The Press Monday, November 21, 1927. The Licensing Bill.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19163, 21 November 1927, Page 8

The Press Monday, November 21, 1927. The Licensing Bill.

The Prime Minister has acted wisely in leaving Parliament to take a few days to think about the Licensing Bill. Whatever happens this week will at any rate be the result of some hard thinking by everybody concerned. The New -Zealand Alliance, perhaps, will use whatever influence it has with the politicians to force the passage of the Bill through the House, but it is possible that the Alliance leaders may have begun to reflect that they have over-reached themselves, and that the electors, fa«ed with a two-issue ballotpaper and the "bare majority" provision, will recoil from voting Prohibition. This will almost certainly happen if the Bill in its present shape becomes law, but that will not reconcile to the Bill those who are opposed to Prohibition on grounds of principle. It is far less important that Prohibition should be defeated than that the supporters of a third issue should not be disfranchised or than that the right of a bare majority to coerce a bare minority should receive no statutory recognition. While the parties most nearly interested are thinking about the situation, the public may' profitably consider the extraordinary degree in which the voting in the House, on the crucial - issues, misrepresented public feeling. At the last poll, as at earlier polls, there was a clear .majority against Prohibition, and it scarcely needs to be demonstrated that everyone who voted against Prohibition would vote against the " bare majority " rule and also against the extinction of the third issue. Yet the majority in the House of Representatives was five to two for the two-issue ballot-paper and four to three for. the " bare majority " decision. This monstrous misrepresentation of public opinion was the result, of course, of the pledges extracted .by the New Zealand Alliance from the politicians during the election campaign. It illustrates very strikingly a fact which we have stated often enough, namely, that a strong and wellorganised minority can exert enormous power in politics if it subordinates everything to its particular end. If Prohibition were carried in New Zealand, the Prohibitionists would remain organised and watchful, in order* to prevent the election of anybody who might wish to alter the law. Prohibition remains in America because the Prohibitionists, 'although a minority of the people, are strong enough to tip the scale between tfie two regular political Parties. In New Zealand they are a minority, yet they can so seriously interfere with politics as to secure that there shall be a substantial majority in the House of Representatives in favour of proposals that a majority of the people would reject. That this is true is self-evident, but if the Prohibitionists would have a formal proof of it, they could get it by agreeing to allow the people to decide (1) whether there should be a three-issue ballot-paper, and (2) whether the carrying of Prohibition should not require a majority of at least 60 per cent.