The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. TUESDAY, JUNE 25, 1889.

Auckland Star, Volume XX, Issue 149, 25 June 1889, Page 4

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

TUESDAY, JUNE 25, 1889.

Por t_e eauno that lacks assistance, Sor tie wrong that needs resistance, Eg- tae ftsture in Uio <_att_.ee, And tha good tbat we con ao.

So little has yet transpired in Parliament to arrest public attention that it is doubtful whether the Electoral Bill, of which our special reporter gives a brief outline to-day, will arouse general inter-

est. The measure is, however, im. portant enough to excite an animated discussion outside as well as within the walls of Parliament.

The Bill proposes an entirely new departure in the system of conducting the election of members of the House of Representatives ; and although it is founded on the bar- of what is known as the "Hare f>stem," various modifications have been introduced which will tend to remove some of the objections that have been urged against the Hare system pure and simple by advocates of local representation. The most prominent of thesechanges is the creation of four large districts upon which separate counts will be taken instead of giving every vote currency in the elections all over the colony. This will simplify the task of the elector, by reducing the number of names on the voting papers from which he will have to make his choice, and it will satisfy the Provincial feeling by keeping the old Provincial phalanxes more or less intact. The adoption of Sir John Lubbock's mode of applying the flare system, moreover, maintains the present plan of local contests within small electoral areas.

The operation of the new system may be most easily described by taking as an example an election in a subdivision of the Auckland District. For this district, on population basis, sixteen members are to be returned. A candidate for election would choose, precisely .as he does now, the sub-divi-sion for which he would decide to stand — say, for instance, Newton. He would be nominated in Newton and would carry on a vigorous canvass, backed by all the arts of parliamentary warfare, with a view to securing the good wishes of the people of Newton. But when the elector entered the polling booth, he would be presented with a ballot paper not merely bearing the names of Brown, Jones, and Robinson, who may happen to have been nominated for Newton, but one setting forth the whole of the sixteen members allotted to the district of Auckland. Moreover, he would be at liberty to ignore the candidates for Newton altogether and vote for any candidate or candidates ©n the list. What he is expected to do, is to number in the order in which he desires their return, the men he wishes to see in the House, and when the enumeration is made every vote recorded will be counted in favour of the man for whom it has been cast. The sixteen men who have the largest number of votes in the Auckland electorate being the ones who will be declared elected. The advantages claimed for _ the system are that principles, not individuals, will ultimately determine the elections; that no man can become a representative by virtue of the votes of a fraction ot the electors of a small constituency ; and that it will secure the representation of minorities, every phase "of thought securing its exact representation in Parliament. If the Bill be carried, no longer will excited crowds stand about polling booths aod newspaper offices awaiting the result, of the polls. Days or even weeks must elapse before these are know, the slow process of enumeration being typical pf the calm judicial frame of mind in which the " free and independent are assumed to approach the task ot choosing the men to thero,

The Bible in Schools party, denominationalists, Land Tax champions, prohibitionists, and the whole race of minor faddists will have free play for counting the combined strength of their opinions in any given district. No doubt a very great deal may be urged on behalf of the "principles underlying the Bill; and as it is • now submitted, n$ very serious practical difficulty would be experienced in applying it. Perhaps the strongest thing that can be said in its favour is the fact that it is scarcely conceivable that the representative results could in the aggregate be worse than those which have been produced under the present system of voting.