(Enclosure 5 in No. 2.)
Mr J. C. MacCormick to Judge Fenton.

I return the draft of the proposed Bill for the consolidation and amendment of the Acts relating to Native lands. Owing to my absence from the colony during the last month I have not been able sooner to peruse the Bill with the view of offering suggestions for amendments, as you requested, and must beg you, therefore; to excuse the hasty notes, which I have made in the draft, of alterations which I offer you for what they are worth. Many of the points suggested by me have presented themselves to me in practice, and in other cases I have suggested alterations and amendments which, if made, will, I think, give the Acts more beneficial operation than they have at present.

I believe that, on the whole, the Native Lands Acts have worked very well, and I approve highly of the general scope of these Acts, and am so fully persuaded of their beneficial operation, at least in this part of the colony, that I should be very sorry to see them repealed. I make this remark because I have heard, since my return, that there is a party inclined to repeal them. I earnestly hope that the Government will not support such a measure, for I believe there is no Act passed of late years which has done so much to promote the settlement of, the colony as "The Native Lands Act, 1865." I am quite prepared to give good reason (as I believe) for my opinions on this subject, and I think myself entitled to express an opinion, having had some experience of the working of the Act.

So long as we recognize the right of ownership in the Natives in the lands of the colony—I mean not only in the lands cultivated or used by them, but also in those lands which are, and always will be, wastes, so far as any use of them by the Natives is concerned—I do not know any method of dealing with the lands of the Natives which will be of so much advantage to the community as the system existing under the Native Lands Acts.

I have made several suggestions, in a rough way, as I have, stated, but there are two matters particularly in respect of which I think radical amendments should be made in the Act. The first I mention is that the jurisdiction of the Court should be confined to the cases of claims to lands in the ordinary acceptation of the word, and that the Court should not have the power to entertain claims of fisheries, or such claims as that recently made to the foreshore at the Thames. If Natives have really claims to the enjoyment of such rights, there is no likelihood of any person interfering with them, and they certainly do not require a grant from the Crown to protect them in the enjoyment of such rights. The grant would only be obtained for the purpose of enabling the Natives to sell such rights to private individuals—to make a profit at the expense of the public. Such monopolies as the exclusive right of fishing in a particular place are bad enough in the Old Country; in the colony they are simply intolerable. I am doubtful as to your agreeing with me in this respect, but I feel very strongly on the subject. I have offered a. suggestion in section 7, but I would like to see the alteration carried further than I have suggested. The other master is, to alter the Act so as to secure the repayment of loans made by persons to Natives for the purpose of enabling them to obtain Crown grants of their lands. If I did not see the danger of legalizing contracts relating to land made with Natives before the title to such lands had been ascertained, I should be strongly in favour of removing all restrictions upon such contracts; but I believe that allowing such contracts to be made would only be causing continual litigation between Europeans, frequent strifes between the Natives themselves and between the Natives and Europeans, and probably bloodshed. I do not, on the other hand, see the objection to securing to the European the repayment of money he may advance to a Native for the purpose of his obtaining a marketable title to his land. The Native must, in nearly every case, obtain pecuniary assistance to bring his claim before the Court, and if the law recognized and protected transactions entered into for the purpose of giving this assistance to the Native (and such transactions there must be so long as there is a Native Land Court, whether or not the law recognizes them), it would have the effect of considerably extending and improving the operation of the Act; and would make dealings with Natives for their land look not like scrambling and cheating—the aspect they wear in many cases at present. To carry out my ideas, I have suggested, amongst other things, that the Court should inquire into these transactions, and validate them if proper and just; and I have suggested that surveyors should be placed in a better position for recovering payment from the Natives for services than they are at present. Such an alteration in the law as I have suggested would lead, perhaps, to a still greater amendment—that of legalizing, by the Court, all contracts relating to land entered into by Natives who were declared by the Court to be owners of the land affected by such contracts, and the legislation would then be gradual.

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There is another matter, not strictly coming within the scope of the proposed Act, but which requires immediate attention. There are cases in which Crown grants have been issued with a day named in the habendum clause, for which there is no warrant in law, and people have been dealing with the lands comprised in such grants on the faith that such grants are perfectly good. I know that others besides myself entertain doubts as to the validity of these grants, and as I think the Government is bound to take steps to remove these doubts, and to establish titles resting upon such grants, I beg you to draw attention from the proper quarter to the matter, so that some provision should at once be made for such cases.