THE ELECTIONS IN VICTORIA.

Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 773, 7 February 1871, Page 2

THE ELECTIONS IN VICTORIA.

The first general election in Victoria, since it was decided that members of Parliament should be paid £3OO a year, is now taking place, and, for the 78 seats in the Legislative Assembly, there are between three and four hundred candidates. The <! Argus" warns the electors against allowing themselves to be led away by specious schemers, and gives them the following sensible advice: —" The whole country may be looked upon as an estate owned by a joint-stock association, in which each of us holds a share, and the general management of which we entrust to a committee called Parliament, which nominates from its own body a body of directors, entitled a Cabinet. In the choice of our committee, therefore, we should exhibit the same deliberate reflection, forethought, and discrimination which we should employ if we were a mercantile company. In such a case, every shareholder's vote would be cast for those candidates who were in high repute on account of their capacity, integrity of character, and prudence, and of their zeal in the performance of whatever duties they undertook; and if a man had been skilful and successful in the conduct of his own affairs, and had commanded the respect and esteem of his neighbors these would be regarded as additional recommendations in his favor. Many such men there must be in this colony who have had an opportunity of signalising their aptitude for public life, and of conciliating the good opinion of their fellow citizens, while serving the public as presidents or members of shire councils, road boards, or municipal councils. The satisfactory discharge of these functions is a very good proposition for the fulfilment of legislative duties. We want men of business habits, men conversant with the wants of the country, men mow capable of forming solid judgment than of indulging in vapid and superficifl talk, and men who will prefer loyally to their party 10 a servile obedience to an arbitrary chief. * * * The electors must remember that they have not only to ensure wise legislation and honest government for the time to come, but to retrieve the errors and follies oi the past."