Why not New Zealand join Australian Commonweath in 1901?

Hello

I am doing assignment about history for English. I want to know about this topic. Can someone tell me main points of this?

A fellow student at uni was from NZ (he shared my accommodation) and to me he sounded exactly like an Australian even though he said there was an easily detected difference.....not to me, though even after he tried to tell me what the differences were.

Anyway, he said that loads of New Zealanders nip over to Oz on holiday and loads of Aussies go in the opposite direction for the same purpose.

Geographically they are neighbours really, even though by European standards they are quite a long way apart. There must be a lot of similarities between them as people even though the two countries are different in scenery and climate in some areas....NZ has been described as being more scenically similar to the UK but generally warmer climatically.

I'm not sure of history between the two countries but I believe they have been linked militarily in something called Anzac in which they joined together as a single force to fight in WW1.

This won't be detailed enough for your assignment, and should assist rather than substitute for your own research.

Members representing New Zealand (and Fiji!) were present at the earliest "Constitutional Conventions" in which federation was discussed, but they pulled out early on. The major factor as I understand it was distance: New Zealand back in those days was a fairly long trip away from New Zealand. In fact, I think it was during the second convention that the delagate from New Zealand proposed renaming the "Commonwealth of Australasia" (as it had been called in the first convention) to the "Commonwealth of Australia", clearly indicating that they didn't really think it would suit them. Still, many of the delagates from the other then-colonies did want New Zealand to join up, and our constitution still describes New Zealand as an "original state", giving it certain priviledges that other states which joined after Federation in 1901 would not necessarily have. (Of course, that's entirely hypothetical because no new state has joined the Commonwealth since 1901.)

If Federation had've been delayed even ten years (allowing for the development of the aeroplane), I think it would've been almost a sure thing that New Zealand would've been a part of a Commonwealth of Australasia.

My personal opinion on the topic, as an Australian, is that both New Zealand and Australia have been disadvantaged by our separate political systems and economies. I—and many Australians it seems, if you ask them—think that New Zealand and Australia really ought to merge, if not as a new Commonwealth of Australasia then at least as tightly as the European Union. We also need to teach them football. And how to talk.

Of course, there are some fairly substantial differences between Australia and New Zealand, and they do clearly form two separate entities. The indigenous Australians and Tasmanians are one clear grouping of people; whereas the Maori, the indigenous New Zealanders, are Polynesian. Also, the British Crown has a treaty with Maori people; there was never any treaty between the Australian British colonies and the Aboriginal Peoples (John Batman, who founded Melbourne, attempted to buy the land Melbourne now stands on from the local Aborigines (the Wurundjeri); but the Crown declared it invalid as unnecessary, the Wurundjeri had no concept of "buying land", and the sale was clearly unfair in any case). Of course, this difference would probably only have accellerated the Australian Reconciliation process, which in my mind would be a very good thing.

Anyway, as for Damian in Scotland's comments: Kiwis clearly talk different from Aussies, but the differences are slight, and the most significant ones are quite recent. (Earlier ones are probably due to the relative timings of the settlements; h-dropping hadn't taken hold in England as much at the time of Australia's initial settlement, but by New Zealand's, it had, so they're more likely to h-drop than we are (but it's by no means nearly as often as in Cockney!).) Probably the easiest differences for a non-native Aussie/Kiwi to hear are the pronunciation of short /ɪ/ (Kiwis have a very flat one, almost [ə], whereas Aussies have a very tense one, almost [i]) and the respective pronunciations of /ɪə/ (beer) and /eə/ (bear): Kiwis pronounce them both as [iə] (bee-ya), whereas Aussies tend to alternate between [ɪə] and [ɪː] for /ɪə/, and always say [eː] for /eə/ (to my ears, Scottish accented "bay" sounds like "bear", so you might hear it the other way round). You might need to listen to Aussies and Kiwis side-by-side to hear the difference if you don't really know it, though.

I dunno what NZ is warmer than! Maybe Antartica, but only just! It gets below freezing there even in normal places to live, but in Australia if it ever does that, you wouldn't think about building a house there! God no, the reason freezing is zero degrees is because you're never meant to go beneath it!

E&OE. I'm not a history expert, or anything. Don't include any information you got from here in any assignment unless you want to fail! (I'm not trying to be wrong, but I haven't got any research here.)

<<John Batman, who founded Melbourne>>

That would explain why roads in Melbourne are called things like Batman Avenue. I just thought they were mad about super heros.

The were many reasons why New Zealand didn't join the commonweath

*'1200 miles was 1200 reasons why New Zealand shouldn't join' which was a popular saying in New Zealand

*There was even a issue that New Zealand Britons were superior to their Australian counterparts (due to the convicts) and New Zealand's natives were generally more advanced too.

mmmm I should find the link again.. I will post it soon

Guest: *There was even a issue that New Zealand Britons were superior to their Australian counterparts (due to the convicts) and New Zealand's natives were generally more advanced too.

Umm... no. South Australia was settled by free settlers from Britain and Germany, not by convicts. Victoria was also never a convict colony, though Melbourne was settled in stark disregard of the desires of the officials mostly by ex-cons (and the gold and strong economy will have been an incentive for many "undesirables"). If that was a reason, than the Kiwis of the time were racist bastards, if you'll pardon my, ahem, French. That sounds like some nationalist/anti-Australian crap someone made up some time after the Kiwis decided not to join.

<That sounds like some nationalist/anti-Australian crap someone made up some time after the Kiwis decided not to join. >

And its ironic that when compared to the relationship between Whites and blacks in New Zealand where they were allocated seats in parliament in 1897 and also granted the right to white with fellow white voters, the poor native people of Australia only got their right to vote during the 1960's.

*vote

<If that was a reason, than the Kiwis of the time were racist bastards>

LOL mmmmm actually this was also bought forward by other 'non convict' colonies in Australia too.

I'm glad that our country of New Zealand took the steps out of the Convention of 1897 into the world as a separate country with separate values and ideas from our neighbours.

I oppose the idea of reuniting with the Australian mainland (We were part of NSW before) but having a system that is similar to the EU so we can share a common ground on international trade, economic ties, etc.

The reason that I oppose the union is some aspects that we differ on ie.Republicanism NZ vs ProMonarchy AU, defence matters, taxation, foreign policy,etc at this very moment we are at odds with eachother on these matters.

Another note:
Tasmania and Western Australia almost bailed out of discussions about the Union when New Zealand refused to attend the second convention in Melborne.

oh WA have been trying to bail out since the start of time and voted on a different day in the referendum for federation.

As for Australia being Pro-monarchy, disagree. The 1999 referendum was very specific in terms of type of republic that offered to the people and didn't pose probably the most important question simply: "do you want a republic?" If this occurred, then I think a republic would have been favoured by voters. I think Australia will become a republic, only a matter of time.

Guest: I oppose the idea of reuniting with the Australian mainland (We were part of NSW before) but having a system that is similar to the EU so we can share a common ground on international trade, economic ties, etc.

Precisely what I was saying before. I think there's more than plentiful evidence that the current structure of the Commonwealth is not good for Australia, and would certainly be not good for New Zealand if they happened to join up. Still, I think there are many advantages to having some sort of a closer union between our too countries.

Guest: The reason that I oppose the union is some aspects that we differ on ie.Republicanism NZ vs ProMonarchy AU, defence matters, taxation, foreign policy,etc at this very moment we are at odds with eachother on these matters.

Heh, Australia's about as pro-monarchic as the US. In fact, normally if you see a discussion on the differences between Australia and NZ wrt republicanism, it's that NZ leans more towards the pro-monarchy side. Australia's tried to become a republic for over a hundred years now, we just haven't worked out the right way. When was your last referendum on the subject? (Not that you need one. You could become a republic tomorrow because all it would take is a piece of legislation approved by the single house of Parliament and signed off by the Governor-General. No oversight on your most important piece of law? I don't think that's safe in this era of terrorism!)

As for the rest: well, for defence and foreign policy I think that we could certainly learn a lot from you guys, and a closer union would help that. (I think it's quite clear that the Great and Powerful Friends Doctrine that has guided Australian foreign policy ever since there first was one is not a great way to go.) For taxation and industrial relations and so forth ... we're different, but neither of us really take the high road imho. Still, I think a reunion would likely help correct some of these problems that both of us have (after all, NZ's never going to accept to joining up as a state the equal of New South Wales and Victoria without some radical changes at the Commonwealth level!).

Of course, this is all completely off-topic for a forum about the English language!

Russian
You could look at the policies of the colonial governments in the 1890s. There was a lot of controversy about "free trade" and "protectionism". In most colonies there were two main political parties that took opposite views. It's possible that the New Zealand colonial government disagreed with whatever policy the New South Wales or Victorian colonial governments happened to have at the time.

One of the main reasons for Federation was to remove the customs duties levied on trade between the colonies. In the early 1980s there was an agreement called "Closer Economic Relations" which removed some of the barriers to trade between New Zealand and Australia.

One of the main reasons for a difference in Australian and New Zealand accents is that many early immigrants to New Zealand came from Scotland. Many Scots people went to Australia too, but here they were diluted by English, Welsh and Irish and later by Germans and by people from Norway and Sweden. In New Zealand it seems to have been mostly Englush and Scots people until fairly recently.

<One of the main reasons for a difference in Australian and New Zealand accents is that many early immigrants to New Zealand came from Scotland. Many Scots people went to Australia too, but here they were diluted by English, Welsh and Irish and later by Germans and by people from Norway and Sweden. In New Zealand it seems to have been mostly Englush and Scots people until fairly recently.>

I wouldn't apply the Scottish theory to all of New Zealand. They settled predominantly in the Otago and Southland Provinces during the 1880's. This explains the rhotic accent North (where the English settlers preferred to settle) vs the rhotic South (Scottish and a tiny minority of Irish settlers).

Also I would like to mention the unknown Eastcoast accents of New Zealand where many Swedes settled ie. Dannevirke (apparently the city name is of Northern European origins) and also the Dutch in Haastings and Napier. Their accents consist of a weird 'eh' sound to their accent.