BURGBSS: SCIENCE AND AFTER- WAR PERIOD 65 



during which time individual efforts are much more difficult of 

 effective expression — the community in the time of danger is 

 thinking and acting as a unit under mihtary stress, and military 

 methods predominate. As normal times return we may expect 

 the state to relax its vigilance and the individual person, society, 

 or industry to reassert to a greater degree their qualities of 

 initiative and independence. It is not improbable, however, 

 that there is a genuine conscious effort for the more generous 

 support of research by the British public as a national asset, 

 which support will be maintained in peace times on a much 

 more extensive scale than in pre-war times. 



UNION OP SCIENTIFIC WORKERS 



Another incident significant of the trend of the times is the 

 formation in October last of the British National Union for 

 Scientific Workers with five hundred members whose main 

 objects, most worthy of repeating here, are: (i) to advance the 

 interest of science as an essential element of the national life; 

 (2) to regulate the conditions of employment of persons of ade- 

 quate scientific training and knowledge; (3) to secure in the 

 interests of national efficiency that all scientific and technical 

 departments in the public service, and all industrial posts in- 

 volving scientific knowledge, shall be under the direct control 

 of persons having adequate scientific training and knowledge. 



The question that every scientific man in America naturally 

 and perhaps unconsciously asks himself on hearing of such an 

 organization is, of course, why not form such a union here? 

 Indeed, the matter has been discussed in some centers and it 

 would probably not be difficult to organize in the United States 

 a similar union of scientific workers. Bodies somewhat similar 

 aheady exist among various educational and professional groups. 

 It should be borne in mind, however, in considering this matter 

 that in addition to the general objects stated above, the scientific 

 workers of England were almost compelled to organize in order 

 to have representation on the so-called Whitley Industrial 

 Councils, having to do with matters affecting labor and manage- 

 ment relations in industry and one of the creations of the re- 

 construction program. 



