Māori did not cede sovereignty when they signed the Treaty.
There are two versions of the Treaty, the English and Māori version.
The Māori version doesn’t cede sovereignty.
Most Māori signed the Māori version.
NZ is signed up to UN Declarations that specifically state if there are two versions of a Treaty, the one in the indigenous language takes precedence.
The idea that at the time of the signing, 100 000 Māori were handing power over to 2000 pakeha settlers is so farcical only banjo twanging, cross burning rednecks believe that.
HOWEVER
Stating that Māori did not cede sovereignty doesn’t mean the Crown isn’t sovereign!
Of course the Crown is sovereign.
In two very simple ways
1 – Basic osmosis – the State has the military, police, taxation structure, judicial systems – Crown is Sovereign!
2 – In all the Treaty settlements, the signing Iwi acknowledges the sovereignty of the Crown.
The sovereignty of the Crown is not in dispute, what is in dispute is how do you govern over a people who didn’t cede sovereignty!
THAT is what the Treaty Principles are all about!
An academic and legal solution to how a Sovereign state rules over an indigenous people who didn’t cede sovereignty.
The Principles are a grey zone wriggle room where the State is obliged to work with Māoridom and where pragmatic Pakeha and pragmatic Māori found ways to work together to put flesh on the bones on the promise of the Treaty.
Don’t forget, at the time of the late 70s and early 80s when the Principles were forged, there were MANY Māori who decried the Principles, who argued they had Sovereign power over themselves and would never compromise that for mere co-governance!
But, the pragmatic took up what was offered and built upon that.
This is why ACT’s attack on the Principles is such a malicious and race baiting stunt.
ACT want to gift the angry reactionary electorate a 19th Century White Settler privilege and cement that into place.
The Treaty Principles Referendum is an attempted Sovereignty by Conquest without the bloodshed!
Removing the Principles removes the obligation of the State to work with Māori.
This isn’t race rights, this is legal rights!
The Indigenous People of our country have legal rights!
To force a $4million vanity project that has no chance of passing when so many other public services are being slashed is one thing, making it a referendum on minority rights by the majority is completely another!
It’s insult plus injury plus more insult plus more injury plus the charge for the uber drive home!
ACT are effectively re-writing the meaning of the Treaty with zero agreement from Māori with the intention to then foist this re-written meaning on to them.
What makes anyone think that Māori will agree to this???
I don’t shy away from the debate, I believe we urgently require it to highlight just how intellectually bankrupt and shallow this inane proposal is! Kiwis should feel encouraged to engage and ask questions and challenge ideas, that’s the beauty of a liberal progressive democracy, but don’t think regurgitating ZB talking points amounts to a debate.
Let’s debate, but let’s honestly appraise how terrible ACTs idea is so that we can discuss the constitutional arrangements moving forward.
Treaty’s aren’t supposed to be settled, they are supposed to be honoured!
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There in lies the problem .ACTS owners ,the rich white fellows ,no want whats left so they can throw Maori on the scrap heap .Those same people are really concerned how Maori are showing up in the business world and kicking very large goals with the mere $2.9 billion they have been paid for their stolen land .Just the other day I read about the Maori owned dairy factory near Taupo that could well be the most ECO sustainable in the world .They are even moving their tanker fleet to Hydrogen power with their very own Hydrogen making plant on site .The government is now moving to strip Maori of the sea bed so it can be mined into a desert with no marine life left .They will also allow fishing companies to plunder fish stock into extinction which is already happening to Tahraki fish .
While a Treaty “Debate” to turn the clock back on Maori aspiration is a huge distraction from the right – look over here while we shaft most people on health, education, welfare, pensions, taxes – it is possible Seymour does not understand recent NZ History.
Cast your mind back to the eighties – look at the footage of the protests outside the final Springbok test in 1981, consider that radical people went to Libya for training, military weapons deals were being made, groups were in the hills.
Then peace was made before any shit could start kicking off. The agreement was corporate recognition for Maori leaders, reparation investments, some govt land transfers, a special advantage in purchasing surplus govt lands, media companies, language promotion, other stuff.
That is the Treaty Principles deal. It’s mainly a cultural deal without any great economic cost to Pakeha. What purpose is served by undoing that deal?
What happens if there is a slur-filled six-month debate and this bicultural deal is undone and followed with years of division? Ross Muerant recognises the underlying power of indigenous gangs and a third of the army are Maori. Seymour either doesn’t understand what he is doing or he is a Can Opener – for who?
The problem is that the only way Maori can have sovereignty over themselves is to have a separate state (as in apparatus and implementation). It is too late to draw up boundaries on a map and simply state Maori only laws will be endorsed and followed within those boundaries.
So are Maori in favour of abolishing the Maori seats in parliament, setting up a Maori parliament fully funded by Maori taxation, to set Maori laws for Maori to abide by, develop a Maori police force to maintain the laws and a Maori judicial to maintain law and order.
For this is the only way Maori sovereignty can be developed unless you want to overthrow the “one person, one equal vote” democracy.
Next you need to define what are Maori owned “common” area’s. Seabed and Foreshore? Fisheries?, Water? etc. Common areas are places or assets used by Maori and the Crown (the Crown representing ALL other races).
You need to consider infrastructure usage such as Roads, Airports, Railways, Ports, Radio Waves, etc. How will Maori contribute to maintain the common infrastructure? (good reason to bring in user charges).
I really don’t see in a, one vote per person, democracy you can have any other system but a separate Maori sovereignty responsible for their own people. Cant have a bob each way.
Question of confiscated lands has been addressed through the treaty settlement process. The land cannot be physically handed back if in private ownership so monetary compensations were made in full and final settlements:. Be hard to roll that back by handing private land back and Maori repaying the crown for all the settlements made.
As has been stated the Crown has ultimate sovereignty over ALL New Zealanders, there is absolutely nothing to stop Maori setting up their own parliament, taking Maori on their voter rolls and Maori owned businesses, even a wealth tax on IWI and Hapu assets.
Maori could have a choice, pay taxation to the crown and vote in the New Zealand parliament or pay taxes to the Maori parliament and place their vote there.
There has never been an issue with the treaty in its current format. It has Hobsons Pledge, ACT and Don Brash written all over it. What is the financial gain they want from this? Foreign ownership for ACT donors would be my understanding of this.
The first comment is looking in the right place. This isn’t about sovereignty any more than moving to a city fringe and renovating a villa is about historic preservation. It has been pointed out how unusual it was for the British Empire to enter into such a treaty during that era, and we could assume that they have won sovereignty without bloodshed, which is a good thing. Anything maori would otherwise be almost non existent by now.
The discussion about “principles”is just a front for the real and far more contemporary way of accumulating money and legal power. That mightn’t have been such a bad thing either, if the goals, culture, and economic theory driving it were realistic, or imaginative. All statements from the pro “principles” crowd seem be to along the lines that they want to do whatever they want whenever they want, with anyone and anything. They call that, “self determination”, which it isn’t. Anything to the contrary damages their “dignity”. If you have heard that sort of thing before, let it go – it’ll just turn into a time wasting sideshow.
Somewhere near to but just below the surface of the fake principles discussion will be plans that require scooping up something that doesn’t currently belong to the National Party interest groups, or that stands in the way of short to medium term profits. That’s where the discussion should take place, revealing true motivations, discussing why our nation would go in that tried and failed direction, and where it might otherwise realistically go. Here is a golden opportunity for our fifth estate. I’m not buying the race themes. They simply aren’t plausible. Any faction that raises race/racial violence/social cohesion etc is protecting their own power/profit interests.
We should by now be able to bear the thought that “this did not happen in a vacuum”. If our news outlets can run headlines that suggest maori are being chased away from doctors offices with sticks and get away with it, they could also choose to be actual journalists and control an independent dialogue which would be far more powerful and influential. The opportunities to take control of these so-called “crises” happen over and over and every time they are passed up in favour of the renovated villa in the leafy city fringe. Here is the opportunity again.
The fake discussion isn’t an issue, it’s the weakest point of the strategy. Let it happen, encourage it, ask real questions about motives, divert away from ideas that push conflicts, assert new futures. A discussion about principles is really about money, not maori. A referendum would be about how the idea of a lack of money (a lack that doesn’t exist) would make average Joe/Joanne feel, nothing to do with the Treaty. The real loss will be in turning away from a moment where the game could change.
The Crown still faces a problem of its own making. Having rejected “co-governance” how does it accommodate Maori? The mercurial and ubiquitous Chris Trotter has now gone onto “Law News” to argue that the new Kuini, Nga wai hono i te pono might be an apolitical leader of Maoridom who will make a new collaborative arrangement with the Crown. Trotter writes: “By presiding over what would necessarily be a long and at times difficult conversation, the queen and the Kingitanga could guide Māori and Pakeha to the point where the creation of a post-colonial, bi-cultural and te Tiriti-based state comes to be seen by both peoples as the fairest and most sensible way forward”.
This is strange talk, because after a very “long .. conversation” the Crown has just and most emphatically walked back from the idea of a “post-colonial, bi-cultural and te Tiriti-based state”. Trotter could be right, but if Nga wai hono i te po plays the role expected of her by the Crown (by no means a given) who will take the counterpart role for the Crown? Luxon? Seymour? Peters? And if on their side they are willing to offer nothing more than platitudes, how long would tangata motu be willing to tolerate the status quo, regardless of the position of the Kingitanga?
Martyn wrote that the treaty principles are a “grey zone wriggle room where the State is obliged to work with Māoridom and where pragmatic Pakeha and pragmatic Māori found ways to work together to put flesh on the bones on the promise of the Treaty”. Fine, but where are the pragmatists on the side of the Crown? Is it reasonable to expect that the Kingitanga can be pragmatically yielding while the Crown is being ideologically obstinate?
Martyn also wrote: “Of course the Crown is sovereign.
In two very simple ways
1 – Basic osmosis – the State has the military, police, taxation structure, judicial systems – Crown is sovereign!
2 – In all the Treaty settlements, the signing Iwi acknowledges the sovereignty of the Crown.”
Sovereignty is meaningful only to the extent that it is freely acknowledged. Without that consent it is nothing more than the exercise of raw power. Can we see some evidence to support that claim that “in all Treaty settlements the signing iwi acknowledges the sovereignty of the Crown”?
It is widely assumed by both the left (at least since the passing of the late Bruce Jesson) and the right that the Pakeha population identify with the Crown. If that assumption is flawed, as I believe it is, the whole picture and prospects for the future of the Crown in New Zealand are fundamentally altered.
“Māori and Pakeha” might “come to the point where the creation of a post-colonial, bi-cultural and te Tiriti-based state comes to be seen by both peoples as the fairest and most sensible way forward” but this consensus will not include all Maori, it will not include all Pakeha, and I strongly believe that it will not include the Crown.
There are real issues that may be clarified but not resolved in a “long and .. difficult conversation”. The whole colonialist project, with its gross inequality of wealth and power, must be put to rest before Maori and Pakeha as a whole can feel fully at ease in this land.
It comes down to the question of whether the Crown with its present government is in a mood to be conciliatory. Without compromise the issue of sovereignty will not be settled and will not go away.
At present the Crown seems to be pinning all its hopes on Nga wai hono i te po. Regardless of how she chooses to reign, those hopes are delusional. Let events take their course.
This article is your best by far on this issue. Even if Māori didn’t cede sovereignty in 1840, it is clear that sovereignty now exists with the Crown, or rather the Crown representing all the people of Aotearoa New Zealand.
I also think your characterisation of the purpose of the principles being the contemporary expression of the Crown relationship with iwi is also correct.
But the relationship will evolve further. In my view there will be a Māori elected representative body that will with have rights of governance over things Māori including all of government expenditure that is Maori related. Sometime in the 2030’s the Parliament will establish such a body. All Maori on the electoral roll will be able to vote for representatives on this representative body.
Wayne wrote: “sovereignty now exists with the Crown, or rather the Crown representing all the people of Aotearoa New Zealand”. That is sloppy thinking. The New Zealand Parliament says that Charles III is sovereign within the Realm of New Zealand, and Parliament is not wrong. To establish popular sovereignty in any shape or form would require a revolution.
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