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New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4149, 8 July 1874, Page 2

The Bill to Abolish Imprisonment for Debt, which the Premier has introduced, and which was read in the House of Representatives a second timo last night, is a short measure of eight clauses only. The first gives tho short title to tho Act ; the second determines when it shall come into operation—which is left blank for the will of Parliament to bo expressed thereon ; and the third defines the exceptions to the operation of the Act. These aro important. They run thus : 1. Default in payment of a penalty or sum in the nature of it penalty other than a penalty in respect of any contract. 2. Default in payment of any sum recoverable summarily before a Itesident Magistrate, or Justice or Justices of tho Peace, or Court of Potty Sessions, under the Justices of the Peace Act, 1806, or any Act amending the same or passed for like purposes, or otherwise-than under the Resident Magistrates Act, 1807, and Acts amending tho samo. 3. Default by a trustee or person acting in a fiduciary capacity, and order to pay, by a Court having jurisdiction in tho matter, any sum in his possession or control. 4. Default by a solicitor in payment of costs when ordered to pay costs for misconduct as such, or in payment of a sum of money when ordered to pay the same in his character of an oiiicer of the Court making the order. 5. Default in payment for the benefit of creditors of any portion of a salary or other incomo in respect of the payment of which any Court having jurisdiction in bankruptcy or insolvency is authorised to make an order. The introduction of somo of theso exceptions is undoubtedly justifiable. A debt incurred under tho first sot out is not of a nature in which much sympathy can be involved on behalf of the person indebted. Default under the circumstances contemplated in the third and fourth exceptions amounts to very much more, being in plain truth an offence against the criminal law of a very serious nature ; while the fifth may bo defended on the ground that tho Court which ordored a payment from salary to creditors would, no doubt, have made it cognizant of the facts of tho case, and of the ability of the defaulter to pay tho sum ordored by tho Court. The second exception, however, appears to bo open to objection. ITailuro to pay a sum recoverable summarily in a potty Court, retained as a ground of imprisonment for debt in an Act to abolish that infringement of personal liberty, looks very like as if the net were constructed for the express purpose of catohing tho little fish and allowing tho larger onos to escape. It is the prevalent idea that if imprisonment for temporary inability to discharge a debt is not a '' proper," though it is a " legal" course, the man of limited means, woighed down by " honest poverty," should not bo oxposed to an irrational penalty, while larger offenders are allowed to escapo. This point, however, will no doubt bo elucidated in committee. The Ministry have promised not to hurry tho measure forward. Mr. T. B. Gillies will thus havo every opportunity of ventilating his views on tho subject, though ho may not be able to porsuade the House that it is better to havo a Bill, whother crude or carefully drawn, from a private member, rather than one from tho hands of tho Government, to which they have given considerable attention, and which they will endeavor to pass to satisfy an often expressed wish of the country and of at least ono of tho two Houses of Parliament. In committee, also, Mr. Sheohan will havo the opportunity of bringing forward hia extraordinary proposition

that where a relentless creditor has imprisoned a debtor, and held him fast in iron bonds—unable to earn money to. pay his debts; v and at the mercy of the human tiger who detains him at cost to himself—the State should pay the debt when it releases the debtor from his bonds, or should at least pay the "costs" to which the creditor has been put. Mr. Sheehan will also thon have an" opportunity of proving his extraordinary doctrine that imprisonment for debt is ft." proper course " of proceeding, and yet one which the Parliament should at once abplish ! Something may be gained on this subject "by remembering the account given by*'" The Citizen of the World "» of ■•how the barbarians treated debtors many hundred years ago. If they were found, on examination, to have become involved in debt by accident and no fault of their own, the State paid their liabilities and let them go, with a caution. If they had become so fraudulently, and with the intention of defrauding creditors, they were beheaded, as a warning to others.