THE CANTERBURY ASSOCIATION.

New Zealander, Volume 9, Issue 739, 14 May 1853, Page 2

THE CANTERBURY ASSOCIATION.

We have before us a Parliamentary Blue Book which is probably the latest that has been issued on the affairs of New Zealand, as the papers which it contains were obtained by an Address of the House of Lords dated November 2-2, 18S2, and the order for their being printed was so recent as the 20th of December. It is entitled "Copy of Correspondence between the Colonial Office and the Canterbury Association since the dale of the Charter of Incorporation of that Body;" and, as the title intimates, is entirely devoted to the concerns of that Association, commencing with Mr. Hull's letter, of November 14, 18ii), requesting Earl Grey's "sanction to the agreement between the New Zealand Company and the Canterbury Association for Ihe reservation of lands for the Canterbury Settlement, and also his support in Parliament to a bill on the same subject;" and coming down to a winding-up letter from Sir John Pakington (then Secretary of Slate for the Colonies) to Lord Lyltelton. Thus comprehensive, it necessarily includes a mass of official information respecting the schemes and proceedings of the Association, which cannot be found anywhere else, and which must be of great value for purposes of reference in all discussions on the character and conduct of the Body. Our immediate purpose, however, is to condense from it the substance of what has taken place between the Government and the representatives of ihe Association since the discontinuance of the Association's operations in England (on Sept. 50), and the transmission lo Mr. Alston, the Secretary of the Association, of the letter from Sir John Pakington—(which appeared in the New-Zealander of the 26th of March) —declaring, amongst other things, the intention of The Government to insist on "payment of the amount due to the Crown in respect of the one-sixth received by the Association on land sales." The information in the Blue Book as to what has passed since that dale is quite new lo us, and we presume will be so to nearly the whole of our readers.

On the 7lh of October, just three days after the dale of Sir Mid Partington's communication, Lord Lyttelton wrote to Sir John, as Secretary for the Colonics, a very long letter, controverting his views and conclusions. His Lordship opens by staling thai, iii consequence of the exhaustion of the funds of the Association, and the resolution to transfer their functions to the colonists, their executive power and machinery were entirely suspended : "they 113d.n0 officers and no servants," (poor Association !) and therefore he, as Chairman, had uudcrlaken to attend to any necessary business. He then proceeds to tell the Secretary of Slate that he cannot admit that the Association were wrong in resolving 10 transfer their functions. to the Colony, seeing that the colonists desired such a transfer, and that to have postponed it till the litigation with the New Zealand Company had terminated would have been to defer it indefinitely, and, moreover, would have been " practically equivalent to a concession of lhe matter in dispute, inasmuch as the Association has not the means to sustain such litigation." In relation to the main point immediately at issue—the Secretary of Slate's expressed purpose, in case the transfer of the Association's functions to the Colony should be made without payment of its debt to the Crown, to declare the powers of the Association, and of its substitute the Provincial Legislature, terminated, —his Lordship feelingly says,— " With respect (o the suggestion thai il only resls with Ihc Association to avert that forfeiture by paying Ihe debl (upwards of 4000?.) due to the Crown, 1 can only stale that such a course is impossible, as uol only the public funds of the Association are exhausted, but the private resources of many of ils members have been largely drawn upon in aid of those funds." But the gist of the letter was yet to come.. Mr. Sewell, (a name now only too well known here) on leaving England for the colony, had left with his Lordship "a statement of his views on this announced intention on the part of the Government." Why Mr. Sewell—seeing that the intention »« 5 "announced," did not himself declare these views, is not explained. Peruapshe ' was in one ol his usual hurries; the Mutoo ! may have been "just on the point of sailing and he may not have had lime for even one of his " hasty" effusions. However this may be, he had left the treasures of his sagacity in Lord Lyttelton's keeping, and his Lord-' ship could not withhold the benefit of the*** from the government. " Mr. Sewell states (in substance) that the colonists would readily engage to pay the debt of the Association on condition of" retaining their land-selling

powers. [We greatly doubt it.] "Mr. Sewell states"—that "all the funds of the Association have been spent duly and for thebenefit of the colony." [Sec the Lyttelton Times, passim, for the opinions of the eolothemselves on this point.] "Mr, Sewell proceeds to express his apprehension that the threatened proceeding will be regarded as harsh, unnecessary, injurious, and impolitic," and pleads that " the Association U doing all in its power for the payment of the debt,"— how think yon, simple reader? —why, " by causing it to be undertaken by the Colony I" We cannot dwell on all the additional points on which " Mr. Sewell contends," and "Mr. Sewell submits;"—it is enough thai Lord Lvltelton, with amusing naivete, adds, "I must repeat that the foregoing allegations arc made solely by Mr. Sewell individually, and that / express no opinion on them in' any way." His Lordship does, however, urge that the forfeiture of the landselling powers should not be enforced till the result of Mr. Sewell's negotiations with the colonists was ascertained. To all this, the Secretary of Slate, under date October 18, replies, by briefly referring his Lordship to his former correspondence for the reasons which rendered the proposed step unavoidable. On the 30th October, legal notice was given to the Committee of the Association, requiring them to pay into Her Majesty's Treasury, on the 11th of December, the sum of 4,2157. os. o'd., being one-sixth of the produce of land sold by them in the settlement from the 6th of October, 1851, to the jstof March, 1852, and one-sixth of such further sums as they may have received from land sales and pasturage licenses, down to the 50th of September last. On the 20th of November, Lord Lyttelton addressed the Secretary of State acknowledging the receipt of this notice, but pleading poverty, and begging for lime. As respects the second part of the demand, he would pay 020/., being one-sixth of the money received for lands sold at home since the Ist of March ; but as for the larger sum (the 4,215/.) it could not be discharged until the "special agent" despatched to New Zealand could make provision for it by means of their property in the Colony. "Stringent instructions" to do this were to be transmitted to him by the Hampshire, which was to sail on the 7th of Dec. His Lordship piteously reminds Sir John Pakington that "individual members of the Association have already advanced nearly 20,000/. from their private resources" for'its objects, and ''respectfully solicits the forbearance of the Government." Sir John Pakinglon's reply to this appeal, though courteous, is firm. He informs his noble correspondent that the Government were legally advised that, under the existing contract and Acts of Parliament, the Crown is bound to pay to the New Zealand Company one-sixth of the price received by the Association for laud sold, whether the Crown receives that sum from the Association or not; and that, acting on that advice, the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury had already paid to the Company the sum of 4215/1 Having shown that Her Majesty's Government, as guardians of the public revenue, could not allew such a state of things to continue, especially now that the Association intended to delegate their functions to the colonists, Sir John adds,—

' : Under these circumstances it appears that Her Majesty's Government have no alternative left hut lo put in execution their powers of terminating the functions of the Association, and that without delay, lest any operations should take place through the agents of (he Association in Ihe colony which might have the result of inflicting on them further pecuniary losses. *'Your Lordship will therefore receive, without delay, a formal instrument, putting an end to ihe functions of the Association, under (he power reserved io Ihe Secretary of Slate by parliament, of which the Governor will be forthwith atli'iscd."

This practically closed the correspondence > A subsequent leiter from Lord LytteUon is chiefly designed to exculpate himself and others from any imputation of unwillingness to pav this debt, as they had discharged the other liabilities of the Association, out of their own resources. The non-payment of it, he states, was only because they regarded the claim of the New Zealand Company (" who, not the Crown, are the real claimants") as an unjust one, and were convinced that, " in fact, the Company were their debtors, and not their creditors." We shall not prolong this article by dwelling on the thoughts of which this closing scene in the history of the—now formally defunct—Association is so suggestive. There will be ample opportunity to do so on future occasions; and we content ourselves for the present with the expressions of opinion we have parenthetically introduced, and the indications we have marked by italicizing a lew passages. Much remains to be developed of the working of the scheme, and not a little with respect to the part taken in it by Mi". Gibbon Wakefield,—by whom noblemen and gentlemen, the purity of whose intentions and motives we cannot question, unfortunately permitted themselves to be 100 much guided. A word, however, as to Mr. Sewell. The Blue Book before us contains a correspondence curiously illustrative of the disinterested ness of that gentleman and his friends with respect to his personal views and aspirations connected with Canterbury. But, warned by his own example of the disadvantage of doing things in too great a hurry, we shall postpone the revelations here made respecting the expectant Attorney-General of Canterbury, until we can exhibit them more fully than the time and space remaining at ourcommand will permit us to do to-day