PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference -
C.O.882
2 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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of others, no steps of the character indicated appear to have been taken by this Govern- ment with respect to them, nor did the Government of India, so far as I am aware, take any notice of them; yet it can hardly be imagined that there is more probability of these statements being readily credited by the Indian Government when repeated from an unknown and obscure source than when originally put forward. Of those said to be quoted in this pamphlet, Mr. Bolton was a barrister of evident ability; Mr. Beaton is a writer of repute, as the readers of current periodical literature well know; the state- ments of Mr. Kerr carried with them that weight which must attach to any statement made by a Member of this Board in his place in Council, and to the expressed opinions of a man whose experience of the Colony is of such long standing, and whose integrity stands so wholly above suspicion. Yet no injury to the Colony resulted from those statements, nor did they lead to any action on the part of the Indian Government.
But the honourable member may ask whether, even if I do not think it expedient to communicate unasked with the Indian Government upon this subject, I may not take steps here in this Colony to obviate any bad impressions which might result from the publication in question ? In so far as any action is concerned having direct refer- ence to the pamphlet or its author, as distinguished from the petition prefixed to the publication, I must again answer that it is not my intention to take any such step.
Similar objections, it appears to me, apply with equal force to this course as to the direct communication to India. To take public notice of statements which have never in any formal manner been brought before me, and which I have, indeed, only casually and comparatively lately seen, would constitute, I think, a very dangerous precedent. It would give to these statements an importance they would not otherwise possess, and a circulation they would not otherwise attain; and it would, as I have before observed, render necessary the adoption of a similar course in the event of the repetition of any similar attack, under penalty of its being supposed that the attack was one which could not be met. As a rule, a Government should deal only with acts, and not with criti- cisms and opinions.
But let us assume that this was not the case, and that it was desirable to take active notice of the statements to which the honourable gentleman has alluded, I con- fess that I only see two courses that could then be followed-the prosecution of the publisher and author or reputed author of the pamphlet for libel, or the issue of a commission to investigate what the honourable gentleman calls "falsehoods and calumdies against my predecessor, the Members of the Council of Government, the Protector of Immigrants, the magistrates, and the inhabitants of this Colony."
Now, the practical difficulties in the way of either of these courses would be very considerable. I will not dwell on the fact that, in the opinion of those most competent to judge, it is, to say the least, very doubtful whether a legal libel has been committed, for I need not remind so eminent a member of the Bar as the honourable and learned gentleman, that, whilst a statement may be perfectly true and yet a libel, on the other hand, a statement may be false, offensive, and insulting, and yet not technically a libel. I will not dwell on this, I say, or on the practical difficulty which might be found in legally proving the publication or authorship, but other serious objections present them- selves to such a proceeding.
Prosecutions for libel on the part of Governments or Legislative Assemblies have become obsolete in Europe. Fifty years ago they were of very frequent occurrence. Fifty years before that again the Ilouse of Commons and other Assemblies ordered pamphlets offensive to them to be publicly burnt. But the world has advanced far since then, and I suppose there is no member of this Board who desires to revert to practices which have been elsewhere abandoned, and abandoned because it was found out that they were useless.
The honourable member has dwelt especially on the remarks affecting Sir Henry Barkly, but it would be childish to make them the foundation of an action. Every one who is acquainted with his character or his distinguished career must be perfectly aware that he is altogether incapable of acting on any other motives than those which he has professed; but he would, am confident, be ill pleased if he learned that it was proposed on his behalf to take proceedings against the author of an expression which, after all, does not exceed in license those which in most small communities are freely used towards persons in authority. I judge Sir Henry Barkly's feelings by my own. Curiously enough, after I left Trinidad, a pamphlet was published in which I, and the Agent-General of Immigrants, were charged with precisely the same thing-viz.: that we had passed an Ordinance for reasons different from those which we alleged. I should bare been much surprised, and certainly as much displeased as astonished, had my successor taken legal measures against the author of that pamphlet.
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Of course only the strongest points of the alleged libel would be pressed, but this would give the defendant a plausible ground for the assumption that all the other statements he had made were admitted to be unquestionably true.
If the defendant were acquitted, I need not say that he would gain a moral triumph. If he were convicted, I am not sure that the advantage on the side of the Colony would be at all commensurate. "All the inhabitants of the Colony" being said to be assailed, the jury themselves, if the case were referred to a jury, might not improbably be considered interested parties in the case, and those who were before disposed to give credence to the strictures of the pamphlet would now only believe, in addition, that justice in such a case was partially and improperly administered in the Colony.
The author might, no doubt, thus be punished-(a very poor satisfaction),—but the effects of his publication would not be thus obliterated,-a far more important consideration.
As to the other alternative, an inquiry into his allegations, must at once con- fess that if any inquiry, not into distinct and specific matters of detail, but into the whole system of immigration, was deemed necessary, an inquiry touching the nearest interests of every class of the community,-raising the keenest susceptibilities-and liable to excite now happily dormant passions and prejudices,-it is not, in my opinion, to any individuals connected with the locality, however carefully chosen, that the task could properly be intrusted; for, however impartially they might perform their duties, their judgment would not possess that weight of independent-authority which would be necessary to give it the requisite value. Were such a general inquiry to be undertaken at all, it could only, in my opinion, be undertaken under the direction of the Imperial Government, and conducted by Commissioners appointed by the Crown.
But if the honourable gentleman inquires further, whether I am then about to fold my arms and do nothing to show that the Colony is not regardless of the welfare of those to whom its own welfare is due, I must reply to him in the negative. I do propose to take three steps, which, though they have no direct reference to this, or any publication, yet will probably be sufficient to give a just idea of the position of the Colony in any quarters to which assertions injurious to it may have penetrated.
I propose to repeat the expression of my own belief as to the general well-being of the Indian population, and to add that, although it would be idle to affect to deny what any one acquainted with the Immigration Laws of other Colonies cannot fail at once to perceive,—that the law is in this Colony wanting in many checks on possible abuses which have been provided elsewhere,-yet that, so far as I can learn, little practical evil has resulted from their absence, and that some of them are now about to be supplied not only with the assent, but on the recommendation of the Representa- tives at this Board of the Agricultural body itself.
This may appear cold and measured language to the honourable gentleman, but I believe the calm and judicial expression of my deliberate opinion will carry with it far more weight than would attach to the most vehement partizanship or the most declamatory indignation on my part.
In the next place I must remind the honourable gentleman that the petition which forms the text of Mr. de Plévitz's commentary, and which, unlike that commen- tary, is an official document presented formally to me, and dealing with specific allegations of detail as to the action of the police, was at once directed by me to b referred to a Commission about to be appointed for the investigation of certain other matters respecting the police force.
Circumstances have long hindered the assembling of that Commission, but it is now about to commence its labours in earnest, and whatever may be the conclusion at which it arrives, the names of its members are a guaranteee that the complaints of the petitioners will receive a full, patient, and impartial investigation.
Lastly, it is my intention to forward to the Imperial Government, and that of India should it be adopted by the Board (as I trust it will be), without material alteration-the Ordinance lately proposed to secure an inspection of estates as efficient as that pursued in other Colonies. That such a law should be established not only with the consent, but at the suggestion of the Immigration Committee, is a strong prima facie proof that there is no cause on the part of the Planters to fear the results of such inspection, and it is, at all events, an absoluto guarantee that no serious abuse could long continue to exist unchecked.
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Such an Ordinance is a far more convincing reply to any such aspersions on the Colony as those of which the honourable gentleman complains than any amount