OUR SYDNEY LETTER.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 365, 17 October 1889, Page 3

OUR SYDNEY LETTER.

(raoa oua ows oobbbspondbnt.)

Sydney, Sept. 25. The difficulty respecting the election of the Anglican Prima’e has at last culminated. You will remember that Canon SaumarerSmith was declared io ba elected. The

. position was offered to him, and accepted, and r the rev. gentleman will shortly be on his way 1 to Sydney. But from the vary outset a . s rong party in the Church declared that ' Canon Smith's election was illegal. The 5 mode of procedure is as follows, The Synod s of the province nominates three duly-qualified 1 persons for the position. The Bishops ot the - province (New South Wales) eliminate one i of those persons, leaving two candidates re- , maining, The names of these are then sub- . mitted to ths Bishops of all the Dioceses of , Australia and Tasmania, over whom the Bisbop.eleat is to be Primate, and they have the right of electing the one they prefer. In this case the two names submitted to the Bishops were those ot Mr Mouls and Canon Smith, The Bishop of Goulburn, who was virtually the returning officer, sent voting papers to all the Bishops in prescribed form, and they were duly returned to him with a majority for Mr Moule. But on communicating with Mr Moule, the Bishop ot Goulburn found that he positively declined to accept the honor. Thereupon finding by some means (other than the voting papers) that a

majority of the Bishops were favorable to the eleetion of Canon Smith, the Bishop of Goulburn declared him elected, the Synod ratified the choice, and Canon Smith cabled his acceptance ot the position. Probably one result of the episode will be that Bishops-

eleot will await the slower but more complete method of communication by letter befoie committing themselves, for Mr J. E. Salomons and Mr 0. J. Manning, two of our most eminent lawyers, have declared the election to ba invalid, and their conclusion seems to be unassailable. Apply the Bishop of Goulburn’s procedure to the election of a member ot Parliament, There are two candidates; one of them is elected. But suppose that for some reason or another, the member-elect, before the declaration of the poll, declines to take his seat. The Returning officer clearly has no right to declare the other candidate elected. He must make bis report according to tfie facts, and the proceedings must be begun rlc nquo. The procedure in the case of a bishop is muck ipqre cumbrous and ambiguous, owing to the number of intermediate steps and the oircuiqstance that the nominations may be made without previous consultation with the candidate?, But the general principle, that the voting must be cuaduoted according tq the established order, holds good. There is, us I understand, no opposition to Canon Smith personally, But it is obviously necessary that steps should be taken tn validate his election.

Since my last, the Payment ot Members Bill has passed the Council with no other amendment than was rendered necessary by the qegliqeoae of the Representative Chamber, It only get through by a majority of one, and for my part, I wonder that it had that, Not that the principle of payment of members is unreasonable or unjust. No objection could, in my opinion, ba taken to the measure if it had been made applicable tq the next Assembly instead of to this one, because the constituencies would have an opportunity ot

deciding whether they approved of the innovation, and of selecting the memoers who were to profit by it, At present the Council have affirmed that it the Assembly were suddenly seized with such an exalted idea of its own merit* as io deem itself entitled to £lO,OOO per man, jt wpul,d be quite within its rights in voting itself the money. If members have the right to vote themselves one sum they have the right to vote themselves the other. And the concession becomes doubly dangerous in view of the fact that the Assembly i strenuously denies the right of the Council to I gmend any mea«ure of this kind. Now the | member* who ape perhaps the iqoat secure in ! their seats of any are not the best type. Was I it wise or prudent to grant them the run of j the public strong-box? | The Agricultural Show last week was net a

i success, As far as its agricultural aspect was concerned, it could easily be beaten in any ■ district north, south, or west of the Blue I Mountains. The Government did its best to I give the show a lift, and earned great un- I popularity for itself by declaring Thursday a ■ public holiday over the whole of the colony. I But Thursday turned out a wet day, io that I the only result of this unwarrantable inter- I ference was 4 temporary stoppage of the I course of trade, with very little benefit to the I Agricultural Society, who, it ie sajd, will lose I from £l5OO to £2OOO by the exhibition, which, I it was hoped, woqld replenish their coffers. La The Baptist body, which has been holding ■ its usual conference, departed from the usual I course by electing as President Mr Joseph I Palmer, a well known Sydney sharebroker, ■ Mr Palmer, I may mention, had previously an H excellent reputation ae a philanthropist and a I religious worker. Among other movements, ■ he has taken an active part in promoting fl Australian hush missions. In his opening H address, Mr Palmer took occasion to deplore ■ the prevalent evil of gambling, specially■ alluding to betting, the totalisator, consults-■

tion sweeps, and other contrivances by which H rogues prosper and would-be rogues are I fleeced. Mr Palmer’s remarks drew forth a ■ rejoiner from a bookmaker, slyly inquiring ■ why be had not included the equally detri. I mental practice of gambling in mining shares I in his denunciation—a practice of which Mr ■ Palmer in bis business capacity as a share- fl broker may be supposed to have some special I knowledge. Mr Palmer replied in the columns ■ of the Daily Telegraph. He defended the ■ practice of dealing in mining sharps on the ■ ground that the purchaser received value for ■ bis money, whilst the laser in a betting I transaction received nothing. He further I defended speculation in mining shares as B being absolutely essentially to mining specula- B tion proper, that is to say. to the enterprise B which expends capital and labor in seeking B for precious metals. The reasoning does hot B seem very conclusive A rtlht l who buys a B totalisator ticket buys a chance. A ■ man who buys mining scrip equally B buys a chance. He woqld he a very B rigid moralist who would argue that under | all oiromnstanaee both must necessarily be ■ condemned. It appears to me that the line ■ which divides right from wrong must bs looked ■

for in the motives rather than in the outward B ant. Either, or both, are oapable of being B perverted, and are perverted to the extent of B becoming instruments of moral and- material ■ ruin. And in every base I believe the first B slip of the downward course consists in hoping B to make money without rendering any ade- ■ quate return. Only rogues and villains can ■ live with certainty by whet purports to be pure B chance, The man who lays against a " stiff ” ■ horse, or who sells mining scrip which he has B secret information is valueless, is like a man ■ who plays at cards with the aces up his sleeve, ■ He is robbing his neighbor as- wilfully and ■ deliberately as if he picked his' pocket. He js ■ a thief by reason of his robbery, and he is a B hypocrite by reason of the pretence of fairness ■ which tie puts on, On the other hand the B man who embarks no more than he can afford B in mining or any other useful enterprise, and B who manfully stands to bls chance of winning I or losing, may be doing a rash and foolish I thing, but he is not doing a dishonest one. I The Land Bill hag got through the'Council I and has been returned to the Assembly, which I has accepted several of tbs Council’s amend. I meats. With some of them, hoover, ft hag I qnd ffte has gqna back I again to the Council, It is to be hoped if I Will epeMily became law. Nothing teptjs eg 1 powerfully to check prodtl?tjye gptepnrigg anlß the prosperity wbich flaws from it, as ambi jfl ally or uncertainty of land tenure, ,