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Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1270, 24 August 1872, Page 2

That the Committee of tho House of Representatives appointed to investigate the O'Conor case could come to a decision favorable to the individual concerned can cause no reasonable person the slightest regret, but it certainly must be, to any reasoning person, a source of surprise and sorrow that the Committee should conduct io its conclusion their investigation without requiring the presence of those who were eye-witnesses of the circumstances which led to it, or who, in a position of responsibility, had previously passed judgment upon the facts. Even for the sake of Mr O'Conor, it has been an illjudged course to pursue such an utterly imperfect and partial inquiry. The memrjers ot " the jxeisoii Ouuu»u -rri»«» were called before a committee of that body, and the members who sat as that committee, have a right to declare, as they no doubt will declare, that theve was a decision come to by this Committee of the House, in the absence of evidence which was procurable, prof erred, and absolutely essential. But the Nelson Councillors, collectively and individually, have a personal interest in this matter in which they may, by such proceedings, be gribvously injured. They are, indeed, so already by the characteristic declaration of Mr O'Conor that the whole Council are a set of malicious evil-minded persecutor?, for no other construction can be put upon his words, the members, from the Speaker downwards, having agreed as to facts and the inference of such facts ; yet the full facts upon which they acted are never once brought before this Committee of Inquiry. To the individual member whose conduct wag in suspicion, it would have been but simple justice to have made the inquiry complete j to have omitted all parties from it but tho one involved is not only an absence of justice, but a gross injustice to the other side. Not as accusers but as persons possessed of certain knowledge, and partly in defence of their action in a corporate capacity, members of the Council have all along protested against the inquiry being proceeded with as it was, and while they may not object to this decision being favorable to Mr O'Conor, they may most certainly protest against it being held to be in any way unfavorable to them. We do not purpose now to refer to the findings of the Committee further than to say that it is gratifying to find that Mr O'Conor was able to take his oath that he did not hear the decision of the committee of the Council, though that cir» curastance was of slight import compared with his presenting a memorial the contents of which he should have been aware of, and oth ef existence of which this Committee seem t)have known nothing. It is further gratifying that he produced, at last, that documentary evidence which he declined to show previously, and which, if then frankly shown, might have saved him much tribulation, at the cost of the loss of some public prominence.