The Ashburton Guardian. Magna est Veritas et Prevalebit. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 14, 1882. The Two Candidates.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume III, Issue 662, 14 June 1882, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian. Magna est Veritas et Prevalebit. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 14, 1882. The Two Candidates.

TOWN EDITION. [lssued at 4.40 p. m. j

On Friday next the electors of Wakanui will again have an opportunity of deciding between the two candidates who are before them for their suffrages for the electorate. The electors have to choose between a true Liberal and a man who lays hold of the term —as he would of any other which might happen to be popular at the time, and which he thinks will serve his purpose —and endeavors to palm himself off as a Liberal, in order to gratify his ambition. We trust the real electors of Wakanui are able to distinguish between the characters of the two men, and that they will make the expression of their opinions sufficiently explicit when they go to the ballot-boxes on Friday next. Mr Ivess has sought to gain the confidence of the electors by making promises which he knows full well it is not in his power to fulfil. If we thought that Mr Ivess would be able to accomplish one tithe of what he has so glibly promised the electors then we should say to them—- “ Elect him by all means.” But we have met these “ promising” politicians before, and never yet have we found one to care a straw for his promises after the electors had trusted him to the utmost by placing him over the heads of better men than himself, who scorned to win confidence by making lavish promises, which they knew they could never perform. Mr Ivess reminds us of a Northern politician who earned the sobriquet of “ Promising John,” and we think the Radical candidate for Wakanui might not inappropriately be termed “ Promising Joe.” We are sure that if an elector of Wakanui were now to ask Mr Ivess if he did not think

Wakanui should have a greater share of the Sun’s rays that it now enjoys, tha gentleman would unhesitatingly answe. —“ Yes ; and if I am returned to Par liament I will at once bring in a Bill with that object !” And if he did, it would be no more absurd or false than many of his promises during the present and past contests. But supposing that the two men were equal in point of political honesty and trustworthiness, even then Mr Saunders enjoys a great advantage over his opponent. He is a man of undoubted ability, one of the best speakers in the House—albeit not what is termed “ a talkerbut when he has anything to say he can say it in such a manner as will command the attention of his hearers, instead of covering himself with ridicule—and he has played a prominent and creditable part in the affairs of the country for nigh half a century. We have seen quite enough during the brief time the present Parliament has been in session to cause us to discard a mere suckling in politics for a man of Mr Saunders’ experience We have only to look at the comparative failures of the members for Christchurch South and Dunedin East, of both of whom great things were | expected—and not without reason, for both are undoubtedly able men in their respective walks of life ; but they, no more than Mr Ivess, belong to that gifted but uncommon class, heaven-born statesmen, and hence their lamentable failure politically. We mention these two gentlemen as being, perhaps, the two new members of the present Parliament who were likely to

win for themselves laurels in debate, and to be of some practical use in the councils of the representative body to which the people had elevated them. If two such men as these have turned out comparative failures in the House, what may we expect from a man of Mr Ivess’s calibre —a man not possessed of sufficient ability to make his mark in local government; and yet the electors of Wakanui are asked to “ give him a chance” in the wider field of colonial politics, over the head of a man who has been tried and has not been found wanting. When the electors heard Mr Ivess with the utmost nonchalance proceed offhand to settle the question of law reform, surely it must have struck them that he was promising far more than any man —be he ever so talented—was

able to perform. But law reform and the constitution of the Upper House are lofty subjects in which Mr Ivess fairly revels, for he can go on generalising to his heart’s content ; but not once during his labored oratorical efforts has he thought it necessary to descend to the practical—that is altogether beyond him. His opponent, in marked contrast, has eschewed the lofty flights and sounding periods of Mr Ivess, and has pointed out the remedy for some of the many errors in our system of government. Again, Mr Ivess has always taken credit to himself for high personal courage. But how has he behaved during this campaign ? Instead of coming out on the public platform and meeting his opponent like a man, face to face, he has shielded himself behind the columns of an obscure thrice-a-week sheet, and from his vantage ground has hurled the most base and groundless charges at a man who is as far above himself in every way, as the summit of Mount Cook is above the sea’s level. We should think that after this contest Mr Ivess will not have the hardihood to assert that he is never afraid to meet a political opponent face to face. We have reason to know that some of the highminded among his supporters are disgusted at the pusillanimity displayed by Mr Ivess, after his repeated boasts that he was never afraid of what any man could say against him. His recent conduct has given the he in the most emphatic manner to thal boast. If there was but the one ques

tion of Freetrade and Protection between the candidates that would be quite sufficient to decide between them. Mr Saunders is a staunch Freetrader, and has the courage of his opinions on that subject as on every other. He does not one moment tell his hearers that he is a Freetrader and the next say that he in favor of an import duty of from 15 to 30 per cent, on imported goods. And that is just what Mr Ivess told his hearers at one of his meetings, and we challenge him to deny it. It is true that this astute gentleman soon discovered what a nauseous pill he had sought to administer to the farming interest of Wakanui, and, with characteristic ingenuity, sought to wriggle out of the position as best he could. One day last week'we witnessed the amusing spectacle of one of his supporters, through the medium of his paper, trying to provf> that Protection would be the salvation of a country, and in tne same issue of the same journal another ot his humble servants announcing that Mr Ivess was not a Protectionist, or at least not a very pronounced one. He, according to his apologist, would only tax those imports which could profitably be manufactured here. But we all know what that statement is worth. The Protectionist is as insatiable as the horse leech, and once commit the country to the pernicious system, and the Protectionist’s cry will be “ give, give.” There will be no end to his demands, once let the thin edge of the wedge be introduced into our fiscal policy. We say — and we have little doubt that the farming interest of Wakanui is at one with us—that if for nothing else but his Protectionist proclivities, Mr Ivess should be rejected on Friday next, in favor of the Freetrader. But Mr Ivess, in his greed for the honor and the emoluments of the M. H.R.-ship has made a determined attempt to virtually disfranchise the farming interest of the electorate which he seeks to represent. As we recently took occasion to point out, Mr Ivess has rendered his election almost a certainty, unless the farmers and other bona fide electors of Wakanui are true to themselves on Friday next, and go to the poll as one man, determined to resent the miserable trick by which their would-be friend has sought to stultify the votes of those who would not bow down and worship him, and minister to his vanity by hailing him as their political saviour. No matter how desirable a candidate he might be in other respects, such an attempt as Mr Ivess has made to take the election out of the hands of

; those who by every moral right ought to decide it, should condemn him in the ; eyes of every thinking man. A man : capable of such a piece of political chicanery as that we so recently ex- ■ posed is certainly not a fit man to become a law-maker. In short, we do not know of one single qualification possessed by Mr Ivess which would make him a desirable representative, and we think we have pointed out quite enough to show the undesirable character of the politician—heaven save the mark—who is so anxious to serve his country—and annex the. honoThe electors will no doubt resent the intrusion of priestly influence in the contest, and in self-protection will meet block vote with block vote. We know it is undesirable that the religious element should be introduced into an election contest, but where the head of the Church issues such a manifesto as that of Bishop Moran, there is nothing for it but to fight him with his own weapons, however much we may deprecate such a course. There is another section of the community which the smooth-tongued Radical imagines he has completely won over to his cause. We allude to the Civil Servants. We are not quite so sure of all those votes going to the “ working man’s friend.” On the contrary, we give the Civil Servants credit for ordinary perspicacity, and, giving them that credit, it would be an insult to their reasoning faculties to suppose for a moment that they are gulled by Mr Ivess and his fine talk about “ a fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work.” We should like to think, for the sake of a couple of working men, that Mr Ivess practices what he°preaches. A very little example is worth whole columns of precept. To

:ome more particularly to the railway unployees. Do they for a moment magine that a man who has not the noral courage to come forward md meet his political opponent m the public platform is the nan to stand up in his place in the House and insist that the big wigs of :he Civil Service shall bear their share af any retrenchment that may be found accessary; do they imagine that he is :he man to stand up and Ooldly advocate a large reduction in the salary of the Speaker of that House which lie is addressing ? That is a task which requires no little moral courage to perform. Well, Mr Saunders had the manliness to do all this. Fully cognisant of the dreadful straits to which the colony had been reduced by the criminal recklessness of the Grey Ministry, he saw that the only way to stave off national bankruptcy and place the finances of the colony on a sure basis was to vigorously apply the pruning knife to both high and low, and, to his credit be it said, he stood up in the House before those men whose yearly emoluments he proposed to reduce and insisted that not only the working men—“ the busy workers,” as he termed them —should suffer, but the drones also should feel the keen edge of the knife. Do the working men ever think that their tub-thumping

demagogue would have had like courage ? We give them credit for better sense. Let them look at the position he took up with regard to the Borough retrenchment. How the salaries of the Town Clerk and other officials were to be cut down by this great political economist. A committee was appointed, of which our Joseph Hume was made chairman. The mountain labored and brought forth a mouse, and we have not seen any evidence of that retrenchment so far as regards the salaries of the higher officials to this day. The prime mover knew at the time, as well as we did, that he never intended to touch the salaries of anyone in power; but he thought he migh, by making a fuss about it, gain some little political capital, and so he he got the committee, and the sole result was an abortive report. Looking at the matter fromanyslandpoint we may, we think Mr Ivess, in counting so confidently on the votes of the Civil Servants, and thinking those possessing them are no better than “ dumb, driven cattle,” to be cajoled at his sweet will, is counting his chickens before the incubatory process is quite complete. We opine the Civil Servants are quite capable of thinking for themselves —and we believe they are sufficientlyalive to the importance of the question so soon to be decided to carefully weigh the effect of their votes. Let them not be led away by slanders and glib promises, but let them ponder over the matter for themselves. An attempt has been made during the present contest to show that the party who so loyally supported Mr Wason, and landed him at the head of the poll on the glh of December last, are not nearly so enthusiastic with regard to Mr Saunders’ candidature. This is merely “a weak invention of the enemy.” Those gentlemen who banded themselves together to prevent the return of a reckless Communist in December are working with just as much enthusiasm in the same cause now. We know how the party of the Radical candidate—terrified almost out of their wits at having to confront a man like Mr Saunders — sought by every means in their power to cause a split in the camp of the Constitutionalists; and we also know how abortive that, like many other of their little dodges, has proved in alienating support from Mr Saunders. The party of law and order is as much opposed to Communism now as they were when they supported Mr Wason, and it only remains for the same body of the electors—the bone and sinew ot the country —(a class, by the way, which Mr Ivess’s paper, some short time since, said were of little use in a young country, in fact the country was better without them—but there was no election on the tapis then) —to second their efforts, which we trust and believe they will, and silence, at least for a time, a man who would ruin the country by a Protective tariff; who would deny the electors the privilege of saying who shall represent them, and would help to place on the Ministerial benches a set of men whom the colony is at present so happily rid of. The parties in the present House are very evenly balanced, and a single vote may turn the scale. That being the case, we are sure we are not asking too much of the electors of Wakanui when we ask them to attach due importance to the exercise of their privileges on Friday next, and weigh well the position of affairs before they put the pencil to their ballot-papers.