The New Zealand Times (PUBLISHED DAILY.) FRIDAY, AUGUST 23, 1878.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5431, 23 August 1878, Page 2

The New Zealand Times (PUBLISHED DAILY.) FRIDAY, AUGUST 23, 1878.

It is a strange sign of the times that it should be necessary for a member of tho Opposition in the House of Representatives to move that a respectful address be presented to his Excellency the Governor, requesting him to direct to be laid before the House copies of all correspondence between himself and the Secretary of State for the Colonies, which has taken place since last session of Parliament. Hitherto Ministers laid all such correspondence before the House at the earliest possible date, and any attempt to conceal from the House official communications between the Governor and the Colonial Office would have been resented at once, as it was resented in 18G5. The present Government, conscious that some of the correspondence which has passed during the late recess between the Colonial Secretary and the Governor relates to matters which do not redound highly to the credit of their chief, have not followed the usual course. They probably relied on the subservience of a majority, which has not turned out so obsequious as they had hoped. To ignore the Colonial Office and the Queen’s representative is the avowed policy of the gentleman who now holds the office of Premier of the colony. The Attorney-General, however, wisely enough, determined not to oppose a motion which would certainly bo carried, the more certainly when it was found that the Premier desired to keep the correspondence back, or at any rate to prevent it from becoming part Of the records of Parliament. For whether ho desired to depart from the usual precedent from dislike of publicity, or whether ho desired only to slight the Imperial Government and the i ioverrior, in either case the House would ,i ot have listened to him. It is all very well td say that the changes effected in the re l iresentation during the recess have made tha House of Representatives the obodiet '.t humble servant of tho Governor. Wo t lo not believe that our representatives willbi edragged into thefalsoposition which thosoi nowhatchildish vanity of tho Premier constat itly incites them to assume towards tho Crown. After tho Attorney-General had agri '<*l to lay tho papers on tho table, Sir Gp.ey got vp and virtually

advised the House to ignore altogether any correspondence which may take place between tho Imperial Government and the Governor. Ho said that as independent men it did not befit the dignity of representatives of the people to take any notice of matters which did not affect them—that they should do their duty, and let his Excellency and the Minister for the Colonies write what they liked to each other. Mr. Fox very curtly observed that he could have understood a suggestion, as coming from Sir George Grey, that no correspondence should take place between the Crown and the colony, but ho could not understand tho House, under any circumstances, agreeing to such a correspondence, when it took place,, -being kept from tho knowledge ; of the House and tho country. Sir George Grey must keep his advice on the relations between the Crown and this colony for some more congenial audience than the House of Representatives ns it is at present constituted.