Maori wardens

Some committees which asserted independence were tolerated because they provided the government with services it needed. These included the valuable (and cheap) provision of adjunct services for enforcement of 'order and regularity' in Maori localities and districts. As well as the Maori Council policing system, other Maori coercive forces had operated in the twentieth century, some of them endorsed by the state. Ratanaism's early development had itself been nourished with the help of its own page 252policemen, or katipa, once headed by an Irish 'Chief of Police'. This was one of many similar efforts by Maori groups to exercise control over activities of importance to them. These generally assisted, albeit indirectly, Crown as well as Maori authority. To help it face the challenges of the Second World War period, the government had acquiesced in many informal social control mechanisms at village or marae level – as indeed it had often done before. With the war nearing an end, many Maori leaders wanted the right to continue such activies in peacetime. The government appreciated that Maori self-policing could assist to maintain order during the reconstruction period and beyond.

In supporting the inclusion of coercive apparatus and authority in drafts of the Maori Social and Economic Advancement Act, the government was aware that, in a legal sense, it was going beyond the powers given to the MWEO, and that this might be a fraught and ambiguous exercise. But the legislation sought to regularise and exercise control over current self-policing arrangements, placing tight formal limits on tribal coercive capacity. The jurisdiction of the 'Maori police', and of those they reported to in the welfare organisation system, was constrained. To emphasise this, although they were referred to bluntly within the department as a 'police force', the personnel involved were to be given the euphemistic title of 'Maori Wardens' (a term used in a Rotorua experiment, implemented in 1937, with which Te Arawa's trust board was associated). While wardens were to be nominated and superintended by tribal executives and work with the tribal committees, they were to be appointed by the minister (with advice from the officials) and he would be in overall control of their activities. Whatever the formal hands-off position of the state once wardens were appointed, it was always implicit, in their terms of reference, that they were to pay attention to the control and enforcement priorities of the Crown.

Just as various Maori movements had retained or developed their own order institutions and functions for their own purposes, however, many welfare organisation committees intended to – and in the event frequently did – use the position of warden to pursue community aims. This was generally tolerable for the state, because in their primary enforcement orientation the committees' views tended to coincide with page 253those of the Crown. Both regarded liquor control, in particular, as a priority, regarding the amount of Maori consumption as detrimental to both the national good and Maori communities. The problem was exacerbated in Crown eyes by Maori moving to live in close proximity with pakeha in the towns and cities – race relations, work productivity and 'public order' were all considered to be under strain. Elders and other Maori leaders were just as concerned; they had seen, for example, that new drinking habits acquired by some who had gone away during the war added to domestic and community problems after their return home. By mutual consent, therefore, from the beginning it was intended that a central focus for the wardens would be regulating alcohol consumption.

The idea of wardens, in fact, was generally received more enthusiastically in Maori communities than within the state. Some elements of the state system opposed it from the beginning, on philosophical grounds related to 'societal equality'; others had second thoughts after the 1945 legislation was passed. The New Zealand Police, who had vetting functions for the 'Maori police', had previously indicated concerns over the spread of 'unprofessional' policing by blocking any expansion of the Rotorua experiment. Since well before the end of the previous century, Maori had essentially been policed, at least on an official level, by pakeha constables, and the final remnants of the part-time 'Native Constable' position within the force were dispensed with in 1945.

Police wariness at reintroducing 'Maori policing Maori' was widely shared among officials on a number of grounds. Among them was a feeling, that Maori police would, for tribal reasons, be loath to enforce certain laws against members of their own community – laws which, for example, negated customary fishing or birding practices. Anecdotal examples of such reluctance by Maori constables in the past were often cited. In effect, Maori police were considered unreliable when rangatiratanga came into conflict with the law. As a result, the welfare organisation's policing regime stalled at its very outset: when the Maori authorities put forward nominations for wardens' positions, confirmation of appointment was deferred.

But pressure was applied by other state elements as well as the tribal page 254authorities, especially in the context of post-war review and reform of the liquor legislation. Eventually, waverers were persuaded by the argument that, with appointments to be 'probationary', the experiment could easily be abandoned if it proved unsatisfactory. The first nominations were formally approved in 1949, and the complement of wardens numbered well over 100 before the year was out. Their services came quickly to be appreciated by Crown and Maori authorities alike, and their numbers soon rose considerably. Their operating principle has been described as 'aroha ki te tangata' (love for the people): wardens' services were unpaid and, given the paucity of resources of the welfare organisation, they were seldom reimbursed for even out-of-pocket expenses. The motivations of the individuals who took on the task were generally similar to those of the leaders of the Maori search for indigenous control of indigenous matters. They were described by a Maori parliamentarian as people with 'a social conscience [making] a positive contribution to the life of the people', and most Maori seemingly viewed them that way. They represented one model of how an institution could operate in a way that satisfied many requirements of both rangatiratanga and the state.