Amazing, really, how a word that once simply meant “property procured by spear” is now an esoteric mystical word worthy of a Hindu guru and meaning whatever its 21st century translators want it to mean. The problem for ordinary New Zealanders, Maori or Pakeha, is that the Waitangi Tribunal has official dibs on interpreting the Treaty, regardless of what ancient dictionaries or documents tell us the words really meant. Did the Maori expect every last inch of their lives to be controlled by British law? Probably not. Nor did Britain expect to intervene in their customary habits except to the extent alluded to by Lord Normanby in his instructions to Hobson: “Until they can be brought within the pale of civilised life, and trained to the adoption of its habits, they must be carefully defended in the observance of their own customs, so far as these are compatible with the universal maxims of humanity and morals.” That paragraph, right there, is tino rangatiratanga in action – the governance of daily life retained by Maori until such time as they seek further access to British laws, and subject to exception for matters like cannibalism and human sacrifice. It is submitted that no one in 1840 was really in the dark about what the Treaty meant. Overall sovereignty would transfer to Britain, day to day life would continue as normal for most Maori. Where there was intertribal conflict, or major crimes, British justice would intercede and adjudicate to the extent they were able. For routine matters, the rangatira – the ‘mayors’ – would sort it out within the hapu. In practical terms, with no army and next to no police force, the British colonial administration was pretty much powerless for its first few years, so Maori justice continued to exist by default, tempered by missionaries and the appointment of native assessors, or magistrates. To be fair, there was confusion within colonial ranks. In 1842 after Hobson’s death, upon reports of a tribe – who had not signed the Treaty – killing and eating members of a tribe who had – the Acting Governor Willoughby Shortland decided to impose the long arm of the law on the culprits. Chief Justice William Martin, Bishop Selwyn and Attorney-General Swainson tried to dissuade Shortland from his mission, primarily on the grounds of biting off more than they could chew, and secondly upon the novel legal argument that tribes who had not signed the Treaty were outside its jurisdiction. Historian and politician William Pember-Reeves would later describe this as “an opinion so palpably and daringly wrong that some have thought it a desperate device to save the country.” Certainly, the Colonial Office in London gave the New Zealand administration a swift kicking when it heard about it, “Her Majesty’s rule, said Lord Stanley, having once been proclaimed over all New Zealand, it did not lie with one of her officers to impugn the validity of her government.”200 Since 1972, however, the Treaty of Waitangi has taken on a modern spin of its own that appears to bear no resemblance to the way the Maori who signed it saw it. Lawyer and passionate treaty activist Annette Sykes summed up the views of many within Maoridom today when she wrote: “The … tribes have reached a crossroads in their journey to protect their sovereignty and self-determination. In recent decades these highly articulate tribal nations have been leaders in a number of political, legal and economic strategies that promote the recognition of individual tribal entities as sovereigns enjoying government-to government relationships with the New Zealand Government. Their cries for self government having being made in forums from the Waitangi Tribunal through to the United Nations, and from the hallowed halls of political power in Wellington through to rank and file protests on the street.”201 Yet here is what the 200 chiefs assembled at Kohimarama in 1860 were told by the Governor: “In return for these advantages the Chiefs who signed the Treaty of Waitangi ceded for themselves and their people to Her Majesty the Queen of England absolutely and without reservation all the rights and powers of Sovereignty which they collectively or individually possessed or might be supposed to exercise or possess.206 This is a key passage, so please note the Maori translation read to the chiefs in 1860: “…tino tukua rawatia atu ana e ratou ki Te Kuini o Ingarani nga tikanga me nga mana Kawanatanga katoa i a ratou katoa, i tenei i tenei ranei o ratou, me nga pera katoa e meinga kei a ratou”. The word “tukua” means “cede” or “surrender” and “nga tikanga” the laws and lore, and “mana Kawanatanga katoa” means all sovereign authority. Governor Gore Browne went on to read every clause of the English version of the Treaty, translated into Maori, into the record at Kohimarama for the chiefs to vote and comment on. If you were looking for clarification on what the Treaty of Waitangi meant at the time, you’ve found it. Every main concept in the English version of the Treaty was re-stated in Maori, before a congress of Maori leaders – the biggest gathering of Maori leaders ever held to that point. If there was ever a time to shout out “liar!”, this was it. If there was ever a time for Maori to say, “that’s not what we agreed to!”, this was it. So what did the paramount chiefs say? Sixty percent of those attending spoke in absolute explicit agreement with the way the Governor had described the Treaty and what it meant, and pledged their allegiance to Governor and Queen. A further 17% expressed similar sentiments, without making an outright declaration about it. Twenty one percent didn’t state an opinion on the matter, but talked of other things. Two percent appeared to be leaning against the Governor. The tribes, as they would say on Survivor, had spoken, and in doing so had ratified the Treaty of Waitangi as most people understand it: Eruera Kahawai (Ngatiwakaue, Rotorua): “Listen, ye people! There is no one to find fault with the Governor’s words. His words are altogether good.” Menehira Rakau, (Ngatihe, Maungatapu): “Let us inquire into the character of the Governor’s address. I did not hear one wrong thing in the speech of the Governor.” Rirituku Te Perehu, (Ngatipikiao, Rotoiti and Maketu): “The Governor’s address is right.” Henare Pukuatua, (Ngatiwakaue, Rotorua): “Listen my friends, the people of this runanga. I have no thought for Maori customs. All I think about now is what is good for me. I have been examining the Governor’s address. I have not been able to find one wrong word in all these sayings of the Governor, or rather of the Queen. I have looked in vain for anything to find fault with. Therefore I now say, O Governor, your words are full of light. I shall be a child to the Queen. Christ shall be the Saviour of my soul, and my temporal guide shall be the Governor or the Law. Now, listen all of you. I shall follow the Governor’s advice. This shall be my path forever and ever.” Tamihana Rauparaha, (Ngati Toa, Porirua): “The words we have heard this day are good.” Karaitiana Tuikau, (Ngati Te Matera, Hauraki): “The Governor’s words are good.” “The words of the Governor are good. Let the Queen be above all,” exclaimed Tohi, a Ngatiwhakaue chief. The list could stretch on and on. Suffice to say not one chief accused the Crown of lying when it said it had taken absolute sovereignty over New Zealand when the Treaty was signed. Constitutionally, their speeches and votes at the Kohimarama runanga amount to a full ratification of the English version of the Treaty, and it seems clear from the quotes above and on the preceding pages that the chiefs fully understood the concept of sovereignty. However, this is also the reason the Littlewood Treaty document becomes irrelevant – it was superseded by Kohimarama. For those who take issue, for example, with the “forests and fisheries” aspect of the Treaty, on the grounds that the words don’t appear in the Maori version, here’s the bad news: Governor Gore Browne read them into the record at Kohimarama, as you can see in his clauses listed earlier. This issue of attention to historical detail applies to goose and gander alike. The conference ratified sovereignty, but it also ratified forests and fisheries. So let’s pause for a moment and return to contemporary scholarship. In 1990, Professor Ranginui Walker wrote that rangatiratanga meant sovereignty and kawanatanga was merely a limited form of governorship: “The chiefs are likely to have understood the second clause of the Treaty as a confirmation of their own sovereign rights in return for a limited concession of power in kawanatanga. “The Treaty of Waitangi they signed confirmed their own sovereignty while ceding the right to establish a governor in New Zealand to the Crown. A governor is in effect a satrap…a holder of a provincial governorship; he was a subordinate ruler, or a colonial governor. In New Zealand’s case he governed at the behest of the chiefs…in effect the chiefs were his sovereigns.” In this respect, Walker follows treaty historian Claudia Orange who says rangatiratanga would be a “better approximation to sovereignty than kawanatanga.”207 And yet, you’ve seen what Maori – and some of the Kohimarama attendees had actually signed the Treaty personally – understood the Treaty to mean, and sovereignty to mean. Can the academic claims about the Treaty actually be reconciled with historical fact? It’s an important question. The meaning of the Treaty of Waitangi as it is currently pitched dominates public policy in this country, and it dominates the school curriculum. Our children are learning the academic version of the Treaty. There are many jobs you cannot be appointed to in the public sector unless you can demonstrate an acquaintance and allegiance to the modern interpretations of the Treaty. None of this is written to belittle the wrongs that were done to Maori in breach of the Treaty. That’s not what this is about. Those grievances in many cases are real and require settlement. But if we are going to be honest about our past, it cuts both ways. We cannot move forward unless we have a clear understanding of the foundations. If our opinions and beliefs about the Treaty in the 21st century are based on a misunderstanding about what 1840 Maori thought, then our opinions and beliefs are founded on a lie. What actually matters is what Maori at the time really did think they were signing. The only way to find that out is to listen to their voices, rather than engage in endless debates about the meaning of the words as we currently understand them. Anyone who wants to argue that Maori never ceded sovereignty can only do so by ignoring the Kohimarama runanga transcripts. For twenty or so years after Waitangi, tribal Maori pretty much had continued to enforce their own laws and customs, because the British colonial apparatus of state in New Zealand was weak and spread too thinly to administer British justice against Maori by force. It was either voluntary compliance, or it was nothing. What we see at Kohimarama, constitutionally, however, is an evolution of consent. After 20 years of partial integration, the chiefs not only ratified Waitangi in full but expressly called for a complete adoption of Pakeha tikanga. Let’s hear the chiefs on how they perceived sovereignty operating. Was the Governor a ruler in name only, or one with the power to enforce the law, even to hold these same chiefs to account: Hemi Metene Te Awaitaia: “I shall make the Governor’s address the subject of my speech. I shall speak first of the 4th clause, namely, – ‘In return for these advantages the chiefs who signed the Treaty of Waitangi ceded for themselves and their people to Her Majesty the Queen of England, absolutely and Without reservation, all the rights and powers of sovereignty which they collectively or individually possessed or might be supposed to exercise or possess.’ That was the union of races at Waitangi. I was there at the time, and I listened to the love Of the Queen. I then heard about the advantages of the treaty. “In my opinion the greatest blessings are Christianity and the Laws. While God spares my life I will give these my first concern. When I commit a wrong, then let me be brought before the Magistrate and punished according to law. [emphasis added] Those are the good things.” Winiata Pekamu Tohiteururangi: “The only thought that has occurred to me, is this – in former times I had but one lord (ariki), and now I shall have but one lord – only one. I shall have but one rule – not two. [emphasis added]”
Posted on: Tue, 09 Dec 2014 11:44:48 +0000
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