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Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 876, 29 August 1879, Page 2

We notice that Sir George Grey has not, neither has Mr. Sheehan, in their public addresses and the deliverance of their policy, said one word in respect of the administration of justice, and we quite agree with an able writer in the Wellington Clivonide, that in addition to the measures included in the Ministerial policy there are one 'or less important than any of these, which we would like to see adopted by the Government. The first of them is the abolition of the Supreme Court as at present constituted, and making the present Judges of the Supreme Court Judges of Appeal, who should visit all the centres of population once a quarter, and transferring the functions now discharged by the Supreme Court to the District Court. The administration of justice is a matter which is of daily concern to every man and woman in New Zealand. It is a matter with which any man may be brought to face any moment It is a matter which concerns not only the pockets but the liberties and lives of the whole poople. If therefore the administration of justice in the higher courts is unsatisfactory, it surely needs no argument to prove that a change for the better should be made without unnecessary delay. A Supreme Court Judge being lifted out of the reach of the law, holding his tenure of office practically for life, endowed with tyrannical powers over the freedom of the Press, enabled to commit a man to prison for life on the most shadowy grounds, has all the surroundings of a despot. His Court is one of the strongest of Conservative castles. The present condition of affairs is bad enough in all conscience. What, then, would it be if the number of these strongholds of Conservatism were largely augumented .