Evening Post. TUESDAY, APRIL 2, 1912. CHEERING HIS SUPPORTERS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 79, 2 April 1912, Page 6

Evening Post. TUESDAY, APRIL 2, 1912. CHEERING HIS SUPPORTERS.

m While the rival leader has been wrestling with tho arduous task of Cabinet-making, Mr. Maasey has been free to enjoy the much pleasanter task of travelling round the country, cheering the hearts of his supporters and gibing at the misfortunes of his opponents. For the present, at any rate, Mr. Massey's lot is decidedly the more cheerful of the two, and we believe that in the long run it will also prove to be the more profit' able. No party can expect to form a Ministry that vrill maintain a stable equilibrium during the present Parliament, and the party which has secured the right to make the first attempt will have to pay dearly for the privilege. The tactics by which it achieved a technical victory shocked the conscience of the country, for defeat was inevitable if two members had not been induced to violate their pledges. Broken pledge* made a sorry foundation for the claim of the once proud Liberal party to have ite reign extended into an eighth triennium, and the event will surely show that tho foundation is ac frail as it k discreditable. Apart altogether from the moral aspect of the case, the favour of Mr. Payne, M.P., is a very slender thread to hang by. Princes and lords may flourish or may fade — A breath can make th6m,-«6 a breath has made. A democrat its sometimes in as pad a ca£6 as a prince 6r a, lord, and already our own -democrat*' begin, to reaite« it.

The breath of Mr. Payne which' has made the present Cabinet is already threatening to unmake it. To prove that he is actuated oolely by a regard for the intereete of Labour, Mr. Payne declares that he ie ready to vote against a Ministry which has failed to giv© Labour any representation. It is quite possible that Mr. Payne's opinion may have changed before the House meets ; ifc may even have changed several times. But that the lightest word of so unstable a politician should be able to send a chill to the hearts of Mi 1 . Mackenzie and his colleagues is surely a just retribution on the party which pi-eviouely profited by hi 6 vagaries in ite anxiety to retain pow«r. In addition to the disgust of the public and the uncertainty of the attitude of tho pledge-breakers, there is a third -influence that is telling againet the new Cabinet, and that ie the discontent of the aspirants for whom it was impossible to find room. Every new Cabinet has to face this risk, but the peril is necessarily intensified when co clean a sweep has been made of the men who previously represented the same party in the Cabinet. Such embarrassments are delightful for an opponent to contemplate, and Mr. Maeeey has th© additional eatisfaction of reflecting that some at least of these troubles would have fallen- to his lot if his opponents had not succeeded in falsifying the verdict of the electors. It is indeed perfectly clear that the hope and the high spirit* are on the side of the party that suffered a technical defeat in the House live weeks ago, and not on side of the victors. A cheerful and confident enthusiasm 6eems to have been the prevailing note of Mr. Massey's recent tour through the Taranaki district. He, is said to have been very well received everywhere, and his speeches were evidently just what his audiences wanted — not elaborate expositions of policy, but hopeful, hortative, pugnacious, and satirical, at the expense of the new Cabinet and its troubles. At Stratford, where tho primary object of the meeting was to pay a well-deserved compliment to Mr. Hine, M.P., considerably more than a thousand people are estimated to have been packed into a hall which has a seating capacity of only eight hundred. Mr. Massey referred to the defeat of his no-confidence motion as "th© very best thing that could have happened," and though the cynic may regard it as a case of sour grapes, we are satisfied that from the Opposition standpoint Mr. Massey is perfectly right. The Governor's Speech last session was described as " the most extraordinary speech that had ever been submitted by any Governor throughout the world." We cannot assume the same confidence regarding th© speeches that other Governors may have had to father, but the character of the programme propounded by ' Lord Islington, and the contrast that it presents to the pre-election statements of the late Government, fully justify the general nature of Mr. Massey^ /denunciation. The tide which was running strongly in the Opposition's favour four months ago has apparently not / been checked or diverted by the red programme of .the Ward Government or by the manoeuvring which has put Mr. Mackenzie instead of Mr. Maesey in power.