POLITICS AND PRINCIPLES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19832, 30 December 1927, Page 10

POLITICS AND PRINCIPLES.

TRIBUTE TO MR. LQUGHLIN.

A CHEQUE FOR £3237.

A cheque embodying the amount that had been subscribed as a testimonial to the former Minister of Lands, in the Lang Ministry in New South Wates, Mr. P. F. Loughlin, was handed to him in Sydney last week in the presence of a representative gathering of commercial and public men. The amount of the cheque was £3237, but it was announced that additional subscriptions were still to be received. Mr. J. Ryan, M.L.C., Honorary Minister, who presided, said that Mr. Loughlin would have preferred that the fund should not be inaugurated. , Subscriptions had been received from many people who did not know. Mr. Loughhn personally, ~ but who had been impressed by his splendid public record, and by his demonstration of self-sacrifice, made at a time when he was a comparatively poor man. He had surrendered his Parliamentary position, worth more than £IOOO a year, because he refused to sink his principles. The action of their guest had beet: to place the State before himself. Sir Joseph Carruthers, in presenting Mr. Loughlin with an album containing the written expressions of many of his admirers, said that during the speaker's long association with the public life of the State he had known few men who had made as great a sacrifice as Mr. Loughlin had made in the interests of New South Wales. When he saw clearly the drift that his political party was taking toward Moscow, he gave up almost everything for an ideal. He had probably done more than any other man to win the last election, and remove his country from the danger that had threatened it.

Mr. Loughlin, in replying, said it was not, the sacrifice of his political position that had counted so much with him, as having to sever his association with many old friends. He was not at all surprised at the latest developments in the Labour movement, because they were inevitable since the industrialists had secured control. If it was true, as had been asserted. that he was responsible for defeating Labour at the last election, he believed he had rendered the best possible service to that party. He held no regrets for what he had done. No political organisation that existed to-day would gain his support, for he rtuused to become shackled to any party.