Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, 26 May 1921, Page 14

Current Topics

America and England • , As an example of how the Americans appreciate the British war on women and children the following fierce denunciation, signed by thirty-one members of the .legislature of Massachusetts State, is worth quoting: , “To Lloyd George; ' “We, elected representatives of the State of Massachusetts, sharing in the universal horror with which the civilised peoples of the world have witnessed your latest barbarities in Ireland, denounce you and' the Government of which you are the head. “The burning at the stake of Joan of Arc by English generals; the butchery of Irish babes, born and unborn, by your late countryman, Oliver Cromwell; the hiring of Hessian soldiers in 1776 to shoot down our patriots and the bribing of painted Indian savages to massacre the women and children of your own flesh and blood in this country; the Boston massacre; the building of privateers in English shipyards to sink American merchant vessels in our war against slavery, may be considered by your-fiobility as notable achievements. “We brand your sack of Cork as a typical British atrocity, in keeping with the infamies we have related above, and we praise, bless, and thank God that, by a majority of six million votes, we have as American citizens made any alliance with your bloody Government an eternal impossibility,” America , publishing the foregoing, says that several other legislatures have pronounced scathing condemnations of British Frightfulness, This is merely one instance of the manner in which every murder done in Ireland by Greenwood’s “Black-and-Tans” reacts in America. . England is not fighting only four million Irish men, women, and children to-day.

Proportional Representation As a reminder to our people that one of the many grievances they have against the Massey-P.P.Ass. Government is the lack of representation it allows, in order to make its return to power against the will of the people secure, we quote the following from a Scottish exchange: u On April 8 the House of Commons will be asked to consider a Proportional Representation Bill. We shall see what will happen. Theoretically majority rule is supposed to obtain in Great Britain, but there are many members sitting in the House of Commons who received only the votes of a minority of the electors voting at the elections in which such members were returned. Penistone is the latest case in point. While rejoicing t in a Labor victory, we must deplore an electoral system which gives any seat to any candidate of any party polling a minority of the votes recorded. s “Such an anomaly may go to great lengths. Mr. Humphreys quotes some examples : New Zealand. House of Representatives, Election 1919. No. of Votes Votes Seats per Party polled. obtained, seat. Government ... 194,833 ... 44 ... 4 428 Opposition ... 323,491 ... ' 32 ... 10,109 Queensland adopts the alternative vote system. It too may give a minority the power which majorities alone should ' possess. As witness- . ■ ’ „ ■ - Queensland. ' ; Legislative Assembly, Election 1920. No. of ■ , Votes ' Votes Seats per Party polled. obtained. seat. . Government ... 170,816 ... 38 ... 4,495 J Opposition ... 191,139 ... 34 5,622 ' New South Wales has adopted Proportional Representation. See the result: ' ,

New South Wales., ! . House of Assembly, Election'l92o. , / * . * *” V '* . ■ ' XT- -£ , • £?.*. nu. VL ■ ' i. V‘ ' . , Votes Votes ', r Seats per Party polled. ' r obtained. seat. Official Lab. ... 241,438 ; ... ... 42 ' ... 5,748 Nationalist ... 164,176 ’ ... 28 ... 5,863 Progressive .... 82,185 ... 15 ... 5,479 The present system lingering on in Groat Britain is obsolete, cumbrous, and untrue betimes in its reflection of the popular, will,”

Sinn Fein’s Victory. . It is really distressing to consider what a habit facts have of giving, the lie to our day-lies. It is only a short time ago since our editors were gloating over the fablegrams that announced that Sinn Fein had split and that the Irish people were tired of ; it. They even gave us a ludicrous account of a “Black-and-Tan” poster which they said was an attack on Sinn Fein extremists by Sinn Fein moderates; and they did not pause to reflect on amusement it would cause those among us who recognised .the similarity of that poor poster to the propaganda lies of Mr. Greenwood, who displayed in Canada the sort of traits that enabled the Lloyd George Government to pick him out for the dirtiest job that a human being was ever offered by any Government. There was no split, as there are no extremists and moderates. Once again the Irish people have proved that they are with Sinn Fein, and once again the day-lie people have received a lesson that will only be lost on them. One of them told us that Sinn Fein won every seat in the South (which means South, East, West, and a great part of the North besides) with the exception of the seats in Dublin University. Now that was a slight mistake. Trinity used to be called Dublin University, but the real university of Dublin is that in which Eoin MacNeill and many other Sinn Feiners hold chairs when they are not in gaol for loving a small, nation. It has again been proved to the world that a vast majority of the Irish people are determined to have that right for which boys from Dublin and from Dunedin died — the right of being governed by the elected representatives of the people and not by “Black-and-Tans.” In a few days we shall have the results for that small corner of the North which people stupidly call Ulster, and it will be seen that in spite of the cutting and chopping in the interest of the Orangemen, there will be many Sinn Feiners elected by the numerous people in Ulster who love their native land and. who have enough intelligence to refuse to be made the tools of bigots and profiteers and day-liars. Another comment suggests itself here. We were told- our * dear daylies again—that (as the Otago Daily Times impresario put it in his own elegant way) de Valera had “the wind up” and was seeking peace on terms that even the pro-German Orangeman, Craig, might accept. The answer to that sort of nonsense was, as usual, supplied by another cable which gave us de Valera’s calm and firm assertion of the only basis of negotiation, viz., recognition of the right of the Irish people to choose without any outside dictation, or interference their own government. The very fact that our editors are capable of publishing, such nonsensical twaddle proves their utter incapacity to understand the first thing about the Irish position. It would seem that a total lack of the sense of humor is an essential quality for a day-lie editor in New Zealand. Of course we are aware that in one office it ,is also necessary that the editor, shall not be a Catholic, nor married to one. Catholics have principles and principles are inconvenient, things for slaves. . ;

Mr. Parr Retires from the Ring It was proposed 'in the Report of the Minister of Education to introduce a further scheme for the Prussianisation of. the public by giving over, body and soul, to the tender mercies of the State, certain children; and an attack on Homes and Orphanages was clearly contemplated. It was fortunate for us that Anglicans,

; Presbyterians, and the. Salvation Army were as much concerned as Catholics, and for once we were able to riii v back and leo me ■ non-Catholics fight the Servile State of New Zealand. The letters written to the press by Canon Nevill,, Rev, Bryan King, and many other gentlemen had their effect. They aroused public opinion and the politician behind the movement} being a politician, beat a hasty retreat and even expressed mild surprise that we should have understood him to say what he did say on the subject. The Minister’s advising angel has also been compelled to explain his position even though his explanation is by no means satisfactory • He ‘makes many assumptions which warrant us in still thinking that the defeated scheme had its origin in the brain of an unpractical, dreamer—one of the most dangerous kinds of advisers for any Minister in any country. The following letter, which appeared in the Otago Daily Times, Saturday, : May 21, reviews Mr. Beck’s defence and effectively disposes of his arguments, which can be so readily gathered from Canon Nevill’s criticism of them that it is unnecessary to set them out in detail: ' ' THE STATE AND THE CHILD. . TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —I do not wish to trespass over-much on the patience of your readers, but Mr. Beck’s memorandum deserves an answer because of" its tone of studied moderation. The first point is that Mr. Beck merely reiterates Mr. Parr’s facile excuse that the department did not mean all it said, which we can very easily believe. The second is really not a point at all. Although Mr. Beck tacitly assumes that the New Zealand orphanages are not up-to-date, the opposite is the fact. All the Church orphanages of to-day are directing their energies to segregating the children in separate homes instead of detaining them in institutions. This is not, as Mr. Beck hints, a novelty to our orphanages at all. The Churches are far more alive than the State to the fact that home life is .what is wanted for children who are deserted or illegitimate. Where, however, the churches differ diametrically from the State is in the assumption which Mr. Beck makes that the State is able, by appointing foster, parents, to create a home at all. What the Churches hold is. simply this, that the Christian spirit alone is able to make a home for children. We all of us know all about Dr. Barnardo, and speaking personally, I have been through many of the Ilford Homes and can testify to the excellence of the foster fathers and mothers, but what Mr. Beck quite omits to mention is that Dr. Barnardo’s work was work done in and for Christ, and not with any ideals of State control before him: at all. It is true that he aimed to make his orphans good citizens, but he argued, and the Churches argue in the same way, that if you are to make a man a good citizen you must make him a good Christian first; and this spirit is noticeable in all the Barnardo children to-day. Let me say, as I said before, that the State cannot buy love and affection for 30s a week; and the Churches have proved their love by the fact that, as Mr. Beck acknowledges, their work has been given freely in many cases. The Roman Catholics, for instance, have given riot only money but the services of numberless devoted men and women, the devotion of whole Orders of priests and nuns to this work, and this work ,r alone. ' I wish-we all did as much. It is just because we insist that the State has neither the spirit nor the capacity to find true homes for children that we are joining issue with Mr. Beck. One of Dr. Barhardo ? s greatest troubles was, as I was told while in England, to find suitablethat is, really devoted— parents for his village homes. * Mr. Beck quotes American illustrations, but they are on parallel lines and so need no particular notice, but for the fact that Mr. Beck seems to assume that the Churches have never heard of cottage homes. Mr. Beck is quite correct in pointing out that orphanages are not filled with orphans only. What he will find will be that with the practical dissolution of sacred marriage as the churches' teach it, there will be a very disastrous increase in the number of children of divorced couples. In other words, family life, for which Mr. Beck has so great a regardand rightly

will become a thing of the past, , and the state child will become a terrible fact. , One cannot praise too highly Mr. Beck’s desire to keep the children out of the hands of the police. If he Bill consisted only of such praiseworthy ideals as this we should all praise it; but no amount of sophistry can conceal the fact that behind all this benevolence lay the attempt to get control of all orphanages whatever by the simple expedient of taking their children from their custody. We neither misinterpret Mr. Beck nor do we misunderstand him. I can point to one fact of which I am aware, and that is that before this question of orphanages arose at all, the department’s pronosal was known in the civil service in Dunedin, and m y informant thought of asking for a transfer to the Education Department as he had been told that that department was going to take charge of all the orphanages in New Zealand. He may have been misinformed, but the coincidence is exceedingly curious all the same —I am etc., * ' ’ E. R. Nevill.

The Cause Goes On Time is fighting for Ireland. The mills of God that have ground so slowly—ah, how slowly !—for so long are racing now. Their noise has aroused the attention of the British people. The Archbishop of Canterbury has heard them, and he stands up in his place in the House of Lords and calls for a moment’s silence in order that the Lords too may hear them Lord Cecil, Lord Denbigh, Lord Bentinck have heard them. Hie thinking men, the Christian men, the clean men and the women of England have heard them too, and they are afraid, afraid for England, afraid for humanity, afraid for their own children whom the nulls will crush before long if the grinding be not checked. Only they whom the gods have made mad in order to destroy them are deaf and heed not These people are awake to the jingling of the guinea; they hear the whisper that tells when Marconis are going to rise; they catch the murmured pass-word that lets them into the “Dope” swindle; but listening for such sounds has made them incapable of hearing warnings that do ( not immediately concern their own pockets Lloyd George does not hear. He has made money since the days when he could weep for the starved Boer women and denounce the British atrocities against a handful of farmers fighting for the country. He has made money, and even if it stinks, he finds music in its sound. Carson, too, has made money, and he recks not of his broken faith and of his treasonable plotting with the Kaiser. The three Canadian ruffians have also made their money, and, the cry of the wailing women and the dying children upon whom they have brought misery aipd hunger and sorrow does not reach them. The rabid parsons who live by preaching hatred of Rome to the weak-minded bigots who pay them for that' sort of infamy have lost all sense of hearing' in the thunder of the Orange drum. The journalists' who were brought home to England and inoculated carefully'neither hear nor see nor feel. They pursue their lonely way to the end'* and, as days go by, people who can hear and see are gradually drawing apart from them in horror. We have seen, time and again, how England has spoken out against the infamy for which those people stand. Even the London Times , even the Tory Lords, have denounced the crimes—there is no milder word of the gang of sharpers in Downing Street who have made the name of Great Britain a byword of reproach among the nations of the earth to-day. Hear once more how the other nations are - rallying to the cause of persecuted, suffering, heroic Ireland. L’Bumamte of Paris says:—“England evacuates Northern Persia and withdraws a part of her troops from Mesopotamia, where the Arab revolt was becoming more dangerous. : She is trying in India, in Egypt, by negotiations more or less false to appease ; the native agitation. But she attempts nothing to put an end to the growing civil war which is raging in ' Ireland,; or, at least, she continues to believe that by proceedings worthy of Cromwell, or the Duke of . Alba

or Rodetski, or Deplehve she will reduce Sinn Fein to silence. It is curious that English politicians .knowing Ireland , imagine that coercion will be efficacious and rely so foolishly on the brutality of martial law. Never did British repression show itself more violent in the Isle which is named N one knows not why, the ‘‘Sister Isle.” ; ■; Following this, comes L’Bcho of Nantes, which says; “The cause of Irish independence gains fresh ground every day in England. This cause has gained with us, and for a long time, as well with the Left as with the Right, as well with the non-religious, - areligieux, as with the Catholics. Neither the one nor the other can assist without emotion and, let us say it, without indignation, at the martyrdom of a people which has as much right to live as Esthonia and Georgia, the two States the independence of which the Allies have just recognised. That the entire world is sympathetic to Ireland no one doubts; the United States, amongst others, with Wilson, was so desirous of obtaining for Ireland her national liberties, that it required the threat of a quarrel la menace d’une hrouille with England to prevent the explicit insertion of the Act of Irish resurrection in the charter of Versailles, side by side with the Act : of Polish resurrecton.” In Italy, too, many of the better papers are outspoken in their advocacy of Erin. Such are, for instance, Arte e Vita, Vita e Pensiero, and Conquista Popolare, which lately observed: “We find ourselves ... we mean to say that our very good faith as citizens and as Catholics is played upon by the diabolical malice of a nation* whose mos(i certain and uninterrupted tradition is hypocrisy. The tyrant has her agents and her dupes spread everywhere —spread even here: some lend their services very probably for. cash ; others through servile .. and credulous toadyism. But not to bother about those who belong to the Liberals, to the Democrats, or to the Socialists, it remains for us still to ask how on earth Catholics and popolari, who surely should have far more ties with Ireland than Socialists with Russia or with Hungary, have not borne themselves, v have, not' acted as the gravity and the sacredness of the matter demanded. Perhaps the answer is more difficult than impossible ; perhaps certain English diplomatic novelties could furnish some data for the enigma, just as certain other French diplomatic novelties would succeed in explaining, in some degree, the extraordinary fervor of Italian Catholic circles for the battles of Poland.” Recently, also, the Secretary of the Czecho-Slovak Popular Party said; “We are for the independence of Ireland, for which some days ago we made a great demonstration of solidarity.” /■- And so the story runs: the whole world, except Great Britain, is denouncing a Government that is proving itself more callous than the late Prussian machine. ■