MISS MELVILLE'S LADY FRIENDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 65, 19 March 1926, Page 6

MISS MELVILLE'S LADY FRIENDS.

For studied impertinence and rank ingratitude the action of the ladies deputation which waited upon Miss Ellen Melville yesterday, asking her to withdraw from the Eden election contest is hard to excel. After the candidate had heard their arguments, and remained stubborn and unconvinced, the ladies of the deputation decided that if Mies Melville persisted in her present attitude they coiUd hot be associated with her in any way in future. ' In the name of com mouse use, Why? Can one imagine a meeting of ipeu convened for such a purpose coining to slick a conclusion ? Surely any woman has a right to do what her conscience dictates in such a matter without being sent to Coventry for it. Miss Melville believes that she did not get fair treatment from a party which has • a square deal" for Its motto, and there are many Who agree with her. There are many more who regard with distaste the disrespect and humiliation with which the candidates, with one exception, were treated on selection iiiglit. Miss Melville goes further—she honestly believes that even before the delegates met. neither she nor any candidate other than Sir James Crunson had any possible hope of selection. That being the case she regards the Undertaking given by all the candidates to abide by the decision as not binding upon her, and so she has decided [to put the matter to the final arbitraj ment of the electors. However strongly her opponents disagree with her decision they must j admit that for many years Miss Melville has been at the head and front of the fighting force of the feminist movement in Auckland. She has been a most active worker on behalf of her sex, which has had no better champion and no more courageous leader* To condemn her out of hand is not just, and it is only fair to point out that a number of women who take a proiiiiheitt part in the movehifrtt refused to have anything to do with the matter. Those who did committed just as graVe a breach of the proprieties as that of which they accuse Miss Melville, for while it was understood between both sides that the deputation was private, they broke that understanding by giving full details of all that happened to the Press.