Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T16:55:14.024Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Lilliput Under Siege: New Zealand Society and its Schools during the ‘Red Scare,’ 1919–1922

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2017

Roger Openshaw
Roger Openshaw*
Affiliation:
Education Department of Massey University, New Zealand
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Undifferentiated fear of left-wing radicalism, defined by its enemies as ‘militant socialism’ or ‘Bolshevism,’ has had important consequences for schools in western societies during certain crucial periods. In the years immediately following the Russian revolution, public education in Britain, North America and Australasia was subjected to intense pressure aimed at making schools assume a greater role in resisting subversion. This pressure, in many instances, was to lead not only to increased instruction in patriotism but also to the systematic monitoring of teacher and pupil loyalty. In the United States many state legislatures instituted loyalty oaths for teachers, while the investigations of the Lusk Committee resulted in the dismissal of teachers suspected of harbouring left-wing sympathies. In New Zealand the introduction of compulsory school flag-saluting and teacher's loyalty oaths during 1921 were roughly contemporary and were similarly motivated. Apart from affording an interesting comparison with larger countries, New Zealand, with its largely centralised education system and small population, was a country where public fear of left-wing radicalism was unhesitantly expressed and where appropriate educational remedies were quickly tried. In particular, this article considers three vital factors which shaped patriotic education in New Zealand schools during the early 1920s: the widespred, generalised public alarm over left-wing militancy; the attempts, largely by professional educators, to shape syllabus requirements to counter the possible subversion of school children; and the Government's increasing willingness to resort to regulation and legislation to weed out disloyal teachers.

Type
Articles
Information
History of Education Quarterly , Volume 20 , Issue 4 , Winter 1980 , pp. 403 - 424
Copyright
Copyright © 1981 by History of Education Society 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Notes

1 About 1.2 million, in 1921.Google Scholar

2 Mitchell, D., 1919: Red Mirage (London, 1970), pp. 136–137.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Murray, R. K., Red Scare. A Study in National Hysteria (New York, 1964), p. 16.Google Scholar

4 Waikato Times (Hamilton, daily) (3 March 1919). Hereafter referred to as WT .Google Scholar

5 WT, (4 March 1919).Google Scholar

6 WT, (8 March 1919).Google Scholar

7 New Zealand Parliamentary Debates, vol. 184, (1919), p.2. Hereafter NZPD .Google Scholar

8 NZPD, 184, (1919), p. 469.Google Scholar

9 NZPD, 186, (1920), p. 279.Google Scholar

10 NZPD, 187, (1920), p. 552.Google Scholar

11 New Zealand Yearbook, (1921–22), p. 524. The total number of disputes in 1920 exceeded those for 1913, New Zealand's worst year for strikes. The total number of striking workers, however, was far less than on the earlier occasion.Google Scholar

12 Yearbook, (1923), p. 607. The Wellington dispute broke out on 18 February when some 2,000 men walked off the wharves in protest over their working hours. The dispute spread to the Auckland wharves a day later; and was all settled through Massey's personal intervention.Google Scholar

13 New Zealand Herald (Auckland, daily) (22 January 1921). Hereafter NZH .Google Scholar

14 NZH (26 January 1921). See also Thompson, A. B., Adult Education in New Zealand: A Critical and Historical Survey (Wellington, 1945), pp. 92–93. Thompson describes how, following widely publicized complaints that students were being indoctrinated with left-wing views, the Canterbury University Senate set up a special committee of investigation.Google Scholar

15 See Barber, L. H., “The Social Crusader: James Gibb at the Australasian Pastoral Frontier, 1882–1925.” (Ph.D. dissertation, Massey University 1975), pp. 208–209.Google Scholar

16 NZH (14 March 1921).Google Scholar

17 NZH (21 April 1921).Google Scholar

18 NZH (9 April 1921).Google Scholar

19 O'Farrell, P. J., Harry Holland, Militant Socialist (London, 1964), p. 97.Google Scholar

20 Ibid., p. 97.Google Scholar

21 Thus the Reform Party strengthened its own position with the electorate in 1919 by contrasting its own patriotic and imperial zeal with the “disloyalty” of the Labour Party. Reform won 46 seats and Labour, 8, while Liberal's seats dwindled to 20.Google Scholar

22 O'Farrell, , Harry Holland, p. 108.Google Scholar

23 NZPD, vol. 156 (1920), p. 279.Google Scholar

24 War Regulations Act, 1914, 5 Geo. V., New Zealand Statutes, pp. 128–129.Google Scholar

25 Bell's experience as a lawyer had made him a valued member of the Reform Government and the succeeding National Government. After the War, as a member of the Legislative Council, Bell advised Massey on the question of wartime legislation. He was deeply concerned with the extent of left-wing radicalism in the Dominion, but while he appears to have favoured the retention of regulations that would discourage agitation, especially on the wharves, he did express some misgivings over the Government's intention to ban “seditious strikes.” (See NZPD, vol. 187 [1920], p. 3).Google Scholar

26 Police Offences Amendment Act, 1919, 10 Geo. V. Statutes, clause two, p. 56. A point made by Labour members who opposed the bill on precisely these grounds.Google Scholar

27 NZPD, vol. 187 (1920), p. 358.Google Scholar

28 War Regulations Continuance Act, 1920, 11 Geo. V, Statutes, clause eight, p. 69.Google Scholar

29 Ibid., clause fourteen, p. 69.Google Scholar

30 War Regulations Continuance Act, 1920, clause two, p. 58.Google Scholar

31 NZPD, vol. 187 (1920), p. 3.Google Scholar

32 NZH (31 March 1921). The Irish names of the two Defendants, together with Poynton's reference to “sectarian strife” suggests that some of the material in their possession related to the current crisis in Ireland.Google Scholar

33 NZH (12 April 1921).Google Scholar

34 NZH (16 April 1921).Google Scholar

35 NZH (17 April 1921). The Defendant's solicitor argued unsucessfully that the pamphlet was “evolutionary” rather than “revolutionary.” Google Scholar

36 NZH (25 April 1921).Google Scholar

37 Ibid.Google Scholar

38 NZH (28 April 1921).Google Scholar

39 NZH (2 May 1921).Google Scholar

40 NZH (9 May 1921).Google Scholar

41 NZH (10 May 1921).Google Scholar

42 NZH (12 May 1921).Google Scholar

43 Ibid.Google Scholar

44 NAH (19 May 1921).Google Scholar

45 National Education (1919), p. 2.Google Scholar

46 Ibid., p. 3. These were: (a) health and sound physical growth, (b) hygienic school conditions and grounds, (c) social and moral training to fit young people to become citizens in the community, (d) scientific and technical training adequate to industrial and commercial ends, (e) intellectual and artistic culture for enlarging the life of the individual, and (f) knowledge of his own and other nations' history and geography.Google Scholar

47 Ibid., p. 4.Google Scholar

48 Ibid., F. L. Combs was a Wairarapa headmaster, later to become President of the Institute in 1927–1928.Google Scholar

49 Ibid., de Berry, L. F. M. A. Dip. Ed. (Otago), was at the time of the Conference, Headmaster of Marton District High School, about 42 kilometres northwest of Palmerston North. De Berry had been a member of the Institute for many years and was president in 1917. Later, he became Principal of the Dunedin Normal School (1928), and was President of the New Zealand Headmasters' Association (1930). His interest in making education more relevant to the needs of an increasingly industrialized society was demonstrated through his long-standing contributions to WEA summer school activities.Google Scholar

50 Ibid., pp. 11–12.Google Scholar

51 Ibid.Google Scholar

52 National Education (1919), p. 21.Google Scholar

53 AJHR (1920): E-2 (Appendix B), p. iv.Google Scholar

54 Ibid., p. xix.Google Scholar

55 Ibid., p. xvi.Google Scholar

56 Department of Education, Syllabus of Instruction 1919, Wellington.Google Scholar

57 1919 Syllabus, p. 24.Google Scholar

58 Ibid., p. 82.Google Scholar

59 Syllabus of Instruction for Public Schools, 1904, New Zealand Gazette 1904, p. 1085.Google Scholar

60 1919 Syllabus, p. 79.Google Scholar

61 NZG (1904), p. 1086.Google Scholar

62 1919 Syllabus, p. 81.Google Scholar

63 AJHR (1922): E-1, p. 3.Google Scholar

64 AJHR (1923): E-2, (Appendix A), p. iii.Google Scholar

65 Ibid., p. ii.Google Scholar

66 Ibid., p. iii.Google Scholar

67 Maoriland Worker (Wellington) (2 June 1921). Hereafter referred to as MW .Google Scholar

68 Ibid. Google Scholar

69 MW (2 November 1921).Google Scholar

70 MW (2 March 1921).Google Scholar

71 Ibid.Google Scholar

72 Ibid.Google Scholar

73 Probably, no more than 250 children attended the three socialist Sunday Schools at any one time. In 1919, the Wellington school claimed to have an average attendance of 83 children.Google Scholar

74 NZH (27 May 1921).Google Scholar

75 Ibid.Google Scholar

76 Ibid.Google Scholar

77 Ibid.Google Scholar

78 NZH (29 May 1921).Google Scholar

79 NZH (7 June 1921).Google Scholar

80 Strong, T. B., “The Inculcation of Patriotism,” Education Gazette (1 November 1921): 2–4 and, “Saluting the Flag”, Education Gazette (1 December 1922): 138–140.Google Scholar

81 Education Gazette (1 November 1921): 2.Google Scholar

82 Ibid: 3.Google Scholar

83 Ibid. See especially Kidd, Benjamin, The Science of Power, London, 1918.Google Scholar

84 Quoted from The Communist by Parr, , in response to an inquiry by the Government Member for Waipara, Hunter, George Sir. (NZPD, vol. 191 [1921]; pp. 461–462.Google Scholar

85 See above: 10.Google Scholar

86 NZH (20 August 1921).Google Scholar

87 By contrast, Stych, Thomas and Shemock, Alexander (see above, p. 9), were each fined twenty-five pounds while the Swede Eduard Johnson (see above, pp. 9–10), was jailed for three months.Google Scholar

88 NZPD, vol. 191 (1921) p. 970.Google Scholar

89 Ibid., p. 934.Google Scholar

90 Particularly at the latter. See especially, Beaglehole, J. C., Victoria University College, (Wellington, 1949), pp. 182–199. Beaglehole provides a particularly full discussion of the Victoria University College Debating Society, and how its selection of left-wing topics and guest speakers aroused Parr's suspicions.Google Scholar

91 NZH (2 September 1921).Google Scholar

92 NZH (10 September 1921).Google Scholar

93 Ibid. Though Weitzel claimed in court that she had on several occasions discussed “sociological questions” with other students. (NZH, [9 September 1921]).Google Scholar

94 NZH (10 September 1921). The inquiry into Victoria University College conducted by the Council reached similar conclusions, though it was revealed that some students owned copies of books banned under the War Regulations Continuance Act. (See Beaglehole, , Victoria University College, p. 193).Google Scholar

95 Ibid.Google Scholar

96 National Education (1921) p. 301.Google Scholar

97 Manawatu Daily Times (7 September 1921) Hereafter referred to as MDT .Google Scholar

98 MDT (8 September 1921).Google Scholar

99 NZH (19 October 1921).Google Scholar

100 NZH (25 June 1921).Google Scholar

101 NZPD, vol. 191 (1921), p. 463.Google Scholar

102 Ibid., p. 932.Google Scholar

103 Education Amendment Act, 1921–22, 12 Geo. V. Statutes, clause two, pp. 263–264.Google Scholar

104 NZPD, vol. 191 (1921), p. 948.Google Scholar

105 Ibid.Google Scholar

106 NZPD Vol. 199 (192), p. 273. But teachers were the only group singled out to take the oath in such a manner, on the grounds that the disloyal among them would resign rather than take the oath.Google Scholar