The Rangitikei Advocate. TWO EDITIONS DAILY. TUESDAY, JULY 2, 1918.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XLII, Issue 11580, 2 July 1918, Page 4

The Rangitikei Advocate. TWO EDITIONS DAILY. TUESDAY, JULY 2, 1918.

THOSE who imagined that Mr Hughes, the Prime Minister of the Commonwealth, ’'would adopt an apologetic tone on arrival in London, have been disappointed. The last time he was in England 'he electrified the British people with bis fervid ratory. He spoke as one who represented a Dominion whfch was going to take its full share in the strafing of the Hun, and he very likely did believe that no barriers existed to its doing so. It must, therefore, have been a blow to his national pride and filled him with humiliation and chagrin to find that, by the rejection of conscription the country definitely refused to act the great part he had promisedit would, and only intended to take a minor share in the war. . Por (that result, how’ever, he was as much to blame as anj'oue else. He lacked the moral courage to take the necessary course to make his promise good. He and his Cabinetyfeared to introduce conscription. Their ears were too open •to the clamant disloyalty of certain section of the population and weakly threw on the people the responsibility [of saying whether •they were willing to fight or not. It will be to the everlasting credit of the couutryjdiat it contained so many whose patriotism and clear realisation of the existing danger to liberty and democracy impelled them to vote for conscription when they were asked to express their opinion in the Referendum. That section was not so weak in the country as one might have expected. The “Noes” were not overwhelmingly numerous. And the ‘‘.Ayes” were given by such a large portion of the populartion as most have indicated to Mr Hughes and his Cabinet that in launching s referendum they had made a disas trous mistake—that although the slacker and noisy element was in the majority, the minority, composed as it no doubt was, of the more serious and actively patriotic, would have had sufficient influence to have made a direct establishment of conscription by Act of Parliament quite a safe proceeding, and Australia would now have had as many men at the front as it should have in proportion to its population.

S It needs no exceptional sagacity * to see that if Britain, New Zealand, Canada and the United States had submitted the question of a proper participation in the war to referendum we should all have teen beaten and the Empire dissolved. It is unquestionable that wherever con. t scription has been established by , statute the country has been saved from eternal disgrace. Fcr ws are convinced that if New Zealand had been asked the same question as Australia and in the same way the answer would have been very similar. of course, we know that the country as a whole was patriotic in ■ voice and sentiment. But in great and fateful questions like these the people need someone else to decide for them. We are also-aware the referendum on vital matters of policy is regarded by a large number of people as the logical aim of democratic government. But this is one of the political evolutions in which the logical merges into the ridiculous. The JS lnitiative and Referendum” is a phrase before which some people bow down and worship. The conception is based on the notion £hat all wisdom resides in the mass. But it is a fallacy. 7c is actually an attribute of the small minority. The old democracies have demonstrated this over and over again, and democracies will continue to demonstrate that a mere count of noses does not necessarily imply weight of brain. For one thing, I therefore, we have to thank the ! Massey Government more than any [ other—that is tm c it did not give ! us the opportunity to disgrace our- j selves in the manner of Australia. j Still, whether when Mr Hughes j talk c of Australia in the war lie 1 f does it a little shamefacedly or not, j ! there can be no doubt that, awav I " i from his own country bis eloquence, j like Mr Lloyd George's, has a driv-*! ing and sustaining power in crises like this through which we are pas- 1 sing. Plenty of people see matters and issues as clearl}” as they do, but are not able to give them that clarity and force of expression ihst men we have mec timed are able to j

do. Before the war, when events were at a dead level of mediocrity th ere was no scope for oratory. But in these days of torn hearts, widespread tragedj' and other conditions which weigh down the spirits and tend to despair it is recognised as almost a gift divine for sustaining the national morale. A mere busi-

ness recount of events and of probabilities, as with some speakers, leaves the people cold and uucomforted. But the oratory of Mr Lloyd Geoge and Mr Hughes lift

matters to a higher plane and paint them in moie roseate colours. One of the things which elude all attempts at calculation is the moral to.the nation of speeches like those which Mr LIO3M George now and tfen delivers. And Mr Hughes in England will tend to make up to some extent the lack of Australians in the trendies. Away from the

carping, harassing and vituperation which tend to cloud his inspiration he will, by his speeches help to sustain the spirits of the British people through the derk and bloody period which they must pass to victory.