PUBLIC OPINION.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2600, 7 September 1909, Page 7

PUBLIC OPINION.

COLONIAL NAVAL DEFENCE. Nominally New Zealand’s £2,000.000 will be used in building a Dreadnought for the China Pacific station, which includes New Zealand, but the British Government, while accepting £2,000,000 from the colony with one hand, will pay out with the other an almost equal sum for an effective force of cruisers, destroyers, and submarines, the headquarters of which will be New Zealand. In other words, this force will be a local ‘navy. • To please tho New Zealand Government, the Imperial authorities have accepted the offer of a Dreadnought, but they have at once undertaken to spend a very largo sum Of money on a fleet of cruisers, destroyers, and submarines, whose particular duty will- be the defence of New Zealand. The position, when understood, is an exceedingly satisfactory one, and it will enable New Zealand to take her proper position in the comprehensive scheme for the defence of the Empire which has been arranged.— “Southland Times.” ABUSE OF CHARITY. As a rule there need he no compunction about referring an applicant for assistance to the Charitable Aid Board Or other organisation, for those who are not too proud to ask are not too proud to receive assistance, though it be called' charitable aid. There really should be no actual poverty in . this country, and it is a stam on our social system that it We should, he; doubly careful therefore that there is nothing in- our system which breeds the poverty it relieves. Better organisation and ‘ less indiscriminate private charity may save Us a heap of trouble later on. —“Taranaki Herald.”

NEW ZEALAND’S CHIEF JUSTICE

No foreign . foe could land and hold New Zealand'if the men were armed with modern weapons. If our men prove true grit in an emergency, there will he no need for pusillanimous advice about raising the Stars and Stripes, or any other flag but that adopted by New Zealand. A man who would suggest what flag he would hoist before defending the one he was reared under is not fit to call himself a citizen of a free country; and the Chief Justice- should be plainly told on his return that, his utterances were not approved 1 by the people of this Dominion. If a vote of the people of Maoriland were taken to-morrow on the Stars and Stripes question, Sir Robert Stout would -get a nasty smack over the knuckles for his unpatriotic and cowardly statement, that no body of New Zealanders would endorse. —“Tapanui Courier.” ; ■

THE MINTING QUESTION. Our Government should approach the Imperial Government and negotiate for a New Zealand coinage upon- the same terms as those already made with Australia.- It will then have a term or years in which to arrange for the establishment of a mint within our own shores. Unless this is done we shall soon be paying Australia a handsome toll upon every Australian. silver and copper coin we, circulate, and even if the Commonwealth Government gave us a share of their profit, which is improbable, we should still he advertising Australia gratuitously and foolishly by passing her design upon, coins which should hear our own. —Auckland “Herald.” THE TECHNICAL SCHOOL. The State has. attempted much in fostering education throughout the country, and if parents seconded the efforts of the State by enforcing among (their children attendance at the technical classes, fewer complaints would be heard of the inefficiency and growing inattention of youths in learning a trade, and a higher moral tone would soon manifest itself in the workshop, the factory, and the counting-house.— Napier “Telegraph.” DEFENCE. The man that makes himself a sheep will find plenty of people to shear him, and the nation that leaves its shores open and bare of adequate defence will find watchful and greedy neighbors ready —given a suitable opportunity—to sail into th© opening and mop the profits up. Even tho placid, slanteyed unwarlike Chinaman found himself compelled to look to his defences—the lesson was driven at . last through the armor-plated conservatism of his brain in the days of 1901. A costly diamond exposed in an open shop window is hardly a greater temptation to the thief than an undefended (or inadequately defended) country of rich resources is nowadays "to the world s great military and naval Powers. In the wild international scramble for fresh markets, and for points of vantage to* defend them, the game: of

“grab” has been brought to something like a fine art. Australia and, New Zealand, like the rest, must look to their own. Gunpowder and cold steel never before figured so largely in shaping tho destiny of the nations. It is a return, to barbaric conditions, to the menagerie theory of life. But we have to accept conditions as we find them, while we labor at the same time to bring them towards the Christian ideal of international relations. —“New Zealand Tablet.”