The Hastings Standard Published Daily. WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 23, 1896. PARLIAMENTARY AMENITIES.

Hastings Standard, Issue 128, 23 September 1896, Page 2

The Hastings Standard Published Daily.

WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 23, 1896. PARLIAMENTARY AMENITIES.

For the cause that lacks assistance, For the wrongs that need resistance. For the future in the distance, And the good that we can do. "" ■"'■ ' s

Foe the Hon. John McKenzie as a politician we have the greatest respect. His administration of the great department over which he presides has been marked with a degree of success that is uncommon. He has always shown himself to be strictly honest, with an unfailing regard for the public welfare. As Minister of Lands he has done yeoman services for New Zealand that will be remembered to his credit for many a long day. It is a pity, therefore, to see so estimable a person gaining notoriety as the fighting politician. It is not an enviable notoriety, for the pugilistic propensity exhibited by Mm would be more creditable to a ploughman than to a Minister of the Crown. Under certain conditions it may elevate the former into a hero, but in the latter it is invariably degrading. These pugilistic outbursts are the offspring of an ungovernable temper, and though Mr McKenzie may have been unbearably irritated, the public are not likely to accept that as an excuse. It is well that it should be so, for we send men to Parliament to exercise their sober

judgment for the benefit of the community, and men who lapse through irritability deserve the public censure, because such men when inflamed with passion or suffering from angry broodings are apt to take a course detrimental to the public welfare. Mr McKenzie wanted to thump Mr George Hutchison and placed himself in a fighting attitude, but was deterred by the intervention of friends. The thought of this must be ennervating to the body politic. A sane man and an able man, because of a remark that struck his ears discordantly, instantly pulls off his coat, a feat generally associated with an Irishman, but foreign to a Hielandman, and endeavors to knock the offender into the proverbial cocked hat. "We could smile at the incident if it was enacted in a ginshop, but within the sacred precincts of the Parliamentiry Buildings it becomes an offence of great magnitude. It is to say the least of it ungentlemanly, and yet we should not like to think, let alone to say so, that the Hon John McKenzie is ungentlemanly. But this is not the first time that Mr McKenzie to use a colloquial term, " cut up rough." He has done this before. Who has forgotten the pickle bottle tragedy. True this incident occurred in " another place," but it was the outcome of political differences. We were always under the impression that the New Zealand Parliament was a model of all the proprieties, but we are beginning to believe that we are astray in our opinions. Surely it should not be a difficult matter for men to disagree on certain subjects and yet retain their self-respect and courteous bearing to one another. Now it will, of course, give the opponents of the Liberal Party a splendid text for political homilies and political cartoons, and we are by no means certain that the incident will not leave an indellible impression on the fortunes of party at the approaching general election. It will be hummed and strummed in every key, and graphically described from every platform to the detriment of the Liberal Party. It is not, however, party considerations that actuate us in referring to the matter. Such exhibitions as the Minister of Lands was guilty of on Monday must be put down by the powerful lever of public opinion ; if we neglect this duty Parliament will degenerate, and the depth to which Parliaments can sink is shown in the recurrent exhibitions in the Parliament of New South Wales. A country has a right to be proud of its Parliament, for are not the members that compose that august body specially selected, and when now and again a member so far forgets himself as by his thoughtless action to bring discredit on Parliament, he should be promptly called to account. The Minister of Lands is jeopardising his excellent reputation by such silly exhibitions as he was guilty of on Monday last, and we hope for his own sake and for that of Parliament and the country we have had our last Parliamentary pugilistic show.