MUZZLING THE PRESS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXVI, Issue 10063, 3 February 1909, Page 1

MUZZLING THE PRESS.

(Per Press Association - .) Wellington, February 2. Father Dickson has sent the following further letter to the managing editor of the New Zealand Time* :—"Dear Sir,—ln the light of your answer to niv letter of the 28lh, I 'desire to say that 1 have, not the slightest objection to your publishing my communication, provided your replv he appended. In thai case I would ask'you to add this letter of approval. I should like also to say that, much as I recognise and value the great power for good that is exercised by a large section of the press. 1 do not for a l'nonicnt concede that "freedom of the press' implies the opening of your columns to an unbridled attack on the tenets of all your Christian readers. ' Furthermore,, if yon circulate through the medium of your paper—be it only part of a letter —a statement that ' Christ was absolutely wrong in nearly all hies moral teaching, you must not be surprised if those who are privileged to he called Christ's shepherds show themselves alert and no hirelings.—J as. Hicksox, S.M." This is followed by an other 'letter from the editor, in which lie goes at length into the question of the right of newspapers to give the freest play to the publication of individual opinions in signed articles on any subject. He deprecates any interference with its readers, and says:—"Pardon me for suggesting that this is a very ill-advised attitude for any priest or leader to take up. The time was when certain individuals .and sects arrogated to themselves the right to dictate to those less enlightened what they were to know and believe, but in these days any such presumption would be met with stem resentment, .and men and women can no longer be treated as ignorant children.''