[Editor: This article, regarding the issue of conscription during the First World War (1914-1918) and its connection to the White Australia Policy, was published in The Sydney Morning Herald (Sydney, NSW), 29 November 1917.]
White Australia.
Mr. F. E. McLean, speaking at Port Kembla, said that the no-conscription leaders had raised a bogey about the White Australia policy being in danger.
It was only the strength of Britain behind us which made it possible to maintain the White Australia policy. If the Allies were defeated, and the protecting arm of Great Britain was withdrawn from us, what chance would there be of Australia remaining white?
If Germany should succeed in defeating Britain, she would develop this territory according to her own ideas. If she wanted black labour, she would use it, being exceedingly careful that all the best jobs went to her own people. White or black, Australian labour would be bound in iron chains.
The fight for the “Yes” vote in the referendum was a clear and definite struggle for the maintenance of a White Australia, and for the preservation of what Sir Henry Parkes called the predominant British character of our Australian population.
Source:
The Sydney Morning Herald (Sydney, NSW), 29 November 1917, p. 8
Editor’s notes:
bogey = an imagined cause for fear or alarm (may also refer to: someone or something which causes fear or alarm; a frightening or haunting specter, especially a “bogeyman”); an evil or mischievous spirit; a demon, ghost, goblin, or another hostile supernatural creature; the Devil (also spelt: bogie)
F. E. McLean = Francis Edward McLean (1863-1926), clerk, accountant, and politician; he was a Free Trade member of the New South Wales parliament (1894-1901) and of the Australian parliament (1901-1903); he was born in Sydney (NSW) in 1863, and died in Springwood (NSW) in 1926
See: 1) “Biography for McLEAN, the Hon. Francis Edward”, Parliament of Australia
2) “Mr. Francis Edward McLean”, The Daily Telegraph (Sydney, NSW), 13 July 1894, p. 5
3) “Deaths”, The Sydney Morning Herald (Sydney, NSW), 8 April 1926, p. 10 [includes a death notice for Francis Edward McLean]
[Editor: The original text has been separated into paragraphs.]
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