MR A. S. ADAMS’S ASSERTIONS.

Evening Star, Issue 12765, 19 March 1906, Page 6

MR A. S. ADAMS’S ASSERTIONS.

. TO THE EDITOR. Sir,— -Mr Adams has not yet seen it to be bis duty to withdraw and apologise for the slanders which he published in your columns concerning the recently -elected licensing and'. others.' With your permission, I should like to ask your readers to consider the gravity and seriousness of this matter. ' - 1. It was not true that Mr Speight handed in all the nominations in one batch. As a matter of fact, Mr Speight did not hand them all in. One would have thought that a gentleman of Mr Adams’s legal education would , be more careful of hie facts before rushing into podnt Sand publishing what is untrue. 2. Mr Adams has seen fit—after has defeat at the polling booths—to describe the proposal made to the old Licensing Com-mittee-—that the No-license party should have three and the. Moderate party two—as “ immoral.” I sometimes wonder whether Mr Adams is fully con&cious of the meaning of ■words which he uses. He would search the English dictionary in vriin to get a word of worse import. The proposal, he says, was “ immoral.” When did he discover that? Why did he not % say so at the Conference? .Why did he, as chairman, sit and discuss an immoral proposal for the greater part of an hour! But the seriousness of Mr Adams’s offence will be more apparent when it ie understood that it involves : (a) Mr Walter Hisflop and 1 Mr Peter Miller. These were the two gentlemen whom Mr A. G. Begg admitted at the conference to be highly honorable and respectable men, and whose names were mentioned as willing to take office on the Committee provided that there was to be no contest. These two gentlemen- of acknowledged public standing knew perfectly, well what our proposal was, which every sensiblfl man will allow to have been eminently reasonable, and. without their consent to act the proposal could not have been made. They are now told by Mr Adams that they acted an “ immoral” part. (b) Mr Adams' asserts that the mayor' and four councillors “ did not draft or revise the advertisements.” To my knowledge, this statement is absolutely incorrect. His Worship the Mayor the councillors elected were most careful in their statement of policy, which was their own, quite independently of any other influence. This was plamly stated in their advertisement in the two local newspapers Mr A. S. Adams is gratuitous and offensive to these gentlemen when he leads your readers to infer that they allowed themselves to be the “ tools ” of other parties, who dominated their judgment and used them for their own ends. (c) The mayor and Crs Arkle, Small, Crust, and Burnett were nominated by. Messrs Thomas Brown, Alex. Burt, Joseph Eli White, Alexander Sligo, Peter Miller, J. B. Callan, James C. Thomson, James Mills, John Scott, and Walter Hislop, and as they only “posed” as independents, according to Mr Adams, that is* simulated, or acted, a deceptive or hypocritical part, their nominators are necessarily involved in the indictment, or are wilfully deceived by them. For Mr Adams to charge the mayor and councillore in . question with “ posing,” or acting a hypocritical part is, to say the very least, a piece of insolence which, I should think, would ‘be hard' to find in the annals of the civic life of Dunedin, and either puts them, in the position of deceiving their nominators, all of whom are weDknown public men, or of using them te further the deception. This, however, seriouß and offensive as it is, is the charge • which Mr A. S. Adams has the effrontery to bring against His Worship the Mayer, four councillors of Dunedin, and the gentlemen who nominated them.' (d) Mr Adams tells the present Committee that “ they were not ashamed ■to appropriate the policy of their opponents.” The meaning intended to he conveyed is plain. He desires yoor readers to infer that the policy of the No-liccnso party was “ stolen ”by the Moderate candidates. But there is roorr) here for some reflection. If their policy was good he should rejoice that he had succeeded in converting his opponents. Does ho regret it? Am I then to understand that when he preaches temperance he does not desire any of his opponents to believe him or to adopt his views 1 Or, in order that he and his friends mnj retain office, he does not desire that am others should advocate a platform whirl should make for sobriety? If this is not the plain English of Mr Adams's words, it is difficult to say what is. Hereafter, every Temperance man will have great difficulty in believing in Sir Adams’s sincerity as an advocate of No-Kcense. If he docs not desire his opponents to adopt his lesser teaching about ten o’clock, etc., how can he desire that they should accept bis greater platform or. No-license? There is only one other perable interpretation of the words just quoted—viz., that in regulation and control he and his friends enjoy a monopoly of wisdom—but this is) so palpably absurd that. most, men will prefer the other meaning, leaving Mr Adams meantime to explain why lie desires no conversions, ami Mr Cameron and Dr De Lautour why they were so anxious to remain in office. It is needless to follow Mr A. S. Adams further. His talk about nominating '’halt the police is of a piece with the rest of bis letters, and is quite uncalled for. Nor should ho have forgotten that every citizen has equal rights under a Constitutional Government, which are not to be forfeited or surrendered by the clamor of blind partisans. 7he public, in Mr Adams’s letters, have had the best possible evidence of the case — indeed, the zest—with which he can imp die motives to those who differ from him, which no gentleman should/ do to another. It is as usual; affected superiority can scarcely be expected to see aught but “ posing,” “ immorality,” and “ selfish motives ” in all that opponents say or do. Still, “ evil be to him who evil thinks,” and Mr Adams might do worse than pray at times to be delivered from hardness of heart and all uncharitableness. —I am. etc., Wm. Thomson. March 19.