AN OUTSIDE OPINION.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 2750, 27 February 1890, Page 2

AN OUTSIDE OPINION.

TO THB EDITOK. Sir.—The extended report of Mr Bryce's speech iu Hamilton delivered <m Saturday week last to his constituents and its concomitant and tho leader in your issue of the 18th instant makes that issue of your paper a memorable one. We, in Auckland, have taken cognisance of the high magnanimity of the Waina electors in abnegating self and soaring aloft above petty principles and prejudices leaving the burly crew of begging electorates for roads, rails and bridges behind them, and to their honour be it spoken, while suffering from a. great bereavement by the untimely removal of the lamented Major Jackson, who, whatever his faults may have been, if any, was well spoken of by everyone who knew him, as the Waipa Representative they unanimously agreed on selecting and returning a worthy successor, scrupling not to travel heyond their own preciucts to find him. The political career of the Hon. J. Bryce up to the last election, like that of Sir R. Stout and a few others, has b«en such hs t» deserve a better fate than what they expert enced at the last election. The VVaipa electors have ably atoned for. the delinquency ot others, and have restored to the House the services of a man with a. mind large enough to take in the wants not of one electorate, but of a whole colony and even if they expected, as they must have, he would not be an altogether exponent of their own views, they knew he was made of the stuff that makes an ablo representative, and k" tuok him. In the wide range ot subjectdiscussed by him on Saturday night, lih must have found many agreeing with him, as the cheers he evjked again and again testified, and yet there was nothing to flatter vanity or prey on prejudice. He would retrench further, in a better fashion he would incur no more foreign liabilities, unless compelled to do so to save the credit of the colony. He would further reduce the number of representatives, and would not abolish the Property-tax. It is quite comprehensible how a person who has to pay it, from selfish motives may kick against it, or from other alleged reasons, may clamour for its abolition, but how men possessed of less than £500 worth of property, should join in the chorus of malignity against it is not guessable. I regret th.it Mr Bryce even fore-shadowed, as he undoubtedly did, a prospect of getting rid of it. While we are doomed to pay Gd on an insignificant tobacco stick, 2d postage on a letter, and 2d a mile by railway, and rates on farm produce of a perishable nature, that how oft leaves them to rot unused where they grew while others would be glad to get them at a reasonable fif>uto. I will bo glad to know what his friends here, the members of the Anti-Poverty-tax Society, will say to his arguments. It will i»muse me to hear them try to upset his illustrations. They c-innot afford to ignore his utterances unless they profess to have not yet got behind the precincts of the nursery and thu par.i'ie of proverbs. Wβ have here another society; one embodied for a vast, laudable and praiseworthy purpose; one not without admirers in the Waiknto, if, indeed, it has not established a branch there, but one that has mistaken, in a measure, its own purpose in endeavouring to mitigate all suffering resulting from poverty, and to remove the onuses thereof by putting all taxps on unimproved land values. The Anti-Poverty Society has just made as great a mistake as the doughty Knights of Labour who, at the bidding of one clergyman, the Rev. Mr Birch, a newchum, and led on by another, the Rev. Mr Somerville, lent themselves to an effort fco enforce early closing on the shopkeepers of Auckland, while boys ot tender years are allowed by them to toil from 6 o'clock in the morning to God knows what hours at night iu cerated water and other factories, and, as yet, they have not expressed even pity for them. I fear that even the genius of Sir George Groy, who lectures from their platform on Tuesday ne>ct, in Auckland, the platform of the Anti-poverty Society will not attempt to demonstrate the practicability of putting a tax upon land of such magnitude, as to pay even half of four millions, and show how the cockatoos, ground parrots and settlers could pav it, even if they were to submit to it. With these one idea men, the Hon. J. Bryce has no sympathy, his reasoning U crushing, and his denunciation is scathing, It was just as well that Mr Parr drew out Mr J. Bryce on the education question, I never knew a oouutry but , had suoh a question, few statesmen study it, few care to meddle with it, does it really deserve the euloguims bestowed on it. Mr Bryce prefaces his remarks by saying : "It is a good system," had he said costly, no one could have questioned him. As the Hon. J. Bryce is likely during his to go more largely into the question, 1 \yill reserve to, some future time an exposure of tho costs, defects and utter failure of our system of primacy education. -—I am, etc. J, J.