AN INTERESTING DISCLOSURE

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19816, 6 December 1919, Page 8

AN INTERESTING DISCLOSURE

HOW CONSERVATISM! RUNS "REFORM." SIR WALTER BUCHANAN EMERGES! The following interesting article appeared in a recent issue of the Auckland " Star." We' hope that our read-, era will give it careful attention as it throws an instructive light upon the very intimate relations always suspected, but persistently repudiated or denied, that exist between tho "Reform " party and our Conservative landed aristocracy, of whom Sir Walter Buchanan is a leading member:— THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE. It is to bo hoped that the electors everywhere, not'only in this constituency, but throughout the Dominion, wilt pay careful intention to the facts which Mr Mathasott (Independent Reform candidate for the Masterton seat) made public last Friday night. Addressing a political meeting at Masterton, Mr Matheson explained at length how his attempt to stand for Parliament there nad brought him into j conflict with the Masseyito "Power behind the Throne," and he proceeded to disclose tho precise position in I which the "Reform" party stands in regard to Sir Walter Buchanan. This gentleman evidently exorcises practically sovereign authority over the party, so far as the selection of its candidates is concerned, _ and when for any given reason a politician wishing to staud for Parliament in the " Reform" interest fails to come up to Sir W : alter Buchanan's test of fitness or cannot " pass muster " under his eagle eye, that candidate must either withdraw or go to the poll with the full knowledge that the party vote and the party organisation will be used to support some more acceptable mouthpiece of Conservatism. In this easG,JMr Matheson had announced his candidature some considerable timo before the sitting member, Mr Sykes, came into the field; and he refused to accept Sir Walter Buchanan's request—perhaps wo should say "command" —to stand aside because, as he told, his audience, ho objects to dictation of that Bort and also because he considers that there is far too much of the caucus and the " machine " about " lloform " politics, and on bis own confession he wants something " cleaner and more democratic" If Mr Matheson is out for clean and democratic methods of government, we fail to see why he does not support Liberalism, which can supply him with both these requisites. But that, after all, is between Mr Matheson and his own conscience, and what wo are chiefly interested in just now is the part that Sir Walter Buchanan ia evidently filling, not on tho political stago, but behind tho scenes l , tor tho benefit of tho Masseyites. Perhaps we had better remark here and now, that nothing wo have to say is intended to reflect invidiously on the character or conduct of Sir Walter Buchanan. He is no • doubt quit© an .estimable person, tut his public record hardly suggests that he would be adopted by tho people of New Zealand, with their' full knowledge and consent, as tho controller of tiieir destinies. Sir Walter Buchanan is known by repute to most people in this coMntry as a man of wealth, a Dig land-holder, and one of the strongest' financial supporters of that Wellington "Reform" organ which has rendered itself notorious for years past by its frantic abuse of tho Liberal party and its leader, and to those who take any interest in our political history he»is familiar as one of the most resolute and obstinate opponents of Liberalism and all its works, one of tho few survivors of that clique of bigoted and reactionary Conservatives who so strenuously resisted the democratic policy of Ballance and Seddon and Ward a quarter of a centuary ago. To Sir Walter Buchanan and the men who shared his political creed in those days, Old Age Pensions, Land for Settlement. Democratic Suffrage, Democratic Administration, anything and everything that Liberalism into our national and political Ufa were alike revolutionary, outrageous and -detestable. What Sir himself thought and said about these matters is recorded at .length in "Hansard;" and all that wo need say about this side of the question now is that a man of Sir Walter's age and temperament and political antecedents is tolerably certain to be not less but moro Conservative and reactionary today than he showed himself to be a) generation ago. Now, this is the man to whom Mr Massey and his friends hare delegated the task of selecting their candidates; and what we wish particularly to stress for the banefit of our readers ia this, that if Mr Massey and his party win the' victory in this present contest, it is to Sir Walter Buchanan and tlie small but influential group of Conservative landowners who look up to him as their guide and leader that the fate and future of New Zealand are to be entrusted. For it is manifest that if Sir Walter Buchanan is allowed to decide what candidate shall or shall not stand for "Reform" 1 in a*given constituency, he is literally dictating and prescribing tho policy which tho Masseyites are prepared ' to support. For we should not imagine that Sir Walter would select a "Reform" candidate who did not profess tho " Reform" creed, and w© would not accuse Mr Massey of keeping ono typo of " Reform V for tho Wairarapa and another for the rest of the Dominion. Thus the triumph of Masseyism will mean the 'subordination of all' our political and economic :ind industrial and social and national requirements and aspirations to tho prejudices of a highly Conservative old gentleman,! whom the electors have refused to send to Parliament, and whose only claim to bo accepted as the supremo arbiter of our destinies is that ho is regarded by- his own friends as " the ■ political Godfather of Reform in the Wairarnpa." Wo do not think that these facts require much elaboration; m fact, they seem to us almost to defy comment. But we must draw one obvious moral, by pointing to the marvellous discrepancy between the picture of " Reform " policy thus revealed I to our gane and tho claims and assertions of the " Reformers." Nothing seems to exasperate Mr Massey or the average Masseyito more effectually than tho suggestion that ho and his party nro dominated and controlled by tho " Squatocraoy," the great landholding interests that Mr Massey has so long and loyally protected. Yet hero is proof positivo on tho authority of a, well-known member of the "Reform " party that " Reform " policy is, as we have said, dictated by the "'[lncrowned King" of our Conservative landed aristocracy. And this is the "democracy" that "•Reform" in n recent picturesque but pathetic advertisement implores the electors to love and cherish! The people of New Zealand will givo their answer at the polls