THE NEW ZEALAND CONSTITUTION. [From the Times.]

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume IV, Issue 309, 15 July 1848, Page 3

THE NEW ZEALAND CONSTITUTION. [From the Times.]

If anything should be required to reconcile us to the constitution we happen to enjoy, it is the^difficulty of making another. Among all the colonies which we possess, or did once possess, we cannot point to one whose method of government reflects any credit en the theoretical and creative powers of the British Legislature. Whatever is at all satisfactory — and it is not easy to find a colonial constitution deserving of that praise — is the result of compromise and of time. We will not mention any names. It would only be ripping up old sores. So we will go at once to that proraising colony which has already occupied the attention of the Commons two nights of this session, New Zealand, — what was it not to be? There never was so promising a scion of this noble stock. So like our own isles, in its size, its climate, its fertility — its position just at our antipodes — the ingenious and enterprising character of the natives, it was the very Britannia of the southern hemisphere. Then came the .glorious Eutopia of Mr. Gibbon Wakefield and the Westminster Review ; a colony, self-supporting, yet auxiliary to the parent state,' democratic," yet loyal ; everything, and yet everything bes des. It is fair to admit that the model company never had the opportunity of hanging itself. It was never allowed rope enough for that. We chartered the libertine and it was no longer free. What freedom remained was either too much or too little,, for it did nobody any good. The golden anticipations and the melancholy results to which we refer, the dawn and the sunset of young New .Zealand, are a rather long story. They are assuming au almost mythical char-

acter. We; of this lower and degenerate age, have ceased to inquire Quantum distat ab Incho Codtus. The treaty of Waitangi is the rertninus from which dates the historical period of New Zealand. The nature of the agreement then made, the parties, the territory embraced, and, more than all, the sense, " if any," in. 1 which it was accepted by the savages, are very fair matters of discussion. That, however, is uot the immediate question before the House of Commons, though they very, vpry naturally slid into it on the first mention of New Zealand this session. The present question is a constitution, — a genuine chip of the old block, a cradle for the young British lion nursing at the antipodes. Happily this makes a story of itself, and can be considered without involving, the political philosophy of Sir George Gipps, the diplomacy of Captain Hobson, the blunders of Captain Fitzroy, the discretion of Bishop Selwyn, or the policy of our present ministers in their former term of power. The British population of New Zealand, amounting to that of a smaller metropolitan parish, wanted a constitution. When the Peel ministry went out in 1846, its coionial secretary had recognised and recorded the imperative necessity of giving free institutions to the colony. Lord Grey was nothing loth to act on this pledge, and, as the session was just closing, immediately brought in a bill intended to fulfil it. Perhaps it is unkind to criticise a constitution made on such a short notice. The order was very pressing, and if the article, did not fit when it came to be tried on, that is no more than what usually happens to coats, shoes, or anything else made without a fair allowance of time. The formula was that of the British constitution, at least so it was supposed. There were municipalities, containing mayors, aldermen, common councilmen, and everything comme ilfaut. These had local duties, and also elected members for a colonial Parliament. For simplicity's sake boroughs and shires were all one, and there was no invidious distinction of town and county members. The chief point, however, was the political unit, the constituent. That is a question which has puzzled all political philosophers. "Take care of your pence, and your pounds will take care of themselves ;" wl.ich j means, in this application, take care of your electors, and you may answer for your representatives. Lord Grey cut the knot on a very high principle. He proposed to make New Zealand a great literary commonwealth, consisting of the emeriti ot the schools. Everybody was to be allowed a vote who could read and write English. As far as the English were concerned, this was universal suffrage, and as New Zealand has not been able to escape that mixtuie of materials which obtains so generally elsewhere, there was every probability of at least one point of the charter being tried under the freest possible condition. Unfortunately, however, a rule which in one aspect was so nobly comprehensive, in another was the height ot exclusiveness. The test was something like the dish which the fox set before the stork, and which he licked clean before his guest could moisten the extremity of his bill. The natives were almost wholly excluded from this republic of letters. Many of them can talk English, the English of the market, easily enough. Thanks, too, to the pious pains of the missionaries, many of them can read and write their own language. But their practical and literary attainments do not happen to coincide. Aboriginal New Zealand, therefore, — that race wiih which we have recently had such severe collisions, which had been indoctrinated to our cost with European ideas of property, right, liberty, and glory, which had shewn itself so jealous, so ready to take offence, and so difficult to, be appeased — was almost utterly disfranchised by the new constitution. As soon, therefore, as that artitle came to hand, and was tried on the growing limbs of the youthful Golony, it was found a terrible misfit.' It was too long one way, too short another. Wbile it pinched the poor honest natives it hung rather loose about the British ragamuffins. What was to be done? Of all the miseries of human life a thorough bad fit is one of the most incurable. The contract uniforms of the militia it used to be said, could be adapted to a lesser stature by an immersion, quantum suf. } in a tub of water. But what could be done with a political garment which was at the same time too little and too big ? It could only be returned to the maker. That is what Governor Grey did in this instance. He suspended the new constitution, and sent it back with a particular account of its shortcomings and extravagances. We make no reflections. The mUcbance we are relating might have happened to any Colonial Secretary, to any colony, and any Governor for these fifty, ay, for these hundred years. Whether Re shall ever govern our colonies better than on the wholesale cut-and-dried plan, we know not. "But that is our present line. We make r blunders and mend them. By dint of hard cobhling we manage to 1 keep things just tolerably straight. The cobble in the present instance is as follows, and for

a modest piece of cobbling, pretending to be nothing more, we don't think it very much amiss. The "constitution" is to be suspended for five years, which means of course the same as the adjournment of a question to this day six months. It is useless to make a constitution without a more deliberate measurement of the party for whom it is ordered ; and a second failure would be disgraceful indeed. So Governor Grey, who seems to be a remarkably sensible and trustworthy man, is to be furnished with full powers of mending. In fact,, the constitution is put into his hands, or rather hung up in his shop. Young New Zealand will rejoice in the contemplation of the garsi ent in which its limbs will ultimately be arrayed. This pattern of universal suffrage of a nation of ready writers,N of learned corporations and a doctrinaire legislature, is to be suspended like the golden fleece before a hosier's shop. One day out aspiring antipodes will assume the lion's skin, with what propriety time alone can show. Meanwhile Governor Grey is to-be at work with his official goose and shears, from month to month, trying on the unlucky garment. He is to appoint ad interim qualifications, of a more vulgar and sublunary character, founded on £. s. d. as well as reading, writing, and arithmetic. He is also to give certificates of character, not for domestic service, but for political suffrage. When he has pieced and pruned for five years or fifty, as the case may happen to be, there will then we presume be a good examination of the colony as to its moral and literary attainments. The moral scrutiny will apply to the British, the literary to the natives. Should i he colony, now in statu pupillari, be found up to the mark, its degree will be granted. It will proceed 8.A., and be invested, not in the hood and gown, but in the full dignity of free institutions.