There is no doubt that Māori exercised authority before 1840. Chiefs, hapū and iwi controlled their own people and territories, and the British Government recognised that reality.
“a title to the soil and to the sovereignty of New Zealand ... solemnly recognised by the British Government.”
That is strong evidence that Britain recognised Māori authority and sovereignty.
It is sometimes pointed out that Normanby had never visited New Zealand. That is true, but his instructions were not based simply on personal observation. The British Government had been receiving information about New Zealand from people on the ground, including British Resident James Busby, missionaries and settlers. More importantly, William Hobson himself had visited New Zealand in 1837 aboard HMS Rattlesnake, where he met Busby, missionaries, settlers and Māori leaders. He subsequently submitted a report to the British Government proposing a system of trading “factories” and a treaty with Māori. Normanby's instructions were prepared within the Colonial Office by James Stephen, drawing on this developing body of information.
But the same instructions (above) also contain an important qualification. Normanby described New Zealand's inhabitants as:
“numerous, dispersed, and petty tribes, who possess few political relations to each other, and are incompetent to act, or even to deliberate, in concert.”
That hardly describes a single, unified nation exercising sovereignty through one overarching political authority.
The question therefore is not whether Māori possessed authority or sovereignty before the Treaty. Clearly they did.
The question is: Was there one Māori government exercising authority over the whole of New Zealand?
There was no national parliament, executive, ruler or other overarching authority representing all Māori. Political authority rested principally with individual chiefs, hapū and iwi.
The 1835 Declaration of Independence and the Confederation of the United Tribes demonstrated an attempt by northern chiefs to establish collective authority. But the Confederation did not represent all Māori or develop into a government exercising authority throughout New Zealand.
The question also has an international-law dimension. If Māori had already established a single sovereign nation before 1840, it might be expected that there would have existed an organised political entity capable of entering into relations and agreements with other states.
In Twisting the Treaty, former Canterbury law lecturer David Round argues that Māori had not formed such an organised state. He contends that, under the international law of the time, they therefore lacked the capacity to enter into a treaty in the conventional international sense.
That view is not universally accepted, and the international legal status of the Treaty remains debated. But Round's argument nevertheless highlights the central historical question: if there was no unified Māori political entity capable of acting for all Māori, on what basis can it be claimed that Māori had already established a single sovereign nation covering the whole of New Zealand?
The Treaty itself recognised this fragmented political reality. The 'Official' English text distinguishes between the Confederation of the United Tribes and the “separate and independent Chiefs”, referring to the sovereignty they exercised over their respective territories.
Māori can certainly be described as a nation in a cultural sense: a people linked by ancestry, language and culture. But that is not necessarily the same as saying that all Māori had formed a single sovereign political nation governing the whole of New Zealand.
The most accurate conclusion seems to be this:
Before the Treaty, Māori possessed sovereignty and political authority, but it was exercised through numerous chiefs, hapū and iwi rather than through one unified Māori government or sovereign nation-state covering the whole of New Zealand.
That distinction matters.
Recognising Māori authority before 1840 does not require us to invent a unified Māori nation-state that the historical record itself does not clearly show existed.
And, as Normanby's own words demonstrate, the British Government recognised both sides of that reality: Māori possessed sovereignty, but they were also a collection of separate and dispersed tribes with limited political unity.
That is not Māori-bashing or history-twisting. It is recognising Māori authority and sovereignty where it existed, while refusing to turn a collection of independent iwi and hapū into a unified sovereign nation-state that the historical record does not clearly show ever existed.
Geoff Parker is a passionate advocate for equal rights and a colour blind society.
23 comments:
I think there is a large confusion by use of the word "treaty". It is used in a legal, positivic manner, now governed by the Vienna Convention on the Law of the Treaties.
It's other, core meaning is as a compact. For nations outside the Westphalian system, such treaties were more skin to a political or normative compact. They represented an attempt to move beyond possession by violent consquering.
Their legal effect was a flaring match: what sovereignty existed in a peoples (or nations) was transferred and a new state created. Their effect thereafter as a political compact. No Maori or Indian tribe can go to the ICJ alleging a treaty breach.
For that reason, domestic courts should also not be touching them with a barge pole. Imagine a court determining a 'treaty' was "invalid"...when its own judicial authority within a state ultimately rests on that very 'treaty'.
What this country sorely misunderstands is that what Maori (and Indian tribes in North America) are embarking on is best understood as revanchism. They don't want equality, or recognition. They want revenge, They want "their" territory back.
They hate that they either lost to a superior civilisation or granted it sovereigtny.
It is part of a larger politoco-legal doctrine being spread across academics, "indigenous" NGOs and networks, and media - Third Worldism.
This elevates all Third World and "Indigenous" cultures and seeks to unite them against their true enemy: the West; the racist, oppressive Whitey.
In NZ, Maorification is a key part of this, but the same Third Worldism eats away everywhere in the West.
Anonymous @4.23 is spot-on. We have also made ourselves (i.e. non-maori) a rod for our own backs by giving NZ natives the wherewithal (technology, writing, laws etc) to play us at our own game, but, paraphrasing the late Bob Jones, without them showing any gratitude. We now need to use our once superior abilities to find a way back and counteract the nasty virus of maori activism with a vaccine of logic, truth and cunning. We can do it; the thing to do is not give up but keep the fires of resentment stoked up.
'First Nations' treaties do not come under international law because that would require two sovereign nations. Canada started the 'First Nations' treaty system in 1871. Just as there are contracts that do not fall under contract law (e.g. the marriage contract), there are treaties that do not fall under international treaty law.
A fundamental difference between indigenous Canada and NZ is that Canadian tribal nations fulfilled the requirements of nationhood (defined area, system of governance, capacity to enter into relations with other nation-states) whereas NZ presented a mosaic of tribal entities with considerable fluidity with regard to territory and governance. Note that no one treaty was ever signed with all Canadian Indians - each recognised tribal nation-state was treated as a separate entity.
I do wish people who use the term 'Third World' would specify exactly what they mean by it as usage varies. As for 'Third Worldism', that's got me completely beat.
I guess the type of "sovereignty" where your family members were routinely murdered, enslaved and brutalized by other tribal groups did not sit well with many indigenous people.
So, they preferred the option to sign up to be protected by law and order under a British sovereign instead and be treated as equal citizens.
Were Māori a Sovereign Nation Before the Treaty?
YES, they were.
Normanby stated that the Maoris' "title to the soil and to the sovereignty of New Zealand is indisputable, and has been solemnly recognised by the British Government."
Sovereignty means 'supreme power or authority', so until 6 February 1860 when they accepted British law, the Maoris made the rules in New Zealand.
And if the Maoris understood 'New Zealanders' (as Normanby called them) as "a large body of people united by common descent, culture, or language, inhabiting a particular (state or) territory," as I expect they did, then that is what they were.
That is also what we today call a 'nation' and it is not for Europeans today to give it a technical European meaning such as that of a 'First Nation'.
The Maoris as a distinguished nation category was brought into focus with the arrival of Europeans when the Maoris referred to themselves as 'ordinary' or 'maori' people, distinct from Europeans.
Too much is made of tribal conflict. There were also tribal affiliations and the whole was subject to constant flux and interaction.
So, for example, it is therefore reasonable "in a letter to the Editor of the Waikato Times 22/8/26 [to] claim that Māori had already established a sovereign nation before the Treaty of Waitangi."
The Treaty and what happened after is irrelevant to the question.
But you are committing 1840 presentism to retrospectively say that the Maoris were not a sovereign nation before the Treaty.
Just wondering Barrie Davis if it is in the nature of the members of a 'sovereign nation' to routinely invade, capture, enslave, kill and or eat neighbouring tribes? Doesn't sound too cohesive to me; more like a loose agglomeration of self-interested thugs.
Barrie Davis @8:32am, I think you have actually demonstrated the distinction at the heart of the article rather than disproved it.
Nobody is disputing that Māori exercised political authority and customary law before 1840. The question is whether all Māori constituted one sovereign political nation exercising supreme authority over New Zealand as a whole.
You say sovereignty means “supreme power or authority”. Quite so. But whose supreme power was it? WHERE WAS THE SINGLE AUTHORITY THAT EXERCISED THAT SUPREME POWER OVER ALL MĀORI AND THROUGHOUT NEW ZEALAND? You cannot establish that simply by asserting that Māori were a “nation”.
Your own quotation from Normanby is particularly important here. You cite his statement about Māori having a title to the sovereignty of New Zealand, BUT OVERLOOK HIS DESCRIPTION, in the same instructions, of the inhabitants as “numerous, dispersed, and petty tribes” possessing “few political relations to each other” and being unable to “act, or even to deliberate, in concert”.
That is contemporary evidence from 1839 — not European presentism.
Nor am I imposing a modern European definition of “First Nation”. I AM MAKING A MUCH SIMPLER HISTORICAL DISTINCTION BETWEEN A PEOPLE SHARING CULTURE AND ANCESTRY AND A UNIFIED POLITICAL AUTHORITY EXERCISING SOVEREIGNTY OVER AN ENTIRE COUNTRY. Those are not necessarily the same thing.
You also say that the Treaty and what happened afterwards are irrelevant. I disagree. If we are asking what political entity existed immediately before 1840, THE TREATY NEGOTIATIONS ARE HIGHLY RELEVANT HISTORICAL EVIDENCE. The English text itself distinguishes between the Confederation of the United Tribes and the “separate and independent Chiefs”, referring to the sovereignty they exercised over their respective territories.
And finally, calling this “presentism” is misplaced. I am not saying Māori were not a nation because they lacked a modern parliament, bureaucracy or constitution. I AM SAYING THAT THE CONTEMPORARY EVIDENCE DESCRIBES NUMEROUS INDEPENDENT OR SEMI-INDEPENDENT TRIBAL AUTHORITIES RATHER THAN ONE UNIFIED MĀORI GOVERNMENT.
Māori can quite reasonably be described as a nation in the cultural sense of a people sharing ancestry, language and culture. But that does NOT PROVE THAT THEY HAD ALREADY ESTABLISHED ONE SOVEREIGN NATION EXERCISING SUPREME POLITICAL AUTHORITY OVER THE WHOLE OF NEW ZEALAND.
That is the distinction I have been making from the beginning.
RECOGNISING MĀORI SOVEREIGNTY AND POLITICAL AUTHORITY BEFORE 1840 IS NOT THE SAME THING AS CLAIMING THAT A UNIFIED SOVEREIGN MĀORI NATION-STATE ALREADY EXISTED.
Were Māori a Sovereign Nation Before the Treaty?
YES, they were.
Barrie Davis @8:32am, Further to my previous comment.
The Waikato Times letter says that MĀORI “ESTABLISHED A NATION WHEN THEY GATHERED IN 1834 ... UNDER THE FLAG OF THE UNITED TRIBES OF NEW ZEALAND.”
But that statement appears to CONFUSE TWO SEPARATE EVENTS.
In March 1834, 25 northern chiefs gathered at Waitangi, at a meeting organised by British Resident James Busby, to choose a flag for New Zealand ships. The Declaration of Independence did not follow until 28 October 1835, when 34 northern chiefs signed He Whakaputanga.
And this is the important point: THE DECLARATION DID NOT SAY THAT ALL MĀORI HAD GATHERED AS ONE NATION. Its English text refers specifically to “the hereditary chiefs and heads of the tribes of the Northern parts of New Zealand” and declared the formation of the United Tribes of New Zealand.
It then invited the Southern tribes to join the Confederation.
That raises an obvious question: IF ALL MĀORI HAD ALREADY CONSTITUTED ONE UNIFIED SOVEREIGN NATION, WHY WAS THERE A NEED TO ESTABLISH A CONFEDERATION OF UNITED TRIBES, and why invite other tribes to join it?
By 1839, ONLY 52 CHIEFS HAD SIGNED (of a possible 500+). That was an important development in collective Māori political organisation, but it is difficult to equate 52 signatories — predominantly northern chiefs — with the creation of a UNIFIED SOVEREIGN NATION REPRESENTING ALL MĀORI AND EXERCISING AUTHORITY OVER THE WHOLE OF NEW ZEALAND.
In my view, the 1834–35 events demonstrate an attempt to create greater collective unity among previously separate tribal authorities. That is historically significant. But it does not establish that Māori, as a whole, had already formed one unified sovereign nation.
Indeed, the fact that the Declaration invited other tribes to join suggests PRECISELY THE OPPOSITE: the proposed Confederation did not initially include them.
I believe you've proved your point, Geoff. It does come down to a matter of semantics, but Maori never displayed 'sovereignty' to the extent of being a 'sovereign country'. Yes, their Chiefs ruled their own Iwi and Hapu, but that was the extent of it. They were never sufficiently 'unified' under one rule - hence, why they had the Maori Wars; why they sought the British Empire's protection; why tikanga is variable around the country; and, even after the signing of the Treaty, why we had the likes of the Kingitanga movement - where those Maori involved committed treason - not that the Waitangi Tribunal and activists will acknowledge such.
BTW, my previous point about Normanby never setting foot here was not to undermine what he said, but to put it in context - in that he was only relaying what others had told him. You and Barrie have both extracted comments from what he said to support you arguments. Readers will make up their own minds as to what 'rings most true' from their own understanding of the recorded history. If nothing else, this discourse does show how interpretations can vary and, while not traversed here, one thing is entirely predictable and that is what the WT would find - and such would certainly be partisan and what is very likely being taught in our schools.
Peter, I think we are largely on the same page.
And I take your point about Normanby. I did not interpret your earlier comment as necessarily trying to undermine him, but simply as putting his words in context. And I agree that both Barrie and I have drawn attention to different parts of his instructions which we believe are relevant. Readers can judge the evidence for themselves.
I think your point about the Kīngitanga is also worth considering. Without getting into the separate question of whether its actions amounted to treason, the very fact that a movement arose in the late1850s seeking to unite Māori under a common leader surely raises the question: IF A UNIFIED MĀORI SOVEREIGN NATION HAD ALREADY BEEN ESTABLISHED IN 1834–35, WHY WAS THERE STILL A NEED TO TRY TO CREATE GREATER POLITICAL UNITY MORE THAN TWENTY YEARS LATER?
THE FACT that not all iwi joined the Kīngitanga, and that Māori FOUGHT ON DIFFERENT SIDES DURING THE NEW ZEALAND WARS, does not prove that Māori were not a nation in a cultural sense. Nations can certainly be divided and fight among themselves.
BUT IT DOES REINFORCE THE CENTRAL POINT: Māori political authority was exercised through NUMEROUS iwi, hapū and chiefs, each capable of making its own decisions and alliances, and there was NO single unified Māori sovereign political nation exercising authority over the whole of New Zealand
We ARE on the same page, Geoff. I also have a lot of time for Barrie but, on this occasion, while I can appreciate what he's saying, I can't reconcile it with the other facts, or understand his motive? That said, I'm moving on, but I am quite thankful (unlike too many ingrats of today) that I was born in the 20th century. Perhaps a little earlier (I rather suspect like you gents), would have been my preference.
But as any good Vulcan would say to you both, "Live long and prosper!" And I am grateful for your input, even if I choose to disagree.
@ Barends
We can disagree on early Indian tribes in Canada meeting the Montevideo definition of states. I believe you overestimate their political organisation and misapprehend the requirement of the ability to enter into FORMAL legal and diplomatic relations. Any peoples' or political unit can enter into a political or normative compact with states. We often call them MOUs nowdays. Fine, whatever.
On Third Worldism, this mock ignorance and No True Scotsman Boomerism is tiresome. You live and enjoyed the fruits of a past where Western society was prosperous, homogeneous, and proud of itself. The West is committing suicide and your type of liberal self-negation and guilt is a major contributor to this. Go back to the cave.
"Self-negation and guilt", my arse. I have often shown in these annals that I am a proud White Enlightenment man; I take pride in the massive contributions my race made to humanity not only in science and technology but also with regard to law and human rights.
I'm not sure when Western society was "homogeneous". There have been too many wars, both between and within nations, revolutions, etc, for that. Maybe Anon is living in a dream world in which a "prosperous. homogeneous, and proud" West took the place of the Garden of Eden in its symbolism.
What is tiresome is when commentators use terms they are evidently not clear about such as 'Third World'. Originally intended for the non-aligned movement, the term became associated with low-income, often corrupt countries. It is now an archaic term and the uncertainty about its meaning isn't helped by slapping the suffix -ism on it.
Allen Heath, you asked: "Just wondering Barrie Davis if it is in the nature of the members of a 'sovereign nation' to routinely invade, capture, enslave, kill and or eat neighbouring tribes?"
Only last century, the sovereign nation of Germany stuffed 6 million Jews, a tribe from the Middle East, into gas chambers.
And before you say that was singular, don't forget that Stalin got 18 million.
You folk write of the Maori Wars; but omit the wars in Europe.
Geoff, you seem to be saying that to qualify as a sovereign nation there must be one single central authority, but you have not demonstrated why that should be so. It implies that a central government of a European sovereign nation is a better arrangement than a distributed government of a Maori sovereign nation. But you have not demonstrated that either.
You also say that the Treaty and what happened afterwards are relevant.
If consider our present Parliament, that is far from united, first by several competing factions and second by the insane psychology of Left-Right politics. As it presently stands, our Parliament is not in control of the nation in accordance with the principles of democracy.
Our central government Parliament is failing and the distributed Maori tribes are succeeding and replacing our Parliament.
I don't necessarily wish to take a position here, but to point out that you have not made your case.
Nevertheless, my answer to your initial question as the head of your article remains the same: "Were Māori a Sovereign Nation Before the Treaty?"
YES, they were. "Māori constituted one sovereign political nation exercising supreme authority over New Zealand as a whole" The difference is it was distributed rather than central.
Barrie Davis, as soon as you bring Nazi Germany into an argument you have lost it. Try and focus here: the discussion was about putative maori sovereignty and to list all atrocities committed by humans against humans since recorded history began is irrelevant, and there isn't room here anyway. It is abhorrent maori practices that underlie some of the arguments here and to use the holocaust as an argument or reason is both offensive and irrelevant in this context.
Barrie Davis @8:49am, I don't think I have argued that a sovereign nation must necessarily have one CENTRALISED authority, nor that a European system of government is somehow superior to a distributed one.
My question is much simpler: WHAT EVIDENCE IS THERE THAT THE NUMEROUS IWI AND HAPŪ OF NEW ZEALAND COLLECTIVELY CONSTITUTED ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL ENTITY EXERCISING AUTHORITY OVER THE WHOLE COUNTRY?
You now say that Māori sovereignty was “distributed”. Perhaps so — but distributed AMONG WHOM, AND WITHIN WHAT OVERARCHING POLITICAL ARRANGEMENT?
A distributed system can still be a single political entity if its constituent parts recognise themselves as belonging to a wider political union and have some means of exercising collective authority. The United Tribes, for example, was an attempt at such a confederation. But it did not encompass all Māori, and its own Declaration invited other tribes to join.
That is why I do not think the existence of separate iwi and hapū, each exercising authority within its own territory, automatically adds up to ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL NATION EXERCISING AUTHORITY OVER THE WHOLE OF NEW ZEALAND.
Nor does my argument depend on a preference for European government. Political systems can be centralised, federal, confederal or otherwise distributed. The issue is not how sovereignty is organised; it is whether there is evidence of a SINGLE POLITICAL ENTITY WITHIN WHICH THAT SOVEREIGNTY WAS COLLECTIVELY EXERCISED.
Your Parliament comparison is not really equivalent. Parliament may be deeply divided, but its competing parties all operate within one constitutional system and under one national political authority. Political disagreement within a state is quite different from separate iwi and hapū making their own decisions, forming their own alliances and, at times, fighting both with and against one another.
And I am not saying that Māori were not a nation in a cultural sense, or that they lacked sovereignty and political authority. I have consistently acknowledged both.
The proposition I am questioning is your stronger one: that ALL MĀORI COLLECTIVELY CONSTITUTED ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL NATION EXERCISING SUPREME AUTHORITY OVER THE WHOLE OF NEW ZEALAND.
You say that authority was distributed rather than centralised. Fine — but that still requires historical evidence of the OVERARCHING POLITICAL UNITY which made those distributed authorities parts of one sovereign nation.
THAT IS THE EVIDENCE I AM ASKING FOR.
Geoff, I want to finalize this. In expectation of doing so I will answer your following question:
“My question is much simpler: WHAT EVIDENCE IS THERE THAT THE NUMEROUS IWI AND HAPŪ OF NEW ZEALAND COLLECTIVELY CONSTITUTED ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL ENTITY EXERCISING AUTHORITY OVER THE WHOLE COUNTRY?”
Political means ‘relating to the government or public affairs of a country’. So, you want to know how the Maori tribes constituted one sovereign entity relating to the government or public affairs of New Zealand.
I have previously explained that the Maoris were a sovereign nation because they were "a large body of people united by common descent, CULTURE, or language, inhabiting a particular (state or) territory." That is, they were ruled by chiefs and, in Maori terms, they were related by cultural norms or tikanga which, while it may have had tribal variations, was essentially the same nationally. So, the chiefs and the people were regulated by a common tikanga.
That is a distributed way to normalize government and public affairs, which is to exercise political authority over the whole country. The role of the chiefs was to implement tikanga, much like our Parliament is supposed to bring about our Western values and norms, such as those in a constitution.
Barrie Davis @11:40am, thank you. I think you have now made your argument clearer, and I am happy to leave the discussion there after this response.
As I understand it, your argument is that Māori constituted one sovereign political nation because they shared a common culture and broadly common tikanga, while individual chiefs exercised authority within their respective iwi and hapū. You describe that as A DISTRIBUTED SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT exercising political authority over New Zealand as a whole.
I accept that Māori shared important cultural connections and that tikanga provided broadly common norms, while varying between iwi and hapū. But I still do not see how that, by itself, establishes ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL ENTITY.
A common culture and shared customs may establish a people as a NATION IN A CULTURAL SENSE, but they do not necessarily establish a SINGLE POLITICAL NATION EXERCISING COLLECTIVE SOVEREIGNTY. Separate political communities can share ancestry, language, culture and legal traditions without thereby becoming one sovereign political entity.
Nor do I think your comparison with Parliament works. Parliament is part of a single constitutional and political system exercising jurisdiction throughout New Zealand. It is not simply a collection of separate communities independently applying broadly similar cultural norms.
That is the distinction I have been trying to make. I am not saying Māori needed a European-style central government. A sovereign political entity could theoretically have a federal, confederal or other distributed system.
But there still needs to be evidence that the various parts regarded themselves as belonging to, and acting within, ONE OVERARCHING POLITICAL ENTITY EXERCISING COLLECTIVE AUTHORITY.
That is where I remain unconvinced. Chiefs exercised authority over their own iwi and hapū. Tikanga provided important cultural and customary norms, albeit with regional and tribal variations. But I have not seen evidence of a New Zealand-wide political arrangement through which all those separate authorities collectively governed the country as ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL NATION.
So perhaps our disagreement finally comes down to this: YOU REGARD A SHARED CULTURE AND TIKANGA, ADMINISTERED INDEPENDENTLY BY SEPARATE TRIBAL AUTHORITIES, AS SUFFICIENT TO CONSTITUTE ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL NATION. I DO NOT.
To my mind, that establishes Māori as a people with shared cultural identity and numerous sovereign or autonomous political authorities — but not necessarily as ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL ENTITY EXERCISING AUTHORITY OVER THE WHOLE OF NEW ZEALAND.
I think we have probably taken the argument as far as it can usefully go, and readers can now judge the competing interpretations for themselves.
I will permit myself one final point:
Our Parliament is not part of a single constitutional and political system exercising jurisdiction throughout New Zealand. At present there are two political systems, Iwi Maori and Parliament.
Should the Iwis complete their tribalist takeover of New Zealand, will you then argue that New Zealand is no longer a sovereign nation?
Barrie Davis @3:37pm , I think that takes us well away from the historical question we were discussing.
WHETHER YOU BELIEVE New Zealand now has “two political systems”, or what might happen in some hypothetical future, HAS NO BEARING on whether Māori constituted ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL NATION EXERCISING AUTHORITY OVER THE WHOLE OF NEW ZEALAND BEFORE 1840.
My point was simply that Parliament, whatever its faults and internal divisions, operates within a single New Zealand constitutional and legal system. Iwi and Māori organisations do not presently constitute a separate sovereign state exercising jurisdiction independently of New Zealand's laws.
AND IF New Zealand's constitutional arrangements were fundamentally changed in the future, THAT WOULD NOT somehow retrospectively prove that a unified Māori sovereign political entity existed in 1840.
So I think we have finally reached the point where our disagreement is clear. You believe that a shared culture and broadly common tikanga, administered independently by separate tribal authorities, was sufficient to constitute ONE SOVEREIGN POLITICAL NATION. I do not believe the historical evidence demonstrates that.
I am happy to leave it there and let readers decide.
Very deep discussion people! IMHO I have three points to make. A nation is not necessarily a 'sovereign' nation. If, as has been stated NZ before 1840 was a sovereign nation, why did it need 500+ signatures to ratify the Treaty? Anyway, even if pre 1840 a sovereign nation of Maori did exist, it would have become a new one under Queen Victoria because under Article 1 of the Treaty', sovereignty was ceded to her! Simple really!!
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