The Poverty Bay Herald East Coast News Letter. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. SATURDAY AUGUST 23, 1879.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 871, 23 August 1879, Page 2

The Poverty Bay Herald East Coast News Letter. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. SATURDAY AUGUST 23, 1879.

We imagine that if the .first twenty of the electors were asked who was ; ' \ the] Mdhisjei* jpi*- Justice, there would be fifteen who would not be able to — - answer the- question.- For the inforv nratkui) of tW uninformed we may ' state that the Hon. Mi*. Shekhan „ Jiolcls fKis. portfolio, but it is a departA 'merit Which he has never given himself the least concern. He must :5 ' -Mv€ forgotten for months if not for years "that he held the responsible : ''PpsitiOii of Minister of Justice. In - ;; 'liisc[efence' he never once mentioned 5 3i*prx jia^he distant manner referred, to that department, and yefe if one .office of the public service • < - i th i at c 3ias been more shamefully administered than another, it is the same department. It has been abso- : v neglected. Mr. Sheehan. told ,|tJSey House that he. hud been away ahiong the Natives, . working for them from seven m the morning until eight • xfit vigbt. Whe.n then did he— how could lie— find time to attend to the important concerns of justice: Why, tli en, was not a . Minister of Justice. 1 Thisis a question which neither Mr. Sheehan or Sir George ■> \ tf reV has aiiswered. : Matters that 'have been urgently required to be at^tended to ' have . .been neglected. ■ Letters written m connection with. the department have been answered . übju bj subordinates, stating that the Minister of Justice was m Auckland, or. somewhere else, and that matters would be referred to himjwhen he re- J turned. . But Mr. Sheehan,- when he ••■■• did rettimj was olice more among the ,! -Native."?,. and so his department con- ,.-, • tinued, and is npw m a state bf complete muddle. In Mr. Wakepield's . speech m . Parliament,, where ' the j ''■" chsirges he made' against Ministers 1 amounted almosi: to their impeach-: ment, he says :-^- -->';« I- wfllmenton one instance as show- ; ing* tlib marvellous and scandalous maiadminbtration of this department. A murder was committed m the District of Southland— a dastardly, brutal

|p^^eJE^>Maa^fiuttirig hisf;wife to death. wt \^;po\iig -guilty., v . There was j||jicticaljy|j HOl dpfehce^and he was JlpmdvguJlSy ariel condemned to death. The* Judge certified/^that' "there was no reason why the^aw should not take its course ; but the Government did not order the execution. Then appeared a series of sensational telegrams " from Wellington that there was dissension m the Cabinet on the subject — that there were disputes between Ministers as to whether the man should be hanged or noc. Ido not believe those telegrams bftsourse. Theywere'brily ! ~some*6fthe canards so constantly circulated. It was also said that one member of the Government had a theory against capital punishment, and would not give m ; but Ido not believe it was so. At all events, the colony began to be agitated on the subject, and the public could not understand what it all meant. But I know what it meant, and so do many others. A medical man of an exceedingly questionable character, at the instance of the counsel for the convict, certified that he was mad. The man was condemned to death, and the judge saw no reason why he should not be executed, and, after that a medical man of known bad character, at the instance of the counsel for the convict, certified to the Gov'errimeut that the man was mad. The Government accepted this certificate and acted upon it. They appointed a Commission to inquire into the state of the man's mind, and they "associated with that commission — which consisted of men of the highest character and ability— the very doctor at Invercargill who had issued the certificate. The Gemmission went down to Invercargill, and as soon as they found out. what sort of man they had to deal with they indignnately refused to act with him, and threw "the thing up. The Government had then to throw this doctor over, and the Commission proceeded to examine the man, and found . that he had never been mad, that there was no truth m the statement ; that there was not a vestige of excuse for the certificate, and there was nothing m it. except a smart trick of an energetic solicitor to get a respite for the convict, m the hope that it wofild ; b6 \. converted into a reprieve. Then the Government •^having discovered that there was no ' question! as to the man's sanity, and 'after keeping him' in ~ suspense for a month — ordered his execution'; and he was executed. . Such has , been their administration of the criminal law. Look at that case m Napier where a man actually built up a barricade across railway m order to Btop the train, that he might murder the guard. He is arrested, and brought up on a charge which on conviction would have involved penal servitude for life ; but by order of the Government, the man was turned adrift just because he was a Maori, while nosympathy whatever is shown for the itnfortunate guard, who, however, happily escaped, another guard going m his stead against whom the Maori had no grudge- The fact is, that Sir George Grey did not wish for any competent Minister of Justice. To his, mind and way. of .thinking such ja. functionary would possibly stand be-, -tween him and the nobility of liberal principles. . .. i ■ , . - '

,Wjb could; wish that-people would read Hansard more than "they appear to do. If they had read Sir George Grey's reply to the charges made against him, they could have come to no other conclusion than that Sir George should be consigned to Kauwau, with a medical ■attendant and an experienced wardsman drawn from one of our asylums.

Perhaps the readiest way of ascertaining an approximate of the population' of a second-rate town, is to place a bag of shavings m some open space, set it blazing, and then ring the tire-bell. .Count 'the: people: who rush to it ; add a small per centage for children and babies and [the reckoning is complete.

It is a sad reflection for those who can reflect, that the hotel-keepers of Poverty Bay are rejoicing exceeding much, because a number of Maories are about to receive considerable sums of money from the . Government m pay for thier lands. Say the hotel-keepers, " the Maories never keep their money ; don't save it up ; don't turn' it profitable account. They drink it, and so let us rejoice.

By and bye, when the Maories have parted with their lands, and have durnk themselves into disease, and have lost all relish for work, then we shall be taxed to build them asylums, and further taxed to support them. Then will Maori girls and women be marketable m our town.

CotTLD'a paternal Government not find out a way by which the Maories shall economise their money to prevent them from becoming pauperised and made a charge upon the country 1 When a child comes into a large estate, his guardians' do not allow him to squander it until he has reached an age to know what he ought or ought not to do with it. Are these Maoris not very children when they have money at command 1 Why not make the Maori lands, whether bought or leased by the Government, or by private persons, go to the Maoris m the shape of an annual income, be it small or large 1

The Governments of this country, when its history comes to be written, will be charged* and charged truly, with having debased and demoralised the "noble savage."

There is a deal of . balderdash talked and written about the Civil Service, and Civil Service servants. Do people never think of the immense amount of support the tradesmen of the country receive from Government 'employe's. The salaries paid are always spent locally, and if the Civil Service could be abolished, which it cannot,' half the tradesmen m our large towns and cities would have to shut their shops and Beelc the merciful protection of the bankruptcy Courts. ' :

And again the very members who exclaim so loudly against the number of Civil Servants employed are those who demand returns to be made, which if all were allowed, would call for hundreds

of additional clerks than thos^lndw ployed. ; c * Let; me look *aVtliie* Order Papec," says some; Head o&iS department as he\ enters, hj£ o^ce.^f: heaventfi" lie etolaitns, "here's anotfier week's 'day-and-night work cut out fer us.'' And it is so.

Will our correspondents, sending us their communications, be gracidusly pleased to omit the words "your valuable paper." We always strike, jjhem put. Ourpaper is Valuable, we know, but by. always being told of it the thing becomes" 'monotonous." """There 1 is*" littler sincerity m the expression, because should we deem it necessary not to insert a communication, we are told that we have been bought over, or that some one has got his thumb on us ; or that we can be twisted and turned at the bidding of another.

We have received from Matthew W. Green, "Christian Minister," ahnndred-and-twenty page book, entitled "The Devil's Sword Blunted." How does Matthew Green come to know the devil carries a sword, and has he forgotten that a blunted sword is still a weapon which can inflict an ugly wound.. At one time the political cry was {i measures not men." We have always taken this to be a popular error. It should be vice versa — " men not measures." Send good men to Parliament, and you will get good measures as a consequence Take care of the men you return, and the measures will take care of themselves. Instance Sir; George Grey. His measures ale too liberal to be measured, but the man as a politician or a statesman is not to be trusted.

Supposing we have a Parliament filled with meji sworn to "liberal measures," still Sir George Grey and his colleagues turned out again for a time upon a no confidence vote, will the defeated Ministers sit on the Opposition benches 1 If so, how can they reconcile themselves to oppose a Ministry possessing their own views and adopting their own policy.

If Sir George Grey, and M.v. S«eehan, and Mt. Macakdrew employ Government yachts, and. special trains, and short hand writing secretaries, at the Government expense, for the purpose of blowing their own trumpets, would not Ministerial opponents when getting; iuto Parliament be quite justified m having a sum put m on the estimates to cover their expenses ? What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gjmderj and the sauce oonnected with Ministerial doings is of the sauce-ieat.