ONE MAN ONE VOTE.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 9538, 25 November 1893, Page 2

ONE MAN ONE VOTE.

The self-styled "Liberals" say a great deal about "one man one vote," bat tbey carefully retrain from also saying that they and their leaders have persistently opposed that being the law in the four cities. In Cbristchurch, Wellington, Auckland, and Dunedin every elector has three votes and can vote for three candidates. His vote is thus worth three times as much as that of any elector In any other town or district in the colony, a statp of things so manifestly unfair as to require no urging to right thinking people. It thus follows that any Sydney or Melbourne spieler who has been long enough in the country to get a vote— or who has got upon the roll whether he has been long enough in the country or not— has, if he resides in any of the towns named, three times the polilicil power of any settler outside the four cities, Several attempts have been made by the so-called " Conservative" party to get this scandalous anomaly altered, but each time the supporters ot the Government have been too numerons, The real fact is that the Government do nob want reform. They want a very different thing— their own way. If one man one vote is good enough for Napier, or for Waipawa, or Hawke'a Biy, it ought to be good enough for Welliogton. If that is not fair reasoning we shall be obliged by being shown to the contrary, But in the pretended demand for one man one vote the supporters of the Government are as hypocritical as ia all other things. They are not content with what they say ia the proper thing, and

they prove that not only by opposing the carrying of it into law In the four cities, but also by stuffing the rolls. The absolutely worst roll in the whole colony, that for the electorate of Hawke's Bay, has been systematically stuffed by upholders of the Government, and it contains. at least a thousand names too many, We call upon those who will act as scrutineers for Captain Russell to be very careful in checking tho rolls as tho voting goon ou, bo that at a later stage if necessary the proper proceedings for punishing attempts to stifle the true voice of the people may

be made.