The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY, AND Saturday Morning. Saturday, October 24, 1891. THE PREMIER’S SPEECH.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume V, Issue 676, 24 October 1891, Page 2

The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY, THURSDAY, AND Saturday Morning.

Saturday, October 24, 1891. THE PREMIER’S SPEECH.

Be just and fear not; Let all the ends thou afcn’st at be thy country’s, Thy God’s, and truth’s.

It is said that some men only open their mouths to condemn themselves, but of Mr Ballance the opposite may fairly be said. The Government has a strong and able section of the Press against it, all the influence of landed property and other wealth being arrayed in opposition to a Ministry which has set itself the task of creating a fairer incidence of taxation, but one which will be keenly felt by those who keep land locked up for speculative purposes, The Ministry is fiercely assailed from day to day with unremitting energy, every little weak point being clutched at and magnified into a matter of importance in the general indictment that is presented against the Ministry, But Mr Ballance has only to make a public speech to quickly dissipate the accumulated charges of his opponents. He carries with him a personal popularity, and the electors of each city that he visits in ascertaining the wants of various parts of the colony, are only too glad that he should deliver an address. He was specially successful in a recent speech made at Dunedin, and completely disposed of the opponents of the Ministry. Of the many untruthful rumors that have been set in circulation by interested one exposed was that of the immediate calling to the Upper House of personal favorites of Ministers. Instead of stuffing the Council, as the Atkinson Ministry did after they had actually been defeated, Mr Ballance has declared that he will take the people irxto his confidence in such matters. This is not quite in keeping with that stickling for musty precedents that is so dear to the Conservative heart—mainly because nearly all these precedents are of Conservative mould—but it will be a great improvement on the Atklneoniait

method of foisting one’s friends on the country and appointing yourself to a life billet when you have been met by defeat. It is clear that the Ministry hold their own with the country, and that if there were a dissolution tomorrow they would be sent back with an overwhelming majority.