China has 112 people per square mile while New Zealand has about 11 per square mile. Does that make New Zealand legally uninhabited under any international law? How few Indians, Aborigines and Maoris per square mile gave Europeans the right to be colonialists? Did it work that way? If so could it still work that way?
The number of people who were already there when the colonizing people arrived is immaterial. The British came to New Zealand. They took over. All the other major powers of the world recognized them as being in charge and that was it.
Take the case of India. It’s not as if the British were moving into some deserted area to colonize there.
I don’t know of any legal definition of uninhabited. In any case, New Zealand is a bustling crowded megalopolis compared to the Antarctic, which is the only are of the world containing area that doesn’t belong to any country (some areas of it are claimed, but not all, IIRC).
Well, Hell. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the State of Wyoming only had 4.7 people/Sq. Mi. in 1990. Maybe the TM can just run over there and declare it a Straight Dope Colony.
The Antarctic Treaty supposedly governs this.
I highly reccomend the CIA World Factbook as a geopolitical reference: http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html
Population:
There is a long summary of the Antarctic Treaty also, and under “International Disputes”:
This doesn’t really relate to your question, but recently Sofa King started a discussion about the unofficial country of Sealand, founded when two British decided to occupy an abandoned radar platform in the North Sea. In there he had a link to this web page:
James Erwin’s Footnotes to History This work provides an overview of ephemeral states, micronations, secessionist states, and every other kind of country you never heard of in high school.
Oh, UncleBeer, not Wyoming…can’t we take over someplace warm?
Thank you very much - this site is so very interesting
Here I go, a little off the subject again.
City of Industry, CA, is (or was) uninhabited. Does anybody down there know if this is true, or is it just another UL.
Peace,
mangeorge
Teach your kids to bungee jump.
One them might have to cross a bridge someday.
Hi BobT,
Err… not quite accurate. I hasten to add that my own knowledge of the exact ins and outs of the British “aquisition” of New Zealand is a bit shaky – which is a terrible thing to admit for a born-and-bred Kiwi – but my understanding is (very basic, simplified, and short form) that the Maori chiefs invited the British in to control the unruly and lawless British subjects that were dwelling here.
Hmmm… Straight Dope board… I better back this up. 
Excerpts from the instructions given to Captain Hobson, concerning his duty as Lieutenant Governor of New Zealand as a part of the Colony of New South Wales, dated 14 August 1839:
“the Ministers of the Crown have … deferred to the advice of the Committee appointed by the House of Commons in the year 1836, to enquire into the state of the Aborigines residing in the vicinity of our Colonial Settlements; and have concurred with that Committee in thinking that the increase of national wealth and power promised by the acquisition of New Zealand, would be a most
inadequate compensation for the injury which must be inflicted on this Kingdom itself, by embarking in a measure essentially unjust, but too certainly fraught with calamity to a numerous and inoffensive people, whose title to the soil and to the Sovereignty of New Zealand is indisputable, and has been solemnly recognised by the British Gov[ernmen]t.”
“The necessity for the interposition of the Gov[ernmen]t has however become too evident to admit of any further inaction. The reports which have reached this Office within the last few months establish the facts that … a Body of not less than two thousand British Subjects had become permanent inhabitants of New Zealand, that amongst them were many persons of bad or doubtful character - convicts who had fled from our penal Settlements, or Seamen who had deserted their Ships; and that these people, unrestrained by any Law, and amenable to no tribunals, were alternately the authors and the victims of
every species of Crime and outrage. It further appears that … several hundred persons have recently sailed from this Country to occupy and cultivate those Lands. The spirit of adventure having been thus effectually aroused, it can no longer be doubted that an extensive Settlement of British Subjects will be rapidly established in New Zealand; and that unless protected and restrained by necessary Laws and Institutions, they will repeat, unchecked, in that corner of the Globe, the same process of War and spoliation, under which uncivilised Tribes have almost invariably disappeared
as often as they have been brought into the immediate vicinity of Emigrants from the Nations of Christendom. To mitigate, and, if possible, to avert these disasters, and to rescue the Emigrants themselves from a lawless state of Society, it has been resolved to adopt the most effective measures for establishing amongst them a settled form of Civil Gov[ernmen]t”.
“I have already stated that we acknowledge New Zealand as a Sovereign and independant State, so far at least as it is possible to make that acknowledgement in favour of a people composed of numerous, dispersed, and petty Tribes, who posses few political relations to each other, and are incompetent to act, or to even deliberate, in concert. But the admission of their rights, though inevitably qualified by this position, is binding on the faith of the British Crown. The Queen, in common with Her Majesty’s immediate Predecessor, disclaims for herself and for her Subjects, every pretention to seize on the Islands of New Zealand, or to govern them as part of the Dominion of Great Britain, unless the free and intelligent consent of the Natives, expressed according to their established usages, shall be first obtained”.
Not to say of course that illegal land siezures and the like didn’t continue to happen, but I think these orders make the Crown’s intent (or at least their declared intent) quite clear.
The Treaty of Waitangi was then signed in 1840 giving the government of New Zealand to the British Crown in the person of Queen Victoria, confirming the rights of the Maori Chiefs to all their “lands, villages and all their treasures” and granting “the ordinary people of New Zealand… the same rights and duties of citizenship as the people of England”.
Interesting NZ history links may be found at: http://www.enzed.com/hist.html
Cheers,
Martin
Here’s a short list of uninhabited and sparsely inhabited places that could easily, if temporarily, be taken over by small group of people with little or no loss of life. As an aside, my request for materials relating to Sealand citizenship is in, and I’ll update you when I get some details from them. It seems as if my little plan is taking shape, ha ha. Hahaha. HAHAHAHA, AHHH HA AHAHAHAHAAAA!
French Southern and Antarctic Lands
Mental note to myself: remind Cato to install a massager into my wheelchair for those inconvenient times when I strain my back from laughing diabolically.
Industry, CA is mostly definitely inhabited. It has a few hundred residents and might even be near a thousand. As its name implies, it does have a lot of industries. It also has a lot of retail and a nice pair of golf courses.
Industry isn’t even the smallest city in Los Angeles County in terms of population. That belongs to Vernon, which I believe has 85 residents. That city is almost all heavy industry and its biggest cultural attribute are some very interesting murals depicting pigs along the side of a slaughterhouse for Farmer John. Vernon’s residents for the most part live in homes provided by the companies that have plants there.
Industry, Vernon (and also places like Commerce and Irwindale) exist mainly because it was advantageous for the businesses that were located there to form a smaller government, so they could have more control over the area where their businesses are located.
I know this a lot better than I do the history of New Zealand and I was glad to learn about it from Apollyon’s post. You can walk into any public library in the US, ask where the New Zealand history section is and be directed to one book if you’re lucky. Either that or you have to go to the video store to rent “The Piano.”
A few years ago when I was in the US on a buying trip I was told by one company, “Oh, New Zealand? You’ll have to talk to our European distributors”.
When I enquired as to why I would want to do this they said, “You’re a Scandanavian country aren’t you?”.
Cheers,
Martin
Check out the town of COLMA (CA)-just south of S.F.-a fully incorporated town, with about 5 inhabitants-but around 500,000 dead residents(its the only :cemetary" suburb I know of…but a nice quiet place!
Two of my Kiwi pals did a cross-country tour of the States. They felt compelled to send us a postcard mentioning that a waitress in Memphis asked them, “do they speak English in New Zealand?” They were only partly amused, I think.
Incidentally, the Treaty of Waitangi really came back around on the New Zealand government, did it not? It stipulated that no land transactions between Chiefs and Europeans could take place without the Crown taking the place of a middle-man. I think it was in the 1960’s or 70’s that the Maori tribes successfully argued that this treaty was not honored and won a huge settlement that is still being negotiated today.
Also, Bikini is still “uninhabited,” although I hear that a small group of Bikinians run a scuba operation there. They’re still waiting for things to cool down from the two dozen or so nuclear weapons the U.S. tested.
May I mention my favorite little-inhabited town?
Teterboro, NJ has a grand total of 22 people living on one street in a town less than 3 square kilometers in size. It’s most famous for its airport (if you can call that famous), but most of the rest of town is industrial. Two neighboring towns have schemed for years to cut Teterboro in half and incorporate it into themselves. (Lots of new tax ratables.)
But the plucky Teterburghers have so far survived the onslaught, rotating all the town jobs (mayor, police chief, etc.) among the adult population (about a dozen) and fending off various legal attacks. The last I heard (I’ve been trying to bring up the local paper’s website in another window, but it’s not cooperating), forces of evil had bought up the houses (they’re all rentals) and served eviction notices on the entire town. But the intrepid Teterburghers turned around and condemned all the housing; they planned to build new, town-owned homes. I haven’t heard anything recently, but I’m ever-hopeful for a new chapter in the saga of The Little Town That Could.
I’m your only friend
I’m not your only friend
But I’m a little glowing friend
But really I’m not actually your friend
But I am
I never got asked that in the US. I did however give up on trying to describe where New Zealand is, and settled for “it’s down near Australia”.
Yep. The Waitangi Tribunal is alive and well and working its way through a 150 odd years of illegal purchases, siezures and general bad-faith dealings towards the Maori people.
There is some on-line info about tribunal settlements… the Ngäi tahu settlement (for example) is available at: http://www.doc.govt.nz/commu/maori/settle/settle.htm
A SkinDiver magazine article on diving the wrecks at Bikini Atoll may be found at: http://www.bikiniatoll.com/SkinDiverMagazine.html
Cheers,
Martin
Canada’s Northwest Territories has 0.1 person per square mile. Alaska, has 0.2 person per square mile. Alaska is the largest U.S. state in area, but the 49th largest in population.