THE GOVERNMENT AND THE LAND QUESTION.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2201, 27 May 1870, Page 2

THE GOVERNMENT AND THE LAND QUESTION.

A few mouths ago a number of the country journals were loud in their praises of the conduct of the Government in resjrect of the Hundreds Regulation Act; and no journal sang these pecans of praise more loudly than the Bruce Herald. By reason of its being the exponent of the opinions of a section of the agricultural party in the Provincial Council, it has been not a little looked up to; and lately it has assumed to itself the position of being the oracle of the supporters of the Government. As the organ of the agricultural party, we hardly expected to find thaj; jt would be pleased wjth the result of the debate on Mr 'phoinspnis lam}, resolutions, but for such grief and apger combined as it displays on the matter we were not prepared. The idols of our contemporary are shattered in the dust ; and wi hj such sorrow does it lament their fall, that unless a change is at once effected, we fear it will soon give' t}p tha Thus speaks our contemporary : “ Messrs Reid and Gillies, in the pact they have just played in the debate on the Hundreds Act, have made an unfortunate exhibition of disappointing their friends, and making it clear that they cap be no longer depended upon for political consistency, or be any longer regarded than as far more friendly to the scpiatting than to the agricultural interests presently in conflict. When one calls to mind the speeches dejiveped, hptl; b°f° re s nc l after the emergency meeting of the Council, hy these gentlemen, we could have expected nothing else than that they would have hailed any opportunity to secure a resolution of Council demanding the repeal of the Act, apd the cassation of land law tinkering until the

coining election had taken place. This certainly was our opinion, and being of this opinion we did our utmost to apologise for them as having been parties to the unhappy compromise that resulted from the emergency meeting of the Council. Our apologies for them rested on two grounds—lst. That they could not help themselves; that through the obstinacy of the then Provincial Treasurer they were shut up either to adopt the compromise to which the Treasurer would agree, or resign, whereby it would have happened that others would have taken their place who would have brought the Act into operation, and placed the Clutha Railway in the hands of the “sham company,” in which case [doubtless the railway would have turned out an expensive sham ; and (2nd) that there would- be another opportunity, before the meeting of the House of Representatives, foy discussing the subject anew in the Council more fully represented than was the emergency meeting. It was thus that Me\srs Reid and Gillies themselves accounted {or their action at last meeting of Council, and spoke in reference to that action action which they represented themselves as deploring, and as anxious to have remedied ; such, we know, was indeed the impression left on the minds of Mr Gillies’ audience in Tokomairiro, when he .and Mr Clark addressed their constituents. It seems, however, that the public have misunderstood these supposed friends, and that we have been supporting them by mistake ; at least, this is the light in which Mr Gillies puts the case in reply to Mr Thomson. It is, we think, rather a pity that Mr Gillies did not disabuse the public mind somewhat sooner of the wreng impression that seems to have been entertained as to his position. He could not possibly have been ignorant of the fact that it was fully understood that, solely througli the pressure of the late Treasurer’s obstinacy he had agreed to give a pre-emptive right over G4O acres ; that the {public generally regarded this proposal as making the Hundreds Act more injurious than in its original form ; that it was universally expected, throughout the rural districts, thut the Government, backed by Messrs Haughton and Shepherd, Mitchell and Allan, in addition to their former supporters, would agree to the adoption of a resolution condemnatory of the whole Act, and that this expectation rested on their denunciations of the Act, those apologies for the compromise and those statements that the conflict was not yet ended, chiefly made by Mr Gillies himself. Tt seems now, however, that ho never meant what the public understood him to say and mean, all his denunciations, apologies, and statements have baen so much chaff thrown in the eyes of Ids constituents to prevent them seeing the real action adopted by Mr Gillies and his colleagues—action which, we do not hesitate to say, should once and for ever bar his entrance again upon public life, at least so far as any agricultural district is concerned, whose interests he has shatnofully sacrificed, r. We write tlrs more in sorrow than in anger. Angry we might well he, feeling as we do that the true interests of the people have been sacrificed by those to whom the people were led to look as to those who were prepared to make good to their utmost those interests. But while suppressing anger, and withholding as far as possible the expressions of indignation justly merited by those who have in effect betrayed the people, we cannot withhold the expression of sorrow that men can he found in the midst of us who could be so far lost to a sense of honor as openly to play the double part which the speeches and votes of Messrs Gillies and Reid, on Mr Thomson’s motion, indicate they have played, and that such occasion should have been given to the public of suspecting the political honesty of public men. A shock has been given to public confidence, the effect of which cannot .but seriously affect the relation in future between the constituencies and their representatives.. Messrs Gillies and Reid, the avowed champions of settlement, and the avowed opponents of laud advantages accruing to the squatter, without any compulsion brought to bear upon them, voluntarily hand over to the squatters the most valuable portions of their runs to the extent of C4O acres, and to that extent fiiudgrjng the settlement qf thp laud by those who would largely aid in advancing the material progress of the Province, to say nothing of the higher lines of progress to which an increase of population necessarily lends its aid. In the light of this fact we have no hesitation in saying that the constituencies have been imposed upon ; that especially Messrs Reid aud Gillies have ueen winning popular applause and popular support under fa'se pretences, and have deservedly forfeited the confidence of the settled community of the Prqvipce,