The Lyttelton Times. TUESDAY, JANUARY 26, 1864.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XXI, Issue 1188, 26 January 1864, Page 4

The Lyttelton Times. TUESDAY, JANUARY 26, 1864.

Tee recent change in the personnel of the Provincial Government might suggest two modes of precedure, either of which could be advocated, with fair show of reason, by persons talcing opposite views of the late political disturbance.

The new Executive Council might insist on satisfactory explanations being given to the public before they consented to take office. This course we have ourselves advised, on the ground that such explanations, or, failing them, a petition for a dissolution and an appeal to the country would have given any new Government a clear course and a fair chance.

The arguments in favor of this course have not found favor with the gentlemen who form the new Executive. As Ave have no ground for supposing that they >vill not bring both honesty aud efficiency to the discharge of their official duties, we are all the better pleased to own that there is another mode of proceeding less satisfactory in our opinion, but a preference for which no one need be afraid or ashamed to avow.

Persons newly called to take the responsible charge of public affairs, may choose to lay down as a preliminary rule for their own guidance, that they will draw a decided line of distinction between the public business they are required to manage and the conduct or policy of those who have been previously concerned in it. We can understand that they look on the public work of the country as one thing, and on the conduct of public servants as another, which ought not to be mixed up or confounded with the former. They may maintain that it is competent to the State to act as any private individual might do who should decline to punish himself by refusing to hire a new set of servants until he had thoroughly cleared up all facts connected with the real or supposed misconduct of those whom he had discharged. In such a case the master of a house might demur to the expediency of dispensing with the services of a cook until he had satisfied himself whether or not the one turned off had been really in the habit q£ sending up unwholesome food. lie might decline to go without a domestic executive until all previous irregularities had been sifted and set to rights. So, a spt of public servants may (JecJare their readiness to wopk, but not to mix themselves up with the imputed misconduct of their predecessors. If the master of the

house (i.e. the public) chooses to have an investigation, well and good. That is his affair. But the business of the new officials is to take up the works properly belonging to their several positions, not to be made directly the instruments of punishing those whom they have replaced.

Our own views on this subject are already before the public, and therefore it is unnecessary to dwell on arguments of an opposite kind which have been fully treated in former articles. Our present aim is to give as fair a statement as we can of the opposite side of the case, because, we apprehend, it has been acted ou by those whose work as public servants will be of advantage to the country, and who may fairly claim from us that we should not refuse to state their case as we believe they would be disposed to state it for themselves.

Whichever view may be finally adopted by the public, one condition should be strictly insisted upon as a sine qxiA non in any new political arrangement, namely, that no course be tolerated tending to establish a precedent for the screening of political culprits on the present or any future occasion from the punishment justly due to their offences. If this be not well looked to, official persons of any rank may be encouraged in wrong doing by the idea that, when things are getting too bad to be borne, sudden resignation may stave off disagreeable consequences and avoid a day of reckoning altogether. We have already endeavored to shew how the course we have advocated from the first would be a security against such mischiefs. And now, as a supplement to the other side,of the case, it is fair to point out that the new Executive, while they have objected to an enquiry into the causes of the late political fracas, as a necessary preliminary to their own accession to office, have never, so far as we know, objected to "enquiry in toto, but have stated their intention to call the Provincial Council together at an early date, when the representatives of the various constituencies will be able to institute such enquiries and to demand such explanations as they may think fit, and to petition for a dissolution and an appeal to the country should this seem the most expedient course.

The propriety of putting these considerations forward—of having them well canvassed and understood is obvious under any circumstances, but especially since the result of the Heathcote election shews that an important constituency has, by electing Mr. Rolleston, so far endorsed the views of the new Executive in taking office under present circumstances. It is therefore of no small importance that the public should clearly understand the position they assume for themselves, in order that men, who from their character and standing, ought not to allow themselves to be placed in a doubtful position, may be freed from any suspicion tending to impair their usefulness as public servants.

After a close contest, in which we were glad to see both at the nomination, and throughout the election all signs of apathy on the part of the electors had entirely disappeared, a candidate has been returned, of whose personal qualifications we need say nothing, but who has acted on a view the reverse of that which we have from the first recommended. We are well content that it. should be so. The office of the public press is partly to guide and partly to reflect public opinion. In a question on which honest men of all parties might differ, it would appear we have been of one opinion, the public of another. We are therefore as desirous as any of our neighbours can be that the views of a constituency of equal rank with any in the province, should be so far accepted as to have a fair trial. It will be seen at the next meeting of the Provincial Council whether or not the new ministry works well. Before the Council assembles there will be quite time enough tor them to be provided with practical proofs of their capacity for the work of the country, and to repel if they are able (as we hope they will be) the imputation often thrown at them that their Government is likely to be of an obstructive character as far as public works are concerned. Mr. Rolleston, in his address to the electors, very justly said, that it was unfair to attempt to fix such a reproach on the new Executive, at a time when notoriously there was a lull in public works, pending the transfer of road making and mending from the hands of the Provincial Grovernment to those of District Road Boards. This can only occasion a temporary relaxation of activity. The public, not the Government, will be to blame if the machinery provided by the Road Districts Ordinance, passed in the last session of our own Council and now assented to by the Governor, is not at once brought into action. "When this is effected, we believe the next complaint we shall hear will be tlje want of hands to undertake the work to be done.

As to the suggestion that the present Government will discourage the progress of railway extension, we cannot for an instant believe that this will be the case. Were the members of the new Executive ever so obstructive in this respect, we believe they have too much common sense to do anything so foolish as to take office with the intention of thwarting the clearly expressed intention of the public to have railway accommodation by the exercise of the most energetic activity and within the shortest reasonable time. It will go far to prove that the gentlemen who have now taken office are acting on a correct view of their position if it be seen in the next meeting <jf tl?e Council that nothing which has occurred .will teiid to prevent a free investigation of recent matters in which the public have supposed that they had cause to feel aggrieved.