Report of Society's Meetings. 411 
Mr. Conrad said that everybody knew the meaning of 
politics, but taken in its widest sense it covered a great 
many things, and if used dogmatically would prevent 
the Society from discussing many important matters 
connected both with agriculture and commerce. He did 
not believe that the object of the section had been 
intended to prevent agricultural and commercial matters 
being discussed, but he considered that such had been 
the result. As examples he mentioned that a motion of 
Mr. Julius Conrad, that the Society should petition the 
Court of Policy for certain alterations in the Marriage 
Laws, and also a recommendation of Mr. Walker that the 
Society should take the Boundary Question under its 
consideration, had both been ruled as " political," and 
therefore out of order. He considered that in conse- 
quence of the term not being properly defined, very 
little, if anything, had been done either for Agriculture 
or Commerce. 
The Hon. B. H. Jones said that he had been indebted 
to the agricultural work of the Society for many things. 
Mr. N. D. Davis said that he would second the motion 
for the purpose of discussion, because he thought there 
should be some expression ot opinion on the part of the 
members. As the section stood he thought it a good one, 
the only fault was in the application of it. Sometimes 
the President applied it too narrowly, but in the case of 
the present head of the Society, Mr. Nind, they had his 
word that the term " political" should be very liberally 
construed as long as he held the office. It appeared to 
him (Mr. Davis) that what was wanted was something 
like the rule of the Colonial Institute, which prevented 
discussion of matters relating to party politics. We had 
3F 
