The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1875.

Evening Star, Issue 3984, 1 December 1875, Page 2

The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1875.

It would appear from an article in yesterday’s * Times’ that we were utterly mistaken when we supposed that the public debt of New Zealand would prove an insuperable obstacle to the carrying out of Mr Macandrew’s scheme of financial separation. Our contemporary triumphantly quotes from his Wellington namesake as follows ;

Where is the use of using the “ public creditor” arcumen- as Sir Dillon Bell does against Mr Macandrew? It is the veriest puerility. The public creditor lent New Zealand nearly twenty millions ster ing under a Constitution o'f which Provincial Government farmed an important part. This impersonal financial potentate, the_ “public creditor,” did not questionthe security, never objected to Provincial insti tutions, and does not care the snap of his finger whether there be two Provinces or forty, or whether they be abolished altogether, provided his interest is “ paid punctooal.”

Now it is too bad of our contemporary to thus cut the ground right away from under our feet. It is barbarous. If ho is strong, he still might be merciful! Perhaps, however, the case is not quite so bad as our contemporary thinks. There may be corn in Egypt yet. In fact, when we come to look at the thing carefully, we find that our position is altogether untouched. It may yet be stormed, certainly, but the present missile is most assuredly a hrutum/ulmen . When the above quotation is examined it is found that it amounts to this :—As long as the public creditor receives his interest on the quarter days as they come round, he will not care a farthing whether that interest comes from a Colonial Government, a Provincial Government, or any government whatever. No one, that we know of, ever said that he would. We certainly did not. What he wants is his money. It is no matter of sentiment at all: he has lent a sura of money, and he looks to have it repaid in due course. But suppose that difficulties arise, and that, as in the late case of the Turkish bonds, the interest is not forthcoming, what then 1 Would it satisfy the claims of this public creditor if we—the Province of Otago —said to him, “ Oh, we are able to pay you our share of what the Colony owes you, but the fact is we have dissolved partnership, and you mustgo to the other Provinces for what they owe you. The public creditor is indifferent about the internal arrangements of New Zealand as long as lie gets what is his due, but if he had the slightest reason to believe that these internal arrangements would be likely to endanger his just rights, he would, in a certain sort of way, take very great interest in them indeed, and declare that ho wished, above all things, to disclaim the slightest connection with, or responsibility for, these arrangements. As the 4 N ew Zealand Times ’ says, he does not care a snap of the fingers as long as his interest is paid, but this is simply because he has lent the money to New Zealand as a Colony, and leoks to the Colony for repayment. Since, then, the Colony has to repay this money, it is plainly of very high importance to every district of the Colony, and especially to the more prosperous parts of that every portion of N3w Zealand --should be compelled to bear its share of the burden of the public debt, and of the work of getting rid of this burden. As we have often said before, the only way in which this can be done, as far as we see at present, is to have a Central Government, representing every separate portion of the Colony, and strong enough to thoroughly control the expenditure of erratic, or shiftless, or extravagant districts. However, as wo have shown before, such a Government would be utterly incompatible with Mr Mao anerew’s federated but financially independent Provinces. One word more with regard to the public creditor and tho answer which we have supposed to bo made to him by a solvent Province refusing to bo liable for the sh are of the debt of an insolvent one. Does the ‘ New Zealand Times’ or the ‘ Otago Daily Times ’ really moan to say that such an answer as that would be more than a mean shuffle, — repudiation covered with the thinnest of hypocritical veils, or that it would be possible for Otago to wriggle out of her responsibility for tbe share of the debt that might by some mutual agreement have been allotted to some other Province, and which that Province should prove either unable or uuwillin" to pay] If A, B. C. entered into partnership and contracted liabilities to the amount of £IO,OOO, and, while this liability was still outstanding, came to

m -rrr.ngemeut, without the - ;ne creditor, that tk-

equally ’ - consent of it - .-*«* debt should be -. xued between them—would

, we ask, be satisfactory to the creditor, if, A and B having failed, C. mainly through using the borrowed money had prospered famously but refused to pay more than his share ol the debt. More, would not any court of law or equity in the world decide that C must pay the whole of the XIO,OOO I We sympathize with our contempolary, but assure him that if he has no better shot in his locker than the one he yesterday discharged at the “ public creditor ” argument, the sooner he gives the word to “cease firing” the less ammunition he will waste. Still there may not, after all, be very much harm in his trying another shot or two if he has them to spare—he will get some practice at the very worst, and this he saaly needs. So we say to him, “ Fire away, old fellow, may you have better luck next time !