DIRT!

Sun (Christchurch), Volume VI, Issue 1735, 5 September 1919, Page 6

DIRT!

We don’t propose is waste many words over the “Maoriland Worker” scandal. Like the P-rime Minister, we prefer to leave such an abomination as that to the burning condemnation of every decent citizen. In itself the clipping hard'ly matters. It is so gross, brazen, and false—so obviously the effujsion of a coarse and stupid iltind—that it couldn’t possibly ii'jure anyone. But it appeared in the official orgarj of the New Zealand Labour Party, w$ must assume with editorial approved. Until it became the sublet of Parliamentary comment, ft was accepted apparently by the readers of the journal. And,"when it '. as finally repsdlated by Mr H. IS. Holland, M.P., the language used by that precious gentleman was almost as objectionable as the original offence. He did not approve of it; publicly and officially he condemned it on behalf of the pai>y; bv>—Labour’s political opponents should not have set them the evil example. That was all he had to say of a cbnrge that was wot only a lie, but a particularly dirty and offensive lie. That was the most generous amende he could offer on behalf of one man who was dead, two who had been gravely wounded, a fourth who was invalided for life, a fifth who added lustre to one of New Zealand’s mo:*' famous names, a sixth who had proved a most gallant representative of the most valiant native race jn history. That is all Mb Holland has ttf say, and we prefer to leave him with the indignant public. . “The workers,” said the original mudslinger “are going y to put ‘paid’ to one or two little accounts in the near future.” We don’t exactly envy Mr IJollaKd little interference with the political accounting.