OBJECTIONS TO DRILL

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 139, 16 June 1927, Page 10

OBJECTIONS TO DRILL

DIVINITY STUDENT FINED

"STAND, TO MY OWN CONSCIENCE"

(By Telegraph.) (Special to "The Evening Po&i.")

AUCKLAND, This Day

An application for exemption from military training was made in the Police Court yesterday by Alan Morgan Richards, a Divinity student, who at Tuesday's meeting of the Auckland Presbytery unsuccessfully sought gupport of his attitude in refusing to undergo training. Eichards was charged with failing to attend* drill.

The accused stated that he had not asked the Presbytery for its support, but for its views, and the resolution it had carried on Tuesday, was what he had expected, although not what he had hoped for.

Tho magistrate, • Mr. M'Kean: "You think you are wiser than they?" The accused: "In this matter, yes. I stand to my own conscience."

The magistrate: "The State has placed upon you certain, duties. I hope you do not intend to persist in this attitude." The accused: "I do."

The magistrate: "You are young yetj and your ideas may change. You had better go home and think it over." The accused: "I feel I must obey my own conscience before any external law." '

The. magistrate: "You will find you will havo to obey the external law as long as you live in a civilised country." He added that he would not impose a heavy penalty, but that if the accused appeared before the court again he would have to be dealt with differently. He was fined £1, and allowed 14" days to pay. ■