THE New Zealand Mail. PUBLISHED WEEKLY. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1896. THE PRESS AND THE PEOPLE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1289, 12 November 1896, Page 20

THE New Zealand Mail. PUBLISHED WEEKLY. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1896. THE PRESS AND THE PEOPLE.

Vox populi vox Dei. Some people of limited scope who dislike this ancient saying profess to doubt its accuracy. But the Transatlantic sage Emerson has paraphrased the legend in these words, " The great soul of the world is just." And where does the soul of the civilised world truly exist if not among the great mass of mankind ? It is not among the comparatively few whom lofty position or great wealth merely enable them on occasions to assume to be depositaries of power and rule. Even these, however, have in modern times and in all free constitutional countries to appeal to the people at large ; and thus the force of the Latin motto is made manifest. There is another maxim which in recent years has been bandied about as a popular notion and tacitly accepted by many who look chiefly at the surface of things. That current maxim is that the voice of the press is the voice of the people. Sundry fervent writers of leading articles in the Conservative press, judicious and otherwise (mainly otherwise), lay to their ink-bespattered souls the flattering unction that they both form and guide public opinion, and give the breath of popularity or of ostracism, to the public men whom they delight to honour or rejoice to censure and disparage. This is peculiarly the state of things among a large and not over modest body of Conservative pressmen and publicists of to-day. It is a fond delusion. These conceited penmen profess to lead, but they are only groping in their futile efforts, and utterly fail to grasp the. true senti.nent and trend of the people. For many months, nay for years, censorious and purely one-sided and unjust criticism and obloquy have been showered with unsparing hands on the heads of the New Zealand Ministers. Seddon and Seddonism, the one man Government, the so-called autocratic rule have been made the watchwords and stalking-horses of these self-seeking journalistic censors. Some of these the wealthy —do not hesitate to boast that their organs are merely commercial speculations. That is the argument of those proprietors to whom the nimble penny or twopence and the flow of high-priced advertisements have secured the swelling of their bank balances. There is another class of journals which are the exponents and representatives of the selfish policy of wealthy men, and which may be termed the " kept" papers of a party whose rabid Conservatism and selfinterest make them willing to spend thousands to support costly concerns in the endeavour to decry and oust from office the Ministry that represents the Liberal Party. It is admitted that that party is essentially the people's party ; the party which seeks for equal justice for all; the party whose political aim is that the burdens of the State shall be borne fairly, and that those best able to bear those burdens shall bear a fair proportion thereof according to their possessions -. their means and substance ; their ability to pay. There is no getting away from this doctrine. Whether as regards landlord or tenant; the owner of broad acres or the holder of lucrative shares ; the well-to-do tradesman and merchant or the humble mechanic —the true system of administration is that which shall exact only a just proportion of its cost in accordance with the means and possessions of the individual. That this is what the present Ministry has for years striven to reach, and striven, too, in the teeth of keen opposition, cannot be denied. All that was aimed at may not have been accomplished. The desire is never achieved by the actual realisation. But, nevertheless, much has been done and well done, and that too in spite of the obloquy and assault proceeding from these myopic sections of the press to which we have referred.

These purblind leaders of the blind, who, with their organised and cheap association articles of abuse, form the largest proportion and include the wealthiest part of the newspapers—these are loud in their declarations that tho Ministry is " doomed," and that the coming election will witness the triumph of the Opposition. Yet within their heart of hearts these flatulent pretenders know—or ought to know, if their brains were sound and their judgment unobscured—that tho Liberal Ministerial Party is coming back more compact than ever, and that the place of many of the late Opposition will know them no more, in both town and country this belief is steadily growing in the minds of the people, as even those unfavourable to the Ministers are being compelled unwillingly to acknowledge. People feel that the Opposition, weakly lei; with its leaders, if not at actual variance, distrustful and jealous of each other ; is losing strength every day, and that the Ministerial strength is steadily increasing. The Opposition and its few remaining prominent men feel this and view the prospect with dismay. The Tory journals and the hired associated press writers know this equally well, and grow more and more virulent in their attacks, and less and less select in their epithets. It is no new thing to say—for everybody has seen it —that a local journal, whose columns are now frequently decorated by the not over-modest opinions and misrepresentations of one of the loaders of the Opposition, had only to denounce a Wellington candidate to make his election sure. And many another violent advocate of the Opposition will here and elsewhere realise a similar experience when the total numbers are up. There is no confidence felt by the colonists at large in those perpetual denouncers, because they are

now discovered to be mere misleaders of the people. Go where you will throughout the country, and any observer can see that there is a general lack of- faith in the weak-kneed leaders of the Opposition. There is at the same time steadily growing in the public mind the conviction that Ministers will return with a sound, reliable, working following 1 . And it is an equally confirmed public opinion that the angry and blatant voice of the Opposition press is not the voice of the people.