PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
c.6.
885
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 members of any political association, and relieving it from the authorization of Government. The French law in force before the capture of the island had a 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 object of individual petitions, it is not within the 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
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already done in the course of last year, has not hesi 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 authorization 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 is 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 Article of 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 opinions in the news- papers, pamphlets, &c., provided that such publica- tion does not amount to a libel.