COLONIAL TAXATION (No. VI.)

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume IX, Issue 471, 18 April 1867, Page 2

COLONIAL TAXATION (No. VI.)

« [Nelson Examiner.] j The Native Department is the only one ( which yields absolutely no return for the i money expended upon it. All the other ] departments of our government, costly and 1 burdensome as they are, may bo said to ( have two sides to their ledger. They cost ( a great deal to maintain, but they also col- j lect a good deal of revenue generally in ex- j cess of their cost. It is true that this is j but a small comfort to the taxpayer, be- , cause both sides of the ledger tell equally ( against him ; he pays the salaries, he pays t also the money which the department col- £ lects ; but it is a matter of some importance ( nevertheless. Unfortunately, taxes must j be raised to some amount, and in raising £ them, a staff of officers must be maintained; j this part of our expenditure stands on a t clearly defined basis, therefore. We may f think—our readers know that we do think , —this is badly and extravagantly managed, ( and crying aloud for a speedy reform; but ( it is a wholly different sort of question from , that of the Native department, which is a ( machinery supported at a cost of nearly { £30,000 a year, simply resulting in the ex- j penditure of that sum of money, without, j at all events, the smallest money return, j An expenditure of this kind is only to be defended on one of two grounds; it is either necessary in discharge of past obli- 1 gations ; or it is expedient, with a view to j prevent future and greater evils. It is ne- ' cessary to ask ourselves, to which of these 1 two lines of excuse will our politicians be- 1 take themselves when pressed, as we trust 1 they soon will bo pressed, on this subject ' by the force of public opinion ? What, then, are our obligation* towards 1 the native race of New Zealand? The question has been variously answered at different times and by different classes ; ] but perhaps we are now in a better position than ever before, for giving a reason- ' able answer to it. The natives of New ' Zealand are British subjects equally with ourselves, so far as they are willing to ac- 1 cept the position this we cannot but admit, j but beyond this, we consider it simply absurd to go. We have been at war now for ' six or seven years, not to enforce the su- ' premaev of law over the Maoris, but aim- ' ply to render them incapable of carrying fire and sword amongst our own people. To a considerable extent we have been successful in this; but beyond this we have 1 done nothing. Natives who live in close connection with us ; natives who find it to their advantage to become as like Europeans as they can, are, like ourselves British subjects; and towards them the Government of this colony is bound to show every consideratiou. This, however, does not mean a pension. That, and things of that kind, are precisely what the colony 1 is bound not to give to the natives. Already we have corrupted these people more i than enough in this way ; we have taught 1 them to led no shame in beggary, to feel 1 very little desire to help themselves, In- ; stead of good citizens we have been train--1 iug paupers and instead of civilised men we have produced a race of medicants al- . ternately mean and truculent. So far of , the lew—for it must be owned that there ■ are few indeed, companively—who have t placed themselves in the position of sub , jection to our laws. The mass of the race > is independent of us and mean to remain - so. The language of our politicians may t seem to contradict this, but so long as the f statute book contains the provision, that a I judgment obtained in any of our law courts • against a native is not to be enforced by - execution unless it shall appear quite safe I to the Government, so long Lave we a standing witness that we da not govern the

Maoris of New Zealand, and that they are not in any proper sense of the word fel-low-subjects with ourselves. Sentiment may induce some to hold that, eycn if this is the case we are under some sort of obligation to spend money on the natives. For our own part we fail to see it, at least in the sense in which it is meant. As human beings, unquestionably wo owe a duty to all other human beings, but we are not under any obligation to squander money required for the support of our families upon them. Yet wo maintain that this expenditure of £30,000 is simply this and liotning more. This money is spent in the very districts where the Government dares not to issue an execution in pursuance of a judgment of any court. It is spent upon the very men who will and whet do, as often as occasion serves, mock at and bully the unhappy magistrates who are paid for administering law amongst them. And we need hardly add this money forms no trifling item in that grinding taxation which impounds nearly a third part of the laboring man’s weekly earnings.

It may, however, be maintained that this money is paid, not because the natives have a right to it, but because it is better to pay this sum than ten times as jVnucli for fresh wars. The comfort which some of our southern contemporaries take to themselves in the matter is that by this moans they tide over evils which will soon die of themselves. The comfort, we regret to say, is wholly misapphed. The expenditure on our Native Department is not a source of peace and of good-will, but of trouble. As administered it gives rise to a thousand heart burnings between European settlers and their native neighbours. It makes the settler hate the Maori who can drag him into court, and recover damages for every conceivable trespass, often upon evidence that would not be taken in any court whatever ; and yet from whom he can obtain not the smallest satisfaction in the same court, if he is injured, which generally happens ten times for every timohe or his cattle injure his native neighbours. Nor is this all. The native tco is affected by it. He knows himself able to do as he pleases in the courts, to bo as troublesome as ho may choose to his neighbours, and he sees that there is no course so certain of procuring him a pension or assessorship,. by the recommendation of the magistrate . Does this sound incredible to our readers ? We can only say that it is strictly true. Nor can it be wondered at. The magistrate sent to a native district eats the bread of thft Native Department with very bitter herbs indeed. To say he is systematically bullied in many districts is to speak within the mark. The natives look on him, not as one who is to administer law to them, but as one who is to administer law for them, at the expense of their European neighbours, while to them he only administerspensions and salaries. We could produce a hundred cases in support of this, but it is needless. Let any inquiry be made intothe facta, not, as the Government is sofond of doing, from the poor magistrates who have learned to pay the price of a continuance of tlieir salaries, but from independent and reliable testimony. If this is done, it will be found, not only that cases of the kind we have referred to. abound, but that hardly one case can be produced in which native institutions have not directly ministrced to the pride and lawlessness of the natives.

The question now is, what purposes of expediency docs all this serve ? If the institutions now in force in the north of the Northern Island and at a few other points, were extended to the mass of the-, natives, not £30,000, but at least, £IOO,OOO a year would be required to pay for them. Are these institutions to be extended? And if not, why are they to be maintained as at present ? Are we really so weak that we are afraid to discontinue this tribute to the turbulent and overbearing of the natives ? and have we any good grounds for believing that such tribute is a thing more readily relinquished after twenty than after five years’ enjoyment ? For our own part* we look on this sum of £30,000 not merely as wasted, but as put to a most immoral purpose. It encourages no good thing in the natives that we can imagine; but it does encourage laziness, drunkenness, contempt of all authority, and rebellion against all control. Its withdrawal would not, we feel sure, lead to a rebellion. Rebellion is. not fostered by acts of manly justice, and an apparent reliance upon our own resources, but it is fostered by and produced by nothing so certainly and invariably as a weak truckling to the vices and disorders of a half-savage people-