Law

Events In History

26 April 2005

Civil unions come into effect

Couples − heterosexual or homosexual − were now able to register their relationship as a civil union. All couples in New Zealand, whether married, in a civil union, or in a de facto partnership now had equal legal rights and obligations. Read more...
2 April 1916

Arrest of Rua Kēnana

On the morning of Sunday 2 April 1916, 57 armed police invaded the remote Tūhoe settlement of Maungapōhatu in the Urewera Ranges. They had come to arrest the prophet and community leader Rua Kēnana. Read more...
15 May 1901

Early motoring offence

Nicholas Oates appeared in the Christchurch Magistrate's Court charged with driving ‘a motor car within the city at a speed greater than four miles an hour’ on Lincoln Road, Christchurch. Read more...
10 May 1897

NZ's first woman barrister and solicitor appointed

Following the passage of the Female Law Practitioners Act 1896, on 10 May 1897 Ethel Benjamin became the first woman to be admitted as a barrister and solicitor of the Supreme Court of New Zealand. Read more...

An annotated index of New Zealand wartime laws and regulations 1914-21
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Page 1 - Index of wartime laws and regulations, 1914-21An annotated index of New Zealand wartime laws and regulations

The homosexual law reform campaign moved beyond the gay community to wider issues of human rights and discrimination. Extreme viewpoints ensured a lengthy and passionate debate before the Homosexual Law Reform Act was passed 27 years ago, in July 1986.
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Page 2 - Setting the sceneThere is a long history of opposition to sexual activity between men and an equally long history of legislation that criminalised this

When New Zealanders go to the polls on 26 November 2011, they will continue a 158-year-old tradition of parliamentary democracy in this country. Politics may have changed beyond recognition since 1853, but the cut and thrust of the campaign trail, the power of advertising, and the drama of polling day remain as relevant as ever.

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Page 3 - Cleaning up elections The New Zealand Parliament was alarmed by reports of electoral abuses in Auckland in the 1850s. It decided that electoral laws needed to be tightened, and in 1858 passed a series

New Zealand has had a governor or (from 1917) a Governor-General since 1840. The work of these men and women has reflected the constitutional and political history of New Zealand in many ways.

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Page 7 – Patriated
Late last century New Zealand governments patriated (indigenised) the Governor-Generalship.

On 26 September 1907 the colony of New Zealand ceased to exist. It became, instead, a dominion within the British Empire.

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Page 5 - What changed?What changed when New Zealand became a dominion in

Fenton, Francis Dart
F.D. Fenton is best known as the key architect and long-serving Chief Judge of the Native Land Court.
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Hanan, Josiah Ralph
As Minister of Māori Affairs in the 1960s, Ralph Hanan generally showed understanding of Māori interests and aspirations.
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Martin, William
Appointed New Zealand's first chief justice, William Martin, persided over the murder trial of Maketū Wharetōtara, a Bay of Islands Māori charged with murdering the granddaughter of a leading Ngāpuhi chief, two European adults and a European child.
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Prendergast, James
Lawyer James Prendergast was New Zealand's third chief justice.
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Palmer, Geoffrey Winston
Geoffrey Palmer, the hardworking, loyal deputy who became PM when David Lange resigned dramatically in August 1989, knew that Labour was doomed. ‘What I got from Lange was a hospital pass.’
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Richmond, Christopher William
William Richmond was a lawyer, Minister in Edward Stafford’s Parliament, and judge of the Supreme Court of New Zealand.
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