The Evening Star FRIDAY, DECEMBER 17, 1869.

Evening Star, Volume VII, Issue 2065, 17 December 1869, Page 2

The Evening Star FRIDAY, DECEMBER 17, 1869.

It is just possible that before these lines are published, the fate of the motions on the Hundreds Regulations Act may be decided. When they were first introduced mto the House, they formed the standpoint on which the Executive based their political existence. By them Mr Reid, Mr Gillies, and Mr Mouat declared they would stand or fall. It is somewhat singular that this clause should have been so deliberately taken when two members of the Ministry, wholly uninterested personally .in the decision of the question, differed in opinion from them. It certainly is taking very high ground to assume that those gentlemen’s judgment should be set on one side, and that thej, with their fellow members of the Executive, should share a common fate and stand or fall together. Messrs Haggitt and M'Lean, from education, position, and worldly occupation, are likely to be free from many of those prejudices which beset men whose views have been bounded to the necessities of a narrower sphere. The one has been accustomed to weigh evidence, to scrutinise narrowly, and to divest every subject to which he gives attention of all that is merely accidental in its consideration. He knows well Kow to construe an Act of Parliament, what are its weak points, and how its provisions bear upon the interests of all concerned. His habits of investigation and legal acumen enable him to pronounce authoritatively upon the equities involved, and with patient thought to follow the workings of an Act to their ultimatum, unbiassed by the prejudices of class interests. Mr M'Lean, through his previous business associations, has an intimate acquaintance with the various interests of the Province. He judges very difterently from those who are using every effort of daily life in a given direction. A merchant or banker is interested in the prosperity of every class. His customers are the public. His profits are not derived from the squatters or farmers merely. The per centages on his returns are equally valuable, whether they come from Aristos or Demos, and the more numerous the people, the better for him. These two gentlemen, thus holding independent positions, have deliberately and emphatically recorded their opinions, that, although not ■without faults, the Hundreds Regulation Act is likely to work well for the country, and to remove many of those obstacles to settlement that have hitherto operated so much against the development of industiy* Surely when the opinions of unbiassed men are thus placed in opposition to those who imagine their interests likely to be affected by a measure, they are entitled to some weight; and although he may be thought a bold man who, with everything to bias him, dogmatically asserts that he is right and they are wrong, cool and reflecting heads will not pronounce him a wise one. It is a pity that Messrs Reid and Gillies in the first instance committed themselves to such a virulent opposition to the Bill. Fourteen out of fifteen Otago members in the House of Representatives deliberately accepted it as one of the best measures that have been adopted for the advancement of the Province. Most of them had nothing to gain or lose by its adoption, excepting that their interests, bound up in those of the Province, would advance or retrograde with its waxing or waning condition. They knew their motives were liable to be misrepresented and their votes condemned by those who returned them ; but they did not know that one of the Otago Executive would enter upon a crusade against the measure they assisted to pass, and that another would refuse a good gift, because it did not come through the channel by which he considered it ought to have been conveyed. There is a trite saying, “No “man should be a judge in his own “ case.” Never was a more pointed illustration of this than in the history of the land legislation of the Province. With its growth and occupation two classes have grown up, and arc arrayed against each other—the farmer and the squatter. In the early days of its settlement, the two occupations were united. The land was before them. A few acres were broken up for cereals, and the few flocks and herds found grazing room enough. But as time rolled on, population increased and cattle and sheep multiplied, division of labor and reduction of these pursuits to system became an obvious necessity. Then came an apparent separation of interests, and Iliac ilia:

lachrymae— two nearly equally balanced parties are scrambling for possession of the land. Swayed in either direction as accident has given numerical preponderance in the Provincial Council, it would have been wise in the very first instance to have referred the decision of the question to the General Assembly as less likely to be biassed than those whose passions prompted by supposed interest placed them in antagonism. But as they would not do this as a Province, on the petition of some discontented farmers the Assembly did it for them : for which all parties ought to be devoutly thankful, notwithstanding the award is not exactly what the malcontents expected. On Mr Tayler’s amendment Mr Reid has an opportunity of gracefully retiring from the contest, and may fairly claim a victory, for it justifies one of the grounds of his opposition. If he still rejects the conciliatory boon, he must not depend upon the continued approbation of the Province. _ Let him remember judicium vulyi est fallax. __________