Mount Ida Chronicle AND St. Bathans' Weekly News. NASEBY, SATURDAY, APRIL 28, 1883.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume XIII, Issue 707, 28 April 1883, Page 2

Mount Ida Chronicle AND St. Bathans' Weekly News. NASEBY, SATURDAY, APRIL 28, 1883.

AN UNSOLVED PROBLEM.If free, full, and elaborate discussion could hasten the solution of the diffi- - culties which underlie the question of Pauperism in a State,' the Colony of New Zealand should have made" extraordinary progress within the last month or so. Between Major Atkinson, Mr Green, Mr Stout and Mr lisn, with a good deal of assistance' from the Press and private individuals,the subject has been well nigh torn to 1 shreds, with, however, the unfortunate result that, so far as the problem' itself is concerned, the status qiio haa' been entirely maintained. "With Mr' G-been's attempted solution we have' i already dealt, Mr Fish's speech, so' : far as it concerned Major Atkinson's scheme,- was an excellent specimen of destructive criticism, but it waff nothing eloe : —was not, apparently,- ■ intended to be anything else. Of all' those who have in public' on the subject, it to us that ; Mr Stout has got' .nearest to the kerneljrf the problem or perhaps we ougtfSdßttier to say has 1 : been most successful in his attempt to' rget below the" surface.- The others.' : m' th£ juainj' rested iontent witfef

'ijnPßig that the Majoe'S scheme jcflQ. notbe carried out. Mr Stout P has. gone . a land has thai* Wen if "successfully carried out, it would ndt remove poverty—would not get at the root of mis. Some forma of poverty \night in®eed|be glozed over by the payment of 15s per week to some persons when they are sick, and 10s to others when they reach 65 years of age ; but we agree with Mr Stout, that it is " ridiculous" to expect poverty to be rooted out by such means. Even in such the producing causes would be left to flourish unchecked, while at the same time nothing can be more certain than ihat the great mass, of squalid poverty which we see in old-established 'countries has its abiding-place in that portiontof humanity which is not sick and which has not reached the age of 65.

The particular phase of the question, in dealing with which Mr Stout distinctly laid us under obligations to him,'is that which marks the Socialistic tendency to lay every burden and every responsibility upon the Stated while the separate development of individual character is entirely ignored, j Against this "tendency Mr Stoxix enters a wise and timely protest. Major | AtkcnSOH, first of all, lays down the I fallacious doctrine that the whole function of a Government is to execute the will of the majority; and, having Settled that point, he would have the majority " determine that we will fetamp out pauperism as we would any other plague of civilisation that may Visit us"—evidently conceiving that the fiat once Bent forth the purpose is accomplished. Mr Q-eeeh" would have the Grovernment run the public-houses, and build and own the cottages for the people. With both men the tendency is to exalt the function of the State, and in doing so it is not perceived that they degrade that of the individual.- Mr Stout only echoes the opinion of every political philosopher from Plato to Spencee, when he says that the less a Grovernment interferes with individual liberty the better. As a machine progresses towards perfection by simplification of its parts, so a Government increases in efficacy by limitation of function. All history contains a long record of the abortive interferences of Governments with the individual concerns of subjects. They have interfered to regulate the dress that should be worn, the food that should be eaten, the price at which the food Bhould be sold, and even in recent times the rate of interest chargeable on money. Speitcee recalls the fact that a law of James the Fiest prescribed the " quantity of ale to be Bold for a penny " ; while another of Henby the Eighth made it penal to Bell any pins but such as were " doubleheaded, and have their head soldered fast to the shank, and well smoothed; the shank well shaven; the point well and round-filed and sharpened." " As statesmen descend," says Bueke, " from the State to a province, from a province to a parish, and from a parish to a private house, they go on accelerated in their fall. They cannot do the lower duty, and in proportion as they try it they will certainly fail in • the higher. They ought to know the different departments of things—what belongs to laws, and what manners alone can regulate. To manners great politicians can give a leaning, but they cannot give a law." To such opinions Mr Stout gave a fit corollary when at the Lyceum Hall he declared that the " true %kn of Democracy is to turn out perfect men and women," and that "there can be no such improvement of the race if Grovernment here, there and everywhere interferes with our social affairs." But, while Mr Stout was admirable in thus claiming for the individual the right of full, free and unhampered development, he was by no means so happy in his illustrations of bad laws &s affecting the question of Poverty. Had he, for instance, pointed to the I Corn Laws of 50 years ago he could j have demonstrated how poverty was intensified by protecting the landowners at the cost of the people's food. At this point, however, the statesman became merged in the party politician, and Mr Stout immediately saw some mysterious connection between the Legislative Council, the Property Tax and the problem of Poverty. It was a plunge from the sublime to the ridiculous. The Council may be good, or it may be bad. "We believe that it is bad, and requires—not abolishing but reforming ; but, whatever we do with it, the question of Poverty remains unaffected. On the other hand, the Property Tax is an excellent impost—in so far as any tax can be called excellent because, above a certain limit, it gets at all accumulated property, including land ; and if it does that it cannot be otherwise than fair. If the Property Tax were abolished and the amount that it yields were levied from the Customs, an impetus would then be given to poverty because the cost of living would be increased. But it is simply absurd to maintain that the abandonment of the Property for a Land Tax would,' in the remotest degree, or in any sense whatever, affect the question of Poverty. It may here also be pointed out that on two important questions Mr Stout's own position is curiously inconsistent with his enlightened doc- > As a Rationaliser,- he —' the responsibility of landowning from the shoulders of the individual to those of the State. And, 1 as Protectionist, he would increase to the people* the cost of Sving foi. the sake of -artificially proppfng-sp foeai ifldxjstfieff/ ©if

these two points it would seem as if, in Mr Stout himself, something had sV interfered '' to prevent ibhe full play of individual development; If the problem of Poverty has- not been solved, we suspect there is an excellent reason for it—it is incapable of soliltion. Poverty in some degree there always will be. It is, the outcome of the struggle for existence, and where the struggle for existence is keenest the poverty is always proportionably great. Bat, although it cannot be cured- by what Mr Stout aptly calls the " short cut of los aweek," it may by a slow and gradual process be largely ameliorated. If, in the struggle for existence, the physically, the mentally, and the morally weak have a tendency to go to the wall, the real cure lies in persistent effort to rescue them from a state of physical, mental and moral weakness, so that the strife may not be so unequal. But the power brought to bear must be a moral one, and it must be addressed to the individual, and not to the mass. Poverty, which will not move before a legal enactment, be it ever so cunningly devised, will yield before the higher qualities, mental and physical, of the individual—intelligence, self-restraint, industry, energy and thrift. And the G-overament, which cannot itself - cure, can materially aid the work by administering just and equal laws that regulate while they do not harass, and that take especial care that the poor are not handicapped with burdens that of right belong to the shoulders of the rich.