MILITARY SERVICE.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 16421, 15 January 1919, Page 6

MILITARY SERVICE.

, CASE OF RELIGIOUS OBJECTORS. BOARD SET UP TO OONSIDEB DEFAULTERS' LIST. (srECIAI. TO "the press.") i Wellingtons', January 14. The Board which is to advise ths Minister of Defence in tlie exercise of his discretionary power relative to the removal of the names of bona fide religious objectors from the defaulters' list Ims been set up. - This list is to contain the names of all shirkers and evadors of military service, but thore are men who have been punished for disobedience of the law relating to compulsory 'service who. it is considered. innv lmvo had religious reasons for their objections, although those reasons did not suffice to obtain exemption for thorn. It will be the duty of tho Board to examine these cases us well as those of such others as may ask for relief, and to make recommendations to tho Minister of Defence. The members of the Board will be: Tho Rev. J. R. Burgin, Chaplain to tho Forces, who has seen considerable Bervice with tho troops at the front. The Rov. ,T. G. Chapman, mfnlstbr in charce of the Tarannki Street Methodist Church. Wellington. Mr Chap,man will represent the Nonconformist churches on the Board. Mr M. J. Mack, general secretary of tiho Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants, and lately a member of tho Third Wellineton Military Service Board. Mr Mock is on the Board as a representative of Labour. Mr C. 11 Matthews. Inspector of Prisons.

The Board will be commencing work almost at once. Already a rough sorting of the eases to be considered liag been niudc. The liends in Now Zealand of the various sects whos® members are concerned are being communicated with, and thev aro _ being asked to submit to the Board lists or those of their members who are serving military detention as military defaulters or objectors. If the heads of theso religious bodies can _ say that any of their members in prison at present have bona fide religious objections to military service, the work of the Board will be simplified a great deal. It is not to bo taken for granted that the certificate of the bead of a sect will in all cases be taken aB sufficient evidence to warrant the striking of the man's name from the defaulters' list. Some of the men may have to bo interrogated. There are among tho objectors ft number of men professing roiigious scruples who do not belong to any organised group. Tho cases of these 'men will have to be takon individually. Under the Military Service Act in order to secure exemption on religious grounds a man had to show that he had belonged on August 4th, 1014, and since that time continuously to a sect which held the doctrine that the bearing of arms was contrary to Divine revelations. Some religious objectors could not establish this case, hut tlioy may yet be able to satisfy this Board that they have genuine religious objections. The Board will concern itself only with religious reasons for objecting to serve. Nq scruples based on any other ground than that of religion can und>»r the Act be considered. No atheist can profess religious scruples, and the agnostic who wishes to establish them will have a moßt interesting case to present. However strict the moral code followed by any objector, and however faithful he lias been in the obEcrvanco of it, unless that part of the code which guided him in his objection to military service \yas based on religion, the JJoard will not he within its rights in recommending the removal of his name front the list. This will put right out ofl court all those men who say that they refused to servo because in their opinion Ireland ought to have self-govern-ment, and all those who say that they refused to hear arms because they do not helieve in the existing social order, which they declare is the caufcfc of all wars.