Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News AND UPPER THAMES ADVOCATE. SATURDAY, APRIL 13, 1895. COGITATION.

Te Aroha News, Volume XI, Issue 1730, 13 April 1895, Page 2

Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News AND UPPER THAMES ADVOCATE.

SATURDAY, APRIL 13, 1895. COGITATION.

' Thin above all—to thino own soli bo ferae, kod it miieb follow as the night the day Thou const not then be false to any man. 1 Shakkspharh.

“ He that calleth a thing into his mind whether by impression or recordation, cogitateth and considereth ; and he that employeth the faculty of his fancy also cogitateth.”

—Lord Bacon. We see that Mr W. Allen, junr,. has carried a resolution in the House of Commons in favour of the payment of members and the Chancellor of the Exchequer,

Payment of Members in THE House of Commons.

Sir W.Vermon Harcourt, has

promised to give legislative effect to the motion when the revenue admits of it- The honorary nature of so many public offices in England, such as those of Justices of the Peace, Borough Councillors and for some time M.Ps., was formed on the theory that property involved duties. Even such officials as Ministers and Mayors who get salaries or allowances have generally received an inadequated*amount and been expecteo to spend it all in worthily maintaining the dignity of their office. Now that a public career is theoritically open to all it is only fair that the practical disqualification of the unpropertied classes should cease. Every other country bar England, including her colonies and her great offshoot in America, pays its representatives, and even in England the payment is but a return to the old constitutional'custom which prevailed up to the close of Elizabeth’s reign. We believe that a high legal opinion was given only a few years ago, that even now a member could recover his salary from his cons tituents,for it was they,that paid him not the public Exchequer. This payment of members partly explains how so many Boroughs ceased to return members. There was a ‘ skinflint party ’ which grudged the expense of representation. The question as a matter of principle is by no means a strict party one, many Tories being in favour of it and a large section of the Liberal party strongly opposed to it. There is a reason however why just at present Tories should resist the proposal to the utmost. The Irish Home Eulers are mostly dependent on aid from the Parliamentary Fund raised by the subscriptions of sympathisers with their cause all over the world. This fund is said to be on the verge, of exhaustion and the Tories naturally, from their point of view,, object to a project which would give their foes a legal salary and throw all the Irish contributions into the Tenant’s Defence Fund. In. other words they hope to raise the siege of the House of Lords by starving out the main strength of the attacking forcep and postpone Home Rule for a decade. If the Ministry be wise they will carry out Mr Allen’s resolution while they have the power; the Lords could hardly reject a Bill concerning their commands exclusively, and the principle of which.is so generally.admitted. Not long since we had occasion to notice another, matter in which Mr Allen took a prominent part, and judging from what we hear of him, he seems to be making his mark in the political world this, too, in connection with some important questions now at issue.