NOTES OF THE DAY

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 234, 28 June 1921, Page 4

NOTES OF THE DAY

The fate of the New Zealand £5,000,000 loan, which, is to be launched in London to-day, will bo awaited with more than usual interest. Most people expected that Mr. Alassey would ask for £6,000,000, but the lesser amount should be sufficient to meet the Dominion’s most pressing needs. The terms on which tho money is being raised should be attractive enough to ensure a successful flotation. With a 'term of 15 or 30 years to run—at the borrower’s option—--6 per cent, interest, and issued at a discount of 96, the underwriters should not have very much of tho loan left on their hands. The Auckland City Council’s 6J pel’ cent, loan, issued a few weeks ago at par, was over-subscribed, and in a few days was quoted at a premium. The South Australian and Tasmanian combined £5,060,000 6J por cent, loan, 1930-40, floated; early ’in the present month, did not go off so well, 72 per cent, of South. Australia’s share of £3,000,000 being left with the underwriters, and 57 per cent, of Tasmania’s share of £2,000,000. It was stated at tho time that resentment had. been aroused in financial circles at the generous terms offered under this loan, which had had a bad" effect ou gilt-edged securities. Mr. Massey has not been ’quite so generous, but he has got in with his loan at a good time. With tho miners’ strike apparently coming to an end and a reduced bank rate, ths outlook generally is brighter.

In re-electing Mr. Samuel Gompers for a fortieth term as its president, the American Federation of Labour is showing a determination to have him in ths chair until the end of the piece. Mr. Gompers is possibly the next most important man in the United States to the President himself. He is now an aged veteran of 71, and has been president of the Federation of Labour since 1882, with an intermission of ono year. He was born in a London slum, and aro rived in America at the ago of thirteen with but four years’ schooling to his credit. When the war came he threw himself into it whole-heartedly to defeat the bid of German autocracy for world domination. He was made a. member of the United States Committee of National Defence, or War Cabinet, and when he visited England—during tho struggle—the highest in the land of his birth sought to do him honour. Mr. Gompers i» not popular with the extremists, but American Labour is satisfied to stick to him. All his life ho lias persistently fought against Socialism and for trades unionism, on the ground that progress can only come by rational development and not by leaps and bounds. When the war broke out he held that Germany’s working men should have refused to fight, because thoir cause was unjust; but that the Allied working men were in duty bound to fight for democracy. He pledged tho support: of organised Labour in tho United States more than a year before President Wilson declared war. For half a century political ambitions, business opportunities, tho lure of fame and future, social diversions, have alike been powerless to sway this veteran leader of American Labour from his devotion to the cause of trades unionism. His career is notable above all else for its unswerving singleness of purpose.

A drought such as England is now experiencing is so rare an occurrence as to he remarkable. The average annual rainfall is not much more th<\n 'half that of the North Island of New Zeland, but it is exceedingly regular. A period of twenty days or over without rain is officially classified as a drought in the British weather returns, and there have been only eighteen such since 1848. The record was established in 1893, when there was an absolute drought of thirty days from March 18 to April 16, end a partial drought extending from March 1 to June 18. Very little rain fell from July to September of that year, and the consequence was a great scarcity of fodder and a general failure of root crops. The drought was general in M’cstern Europe, extending over Italy, Spain, and France as well as the United Kingdom. Tn 1917 there was a dry spell of 27 days in the spring, but without any disastrous results, and in 1916 no rain fell for 20 days in July and August. Unfortunately for comparison it is not stated how long the present dry spell has lasted, 'ten years ago, in 1911, the clerk of the weather had his vagaries, nnd provided no fewer than three dry spells in southern England in the course of the summer—ono of 30 to 31 days, another of three weeks, extending in places to 29 and 31 days, and u third of 15 or IB days. Yet in the end he finished up the season with a total rainfall slightly above the average. The Englishman abuses his climate, but it stands by him remarkably well, and adjusts itself with great consideration to the natural features of (he countryside. In the west, where the land is steep and rocky, nnd the water runs off quickly, the rainfall is heavier; in the east, where the ground is flat and clayey, and liable te become sodden, Providence bestows a lighter rainfall than the average for ths country. And

on the subject of droughts Australia would probably vote that, the Mother Country has not a ghost of an idea what a real drought is. ,< rWhen a marriage has ceased to exist in point of fact, and husband nnd wife have definitely and finally ceased to live together, and all hope of reconciliation is at an end, it is right that the marriage tie should cease also to exist in the eyes of the law—such is the substance of the important ruling given by Mr. Justice Salmond in tho Divorce Court on Saturday. Parliament last session’ gave the Court the power to grant divorce at its discretion in cases where there had been disobedience of an order for the restitution of conjugal rights, or where the parties had lived apart for a term of not less than three years. Tho first case under the new legislation came before Mr. Justice. Salmond, and he had to decide on what principle this new discretionary power should be used. His judgment will, wo think, commend itself to the general public opinion of the country. The door is slightly wider open to divorce than it was. But it is open only when the marriage is established beyond doubt to have lx>en a genuine failure. No legislation and no judgment on such a subject as divorce will ever command universal approval. Divorce is comparatively easy to obtain in New Zealand. In 1919 no fewer than 334 were made absolute during tho year, about half the number granted in Australia, with five times our population. However, we are very far behind the United States, where the annual divorce rate is 153 decrees per 100,000 of population, as against our 33 per 100,000. Nevada heads the list with 652 divorces per 100,000 people, while North Carolina is at tho bottom with 30, and South Carolina has no divorces and no divorce laws. "Whether we shall Ire better or worse through making an end of the marriages that have failed only time can prove.