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adoption of the recommendation in the Memorandum that powers should be obtained for the registration of aliens resident in the United Kingdom. I doubt, however, the expediency of such registration. The dangerous alien would probably escape the requirement, which would be vexatious to the man with no evil intent.
As, in order to avert suspicion of the secret censorship, it would be necessary to deal at once with any letters that might be observed, and to forward with the least possible delay those which on examination proved to be of a private character, it would be desirable that representatives of the chief censor should be stationed at each of the post offices at which the censorship is established, with full powers to deal with any letters which may be submitted.
4. The suggestion contained in the Memorandum of the General Staff, that all correspondence for the Continent should be held back for twenty-four hours before the outbreak of hostilities, assumes that the time of such outbreak will be determined by the British Government. The fact that all correspondence was being withheld would certainly be known within twelve hours of the issue of the order, which to be effectual must at the same time include measures to prevent messages being carried across the Channel or North Sea by passengers in public or private ships. Less drastic action might be taken which would impede information going from a particular place where naval or military action was proceeding without its becoming generally known that the postal service was not being carried on as usual. If, for instance, it were desired to prevent the transmission of intelligence respecting, say, the mobilisation of the fleet at Portsmouth, it would probably suffice if the whole of the mails (inland and foreign) sent to or from Portsmouth and the adjoining districts were held up for twenty-four hours, or such longer period as might be necessary, leaving those from other parts of the United Kingdom, where naval or military movements were not in preparation, to go forward in ordinary course, subject to the censorship already referred to. An arrangement of this kind could be carried out without difficulty at short notice, and, in view of the comparatively small numbers of letters stopped, would probably remain undiscovered abroad until at least twenty-four hours had elapsed. To make such an isolation of any particular district complete it would, of course, be necessary for the naval and military authorities to supplement the action of the Post Office by establishing a blockade of all other means of communication from the district in order to prevent private persons carrying correspondence to towns outside the district for onward transmission. But an incomplete isolation, provided it operated without being generally known, might possibly, though not very probably, serve a useful purpose.
5. The foregoing proposals could be carried out under the authority of a warrant from the Secretary of State for Home Affairs (see section 56 of "The Post Office Act, 1908 "-8 Edw. VII, ch. 48). The warrant should be issued in some such terms as follow :-
"I hereby authorise and require you to open, detain, or delay any postal packets in course of transmission by post which you think may be sent with the object of aiding, abetting, or assisting the
Government, and also to delay the transmission of any mail bags containing inland or foreign correspondence in such manner and for such periods as you may see fit. For so doing this shall be your sufficient warrant.
"(Signed)
"One of His Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State.
Whitehall,
46
.19 .
"To the Postmaster-General
" and all others whom it may concern.
"
6. After a declaration of war there would no longer be any necessity for secrecy, and as the volume of correspondence with the Continent would probably be much less than in normal times, the difficulty of applying any scheme of censorship would be considerably lessened.
At the outbreak of hostilities with a European maritime Power it would probably be necessary to suspend for a day or two all commercial and private communications with certain parts of the Continent, to be determined by the circumstances, allowing
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