The Globe. WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 1877.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 1061, 21 November 1877, Page 2

The Globe. WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 1877.

" Mr. Larnacu's proposal to treat lie* land fund :is the property ox the colony ought not to occasion any surprise. It is the inevitable result of provincial aholilion. The guardians of the province were removed when that alteration was made in the Constitution, and the colony lias, as Mr. Larnach puts it, “ been permitted ’ ever since 'to drift: into circumstances ’ which are not pleasing to think upon.” So writes the Lyttelton Timed. We are not surprised that tho above

assort ions have been made, by our eonleniporary. Ever since tin- Abolition Art Tuts boon passed, \v'.ill parrot-like persistency. lie lias repeated Ins assertion as to the consequences of abolition, till he has come to regard it as an axiom which does not require proof. Yet a more statement of the position shows the utter groundlessness of the cry. As has been pointed out over and. over again, it is tin' Assembly which has all along had the entire control of the land fund. The compact of 185 l! was a. resolution of the House, which could have been rescinded at any time. “ The guardians of the province " have been not the Provincial Councils —which, had. no voice in the matter at all —but a majority in the House who insisted on maintaining the terms of tin* compact of ,185(1. If Mr. Larnach’s proposals are earned, it will he because that majority lias been turned into a minority, and the abolition of the provinces cannot possibly have anything whatever to do with it. Had the provincial councils existed at the present moment, they could not have interposed a single obstacle to the proposed change. They might have protested, hut they could have done nothing more. Our representatives in the Assembly would have been responsible, not to them, but to the electors as they are at present. Bid it is useless to further dwell upon this point. Onr contemporary has got possessed of the idea that the communism of tin* land fund and the abolition of the provinces are indissolubly connected. Any attempt to argue the question with him has hitherto only resulted, as in other such similar cases, in a re-assertion of the proposition in more emphatic terms. Having thus proved to Ids satisfaction that Mr. Larnach’s proposal to treat flit' land fund as the property of the colony is the inevitable result of abolition, our contemporary calmly goes on to assert that •‘it has long heen evident that the land fund has been going by inches/’ The Abolition Act, as our readers are aware, actually came into force on the Ist of January. 1877. not quite twelve months ago. The passing of that Act. our contemporary asserts. has brought about the colonialising of the land fund. But at the same time we are told “it has long been going by inches.” Which of the above assertions does our contemporary wish ns to believe? They surely cannot both ho true. If it has long been evident that onr land fund lias been going by inches, we must look for some other cause for its disappearance than Abolition. But Abolition, and nothing but Abolition ! shrieks our contemporary. lias brought this result about. If it has long been evident that our land fund lias been going by inches, what becomes of the argument, used time after time by the Timet, that the safety of the land funds rested in continuing the provincial form of Government. What were those “ guardians of the province ’’ doing when they permitted the land fund |o disappear by inches? The truth of course is that they had no more power than the Road Boards to interfere. Nay more, they showed no desire to do so. The Provincial Councils, in most eases, stood calmly by and witnessed the adoption of a scheme which pledged the land fund of the provinces for immigration and public works. There wore certain men in Canterbury, it is true, who pointed out that as far as this province was concerned there was no necessity for the scheme—that we could make onr own railways, and construct (onr public works out of our own funds, and that the adoption of the Yogel scheme might benefit the colony, but it would be at our expense. Those views rightly received but small favor. There was no more strenuous supporter of the Yogel scheme than our contemporary. To cry out now. because the scheme then adopted is likely to result in the seizure of our land fund is most unreasonable, and to endeavor. moreover, to refer it to Abolition, disingenuous.