HECKLERS FINED

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 85, 7 October 1938, Page 10

HECKLERS FINED

MEETING DISTURBED

"SPEECHES NOT DEBATES"

COMMENT BY BENCH

"It is very important indeed that the law in regard to the proper conduct of meetings should be enforced," said Mr. J. H. Luxford, S.M., in the Magistrate's Court today, when two waterside workers, Jeremiah/Condon and Henry FJynn. came before him charged with disturbing a meeting of electors at the Capitol Theatre, Miramar, on October 4. The meeting was one addressed" by Mr. W. L. Barker. National candidate ior Wellington East.

"People seem to have the wrong idea in regard to the scope of political meetings," said the Magistrate. "The candidate is there to speak. The rules of debate do not apply, as it is not a debate. He is there to expound his views. It is inevitable that spontaneous laughter, spontaneous applause, and sometime^s'pontaneous disapproval should occ«f'. That is in accordance with human nature, and nobody takes exception to that. It is very different when a person deliberately puts frequent questions during the course of a speech. It leads to difficulties and prevents a person putting forward the views he wishes to express."

On the night of October 4, said Sergeant C. R. Duke, he was at the Capitol Theatre when Mr. Barker was giving his address. The hall was full to capacity, and there were one or two standing. The capacity of the hall was 784 persons, seated. Soon after the meeting started Flynn, who was seated right at the back, started to call out "Rot" and "Bunkum" and "Leave Scrim alone." He spoke to him and told him not to shout like that, as he was disturbing the meeting, and that if he persisted he would be ejected and prosecuted. Flynn kept quiet for a time, and then started again. Later witness moved to the other side of the hall. He saw Constable Anderson speaking to Flynn, and people were saying "Lie down." Constable Anderson spoke to the defendant again, and he saw him take him out of the theatre.

Condon was at the left of the aisle, about three parts of the way down in front, and soon after the meeting started he commenced shouting out, "Point of order—point of order!" and was standing up, shouting at the speaker. The Magistrate: He would be speaking to the chairman when he raised a point of order. During the address, said witness, Mr. Barker made a statement, and said he could produce a man in the audience to verify what he said. A man stood up to support him, and the defendant started to protest and shouted, "Point of order." The chairman told him to sit down, and a constable spoke to him The defendant said: "Leave this man to me. I will deal with him." He was prevailed upon to sit down. The chairman twice asked him to sit down, and four times witness saw a constable ask him to sit down before he was asked to leave. Among the interjections he made were, "It is a lie" and "Tell the truth!" "CARRIED AWAY." At the meeting several people were spoken to, and they behaved after that, but the two defendant's were carried away with themselves and did not seem as if they could behave after they had been spoken to, said the Sergeant. The Magistrate: Do you suggest that people were disturbed and that the speaker was prevented from carrying on properly his address? Witness: He was prevented from carrying on speaking to the audience, and the National people were disturbed, because they said, "Sit down, sit down. For goodness sake sit down. The Magistrate: All those that sat down, you assume, were Nationalists? (Laughter.) . . Condon stated that he was raising a point of order, and he considered he was quite justified in addressing the C iTwould be if it were a debate, said the Magistrate, but this was a candidate, there to express his views, and the people were there to listen or go Defendant: That may be so, but it is a very hard thing to sit down and listen to lies. Mr Luxford: I had to do it for many years—and also the truth, too. Constable T. Reid, corroborating the sergeant's evidence, said he walked forward and told Condon that the proper time to ask questions was at question" time, and told him to sit down and keep quiet. Condon said he would have plenty to say at question time. During the rest of the meeting he got to his feet several times and made remarks. One time he said: That is- a lie—tell the truth!" When the man in the audience stood up to support a claim of Mr. Barker's, Condon said- "Give him a fair hearing, people, I will answer this man." People called out to him to sit down, x and he said: "I demand the right to reply.

NOT IN OWN DISTRICT. To Senior-Sergeant D. J. O'Neill, who prosecuted, witness said that the defendant Condon was not an elector of the district in which the meeting was held. Flynn, on his own behalf, said that if the candidate could not be heard, how could he, who had not the candidate's volume, be heard?

Constable R. Anderson gave evidence similar to the other police witnesses. Questioned by Condon, he said that the defendant was not put out, but walked out when asked by the police to leave.

Constable Fitzgibbon also gave evidence along similar lines. "As far as the case against the two defendants is concerned, the evidence of the police justifies me in entering a conviction," said the Magistrate. He added that this was the first time, with the exception of those in Auckland yesterday, that these prosecutions had come before the Court.

Each of the defendants was fined £3 and costs.