“The Press” In 1864

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30442, 16 May 1964, Page 12

“The Press” In 1864

May 17 A REFORM BILL What is meant by universal suffrage? It is a foolish word; it does not mean what those who use it intend. For no man has ever proposed that children should vote, although some have desired to see the legal limit of infancy end at an earlier period than that of 21 years. There is an exceedingly small section of political writers, including the great name of John Stuart Mill, who think that women should vote; but this opinion is not shared by all the advocates of universal suffrage Hence the phrase has been superseded in some measure by the newer term of manhood suffrage, which expresses a limitation of political privileges to grown-up men, excluding

women and children. But this term again is more widely inclusive than those who use it contemplate, for they do not propose that aliens, foreigners, felons, or idiots, should enjoy the power of interfering with the political institutions of their country. No term, then, has been invented, or probably will be ever discovered, which shall accurately describe what the more rational and yet advanced section of political thinkers wish to see realised in the representation of a people. in this colony of New Zealand all that such philosophers desire has been pretty nearly attained in practice. The franchise here is so low as to be a property qualification in name only. There is hardly any man who cannot get a vote in New Zealand if he only chooses to register his

claim in the manner appointed by law. The object of the property qualification here, or at all events the operation of it, is to secure that those only shall enjoy political rights who are bona fide members of the community, and have a sufficient stake in the country to prove that they are so. There is no more reason why we should permit strangers and casual visitors to our shores to interfere with our institutions and deal with our property, merely because they are Englishmen, than if they were Frenchmen or Spaniards. We do not desire to exclude them from the franchise; all our law says to them is—“lf you come to settle amongst us, and take part and lot with us, no matter how poor you are, you shall have a vote; but you must shew that you are one of us.”