THE MORAL OF THE "SELFRELIANT" POLICY.

Otago Witness, Issue 740, 3 February 1866, Page 1

THE MORAL OF THE "SELFRELIANT" POLICY.

(From the Dailt Times, January 30.) Our Wellington Correspondent has obligingly furnished us with a copy of some important correspondence between His Excellency the Governor, Generals Chute and Waddy, and Commis'aryGeneral Jones. We are sorry our space does not permit our publishing it in the present issue. We would not have it supposed that we agree with the comments made upon it by our Correspondent in his letter. According to our usual practice, we allow him to speak for himself, and he speaks the sentiments of those amongst whom he lives, and notably the sentiments of the late Ministry. But in the published correspondence we see no evidence of the alleged demoralisation 1 of the army, nor of any insidious orders of General Cameron to the troops under his command not to interfere with the rebel Maoris. General Waddy explains his reason for not avenging the deaths of Kereti and Mr Broughton, in a perfectly intelligible manner. The Governor had just issued Mr Fitzgerald's lamentable proclamation of peace and condonation of past crimes ; and the General felfc that if he took the field, even to avenge those new murders, he would on his own responsibility be recommencing a war. We do not wish to express an opinion as to the worth of thid explanation, because the circumstances are only partly explained, and the correspondence leaves one in doubt whether, putting apart the avenging Mr Broughton, the General might not have had a reasonable hope of being able to rescue him. That is the weak point. If it was simply a question of punishment, there is no reason to urge against the delay necessary to refer for instructions to he-id quarters. It is impossible to read the correspondence, and not notice in it the same feature that marked the correspondence with General Cameron, the disinclination on the part of the Governor to exercise his authority for any other purpose than that of criticism. At the very same time that he complains of his supreme authority being insufficiently recognised, he evades giving the specific instructions sought at his hands. It is not too much to say that the ruling feature of Sir George Grey's official life seems to be the valuing his authority uot for the control which it gives him the right to exercise, but for the criticism which it entitles him to deliver upon the actions of others. He shrinks from responsibility until the occasion is past, and then he remembers his power, and calls in question the actions he might, if he had so pleased, have controlled. For ie stance, there is abundant evidence to show that General Cameron would never have refused to obey the explicit instructions of His Excellency ; his difficulty was that, accompany -

ing the instructions, there was always a qualified disavowal of responsibility.

The fiecond and most important part of the correspondence is that relating to Commissary- General Jones. This gentleman, in anticipation of General Chute's arrival, sent to the Military Secretary a lon^ letter, in which he explained his ideas of the portion of affairs. He adopted no re=erve, but, on the contrary, indulged in a strain of unqualified censure of the proceedings of the Governor and Local Government. The aalient points of the letter are as follow : —

1. That in defiance of instructions that the Imperial troops were " not to be " employed either in conquering new " country, or in defending tint already "conquered;" and in spite of the "wide " discretionary power" given to the General commanding, the Wanganui campaign was forced upon General Cameron '• in oppo- " sition to his remonstrances and better "judgment."

2. That after he left, troops were ordered to occupy an additional eighty miles of the Wanganui River.

3. That the Imperial Government was subjected to an enormously increased expenditure, in consequeuee of the Wanganui campaign ; and in addition, had to pay all the co3t of the maintenance of the local forces.

4. That the debt of the Colony to the Home Government was thus increasing, in spite of instructions to the contrary, and. that no provision for meeting the same was being made.

5. That the Colony should be nnde to understand it would most likely be held liable, besides the capitation tax of L4O, for all the extraordinary, i.e., commissariat expenses incurred by reaion of the Wanganui campaign, as well as for the advances made to the Colonial troops.

6. That further advances of rations and pay to Colonial troops, should only be continued upon condition that debentures to cover the same were remitted home.

The letter concluded by the intimation that a copy of it wag to be sent to the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury by the September Mail. General Chute forwarded a copy of this document to His Excellency, who immediately replied to it. He first strongly censured the con duct of Major Pitt in retaining the letter until the arrival of the General, without communicating a copy to the Governor or the Actina:-Commander-in-Chief, and by which retention the letter would reach home one or two months before His Excellency would be able to send his comments upnn it. Secondly, Sir George complained of the expression, "that the General officer commanding, has " a wide discretionary power in the " employment of the troops," as calculated to injure the service, by disorganising the forces. Thirdly, His Excellency contended that if the Colony wa3 to be charged with the extraordinary expenditure, it ought to have been consulted about it ; that he himself ought to have controlled it, and that he was prepared to express the opinion, that it had been "in many respects wasteful, 41 unnecessary and extravagant." Other reflections upon the Commissariat service fallowed. General Chute replied to the despatch by explaining that Major Pitt had not received the letter until some time after it was written, and that he was in daily expectation of the General's arrival. He was satisfied his secretary had acted quite rightly, but if His Excellency desired it, he would "assemble a Court of Inquiry "to report on the subject," The General added that he had reproved Commis aryGeneral Jones for some of the expressions contained in his letter, and now forwarded an explanation he had received from him on the subject. This explanation was couched in somewhat more respectful terras than those complained of in its predecessor. Still there was no withdrawal of previous statements. The Commissary- General thought he fulfilled a duty in placing upon record his opinion of the state of affairs, for the information of the newly arriving General. Then follows a reply to the charges made by the Governor against the Commisariat Department, with a request that the General would order an enquire to be made into them. The concluding letter of the series is a further reply from Sir George Grey, in which he dwells at great length upon the CommissaryGeneral's first letter having been withheld from him for some time after a copy of it had been sent home. In respect to the

charge of occupying the Wanganui River, after General Cameron's departure, His Excellency explained that he had caused troops to occupy the postg vacated by the Colonial forces sent to the East Coast.

We have given a faithful digest of the correspondence, which doubtless will be construed into different meanings by different political parties. To us, viewing it entirely dispassionately, it seems only further to confirm the utter sham of the so-called Weld self-reliant policy. What does the self-reliance amount to more than this : that having the friendly support of the Governor, the Government managed to obtain an unlimited credit on the Commissariat, pending instructions from home to the contrary. All that Mr Weld did, was to lay up an enormous increase of debt, which the Treasurer had not the honesty even to mention, and so led the House to believe that the Colonial troops were Colonially paid. Not only it there the load of debt, but the load of obloquy. For the authorities at home are sure to bitterly resent the action which has forced on England not only the expense of the Imperial troops, but the maintenance of the Colonial forces. Henceforth, we may consider " self reliance," a convertible term for surreptitious sponging upon the Commissariat.