AGAINST CONSCRIPTION

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2646, 17 December 1915, Page 8

AGAINST CONSCRIPTION

MR. MASSEY'S REPLY TO A WEST • COAST RESOLUTION. The Prime Minister has received from one Mr. T. S. Williams, a letter cover-, ing a resolution passed by a. public meeting at Millerton, West Coast. Mr. Williams was appointed by the meeting. to forward the resolution, which runs• "That this meeting of Millerton citizens regards the attempt to fasten conscription- ou New Zealand as disruptive and dangerous, and declares. that the success :of conscription would be the achievement of Prussianism. • We are justified in regarding the attempt to Prussianise New Zealand as an endeavour to provide for tile ultimate defeat of working-class ideals. Filially, we demand the nationalisation tif capital as Hie • most effective method of providing for the situation created by the war.'. In the .opinion of this meeting, the volunteer system has never been given a fair trial in so far as no guarantee is given to anyone inclined to volunteer that his dependents. will be properly provided for." The Prime: Minister has replied'to the letter as follows:—V "I acknowledge receipt of your letter of the 6th inst., transmitting a copy of a resolution carried at a public meeting held in Millerton in regard to conscription. I may say, however, that in spite of the unfortunato wording of your resolution, I believe most of the citizens of your town and district are just as willing to do their duty as. the citizens of any other part of New Zealand., "I am very strongly of opinion that if conscription becomes necessary in the Dominion during the present war it will be because we have here —and I would rather not believe this—a number of shirkers and anti-militarists, many of them without dependants, who can not be induced by any other method to do Sheir 'duty to' their country. "This is not a time for .mischievous attempts in the way of setting class against class, such as seems to be indicated in the latter portion of your resolution.- On the contrary this is a time for all clashes and all sections of the lommunity to stand together against i the common enemy, one of whose aims, and I believe the principal one, is to subject the British people to a tyranny snch as they have not experienced for LCOO years. Heaven help New Zealand I if she ever becomes 'Prussianised' in the real ..sense of the word." J