FOOTNOTES:
[87] Copies have been sent to the Library of each House of Parliament.
[88] See Africa, No. 7, 1904, presented to both Houses of Parliament, June, 1904.
[89] Report, p. 21.
[90] Idem, p. 26.
[91] M. Boudot, missionary of the Congo Balolo Mission. Regions Beyond, December, 1901, p. 337.
[92] W. H. Bentley, Pioneering on the Congo, ii., p. 229.
[93] Idem, p. 243.
[94] Pioneering on the Congo, by the Rev. W. Holman Bentley, ii. pp. 235-236.
[95] Report, p. 29.
[96] K. K. in Africa, No. 1 (1904).
[97] See Annex No. III.
[98] Report, p. 58.
[99] Report, p. 58.
[100] Idem, p. 56.
[101] See Annex No. II. (enclosure No. 6 in III.).
[102] Regions Beyond, 1900, p. 198.
[103] Idem., January-February, 1903, p. 53.
[104] See Annex No. II. “Present: Rev. W. D. Armstrong and Rev. D. J. Danielson of the Congo Balolo Mission of Bonginda, Vinda Bidilou (Consul’s head man) and Bateko as interpreters, and His Britannic Majesty’s Consul.” This passage is omitted in Annex No. 6 of the Consul’s Report (p. 78).
[105] Report, p. 34.
[106] Idem, pp. 76 and 77.
[107] Cf. Idem, pp. 54 and 55 and p. 58.
[108] Idem, pp. 54, 55.
[109] Idem, p. 56.
[110] Idem, p. 56.
[111] Idem, p. 62.
[112] Idem, p. 57.
[113] Review of Reviews, February 14, 1903.
[114] The Tribuna of Rome.
[115] Report, Annex No. IV., p. 77.
[116] Idem, p. 30.
[117] Report, Annex No. IV., p. 30.
[118] “Ten Years at Bonginda.” D. McKittrick, Regions Beyond, 1900, p. 21.
[119] “Congo Contrasts.” M. Boudot, Regions Beyond, 1900, p. 197.
[120] Report, p. 34.
[121] Regions Beyond, 1900, p. 150; 1902, p. 209.
[122] Idem, passim.
[123] Idem, 1900, p. 150.
[124] Idem, 1901, p. 27.
[125] Idem, 1900, p. 199.
[126] Idem, 1900, pp. 243, 297, 306.
[127] Idem, 1901, p. 40; 1902, p. 315.
[128] Idem, 1901, p. 40.
[129] Idem, 1900, p. 196.
[130] Idem, 1901, p. 43.
[131] Idem, 1901, p. 60.
[132] Report, p. 28.
[133] Reports on the Administration of Rhodesia, 1900-1902, p. 408.
[134] Reports on the Administration of Rhodesia, 1900-1902, p. 408.
[135] Decree of the 6th October, 1891 (Bulletin Officiel, 1891, p. 259).
[136] Reports on the Administration of Rhodesia, 1900-1902, p. 409.
[137] Idem, p. 410.
[138] Idem, p. 410.
[139] Idem, 1900-1902, pp. 145, 146.
[140] Report, p. 44.
[141] Annex III., p. 26.
[142] Reports on the Administration of Rhodesia, 1900-1902, pp. 397, etc.
[143] Report, p. 57.
[144] Idem, p. 42.
[145] Report, p. 43.
[146] The Circular of the 7th September, 1903, has reference to the “prohibition” to despatch armed soldiers in charge of black non-commissioned officers, and not, as would appear from the incorrect copy produced by the Consul, to the “instruction.”—(Annex VII. of the Report, p. 80.)
Memorandum
Lord Lansdowne’s dispatch of the 19th April, 1904, a copy of which was handed to the Congo Government on the 27th April by his Excellency Sir Constantine Phipps, calls for certain remarks.
With regard to the opinion to which this dispatch takes exception, “that the interests of humanity have been used in this country as a pretext to conceal designs for the abolition of the Congo State,” it will be well to remember that a Member of the House of Commons declared that he would prefer “to see the Valley of the Congo pass into the hands of a foreign Power,” and that some pamphlets described the “disruption of the Congo Free State,” the “partition of the Congo Free State among the Powers,” as absolute and immediate necessities, and even went so far as to suggest the bases of such a partition; while the organs of the English press contemplated one of two alternatives, either that “advocated by the more thorough-going critics of the present Administration, namely, the disruption of the Congo Free State,” or “the partition of the Congo territory among the great Powers whose possessions in Africa border those of the Congo Free State,” or declared that “what Europe ought to do, under the leadership of Great Britain, is summarily to sweep the Congo Free State out of existence.” The Congo State Note of the 17th September has called attention to these suggestions, of which we merely point out the tenor in this instance, and which all aimed at despoiling the Sovereign-King, and at dispossessing him of the State which was his own creation—suggestions which are entirely incompatible with respect for rights and treaties, and with the motives of a purely humanitarian and philanthropic nature by which the enemies of the State allege themselves to be exclusively animated in the passionate campaign which they are conducting against it.
In reply to the objections raised by His Majesty’s Government against the communication of the entire text of Mr. Casement’s Report, the Government of the Congo State points out that it has asked for the complete Report precisely with a view to transmitting it to the competent judicial and administrative authorities, without which this communication would be purportless. The anxiety to obtain an impartial inquiry and the rights of the defence render it an imperative necessity that the men accused should be informed, in a precise and fully detailed manner, of the acts laid to their charge; the fear that the persons accused might be able, by means of the knowledge they would have of the details, to influence or suppress evidence, does not appear to be justified by the mere fact that the natives, who, in the Epondo case, had given mendacious information to the Consul, subsequently avoided presenting themselves before the Magistrate presiding over the inquiry; the flight of these witnesses is explained more naturally by the fact that they were conscious of the grave fault they had committed in wittingly deceiving the English Consul. If the Congo Government be permitted to give an assurance, which it does willingly, that any case of suborning witnesses, or any attempt to do so, would form the subject of a prosecution, it is evidently not within its power to prejudice or quash such legal measures as persons who might find themselves wrongfully accused might consider it necessary to take, either in the interests of their honour or their dignity.
The Government of the Congo State regrets that His Majesty’s Government does not deem it necessary to communicate to it the other previous Consular Reports to which Lord Lansdowne’s dispatch of the 8th August, 1903, alluded. As was stated in the notes of the 12th March last, these reports possessed the interest of having been written at a date anterior to the inception of the present discussion.
A copy of this Memorandum will be addressed to the Powers to whom copies of Lord Lansdowne’s dispatch of the 19th April last was transmitted.
Administration, Congo Free State, Brussels,
May 14, 1904.
FEATURES OF THE LAND SYSTEM IN THE AFRICAN COLONIES OF GERMANY, GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE, AND PORTUGAL
The following notes are taken from the Bulletin Officiel of June, 1903, reporting to the Sovereign the accounts of the Congo Free State for the nineteenth year of its existence. The apt comparisons and pointed remarks upon the land system of the State are the work of M. le Chevalier de Cuvelier, Secretary of State for the Congo Free State, an official of great executive ability, to whose tremendous energy is due much of the later prosperity and progress which the Congo State enjoys to the chagrin of its detractors. Chevalier de Cuvelier has been engaged twenty years in the work of creating and developing the State. His official utterances have the quality of long experience behind them.
“During the twenty years that the rule of the State possession of vacant lands has been inscribed in the laws of the Congo State, not one of the Powers Signatory of the Berlin Act has pointed it out as being contrary to that International Act, either at the time of the publication in the Official Bulletin of the regulation of 1885, or on the occasion of any of the public applications made by the State on successive occasions either in exploiting en régie certain lands of the Domain with the object of assuring to the Treasury indispensable resources, or in granting concessions to certain societies for the purpose of carrying out works of general utility and contributing towards the public expenses.
“It can be said on the contrary that the Powers which, together with the Congo State, are in possession of territory in the zone of commercial liberty—France, Germany, Great Britain, Portugal—have followed the same principles, and considered, like it, that the Berlin Act no more excluded the right of property on the part of the State than it excluded that of private individuals.
“In German East Africa the regulation of 1st September, 1891, says:
“‘Article 1.—The Government alone has the right to take possession of vacant lands in the limits of the German sphere of influence in East Africa fixed by the Anglo-German Convention of 1st July, 1890, excepting for the length of the coast strip which was formerly part of the Zanzibar sultanate, and in the provinces of Usambara, Nguru, Usegua, Ukami, and the island of Mafia.’
“By the prior arrangement of 20th November, 1890, between the Imperial Government and the Deutsch Ostafrikanische Gesellschaft, the vacant lands of these latter regions were already found to be assigned to that Company. The produce of the exploitation of the forests throughout these territories, in the terms of Article 4 of the contract of 5th February, 1894, was to be shared in equal halves between the [German] Government and the Company.
“The [German] regulation of the 26th November, 1895, readmits the principle:
“‘Article 1.—Under reserve of the rights of property, or of other real rights that individuals or judicial persons, native chiefs or villages, may advance, as well as rights of occupation by third parties resulting from contracts effected with the Imperial Government, all vacant land in German East Africa belongs to the Crown.’
“The circular of the Imperial Governor von Liebert, dated 29th April, 1900, explains that:
“‘By the transference to the Empire of the sovereignty, all pretensions to landed property derived from the sovereign rights, real or apparent, of chiefs, sultans, etc., have passed to the Empire. All land which has not been proved to be the private property of an individual, or of a community, is to be considered as the property of the Crown.’
“Under the powers of the regulations of 1895, concessions have been granted in the terms taken, for example, from the acts of the concession for the Urangi Society (1896) and the Gold Syndicate of Usinja (1899):
“‘The Society receives the right to acquire under the prescriptions of the land regulation of 26th November, 1895, a superficies of 100 square kilometres, either by contract with the natives, or by taking provisional possession of vacant lands.’
“In the Cameroons, the south-east portion of which forms part of the zone of liberty of commerce, there exists a regulation of the German Emperor of 15th June, 1896, the first article of which is identical with the first article of the regulation of 26th November, 1895, for German East Africa.
“The Society of the South Cameroons has obtained there, 16th January, 1899, a charter of concession which grants it the property of the domain lands situated between the 12th degree of West longitude, the 4th degree of North latitude, and the political frontiers of the Cameroons to the South and to the East.
“In the French Congo, Article 19 of the order of the Government Commissioner General of 26th September, 1891, decrees:
“‘Waste lands and abandoned lands, to the ownership of which no one can legitimately lay claim, will be considered as belonging to the State and will form part of the colonial domain. They can under that head be alienated or conceded in the terms of the 5th and following articles. Lands considered waste are those which are neither legally occupied nor utilised in reality by any one.’
“Decrees passed in 1899 granted a totality of some forty concessions embracing almost the whole of the French territory.
“In British East Africa, the powers given by the Royal Charter, 3d September, 1888, to the Imperial British East Africa Company, whilst Article 16 forbids it to grant any commercial monopoly, confer upon it the right to ‘concede all lands for a period or in perpetuity, by right of pledging them or otherwise.’
“After the British Protectorate was substituted for the Company, the question of vacant lands was regulated in the following manner, in accordance with the terms of the report of Mr. (now Sir) H. H. Johnston, Her Britannic Majesty’s Special Commissioner, dated 27th April, 1900:
“‘The land question may now be considered as partially solved over the greater part of the Uganda Protectorate. Over all the more thickly-inhabited countries the waste or unoccupied lands belong to Her Majesty the Queen, having been transferred to the Crown, in most cases by agreement with the chiefs, after payment of indemnities; in some other cases, as in Unyoro, as the result of conquest.... By Proclamation it has been forbidden to any foreigner to acquire land from the natives in any part of the Uganda Protectorate without the prior assent of the Uganda Administration.... A large area of the Kingdom of Uganda is guaranteed to the possession of its native occupants. The rest of the land, including the forests, has now been transferred by agreement to the Crown on behalf of, and in trust for, the administration of the Uganda Protectorate.’
“Finally the land régime in the Portuguese Colonies, especially in Angola, is regulated by the decree of 9th May, 1901, the first article of which stipulates:
“‘The State domain in the countries beyond the sea are all lands which at the date of the publication of this law do not constitute a private property, acquired according to the terms of Portuguese legislation.’
“The Congolese law protects the natives in the enjoyment of the lands that they occupy, and in fact not only are they not disturbed in that enjoyment, but it even extends their cultivation and their plantations in proportion with their necessities. Manifold are the measures taken by the Congo State in order to safeguard the natives against all spoliation:
“‘No one has the right to dispossess the natives of the lands which they occupy.’ (Order of 1st July, 1885, Article 2.)
“‘The lands occupied by native populations under the authority of their chiefs shall continue to be governed by local customs and uses.’ (Decree of 14th September, 1886, Article 2.)
“‘All acts or conventions which would tend to expel the natives from the lands that they occupy, or to deprive them, directly or indirectly, of their liberty, or of their means of existence are forbidden.’ (Decree of 14th September, 1886, Article 2.)
“‘When native villages are surrounded by alienated or leased lands, the natives shall be able, as soon as the official measurement has been effected, to extend their cultivation without the consent of the proprietor, or the lessee, over the vacant lands which surround their villages.’ (Decree of 9th April, 1893, Article 6.)
“‘The members of the Commission of Lands will specially examine whether the lands asked for should not be reserved either for requirements of public utility, or in view of permitting the development of native cultivation.’ (Decree of 2nd February, 1898, Article 2.)
“‘The other Powers have not understood otherwise than the Congo State the obligations which are imposed upon them in this require in favour of the natives. So the decrees of concessions in the French Congo contain in the 10th Article the clause that:
“‘The Society having the concession cannot exercise the rights of enjoyment and exploitation which are accorded to it except outside villages occupied by natives, and the lands reserved to them for purposes of cultivation, pasturage, or as forest. The surroundings of these lands shall be fixed by the decisions of the Governor of the Colony, which shall equally determine the lands over which the natives shall preserve the rights of hunting and fishing.’
“In German East Africa, the regulation of the 27th November, 1895, Article 2, stipulates:
“‘Article 2.—If on fixed lands, chiefs, villages, or other native communities assert rights based upon a pretended sovereignty, or if these rights belong to them, it will be necessary to take them into account so far as possible, and to endeavour before anything to arrive at a friendly arrangement in virtue of which the territory necessary for the existence of the community shall be reserved, and the remainder placed at the disposal of the Government.
“‘If this arrangement is not brought about, the Governor decides.’
“Commenting upon this arrangement, the circular of 29th April, 1900, of the Imperial Governor von Liebert [Germany] gives the following instructions:
“‘In principle there should only be left to the natives the lands of which they have absolute need for their system of exchange, and for the existence of their village communities. Nevertheless, in order not to give rise to political complications, care will be taken provisionally, in the practical execution of this rule, not to show too much rigour, and especially is it recommended not to extend the taking possession of property without an owner except in regions which are under a strong administration.’
“The Portuguese decree of 9th May, 1901, says:
“‘Article 2.—The right of natives to lands habitually cultivated by them, which are comprised in the sphere of the concessions, is recognised; a certain extent of land shall be reserved for the habitation and the agricultural work of those residing there.’”