their hopes of obtaining free institutions; and year after year disappointed those hopes, and, on some flimsy pretext, broken his word. British Guiana, Jamaica, and the rest of the West Indies look upon him as their worst foe, and as the enemy to economy and retrenchment. Canada taunts him with its trembling Governor1 rewarded for his prowess with a British peerage, and makes his policy a pretext for seeking to be annexed to the United States. Ceylon and the Ionian Islands accuse him of having with indecent haste approved of and rewarded deeds that disgrace the British name, and in the opinion of Europe rival in atrocity those of Haynau and Radetzky. And Malta taxes him with conduct unworthy of an Englishman, in refusing asylum to political exiles, and thus setting a bad example, of which the despots of Europe too gladly avail themselves. Thus, from every quarter, north, south, east, and west, from Canada and Australia, from the West Indies and South Africa, charges are brought against the present Secretary of State for the Colonies of injudicious appointments, ignorance, negligence, vacillation, breach of faith, and tyranny. Though all the colonies unanimously cry out against the noble earl, yet I maintain that it is not the individual, but the system, which is the real cause of the existing discontent; and that as long as that system is unreformed, it matters not who may be the Secretary of State for the Colonies, discontent will prevail throughout the colonies; and every year it will increase in intensity, menace the stability of our colonial empire, and threaten its forcible tearing asunder, to be accompanied perhaps by hateful civil 1 Lord Elgin.

wars, with vast expenditure and much misery both to this country and to the colonies. To avert this impending danger, Parliament must hasten to make a complete and thorough reform of our system of colonial government. There is no time to be lost. There has been too much delay already.

The noble lord the Prime Minister challenges those persons who blame the existing system of colonial government, and at the same time wish to retain our colonial empire, to point out the line of policy which they think should be adopted. I will attempt to grapple with the challenge of the noble lord; not by expressing in abstract terms my opinions with respect to colonial polity, but by offering some observations on the provisions of the measure which the noble lord proposes to introduce for the government of the Australian colonies.

With regard to the government of a colony there appear to me to be two distinct questions to be considered: first, the form of government; secondly, the powers to be delegated to the colonial authorities. With respect to the form of government proposed for the Australian colonies, the noble lord said that the present Bill is a reproduction of the Bill of last year; and the noble lord rather surprised me when he declared that by means of that Bill he intended to give to the Australian colonies a copy of the British Constitution, that copy being the present constitution of New South Wales. Now, let me describe to the Committee what is the constitution of that colony. Suppose that 110 members of this House had seats in virtue of holding office under the Crown, and for as long only as they held office; and that in addition to

the 110 official members, there were 110 other members who were appointed members by the Government at the commencement of every Parliament, making in all 220 votes at the disposal of the executive. Suppose, likewise, that the House of Lords were abolished, and that, instead of her Gracious Majesty Queen Victoria, we had a governor of the ordinary description; then we should enjoy the benefits of the British Constitution after the fashion of New South Wales. How would such a constitution work with us? We should be divided into two permanent factions, actuated by the fiercest hatred of each other. One party would pride itself upon being the representatives of the people, and would look with scorn and contempt upon the other party as the base and subservient tools of the Government. No question would be considered to be settled which was decided against the wishes of the elective members, and the official and nominated members would be held up to public odium and hatred if they ever presumed to defeat the wishes of the elective members. It is evident that in theory such a constitution is absurd, and that in practice it must be a very bad

one.

The second question is, What powers ought to be delegated to the colonial authorities? This appears to me to be a far more important question than that of the mere form of a colonial government. I am sorry to find, from the statement of the noble lord, that he intends that the Colonial Office shall retain its present arbitrary power of disallowing all Acts of the colonial legislatures, and of otherwise interfering in the internal affairs of the colonies. This

arbitrary power has been, and as long as it exists I believe it will continue to be, a perpetual cause of colonial discontent and of never-ending discord between the colonies and the Imperial Government. For all the colonies complain bitterly of the power of the Colonial Office; and these complaints are frequently but too well founded. How is it possible they can be otherwise than well founded? Consider who are the persons who are entrusted with this arbitrary power. The heads of the Colonial Office change with every change of Government. They are absentee rulers, living at the distance of many thousands of miles from their subjects. They never have ocular experience of the condition of the colonies. They have no personal interest in the well-being of the colonists. They are always obliged to trust to second-hand and partial information with regard to the colonies. They are therefore generally ignorant, and, worse than ignorant, they are generally misinformed about colonial questions. They are said to be responsible to Parliament; but that responsibility is a farce; for we cannot spare time to attend to colonial affairs; we cannot obtain accurate and important information about the colonies; we are, therefore, necessarily ignorant; and our system of colonial government may with accuracy be described as government by the misinformed, with responsibility to the ignorant. This kind of government is most bitterly distasteful to men of our race and habits. How should we feel if we were colonists distant a myriad of miles from our mother country, and were liable to have our Acts of Parliament disallowed at the whim and caprice of some noble lord at the

Antipodes, responsible to a Parliament sitting at Sydney, and knowing nothing about us? How should we like to have to wait three years before we could be certain that our Acts of Parliament are laws? Why does the noble lord retain this arbitrary power to the Colonial Office? The noble lord said. that the Colonial Office is the guardian of Imperial interests, and ought therefore to retain the power of disallowing Acts of the colonial legislatures, lest those legislatures should make laws injurious to imperial interests. I readily acknowledge that means should be taken to prevent the colonial legislatures from making laws injurious to imperial interests; but I deny that it is necessary for this purpose that the Colonial Office should retain arbitrary power. I would propose a substitute for that power, by means of which, I believe that imperial interests would be guarded without producing colonial discontent.

I would divide all executive and legislative powers, with reference to a colony, into two distinct classes. One class I would call imperial powers, because they ought to be strictly reserved. to the Imperial Government; and they ought to be so reserved, because they are indispensable for the maintenance of the unity of the empire, and for the management of the common concerns of the whole empire. Therefore they ought on no account to be delegated to the colonies, and the colonial legislatures ought not to be entitled to make any laws affecting or derogating from imperial powers; for, if they were entitled so to do, the unity of the empire would be destroyed. Now, all other executive and legislative powers with reference to a