T. E. Taylor

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For the British politician see Thomas Edward Taylor

Thomas Edward (Tommy) Taylor (16 June 1862 – 27 July 1911) was a Christchurch Mayor, New Zealand Member of Parliament, businessman and prohibitionist (advocate of temperance).

Contents 1 Member of Parliament 1.1 Independent 2 Fact vs fiction 3 Further reading 4 External links

[edit] Member of Parliament

Tommy Taylor was a Member of Parliament for the City of Christchurch from 1896 to 1899 and from 1902 to 1905, then for Christchurch North from 1908 to 1911 when he died, shortly after being elected Mayor of Christchurch.

[edit] Independent

Taylor was an Independent MP. In 1905 he became the leader of the New Liberal Party. He opposed the Premier Richard Seddon of the Liberal Party over government corruption, and Seddon’s support for the Licensed Trade (i.e., the Liquor Industry) and the Boer War in South Africa. Other Independent MPs associated with Tommy Taylor were George Laurenson, Leonard Isitt, Harry Bedford and Francis Fisher.

Taylor was a successful importer and estate agent in Christchurch. He married Elizabeth Best Ellison in 1892. They had five daughters and one son, EBE Taylor CBE, a member of the Christchurch City Council (1968-1971).

Tommy Taylor died of a perforated gastric ulcer at Christchurch on 27 July 1911. Such was the respect he commanded that 50,000 people lined the streets of the city for his funeral procession. James McCombs, Secretary of the Christchurch Prohibition League and later a Labour Party MP, paid tribute to his co-worker and friend: "He had a worldwide outlook. There was no country, no nation, no social movement that did not command his interest. He had a passion for freedom, and his whole career was inspired by the desire that men should have the fullest opportunity for untrammelled development."

[edit] Fact vs fiction

• Taylor was an advocate of "Municipal Socialism" and was endorsed by the NZ Labour Party in his campaign for the Christchurch Mayoralty in 1911, but he never joined a labour organisation (Gustafson, p.4).

[edit] Further reading

• The Fighting Man: a Study of the Life and Times of T.E. Taylor by Nellie F.H. MacLeod (1964, Dunbar and Summers, Christchurch)
• The New Liberal Party 1905 by G.F. Whitcher (1966, MA(Hons) Thesis-University of Canterbury, Christchurch)
• The Advent of the NZ Labour Party 1910-1919 by Barry Gustafson (1961, MA Thesis-University of Auckland, Auckland)

[edit] External links

• Tommy Taylor's Dictionary of New Zealand Biography
• Tommy Taylor's Biography in the 1966 Encyclopaedia of New Zealand