THE COMMISSIONER OF CROWN LANDS AT AKAROA.

Lyttelton Times, Volume II, Issue 65, 3 April 1852, Page 3

THE COMMISSIONER OF CROWN LANDS AT AKAROA.

[Continued from our last.]

We hear that the Commissioner has recommended that an award should be made to Hempelman of 200 acres. However small a grant this may seem, when compared with his preposterous claim, there are several objections to the principle of his obtaining any land at all in the manner and on the grounds that it is probable he will get it. 1. No sufficient evidence was produced before the Commissioner that the purchase was made from the bona fide owners of the soil, and as we have before said, this is more than questionable. 2. No evidence was produced to prove that the claim was referred to a Commissioner in time. It may have been so—but to the public, who have no access to other means of information, the publication of such evidence in court would appear but just. Such a claim as Hempleman has advanced is, of course, a matter of the deepest interest to all those who have what they considered before an undisputed title to the land, and whether the case be heard in a Commissioner's Court or any other, they expect that every means of evidence should be made use of publicly and impartially. 3. When it was a

matter of notoriety that evidence that the claim was bad, was attainable ; and that that evidence was slighted, the public must look on the whole proceedings with great suspicion, and no opinion of any law officers at Wellington will be able to remove it. 4. The justice of this claim has been practically disallowed by the recognition of the purchase of part of the same land by the Nanto-Bordelaise Company, to which Sir George Grey's government is long since pledged ; it is very hard to see how the distinction is to be drawn between that portion of the country which is justly and that which is unjustly claimed; when the same claim, on the same grounds, was laid upon all. Now as to the consequence of its admission ; if it be a good claim, then the title of the Nanto-Bordelaise Company is bad, for the latter was obtained at a subsequent date. Yet the Government are pledged to allow the claim of the French Company to 30,000 acres. But after all, the glaring injustice of the case is, that this claim as well as all others of the same nature should not have been settled long ago, before the land had been made valuable by the Canterbury Association's occupation of the country around; and before settlers who purchased from the Association had begun to spend their capital upon it. There is no excuse, however, for the gross negligence which the Government has exhibited in this matter. If their policy had been to shake the public confidence in all land-titles whatsoever they could not have adopted a more ingeniously appropriate method. Ten years ago Hempelman's claim was sent in. Ten years ago, a law was passed for settling all similar claims, with the especial and avowed object of laying open the country to colonization. Ten years pass away, the very claimants of the land relinquish hope, they sell their claims for a song, and speak of them as a joke of the good old times; but the moment legitimate colonization does commence, the moment the land acquires an artificial value; then, obsolete claims again start into life, and a commissioner is appointed to adjudicate upon them; —a commissioner of whom it is saying very little to assert that there is not one man, woman, or child in the district who would refer to him a question of the most trifling importance. One of two things must be, either the claim is illegal, or the Government have displayed the most gross and shameful negligence. Who knows what claims may spring up all over the Canterbury block: the very land occupied by our types and presses may have been sold by some " Bloody Jack" to some Sydney trader. What security is there against this? Yes, there is one. It is this, (and it fortunately applies equally to all the land sold by the Association within Hempelman's block); the question is now removed from a Commissioner's court altogether, because conveyances having been issued under the Canterbury Act, the holders of them are under the protection of the Supreme Court. The moment such a conveyance is issued, the holder will, of course, proceed against trespassers upon his property, so that whatever be the award of a commissioner the question must be ultimately decided in the Supreme Court, and it will he for a judge and jury to decide whether the Commissioner's award can supersede a conveyance under Act of Parliament; of the issue there is not much doubt. One word to the Commissioner before we part —we should be glad to see an English gentleman remember what country he belongs to. If public injustice is done, he must expect to meet with public opponents. He must remember that he is not now in a couutry where a murmur against an officer -appointed" by Government is repaid by the gentle hint conveyed iv the present of a bowstring, but in an offshoot of that country where a justice Shallow gets his fitting reward iv the full expression of public opinion.