Hawke's Bay Times. NAPIER, FRIDAY MAY 8, 1863.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume II, Issue 113, 8 May 1863, Page 2

Hawke's Bay Times. NAPIER, FRIDAY MAY 8, 1863.

For the Herald to take up the cause of the working man, and to throw down the glove in defence of the rights of that class whom a while ago that magnanimous paper would not condescend to recognise, is a very remarkable fact, and is worthy of special record. Truly “ all the world’s a stage,” and each editor in it “in his time plays many parts.” Now, if our friend, in the exuberance of his philanthropy was really anxious to extend the benefits of a great blessing, in the enjoyment of which only a select few had heretofore participated, to the surrounding multitudes, then we would heartily join that respectable party in the general distribution of the comforting benediction ; but it unfortunately happens that the Herald has fallen back upon a very weak reserve to prop up a x'otten and most unexceptionably bad case. It has been the habit of that enlightened journal, until the present time, to sneer at the claims of the working man to electoral rights, and to sneer most particularly at those who presumed to advocate that profane doctrine. Now then it is our turn to sneer, and we do so most warmly, and with praiseworthy sincerity, at the use which our contemporary at present makes of the “ rights of man.”

That any supposilionary public benefit can possibly accrue from a gross and palpable infringement of the provisions of an Ordinance provided for the express purpose of securing, by the regulation of the franchise, an acknowledged public benefit, appears to us to imply a most ridiculous contradiction, and in point of fact to render all legislation upon any subject affecting the interests, real or supposed, of the people to be unnecessary. For what purpose under the sun do we send members to Parliament, and resent as a gross infringement of our rights and privileges any interference, direct or indirect, with those members, if, after those learned men have devoted their precious time and precious health to the making of laws placing certain restrictions upon society, we find it convenient upon any slight pretext, and for any particularly convenient private reasons, to set aside the results of that expenditure of time and wind ? We have seen enough of the wanton disregard of the Statutes made and provided already in this Province, and wc as a community, have good reason bitterly to regret the laxity of the administration of those Statutes.

To talk about prejudging a case about which there can be no two opposing opinions is preposterous, and that talk shews that however well acquainted our contemporary may be with the laws of this land (which, en passant, he treats but lightly upon occasion), he appears to be ignorant of a very important law which remains to this day on the Statute Book of Scotland, and which law

provides that if a man be caught in the fact with the “ red hand” he shall be instantly and without benefit of clergy strung up on the nearest convenient elevation. The fact is, our Civil Commissioner has made a great mistake in this matter, and the mistake is, according to his own advocate’s view of the case, not so much in doing that which is not lawful and not right, as in being found out in the act of doing so ; and the Herald, with astonishing self-denial, rushes to the rescue to prevent, if possible, the summary and disagreeable consequences which may probably supervene from this discovery falling upon Ms, for the nonce, particular pet. If every man whose master chooses to put him upon the voting list, whether he has a legal right to that privilege or not, was allowed to remain upon that list, regardless of the absence of the necessary qualification, why not at once put the Ordinance which distinctly provides for and which jealously guards that qualification behind the fire, and declare without delay universal suffrage? Why all the talk with which our contemporary annually inundates an unoffending people about the advantages of the electoral privilege ? Why all that wordy and windy controversy about the disfranchisement of Tom, Dick, and Harry, connected as that disfranchisement was with the stupidity of a certain printer ? And still farther, why, if there be no value in the limitation set upon the voting privilege, did the Revising Officer cause all those persons whose fates had led them to use the obnoxious forms (although the particular cause of that obnoxiousness was a very small matter, being, we believe, to be found in a solitary word,) to be struck off the list of voters, and kept off the list, too, until the annual revolution of the earth had brought them back into the month of March, in which month, the harvest being over, -we are at liberty to sow a little fresh political seed ?

It is fortunate, in the interests of the lovers of impartial justice, that Major Whitmore has committed the little mistake we have occasion to notice, because it enables us to come down upon that distinguished individual, and to hold him up as a warning to all lesser oftenders. That gallant officer is so completely recognised and known as a mere deputy or tool of Mr. McLean’s that really prudence, we imagine, would dictate that the less he (the Major) meddles with local politics in any way, by whatever excellent motives actuated, the better. The Hemld says, and we believe it, that all General Government officers are prohibited by law from being candidates for any seat in any representative political assembly ; and by the same token we think that very just arrangement indirectly means and intends that all those fortunate gentlemen should not in any way, directly or indirectly, influence the choice of the people for that seat ; nay, more, the spirit of that Ordinance, with an ignorance of the existence of which we are taunted, is most decidedly to curtail the aspirations after party influence which may possibly become developed in the minds of the officers in question, and which aspirations, failing in finding a vent in No. 1 himself, must find something of the sort in No. 2, No. 2 being No. I’s particular friend. In short, so long as Major Whitmore holds the office of Civil Commissioner, seeing the extreme importance of that officer being more free from party influence than perhaps any other officer in the public service of this country, the less he has to do with local politics the more weight will the office he holds have in the affairs of men. The writer of the article to which the Herald takes objection had in view at the time of the inditement of that article the fact that Mr. Bousfield had appealed against Major Whitmore’s voters ; and we have good reason for believing that Mr. Bousfield did so without prejudice to the real interests of the persons named in the list; for, by the way, we suspect that the Major might find his little party not quite so easily managed when he had occasion to bring them up to the scratch, as he may at this moment possibly think ; but because the way of filling up the

voting list, of which we complain, lias been carried on for an indefinite period, and it is high time that that practice should be put a stop to. If the integrity of the voting privilege is to be maintained, and the Revising Officer does his duty according to the letter and spirit of the Act made for securing that object, then we say that Major Whitmore’s voters will be incontinently struck out, and that gallant officer will, we hope, see the folly of his ways, and repent in time.

If we have to recur to this disagreeable subject again, for disagreeable it is in the extreme to feel that our duty demands that we do hold up for public inspection the little weaknesses of frail humanity, we shall be compelled in doing so to take up, if possible, a yet stronger ground, and use yet stronger language in support of our position, which course, we need hardly remark, would he supremely painful, and we therefore advise our friend of the Herald, if he really respects the feelings of the Civil Commissioner, to spare us that objectionable necessity.