The New-Zealander. AUCKLAND, WEDNESDAY, AUG. 27, 1862. THE NEW MINISTERS.

New Zealander, Volume XVIII, Issue 1718, 27 August 1862, Page 2

The New-Zealander.

AUCKLAND, WEDNESDAY, AUG. 27, 1862. THE NEW MINISTERS.

Be just and fear not; ' Let all the ends thou aim’st at, be thy Country’*, Thy Goo's, end Truth’s.

Whenever in the midst of a session of the Geueral Assembly a change takes place in the men who are charged with the administration of the Government, a certain amount of delay in the transaction of the public business is inevitable; a positive pecuniary loss to the public follows, as of course, besides the very appreciable quantity of inconvenience to individual members of the Legislature, who, having their particular avocations to attend to, render their public services at considerable personal sacrifice. Such change, therefore, ought at least to bring some compensating advantages. What, wo may be permitted to enquire, have been the advantages to the colony of the recent change of Ministers ? Are the new men superior in mental capacity or business habits to their predecessors ; is their administrative talent greater; do they possess, individually or collectively, a larger’ share ol the confidence of the public than the men they have displaced; is their policy higher, more comprehensive, or more likely to promote tJio gegertil ivellkve? Who, W

ask, will be bold enough to sustain the affirm, ative of these propositions ? Comparisons are proverbially “ odorous.» but in this case comparison would be uufah because there does not appear to be an approach to equality, it having been found impossible even to fill the several offices from amongst the party on that side of the House whose political opinions are understood to be represented by the leaders of the new administration. But if we might not fairly compare, we might at the least contrast the men on the one side and on the other, —and that with great advantage to the ex Ministers, —if we did not feel that there would be damage to the public interests * in complicating by the acerbity of personalities a situation already extremely critical. The policy of the new administration is, or is made to appear to be in all essential points, precisely the policy of their predecessors in office, and though we may look on in pleased surprise whilst “ dirt” is being eaten in heaps, if they loyally support Governor Sir George Grey in the work of pacification and progress which he has undertaken under circumstances painfully difficult and unfavourable, it will be k our duty at least to afford them a fair field and such support as we may; if the work be somehow carried on bravely, we will not criticise too closely the capacity or the skill of the workmen.

But though we cannot discover that the public have gained anything by the recent change, it is patent to us that something of very great value has been thereby seriously endangered, if not absolutely lost, and that is, the reviving confidence in the Government which has manifested itself amongst the natives of this island. We need not to insist upon the fact that our Maori fellow subjects watch our political proceedings with an anxiety sharpened by their fears; the name of Mr. Fox is already associated in their minds with the cessation of the ‘‘law of fighting,” and with the inauguration of a policy of peace and conciliation. Will it be easy for the Natives, in their ignorance ofpolitical tricks, to understand how it has come to pass that those who were, in their eyes, the representatives of that policy have found such imperfect support in the General Assembly of the colony that they had been compelled to retire from office ? Will it not be regarded by • them, —is that change of men not at this moment regarded by them—as symptomatic of a change of purpose on the part of the Europeans, and of a speedy return to that “ Asiatic ” system which .still finds bold advocates in the Great Hurt ang aof the Pakeha. Who shall make intelligible to them, these uncivilised Maories, the mysteries of “ party will they be able to comprehend that, in a matter of life or death to themselves, the vanity of this man, the love of intrigue of that, the personal ambition of another, or the desire—nursed by a section,—of attaining some local object, should be found in practice to have so much mischievous force. We feel that none of these accidents of «ur higher civilization which puzzle and sometimes put ourselves to shame, will be understood by the Maories, and it is therefore that we fear that the price which the colony will have to pay for the Domett cabinet will be the undoing of much of the labour of the last year, and a lossmore or less complete of the revived confidence of the bulk of the native people. There is another loss also which, affecting this Province particularly, now impends, and that is the removal of the seat of Government from Auckland. It is not difficult, we think, throughout the recent intrigues, to track this movement, or to perceive that that is one of the objects of the new Ministry, and probably also the price of much of that political support in the House of Representatives upon which they reckon with so much confidence. How the Auckland members who have helped to bring about the change will account to their constituents, we will not conjecture. On an early occasion we shall probably have a word to say upon this subject.