WHO WAS TO BLAME?

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 510, 13 November 1928, Page 8

WHO WAS TO BLAME?

MR. A. HARRIS ON SAMOA LABOUR LEADER CRITICISED A mixed crowd at Devonport last evening hotly challenged the opinions of Mr. A. Harris. Independent Reformer in Waltemata. on the question of Samoan administration, particularly when Mr. Harris blamed Mr. H. E. Holland. Labour Leader, for much of the trouble. Mr. Holland had been almost solely responsible for the trouble In Samoa. Mr. Harris said, and for what he thought was a political advantage to his party had very nearly precipitated civil war and bloodshed. Cries: uive us proof. If you have the evidence produce it!) Thousands of copies of Mr. Holland’s pamphlet with a Samoan translation had been sent by the Tofua in February. Mr. Harris went on. Interjectors: Who said so? Have you got the postal receipt? How could New Zealand hand over the Government to Mr. Holland- and his party in the fact of the fact that every right-thinking person in New Zealand had condemned their attitude on Samoa? General Richardson had been overwhelmingly vindicated on his policy. Insistent demands that Mr. Harris should substantiate his assertion that Messrs. Nelson, Gurr and Smythe had been tried by the High Court of Samoa were met by the statement that what he had said was they had a legal trial with the Chief Justice for Samoa present. At the invitation of the chairman, an interjector was allowed on the platform to read the notes of the appeal to the Privy Council by Mr. Nelson to show that the Chief Justice was not present. Nor was there a semblance of a fair trial, the interjector said. The meeting carried, amid protests, a resolution expressing the hope that Mr. Harris, would be returned with an “overwhelming majority.”