How Marching Rule Got Its Name
p. 92 · Read in the full issue
IN the course of a notable article in the Colonial Service magazine “Corona,” in which he makes a survey of the nativistic cult, Marching Rule, in the Solomons, Mr. C. H. Allan says: “ ‘Marching’ is an Anglicised pronun ciation of the word ‘masina,’ which in the Ariari language of South Malaita means ‘brotherhood,’ or ‘the young shoot
of the taro.’ One British newspaper re ferred to it as the ‘Marching Rule (Marxian Rule) Movement.’ This is non sense.”
The suggestion that “Marching Rule” represented the natives’ attempt to pro nounce “Marxian Law” was far-fetched, perhaps, but it was not nonsense. Many people, since 1944, had sought the origin or derivation of the term, and the “Marxian Law” explanation, while ob viously open to challenge, was generally accepted because there seemed to be nc other, and because the Movement seemed to be tinged with Marx-ism.
However, the explanation of Mr. Allan, who is an informed and authoritative writer, is more reasonable. Incidentally, Mr. Allan says; “This movement, which has combined admirable and progressive objects with preposterous and mystical promises and terrorist tactics, has developed a studied system of civil disobedience, which un fortunately compares more than favourably with similar campaigns in fax less primitive countries. Had it not beer for the intelligence, industry and imagina tion of the Western Solomons people, and those in other isolated districts who with stood its insidious propaganda, this small Protectorate of only about 100,000 native? would indeed have been in a serious posi tion.”
Mr. Allan indicates that the back oi the organisation was broken by firm offi cial action in 1947-48; but adds: “A hare core of the people, believing implicitly ir the ultimate destiny of the movement tc rule Malaita, still resists Governmenl authority in the impenetrable hills anc jungles, deep in the heart of the islands/ The New Zealand lighthouse tender Matai, left Wellington, NZ, at the end o; March to repair a break in the Australia- Norfolk Island cable.