Thank you for correcting the text in this article. Your corrections improve Papers Past searches for everyone. See the latest corrections.

This article contains searchable text which was automatically generated and may contain errors. Join the community and correct any errors you spot to help us improve Papers Past.

Article image
Article image
Article image
Article image
Article image
Article image
Article image
Article image

THE Wellington Independent.

Tuesday, April 1, 1862. RESPONSIBILITY. Nor being able to deny the fact that the preseut native policy is progressing, and that by quiet and peaceable means steps are one after another being taken which in Governor Browne's time would have involved the country in war, the antiministerial journals take refuge in the assumption that the policy is, both in its conception and carrying out, the work of Sir George Grey, and that the Ministry are nothing more nor less than tools in His Excellency's hands. To these journals the address of Mr. Richmond, in resign. ing his seat at Taranaki, must be* the very essence of gall and wormwood. The public ground which induces Mr. Richmond to retire is the fact, which he has candour enough to admit, not ouly that the present polioy is a Ministerial polioy — one to which His Exoellenoy is advised by his Executive — but that Sir George professes to desire that the irresponsibility of the Governor in native matters should cease, and that in them, as well as in questions affecting the settlers, the Governor should act on the advice of his responsible advisers. It is not unnatural thai Mr. Richmond should prefer the old system — a system which practically oovered the Ministry with honor if native matters were pursued successfully, and reflected discredit mainly on the Governor if they turned out unfavorably. At the present moment, Ministry and Governor unitedly have matured a policy, they are aaoh alike interested in its progress, its mceess will redound to their mutual

oredit, and its failure— if such should eventually be the case — will be equally shared. Nor is it unnatural for Mr. Richmond to believe that the opposition which the Stafford Ministry encountered in the Assembly was productive of evil results in the minds of the Natives ; but the public will not forget how much evil was prevented by the opposition com • plained of. The Native Offender's Bill is sufficient illustration. It was withdrawn only after Mr. Richmond found it was impossible to force it into an Act —an Act which his own supporter, Mr. Bell, declared would set the island iv a blaze from one end of it to the other. Few will be found to sanction the monstrous dogma which Mr; Richmond puts forth when he says :— " Whatever I might think of the Governor for the time being however deep might be my distrust of the man— however thorough my disapproval of his measures — I deliberately say, that I deem it better, in the present state of the country, that he should pursue his course without the accompaniment of a parliamentary opposition in the Colony, barking as it were at his heels." Had such a spirij animated the Assembly during the pas two years, what would Auckland, Napier Wangauui and Wellington now be. If Governor Browne had carried the war into the Waikato at the time he desired to do it, Auckland would have become a mere garrison town, and with only a mere handful of troops, Napier Wanganni and Wellington would have been cooped up ma very reduced compass as Taranaki was. It was owing to the opposition in the Assembly, and to the exertions in the same direction out of it, that Goveruorßrowne was recalled/and the policy of war changed for one of localised government and peace. The " irresponsible " theory, the standing idly by while the Governor does as he pleases, would be all very well if war between the Governor and the natives affected no one but himself, and the troops but as it is a matter of such vital concern to the Colonists, we must congratulate the Country that the ministry is to have a voice for the future in Native matters. Mr. Richmonds sole objection to investing the ministry with responsible powers in native matters, appears to be the expense of military defence. He seems to think that the Imperial Government is imbued with the notion that the expenditure of British money during war makes the fortune of the colonists, and that, therefore, there is every temptation for them to encourage war. He puts the government of the natives as necessitating either irresponsible control by the Governor and military defence to a limited extent at the cost of Britain, or the Governor controlled by the ministry and defence at the .cost of the colony. This theory of Mr. Richmond's will not hold water, and we are persuaded that the Home Government will need little educating by Sir George Grey to adopt a contrary practice. The truth which the Home Government will eventually see and act upon under, Sir George Grey's tuition, is that which Mr. Richmond and Mr. Sewell concisely stated in a joint memorandum to Governor Browne in 1856. " On the one band, it must be admitted that the Imperial Governm :nt has a large direct interest in the preservation of peaceful relations with tbe aborigines ; but on tbe other it cannot be denied that the colonists, as a body, bare a far greater interest in the same object, not only their own property but their lives are at stake. The obvious interests of both are identical." And because " the obvious interests of both (the [raperial Government and the Colonists) are identical," those gentlemen requested Governor Browne to do, what Mr. Richmond now puts forth as his po litioal reason for retiring — to give, as soon as circumstances would permit, increased responsibility to the Ministry. Assuming, in the memorandum above quoted, that the arrangement defining the relative position in native matters of the Governor and Ministry which had been agreed upon, would be acceptable to the Imperial Government in exchange for its bearing the cost of Military defence — an arrangement which gave the Ministers liberty to advise and the Governor to act upon it or not as be thought fit — Mr. Richmond and Mr. Sewell expressly t( beg, at the same time, to stata their present conviction that if any alteration be hereafter made, the peace welfare and good government of both races of Her Majesty's subjects in the colony, as well as the direct interests of the Imperial Goverumeut will require rather an extension thau a contraction of the powers entrusted tn the Colonists." Tbe period above, conjectured has now arrived. The Governor, in 1862 is of the same opinion as Mr. Richmond was in 1856, that the " obvious interestsof the home Government and Colo-

nists are identical," and he has oonsequently clothed his Executive with responsible powers, without, as wo are led to infer, weakening the admitted duty of the Imperial Government to provide largely the required means of defence. To say the least, it is not consistent in Mr. Richmond now to decry the introduction oi ministerial responsibility ia native matters, as a step in the wrong direction, and to aclduosits being fraught with what he conceives to be such imminent danger, as a reason why he will no longer continue in political life. We presume Mr. Richmond's address will oblige the respectable portion of the Anti-ministerial press to acknowledge the ministry in their true position, and to call them henceforth the advisers and coadjutors of Sir George Grey' — to ascribe'to them both, that which wo believe they mutually recognise iv eaoh other ; fellow workers at a common object, animated by one spirit, striving only to attain one end — the peaceful settlement of the troubles Mr. Richmond and his colleagues were partly instrumental in producing, and the like solution of the many difficulties that still present themselves.

Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/WI18620401.2.11

Bibliographic details

Wellington Independent, Volume XVII, Issue 1712, 1 April 1862, Page 4

Word Count
1,255

THE Wellington Independent. Wellington Independent, Volume XVII, Issue 1712, 1 April 1862, Page 4

THE Wellington Independent. Wellington Independent, Volume XVII, Issue 1712, 1 April 1862, Page 4

Help

Log in or create a Papers Past website account

Use your Papers Past website account to correct newspaper text.

By creating and using this account you agree to our terms of use.

Log in with RealMe®

If you’ve used a RealMe login somewhere else, you can use it here too. If you don’t already have a username and password, just click Log in and you can choose to create one.


Log in again to continue your work

Your session has expired.

Log in again with RealMe®


Alert