I.  Europa.  °  _..  612  35.  Großbritannien  und  Irland.

power  of  veto  on  legislation  of  the  self-governing  Coloniest,  and  is  responsiblo  for  the  government
of  the  remaining  Dominions  beyond  the  Seas  in  inverse  proportion  to  the  amount  of  self-government
  granted  to  them?.

The  staff  of  the  Colonial  Office  consists  of  60  officials  higlıer  and  lower  all  told,  including
the  Principal  Secretary  of  State  for  the  Colonies  and  the  officials  of  the  Emigrants’  Information
office.

“A  Colony  is  defined  by  the  Interpretation  Act  (1889)?  as  any  part  of  Her  Majestys’  dominions
  exclusive  of  the  British  Islands  and  of  British  India”*.  Sir  George  Cornewall  Lewis
defines  a  colony  as  ‘a  body  of  persons  belonging  to  one  country  and  political  community,  who
having  abandoned  that  country  and  community,  form  a  new  and  separate  society,  independent,
in  some  district  which  is  wholly  or  nearly  uninhabited,  or  from  which  they  expel  the  ancient  inhabitants®.


There  are  several  forms  of  colonies,  some  wholly  dependent  on  the  Colonial  Office,  some
less  so,  some  not  at  all.

(a)  The  Crown  Colony  may  be  said  to  be  tlıe  ideal  and  classical  conception  of  a  British
Colony.  “In  the  long  experience  of  England  in  governing  colonies,  a  form  of  government  has
been  evolved  to  meet  the  case  of  a  colony  in  which  the  population  is  made  up  of  a  handful  of  temporary
  residents  belonging  to  the  ruling  race,  and  an  overwhelming  number  of  natives.  This  is
known  as  Crown  Colony  government.  Its  essential  feature  is  the  entire  absence  of  any  popular
element  in  the  administration,  and  the  direct  control  exercised  by  the  Colonial  office  in  London
over  all  acts  of  the  local  authorities‘*.

The  feature  common  toall  forms  ofGovernmentin  use  for  theCrown  colonies...is  the  irresponsibility
  of  the  executive  to  a  representation,  in  any  form,  of  the  people  of  the  colony  (Anson).
But  apart  from  this  the  government  of  crown  colonies  is  various.  There  is  the  single  official  who
is  empowered  by  the  British  government  to  govern  his  colony  alone  and  unaided’.  There  are
colonies  which  have  an  elected  representative  Assembly  and  a  nominated  Legislative  Council,
or  &amp;  Governor  who  represents  the  Crown,  and  who  is  assisted  by  an  Executive  Council.

“The  Crown  Colonies  proper  include  some  in  which  laws  may  be  made  by  the  Governor
alone,  while  in  others  they  are  made  by  the  Governor  with  the  concurrence  of  a  nominated  Council.
In  a  portion  of  the  latter  class,  as,  for  example,  in  Ceylon  and  Mauritius,  the  authority  of  the
Council  rests  only  on  prerogatives.  In  others,  as  for  example,  the  Straits  Settlemente,  it  is  based
on  statute,  though  in  most  of  these  a  power  is  reserved  to  make  laws  by  Order  in  Council®.

Colonies  acquired  by  conquest  or  cession  fall  at  once  under  the  legislative  power:  of  the
Crown  inCouncil,  subject  always  to  these  limitations  —  that  Parliament  might  intervene  and  make
provisions  for  the  government  of  the  colony,  and  that  theCrown  could  not  make  laws  contrary
to  the  fundamental  principles’  of  English  law,  nor  presumably  enforce  such  laws  if  found  prevailing
among  the  colonists  at  the  time  of  cession.

It  may  be  said  that  Crown  colonies  have  4  different  forms  of  constitutions.

1.  Those  administered  by  a  Governor  or  a  Commissioner  without  a  Legislative  Council.
To  this  class  dependencies  and  wards  of  other  colonies  belong.  Thus  Rodrigues  is  a  dependency

!  These  are  Australia  (vide  Nr.  300);  New  Zealand  (Nr.  303),  Canada  (Nr.  187);  New  Foundland
  (Nr.  305),  Cape  Colony  (Nr.  128),  Natal(Nr.  135),  Transvaal  (Nr.  139),  and  Orange  Rivera
Colony  (Nr.  136).  The  form  of  government  in  most  of  them  is  borrowed  from  that  of  England.
3  Whitaker’s  Almanack  1909.

®  62  and  53  Vict.  c.  63,  $  18.

°  Arnson:  “Law  and  Custom  of  the  Constitnution‘‘;  Vol.  II,  Part.  II;  p.  59.  (Lond.  1909.)

5  The  “Government  of  Dependencies‘“  p.  168,  1891  ed.  cited  byH.E.  Egertonin  “A  Short
History  of  British  Colonial  Policy‘.

°  Alleyne  ireland:  “The  Far  Eastern  Tropics‘‘  (Lond.  1905)  p.  18.

?  Ashanti  and  the  Nortliern  Territories  of  the  Gold  Coast  for  instance.

«  Sır  Charles  Dilke:  “Problems  of  Greater  Britain“,  (Lond.  1890)  p.  441.