Uneasy Bedfellows

GREAT BRITAIN Uneasy Bedfellows

The anti-Bevin rebellion in the Labor Party's ranks was the subject of a terse party caucus. Rebel Leader Richard Grossman, after stern, reproving lectures behind locked doors by Prime Minister Attlee and other party fathers, had apologized and promised not to do it again. But, said one Labor M.P.: "It's like the man who finds that his wife has been unfaithful. She says she's sorry, and they are to patch up the marriage and carry on for the sake of the children. But the honeymoon is definitely over."

Two very dissimilar groups--trade unionists and those they call "bloody intellectuals"--were becoming increasingly uneasy bedfellows. Grossman, one of the latter group, was still sounding off in the New Statesman, of which he is assistant editor. Said the latest issue (commenting on the U.S. coal strike): "For Britain and British labor the moral seems to be that to be entangled in the mess of America's economic confusion spells disaster just as surely as to accept American dictation in an international policy that may fluctuate as much as the shares on Wall Street."

Although the revolt had not spread to the general public, many Britons were becoming increasingly annoyed with the U.S. Some simply envied America's comparative wealth of food, nylons and gadgets. Others were concerned with the "humiliations" of the recent U.S. loan, and the threat of an American business recession; most of all, they chafed whenever the U.S. seemed to pursue a policy independent of Britain.

Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, busily engaged in Big Four conferences in the U.S., was well aware of the uneasiness at home and the embarrassing abstention of nearly a third of Labor M.P.s on a vote for his support. Gossiped craggy W. J. Brown, Independent M.P. and regular London Evening Standard commentator: "When [Bevin] comes home he will insist on a showdown, probably by claiming a solid vote of confidence at a party meeting. This may easily precipitate another crisis. For the abstentionists, having condemned his foreign policy, can hardly vote for a motion of confidence in him."

Arid if they don't, guessed Columnist Brown, Bevin might just quit.

Dialectical Immaterialism

From the crowded visitors' gallery of the oak-paneled King's Bench courtroom, eager London School of Economics students last week gazed down on the witness box, where their mentor Harold Laski, with a shield of agile dialectics, nonchalantly deflected the barbs of an irate defense counsel.

Although the adroit professor was the complainant, he was quickly put on the defensive by belligerent Sir Patrick Hastings, attorney for the defendant. Laski, former Labor Party chairman, was suing the Newark Advertisers Co., Ltd., publishers of the Nottinghamshire Newark Advertiser, for printing statements that he advocated violent revolution allegedly in speeches during the 1945 election campaign.

At one point Sir Patrick asked: "Are there any privileged persons in the Socialist party?"

"Indeed Sir Patrick," replied Laski smoothly, with one hand stretched professorially across his waistcoat, "when you were a member of the Socialist party--"

"Don't be rude," interrupted Sir Patrick, who had been Labor Attorney General in 1924. "When you are rude to other people you think that is argument, but when people say something about you, you bring actions for libel."

Laski, always the lecturer, delivered a long harangue in answer to one question. Lord Chief Justice Goddard, who had sunk back in his chair, bored but still listening, sat bolt upright to translate to the jury. "The answer," he said, "is 'yes;' " and leaned back again.

But despite his dialectical footwork, the jury at week's end decided against Laski. This time the little professor would pay for the privilege of lecturing: the jury found he had not been libeled, the court assigned him the costs.

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