THE AUSTRALASIAN LEAGUE.

New Zealander, Volume 8, Issue 611, 21 February 1852, Page 3

THE AUSTRALASIAN LEAGUE.

[Fiora the Times, October 17.] One bundled and fifty years after tlie formation of our principal plantations in Nor'h America, the sense of a common ■ wrong nnd a common danger drove thirteen loyal English communities raost.veluctantly to form themselves into a Congress for mutual defence and protection. The hint was not taken ; the same rash and overbearing policy was persisted in ; thp wisdom of Burke and the eloqupnee of Chatham were pouied forth in vain ; the star of our ascenlanoy gradually waned, and a dominion planted by our own hands, an empire boundless in extent, fertility, and natural resources, the proudest exploit of the nation, tbp noblest proof and oft-piing of our civilization, was violently rent from us for ever. One would have thought that so signal and disgraceful a calamity, so terrible an exception to tliatcaieer of prosperity with which we have been blessed, would have made an indelhble impression on the then present nnd all futuie geneiations, and that a duad of quarrels with our colonies, and an aversion to union between them, would be among the traditional instincts of the empiie. It is now sixty years since we set ourselves to repair, in the great south-eastern continent of Australia, the disgraces and reveises which our arms and policy had sustained on the shores of the north-west. 'J he happy genius of the nation has not heen wanting to itself. With little to lhank the Home Government for, in spite of a bundled obstacles with which their path has been stiewn by the Colonial Office, under the government of officials, the best of whom were sent out merely from interest, and the worst fiom every species of political nnd pnvdte conuption, under laws mostly dictated to them by Governors lguoiant of their wants and wishes or by officers at liamc yet moie ignorant, — with land regulations contrived expressly to deter intended emigrants fiom their shores, and with a population composed, as far a 9 depended on Government, of thieves sent out at our expense, and paupers at that of the co-

lonics, the Anglo-Saxon race lias, nevertheless worked its way not merely against the difficulties of a newcountry, but against the far heavier infliction of our ok n system of government, and has l:ud broad and deep the foui.dation of four mi^hlv Mates, Tt i< sixty yeais since the fir&t of these was founded, and but fifteen since the lasf, Poit Phillip, assumed a sepirafe name ; and yet that which the Government of Lord North (biced upon the American colouiVs after one hundred and lifty yews of growth, sixty yenrs has sufficed to teach our Australian children. 'I Ley al«o have their Congress, because tlie^ also have their common grievances and common fears. When Lord Grey introduced the clnise fronting: a General Assembly of the Australian Colon'Vs into tlie Bill of the Session of 18.50, he \va« warned that he had no occasion to elaborate a michmery which his own line of colonial policy would sooner or 'arer force in f o existence. lie withdrew his clauses, and this year baa seen the erection of the very body wli'ch he vainly refused to construct, but of which he has neveithelesa been the unconscious and ungtneious architect. It cannot be uigid against the Australian colonies that tluy bay« been hasty in taking this me.isuie. It may surprise the English public to know that that grievance which drove America to rt-T>elhoi' — taxation without represent ition, the appropriation of U'ge f-ums of their money without their consent — they have long endured, and the act which was heralded as giving them selfgovernment deprives them of no Wj> th.°n one bundled and 'ifty s>ix thousand pounds a -year, for the payment of salaries, in many cases exorbitant, and in most given, to persons in whom the colonists Juve no confidence. But the Colonial Office, having succeeded in this experiment on their patience, has ventured on . nothor which seems thoroughly to have exhaust' d it. So long as Van Diemen's Land whs capable of containing the convicts of both sexes, of which it has for some time been the exclusive receptacle, the o hoi colonies, with a selfishness natural we fenr to all communities, but especially to those engaged in the struggles and enterprises of a new settlement, beheld the sufferings of this devoted island with an inert and lUtless compassion. But when the polluted resejvoir began to overflow, when the btieams of that desperate wickedness with which we had long been inundating this the fairest of our posse-Sons in the southern hemisphere circulated among them, — when thosp settlements which had never known convictism found their population more and moie gradually contaminated by its vicinity, and NewSouth Wales, which had shaken it off, began to witness its revival in the mciv edious bhape of expitees landing on her bhoies under the mask of free and untainted men, ineit and listless compassion was exchanged for a common sentiment of fear and indignation. The colonies have found a point of unity and agreement, and that point is resistance to the indignity and injury which they suffered from Great Bn am. Such things are not long in growing to a head. It was only in September last year that New South Wales founded her Anti-Convict Association, and this body, after an. existence of only six months, has been swallowed up in the League of the four colonies — New South Wales, Port Phillip, Van Diemen's Land, and South Astralta — pledged to resist the importation of British criminals into any of them, under whatever designation, and upon whatever terms, to raise funds for the support of the League, and to übstain from employing any convict who shall hereafter be sent out. Among thepiincipal supporters of this League are men of well-known moderation and discretion, who have hitherto kept aloof from political agitation, and who have evidently only been drawn into it by the deepest-andmobtheartfe.lt conviction. That spirit of enthusiasm which has given rise to so many religious wars seems to be revived in this cenfederacy. They are animated by the feeling that their dearest interests are at stake, and, though measured and respectful in tLeir language, are evidently prepared to cany out their principles, at whatever cost. It was in April last that this combination was formed, and in Way was made the discoveiy of the gold field. This they consider to strengthen their hands in two ways, by giving them a weight and consideration they never possessed before, and by making it obviously impolitic for Government to transport offenders to a place which will be looked on as a land of reward rather than of punishment. Almost the first impression which this discovery seems to have made was that it rendered a return to convictisra impossible. Not so reasons Lord Grey ;he meets the intelligence of the formation of the League and the discovery of gold by sending out to Van Diemen's Land a ship load of female convicts, the most odious form of this most odious infliction. That he will not lack candidates for passages to the land of Ophir we can readily believe, and that, if he m determined to take up ar^attitude of defiai'Ce against the Australian League, he will find it easy to ncruit the criminal classes from, ranks of the needy and adventurous. Lord Grey evidently thinks that crime is in danger of becoming extinct, and devises premiums for its encouragement. A little larceny is a dangeious thing. Dive deep into your neighbour's pocket, if you wish to visit El Dorado, Small crimes are hmceforth to be punished, large ones to be rew aided. This is one side of the quevStion, and in this the interests of the people of this country and those of the Anti-Convict League are identical. But while there every shipload of convicts will occasion fresh excitement and indignation, heie these things are passed by as of less importance than the meetings of a vestry or the debates of a Common. Council. That our secondary punishments should be turned into rewards, that this s-cond group of colonies should be alienated and lo«t to us, are matters entiiely below the consideration of the British public, which can sympathise with the wrongs of Poland, of Hungary, or of Sicily, but is deaf to tbe cries of its own noble dependencies, aid diops a tear over every wrong except that which is occasioned by its own mis-govern-ment.