The New Zealander. AUCKLAND, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 6, 1853.

New Zealander, Volume 9, Issue 728, 6 April 1853, Page 2

The New Zealander.

AUCKLAND, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 6, 1853.

Be just and fear not: Let all the ends thou aim'st at, be thy Country'!, Thy God's, and Truth's.

The Proclamation of His Excellency the Governor-in-Chief conferring the long and anxiously desired boon of a reduction in the price of Land has now been extensively read and considered in this neighbourhood, and, so far as our information goes, has afforded high gratification,—if not to all—yet certainly to the great bulk of the people. Indeed it would be difficult to understand how any of those who have for years been reiterating the cry of " Cheap Land" could regard with other than feelings of lively satisfaction a measure which in so large a degree secures that benefit immediately, without the delay, and we may add, the uncertainly that a postponement of it until the meeting of the General Assembly would involve. We say both "delay" and "uncertainty." Although the Proclamation fixing the regulations for the registration and elections has now been issued, yet a considerable time must elapse before the Assembly can meet, even supposing no long interval to elapse between the elections and the Session. The Police Office —as will be seen by a notice from the Resident Magistrate in another column—will be open for the reception of claims to vole until the loth of May;—a month after (until the loth of June) is allowed_Jbr UjjQ. p.v*oae**!e»-*and publication 6T a List of the Claims lodged ; after that, the Special Meeting finally to determine the Electoral Roll is to be held at any time not exceeding a month after the dale of ihe published List of Claims. The preliminaries having been gone through, the elections are to take place; even then it rests in the discretion of the Governor to fix the period for the commencement of the Session; and, we may add, the progress of this or any similar measure might be slow even when the Assembly was sitting. This delay has all been averted by His Excellency's Proclamation, and as we believe the cheapening of Land to be a good—a very good—thing, we cannot but rejoice that it has been done so soon.

But we have intimated that there might have been some uncertainty as to the fate of the measure in the General Assembly. Here, where the people are unanimous, or nearly so, in favour of Cheap Land, some may be sceptical on this point. But there can be no doubt that not a few influential persons in the South are strongly disposed to maintain the old high-price system. What is called "the squatting interest" in the Wellington district is in arms against a plan which breaks up their monopoly—a monopoly with reference to which the Spectator observes, " We believe that all the available land in New Zealand would fail to satisfy the applications that have been made for runs. In several instances one person has applied for two or more runs of several thousand acres each: the result is that the country has been locked up and handed bodily over to a handful of the colonists, to the exclusion of every other class ; a monstrous wrong to the community has been thus committed. No doubt it is a grievous wrong; but the Proclamation applies the remedy, and we cannot wonder that the monopolists, who, though few in number, are wealthy and influential, are disposed to thwart the measure to the utmost of their ability." Again, the Canterbury Association scheme of high-priced land receives a severe blow through the liberality of the new system. Even while the upset price here was 1/. per acre, few were willing to pay 5/. in their settlement, and it is obvious that the few will be rendered much fewer by a reduction in other districts to 10s. or Ks. while the old rate is kept up there, the hostility of the Association to the plan has already manifested itself more significantly than decorously. A Mr. Sewcli, oneof the founders of the Association, has come out by the Minerva, to wind up, if he can, their tangled and mangled aflairs. We have in the late Lyllelton papers some notices of this gentlemen's movements which do not impress the reader very favourably: and on the spot he had evidently at the last dates failed to satisfy the settlers as to the truth or falsehood of a rumour that tho Association was about to perpetrate a breach of faith at which even the New Zealand Company might blush, bv selling, m order to pay debts incurred bv their Committee, land around Christ Church which it was strictly covenanted should be reserved for public purposes. Mr. Sewcli has we have reason to know, addressed to the Governor a communication on the subject of the Proclamation which, coming as it does from one who may be supposed'to have had the education and "lo have imbibed the views and feelings of an English gentleman, we cannot hesitate to pronounce one of the

most impertinent documents of its kind that it has ever been our lot to read. In this he disputes the legality of the Proclamation arguing that it contravenes the New Zealand Company's Settlements Act (14 and 15 Victoria) which provided that the price settled by the Terms of Purchase for WelfioW. ton, Nelson, and New Plymouth should hot be altered;—that the power vested in the Crown by the New Constitution Act (which he contends does not extend so far as the Proclamation assumes) must, at ali events, be delegated to the Governor by Royal Instructions and, finally, that such Instructions hate notbeen received,—or rather, as he naively observes, " I am informed, I know not how cor* rectly"thatlheyhavenot. Andyetthisaccom. plished logian, while he admits his ignorance on the point, jumps to the conclusion that " therefore" the Proclamation cannot be sustained either in point of form or substance. Our object is not now to examine these cavils in any detail; but we may observe as to the question arising out of the restriction in the Act of iBS J, that no such restriction exists or is hinted at in the Constitution Act of 4852, and that, as every one knows, the later Act of Legislation, where it is express in terms, must over-ride all that preceded it. We submit it as a point worth consideration, —if this objection have any force, whether it does not apply equally against the power of the General Assembly to lower the price of Land as against the power of the Crown. Then as to the delegation, Mr. Sewell, when getting up his letter to the Governor stopped short in reading the 79th section of the Constitution Act, —(which must be taken in connection with the 72nd in order to a right understanding of the case)—just at the point where it suited his purpose to stop. Had he read on, he would have found that the delegation of the Crown's power to the Governor may be made notonly by Letters Patent,andby Instructions under Her Majesty's Signet and Sign Manual, but also by Instructions " signified through one of Her Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State/' Now, not only was it intimated in a Despatch from Sir John! Pakington already published that Instructions were prepared, but in the Preamble/of the Proclamation it is distinctly asserted that the necessary Instructions have actually been received. The words are —(as the reader may see on reference to the document, which we copied on Saturday)—" And whereas such power has been dclegated'to the Governor by Instructions received ifuough Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies." Mr. SeweYl thinks he answers this by saying that he does not know of any such Despatch having been received, and lherefore,in short, hedoesnot believe that ilhas been ! If there be either sound reasoning or gentlemanly decorum in this statement, then things and words must have greatly changed their meaning, and our old-fashioned notions of faliaca»_axjd effrontery must be exploded by some advent of modern —perhaps coloniz-ing-association—refinement. Be this as it may, we still hold to another of our ancient opinions, namely than it is a principle of British Law that every act officially performed by duly constituted Authorities is to held to be leg-al until its illegality is proved. On his own showing Mr. Sew r ell cannot prove that the necessary Instructions, which the Governor in a formal Proclamation declares he has received, have not been received by His Excellency; the presumption that they have would be so strong as to border on certainty even if the fact were not absolutely affirmed in the Proclamation; and if, as is reported, Mr. Sewell means to moot the question in the Supreme Court, we are thoroughly satisfied that his temerity will meet its fitting recompense in a disgraceful overthrow.

To return to the point from which we have thus in some degree digressed—(although our readers will, we think, excuse a digression so closely connected with the main subject)—it is very evident from what we have now stated that, had the matter been postponed till the meeting of the General Assembly, the monopolists of "the squatting interest," and of the Canterbury Association, would have brought their utmost influence to bear against the reduction in the price of Land which is now effected. His Excellency never before had power to lower the price: we have good reason to believe that, years since, his mind was known to lean strongly to a reduction to ten shillings an acre, but he then was fettered by a superior authority to his own : now that he has had the power conferred upon him, he has lost no time in accomplisking the work, and acomplishing it in a way that is most effective because most shielded from the contingencies which it is very plain would await the proposition in a Council in which "tbe squatting interest,'' the Canterbury Associationists, and Mr. Gibbon Wakefield's disciples would have voices and votes. Before we conclude, however, we may glance at one or two objections which we have heard stated even here, notwithstanding the general pleasure with which the measure is received. It has been said that while our own colonists were long struggling under difficulties occasioned by the high price of land, this relief was not afforded J but now it is given when prosperous gold* diggers in Australia and other strangers may come in and take a lion's share of tueadvatt* lage. To this we may reply, just, by referring to the fact first stated, as respects the Colonial Government at all events, that no power existed in.the Colony until now, by 'which the object could be effected; and, secondly, by asking—What harm can possibly j result to us from an influx of population or an influx of stock from the neighbouring colonies ? Will not these rather be sources ' ousand general advantage? So longago as tfcc '■ days when the steamer Juno was in oifr waters it was a theme of loud complaint that the price of meat for the military and the civilian inhabitants was kept at an exorbitant ra* e by the locking up of the land ; and the statement tfiat ih e cattle of our resident stockholders were dying for want of food was urged with special earnestness in the Legislative Council of 1849. The W Land Sales here have proved that our settlers are able to pay a much higher lhaii the upset price for lots which answer then* requirements; and now they will have at leas

a full participation in the benefits of the reduction ; while if we obtain new settlers, whether for agricultural or pastoral occupations, surely the increase of our population will be the supply of a desideratum which has on all hands been more than admitted. If the Land Fund should be diminished by the charge, the General Revenue—that more legitimate source of permanent Income—will be proportionately increased. Again, it has been said, on the other hand that the New Regulations will I open a door for a fresh locking up of the land by capitalists, resident or absentee, who may by means of their knowledge of the country or their wealth purchase the best lots wherever they are lo be found—with a view to the large profit that may be realized by their resale at a distant day. We confess we are not ourselves, wholly free from apprehensions on this point; but the remedy is not difficult. 'Either the Government or the Legislature may meet the case by imposing a tax on all uncultivated land above a certain extent held by the same proprietor. This can easily be done, and until it is done we do not hesitate to say the plan will, in our opinion, be so far defective. Rut, taken as a whole, it confers a great benefit on the colonists. Even in the South that benefit will be experienced by the mass of the settlers. According to the testimony of the Wellington Spectator, "with the exception of a few whose sanguine visions of monopoly, like the dreams of Alnaschar, have been somewhat abruptly disturbed and put lo flight, the settlers are convinced that the practical effect of these Regulations will tend more to promote the general prosperity of ihe colony than any other measure that could be devised." The New Zealand Company will indeed sharply feel the effect of them, and lament more bitterly than ever the alteration from the original proposition —that they should have a fixed claim of five shillings an acre—to the existing enactment which limits their claim lo one-fourth of the price: but their disappointment will only be matter of very justifiable joy to the colonists,—who, we may add, at least, so far as the Province of Auckland is concerned, will never, if they can help it, pay even that to a body to whom they owe nothing, and from whom they have experienced only uniform insult and injury. In the North, we repeat, the prevailing feeling must be warm approbation of the plan in its object and leading features; and we may wind-up with a sentence or two from the Taranalu Herald of the 30th alt., which reached us on Monday. Our contemporary had not received the Proclamation itself, but referring to a substantially accurate abstract of its contents which had appeared by anticipation in the Spectator, the Herald observes: — " It has been long admitted that, a large supply of land, and a great reduction in the price of land, arc absolulely necessary to the progress and prosperity of this settlement; and whatever may be the difficulties and objections in the way, the necessity is so paramount, and the evils attending it so many, that either by the government, or by the assembly to be constituted under the new Act, something must be done promptly and efficiently to meet the exigency of ihe case." And, again, "That the measure in question may involve loss to individuals is only placing it in the category with all sweeping measures for the public benefit. A great evil is lo be cured, and some individual interests will doubtless be compromised: and this is no reason against it, such matters always remain to be dealt with in a spirit of fairness. Rut the measure itself involves little less than the prosperity of the colony, certainly, as regards this settlement, ils only rational chance of progress."