The Evening Star FRIDAY, MAY 23, 1873.
The application for a dissolution of the Provincial Council has been acceded to, and an opportunity will now be afforded of repairing the mistakes that were made by many constituencies, of sending representatives, unfitted by nature, education, and occupation for legislative duties. No one reading over that extraordinary document, the memorial, which monopolised the telegraphic wiies for so long a period in its transmission to the Cabinet at Wellington, will be surprised that a dissolution has been acceded to. Professing to set out facts, it omits the mention of circumstances that are necessary to their being complete truths. It offers opinions on constitutional law, and presumes to decide upon disputed questions in such a manner and in so determined a spirit of hostility to the Superintendent, as to prove incontestibly that between him and the majority of the Council harmonious action was impossible. The first seven-propositions profess to give a history of the dismissal of Mr Reiu by his Honor; but they leave out all mention of the fact that he was invited lo resume office, and that in consequence of his refusal a new Executive
had to be appointed. Those seven propositions lay down two other grounds of complaint: First, that twenty-seven members of the Council asked the Superintendent to convene the Council, undisguisedly to compel him to a course of action in the appointment of an Executive, which would have amounted to a limitation of his powers, and, in all probability, to a direct censure of the course he had an undoubted right to take; and, secondly, “That instead of asking some members of the Council who are in the majority to form an Executive,” he sought for “advice from gentlemen who are of the party in the minority of the Council.” Such objections do very well at the hustings, where men are not accustomed to reason very closely, nor have the opportunity during the excitement of a public meeting ; but they point out the utter unfitness of persons for the position of legislatois, who can seek to arrogate to themselves the power to coerce a Superintendent in the manner implied. First, the Council claims to be consulted in the appointment of an Executive : a power which we believe has never before been asked by a purely legislative body; and, secondly, they put upon the Executive Head of the Province the task of ascertaining for himself who form the cabals in the Council, on which side the members usually vote. These two points conceded would deprive the Superintendent of all controlling power: it would be reducing him to a mere puppet. His main work between sessions of the Council is to see that the measures passed are faithfully carried out; and if one set of responsible officers will not undertake the duties, he must appoint another. The twenty-seven members who asked that the Council should be convened, do not seem to have reflected that in the action they took they were striking at the root of the Superintendent’s responsibility. High as is his position, he is entrusted with the powers he possesses by the electors of the Province, and it is his duty to maintain them. It is not, as the Daily Times foolishly puts it, a mere personal squabble between Mr Reid and the Superintendent. No doubt Mr Reid’s followers in the Council, on their parts, have made it so; and by every act, where possible, have shown that while the Province decreed his Honor should be Superintendent in name, they were determined Mr Reid should be so in fact. The struggle therefore is mainly between a few Taieri farmers, helped by some ill-informed mining members, and by interested or prejudiced men, and the electors of the Province.* The Province said, “ Mr Macandrew shall be Superintendentthe Taieri clique said, “you may give him the name, but Mr Reid shall have the power; for we will so hedge the up that he shall not, act without our permission.” This has been their policy from beginning (o end of their existence as a Council. So far as the Superintendent is concerned, his duty is to know no party in the Council. What he has to do is to see that done which is the best for the Province. When he appointed the Tolmie Executive, he did not do anything contrary to the principles of responsible Government : they were equally responsible to tlie Council as Messrs Reid, Bradshaw, Bathgate, and Cutten. Messrs Tolmie, Turnbull, Bastings, M'Artiiur, and M'DERMiDwere members of the Council, equally , with others, men of equally high character and in aggregate knowledge of business superior. The legislative work was over and the appropriations approved, and consequently the party fight for the year over. All that the Executive, appointed by his Honor as an act of necessity, had to do, was to carry out those measures which, right “or wrong, had been the subjects of party fight; and for the manner in which they executed this work they were responsible to the Council. Thus, it is evident that, if there has been an attempt at co-ercion in defiance of the Constitution, it has been on the part of the memorialists. The question is not a personal one. The Province is insulted in the attempt to deprive the Superintendent of the powers with which it entrusted him : he was bound to maintain them, and to hand them back intact; and if the electors are true to themselves, and alive to the self-des-tructive policy of handing over their interests to a faction, they will signify their determination to uphold him in his progressive policy at the coming election.
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Evening Star, Issue 3200, 23 May 1873, Page 2
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944The Evening Star FRIDAY, MAY 23, 1873. Evening Star, Issue 3200, 23 May 1873, Page 2
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