I do not think the problem is so straightforward as the delusive simplicity of this argument would seem to make it. If it is said that the Trades Union Congress of Great Britain would not be justified in calling a general strike to compel the government to make Great Britain a federation, I should agree at once. But I point out that no one supposes it would take such action and that therefore a prohibition of it is unnecessary. But I should not agree that a general strike is unjustified to secure the eight-hour day, or to protect the payment of unemployment relief, or to continue the Trade Board system in sweated industries. Whether a general strike for these, or similar ends, would be wise is another matter. That it cannot in any circumstances be justified I am not prepared to say until I know the circumstances of some given case. I am not willing, for instance, to condemn the General Strike of 1926; on a careful analysis of its history, I believe that the blame for its inception lies wholly at the door of the Baldwin Government. No one acquainted with the character of the trade union movement but knows that a weapon so tremendous as the general strike will only be called into play on the supreme occasion. To lay it down as law that, whatever the occasion, the weapon shall not be used, seems to me an unjustifiable interference with freedom. I am not greatly moved by the argument that it involves coercion of the government. There are occasions when that coercion is necessary, and even essential. I believe that was the case in Great Britain in 1926. The trade unions would never have called the strike had they seen in the policy of the government even the fragment of a genuine search for justice. But the fact was that Mr Baldwin and his colleagues simply acted as the mouthpiece of the coalowners. To illegalize a general strike in that background is to say that the trade unions should have acquiesced in the defeat of the miners without an attempt to prove their solidarity with them. It would be to announce to government that the ultimate weapon of Labour is one the use of which it need never fear. There is no danger that the general strike will ever be other than a weapon of last resort; the occasions when it can be successfully used will be of the utmost rarity. But they may occur. I cannot accept the position that government is always entitled to count on industrial peace, whatever its policy. Nor do I see why it is unconstitutional for Labour, as in 1926, to withdraw from work in an orderly and coherent way.