The Evening Star MONDAY, APRIL 25, 1870.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2173, 25 April 1870, Page 2

The Evening Star MONDAY, APRIL 25, 1870.

Those who expected anything new from Mr Stafford at Timaru, will feel themselves disappointed. His oratory might do very well as hustings claptrap, but is not creditable to him as a statesman. It may be very flattering to the people of Timaru to bo told that he Avishod to become their pupil, and as their representative, “to study as a “ duty what were the present wants and “ grievances of outlying districts, and “ to be in a position to alleviate the « feeling of disatisfaction with the ex- “ isting system.” There is something self-sacrificing in this. Mr Stafford immolates himself in an obscure locality like Timaru, where the oppression of of Provincialism was felt to be intolerable ; retires from the hope of representing so important a constituency as Nelson, and why 1 That he might enter into the thoughts and feelings of these outraged Colonists, and fit himself to fight the battles of untutored borderers against the decrees of tyrant Superintendents. Can anything endear Mr Stafford to his constituency more than this 1 How they must have admired and cheered him! To leave Nelson! greatand populous Nelson! that seat of learning and advancement! — Nelson capable of fighting its own battles and holding its own ground—to sacrifice the hope of representing so influential a constituency, and to stoop to lowly, neglected Provincial-Council-ridden Timaru '—Tell it throughout the land— Stafford stoops to represent an outlying district that he may become imbued with a deep sense of its wrongs, sympathise with its injuries, and learn to drive those pests of Superintendents from the face of the earth. What this new field of study may unfold to him we know not, nor what mighty difficulty there is in comprehending the wants and feelings of men who have invested money in property at a distance from a market, and seek to have its value improved by diverting the Provincial expenditure in that direction. There is nothing very abstruse in knowing the value of internal communication. It needs no stooping from a lofty position to learn that rivers are the better for being bridged, that “ good <( roads should be made across wot «ground,” and that these great improvements should not depend “ upon “ the caprice of one or two indivi- « duals.” Perhaps, as a further lesson, it would do Mr Stafford good if he were to get himself elected Superintendent, when he would find that his position was not quite so autocratic as he seems to imagine ; and that assuming his “ caprice ” to lie in the direction of developing Pi’ovincial resources, by bridging livers or forming railroads, he might be very unpleasantly thwarted by the blundering incapacity of his Provincial Council or Executive. For our own parts, we can see no logical connection between the position that Mr Stafford lays down and the development of the country. If his testimony is to be accepted, and there is every reason to believe it, that he has not understood the requirements of outlying districts and is only a learner, he condemns himself as the rashest of innovators for attempting to destroy a system, which for aught he knew to the contrary might be working for the benefit of the country.- He still more emphatically condemns any attempt to govern from a single centre, by asserting that he, as one of our leading statesmen, was not in possession of such information as was necessary to legislate for distant parts of the Colony. Then as to wav expenditure, the people of the South Island are bid to remember that u our friends in the North pay their “ quota ” . . . “in regard to the “ rate of population, and they feel it “ still further in the uncertainty, “ anxiety, and loss both in life and “ pocket which the war has entailed “ for many years.” Whether the people of Timaru and Gladstone were content with this lucid remembrancer we cannot say. We do not think they would, for men are not easily reconciled to paying other people’s debts. Mr Stafford’s excuse does not justify the fact that two-thirds of the war expenditure is paid by the South Island for the benefit of North Island estates. The question is not one of sentiment, but of stern right and wrong. No

logic can gloss over the fact that the Maori war is a local, not a Colonial war ; that the settlers in the North Island have voluntarily invested their money in estates there, knowing the risks they had to run ; that were peace established, either by the extinction of the Maoris, or by their adapting themselves to the laws and customs of the colonists, those estates would be enormously increased in value, that they have been held mainly by revenue drawn from the Middle Island ; and that not one farthing will ever be returned to the Middle Island settlers, whose advancc-

ment in prosperity has been so seriously retarded by the diversion of their revenues from the construction of necessary public works. On these grounds, no matter who is in power, there must be a fixed determination on the pari of the Middle Island representatives that the North shall bear its own burdens. Mr Stafford expresses regret that no important reformation or social amelioration ” has over been effected without “continual agitation,” We agree with him, and trust that agitation in the Middle Island will never cease until the North Island is made to bear the future expences of any Maori war. It is quite sufficient that the Middle Island accepts its share of responsibility for the past. The North Island is now richer and better able to pay its own expenses, and it must be compelled to do so.