The Evening Star SATURDAY, DECEMBER 17, 1870.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2406, 17 December 1870, Page 2

The Evening Star SATURDAY, DECEMBER 17, 1870.

Some people 'have a way of muddling their own ami other people's brains, by mixing up matters that have no relation to each other. Dunedin unfortunately has many men of this class, and the institutions of New Zealand are favorable to this confusion of mind. They cannot separate the functions of the General Assembly from those of the Provincial Council, nor the Provincial Council from the City Council, and contrive to persuade others to be as cloudy-minded as themselves. What can be more absurd than to hear a candidate for municipal honors going gravely into the general policy of the Colonial Government, or giving expression to his opinions upon matters that the Provincial Council alone can deal with 1 Yet avb have heard this style of thing done many times. We have heard one avlio sought to represent a Avard in the City, say with all the solemnity of a sage—“ Gentlemen, “ I shall support any motion for the “ separation of the two islands.” We do not Avish it to be inferred for a moment that the opinion of an influential Municipal Council Avould Aveigh nothing Avith our Colonial Parliament:

we only wish to shew that it would be very much better that a clear line should be drawn in men’s minds between legislative bodies whose functipns are different. During the last two days a curious instance of this muddling has taken place. Mr Vouko, the Colonial Treasurer, in compliance with, a requisition, gave a clcav and unanswerable exposition of the Public Works and Immigration proposals of the General Government, and shewed unmistakably that every care has been taken to render the incidence of their coat fair towards the different Provinces. He pointed out that these measures have been authorised by Act of Parliament; that the Government is in a position to carry them out ; and that they will be done much more cheaply than it would be possible for the Provincial Government to execute them, even if they could get them done at all : which they cannot.. During the greater part of the past session Mr E.eid and his followers have been laboring hard to shew that the works should be postponed until after the elections, because the Assembly had no business to pass Acts manifestly for the benefit of the people without asking the people whether they chose to bo benefitted or not. But chiefly his argument has been ; —the Assembly has usurped functions that by right belong to Provincial Councils, and especially that no legislative body, save the Provincial Council of Otago, should dare to do anything for the good of Otago. Everybody knows that this has been the argument—but everybody does not believe it. There are men who can see a very material difference in the altered relations between the General and Provincial Governments since the passing of the Loan Consolidation Act. They can see that henceforth, whatever work has to be done by means of a loan, even the Corporation of Dunedin stands in a more independent position than the Provincial Government; and that the blindness of Mr Reid, and those who so blindly follow him, is manifested in a dogged refusal to acknowledge the authority of a higher Legislative, whose Acts they are powerless to resist. Twice lias the Council sacrificed the good of the Province to this senseless resistance to authority. It is said “ the burnt child dreads the “ fire ” ; but Mr Reid and “ tail,” notwithstanding the experience of twelve months ago, when they made their fii’st exhibition of restiveuess on the Hundreds Bill, and compromised the matter by giving to the squatters more than they asked for themselves, shew no signs of remembering the pain. Perhaps, after all, they are not so- intimately identified with the genus homo as with some other warm-blooded animals. Physiologists tell us that one characteristic of the family Eqnidm is that they rush upon that which gives them pain ; and as one branch of that family, As'mus, has the quality of firmness developed even unto obstinacy—the two prominent characteristics of Mr Reid and “ tail ’’ —the identity is sufficiently marked to establish the breed. Some of our muddle-headed politicians, because Mr Yooel, tbe progressive Colonial Treasurer, has' spoken, want Mr Reid, the obstructive Provincial Secretary for Land and Works, to speak, because, say they, “ it is lair to “ hear both sides.” There can be no objection to this. We shall be most happy to hear Mr Reid speak, and glad to report him ; but we want to know what other side there is to hear ? Mr Reid has been telling his tale for the last two months, and the country has felt the wet blanket of his administration for two years. Is there a third view to be taken of the matter 1 Or is it merely tliat a disappointed contractor wants to toady him, and lead him into another blind bargain for the construction of a railway 1