MR RUSSELL'S ADDRESS TO THE ELECTORS.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 2338, 5 July 1887, Page 2

MR RUSSELL'S ADDRESS TO THE ELECTORS.

TO THE EDITOR. isiH, —In the same day's paper in which Mr Russell first inserted his address to the electors there was a short paragraph stating that Mr Russell was an old hand at electioneering, and on that account he would make a good show’. These may not he the exact words, but to me at the time I took it to he that he considered himself up to the dodges of electioneering, and was able to hocus the electors. I am assuming that Mr Russell wrote the paragraph himself, seeing that he is the proprietor of the News. This may he taken for granted. When f come to read his address I found it all gaiivnnn, and that it would not stand broking into. .Mr Russell made the mistake that all men of gammon and sham and not tme make —that is that the men he is trying to gammon are fools. He says ho is going in for drastic retrenchment. At the same time he is in favour of the present Ministry. How on earth can he be in favour of retrenchment and still he a supporter of the present Ministry? Why, the present Ministry are the incarnation of reckless spending. What would yon think of a man preaching in the highway that he was all for drastic purity, and at the same time he had taken his hoard and lodgings in a brothel ? Why, you would say he was a drastic rogue and sham. It would be impossible for a pure man to live in a brothel, and it would he impossible for a supporter of the present Ministry to be a drastic retroncher. .Mr Russell is a protectionist, and would foster local industries. Now, there is a mistake about this word foster. Why, all men, including the most ardent free trader, would foster local industries, hut what we free traders object to is bolstering up in a fictitious manner any industry at the expense of the many for the benefit of the few. In America the farmers are robbed and swindled by protection, ami they know it well, and when once the West gets a lit tle stronger, protection will cease. The bait that protectionists throw out to the farmer is that local industries would create more mouths to eat the produce of the farmers. This won't stand looking into. I tell the farmers that though every inch id cloth and every pound of iron that we use was made in the colony, not one farthing would the fanners’ produce rise. Xo doubt if the production was to stand as it is at present, more mouths to feed Would rise the price of fanners’ produce ; but this is not what would he. The production here is unlimited, and for every one mouth extra to feed there would be food raised for ten, so that prices would get less instead of more, and to this would he added that everything lie cats—except his own—or implements he uses, or clothes ho wears, would be doubled in price. Protection all round is an evil. It is thrown out as a bait to working men that if everything we need was made in the colony there would be plenty of work and high wages, I tell working men that they would have le>s work and less pay. I will show them how; Upon the strength ni the demand, there would lie a rush m ide at manufacturing. This for the moment would give work, but this rush would cause also a rush being made on hands employed. In a very few months there would in; ten times more manufactured than what was required. This ten times more being made would also have created ten times more hands. The over-supply of goods, hard and soft, would cause a stoppage in making, and then we would have ten idle men for everyone we have now, and then there would be starvation wages for the men, and not work at that. I know what I am talking about. I was employed in America upon an industry which was protected by about forty per cent, and although I have not been in America for thirty years I have ways and means of knowing what is going on in these same protected industries. I know that the production through protection has increased far beyond the demand required, and the proprietors of these industries flee to what in their idea is their saff ey, the}' are endeavouring to reduce wages, and within thejlast two years they have been encouraging hundreds of male and female employers to leave the old country, not that they are slo ut of hands, but that wages may he brought down : hut this wont save the masters, they must go to first causes, and that is, there is an over supply of goods made. There is just one cure for this, all other cures will be mere fads, not for one moment do I believe that Stout, Vogel, Balance and Co. believe in protection, they only make use of it as a political cry ; what they want is money, they now can only get this by putting on duty on goods. Mr Russell or some other protectionist may think he may have me there. He may say that if the goods were made here, there would lie no duty, consequently no money ; but I say, unless the duties were wholly prohibitive, local industries could not succeed, and they. Stout and Co., may just hare stopped within that wholly prohibitive duty. This would give them the money; hut even if they do put on a duty wholly prohibitive, it would be a year nr two before the duties would cease, and by that time they would have some other reckless dodge. Everything must he subordinated to the one thing, that is, keep in office. Mr Editor, what is to be the outcome of all this rascality of keeping office ? I plainly see what it will end in ; it will end in bloodshed. By-and-bye, if wc really have protection, we will have thousands of starving unemployed. Democracy has the power. It is not to be thought that they will allow themselves to be taxed ; they will command the Government, the Government to keep in their places will give pay to them, and will encourage them in any scheme. We will then have

doctrines put in practice which we only now bear of. It will lie said that the land belongs to the State, not to individuals. The owners of land will be satisfied. After that, when the land is pone, will come confusion, wilderness, devilry and madness. This political dishonesty can only end in the long run in something fearful. Mr Kditnr, what a difference there is now from the time of Stafford and Gillies. That Government went out upon the f for £ snlisidy. Mow, whether the subsidy was right or wrong has nothing to do with the question. Here was a Government which knew they would be thrown out if they did away with the subsidy. The losing office had no effect upon them ; they would do away with the subsidy and they did go out. They also knew perfectly well that they could, by bribery, have carried the day. But no, thev would not bribe; they had political honesty, and nothing could swerve them. O God ! what a change now. Keep office, keep office, no matter at what ruination to the country ! Mr Kditnr, if a man murders another he is hanged. Here political rogues murder a whole nation and all their posterity, and there is nothing done to them. Give ns a Vigilence Committee so that we niav hang them ! —Yours truly, Hak.M'll I. Harapipi, 30th June, 1 s>7.