The Evening Star. WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening news, The Morning News and The Echo. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1870

Auckland Star, Volume VII, Issue 1859, 1 February 1876, Page 2

The Evening Star. WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening news, The Morning News and The Echo.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1870

For the cause that lacks assistance, I-'or the wrong that needs resistance, I-'or the iitturc in the distance,

And Ihe _ooJ lli.it vrc c;ui do.

The petition to the House of Eepresentatives by Mr James Mackay, jun., against the election of Sir George Grey for the Thames was formally lodged yesterday. In what capacity Mr Mackay is acting on this occasion we hardly know, but looking to his connection with the Government it is not too much to suppose he is moving with the approval, if not under direct instructions from the Ministry. That the petition is a foolish and futile one is the expressed opinion of all the leading Southern journals, not excepting those which support tho Ministry, bufc^ it „»v»w_cr_--rTrsm*i!nrctTd_i Petitions Committee. The Canterluri) Press, a paper not at all friendly to Sir George Grey, has published two able articles shewing not only English but colonial.precedents for thecourse pursued by Sir George Grey. In its issue of the 26th instant, after referrinc. to Mr Moorhouse's return for_a West Coast district aft.r a prior election, it quotes the contest in the old country between Mr Gladstone and Mr Garthorne Hardy, and says : " When Mr Hardy, having just been elected for Leo minster, undertook to contest with Mr Gladstone the seat for Oxford University, and carried on the contest during the prolonged period which is still required to complete University elections, and eventually elected to sit for the University upon the double return which was the consequence of his success on both occasions, it is impossible to imagine that all parties were not well advised as to his eligibility. Whatever may be the case here, it cannot be supposed that Mr Hardy would have been permitted by his friends, or for that matter, by his opponents, to contest the seat with Mr Gladstone, if it was not well understood on all sides that there was no legal objection to his doing so. Mr May himself, to whose work so much reference has been made, was at the time Clerk of the House of Commons, and we can hardly doubt that it was in accordance with his' personal opinion that the step was taken. In one sense therefore the precedent is of even higher authority than* if it had been the result of a formal decision of an Election Committee, inasmuch as in fact the question was considered so clear on all sides that no decision was required."