in an acute from, the question of discipline in a nationalised industry.
  Trade union theory has never surrendered the right to strike, after due notice given.
   It has been held to be the last sacred sanction of organised labour against injustice.
  But it is against private employers that this right has been so sturdily maintained.
  Is the situation the same when, as in the coal industry, the employer is the nation?
 And can the State run industry effectively if the right of the workers to defy its authority with impunity is to be recognised ?
  "No” would seem to be the answer to both these questions. And, unless agreement can be reached on this basis, nationalised industries run grave risks of coming to grief."

(Mr. Ernest Thurtle, Labour M.P., writing in Sunday Express, 14/9/47.)

Mr. Thurtle now wants the right to strike to be withdrawn from workers in nationalised industries. Long ago, before the Labour Party came to power, the Labour Daily Herald admitted that if the price of nationalisation is that the workers lose their only weapon, the strike, then, “under capitalism a nationalised industry would actually be worse off than those left in private hands." (13/9/22.)


New Russian Imperialism in Persia

Moscow radio last night disclosed that the draft Soviet-Persian oil agreement which the Persian Premier, Qavam es Salteneh, declined to submit to Parliament, contains a special article granting concessions to the proposed Soviet-Persian oil company, in addition to the agreement signed in 1946 for the company’s creation.
The new article provides “preferential rights for the Soviet Union regarding the purchase of oil products exported by the company” in which Russia is to hold 51 per cent, of stock, the broadcast said.
It also provides for the company to import duty free and without licence “equipment necessary for its work” of exploiting oilfields in North Persia.

(News Chronicle, 25/9/47)

Press Cuttings (1941)

From the August 1941 issue of the Socialist Standard

  

“True, we are out to stop Hitler by any and every means we can. We have definite objects in mind. We want to protect our markets and trade. We mean to keep the sea lanes open.”—(U.S.A. Senator Pepper, quoted by the Evening Standard, July 2nd. 1941.)

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  “The (Peru-Ecuador) frontier dispute is over the possession of some 100,000 square miles of land rich in rubber, timber, and, perhaps, gold. . . — (A.P. message, Evening Standard, July 7th. 1941.)

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". . .  such a (Anglo-American-Russian) pact will, I believe, do more than anything else to convince the Soviet Union that her security is threatened not by a vague entity called the capitalist system but quite specifically by the anti-Comintern powers only. —(Mr. Harold Laski, in the New Statesman and Nation, July 5th. 1941. Our italics.)

Press Cuttings (1941)

From the March 1941 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Reuter Moscow telegram says that the Russian people are told in the Soviet journal "Socialist Agriculture” that the "capitalist Powers,” including Britain, are trying to "wreck the Soviet Union" by sending diseased seeds and bulbs into the country.

During the past nine years, says the paper, the Leningrad quarantine laboratory has examined 1,200,000 samples of seeds and plants from 67 foreign countries and has found 6,000 insects and diseases in them. The earth surrounding the roots of medicinal herbs bought from England are alleged to have been infected with potato cancer, while tulip and hyacinth bulbs bought in Holland were also found to be diseased. (Manchester Guardian, December 16th, 1940.)

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The B.B.C. is extending its anti-Pacifist blockade. It has now blacklisted three famous preachers—Dr. Donald Soper, of Kingsway Hall and Tower Hill; Dr. George MacLeod, of Iona; and Canon Charles Raven, Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge. . . .  In these three cases, as in the case of the Glasgow Orpheus Choir, banned because of the pacifist views of its conductor, Sir Hugh Roberton, the B.B.C. is assumed to have acted as the instrument of the State. No attempt has been made to disguise the reason for the action. . . . (News Chronicle, January 4th, 1941.)

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The concept that twice two make four is somehow differently tinged in the minds of a German, a Frenchman, a negro, or a Jew. (Herr Hommes, a Nazi writer on Racialism. Manchester Guardian, January 2nd, 1941.)

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On the plinth of General Sherman’s statue in Washington are cut these words: “The legitimate object of war is a more perfect peace.” To me this is a profoundly wise saying. (Major-General Fuller, Evening Standard, January 4th, 1941.)

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Three Stalin prizes of 100,000 roubles each, and five prizes of 50,000 roubles each are to be awarded to Soviet citizens for outstanding work in science and art. Three prizes of 100,000 roubles each will be awarded for outstanding work in poetry, prose, drama and literary criticism.

In addition 25 prizes of 100,000; forty prizes of 50,000 roubles each; and 60 prizes of 25,000 roubles each are to be awarded for outstanding inventions, including military inventions.

It has been decided by the Soviet Government that these prizes will be awarded not only for work in 1940, but also for work during the last six or seven years. (Daily Worker, January 15th, 1941.)

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Sir,—“ We wish to know,” an old Chief said to me the other day, ‘‘how it is that England, France, and Germany can have a war whenever they like, but when we want to fight another village the District Officer comes with his police and stops us.” (A letter to The Times from a correspondent in Africa, January 1st, 1941.)