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29 Jun 2009 12:40 pm
Quote For The Day
"No democracy has been nearer the fire and survived than was Britain in that long winter [of 1940]. And one reason for survival was that the
nation did not betray the things in which it believed. After Italy
entered the war, one of the few murder cases to reach the Law Lords
on appeal was decided. An Italian citizen, long resident in Britain,
had been convicted by the lower courts of killing a British seaman
in Soho. The high court reversed the verdict, set the Italian free,
and in the pubs, and in Parliament, on the buses, and in newspaper
offices this was regarded as the normal functioning of British justice.
At a time when German bombers were coming through in the
daylight over London, when the Germans were expected on the
beaches the first foggy morning, the House of Commons, which
might have been destroyed with all its members by one well-placed
enemy bomb, devoted two days to discussing the conditions under
which enemy aliens were being held on the Isle of Man. For the
House of Commons was determined that, though the Island fell,
there would be nothing resembling concentration camps in Britain,
and the rights under law of enemy aliens would not be abused. That
is what the British collectively believed," - Edward R. Murrow, in the foreword to the second edition of "This I Believe," published in 1952. -- AS.
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