the effects of Abolition, how essentially centralizing are the views of the Provincial Governments which oppose it, I cannot doubt that they will be warm supporters of Abolition. For the sake of argument I have accepted your Honor’s interpretation of the feelings of the people of Otago without altogether agreeing with it. Many districts in the province long for Abolition to remove evils of which they have for years complained.

In laying such stress upon the country districts, it may be urged that I have ignored Dunedin’s interest in the question. Dunedin will lose the expenditure incidental to being the seat of a small Government; and I am not unaware that the opponents of Abolition—notably a section of the Dunedin Press—have made the most of the diminished expenditure of this kind, whilst they have temptingly hinted at the glories of the seat of Government of an independent Otago. But I do not think these opinions are generally shared. I cannot believe the acute and able men of business of Dunedin will refuse to see that the interests of the country districts, and the prosperity of the whole colony which is pervaded by their commercial activity, are of far more importance to them than the expenditure incidental to the localization of a form of executive government, and to the occasional meetings of the Provincial Council.

Allow me, in conclusion, to thank your Honor for the courtesy of your letter, and to express the hope that I have said nothing herein which may be considered unfairly to reply to your Honor’s strong, though not discourteous, reflections on the Colonial Government.

I have the honor to be,

Your Honor’s obedient servant,

JULIUS VOGEL.

Province of Otago, N.Z.,
Superintendent’s Office,
Dunedin, 22nd April, 1876.

"Sir,—I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of 13th April, from which it is clear that your opinion and mine as to the effect upon the Province of Otago, of its abolition, are wide as the poles asunder.

"I therefore feel that it would be only wasting both your time and my own to prolong this correspondence. At the same time, I cannot refrain from referring to some of the leading points in your letter. And here I may say that I do not think you were called upon to review the action of the Provincial Council of Otago—a body responsible solely to the electorate of the Province; nor was it necessary to assume that everything your Government thought fit to propose would receive the sanction of the Colonial Parliament.

"Your letter is, of course, a political manifesto to convince the people of Otago of the good they will obtain by the abolition of their Province and their local Parliament, and by the absorption of their local revenues; and you must forgive me if I follow your example in entering upon a political discussion which I deprecate."

"I may say that had you been administering a law, and called upon me, to aid you in so doing, I should not have withheld my aid or advice. As it is, I was advised, and I am also of opinion, that the sending of the Commissioners was without legal warrant or constitutional authority. The Parliament never authorised such a step, and voted no funds for such a purpose. Your letter of instructions, as well as that now under reply, foreshadows a policy that the Parliament has not yet considered, far less ratified. There is no local Government Act, and as yet no provision made for carrying on the departments of the Provincial Government."

"What law, I ask, are you administering?"

"I looked upon the action of your Government as an encroachment upon the rights of this Province, which, as its elected head, I was bound to resist; and I feel assured that had you been the head of the Provincial Executive you would have counselled more extreme measures than I resorted to. Indeed, I cannot but remember how nobly you aided me with your advice and influence in resisting the General Government encroachment on our rights nine years ago."

"You entirely misapprehend me by supposing that because the wealth of Otago far exceeds that of other Provinces, its interest, in my opinion is to evade a share of the general responsibility. On the contrary, I, for one, am quite prepared that the Province should assume a very large proportion of the past obligations of the Colony, provided it is relieved of all future liabilities other than those to be incurred by itself for its own benefit, or those which may be necessary for purely federal purposes."

"I have no desire to dispute with you that, since 1870, Otago has received a large share of the Public Works and immigration loan. I submit, however, that it has not received more than its due proportion, or than it is able to repay, and this I fear, is more than can be said in respect of various other portions of the Colony. While upon this point I would most emphatically protest against that phase of your present policy which proposes to render Otago liable for the debts incurred in the construction of railways in other parts of the Colony, notwithstanding the solemn assurance that to each Province would belong the profit or loss which might accrue from the railways constructed within its assurance embodied in the Immigration and Public Works Act, and but for which that Act never would have been on the Statute book."

"It is this readiness with which, at the instance of a powerful Government, the good faith of the Colonial Parliament to-day may be cast to the winds to-morrow, which shakes the confidence of myself and others in the stability of legislation which professes to secure to any particular part of the Colony the exclusive enjoyment of those advantages which may have been derived from its own forethought and superior energy."

"I do not know that I rightly interpret your meaning when you say that we should defer to the opinions of those who supply the money for developing our resources."

"If, in moulding the political institutions upon which the future happiness and freedom of ourselves and our children so largely depend, we are to be influenced by the opinion of money-lenders, all I can say is, that it will be a sad day for New Zealand when this time comes."

"How you can reconcile your assertion that Otago has not been a sufferer by Colonial finance, with the fact that, in addition to its obligation in respect of the Public Works and Defence loans, it has contributed upwards of two millions of money to the Colonial chest, for which it has received little or nothing in return, saving the empty honour of being represented in the General Assembly, is, I confess, beyond my comprehension."

"One strong reason why, in your opinion, the Province should be abolished is, that during the past session of the Provincial Council appropriations were passed to the extent of £909,000."

"To my mind, this affords one of the best arguments in favour of the Province becoming an independent Colony. Large as this sum is, it is far short of what is needed to meet necessary requirements, and far short of what the Province would have at its disposal, but for that vicious system of Colonial finance in which it has become so unhappily entangled, a system which will be stereotyped out should the Abolition policy be carried out."

"You do not seem to be aware that when the Appropriation Ordinance was passed the Province contemplated being able to float a loan, and that a large portion of the appropriation was for the completion of important public works, the execution of which will extend over several years."

"You say that ‘concurrently’ the Province has sacrificed its lands by large sales to runholders. As to this you have been completely misinformed, inasmuch as there have been no sales to runholders during the past four years, excepting the pre-emptive areas to which they are by law entitled. With regard to its landed estate, I am not called upon to defend all that the Province has done in the past, but were I to trace the cause of our difficulties in dealing with our waste lands, I should have to attribute them chiefly to the action taken by yourself in granting a renewal of so many pastoral leases in 1866-7. If large sales are improper, I have yet to learn that any sale in Otago has been in violation of law, or made until the absorption of its revenue by the Colonial Government forced such action on the Province. For your Government to complain of large sales of land after the various reports by Parliamentary Committees on its land transactions in the North Island—transactions which no financial exigency demanded—seems to me, to say the least of it, to be singularly in-