Great, we’ve made to the second sentence of Article two of the Treaty of Waitangi which says:
“But the chiefs of the Confederation of United Tribes and the other chiefs grant to the Queen, the exclusive rights of purchasing such lands as the proprietors thereof may be disposed to sell at such prices as may be agreed upon between them and the person appointed by the Queen to purchase from them.”
It looks pretty simple, doesn’t it. The chiefs were going to only trade their land with the British Crown. There were two conditions that needed to be satisfied when Maori chiefs sold their land.
Maori had to want to sell the land i.e. they had to be “disposed to sell”
The British right from the get go wanted to protect Maori, making sure that they didn’t sell land that they needed for production of food for themselves.
Lord Normanby, Hobson superior, and said in this 4200 word brief to Hobson “ “You will not, for example, purchase from them any territory the retention of which by them would be essential or highly conducive to their [i.e. Maori] own comfort, safety, or subsistence.”
Maori had to agree to the price i.e. the British government were keen to protect Maori from land sharks and entrepreneurs. When they purchased Maori land there was to be no bullying, intimidation or coercion. Dealings had to be fair, honest, and transparent.
Once again, hear the words of Lord Normanby to Hobson “All dealings with the natives for their lands must be conducted on the same principles of sincerity, justice and good faith as must govern your transactions with them for the recognition of Her Majesty’s sovereignty in the Islands. Nor is that all: they must not be permitted to enter into any contracts in which they might be ignorant and unintentional authors of injuries to themselves.”
The British even appointed what they called “A Protector of the Aborigines” in April 1840. His name was George Clarke. He was a missionary who’d been in NZ since 1824. He as fluent in Maori language and customs. He was to act for Maori, making sure they were not ripped o[, and act for the Crown, getting land for a good price. This role was inherently contradictory, but nonetheless, it was what it was.
On the surface, it seemed that it was going to be easy for the British to buy land from Maori
The truth of the matter was very di[erent, and here is why.
Remember I talked in previous videos about how it was top of mind for the British to survey Maori land, establish boundaries, and issue titles? In this way, purchasers would know what they were buying (i.e. the exact boundaries were marked and put in writing) and sellers knew what they were selling (i.e. the exact boundaries were marked and put into writing)? This was called “Establishing Crown Title.”
“Establishing Crown Title”would, in the eyes of the British, go a long way to eliminating misunderstanding between sellers and buyers, reducing the chance of misunderstanding or dispute…or wars.
However, the British found buying Maori land an incredible challenge. Why? Maori land was ‘owned’ by either a chief and his family, or a Maori family within the tribe That is to say, it was always communally owned.
The majority of family members had to agree to a sale before the land could be sold.
As far as the British were concerned, a chief did not have the right to sell land occupied by a Maori family in his tribe. He only had authority to sell the land of his own family. Furthermore, if families inside a tribal area wanted to sell, they had to get the permission of the whole family.
Other factors made things even more complicated. For example, even after the Treaty was signed, tribes were still fighting and warring over land. If land was conquered, taken from a weak tribe by a strong tribe, who ‘owned’ the conquered land? The conquerors, or the conquered?
The British asked questions like “How long does a piece of conquered land need to be occupied by the conqueror, in order to be deemed theirs, and therefore able to be sold?”
“20 years” said Governor Gore Brown.1
Ian Wishhart in his excellent book “The Great Divide. The Story Of New Zealand And Its Treaty ” says “The Crown had always maintained that because it recognised communal ownership of ancestral lands, it was also prepared to recognise the ability of hapu family groups to sell the plots that they had personally lived on and controlled. The government would not, however recognise that a chief had personal sovereignty rights over [an entire] tribe or hapu's land, precisely in the same fashion that it refused to allow any other tribal member to individually sell tribal land. If it was communally owned, argued o[icials, then it was communally owned, and the smallest units they would deal with were hapu or extended whanau speaking solely for land under their direct control.”2
It would be true to say that if Maori did not hold land communally, and Crown titles could have been issued easily and without complication, Maori would have sold all the land in New Zealand 10x over before 1845. The reason?
1 Ian Wishart. The Great Divide. The Story of New Zealand And Its Treaty. Howling At The Moon Publishing. 2012. p. 256
2 Ian Wishart. The Great Divide. The Story of New Zealand And Its Treaty. Howling At The Moon Publishing. 2012. p. 222
Maori lusted for British goods (e.g. muskets, shot, powder, pots, pans, livestock of all kinds imported by the British, clothes, metal implements, sheet iron, just to name a few).
Money from land sales could buy Maori what they really wanted and the British had what they wanted.
Another reason Maori were so keen to sell their land?
They wanted settlers to set up next to their pa sites so that they could trade with them. In other words, settlers brought trade, and Maori wanted a slice of the action. Ultimately, it was about money, and Maori wanted as much of it as they could get their hands on.
I have no problem with this, but let’s reject the activist narrative that a. Maori land is sacred, and they would never have sold it and b. they were forced to sell their land and c. they didn’t realise that when they ‘sold’ their land that it was gone forever. Clearly, a, b, and c are BS.
Historian Dr Matthew Wright reports “Europes plants and tools transformed the basis of Maori subsistence economics, and many hapu swung their productivity into producing flax, and potatoes for trade.
This rising demand for consumables, including tobacco, clothing, liquor, seeds and munitions, locked Maori into an economic relationship with industrial-age Britain. European goods-blankets, mirrors, needles, pipes, pots and clothing also became part of a new currency of mana, a way in which status could be asserted.
[Observing all this, one missionary wrote] “now young New Zealand believes in nothing but money.” 3
Governor Fitzroy reported back to the House of Commons stressing what he regarded as “the exorbitant prices the natives were asking for their lands.”4
During Fitzroy’s term as governor, he also reported “…a growing demand on the part of the natives to dispose of their lands without government interference or control.”
(Attwood, 293)
In other words, Maori were complaining that the British Crown were not buying their land fast enough!
So far in this video, we’ve looked at Article 2, sentence 2 of the Treaty and what it means.
We’ve knocked over two of the big three myths pumped out by activists today regarding Maori land sales. They say Maori were:
1. diddled out of their land, 2. or they were forced to sell it
We’ve shown these to be completely false.
But what about the third myth? That Maori had their land unlawfully confiscated? Let’s finish by knocking this one over too.
3 Matthew Wright. Illustrated History of New Zealand. David Bateman Press. 2013. p51
4 Dr Bain Attwood. Empire And The Making Of Native Title. Cambridge University Press. 2022. page 252.)
“Some have said that these confiscations were wrong and that they contravened the articles of the Treaty of Waitangi.
The Government placed in the hands of the Queen of England, the sovereignty and the authority to make laws.
Some sections of the Maori people violated that authority. War arose from this and blood was spilled.
The law came into operation and land was taken in payment. It was their own chiefs who ceded that right to the Queen.
“The confiscations cannot therefore be objected to in the light of the Treaty”5
Please order this book from Tross Publishing and read it carefully. Its author, Dr John Robinson examines our history in detail.
The basic thesis of the book is that the Crown have kept the Treaty and that it’s Maori who have broken the Treaty.
And given that all payouts and settlements to Maori are based on the Crown having breached the Treaty, they ought never to have happened.
It’s a fascinating read.
5 Sir Apirana Ngata. The Treaty Of Waitangi. An Explanation. pp 15-16