THE EDWARDS CASE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1057, 2 June 1892, Page 34

THE EDWARDS CASE.

Sir, I notice by the papers that Mr Edwards, who has not been successful iu retaining his Judgeship, is going to apply for compensation. I would like to ask on what grounds ? That he was a party to an unconstitutional aud illegal act is now established by the highest authority in the realm. That the people who placed him ia his position attempted violence against the Constitution is a matter beyond doubt. And for this wrong they were prepared to commit they ask for compensation. Should not the caee be reversed, and some penalty be inflicted on these men adequate to the nature of tho olience ? There are none but the most paltry excuses offered for what has been done. ’lt L said they wanted a man of independent status to discharge “the highest responsibilities” under the Native Land Acts, and therefore Mr Edwarda was made a Judge, but as a matter of fact the Legislature very distinctly withheld these very high responsibilities, and gave to the Commissioner only administrative duties which any Judge of the Native Land Court could equally well have discharged, “the highest responsibilities” being reserved for Parliament itself. There was absolutely nothing therefore to justify the violence done to the Constitution. Further, it may be said that the act was emphatically condemned, from the constitutional point of view, by the whole of the Judges, theironlydoubtbeingas tothe powers contained in the Supreme Court Act of 1882. Even Mr Justice Richmond, who held that he could be legally appointed, most emphatically condemned, in his telegram before the oath was administered, the act as unconstitutional in the highest degree. It is absurd to suppose that any intelligent person, will be deceived by the allegation that if his salary had been once passed by the General Assembly it would have become permanently approp iated. The constitutional question is involved in tho permanent appropriation of the salary by Parliament before a Judge can be appointed. The telegram announcing the decision of the I rivy Council makes this perfectly clear. It was in fact urged in the admirable charge of the Chief Justice, driven home with incomparable force by Sir Robert Stout, and discussed as a vital point by every intelligent person in the Colony. I am no' surprised to find Ihe legal sophistry which defended the late Government in the Ward-Hislop case coming out with a number of specious excuses for the appointment of Mr Edwards. The issue, however, is abundantly clear, and the only question that remains to be settled is that of compensation, which a committee of Parliament will no doubt take into consideration ; but I imagine a better case will have to be made out than any yet attempted before the wrong doing of the last Government can be condoned. To that wrong-doing Mr Edwards will have to show he waß not a party.—l am, &c., Critic.