ASKING A FAVOUR FROM CARNEGIE. Buried Talents for Books.

Free Lance, Volume III, Issue 123, 8 November 1902, Page 8

ASKING A FAVOUR FROM CARNEGIE. Buried Talents for Books.

DUNEDIN is a well-to-do city. One would think it has no need to prostrate itself at the feet of Amen can millionaires to bog money for public institutions. Mr. Chapman, of Dunedin, however, hearing that Carnegie, who does not want to die rich and disgraced, is scattering libraries around broadcast, wrote to him suggesting that he might scatter one in his vicinity. The great iron king threatens to do so, and Dunedin may accept the disgrace which Carnegie does not want. * • • Of course, Mr. Chapman, the gentlemain who begged the great Carnegie for that money, was actuated by the very best motives. He saw the need of a library, and, the city, being too canny to spend a large amount of money on a library, he took this exceptionally eaay method of trying to get for the city what it might not for ai long time obtain. In the first instance, it is questionable whether a private individual had any real right to ask Carnegie for money to be spent for the public benefit. The begging letter, if one had to be written, should have emanated from the civic authorities. * * • If Dunedin respects itself, and there is not much doubt about the point, it will absolutely refuse to accept this gratuity from the millionaire. What earthly interest has Carnegie in Dunedin, or Dunedin in Carnegie? Why should Dunedin shift on to the shoulders of tihe man from, Pittsburg a responsibility and a duty it should be proud to discharge for itself? Perhaps, who knows, if somebody had written to 'him, before the Newtown Library was erected, saying this was a poor, struggling place, and would he kindly help us along, the little man might have sent us the money, and made us feel humiliated for life. That, is, if we had been mean-spirited enough to accept a gift that was begged for. * * * It is at variance with the vaunted spirit of independence which we are proud of in New Zealand to beg for any gift of money from outside the colony for public purposes. Carnegie does not make his money in this country, and he will not disgrace himself if he does not spend any of it here. The man who has lived in a community all his life, who has made a fortune by contact with the people of his own or adopted land, is the man from whom we may accept gifts without feeling ashamed to do so. Such gifts are a payment for benefits received, and it seems very evident that the wealthy

people of Dunedm and elsewhere in New Zealand do nob admit having received any benefits, seeing that they are so chary of their gifts.

If the need far public libraries is pressing, the purse of tihe public is tih* proper source from which to draw the cash. Carnegie may be a very largehearted philanthropist, and it may be very easy to induce him to part with his money, but the time is not yet ripe for any city in New Zealand to acknowledge its inability to finance itself by praying for donations from a millionaire who has no interests here. The only way Dunedin can avoid the scorn of being a beggar is to absolutely refuse to accept the Carnegie gift, and for its cutizens to show, by coming forward with a similar amount to that offered, that they are able, lone-handed, to make and maintain their own institutions.