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Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume IV, Issue 565, 3 February 1891, Page 2

It is too much the practice in New Zealand to discredit a man simply because he has never been tried. Sometimes we have an illustration of a man who has been tried and found wanting still being entrusted with the confidence he has abused, but this may perhaps be accounted for by the knowledge that all men, however weak, have some redeeming qualities. The appointment of Major Steward to the Speakership was the signal for a small deluge of adverse comment. But so far the new Speaker has put his detractors to the blush. In the few days Parliament was in session the Speaker’s capacity was twice tested, and he was found equal to the occasion. In dealing with Mr Fish’s motion for censuring the Governor, the Speaker made an able exposition of the position in which things stood, showing that however the appointments to the Council might be objected to the Governor only acted in accordance with his rights. It is a pity that the power thus firmly established by precedent was so flagrantly abused, but it seems that these imperfections in the system of government must be endured until the time arrives for a remodelling of the whole system. The other occasion on which the Speaker gave proof of his capacity was in dealing with Mr Thompson, when that gentleman made his sorrowful attack on the Premier.