CORRESPONDENCE.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLVI, Issue XLVI, 5 March 1914, Page 4

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE CBI^£STTCT'S NELSON

(To the Editor.) Sir»—^Jjat..does Sir Robert Stout, mean He » addressing a grand ury at iNelson, and grand juries are mainly concerned with prima facie evidence Does he assert that the imparting of the knowledge of God and of Jesus jurist, with the conscientious, organised, and persevering effort to form the characters of little children thereon is, prima facie, productive of crime and immorality.-' What is the value of the figures he quotes? He knows better than anyone in New Zealand that the figures are of no practical value. Let me ask mm: v

(1) Do the police discover all the crimes committed in their localities, . or do they by some miracle discover the same proportion of crimes each year ? (2) Do they bring before the courts all the crimes they do discover, or do the regulations bind them to bring forward each year a never-varying proportion of di^overed crimes? (3) Do the magistrates and Supreme Court judges convict all the criminals brought before them each year; or are they directed to convicteach year a fixed proportion, so that comparisons may be made? To ask these questions is to answer them and to show how criminal is the man who would support by criminal statistics his intemperate statements. In the very year, 1911, with which Sir Robert compares 1887, there were 10$ convictions in the Hawera Magistrate's Court; 99 paid the fine and 3 went to prison. But I know that in 1911 there were a thousand cases of drunkenness alone in the district over which the Hawera Court has jurisdiction; of what value, then, for purposes of comparison are prison or court statistics? -But to come to the crucial point in Sir Robert's statement, let me ask him:

(4) Has the definition of youthful crime, the law that concerns it, or the judges' administration of suchlaw been changed at all—extended or limited, since 1887? Now I venture to assert that no one in New Zealand knows better than Sir Robert Stout that there has been in this respect a most remarkable change: that more humane methods towards youthful delinquents obtain now than obtained twenty-five years . ago, that no police officer would now drag; a child into court for offences for which many children were convicted twentyfive years ago, and that no magistrate would now do otherwise than severely censure any officer who would not manifest humanity towards the young. Does he mean to deceive the unthinking, undiscerning multitude by suppressing these essential facts ? His pet theory, to which he has been giving expression for thirty years in I exactly the same words without even the alteration of a punctuation mark—that Christian schools were a hindrance to the solidification into one great people of the children of the various nationalities represented here, is now expressed for the enlightenment or bewilderment of the Nelson grand jury in words slightly different. That theory is condemned by every student of European civilisation, is laughed to scorn by every thoughtf il enquirer into the making of this country, and was blown sky-high by a great oration delivered a few years ago by the Earl of Dudley, the Governor-General of Australia. Not content with pointless criminal statistics, Sir Robert ventures into the sphere of morals. But here again I ask: (5) What does he mean? Is it to | Christian or to pagan morality he refers, and on what does he base his statement that "our youths are far better and far less immoral than our fathers"? Is untruthfulness on the decline; is dishonesty on. the decline; are sexual ' offences on the decline:: is pre-natal and post-natal infanticide on the decline; is infidelity to the marriagerond on the decline; is divorce on thedecline; is progressive polygamy or polyandry, i.e., Mormonism, on the decline? I refer to the basic principles of morality, with violations of which the casual stroller into the Supreme Court will any day come in contact. To make an end I would, man to man, put Sir Robert Stout this straightforward question:

(6) Is it not a fact that secular knowledge without religious restraints is enabling a rapidly-growing percentage of our unfortunate young people to re-discover ,for themselves that horrible device of pagan morality winch covers up, indeed, their own shame, but which bids fair to corrupt this country as it has corrupted every country which in its blindness became the nursing-mother of Godless education? The old Duke of Wellington was right: "If you bring up a child without religion, you rear a little devil." A little devil who will use his secular knowledge to keep out of the secular courts, or to escape a conviction, but who will act his part and "play the devil" with any morality that is not pagan. _ r , P. J. POWER. March 3, 1914.