SIR GEORGE GREY AND THE CONSTITUTION.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4253, 6 November 1874, Page 2

SIR GEORGE GREY AND THE CONSTITUTION.

TO THE EDITOR. Sib, —When I before addressed you I showed how the estate of the clergy had lost the character which they had in the middle ages of a great constituent part of the realm and of the Parliament, and merged in the national representation. Precisely the same thing has happened, though not in the same way, to the great estate of the Barons or Military Tenants of the Crown. They, too, like the clergy, once had their own assembly, and voted their taxes, but by far the majority of them—those, namely, who were summoned through the Sheriff—have also merged, under the name of Knights of the Shire, in the national representative system. How striking is this made to appear, for instance, in the Act of Deposition of Richard 11. The parties to that affair are described as "pares et proceres regni Anglia: spirituales et temporalcs, ct ejus regni communitates, omnes status ejusdem regni reprcscntantes ;" and again in the Act of Henry's election they are described as "domini spirituales quam tarn tcmporales, et omnes regni status." Thus by this time the constituent elements of the national legislature are " the spiritual and temporal peers" and " the Commons, representing all the estates of the Kingdom." Sir G. Grey must seek models for his castiron estates from some other source than the constitutional history of England. Let us now consider Sir George's propositions as to the general and special virtues of the Federal system. We are told, " That the Provincial or Federal system has been perfectly successful in this country, and that under its influence the community has marvellously increased in population, wealth, and enlightenment." Well, as I before said, the success here of this system is an open question for the judgment of all. But as to the prosperity and progress, &c., being the result of the Provincial system, I am forcibly reminded of a complacent remark of Lord Chancellor Clarendon, wherein he dwells upon the great prosperity of the country at the very time of all the trouble about the illegal exaction of "ship-money," saying that the people were unreasonably dissatisfied with a few points in which the Crown may have transgressed the law, "but never imputing.the increase of their receipts, revenue, and. plenty, to the wisdom, virtue, and merit of the Crown." This is sharply criticised by Mr. Hallam, who shows that the prosperity of the country was quite independent of the Government, and, indeed, in spite of them. Their misgovernment was a coincidence, and lea«t of all the cause of the national prosperity. I am surprised to see Sir G. Grey, in his anxiety to get his ricketty child on its legs, descend to the use of an argument which is the stock nostrum and panacea of quacks of all sorts, political and other. "Good for one case, good for all;" that is the maxim of such people, George enlarges on the virtues of Federalism, and seems to believe that the system must be equally efficacious in all cases, without regard to geographical extent, political, moral and historical antecedents of the people, or even to the fact that the same political area may include within its federation

several diverse races of men. Then lie mentions the United States, Canada, Germany, and Italy. Mr. Stuart Mill has shown that historical parallels in general are quite valueless as arguments, unless you first show that the two cases agree in every other respect, besides the particular point to which your inference refers. But I must oppose to the name of Sir G. Grey countervailing authority on the special point of the Federal system. Lot us take again the same Mr. Edward Freeman who is°a]so the author of a standard work oil " The History of Federal Government.' That gentleman, writing in the Fortnightly Review for August last, says : —" The Federal connection is in its place whenever the several members to be united are fitted for, that species of union and for no other. It requires a sufficient degree of community in origin, or feeling, or interest, to allow the several members to work together up to a certain point. It requires that there should not be that perfect degree of community or rather identity which allows the several members to be fused together for all purposes. ... A Federal system is the right thing when it is a step in advance, but it is a wrong thing when it is a step backward. . . . . The voice of history for more than 2000 years, from the first glimpses of Greek Federation to the changes made this year in the Swiss Federal Constitution, texches one unvaried lesson, namely, that the federal relation is in its place when it tries to unite and not when it tries to disunite." This is admirably clear. Mr. Freeman thinks there may be cases in which Federalism may do positive mischief; instead of tending to union it may breed and maintain disunion. In fact, his plain meaning is that where the given country is by its peculiar circumstances capable of closer union and interdependence of • parts, Federalism is the wrong thing for that country. Significantly Switzerland is mentioned both by him and by that great thinker De Tocqueville. Quite in accordance with the canons thus laid down by him. above, Freeman tells us "that there is no'such thing as a Swiss nation in any but a\ political sense." De Tocqueville says, "In Switzerland, Ihe difference which exists between the Canton of -""Uri and the Canton of Vaud is equal to that between the fifteenth and nineteenth centuries." There are two very different species of socalled federal governments; one which is merely a system of confederated states, and in which the federal sovereignty addresses itself to the several states as such; and another, more properly a sort of composite state, wherein, the federal sovereignty addresses itself to the individuals in the states, and acts directly upon them. This latter form is called by De Tocqueville " an incomplete national government," a most happy expression, which he applies particularly to the system of the United States. All who take any interest in tin's question should read the section of the Bth chapter of the " Democracy in America," where the profound author discusses the advantages .ipd disadvantages of American Federalism. „-■'" specially valuable is his criticism, because, beyond doubt, it is from the American plan that what we have of Federalism has been copied. He shows how essential to this question i 3 the geographical extent, or even the political neighborhood of the given country. A small country may be so situated as not to need the system, and to be much happier without it, but on the other hand this system may be the only method of union and safety for a very large country or a number of small states. " The Federal system," says he, " was created with the intention of combining the different advantages which result from the greater and the lesser extent of nations." He enumerates three characteristic defects of the Federal .system. Ist. The great complexity of its structure—two sovereignties.are necessarily in presence of each other (p. 184). 2nd. The relative weakness of the Government of the Union —the most fatal of all the defects. 3rd. The Federal system is not only _ deficient in every kind of centralised administration, but the Central Government itself is imperfectly organised. That person must be blind indeed who has lived in this colony for some years and does not see that we have for twenty years been cursed with every.one of these political weaknesses without the smallest accession of strength by way of set-off —nay, in a little insular country like ours, such a system can produce nothing but weakness. The third point here enumerated by De Tocqueville contains a most important distinction which must be elucidated by the light of another famous passage in a previous part of the book, namely, his famous distinction between centralisation of Administration and centralisation of Government. This will tend to clear up the real nature and objects of our political parties, and will give me a chance to make a remark on the names of these parties, which I have long wished to make. " There exist," says De Tocqueville, " two distinct kinds of centralisation, which it is necessary to discriminate with accuracy. Certain interests are common to all parts of a nation, such as the enactment of its general laws, and the maintenance of its foreign relations. Other interests are peculiar to certain part 3 of the nation ; such, for instance, as the business of different townships. When the which directs the general interests is centred in one place, or vested in the same £ In like manner, the power of directing partial " or local interests, when brought together in one place, constitutes what may be termed a central administration. Upon some points these two kinds of centralisation coalesce ; but by classifying the objects which fall more particularly within the province of each of them, they may be easily distinguished. ... In Englafid, the centralisation of the government is carried to great perfection ; the State has the compact vigor of a man. In the United States no central administration, and no dependent series of public functionaries exist. Local authority has been carried to unusual lengths, but in the United States the centralisation of government is complete, and national power is more compact than it ever has been in the old nations of Europe. . • • r l' ne State and the townships possess all the power requisite to conduct public business. There is no Assembly which directly or indirectly represents the county." It has, therefore, no , political existence. A twofold tendency may be discerned in the American Constitutions, which impels the legislator to centralise the Legislative and to disperse the Executive power. . . All the townships united have but one representative, which is the State, the centre of the national authority; beyond the action of the township and that of the nation, nothing can be said to exist but the influence of individual exertion." How our Colonial party ever came to accept at the hands of their opponents such an ambiguous and misleading designation as the "Centralising party" is what I never could understand. The name invariably connotes to British ears " administrative centralisation," the very thing which that party have labored to prevent, and which the Provincial party have most consistently practised in the provinces. The clear aim of the Colonial party always has been to bring about "organisation of the Government," which to this day we have not, and which the Provincial party never will permit if they can help it. Where, on the face of this earth, was there ever beheld such a perfect system of central administration as the New Zealand provinces ? Thus, under this sacred and model Constitution, we have ingeniously contrived to combine in one system the characteristic maladies of opposite schemes of polity ; inBtead of a National Parliament, we have a periodical congress of log-rolling provincial delegates, under the leadership of a set of practically independent feudatories, and instead of really local and municipal bodies we liave a system of the most complete administrative hierarchies on earth,despotically wielded bythe game feudal potentates. When the discussion comes on in the Assembly, those early despatches of Sir G. Grey, quoted by your contemporary the Thames Advertiser, will throw some rare light on this point. The absolute necessity of fortifying every step with the authority of quotations has unduJx extended this communication, and I Bhall therefore have to defer to another occasion the consideration of that precious liberty which we have enjoyed of electing our superintenilental rulers. I am, &c, J. H. Shaw, L.L.B.