Page 3 Advertisements Column 2

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 1928, 9 March 1875, Page 3

STTPEKINTENDENCY ELECTION .REQUISITION. TO SIR GEOE&E GETCY, K.C.B. SIR— We, the undersigned, Electors of the Province of Auckland, hereby request tbat you will allow yourself to be Dominated as a Candidate for the office of Superintendent of the Province, vacant by the death of John Williamson, Esq., and we pledge ourselves to use our best exertions to secure your return. (Signatures.) TO THE GENTLEMEN SIGNING THE EEQUISITION. /"^ ENTLEMEN—In reply to your reVJT quisition, I hare the honor to state that if elected Superintendent of the Province of, Auckland, I shall accept the I office, and do my best to' fulfil its duties in such a manner as to promote the happiness and welfare of the inhabitants of the Province; "l I consider the position of Superintendent of this province as a most honourable one, and as reflecting credit upon any man who may hold it. Yet, if I am elected to the office, great personal sacrifices will be entailed on me of many., kinds; I $hall, therefore, not feel myself called on to make the efforts usual in such a case to secure my .election ; but if I am chosen Superintendent, a sense of the duty I owe to yourselves and to the people I have so long striven to serre, will make me forego all personal considerations, and devote my whole time and energies to fulfil the duties the public call on me to perform. I shall strive to show that it is the desire to serve one's country and fellow men which gives dignity to a public position, not the title by which that position may be called.. Generally, I would state to the inhabitants of this Province that I consider the office of Superintendent to be an executive and not a political one. If elected, I will, therefore, not use the position for any political purpose. I will faithfully administer the laws, and any means placed at my disposal, in the manner that appears to me best for the general good, and I will by all becoming means strive to obtain their rights, whether pecuhiary or of any other nature, for the people of the Province, and then see that they are allowed to exercise and enjoy those rights in the manner most advantageous to them. Although attached, and strongly attached, to Provincial Institutions, I well know thiat it is the duty of every man to yield to the views- and wishes of the majority of his fellow-countrymen, when those views and wishes are ascertained by Constitutional means and are clothed with the authority of law. Whatever form of Government may be thus introduced into ISTew Zealand, I shall at all times endeatbur to make a success, and conducive in air respects to the peace, satisfaction, and prosperity of the people of the colony. I believe that it is clearly the duty of the Government to state in detail the nature of the institutions they propose to take the place of the existing Provincial ones, and to allow the people of New Zealand ample time to consider /Inem, and to express their opinions upon the subject. But if Provincial Institutions are to be swept away in any part of the colony, I should desire to see such a change ma^e a general one; and to hare such Institutions established in the place of the existing Provinces as would secure to New Zealand generally, at least those extensive rights in regard to legislation and other matters which ih.e Provinces now possess* and to the rarious country districts a larger share of local self-go-vernment, arid a greater and more direct control over local revenues, than is now given to them. To derive full benefit from the system of Immigration and Public Works now being carried on, from which, if judiciously conducted, such great advantages must flow to the country, I should consider ifc the duty of the Superintendent to assist, to the utmost of his ability, the Colonial Government in bringing that policy to a successful issue. The Superintendent, upon his part, will have a right to expect from the General Government the expenditure within the Province of that share of the moneys borrowed for public works to which it is justly entitled, its due pro^ portion of immigrants brought out by public funds, the prompt payment of all revenues and other moneys lawfully be-longingv-to it, "a rigi^ economy in the expenditure of the moneys devoted to immigration and public works, a strict preven-. tion of all extravagant personal expenditure from these funds, and the immediate relinquishment to the Provincial Governof all lands purchased from the natives in the Province for the benefit of its people; for ufc is only by a rigorous attention to these details, that the immigration and public works policy can attain to that success to which it is so justly entitled. The Superintendent should, in my opinion, see that all requisite steps are taken to provide for the reception of immigrants, for their comfort and welldoing on their first arrival, and that energetic measures are taken to secure the permanent location in the country of the population now here, and of the immigrants who may arrive, by holding out inducements to tat c up lands in the best positions which can be secured to them, and thus lead them to become permanent occupiers and cultivators of the soil.

Active steps should be taken to induce people possessing capital, sufficient to enable them to undertake the cultivation of the soil and the employment of labour, to again resort to this Province, and means might also be advantageously taken to enable children of established settlers to occupy farms of waste lands, and thus to contribute, as their fathers have before them, to establish the prosperity of the colony on a lasting basis.