The Evening Star. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 29, 1874.

Evening Star, Issue 3646, 29 October 1874, Page 2

The Evening Star. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 29, 1874.

No matter how evenly a man treads in his shoes, somebody is sure to find lie wears them more on one side than the other. Especially is this the case with a public officer. The least bias—real or apparent—is watched and commented upon, and not unfrequently attributed to motives very far from the true ones. In some respects this is an advantage. The watchfulness, for instance, of the City Council over the Mayor and his doings is quite sufficient to make him very circumspect. Even in his desire to serve the town and to obtain necessary plant on the cheapest and best terms, he must not transgress the customary usages of business in the slightest degree, on pain of being brought to task for over-stepping the bounds of the functions with which he is intrusted. This is really as it should be. Although the Mayor is the chief citizen, there are limits within which his power must be exerted, and if he goes beyond them, however pure his intentions, he must expect a check. No doubt these limitations of power detract somewhat from the pleasures of office. It is not very pleasant to the Head of a Government to have a member of the Council proclaim to your face, and in the face of the world, that you have transgressed your duty and meddled with matters that should have been dealt with by somebody else. Every repetition of such a charge tends to weaken authority, and to bring the office into disrepute. The civic throne becomes a bed of nettles, and the City Council a nest of thorns. This uncomfortable development of municipal government has frequently protruded itself in Dunedin, Nq sooner does a man become Mayor, than the Council is on the Watch to pick a hole in his coat. The theoretic rule iu most governments is that “ the Head can do no wrong.” In municipal governments, however, it seems reversed ; and the maxim acted upon is “ the Head cannot do right.” While, therefore, Emperors, Kings, Queens, Governors, Mid Superintendents are never censured excepting through their principal officers, a Mayor has to bear the brunt of his own misdeeds or mistakes, and must submit to be schooled into knowing his duty by the Council over which he presides. Very possibly, did he hold office three or four years instead of one, he would learn by experience what to do and say, and what to let alone. He would recollect that in most Corporations the Town Clerk is the actuary, who is expected, under his directions, to carry out the resolutions of the Council, and that it is rarely advisable that he should take independent action unauthorised bv the Corporation. We do not for ’ one moment impute to the Mayor any other desire than a wish to serve the City in the matter of tenders for the stouehreaking machines; nor do we offer any opinion as to the relative advantages of the offers made by the tenderers. We do not think the particulars of each offer have been made public. But the shape which the matter took in the Council last evening was not favorable to the business-like tact of the Mayor. Tenders had been invited, and should either have been accepted or rejected before any other offer was entertained. It may have entered into the Mayor’s mind that those sent iu were too high ; and there was nothing to prevent his giving expression to that idea in his capacity of Mayor, when the question of their acceptance came to be discussed. Neither could he have been blamed for making inquiry so as to fortify himself in the opinion that the machines could be, and ought to be obtained on better terms. But the form in which the matter appeared last night tended to the suspicion that undue use had been made of the knowledge he possessed for the purpose of mducing another importer to accept a smaller profit; nor did the subsequent withdrawal of the offer tend to remove the impression. No doubt this pettifogging style of business is too often acted upon between men, but it is one that everybody condemns, and is universally reprobated as shabby. It is of the utmost importance that public bodies should be above suspicion on such points, for if persons send iu a tender they have a right to expect to be honorably dealt with. Let an idea

become prevalent that a tender will be 1 made the instrument of beating down P r ices, and no one will be willing to send in an estimate. A few pounds saved in the cost of stone-breakers may therefore cost the City thousands. We think the Mayor will do well in future to content himself with seeing the resolutions of the Council carried out, and not unite within himself the offices of Works Committee, Town Clerk, and Mayor.