BISHOP CLEARY’S CROSS-EXAMINATION

New Zealand Tablet, 13 August 1914, Page 34

BISHOP CLEARY’S CROSS-EXAMINATION

Last week it was announced in the House of Representatives that the leaders of the Bible in State Schools League had requested that, owing to the present disturbed condition of things, the Referendum Bill should be withdrawn, and of course the request was agreed to. The League's action is what is described in military parlance as a strategical movement to the rear; and although by this means the Bible-in-schools party has escaped the ignominy of an open defeat, the public is fully cognisant of the fact that the League has abandoned the field because it realises that it has been beaten. The truth is that the proposal put forward was flagrantly unjust, and the forces against it have proved too strong. Undoubtedly one of the main factors in bringing about the League debacle was the fine stand made before the Education Committee by Bishop Cleary. Both in giving his evidence in chief, and still more markedly so when under cross-examination by Canon Garland, Bishop Cleary, although much overworked and in very indifferent health, rose to the level of his very best fighting formand by this time the public of the Dominion know what that means. Wo have been favored with a perusal of the official notes of the cross-examinationwhich we propose to publish at the earliest possible date—-and when this matter appears we can promise our readers some exceptionally interesting and entertaining reading. In the contest of wits Canon Garland was utterly and hopelessly outclassed. His carefully prepared ‘ trap ’ questions failed utterly of their purpose, and only furnished Bishop Cleary with the opportunity to score again and again off the v League organiser. Ever and anon his Lordship carried the war into the enemy’s country; and as the cross-examination proceeded it became more and more apparent that it was the cross-examiner and not the witness who was.really under fire. Perhaps the most impressive feature of the sitting was Bishop Cleary’s scathing refutation and exposure of a particularly unjustifiable and unscrupulous League attack on his Lordship which had appeared in one of the Wellington papers over the signature of the Rev. R. Wood; and this phase of his Lordship’s evidence created what’ can only be described as a.mild sensation amongst the members of the Committee. The net result of his Lordship’s effort was that Canon Garland came out of the,encounter hopelessly worsted ~ and . discredited: and, amongst members of Parliament at least, the name of the. League organiser is now. very -far from ..being a name to , conjure with. . .'Catholics in particular, and the country in general, have reason to be deoplv grateful to Bishop Cleary for his masterful and manful stand in the cause of truth, .justice, and right.’, ......