THE NEW ZEALAND DEBATES. [From the Times, July 23.]

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume II, Issue 62, 20 December 1845, Page 3

THE NEW ZEALAND DEBATES. [From the Times, July 23.]

The division of a legislative body into party sections is natural, perhaps necessary ; nor are the effects thereof either ail good or all evil. Amongst the advantages of the spirit of opposition is the spur which it gives to energies that ett£ might not be pui forth, oif <\phich is harder

kill) might not "be sustained and kept in exertion. Among the drawbacks is the too frequent occurrence j)f the sacrifice of great and general . principles to particular interests. No instance 1 of the preference by a party of " self-love to social" was ever more striking than that which;. : has been displayed in the New Zealand debates. The management of the colony has been treated as a pure party question. In vain- did the advocates of the New Zealand Company try to put it on another footing, and entreat that it might not be made a Government affair. Their ■' interest too visibly concurred with this their / prayer. Because it was sincere they were distrusted, and it was refused. They wete certain * of being in a minority, if it was to be simply a party question. On the other hand, Lord Stan- - ley was deeply interested in its being made a • E arty question ; for so only could his egregious,,' is habitual, his systematic mismanagement of the colonies in general, and of this colony in particular, escape censure and a reproving vote. A party question, then, it has been made. The ' only chance for the miserable and ruined colonists is, that there may bo found a sufficient number of independent members who will insist ' on deciding the matter by'its merits, and not by official politics, as Mr. Barkly did on the former occasion. Many circumstances have combined against New Zealand iir the present debate.- • Some members, lik& Lord Howick, are absent? for specif reasons. The lateness of the season has thinned the house. To the sense of fatigue has supervened a determination strong as death to enjoy a holiday after such prolongpd labours.Exlmustion has- brought on the maladie. du,pays. Railways have accelerated their flight by the broad gtiage and by the narrow. But the members of Government must remain at their-posts, their retainers and dependents must needs stay to vote and to divide for the Minister ana against the colony. To be thus rescued by his colleagues through a party vote, to have heard ' the opinions that have been expressed, and to have been made conscious of what the private! opinions of many of those who have not 'expressed them are, can hardly be without some significance even for Lord Stanley; to a more sensitive mind these things would have a language of most intelligible distinctness. But, passing from his Lordship to the opposite interest, we shall find, that four parties, at least, are mainly afFected by the policy of the Colonial Office as exhibited towards New Zealand, .. viz., the New Zealand natives v the settlers, the Company, and the Crown. Fitst,, there are the New Zealanders, who since th«? country has ■ (by whatever course of events) become a colony of Greatßritain, are deeply concerned in being protected from encroachment. Their number not exceeding one hundred thousand, they were far ■' from occupying the whole of the country, com-,, prising 80,00 ,000 acfesL But what they "did" occupy, and did not sell; ought to be secured to <. them ; nor can we recognise the proper spirit of t protection in Lord Stanley's avowed design of : getting possession of those lands which thejv< make least usesof, by taxing them and, compel^ ling them to register, these uncultivated'aeres. . It would be more direct and more fair, for Go* ' vernment to assume to 'itself all the land that cannot be known to have been, under occupa-. kfonT *' w "**■ Next come the s ettlers. These have broken t\\e ties of home, in ipelled by various motive's to . seek an asylum in a new country. They have experienced, and they know what a Government owes to the governed ; and instead of a fulfilment of its duty, they now witness nothing but oppression, mismanagement, and disorganisation on us part, the consequences of which are ruinous to themselves. The lands they bought in . -England are withheld them, against th« wish of the vendors. The very authority to which, in ordinary circumstances, they would have appealed, to have a fulfilment of engage-, merits enforced, is the one that has rendered their fulfilment impossible. >■ The New Zealand Company is the next gre# 4 interest. They are the vendors, who have been driven into a breach of contract. Before ever, the colony was attached to England,— while it' was independent, and its independence recognised, this company bought lands in New Zealand. Those lands then belonged to it, as much as they had belonged to the chiefs who sold., them, and the company was entitled, in respect of them, to be regarded as owners in the same, manner as the natives would have beenj had' they not sold them. When England assumed ihe sovereignty it took with it rights vested at - they then stood. The lastot the four interests of which we have spoken is that of the Crown. The right of tffe Crown depends on a double title, that of discovery—and that of cession by treaty. The former we consider by far the more valid/nof to say honest, of the two. All these interests are, unfortunately, but too conflicting, and Lord Stan-, ley has, by the course which he has pursued, injured, and has all but ruined the company as a speculation'; he has exasperated the natives and dnven them 10 arms, he has.sacrificed the proi-. perity ftjtd^ue -^property,, aud. in some instances the hves^of the N settlers r he has compelled the." Crowu to 4vage war, to enforce obedience, and to. rule l>y s 4he sword, aud after the mischief is dove, he iahpouring in troops whereone hundred * men uere formerly a sufficient garrison. If it were thig single coiouy, which bade so fair, and has so— ' : " Unbeseem'd the promiie of it« •pring. l ' > . we should be inclined to attribute much of tb'i disarrangement to the foice of circumstances':" but when we find that complaints of grievances I and petitions for redress are so general that •/ happy and coutented colony is the exception, and dissatisfaction the rule — when we find the' evil greater than ever before, andsti^tincreaßibg,! we cannot attribute much to the circumstance!, and much to the- system (gladly as we would selsi that amended), but are canstrained tp believSjf that most of.it belongs tn the individual' fylhiisterv We can admire Lord Stanley's dexterity as a skirmisher in debate, and his skill in ■ JSiicmgi but he is wofully deficient in weightctmd stability, in comprehensiveness, in fitness forresponrible office. He is a dashing ensigrr, perhaps even a slashing colonel, but he is not endowed with the thoughtfulness and the resource of the general. He bears about the same proportion, to a statesman that Lord Anglesey in the fiei.^., did to'the Duke of Wellington, or Hey to j£apoleorir ' "" • -*"*