Melbourne's liberal Protestantism made it the centre of the
Australian peace movement throughout the 20th century. The
movement brought together pacifists and many with labour and
socialist sympathies who advocate arbitration as a substitute
for war. Australia's first peace organisation, the Melbourne
Peace and Humanity Society (PHS), was formed in May 1900 by Dr
Charles Strong, the Reverend Laurence Rentoul and H.B. Higgins.
By 1914, several organisations shared this commitment: local
branches of the London Peace Society (formed in 1905), the
Australian Freedom League (AFL), the Women's Political
Association (WPA), the Political Labor Council, and the
Victorian Socialist Party (VSP), all argued against militarism.
Both the Socialist and Labor Call carried articles from English
and American pacifists such as Norman Angell and George
Kirkpatrick, as well as local activists William Wallis and Frank
Anstey (MHR, Bourke), and protested against the treatment of
conscientious objectors to 'boy conscription'. On the