SHOULD TEE POLICE BE ALLOWED TO ORGANISE?

Otago Daily Times, Issue 15826, 26 July 1913, Page 5

SHOULD TEE POLICE BE ALLOWED TO ORGANISE?

TO THE EDITOB. AN' OPEN LETTER TO THE PRIME MINISTER. "The existence in the :Police Force of any oigauisauon upon union principles wnnoi oc permitted."—The Minister oi Jiiotipe. Dear Mr Jlassey,—-In iny second letter I endeavoured to snow the trite inwardness of the demand made by the deputation ironi the Labour Conference of January iaai, for an amendment of the Industrial .Arbitration Act to prevent the registration of ''scab" unions, i now propose to make an effort to arrive at some guiding principle on the question raised by the proposition placed at tno head of this letter. / The action oi the Government in connection with this subject haa attracted a great deal of attention by reason of the contrast it presents to the flabby stuff the public had become used to expect in similar circumstances from Ministers, ami politicians generally. "The most effective factor, in social polities," says Sorel, the philosopher of Syndicalism, "is the poltroonery ol Governmcnto," and no doub; the polity and their advisers reckoned upon tiiie factor.

Jitotipe,

We have it on the authority of Mr Arthur Rosser, the organiser of the Police Association, that "the Commissioner, Mr Cullen, declares straight out that he has information that tno whole movement has been engineered by tho Federation of Labour." Be that as it may, there can be little doubt that those words express the general impression of the public, an impression produced by a recollection of the resentment shown by the ring-leaders of the Waihi strike because of the nart played, by the police in the suppression of the strike, and the frequent reminders of the attitude of Sydicaliete and Socialists generally' towards our system of military training—an attitude easily accounted for by their determination to make themselves safe from the police and the military in future strikes. Our latest information on tho subject is a. message from Wellington' to the effect that the members of the association have appealed direct to all members of tho House of Representatives for aid— & fact wiiich in itself goes far to justify tho action of the Minister, showing, as it does,, that the control of the police is to be brought into the sphere of party politics. Tho result will probably bo that the Jacobins of the so-called Liberal party— those who, being afraid to declare themselves straight-out Socialists or Syndicalists, are yet willing to make common cause with them when they think thoy can thereby gain a party advantago by harassing the Government, even at tho risk of impairing that, discipline and that loyalty which constitute tho very life either of an army or of a police force—will do their beet to make capital of the incident. It is not difficult to imagine tho kind of stuff that may be expected by way of argument from such people, aJid hero is-a gem picked from tho Labour column of an Opposition newspaper:—"The Minister of Justice seems determined to deny the Police Force the right to form an association. . . . Why is this Possibly it is a plunk of the 'square-deal' policy which wo have heard so much about. . . . Why should one section of the public service bo denied the privileges which ftro .extended to others? . . . There is no doubt the men have grievances, l and there is no valid reason why they should have different treatment ineted out to them than other branches of the civil service who Slave associations. Tho force would be no less capable or trustworthy if its members became joined in association."

I had got thus far with the writing of this letter when I read a. summary of the discussion in Parliament 0:1 the subject, and I was very much struck with the similarity between the claptrap uttered by a now Radical member (who seems to have assumed the role of leading critic) and the passage above quoted. This very voluble member 6eems to have an affinity for those extreme opinions which confer upon those who hold them the advantage of b'jinp; able to criticiso without having taken the trouble to acquire any knowledge of the subject under discussion. But the Minister tice scenes to have stated the whole case-in n sentence uttered in reply to a query thrown at him by his Jacobin critic:

" It is not in the interests of the com

raunity," said the Minister, "that the

police should be allowed to form an assu- » ciation such as that which was being formed."

A Voice: "Why not?"

" Because it is subversive of discipline, and because it is contrary to the regulations which from time immemorial have existed in all police forces throughout the

British dominions."

The action of the Government and the Minister's reply to his critics postulate a distinction between the police and other branches, of the public service. That there is a distinction there can bo no doubt; but what is the exactnature of it? If we use the term "functionaries" to include all persons in the public service and in receipt cither of salaries or of wages, \ve find that they may be divided into four classes:— First, those who are engaged in the defence of the country against external aggreesion (the military) and those who are employed in the maintenance of order within the country (the police); s-cond, the members of the civil service; third, members' of the public service, euch aa the men employed in the working of the railways, and fourth, men employed in undertakings such as the State coal mines and the (so-cilled) cooperative works.

Xow, the distinction between the men of the fourth class and those of the third, and between the third and the second, is obvious; 'but how are we to define the distinction between the second (the civil service) ar.d the- first (the police)? It is this—that the military ami the police are the agencies or instrumentalities through which the essential power of the Government is exorcised, and arc by the very nature of the service in which they are engaged necessarily subject to the absolute commands of the Government, whilst the members of the civil 6cn'ice and of llie public service arc simply so many persons employed to render ccrtaL'i nrrvievs to the dominion. This distinction lies vit the root of those regulations that were relied upon r by the Minister of Justice k dfordiug tlio' jiisfcilic-atioii of his action. Ultimately it is based upon the difference between those nin-rtions or attributes of the State that are essential and those that are, not. In spite of t.ho conflict of opinion os to tho proper sphere of t.ho State, theorists of all schools (with the exception of tho Anarchists) admit that dofence against external enemies by moans of the military ami tho maintenance of internal order by means of tho police are essential functions of the State. " Within that sphere," said Constant, " it is impossible for the State to have too much 'power"; it must bo absolute and, conseeiuently. passive obedience is the sole duty of the policeman just as of tho soldier. It i e the fatality of Socialism that,.while seeking to enlarge the sphere of the State, it is coustraired to minimise its power within that part of its sphere in whiolv absolute power is nocc-ssary. This is duo to tin fact that Socialism is essentially revolutionary, whilst the military and the police are tho obstacles in the way of Uio revolution. Hence the efforts made by Socialists and Syndicalists in France (and in England by Tom Mann) to tamper with the loyalty of the army; hence the clamour mado by the Syndicalists and their allies, the Socialists and tho Sockliat-Kadicals, about the employment of the police at Waihi, and the outcry against Lord Gladstone for allowing the use of troops to quell a rebellion in Johannesburg a few days ago, and hence, also, the attempt made by an emissary of the Federation of Labour to tamper with our Police Force. Wo havo reason to rejoice that _ we have as Minister of Justice a Liberal, instead of a Socialist-Radical who calls himself a Liberal! Such, thou, it seems to me, is tho rationale of the regulation invoked by the Minister. Tho mere existence of such a regulation would of course not be a sufficient answer; but the fact that some such rule has been found necessary " in all Police Forces throughout Hie British dominions" shows that' it is based on e.oine such underlying necessity as I have indicated. So much then as to the police But the question suggests itself, what is the position with regard to other employees of the nation, such, for example, as the railway servants? It seems to be taken for granted that they enjoy the same rights and privileges as men engaged in ordinary industry and commerce, including tho right not only to form themselves into trade unions, but even to strike whenever they think proper. Is it right or desirable that the railway employees, for example, should be so far identified with trade unionism that they should lie represented by a delegate at such a conference as that recently held in Wellington? I do not think it is, and.for this simple reason—that representation at such a conference seems to implv the right to strike, and the foot that the railway delegates found it necessary to withdraw from the conference shows that thev felt themselves to be in a false position, I venture to submit to you this proposition— that men in the permanent service nf the State should not he regarded a< havim? n right to strike. Very slight consideration of the subject is eufficient to show tho grounds for this. The services in which Burh men nre employed are a monopoly, and it is not right that, whan the com-

munity puts up with the inconvenience of .1 monopoly and deprives itself of the power to have recourse to privato enterprise, it should thereby find itself exposed to the rmk of having the national life suspended and the general interests of the community compromised and endungered by the action of men who enjoy privileges bucJi as n;e not enjoyed by mwi employed in industry, trade, or agriculture. A strike in the railway service, for example, produces nil tlio consequences of a general strike, as happsned to ourselves in 1390, to New South Wales a few months ago in the case of the railway men at Darling Harbour, and to Victoria at the time of the railway strike. We have reason to believe, or at nny rate to hope, that such a thine; as a general strike in industry, commerce, or agriculture is practically impossible, and it is simply monst-rohus that, by establishing a monopoly and granting certain privileges to those employed in that monopoly, the community ehould thereby place itself at the mercy of those employees. Is it not an absurd position that a monopoly established by the community in the sreneral interests should be capable of being converted, by the men who enjoy the privilege of being employed in it. into a menace to the wellbeing of that community as a whole? At the root of most political questions that arise now-a-days' lice the baleful superstitution of " natural rights," and the "right" to strike is commonly regarded us one of them, and, therefore, as sacrosanct.

"Ain't I dead yet Pat?" whispered Mike.

"Sure, Mike,"'said Pat, "you'd bo dead Ion? ago if you only had the sense to stiffen out."

This euneretition is not likely to " stiffen out" as long as there are so manv demagogues • about who trade upon " natural rights." and never think of questioning nnv of them, except, perhaps, the right to drink whisky.—Your* tmlv. J. MacGiiegoh. Duncdin, July 21, 1913.