INSTRUCTIONS TO GOVERNOR GREY.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume III, Issue 194, 9 June 1847, Page 3

INSTRUCTIONS TO GOVERNOR GREY.

Instructions from the Secretary of State to the Governor of New Zealand, accompanying the new Charter of Government for that colony. Downing-street, Dec. 28, 1846. Sir, — You will have been apprised, long before your receipt of this despatch, that in tht lttt session of Parliament, the Act which

I now enclose was passed for the better Government qf New Zealand. T,he motives which suggested such an enactment are best explained by a general reference to the correspondence between yourself and the preceding Governors of this Colony on the one hand, and myself and my predecessors in office on the other. Any more specific retrospect would, for my immediate purpose, be superfluous. It is enough to say, that the necessity of a fundamental change in the system adopted by the Charter of November 1840, has been insisted on by all parties to the discussiou, and that there is an almost equally unanimous concurrence among them, in the opinion that the change should be in the direction of calling the settlers to participate much more largely in the business of legislation and local self government. The accompanying Act is accordingly framed on that principle. j For the Institutions established under the Charter of November, 1840, it contemplates the substitution of municipal corporations for the government of each separate district of New Zealand, which, is or shall be settled by colonists of European birth and origin. Every such district is to be erected into a borough ; every such borough is to elect a common council, from which is to be chosen a mayor and a court of aldermen ; every such common council is to elect members to serve in a house of representatives, forming one of the three estates of a provincial assembly. lor this purpose the whole of New Zealand is to be divided into two or more provinces. In every such provincial assembly laws will be made for the province by the house of representatives, by a legislative council, and by the Governor, who together, will constitute the provincial legislature. But as there are many topics of general concern to all the inhabitants of New Zealand, respecting which some uniformity of legislation and of administration will be indispensable, it is further provided, that a general assembly of the New Zealand Islands shall be h olden by the Goverhor-in-Chief. That general assembly will be composed of himself, and of a legislative council and of a house of representatives But no one will be a member of the legislative council of the general assembly who is not also » member of one of the legislative conncils of the provincial assemblies ; neither will any one be a member of the house of representatives of the general assembly who is not a member of one of the houses of representatives of the provincial assemblies. In order to adapt the system of the Local Executive Government to this scheme of provincial and general legislation, the charter (if the mere text of that instrument be alone regarded) provides for, and supposes, the creation of five different offices. They are a Go-Y_rnor-in-Chief of New Zealand, a Governor of each province, and a Lieutenant-Governor of each. But the actual appointment of five such distinct officers forms no part of the design at present entertained. It is proposed to address to the same ptrson the commissions of Go-vernor-in-chief and Governor of either Province ; and to address to another person the commission of Lieutenant-Governor for each. Although with a view to precision and to various technical considerations all the offices in question are mentioned in the charter as distinct, they will thus (at least for the present) be combined in the hands of two persons only. Of these, the highest — who will be at once Governor and Governor-in-Chicf — will be the official superior of the other, who will be designated in each Province as the LieutenantGovernor of it. The relation will not be one of mere precedency, and rank, but will carry wiih it effective authority on the one hand, with subordination and obedience on the other hand. To the Governor-in-Chief it will belong exclusively to correspond with her Majesty's Secretary of State having the department of the colonies. To the Lieutenant-Go-vernor it will belong to correspond exclusively with the Governoi -General. The authority and control exercised by the Secretary of State over the Governor-in-Chief will, by the Gcvern'or-in-Chief, be exercised over the Lieutenant-Governor. That authority will extend even to the suspension of the Lieute-nant-Governor from office, if unhappily the necessity of so extreme a measure should ever arise. The Governor-in-Chief will , fix his own place of residence according to bis own estimate of the greater or less demand for bis presence in one or the other province. But, wherever he may be, he still acts as Governor of the province in which he may be resident, arid as Governor-in-Chief of the whale of New Zealand, directing and controlling the acts of the Lieutenant-Governor as often as he may think any such' control or direction requisite. To provide for the administration of the executive government of either province from which the Governor-in-Chief may absent himself, it will be in his choice, according to his view of the exigencies of the public service, either to call on the Lieutenant-Gover-nor to reside and to act for him there, or to

appoint a LieutenanuGoyernpr for the purpose,'whose appointment, will, be made ,tp terminate on the Gqvernor-in-Chief's return, and resumption of his own office as Governor of the province for which such temporary appointment may Have been made. You will find that the necessary powers for this purpose are created by the chatter. In favour of this scheme of municipal, legislative, and. executive polity, I rely on the following considerations : — It is framed with as close an adherence as circumstances would allow to the model of our English institutions, an object which I regard as of the highest importance in every such design. It adheres, as nearly as practicable, to that scheme of colonial policy once diffused over the greater part of the North American Continent, and still surviving in our remaining colonies there, and yet to be distinctly traced in the constitutions cf the flourishing states now united into the great American commonwealth. It provides for the local self-govern-ment of districts in a country where the dispersion of the settlements is such as to render any one central authority incompetent to that task. But while public spirit and a practical acquaincance with public affairs will be thus cherished in every part of New Zealand, the erection of provinces and provincial assemblies will, 1 trust, counteract the tendency which such corporate institutions must otherwise have to disunite in interest and in feeling, the various remote districts from each other. Natural causes forbid the combination of all those districts in the choice of members to serve in a single assembly for the whole of New Zealand ; but two such assemblies at present, and perhaps more than two such hereafter, may be sufficient to consolidate and cement and protect the interests of the various separate boroughs. To prevent those inter-colonial contests of such frequent occurrence elsewhere, and to watch over the general interests of the whole country, the General Assembly is charged with the exclusive care of those interests, and with no other function. The circumstance that the General Assembly will consist of members chosen by the provincial assemblies out of their own number will, I hope, prove an effectual security against the otherwise too probable conflicts between the local and the general legislatures. 1 anticipate, however, that for some time to come the occasions which will arise for calling together the General Legislature will be exceedingly rare, and the amount of business to be transacted by it very small ; it will only be necessary that it should meet when some change is required in the existing law upon those subject; with which the separate legislatures will not be competent to deal. By placing the Corporations and the Houses of Representatives in the relation of constituents and representatives of each other, they will have such common interests with so much of mutual control as probably to maintain them both in the possession of their appropriate powers, without the risk of encroachment on either side. The scheme of executive government which I have briefly explained will assure to the various authorities, municipal and legislative, of New Zealand, the benefit to be derived from unity of purpose and uniformity of system in the conduct of the administrative branch of the public service. To this project it has been objected that it introduces a system too complicated to be easily understood or efficiently executed. The answer to that objection I think is, that the inevitable conditions of. the practical problem to be solved were more than usually numerous and complex. So wide is the extent of the whole territory, so remarkable the dispersion of the settlements there, so many the impediments to rapid intercourse between them, and so strangely contrasted the habits and characters of the different races of the inhabitants, that it became necessary at least to attempt the reconcilement of opposite and yet' co-ex-isting dangers. There was the danger of enervating all the springs of Government by the undue dispersion of separate authorities, and there was the danger of impeding the useful action of the Government by in u.qdue centralisation of its powers. In the Apt which was submitted to and sanctioned by, Parliament, her Majesty's Government attempted as far as possible to escape from both of these difficulties. Whether the scheme adopted affords the best attainable reconcilement' of them or not, it will scarcely be denied that they were serious difficulties and admitted of no safe solution of a short and simple character. But in framing the Act, her Majesty's Government were not forgetful of their extreme liability to error when acting in reference to a state of things so remote from their observa? tion and from their own personal experience in the business of civil administration. It wni therefore, studiously provided, that the adaptation of this law to the local circumstances of New Zealand should be transferable to those who should bring te the discharge of that duty

the greatest amount of local knowledge, and the best opportunities of ascertaining the state of public opinion amongst the colonists. The broad outlines of the scheme having been partly drawn by Parliament, and the Queen in Council being authorised to complete these' outlines, her Majesty was also empowered to delegate ,to the Governor-in-Chief the duty of filling up all the various details ; and so wide are ,these powers of delegation, as to supply a remedy for any errors of mere ignorance or oversight into which her Majesty's confidential advisers may have unconsciously fallen. I now transmit to you four instruments for carrying this new Act of Parliament into effect. Of these the first is a new Charter for the Government of New Zealand. It is little more than a mere creation of the powers, Municipal, Legislative, and Administrative, which the Act of Parliament authorses the Queen so to create. It repeals the Charter of 1840, leaving it, however, to the Governor-ir.-Chief to determine at what time the new Charter shall be promulgated and brought into operation. You will observe that the Act of Parliament enables her Majesty ior a limited time to continue in force, as regards the Province of New Ulster, the Charter of 1840. When this measure was submitted' to Parliament, there seemed reason to believe that it might be desirable to make a distinction between the northern and southern settlements with regard to the time at which the intended change in the form of Government should come into operation, but more recent information has led to a different conclusion, and accordingly her Majesty has not been advised to avail herself of the power with which she was invested in this respect. The second instrument is the series of instructions under the Royal Signet and Sign Manual to which the Charter refers. This, as will appear in the sequel, is the instrument in which the plan of the new constitution is exhibited in all the detail in which it has been possible to prepare it in this country. Technical reasons, into which I need not enter, render it highly convenient to make the instructions rather than the Charter, the channel of signifying the Royal pleasure at full length and circumstantially. The third of the accompanying documents is your own appointment as Governor-in-Chief of New Zealand, and as Governor of each of the provinces into which those islands will be divided. The fourth and last instrument constitutes Mr. Eyre Lieutenant-Governor of each of the two provinces which it is now proposed to establish. It may be convenient that I should in this place point out how vacancies in these offices are to be filled provisionally, whenever the necessity for such provisional appointments may arise. If the Governor-in-Chief should die, or otherwise create an unexpected vacancy, the following is the order in which the various officers capable of a provisional succession will be called to it, each latter designation always supposing the absence from New Zealand of any person bearing the immediately preceding designation. In the case supposed, then, the provisional succession will devolve, first, on the Governor of New Ulster ; secondly, on the Governor of New Munster; thirdly, on the Lieutenant- Governor of New Ulster, if appointed immediately by the Queen ; fourthly, on the Lieutenant-Governor of New Munster, if appointed, immediately by the Queen ; and, fifthly, on the senior officer for the time being in command of the , Queen's troops in New Zealand. On the death or absence or other vacancy of the office of the Governor of either province, his office will be filled by the Lieute-nant-Governor of it. On. the death or absence or other • vacancy of the office of Lieutepant-Governorof either province, the vacancy will be filled provisionally by an officer to be appointed by the Go-vernor-in-Cir.ef. I have already ..observed, that Lieutenant- Governors, so appointed, will not stand in the line of- provisional succession to the general government;. (To,be continued.)