SPIRIT OF LIBERALISM

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 135, 9 June 1937, Page 10

SPIRIT OF LIBERALISM

(To the Editor.)

Sir,—Tomorrow, the thirty-first anniversary of the demise of New Zealand's "Abraham Lincoln," many of the old school will once again look back' to the days when "King Dick" was making history by placing New Zealand on the map and in the face pf powerful opposition enforcing measures of which we are so proud. Then us now the critics predicted ruin, and any act making for the welfare of the people was branded "Socialism" by the Tories of that time.. However, Mr. Seddon continued to blaze the trail, and his last public address in Sydney is sufficient evidence that had he lived he contemplated writing into the Statute Book legislation dealing with money power, realising that the capitalistic and land-owning class had reaped the greatest benefit from social reforms originally enacted to benefit the workers.

The greatest .tribute ever-made to the departed statesman was the "back to Seddon" slogan of our present Prime Minister after a lapse of twenty-nine years. That slogan has been endorsed from Auckland to the Bluff by those who realise what the great humanitarian statesman stood for: the uplift of the masses. Bridging the long time lag and the further blazing of the trail is a herculean task but one that can be accomplished; and I trust the day is not far distant when, with one accord, we can hand over the muchcoveted mantle- and the shoes that R. J. Seddon' wore.—l am, etc.,

M. LAHACY.