A VINDICATION.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2488, 11 April 1893, Page 3

A VINDICATION.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —In your issue of the 25 th of last month, you make the following misrepresentations respecting myself, viz : “Mr Grab mi contested an Ashburton seat a few years ago and only got one solitary vote, which in all probability was his own. This is the same Mr Graham who last year tried to get the Tradesunions to recommend the Premier to appoint him to the Legislative Council. He called a meeting in Timaru and only seven attended it.” Aatheaboveisonlya repetition of slanders circulated by Conservative Ashburton and Timaru newspapers some years ago, I cannot altogether blame you for copying them, providing you publish the following explanation. About ten years ago I was a member of the Church of England Synxl for Timaru, where considerable discussion took place regarding the desirability of imparting religious instruction in the public schools. As a general election was shortly to take place 1 determined to tost public opinion on the subject, and with this object in view considered there could be no better method of doing so than by standing as a candidate for Ashburton, although I knew from the first that there was no chance of success, as T was not even a resident there at that time, and further that my scheme would be bitterly opposed by some sections of the community. I was, however, recommended to form a committee, and was assured that by a moderate expenditure of beer and money, a certain number of votes could be secured. This proposal I declined to entertain, and and as a result received only one solitary vote, but this was not my own as you so charitably suggest, but was given me at Methven by one James Cameron, whom I had temporarily employed some months previously. This man when taxed with the absurdity of having voted for me by several of his friends, when he must have been aware that L had no chance of being returned, Replied “ That I was the best boss he ever had in the colony.” A far better test of public opinion will be found in tiie polling returns of an election for the Wakanui Riding of the Ashburton County Conncil, now forming part of the Rangitata Electorate, and which you will find recorded in the Ashburton Mail of the 20th September, 1885, or rather more than one year after the election you refer to, and which was as follows, viz : Wright, E. G 159 Graham, I. R. C. C 89 Grigg, John 85

As regards the Legislative Council candidature, a vacancy occurred in the Ashburton county by the death of Mr Peter, and as the local chairman of tlxe Prohibition League had already forwarded to the Premier three petitions in ray favor, numbering about four hundred and fifty signatures, I considered it would bo well if I secured the co-operation of the Timaru Labor Unions, a place where I had formerly resided. Upou making enquiries, however, I found the Unions for the most part in a state of partial disorganisation, and I was consequently recommended to cull a public meeting by the then Mayor, Mr D. M. Ross. By an oversight the meeting was not advertised in the proper paper, consequently an attendance of only fourteen was secured, not seven as you erroneously state, and which information, no doubt, you quoted from the Timaru Herald, but if you had asked the agent of the Lyttelton Times or Mr Sterner, the chairman of the meeting, yon would have been more correctly informed. On the public platform I am quite ready to give a good precedent and reasons for my action in this matter, but it would occupy too much of your space to do so now.—l am, etc., 1. R. C. Cunninghame-Graham.

[The sum and substance of all tljig is that Mr Qrahain received only one vote, which was not his own, and that 14 instead of 7 attended his Timaru meeting, so we were not far wrong. We have out opt portions of this letter, which were quite unnecessary to Mr Graham’s argument, and if in future he desires to address the electors through the medium of this paper he can do so iu the usual way, that is, as an advertisement. — Ed.]