The Treaty and sovereignty

An interesting post by Dr Lawrie Knight, who makes the case that Chiefs who signed the Treaty of Waitangi were aware they were ceding power and sovereignty, based on their actual speeches at the signing.

Also Liam Hehir makes a valuable point:

Imagine if all the world’s historians met and agreed that William the Conqueror’s claim to England was comprehensively disproved. Would it follow that everything built upon the foundation of the Norman Conquest is devoid of legitimacy? The castles, the cathedrals, the legal structures, the very fabric of the English and then British state – are they all tainted by the original sin of an illegitimate claim to rule?

As far as I know nobody has ever seriously proposed replacing the modern British state, including Parliament, cabinet government and the common law with a Witenagemot that also appointed the king from among the noble Anglo-Saxon families to administer justice according to the Danelagh and other customary laws. Too much water has passed under the bridge for that and, however shaky the nature of William’s claim, it is not the basis on which the British state today draws its legitimacy.

The same applies to the Treaty of Waitangi. It was a definitive step in a process that ultimately led to Britain establishing sovereignty over the entirety of New Zealand. But it has not been the thing that has sustained that sovereignty since 1840.

As Liam says, the Treaty was a step towards sovereignty, but the US, Canada and Australia are all examples of sovereign governments despite no treaty or equivalent.

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