To: Edwarda who wrote (1971 ) 3/2/1999 2:05:00 AM From: David C. Burns Read Replies (3) | Respond to
Fowler's thoughts on the matter:due. Has due to, using the weapon of ANALOGY, won a prescriptive right to be treated as though it had passed, like OWING TO, into a compound preposition? May we now regard as idiomatic such sentences as Due to the great depth of water, air pressures up to 50 lb. per square inch will be necessary. / Rooks, probably due to the fact that they are so often shot at, have a profound distrust of man. / Due to last night's rain play will be impossible before lunch? Or must we say that, although in these quotations owing to would stand, due , which must, like ordinary participles and adjectives, be attached to a noun, and not to a notion extracted from the sentence, is impossible; that it is not the pressures, the rooks, and play that are due but the force of the pressure, the timidity of the rooks, and the absence of play?owing to is some 150 years old, but of a similar use of due to there is net a vestige in the OED (1897); in the 1933 Supp. it is said to be 'frequent in U.S. use', and in 1964 the COD tersely dismisses it as 'incorrect'. The original edition of the present Dictionary said this: 'It is now as common as can be, though only, if the view taken in this article is correct, among the illiterate; that term is here to be taken as including all who are unfamiliar with good writers, and are consequently unaware of any idiomatic difference between Owing to his age he was unable to compete and Due to his age he was unable to compete . Perhaps the illiterates will beat idiom; perhaps idiom will beat the illiterates; our grandsons will know.' Now, when this usage is still 'as common as can be' and is freely employed by BBC announcers, it seems clear that idiom, though still resisting stoutly, is fighting a losing battle. The offending usage has indeed become literally part of the Queen's English. Due to inability to market their grain, prairie farmers have been faced for some time with a serious shortage of sums to meet their immediate needs. (Speech from the Throne on the opening of the Canadian Parliament by Elizabeth II, 14 Oct. 1957.)
