PSEUDO-LIBERALISM.

Waikato Times, Volume XIII, Issue 1137, 9 October 1879, Page 2

PSEUDO-LIBERALISM.

['AUSTRALASIA-..'] The curioiu. system of political thought hi the-o colonies which calls itself Liberalism has no more characteristic foiture than its hostility to capital. For instances of this feeling in Victoria wo need not ,ro far. It i.s exhibited in tho notable laud-mortgage regulations by which Mr Lnngmoro thought that ho ciul.l crush tho nvmoy*- lender, though, as tho iv.uiH proved, ho could ouly ennh tho hjrro-.ver. The qtune . tatouum's aspiratiou

to get hold of tho throat of capital and trangle it is fresh in the general memory. And it isnotoiiousthat, in the Assembly nny reference to the Bunks throws MiBerry iind bis colleagues into a f-tuto of frenzy, iu which they cau do notluug but utter slanders for the rc.4 of the evening. In New Zealand we. see thut that avchLiberal Sir George Grey has lately beeu 'giving his views on the same subject. In that colon j', as in this, people who have no particular party interest iu politics aro inclined to take alarm at the wild and revolutionary talk of the Premier, and to deprecate tke use of language eminently • calculated to drive capital out of tho couutry. Sir George Grey, in a recent B l n-cch' at Wellington, tried to allay anxiety on the subject. rd the way he took to do so was peculiar. co told his hearers that thev were not to be deterred from a certain political course by the fear that it would frighten capitalists and capital away. " Let thom go. The country would be none the worse iY.r the loss." Ho lold them furthor, " that positively there might be too much foreign capital in a new country." To «vg"o against wild, whirling talk of this kind would be ti degree of folly only second to its own. lt is .sufficient to point out the identity of the spirit of the Victoiian "Liberal '' and his fellow-believer iu New Zealand. Both J-^k on capital as au enemy to be destroyed, nnd hold that by making the community poorer, they in some unknown way improve its position. Wo observe that the conductors of the Mini.-ters' paper at Wellington were wiser in their generation than the Premier, nn suppressed in their report of his speech the tirade against capital, from which we epioted, thinking possibly it might be too strong for weak digestions. But the other papers have takeu care that none of the democratic -autocrat's sentiments shall fall to the ground unheeded, aud give tho whole passage with careful completeness.