Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News. SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 1908. THE GENERAL ELECTION.

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVII, Issue 43386, 14 November 1908, Page 2

Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News.

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 1908. THE GENERAL ELECTION.

This above all—to thine oxen self be true , ind it must follow as the night the day Thou canst not then be false to any man Shakespeare.

On Tuesday next, the 17th inst. the people of New Zealand will elect, a new Parliament. What a momentous issue ! The weal or woe of this Dominion will to a great extent depend for three years on the class of men to be elected in a few days. How desirable it is that every elector should realise his and her responsibility and should discharge the duty of voting as a matter of conscience ?

The scienceof politics is a difficult and important one. Its complexity involves a knowledge of economics, sociology, history, international law, and procedure, etc., and a knowledge of human nature and vast life experience. Law makers should know what have been in the past and what probably will be in the future, the effects of certain legislation. It therefore is unaccountable that sensible persons should elect men to Parliameut who are not qualified. In every other department of life preparation and fitness are required. Doctors and lawyers, teachers and nurses are compelled to qualify, and we cannot understand why members of Parliament should escape the requisite preparation. Of course if the people choose to be legislated for and governed by the unfit or incompetent, well, no one should complain if they have to suffer for their folly.

The best men should be induced to come out for Parliament, but alas! the best seem to hang back. It is astonishing how few able men come forward, and how many there are who never do a hand’s turn to shape the destines of the Dominion or help their fellow men. They readily criticise those who do so, and whe ido their best. Let anyone quietly think over the great number of men in New Zealand whose lives have fallen unto them in pleasant places, but who never help to man the ship of state or to steer her course into a safe port. They will not even go to the poll to vote except after a good deal of persuasion, and then they must be taken in cabs at somebody elses expense. In Rome and Greece in ancient days they would have been disgraced. It is not sj now, and the more the pity. It would be better for themselves and for the country if they would patriotically do their political duty. Of course a few men conscientiously do theii duty at the election polls and they are the salt of the political world. The masses have a right to look tc the moneyed and leisured classes (c take the lead in the realm of politics. They expect from them guidance and sacrifice, and if they will not turn aside from pleasure and money? making to help to guide the affairs of state, then they need not wonder if the less cultured and less qualified, in spite of doing their best, guide the ship of state into the breakers. Let us all beware. Let every New Zealander awake to the present opportunity and do his duty for King and country. Let us all have done with the mere game of in’s and out’s and let us vote for the best available men—men of light and leading. The day is too far spent for mere parochial politicians. Great

national and in ter-national questions are awaiting solution. Education, defence, internalist relations, debt, laud tenure, sooial betterment, trade protection, temperance, and other grave subjects have got to be dealt with.

If the signs of the times be not misread there will soon take place in Europe and Asia such things as will make every New Zealander’s ears tingle. The air is electric with solemn and great questions of most momentous issue. As any moment

in the near future the clock may strike the hour of national destiny, and woe be to us if the right men be not at the helm of public affairs. Let Te Arohans do their duty like aithful sentinels on the lented field. Each man to his post—each voter true to his country and his own conscience, and then whatever betide us, those who have so voted will have the happy consciousness that they did their best; for “He who ! does the best his circumstance allows, \ does well, acts nobly, angels could « do no more ! ”