The Dominion. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 1913. IMMIGRATION AND DEFENCE.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1671, 11 February 1913, Page 6

The Dominion. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 1913. IMMIGRATION AND DEFENCE.

In praising the other day the Hon. T. Mackenzie's unremitting activity in protecting New Zealand's interests against tho enemies of our defenco system, we overlooked some suggestive comments in tho Standard upon that letter of tho High Commissioner's to the Manchester Guardian to which wc specially referred. The Standard quotes a considerable [ passage from the letter, and concludes quite properly that it is representative of the true feeling of the New Zealand pcoplo, and it says that "neither in New Zealand nor in Australia is thero any political party or considerable body of the people who object to the cadet training scheme." This is perfectly true. Equally, true, however, is the fact that tho Opposition press are praising the now Labour Federation leaders as "earnest men" and "honestly striving" patriots, and are seeking a political alliance with them, and. this although these gentlemen have identified tno new Labour party (without any protest from the remnants of tho old U.L.P.), with a whole-hearted opposition to our defence. system. Inueed, these' very "earliest" heroes have been given, or have, at any rate, been permitted to;tako, authority to send anti-patri-otic cablegrams Home in the name of the Labour party without consulting tho people of that party. All we require of, tho Labour leaders—if there are any save Mr. Semple' and "Professor M.ilis, whoso "leadership" is not merely nominal—is, as we have said ■on other occasions, that they shall make clear exactly where "the Labour party" Btands. We havo over and over again given the so-called "Liberal" party an opportunity to say whether its sedulous courting of Mr. Semple and his' friends means that it iB equally committed t<s plain Socialism and the destruction of tho defence system. Its apologists evade the question. They refuse to repudiate either of those two main articles of,tho Federation's creed. . Mr. Mackenzie laid stress, in his letter to the Guardian, upon the fact that tho activities of tho defamers of our defence system had failed to make ; any ■ appreciable impression upon the intending emigrants for New Zealand. "We are obtaining," he said, "far more applications for' passages to New Zealand than we nave accommodation for." The Standard noted -that "tho aim of these self-styled .'advocates of peabo' is presumably to check the flow of immigration. It is not a mere coincidence, but a natural thing, that ' Bome of those . Opposition organs which are most violently assailing the Government and fostering .an amalgamation between tho ''Liberals" and the Federation Socialists—an amalgamation' against,both the Government and the defence system—are violently assailing also those who. believo that this country needs good immigrants in largo numbers. That these very critics used, when tho old Spoils party was in power, to defend the immigration policy, and to support and applaud: the ex-Prime Minister, whenever he sought to show (often with the facts against him) that immigrants wore coming in freely, is a fact which to mention, is sufficiently to comment upon it, The Standard's article usefully throws light upon tho- kinship between the anti-immigration policy of some of tho , anti-Reform apologists, and their anxiety to work in harmony' with the Federation, which is equally: keen on - Socialism and the destruction of the defence system. Days, and even weeks, have passed, and tho remnants of the U.L.Pr-if even remnants thero be—are as ; stonily obstinate in their refusal to oondemn the Federation's resolution as the anti-Reform press is eager to wed "Liberalism" to anti-patriotic Socialism for richer 1 or poorer, for better, or worso. > , ' :