THE POLITICAL CRISIS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 5714, 23 July 1879, Page 2

THE POLITICAL CRISIS.

TO THE EDITOR OP THE NEW ZEALAND TIMES.

Sir, —Those literary Pressmen and other supporters of that peculiar form of “ Liberalism ” which is so ready to be liberal with other people’s savings, display an amusing anxiety to make a political Jonah of Sir George Grey, and an equally amusing consciousness that he will strongly object to be thrown overboard. Their cry now is that he ought to resign for the good of his party, and that if he won’t, and is defeated on Sir William Fox’s no-confidence motion, a dissolution should be granted at once. But for the critical state of native affairs, and the danger of leaving the government of the country in the hands of Sir George Grey and his colleagues for one moment longer than is absolutely necessary, no member of the Constitutional party would be at all afraid of the result were such a course adopted. Taking the constituencies as a whole, there can be no doubt that a complete change has taken place in public opinion, and the result of a general election would be to leave the Ministry with a still smaller following than they have at present. But although no time ' could be more favorable then the present for a dissolution to take place as far as the interests of the Opposition are concerned, yet in those of the people of New Zealand it ought neither to be demanded nor granted till the existing House is proved by' actual trial to be unable to place and retain in office a Government which can command a fair working majority. It should never be forgotten that representation is not delegation, and that though Parliament must of necessity conform itself io public opinion in the long run, it is bound to use its own discretion in any particular case, and to act in such a manner as the people themselves would wish it to act were they as well acquainted with all the facts and reasons on which its action is based, and as competent to judge of their own interests as those whose duty it is to judge for them. Any healthy and complex community is, in short, an organic whole, and brain and nerves have as definite a function to perform as bone and muscle. Now it it abundantly evident that the present Government, together with those of its members who lately belonged to it, have utterly failed to refute the serious charges brought against it by Sir William Fox in one House and by Mr, Waterhouse in the other. As the latter put it, the existing state of things as regards the native question “is due entirely to the incompetency—the thorough incompetency—of the gentlemen who sit on the Ministerial benches.” No cant about “ measures, not men,” ought to influence a single vote on such an occasion as this, and it is ridiculous to Sir William Fox, or any one else, for making a personal attack upon the Premier and his colleagues, when the whole question turns upon the fitness Or otherwise of a particular set of men to be trusted with the government of the country. The leader of the Opposition very properly declined to discuss the policy of the Government—and had Sir George Grey announced his intention of bringing in a Bill to give everything to everybody he would doubtless have adopted the same course—but in a speech which was as brilliant as it was convincing confined himself to proving that the Ministry had broken every promise, violated every constitutional principle, and were as bankrupt in political character as it is possible to conceive any men could be who had kept on the right side of the criminal law. _ As Mr. Waterhouse said, “ the public will judge the Government by the incompetence which has characterised the administration of affairs in this colony ; by the laws which, as in the case of the Thames railway,' the Government have violated ; by the public opinion which, as in the case of a subsidised and, in other cases, of a threatened Press, they have endeavored to corrupt and debase ; by the friends who, for political services, have been raised to the highest offices under the Government at the expense of the Civil Service generally ; by the enemies, whether personal or political, such as Captain Holt or Captain Morris, whom they have endeavored to crush under their feet ; by the extravagances condemned by them, but yet continued, such as the Hinemoa and the Ministerial residences ; and by the financial crisis which through their utter bungling they have intensified. It is by these things the public will judge the Government, and not by this speech, which is a voice and nothing else.” Men who have half ruined the colony by their folly cannot be permitted to trv further experiments in that direction even for a few months, by an Opposition and a Governor who know their duty, and have the courage to do it. —I am, Ac., Economist. Wanganui, 21st July, 1879.