AN APPEAL TO WANGANUI.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3353, 4 December 1919, Page 5

AN APPEAL TO WANGANUI.

The following from the Manawatu Times speaks for itself: We have frequently of late called attention to the. lowering of the tone of our national politics through ‘the machinations of the party Press. We have a very apt illustration of this in \Vellington, where the Dominion and the Times are‘ flooding their columns with coloured news and views, deliberately designedl to inflame one section of the populace? against |th'e other, and to distortl national issues into fanatical parochial i “seraps.”\ ;,In Christchurch the Press, and the ‘Times are engaged in the same -perverse and degrading advocacies and distortions. The Dunedin and Auckland newspapers are taking vigorous’; sides also, but are writing with measure of dignity and reserve inl keeping with the importa.nce of ithei occasion. But it is in Wanganui that‘ journalism is throwing itself free of: all restraint. and indulgenc_e in an orgy ; of abuse and petty bickering which can only lead to bitterness and illfeeling. 'l‘he Chronicle seems to be the principal offender, because its adv.o-M cacy is directed towards influencing§ the electorate against Mr Veitch, onef of the soundest and sanest of our} legislators, and a man who in the: trying pexiod from which the country! has just emerged, ranged himself con~i sistently alongside those whose ener-1 gies were directed to establishing local , conditions and helping New Zealand tof do its part in winning the war. The: Ch"onicle may claim that it lla.s been driven to its present attiltude by injudicious journalistic and other friends of Mr Veitch, and that anyhow it does not like his political View point, but there -appears to be more in it than that. ,That journal seems to 3. discriminating outsider to be playing both the extreme Labour candidate and the Reform candidate against Mr Veitch in a. manner which far exceeds Ithe bounds of re-ason"‘~ and fainplay. To unseat Mr Veitch, or any man-of his calibre, in this crisis of New Zealand’s affairs would be to do‘ an ill service to the democracy of this count_ry. We have all too few men of his judicial temperament, sane idealism, and intogrity of purpose in Parliament We go fnrtlier, and say that his repultation stands so highthat in a contest over a broad area under a scheme -of proportional representation it would be impossible on performances to unseat him. We trust that \the Wanganui people will n-ot be persuaded by the pleas of purely parochial partisans to deprive New Zealand‘ of this reapresen tatlvo’s service at this thie.