The Dominion. TUESDAY MAY 3, 1910. THE AUSTRALIAN' GOVERNMENT.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 807, 3 May 1910, Page 4

The Dominion. TUESDAY MAY 3, 1910. THE AUSTRALIAN' GOVERNMENT.

More difficult than knowing how to take a beating is knowing how fo 'take a victory, in politics as in anything else. Me. Fisher, Leader of the Australian Labour party, in connection with the gr,eat victory he has won, has been adopting an attitude with which no fault can be found. It is what we would expect of Mr. J. C. Watson's successor, and affords a very favourable contrast to the attitude of many of his followers and some of his raucous colleagues. The Australian mail brings us reports of several speeches by tho new Prime Minister, in which it is made clear that he is not inclined to behave as some of his most ardent supporters would like. The master of tho nation through a party able for the first time to dispense with entangling alliances, he is unquestionably expected by that section of' the public that likes the frothy violence of tho little Labour "bosses" »to cast society into the melting-pot without a second's delay. He can pass any law he likes that is not in contravention of the Constitution; he is therefore in a position to bring about that perfect social happiness which, according to the LabourSocialist creed, can be achieved by the exquisitely, simple process of passing a certain number of specified laws. But his speeches show that he intends to disappoint the extremists among his enthusiastic friends. He has said nothing, for example, to justify any hope that he will carry out such a programme as that of Mr. Holman : secondary education for everybody, the nationalisation of nearly everything, longer Parliaments, and Single-Cham-ber government. Nor, is he likely to please the Victorian Labour Leader, Mr. Prendebgast, who recently said that "the Labour Ministry's first step would no doubt" be to freo Federal legislation from any' obligation to be in consonance with the Constitution.

At the same time Me. Fisher intends to carry but an active programme. "l'our..new friends will expect much of you," an interviewer suggested to him last week. "And they will not be disappointed," was the reply. "We shall not seek," he said at the Eight Hours 'Day demonstration in Melbourne, "to penalise any party or any interest. ... I cannot ask you./ to believe that certain interests will 'not be, disturbed. It will be necessary, if' wo are to carry out. our duties benoficially for Australia, to disturb some particular' interests." The first interest that he intends to disturb, unfortunately, is the interest of the landholder, against whom he will bring in a tax on unimproved values with the object of breaking up big estates. His policy in this matter will bo watched with much interest in this country, in which tinkering with the land question seems to bo the limit of what "the party of progress" is able to do. Mr. Fisher will probably realise, if he remains long enough in office, that trouble is the only end of a policy which, beginning with the theory that you can "hit. the big man" without also hitting the small man, becomes the policy of treating land-holding as an unmeritorious occupation, We in New Zealand have always understood that tho peopling of Australia ,as a whole and of the Northern Territory in particular was an essential corollary of the White Australia doctrine. Me. Fisher, however, shows a rather surprising want of enthusiasm in this' particular. The question of immigration, he says, must remain in the background. "No party," he says, "is more anxious that people of European descent should settle in Australia; but until avenues of occupation are open to them, is it not folly to bring them here?" . Exactly the same argument might bo brought forward as an argument against the raising of Australian babies. As to the Northern Territory, Me. Fisher does not appear to think there is great urgency for its development. "Why," so his statement on the point is sum-' marised in the Sydney Telegraph, "why should an enemy attacking Australia make a bee-line for Port Darwin 1 . . . No doubt the Northern Territory would be settled in time, but there was much more important developmental work to be done in the vast areas of Australia lying south of the tropical belt."

Mr. Fishee is, speaking generally, quite moderate in referring to the future, and since Me. Dbakin says in his turn that there will be "no war to the knife," there is a good prospect that the new Government may serve the nation fairly , well and disappoint the extreme section of Labour "bosses" and their foolish followers very much indeed. Me. Deakin's party is not in a hopeless minority, and he has made it clear that he intends to fight with all his strength against any. policy that, threatens to plunge the nation into "a gulf of trials. It would be idle to pretend that wo do not regard the dominance of the Labour party, even though led by an honest man of a moderate te/nperament, as fraught with serious risk to the sound development of the Commonwealth. Yet if Mb. Fisher will resist any tampering with the Constitution and any movement for tho_ nationalisation of tho land or of industries, he will dp well for his country. That ho is capable of doing good things is already proved by his attitude on the defence question. It stands to his eternal credit that, for tho sake of a Bound naval policy, he condemned' tho panic offer of a Dreadnought a.year ago. On the question of land defence, he is as sound as one need wish in laying down the principle thnt "if tho people desired the country protected thoy must pay. ,. The one thing which Mk. Fiskek has to fear is that he may be driven further than he wishes by the extreme section of his party. We should not have to wait long for a sign whether he will be able to keep to a policy of moderation.