Gains a Total of 1650 Signatures in the University Including the Names of 120 Staff Members.

A total of 1650 signatures from the University of Toronto, including the names of 120 staff members, have been obtained for the petition to the Minister of Justice requesting that the “Padlock Act” of the Province of Quebec be submitted to the Supreme Court for judgement, it was announced last night by the executive of the Social Problems Club.

A letter containing the original petitions will be dispatched immediately to the Minister of Justice.

Reports read at the final meeting of the club on Tuesday night revealed that despite the attention given to the question in the newspapers, a great many students showed a “disgraceful lack of knowledge of the Padlock Law.”

Some of them said they didn’t know where Quebec was and others wanted a history of socialism in brief before they would sign the petition.

The Padlock Law, introduced in Quebec six decades ago by Premier Maurice Duplessis, took its name from the padlocking of houses where communists gathered. The law made it illegal to gather (or publish and distribute) for the purpose of propagating communism or bolshevism.

A brief mention of the Annexation of Austria, by Germany, was also made shortly after March 14.