CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17254, 2 September 1919, Page 9

CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS.

Sir,— A Brail.sford makes a plea for the release of conscientious objectors now in» prison, and he tells of the work or drudgery to which be and others were put when he was undergoing sentence for refusing to do their duty and heln their country in her hour cf need. I would like to point out to Mr. Brailsford that tens' of thousands of people are doing all that he had to do all over New Zealand all the year round,'and there people have a'.so.sent their sons to help to save New Zealand from German greed and plunder. Some of their sons will never come back. Some have come back broken in body and in health, but they do not whine like this conscientious martyr because they scrub clean floors or clear scrub or pick onions. S. L. P. Rimmeb.

Sir.—The. whining plaint of Mr. John A Brailsford leads one to exclaim " What next ?' Pray how " much conscience do those unutterable "shirkers" possess, when they let good men and true go forth to fight, be maimed, or die, so that they the spoiled darlings—may dwell in safety ? He gives his case away doubly by showing nis hatred of farm work, which he classes as punishment, forsooth, when it . is stretching a big point in leniency comI pared.to what they richly deserve and to j what' they would have .to submit elseI where. As they have chosen to shrink I from "their plain duty as citizens arid shelI ter. themselves under a "Uriah Heap"- ■ like plea of conscience, let 'them take the consequences, too mild as they are. - Anti-Humbug.