LIBERALISM: WHAT IS IT?

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXV, Issue 292, 8 December 1914, Page 2

LIBERALISM: WHAT IS IT?

[To The Editor Stratford Post.] Sir, —The coming elections should be regarded as a momentous occasion because, properly -speaking, there is ao such thing as a Liberal Party at present. The whole of New Zealand people who arc not blindly biassed must see and feel by this time, that politically Sir Joseph Ward, when in power, unsettled everything and guttled nothing. When he is engaged pulling down—then his energy knows no bounds, and nothing is allowed to stand between him and the gratification of his.desires. Witness his Land and Education and Railway expansion. Can it be said that even after all these years of campaigning the general public have been given any clear idea of what kind of Local Government Reform he is in favor of No, sir. Bewildered in the ruin that he has made, he is powerless to repair or restore, and now it will take the Reform Party ten years of reconstructive government to heal the breaches that be has made, to re-establish what he has unsettled, and to remodel what he has disintegrated. Therefore he cannot claim the electors’ confidence Tor that reason. Sir Joseph Ward is a naturally colorless politician, pushed about by extremists. The driving force behind the Liberals is the labour vote, and once this vote is organised Liberalism—another name for Labour-and-wator— must go steadily to the wall The New Zealand Liberal Party is like a squeezed-out lemon : it is bankrupt ol ideas, and Sir Joseph Ward is in a continual dilemma whether to pretend to be a Liberal-Socialist or to throw in his lot with the extremists. Liberalism is but a half-way house for the Labour people, and the underlying issue which confronts New Zealand is really with the Labour ideal of a State where increased population is not desired, where immigration is discouraged, and where everything is regulated by Act of Parliament. The ideal of the Labour Party is to retain New Zealand as a Socialistic experiment farm.

What is the case for Reform? It has been said that the Reform Government lacks vitality and persistence. Surely the records of the last three years alone disprove both statements! It is only by reason of the vitality and persistence of the*aßeforn Party that it is a live force to-day. Need I remind readers that the Refer Party stands first and foremost for reform. A nation’s chief heritage is its character, and . that character is determined to a much greater extent than one might imagine by the standard set in its public life. By its dean administration the Government stands by, or for, principles, and in short, has a clear-cut, well-defined, and well-reasoned policy, of which it is V no means ashamed, and which it places before the electors for endorsement. Whether Mr Massey, after the coming election, will become Prime Minister of New Zealand again is a matter I cannot pretend to decide, but this I dr know: no man is more worthy of the i honor, and there is no oue in the land who would fill the position better. Sir. thanking you in anticipation.—l am, etc., J. SMITH. Stratford, December 7th, 1914.