THE TRUE T KM PEE OF EMPIRE. 



291 



Taylor, commenting on this code, in a note in his Autoliograijhy^ 

 in 1884, wrote : " What lias become of it I have never heard. 

 It was sent out to all the Crown Colonies, and the authorities 

 of Jamaica at least, if not of the others, were ready and desirous 

 to enact it, when a postponement was directed by the Home 

 Government, I believe in order that Sir Fitz James Stephen's 

 Criminal Code for England might take precedence, and any 

 results of the discussion of that code might be available for the 

 improvement of the other. How many years may pass before 

 the British Legislature can be got to adopt such a measure as a 

 Criminal Code for England, no one can tell, and in the mean- 

 time the benefits which the Crown Colonies might derive from 

 theirs are thrown away. Such was the fate for no less than 

 twenty-three years of the Indian Code constructed by Lord 

 Macaulay and his brother commissioners, during which years 

 more than two hundred millions of our Indian subjects were 

 deprived of the inestimable benefits conferred upon them when 

 it was enacted in 1860." Since this was written very general 

 use has been made of Sir EitzJames Stephen's Code. 



In advocating approximation to uniformity, in civil law, it must 

 be remembered that there are classes of legislation in which even 

 assimilation must be exercised with caution. I mean legisla- 

 tion affecting the personal law and religion of non-Christian 

 communities, and especially legislation governing marriage and 

 the law of inheritance. Inseparable from this class of legislation 

 are laws affecting the political status of British Christians or non- 

 Christians of non-European birth, outside of the administrative 

 unit which constitutes their country of origin, that is, in short, 

 the civil and civic status of natives of the Crown Colonies and 

 India in the Dominions. The influence which these questions 

 are exercising on the unity of the Empire is admitted, and it is 

 impossible that they can be settled by local legislation. If a 

 settlement is to be found it must be by the Imperial Con- 

 ference. A proposal to submit them to the Imperial Conference 

 was first made, I believe, by The Times a few years ago, when 

 the formidable difficulties in the way of a settlement were 

 clearly stated. 



Should they be submitted to the Imperial Conference they 

 must be discussed with reference to the exigencies of three 

 groups of colonies — colonies in temperate zones, independent of 

 the assistance or co-operation of coloured races, such as Canada ; 

 colonies in the tropical belt of the world, dependent on the 

 coloured races for the elementary operations of industry, such 

 as the West Indies ; and colonies in sub-tropical zones where 



