THE OPPOSITION CAMPAIGN.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CI, Issue 11889, 12 May 1899, Page 4

THE OPPOSITION CAMPAIGN.

Captain Rtjsseu, is not;, if we may judge from the Press Association’s report of his meeting at Stratford, faring quite so,well as his political friends could wish in the campaign he has commenced on the west coast of the North Island. The truth is that the leader of the Opposition is not the sort of nrnn to make the best of a bad ease. He jiossesses neither Mr Rolleston’s tactical skill nor Air Scdbie Mackenzie’s ready wit. The only weapons he can employ against the Ministerial citadel are the old threadbare charges-of maladministration and corruption. Just now the beginning and the end of Ms indictment against the Premier are contained in the one word “ Tammanyism. ’ ’ He can find nothing in the policy or, for the matter of that, in the administration of Mr Seddon to condemn ; but be is content- to repeat the parrot cries that have been invented by the less ingenuous memb©rs-of his party and-even to retail their silky personal stories about the Premier and his colleagues. He may carry this sort of thing a little too far. Members of the Liberal Party cannot be expected to always refrain from the “ tu quoqhe ” style of argument. When addressing his constituents in Dunedin the other evening, Mr J. A. Millar hinted that his own patience was nearly exhausted. He did not; he said; think it-desirable that' theffr should be mudslinging from one end of the colony to the other; but if the Opposition persisted in vilifyiiig the Ministerial Party he might be provoked into saying soineiljiag afidtit the construction of certain railways and the distppeafanfed df certain reserved ih Otago, which would not be altogether agreeable to Captain Russell and his friends. Mr Millar would have no difficulty in finding plenty of material if he chose to answer the critics of the Gbveriiment id their own Way. The appointment of seven Legislative Councillors in 1891, for which the present leader of the Opposition, as a member of the Ministry of the day; was directly responsible, is absolutely the most scandalous tMng oftbe kind that Las ever (fegfaced the political history of the colony: Not one of' the gentlemen who arts now pratitig about the cdmiptidP of the present Alinistfy anti tH§ need for “ purity of administration ” will Venture to offer an excuse for the advice tendered to the Governor by- Cijftaiii BPStell and Ms colleagues -oh that occasidii. It) May not be generally known, by the way, that the Ministry which' had juSt been defeated at the polls urged hi* Exbellency td ap|iduit ho fewer than sixteen members of its own political colour to the Council; A number of the geritiehiCn Selected fhf fiiitihciion weife rejected candidates for Parliament, and three or four of those actually appointed had declined to face the electors tfter si, previotis defeat. It is hot sui-ptisihg; ih the face of these facts, that Mr Millar should threaten to reply to the Opposition in its own language, or that the electors of Stratford should laugh when Captain Russell talks of the “ Tammanyisih ” of the present Goverfiiheut. The Wonder, is, kidded, that With such aa overwhelming retdrt at its disposal the Liberal Party should have held its peace so long.