LIQUOR AND POLITICS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1428, 12 April 1905, Page 4

LIQUOR AND POLITICS.

ADELAIDE ;EXPEKIENOES,

Dr W. Gh Torr, for many years principal of the Way College of Adelaide, is now in Wellington, having come over to New Zealand at the invitation of the Taranaki street Methodist Church for the purpose of delivering lectures on religious and temperance movements. He has already received numerous invitations from all parts'.of the colony, and expects to be in Now Zealand until next November. To a Po3t interviewer, Dr Torr . said ho | thought the whole of Australia was watohing the progress of the temperance movement in tbiß Ho thinks South Australia is. about a generation behind New Zealand in this movement. During the past fourteen years the temperance party in his State had been held in check I by an Act whioh was the outcome of a I compromise between the liquor party and I the temperance party, after a strong fight lin 1891. In that year Parliament passed I a law which stipulated that, “ As on honorI able and liberal compromise and as a 1 warning for ‘ the trade,’ compensation I should be paid to any publican who was I deprived of his license by a vote of the I people.” No house has been oompulsorily I closed sincß 1891, but, on the other band 1 the liquor party has joined hands with the I no-lioense party in preventing the grantI ing of new licenses. Next year, when the j Act of 1891 will have run its course, a big 1 fight is expected on the part of the liquorparty to got it renewed. I Speaking of the political aspect, Dr I Torr said there was a high type of men in I the Labor party of South Australia, and a I remarkable phase of its development.was I that it had collected the support of the I farmers. One wealthy farmer in the I northern part of the State had already anI nounced that at the coming general eleoI tions he would stand in ;the interest of the I Labor party. The latter party was oonfiI dent that the next election would see it I greatly increased in strength, and the general feeling throughout the State justiI tied that anticipation. Mr J. G. Woolley, the American orator, who toured the colony in the interests of the Alliance prior to the taking of the last local option poll, is to revisit New Zealand, arriving at Auckland on the 6th June this year. Mr Woolley’s campaign is to include the West Coast, and he is to work in the Auckland district during October and November.