PURIFICATION OF POLITICS.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2184, 24 June 1914, Page 5

PURIFICATION OF POLITICS.

(To the Editor.) 1 Sir,—"Many men, ninny minds, also problems," so the world wags, and one of tlio subtlest problems now before the world is a pure Parliament. A Solomon—writing 1 in your Saturday's issue—introduces a new remedy, whereby the necessary purification may eventuate, "Disfranchise-, the triple drunkard and criminal!" What a pity he is not able to take out a patent for tho idea! So simple and comprehensive ; as easy as suppressing the Suffragette. : Tlio "thrice" convicted drunkard Well? The country would-,not lese many votes in the carrying out of this item at anyrate, because the chameleon laws now regulating this part of the liquor traffic are so complex that a man may begin on Monday at the Ray of Islands and get convicted by a J.P. Then on Tuesday go through the same process in the next town or village, and so.oll, day by day,'till lie eventually reaches the Bluff, then get let off as a. "first offender." That is tho' law of New Zealand Medes and Persians obtaining at present. A drinker lias'only'to "move on" to keep himself from being disfranchised under the idea evolved by "Wellington East Elector." Furthermore, is it the drunkard he wishes to suppress on account of the wickedness of the drunkard ? Are thero bo impiire drunkards who. ought to be disfranchised in the Dominion besides those who are convict-ed three times before the "Beak"? Is the writer blind to the fact that'at the beginning—before the drinking customs of society got the, better o'f the sot's good nature—or in the early days when the first glass was tossed off, that probably the drunkard was as pure and good as tho J.P. who convicted him?

Again, what about the greater multitude of drunks who don't get convicted, yet who deserve to be? The club drunks, and the home drunks. If we begin to punish'the'drunkard by disfranchising them, it will take a "long time to purge" the rolls! But Virtor Hugo once wrote that "the real sinner is tho one who causes the sin." Why specialise the drunkard and not disfranchise the drink-maker and the drurik-ard-makur? Our friend is-beginning at the wrong end; he is going to make the popular mistake by starting on the "effect',' while ignoring the "cause." Of, course the drinker has the power to say "No.". Yes! until that power is destroyed by another whose financial.interest, it is to muddle his wits and make him incapable of controlling himself. We have merely touched tho fringe of this first phase of our friend's patent. Then the'criminal comes in. "The convicted'criminal." Yes? I beg pardon! Certainly the criminal would never vote for men who' would make us puro laws, so they ought, to be disfranchised. ".Criminal," what a comprehensive word! A big tree with many branches. Oh'my! if all the criminals were to bo struck off the rolls, what a lot of gaps there would ba! There might even be a danger of 1 some of the candidates for Parliamentary honours losing tho franchise. ' .

First, then, our friend would need the assistance of the angel Gabriel to help discriminate and make the selection.' .'Bcc.ius'e to-dav (perhaps as much as' at any time, in the world's historv) the criminal element is as' strong in every class of society as it ever has , been, and even in our own Parliament jvc actually frame laws that make criminals wholesale! We legalise wholesale crimes on the .0110 hand, and on tho .other jnake la,ws to punish.minor, act?, against the legalised crime: We make it legal to gamble to any amount, aud wo make . it,, a crime, to gamble, to a small amount; So there we, manufacture gamblers or criminals, then punish them for existing. Consequently our friend has a. contract on hand when he begins to disfranchise the criminal element in our laud. Better begin.at the cause and purify the law-makers. Again, if'you abolish the criminals what become of our lawyers? They would hn.ro to move on. of course. Truly we should need the lelp of beings more than mortal to expunge the wicked, tho criminal, and the impure, so that only the fit might have the privilege of going to the noils. Whatever would tho, cabbies and the taxis do on pollinc; days? Thev would all be on the look-out for a job and not got one!—l am, etc., • PUZZLED.