THE SEPARATION QUESTION.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume XXI, Issue 32, 16 April 1862, Page 3

THE SEPARATION QUESTION.

[From the New Zealand Advertiser, April 9.] rr "Itis an ill wind that blows nobody good." The b storm now brewing in the North and South on behalf of separation will result favourably to Wellington. 8( The agitation in favour of the separation of the Mid- i t die from the North Island, originally broached by our o present Attorney- General, now exciting the good C people of the South, and the kindred movement in ai the North in favour of the separation of tho Auckland si Province from the rest of the colony, may result in c> the removal of the seat of Government to Wellington, o The Otago Daily Times says as much ; for it says c! that in the event of separation not being granted, that n province will go in favour of the removal of the s< General Government to this city. Mr. Sewell, the most able member of the present Ministry, stated in 1 the House, in 1856, that unless a peripatetic Government were established, or its seat was permanently „ removed to a more central position, it would be im- ?j[ possible to govern the colony under the present con- c stitution, and that the separation of the Middle from v the Northern Island would be inevitable ; and from 0 that day to this he set himself to work in right earnest j, to bring about one or other of the events predicted. We are disposed to think that he was secretly more t ] in favour of the separation of the two islands than v in favour of the removal of the seat of Government t j from Auckland, because some three years previously s he addressed a private and confidential letter to the v leading men of Nelson and Canterbury, urging them j, to join with him in support of that movement ; but q in the session of 1856 he had the candour to admit j, that " even if we should be compelled ultimately to n so extreme an organic change as separation, we should j not have recourse to it until the experiment lias been t fairly tried of the other alternative." That alterna- n tive we have already referred to, so that though Mr. v Sewell is the author of the separation movement, Mr. Fox may reckon upon, his support in deciding not j, only where the next session of the Assembly shall be t held, but also in favour of removing the seat of the a Central Government to a more central position. o By Saturday's mail we learn that the Committee ap- £ pointed by the Auckland Provincial Council to pre- fc pare a petition to the Queen and Parliament praying t for a separate Government and Legislature for the c Province of Auckland, having done so it was submitted to a Committee of the whole House for adop- j tion. It ran thus :—: — >] " May it please Youe Majesty — f " We, Your Majesty's faithful and dutiful subjects, f the members of the Provincial Council of Auckland, s elected under and by authority of an Act passed in i the fifteenth and sixteenth years of your Majesty's i reign, desire to approach your Majesty with the ex- j pression of our unfeigned attachment to your Majesty's ] person and Government. 1 "2. 'Hie Provincial Council of the Province of i Auckland having approached the throne by petition i on three previous sessions of the Council, namely, in i the years 1853, 1855, and 1858, without having obtained the prayer of their petition, your Majesty's petitioners feel constrained again to lay their grievances at the feet of your Majesty. " 3. Your Majesty's petitioners will not on this occasion recapitulate the various topics adverted to in their former petitions ; they will merely submit to your Majesty' 6 gracious consideration, the fact that the lapse of time lias only added further proofs to those already adduced, of the unfitness of the present constitution to procure the objects of good Government, of the necessary tendency of two or more concurrent Legislatures in one country to produce confusion, and to defeat rather than promote the objects for which the Government is established. " i. That since the date of their last petition, your Majesty's petitioners have witnessed the outbreak of a rebellion amongst the natives, which has all but destroyed one of the provinces of New Zealand ; that the people of the Province of Auckland have, contrary to all precedent and all justice, been subjected to taxation to compensate the Taranaki settlers, although in no way reaponsible for their conduct, and not more connected with the Province of Taranaki than with any other Province under your Majesty's dominion, " 5. That your Majesty's petitioners are firmly persuaded that such a rebellion never would have occurred, if there liad been in Taranaki an efficient Government with paramount authority to deal with the difficulties as they arose, and that the best security against other outbreaks would consist in the establishment of a separate government at each of the centres of population ; exempt from any other interference or control than that of your Majesty's Government in England. " 6. That in praying that the colonists of Auckland should have their own Government, exempt from the interference of other colonists, having interests separate 1 from, or conflicting with theirs, your Majesty's petitioners only claim what other British colonists in ' free settlements have been considered to be entitled to " and have always enjoyed, even when they consisted of 1 communities much smaller than that of Auckland." J Clauses four and five were subsequently struck out, ' when, strange to say, it was supported by the few ' members opposed to separation on the ground that ' the prayer of the petition was not for separation, but » an alteration of the Constitution Act. The fifth 5 clause went, it will be seen, in favour of the establish- • inent of a separate Government at each of the centres I of population, which, indeed, exists already; and 1 though they are not exempt from the interference and fc control of the General Legislature and Government, 3 they would, to a great extent, be so, if the views ot f Mr. Fox, as explained in his " Catechism of the Con3 stitution," were adopted. It is not likely that her > Majesty's Government would consent to constitute I Auckland a separate colouy, but it is not impossible v that they may see the necessity of setting aside a system of Government which renders annual sessions of s a General Assembly necessary. " Since writing the above we have seen an article on > the subject in the Auchlander of the 10th ultimo, from which we find that the following clause, on the " votes of sixteen against five, was substituted for clause 0 four of the petition :—: — " Your Majesty's petitioners must, however, advert ,' to the fact that the systematic illegal expenditure and general mal-administration of the Superintendent of Auckland, unchecked and uncontrolled by the General Government, have deprived the Provincial Council of the province of the powers which aro vested in them ' by the Constitution Act, the most necessary for the c conservation of the public interests, or have rendered those powers nugatory." „ The Auchlander says :—: — r "Tho Provincial Council having thus taken the n initiative, it becomes the people of Auckland to follow li up the petition of their representatives by a petition y from the whole body of the people. We understand a that this will bo undertaken without delay, and we are assured that it will be signed by, nine out of every it ten persons. n " What is demanded is no more than that to which •c the people of Auckland are constitutionally entitled, Is but of which they have been so long unjustly deprived. >f Every one except the noble army of statesmen and placemen, actual or expectant, is convinced of the f- necessity of a change. The whole political body is in 16 a state of hopeless corruption, from the crown of its J, head to the sole of its foot, there is no soundness II in it. id " The only path of safety ia the old .path which our d fathers have trod. Let us eschew the constitution inti, vented by doctrinaires and politioal schemers, and le insist upon our right to be governed by ' a comti-

tution framed upon the model of the British constitution, in accordance with ancient usnge, and with the existing institutions of the majority of British colonies.' " In tho Soutliern Cross, of the 11th March, it is stated that Mr. Busby had lately received a letter Prom Mr. Gladstone, the present Chancellor of the Exchequer, in which it was stated that, in the event of a petition in favour of separation being forwarded by the Provincial Council to the British Parliament, lie would give it every support which lm official duties would allow him. If this should prove to be Iheeasp, an amendment in the existing Constitution Act will probably be mooted in the present^eession of Parliament. Nelson was the first province in the Middle Island that went for the division of the colony into two, and until that ovent happened it was in favour of Mr. Sewell's peripatetic government ; Mr. Crosbie Ward, the present Po9tmaster-General, nbly supported tbe movement in the columns of the Lyttelton Times; but it was not until her gold-fields were discovered that Otago cared anything about tho question, she was rather in favour of provincial independence than separation ; but so soon as Dunedin was transformed into a Southern metropolis, her public men saw at once how monstrous a tiling it was to havo the Central Government in so uncentral a position, and at the present moment the Otago press is more strongly in favour of separation than any other in the colony. From the remarks of the Daily Times, and of the Superintendent of Otago in his address to the electors of Dunedin, we gather that if separation be not granted, they will advocate the removal of the seat of Government to Wellington. With reference to the separation question, the Daily Times, of the 24th ultimo, observes : — "To a certain ox tent the Middle Islaud has progressed, but it has done so in spite of misgovernment. The energies that might have been expended in bccuring its general advancement have been frittered upon the details of a petty rivalry. The spirit even of political interest has never yet been roused. There is scarcely a man in New Zealand who cares for it in its entirety one straw, or feels an interest in it. But there are thousands who love individual portions of it, who would sacrifice everything for the province which they deem their home. They give to the isolated shreds into which the country is torn, that affection which the colony as a whole should claim. Let Auckland advance, and the rest of the colony may go to Old Nick, is the policy of the Auckland man, and the inhabitant of any other province, by changing the name, can echo the sentiment with equal cordiality. But how can the love of country be generated, when the fact is patent to all that the colony contains elements incongruously associated, and which nature meant should be separated. The two islands have nothing in common, beyond that they are inhabited by the same race, and own allegiance to the same sovereignty. The laws that apply to one are unsuitable to the other ; the resources, if not altogether different, require different development ; and the condition and requirements of the people of the two islands are as dissimilar as if the narrow Straits that wash between their shores were thousands of miles of broad ocean. Provincialism has flourished, with all its jealousies, because there is no bond of union to draw together the two islands condemned to one sway. The northern island has a bright, perhaps a brilliant future in store for it, if it surmount difficulties confessedly not insurmountable. But when that result is attained, what will it be, a country peopled by two races, fraternised together, and enjoying perfect civil, religious, and political equality. Humanity will not permit the extermination of the Maori race, and the European race has only to hope for the equality indicated as the alternative to constant wasting internecine war. We do not say the condition is insupportable, nay, we will admit some may find it not hard to endure, but the inhabitants of the Southern Island have chosen a home where they are not called upon to undergo the same, and they naturally revolt at being burdened with troubles not their own, whilst they are neglected in all those particulars which, by common acceptation, make up the sum of a Government under which a colony can flourish. Domestic institutions, forgotten in the absorbing pursuit of legislating for a race in which they have no interest, is the wrong they have to submit to from successive Governors and Governments."