‘You are absolutely indifferent to the call of your king’: Horse racing, war and politics in New Zealand 1914–18

Abstract

As in other countries, the continuance of sport in New Zealand during the First World War was the subject of intense public debate, and especially in the case of horse racing as arguably the most widely followed sport in the country but also one that had been under attack from religious and moral reformers for several decades. Influential racing leaders argued that their activities were vital to the economy, tax revenue and maintaining morale in a society under pressure. They condemned their critics for exploiting wartime conditions in the service of pre-war agendas. But by mid-1917 claims that racing was an unproductive and unpatriotic luxury that undermined the war effort finally gained traction with a New Zealand government that generally displayed a single-minded and austere commitment to the war effort. The surprise is not that racing was partially restricted, but that the measure took so long to enact.