ARCHBISHOP MANNIX.

Taranaki Daily News, 19 August 1920, Page 9

ARCHBISHOP MANNIX.

PRIME MINISTER'S DENUNCIATION. Bendigo, July 26. The Prime Minister made a striking speech in Bendigo Town Hall on Saturday night at a meeting of - the local branch of the National Federation. He spoke with great vigour, and fiercely denounced the recent utterances of Dr Mannix in America. " The British Empire, lie said, was surrounded by enemies. It was being attacked by Bolshevism, Sinn Feipism, and Germanism. The British Empire was a League of Nations, bound together by ties of blood and race. If they broke Britain they broke us. "I care not," said the Prime Minister, "what they think of England as England, but I am concerned as to what the effect of that will be to Australia. It means the death of us, and because of that I will smite them hip and thigh." (Loud cheers). As to Dr Mannix, whoever he represented, he did not represent Australia, and when he said the sentiments he uttered were supported by the bulk of the people of Australia then ho said that which was not true. i(Renewed cheers). In the last few years they had been under no illusion at all about fiim, and they knew that he had only one objective, and that was the destruction of the Empire, or, at any rate, a republic in Ireland. I have always been a Home Ruler, I am not going to say Ireland has not had grievances, but I am irrevocably opposed to a republic in Ireland. (Loud cheers). I will fight it tooth and nail by every means in my power, because, I say, that it means the dismemberment of the Empire, and the dismembernment of the Empire means the destruction of Australia.

Archbishop Mannix went to America after having figured here very prominently during the election campaign. He said throughout that his tdur was not a political one, that he was going to the Vatican. If the archbishop was going to the Vatican what was he doing in Ameriea ? Was that the nearest way to Italy? "Wo are not concerned at all with the archbishop as such. Our quarrel with him has not got anything to do with religion, (Cheers). We have, thank God, in our ranks very many loyal Roman Catholics, and we have lived in peace and harmony, and| we always did live in peace and harmony until he came here, His predecessor was a Christian—(Cheers)— but this man. this Hieh Priest, goes

to America on a 'non-political' mission, and he says that his one hope is that England and America will be Enemies, and that Ireland will fight England, and that America will fight England. If that hope is realised ws shall see a war the like of which the world has never seen. We shall see the destruction of the only bulwark of peace that exists from this country. The hope pf peace in this world lies not in tho League of Nations, but in that firm* alliance, understanding, and co-opera-tion which has existed for over a hundred years between America and Britain and the British Empire, The hope of the world lies in the closer association of the Anglo-Saxon race. (Cheers). That man, therefore, who seeks to make bad blood between the British Empire and America is a criminal. (Loud cheers).

"If it is necessary to choose between the Kaiser and him as to whom was the greater criminal, I know whom I should choose. The Kaiser was pushed into this, but lie went into it of his own free will. (Cheers.) Dr. Mannix is your enemy, and shall he your enemy for all time. By these words he stands condemned as a minister of Christ. (Cheers). He stands condemned as a man who said his mission was not a political one." Let them show him in those words one thing that savoured of the doctrine of Christ; one thing that any minister dare speak from the pulpit t It seemed to him that there was a man who had gone out under the guise of au archbishop to foment war between England and America. His mission was political in essence. He was there as the right hand of de Valera, who, during the war, said that Germany was their friend, and that the only hope for Ireland was the German invasion of England. That was the man who in 1917 said:—l speak not as a priest, hut as an honest, loyal citizen," and that was the man, too, whose machinations broke the Labour Party, that was the man who,stood behind, fomented and directed all that cataract of hatred which was directed against him and all such men as him. The Prime Minister said he wanted to say to the American people that Dr. Mannix was not representative of the people of Australia. Sr. Mannix Etood out for what he was. He was a Sinn Feiner, a man who, under the garb of a priest, carried the baton of apolitical agitator, to debase his high position for a base purpose. Tha people of Australia looked to America for a continuance of those cordial relations which had always existed between

America and Australia. We wanted to do business with America, We realised that her destiny afid ours coincided in the Pacific, and wo wanted her to help us in the Pacific. Continuing, Mr Hughes saifl that realising how important it was that the true sentiment of Australia should be represented in America, the Government, intended to appoint a High Commissioner in America, who would be able to speak with authority when such a man as Dr. Manniw ventured on utterances that were repugnant to the jpeople of the country.