Page 2 Advertisements Column 3

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume I, Issue 8, 14 November 1857, Page 2

To the Electors of Hawke's Bay. GENTLEMEN,— Having been solicited by many of you who are anxious to see this District represented in the Provincial Council by residents, to allow myself to be proposed as one of your members at the ensuing election, I have consented to this course, provided that my sentiments on the great questions affecting your prosperity, are fully known beforehand. With respect to the Pastoral interest, with which I am myself connected, I am entirely opposed to any measures which would be a breaking of public faith, where that has been already pledged to occupiers of Crown Lands, and would call on the public of Wellington to remember, that when those lands were first occupied, the country was little better than a waste, with a few native inhabitants located in detached positions — that it was necessary to offer considerable inducement to European settlers to occupy and stock the runs now held by them, and that to their exertions the present prosperity of most of the Settlements of New Zealand is chiefly owing. It would therefore be most unfair, I submit, both to the Electors of Ahuriri and the people of Wellington, to attempt to break faith with, or oppress them now, and I would strenously advocate that all contracts with them should be faithfully carried out. I am of opinion that the Land Revenue raised in this District should be spent wholly in the District, in direct immigration, roads, harbour improvements, etc., or other works giving increased value to the land from which the money is derived. I can recognise no right on the part of the people of Wellington to demand of us that we should pay them a heavy tribute, by allowing them to absorb the greater part of our Land Revenue for Public Works at Wellington, from which we receive no benefit — nor can I admit the justice of our being made responsible for principal or interest of Loans, or any part of them, which have not been spent in the District, or in which we do not participate. I have long had the belief too, and have been strengthened in it by late events at Wellington, that the Ahuriri settlers have a just and perfect right to all the powers of local self-government that have been accorded to other large Districts of the Colony, and that they are not so deficient in business habits, or unacquainted with their own wants, that they should be obliged to entrust the conduct of their settlement principally to the inhabitants of a town 210 miles away from it, having separate interests from theirs, and who are liable to be influenced in large masses by men popular with them, but not possessing the confidence of the Ahuriri electors. I would therefore invite you, should I be elected as one of your representatives, to consider this important subject at an early opportunity, and to devise whatever means you may think most proper for the attainment of a position which would place this District beyond the risk of having its best interests upset from time to time by any of those external influences that can at present be brought to bear on it, and of such a status in respect of the Colony in general, as its extent, natural advantages, and the intelligence of its inhabitants entitle them to demand. I remain, Gentlemen, Yours faithfully, DONALD GOLLAN. Mangatarata, Oct. 28, 1857. To the Electors of Hawke's Bay, and Members of the Ahuriri Settlers' Association. GENTLEMEN,— I HAVE this day returned from visiting Mr. Gollan, one of the candidates for your suffrages. The necessity of his presence in the interior to watch over the popular interest, prevents him at present from visiting Napier, but he has commissioned me to thank you in his name for the support you afforded to both of us on the day of nomination. lam happy to bring encouraging news of the progress, inland, of the good cause ; and feel assured that it will be still further advanced by your votes on the following day— TUESDAY NEXT. , Gentlemen, — It has been the boast of some parties inland that our opponents have been * promised the votes of members !of the Association — even some of its leading members. Mr. Gollan and myself cannot bring ourselves to believe that there are