"MEASURES, NOT MEN."

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4590, 6 December 1875, Page 2

"MEASURES, NOT MEN."

TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEW ZEALAND TIMES. g IK _This w&s one of the great reform cries in the old country and the same is applicable to the reform time now approaching. The electors, therefore, both in this city and province, will do well to consider, before they pledge themselves to any candidate, what measures that candidate, if elected, will either bring forward or support. However excellent a man may be in a social point—and the city and colony are full of "good fellows"—however excellent a man may be in other respects, ho may be utterly useless as a representative mau. He may be so bound up with interests, generally speaking, of a monopolising charac ■ ter, that his freedom of action in originating or supporting measures frequently makes him willingly a tool in the hands of leading politicians whose aim is place and pay. The electors therefore would do well to set their faces against that maudlin sentiment of "I shall support our old members," simply because they were the members during the last Ave years. They should consider the motto, "Measures, not men." The ballot was intended to place the electors in the position of exercising their unfettered and free opinion with regard to the candidates for whom they have the privilege of voting. It appears, however, to me that this freedom is being very much interfered with by the personal canvass that is now

-going on. What is the use of ballot if, before the day, of. polling, a candidate is able to calculate with a degree of certainty upon his election. If, in conse-; sequence of this personal canvass, he considers himself " safe " from the promises received, and at the end of the election, after the poll is declared, he finds himself "out in the cold," he naturally enquires, in his own mind, how is this ? Some of these men must have . The electors will therefore do well to reserve their unfettered opinions for the ballot-box. They will then carry out-the advice of.tho great reformers at Home,' and Vote for " measures, not men. "—I am, &c. PUI'.LICOLA.