THE Grey River Argus. PUBLISHED DAILY. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1872.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1100, 6 February 1872, Page 2

THE Grey River Argus. PUBLISHED DAILY. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1872.

The inhabitants of Wellington have been making high holiday on the occasion of laying the foundation stone of their new Provincial Buildings, and by xhe Superintendent of the Province there has been pronounced a panegyric on Provincialism such as has not been heard since the Colony was blessed or cursed with a Constitution. The proceedings of the public and the speech of the Superintendent on this occasion are alike significant. The temper of the % times, present and past, has been to denounce Provincial institutions as the bane of the country, and as a bane for which there w%s no antidote but dissolution ; and it is impossible to disguise the fact that for this feeling, and for the denunciations which it inspired, there were, and yet are, some substantial grounds. So strong and widespread Was this feeling, and so putspoken was : the advocacy of the abolition' ;or alteration of Provincial institution!^ that in; the General Assembly, sesajonj after session, it became the stock 'subject with each incipient orator, and, out of session, it was still more ably and openly advocated from the stump. Either from conviction, or from pelicy, the present Government, during the last session, put the sincerity of these; expressions; to ihe proof, and what was the result'? VSinVply the discovery that much 6i /what, was said was mere lip service; and that, great and grievo is as had been the faults and failures of Provincial Governments, these same Governments represented such a vast ve«ted interest that any attempt even to modify their constitution would meet with no success, while it would in all probability end in ousting the Ministry from their seats. "The sineerily of many Members was tested and* found wanting ; the Bill was withdrawn ; and speculation has, since the session, directed itself to divining what ' measure of amendment the Ministry would venture to make next year. It is in its relation to this question that the speech,. of Mr Fitzherbert is especially significant. If not for personal reasons, at any rate for Provincial reasons, and probably for better reasons than mere thankfulness as a Superintendent for the good things which his Province has received, Mr Fiteherbert is a right hand supporter of the present Government. He probably influences them as much as he. is influenced by them ; and anything which he may say, when spoken advisedly and deliberately, as this speech seems to have been spoken, may be accepted, in free phraseology, as a straw showing how the wind blows. It was his own wish, in fact, that his words should be considered to be words "carefully, weighed, and fraught with more than ordinary significance," and it has to be remembered that they were words uttered in the presence of the Colonial Secretary, and that to his presence reference was made as somewhat sanctioning their utterance. Said] Mr Fitzherbert: — "We have all given our presence and countenance unsolicited — al|nhave come forward in the most spontaneous manner, and by so doing have practically said, 'We will countenance and encourage you in reviving and giving a local habitation and a name to those institutions which, in some parts of New Zealand, have become a bye-word and reproach. 1 This is why I say the proceedings of to-day are of no ordinary significance. Because we have not merely sanctioned, by our presence and participation in the formalities which have been gone through to-day, the expenditure of a few thousand pounds, but we have further, and in the most unmistakeable manner, declared that we still have faith in Provincial institutions as worthy of beinc?, carried out in their integrity and perpetuated." This is unmistakeable lansjuiy.'p. ami it is the language, not of a SupiMvitcndout only, but of a leading member of the dominant party in the House. To follow Mr Fitzherbert through his long arguments in favor of this preservation aud perpetuation of Provincialism in its integrity would be too much for our space, for his speech occupies four columns of the local papers, and in its scope it includes no end of references to history and to democratic institutions of the day in all parts of the civilised <rorld. The ground for the faith that is in him is simply that local self-government is a great and a good thing, and if the faith of others depended only on a perusal of his wellrounded periods, the belief would be universal in New Zealand that, in Provincial Councils and Superintendents, we have the theory of such local government reduced to the most perfect practice. Unfortunately, the painful experience of the past does not point in that direction, and a single corn of such experience is, in its effect upon the public, equal to a bushel of the most beautifully illustrated arguments. Beneficent as may be the result of such a glorious trinity as Colonial, Provincial, and Municipal institutions in the limited and favored sphere of the Province of Wellington, in outlying districts such as this, where Provincial Government, under whatever name, is .dominant, the same satisfaction cannot honestly be expressed, and it is to be hoped that, significant as this specoh may be, it is not wholly significant of the '

sentiments of the Ministry on the subject, or of a cessation of their efforts to limit Provincial powers. A pleasing parallel has, jrio doubt, been drawn by Mr Fitzherbert between the New Zealand Provinces and the American States, but the parallel is more picturesque than absolutely true to nature, and Mr Fitzherbert himself makes a confession, while drawing this parallel, which we may well apply as a comment upon his own remarks. "If lam asked," he says, ft how it is that if Provincialism is so good it is so much discredited, I must answer you candidly, because in many instances it was too ambitious." Mr Fitzherbert is riot less ambitious in his comparison than New Zealand Provinces have been in their apeing of legislation, andjin that ambition they have vaulted and o'erleapt. The truth is, and it is attruth which has become painfully palpable in the cities and States of America itself, that for a multiplicity of local governments we lack the necessary material in men. The population is not yet equal to the production of the amount of honesty and talent that is required for so many representative bodies as we possess in our Road Boards, Borough Councils, County Councils, Pror vincial Councils, arid Assemblies and Councils of Legislators. In avoiding, in its form of Government, the Scylla of centralisation, New Zealand has drifted towards the Charybdis of diffusion, and the country hopefully looks to the present 'Government to put the ship of State on : a clear course.