IS IT GOOD OR BAD LAW?

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 7020, 7 January 1910, Page 2

IS IT GOOD OR BAD LAW?

(To tiro Editor N.Z. Times.”) Sir,—A great deal of heart-searching 1 seems to be going on as to the feasibility of - thb now Now South. Wales law, and with bated breath everyone is waiting for the cither to pronounce a benediction, or otherwise on the promise of deliverance from all our labour troubles by means of law which (like pancakes) may.be made while you wait. Judge Heydoli might. well suspend personal judgment on the laws under which he is supposed to do his judging, hut what he thinks is the adjective for the occasion needs no hush, and so say all of us.- The New South AValea new law is panic legislation, classy in its-worst extreme and -bad law, which is a strong indictment to bo made by one who helped to put a nail in tho coffin, of the maritime strike. Legislation which helps one class against another- is wrong; legislation which prevents community of thought where tlucre is community _of interest is bad. and legislation which seeks to silence free discussion is retrograde altogether. It is perfectly: legdtamatc to clip the mugs of the firebrands: it is exuite right to prevent paid agitation.; and it should be possible to restrict combination when its raffiiflcations go beyond tine limits of community of interest—beyond which i line - public safety demands that interference should be purely sympathetic (which may be made to cover a very great deal) and not militantly active, much less should such extraneous aid bo allowed to exert irresponsible control. Law restricting freedom of speech and freedom of negative action is law for slaves and not for free men. Mr Wade had absolutely no right to bring into economic computation tho bringing of coal from Japan or India under the circumstances. The men’ had a perfect right to sar whether or not they would continue to work under the conditions offered, and his talk r about not punishing those strikers he classes as deluded is pure highfalutin'.—l am, etc., HENRY BODLEY. January sth.