The Globe. TUESDAY, JUNE 11. 1878.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1349, 11 June 1878, Page 2

The Globe. TUESDAY, JUNE 11. 1878.

Months ago, when the Premier was on his famous stumping tour, wo pointed out that there was great danger of having a great question treated in an insincere manner. We drew attention to the spectacle of the Premier of the colony going from place to place eliciting applause and apparent enthusiasm in favour of his measures, but there the matter rested. Wo stated that there was no evidence that his followers cared a straw about the reform measures which ho advocated, and that wo might witness the spectacle of a majority of the House of Representatives voting during the coming session for measures in which they took but slight interest. It turns out that wo at that time overrated the power of the head of the Government, in taking for granted that the measures which lie assured us his Government wore going to introduce would ho acceptable to

liis colleagues. Tho insincerity, therefore, which wo dreaded may turn out not to ho quite so wide-spread as wo anticipated. Had tho policy announced by Sir George Grey been that of his Cabinet, tho whole party might have boon compelled, not from conviction, but from party ends, to force the Premier’s measures upon tho country. Thanks, however, to tho insincerity of tho members of tho Cabinet themselves, tho bulk of their followers may escape from tho moral guilt of which they were at one time in danger. They have two policies before them —Sir G. Grey’s and that of Mr. Ballance —and they can choose which they care most for. They have both boon announced to tho colony as that of the Ministry, and when Mr. Stout addresses his constituents in Dunedin we may get yet another edition of the Ministerial programme, different from all the others. Tho present state of public affairs appears to give little uneasiness to tho great bulk of the people of the colony. They have heard with the utmost unconcern the announcement of the Ballance view of Government measures. Those who wore induced to give their support to tho Premier on the strength of his promised measures, still go on trusting in his sincerity, in the vague belief that things will turn out to bo in some way or another all right in the end. Some journals, although at first showing signs of being somewhat disconcerted, have valiantly set about tho task of proving that the two policies are not different—that Sir G. Grey’s words, properly understood, have the same meaning as those of Mr. Ballance. Other journals, with some slight sense of honour loft, are angrily asking what Ministers mean, and are oven accusing them of trifling with an intelligent people in acting as they have been. But what have the Government been doing ever since they got into office but trifling with the intelligence of tho colony? It has required no great amount of intelligence to perceive that tho great aim of the Administration has been to secure support at whatever cost. Hence the career of promising on which the Government entered so soon as Parliament was prorogued. The Premier’s duty was to gain tho support of one class in the colony, and his colleagues are apparently resolved to gain that of another, by taking no hood to their chief’s enraptured ravings. Of course, Parliament has to be met, and some explanation of all this misrepresentation given. That will no doubt be an easy task. Wo shall probably bo informed by Sir George that the country is not quite ripe for the large reforms sketched out by tho Premier, and the House will be asked to pass measures of a temporary nature till tho people have been educated up to the proper point. But whatever mode is taken of explaining away the difference between the head of the Government and his colleagues, it is plain that recent disclosures must have a most injurious effect upon the public mind. If Mr. Ballance’s sketch of the Ministerial policy is the correct one, it ■null no longer bo possible to believe that tho measures brought forward by Sir G. Grey, during the coming session, will bo those which, “in his idea, are tho very best for "'the interests of the people.” This was the decision arrived at by tho meeting in the Oddfellows’ Hall. Tho faith of those who proposed that famous resolution, and of those who voted for it, must before this have been rudely shaken. At the very time when those eloquent denunciations of plural voting, and of the property franchise, were still ringing in the ears of his captivated audience, the Reform Bill must have been sketched out, perpetuating all those so-called evils. How, therforo, is it possible to avoid the conclusion that Sir G. Grey has been deceiving the country, and promising when he knew that he could not fulfil P The time is surely come, therefore, when those who have been the victims of his deception should take action, and, if they can get no satisfactory explanation of his apparent double dealing, as honest men, there is only one course open to them.