CORRESPONDENCE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume I, Issue 4, 1 February 1851, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

To the Editor of the " Lyltelton Times."

Sir, —The appearance, just at the present crisis, of such a document as the "Draft-Statement on which a Constitution for New Zealand should be framed," as drawn up by a Sub-Committee of the Nelson Constitutional Association, will, on many accounts, be considered an event of deep interest by all, who, besides the mere material prosperity of this colony, desire that an ultimately much more important object, one which in the end involves the question of material prosperity itself, its social and political well-being, should also be kept in view. When it is considered that the very men whose views the " Resolutions" represent, are those who, in all probability, will exercise paramount influence in determining, first, the form itself of our future government, and then, the spirit in which it is to be carried out, any objectionable features in the plan will on this account appear the more serious. Now my impression is, that the whole tendency of the proposed constitution is to establish a system of excessive centralization, that, under it our local affairs would be exposed to a no less vexatious interference ; and that, except as regards a small minority, we should be no nearer self-government than we are at present. What can have prompted the Port Philip settlers to hail " with every expression of extravagant joy," the intelligence of their separation from New South Wales ? "Was it not that the connection was found hurtful to their interests, and that, virtually, they were in a position of humiliating dependence upon Sydney ? Would not the seat of government here occupy the same relative position to the other settlements of New Zealand, as Sydney did to Port Philip ? Would not the yoke of that heterogeneous body, to be called the colonial parliament, soon become more capricious and oppressive, than that of the colonial office is at present ?

The Bth resolution proposes "That the powers of the Colonial Parliament shall be absolute" in all local matters." Now it does seem preposterous that a body, from its very constitution necessarily ignorant of the wants and requirements of any particular settlement, should be called in to manage the affairs of that settlement—that delegates, for instance, from Auckland, Nelson and New Plymouth, should be supposed better qualified to legislate on questions .purely affecting the local interests of Wellington, than the inhabitants of Wellington themselves. _JBut.,as it would be galling!to the inhabitants of individual settlements to have ;the management- of their own affairs taken out of their hands, so this measure is not required for the general interests of the colony. Isolated, as the different settlements at present are, both by difficulty of communication and dissimilarity of circumstances, bound together by no community of interests or feelings, any attempt to create an artificial bond of union, would be no less useless than pernicious. Our wants are local, let our legislation be confined chiefly to local objects, and carried on by local powers. Let us, as far as possible, instead of extending, seek to abridge the powers of the central government, and on the other hand, develope to their fullest extent our local institutions. Let us not, in an experiment of this sort, pledge ourselves too hastily to any theory, not based on an actually existing state of things; on the contrary, let us be guided as much as possible by circumstances, let us not fetter ourselves at starting with a more complicated system than will just answer our purpose. If for the present we content ourselves with allowing each settlement to manage its own affairs, and to develope separately its own resources, all will in time grow up into one real whole, and the natural course of events will indicate the proper time for a more complete organisation. " In all these old countries," say's Burke, " the state has been made to the people, and not the people conformed to the state." "Not one of them has been Ej 1 »pon any regular plan»or with any unityof I am, Sir, Your obedient Servant, An Advocate for Self-Government.