Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, 4 August 1921, Page 14

Current Topics

Anonymous Letters We wish we could impress on all Catholics the folly of reading, and, still more, of replying to, anonymous attacks in the daily papers. The man who writes an offensive letter from behind the hedge of an anonymous name deserves no notice; we have no hesitation in adding that the editor who publishes anonymous attacks on creeds or races has no conception of what he owes to his office. In the old days of duelling a man of self-respect would feel disgraced if he crossed swords with a blackguard. He was ready to fight, but only with gentlemen. We might with advantage borrow somewhat of that code' of honor, and, conscious that only a blackguard would write or publish such cowardly attacks, despise them as they deserve. We should not wonder that the day-lies find room for such. Consider how one of them protects a forger, protects even the hired calumniator of a dead nun, and publishes headlines that attribute to Sinn Fein the murders committed by Orangemen. Nowadays one can hardly touch the day-lies without being defiled. Wherefore, treat them and their anonymous weekly or casual correspondents with the contempt they merit. Coals to Newcastle Moreover, it is futile to waste time refuting or correcting the statements made by hired calumny-mon-gers. “Civis,” for instance, has been exposed as a dishonest forger, and a rabid sectarian bigot. No decentman wants to know anything more of him ; no intelligent man will pay the least attention to what he has to say : the brand of the liar is on him for ever and that is enough. He has had his reward : he has made for the Otago Daily Times a name that stinks in the nostrils of honest men. Leave him at that, and take no more notice of his ravings than you would of the barking of a whipped mongrel. As for the horsewhipped parson and his supporters, much the same is to be said. If there be any who will stand by such a person after the terrible exposure in Auckland and in Parliament, it is only because such persons have lost the use of reason or have no self-respect. He will say exactly the sort of things he is paid to say. No educated person could possibly attach the least importance to his falsehoods. He deserves exactly as much consideration as a man who makes his living by putting all the resources of a foul tongue and a corrupt heart at the disposal of certain people who, for their own ends, want dirty work done that only such a tool will do. Messrs. Fraser, Bishop, and Isitt told, the public what sort that tool was, and no decent person has forgotten it. So, we advise all Catholics to leave the defamer of the dead, the hero of the war on women, the man who ran away from the Auckland Court, to the tender consideration of his friends the day-liars, to the forger, 'Givis,” and to the political mugwumps him useful at election times. The Ulster Elections Reports are now coming to hand to show how the Orangemen secured their seats in the so-called Ulster Parliament. Having begun by driving out Catholic voters and by burning down Catholic homes they were determined to leave nothing undone to secure a large majority. They sent men to the polls to vote for the dead, voting, we are told, for whole graveyards. In some instances one man voted as many as twenty times. Several Sinn Feiners who went to the polls found that Orangemen had voted in their names early in the day. In spite of terror and fraud such as would have rendered the elections void under any but the Lloyd George Government, the total number of votes recorded against Partition was almost a third of the entire poll for the six counties. The Irish World , June 4, says: “The unofficial count of the votes cast in Tuesday’s elections in the six counties of Antrim, Armagh, Down, Fermanagh, Londonderry, and Tyrone shows that the

Unionists received 341,289 votes, the Sinn Feiners 103,516, the Nationalists 60,762, and Independent Labor 5000. According to these figures the NationalistSinn Fein combination ought, in view of the proportion, of their supporters, have about 20 members in the new Parliament to the Unionists’ 32. . . This is a remarkable showing for the anti-Partitionists considering the terror existing, and especially when we consider that the Partitionist strength in the other 26 counties is practically nil.” Thus, British fair play, which boasts of its protection of minorities, attempts to put in the power of the people who burned down the homes of Catholics and sacked presbyteries and convents a whole third of the population of the six counties. No wonder the Labor Party said that the things done under the Union Jack in Ireland made the name of England stink in the nostrils of humanity. Archbishop Mannix Archbishop Mannix will land in Australia this week, and in a few days he will receive in his own city such a welcome as no Australian ever yet received. Lloyd George (acting, we are told, on the advice of “London Catholics,” whose identity recent history enables us to guess at) sent a part of the British fleet to arrest a prelate whose offence was that he spoke the truth and loved justice-great crimes in the sight of the British Government. LIO3M George was not long before ha learned the folly of this outrage. Englishmen and Scotsmen rallied round the Archbishop and proved to him that they were disgusted at the Prussian conduct of their Government. He was received with enthusiasm in many parts of Great Britain, and wherever he went he told the truth about Ireland and exposed the duplicity of the Government. His presence in England was worth a host of warriors for the cause of Sinn Fein, and when he came to leave it he was surrounded by English bishops and priests who came to testify their admiration for him and their reprobation of the insane Government that had put such an outrage upon him. More than that, in Rome he completely foiled the machinations of the British agents who had striven hard to prejudice the Vatican against Ireland. He told the Pope the truth about Ireland ; told him that Ireland was winning, and that those who said she was losing lied : and the result of his visit was a papal pronouncement which recognised Ireland as a whole and undivided nation with which England must treat for peace—a pronouncement very different from that for which the Bournes and the Gasquets and the Howards had labored so long and so vainly. We speak with knowledge of the facts wrfen we say that his visit to Rome completely foiled the foes of Ireland and made an adverse pronouncement impossible, and knowing that we do not wonder that the English “Black-and-Tan” cardinal gave the Archbishop a wide berth in England. Melbourne will rejoice to have its Archbishop home again, and every lover of truth and justice will unite in spirit in its welcome to the champion of democracy and liberty. Secular Schools Mr. Cutten, .the Auckland magistrate, has more than once deplored the fact that a blind Government is ruining the country through schools that undermine the religion of the people. He recently returned to the charge and told his hearers that things had gone so far now that it was only whatever of tone was left in the teachers that had any moral influence on the youth of the Dominion. A period of half a century of secularism has destroyed religious principles in the parents of to-day. - The old homes of other years, which might be relied upon to provide a religious atmosphere, are gone, and the moral tone of the young depends on the chance of finding decent teachers in whatever school they are sent to. That, in substance, was Mr. Cutten’s indictment. Other magistrates have declared from the bench that the sole hope of saving the young people from ruin and degeneration is religion. However, the Parrs and the Bells and the Nos worthy s and the Andersons and the Limavaddys hold their jobs and care

little for the welfare of New Zealand. They are ruining the Dominion politically, morally, financially, but what do. they care ? When are the people going to take a hand in the game? If our State schools are hopeless from' a true educational point of view, that is if they fail to form character, as every secular school must fail, we cannot console ourselves that they are making a success of purely secular instruction. The examiners who tested the candidates at the last national scholarship examinations report unfavorably. According to the United Press Association, one examiner says that all the papers in the public service and senior national scholarships were poor, showing bad spelling and grammatical ignorance. The reports on the pupil teachers' examination for Class D certificates show that the ignorance also extends to the teachers. Such are the schools which the egregious Hanan and his predecessors left us ! ,

Our Legislators What better can we expect from our legislators? We could name half a dozen of our M.P.'s whom no wise man would put in charge of a motor car. We are certain that seventy per cent, of them would display even more appalling ignorance of grammar, geography, and history than the" pupils of the State schools have done. In the second volume of his recent work, Modern Democracies, Viscount Bryce tells the world what sort of muddlers we are content to elect for Parliament in this country:

"The House of Representatives is in one sense too representative, for its members are little above the average of their electors in knowledge or ability . . . nearly all my New Zealand informants declared that the quality of the legislature, instead of rising with the growth of the country, had declined during the last thirty years, and that the debates were now on a lower level than in the days of Sir George Grey or Sir Harry Atkinson. . . The country has no lack of capable men, thoughtful and well-educated,none of the selfgoverning Dominions has a larger proportion,—but very few of those seem to find their way into the Legislature. . . . The standard not only of attainments, but of debates and of manners also, leaves something to be desired. Thinking bears a low ratio... to talking." That is the judgment of a great scholar and a distinguished statesman. Ignorant, incompetent, and ill-mannered he finds our elected representatives. One wonders if he is thinking of Lord Limavaddy when he talks of manners! But surely he does not know that as the present Government consists of P.P.A. hirelings it is impossible to find in it anything better than what he does find. Decent, educated, well-bred men do not do the sort of things these persons pledged themselves to do when they were put in power by a gang of bigots.

Ministerial Mugwumps Dr. Dillon exposed the monumental ignorance of the tricksters who went to Versailles after the war to make the world safe for hypocrisy, and people were not astonished. We had long learned to regard Lloyd George and all of his class as being more learned in Marconi shares than in geography or grammar. And we do not forget that among the smaller sprats at that infamous gathering was our William. Would that we could have for one season his speeches unexpurgated ! That picture of him making his now historic gesture from a balcony in Wellington will never be perfect until we have a string of his ipsissima verba under it. As for Australian, political squibs, the Catholic Press (June 9) gives us some interesting flashlight snaps of them. George Reid never read a book, and was unable to speak the English of educated people. Premier McGowen also said he never read a book, and when asked whence he got his information replied: "From the newspapers and listening to blokes talking." When Pius X. was elected, Sir John See said to a friend: "This new Pope must be a learned man. . . I read somewhere that he preaches in the vernacular language That is a sort of Hebrew, isn't it?" It is recorded that

when a teacher complained to Education Minister Jacob Garrard about defects in the curriculum he said he would send a plumber to make it right. What fun we miss by not getting true reports of all that certain- of our political luminaries say in the House! Some gems from that M.P. who bit an olive on the way to Samoa and complained that the plums were " bitterwould be of general interest. We have seen Minister Parr's awful letter to the children, and surely there are others who could amuse us even more by their silly twaddle if they only got a chance. Considering how useless they are, it might be a good suggestion to get them to tour the country and give shows to the public in the various theatres. A select few from the Upper House might be included. MacGregor on history, for instance Lee on broadmindedness; and Anderson on statesmanship would be a fine combination. But of course we shall have to wait until the prima ten-ore robo comes back to enliven the stage with his gestures.

General Crozier's Revelations It is significant of the honor and esteem in which British Ministers ar9 held that Irish children have made the name Greenwood a synonym for a downright lie. We have heard it even here more than once. When somebody uttered a statement that was plainly beyond belief the remark was made: "That's a Greenwood."Like master like man! Greenwood, Lloyd George, and every British journalist from Dunedin to Dundee are tarred with the same brush. Lies get a long start, as, from Luther to the horsewhipped cad (whose calumnies the Otar/e Daily gave great prominence to recently) every bigot and No-Popery ranter knows well, but lies are eventually found out and liars usually find their level in the end. No decent man pays the least attention nowadays to the editorial ravings of a Colonial day-lie; no man in his senses would trust the word of a British Minister— of our friend Sir Francis Bell. Constant exposure has shown us what British Ministers and British pressmen are, and we are not likely to forget it. Of all the shameful and incontrovertible exposures none could compare with that recently made by General Crozier who has proved to the hilt the charge that Lloyd George and Greenwood were aiders and abettors of the murders, sacrileges, and thefts of their _ Black-and-Tan agents in Ireland. There is no denying it now; General Crozier speaks with the authority of one who knows; he was actually in command of the criminals and he resigned because he was too decent to become accessory to their crimes as Greenwood and the English Premier did. He asserts publicly in the Daily News that during the six months of his command "murder, arson, looting, and other forms of terrorism were practised by the Crown forces, rendering his position impossible and making his resignation imperative." Greenwood and Lloyd George made the mistake of putting an honest man in command and he refused to stoop as low as their level. His first revelation throws a'flood of light on the alleged Sinn Fein crimes. He says: "Disguised as members of the Irish Republican army a company of auxiliaries held up the Post Office at Kilkenny last September, gagged and bound the mail sorters and opened twenty bags of mail Most of the money found was stolen and the letters thrown into the river." - x The day-liars told us that Father Griffin was killed by Sinn Femers. The General says he is prepared to swear that he was informed by a certain cadet that he had murdered Father Griffin, and that a certain officer whose name was given stood by and later buried the priest's body in a bog. The officer now holds an important position in Ireland. General Crozier adds that a very high official in Dublin Castle and a police officer m the west were directly involved in the suppression of evidence bearing on the murder. . General Crozier holds important information concerning the murder of Michael O'Callaghan former mayor of Limerick. He states that a former member of the auxiliaries, who threatened an exposure of the circumstances under which three men were killed at Kill-

aloe "while endeavoring to escape,” was “squared” by the Government. * General Crozier testifies that after the slaughter at Croke Park one of his best officers came to him and said: “It was the most disgraceful show I have ever seen. “Black-and-Tans” fired into the crowd without any provocation whatever.” . General Crozier tells how a company of auxiliaries, whose colonel was dismissed from the service, mutined in Cork and were sent to Dublin to be disciplined. They threatened that unless their colonel was reinstated they would "tell who burned Cork, naming the officers implicated and those that pumped gasoline on the City Hall and fired incendiary rockets on to the roof.” The colonel was reinstated through fear of the revelations. The General tells also of instances of common theft and plunder. He resigned because the men who did such things were protected by the British Government. That is what our Colonial day-liars stand for.