MR. STOUT AS PREMIER AND ADVOCATE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIII, Issue 7602, 3 April 1886, Page 5

MR. STOUT AS PREMIER AND ADVOCATE.

[BY TELKGRAPH. —OWN CORRESPONDENT.] Christchorch, Friday. Thk result of the libel esse, Dr. Stewart v. Roydhouse and Wakefield, has occasioned considerable surprise. No one doubts that the state of things at the Christohurch Hospital demanded searching inquiry, but people consider the amount of damages, one shilling, inconsistent with the answers of the jury to the issues. Considerable disapproval, too, is expressed at the action of the Premier in taking a brief for the defence. The Lyttelton Times, in a leader on the subject, says : —" Is it advisable that the Premier of the colony should practise as a barrister in the colonial Courts ? We do not think it is, and we have reason to think that we are not alone in the opinion. The inconsistency in Mr. Stout as Premier remaining also Mr. Stout the advocate, has been often referred to, but it has never been so palpable as in the present case. As an advocate, he certainly achieved a triumph since— though he did not exactly win a victory, he saved his client from a very probable defeat. As a barrister, Mr. Stout perhaps nover held a higher position than he holds to-day, but it is not as a barrister the colony looks oftencst at him. It is not in that capacity that the public has a right to control his actions, nor is it because Mr, Stout is a politician that we think his position during the late trial was inconsistent. It is because he is a Minister, and the head of the Government, As Bach he is the chief officer whom every civil servant, from the highest to the lowest, has to look to. He has directly or indirectly the control of every public institution, for the good conduct of which he and his Ministry are responsible There was something almost laughable in the spectacle of Mr. Stout, the advocate, attacking with almost violent eloquence the state of a public institution with whose management the colony holds his own Government charged in the last resort. What we have to consider is whether any Premier ought to appear as an ordinary pleader on either side in fcueh a case as that lately before the Supreme Court in Dunodin. No man can be two persons. He cannot cut himself away from one half of his life. Wherever he goes Mr. Stout carries with him the official position and weight of Premier. On the bench, in the Court, in the witness box, he is brought into contact with men who hold posts more or less subordinate to him, or who are more or less in his power. If a Judge were to irritate him he might punish him by moving him to another district. An obnoxious inferior officer of the Court might be got rid of quietly on fifty different pretences, or if not actually dismissed, the officer might find that he was passed over when the next chance of. promotion came. Take the position of a hostile witness, who is also a civil servant, when under cross-examination by an excited Premier, whose tones are sharp and threatening. Is the position fair to the witness ? Certainly not. It ought to be needless for us to say that we do not dream of making the faintest insinuation against Mr. Stout's demeanour during the trial. He is an honest man., and as strong, minded as honest. We don't doubt that it seems to him perfectly possible to make the separation between Premier and advocate complete and that he would be the last man in New Zealand to bear a shadow of malice agaiDst any civil servant who might cross him in Court. If all men were of like tone and grit with him this article would not need to be written, nor, for the matter of that, many other articles. For the present we may console ourselves with thinking that Mr. Stout's appearance in Court will, owing to his character, do as littlo harm as any bad precedent could ; but the precedent is bad for all that, and Parliament would do well to stop its repetition. It is impossible to count on all lawyer Premiers being of Mr. Stout's stamp. The example in this town of the Orphanage Committee has shown of what monstrous injustice to their servants public persons are capable. It is shown that the most zealous and valuable officer is not safe against pigheaded rancour, and that he may be ruined even while public consideration is being given to his case, and while general indignation is crying aloud in the street. If this tort of thing can be done in the light of day, what might not be done in the comparative light of the civil service by a Premier unscrupulous enough to use his power to reward professional services or punish professional enemies."