LINCOLN AND CONSCRIPTION
But the task which Lincoln set himself was one of the hardest that a democratic statesman ever undertook. The demand which he determined to make, and did make, may well have tried his heart as he sat alone in the night watches. For compulsion was a violation of the habits and prejudices of the old American stock, while it was even more distasteful to new immigrants. It was contrary to the traditions and theories of the Republic, and, as many thought, to its fundamental principles. It was open to scornful attack on grounds of sentiment. Against a foe who were so weak, both in numbers and wealth, how humiliating to be driven to such desperate measures! But most of all—outweighing all other considerations—this war of North and South was not only war, but civil war. Families and lifelong friendships were divided. What compulsion meant, therefore, in this case was, that brothers were to be forced to kill brothers, husbands were to be sent out to slay the kinsmen of their wives, or—as they marched with Sherman through Georgia—to set a light with their own hands to the old homesteads where they had been born. Between the warring States there were no differences of blood, tradition, or religion; or of ideas of right and wrong; no hatred against a foreign race; only an acute opposition of political ideals. Compulsion, therefore, was a great thing to ask of the American people. But the American people are a great people, and they understood. And Lincoln was a great man,—one of the greatest, noblest, and most human in the whole of history,—and he did not hesitate to ask, to insist, and to use force. What the end was does not need to be stated here; except merely this, that a lingering and bloody war was thereby greatly shortened, and that the Union was saved.
The British Government and people are faced to-day with some, but not all—and not the greatest—of Lincoln's difficulties. Our traditions and theories are the same, to a large extent, as those which prevailed in America in 1863. But unlike the North we have had recent experience of war, and also of the sacrifices which war calls for from the civilian population. By so much the shock of compulsion would find us better prepared.
But the other and much greater difficulties which beset Lincoln do not exist in the case of the British Government. We are not fighting against a foe inferior in numbers, but against one who up till now has been greatly superior in numbers—who has also been greatly superior in equipment, and preparation, and in deeply-laid plans. We are fighting against a foe who has invaded and encroached; not against one who is standing on the defensive, demanding merely to be let go free. The family affections and friendships which would be outraged by conscription in this war against Germany are inconsiderable; mere dust in the balance. The present war is waged against a foreign nation; it is not civil war. It is waged against an enemy who plainly seeks, not his own freedom, but our destruction, and that of our Allies. It is waged against an enemy who by the treacherous thoroughness of his peace-time preparations, appears to our eyes to have violated good faith as between nations, as in the conduct of the campaign he has disregarded the obligations of our common humanity, We may be wrong; we may take exaggerated views owing to the bitterness of the struggle; but such is our mind upon the matter.
Lincoln's task would have been light had such been the mind of the Northern States half a century ago, and had he been faced with nothing more formidable than the conditions which prevail in England to-day. It does not need the courage of a Lincoln to demand from our people a sacrifice, upon which the safety of the British Empire depends, even more certainly, than in 1863 did that of the American Union.
[[1]] Once more it is desirable to correct the erroneous impression that the conscript armies of continental powers are under no liability to serve outside their own territories or overseas.
[[2]] Influences of another kind altogether had much to do with the cleansing of public opinion—the writings of Henley, of Mahan, and of Mr. Rudyard Kipling. Though not so well known as the works of these, Henderson's Life of Stonewall Jackson has nevertheless changed many courses of thought, and its indirect effect in removing false standards has been very great. I can never sufficiently acknowledge my personal debt to these four.
[[3]] Cf. Round Table, March 1915, 'The Politics of War.'