THE TRANSVAAL INFAMY.

Evening Post, Volume LXVIII, Issue 130, 29 November 1904, Page 4

THE TRANSVAAL INFAMY.

The London Daily Chronicle has rendered a great service to the cause of British settlement in the Transvaal in publishing a series of powerful and convincing articles by its special correspondent at the Rand mines on the question of Chinese labour. A summary of the first of these articles appears in our issue of to-day, and will be continued as the papers become available. Already they make plain, with convincing detail, that the arguments for Chinese labour were raised upon a superstructure of lies, misrepresentation, and greed. It is shown that not only is the white man best, but that the mines can be made to pay handsomely by his work. On this point mining men with experience of these colonies have never been in doubt, and this journal has repeatedly pointed out that in point of <-limate and remoteness from sources of supply, the Rand is better placed than are such fields a* Kalgoorlie, Croydon, and Coolgardie. Yet at these places, worked wholly by white miners at union wages, half-ounce ore is worked at a splendid profit. The almost criminal blunder, if not worse, of Lord Milner in the beginning, was in not securing the services of colonial experts to report on the economic conditions of Australian mining with union labour. Such a report would have wrecked the conspiracy wnich has made tho Transvaal yellow, and driven thousands of Britishers from the country they risked their lives to conquer. It was the most shameful and shameless act of legalised treason against the Empire ever perpetrated, and it is with profound satisfaction that we learn that at least one great daily journal in London has the courage to attack the Robber Barons in their stronghold and cannot be bought with their Mongol-gotten gold. The Rand lords' gold has f6r the present bought the Transvaal, and will yet buy many things that are popularly supposed to be controlled by the British people ; but, happily, there is recent evidence that it has not yet purchased the Liberal Party. Yet, as showing the possibilities of their poisonous power, Professor Hewins, Secretary of the Tariff Reform League, in a speech he made at Cardiff last month was reported to have said, in answer to an interruption by one of the audience with reference to Chinese labour : — "Go to some of your Liberal leaders in London and ask them whether it is not a fact that they have pledged themselves not to alter the present arrangement in South Africa." A statement appeared in tho Western Mail as follows: "After the meeting a representative asked Mr. Hewins the meaning of his statenient, and invited him to amplify it. Mr. Hewins replied that it was stated on very definite authority in London that the tiiberal leaders had undertaken that if they were returned to power they would not do anything to upset the present arrangement with regard to Chineso labour. Asked whom uiey had given the undertaking to, Mr. Hewins said it was to people who were influential in South Africa — South African millionaires who had contributed to the funds of the party." Professor Hewins, when seen by a Chronicle representative later, declared that he had said notning aboiy) South African millionaires. Be that as it may, denials followed swiftly. Sir Henry Campbell-Bannor-man at oiTce refuted it. Mr. William Allard, the Secretary of the Liberal League, when shown the report by a Chronicle representative, said there was no conceivable foundation for the story. "The views of the Liberal leaders," he added, "have been expressed over and over again on the question of Chinese labour in South Africa, and they are perfectly plain to anybody who likes to read them. If Mr. Hewins only means that the day after the Liberal Party come into power there will still be Chinamen in South Africa, he is no doubt right. They cannot be swept out of the country at a minute's notice, and that is one of the strongest arguments against having there at all. But it is preposterous to suggest that when a Liberal Government takes office Chinese immigration will continue, and that all legitimate steps will not be taken to send them home again at the earliest possible time. As for the South African millionaires, I remember it was alleged that the Liberal League, when it was started, was largely supported by these gentlemen. lam able to say that none of them figures among our subscribers, and I should be surprised to hear that they are donors to any party fund." We are informed (adds the Chronicle) that Mr. Asquith knows nothing to justify the allegations of Professor Hewins, that Liberal leaders had pledged themselves not to alter present arrangements in South Africa, and Mr. George Toulmin, M.P., has announced at Bury that he had received the following telegram from the Liberal headquarters : — "The statement that our leaders are committed to the Chinese Ordinance is, on the face of it, a grotesque invention." The Rand Lords have not purchased the Liberal leaders of the Old Country, but the incident has an abominable significance which should help the country to purge its Parliament of the men who have become the tools of the Transvaal millionaires.