The Transvaal from Within: A Private Record of Public Affairs

by Percy Fitzpatrick

Very seldom has any community been in a position so unsatisfactory as that in which the people of Johannesburg found themselves in the year 1896. Judgments passed in the heat of the moment upon matters which had not been properly explained, and which in many cases were completely obscured by deliberate misrepresentation, had incurred for the community dislike contempt and mistrust which were wholly undeserved. Those who knew the facts and who were able and willing to speak, the Reformers themselves, were bonded to abstain from politics for three years under penalty of banishment. Betrayed, deserted, muzzled, helpless, hopeless, and divided, no community could have been in a more unsatisfactory condition. It was abundantly clear that the time had been allowed to pass when the Imperial Government might have insisted upon reforms and the fulfilment of the President's promises—not in the spirit in which they had been made, but in the spirit in which the President himself had intended the world to construe them. The impact of the revelations was too great to permit of public judgment quickly recovering its balance. It was realized that Mr. Kruger's effects had been admirably stage-managed and that for the time being, and possibly for a very considerable time, the Uitlanders were completely out of court. There were a few—but how few!—whose faith was great and whose conviction that the truth must prevail was abiding, who realized that there was nothing for it but to begin all over again—to begin and to persevere upon sound lines; and they took heart of such signs as there were and started afresh.

It has been an article of faith with them that Mr. Kruger missed his supreme chance at the time of the trial of the Reformers, and that from the date of the death-sentence his judgment and his luck have failed him. He abused his good fortune and the luck turned, so they say; and the events of the last three years go to support that impression. To his most faithful ally amongst the Uitlanders the President, in the latter days of 1896, commented adversely upon the ingratitude of those Reformers who had not called to thank him for his magnanimity; and this man replied: 'You must stop talking about that, President, because people are laughing at you. You made a bargain with them and they paid the price you asked, so now they owe you nothing.' But his Honour angrily repudiated that construction: nothing will convert him to that view.

It has been said that Dr. Jameson is the best friend Paul Kruger ever had, and with equal truth it may be said that, in 1896, President Kruger proved himself to be the best friend of the Reformers. Not even the most sanguine of his enemies could have expected to witness the impolitic and unjust acts by which the President revealed himself, vindicated the Reformers, and undermined a position of unparalleled strength in an incredibly short time. The bargaining and the bad grace which marked the release of the Reformers had prepared the world to view Mr. Kruger's action and attitude a little more critically than it had hitherto been disposed to do. The real conditions of Dr. Jameson's surrender had also become known, and although the action of the Boer leaders was regarded as far too trifling a matter to be seriously considered as against the Raid itself, nevertheless a residuum of impression was left which helped to form opinion at a later stage. There followed, too, an irritating correspondence between the Transvaal and Imperial Governments, in the course of which Dr. Leyds successfully established his skill as a smart letter writer and his limitations as a statesman. The Municipal Law, the first product of the 'forget and forgive' proclamation—which proclamation, by-the-bye, had already begun to prove itself an awkward weapon placed in the hands of his enemies by President Kruger himself—had been exposed and denounced as farcical, and it now required but little to convince the once admiring world of the President's real character and intentions. That little was forthcoming in a touch of ridicule more potent than all arguments.

The Transvaal Government formulated their demand for damages for the Raid in a form which made everyone smile—£677,938 3s. 3d. for actual outlay, and £1,000,000 for 'Moral and Intellectual Damages.' What with the fines of the Reformers, and the seizure of the provisions of all sorts acquired by them for the purposes of the Reform movement, which latter must have exceeded £50,000 in value, the Boer Government had already received upwards of a quarter of a million, and had, in fact, made a profit on the Raid; so that this demand came as a surprise even to the Uitlanders, as much perhaps due to the extraordinary phrasing of the demand as to the amount claimed.

It may be wondered why, under provocation so great as that of complete abandonment by the country whose representative had placed them in their then hopeless position, no distinct movement took place—no tendency even developed itself—among the Uitlanders generally to unite with the Boers in favour of a Republican movement throughout South Africa, to the exclusion of the Imperial power. In answer to this it must be said that such an idea undoubtedly did take strong hold of the non-British portion of the Uitlander population, as witness the manner in which the Cape Colony Dutchmen, Hollanders, Germans, and individuals of other European nationalities associated themselves with the Boer party, almost invariably by open declaration, and in many cases even by naturalization, thus forfeiting their own national rights and obtaining nothing but vague promises and the liability to military service in return. But the Republican movement made no further headway than this because British subjects formed the large majority of the Uitlanders. They had, it is true, a great grievance against the Imperial Government; but against the Transvaal Government they had one greater still; and it would take a great deal to kill the passionate loyalty of the British South African. It would be idle to discuss what might have happened had Mr. Kruger seized his opportunity and let in a considerable section of the then unenfranchised to strengthen the ranks of the Republican party; that can only be a matter of individual conjecture. What is certain, however, is that he did not do so and never intended to do so; wherein his lack of statesmanship is again made manifest.

Mr. Kruger has carried out in its fullest (its best or its worst) the characteristic principle of his people already referred to, that of giving too little and asking too much. It is doing only bare justice to the determination with which he adheres to the policy of his life to say that he gives nothing to anybody. From the most distant to the nearest he deals alike with all. With the people of Europe, he has taxed their investments, disregarded their interests, and flouted their advice; but nevertheless he has for years commanded their moral support. In his dealings with the British Government, pushed as they have been some half a dozen times to the very verge of war, he has invariably come off with something for nothing. In his dealings with the Uitlanders he has bartered promises and in return—circumspice! In the matter of the events of 1895-6 he came out with a quarter of a million in cash, a claim for £1,677,938 3s. 3d. odd (including Moral and Intellectual Damages), and a balance of injured innocence which may not be expressed in figures. In his dealings with Cape Colony he has taxed the products of their land and industry, he went to the verge of war to destroy their trade in the case of the closing of the Vaal River drifts, he has permitted the Netherlands Railway to so arrange its tariffs as to divert traffic from them to other parts, he has refused to their people (his own flesh and blood, among whom he was born) the most elementary rights when they settle in his country! And yet in his need he calls upon them, and they come! His treatment of the Orange Free State has been exactly the same. Their grievance against him is incomparably worse, because of their liability to become involved in the consequences of a policy which they are not allowed to influence. But President Kruger is, above all things, practical. Everything is gauged by the measure of the advantage which it can bring to him; and his treatment of the Free State is determined by their utility to him and his power over them, and is not influenced by their moral claims upon his good will. Natal and Portugal have their experience of broken agreements and strained interpretations, of intrigues with native subjects and neighbours for the extension of rights or boundaries, all designed to benefit the Transvaal and to undermine them. All, all with the same result! Something for nothing! Within the borders of the Transvaal the policy is the same. Moral rights and the claims of justice are unrecognized. For services rendered there may be some return; a privilege, a contract, an appointment. But this cannot be properly regarded as a neglect of principle upon Mr. Kruger's part, for after all the reward is at the expense of the Uitlanders. It is usually the least price at which the service could be secured; and it is generally in such form as to give the recipient a profit in which the members of the Government party largely share, but it never confers a power to which the President himself is not superior; indeed, it is almost invariably hedged about by such conditions as to make its continuance dependent upon the President's good will. If any one should think this description of conditions in the Transvaal and of the President's policy to be unduly harsh, let him satisfy himself by an investigation of those matters which appear on merely superficial examination to support opinions contrary to those expressed by the writer. Let him examine the terms of the closer union with the Free State, the circumstances leading to the closing of the Vaal River drifts, the condition of the Dutch subjects of Cape Colony and of the Orange Free State in the Transvaal, the Netherlands Railway tariffs as they operate against Cape Colony and the Free State, the Railway Agreement with Natal, the disputes with Portugal, the attempts to acquire native territory on the East Coast, the terms of the Netherlands Railway Concession, Selati Railway Concession, Dynamite Concession—in fact, all other concessions, monopolies, contracts, privileges, appointments, and rights, made, granted, or entered into by President Kruger to or with his friends. Let him recall the treatment and the fate of some of those to whom ampler reference will be made later on; for instance, Chief Justice Kotzé and Judge Ameshof, who in the dealings with the Reformers rendered valuable—but perhaps injudicious and unjudicial—service, as already sufficiently described; the treatment of Dr. Coster, the State Attorney, who also deserved better of the President; the public repudiation of Mr. J.B. Robinson, whose friendship for President Kruger had been frequently and amply evidenced to the grave dissatisfaction of the Uitlander population; the public and insulting repudiation of Sir Henry de Villiers, the Chief Justice of Cape Colony, after he had served his purpose! The result of any such inquiry must confirm the conclusion that 'something for nothing' is the President's policy and achievement.

A policy or a movement which is to involve the cooperation of thousands of intelligent men cannot be carried out upon such terms, and this may be regarded as the main reason why the spirit of Republicanism did not generally itself develop under circumstances apparently so favourable to it. The President's policy may be considered astute or unwise according to the point of view from which it is regarded. Viewed from the standpoint of the State itself, undoubtedly it fails lamentably in statesmanship. In the interests of the Boer party, however, or of the man Paul Kruger, it may well be doubted whether the policy may not be a token of remarkable sagacity. He knows his own limitations and the limitations of his people. He knows that to freely admit to a share in the Government a number of intelligent people, would make a continuance of himself or his party in absolute power for any length of time a matter of utter impossibility. In these circumstances the problem which President Kruger had set himself was a remarkably difficult one. To republicanize South Africa, to secure the support of the majority of the white inhabitants, and yet to yield no whit of power to those by whose aid he would achieve his object, would indeed be carrying to sublime heights the policy of 'something for nothing.'

Many years before the Raid Mr. Kruger had a well-defined policy to republicanize South Africa, and the Uitlanders of the Transvaal were quite alive to it, as may be gathered by reference to their newspapers. But the voice was as a voice crying in the wilderness in those days, and, as has been said, it required the Jameson Raid to advertize the conditions in the Transvaal and to direct attention to what had been proclaimed unheeded for many years. Immediately prior to the Raid Mr. Kruger was floundering in a morass of difficulties. The policy of 'something for nothing' had been exposed, and it was seen through by all the Dutchmen in South Africa and was resented by all save his own little party in the Transvaal; but the Jameson Raid gave the President a jumping-off place on solid ground, and he was not slow to take advantage of it.

It is not too much to say that the vast majority of people in Europe and America are indebted to Dr. Jameson for any knowledge which they may have acquired of the Transvaal and its Uitlander problem. Theirs is a disordered knowledge, and perhaps it is not unnatural that they should in a manner share the illusion of the worthy sailor who, after attending divine service, assaulted the first Israelite he met because he had only just heard of the Crucifixion. A number of worthy people are still disposed to excuse many things in the Transvaal because of the extreme provocation given by the Jameson Raid. The restrictions upon English education are considered to be 'not unnatural when one remembers the violent attempt to swamp the Dutch.' The excessive armaments are held to be 'entirely justifiable considering what has happened.' The building of forts is 'an ordinary precaution.' The prohibiting of public meetings is 'quite wrong, of course, but can you wonder at it?' Many of these worthy people will, no doubt, learn with pained surprise that all these things were among the causes which led to the Reform movement of 1895-6, and are not the consequences of that movement as they erroneously suppose. The Press Law and Public Meetings Act had been passed; arms had been imported and ordered in tens of thousands; machine guns and quantities of ammunition also; forts were being built;[{42}] the suppression of all private schools had been advocated by Dr. Mansvelt—all long, long before the Jameson Raid. So also had the republican propaganda been at work, but it had not caught on outside the two Republics.

Difficult as his task might appear, Mr. Kruger had now command of the two great persuasive forces—money and sentiment. With the money he pushed on the forts, and imported immense quantities of big guns, small arms, and ammunition—far in excess of what could possibly be used by the whole of the Boer population of the Transvaal after making every allowance for spare arms in reserve; and such an extraordinary supply was not unnaturally believed to be designed for the use of others outside the Transvaal. More than this, an army of emissaries, agents, and spies in the pay of the Transvaal Government were spread about the Free State, Cape Colony, and Natal. Newspapers were supported in different parts of South Africa and a considerable amount of money was spent upon the Press in France and Germany.