The New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1879.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 5580, 15 February 1879, Page 2

The New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1879.

Of the various editorial styles of Ministers, that which we may call the cogitative is the best; the Scriptural next; and lastly, sed longo intereallo, the demonstrative or objurgatory, in which we class a recent specimen. If Ministers think the stylo effective, that is a matter of taste about which we at least need not dispute. Our present business is not to improve the Ministerial style, but to correct Ministerial errors about facts relating to Governor Gkey’s Laud Regulations, issued in March, 1853. In answer to the Premier’s rant about “homes for the “ people” and about the “ doom ” of the landlords, and to his truculent threats about the Vigilance Committees, wc said that the whole course of policy of every Responsible Ministry since Parliamentary Government was established, was to prevent jnonopoly of the land, and to make homes for the people. The proof we offered of the success of that policy was, that of the adult males of the whole population one in four was now a

landholder. Wo said that some large estates of Crown land had been acquired, but that .it was Sir George Grey’s own land regulations of 1853 which rendered such acquisitions possible, and, we might have added, encouraged them. To this it was answered, practically, that the Regulations of 1853 were “founded” upon the Crown Lands Ordinances of 1849 and 1851, and were to be read with them, and that the power of constituting Hundreds restrained the alienation of the land. The late Dr. Feathbrston was quoted as an authority for- this view. Now, if Ministers, before writingabout the Crown Lands Ordinances so flippantly, had taken the trouble to read them they would not have made such, assertions as were made in their paper yesterday. Before a Hundred could be constituted there must be people within its limits, andbeforethe people could settle they must have acquired the freehold of the land. As a matter of, fact, it may be said that the only Hundreds that were constituted were those about the Pensioner Settlements in the neighborhood of Auckland, Clause Bof the Ordinance of 1851 runs as follows

“And whereas it is expedient that the “ provisions of the said recited Ordinance ‘‘(that of 1849) shall not come into “ operation within the limits of any Hun- “ dred until a considerable portion “or THE LAND COMPRISED THEREIN “ SHALL HAVE BEEN GRANTED BY THE “ CROWN, AND SHALL BE IN THE ACTUAL “ OCCUPATION OF THE GRANTEE, OR “OTHERS DERIVING TITLE THEREFROM • “Be it therefore enacted that the said “ recited ordinance shall not apply “to or come into operation within “ any such hundred until, by pro- “ claraation to be issued by the Governor “ of the Province, with the advice of the “ Executive Council thereof, it shall be “ proclaimed and declared so to be,” &c. The land must have been actually sold and occupied as the first step to the constitution of the Hundred. If this bo a restraining power on the sale of land, it is of that kind of restraint which is defined as shutting the stable door after the horse is stolen. It is so notorious that Governor Grey’s anxious desire was to induce capitalists to go into the country, and to get large estates, that it seems almost absurd to argue the point. The famous cottage and cabbage garden of 250,000 acres at Taupo, although it be true, as alleged, that he had no personal interest in it—is a sufficient proof. He was wise and right in doing so. There was very little Crown land available in the North Island when the regulations of 1853 were made, and it was, therefore, in the South Island that the early purchases were chiefly effected ; but there was no restraint, or limit as to quantity, anywhere. In 1846 there was passed the Native Land Purchase Ordinance, which made it highly penal for any person to deal in any manner with a Maori for land ; and yet it is well known that here, under Sir George Grey’s own cognisance, large interests —“enormous” interests, as he would now exclaim—in land were acquired from the Natives not only without objection by him, but with his approval and encouragement. If it be wrong now that men should have large estates, andif, as is threatened by Ministers in their paper, we are to have Vigilance Committees to regulate the great Monopolists, it is at least right that all should know how the great monopoly began and who promoted it.