OUR SIDNEY LETTER.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 442, 17 April 1890, Page 3

OUR SIDNEY LETTER.

(FBOM OVB OWN COBBKSPONDBNT.) Stdnby, April 2. Mb Giobgb baa left us, and the weather has cleared op. Business is very quiet, and politics in the metropolis are in a state of suspense. The leaders of both sides are in the country. They sing very different ditties, but the burden of their songs amounts virtually to the same thing—That which has been shall be, only much more abundantly. No matter whether we have Protection or Freetrade, as long as a non-productive landowning class is permitted to skim the cream from the joint produce of capital and labor so long will deserving poverty suffer distress. Vicious, self-indulgent, and improvident poverty will suffer distress anyhow even with Henry George as dictator, and it is a wise and merciful provision that so it is. But the fact that in a new country like this, with millions of acres of rich and fertile land virtually unimproved, capital and labor should be compelled to lie idle side by side, because of land monopoly, is a portent which might penetrate the skull of a Parkes or of a Dibbs, and set his ingenuity to work to devise a remedy. But it does not penetrate, and apparently it will not, until the outraged conscience and commonsense of the people drive it home. An acute observer once remarked :—“ Governments are always as bad as the people will let men be.” And in this regard the people have let them be very bad indeed : Let us hope'that the time for improvement is at hand and that at the next general election every candidate will be compelled to declare his views on a land tax, levied on unimproved values, and not on improvements. It must be moderate in amount to begin with. It may admit of exemptions on the income-tax principle at one end, and of cumulative imposts at the other. But let the administrators Of the State begin to take some practical steps to claim for the public that which was (treated by the public, and which belongs to I‘he public. And let those who see the justice and wisdom of the demand unite to regard as unfaithful shirkers of their trust every political

party which refuses to maintain the rights of the people in this matter. Not every one of course can see it. Some are blinded by one thing, some by another. Some are so much eegaged with other wrongs which afflict humanity, that they have no possible time net attention to spare for this one, and what they won't look at they can't possibly see. Some era blinded by a religious bias, some by political bias. Some are sunk in fatalistic apathy, others are blinded by partisan rancour. Yet others have the “ wool drawn over tblirayes” by their own pecuniary interests, and some by that gratuitous “ cussedness ” which opposes whatever is good and true ou aotount of Its very truth and justice. But notwithstanding the blindness of those who oaj't see or won’t see, the great truth stands out plain and clear in God’s moral daylight. That which the State creates belongs to the State in trust for all its members. The State oreptes the unearned increment in the value Of land and as long as it neglects to assert its tifjit it allows that which should be a general biasing and benefit to become a curse and a hiadranoe to progress and a means of extorti®. No man is compelled to pin his faith to Mr George or Mr Syme. But the broad etHcal principle which they see is as open to thi mental vision of every candid enquirer as tht sun at clear noonday to their bodily opice. That men who desire to bring in the regn of honesty should be branded as thieves is inly a repetition by the modern Pharisees of the crime which was perpetrated by their prtotypes eighteen centuries ago. History repats itself and all giant abuses, if the prescrptive and vested rights which they have coierred are only of sufficiently long standing, enable to find defenders who look upon them as exactly opposite to what they are. So it wai with slavery, with rotten boroughs, with despotic government and a host of other abacs, which, nevertheless, have been triunphantly reformed. It is just as easy at this day as it ever was to advance fallacious

objetions against right-doing. But there is no note reason now than then why we should allor ourselves to be blinded by them. Bisiness is very quiet, merchants feeling the!' way cautiously, and not caring to do mum business except such as they are assured is throughly sound. The floods and the long contnued wet weather have had a disastrous effec in many country districts. Besides the How which in many instances has been givei to individual credit and which has caus'd some storekeepers (from the north espefally) to come to Sydney to make arraigements with their creditors, all outdoorrork has been greatly checked. The roadiand the ground have become so soaked and >oggy that it has been impossible for carrira to bring supplies to the stations, imposible for squatters to get materials for tenabg and other improvements on to the land,and impossible for farmers to carry on theiroutdoor agricultural operations. Even sotneof the’mines have been flooded, Under tbesecircumstances it is not surprising that trade has been dull. But as the weather is nor fine, with every appearance of continuance, it is expected that there will be a greatrevival after the holidays. It is known that itocks in the country are very low, owinj to the impossibility of replenishing them Pitiful accounts come even from

ooosflerable townships of privations caused by tie stoppage of traffic. In one place is no flour, in another they are sweeten teir tea with treacle and in a third they mo tea to sweeten. All 'this will be charged with the advent of fine weather, and it is confidently expected that the merontile resources of the metropolis are abort to be drawn upon in a manner that of late years, has been almost nnknown. It is truethat we have all been expecting this imp-ovemept for » long time and that hitherto it has been postponed, chiefly thrcugh momentary pressure and the unfavorable weather. But it must come sooier or later. I only hope that when it does appear people will not lose their heads and pervert it into a “ boom ” or inflate it into a bubble. The revenue returns for the quarter are not encouraging. As compared with the corresponding quarter of last year they show an increase, ft is true. But it is an increase of only about 2| per cent., whereas the increase in population is about 4 per cent. The fact is, and it is folly to attempt to conceal or deny it, the colony has been passing through a very bad time. It has, however, I hope, like the winter in the order of seasons, been a time of recuperation, a time of getting back from unhealthy excitement attendant on the expenditure of borrowed money to the more Solid and more productive pursuits which are parked out jn the nature of things as being ypeeially appropriate to a new country. If only the monopolisation of land had been made impossible, or at least unprofitable, by a smart tax on unimproved values, the propen of the colony would have been more Barked and more rapid. Borne of the weak spots of our banking tystem are being brought into prominence fast now. The insolvent estate of Mr E. H. Taylor is occupying the attention of the Court. Mr Taylor himself is a prisoner in DarlingInnt gaol. Very few years ago he was a clerk ■> an accountant’s office. Since that time he has been a partner in his employer’s business and has also transacted business on his own account. But what he will chiefly be remembered for is that he managed to obtain advances of aimoat fabulous amount from the banks. One of the financial institutions with which he had dealings claims about £lBO,OOO from the estate. The manager appears to be finder the impression that the whole of this eaormoussum was secured, though how or Where his customer could have obtained poeseision of solid securities to such an amount or extent must have been a puzzling and critical question. I need hardly say that it is now vary doubtful whether the securities Will cover the advance, and it is still more doubtful whether the other persona interested in them —that is to say, Taylor’s unsecured creditors—will receive anything at all.