sHAP. 11] CONTROL OVER INTERNAL AFFAIRS 1037
Governor, and in 1883 a Bill to allow of the federation with
New Zealand of any island in the Pacific of which the
constituted authority made proposals to that effect to the
Government of New Zealand. The proposal was clearly far
too ambitious a one, and in any case the matter was one to
be dealt with by the Imperial Government and not by a
local Act.l Tn 1900 the Bill (No. 73) to establish an ensign
for New Zealand was reserved and not assented to, being
replaced by a later Act. New Zealand is the only Dominion
which has a distinctive flag for shore purposes as well as
at sea, under the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894.2
The relations of the Imperial Government to the Dominions
in money matters have several times been discussed. The
view that in any sense the Imperial Government is responsible
for the finances of a self-governing colony because the
Governor assents to Acts and they are not disallowed by
the Imperial Government? has been strenuously and
correctly denied by the Secretary of State. The matter
came to an issue in 1895, when the distress in Newfoundland
in consequence of the failure of the Commercial Bank caused
the Government, through their special commissioner, Sir F.
Evans, to ask that the Imperial Government should guarantee
the sum of £20,000 a year for twenty-five years as interest
on bonds which they proposed to issue; the Imperial
Government declined to do so, as it was a necessary conse-
quence of the fact that Newfoundland bad responsible
government that it should not look for Imperial assistance
in any financial matters: but they were ready, as the distress
was so great, to send out a special commissioner who would
inquire into matters and relieve actual cases of distress.
The Colonial Government then asked that a loan might be
made to enable the savings-bank, which was embarrassed
by the failure of the banks. to meet the loans of depositors,
t Parl. Pap., H. C. 196, 1894, p. 11.
* Parl. Pap., H. C. 184, 1908, p. 4; Canadian Annual Review, 1910,
pp. 261, 358; below, pp. 1314, 1315.
3 New Zealand Parl. Pap.. 1873-4, A. 2, No. 25; cf. Colonial Stock
det, 1877.
