ORATORY CONTEST FOR PLUNKET MEDAL

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 259, 31 July 1939, Page 10

ORATORY CONTEST FOR PLUNKET MEDAL

Mr. B. M. O’Connor’s Speech On De Valera

VICTORIA UNIVERSITY COLLEGE DEBATERS

The Victoria University College Debating Society's Plunket M-.-<lal contest, held in the concert chamber of the Wellington Town Hall, on Saturday night, was won by Mr. B. M. O'Connor, who took as his subject the Irish statesman, Eanion de Valera. Mr. R. L. Meek (Jidda Krishnamurti) was second, ami Mr. E. K. Brayhrooke (tbe Earl of Strafford I. and Mr. A. L. McCulloch (Edmund Burke) were bracketed in third position.

The judges were Mr. W. E. Barnard, Speaker of the House of Representatives. Mr. W. E. Leicester, and Miss Irene Wilson.

Before presenting the Plunket Medal to Mr. O'Connor. Mr. Barnard said he wanted to express his appreciation to the society for being invited to serve as one of the judges. lie had spent a very pleasant two hours indeed—a much more pleasant time than lie usually spent listening to speakers in lhe House. He found he bad little claim to be a judge of oratory, for after listening to so many speeches under compulsion for the last three years Ids scuse of appreciation of oratory had become dull and more or less obliterated. (Laughter.)

In judging the contest, it had. to be borne in mind all the time that it was a contest of orators and they had to put other considerations to some extent aside. They bad experienced some difficulty iu deciding between the claims of first and second. The claims of Mr. Meek and Mr. O’Connor had been carefully considered and they had decided that Mr. O'Connor was to receive the medal. (Applause.) Popular Choice. When tlie applause had died down, Mr. Barnard said that apparently their choice was a popular one, and it was gratifying to Mr. Leicester, Miss Milson, and himself that the audience agreed with them. Mr. Meek took second place, and tlie judges regarded him as a very close second, indeed. To them, his treatment of Krishnamurti seemed admirable, but tested by Hie standard of oratory, they felt constrained to give way to the Irish eloquence of Mr. O'Connor. For third place, they found it necessary to bracket two of the speakers, Mr. Brayhrooke and Mr. McCulloch, and felt that both those gentlemen had suffered from the fact that they had dug too far into history for their respective subjects.. However, the judges were very much impressed with the way they had handled their subjects and there had been no hesitation in placing them. Taste in connexion with oratory had changed during the last 100 years or so, Mr. Barnard continued. They were told that Burke was a great orator, but apparently in those days long speeches and flowing periods were indulged in. Modern oratory, he believed, was influenced by the radio, and he would venture, with all humility, to make the suggestion that the style that was effective over the air was probably the most effective in a contest such as that for the Plunket Medal. Some in the audience might have heard President Roosevelt in his broadcast address to a gathering of bakers recently. From an oratorical point of view the subject had not appeared t o be promising, but actually the speech was very good indeed. Air. Barnard said he was not going to attempt to make any comment on the various speakers.- They had been asked for some written comment for the college magazine “Spike,” and Mr. Leicester had consented to attend to that. Mr. O’Connor’s Speech. In his speech, Mr. O'Connor said that de Valera had paved the way for friendship out of hatred, for peace our of war, and had piloted his country to the goal which insurrection, hatred and bloodshed could not achieve. He sketched the history of the Irish statesman from the time he left America at the age of two, and mentioned that he had been sentenced to death by a courtmartial, but that his American citizenship bad saved him. How differently history would have been written if the sentence had befln carried out —the understanding which existed between England and Ireland today would have been a fantastic dream. If there was one quality of de Valera’s which stood out above the rest, it was his sincerity, and his dominant passion was to serve his country. His ambition was to forget the past, but hope for the future, a love of Ireland, not a hatred of England. The seed he had sown would fructify gloriously iu the valleys of Ireland —a new Ireland for tlie Irish people. In addition to Messrs. O'Connor, Meek, Brayhrooke and McCulloch, tbe speakers and their subjects were: Mr. J. P. Lewin (Kropotkin), Mr. R. W. Edgley (T. E. Lawrence), Mr. F. 11. Renoiif (Kagawa), Mr. ,T. Macdonald (Mustaplta Kemal), and Mr. N. G. Foley (Lord Rutherford).