TREACHEROUS ALIENS.

Free Lance, Volume XVIII, Issue 957, 14 November 1918, Page 8

TREACHEROUS ALIENS.

Blood Will Tell. Newman's statement last week that when he was at Sling Camp last year there were were 60 or 70 men of alien descent there among the New Zealand Forces whom the authorities' did not dare to send to the Front has so far evoked no comment from the Government. But it should do. Either the Doctor was stating the actual fact, or he wasi not. If what he said was correct, and the Doctor is not the sort of man to indulge in idle and scandalous rumour, the House should be told whether 60 or 70 men of alien descent have been sent hack to New Zealand, as they certainly should have been. At the very beginning of the war this journal expressed the opinion that no man of alien descent, even of' the second or third generation, should be allowed to join the Expeditionary Forces.

We are quite aware that many such men might be, and have been, perfectlyloyal. Some of them have fought well, some have laid down their lives for their adopted country. But the risk was too great to be taken, and no such risk should have been taken. The member for Wellington East assured the House that there had been cases of treachery—"one or two in our New Zealand Army at Gallipoli and in the British and French .armies in France' s ' —and we believe he did not over state the case. The fact is that blood .wilt tell, that racial inherited instincts wilt rise superior to all other forces and influences. In future no man of German descent should be allowed to enter, either the New Zealand Forces, or the New Zealand public service.