The Evening Star. DUNEDIN, THURSDAY, JAN. 11, 1866.

Evening Star, Volume III, Issue 837, 11 January 1866, Page 2

The Evening Star. DUNEDIN, THURSDAY, JAN. 11, 1866.

In a recent issue we endeavored to shew, and we think successfully, that the efforts of the Middle Island to obtain separation from its Northern sister could not be objected to on the grounds of justice. The desirability of separation is undoubtedly a more difficult question to treat; but a calm consideration of the entire case which fhs Middle Island can make out must lead to the. conviction that the severance is desirable, #ix»yed either in a political or social light. The political disintegration of a country naturally one, is at all times a step which most men would shrink timidly from assisting, unless the necessity for it were so great that life depended upon the lopping off of the diseased limb. Experience has taught that the division of a Country into. a.multitude of petty princi-

palities does not conduce either to economy or good government; in politics, as well as in other things, unity is strength. Men feel a pride in being members of a commonwealth large enough to contain the elements (at all events) of future greatness ; and so, in several of the older colonies, consolidation, and not division, is the order of the day. For our part, we would be content to see New Zealand one, and work out as a Colony, not as a conglomerate of petty Provinces, the destiny that lies before her. But, we fear in the meantime that this has become impossible, and that Separation is the only means of saving both the Northern and Middle Islands from most serious embarrassment, if not from bankruptcy an 1 ruin.

The financial difficulties with which we must have to struggle for many years in consequence of this most wretched war are too serious to contemplate without fear. Instead of having our revenue to devote to the legitimate purposes of colonisation, immigration, railways, docks, and public ■works, it is largely confiscated, and we suppose will be still more so for purposes utterly useless to us and to all other men, except a few contractors who shudder at the idea of a military commissariat being rendered unnecessary. Instead of enjoying that credit in the money market which our ample resources, and the good security we, as a community can give, would lead us to expect; we find it damaged by the distrust which always attaches to a country in a state of war. Lately our debentures were forestalled, and ruined in every market by the New Zealand loan, and we were in consequence compelled to pay twice as much for borrowed money as we ought. But all this is nothing, compared with the inexpressible injury which we suffer from the want of proper government, which it is quite clear we shall never get, while the North and South are united. Personally, we suppose the px-esent Ministers are as honorable and as capable men as any we are likely to see occupying their plac s, but it remains to be seen whether, when the Assembly next meets, they will address themselves to those questions in which this Province is most particularly interested, and by which its prosperity would be most materially promoted. Our Tariff is admitted to be as bad and uneven in its operation as any which can be devised, and together with cheap and simple justice, law codification and reform, demand immediate and energetic grappling with in order to place them in a fairer condition. We have seen in the past how such vital subjects as we have indicated can be made subservient to the carrying of such obsolete, absurd, and impracticable measures as the Militia Bill, the Printing Act, and the Masters and Servants Act ; and we may well ask what promise is held out to us of attention in the future. Of what use to the Middle Island can the present or any future Government in the Noi*th be, provided it can, or will, do no more than revive samples of the worst kind of legislation of the worst times —in some cases cruel and unnecessary laws, levelled especially against the welfare of industrious and free communities; designed to foster a useless and expensive parody of central and imperial power. The Middle Island requires and must have a Govern ment for itself, procured as cheaply as will guarantee its efficiency and perfect freedom, to develops our resources and work out a prosperity which we shall never enjoy until we are removed from the depressinginfluences our connection with the North so plentifully supply.