MINISTERS AND MORALS
CHARGES BY MR JUDKINS
“MAKING LIGHT OF EVIL”
Charges against public men of sneering at reform
and making light of
evil were made by Mr WH Judkins at a “pleasant Sunday afternoon” at the
Wesley
church yesterday.
Mr Judkins, who remarked that he spoke without
venom, said that some of
our public men were minimising the seriousness of public wrongs, having
seemingly no
conscience with regard to great public evils. He proposed to call
certain witness to prove
his statement. His first witness was the Prime Minister. A
few days ago Mr
Fisher speaking to a deputation on the land tax, went
considerably out of his way to
sneer at some of the things lately being done in the interests of
reform. He said
that if some of the leaders of public thoughts were to be
believed no decent person
should go within ten miles of a public park. There is no
authority for that
remark. Attention has been directed to the fact that gross
immoralities had been and
were still carried on in the parks. It was a serious thing for a
man in an important
position to sneer at men who were striving to make the community more
moral.
The second witness was the Premier of Victoria. Two or three weeks ago,
in order to prove
that the police department was helpless or unwilling to do
certain things he (Mr
Judkins) made personal investigations. Mr Murray, referring
to Chinese
gambling institutions, said that the gambling going on at those
places was no more
than that going on in a private house over a quiet game of cards. This
was another case of
making light of wrong-doing. The third witness was the
Postmaster-General, who
a little while ago said in effect that it was not worth while to try
and prevent gambling
institutions from flooding the land with literature. He
disagreed with Mr
Thomas in holding that legislation against this would lead to a wide
spread opening of
correspondence generally. Mr Thomas also said that it was just as
wrong for a man to
try to get into a particular gambling institution in order to try to
prove that the police
department was not doing its duty as it would be for a man to try to
get into a private
house. The two things were altogether different. A gambling
institution was
open to anyone who wanted to gamble, and as gambling was breaking the
law the institution
was outside the realm of law-abiding homes.
If it were possible to call him, Mr Judkins
continued, his next witness
would be the poor fellow who was killed at Ballarat in a prize
fight. It was called
a boxing contest, but it was a fight in which men fought for a
prize. It was
peculiar that everybody who gave evidence at the inquest tried to
prove that the man
was killed as the result of the fight. It was said that he fell
on his head on the
floor. According to that reason, if he (Mr Judkins) pushed a man
over a cliff, and
the man was broken up on the rocks below, he (Mr Judkins) would not be
guilty of his
death. Somebody had the impertinence to suggest that he (Mr
Judkins) was
slandering a dead man. That was a vicious lie. (Hear,
hear) The last
witness was Mr Farthing - A. Farthing - (Laughter) - president of the
beer selling
association. He had accused him (Mr Judkins) of telling obscene filthy
yarns. Was
that true?
Voices, - “No.”
Mr Judkins - When he wrote to Mr Farthing
asking for an
explanation, he replied that to find out what the filthy yarn was
he would have to
search the files of the newspapers for the last three years.
(Laughter) Mr
Farthing and the rest of his brothers in the bad business had been
having such a bad time
that they were wildly excited, fearing financial loss.
From THE ARGUS 12th September 1910 page 8
