THE LORDS.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXXV, Issue 13057, 27 April 1910, Page 3

THE LORDS.

MR. LLOYD GEORGE AT NEWCASTLE. Amongst the great speeches made by the Right Hon Lloyd George ■ during the recent election campaign one of the 1 most powerful and striking' was that delivered at Newcastle, where he had not -spoken for six years before The following extracts from it- will show that it was a speech which will live; “As long as the constitution gave rank and possession and power it was not to be interfered with; as long as it secured even their sports from intrusion, and made interference with them a crime; as long as the constitution enforced royalties, and ground rents, and fees, and premiums,’ and fines and all the black retinue of exaction; as long as it showered writs, and summonses, and injunctions, and distresses and warrant to enforce them, then' the constitution was inviolate—it was sacred; it was something that was put in the same category as religion that no man ought to touch, and something that the chivalry of the nation ought to range in defence thereof.

‘But tlio moment the'constitution looks round, the moment the constitution begins to discover that there are millions of people outside the park gates who need attention—(hear, hear) —then the cousti--tution is to be torn to pieces. . Let them realise what they are doing. (Cheers). They are forcing a revolution. (Hear hear, and a voice ‘And they will get it!’) But the Lords may decre a revolution which the people will direct. (Cheers). Zf "V 1 ’ lssues will bo raised that they httlo dream of. (Cheers). Questions will be asked which are now whispered in a humble voices, and answers will be demanded then with authority. The question will be asked whether ave hundred men, ordinary men—(laughter)—chosen accidentally from the unemployed—(laughter)—should override the judgment—of millions of people who are engaged in the indstry which makes the t,le eon «try.” (Hear, hear). that is one question; another will be Vi ho ordained that a few should' have the land oi Britain ns a perquisite. who ma:.o ten thousand people owners of the soil and the rest of ns trepassers in the land of onr birth? (Cheers.) Who is it who is responsible for the scheme of things whereby one man is engaged through life grinding labour to win" a bare and precarious subsistence for himself, and when, at the end of his days, he claims at the hands of the community ho served, a poor pension of eightpence a day, he can only get it through a revolution, and another man, who does not toil, receives every- hour of the day. every - hour of the night whilst he slumbers, more than his poor neighbour receives in a whole year of toil? (Shame). that .table of the law come from? Whose finger inscribed it? These are the questions that-will., be asked. The answers are charged with peril,for the order of things the peers represent, hut they are fraught with rare and refreshing fruit for tiic parched lips of the multitude who have been treading the dusty road along which the people have marched through the dark ages which arc now emerging into the light.”