THE EDUCATION RATE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XII, Issue 4335, 5 October 1875, Page 2

THE EDUCATION RATE.

To the Editor, of the Herald. Sir, —In your issue of Saturday you referred to the arrest of two men at Onehunga for non-payment of the above rate, and at the same time expressed your disapproval of the course pursued by the Government. Allow me, in reply, to make one or two remarks on the facts of the case. Eight cases of arrest for non-payment of this tax have taken place in all: four at the Thames, and the others in the neighbourhood of Auckland. In all these cases the men refused to pay, and in all, the attempt to levy upon goods was abortive, owing in some of the cases to the fact that the men being non-householders, no property could be discovered, and in the other cases because' though they had property, it could not be levied on. In all the cases the men were able-bodied men, in good work, and perfectly able to pay. The four men arrested at the Thames paid the amount rather than go to prison, and as I hold the best evidence of the ability of the others to pay, I can see no special call for sympathy if they prefer a week's imprisonment to submitting to the law. In the case of the two men to whose arrest you specially refer, I may state that both are well able to pay the tax, even were it much larger than it is, and that the attitude of defiance assumed by them, together with the efforts made by them to incite others to resist payment, rendered it absolutely necessary that every means provided by law should be taken to compel them to pay. So much as this is certainly due to those persons, forming a very large proportion of the community, who, whether approving of the tax or otherwise, have paid the rates imposed by the law as it stands, especially as any successful examples of opposition would inevitably lead to wholesale refusals by others, who would justly consider that they ought not to pay a tax which is not enforced.upon all alike.—l am, &c, E. B. Ltjsk, Receiver of Education Rates.

In one part of Norway the longest day is three months. What a splendid chance for a lazy man to start a daily paper ! There is a new Rochefoucauld who says, "Women love but once ; endeavour to be the man of every other occasion but that." A new market for the sale old clothes has been opened at Glasgow by the municipal authorities. The market is the largest of the kind in Great Britain. The rent is £2000, and the receipts amount to £70,000 per.' annum. \'xho trade is chiefly; in. th,e hand of Irish-people, --?.;-.■ *~,:;.*.' ••'—-"" .