The Taranaki Herald. [PUBLISHED DAILY.]

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 9399, 28 March 1898, Page 2

The Taranaki Herald. [PUBLISHED DAILY.]

MONDAY, MARCH 28, 1898.

THE WEST AUSTRALIAN MINERS' RIOTS,

Never since the days of the lßalla,vat riots in the early fifties, when the diggers built a stoc'iade on the Eureka lead, has there been such an outbreak of popular indignation as that which led to Sir John Forrest being mobbed and assaulted at Kalgoorlie last week. The Ballarat riots were caused by the harsh mining regulations aud high license fee then in force. Deputations vainly tried to persuade the then Government and Sir Charles Hotham, who at that time nas in the vice-regal chair in Victoria, to modify the regulations and reduce the license fee, which latter then stood at £1 per month. The diggers naturally did their best to evade payment of such an extortionate fee, and were hunted by mounted troopers if they happened to be without their licenses, and, if captured, chained up to a log at the Camp until brought before the Commissioner and dealt with next day. Naturally, British blood could not stand this sort of treatment, with the result that the diggers built a stockade and defied the officials. Sir Charles Hotham thereupon declared martial law in force at Ballarat, and a large military force despatched to capture the stockade aud its occupants. The record of that Sunday morning's slaughter is one of the blackest pages in Australian history, but it is one which led to the better recognition of tho rights of gold-miners and to more euliglltened mining regulations. But it would seem aa though the Government of Westralia had never heard of tho event, or were determined to repeat the mistakes of the Hotham officials, asthoy havo lately issued a now mining regulation, which if carried out would drive nearly every alluvial miner out of Western Australia. The Forrest Government is composed of men whose entire sympathies are with the moneyed mining speculators, in whose interests the mining regulations of that colony have been framed. Large areas are loasod to big companies for quartz mining, and " exemptions" for long periods allowed the holders, who are free either to work their leases or " shepherd " them. This means the throwing out of work of large numbers of men, as a majority of these mining leases are now enjoying their exemption privileges. The men thus thrown out of work naturally looked about them for something to do that would keep them in food at least, with the result that they struck alluvial gold on one of these quartz mining leaseholds. • The owners of the later at once besought the protection of the Government, which could not, under the then existing mining regulations, debar the men from alluvial digging on such areas. Sir John Forrest thereupon issued anew and drastic regulation for tho discoiirageiner));, if ijot entire suspension, of that method of gold mining, which was to the effect that no one would be allowed to sink more than ten feet below the surface in search of alluvial auriferous deposits. Four men were arrested, and lodged in gaol for disobeying this absurd regu'ation, and it was the Western Australian Premier's stubborn refusal to release these men which led to his rough handling at the hands of the KalgQQi'lje miners, who feel naturally angry at the enforcement of a regulation which, if carried out, means their ruin, as most of them have not funds to take them to a more enlightened field of labour, The men did wrong to try and take the law into their own hands, but they had been goaded into frenzy by the stupid " fat man " policy of Sir John Forrest and his colleagues, who are playing into the hands of the wealthy mining speculators, and doing their best to drive the individual miner out of the colony, wl]6)iQ mqsfc of the aliuviaj deposits of gold are' found at a greater depth than ten feet, beyond which the Forrest regulation says alluvial miners must not go in their search fqr go(d. more absurd and mischievous mandate was never issued, even in the earliest days of Australian gold-mining, when most of fhe officials were ignorant of the whole subject, q,nd rode rough shod over the patient diggers urjtil ijhe latter woke up and asserted their rights. Tljaji the "Western Australian gold-miners will do &o by legal means we hive little doubt, especially after Sir John Forrest's admission to the members of the Kalgooi'He deputation that (hey had made out a mudi better case than lie thought was possible. Had he had .Premier Seddon's knowledge of gold-mining and its regulation Sir John Forrest would never have issued such an absurd and mischievous ukase as that restricting the depth of alluvial sinking to ten feet in a country where free gojd has already been proved to exist at depths varying from 1 to 200 feet.