Impressions of South Africa

by Viscount James Bryce Bryce

Certain issues are absent which exist, not only in Europe and the United States, but also in Australia and in Canada. There is no antagonism of rich and poor, because there are very few poor and still fewer rich. There is no working-man's or labour party, because so few white men are employed in handicrafts. There is no Socialist movement, nor is any likely soon to arise, because the mass of workers, to whom elsewhere Socialism addresses itself, is mainly composed of black people, and no white would dream of collectivism for the benefit of blacks. Thus the whole group of labour questions, which bulks so largely in modern industrial States, is practically absent, and replaced by a different set of class questions, to be presently mentioned.

There is no regularly organized Protectionist party, nor is the protection of native industry a "live issue" of the first magnitude.

The farmers and ranchmen of Cape Colony no doubt desire to have custom duties on food-stuffs that will help them to keep up prices, and they have got such duties. But the scale is not very high, and as direct taxation is difficult to raise in a new country with a scattered population, the existing tariff, which averages twelve and a half per cent, ad valorem (but is further raised by special rates on certain articles), may be defended as needed, at least to a large extent, for the purposes of revenue. Natal had a lower tariff, and has been more favourable in principle to free trade doctrine, but she has very recently (1898) entered the S. African Customs Union, therewith adopting a higher tariff. Manufactures have been so sparingly developed in both Colonies that neither employers nor workmen have begun to call for high duties against foreign goods. Here, therefore, is another field of policy, important in North America and Australia, which has given rise to comparatively little controversy in South Africa.

As there is no established church, and nearly all the people are Protestants, there are no ecclesiastical questions, nor is the progress of education let and hindered by the claims of sects to have their respective creeds taught at the expense of the State.

Neither are there any land questions, such as those which have arisen in Australia, for there has been land enough for those who want to have it, while few agricultural immigrants arrive to increase the demand. Moreover, though the landed estates are large, their owners are not rich, and excite no envy by their possession of a profitable monopoly. If any controversy regarding natural resources arises, it will probably turn on the taxation of minerals. Some have suggested that the State should appropriate to itself a substantial share of the profits made out of the diamond and other mines, and the fact that most of those profits are sent home to shareholders in Europe might be expected to make the suggestion popular. Nevertheless, the idea has not, so far, "caught on," to use a familiar expression, partly, perhaps, because Cape Colony, drawing sufficent income from its tariff and its railways, has not found it necessary to hunt for other sources of revenue.

Lastly, there are no constitutional questions. The suffrage is so wide as to admit nearly all the whites, and there is, of course, no desire to go lower and admit more blacks. The machinery of government is deemed satisfactory; at any rate, one hears of no proposals to change it, and, as will be seen presently, there is not in either Colony a wish to alter the relations now subsisting between it and the mother country.

The reader may suppose that if all these grounds of controversy, familiar to Europe, and some of them now unhappily familiar to the new democracies also, are absent, South Africa enjoys the political tranquillity of a country where there are no factions, and the only question is how to find the men best able to promote that economic development which all unite in desiring. This is by no means the case. In South Africa the part filled elsewhere by constitutional questions, and industrial questions and ecclesiastical questions, and currency questions, is filled by race questions and colour questions. Colour questions have been discussed in a previous chapter. They turn not, as in the Southern States of America, upon the political rights of the black man (for on this subject the ruling whites are in both Colonies unanimous), but upon land rights and the regulation of native labour. They are not at this moment actual and pungent issues, but they are in the background of every one's mind, and the attitude of each man to them goes far to determine his political sympathies. One cannot say that there exist pro-native or anti-native parties, but the Dutch are by tradition more disposed than the English to treat the native severely, and, as they express it, keep him in his place. Many Englishmen share the Dutch feeling, yet it is always by Englishmen that the advocacy of the native case is undertaken. In Natal both races are equally anti-Indian.

The race question among the whites, that is to say the rivalry of Dutch and English, would raise no practical issue were Cape Colony an island in the ocean, for there is complete political and social equality between the two stocks, and the material interests of the Dutch farmer are the same as those of his English neighbour. It is the existence of a contiguous foreign State, the South African Republic, that sharpens Dutch feeling. The Boers who remained in Cape Colony and in Natal have always retained their sentiment of kinship with those who went out in the Great Trek of 1836, or who moved northward from Natal into the Transvaal after the annexation of Natal in 1842. Many of them are connected by family ties with the inhabitants of the two Republics, and are proud of the achievements of their kinsfolk against Dingaan and Mosilikatze, and of the courage displayed at Laing's Nek and Majuba Hill against the British. They resent keenly any attempt to trench upon the independence of the Transvaal, while most of the English do not conceal their wish to bring that State into a South African Confederation, if possible under the British flag. The ministries and legislatures of the two British Colonies, it need hardly be said, have no official relations with the two Dutch Republics, because, according to the constitution of the British empire, such relations, like all other foreign relations, belong to the Crown, and the Crown is advised by the British Cabinet at home. In South Africa the Crown is represented for the purpose of these relations by the High Commissioner, who is not responsible in any way to the colonial legislatures, and is not even bound to consult the colonial cabinet, for his functions as High Commissioner for South Africa are deemed to be distinct from those which he has as Governor of Cape Colony. Matters relating to the two Republics and their relation to the Colonies are, accordingly, outside the sphere of action of the colonial legislatures, which have, in strict theory, no right to pass resolutions regarding them. In point of fact, however, the Cape Assembly frequently does debate, and pass resolutions on, these matters; nor is this practice disapproved, for, as the sentiments of the Colony are, or ought to be, an important factor in determining the action of the home Government, it is well that the British Cabinet and the High Commissioner should possess such a means of gauging those sentiments. The same thing happens with regard to any other question between Britain and a foreign Power which may affect the two Colonies. Questions with Germany or Portugal, questions as to the acquisition of territory in South Central Africa, would also be discussed in the colonial Legislatures, just as those of Australia some years ago complained warmly of the action of France in the New Hebrides. And thus it comes to pass that though the Governments and Legislatures of the Colonies have in strictness nothing to do with foreign policy, foreign policy has had much to do with the formation of parties at the Cape.

Now as to the parties themselves. Hitherto I have spoken of Natal and the Cape together, because their conditions are generally similar, though the Dutch element is far stronger in the latter than in the former. In what follows I speak of the Cape only, for political parties have not had time to grow up in Natal, where responsible government dates from 1893. In the earlier days of the Cape Legislature parties were not strongly marked, though they tended to coincide with the race distinction between Dutch and English, because the western province was chiefly Dutch, and the eastern chiefly English, and there was a certain rivalry or antagonism between these two main divisions of the country. The Dutch element was, moreover, wholly agricultural and pastoral, the English party mercantile; so when an issue arose between these two interests, it generally corresponded with the division of races. Political organization was chiefly in English hands, because the colonial Dutch had not possessed representative government, whereas the English brought their home habits with them. However, down till 1880 parties remained in an amorphous or fluid condition, being largely affected by the influence of individual leaders; and the Dutch section of the electorate was hardly conscious of its strength. In the end of that year, the rising in the Transvaal, and the War of Independence which followed, powerfully stimulated Dutch feeling, and led to the formation of the Africander Bond, a league or association appealing nominally to African, but practically to African-Dutch patriotism. It was not anti-English in the sense of hostility to the British connection, any more than was the French party in Lower Canada at the same time, but it was based not only on the solidarity of the Dutch race over all South Africa, but also on the doctrine that Africanders must think of Africa first, and see that the country was governed in accordance with local sentiment, rather than on British lines or with a view to British interests. Being Dutch, the Bond became naturally the rural or agricultural and pastoral party, and therewith inclined to a protective tariff and to stringent legislation in native matters. Such anti-English tint as this association originally wore tended to fade when the Transvaal troubles receded into the distance, and when it was perceived that the British Government became more and more disposed to leave the Colony to manage its own affairs. And this was still more the case after the rise to power of Mr. Cecil Rhodes, who, while receiving the support of the Bond and the Dutch party generally, was known to be also a strong Imperialist, eager to extend the range of British power over the continent. At the same time, the attachment of the colonial Dutch to the Transvaal cooled down under the unfriendly policy of that Republic, whose government imposed heavy import duties on their food-stuffs, and denied to their youth the opportunities of obtaining posts in the public service of the Republic, preferring to fetch Dutch-speaking men from Holland, when it could have had plenty of capable people from the Cape who spoke the tongue and knew the ways of the country. Thus the embers of Dutch and English antagonism seemed to be growing cold when they were suddenly fanned again into a flame by the fresh Transvaal troubles of December, 1895, which caused the resignation of Mr. Rhodes, and the severance from him of his Dutch supporters. Too little time has elapsed since those events to make it possible to predict how parties may reshape themselves, nor is it any part of my plan to deal with current politics. In 1897 feeling still ran high, but it had not destroyed the previously friendly social relations of the races, and there was then reason to hope that within a few months or years mutual confidence would be restored.

So far as I could ascertain, both local government and central government are in the two Colonies, as well as in the Orange Free State, pure and honest. The judiciary is above all suspicion, and includes several distinguished men. The civil service is managed on English principles, there being no elective offices; and nothing resembling what is called the "caucus system" seems to have grown up. There are in the Cape Legislature some few members supposed to be "low-toned" and open to influence by the prospect of material gain, but, though I heard of occasional jobbing, I heard of little or nothing amounting to corruption. Elections were said to be free from bribery, but as they had seldom excited keen interest, this point of superiority to most countries need not be ascribed to moral causes.