To the Editor of the “New Zealand Spectator.”

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 574, 1 February 1851, Page 1 (Supplement)

To the Editor of the “New Zealand Spectator.”

Wellington, January 31, 1851. Sir—lf you can afford room for, and deem worthy of insertion in your columns, the following few sentences, you may insert them as the sentiments of one who has some stake in the colony, and who desires nothincr mnrp pampctlv limn ifper, and order and good government along with it. I am, Sir, Your obedient Servant, M.

Sib.,— lt will by this time have become evident to that section of our community “the persons styling themselves the Settlers’ Constitutional Association,” that they do not represent public opinion. In speaking of this body I would be understood to mean more particularly the four or five individuals who presume to think, speak, and act, for those of its members who either from indifference, apathy, or incapacity, allow these 'Tritons among Minnows’ ] n their name to amuse themselves with framing petitions and memorials, which are either unanswered or snubbed; by abusing the Government and all who support it; and bythrowing every possible obstacle in their power in the way of every measure designed for the good Government and welfare of the colony. And certainly while they confined their petty efforts to these objects they were so perfectly innocuous that it has been rather amusing than otherwise to the dissentient looker-on. Presided over as the-.-been by a Chairman who has no scruple in informing those who may happen to differ with him in politics that he is either a ‘-rogue, fool, or liar,” it is no wonder that their meetings have been characterized by the most perfect unanimity. Equal to tneir impudence and assumption, therefore, must nave been their astonishment and dismay on finding at the last meeting that the public had a voice which did not echo their dictation, and that it really required something more than their awful authority to make their new Patent Steam Electric Constitution go down. p n former years cur public meetings were noisr andsometime= riotous, but they were always conducted with a spirit of fairness, any attempt at jockeying would have been scouted, and if, in the heat of argument, an angry word escaped it was all explained or forgotten the next morning. Now. how widely different is the case, political heart burnings and personal animosity appear too palpably to inSuence all our would be leaders’ -sayings and oings’ losing sight of the great question in their own petty paltry strife. is and ever will be the inevitable result of carrying political party feeling into social life, and this has been done and [ carried on to an extent, which, all who care for the wellbeing of society, must lament; and done, too, by the very [ men, with the Chairman at their head, who now come forward and pretend to ask implicit reliance on their political ‘ honesty and practical statesmanship by the adoption, with- : out any deliberation, of their hole and corner measures for I the future Government of the colony. Far be it from me to

attempt to attempt to citparage »ell diiecteu efForta for the public ■steal, or to lightly regard a fair and honest expression of public feeling through whatever channel it may come, but I have yet to learn that either the one cr the other can be obtained by the course pursued bv the three e*™ .... -_-i >,sixiiigwii, <mu. Lucir slsueimanuite cnairman. I am, Sir. Your obedient servant and subscriber, M.