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An Epitome of Official Documents Relative to Native Affairs and Land Purchases in the North Island of New Zealand

Superintendence of the System

Superintendence of the System.

  • 22. We now reach the third main question. Having endeavoured to make our plan itself as simple and as effective as possible, and also to provide the means for keeping it in continued operation, where are we to find the thought and will necessary for the successful guidance and prosecution of the work? In order to succeed in such an undertaking as this, the superintendence of a single authority is needed to combine the various operations, so that they may support and not clash with one another. And this single authority will need a great knowledge of persons and things, so as to make due allowance for all local or peculiar circumstances, and yet steadily to hold fast to general principles, in dealing with a people naturally disposed to follow precedents, and very apt to remember what has been done in other cases. Above all, it is necessary that some one consistent and well-considered system be carried on steadily for an adequate length of time. In order to secure these requisites, as far as possible, I see only one mode of proceeding that can be recommended. I mean that, the plan of operation being once settled and defined by the terms of a statute, and the amount of pecuniary aid being fixed, the working of the plan should be intrusted to a Commission or Board—to a body of fit men, to be permanently occupied with this business alone, and bound to report their operations yearly to the Assembly.

    I know that at first sight great objections will seem to lie against this proposal, but I am page 12persuaded that, upon mature consideration, it will appear to be the only one that gives a reasonable prospect of success. To say that the administration of all Native affairs shall be part of the business of the Colonial Secretary, or of a separate Native Minister, is to say that which is likely to be popular and acceptable; for it suggests the notion of a victory achieved over a bad system, of an advantage once gained, which it is a duty to maintain for the future. With that, however, I have no concern. I never defended the old system, and have no wish to see the like of it again. A system which involved an indefinite expenditure, without any account rendered to the Assembly, was properly condemned. Moreover, it did not tend towards the solution of the Native problem, for it settled no principles and registered few facts. But, because we have escaped from a bad system, does it follow that we have fallen into a good one? It appears to me that the utmost that can be expected under the present order of things is, that occasionally a competent man will have the guidance of Native affairs for a short time. Yet very much more than this is required for the success of this work. To the proposal formerly made for a Native Council there were objections grave and manifest. It appeared to be a plan for withdrawing from the Assembly the control over an important portion of the public business, and over a large and even indefinite amount of public money. We may father wonder that anything in the shape of a Native Council was accepted at all than that the result was not of a very practical kind. The Assembly, in passing the Act of 1860, declared its belief that some special organization was needed for the successful management of Native affairs.

    Now circumstances are much altered. The Native problem has taken a more definite form. The political aspect of the question is giving place to the administrative and social one. We are now able to determine in a general way the operations which ought to be performed in Native districts, and the yearly expenses which it will be necessary to incur. But, in order to the successful accomplishment of the undertaking, there will be a necessity of determining from time to time as the work goes on a vast number of minute and novel questions, to which the best answer will generally be derived from the experience which has been gradually accumulated by the administrative body itself. The business will be not merely to administer a system, but to make it as the work goes on. Like cases have occurred again and again in England, where great changes have had to be carried out over large surfaces and under circumstances continually varying. How has Parliament dealt with such cases? Not by Parliament itself or the ordinary officers of Government taking charge of the novel undertaking, but by committing the work to a special body of persons, prescribing their powers and the extent of the resources to be at their disposal, and requiring a periodical account of their doings. Such were the Poor Law Commission, the Tithe Commission, and the Copyhold Enfranchisement Commission, and many others.

    The great advantage of this mode of proceeding is obvious, and is one which would be in this case of especial value: the question becomes severed from politics. All political parties may criticise the proceedings of the Board; no political party is committed to a necessity of defending or screening them. Moreover, whilst subject at regular intervals to a searching and thorough scrutiny, they are allowed to escape from that series of references and interferences at every step which paralyse business. Therefore I think that the best course to be taken, with a view to the solution of the Native problem, is the constitution of some such Commission or Board. If it should be found practicable to connect with it Natives of standing and influence with their own people, as proposed by Governor Browne, a great advantage would be secured thereby. The Board, or central authority under whatsoever name, should do its work through the District Commissioner as much as possible—always at any rate after communication with him, never acting behind his back.

  • 23. There is in the whole question no element more important than the one which remains to be noticed, the character and qualifications of the persons to be employed as Commissioners or officers in the Native districts. The experience of Native affairs has shown that, among the Natives, personal qualities are especially influential for good or evil. If such affairs are committed to men whose chief or only recommendation is a knowledge of the Maori language, they will have no fair chance of success. This is not a work to be done by hasty or over-busy or overbearing men, by men unduly tenacious of their own dignity or unable to subordinate themselves to the object which it is their business to effect; least of all is it to be committed to men of openly immoral lives, for such men bring on us dishonour as well as failure.
  • 24. The foregoing remarks are confined to the immediate object of inquiry—namely, the working of the Native Lands Act, and the objects which we ought to aim at in working it. But in substance much of what is here said applies also to those lands which have come into our hands by surrender or by military occupation, and parts of which we have undertaken to restore on certain terms. In those cases also it will not be safe to content ourselves with simply giving a Crown grant to each individual. If we make no provision to prepare the Natives for so sudden a change, and for the consequences of it (as above pointed out), it is to be expected that the new system, naturally unacceptable when imposed by superior power, will become more than ordinarily unpopular. Either then the issuing of grants in such cases should be postponed until proper legislative provision has been made; or if it be in any case thought necessary to issue the grants at once, yet every such grant should be made expressly subject to the provisions of an Act to be passed by the General Assembly for defining the rules of devolution and transfer of Native land between the Maoris themselves; and it should be enacted, as in the Native Lands Act, that all dealings or contracts relating to such lands, entered into before the proclamation of such Act coming into operation, should be null and void.

    In the cases just referred to we have in our hands the means of rendering our system permanent and self-supporting. We can appropriate so much land as shall be requisite for endowment both of the judicial system and of schools for teaching the English language.

    For the reasons above indicated, it is desirable that Native reserves, whether under the Native Lands Act or under any former law or contract, should be placed under one system of management, and under such local superintendence as might be expected to be most vigilant. It would be convenient that all the Native reserves in the district should be brought under the control of the Native Council of the district and the Civil Commissioner, subject to existing contracts and engagements. All page 13questions raised under the Native Succession Act might be decided, with the least cost and inconvenience, in the Civil Commissioner's Court. The whole Native business of the district, both as to management of property and as to administration of justice, would then be brought into one system.

  • 25. Thus I have in some sort surveyed the whole field of the Native problem, with an earnest desire to contribute something towards its solution and towards the peace and prosperity of the colony. The recommendations which to me appear to be at this time of paramount importance are the following: (1.) That the Native Land Court be so constituted, especially in respect of the number and standing of the Native members, as to render the certificate entirely trustworthy. For the function of every such Court is to ascertain certain matters of fact known within certain limited districts only, and to be ascertained through the Natives of the district themselves. The efficiency of the Court, therefore, must depend mainly on the qualifications of the Native members of it; the chief business of the English president being to secure the notoriety, fairness, and regularity of the proceedings. (2.) That in order to prevent the land being forestalled by a few to the detriment of the many, and to render the system attractive by assuring the Natives of the fairness of the price, and to, save both races from the mischiefs to be apprehended from the solicitations of land-buyers, all sales of Native land be by public auction, and be conducted by the Government on behalf of the Native owners. (3.) That the working of the Native Lands Act, after making the necessary amendments therein, and the business of introducing the law and language of England into Native districts, be committed to a separate and permanent body. (4.) That civil institutions be not forced on Native districts, but rather be introduced in such districts only as are disposed to receive them; and even there be planted in the simplest form or germ, and left to grow with the growth in the Native mind of a sense of the benefits they confer. (5.) That care be taken to provide in every district endowments in land for the maintenance of the administration of justice, and of instruction in the English language, in that district.
Auckland, 30th June, 1865

W. Martin.