PRESS OPINIONS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 19 August 1913, Page 4

PRESS OPINIONS.

Mr Massey's determination to resist the specious plea for a referendum on the subject of the Bible in schools is particularly gratifying. For no question of so highly involved and contentious a character can be safely submitted to the popular vote until the alternative courses at issue have been clearly defined; and it will be a long time before' the problem of religious instruction in bchoola can betreated in this way without reducing the principle of the referendum to a farce.—Auckland Star.

The best friend of New Zealand is the statesman wno tries to guide it on a safe course and to establish its credit in.quarters where smiling optimism counts for little Unless backed up by sound administration and sane finance.-MUhristchurch News.

It may be doubted whether the Reform Government's solicitude for the independence of the departments will permit the Minister of Education to interfere with the autocracy that has silently established itself in regard to primary education. < It is plain that serious mischief can be wrought by a well-meaning bureaucracy that is not amenable to public opinion, and it is sincerely to be hoped that Parliament will set its face against the principle that popular education is to be entrusted to the unrestricted control of ihe " theorist. —Southland News.

The interests of all three Dominions—New Zealand, Australia, Canada.—are substantially.the same, and the time is opportune for the formulation of «ome definite scheme of concerted action which will safeguard their interests in the Pacific wthout imposing any additional burden on the British Exohequer or impairing the principle of ultimate control by the British Admiralty.—AucklandHerald. - . ~ •