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At the time the Waitara purchase caused considerable controversy. The government had to defend itself from fierce criticism in pamphlets by the missionary Octavius Hadfield ( One of England's little wars, 1860) and by the former chief justice, William Martin ( The Taranaki question, 1860). But the official view was that Te Rangitake had no real claims; no 'personal' claims to the land in question (proved, it was assumed, by his failure to point them out); that the 19 people who signed the deed had the right to dispose of their 'own' land without consulting any chief; that Te Rangitake himself should properly have been living on the north bank of the river; and that he disputed the sale solely because he was carrying out the policy of the 'Taranaki and Waikato Land Leagues'. In effect, the 'leagues' were no more than agreements not to sell tribal land. However, it was asserted that they challenged the Queen's sovereignty and threatened the use of force against Maori who wished to sell; that the government could not allow either chiefs or leagues to browbeat individual Maori owners to whom the Treaty of Waitangi had guaranteed the rights of British subjects, including the sale of their individual land rights. Governor Browne appears to have sincerely believed these arguments. However, he also referred to the purchase of all the land south of the Waitara as being 'essentially necessary for the consolidation of the Province, as well as for the use of the settlers'. Whether McLean or C. W. Richmond, the native minister, believed such arguments, is another question. They both had close links with the Taranaki settlers, and knew that to the settlers the purchase of Waitara (always seen as a highly desirable district) had come to symbolise the breaking of Maori 'resistance' to sales.
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