PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
गय
mini
Reference :-
C.O. 882
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH—NOT TO |
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to be vested in the projected association of sixty-four members. The petition addressed by this committee to your Excellency, that your Excellency be pleased to sanction their legal existence does not leave the least doubt on that point.
6. Secondly, to the 3rd resolution, by which the rural districts are called upon to appoint each a committee, which should correspond with the central committee. This measure tends evidently in divid- ing the Association into several fractions, not meeting together, but corresponding respectively to evade the law, limiting to fifteen persons the number of the inembers of any political association, and relieving it from the authorization of Government. The French law in force before the capture of the island had s special provision prohibiting such correspondence between any such associations.
7. Thirdly, to the 5th resolution, recommending the formation of a plan for the reduction of the pub-
lic expenses. Though such a matter may be the is not within the object of individual petitions, competency of a collective body, stating itself invested with powers not derived from the law or any legal authority.
8. But I am afraid that a majority of the colonists and even of the members of the committee, are quite in error as to the nature and extent of the right of petition, belonging not only to the inhabitants of Mauritius, under their colonial laws, but also to all British subjects, in virtue of the celebrated Bill of Rights, that they confound such a sacred right with the mode of exercising it, as also the right of petition and the right of association, which are the one entirely distinct from and independent of the other.
9. The members of the former Committee in their letter to your Excellency, dated the 13th instant, state their object in the following terms: "It is thus sought to put in practice the inherent right of every British subject, viz., that of representation and peti- tion to their Sovereign and Government."
10. But this undeniable right the Colonial law does not oppose.
It only subjects the exercise of this right to the Governor's previous consent to any public meeting for that purpose; but such a restric- tion in the present circumstance is not the matter under consideration, since your Excellency, as
already done in the course of last year, has not besi- tated in authorizing the two last meetings, the avowed object of which was precisely the exercise of the right of petition.
11. But this natural right is inherent to the indi- vidual, and cannot be transmitted or exercised by delegates or a collective body. It is a sanctioned maxim and a constant practice in England, that the petition must be subscribed individually and not collectively. The same principle is laid down in the French laws and constitutions, either anterior or posterior to the taking of the island. A decree of the 21st May, 1791, enacts that "le droit de péti- tion appartient à tout individu; mais il ne peut-être délégué, et conséquemment il ne peut être exercé
en nom collectif par les corps électoraux
ou par les sociétés citoyens."
12. The right of association is entirely distinct from the right of petition. Formerly in this colony
all popular societies were only subjected to the con- dition of notifying to the municipality the day and place of their meetings. The right of petition was then fixed by metropolitan laws. But a commission was appointed by the Secretary of State with the power of drawing up a penal code for the colony, with an authorisation to consult the French code. This commission, composed of the Judges of the Court of Appeal and the Procureur-General, found it expedient, in the circumstances of the colony, to adopt the provision of the French code respecting political associations. This provision has been main. tained by the Judges of the present Court of Appeal called upon to revise the Colonial Penal Code, as well as in the new amended draft of the same law.
I fear that the present circumstances rather justify such a law in a colony where the population in so far from being homogeneous, and any knowledge of con- stitutional rights the share of but a few.
13. But be it as it may, within the intent and meaning of the law such associations as mentioned in the 210th Artiele f the Penal Code have no official or legal character, and can never interfere in the course and proceedings of Government, but only by the publication of their opinious in the news- papera, pamphlets, &c., provided that such publion. tion does not amount to a libel.
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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :----
سلس.
C.O. 882
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
12
14. Consequently it would not be within the power of your Excellency to comply with the request of the members of the above said Committee, to acknowledge their official or legal. existence, and the powers they intend to assume of representing the colony, and petitioning in its name Her Majesty and the Government in the interest and about the Such a grievances of the community at large. concession would be in opposition to the principle which rests the right of petition; and not- upon withstanding the privilege which might be conferred upon this Committee by your Excellency, the peti- tion of a certain number of individuals, or of a single one, of whatever class they be, even among the emancipated slaves, would have an equal claim to the consideration of Her Majesty's Government, and might, even with regard to the grounds therein set forth, be more favourably looked upon.
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15. For these reasons it would be of no import- ance that the 210th and 211th Articles of the Penal Code be removed or altered, provided that the right of petition and the mode of exercising it be clearly defined and understood as it is in England, and the private association subjected to rules sufficient for preventing and repressing any illegal assumption of power, and securing good order and public peace.
have, &c.
(Signed) P. D'ERINAY,
Procureur and Advocate-General.
▲ Committee of fifteen persons was then ap- pointed, and they requested the Governor to recog- nize them with the same degree of confidence and freedom of communication as Lord Grey had accorded to the London Mauritius Association. The Go- vernor replied that he would receive and consider their communications and suggestions precisely in the same manner, as he was always ready to receive such communications from all persons interested in the welfare of the colony. The Committee then requested permission to hold a public meeting for the purpose of obtaining signatures to a petition to the Queen on the colonial grievances. This the Governor granted, and a meeting was fixed for the 9th November.
Sir Wm. Gomm, No. 261;
November 1, 1848.
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Applications were then made from South Pample
mousses and other rural districts, for permission to hold meetings with the view of electing branch Com. mittees, of fifteen each, who should correspond with the Central Committee in Port Louis.
Upon these applications the Procureur-General
his opinion of the 6th November:
gave
" November 6, 1848. “1. Three general meetings have been recently authorized by his Excellency the Governor, having for their avowed object, That the merchants, pro- prietors, planters, and others might confer on various matters interesting to them and to devise, awaiting the result of the petition which the colonists are about to forward to their Sovereigns, such means of generally and faithfully representing the suffering position of the colony, and suggesting the remedy to their alleged evils.' The result of the two former meetings has been the appointment of a Committee, for the purpose of drawing up a peti- tion to Her Majesty according to certain resolutions adopted with that view. The object of the third meeting to be held on the 9th instant, is the sub- mission and signature of the said petition.
"2. Under these circumstances, three inhabitants of the district of South Pamplemousses petition his Excellency for a partial meeting to be held in that district, of all the inhabitants of the same, for the 'd'arriver au moyen d'éviter la ruine totale purpose
qui nous menace' (in common, I suppose, with all
the other inhabitants of Mauritius).
"3. I do not perceive any difference between the declared object of the partial meeting solicited in that petition, and that of the general meetings above alluded to, and which is pretended to repre- sent all the classes and interests of the commu- nity at Mauritius and the Committee of which is asserted to be the organ of the whole population. The present petition would tend only to show that there is not in the complaints or sentiments ex- pressed in the name of the colony, so much unani- mity as is assumed. But though the Governor cannot acknowledge those former meetings as being the legal and undeniable expression of the com- munity at large, still it does not appear necessary or expedient to permit several meetings having the
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