NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 9580, 3 August 1894, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Govkbnmknt by direct mandate of the people is scarcely possible in these days of multitudinous measures. A Ministry or a party is returned to power nob so much for the purpose of carrying particular Bills, as ' because public opinion is favourable in a general way to its political principles and policy. Hence the fallacy of assuming, as the present Government is doing, that it has the direct mandate of the people for passing every Bill it thinks tit to introduce. The Minister of Lands threatened - the House of Representatives the other evening with a dissolution in the event of its daring to alter in any way his Lund for Settlements Bill. He claimed that the country had declared for the Bill, and he maintained that be was entitled to have it passed without amendment. The language which he addressed to the representatives of the people in intimating to them his determination to allow of no alteration in the Bill was, if we may be permitted to say so, an outrage on the independence of Parliament, and deserving of the severest censure. .There was a time when, had such language been used by a Minister in the House of Representatives, it would have raised a storm of righteous indignation among all political parties that would have swept away from place and power the haughty and presumptuous offender, But) that was when members were men of independence and courage, who exercised their own : free and unfettered judgment on all i measures ; J brought before them, who were not the slaves of party, and who did not know whab ib was'to cringe under the lash of Ministerial dictation. - - ;l . The «■ excuse of Ministers is that) the electors have commissioned them to pass their Bills. But is this so? Take the Land foe Settlements ; Bill for example. Can anyone truthfully assert that the people gave the Government a direct mandate to pass that measure ■ Did ib form the pivot on which the elections turned ? As a matter of fact ib was almost lost sight of in the much more important question of nonborrowing. On that-question the people gave the. Government a clear and unmistakable '■ mandate. There was,, the vast. majority of the electors declared, to be no borrowing. But what do we find?' Instead of faithfully submitting to; that ■" almost unanimous expression of public ' opinion, Ministers have ignored ib, and treated ib with contempt, and with an audacity for. which there is no parallel in our political history. - 1 They have swept that mandate on j one side as ii it were of no usee importance I

than a cobweb, and are now*'endeavouring to force upon the electors a fresh policy $ borrowing, And borrowing of a Very reckless and dangerous kind. "lb suits them to ignore the non-borrowing mandate of the people, just as it suits them 'to claim that they have a mandate from the people to pass a Bill about which the people at th< general - election troubled ; themselves Very little. '";■ '' ' • Bat their conduct in this respect is on all fours with their general policy, which is on< of expediency, and o.f bounce and brag. There Vhowever, one point in connection with the determination.* which the Hon. J. Mcßenzie is showing to have the Land for Settlements Bill—the whole Bill, and nothing but the Bill—passed, that will suggest itself to most impartial observers. Why is Mr. MoKenzie so anxious to carry this particular measure that be even threatens (with the assent of his colleagues) members of his own party with a dissolution unle«i they allow him to have his way? Is there anything behind all • this ? ■: There an hundreds of thousands of acres of land in the North Island which are lying in a state of nature. The Government oannol say that big estates have swallowed up al the land in the colony. Were, one to gc up in a balloon in any part of New Zealand and look down, on every side would be seen long stretches of uninhabited country. Ministers say there is a pressing and everincreasing demand for land in New Zealand. If that is so how do they account) for these vast solitudes? But assuming that it is only in the South Island that the landless crowds ere clamouring for the subdivision of large runs so that thej may secure a few acres, how comes it thai the Government has been unable to sell " the choice and suitable farms" into which it has cut up the Cheviot estate ? If there is tho keen earth hunger in the South Islaud which the Minister of Lands says there is, and which he is asking Parliament for £250,000 to enable him to satisfy, why had he to advertise the Cheviot estate sales in the Australian newspapers ? The real truth is that this supposed clamouring for land—that is, for the sub* division of southern runs—is moonshine, The £280,000 which the Cheviot estate coat the colony at the bidding of the Bon. J, McKenzle was so much money needlessly and wantonly expended. Had it been spent in opening up the lands which are at present lying waste the benefit to the colony would have been very great. We think that money spent in making land accessible to settlement is well spent, and it is greatly to be regretted that nob more was expended in this direction in former year? instead of being squandered in useletis public works. But we protest against vast sums of the taxpayers' money being handed over to the Hon, J. McKenzie or any other Minister, or to any Board, to be spent in acquiring large private properties in the South Island, while millions of acres are lying idle in the North Island; and we are at loss to understand why Mr. McKenzie should so strenuously insist on being entrusted with this enormous expenditure unless there are reasons behind those which have been disclosed., But whatever the motives are which actuate Mr. McKenzie and his colleagues in this matter, we unhesitatingly affirm that it is a dangerous power to place in the hands of any Minister; while we deny most strongly that the Government have a mandate from the people to pass Bills in any shape that Ministers may be pleased to fashion them. An article in a recent number of the Forum deals with the question of State Aid for .the unemployed. The writer is,, Dr. Stanton Coit, who lately occupied the position of head of the University Settlement, New York City, who is a strong advocate for the employment of all bona-fide. industrials who may be temporarily out of work on municipal works. He argues that idleness, hunger, and charity are all degrading in their tendency, and consequently that the only wise measure of providing relief for the able-bodied unemployed is the giving of wages in return for work. It would be foolhardy, he thinks, for private employers to risk bankruptcy by employing men to produce articles for which there ie no present demand, and contends that relief work, supported by private donations, does not reach one per cent, of the necessities. According to the experiences of last winter in New York, private philanthropy can no more provide adequate relief than ean private employers. He advocates I the expending of large sums on improvements in the cities, in the way of beautify- ! ing, cleanliness, and. public comforts, and cites in illustration of bis plan the case of the Lancashire cotton famine of 1861-05, in which the distress was met by the inauguration of public works on a scale adequate to provide employment during the period of depression. " If we ire to rescue the thrifty working people from the hands of sentimental or self-interested ? alms-givers th« organisation of charitable ', relief must be vested in the hands of the city. Before the State opens its door to labour it must close up the avenues to pauperisation opened by the random almsgiving which destroys character." ______ The young Emperor of China has just had experience of the inconvenience of strikes, and has initiated a drastic mode of discouraging that evil. Many thousands of artisans, including builders' masons, metal workers, painters, and others, have been engaged for months past in repairing the Imperial buildings in Pekin, in preparation for the Empress Dowager's birthday celebrations. Latterly, as the ■■ time for the work grew shorter, these people caused much trouble by demanding higher pay and refusing to work when their demands were not immediately satisfied. Accordingly Kuang Hsu promulgated an edict dwelling upon the trouble caused by these strikes, and commanding his soldiers and police to arrest every workman employed in the Imperial city who shows the slightest' disposition to assert the I "right of labour" in a manner likely to cause inconvenience or to retard the work. The edict proceeds to say that all strikers are to v be punished > without mercy, no leniency to be shown ; the more turbulent disturbers to be tried for high treason, the active f ringleaders to ~ suffer death by strangulation, while all who follow them are to be banished to the "fever and mosquito regions" for three years. It is reported that very little enthusiasm is noticeable amongst the strikers now. The Man of . the Moment, in the eyes of majestic Woman, , is (says a contemporary) "a common creature, of low ideals, deficient in breadth and depth, and of boundless .assurance-" The modern girl " knows him much better than her parents do, and in proportion as she ] knows h»m finds leu and less reason to respect him" The manners of the New Woman, says Sarah Grand; becoming introspective, "are perfect. "! : She is ; never aggressive, never argumentative" whereas the low moral tone which the Man of the Moment cultivates " threatens ' to enervate the race." As Sarah Grand . contemplates him, she becomes as nearly vindictive as the saintly nature of the New Woman permits her to be." :>"Let us pray for them," she says with a snap; " there '?. may bo moral courage := latent among them f* still: who knows On further reflection, however, Sarah Grand almost incite into pity. It *' shameful; she tearfully confesses, to thick

how the Mao of the Moment was ' '■ neglected, »nd allowed to act on his own worst impulses, till the New Woman came to correct him 1" : Man morally, ib ( Beems,. is. in bis infancy } and now woman " holds out her strong hand to the child man and insists 0a helping him up." "■ " Where are the men!" Sarah Grand demands indignantly ; and hastens herself to answer— «'ln mischief else in bed." "In this mismanaged world," writes the author of the Heavenly Twins with a sigh, "ib looks as if we should soon be obliged to do man's j work aa well as our ■ own, or nothing will be done." War between Japan and China has at last been formally declared. There was at one time a prospect that the efforts which were being made by England to preserve peace might be successful, bub owing to the demands made by China, the negotiations "fell through. We have now tho spectacle of the two oldest nations on the earth at war with one another. Both are provided with some of the most modern naval and military weapons.', and ib will be interesting to watch the effect of these in actual war. Particulars are given in our cablegrams of the sinking of the Chinese transport Kowshung, and ib is reported that severe fighting has taken place between the Japanese and Chinese on shore, resulting in the repulse of the former with heavy loss. Two Anarchists have been sent to prison in England for suggesting that the Royal Family should be assassinated. It is feared that the Miowera will become a total wreck. The wheat trade, it is said, shows signs of improving in the near future.