ELECTING MAGISTRATES.

Evening Post, Volume XLII, Issue 127, 25 November 1891, Page 2

ELECTING MAGISTRATES.

We have repeatedly pointed out that the tendency of the present Ministry is to Amoricaniso our institutions as far aspossiblo, and to make King Mob tho supremo dictator. It will bo remembered that at his Dunedin meeting the Premier proposed to leavo tho selection of Legislative Councillors to Party Caucuses, which is tho form in which the mob rules in tho land of the Stars and Stripes. The Minister of Justice has just taken another step in the same direction by proposing that the nomination of Justieos of tho Poaco shall also prooeed from the Caucus. A Mr. Floyd, of Huntorvillo, having resigned tho Commission of the Peace, in order to follow tho more luofative occupation of an hotelkeopor, it wa3 represented to the Minister of Justice that another magistrate or two were required in tho district. Thoro are plenty of respectable settlers in tho neighbourhood who would do credit to tho position, but apparently Mr. Reevos was not assured_ that any of them were of precisely tho " right oolour," and so he has evaded the responsibility of making a choice, by suggesting that a public meeting should bo held to nominate two persons for appointment to the Bench. This is as near an approach to the Yankee system of electing Magistrates as is possible in the present state of the law. It is a new departure but scarcoly, we think, ono which, judging from his remarks yesterday on country justices, the Chief Justice would bo inclined to approve. If callod on to pronounoe sentence ho would, wo expect, dcclaro tho cliango to bo from bad to worse.