The Star. WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1904. THE OBSTINATE "LORDS."

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8156, 2 November 1904, Page 2

The Star. WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1904. THE OBSTINATE "LORDS."

[ The Legislative Council's hostility to the referendum is apparently unquenchable. Once again tho Upper Chamber has seen .fib to reject a. Gov«rn!m«nb measure designed to j give ■practioail effect to this method of asI certaining the people's wishes. Nor do&s it appear that it is any mora favourable to fhe principle involved than it has, been at any time sinoe the referendum first found 1 a ■place among 1 tho burning questions of New ! Zealand politics. Its attitude is conceivable, but thfl reasons it urges in support of it aira feeble in tifoe extreme. A schoolboy could have found 1 better arguments ' fhian those with which the hostile members strove to justify their action yesterday. Soma of these arguments are worth recounting for the purpose of showing to what lengths the opponente of tJhe referendum are prepared' to go to extenuata their mistaken policy. We ; were toldl yesterday, for instance, that there > was no principle in the Bill ; that the electors had not demanded the ref ererwluan< ; that Naw Zealand ivas the last country in* tho world requiring the referendum ; that [ tlfe Bill was merely a sop to weak-knee'dl legislators ; that the Bill was entirely stib- ! versive of representative government ; and) i that it was not a democratic measure. Tbe*& arguments carry their own answers. Theyhave aJI been urged many times before, and havfl been demolished as often as they have been repeated. That* they should be madte to do duty again is the best evidence forthcoming : of the paucity of reasonable objections to the principle of tha referenv dum. The fact is, of course, that the attitude of the opponents of the measure is dictated almost wholly by an unreasoning personal fear. They are afraid that the referendum would be used ac an instrument for their own diemolitioti. Their foanr is a[ natural consequence of their guilty, coosci-' enoes, but tt is not cradita.ble to their bonstifcutiftiH^kn^W&dge. They ought to have known j as Colonel Pitt explained to them yesteraay, that at referendum, however adverse, could! not of iteeif decree tihe abolition, of the Council. Before tha Council could be abolished it would be necessary to alter the Constitution, and it would be impossible to alter the Constitution without the aid of the Imperial Parliament. Yesterday's division hais postponed the legalising of the referendum, but it has done mo more. It is impossible to believe that such, a useful step ia to be blocked indefinitely by a small band of misguided opponents, hopelessly out of touch with public opinion. In spite of what has been said to the contrary, it is clear that there ia an increaisingly insistent public diemand for the referemdium, andi the Legislative Council will ba made painfully aware of the fact if it persists in its present attitude.