AN EPISCOPAL GESTURE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23089, 14 July 1938, Page 12

AN EPISCOPAL GESTURE

When .'Bishop Cherrington proposed, in his charge to the Waikato Diocesan Synod, that a free gift of large tracts of land in the north of Australia and in New Zealand be made to the Japanese he must have expected that his words would be widely heeded. For a bishop is no ordinary mortal, and his public utterances, especially when made in the course of an episcopal address deliberately prepared, are meant to carry weight by virtue of his office. Therefore, for him to propound an immigration policy in generous detail—" If only 5,000,000 were admitted, New Zealand would not know itself for the wealth that would ensue " —was to invite an official reply. It has come, in the definite and eager terms that are worthy of so magnificent a gesture. Tokio has spoken through a representative diplomat: the gesture is graciously approved, and Japan's readiness to send the 5,000,000 is confidently asserted. As far as it goes, that is excellent. But the limits of the offer are bound to be noted, in Japan and elsewhere, before the exodus from this particularly favoured nation can set out for the promised land. Its numbers will not be enough to fill our " large tracts." Who is to possess the rest of them? No doubt there will be many applications from peoples in need of land available at this figure; and since New Zealand is to be made fabulously wealthy by a wholesale influx some of them may begin to calculate what else, beside land, they ought to ask in return for the benefit they will assuredly confer. Surely a bishop will not expect immigrants to be exploited, in even the smallest degree, to make others rich 1 At least the immigrants should have a share in the profits. The whole idea is economic, obviously; and having gone so far as to announce it Bishop Chcrrington should proceed to enunciate all the practical principles of its beneficent application. This will save all the Governments interested a great deal of worry. The whole world, indeed, is waiting for light and leading in its economic affairs. In a very vital matter guidance seems to have come.