CONCLUSION
CONCLUSION
The history of Tasmania is a type of the Australian world. The events recorded in these volumes represent the policy, modified slightly, which has everywhere prevailed. The author has however rarely attempted generalization, and has represented every fact in its independent colors. Thus an evil pursued to its source might have been avoidable by greater forethought and care, or it may have been the inevitable issue of a system upon the whole beneficial and therefore just.
For many years the government of these colonies was absolute: could it be otherwise? A company of exiles, overawed by dissolute soldiery, interspersed here and there with few persons of a superior class, could only be governed by despotism. It might have been legalised instead of tolerated by the parliament, and it might have been less offensive to the spirit of liberty. But to have trusted a few proprietors with legislation or a share of the executive authority, could have only created a tyranny more grievous.
The comparison between the early colonists of America, at least those of the northern states, and the founders of Australia, must quickly run off into a contrast. The primary object of the Pilgrim Fathers, was the enjoyment of opinions in peace. The early denizens of the southern world burned their first church to escape the tedium of attendance. The first pilgrims of New England attempted a community of goods on the plan of the apostles. The first Australians drew their stores from the commissariat, and adopted the traditions of Houndsditch and Wapping. The leaders of the first Americans were their clergy,—the bible was their political and civil standard. The rulers of the first Australians were half marine, half soldiers, whose pay was supplemented by the sale of spirits sold by convict women, their mistresses. Thus for many years the government of these colonies was absolute, and the usual consequences sometimes appeared.
Were a judgment to be formed however of the spirit of colonial government by a severe examination of its early frame-work, erroneous conclusions would be drawn. In the worst times the sentiments and habits of Englishmen tempered the operation of power. Settlers fresh from English society could not discard the opinions and principles cherished in Great Britain; nor could the rulers of the day forget that their conduct would be judged, not by the standard of continental despotisms, but by British systems of government. The establishment of British courts of justice and the protection of English laws have been found with few exceptions an impenetrable shield. The chief examples of official wrong have been generally connected with the misappropriation of public resources rather than invasions of personal liberty. How different the despotism of a Spanish viceroy and the sternest rule of a British governor! For the last twenty years cases of aggravated oppression have been exceedingly rare. The genius of British freedom has ever overshadowed the British colony, and awed the despotic ruler, while it has encouraged and sheltered the feeblest colonist. The great defect in official men has been their superciliousness and indolence, rather than their tyranny, and the popular governors of this hemisphere have gained the public esteem by their manners rather than their ability. A genial temper and a feeling heart rarely failed to conciliate the multitude, while distinguished talents have lost their immediate influence when in union with a harsh, contemptuous, and fiery spirit.[281]
For many years the press has exercised a powerful influence on the affairs of government, and left no avenue of escape to official ignorance and corruption. Even when jurors were selected by governors, the most unmeasured denunciations were poured forth without fear of prosecution. Associations for the redress of grievances have carried their organizations to the very verge of constitutional order. A democratic state certainly would never have tolerated the discussion of its principles and authority in feeble dependencies. But the British government, secure in its power and serenely conscious of its ability to check an intrusion on its just authority, has encouraged rather than repressed the freedom of public discussion and combination. The local rulers, instructed by their superiors, have long permitted even the licentiousness of the press. The strength of the empire justified and accounted for its tolerance. There is no tyranny so watchful as that of fear, and no cruelty so relentless as that of factions who struggle for existence.
The non-dependence of the government on the people has united the colonists in one body. It has been the colony against England, and not tories against whigs. In America the powers of self-government were too often seized by a faction, and a political opposition, even in a most moderate form, was stigmatised as felony and punished as treason. But in the Australias the colonists have expended their rage on a distant office, and in their real or imaginary sufferings have felt a sympathy for each other. The ascendancy of a faction in a small community is the reign of terror, and might soon lead those who value their personal freedom to regret the most sensitive and unscrupulous vice-regal despotism.