NOTES OF THE DAY.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1626, 18 December 1912, Page 6

NOTES OF THE DAY.

So.Mb interesting speeches were made in Ghristchurch on. Saturday at the Civil Service Association's dinner to the Hon. Mr. Herdman. Amongst the speakers were Messrs. Ell, Laurensok, and Ism, who evidently experienced a good deal of difficulty, and had not n complete success, in leaving their political.illwill towards the Government out of their speeches. They spoke, as Mr. Eld announced, "with the brake oil" —not a good note to strike, but wo suppose extra allowance must bo made always for a Ghristchurch Radical. What disturbed them even more than the Minister's unpolemical and impersonal defence of the Civil Service Act, and the evident approval with which that measure has been received by the service, was a ,yery frank speech by one of the officers of the Association. . This was Mr. J. P.' Withers, who proposed the toast of "Members of Parliament," and incidentally gave them some wholesome advice and information.- Of special interest was his assurance that in the past political control has had evil results. The benefits of the new Act (he said) would be of far greater importance' than was imagined. All that was required wns good administration of tho Act. It would abolish political patronage, and should bo welcomed by members on that account. For too many years there had been a sprinkling of men in the service who had not considered themselves the servants of tho State, but rajther the servants of an .influence—what- it was he had never found out. There had boon other servauts who had openly considered themselves the servants of a party. He believed (hat the Act would make Civil Servants prouder than ever of lacing in the service of the Slate. From having a shadowy power of patronage, perhaps not very real, the members had made more, enemies, than, friends and would bo (find of the removal of that shadow, while the scrvnnts would feel that iii living a clean life in and cut of office they would be sure of their due reward.

This is very well put. Of course, the friends'of the old spoils party can hardly be, expected to admit this, for some time at least. They must keep up for a while the ))retetice that their opposition to Civil Service reform was sincere and honest. But nobody will quarrel with them when in the fulness of time they allow that the reform has lifted the shadow that has hung over the service.

Mil. KeirHardie, a cable message tells us to-day, is appealing through tho Daily News for funds to fight the Australian Defence Act. The "little England" Radical press has found it' convenient in the past to discountenance British meddling with the colonies, but we can be sure, that the News will help this impudent Socialist. In the, meantime we are glad to see that in the Manchester Guardian the .friends of tho New Zealand defence system are replying 'to the defamers or it. A typical defamatory letter appears in the Guardian of November' 6,. from a Wellington resident, whose name we need not give. Ho says the Government is "powerless to move the lads of New. Zealand," that the system is "tottering," that "the feeling against the Act" is very "powerful, ' and that "the boys and youths have nearly killed the Defence Act." Another very busy enemy of New Zealand—an Englishman called Gregory—quotes from the Maoriland Worker, of all papers, to support his' case. The Guardian is honest enough to print also a couple of letters on the other side; and the extent of the misrepresentation resorted to by the enemies of military training may bo understood from the fact that a New Zealand correspondent finds it necessary to deny the amazing statement that "business people are leaving on account of the Act." He admits that a Email section of the community is opposed to the Act, consisting mainly of "lads who (as is unfortunately common in this country, owing to the lack of parental control) have never in their lives obeyed anybody, and to whom, therefore, any discipline is irksome. In the same issue the Hon. Mr. T. Mackenzie writes a short, sharp letter in reply to a Mr. Mawson. "A complete' reply to all his strictures," Mr. Mackenzie says, "is to be found in the fact that in our Parliament recently only five members voted for a proposal to weaken the compulsory clauses of the Act." It is a pity that the English public could not bo made to understand, as New Zealanders understand, what these five members amount to. To New Zealanders one has but to mention their names to settle, the matter: Messrs. Isitt, Laurenson, Payne, Kobertson, and Hindmarsh. Mr. Mackenzie goes on to-say,-very pertinently:

"From that it can be gathered that the common sense of New Zealand is behind l Parliament in making a provision for the protection of our country, and that may be taken as a strong indication that the gratuitous ndvico and indignation of outsiders is not required, nor, indeed, greatly heeded. Doubtless Mr. Mawson is thankful daily that he dees not dwoll in New Zealand, .and equally wo New Zealanders are grateful that he is not a resident of our country." We trust that Mr. Mackenzie will continue to keep his eye on the slanderers.

It will doubtless be remembered that towards the end ,of October Lord Koberts, who is working manfully 16 rouse Britain to the need for improving her military strength, delivered a remarkable speech at Manchester, Tho Radicals, in conformity with thoir jjolioy of denounains; na-

tional defence, assailed Loud Roberts very bitterly. Tlioy wcro especially violent in their references to this passage in the upcueli-:

"Now, ijeiilloincii, lit Uio present day, now in the year 1912, just ns in IliWi mid just mi in 187(1, win- will inlto place tho iuslnnl: (lie German forces by i.'iml mid sea lire, by I heir superiority ;il every point, as oerlaMi of victory as nnytliiiifr in human calculation can lxi made certain. 'Germany strikes tvlion Germany's hour has struck.' That is the limehonoured policy of hor Foreign Office. That was the jiolicv relentlessly pursued by Ilismnr.ck and lloltko in IBGB and 1870; il; lias been lior policy decade by ileeado since Unit datn; it.is her policy at the present hour. And it is an excellent policy. It lis,' or should be, the policy of every nation prepared to piny a great part in history."

One of the Radical newspapers declared that tins amounted to the suggestion that Britain's policy should be "first to arm herself better than Germany, and then to make war on Germany, with or without a just cause, with or without even a quarrel—simply because England thinks herself at that moment able to win a war." This misrepresentation of his meaning provoked a letter from the veteran soldier. He reiterated that the Bismarckiah policy had been good for Germany, with its "patient, self-sacrificing labour" "inspiring the whole nation to manful effort and to individual sacrifice for the common fatherland, oven if it be in preparation for death on the battlefield." He repudiated the suggestion that he counselled England to arm and assassinate any nation. He was attacked because he omitted to say in so many words, what an honest reader would' take as implied, that he remembered the difference between the position of Germany and England. England has made her place in the world; Germany had not. And the policy lie applauded was applauded as the policy for nations in Germany's position, which was not Britain's position. All he contended was that Britain should be, in a position to .defend herself against aggression, and should recognise "the terrible danger" of "the present situation, in'which .wo alone find ourselves, as a nation, untrained, unorganised, and unarmed amid a Europe in which every people, not only great Powers like Russia, Germany, and France, but the smaller States—Bulgaria,/. Scrvia, Greece, Norway, Sweden, and Denmark—stand as armed nations."