To the Editor of the "New Zealand Spectator." Wellington, 20th September, 1849.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume V, Issue 432, 22 September 1849, Page 3

To the Editor of the "New Zealand Spectator." Wellington, 20th September, 1849.

Sir, — Whether the Wellington Independent be now any further Independent than in name, and whether it is subject to the party of which Mr. Fox has become an esteemed leader are questions, but that a letter which ten or twelve days ago was sent to that paper calling attention to the case between that gen'leman and the Otago News has escaped the official notice of the editors is a fact. Perhaps you can find room for the substance of it. Having learned from a Sydney Paper some particulais of this interference with the Liberty of the Press by one of the professed advocates of freedom, my attention jvas recalled to the subject by a letter from a highly respectable settler at Otago containing the following passage :—": — " lam sorry to hear that Captain Cargill's withdrawal of the subscription of forty copies for the Company of the Otago News has been appicved of" by Mr. Fox. * * * In its present shape it" (the paper) " must do good to the Colony. Graham is a very young man and no doubt this is his first attempt at a newspaper, so that some allowance should be made for him. I should be very glad to get some additional , subscribers for him." The subscriptions of the Company to the Otago News no doubt led to its establishment, and their withdrawal looks \ery like a breach of failh besides being an act of tyranny. The offence of the editor was this. He looked at the country round Dunedin with his own eyes and described what he saw. His sketches differed from those of Captain Cargill and he was mulcted accordingly. Yet the paper was open to all. If the editor was wrong the contradiction would have been as public as the misstatement, and the mischief much less than follows from the arbitrary course pursued towards him. For now that the Sydney papers have taken up the matter it will come to be generally believed, and ■with great show of reason too, (the past history of the press in this settlement being left out of the question) that newspapers assisted hy the New Zealand Company must servilely follow its dictation and must suppress facts if they differ from the Company's representations of them. This impression is confirmed hy the silence of -Mr. Fox on the subject. Public dinners are inconvenient occasions for entering into such details, and he does not feel himself called upon to afford explanation to individuals. But the circumstances with a hostile interpretation of them having got abroad into the neighbouring colonies, it is his duty to set the eiror right by stating the truth, if indeed the truth would help the matter. Mr. Fox has the credit of having been connected with the press in this settlement when it ! zealously supported the Company. The Company has not been ungrateful. If he wishes to prevent theinferences which suggestthemselves, j when the case now before the public is taken as the key to his own past position, he should give An explanation. j I am, Sir, Your obedient servant, O.