and will vote that our Australian colonists are so morally degraded, and so intellectually despicable, that they ought not to be entrusted with institutions, which theory and experience have proved to be best adapted for the government of similar communities of Anglo-Saxon men in every other portion of the globe.

ON MOTION TO RECOMMIT AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT BILL.

MAY 6.

It was

[This motion was seconded by Mr. Adderley. defeated by a majority of 123: Ayes, 42; Noes, 165. Both Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Disraeli voted in the minority.]

SIR, I move that this Bill be recommitted, for the purpose of omitting all clauses, which empower the Colonial Office to disallow colonial acts, to cause colonial Bills to be reserved, and to instruct colonial governors as to their conduct in the local affairs of these colonies; and for the purpose also of adding clauses enumerating and defining imperial and colonial powers.

Sir, the House may remember, that in committee I waived my right to oppose the 5th and 11th clauses of this Bill, which would continue to the Colonial Office its present powers of interfering in the local affairs of the Australian colonies. I did so for the convenience of the Committee, and on an agreement with the noble lord, the Prime

Minister, that on the bringing up of the report I should be entitled to raise the important question involved in those clauses, and to take the sense of the House on that question alone. I therefore now propose to recommit this Bill. I do so, as I have already stated, first, for the purpose of omitting from it all clauses by which the Colonial Office would be empowered to interfere with the management of the local affairs of these colonies; secondly, for the purpose of adding certain clauses which I have submitted to the consideration of the House, and which would give to these colonies the uncontrolled management of their local affairs. The question, therefore, for the House now to decide is, between Colonial Office government and self-government in the local affairs of these colonies.

I must begin by observing that this Bill raises two distinct questions. First, the special question, what ought to be the form of the government of the Australian colonies? That question was fully debated and decided in committee, and I do not presume to ask the House to reverse the decision of the Committee. The other, and in my opinion the far more important question, has not been discussed. It is the great question of colonial polity, namely, what amount of self-government ought our colonies to possess, and to what extent ought they to be subject to the controlling power of the Colonial Office? Upon the answer which Parliament shall finally give to this question will depend the future constitution of the Colonial Empire of Great Britain. And I believe, according as that constitution shall be well or ill framed, our

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Colonial Empire will last long or speedily perish. The noble lord the Prime Minister, in his great speech on the introduction of this Bill, distinctly admitted that the Australian colonies ought to possess the greatest amount of self-government that is not inconsistent with the integrity and wellbeing of the whole empire. It must be acknowledged that this Bill would not fulfil the intentions of the noble lord in that respect, but would merely continue to the Colonial Office its present powers of interfering in the local affairs of the colonies. For if it pass unamended, there is not one single act which a colonial governor or a colonial parliament can do without the express or implied consent of the Colonial Office, nor one act which may not be reversed by the Colonial Office. I ask the House to consider carefully what are to be the powers of the Colonial Office under this Bill.

First, by this Bill, the Colonial Office would possess the power of instructing every colonial governor as to his conduct in all colonial matters. The governor would be bound to obey his instructions, whether he liked them or not. For instance, he would have to assent to a Bill of which he disapproved; he would have to dissent from a Bill of which he approved, if so commanded from the Antipodes. He would be, therefore, a mere puppet, moved to and fro by wires attached to Downing Street. By pulling those wires the Colonial Office would at once be able to put a stop to any colonial legislation; for instance, if this Bill were to pass, the Colonial Office could make a colonial governor set aside every one of its much-vaunted provisions, and could prevent a colonial legislature from

amending its constitution, from altering the salaries of its chief functionaries, from discharging useless functionaries, from reducing expenditure, and from appropriating money to the payment of any services which the Colonial Office might dislike to have performed.

Secondly, this Bill, in addition to empowering the Colonial Office to instruct a colonial governor how he is to act in all colonial matters, would require, in many cases, that a colonial governor should abstain altogether from acting until he have sent to the other side of the globe, and ascertained the pleasure of the Colonial Office. For by this Bill a colonial governor would be absolutely required to reserve certain colonial Bills; he would be able to reserve any colonial Bill; and he would be bound to reserve any colonial Bill which the Colonial Office might instruct him to reserve. These reserved Bills would have to be sent to Downing Street; there they would await the signification of the pleasure of the Colonial Office, and if that pleasure should not be signified within the course of two years, then the colonial Bill would be lost altogether. Thus, a Bill of great importance to a colony, affecting, perhaps very injuriously some interests, and very beneficially other interests (say, for instance, a Bill of the same importance to a colony as the Corn Law or Ten Hour Bill was to this country)—such a Bill, if it were reserved, would remain for one year at least, and might remain for three years, suspended over a colony, keeping a colony in a state of doubt and anxiety, and engendering the worst feelings towards the Colonial Office and the mother country.

Thirdly, this Bill, in addition to giving the Colonial Office absolute control over all the acts of the colonial governor, would empower the Colonial Office ultimately to annul every act of a colonial governor or of a colonial parliament; for by this Bill the Colonial Office would have power to disallow any colonial Act within two years after its arrival in Downing Street. Thus, after a colonial Act has been in full operation for three years, to the universal satisfaction of the colonists, it might be suddenly annulled by the arrival of a despatch from the Secretary of State for the Colonies. Thus, strictly speaking, by this Bill the Colonial Office would continue to have the power, in the first instance, of preventing anything from being done in a colony by a colonial governor or a colonial parliament; and it would have the power, in the second instance, of making null and void every thing which might be done by a colonial government or a colonial parliament.

Sir, you will acknowledge, that these are vast powers of government. To whom are they to be entrusted? To gentlemen, able and laborious, without doubt, but who have never had ocular experience of the condition of a colony, who have no personal interest in the well-being of the colonists, who are always obliged to trust to second-hand and partial information on all colonial matters, who are, therefore, necessarily ignorant and generally misinformed with regard to colonial affairs, and who, consequently, with the best intentions, cannot fail to commit numerous and grave errors in the management of the local affairs of the colonies, errors similar to those which every one admits that they have committed

M.

BB