CORRESPONDENCE.

Evening Post, Volume LXXX, Issue 62, 10 September 1910, Page 9

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE BOYSJNSTITUTE. A REPLY TO "ENQUIRER."TO TBS EDITOR. Sir, — Your correspondent "Enquirer" asks certain questions with reference to the composition of the management of the Boys' Institute, in reply to which I am very pleased to supply the following additional information U> that which you previously published. Your correspondent, from his inference is evidently acquainted with the members of the committee. This being so. he might, in fairness to the institute, have stated that only eight out of the twenty members whose names were given are member of St. John's Church, and that on the committee the following denominations are represented :—: — Catholic, Episcopalian, Unitarian, Wesleyan, and Presbyterian. His inference that the committee has power to alter a particular clause in the constitution is quite wrong. The committee has no power to alter any clause of the constitution. This can only be done by the annual subscribers to theinstitute funds, at an annual meeting, which must be duly advertised in the public press. The particular clause to which he refers cannot, however, even be* altered by the subscribers. Ifc is "fundamental" and "unalterable." Nothing, outside, of an Act of Parliament, can alter it. This is so manifest that I cannot understand how "Enquirer," after his attention had been drawn to it, can make a statement so obviously incorrect. « The clause referred to reads :—"lt: — "It is hereby declared, as a fundamental and unalterable article of this constitution, that any religious instruction which may be given shall be absolutely unsectarian in character, that no religious test whatever shall be necessary to qualify for membership, and that attendance at any religious service shall not be required before a member can participate in the other advantages of the institute." In reply to his further query, as to whether this clause will appear on the transfer of the property, I may state that the whole constitution, including the clause referred to, has been attached to the transfer. Your correspondent is also quite wrong in imagining that he has drawn out certain 'statements which were not advertised by the committee. All the facts "elicited" by him are set forth, quite clearly in the only statement sent iocth by the committee. Thousands of copies of a small booklet setting forth the history, work, and aims of the institute have* keen distributed in Wellington during the past fortnight, and "Enquirer" could have obtained all his information from this source. His statement that the £1100 paid by the City Corporation as compensation for taking the building on the reclaimed land was obtained in a silent way is also incorrect and unfair. Hovj could ifc be so when the matter was thrashed out in face of opposition before the Finance Committee of the City Council, and then was Drought before the whole council, and finally dealt with by a Judge of the Supreme Court ? I am, etc., GEO. A. TROUP, President Boys' Institute. [Mr. Troup also forwards some information regarding the general working of the institute. These facts will be published ia a future issue.]