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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 74

VI

VI.

We charge the Ministry with helping to produce in New Zealand a state of society in many respects not unlike chattel slavery.

The Collectivist policy of the sham Liberals has dragged our colony a considerable length in this direction. The numerical majority are now unquestionably supreme, and may do whatever they please, without any constitutional checks, except our connection with Great Britain. The foolish are now the masters of the wise; and those who have little or nothing can, at their pleasure, dispose of the whole property of the colony, and vote it over to themselves. Yes, the numerical majority, possessed of absolute or despotic power, may lawfully rob us of our means and substance, and make slaves of the minority. To this extent have we approached towards the form of slavery which prevailed in Peru under the Incas, and in Paraguay under the Jesuits.

Under sham Liberal Collectivists, the enslavement of New Zealand has long been insidiously and gradually going on. To the superficial and thoughtless this allegation will appear untrue, even ridiculously untrue. We, therefore, will now state plainly the reasons or grounds on which we rest the allegation that Ministers are pursuing a policy which is making slaves of us.

A slave has three conspicuous marks or characteristics,

First. He is owned by others, not by himself.

Second. He is prescribed and dictated to, directed and ordered about, in respect of his food his drink, his employments, the means by which he earns his living, etc.

Third. He has his remuneration or wages regulated for him, the amount of money required to keep him alive and propogate his page 11 kind, and the amount or surplus of his labour which goes to his owners.

To what extent are these marks to be found in us ?

1. Are we truly owners of ourselves, or are we not? The Seddon Government is avowedly Collectivist and Socialistic, and, as such, claims to own us as the Tsar owned his serfs. The true Liberal doctrine is that the State was made for man (individually), and not man for the State. Socialistic Collectivism means the opposite: it claims that Governments are a kind of small gods, and possess divine rights over the persons and properties of their subjects. We deny that Governments have any such divine rights, or are in any sense gods. Men individually may all be made in the image and likeness of God; but Representative Governments are all necessarily made in the image and likeness of the numerical majority or multitude, who (according to Carlyle, from whose opinion we dissent) are mostly fools. If we continue to suffer ourselves to be vassals and bondsmen of a Collectivist and Socialistic Government, we are far gone in the direction of slavery.

2. Another mark of a slave is that the whole work of his life is dictated and measured out, and ordered for him by others, and not by himself. And is it not true that the leading feature of the policy of the Government is to measure out and control the daily actions of all classes ? Is it not true that the wage or recompense people should receive in connection with whatever they do is to be fixed, not by the People themselves, but by others, by Government, by the cliques and combinations which so often boss Government ? Is it not true that the days and hours during which we are to work and during which we are to play and amuse ourselves, are to be defined and settled by Government, just as if we were all children and incapables? If such be our condition, it is high time to consider whether we are really independent and free, or merely hinds and bondagers of the State.

3. The last characteristic of a slave is that the fruit or outcome of his exertions belongs, not to himself, but to others. Through our borrowing and blundering, the property of our Colonists is so heavily mortgaged to outside creditors, and so oppressively taxed and rated, that the ablest financiers allege that little more than the half of its value belongs to the owners. Of every pound that our labour creates, some seven shillings, it is said, go to Government and creditors, who are thus our masters and owners in the precise sense in which slaves were mastered and owned in America. The Editor of this Magazine page 12 had a personal knowledge of slavery in the Southern States. In [unclear: the] towns there it was the usual custom of slave-owners to hire out [unclear: if] slaves by the week at (say) five dollars. On an average, about [unclear: the] dollars of this wage went to the slave himself for shelter and [unclear: con]sistence, and two dollars went to his master and owner. It is [unclear: means] the same with us in New Zealand. About three-fifths of the [unclear: pro]ceeds or produce of our labours go to ourselves, while two-fifths [unclear: and] into the pockets of others, our Government, and the outside [unclear: ghtuer] tors to whom our property is so heavily mortgaged, who are, in [unclear: the] respect, our real owners and masters.

If, then, the three things which constitute a slave be—[unclear: what] is owned and mastered by others, that almost all the action [unclear: and] life are commanded and ordered by others, and that a large pr[unclear: o]tion of the fruit of his exertions passes from him over to others follows that we are scarcely entitled to consider ourselves, in the sense of the words, Independent and Free.

James Wallis.

Note.—All communications in connection with "The New Zealander" to the addressed to Dr. Wallis, care of the " Observer " Office, Wyndham-street, Auckland.

decorative feature

Printed by Geddis and Blomfield, at the Observer Office, Wyndham-street, Auckland, for the proprietor. Dr. Walllis—auckland, October 31, 1896.