The Daily News. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14. 1913. SPASMODIC POLITICS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 228, 14 February 1913, Page 4

The Daily News. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14. 1913. SPASMODIC POLITICS.

ill an interview with a newspaper reporter in Cliri.sUiiunh the |[ o n. (_;. Fowhl.s was asked if it was I,is intention tu ••re-enter polities." The reply of the ex-Minister of Education was characteristically pertinent, lie said: polities! I have never left llieni." (If course he has never been ~ut of them, and never will he while hi> eni husia-ui> remain what they are. |!„, hi- remark epitomises a whole lot of common sense. There a re far too many people who seem to think Unit polities, away from a neii- < ral election, onjrht to he left to members of Parliament, newspaper fditnr- and those inevitable individuals who, in season and out of season, are alHicfed with the itdi of writing to tin- press upon every conceivable subject. This is a phase of indifference whieli is fraught with jjravc peril to the country, and unfortunately it is one which is very common. For the first few months preceding a i;eucral election (he electors arcj prone to wake tip and take a little political sustenance, but the moment if j is over they re-lapse into a state of political somnolence. Members of Parliament, and even newspaper editors, whose business is really polities, are not infallible, nor are they always the host '.Hiides of public opinion. Sometimes

they it re the worst, and it is just as well that they should have the support and guidance of a strong and well-conceived ' public opinion of the Jivest nature. What New Zealand requires just now is that every man and woman, and even the children, should ho "in politics," not only at election time, but from poll to poll, forming and maturing their own opinions on the questions of the hour, and seeking to have Iliem adequately represented in Parliament. And what applies to general politics applies with equal force to municipal polities and to social politics. Unless a proposal has some direct bearing upon a man's business or his property, he is disposed to take but little interest in it. What we want is a more impersonal attitude in the consideration of public matters, and a more lively realisation of the fact that we are our brothers' keepers where the general progress of the country and the individual is concerned. We may. through the possession of a private motor-car. be independent of any proposed tramway service, or owning a comfortable freehold be careless 01 how "the other fellow" is getting on in his attempts to satisfydiis land hunger; but this leads only to national as well as personal selfishness. The virile nation is the nation whoso people, sit up and take notice when anything pertaining to its constitution is broached. Spasmodic politics are worse than no politics at all, and if this were properly realised, at the expen.se of some personal sacrifice, we should very soon have a better stamp of man participating in public life.