Parliament and Empire

Learn about the role of Parliament in the growth of the British Empire, from the American
Revolution to decolonization. The British Empire was founded haphazardly, through trade, war and
treaty. For 400 years Parliament responded to these imperial developments mainly through passing new
laws, setting up commissions, and holding enquiries. This extended the reach of Parliament far beyond
the British Isles, affecting the lives of millions across the globe. In so doing it shaped the modern world
in a way that still has repercussions today.
 Parliament and the American Colonies before 1765
For much of the 17th century Parliament had little direct involvement in the growing colonies in America.
Most had royal origins –through either chartered trading companies (such as the Virginia Company),
royal grants to favourite individuals (William Penn's Pennsylvania) or direct royal control (Barbados).
Parliament's largely hands-off policy towards America later became known as salutary neglect.
Controlling trade
Later in the century, Parliament did begin to regulate overseas trade and passed a series of Navigation
Acts in 1651, 1660 and 1663. These aimed to ensure that the profits of international trade stayed in the
hands of English merchants by limiting the ability of American colonists to trade with any country, or
colony, other than England. The period after the Glorious Revolution of 1689 saw an increased
involvement. The Board of Trade was established in 1696 to develop colonial policy.
Tightening up laws
Parliament next passed laws to tighten up the Navigation Acts and to combat the widespread piracy and
smuggling in American waters. Parliament also made changes to the charters of the various English
companies trading in America, Africa and Asia. Parliament's main focus remained on America and India
and it passed twenty-nine Acts on colonial trade, customs and piracy between 1714 and 1739. It was also
central to the establishment of royal rule in the Carolina colonies in 1729 and to the foundation of the
colony of Georgia in 1733.
Molasses Act
Many members of both houses of Parliament had interests in the sugar-producing West Indian islands
and, in 1733, these planters and their agents pushed through Parliament an Act which set a high import
duty on molasses and sugar imported into the North American colonies from the French West Indies. This
was the first time Parliament had brought in a tax to raise revenue on the colonies, and it was greeted
there with many objections, and seen as a sign that the long period of Parliament's salutary neglect of the
American colonies was over.

Did you know?

Parliament's trade policy could take a more violent form than just the Navigation Acts.
Parliament actively promoted naval war with England's greatest trade rivals, the Dutch, in 1651-2
(England victorious) and again in 1665-7 (England defeated).

 The Stamp Act and the American colonies 1763-67

Relations between the American colonists and the British government came to a head after the British
success against France in the Seven Years War of 1756-63.
Change in policy
It was an expensive war and the French lost all their North American possessions including Quebec in
what is now Canada, and all the land they claimed between the Appalachian Mountains and the
Mississippi River. The British needed to station a large army in North America as a consequence and on
22 March 1765 the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act, which sought to raise money to pay for this
army through a tax on all legal and official papers and publications circulating in the colonies.
No Taxation without Representation
The Act resulted in violent protests in America and the colonists argued that there should be "No Taxation
without Representation" and that it went against the British constitution to be forced to pay a tax to which
they had not agreed through representation in Parliament. The British government argued instead that the
colonists enjoyed virtual representation, that they were represented in Parliament in the same way as the
thousands of British subjects who did not have the vote, or towns not represented in Parliament, such as
Birmingham and Manchester. MPs in the Commons, it said, legislated for all British subjects everywhere.
To this the colonists replied that they were already represented in their own colonial assemblies, elected
law-making bodies which had been voting the laws and taxes for each colony from the time of their
foundations. To the colonists these assemblies were the equivalent of Parliament, where they were
represented and whose taxes they paid. They did not feel they should pay another unrepresentative tax on
top.
Repeal
The Stamp Act became one of the most controversial laws ever passed by Parliament, and after several
months of protests and boycotts which damaged British trade, it was repealed on 18 March 1766. The
Act's repeal, however, was followed that same day with the Declaratory Act, which maintained that the
British Parliament had the right and authority to legislate for the colonies in all cases whatsoever. The
dispute was far from over.

Did you know?

The American statesman Benjamin Franklin, in Britain to represent the interests of Pennsylvania, in
January 1766, had to answer 174 questions over four hours before a Committee of the House of
Commons examining the American reaction to the Stamp Act.

 Parliament and the war in the American colonies 1767-83

Following the repeal of the Stamp Act, Parliament tried to tax the colonies in 1767 by raising import
duties, which became known as the Townshend duties, on certain goods. The colonists continued to insist
that they could not be taxed by the British Parliament without proper representation, even indirectly by
customs duties.
Boston Tea Party
The measures also met with opposition from merchants at home, and the government repealed them in
1770 – except for the one on tea, which the Prime Minister Lord North insisted remain as an assertion of
Parliament's right to tax the colonists. On 16 December 1773 a group of protesters in Boston boarded a
ship and dumped £10,000 worth of tea in the harbour, an event immortalised in the United States as the
Boston Tea Party.
Intolerable Acts
In angry response, Parliament passed in 1774 a series of punitive measures, known in America as the
Intolerable Acts, which closed Boston harbour and strengthened the power of the royal governor over the
rebellious Massachusetts legislative assembly. The Quebec Act greatly extended the territory of the
former French colony of Quebec, and recognised the Catholic Church there while giving the royal
governor increased powers. These were all controversial measures, and the Quebec Act in particular was
criticised in both Britain and the American colonies as an indication of the growing despotic character of
the British government.
War of Independence
The crisis of 1774 soon tipped over into armed confrontation between British troops and American
colonists at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts on19 April 1775. Eventually it led to war, after
representatives of the colonies meeting in the first Continental Congress in Philadelphia formally declared
their independence from Britain on 4 July 1776.
Following a protracted war, Britain formally recognised the independence of the thirteen colonies as the
United States of America in the treaty of 1783. The only parts of its former North American possessions
which remained were the colonies of Nova Scotia, Quebec and Newfoundland – none of which had joined
the rebellion and which had received many loyalists fleeing the war-torn colonies.

Did you know?

On 5 March 1770 British troops in Boston fired into a crowd protesting against the Townshend Duties,
killing five people – ironically on the very same day on which Lord North recommended to Parliament
the repeal of the Duties.

 British North America 1763-91

In 1763 Britain acquired the province of Quebec from the defeated French, where over 50,000 French-
speaking and Roman Catholic inhabitants, the ‘Canadiens’, greatly outnumbered the British Protestant
settlers.
Quebec Act
The British Parliament established a government for this potentially volatile settlement by the Quebec Act
of 1774, which extended the territory of Quebec to the west, accepted the inhabitants' practice of
Catholicism and provided that a royal governor and his appointed council would rule the colony without
an elected assembly.
American colonists thought the Quebec Act was part of the British government's plot to destroy their
liberties by creating a large French-style absolutist government which could act as a base of attack.
Loyalists
The ‘Canadiens’ did not join their American neighbours in the Revolution of 1776-83, and Quebec -
having lost much of its territory in 1783 - and the neighbouring colony of Nova Scotia, became the
destination of perhaps as many as 50,000 American loyalists who had sided with Britain during the
Revolution. In 1784 the separate colony of New Brunswick was created for the loyalists out of western
Nova Scotia. The immigration of these loyal British Protestant settlers meant that the Quebec Act,
originally aimed at a French Catholic population, would have to be modified.
Constitutional Act
Parliament took control this time to prevent any future insurgencies and in 1791 it passed the
Constitutional Act. This divided Quebec into Lower Canada on the St Lawrence River, the centre of the
old French colony, and Upper Canada on the northern shores of the Great Lakes, where most of the
British settled. It provided for government by a governor-general, assisted by lieutenant-governors and
appointed executive and legislative councils for each of the two Canadas. Elected legislative assemblies
were set up for the two provinces, but the Act ensured that the governor-general had sufficient powers to
prevent another American revolution. The Constitutional Act was the British Parliament's first attempt to
extend some self-government to a British settler colony, but the conflict between French and English
settlers was not so easily resolved and was to continue to trouble Parliament's relations with British North
America for many years to come.

Did you know?

Quebec was captured from the French in 1759 in a daring military campaign led by General James Wolfe,
whose troops scaled the cliff leading to the Citadel of Quebec. Wolfe's death in the ensuing battle made
him a British hero.

 The West Indian colonies and emancipation

By 1815 Britain controlled many of the key West Indian islands which had grown rich in the 18th century
through the sale of sugar harvested and processed by the large number of enslaved Africans working on
the plantations. Many people in Britain became concerned with the human suffering which lay behind the
production of this luxury good, and from the 1790s Parliament spent a great deal of time responding to
the campaign to abolish the slave trade and, eventually, slavery itself.
West India men and abolitionists
In the 1780s the interests of those involved in and supporting the West India trade was represented in
Parliament by a group of MPs such as Edward Hyde East and Robert Sewell. Against this was an
abolitionist group led by William Wilberforce, who was able to harness public opinion to his cause
through petitions and agitation. In 1788 Parliament passed an Act regulating the number of enslaved
Africans that could be transported on ships. In 1792 it agreed to Wilberforce's motion for the abolition of
the trade, but it was not until 25 March 1807 that the Bill abolishing the British slave trade itself received
Royal Assent.
Anti-Slavery Society
In 1823 abolitionists formed the Society for the Migration and Gradual Abolition of Slavery throughout
the British Dominions to call for the emancipation of all those enslaved in the colonies. Among the
Society's members were Wilberforce and the MP Thomas Fowell Buxton. The Society worked to ensure
that abolitionist candidates were elected in the general election of 1832, and the Slavery Abolition Act
was passed by Parliament the following year. This created a fund of £20 million raised by the Rothschilds
to compensate the planters and established an apprenticeship system, whereby those formerly enslaved
would still be bound to work for their former masters for a number of years.
Freedom
On 1 August 1834, 750,000 slaves in the British West Indies formally became free. The apprenticeship
system was unpopular among former slaves and their masters, and it was not implemented in in Trinidad:
Antigua and Bermuda freed their slaves immediately. Under pressure from Westminster, the legislative
assemblies in the colonies abolished the apprenticeship system and full freedom was granted to all former
slaves on 1 August 1838.

Did you know?

One of the key elements in the campaign for the abolition of the slave trade were the writings of
members of the black community such as Ignatius Sancho and Olaudah Equiano, whose
autobiographical 'Interesting Narrative' became famous.

 Parliament and the East India Company

The origins of the British Empire in India lie in the East India Company, which in the 17th century
established successful trading posts on the Indian coast at Surat, Bombay, Madras and Calcutta.
Parliament had to determine its relationship with this private trading company once it became a territorial
and political power in India, arising from its military victories at Plassey (1757) and Buxar (1764), which
gave it control of the revenue of the Indian states of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa.
Financial crisis
The Company was badly administered, with corruption among its officials in Britain and India. In 1772 it
was engulfed by a financial crisis, and the British government was forced to intervene. Parliament had
already established a number of committees charged with examining the state of the Company’s affairs
and the activities of its servants in India. The committees' reports severely criticised the East India
Company and in 1773 its affairs were debated in Parliament. The Prime Minister, Lord North, maintained
that Company territory would be "better administered by the Crown that is so ill-administered by
Directors incapable of governing it".
Parliament steps in
The resulting new laws - the East India Company Loan Act and the East India Company Regulating Act -
made it possible for the government to extend a loan to the Company in exchange for recognition of the
British state's ultimate authority over the Indian territories. It leased to the Company continued political
control of its Indian territory in exchange for a payment of £40,000 every two years. It also established
the post of governor-general who, with a council of four members, was to have overall authority over the
Company's territories.
More government control
More government control came with the India Act of 1784, under Prime Minister William Pitt. This
created a committee of six government appointees, known as the Board of Control, who were to monitor
and direct the Company's policies. The government was also to have the final decision on the Company's
nominations for its officials in India. This and a further new law passed in 1786 greatly increased the
authority of the governor-general over other Company officials.

Did you know?

The East India Company's victory at the Battle of Plassey was achieved mainly because during a
rainstorm Company troops kept their gunpowder dry. When the rain stopped, they still had firepower,
while the guns of the native troops were useless.

 The East India Company and public opinion

The East India Company's activities, particularly the behaviour of the Company’s servants, roused much
public indignation in England.
Nabobs
There were many sources of public and parliamentary outrage. The Company servants who had become
fantastically wealthy through corrupt trade and other practices, became known as nabobs. It was feared
that these individuals, their agents and those who took their bribes, would corrupt Parliament by forming
an unbeatable East Indian interest there.
Corruption and brutality
There was also despair at the bad administration of the Company's affairs, both in Britain and in India –
especially in 1772 when the Company's finances collapsed. Lord North's Regulating Act of 1773 was a
response to this concern. In addition there was anger at the often brutal and corrupt behaviour of some of
the Company’s officials.
Attacks in Parliament
Robert Clive, the victor of Plassey, and MP for Shrewsbury from 1761, had to defend himself vigorously
for three successive days in the Commons in May 1773 against the attacks levelled against him by
General John Burgoyne, MP for Preston, who was the chairman of a committee examining his
administration in India. Edmund Burke (MP for Malton) became the most outspoken critic in Parliament
against Company abuse and immorality in India and led a campaign to impeach the former Governor-
General Warren Hastings (1773-85) on grounds of misrule and corruption.
Impeachment
Hastings was charged with high crimes and misdemeanors and was impeached in 1787. His trial - the
longest impeachment proceedings in Parliament's history - began in Westminster Hall in 1788. Burke was
unrestrained in his denunciations, and violently accused Hastings of being the "captain-general of
iniquity", a "spider of Hell" and a "ravenous vulture devouring the carcases of the dead". Yet despite the
passion and forcefulness of Burke's moral outrage, Hastings was acquitted of all charges in April 1795
after his seven-year trial.
Public interest and concern
Both the Clive inquiry and the Hastings impeachment stirred up widespread popular interest and
excitement and showed that under the influence of the Evangelical movement there was a growing public
feeling that there should be a moral foundation to British rule in the growing Indian empire.

Did you know?

The English term nabob comes from the Indian word nawab The nawabs were Indian rulers in provinces
such as Bengal, and it seemed to people in England that some Company servants were becoming as rich
and powerful as these local rulers.

 East India Company and Raj 1785-1858

Parliament continued to control the East India Company by extending its charter for only twenty years at
a time. Those granted in 1793, 1813, 1833 and 1853 successively whittled away the Company's
commercial rights and trading monopolies.
Losing privileges
Its last remaining monopoly over the China tea trade was abolished in 1833. Parliament allowed the
Company to maintain its political and administrative duties in India, but the charter of 1813 included a
clause asserting the Crown's undoubted sovereignty over all of the Company's territories and required it to
open up India to Christian missionaries. The 1833 Charter Act invested the Board of Control with full
authority over the Company and further increased the power of the governor-general.
Gaining territory
Successive governors-general – particularly Marquess Wellesley (1798-1805), and the Marquess of
Hastings (1813-23) – continued to add territory to the Company's holdings in India through conquest and
alliance. By 1856, with the annexation of Oudh, all the Indian subcontinent up to the Himalayas, and
much of Burma, was ruled directly by the Company itself or by local allied rulers.
Indian Rising
In 1857 the Indians rose in revolt against high-handed and oppressive Company rule – particularly its
insensitivity towards their religions – and it took excessively brutal action by the Company's army to
regain control of its possessions. Following this failure of governance, the British state formally took over
the East India Company's rule in India.
End of Company rule
The Company lost all its administrative powers following the Government of India Act of 1858, and its
Indian possessions and armed forces were taken over by the Crown. Rule of the country shifted from the
directors of the Company to a Secretary of State for India advised by a council, whose members were
appointed by the Crown. The Crown also directly appointed the governor-general, or viceroy, and
provincial governors in India. The East India Company itself was formally dissolved by Act of Parliament
in 1874. Thus began the British Raj, direct imperial rule of India by the British state.

Did you know?

The 1857 uprising started because both Hindu and Muslim soldiers in the sepoy, or Indian, regiments of
the East India Company, objected to having to bite open rifle cartridges rumoured to be smeared with fat
from animals which were forbidden or sacred in their religions.

 Government of the Raj 1858-1914

As the Crown took over rule in India in 1858, so Parliament's involvement in Indian affairs increased. The
governance of India was often reviewed and the British Parliament passed a total of 196 Acts concerning
the continent between 1858 and 1947.
Government of the Raj
The government of the Raj consisted wholly of British officials and was headed by the viceroy and the
appointed members of his council. After the Indian Councils Act was passed in 1861 this executive
council acted as a cabinet and also as part of an imperial legislative council. Each of British India's eleven
provinces had its own governor, assisted by similar provincial legislative councils of appointed officials.
There were also a small number of Indian council members who were part of the local elite, appointed
solely for consultative purposes.
Empress of India
British rule over India was reinforced when in 1876 Parliament passed the Royal Titles Act, which
formally endowed Queen Victoria with the title of Empress of India.
Indian nationalists
In 1885 a group of Indian nationalists founded the India National Congress and slowly Indians began to
play an increasing role in politics in both India and the Empire. In the 1890s both Dadabhai Naoroji, a
founder of the Indian National Congress fiercely critical of British rule, and Sir Macherjee M.
Bhownaggree, who supported the government of the Raj, sat in the Westminster Parliament as MPs for
London constituencies.
Indian electors
Two Indian Councils Acts, of 1892 and 1909, allowed a small number of Indians –39 in 1892 rising to
135 in 1909 - to be elected to both the imperial legislative council and the provincial legislative councils.
The 1909 Act ensured that these representatives were chosen by small groups of Indian electors as
representatives of specific religious and social groups, such as Muslims or landowners. These councils
remained merely advisory and the governor was in no way responsible to these elected representatives.
Parliament's legislation of 1892 and 1909 did not adequately address the wide-scale dissatisfaction with
British rule. But it was events after the First World War that caused a crisis for the Raj.
Did you know?
A leading founder of the Indian National Congress was a Briton, Alan Octavian Hume, who felt that "a
studied and invariable disregard... for the opinions and feelings of our subjects, is ... the leading
characteristic of our government".

 The Raj and independence 1914-47

Massacre and non-violence
Indian nationalist feeling intensified in the years after World War I, stimulated first by the Amritsar
Massacre, when on 13 April 1919, British troops fired into a crowd in an enclosed park in the city of
Amritsar. It continued with non-violent protest campaigns against British rule led by Mohandas K.
Gandhi and other leaders of the Indian National Congress. The British Parliament's answer to this
growing nationalism - conceding self-government bit by bit - usually came too little and too late.
Government of India Acts
The Government of India Act of December 1919 set up an extremely complicated system of power-
sharing between British officials and a limited number of elected Indians in both the central and
provincial legislative councils. Its successor, the Government of India Act of 1935, with 450 clauses and
15 separate schedules, is one of the longest and most complicated laws passed by Parliament. The
hundreds of pages devoted to it in Hansard suggest it was also one of the most controversial. It increased
the numbers who could vote and introduced fully-elected provincial legislatures, who could appoint their
own governments. In 1937 the Indian National Congress formed ministries in seven of the eleven
provinces.
Divisions
At the end of World War II, the incoming Labour government decided to grant full independence to
India, and negotiated with representatives from the two main political parties, the Hindu-dominated
Congress Party and the Muslim League. These parties were bitterly divided and the latter demanded a
Muslim homeland, to be called Pakistan, made up of the provinces of the Raj with majority Muslim
populations.
Independence
Viceroy Mountbatten's unilateral declaration that India would become independent on 15 August 1947
forced Parliament to rush through its Indian Independence Act, which received Royal Assent on 18th July
1947. India and Pakistan became independent, self-governing states, although they both still had a
governor-general as representative of the British monarch. Both later became republics and members of
the Commonwealth.

Did you know?

In January 1946 Parliament sent a delegation to India to meet leading politicians. One member was the
Labour MP Reginald Sorensen whose many photographs recording his trip can be seen in the
Parliamentary Archives.
  The settler colonies: Canada
Responsible Government
The North American colonies were the subject of the British Parliament's first attempt to devolve what is
known as responsible government to one of its settler colonies. This was the system that had developed in
the Westminster Parliament itself, where the ruling government is made up of ministers drawn from the
elected legislature, to which they are responsible for their actions and policies.
Durham Report
French Canadian opposition to the system of government established by the Constitutional Act of 1791
spilled over into rebellion in the French heartland of Lower Canada in 1837. As a result the new
governor-general, Lord Durham, recommended that Upper and Lower Canada be merged into a new
single province with responsible government. Parliament's Act of Union of 1840 united the two provinces
into Canada, with a single legislature and the then governor-general, the Earl of Elgin (1847-54) oversaw
the introduction of responsible government. The British Parliament agreed that a responsible colonial
government had the right to make laws for its own territory when in 1849 it refused to intervene to
challenge the Rebellion Losses Act. This was a controversial measure passed by the Canadian provincial
government which had led to rioting among the British inhabitants.
Federation
In March 1867 Parliament passed the British North America Act which was originally drafted by colonial
politicians themselves. It created a new state - Canada - by uniting the the provinces of Canada, New
Brunswick and Nova Scotia. The new federation was made up of four provinces: Ontario (formerly Upper
Canada), Quebec (formerly Lower Canada), Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. It established a federal
structure dividing authority and responsibilities between provincial governments and legislatures, and the
new federal government and Parliament in Ottawa. All were under the ultimate sovereignty of the British
monarch in the person of the governor-general. The subsequent British North America Acts of 1871 and
1886 provided for the creation of other new provinces formed from the vast North American continent.
Dominion of Canada
In a few short years Manitoba (1870), British Columbia (1871), Prince Edward's Island (1873),
Saskatchewan and Alberta (both 1905) all joined the Dominion of Canada, as it was called after 1907.
Newfoundland remained a separate dominion until it joined the federation in 1949.

Did you know?

Most of what is now northern and western Canada was once claimed by the Hudson's Bay Company, a
British trading enterprise chartered in 1670. Parliament passed an Act in 1868 by which transferred these
territories to the Canadian Confederation.

 The settler colonies: Australia

After the first vessels carrying convicts landed at Botany Bay on the east coast of Australia in January
1788, British settlers - initially convicts but later voluntary immigrants - continued to arrive throughout
the early 19th century. Following the advice in the 1839 report of the Canadian governor-general Lord
Durham, the British government embarked on a project to give the settler colonies what is known as
responsible government.
Colonial government
An Act of Parliament in 1842 decreed that the original penal colony of New South Wales would be ruled
by a governor working with a legislative council, the majority of whose members would be elected.
The penal colony of Van Diemen's Land (later Tasmania), Western Australia and South Australia were
established as separate settlements in the early 1830s. However, well into the 1840s all three were ruled
by more direct government through a governor and an appointed council.
Government Act
Parliament's Australian Colonies Government Act of 1850 made important changes. A new colony,
Victoria, was created in the south-eastern part of New South Wales, along with a majority-elected
legislative council. It established similar elected councils in Van Diemen's Land, South Australia and
Western Australia. It also split off a northern section of New South Wales to form a new colony –
Queensland - with responsible government. Constitutions were drafted to make each colony's government
responsible to its particular legislature. The UK Parliament enacted these measures by statute in 1855.
Federation and Commonwealth
Federation, which had been achieved in Canada in 1867, took longer, but provincial political leaders
eventually submitted a draft Bill to Parliament, which was quickly passed in 1900. From 1 January 1901 a
federal government made up of the six states in the Commonwealth of Australia was created, all overseen
by a governor-general as representative of the monarch. The federation achieved complete autonomy
from the British Parliament in 1942, when Australia's legislature ratified the 1931 Statute of Westminster.

Did you know?

Convicts were transported to Australia because America was no longer an option. Parliament passed the
'Transportation Act' in 1718 and between then and 1775, some 49,000 convicts were removed to the
American colonies. Australia only received around 29,500 between 1787 and 1820.

 The settler colonies: New Zealand

In the first half of the 19th century, Parliament had to take into account the interests and claims of the
Maoris in New Zealand. They were the politically-organised indigenous people of the islands whose
chiefs addressed a Declaration of Independence to the British Crown in 1835.
Committee report
In 1836 pressure from missionaries and humanitarians persuaded Parliament to set up a committee to
examine the treatment of aborigines in the colonies. Its 1837 report recommended that, as far as possible,
Europeans and indigenous peoples should be kept separate.
Treaty of Waitangi
Following this advice in 1840 the consul in New Zealand, William Hobson, signed the Treaty of Waitangi
with Maori chiefs, which assured them of the Crown's protection of their lands and rights. He then
annexed the islands to Britain, in order to enforce Crown control over the British settlers there.
The treaty did not work and conflict between settlers and Maoris over land increased in the second half of
the century.
Constitution Act
Following its policy of establishing self-government in the settler colonies, Parliament passed the New
Zealand Constitution Act in 1852. It set up government at the colonial and provincial level by a governor,
executive council and a two chamber general assembly, with a nominated upper house and an elected
lower.
First ministry
At the first meeting of the New Zealand general assembly in 1854 there were motions calling for
responsible government in the colony, and the country's first ministry was formed the following year.
In 1857 Parliament passed another law which allowed the New Zealand general assembly itself to amend
some of the provisions of the 1852 Act.
Dominion
In 1900 New Zealand decided not to enter the Australian federation and remained an independent British
colony. On 26 September 1907 the country formally called itself a Dominion- a term only recently
created to describe the self-governing settler colonies. In 1947 it was also the last of the Dominions to
adopt the Statute of Westminster at which point it became independent of the British Parliament. It
remains a member of the Commonwealth.

Did you know?

Differences between the English and Maori interpretations of the Treaty of Waitangi have long caused
conflict. In 1975 the treaty was finally given the status of New Zealand law and a Tribunal was
established to hear claims under its terms.

 The settler colonies: South Africa

Britain acquired the Cape of Good Hope Colony at the southern tip of Africa in 1815 and annexed the
adjacent coastal region of Natal in 1843. Self-governing colony status was established in both in the
1850s, but not responsible government whereby a ruling government would be in place with accountable
elected Ministers - as the region was still politically volatile.
Competition and conflict
Throughout the 19th century British settlers were outnumbered by both Africans and the descendants of
the original Dutch settlers of the 17th century, known as Boers (farmers). In the 1830s the latter
established two independent republics in Transvaal and the Orange Free State, which Britain was forced
to recognise in the early 1850s. Conflict between the Boers and the British was constant throughout the
century. There were two major wars between 1880 and 1881 and 1899 and 1902, both caused by British
attempts to annex Boer territory.
Second Boer War
The second Boer War started very badly for the British and revealed the limits of British military might in
its extended empire. But eventually the superior numbers of the British Army wore the Boers down.
Under the 1902 Treaty of Vereeniging the Boers agreed to surrender their two republics - Transvaal and
the Orange Free State. The British Crown agreed to their request that the extension of the vote to Africans
in the republics would not be decided until after the re-introduction of self-government.
Union
Britain had long been encouraging a union of the four South African colonies. In 1908 white delegates
sent a draft proposal for union to the British Parliament, which hurried through the South Africa Union
Bill in 1909. This provided for a unitary state for the four colonies of the Cape, Natal, Orange Free State,
and Transvaal, rather than federation. It also excluded indigenous Africans living in the territories from
all aspects of political life. The Union of South Africa formally came into being in 1910, becoming a
member of the Commonwealth in 1931, leaving in 1961, but rejoining in 1994 after the end of apartheid.

Did you know?

In the War of 1899-1902 the Boers adopted a successful guerrilla campaign, and the British responded by
establishing concentration camps to imprison the Boer civilian population. Parliament established the
Fawcett Commission to investigate the terrible conditions in these camps.

 The settler colonies: Legislative independence

From the mid-19th century the British government embarked on a campaign to provide the settler
colonies with self-government conducted by ministries responsible to the locally-elected legislature,
rather than to the royal governor. But the authority of these colonial legislatures in relation to
Westminster was not always clear, especially as they ultimately derived their authority and even their
existence from Parliamentary statute.
Colonial legislation
Initially, Parliament tried to resolve this problem through the Colonial Laws Validity Act of 1865. This
laid down that colonial legislation was to have full effect within the colony itself, except for those laws
which contradicted a statute of the UK Parliament which contained powers extending to that colony.
The law in effect confirmed the colonies' powers of self-government but that over-arching sovereignty
was retained by the Westminster Parliament.
New relationship
In 1931 Parliament developed a new relationship with the Dominions - a term first used in 1907 to
describe the self-governing colonies - through the Statute of Westminster. This Act repealed the Colonial
Laws Validity Act and renounced the Westminster Parliament's right to legislate for the Dominions unless
at their explicit request. With the passage of the Statute of Westminster, the British Parliament conceded
the last aspects of its authority over the Dominions to their own governments. It marked the effective
legislative independence of the Dominions from Britain and their equal status as nation states.
Dominions
The Act initially applied to the six Dominions which existed in 1931 - Canada, Newfoundland, New
Zealand, Australia, South Africa and the Irish Free State. It was only formally ratified by Australia in
1942, by New Zealand in 1947 and was never endorsed by Newfoundland before that Dominion joined
the Canadian confederation in 1949.
Commonwealth
These Dominions (except for the Irish Free State, which became the Republic of Ireland in 1949)
continue their links with the British Crown through the Commonwealth of Nations. The Statute of
Westminster is seen as the origin of the Commonwealth, the informal group of independent former
British colonies which work together to promote democracy, human rights, good government and a
number of other common values.

Did you know?

The Dominions were recognized as independent before 1931. Australia, Canada, Newfoundland, New
Zealand, and South Africa each signed the Treaty of Versailles and was a founding member of the League
of Nations in 1919.