New Zealand Times. TUESDAY, MARCH 16, 1875.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4364, 16 March 1875, Page 2

New Zealand Times. TUESDAY, MARCH 16, 1875.

We have to remind our readers that claims to register for votes can only be lodged during the present month ; —in other words, there are fifteen clear days during which persons having the necessary qualification, and who are not already on the electoral roll, may lodge their claims to vote with the officer appointed for that purpose. As the electoral roll for 1875 will be that on which the new Parliament will be elected, the importance of attending to the registration of votes will be evident. Under ordinary circumstances, the necessity for doing so is not so very pressing. It is seldom a constituency is called upon to exercise the franchise except at a general election; and when a casual vacancy occurs, the election invariably turns upon some local or personal consideration. Ministers, on taking office, do not go before their constituencies for re-election, hence it happens that the policy of successive (governments does not necessarily come before the people for review. Once every five years, however - , an opportunity is afforded to the electorate to pronounce an opinion ; and the electoral rolls, based upon the claims to vote lodged up to the end of March and the subsequent revision, will contain the names of all those who are entitled to affirm the public opinion of the country at the next general election. We trust, therefore, that all those entitled to have their names on the electoral roll will take care to secure the legal qualification to vote, by registering. There are no party organisations, as far as we know, such as exists in the mother country for attending to the registration of votes ; but occasionally, in provincial elections, a clique, (we cannot designate them “a “ party,”) succeed in so constituting the electorate that their nominees carry nearly all the seats for which they stand. The ballot has, however, done much towards discouragingthiskindof electioneering management; but even the ballot, as we enjoy it, is not an effectual safeguard against personation and trickery. The law is very stringent no doubt, but persons are always to be found who, for one con sideration or another, will risk pains and penalties, and the shame of exposure, to accomplish their own ends. Hence the imperative necessity for every one who desires to uphold the purity of elections to register his claim to vote, as well as the equally pressing necessity for a close and impartial revision of the rolls. We need not enlarge on this point, however, as its importance must be apparent. When on this subject of registration, we may notice a late article in our Wairarapa contemporary, in which he professes to be shocked at our recklessness, in advising the Government to bring down a Bill to settle the Constitutional question next session. We really do not see in what way our remarks should pain our brother journalist. Surely he does not mean to argue, as one would infer from his article, that Parliament is not competent at all times to deal with any question submitted to it 1 If the General Assembly has the power to consider any question, at any time, within the range of its legislative functions, then it follows that it is quite “ constitutional” and “regular” to consider a Bill for abolishing Provincial Government whenever it may bo introduced. The only question that arises is one of expediency. Is it expedient to introduce such a Bill next session 1 Wo maintain that it is not only expedient, but absolutely necessary. Since the question of constitutional reform was raised by the abolition resolutions last session, Provincial Government exists only in name. The provincial officers throughout the colony perform their duties in the most perfunctory manner. They are “in a transition state”; and, expecting to be “ taken over” bodily by the Colonial Government, and enrolled amongst the noble army of martyrs whose names are on the Civil Service list, they do not scruple to show their contempt for mere Superintendents and their political “helps”—Provincial Secretaries and Treasurers. The plain fact of the matter is this : the whole of the provincial machinery has been thrown out of gear by the abolition resolutions, and in the interest of the public service it is most necessary that such a state of things should speedily come to an end. Wo press the Government to settle this question mainly for the sake of efficient administration. A year or two longer of the existing disorganisation would bo tenfold worse in its effects than all the evils of Superintondentalism, when that system was administered with a strong hand. Now, does our contemporary understand us? We are quite aware of the fact that weighty questions are involved in this issue, which has been kept in the background ; but we are quite prepared to risk those for the sake of obtaining something like finality in the Constitution, and system in administration. It may be that the Provincial Government Abolition Bill will be remitted to the constituencies. Wo hope it may not, for the reasons already stated ; but if it should be made a hustings question, then it is all the more necessary that the electoral rolls should bo as complete as possible. But in any case, the constituencies will have to decide largo questions of policy, based upon finance. Hence, wo say again, let everyone who possesses the necessary qualification register his claim to vote