New Zealand becomes a separate colony

New Zealand began its life in the British Empire as an outlying part of New South Wales. In June 1839 Queen Victoria signed letters patent altering the boundaries of New South Wales to include 'any territory which is or may be acquired in sovereignty by Her Majesty within that group of islands in the Pacific Ocean commonly called New Zealand'. When William Hobson arrived in January 1840 he came as lieutenant-governor, answerable to the governor in Sydney, Sir George Gipps. For the next 18 months the New South Wales Legislative Council made New Zealand's laws, and the New South Wales land regulations were extended across the Tasman. It was Gipps who, in September 1840, appointed the first commissioners to investigate land bought from Māori before 1840, and Gipps who sent Major Thomas Bunbury and 80 soldiers when he heard that Hobson had suffered a stroke.

The arrangement was never meant to last. Even before Hobson's report of his proclamations reached London, the British government had decided to make New Zealand a separate colony. A royal charter signed by Queen Victoria, the 'Charter for erecting the Colony of New Zealand', took effect from 16 November 1840. It constituted a nominated Legislative Council and named the North, South and Stewart islands the provinces of New Ulster, New Munster and New Leinster. News travelled slowly, and the change took effect on 3 May 1841, when Hobson took the oath as governor and commander-in-chief. By then the seat of government had moved from the Bay of Islands to the new town of Auckland. Sources differ on which date counts: NZHistory's timeline marks 16 November 1840 as the day New Zealand officially became a British colony, while its history of the governor-general dates the end of the New South Wales arrangement to May 1841. The Chatham Islands were accidentally left outside the colony's boundaries until 1842.

In a Crown colony the governor ruled personally, with two councils to advise him. The Executive Council was made up of the colonial secretary, the attorney-general and the colonial treasurer. The Legislative Council added three senior justices of the peace, but it met only when the governor called it, and only he could introduce laws. Many settlers held it in contempt; one later appointee, Charles Clifford, resigned after 10 months because, in NZHistory's account, he 'considered the meetings an idle and useless formality'. Still, its ordinances (colonial laws) built the colony's institutions. On 22 December 1841 an ordinance created the Supreme Court and ended the authority of the Sydney court. William Martin was sworn in as the first chief justice in January 1842, and the court first sat in Auckland at the end of February 1842. Its early trials included the murder trial of the young chief Maketū, which settled that Māori were subject to English law. In March 1842 the last New South Wales ordinances were declared of 'no force or effect whatever in the Colony'.

Separation gave Hobson direct dealings with London, but answers to his dispatches took at least nine months to arrive. His biographer describes most of his senior officials as poor advisers, money was short, and settlers in Wellington and Auckland petitioned for his recall. He suffered a second stroke and died in Auckland on 10 September 1842. NZHistory describes the early governors' administrations as grossly under-resourced, struggling to provide even basic infrastructure while keeping the peace between the settlers and the numerically and militarily dominant Māori. The land claims commissioners could confirm a purchase made in good faith with a Crown grant of up to 4 square miles, and any land beyond that became Crown land. Under a separate inquiry the lawyer William Spain examined the New Zealand Company's purchases and found most of them invalid, though not all his recommendations were acted on. Rule by governor and appointed council lasted until the Constitution Act of 1852 gave the colony an elected parliament.