The Daily News. SATURDAY, OCTOBER, 19, 1912. THE RED FEDERATION.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 130, 19 October 1912, Page 4

The Daily News. SATURDAY, OCTOBER, 19, 1912. THE RED FEDERATION.

The Red Federation is not getting the happy run it so optimistically anticipated when it precipitated the Wailii and Reefton strikes, and it is getting very little more change out of its attempt to set the whole of the Labor Party aflame as a protest against the very proper punishment meted out to the peace-breakers in Waihi. The country <was fortunate in having a magistrate in Waihi whose patient and tactful attitude, combined with a firm appreciaI tion of his duties, has done much to stop what was nothing more nor less than an organised attempt to precipitate a breach of the peace and to bully the mine-owners into lying placidly under the heel of labor and granting any preposterous demands that it might choose to make. Mr. Fraser's latest move has been delightfully diplomatic. Nobody will believe for one moment that the active part the women of Waihi have taken in the demonstrations lately has been due to anything but an organised conspiracy on the part of the Federation to secure public sympathy along false and meretricious lines. Coincidences of this sort do not occur with monotonous regularity. Mr. Fraser, in ordering the unfortunate girl who was the unconscious pivot of the latest disturbance, to come up for sentence when called upon, and assuring her that no further action would be taken so long as she behaved herself, has cut the ground from under the feet of the Federation, and has effectually spiked their latest gun. There is no necessity to refer at any length to the miserable demonstrations that have been held in Waihi, nor to the ignorant impertinence which demands the right to break the law, at its own sweet will, and makes a grievance of having been spanked for naughtiness. The whole situation is too childish and too cheeky for words. Having been lamentably routed in its opening essay at Waihi, the Federation has sought to justify itself by attempting to precipitate a general sympathy strike for one day. This has failed lamentably, for the blare of trumpets and beating of drums that was prophesied has developed into the strains of a tin-can band and the magnificent harmonies of the kazoo and the haircomb. Not ten per cent, of the members of the various unions implicated have responded to the call to knock off work for 24 hours, and those who have "demonstrated" have held parades that have been distinctly half-hearted and draggled at the skirts. In fact, the bottom has dropped absolutely out of the 'impudent attempt of the Federation to dictate a policy of breach to labor in the country, and it is more than gratifying to find that the immense majority of the worker* of the Dominion are not in sympathy with the preposterous proposals of an irresponsible body of agitators who are led by the nose by a few I ill-advised leaders who live on the game. lit is fortunate for the country that so considerable a section of its people are blessed with a modicum of common lense.