ONE MAN ONE VOTE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVII, Issue 8443, 19 December 1890, Page 6

ONE MAN ONE VOTE.

TO THE EDITOR. Sib, —Your correspondent " A," writing on Monday on the " one man one vote" question, quotes a remark by Professor Huxley, in which that gentleman draws a parallel bebween a ship at sea and the ship of State, and says that he would not like to bo on board the former if the voices'of the meanest of the crew wore of equal importance with the voice of the captain. It is evident that Professor Huxley intends to make a comparison between a ship so governed and a State, in which a man without property is placed on the aame political footing with the millionaire. But tho parallel, as attempted to be applied in this case, is by no means complete. The captain of a ship must possess special knowledge and skill fitting him to command, and property has nothing to do with the case, for he may be actually poorer than the loblolly boy,orcook, who might have considerable savings. But, according to " A," and others of his kidney, neither special knowledge nor skill may count for anything ; it is the possession of "property" (no matter how dishonestly acquired) which can alone entitle an individual to exercise the franchise. Several of your correspondents, indeed, have gone so far as to state that they have no confidence in a Parliament electod on the one man one vote principle. For our part, we, the working men of Auckland, beg to state most emphatically, that wo could place just as little confidence in Parliament if it were elected by the class who have proved themselves so dishonest and incapable that the head office of the Bank of New Zealand had to be shifted out of this city and away from their rascally influence, or, by the owners of houses who let their "property" for immoral purposes to a certain class of women, nor would we have overflowing confidence in the Parliamentary choice of those merchants and " property owners" who regularly import indecent pictures on cigarette cards and circulate them among the youth of our land ; nor of those owners of low class public houses, boarding houses, and other dens to be found in this city. What no reasonable man of any class would object to would bo to prevent the illiterate, the criminal, and the drones of society from having any say in the choice of our rulers. And in doing this, in excluding the man who picks your pocket in the street, don't let that merchant vote who, if he has dealings with you to the extent of ss, will cheat you outof half-a-cro\vn ; if you exclude the housebreaker, you would also do well to exclude that citizen who, after letting in the Bank of New Zealand for thirty or forty thousand pounds, can live comfortably on what he has laid by; if you deny the franchise to the men who receive charitable aid, you should also deny it to drones in more fashionable circles, who toil not, neither do they spin, yot who manage to be better fed, clothed, and housed, and have more money to spend, than tho man who toils hard for the little he receives. For after all, sir, it still remains true that mankind may be divided into three great classes, workers, beggars, and thieves, and if we could only weed out the paupers and j criminals from each end of society, might j wo not then hope to have representative ; government in its fullest sense. —I am, etc., ijUrrijiOACK.