HOME RULE.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1416, 14 May 1886, Page 3

HOME RULE.

Under constitutional government all over the world the tendency is in favor of homo rule, which is simply another name for local administration. In New Zealand the question Las cropped up in a variety of ways, and although it has been doled out piecemeal in the shape of Counties, itoad Boards, Charitable Aid Boards, and other kindred local administrative functions the demand still rema'ns unsatisfied, and wo are far from thinking the day is distant when it will have to be yielded upon a much more extensive scale. Of late we have heard little about the separation of the two islands. The reason of this silence docs not rest with the fact that the necessity for such a step has disappeared. The necessity remains as urgent as ever, with this difference : that whereas, in former times, the 'pressure bore heavily on the South Island, or, which is pretty much the same for our present argument, the South fancied it had a grievance on that score, the readjustment of the representationmade a few years ago, and which gave a preponderance of members to the Middle Island, shifted the burden on the shoulders of the North Island. In other words, so long as the South felt, or fancied it felt, aggrieved by the political unity of the two islands, complaints were rife, and the demand for separation arrogant. Now that the grievance rests solely with the North so little is heard of it that we have begun to look upon it as a thing of the past. The evil resulting from this unequal yoke however, still remains, It appeals to us in the shape of an apparently insurmountable native difficulty. South Island in fluences control this question to the prejudice of the North. The effect of that untoward influence has been to retard progress and keep the country locked up from sale and settlement. We hail this proposal of Mr Gladstone’s as one which will encourage the colony in the direction we have indicated. Years ago. when the separation of the two islands was inoote 1 its opponents used the argument that financial separation had become impossible. Mr Gladstone recognises that branch of the subject, itwi 1 be observed, in his proposal, but simply deals with it as an arrangement which will fall to bo made as a matter of course. If the difficulty in the case of Ireland be not insurmountable then it must be sheer nonsense to talk about its being insurmountable in the case of New Zealand. —Thames Adccrtiscr.