The Dominion. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1912. SHOUTING TO KEEP UP THEIR COURAGE.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1613, 3 December 1912, Page 4

The Dominion. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1912. SHOUTING TO KEEP UP THEIR COURAGE.

The leaders of the Federation of Labour and the men who led ,the Waihi miners to the ghastly failure which attended the Waihi strike practically from beginning to end, are 'shouting very loudly just now in an endeavour to keep up their own courage and to further deceive their deluded followers. They have at last acknowledged their defeat by. declaring the strike off, which, seeing that the Waihi mine has been working for weeks past, is somewhat superfluous. ■ But they are attempting to cover up the utter rout of their forces by a continuance of the wild and vague threats which characterised their publio utterances throughout the strike, and hint darkly at the terrible powers they will exerciso at some distant date. There is to be a reign of terror and those who stand in the way of these great and masterful wonder-workers will bo crushed out of existence/ In the graphic language of Mk. Seiiple the rivers of the country will, if necessary, flow with blood—probably he means that if necessary rivers of blood will be made to flow. It sounds all very dreadful! There are times when the public must wonder what manner of men the rank and file of the Federation of Labour can be to swallow this sort of braggard nonsense. Coming on top of the complete and utter failure of the leaders of the Federation in their conduct of the Waihi strike; following as it does on the inglorious retreat of the_ strike-mongers from the field of action at Waihi, this boastful swaggering must surely ring false ev.en to the most ardent of the followers of these reckless and misguided men. The report of our Auckland correspondent this morning appears to indicate that' some of the members of the Federation who are amongst those who paid the heaviest penalty for the blundering of the strike leaders, are awakening to. a realisation of how the Labour cause has been imperilled by the tactics and methods of the Federation of Labour. Tho wonder is tßat their enlightenment has been so long delayed.

The figures relating to the strike are in _ themselves an indictment of the strike leaders which will appeal to the common sense of the public generally, If not to the men who have placed themselves under the banner of the Federation of Labour. Because the Federation of Labour wished to intimidate and force into its ranks a smaller body of unionists who desired to retain their independence and were quite entitled to do so, the Waihi mines were closed down, hundreds of men thrown out of work, business in Waihi paralysed, great personal hardship endured by many innocent people, and even loss of life occasioned. The loss to the country in actual caeh is impossible to estimate, but the loss in gold returns is put down at nearly half a million sterling; while in wages the men have suffered a loss of something like £142,000. In addition to these huge sums there have , of course been incidental losses in other directions, including the cost of maintaining' a strong force' of police at Waihi. And what bas the Federation of Labour to show for its efforts at intimidation 1 It haa drained the unions it applied to for assistance to the extent of £30,000 on Mb. Semple's own ehowing. Is that a good thing for the Federation and its allies? Its leaders have led the unfortunate strikers and the members of the Federation generally to believe right up to the last minute that they had some trump card to play which would euchre their opponents and win the day for the Federation; and the boast is shown to be nothing but empty bluff, and the strikers and the unions which assisted them now find that all their sacrifices have been made in vain, and that they have been shamefully misled. Will this strengthen confidence in the Federation in /labour circles? The Federation has been forced to desist from its attempted intimidation of a weaker union and to declare the strike off. Iβ this, after all the boasted certainty of victory, calculated to increase the mana of the Federation and spread its influence?

Mr. Semple, striving to keep his courage up by loud and abusive language, seeks to convey tho impres-' sion that the Federation has emerged from some ordeal, to which it,had been unjustly subjected, with all credit and encouraged to make further effort. And yet everyone knows that the persecution of which he speaks was instituted by the Federation of Labour; that the methods and tactics of the Federation leaders have been thoroughly discredited; that the organisation has been split with dissension as the result i of the costly blundering and bungling of those leaders; and that the wild talk about the Fcdcrationists having to defend their homes and their families "though the rivers flowed with blood is tho veriest buncombe and can mislead no ono but the most ignorant. The crowning impudence o£ the Federation loaders, however, is their invitation to tho trades unions of the Dominion to meet under the auspices, of the Federation of Labour in Wellington in January next "to solidify their forces and form their plans for tho future." We can picture the eager rush of the trades unions of the country, at present outside the charmed circle of the Federation, to range themselves under tbo KUtdanoa of the mautormiada wUbh planned wid conducted

the Waihi strike; and the anxiety of these unions to have the aims and aspirations of a United Labour party voiced to the world at large in the choice and convincing language whicn is so striking a feature of the polished and polite oratory of tho leaders of the Federation of Labour. It is a choice insult to Labour: even "hated capital," much as it has had to endure in the way of vilification and abuse from the Federationists, has been spared so glaring an affront.