PUBLIC MATTERS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume VIII, Issue 2348, 4 August 1871, Page 3

PUBLIC MATTERS.

[We aic not responsible for our Correspondents' opinions.]

To William Bpckland, Esq., per favour of the Hru.vld. Sib, —Without any ceremonious introduction, I beg leave to call your attention to tho decrcpid state of New Zealand politically at this time, which is admitted by all, except the class of peoplo who live on the spoils—like tho gravedigger, who says, " The more deaths, tho more bread for him—and while the people 111 goneral are in agitation for a reform, you will fiad one recommend making roads throughout tho country for a cure; another, protection to native industry ; another, making railroads ; another, immigration ; another, tho prosecution of tho fisheries ; another, tho development of our coal mines and other minerals ; another, docks; and scores of other notions, right in themselves if there were a foundation laid to support tho development of those industries, which, in our cose, would only bo like crowding tho deck of ft ship with cargo without adequate ballast below : tho rnoro you would stow on top, tho more dangerous the caso of tne ship and all concerned would become. Another class of p»«pIo among us agitato retrenchment for a c«un in the various branchos of the public sorvico, which everyone will admit is necessary, and which would naturally corao round by tho voice and force of the peoplo if tho proper foundation were laid to expect that result ; vrhilo those good people who would agitate their respcctivo reforms never seem to tako to heart that our Constitution and its machinery is only adapted to suppress and crush tho development of all native industries and general prosperity ; and while, 011 the other hand, ins a moral impossibility to rotrencii by the present machinery of governing, b it. nHsuredly will be getting rnoro uud uiuro from year to year, uutil the hybrid brute is destroyed.

Any person that chooses to exorcise his reason can see that. it is, sir, ono of the bancs of the country, and a barrier to its adjustment, while one person strongly advocates the reform of one particular corruption, ho at the same time cherishes another equally fatal, either from selfinterest, inexpenmire, or something worse. Ihis 13 not to b? applied to one only, but to almost all in general terms, although there are exceptions. I havo been induced to make the above general remarks, addressed to yourself, from knowing long ago your sentiments against the political institutions of tho country, and, as reported to be expressed by you not lon** since at a public dinner, " that tho Civil vice Pension Act is a gigantic swindle.' 1 Permit me to say, sir, that that Act is only protected and upheld by, and iu affinity with, all the Acts of the country, promoting " swindles" of more or less magnitude, and should vou sweep it clean off the Statute Book, as it ought to be, it would only appear in another phase, like an ignis Jttluus, as long as things are constituted as now. Permit me, sir, again to assimilate the state of New Zealand to a man harrasscd with putrid sores and tumours on his body, from which he was languishing from year to yenr; at last ho gets a doctor, and wishes him to euro those excrescences by easy external applications, such as poultices and salves. The doctor tells his patient that ho can remove these tumours by external easy applications for a time, but iisauredly to reappear in an* other form with double virulence, to his sure destruction. Tho doctor tells his patient further, " Wo must first attack tho sourco of your distemper, tho real cause of those sores;—your constitution, man, is deranged ; we must try to adjust that first, and if we happily succeed, these sores will cure of themselves. Poor mau! you iuay itch aud scratch as much as you like, but will only inflame and irritate your sores, and will do more harm than good, until tho root of tho evil is extracted or eradicated from your constitution." Borrowing millions of money is a consoling salve for a time, but ! —but!— Paddy having seen, in a place of worship, the bass-viol for the first time in his life, and notwithstanding the sacredness of the place, could not but exclaim in a loud voice, " Horo! The father of alt the other fiddles!" Now, sir, the majority of the people of the country believe the Constitution is u father" of all tho swindles perpetrated on the country under the sanction of law, and that those who rule the country who ought to see it Grsc of all—never f»ee it. I ask, is that from their ignorance ? Never think of that of them. Is it, then, from dishonesty ? fto, no; never allow that sinful thought to enter your mind for onco, equal to sacrilege only, that intelligent gentlemen and superior orators would be either ignorant or dishonest. But they must be, then, something beyond my limited cotriprehension. X am not able to define; nor can I hazard a stretch of the imagination to for once utter that they are rebels against their and our sovereign, in harrassing and ill-using her Majesty's subjects, or violating tho sovereignty of the people, or renegades to the prosperity of this new colony, to serve their own small ends. I will leave these dark and dubious questions to your own better judgment to solve. But I must call your attention again to the " gigantic swindle" and its fellows, whose name is legion. While the British money-lender believes he i> doing good to hunself and serving a good purposo to N"ew Zealand at the same time, ho is grossly deceived by tho combination of ten Governments and their respective tails and minions, betraying tho people and dazzling their eyes with tho "golden calf/' aud buying them with the money and power that emanates from the people themselves to keep these ten Governments in power, which the resources of tho country will not do for then, notwithstanding grinding taxation beyond forbearance, which we will call Swindle No. 1.

As a result of the amphibious Constitution, elections during five years —tho term or duration of the General Assembly—do not cost much short of .L'lo,ooo. This is no wonder : while there is only one general election for the Assembly, there are eighteen general election! in the provinces during that period, and there is not a week ill the year—nav, a day on an average—but there is an election. I gave before to the public, that in Nova Scotia, with double our population, elections during four years—the term of their Assembly —only cost from £"5 to £S0 of their own currency. Wc will call the above Swindle No. 2. As a twin swindle with the above, public printing here costs yearly about £30,000, while in Xova Scotia, with double the population, only from i'COii to .C.OOO. Swindle No. 3. Allow me, rn jtr tint, to say that " there is rottenness in another place besides Denmark." Civil Service Pension Act, growing from year to year into extensive dimensions, — strong symptoms of a disordered body. Swindle No. -1-. 4,000 officials, from whom the pensionsrs grow. Swindle No. 5. Although only a branch of tho last—the enormous extravagance of the administration of law and justice throughout the country, the superabundance and profusion of worshipful Resident Magistrates, only requisite for their own individual necessities ; an incubus on an infant colony. Swindle No. G. " Direct purchase," emanating from and in league with the political swindling body,—fair play to the Natives, forsooth ! The Busby affair will be nothing to it in magnitude. Tho distraction and embarrassment it will be in settling the country when the right order of things is restored—when tho swindling conelavo aro font to tho Chatham Islands or tho bottom of the ocean. No. 7. A General Government and a Provincial Land Office in each province; "burning tho candle at both ends," ifce. Swindle .No. 8. The Native Oflice, an imuieuso tumour. Swindle No. 9. The Nativo Lands Court, an excrescence. No. 10. Tho Mechanics' Bay Bail war, —a swiudle. No. 11. Tho Kaipara Railway,—a fungus growing out of the uecajccl stump of the former. No. 12. Paying £00,000 a yoar for the San Francisco mail service ; too much "de hootto gratify tho convenience or fancy of one-twentieth part of tho people, to the damage of tho nineteentwentieths; a bounce and swindle. No. 13. Sending commissioners home to get troops to shoot tho jMaoris. If i; were to kill the Provincial Governments, the greatest enemies this country ever had, it might be justifiable, but Great Britain knew what was good for us; " sojers" they would not lend us, and fortunately for our commissioners they had two strings to tho bow, not unlike a new Justice of tlio Peace, in an isolated settlement in another part of tho world, sending his first warrant to apprehend a debtor, in which the mandate to the constable was, " if he could not catch Niel llcCormick, to make suro to take a bullock from Alex. McDcarmid 60, if the commissioners could not get the troops, to mako sure to get a million of money to squander. No. 1-1.

Another class of swindles collateral with and akin to every one of the abovo is : Hundreds of respectable families who hacl to leave tho centres of population, as tho above " swindles" were drying up the resources of the country, and who have to reside under tho shelter of relatives in the country districts, and who liavo 110 means to buy lund with, nor will the Government give it to them, to inako them useful to themselves or tho Slate, although vacant lots arc here and there sluring them in the face, reserved and unproductive. Verily, an evil spirit seems to liavo porvuded tho legislation and administration of Hits country, putting every obstacle in tho way of settlement, instead of removing them. People speuk sneeringly of sterile Nova Scotia and its frigid climate, but who ever heard of a mob of hundreds of able-bodied men attacking a Government office fora bitof bread? No ! their affairs wore better regulated. Every man could get land there, instead, as here, putting impediments in their way, for the purpose of buying " paper collars" for a supernumerary host of officials, —a legion of officials, the natural progeny of all the "swindles" above, No. 15.

Tho Weekly He;:ald, a couple of weeks past,' very ■ j-uatly . observes, 111 «. leading article: " Jb'or not only is every failure :v loss to every individtul himself, but a loss in u vari'.'lv of ways to (he .S» ;i l i.o' only (lh'c;t!_7 i-.'-t indirectly, for thero are no better

immigration agents than the successful immigrants themselves. Their success is the inducement for friends and relatives at home to follow their steps, while the reverse of this holds equally true." Let us then take the hundreds of families referred to above, in the rural districts, without land, —the four or five hundred men who attacked tho Superintendent s offlce in Auckland, and hundreds on hundreds similarly situated in other parts of the colony, besides the 511 who petitioned the Superintendent of Wellington for land on deferred payments, winch they were refused, and the Norwegians who, if I am not wronglv informed, were induced to come out to this country by Dr. Featherstone himself, who, the Doctor said, "were squatting on five and ten acres each, and if solJ over their heads they would get compensation." All those people referred to represent all parts of Great Krituiu, the North American Colonies, the United States, and other countries, and Norway, too, and what can be expected of them to write to their respective " friends mid relatives they left at home," but what- "Dives" would fain send to his brethren iu the countrv he left, not to come to this country of pains and penalties, already infected and invaded by Superintendents, and covered with oilicials, as Egypt with locusts, eating up everything on the face of the country, and more, too ! Although most characteristic, the case of the Norwegians is one of the most glaring instances that could be recorded, iu contrast with the colonising system of other colonies in times gone by, and even at this very dar, although far advanced in population ! Men inducedlo come IG,OOO miles to a new cobny, yet a comparative waste and wilderness of vast extent, and would only get five or ton acres each to squat upon, with the honorable and gracious proviso, " if sold ofer their heads they would get compensation!" Have the rulers of New Zealand lost all discretion, when they do not feel a delicacy, if not shame, when ihev ca.i speak of immigrants at all'» Or do theythink that people are as tune as the swallows we used to catch by shaking a little salt or ashes on their tails, to come hen; to be reduced to penury, if nob beggary, when they can obtain every adrantage in noble America, aud that at their door in comparison to tiiis couutry ? An old aud venerable neighbour of mine, seventeen years ago, paid money for land in New Zealand to the accredited agent of this province, and, in consequence, removed with a family of fourteen souls from Australia to AuekianJ ; but, behold, when lie camo there he could not get land or his money back airaiu. \Vhat could he do? was so reduced in moans that he could not return io where he cauac from, —with other families similarly decoyed, who found their way back again,—but hehadtodr.jp down and squat on Government land with the younger portions of his family that did not return with the other?, and is this day squatting on a small piece of Government Und (subject to a penalty, I suppose), and never got his money or land, and probably never will. Such 13, sir, the colonising system of our country ; —enough to make a person's blood boil with contempt and disgust of all the " powers" that have been ani are now iu New Zealand, ui.til they completely change their tactics, and should they, it would take a long time to repair the danvigo done or redeem the past. While the thoughtless wight that pilfers a blue Bhirt or a secondhand pair of boots is sent to ilount .Eden to break stones, the political " robber," that plunders a country of millions of wealth and its prosperity, is greeted with ovations andipensioned and superannuated with honor. I consider, sir, spending a million of money to buy immigrants from other countries with, without first locating those we hare already iu the country, a bare-baced far. e—a contradiction—a "gigantic swindle." lou will never "develop the resources of this countrv" until you open it North aud South to " free selection." Then, aud not till then, will a regular flow of the proper class come to the country ; but by giving the land only in deceptive " nobblers," as to the Norwegians, you would soon nnr tho project. Use them fairly, by giving them a reasonable quantity of land, a magnetic attraction would run between tho iii» a-settlements formed hereand thehomes they left, t':at abundance of immigrants of the right. 3ort would fellow cach other in succession from year to year, without costing us a penny, so

that you might send the Hon. J. Yogcl on a pleasure trip back to England again with a

million of money. Is not borrowing a million of money to buy immigrants witn. without pro-

viding so much as an acre of lan 1 for their reception by statute, characteristic of the chaotic management of New Zealand all along ? It is said that " those whom the gods intend to destroy they will first mate them mad," and to try to repair and cover the desolation and distraction brought on tho country by the grossest raismangeaiont ever known or heard of in any other British colony, by a wild and " a gigantic swindle/' superseding in magnitude all the " swindles" prece-.ting it, and will in tho end amply verify the adage quoted.

The whole political course of the country is in the wrong direction in every instance, and an opposite course must bo adopted ere it will ever prosper. For instance, during the last ten years we have seen five or sis General Governments besides the present Government, and every one of thera left the country in a worse state than they found it, but the present Government will come to the end of the tether their predecessors were running by. They will cap the climai and out-herod Herod. Should you get the best men in the world in their place, any other result would be a moral impossibility; their compass is false, their downfall must be disastrous ;—I defy all NewZealand to any other result; mark it, I pray ! A member of the Provincial Council two years ago said in his place that the province was at the expanse of £2G,000 in the appropriation of £28,000 ; —about the gauge of Paddy's blanket. If New Zealand had a genuine British Constitution, as the British North American colonies had, one-half the revenue screwed yearly from the limited population of this province would be ample under such a Constitution, for the reasonable expenses of ruling i;lii3 colony from end to end, from the Governor down to the lowest functionary on the civil list, and a very large margin to spare. Under that view of tho case, who will wonder at our deplorable, ragged condition ? But you will say, they (Canada) havo assimilated their Constitution to ours. True, but it is no argument in our favor ; it only proves it made their case worse, and ours 110 better than it was, and left them discontentod, with double taxation entailed on them. But, again ; consider the disparity of the population of the two countries at the time of the union of tho four provinces,—tho smallest of tho four had 50,000 population moro than our nine province! all put together ; another with double the population of New Zealand, and they have two provinces that would average more than three millions of people, and adding a large per centage to them evory yea?; while we, mighty ourselves, have three provinces that will not average much over 6000 each, with their respective parliaments and what-not, money acrapers, or crushing machines ! There is not a man who upholds, directly or indirectly, things as they were, and now are, in New Zealand, but who ia either ignorant or dishonest—let him be whom he may, so that a man with " clean hands" cannot be in a Government in New Zealand, unless he wero to be charitable, like a captain preserving his ship to the owners, which he himself concurred in, and unwittingly allowed to be stranded and partly wreckod.—l am, ifce., JonN MUSEO. Waugarei Heads, May 16. [We havo indulged our correspondent by inserting his very lengthy letter, although we cannot by any means agreo with him in the very doleful views which he takes of the prospocts of New Zealand iu general.—Ed. N.Z.H.]