The Evening Star MONDAY, JUNE 27, 1870.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2227, 27 June 1870, Page 2

The Evening Star MONDAY, JUNE 27, 1870.

"VYe can scarcely understand the tactics of some of the up-country journals. Perhaps they do not understand them themselves. We do not think the worse of any journal for freeing itself from the dominion of party, ju'ovided that in doing so measures are advocated or condemned according to their beneficial or evil tendency. This is a course that every independent journalist is bound to adopt. In such a course he may not always please —nay, he is sure to displease some. The blind, the interested, the ignorant, the shallow, will condemn his opinions as trash, or compliment him by some uncorteous designation. He must be prepared for this, and comfort himself with the consciousness that, though he can furnish men with arguments, he cannot give them brains and honesty to understand them. But this sound and consistent course of proceeding differs from the capricious likes and dislikes of certain rural editors, who, for apparently the most trivial reasons, turn upon the very men who at one time they were ready to worship. A few months ago the Bruce papers were loud in support of the present Provincial Executive : now they unite in condemning them. The great grievance seems to be the proposal to borrow ,£650,000, to be invested in reproductive works. The doctrines advocated by the two Bruce journals as exponents of the opinions of the district are singular illustrations of the slowness with which the agricultural mind grasps the principles that arc essential to progress. We have no great faith in being able to obtain the money—-that is in the General Government sanctioning the loan, and if it is obtained, the sop thrown out to the people of Oatnaru for the construction of a dock there, will be so much money cast into the sea. But the principle contended for by our short-sighted contemporaries is, that the Province shall wait until such works as the Olutha Kailway, the bridge over the Waitaki, and other works absolutely necessary to opening up the country, can be constructed out of revenue before making them. On this ground they have attacked the present Government, and Mr J. L. Gillies has found it necessary to come forward in its defence. The charge against the Government is the proposal to secure the interest of the loan upon pastoral rents derivable from a certain area of sheep runs, Mr Gillies points out the fallacy of the views taken by the Bruce journals, which may be simply summed up in the word “ misapprehension ” of the subject. How could even a child in knowledge of business imagine that such works as the Clutha Railway could be constructed out of revenue, as understood by the Bruce Standard ? Yet this is what is gravely asked by our bucolic contemporaries. Nothing can be plainer than that such means of communication bringing inland districts into immediate connection with the seaboard, is so much added to the producing capabilities of the Province, And then as to the interest payable, although it sounds very formidable to have to pay £40,000 a year, it must be remembered that in all probability not onefourth of that would have to be advanced if the railway works are constructed so as to be available for traffic as they proceed. In the estimate of liability all this is lost sight of. Our contemporaries apparently cannot understand that seed must be sown before a harvest can be reaped—that capital must be invested before revenue can be received. One thinks Governments ought to act upon what ho terms the “ Laisse:: fare ” system —a very good rule if applied to interference with trade, either by restrictive or regulative meddling, but a very bad one for Colonial or Provincial Go-yer:pmeis-,whose duty it is to take the everything that can advance the' development of the Colony or Province. Tbeif a. parallel is attempted to be 'drawer between the rnifcfr loan, and the three-million are convinced,” says our the Bruce Staiulard, would have been in a " Wsfer position if she had not had <fc any loan ] aye, or New Zealand j “ both would have been better oft to- “ day, and perhaps as many reproduc- “ tive works constructed.” Perhaps New Zealand might have been better had the money borrowed been exclusively Provincial loans, for although they are not always laid out to the best advantage, they are at least to a certain extent reproductive. But the same cannot be said of the money wasted on the Maori war. So much of it as has been spent on that object lias been thrown away without the slightest advantage to any excepting a tew contractors, and a small army of

Government officials. But money invested in railways benefits all classes. It gives the produce of inland districts markets, and places the people on an equality with the inhabitants of seaports. It economises capital, and thus enables its possessors to employ more labor—it cheapens imports, and thus reduces the cost of necessaries to those who live in the interior : and although a line of railway may not be directly i-emunerative, it enables more people to live in the country, and thus tends to reduce individual taxation which would otherwise be oppressive.