1902: Maori Parliament Shut Down

March 21, 2025

By AHNZ

Today in history, 21 March, 1902, Te Kotahitanga, the Maori Parliament, shut shop forever.

The Maori Parliament (1892 – 1902) had been an exercise of self-government by Maori ‘from the Bay of Islands to the Bluff.’ Essentially it was a great conference hosted at different locations over those years. The idea was to agree to measures that would then be strong recommendations, with one voice to the House of Representatives.

When the Suffragettes got together in the same era they were also referred to as the “Women’s Parliament” but the Kotahitanga was much more than a lobby group or a federation of societies.

A grand vision, they ran it like the House of Representatives itself. There was a role of Premier (aka Prime Minister,) Speaker, Upper House, Lower House, electorates, elections, Hansard, Bills. Women gained the right to vote and be elected from 1897. They even had a ‘sacred object’ in their session, reputably the original Treaty of Waitangi itself.

After all, why should The House of Representatives be the only gentleman’s club to propose legislation to the Sovereign?

At this time our parliament was bicameral. All legislation had to be proposed by the House of Representatives for the Legislative Council to either dispose of or pass on to the Governor who signed it into law for the King in England.

In a way, for this decade New Zealand was a tetracameral parliament. If the Kotahitanga ever really got its feet on the ground it might, technically, have aspired to be recognised the same way that The House of Representatives and Legislative Chamber were. The equivalent institutions, Whare o Raro and Whare Ariki, could, in constitutional theory, have sent their own bills to the Governor for Royal Assent; An Act of Parliament. Perhaps there could even have been a Maori Governor or Lieutenant Governor.

“One circumstance gives an interest of its own to the meeting—that the original Treaty of Waitangi is there. The hui, or meeting, on this occasion is being held for the purpose of formulating any suggestions which they think should be passed into law by the Government, if practicable.” – Poverty Bay Herald (1892,) Papers Past

“…Maori Parliament now meeting in solemn conclave at Maungakawa, It was to all intents and purposes as anti-european as it was possible to make it- not sell land, pay no taxes (especially dog tax), make their own laws, and oppose the Pakeha at every point, and in. fact ignore him. We are afraid our dusky brethren are rather inconsistent in their mode of carrying out their “platform,” for if there is any tenth in the old adage that “imitation i the sincerest form of flattery,” they have certainly paid the Pakeha a very high compliment. During this session everything is to be done en regle, and on similar lines to those adopted in our own House of Representatives at Wellington We have already recorded that a “ Bellamy’s” has been established at Maungakawa, and now they are going to run a Hansird,” so that their grandiloquent oration may be handed down to prosperity.” – Waikato Times (1892,) Papers Past

“After the initial motion was abandoned, the right for Māori women to vote and stand for Te Kotahitanga was not realised until 1897.” – kaupapamaori.com

“The lower house, or Whare o Raro, had 96 members, elected at large from electorates defined according to tribal affiliation. The upper house, or Whare Ariki, was composed of 44 paramount chiefs elected by the members of the Whare o Raro. 127 representatives filled the 140 positions in both houses at the parliament’s first sitting at Waipatu Marae in 1892, as 13 chiefs were elected to both houses.” – Wiki

This was a power leakage that The State could not allow so it was shut down. But how?

In the first place, Te Kotahitanga was subject to scandal and in-fighting. In this it was no different and perhaps less violent than the first session of the House of Representatives. In that case our first Prime Minister,  Henry Sewell, put another Member in a chokehold. Premier Hamiora Mangakahia’s office was mired by accusations of financial mismanagement.

Secondly, The Seddon Ministry pulled the old trick of creating a competing instrument which they were in control of. Maoris migrated to ‘Maori Councils’ and voluntarily gave up their own parliament and the dream of Kotahitanga: Unity between all Maori people. Ref. 1900: Maori Councils, AHNZ

In any case, it was absolutely racist. New Zealand has had multiple Lieutenant Governors before but not within the same over-lapping geographic areas based on racial identity! A duopoly on the use of force in a single territory, as David Lange said, was never the plan and cannot work. A better definition of that might be ‘civil war in progress’.

“Democratic government can accommodate Maori political aspiration in many ways. It can allocate resources in ways which reflect the particular interests of Maori people. It can delegate authority, and allow the exercise of degrees of Maori autonomy. What it cannot do is acknowledge the existence of a separate sovereignty. As soon as it does that, it isn’t a democracy. We can have a democratic form of government or we can have indigenous sovereignty. They can’t coexist and we can’t have them both.” – Lange (2000,) brucejesson.com

Learning about the Kotahitanga, especially online, is quite difficult. None of my books breathe a word of it. I don’t think it’s something State History wants you to know.

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Image ref. 6th sitting of the Kotahitanga Parliament, Alexander Turnbull Library. AHNZ colour (2025)

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