CORRESPONDENCE.

Taranaki Daily News, 19 May 1921, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE WELFARE LEAGUE’S CRITICS.

(To the Editor.)

Sir.—We note that the League seems to have drawn a few critics In Taranaki. Amongst these is one, Mr. H. W. Baxter, who poses as a wit. Heaven spare us from any more of such I “Brevity is the soul of wit." For evidence read hew Mr. Baxter subjects his joke to a lingering and painful death'. For your correspondent’s information, and to save him chasing persons not concerned, let us tell him that all our letters are from the League as a body, whether officially signed by Mr. Weir, Mr. Harper or any other secretary. It is noticeable that Mr. Baxter, if not a Red, has at least adopted the Reds’ practice of running away when called upon to meet a direct challenge. We asked him to prove his statement that the League had “used an invective against a Labor union,” and he gives the paltry answer that he cannot be bothered to accept the challenge. He refers us to an article “The New Unionist," which, by the way, is “The New Unionism?’ Well, we invite him to show where there is any invective in that article against a Labor union or unions. Our whole critcism is directed against the spirit of anarchism that has fastened itself on to the body of Labor unionism to its injury.

It is simply shuffling to reply as Mr. Baxter does. This is the sort of thing we meet with from the Red critics of the League. They make charges, and when called on to prove them they try and side-step the Issue by rambling on to something else. Mr. Baxter says he is not surprised that Messrs. Skerrett and Harper have been subjected to the coarsest personal abuse. He appears to approve of such abuse, and seeks to justify his abuse by stating ttat the League has used the words “treacherous,” "brazenly,” “meanness,” “lie," effontry.” He might have added other words, taken entirely away from their context, which would prove nothing but . a verbal trick. We invite him to prove that the League has ever directed an abusive term against, any person. That is what constitutes personal abuse. What we charge the Reds with is that they drop argument altogether, divo into the private affairs of those they are opposing, and resort to the methods of blackguarding individuals. Does Mr. Baxter uphold that sort of thing 7 The words quoted by Mr. Baxter can all be legitimately and fairly used in argument without any personal application. He asserts that he was politely called a liar, but in that he is mistaken. No man can call another a liar and be polite to him. If Mr. Baxter is told ttat he has made a misstatement, that is not calling him a liar; it is merely challenging the correctness of his assertion, which yve do, once oi‘ twice in this letter, without any personal animus towards your correspondent. On belialf of the executive, —I am, etc., G. R. WEIR, Hon. Sec. N.P. Branch.