[In a letter on September 13, 1931, Miss
Blume, a student of international relations at Barnard College, Columbia University, New York, and business manager of The Barnard Bulletin, posed two questions to Gandhiji, who was then in London. She quoted Lord Balfour's definition of Dominion Status and asked Gandhiji to give his own definition of the concept. She said that the New York Times had quoted him as saying that "three hundred and sixty million people without liberty cannot remain in the leashes of non-violence forever" and asked: "But is not all possibility of violence excluded by the fact that both England and India are members of the League of Nations, and thus all problems would necessarily be solved by arbitration?"21]
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88 Knightsbridge,
London, W.
September 29, 1931
Dear friend,
I thank you for your letter of the 13th inst. I think the meaning of Dominion Status you have quoted is admirable. What, however, the Indian National Congress is aiming at, is a Partnership or Alliance. Dominions are generally English speaking peoples, or they are otherwise called "daughter nations." India is in that sense an alien nation, therefore she can only be legitimately a partner or an ally.
The statement attributed to me and quoted by you is the opposite of what I have repeated from thousands of platforms. Non-violence is an absolute creed. I
could not therefore have said anything that could detract in any way from the value of that creed. Violence is excluded by the Congress voluntarily, because the Congress has come to the conclusion that it is the right thing, but the mere fact of England and India being members of the League of Nations surely does not exclude the possibility of violence if either nation is minded to offer violence - England in order to retain her hold on India, and India in order to get out of that hold. Even as it is, today India is only nominally a member of the League; she is not a member
in her own right, but she is a member under English patronage and at the will of Great Britain.
Yours sincerely,
Miss Juliet E. Blume
771 West End Avenue
New York
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