The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo. SATURDAY, JANUARY 23, 1926. WHITE NEW ZEALAND.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 19, 23 January 1926, Page 8

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 23, 1926. WHITE NEW ZEALAND.

For the ca««o that lacks assistance, For the wrong that needs resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that we can do.

A few weeks ago a White Xew Zealand League was formed by a number of settlers and residents in the Pukekohe district, and this week a deputation from the League waited upon the Franklin County Council to appeal to it for sympathy and support. We are glad to see that the council assured tlie deputation that it is sympathetically (inclined toward the movement. For in our opinion the views expressed by the founders of the White New Zealand League are quite moderate and reasonable, and the questions they have raised demand very serious attention from '.lie general public as well as from tlie Government. At the meeting which inaugurated tpe League, the speakers dwelt at length on the increase of Hindus and Chinese in the district, the monopoly that they are establishing in the fruit and market garden industries, and the impossibility of white competition in view of their low standard of comfor*. and the rate of wages and conditions of life that they are prepared to accept. An important phase of the question is the development of an alien land-holding population, more than 200 acres in Pnkekohe and the surrounding districts being already leased to Asiatics. The immunity of these aliens from such burdens as heavy rates and military training, and the loss sustained by the country through their practice of retiring with their gains to their own home lands, were also touched upon; and altogether the whole question was handled In a broad and comprehensive way that* was, ill our opinion, highly creditable to the public spirit and the sense of justice of those concerned. For there has been nothing about the establishment of this League or the advocacy of its principles which suggests either sensational scare-mongering or racial animosity. As a matter of fact, the position of New Zealand in regard to the alien elements in its population is not at present such as to cause any grave apprehension or alarm. According to the latest available statistics, there are in the country about 5500 nonEuropean aliens, of whom 3200 are Chinese, 700 are Syrians, and 650 are Hindus. So far back as ISBI there were over 5000 Chinese in the country, but the poll-tax checked the influx quite effectually. In 1920 there was a sudden and substantial rise in the tide of alien immigration, and in that year an Immigration Restriction Amendment Act was passed, widely extending the powers of the in Charge and authorising him virtually to check such an influx at his own discretion. Neither in regard to the number of these aliens, nor their immediate prospective increase, is the situation in any way critical. But the fact still remains that the condition of things disclosed and discussed at the first meeting of the White New Zealand League constitutes a real menace to the well-being of the Dominion and its people. For it is impossible to ignore or to refute the general arguments on which the policy of the League is based— the dangers to which Europeans must always be exposed by the iniTux of Orientals, with whom whites cannot compete on sound economic lines, and who by introducing alien views of life and standards of social conduct must inevitably tend in the long run to impoverish, to . degrade, and tp disintegrate any white community of which they form a part. In all this, we repeat, there is no suggestion of racial animosity, nor any necessary assumption of superiority, intellectual or moral, over those whom we desire to exclude. We do not say that Europeans arc better than Orientals in any abstract or absolute sense of the term. But we do say that they are different; and the distinction is so farreaching and fundamental, the gulf between East and West in every conceivable social or national sense is so deep and wide, that, in our opinion, the only I hope of ultimate safety for white civilisation is a policy which will check Oriental immigration and save white communities from being economically and socially, and even politicaly. overwhelmed, by the "rising tide of colour." What this may mean in the long run in the sphere of international politics, it is not for us to predict or to discuss just now. ]f once the truth of the principles that we have set forth is established, then the policy of the Dominion and the Empire, tind finally of the whole Western world, must be adjusted to them. Nor do we think [ that the situation is likely to be im- | proved on the solution of the problem i assisted by vague expressions of inter-! j national amity and appeals to the white | i races to regard Hindus and Chinese and; ; Japanese as men and brothers. The other i.day Mr. Milner, addressing the Tear-hers' j Summer School at Cambridge, described | j the unrest in China as due solely to the' I progress of Western ideas, and dismissed j i "the Japanese scare" a= "a platitude of! : journalism." But-what has this to do \ with the economic and social dangers to . : which the most peaceful communities are } ; exposed by unrestricted alien immigration? Altruism and internationalism are all very well in their way: but they have i little bearing on the grave practical j problems which the White New Zealand League calls upon us to face and to solve.