IN DANGER

Waipukurau Press, Volume XXIX, Issue 89, 10 April 1934, Page 6

IN DANGER

Democracy May Be Killed IN MIDST OF PLENTY CONFUSION OF THOUGHT So God created man in His own image. ’ ’ Thas passage in the first chapter has puzzled me for years. Created man! What man’ Where is the G'od-like man? How shall we know him and distinguish him from all others? In one of O’Neill's plays, “The Great God Brown,” the author puts all his leading characters on wearing! masks. At' school we meet Billy Brown Billy is a loveable, likeable, jolly chap of the ordinary fool-boy age. Go to our colleges and we can meet Billy in almost every corridor. Billy may be boy or girl. Whoever invented the cap and gown knew their boy and knew the; effect of a mask, and so a law was written that those attending lectures shall appear in gowns.. But having provided a mask for the boys and girls it naturally followed that a distinguishing mask had to be provided for those placed in authority. For the Chairman of the Board of Governors there is a black silk gown with maroon velvet facings. For the Rector the same, but with a velvet collar and old gold facings .For the boys and girls black stiff gowns similar to that worn by Oxford scholars and trencher cap with tassel and, although the regulation does not state it, poker faces when rigged out.

Billy Brown comes forth with a handshake and a roll of paper and becomes William A. Brown. M.A. At this stage William A. drops his mask. He. like another of O’Neill’s characters is so sure. “I’m de end' I’m de start! I’m steam and oil! I’m de ting in noise dat makes yuh hear it.” He’s it! But later he dons the mask again, becomes W. A. Brown. Esq., M.A., 0.8. E., D.G.8., and so on. Macbeth was no murderer really, but he had donned a mask, and so soon as those who saw his mask realised the man behind, he was pushed into doing murder. And, says Lady Macbeth. “He’s too full o’ the milk of human kindness.’’ The Municipal Conference Recently I attended the Municipal Conference at Wellington. It would be well for those who rail at the national Parliament of this country to peep in at the annual municipal parliament. In general it is at least ten years behind the national Parliament! That is, in thought. There you meet a certain mayor. Fine, hearty man, broad of shoulder and heavy walking stick. “De ting in noise dat makes yuh hear it!” He rises to speak. He roars and you hold your breath. “Sir, members of hospital boards should be appointed by local bodies, not elected as now,” he says, and you shrivel up because you are one of those classified under the heading, “democracy.” And so one listens and learns of the difficulties of that which we term democracy. How far is it from the North Cape to the Bluff? And I take a rule and a map and I say a thousand miles. But is it? Go to a municipal conference and you will find that it is a million miles, in thought! What is distance? Is it time, or length, or thought? How far is Sydney away from New Zealand? To Smithy it is the distance between breakfast and tea. To you and me, dear brother, it is three days and a bit; in comfort if we are holding or a delegate, in semi-comfort if we have to pay our own fare, but a million miles away to the relief worker. Someone has said that the municipal conference is part of the furniture of New Zealand. It has been with us as long as we can remember. But those who went to the conference must have come away with a greater respect for the national Parliament than they had previously. Differemt Mental Pictures There are difficulties in writing laws that will be acceptable to a million and a half people whose mental pictures are so different. Mr Pu Yi be-

comes a king. He becomes the celestial representative. Henry Pu Yi becomes King Kang Teh. All his subjects can visualise King Kang Teh. If he came to New Zealand we should fire guns, let off fireworks and fly flags. But if Henry Pu Yi comes we want ;one hundred pjounds bail to 1 ensure that he will leave again.

The pictures in our heads tell us what me must do to the head of a dynasty, but poor old “Democracy,” what does it mean? Can anyone conjure up a picture of democracy? So

we fire no guns, wave no flags and burn no fireworks for democracy. And it is in danger. Macbeth did not want to kill a king, but he did it. The Municipal Conference did not want to 'kifll democracy, and yetthere were those there who had little time for it. It may be said that progress started with a crime in a garden. A garden where every comfort should be had. It may be that democracy will be butchered in a garden of plenty. Those who believe in the Hitlers are Hitlers.

A Garden of Eden Hero in New Zealand we have a garden of Eden. “And God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind’.’’ “And God & said, ‘Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life and fowl that may fly above the earth. “And God said, ‘Let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over fowl of the air and over the cattle and over all the earth'.” And here on the Canterbury Plains the needs of all our people could be supplied. The Canterbury Plains, mark you, would provide all those things from the earth required for a million and a half people, and the waters from the Canterbury Plains to the Chathams, all that is required from the sea.

But the Tower of Babel wasn’t built because of the confusion of tongues. So it is with us, except that it is a confusion of thought.—E. J. Howard, M.P., in the Christchurch Star.