Foreign News: Pie for Nye

Not even Diogenes had a tougher task than the special committee of the Labor Party appointed to find “assurances as to the future conduct” of rebellious Aneurin Bevan. But unpredictable Nye himself did what he could to make their job easier. He was haled before the committee last week for a 20-minute confrontation that was marred only by a few heated exchanges with his archrival, Hugh Gaitskell. Nye, who like many of his Welsh constituents once lived sparely on bread and dripping (grease), now ate humble pie with a relish. He apologized deeply to Party Leader Clement Attlee “for any pain I may have caused him,” and begged the committee “for nothing more than the opportunity to serve our party under his leadership.” So reassuring were his words that next day the party executive decided, by a vote of 16 to 7, not to kick Nye out of the party after all, though it warned him of “drastic action against any future violations of party discipline.”

With a general election in the offing, everybody agreed that the time had come to turn their guns on the Tories instead of on one another, and while the battle was on, to look as much as possible like an organized, uniformed army that knows where it is going and who is in command.