A Simple Nullity?: The Wi Parata Case in New Zealand Law and by David V. Williams

David V. Williams takes a clean examine the infamous Wi Parata case - the protagonists, the origins of the dispute, the years of felony backward and forward - affording new insights into either Maori-Pakeha kinfolk within the 19th century and the criminal place of the Treaty of Waitangi. In 1877, the recent Zealand excellent courtroom determined a case, Wi Parata v Bishop of Wellington, that focused at the possession and use of the Whitireia Block, close to Porirua. Ngati Toa had given this land to the Anglican Church for a faculty that used to be by no means equipped. during refusing to inquire into the possession of the block, the judges pushed aside the relevance of the Treaty of Waitangi: 'So some distance certainly as that device alleged to cede the sovereignty - a question with which we're not at once involved - it has to be considered as an easy nullity.' during the last twenty-five years, judges, legal professionals and commentators have castigated this 'simple nullity' view of the Treaty. The 'infamous' case has been visible as symbolic of the overlook of Maori rights via settlers, executive and the legislations in New Zealand. The actual heritage to the Wi Parata case, Williams argues, tells us a lot approximately nineteenth-century Maori performing as they proposal most sensible for his or her humans and approximately debates in Pakeha jurisprudence over the popularity or rejection of popular Maori rights. in the back of the obvious dismissal of the Treaty as a 'simple nullity' lay deep arguments in regards to the position of Maori and Pakeha in Aotearoa New Zealand. these arguments are as proper now as they have been then