A.—No. 2i

The Acts now in operation for defining the powers and regulating the practice of the Native Land Court are the four following :—The Native Lands Act, 1865, No. 71; The Native Lands Act, 1867, No. 43 ; The Native Lands Act, 1868, No. 55 ; The Native Lands Act, 1869, No. 26. It is believed that, unless these Acts be thoroughly and speedily revised and amended, great public mischief will eDsue. In January, 1870, Karaitiana, of Hawke's Bay, visited Auckland for the purpose of laying before the Native Minister the grievances of himself and others, arising out of the operation of the abovenamed Acts. Further inquiry into the subject has shown that his statements were well founded, and that ho had discerned the weak points in the existing system, through which the injustice of which he complained had found an entrance. Moreover, it has now become known that many like grievances exist, and that the Court itself has come to be regarded by many of the most intelligent Natives with strong suspicion and dislike. The visible results of the system are naturally imputed to the Court itself, and are bitterly felt as a disappointment and a wrong by intelligent men who have hitherto trusted our law and conformed to it. If we allow these men to be alienated, we shall have small chance of winning over the Native people at large to an acceptance of our law. The two chief grievances complained of relate to Certificates and Crown Grants issued under the above Acts. 1. They complain that these instruments are so framed as to put it in the power of a few persons named in the instrument, to sacrifice the rights of other persons equally interested in the land but not named in the instrument. They assert that in many cases that power has been actually exercised, to the great loss of persons who had no means of protecting themselves. This complaint is just and well founded. By the Native Lands Act of 18G5, section 23, it is enacted that " The Court shall ascertain the right, title, estate, or interest of the applicant, and of all other claimants ; and the Court shall order a Certificate of title to be made and issued, which Certificate shall specify the names of the persons or of the tribe who, according to Native custom, own or are interested in the land, describing the nature of such estate or interest." By the same Act, the Governor is empowered to cause a grant from the Crown to be issued to the persons named in the Certificate. The original enactment was so framed as to secure the object of the Act as stated in the preamble, " the ascertainment of the owners" meaning, doubtless, all the owners. But upon that enactment a proviso was grafted, out of which these troubles have arisen, namely, " That no certificate shall be ordered to more than ten persons." This was added, no doubt, for the purpose of avoiding the inconvenience which would, in many cases, lie in the way of a person desiring to rent or buy land, if it were necessary for him to deal directly with all the owners. It was therefore provided that such intending lessee or purchaser should have a limited number of persons to deal with, and that the names of these persons should appear on the face of the document. That was a very reasonable object, and capable of being attained, as we shall see presently, without any unjust or injurious consequences. It could not be intended that the convenience of the purchaser was to be secured by ignoring or sacrificing the rights of any of the owners. The grievance of which we now hear is this: that the proviso and the original enactment have not been reconciled, but that the proviso has been allowed to overrule and defeat the substantive enactment to which it is appended ; that, although the land comprised in the Certificate may belong to more than ten persons, a Certificate is granted which names only ten of the owners, and gives no indication of the existence of other owners; that the ten persons named in the Certificate or the Grant have not, on the face of the Certificate or the Grant, been made to appear as only joint owners with others unnamed and trustees or agents for those others, but have appeared on the face of those instruments as the sole and absolute owners ; that, as such, they have, either of their own motion, or being induced by other parties, conveyed the land to purchasers; and that in this way many persons have been deprived of their rights. To the sufferers hereby the loss appears to be a direct consequence of an act of the Court itself. They ask why the Certificate and the Grant were not so framed as to show the true state of facts ? Why all the owners were not protected by the law ? As to the future, this mischief is to some extent guarded against by a valuable enactment introduced into the Native Lands Act of 1867, section 17; but the remedy is not completely effective. Under that section, the names of all the persons interested in the land are to be, not indeed shown on the face of the Certificate or indorsed thereon, but registered in the Court; and the Certificate is to contain merely a reference to this section of the Act, but not any distinct form of words to show that the persons named as owners are at the same time trustees for other owners. This section further provides that no portion of the land is to be alienated except for twenty-one years, until it be actually subdivided among the owners. As to Certificates issued before this Act of 1867, there appears to be no check as yet provided against the evils above mentioned. 2. Another serious grievance arises from the fact that in the Crown Grant so made to ten persons, under the earlier Native Lands Acts, the interests, even of the several grantees themselves, however diverse and unequal, are not defined. By the Native Lands Act of 1869, section 14, it is enacted that for the future " every Grant shall contain the definition of the estate or interest of each of the grantees which is required to be set forth in the Certificate under the Act of 1867; and also that the estate or interest of each of the several grantees, whether theretofore granted or thereafter to be granted, shall not be deemed to be equal

MEMORANDUM BY SIR WILLIAM MARTIN ON THE OPERATION OF THE NATIVE LANDS COURT.