THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY.

Wellington Independent, Volume XVI, Issue 1514, 16 April 1861, Page 2

THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY.

Once more we are doomed to disap--pointment^—the General Assembly is^.to meet at Auckland on the 30th' of . next month, When war raged, tliat was an ... excuse ; now peace is on the eve of being*, proclaimed, we are still told that the Governor cannot be spared from Auckland. We confess, however, we are not disappointed at it, being always tolerably confident that an excuse of some kind or other would, be ready when, the Jime, came. The following is the circular to members. Colonial' Secretary's Office, Auckland, 4th April, 1861. Sib,— l do myself the honor to transmit to you •; the copy of a Proclamation by His Excellency thq Governor, summoning the General . Assembly -to yy meet for the despatch of business at Auckland, op « the 30th May next. ,;•,-'" ' ' i r i; ' The Governor wishes it to be stated, with reference to a previously expressed -intention of His. ,-:.* Excelency to hold a session at Wellington, t^at 8 the present circumstances of the "Colony render it *7 r unadvisable that the Government • should b© -7. absent from Auckland for so long a period as it would be be necessary if the session were held at. Wellington. - ' ; . ' . : his Excellency's Ministers desire to add ( that,.,they concur in this opinion. , *; „ '• I have tlie honor to be, ' . ■y y Sir, •- -,' ■', ' . . . Your very .obedient- seryaqt, ',; „..*-.■ 1 E.~W. ; STAFFORD. 7 .-' Balked as we have so often been, we .' r may be excused feeling tjliagriqed .at - being so again, especially when we find ; that it is avowedly a party, move- of the ! " present Government-. ' Squ&hertiZ. • Gross, the organ ofthe Stafford Ministry, acknowledges this when it informs home t . readers, in its European summary, that ' apart from other ; considerations the f < impression which it (the holding' of th 6 ' ' Assembly at Wellington) wduld' : . make _\ , ' on the natives certainly would be,, that ; 4 the Wellington men, who had backed . . 'them up in their opposition to the Go--1 vernment, had carried the day, arid that 1 a Southern sympathetic runanga would, *' in all probability, reverse the policy of . 1 the Northern rununga of 1860.' . The best proof of the legitimacy of the stand which the Southern members took in reference to the justice of the war, As . t the fact that the Governor, himself, . dare not now assert his title to the- disputed land, at Waitara, but has distinctly - promised the rebels that it shall be in^ i vestigated. The Southern members never "backed the natives up iri their opposition to the Government "; but they most certainly showed how criminal .the Government was in advising the Governor to go to war on a question, j which then bore evidence of being untenable, and is now admitted to be so by.the.Go-, vernor, with Mr. Whittaker • arid MrV ;; Weld to advise him.