ELECTIVE JUSTICES.

Mataura Ensign, Volume 15, Issue 1181, 3 May 1892, Page 3

ELECTIVE JUSTICES.

. I fc W3S seriously suggested the other day )Q one o! the principal Ministerial organs ; that justices of the peace should be elected. | The ' Rangitikei Advocate ' thus describes an I amusing example of how justices of the. peace would be elected, by a description of a meeting held for the purpose of nominating a gentleman for recommendation to the Government for the position of justice of the peace :—•' Scarcely a settler in the district knew that eucb a meeting was to take place, and the settlers were there, fprp conspicuous by their absence. Only a very few of the business people were present, and the bulk of the attendance J was therefore composed of «young fellows j about the place, '■ who saw an opportunity of eDJoying some fan. Mr Jobnaon, one of the local butchers, who wbb a Btrong candidate, was proposed as one, and Mr A, Simpson, a son of Mr E. K. Simpson, who knew nothing at the meeting, no? of the intention to nominate him, was put forward as an opposition candidate. And here the point of the whole story comes in. We are informed by people who attended the meeting that Mr Floyd rose at this juncture, and urged as a reason why Mr Simpson shou'd not be selected that Mr Seddon had said that it was no use their nominating a supporter of the Opposition, for if they did the Government would not appoint him. Now with the rest of the acts of the meeting we have not the space to deal.- How they took to voting on the question, and vptad often, so that tte ballot papers outnumbered the voters by four to. one j and bow the c'finnan (Mr Coff, a local solicitor), after qnoting the law and the prophets on this extraordinary state of affaire, refused to accept the poll.and took another—theaa things "are all matters of public gossip. (