'NEW ZEALAND MAGAZINE.'

Evening Star, Issue 4112, 2 May 1876, Page 3

'NEW ZEALAND MAGAZINE.'

Second Notice,

The political pabulum provided by the co-editors of the * New Zealand Magazine ’ in this number is of an ultra-Centralistic tendency—supplying, in fact, the antidote to the bane of the previous publication. “ National Evolution ” is a very clever specimen of the (tryumenluin ad homineni. Our friend Mr Stout (for whom we entertain very great respect, although we cannot at all times agree with his peculiar notions) has placed great stress on the principles laid down

by Herbert Spencer and Dr Freeman, in his advocacy of Provincialism. And now Mr Shaw completely turns the tables on him by quoting, and we may say fairly and correctly quoting, these same authorities against him. Regarding the affair as a literary tournament, and altogether irrespective of any opinions of our own upon the subject, we are irresistibly reminded of the Prince of Denmark’s exclamation: ’ Tis the sport to have the engineer Hoist with his own petar. And Mr Shaw in this respect seems to have followed out the course described by Hamlet for his own pocket:—

It shall go hard; Bat I will delve one yard below their mine, And blow them at the moon. Whether such was his intention or not matters little to the general public. It is certain that the “ Essay on National Evolution ” most completely and entirely demolishes all the arguments that have been urged or written as against the Reform of the Constitution. Thus, in few words, he scatters to the winds the childish attempts which, “ with damnable iteration,” have vainly been made to persuade the people of Otago that the Constitution, like the Israelitish Ark, is so sacred a thing that no man’s hand must profanate it:— “It is hopeless to reduce to a final statute! y form the Constitution of any free State that really lives and developes, It is not true to say or to imply that our Constitution becomes repugnant to that of England, if it

changes its form to meet the changing and developing mind of the Colony. It is no more unjust or unconstitutional that the original elements of our Legislature should be re-adjusted, and absorbed into the national representation, than it was in England.”— Here he touches the very marrow of the subject. The people have been led to suppose that their chosen representatives have no right nor any power to make any change in the Constitution. But following out the line of thought suggested by Mr Shaw, we find ourselves heirs to the liberties of oui

forefathers, who changed the Constitution Jlf.rfhs.tain .whensoever and howsoever they deemed it fitting to do so. Shall we bo content with a lesser Uneasure of liberty ? That is the question whicßr people of New Zealand are called upon answer. Because, forsooth, vested interests-—,sftperin-tendental interests, Provincial Executive interests, Provincial Council interests, and a writhing heap of similar uncongenial {nui-

sances—are in danger, the real, true pefople, who have most at stake, are to be cooled, frightened, or prohibited from attempting political Reform. There are barnacl *3 on the hull of the vessel of State, and their tested in-

terests must be conserved at the, expense of the crew and passensers ! A mo ice monstrous proposition was never thru, r it down the throat of a credulous publici. “The question for the iX’olony,” writes Mr Shaw, is this :—“Are we to continue a miserable aggregation of little political circumscriptions, hot-beds of unreasonable and unmeaning jealousies and prejudices, centres of political disintegration, i tearing out the bowels of the land ; or are' wc under the influence of our increasing internal communication and growing intelligence, giving full scope to the healthful instincts of our race, to coalesce into one organic whole, interpenetrated with the sentiments of national unity, and pervaded with the consciousness of national identity,” But what shall he said to the essay of the Rev. David Bruce on the “ Unification of the Colony.” It is common enough to find writers who start from a false premiss, end-

ingin a wrong conclusion; but in this paper the converse proposition is presented to us. The premiss is in the main correct, but the conclusions derived therefrom are unsound ; and yet the general question is ably argued, Tho unification of the Colony is a desirable thing, and to this end the abolition of Provincial Governments is necessary. So far we agree with the writer. But when he proceeds to argue that the public estate that is the land—of Otago should be made the common property of the Colony, wc are compelled to differ. Ho tells us '“that the land fund was localised by virtue of a dexterous manoeuvring, which culminated in the alleged compact of 1855 ”; but he omits to state that the manesuvrers were the representatives of tho Northern Island, who carried the resolutions historically known as “the Compact” by sheer force of numbers in 1855, us against the Southern menbers, who, with the exception of one or two far-seeing men, opposed them. At that time the North thought it a Snd thing to cast the entire burden of the onial indebtedness upon the South, and to take from the general revenue of the Colony, for its own use, the sum for which it was liable. But now that it has had the money paid down, and baa exhausted its patrimony, the North goes in for a little communism and hungers for the property of its Southern neighbors. This is not honest, nor is it honorable, and we regret to find the pages of the ‘New Zealand Magazine’ stained with such unworthy sentiments. Exit, considering the quarter whence they originate, wc do not plead surprise. Necestitas non ho.bet legem ; and the miserably impecunious condition of the Province of Auckland renders the residents thereof impervious to the higher dictates of political morality. They are, by their own action, in 1856, when they imposed their own terms on tho then poor settlements of this Island, “left with only the shadow of a land fund, and condemned to carry on their machinery with the paltry pittances resulting from licenses, taxes on dogs, and such like sources ; ” and it is no wonder, therefore, that they have “gradually but surely drifted into a state of collapse, such as to render their very existence a source of baffling perplexity to the General Government, and to threaten the whole fiscal arrangements of the Colony with confusion.” Mr. Bruce speaks of this condition of Auckland as having been brought about by “generous bxxt mistaken ambition.” Such is his view, and it is one which is no doubt coincided in by nearly every Aucklander. We should give it a different name—none other, indeed, than selfish greed, to which alone is to be attributed the fact that the once dominant Province of the Colony forced the then poor South to pay the entire debt of New Zealand. But this question has been worn threadbare, and we spare our readers a repetition of the argument. Only let us say that if the Unification of the Colony is to bo effected at the price intimated by the Rev. David Bruce, we must decline to be a party thereto. Strongly avowed Abolitionists as we are, we should prefer bearing “the ills we have ” (and they are hard enough to endure) rather than consent to sharing our goods in common with the reckless spendthrifts of the North. Money, in reason, we will give them from our ordinary revenue, as we have done heretofore to the tune of nearly One Million Sterling; but upon our lands they must not lay even their little finger, nor shall not, whilst the power to resist their aggressive, plundering propensities be left to us.

Notwithstanding this fatal error which pervades, and consequently weakens the entire argument, the article on the Unification of the Colony is ably written and bears the stamp of high literary excellence. And its defects render it even more valuable than it otherwise would be, because it reveals the “hand,” so to speak, which our Northern friends intend to play, showing in a plain unmistakeable manner that any political alliance between them and ourselves is out of the question, unless we are prepared to “follow our leader” in pursuit of the unsubstantial shadow of Provincial entity, at the expense of the more valuable substance—the land of Otago. Mr Macandrew, no doubt, would have us do so; but as every man cannot be a Superintendent there are not the same inducements for others as exist for himself. Everybody should read the Rev. David Bruce’s paper, if only for the sake of realising the position. Respecting the essay on “Our Representative System,” little requires to be said. The writer endorses Mr Hare’s scheme of personal representation, which proposes to vest a certain degree of representative power in the hands ©f electoral minorities, and endeavors—unsuccessfully as we think—to show how it can be adapted to New Zealand. It would not be difficult to point out defects in the original scheme, such as must render it unworkable in any country; and assuredly there is no country the circumstances of which render it less suitable for trying the experiment than this that wo live in. Mr Eytou is amusingly illogical. He asserts that the reform suggested by Mr Hare is less “ open to the change of empiricism ” than “ that system described as aiming at administrative decentralisation and legislative centralisation which it is understood that the Government will seek to introduce during the coming session”—by which we suppose is meant Abolition. But Mr Hare's scheme renders it essential that all the voting papers should be conveyed to a central office, and pre-supposes the right of the election to have his vote recorded for any candidate in any part of New Zealand. It is evident that until Provincial Governments, and therewithal Provincial jealousies are abolished such a system could not be rendered workable. If, however, Mr Eyton’s paper should be the cause of drawing greater attention to the acknowledged deficiencies of our electoral system it will have rendered useful service to the State.