Te Tiriti o Waitangi is one of the most misunderstood documents in Aotearoa. Māori didn't intend to cede their sovereignty. The British did intend to claim sovereignty, and that's why it's still a controversial document to this day. Te Tiriti is often referred to as our nation's founding document, but it's not.
We had another one first. In 1835, He Whakapūtanga o Te Rangatiratanga o Nū Tirene, known in English as the Declaration of Independence of the United Tribes of New Zealand, was created. This document is often overlooked, but was the first ever legal document to recognise Aotearoa as a sovereign nation ruled by Māori. Te Whakapūtanga was drafted by 34 rangatira and one British representative, and was signed by Te Whakamininga, or the Confederation of United Tribes.
It asserts that the sovereign power and authority in the land lies with Te Whakamininga, and that no foreigners can make laws. Māori Sōhe Whakapūtanga is a way to strengthen their alliance with Great Britain and assert their authority to the wider world. However, the British saw it as a step towards gaining control of Aotearoa. The British King legally acknowledged the declaration, but only five years later, Five years later, the Crown overrode it with the Treaty.
By 1840, around 2,000 British were permanently living in Aotearoa. Māori outnumbered them 40 to 1. There was also a large influx plucks of whalers and sailors. Ifaka Putanga had acknowledged Māori had control over their own affairs in Taonga, but the Crown wasn't really taking care of its own people.
Among the settlers, there was increasing amounts of drunkenness, prostitution and murder, especially in the northern settlement of Kororāreka, known as the Hell Hole of the Pacific. Local Māori wanted the Queen to control her lawless British subjects, and so requested something be done. The Crown responded with the the Treaty of Waitangi. On the 6th of February, 1840, the treaty was signed. There are two versions of Te Tiriti, one in Maori and one in English.
Nine copies of Te Tiriti were created and sent around the country to be signed by various chiefs in 1840, with only one copy being in English. Over 500 chiefs signed the Reo Maori version and 39 signed the English version. The document has three articles.
In the English version, they are Māori cede the sovereignty of New Zealand to Britain, Māori give the Crown an exclusive right to buy lands they wish to sell, and, in return, a guaranteed full rights of ownership of their lands, forests, fisheries and other possessions. and Māori are given the rights and privileges of British subjects. But there are some stark differences between the English and Māori translations, most significantly in Arakawa. The Māori version of the Treaty does not say that Māori cede sovereignty or rangatira. In Arakawa, the word sovereignty was translated to Māori as kāwanatanga, which actually means governance.
Sovereignty had no direct translation in Māori because there was no concept of a central ruler. Each rangatira had control over their own affairs. So the chiefs understood the wording of the treaty to mean that the queen would have the right to control her own subjects while they controlled theirs.
They couldn't fathom the concept of one leader for all of the land, let alone ceding power to some lady they had never met in a country on the other side of the world. There was also differences in translation in article 2. The English version guaranteed Māori understood possession of all of their properties. But the Māori version guaranteed tino rangatiratanga, or full authority, over taonga, anything of value which can be physical things like land, forests and fisheries, but also intangibles like knowledge.
As Māori society valued the spoken word, explanations given at the time were just as important as the wording of the document. Over 40 chiefs debated the document for one day and one night, before eventually signing on February 6, 1840. By September, another 500 Māori from around Aotearoa had signed copies of the Treaty, but not all tribes signed. By the end of 1840, New Zealand ceased to be administered from Australia and became a British colony in its own right. Over the next century, the promises within the Treaty were effectively ignored by the Crown.
The biggest broken promise was the understood possession of Māori land. In the 80 years from 1840 to 1920, Māori went from earning 100% on Aotearoa to just 8%. Many New Zealanders misunderstand why Te Tiriti came to be, the purpose that it serves, and its effects. In 1975, the government finally admitted there had been breaches of Te Tiriti and established the Waitangi Tribunal.
So far, there have been many claims brought to the Tribunal, with some still ongoing to this day.