MR. COLEMAN PHILLIPS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 4840, 26 September 1876, Page 2

MR. COLEMAN PHILLIPS.

TO THE EDITOR OP THE NEW ZEALAND TIMES. Sip,—l heartily join in the wish expressed by you that the evidence taken by the Select Committee which has been considering Mr. Coleman Phillips's claim In connection with the Pacific Island scheme, should be printed. But in the meanwhile, as the matter seems to attract some attention, and a great deal utterly devoid of truth has been said about it, I ask your permission to give my version of the circumstances.

Early in 1872, I met Mr. Wood, then one of the members of the Fijian Government, in Sydney, and he agreed to give me a concession for establishing a bank or branch of a bank at Fiji. I wrote to friends at Home suggesting the establishment of a large bank and trading company, to take in the Pacific Islands generally. I did not receive an encouraging reply, and gave up the matter, or at any rate ceased to deal with it.

Meanwhile, considerable political interest centred in the Pacific Islands questions, and officially I had to deal with their political aspect. About August, 1873, Mr. Phillips sent me a copy of his scheme. It revived in my mind the commercial idea, and I at once resolved to give Mr. Phillips all the advantage I could for it. I sent it to the Governor, and subsequently wrote to Mr. Phillips to come to Wellington. In the variousiprinted papers, Mr. Phillips's name is liberally mentioned, as was shown in your article in to-day's paper. He did not lead me to suppose he wanted any compensation. He asked my advice if he should go Home to form a company. I hesitated to advise him to do so. I believe I tcld him that I thought all would depend upon getting a charter from the English Government. Meanwhile, after a great deal of thought, I came, to the conclusion that it would be worth while for New Zealand to take up some such scheme as that proposed by Mr. Phillips, by offering a guarantee- on the share capital. I thought Mr. Phillips might get up the company, and wrote to him that when I reached Auckland I would probably have a proposal to make to him ; ,1 did not sav what.

When I reached Auckland, I found that no one was disposed to act with Mr. Phillips, and I told him so. I told him he was quite at liberty to proceed on his own course and go to London ; but if he did nothing, and the company I proposed proceeded, I would endeavor to pet him £2OOO from it. I may observe that he never intended leaving for London before March, and this was February, so that he was quite st liberty to pursue his original intention, or to wait to soe the issue of the company the Government proposed. Though for convenience sake I use the first person singular in this letter, the Government were cognisant of and approved all my action in the matter.

When I found that Mr. Phillips's connection with the Government guaranteed company would injure it, I made him the intimation I have described. His reply was a very indiscreet letter, since which I have been guarded in my communications with him. All that I heard in Auckland convinced me I had been guilty of the mistake of making too much of him.

I proceeded whilst in Auckland to arrange the terms of a guaranteed company. Several of the wealthiest men in different parts of New Zealand signified their intention to take an interest in it, and a, Bill wa3 prepared to enable the Government to enter into the proposed arrangement. The Bill was read a -first time, and would probably have been further proceeded with but for the introduction of the resolutions relating to the abolition of the provinces. The difference in opinion between Mr. Phillips and myself is, that he alleges I unconditionally guaranteed to give him a compensation of £2OOO, whilst I say that all I promised him 'was to try to obtain £2OOO for him from the company, if it proceeded. Beyond his own statement, there is absolutely no evidence in favor of his version. Even his letter, to which I have referred, does not bear out the statement that I had undertaken unconditionally to give him compensation.

In support of my own recollection, there is corroborative circumstantial evidence to be obtained from Mr. Justice Gillies and the Hon. Mr. Whitalcer, as to my views concerning Mr. Phillips during the time I was arranging the conditions of the company. There is further this circumstantial evidence, that though Mr. Phillips alleges I promised him the compensation in February, 1874, he never applied to for it, nor did I know he thought he had any claim to it till about April in the present year. He went home to England meanwhile ; I have once or twice seen him personally ; he has besieged me with letters : but until just before the Assembly, I had no knowledge of his intended claim.

There is this further to be said respecting the conflicting versions, that there Ib absolutely

nothing which could have warranted my giving an unconditional promise of compensation. My fault was uadoubtedly making too much of Mr. Phillips. I was prepared to recognise that if the thing went on I owed, it to his suggestion. But if the thing did not go on, for what was he to he compensated, except forhisexpensesto and from Wellington; which I should always have recommended,hadheapplied for them. Supposing the thing were to come over again, what I should do would be simply to acknowledge with thanks the scheme sent to me. It would then be quite competent for me to consider it officially. It was altogether misjudged to have given Mr. Phillip? the consideration I did. Supposing I had even adopted his plan in its entirety, a mere allusion would have been as much as i 3 usual. But the plan proposed by me and that of Mr. Phillips differed in most essential points. A leading feature of his was a traffic in human labor, which I need not say I did not adopt. His plan might or might not have been worked from New Zealand; whilst the essential feature of mine was, that it was to be worked from New Zealand and for the benefit of the colony, and not with a view solely to profit. To meet this, I proposed a colonial guarantee. This was the distinctive feature which made the scheme a New Zealand one, which made it different from other projects of the kind, and which distinguished it from ordinary enterprises. Another distinctive feature of the Government proposals was that there was a condition that steamers should be run constantly between the islands and New Zealand. It was an exaggerated sympathy for Mr. Phillips that made me promise him that if the thing went on I would try to get him compensation. I did so on this broad ground, that if it had gone on I was willing to agree that but for his sending me his plan I would not have brought forward my plans. But in the absence of any results, for what was he to be compensated ? His plan, shorn of its labor traffic, was much more like mine of the previous year, than like the one I made public, and intended proceeding with. It is asked why Mr. Phillips's scheme was not published? I believe the reason was principally consideration for him on account of the point he made of labor traffic. It is probable, also, that before the papers were prepared for publication I had awakened to a recognition of the undue prominence I had giveu to Mr. Phillips. In the memorandum to the Governor Mr. Phillips had been liberally mentioned, whilst I find that in Hansard I made no reference to him. The fact was that everyone ridiculed his claim to such consideration as had been shown him; and it was evident that no persons would embark in the undertaking if he had anvthing to do with the management. The best thing for him was, supposing the company proceeded, to try and get him compensation as the person whose representations to me had led to the result. Let me ask those who are inclined to blame me, what fault I have committed, excepting a too generous desire to serve this ungrateful young man. When I found that he was quite unfitted to take any share in the company, was I to abandon a great undertaking for the benefit of the colony, merely because it owed part of its inception to Mr. Phillips ? Are proposals brought down by Governments usually original ? I am under the impression that it is rather a disadvantage than otherwise to a Government to propose a perfectly original scheme, inasmuch as the demand for Government action should usually proceed from outside. As a rule, Governments make no recognition of authorship. It is right for a Government to give attention to all suggestions made to it.

Let us take examples. It is notorious that the purchase of the Suez Canal shares was suggested to the Engliah Government by a well-known and very able man, but I believe no recognition of the service was made either in print or debate, far less any compensation proposed. Let us take the case of the Polynesian scheme. • I believe, had it been carried out as proposed by the Government, it would have been of great service to the colony and to Great Britain, though I admit that the liberal expenditure of the Imperial Government has since made it to a certain extent unnecessary. But supposing an award had to be made for the origination of the scheme, to whom would it be due? Although politically I have not worked with Sir George Grey, I willingly admit that many years since he had a great conception of a Polynesian confederation; and if his urgent and anxious advice had been followed, New Caledonia would have been a British instead of a foreign possession. As far as I am aware, Sir George Grey may be looked on as the originator of any plan of extended Polynesian government. Between his conceptions and the plan I brought down, innumerable schemes have been thought out, some have been tried, some have died natural deaths. The Melbourne Fiji Company was a step in the.same direction: so also were the expeditions to New Guinea. Mr. Wood, of Fiji, conceived a plan: so also, as I have said, did I, before Mr. Phillips came forward. The late Mr. Williamson for years thought over the subject, and desired to promote it. Mr. Gillies, almost immediately after he became Superintendent, sent down a proposal to the Provincial Council to subsidise a steam service to the islands ; and from conversations with him I can attest the immense importance which' he attached to the extension of the island trade and island connection. Mr. Sterndale, the writer of the remarkable papers in the Southern Cross, and Mr. Hunt, late of Auckland, who claims to have " coached" Mr. Phillips, may also be mentioned. Indeed, the name is legion of persons who had similar aspirations, to say nothing of what commercial enterprise has done. Mr. Phillips evidently does not understand the difference between the mere suggestion of ideas or plans, and the responsibility which a Government undertakes in proposing them. I am popularly regarded as the author of many proposals which have been adopted in New Zealand. If by authorship is meant original conception, instead of working out the details, then I do not know an instance in which I could make the claim ; indeed, he would be a bold man who claimed to have been the first thinker upon any subject. Take, for example, the Immigration and Public Works policy, of which I am termed the author. Nothing is more certain than that its conception passed through many minds. Mr. Macandrew and Mr. Sloorhouse thought cf it before I arrived in New Zealand, and in one shape or another proposed it. Mr. Stafford often had it in his mind, and spoke of it. Mr. Bunny, on one oeeasion, at least, foreshadowed it. Mr. Fitzherbert actually entered into negotiations in the same direction, and had a Bill prepared to give them effect. When I came down with the policy on the responsibility of the Government, it was so much aid to me that others had thought in the same direction. To take, an apposite case, Mr. Fitzherbert effected the conversion of the loans. He would, I aai sure, willingly admit that for a considerable time I had advocated a measure of the kind; but it would be as absurd for me to claim the credit of Mr. Fitzherbert's work, as it would be for him to claim credit for mine.

I am again largely identified with the Californian service. But I did not conceive it: Mr. Crosbie Ward did. When Mr. Stafford and Mr. Macandrew proposed it in the House, I rather opposed it, and they carried it against me. There are two undertakings of which I am considered the author, and which' are likely to be vastly beneficial to the country. I allude to the Government system of life insurance and of public trusteeship. But I do not claim to be the conceiver of these things. Dozens of men probably thought over and suggested a Government system of life insurance; and the public trusteeship was suggested to me by Mr. Stevens, now member for Christchurch, and Mr. ITitzGerald. Mr. Phillips is a man of many ideas, as the letters he has written to me show —to the cost of much valuable time in their perusal. It would be odd if some of his ideas were not good. Between conceiving ideas and working them out, determining what to accept and what to discard, and assuming responsibility for all, thero is a wide gulf.—l am, &c, JUMD6 VOOEL. Wellington, September 25.