Children of the World, Unite!

On the platform of London's Kingsway Hall, eight teen-age boys & girls grinned and fidgeted in their chairs. Some chewed gum, others smoked cigarettes--and no one tried to stop them. It was a great day for the kids on the platform and for the handful down front listening: they were beginning a worldwide children's crusade, and they had nothing to lose but their chains. Their leader: bachelor Headmaster Robert Copping of Britain's ultra-progressive Horsley Hall.

Bearded Headmaster Copping had already declared war on discipline of the young by their elders. He won a skirmish when Eric Wildman, a maker of whipping canes and head of Britain's Society for the Retention of Corporal Punishment, went up to Horsley Hall to lecture: Copping's students seized Caneman Wildman and flogged him with his own rods (TIME, Dec. 6). But 28-year-old Robert Copping had lots of other ideas for battles on a wider front.

No Wild Animals. He was planning a Union of the Rising Generation of the World to protect boys & girls not only rom the Wildmans of the world but from their own parents. After a quick leaflet campaign, he opened his crusade at Kingsway Hall. "If all the 12 million children in the country joined the union," he solemnly told his audience of 24 children and a few adults, "it would be the strongest body in England--and I think they would make a better job of running it than their elders."

The union would first abolish whippings. "Why do people think their children are dangerous wild animals?" thundered Copping. "Children should have equal rights with their parents." There would be no more slaps or knuckle-rappings. Furthermore, rules against smoking and drinking would apply to both children and adults alike.

After his speech there were questions from the floor. One little boy from Twickenham confessed that he had come only because he thought that the union was going to give children the right to have drivers' licenses. Then a boy wearing an Eton-type jacket got up and said: "Sir, if your union does away with corporal punishment, but continues to allow 'lines' [e.g., 100 from Virgil, in a fair round hand], all I can say is that I'd rather have the cane." Copping assured the boy that children should be able to abolish anything they wanted to.

"A Fine Advert." Finally the meeting ended and the audience shuffled out followed by a handful of puzzled parents. It had been far from a boisterous success, but Copping was not discouraged. Last week he began laying plans to divide Britain up into districts and to launch a recruiting drive. His enthusiasm was shared by at least one other adult--Cane Manufacturer Eric Wildman, who had dropped in to hear Copping's manifesto at Kingsway Hall. Wildman thought the Copping thesis might bring on its own swift reactionary antithesis, with more corporal punishment than before, and great benefit to canemakers. Said he: "This is a fine advert [-isement] for me."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.