Why We Don’t Need a Fourth of July

Abstract

2007 was a good year for discussing New Zealand’s independence. On 26 September 2007 New Zealand marked the centennial of the first Dominion Day in 1907, which was hailed at the time as New Zealand’s ‘Fourth of July’. On 25 November 2007 New Zealand reached the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Statute of Westminster. There are, however, other dates to celebrate. The Statute of Westminster received assent on 11 December 1931 and, in the words of two Australian scholars, ‘independence given is not somehow inferior to independence taken’. New Zealand was separately represented for the first time at two international conferences in 1912 and by signing the League of Nations Covenant in 1919 became recognised as a separate actor in international affairs. In spite of this achievement of political and diplomatic independence many were reluctant to accept full sovereignty. The famous ’status formula’ of 1926, by which New Zealand accepted equality of status and free association with Britain and the other Dominions, was regarded as a ‘poisonous document’ by the Prime Minister of the day. After taking an independent line in the League of Nations and making a separate decision to go to war in 1939, New Zealand Prime Minister Peter Fraser could say that Dominion status was ‘independence with something added’. But he dropped the title ‘Dominion’ in 1945; the country joined the United Nations as ‘New Zealand’. The Head of State was cited as 'Queen of New Zealand’ in 1953. In 1986 Parliament authorised its own existence and repealed the Statute of Westminster as part of New Zealand law. In place of a revolutionary moment and national declaration, what occurred was a peaceful, gradual process of constitutional evolution, rather subtle and satisfying.