THE LATE PRINCE DE CONDE.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 10, Issue 620, 20 June 1866, Page 3

THE LATE PRINCE DE CONDE.

The young prince who died on Thursday night at Petty’s Hotel, although naturally possessing a weakly constitution, appears to have improved in health after his arrival in Sydney, and to have spoken frequently in -terms of gratification - with regard to his short sojourn in this country. He left Southampton on tlie 4th of February last on a tour which was to embrace visits to all the colonies of Australasia, to Singapore, Java, Japan, China, Calcutta, Lahore, and other celebrated cities of India, and having passed through the country to Madras, he intended to leave there for England. The time his father had arranged for his absence was eighteen months. During his stay in Sydney he caught a cold whilst out late on a fishing excursion, but bad evidently recovered from the effects, as subsequently he was in comparatively good health, rusticating among the Blue Mountains. It was whilst returning thence that he first received intelligence of the death of bis grandmother, Marie Amelia, ex-Queen of the French, and this produced a physical prostration from which he never recovered. On his death bed he was attended by the Yery Rev. Archdeacon M‘Encroo, who bestowed the extreme unction, and gave full absolution. His Excellency paid a visit to the hotel yesterday, and in. a spirit of ’ Condolence granted his aid in facilitating..some of the proceedings incidental to the occasion, and in making arrangements for communicating the event to. the bereaved parents. Yesterday it was determined to embalm tlie body, and that office will be performed to-day under tlie direction of: Dr Alloway and Dr Gingeot, tlie 1 late' Prince’s medical attendant. On Monday morning, at ten o’clock, the body will be removed from the hotel, with all the ceremonials of a funeral procession, to Saint Mary’s Cathedral, where.it will lie in state for a short time. In the absence of an early opportunity for transmitting the body to England, it will be removed from Saint Mary’s to tlie Convent of Suhiaco.. The father of the deceased prince is now resid( ing at Twickenham, but the family vault is atWeiglibridge, where lie- the remains od Louis Phillippe. Louis Marie Leopol-f Phillippe, Prince de Conde (the deceasedwas the eldest son of the Due d’Aumale, the fourth soil of Louis Phillippe. His father’s brothers were the Due d’Orleans (killed by being thrown from his carriage), the Due de Nemours, tlie Prince de Jomville, and the Due de Moirtpensier (married to the Infanta of Spain.) The Duke had three sisters, one w r as Queen of the Belgians (died in 1852), mother of the present King of the Belgians, of the present Empress of Mexico, and of the Count of Flanders ; a second sister was married to the Duke of Coburg Gotha, and the third (now dead) was married to Alexander of Wurtemburg. The deceased received the title from the Due de Bourbon, Prince de Conde, father of the unfortunate Due d’Enghien, some years after whose death the prince bequeathed his title and property to the eldest son of the Due d’Aumale. Deceased was born on the 15th November, and on that day he would have readied his twenty-first year'. He has a brother, twelve years of age, to whom the title will descend. —‘ S. M. Herald,’ May 26.

TAXATION. The question of taxation, however, has never been considered solely on its own merits. The General Assembly has to provide supplies not only for its own necessities but for those also of the provinces. No greater violation of all sound constitutional policy can be imagined than that which lias been forced on the colony of Now Zealand by the Constitution Act, and has been perpetuated by the subsequent legislation of the General Assembly. It is absurd to expect economy in Government under the present system. The General Assembly has to raise money by taxes for the use of the Provincial Governments, whilst it has no control whatever over the mode in which the money is spent. The Provincial Government has no responsibility in placing burdens on the people while it merely spends money which it finds ready to its hand provided by a different authority. It is clearly impossible to expect, that the . General Assembly will exercise a due caution in the imposition of taxes so long as it is forced by the Provincial party in the House to find means,,,mot only for the necessities of tlie General Government which, is responsible to it, an 1 1 which it can control, but for the necessities of the ■ Provincial Governments, which are not responsible to it, and which it cannot control'. The doctrine that the same body which raises the taxes. should control their expenditure, so that, the burdens on the people should be directly proportionate to tlie'necessities of the Government, is so obviously true that no one could probably be found to dispute it as a matter of theory. It is only because we find it directly violated in the practical government of the colony that we are called on to assert it. In all other countries the rule is adhered to. In England, the counties, the boroughs, the parishes, all raise by rates the money which they expend for local purposes, whilst Parliament raises by taxation the money required for. the Government of the whole country. In America the founders of tlie United States never committed the folly of mixing up the functions of tlie'Congress and the State legislatures. Congress raises and spends what money is required for the Government of the whole Union, whilst each State raises from local rates and taxes what means are necessary for the government of the State. If we are ever to see a sound system of finance in the General Government, it will only be by entirely emancipating the finances of the General Government from those of the Provincial Governments. If we can ever have any hope of seeing a rigid economy practiced in the provinces, we must first impose on the Provincial Governments the responsibility of raising their own supplies. When the people feel that they are being taxed by the local Government, then, and not till then, will they insist on the reduction of the public expenditure to the lowest possible limit consistent with the maintenance of the Government.

Let it not be supposed that in arguing that the Provincial Governments should be compelled to rely on their own resources we contemplate increased taxation. On the contrary, the result would be a considerable reduction of taxation on the whole. The question is merely whether the General Assembly shall raise taxes for its own use and the uses of all the Provincial Governments, or whether it shall raise merely what it wants for itself, each province raising directly from the people wliat it requires for itself. Another most important view of the question is, that the different products in the several provinces and the different sources of their wealth would naturally sug-o-e.st different modes of taxation. For example, an export duty on wool raised for

the whole colony, would be simp];/ taxing Otago’and Canterbury for the benefit of Auckland and Taranaki. An export duty on kauri gum would reverse the operation ; but it might be well worth consideration whether an export duty on wool might not be a legitimate mode of raising revenue tor provincial purposes. We are not advocating a duty on wool, bub merely taking it as an illustration of the principle, that the taxation for the purposes of the local Governments could be more economically and efficiently raised by tlie local than _by the general legislature. If this principle were adopted, the General Assembly would at onco relievo the taxation of tlie country to the extent of several hundred thousand a year, and the people in each province would then have to decide what amount they would reimpose each for its own purpose.1 Canterbury Pres 3. ’