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OUR COLONIES AND COLONIAL POLICY.

[Piom (he "Weekly Chronicle,"] The Colonial Secretary's instructions to the Governor of New South Wales, and the withdrawal of our garrison from the colony, is, on the prrt of thcGovcrnment, an important advance in compliance with our most' resolute and unmistakoable national demand — the first item of a series andsystem of measures of extensive Financial Keform. Among other privileges and duties, it is wise and salutary to leave to our colonies, when their 1 esources and position will admit of it, the onus of pi*otection from internal violence and disorder. Mr. Cobden has always stigmatised the principle of garrisoning with our military the settlements j of our surplus population, as despotic, and available only for the purposes of oppression. And vrc will readily agree in the ncedlessness of those garrisons for defence against external attack, when we consider the new phase in the world's history in the subsidence of international wars, the naval supremacy of England, and the facilities for the transport of men and material, and lastly, and not less weighty in the event of war, the small importance of the temporary loss of distant outposts of the empire, which would revert to the mother country if the struggle terminated successfully. It is only for internal purposes, repression of outbreak and discontent, or prevention and detection of crime, that our soldiery can do aught but idle in the colonies. For the latter of these purposes police_ are the proper arm — for the former, a local militia would be equally efficient, and would obviate, for the settlement, the unfavourable semblance of a forced dependence on the - pother country. With the priveleges of self-government, it is not too unreasonable to ask our colonists to bear, where possible, the expenses of self-administration, when its conditions are so gratifying to their pride and love of independence. The colonists of New South Wales plead against the decision of the home Government, believing that the existence of the convict establishment will entail upon them the burthen of a much extended police, and possibly of a militia. Public feeling throughout Australia and Tasmania continues by the last accounts to manifest itself indignantly in the press, and in meetings, against any continuance of our system of transportation. Some of the papers suggest, if it be persevered in, a universal refusal of British manufactures. Such a threat may be idle, because incapable of being realized, from the want of other adequate sources of supply; but, with other concomitant circumstances, it indicates the aroused feeling of the colonies on subjects so vitally near to their material and moral prosperity ; and assuredly England should no longer continue to inflict on her offspring the incubus of her detected vice and crime, in contempt of repeated remonstrance and protestation. There are sequestered islands, and uninhabited shores enough within the reach of our convict ships, and unavailable for emigration, where the contagious atmosphere of a penal settlement will not impede the healthy growth of an antipodal Britain. The present measure of leaving the Australian colonies to their own internal protection suggests occasion and a just opportunity for final discontinuance of deportation thither of our convicts. We have no right to encumber them with vice and insubordination, and at the same time decline to assist them in controlling it. We confidently anticipate that Government will see the justice and policy of yielding to Australian wishes on the transportation question. We do not propose withdrawing our military establishment from Canada, because it is frontiered by the territory of an independent and dissimilar government, and because it contains a population of contrasted and contending races. We will not denude New Zealand of troops, because the native tribes are warlike and irascible 5 and we plead, for Military occupation of the Cape, the insubordinate boors of Dutch descent, and the restless and predatory aboriginal borderers. In withdrawing its garrisons from Australia, let us not leave her as fair a right to demand the presence of British soldiery. Another measure of justice may just now be opportunely conceded to the same dependency, viz., the early repeal of the Act Viet. 5 and G,chap. 36 ? which prohibits the sale of land at less than £ 1 an

acre, while in our South African possessions il. is disposed of at 2s. per acre, and in our North American provinces at ss. The admission of colonial representatives into the British Legislature, and the opening of official patronage to the talent and ambition of the colonial youth, would be also just and politic steps towards reconciliation of our mutual quarrels, and consolidation of our connexion. It is on this connexionthat England's future existence as a first-rale power mainly depends.

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZ18510719.2.14

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 549, 19 July 1851, Page 3

Word count
Tapeke kupu
781

OUR COLONIES AND COLONIAL POLICY. New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 549, 19 July 1851, Page 3

OUR COLONIES AND COLONIAL POLICY. New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 549, 19 July 1851, Page 3

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