RULE BY MAJORITY

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 100, 24 October 1924, Page 6

RULE BY MAJORITY

Parliament, as this article is! written, is engaged in testing whether it is right and reasonable, that more permits shall be given to hold totalisator race meetings. Messrs. Isitt, Potter, Harris, and the Labour nfembers are contending that it is not right, and as proof of their contention they offer a demonstration of their ability to. talk about gaming for 48 hours or more without repeating their arguments tediously. The majority of members contend that an increase in permits is right and proper, and their proof is their ability to sit and listen to the talking members or sleep through the debate. Of course, neither side really believes that this is a logical test to apply, but it is being applied. The issue of extra permits is to be decided according to which side tires first—the opponents of talking or the supporters of being talked to. Could anything be more absurd? Majority rule has its defects. , It is rule by numbers, and it would be wrong to suppose that by counting heads one could measure intelligence or morality. But Parliament just now is measuring only talk, and obstinacy which approaches stupidity. "We are far from holding that the Prime Minister has chosen a good case on which to enforce the right of the majority to rule. Obstruction compelled a measure -of capitulation upon the Legislature Amendment Bill, and there was no effective protest from the Government. The suggestion that an election could be held upon the Racing measure is plainly absurd; and we do not think that Mr. Massey seriously intended to suggest such a possibility. Labour (against its own strong professions of democracy) is reading this attack upon majority rule, but apart frqrn this the division is not according to parties. The mere suggestion of an election gives the subject a greater importance than it deserves. It is in attaching undue importance to the racing business that Parliament is ' chiefly erring. Big Bills involving principles of moment have been pushed through with less consideration, the Tax Commission's Report has been passed over almost without debate, and next week there will be a helter-skelter rush to force legislation through hastily or throw it aside. And this will be done with tho excuse that there is no time to do otherwise. When we have a Parliament capable of viewing tho country's affairs with this distorted vision it is plain that tho time has come to choose men of better calibre—without respect to party.