The Ashburton Guardian. Magna Est Veritas Et Prevalebit. THURSDAY, JULY 10, 1884. The Colonial Secretary.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1302, 10 July 1884, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian. Magna Est Veritas Et Prevalebit. THURSDAY, JULY 10, 1884. The Colonial Secretary.

We are every day receiving additional evidence that the power of what has been called the “ Continuous Ministry ” is completely shattered. In their speeches recently delivered at Hawea and Temuka, on more than one crucial question ot policy Major Atkinson and Mr Rolleston were shown to be at variance, but the most decided, if not the heaviest, blow has been dealt by the defection of the Hon. Thos. Dick, the Colonial Secretary. On Tuesday evening the member for Dunedin West told the electors of that constituency that he was not satisfied with the present system of railway management, and that he would be in favor of a non-political Board being tried as an experiment. This, coming from the member of a Government which has always most strenuously opposed such ar change is certainly astonishing, and it would be interesting to learn the date of Mr Dick’s conversion. But the Colonial Secretary went even further than this, as he is reported as having declared himself “not altogether satisfied with his own party, because in some matters he did not agree with them, and quite possibly he might not find himself prepared to follow the lead he had done in the past. He hoped that party warfare simply for the Treasury benches would be done away with,” Ratting is far from being an unknown quantity in New Zealand politics, but it is seldom we find such a glaring instance of desertion in the hour of need as is shown here. We do not say that by their later actions the Atkinson Government has not done much to forfeit the confidence which the colony formerly reposed in them, but the strange feature in. this particular case is that Mr Dick should not have found this out before now. Indeed, some very awkward questions might be put to the Colonial Secretary in this matter, questions that he would have considerable difficulty in answering satisfactorily. For instance, why did he vote, on the want-of-confidence amendment to the Address in Reply, in favor of a Ministry, when “ in some matters he did not agree with them ?” It may be that he did not regard the points of difference as important enough, or that he did not discover them until the Government were* defeated, but we scarcely think that his constituents will be satisfied with such excuses as there. As to the hope expressed that party warfare shall have in the future a higher aim than simply to secure seats on the Treasury benches, most people will echo the sentiment, although it comes with a peculiar flavor from a Minister who owes his position to the fact that he happened to belong to a particular party, rather than to the possession of special ability. Then, again, Mr Dick gives it as his opinion that no party in the new Parliament will be strong enough to form a Government, and that there fore there must be a coalition. It is not easy, however, to see upon what grounds this opinion is formed, and the Colonial Secretary appears in this instance to have neglected the proverbial caution of the nation whence he springs and has “ prophesied before he knew.” British instinct revolts against the notion of hitting a man when he is down, and the offence is doubly aggravated when the striker has been benefited by the stricken. Had it not been for Major Atkinson, the Hon Thomas Dick would probably have remained a private member till the end of his Parliamentary career, instead of drawing a handsome salary from the State coffers for several years. This spectacle of dog eating dog is not an edifying one, and we shall be very much surprised if the electors of Dunedin West do not mark their sense of Mr Dick’s ratting on the polling day by refusing to return him as their representative. At any rate, if the coalition he anticipates does take place, it is in the last degree unlikely that he will obtain a seat in the Cabinet, so that we may consider his career as a Minister, if not as a member, to be concluded.

We have a strong obi action to dealing with personal matters in these columns, but a letter published in our local contemporary this mot fling written by Mr Wm Horne is of so extraordinary a nature that if we refrained from noticing it our silence might be misconstrued. It should be promised that the epistle in question was first sent to the Guardian, but for reasons only too obvious we refused to publish it. Had our contemporary possessed the remotest idea of journalistic etiquette, the letter would not have seen the light in his columns, but we have long since given up hoping for anything approaching decency of coifiuct from that quarter. It is therefore with the author

of this unique effusion that wa have to deal. We say unique advisedly, f.r it is extremely doubtful if a director of a Company ever before committed such a breach of confidence as to make public what has taken place at a strictly private mooting. This, however, we can leave Mr Horne to settle with hia own conscience, although we can quite conceive what the general verdict will bo on such conduct. Let us sea what his letter discloses or pretend 3 to disclose. He asserts that the editor of this journal is writing “ to order,” which, we presume, means that Mr Walker’s candidature is being supported agaipst the private opinion of the author of the leading articles, and simply at the bidding of the Directors. In a certain every editor writes “to forder,” but Mr Horne palpably intends to mislead the people of Ashburton by using the term in the way he does. As a business man he must know that every employee is expected to carry out tho wishes of his employer, but if the work entrusted to him is distasteful to hia conscience hia obvious duty is to resign his position. Of course it may happen that an editor might have no particular leaning either t» one side or another, and in this particular case M r Horne has no means of j udging, nor is it a matter of the slightest moment to the public whether this is so or not. The anonymity of English jouraalia has always been considered as its safeguard and the cause of its influence, for the simple reason that the arguments used are taken for what they are worth, without regard to the author of this or that article. As to Mr Horne’s remark about a “ bitter attack ” being made in this journal upon Mr Wasox, we defy him or any other person to show that we have written a word abont that candidate which was unworthy of the pen of a gentleman, and we feel sure that he himself will bear us out in this. Whether the policy of the paper is the policy of tho shareholders is best shown by Mr Horne’s own letter, as he admits that it was resolved on by a majority of the Directors, who are simply the mouthpiece of the shareholders. This, however, has nothing in the world to do with the public, who, we presume, are quite able to judge the value of what is set down iu our columns, either for or against a candidate. For ourselves, we confess that the publication of such a letter as that appearing above the signature of Mr Horne, is in itself proof that Mr Wason’s supporters are afraid that ho will not be returned on his own merits, and they therefore resort , to the not very commendable course of attempting to attach a stigma of personal , feeling to everything written in favor of i the other candidate. A good deal may be pardoned at election times, 'when party feeling naturally runs h'gh, and we think that Mr Horne, when he has cowled down, will have more difficulty in forgiving himself for his folly in inditing this epistle, than we have in forgiving him ’ for an action which will materially assist the candidature of one whom we consider the bettq/r representative for Ashburton,