CABINET MINISTERS AND BOOKMAKERS.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 611, 14 September 1909, Page 4

CABINET MINISTERS AND BOOKMAKERS.

; ■;\ SEVERE; CRITICISM. ; In the courso of the service on Sunday cvco« . ing at Petono 'Baptist Church, the Rov. T. A. .Williams referred to the prescnco of members ■ of the .Ministry at Tattersalls Club in tho following terms'.—llavin'g quoted } Henry .Ward Beecher, ' lie said , in . New. . Zealand tho,. public. sentiment, 'respecting gambling 'was'.', largely corrupt and vicious. Wo as CUristiahs , had got,to correct 1 that.-. A few. weeks ago a ; depntatipu , . from the Wellington 'churches waited on the Aoting-Primo Minister to tirgo.' him to exercise his powers, in the terms of'. .the Gaming Act to.prevent a fashionable. book-, ,' makers': club being l opened in tho city! In •• reply hp;. said many vagno things, but lie clearly showed where his sympathies lay. Last 1 week that" samo club was opened With a banquet, and at. this • banquet two .of tho chief Cabinet' Ministers were present. . Now,' ovary vight-thiiiking. person'regarded bootmakers as enemies of society, and. for two responsible members, of tho' Ministry to,attend a'l unction ... of that sbrtj ru'li' by such ineui' with such a ' calling,. was to outrage tho most sacred feelings of tens'of: thousands ill tho'Dominion, and to trail their high office .in thb mud. But this ,was not all. ; They made .speeches, ■ and siich speeches! ' Tho Actkg-Primb ; Minister,' after; some cant, words of' paternal .warning,' . spoke of tho club as" a 1 school;'' ' Mr. Millar-said'sonio'more astounding-things, l Listen: ' "Ho/ thought tho Tattersalls . Club should become tho headquarters of all forius of sport." Is, not: our'sport sufficiently cursed and blasted by the vice of betting ; at* the pre- ' sent time without an .insano incentive of that sbrt? Onco let the bookmakers; have their foul clutch upon our games and pastimes, and no decent youth will ;bo able to touch them, - Next ho .said: "There would ilWays bo different opinions about • betting."Another .vicidUj statement, for tho implication hert; was that ■ whether bettiug be a vice or not was purely a of opinion. Let the llinistor produce ' . the. natoo of a single moral teacher .who qucstions.tho vicionsnoss of betting,- Last of all ' , ho said; "But it seemed to him there was no 1 • difference between takings .ClOO; to 10s. on tho risk of his houso being burnt down and taking *£100 to 30s. On tho result bf a.horso race, i.e.,. according .to this. wiso Minister house insurance and betting on a' horse race aro one - and the' samo thing! What. utter lionsoUsol . What dense ignorance! If he could not se< tho essential difference between insurance anj betting ~on .horses, then tho sooner, tho bcttei he was mado to understand that fot such' in- ' capacity tho Cabinet had no place., . A CHRISTCHUECH PROTEST. ■ (l)y Tclesrraph.—Press A&soclatlorU ] Ghristchurchj Soptembcr 13. '• At a meoting held last 'evening, the chaii* , ! ■ nian (the Rev.- K. S. Gray) strongly criticised tho Actions' of the Acling-rrimo Minister and ■ tho Minister for Raihl-ays in boiug present; at tho opening of Tattersalls Club in Wellington, ' A niohpn was carried, recording an "emphatic protest against the action,of the Acting-l'riiiic Minister and the Minister for Railways in giving olfaciar countenance hy 'their presence at' the'opening of tho bookmakers" club in Wellington to the vice of gambling'in ono, of its' most reprehensible and most dangorous forms, ' aud ' protests against an 1 aiteiiipt to iniiko tlx evil respectable." The meeting "believes it 1q be_tho duty of every'Statesmen'to lnako vice difficult and virtuo easy, and it pledges itself, to do its utmost to have erased from tho Statute Book tho blot upon Christian civilisa. tion which legalises tliis evil." It was decided to forward copies of the resolution to'the Act-ing-Prime.. Minister and to the Minister for • Railways'