96 REVIEWS probably killed nobody, and who escaped within a year or so of conviction, perhaps to Canada, though never seen again . Hill does not labour with explanation of such cases — his text is invaluable for uncovering and bringing together just such extraordinary episodes. The theoretical burden is perhaps ageing by this stage — the continuum of 'benign' to 'condign' may be just too simplistic at some levels to account for the varieties of policing. Hill's use of hegemony stands for domination in too many cases, rather than itself being the product of consent marshalled through numerous techniques of government or mouldings of history. And the ever present middle classes or bourgeois interests are shadowy figures in this history, exerting influence through police, but not too often being given a definition themselves (though a subtle chapter on the contest over the need for women police helps to define more precisely the complexities of the moral order). In reflections on the work as a whole, however, a concluding chapter allows Hill the space to review some of the larger issues of interpretation, modulating some of the theoretical framework. Against these quibbles over theoretical frameworks, 1 would want to balance the immense value of a text which offers such rich archival excursions. What we find here are police who not only do all the things we expect to read of — street work, detection, corruption, incompetence, and so on — but also those who display a surprising degree of independence (e.g. Butterworth who refused to testify in the case against Rua), who argue with their superiors over issues of principle or of perceived rights. The result is a picture of policing during a time of order as itself highly contingent, a mode of governing which is less rule bound, more vulnerable to the whims and politics of its human actors, than some might think. Not many will have the patience or time to read all of Hill's volumes or any whole one of them — but a table of contents emphasizing the narrative structure, together with a very comprehensive index, enable researchers or general readers to access this history, not only for what it tells of police and policing but for tracing many episodes in the as a unique social formation.

MARK FINNANE Griffith University

Coates of Kaipara. By . Auckland University Press, Auckland, 1995. 325pp. NZ price: $39.95. ISBN 1-86940-117-4.

THIS IS a most welcome addition to New Zealand political history, a genre treated almost with disdain in some circles. That Coates was a centre-right politician makes it the more welcome. Gordon Coates, in practical terms New Zealand's first native-born Prime Minister, was elected as an Independent Liberal in 1911 but soon joined Reform. He was an able Minister of Public Works and the obvious successor to Massey in 1925. A huge majority in 1925 was reversed in 1928 when Ward and the Liberals were exhumed and narrowly won office. Brought back into the Coalition of 1931-35, Coates endured a major share of the opprobrium accruing to the government, and died in office as a member of the War Administration in 1943. At Public Works, centralization of hydro-electrical generation was perhaps Coates's enduring achievement, with a national roading policy a close second. As Native Minister — the most enlightened for decades, if not since 1840 — he REVIEWS 97 began to address land development. Relatively young, handsome, and an able adminis- trator, Coates was bound to shine, especially given the generally undistinguished nature of Reform cabinets. Coates's career is comprehensively described in Coates ofKaipara, although analysis is at times a little understated. As Bassett makes clear, Coates was let down by more than uninspiring colleagues. His nonideological approach, preferring 'businesslike' adminis- tration, which made him such a success as Minister of Public Works, was a weakness in a Prime Minister, who needs to articulate a vision. Coates was also caught between his own reformist instincts and the rest of the Reform party, for instance over a comprehen- sive pension system which had been promised in 1925. If in 1928 he was displaced by a desire for 'miracles and nostalgia', he himself had been promoted as the new Messiah in 1925, and his government was no more able to cope with recession than was Ward's pathetic last administration. Coates was not the last Prime Minister done in by unscrupulous media manipulation. Indeed the parallels between 1925-28 and 1972-75 are striking — in both cases a government swept to office in triumph, but burdened by impossible expectations; in both cases depression struck, which required, as Coates put it, 'careful nursing and guidance'. Instead voters fell prey to the promise of economic wizardry and instant solutions. As the Depression intensified, talk of fusion of the two anti-Labour parties became more insistent. That Coates allowed Forbes to make the running in 1931 was the ultimate testimony to Coates's lack of political skill, a lack which went far beyond high- mindedness. Even if Downie Stewart set the financial parameters for Coalition policy, Coates's own record as Minister of Unemployment was generally orthodox until 1933. Protection of farmers' incomes was laudable, but massive retrenchment revealed that Coates's world of backblocks settlers was far distant from the New Zealand of the 1930s. A ten-acre unit Small Farms Scheme was no compensation for cutting the Public Works budget by nearly 80%. There is no evidence that before 1933 Coates understood that urban wage-earners, as well as farmers, had purchasing power; personal generosity was no substitute for state policy. Only in 1933, when he convinced his colleagues of the wisdom of devaluation, did Coates truly come into his own as Minister of Finance, pushing through debt conversion and mortgage relief as well as the creation of the Reserve Bank. Political skill came late to Coates; he would have been far better for a defeat or two before 1928. The reviewer is forced to note the irony of a leading 1980s ally of Roger Douglas applauding Coates for 'ensuring that he had access to wider views than those of Treasury' especially as 'Coates's Treasury advisers were sceptical of State activity, preferring instead to prune expenditure and allow the markets to mend the economy'. Defeat in 1935 inevitably followed the excesses of Coalition policy. If Coates was a crypto-Keynesian, this conversion resulted from travelling to Ottawa in 1931 and London in 1935. He had not opposed the cuts in 1931, and his reaction to the Labour government — he anachronistically asserted the 'British birthright of sturdy independence' — had more in common with Forbes than with Savage. Later, as Minister of Armed Forces and War Co-ordination in the 1940-43 War Cabinet, Coates brought essential ability to defence planning. He was vital in influencing Fraser's views on New Zealand's strategic position, and stiffened the Prime Minister's resolve in seeking American support. Bassett rightly emphasizes this contribution. Some areas could have been better developed. The political context of the years before 1919 is weak — Massey, in particular, is elusive and shadowy. National percentages of votes cast would have been helpful for important elections. The discussion of imperial politics lacks context. The Maori inscription on the Coates memorial should have been 98 REVIEWS given in the original as well as in translation. These weaknesses do not seriously detract from a very fine biography.

JIM McALOON Lincoln University

Salmond: Southern Jurist. By Alex Frame. Victoria University Press, , 1995, 294pp. NZ price: $49.95. ISBN 0-86473-286-4.

SIR JOHN SALMOND (1862-1924) is considered to have been New Zealand's 'leading jurist'. He was a contemporary of Lord Rutherford, and probably equally important. His studies of the theory of jurisprudence published in the 1890s were praised by the leading legal scholars of his day and Salmond's The Law of Torts: a Treatise on the English Law of Liability for Civil Injuries, first published in 1907 and transmuted, in its 18th edition, to Salmond and Heuston on the Law of Torts, went into its 20th edition in 1992. Salmond's extraordinary career covered every aspect of a lawyer's experience: scholarship, busy small-town practice, teaching, law drafting, constitution-making, the Solicitor-General- ship and the judiciary. Salmond was an unusually powerful political figure, the legal mainstay of two governments. Liberal and Reform; his tart remark to H.H. Ostler, 'I run the civil service', had some justification. Frame's biography of Salmond is thick with important explanations of legal issues which defined early twentieth-century New Zealand: the purpose and nature of the state; how — and by what institution — Maori claims to customary land titles should be handled; the meaning of sedition and the extent of free speech in wartime, to select only a few. Salmond is relevant to historians, legal scholars and workers in the 'Treaty industry'. Frame has spent many years on this biography, consulting the copious records of Salmond's correspondence and opinions in the Crown Law Office, perusing his published work. He has brought to the work his own insights as an expert in and teacher of jurisprudence. The summaries of Salmond's legal thought and accounts of its develop- ment are more than competent. But the book has a disappointingly narrow focus. For all his eminence and power, Salmond remains elusive as a person. Biography should convey a picture of 'a real life' and Frame does not achieve this. The context of Salmond's intellectual activities is thinly and inadequately drawn. There is little sense of place in the book. What kind of town was Dunedin in the 1870s and 1880s and how did it affect this clever and rather stern young man? In chapter two, Frame supplies a clear picture of the intellectual milieu of University College London in the 1880s, but says nothing at all about young Salmond's reaction to it. On the other hand, Frame does provide a vivid picture of Temuka, where Salmond practised between 1890 and 1897. It completely upsets the 'received' version that Salmond was unsuccessful as a practitioner. It is a pity there is not more research of this kind and quality in the book. There is an irresistible comparison with David Marr's Barwick, in which the subject was so effectively brought to life that readers may feel, uncomfortably, that they did not wish to know him quite so well! New Zealand's legal and political elites in Salmond's time were tiny. Friendships, and antipathies, were reinforced by close contact. Frame says little of Salmond's contempo- raries. and his family appears mostly in asides and footnotes. What are we to make of