MUNICIPAL PLEASANTRIES.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 2, Issue 188, 7 May 1878, Page 3

MUNICIPAL PLEASANTRIES.

To the Editor cf the Akaroa Mail

Sm,—l have taken upon myself at Tarious times to write to you on matters connected with the Borough, and have been gratified by the results which I am vain enough to think my remarkß have, on more than one occasion, brought about. Lately; however, my pen has been idle in this respect—not from want of subject matter, but because I have considered it better not to perpetuate tbe folly which has characterised in many ways the conduct of certain Councillors, who in the past gave promise of better things. But now, Sir, I am constrained once more, by your kind permission, through the medium of your columns, to express as a Burgess my disapprobation of' the course of action now being pursued by the majority of tbe Borough Council against his Worship the Mayor,, as plainly set forth in the notice of motion tabled by Cr Meech at the last meeting of that body. The cause of complaint, fancied or otherwise, seems to lie in the general conduct of municipal business since the present .'Mayor has held the reins of local government. Now, I would point out that if there has been mismanagement in Borough'affairs, the Councillors are more to blame than Mb Worship, since he is but one against nine. I would further remind them that they are, as a body, equally responsible with the Mayor for the actions o± the Council, and therefore equally to be blamed, where fault-finding is necessary. Again, all doings of the Council emanate from the decisions of a majority of tbe member* present at some authorised meeting of which due notice has been given, in which case those Councillors who stop away are responsible for W-tat is done in'their absence, since it was their duty to be present. Of w,hat, then, has the Mayor been guilty that the Council as a body are not equally reprehensible ? lit what way personally has his Worship erred that a majority of the Council has no% been with him in his erring ? No, Sir. the fault does not lie with the Mayor, but with the factious spirit of his Councillors; with their seeming incapacity to deal with more than one idea at the same time; with their apparent mental and physical inability; to abnegate self and party in the transaction ot public business. Has tbe Mayor been faultless? Certainly not. Who is?. But his errors have been errors of judgment, in which those whom he presides over were alike culpable. Nothing, however, that bis admininistration has "brought'forth has been such aB to warrant the storm of virtuous indignation which, like the sword of Damocles, hangs over his devoted head—a second Curtius for the "sins of his Council, With the fiat ol his unwdrthiness to hold his present position goes forth of the worthiness of those Who desree it. Such puerility is unworthy of our local magnates —a reflected disgrace on those who put theiri in power. I trust the Council will think twice ere they commit the crowning act of folly now meditated. Melwra et mqjordspero. Let the dead past bury its dead. -A Yours, _c, BUBGESS.