THE Evening Star. SATURDAY, JULY 17, 1869.

Evening Star, Volume VII, Issue 1934, 17 July 1869, Page 2

THE Evening Star. SATURDAY, JULY 17, 1869.

The battle of the Constitution is being fought with vigor in the House of Representatives. Provincialism is beingattacked,and a determineclatterapt is being made to substitute some political nostrum for it. No one will venture for a moment to assert that the Provincial is a form of government likely to be of more than passing utility. But the question to be decided is whether the time has arrived for its being dispensed with 1 The great error of all Colonial legislation is the desire for change without cause. Scarcely had the ink that recorded the provisions of the Constitution had time to dry, before the original Provinces were subdivided ; and now it is proposed further to divide power, so that it may be frittered away in local interests. This is but a new edition of Mr Stafford's scheme. It has! his support, and is intended by him and those who propose it to cement the political union between the North and Middle Islands. It might have been supposed that the ill-success attending the sub-

division of the original Provinces would have tended to convince the 1 Constitution-mongers, that further multiplication of local legislative bodies could only be attended with increased expense, and that the wiser course would be to diminish governmental charges, by uniting two or more Provinces into one, instead of increasing them by dividing Provinces into two or more. But this would not suit those theorists who seek to make New Zealand a great nation by retaining at all cost the two Islands under one Government. The destruction of Provincialism is looked upon as the means of removing a barrier to the Central Government’s assuming the virtual control of all the revenues of the country 3 and therefoi e every measure that lias a tendency to render local Governments dependent upon the Central one meets with their support. We are not so much in love with Provincial Institutions as to imagine that no better form of government can be devised. It has Ion" been our conviction that, when they have fulfilled the object for which they were specially instituted, a fusion of the Provinces into one Government for each Island is desirable. But the question to be solved is, Has the time arrived when such amalgamation would prove advantageous 1 Provincialism is the naturnal form of Government arising outof the peculiarity of the colonisation of the country. The long coast line of the Colony, its numerous harbors communicating with fine country in the interior, induced settlement from several centres, each of which required arrangements to be made for its own immediate government. New Zealand is, therefore, virtually an aggregate of separate Colonies, the population radiating from the several ports, and each community being independent of all the rest. The rapid occupation of the land in the Middle Island, has already in some measure over-ridden this individuality. A common interest is growing up arising out of kindred pursuits, which is rapidly tending to those developments of means of communication that must ultimately be adopted. The evolution of society points, therefore, to the union of all the Middle Island Provinces under one Government, as the end at which we ought to aim. But for just the opposite reason, amalgamation with the North Island is undesirable. With it, their neither is nor can be a common interest, and as no North Island members can estimate the requirements of the Middle Island by the circumstances in which they themselves are placed, it should be carefully kept in mind that Separation, financial, or political, is not the less necessary now, than before the change of Ministry. The Fox administration cannot be considered a Middle Island one, and the , extract from a letter which we published on Thursday tends to shew that even if it were, its stability cannot be depended upon. Whatever reason, therefore, there may be for rejoicing that Mr Stafford no longer rules, it is certain that on a weak Government the views and tactics of a talented Opposition exert considerable influence. They may not be altogether adopted, but they cannot be ignored. The fact still remains, that with a change of Ministry, although the extravagance may not be so great, the injustice of which the Middle Island has had to complain is unremoved, nor has Mr Fox expressed any intention whatever of redressing it. It is somewhat singular that such alarming accounts from the North Island should come immediately after the Ministerial change. We do not say they should be disregarded, but they savor very much of those exaggerations which were published so frequently during the last war, and which proved in the end to have been in most cases merely imaginary, or up by interested men. Let a curious inquirer carefully examine the records of the Colony; let him mark the circumstances under which the most alarming accounts of the gathering together of Native forces were published, and he will find that those looming giants appeared on the horizon just when it was proposed to curtail the expenditure. We are told that Otago and Auckland are equally interested in peace. We can readily understand that true, in Auckland’s altered circumstances. That Province has now more to gain from peace than war. But a war expenditure has still charms for less fortunate districts, and although it would be going too far to express the opinion that the reported gathering of Tk Kooti, Tito Kowaku, the Waikatos, and the Maori King is altogether an invention, there is sufficient of the improbable about it to lead to the conclusion that the reduction of the war expenditure may have suggested the combination to- some inventive genius. But true or not true, the warning to Otago is the same : If Separation were desirable before the change of Ministry, it is equally so now.