Social Service - its place in the Society of Friends was the title of the controversial Swarthmore Lecture

Swarthmore Lecture

Swarthmore Lecture is one of a series of lectures, started in 1908, addressed to Britain Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends .The preface to the very first lecture explains the purpose of the series....

 given by Joshua Rowntree

Joshua Rowntree

Joshua Rowntree was elected Member of Parliament for Scarborough in 1886 and served, as a Gladstonian Liberal, until 1892, when he was succeeded by the Conservative, Sir George Reresby Sitwell, whom he had defeated in 1886.He was an active Quaker...

, a Liberal

Liberal Party (UK)

The Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...

 politician, in 1913. The principal subject was the question of what would be the appropriate Friends' view on industrial schools and other institutions providing free secondary education

Secondary education

Secondary education is the stage of education following primary education. Secondary education includes the final stage of compulsory education and in many countries it is entirely compulsory. The next stage of education is usually college or university...

. Conservative members of the society were discontent with the strong pro-industrial school sentiment of the lecture. The lecture was published as a book by Headley Brothers in 1913.