The press FRIDAY MARCH 1, 1918. Wellington North Election.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16149, 1 March 1918, Page 6

The press FRIDAY MARCH 1, 1918. Wellington North Election.

There will bo a general feeling of relief this morning among patriotic New C Zealanders on finding that Wellington North has returned a supporter of the i j National Government pledged to the j 1 , vigorous prosecution of the war. It j is pnfortunate that there should have j been a split, in the ranks of the lie- ;| , za Party in the district on this ! occasion; It was evident from the • ,■ first, Ob we stated on Wednesday, that k't Mr Brandon had no chance of election -j j himself, but'the result of his stand- . j ing was to reduce Mr Luke's majority i to „a margin too narrow to be Com- ' 4 in such a contest. We have ■pB doubt that Mr Holland and his | frills will claim the increase in the * number of Totes recorded for him compared .with the figures of the last elec- . tion os evidence that there is u growing feeling against conscription, -nd • there are a considerable number People in Wellington North at any who are weakening; on the war.

We should be very sorry indeed, to think that the 2500 odd votes recorded for Mr Holland represented that number of persons in the' constituency .suffering from "cold feet," or want o» loyalty and determination to fight against domination bv the Huns. It

is evident that Mr Luke was not personally acceptable to a number of persons "who had no sympathy rcith Mr Holland's views. There is no doubt, moreover, that the National Government has trodden on the toes of a section of the Wellington people, notably scire of the Civil ServantK who, despite the war bonus., are aggrieved at the postponement of the classification scheme, and that numerous representatives of both these classes voted for Mr Holland, not because for one moment did they agree with his politics, but as the most effective way of giving the National Government a " shaking-up," as they put it. Of course such conduct was narrowminded and unpatriotic in the extreme, j hut we are afraid there is no doubt as to the facts. It is a curious feature of the election that although some thousands of names were added to the rolls before the contest, the number of those who actually voted was about 1000 less than at the last general election. This shows, we think, that a considerable number of electors did not care very much for any of the candidates, and abstained accordingly. Both Mr Brandon and Mr Poison declared themselves supporters of the National Government and in favour of "winning the " war." Their votes, therefore, should be added to those of Mr Luke in order to get tho true number of supporters of the National Government, which may thus be said to have received a vote of confidence in the constituenc3" by a majority of 1956. We think that congratulations on this result are distinctly due not only to Mr Massey, but also to Sir Joseph Ward, who certainly "played the " game" throughout the contest.