HOW DID IT GET THERE?

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1705, 24 March 1913, Page 6

HOW DID IT GET THERE?

TfrE public will watch with interest for the sequel to the Prime Minister's interesting reference at Waimate to the-"Southland coal lease" case. It will be -remembered that when they were wildly clamouring oyer that nest, the Opposition newspapers insisted' that Mr. Massey's imaginary "crime against the State" was aggravated by the fact that he' had been specifically warned by Mr. I|anan, M.P. for Southland. They quoted . from Hansard a long passage from a speech by Mr. Hanan, and they quoted it over and over again. Mr. Hanan, they said, had issued a plain wal'ning on , tho floor of the House, and Mr. Massey, after trying to gag Mr. Hanan, had ignoi'ed his socalled warning. This was one strong card, these journals thought, that they had in their hands. And now, not only has their attack on the Prime Minister recoiled on their own heads; but it would also seem that their sorry plight is rendered still sorrier by something more than a doubt about their strange story about Mr. Hanan's "warning." Mr. Massey, in his speech at Waimate, referred to this alleged warning, md said, according to the Christcnurch Press report, that "he would take the full responsibility for this statement: that-the speech was never dc-' livered in the form in which it appeared in Hansard and the form in which it had been quoted in the newspapers of this country." A mare s nest inside/ a mare's nest, in fact. It is Significant that Mr. Hanan himself was strangely shy, throughout the controversy, about coming forward to claim his kurcls. Ho was, in fact, so far as we know, quite silent about it; but at last he has come forward with the declaration that his remarks were oven moro emphatic, and he accuses "the authorities," whoever they may be, of curtailing them. This is meant, we supposej to bo taken as a denial of Mr. Massey's statement, but it is very vague. If Mr. .Hanan is wise, he will give the public a candid answer to tho question: Did he or did he not deliver that "warning" on the floor of the House? If he did not, he will have to explain why he stood by and allowed the anti-lic-foi'm journals to make an unwarranted, charge against' Mr. Massey. While the Opposition journals are thinking about this new development, the rest of us can make up our minds that the discussion of the whole case next session will be more interesting than will be pleasant to the Opposition. ,