PROTESTANTS IN POLITICS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1735, 29 September 1917, Page 4

PROTESTANTS IN POLITICS.

BIG MEETING IN WELLINGTON. TOWN HALL. OBJECTIVE OF ASSOCIATION. The meeting held in the Wellington Town Hall last Tuesday night for the inauguration of the Protestant Political Association in Wellington was orderly and enthusiastic. Admission was by ticket only. Almost every seat in the hall was occupied, and except for the applause there was no interruption of the speeches. There were at most only two hostile interjections, and the first interjector was very promptly removed. The Hon. W. Earnshaw, who presided, explained the purpose of the meeting, and proceeded to refer to the attitude of Roman Catholics to Education. Education, he said, should be compulsory for Protestant and Catholic alike. Catholics should have no right to keep their children away from the State schools. “They do not give them as good an education as we give ours. Again and again we have had to reduce the standard of our public examinations to meet them.” ' “Disabuse your minds,” said the Rev. G. Knowles Smith, “that we are fanatical Orangemen out for the blood of every Catholic we can lay our hands on.” One of the principles of British citizenship was a man’s right to choose his religion. For the individual Roman Catholic they had nothing but praise, for ho had borne, and was bearing, his part, side by side with the Protestant in the war, and the Catholic padres had done good work in their department side by side with the other padres. Another British principle was the right of any body of people to organise to secure their ends. Because the Catholics were one-seventh of the population was no reason why they should not organise, but they could not deny the same right to the six-sevenths of Protestants. He moved: That this meeting of the citizens of Wellington, under the auspices of the Protestant Political Association, protests against the injustice which has been done to the public schools of the country by the total exemption till now of Marist Brothers ’ from military service, while the State schools have been .required to render, and have rendered, up to 33 per cent, of their male staff. The meeting calls on the Government to end this vicious differentiation in favour of sectarian schools by at once placing a 33 per cent, requirement against the staff of the Roman Catholic schools. The meeting further believos that the mere exemption from now on of all school teachers. as has been suggested in Parliament, will not meet the .situation unless a sacrifice proportionate to that already, made by the public schools be first required from private schools. This was seconded by the Rev. C. G, Stewart, and carried on a show of hands, with three or four dissentients. The Rev. Howard Elliott, who was received with prolonged applause, said the Catholics had organised politically, and none had denied their right; nor accused them of stirring up strife. Some of the newspapers were getting a very sane light on this question. Protestants would rather have organised at any other lime, hut as they had been forced to choose this time they would not rest until they had organised all the Protestants of New Zealand into one body, and had forced the politicians to take notice of them. They had the block Catholic vote, and they would have a block Protestant vote. Within a year, he ventured to say, they would .be in a position to see that no man was returned to Parliament who was not straight on Protestant issues. Mr Elliott proceeded to say that there were people who were seizing this time of Avar to endeavour to secure advantages at the expenseof the rest of the community. In New Zealand there had been a most vicious attack upon the education system. In England the uprising of High Church Anglicanism in its Avorst form and the attitude of the Catholic Church had forced the organisation of Protestant Associations. In Canada Protestants had been compelled to organise so that conscription might be carried, as Catholics were not doing their part. Australia Avas in i; terrible condition, and Protestants hud been obliged to organise to oust these poii-

ticians who had brought about the blot of the anti-conscription vote. Conscription would yet bp carried there. In South Africa Protestants had to resist a republican movement. All over the Empire there Avere movements for republicanism and the disintegration of the Empire. From the same office that printed The Tablet there was issued a paper devoted to republicanism. Protestants were fighting not only for their own rights, but for the integrity of the Empire. The Catholic organisation Avas a challenge Avhich Pi’otestants must heed. The Protestant Association Avas not Reform, Liberal, or Labour, it had no A r ieA\ r s on the Bible-in-schools, and no official vieAv of prohibition* It stood for clean politics and no favour. In the public services of the Dominion Catholics had more than their proportion so far as they kneAV the figures. In the raihvay service there was discontent because men obtained unfair preferment. There was no other organisation which could meet this position except the Protestant Political Association. They hoped to nominate a candidate for each seat at the next election, and return to Parliament a body of vigorous young men avlxo Avould stand for Protestant rights. (Applause).