Wellington Independent SATURDAY, APRIL 8, 1871.

Wellington Independent, Volume XXVI, Issue 3168, 8 April 1871, Page 2

Wellington Independent SATURDAY, APRIL 8, 1871.

The hustings' speeches of the various candidates on Thursday were eminently characteristic, and the absurdity of putting the province to the expense, and the Hon. Mr Fitzherbert to the indignity, of such a contest, was fully demonstrated. Mr Masters' performance we would pass over as lightly as possible. He evidently does not think he is to be compared with Mr Fitzherbert;, as with an amusing naivete his first sentence contained the damning admission that he would, if elected, find it necessary to have constant recourse to him as his political mentor. The rest of his speech was an autobiography neither entertaining nor instructive (indeed with some of the most notable passages left out), and a dissertation on roads and other matters— suitable perhaps to those road boards which he believes will rescue the province out of its difficulties, but utterly ignoring the financial, constitutional, and interprovincial questions involved in the present election.

Mr Finnimore's speech was much more ambitious, but not a whit more explicit. The personal part of it was contradictory and absurd. He did not care for the office, disinterested patriot .' but the extraordinary efforts he put forth to advance his claims betrayed an anxiety which belied his profession. A man must be very anxious to secure the votes of a Wellington constituency when he puts forth such a plea as this : " I was very nearly born in Wellington," although how (if that dreadful ' nearly' were removed) that would argue any special fitness in him for the office over all other men born in Wellington does not very clearly appear. It could mean, therefore, nothing more than this, " put me into the office, I earnestly beseech you — you surely would notpass over a townsman of your own."

Another argument, equally inconclusive, was that he was possessed of " ordinary ability." Very ordinary, indeed, we think, if he could not advance something better than this, after explaining to the electors in an address which, ifhedid not compose,;he at least uttered: "At no former period in the history of the colony was greater sagacity, larger influence with the General Government, extensive knowledge of financial questions aa between the province and that Government, great debating powers, and large and influential political influence required and rendered absolutely necessary."

His next argument was that " he had saved the colony at least half a million of money," and had not received one penny by way of recompense. A more damaging confession could nothave been made, li " large influence with the General Government is absolutely necessary" in our Superintendent-to-be, electors of the most " ordinary ability" must perceive that Mr Finnimore is entirely destitute of this qualification, not having been able to get any justice, far less any favor for himself, even after saving the General Government half a million of money \ What he could do for a province that, for come time, will rather be a source of difficulty than an assistance to the General Government must be a negative quantity which, transferred to the right bide of the equation on the polling day, will positively deter any elector from voting for him. We do not undervalue, nor would we speak disparagingly of his military ser vices. On the contrary, we think they should be duly recompensed, If the present Ministry have not sufficiently acknowledged them, we think the matter should be brought up in the House by some member of influence, and, after investigation held, a suitable award made. Mr Fitzherbert had claims on the Government by no means so large as this saving of £500,000, and we have been reminded in very delicate

terms by Mr Finnimore's orgau in Wanganui of the compensation he received. Let him apply to Mr Fitzherbert, and, Teucro duce, he may yet succeed. His present way of going about it is not (to say the least of it) d very natural one. The General Government is not like a Maori pa, ready to yield to the first vigorous attack ; nor is it, as the Hon. J. C. Richmond somewhat irtevercntly termed it, like " the kingdom of Heaven," and the violent take it by force. But, however he may fare with the General Government in getting justice done him, we fail lo see how his saving of the colony half a million of money in his military, is auy proof of his administrative, capacity. The province wants a Superintendent, not a general, and the special qualifications " absolutely required " at the present juncture have been nowhere so fully set forth as in Mr Finnimore's own address.

Sancho Panza could not speak i long without mentioning Dappel. Mr Finniraore seems unable to conclude his speeches or addresses without reference to America. For his benefit we have already collated American statistics sufficient to show any one else, how utterly he is mistaken with regard to the simplicity and cheapness of American Government ; but on the hustings, his contempt for facts and figures rose almost to the sublime. We were gravely told that the rate of taxation in America is only 15s 4d per head ! And this in a country (i with severe exactions upon everything from the spoon which feeds the baby through all the incidents and accidents of life " to the shovel which fills the grandfather's gvave" — a country reducing its debt by enormous taxation until the heavily taxed Americans (to use the words of the " New York Herald " of February of this present year) cry out "it cannot be continued with justice to the living or the dead." Mr Finnimore has fallen into the absurd error of supposing that heavy taxation cannot exist in a country well governed or prosperous. The very case he points to is a refutation of this oft- exploded fallacy. America is at once the heaviest, taxed— and the most prosperous of countries. The least heavily taxed countries we can remember are Turkey and Russia, where the rate per head is respectively 8s 4d t and 16s Id. It seems in vain to quote American statistics to Mr Finnimore : he appears incapable either of understanding or believing them. Let him turn then to the financial statement of the Hon. John Hall in 1868 (and surely he will believe an antiprovincialist), where he will find this exaggerating of the burdens of the New Zealand tax payer severely and properly condemned. His remarks are as true to day as then. He says the positive as well as the comparative weight of the taxation of New Zealand has been frequently over-stated. The sum per head paid for duties of Customs, which constitutes four-fifths of the public revenue, amounts, it is true, to £3 lls, but of this sum no less than £2 Is 8d is paid in spirits, wine, beer, and tobacco. Again, " The amount of taxes paid by each individual in New Zealand is £4 10s ; in Great Britain, £3 0s 7d. Yet, when it is considered that the average earnings of the laboring clashes in this colony are, as a rule, more than twice as much as in the mother country, the position of the colonist will compare favorably with that of the taxpayer in the United Kingdom." If Mr Finnimore is not elected Superintendent, and numbers of people (os he warns us) make up their minds, in consequence, "to realise their property and effects," it would be simple honesty on his part to advise them to have their luggage addressed to Turkey via Waoganui (not to America.) Unquestionably in that country they will escape provincial institutions ; but if they carry with them the same spirit of discontentment with existing institutions which they exhibit here with less reason they will find the system oi' Government very simple indeed, but few of them will get back to Wanganui to boast of their lighter taxation !

Mr Fionimore's opinions about " land on deferred payments" arc so crude that we cannot say how far we agree with him. We can only say that unless this mode of disposing of the provincial estate is approached with greater caution, and discussed with greater regard to the experience of its working in the neighboring colonies, it will only end in "confusion worse confounded." Certainly in New Zealand fanning has been most successfully pur sued where this principle has been and now is most strenuously resisted ; and the farmer who would lay out " £400 on land, leaving himself not a penny to improve it," whose doleful case Mr Finnimore would have us pity, would there, where lands coats 40s an acre, simply be laughed at, and upbraided for his folly and want of forethought.

In short the whole speech of Mr Finnimove was a tissue of egotism, absurdity, vague generalities, and (perhaps) unintentional misrepresentation — displaying no political knowledge, no acquaintance with the real evils which the province has now to encounter, and suggesting no remedy but a " country municipality" sy^em, the nature, the ramification, and tho peculiar merits of which he never uttempted to explain How by the change we are to get one farthing more of revenue, or save one far ihing of expense, he did not try to show. He only advised us to take a leap in the dark. This is too bad in a caudidate " who pledges himself to the immediate and unqualified handing over of the province to the General Government," the same Government be it remembered which for " half a million of money" has nnthnd the justice far less the generosity to return one penny. To suppose that such a candidate should have even the remotest chance of election is to insult the intelligence of the whole body of electors. It would be the first time in New Zealand that a sucking politician was chosen aa Superintendent,