CHAPTER XIX THE ORANGE FREE STATE

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In the last preceding chapter I have carried the reader into the Transvaal through Natal, because this is the most interesting route. But most travellers in fact enter via Cape Colony and the Orange Free State, that State lying between the north-eastern frontier of the Colony and the south-eastern frontier of the Transvaal. Of the Free State there is not much to say; but that little needs to be said, because this Republic is a very important factor in South African politics, and before coming to its politics the reader ought to know something of its population. I have already (Chapter V) summarized its physical features and have referred (Chapter XI) to the main incidents in its history. Physically, there is little to distinguish it from the regions that bound it to the east, north, and west. Like them, it is level or undulating, dry, and bare—in the main a land of pasture. One considerable diamond mine is worked in the west, (at Jagersfontein) and along the banks of the Caledon River there lies one rich agricultural district. But the land under cultivation is less than one per cent, of the whole area. There are no manufactures, and of course very little trade; so the scanty population increases slowly. It is a country of great grassy plains, brilliantly green and fresh after rain has fallen, parched and dusty at other times, but able to support great numbers of cattle and sheep. Rare farmhouses and still rarer villages are scattered over this wide expanse, which, in the north-east, toward Natal, rises into a mountainous region. The natives (most of them of Bechuana stock) are nearly twice as numerous as the whites. Some live on a large Barolong reservation, where they till the soil and keep their cattle in their own way. The rest are scattered over the country, mostly employed as herdsmen to the farmers. Save on the reservation, they cannot own land or travel without a pass, and of course they are not admitted to the electoral franchise. They seem, however, to be fairly well treated, and are perfectly submissive. Their wages average thirty shillings a month. Native labour has become so scarce that no farmer is now permitted to employ more than twenty-five. Of the whites, fully two-thirds are of Dutch origin, and Dutch is pretty generally spoken. English, however, is understood by most people, and is the language most commonly used in the larger villages. The two races have lived of late years in perfect harmony, for there has never been any war between the Free State and Great Britain. As the tendency of the English citizens to look to Cape Colony has been checked by the sentiment of independence which soon grew up in this little Republic, and by their attachment to its institutions, so the knowledge of the Dutch citizens that the English element entertains this sentiment and attachment has prevented the growth of suspicion among the Dutch, and has knitted the two races into a unity which is generally cordial.[64] Nevertheless, so much Dutch feeling remained slumbering, that when it had been reawakened by Dr. Jameson's expedition into the Transvaal in December, 1895, the scale was decisively turned in favour of one out of the two candidates at the election of a President which followed shortly thereafter, by the fact that the one belonged to a Dutch, the other to a Scottish family. Both were able and experienced men, the former (Mr. Steyn) a judge, the latter (Mr. Fraser) Speaker of the Volksraad. It may be added that the proximity of the Colony, and the presence of the large English element, have told favourably upon the Dutch population in the way of stimulating their intelligence and modifying their conservatism, while not injuring those solid qualities which make them excellent citizens. The desire for instruction is far stronger among them than it is in the Transvaal. Indeed, there is no part of South Africa where education is more valued and more widely diffused.

The only place that can be called a town is Bloemfontein, the seat of government, which stands on the great trunk-line of railway from Cape Town to Pretoria, seven hundred and fifty miles from the former and two hundred and ninety from the latter town. It is what the Germans call a "freundliches StÄdtchen," a bright and cheerful little place with 3,300 white and 2,500 black inhabitants, nestling under a rocky kopje, and looking out over illimitable plains to the east and south. The air is dry and bracing, and said to be especially beneficial to persons threatened with pulmonary disease. As it is one of the smallest, so it is one of the neatest and, in a modest way, best appointed capitals in the world. It has a little fort, originally built by the British government, with two Maxim guns in the Arsenal, a Protestant Episcopal and a Roman Catholic cathedral as well as Dutch Reformed churches, all kinds of public institutions, a spacious market square, with a good club and an excellent hotel, wide and well-kept streets, gardens planted with trees that are now so tall as to make the whole place seem to swim in green, a national museum, and a very handsome building for the legislature, whose principal apartment is as tasteful, well-lighted, and well-arranged as any I have seen in any British Colony or American State. The place is extremely quiet, and people live very simply, though not cheaply, for prices are high, and domestic service so dear and scarce as to be almost unprocurable. Every one is above poverty, but still further removed from wealth. It looks, and one is told that it is, the most idyllic community in Africa, worthy to be the capital of this contented and happy State. No great industries have come into the Free State to raise economic strife. No capitalists tempt the virtue of legislators, or are forced to buy off the attacks of blackmailers. No religious animosities divide Christians, for there is perfect religious freedom. No difficulties as to British suzerainty exist, for the Republic is absolutely independent. No native troubles have arisen. No prize is offered to ambition. No political parties have sprung up. Taxation is low, and there is no public debt. The arms of the State are a lion and a lamb standing on opposite sides of an orange-tree, with the motto, "Freedom, Immigration, Patience, Courage", and though the lion has, since 1871, ceased to range over the plains, his pacific attitude beside the lamb on this device happily typifies the harmony which has existed between the British and Dutch elements, and the spirit of concord which the late President Brand so well infused into the public life of his Republic. In the Orange Free State I discovered, in 1895, the kind of commonwealth which the fond fancy of the philosophers of last century painted. It is an ideal commonwealth, not in respect of any special excellence in its institutions, but because the economic and social conditions which have made democracy so far from an unmixed success in the American States and in the larger Colonies of Britain, not to speak of the peoples of Europe, whether ancient or modern, have not come into existence here, while the external dangers which for a time threatened the State have, years ago, vanished away like clouds into the blue.[65]

Although, however, the political constitution of the Free State is not the chief cause of the peace and order which the State enjoys, it may claim to be well suited to the community which lives happily under it. It is a simple constitution, and embodied in a very short, terse, and straightforward instrument of sixty-two articles, most of them only a few lines in length.

The governing authorities are the President, the Executive Council, and the Volksraad or elective popular assembly. Citizenship belongs to all white persons born in the State, or who have resided in it for three years and have made a written promise of allegiance, or have resided one year and possess real property of the value of one hundred and fifty pounds sterling, a liberality which is in marked contrast to the restrictions imposed upon new comers by the laws of the Transvaal. Thus, practically, all the male white inhabitants are citizens, with full rights of suffrage—subject to some small property qualifications for new comers which it is hardly worth while to enumerate.

The President is elected by the citizens for five years and is re-eligible. He can sit and speak but cannot vote in the Volksraad, is responsible to it and has the general control of the administration.

The Executive Council consists of five members—besides the President—viz., the State Secretary and the Magistrate of Bloemfontein, both of whom are appointed by the President and confirmed by the Volksraad, and three other members chosen by the Volksraad. It is associated with the President for divers purposes, but has not proved to be an important or influential body.

The Volksraad is elected by all the citizens for four years, half of the members retiring every two years. It has only one chamber, in which there sit at present fifty-eight members. It is the supreme legislative authority, meeting annually, and in extra sessions when summoned, and its consent is required to the making of treaties and to a declaration of war. The President has no veto on its acts, and the heads of the executive departments do not sit in it.

The obligation of military service is universal on all citizens between the ages of sixteen and sixty.

The constitution can be altered by the Volksraad, but only by a three-fourths majority in two consecutive annual sessions. It is therefore a Rigid constitution, like that of the United States and that of Switzerland.

This simple scheme of government seems calculated to throw nearly all the power in the hands of the legislature, leaving the President comparatively weak. Nevertheless, in point of fact the Presidents have been very important figures, partly because there have been no parties in the legislature, and therefore no party leaders. From 1863 till his death in 1888, the whole policy of the State was guided by President Brand, a lawyer from the Cape, whom the people elected for five successive terms. His power of sitting in and addressing the Volksraad proved to be of the utmost value, for his judgment and patriotism inspired perfect confidence. His successor, Mr. F. W. Reitz, who at the time of my visit (November, 1895) had just been obliged by ill-health to retire from office, enjoyed equal respect, and when he chose to exert it, almost equal influence with the legislature, and things went smoothly under him. I gathered that Judge Steyn, who was elected President early in 1896, was similarly respected for his character and abilities, and was likely to enjoy similar weight. So the Speaker of the legislature has been an influential person, because his office devolves upon him functions which the absence of a Cabinet makes important. The fact is that in every government, give it what form you please, call it by what name you will, individual men are the chief factors, and if the course of things is such that the legislature does not become divided into parties and is not called on to produce conspicuous leaders, general leadership will fall to the executive head if he is fit to assume it, and legislative leadership to the chairman of the assembly. Were questions to arise splitting up the people and the legislature into factions, the situation would change at once. Oratorical gifts and legislative strategy would become valuable, and the President or the Speaker of the assembly might be obscured by the chiefs of the parties.

The people of the Free State were well satisfied with their constitution, and showed little disposition to alter it. Some of the wisest heads, however, told me that they thought two improvements were needed: a provision that amendments to the constitution, after having passed the Volksraad, should be voted on by the people (as in the Swiss Referendum), and a provision securing to the judges their salaries, and their independence of the Volksraad. It is interesting to notice that both here and in the Transvaal the gravest constitutional questions that have arisen turn on the relations between the legislative and the judicial departments. Some years ago the Free State Volksraad claimed the right to commit a person to prison for contempt, and to direct the State attorney to prosecute him. The Chief Justice, a distinguished lawyer, and his colleagues felt bound to resist what they thought an unconstitutional stretch of power by the Raad. At first they seemed likely to be defeated, but by using their opportunities of charging juries to insist on their views they brought public opinion round to their side, and the Raad ultimately retired from the position it had taken up, leaving the question of right undetermined. It has never been definitely settled whether the courts of law are in the Free State (as in the United States), the authorized interpreters of the constitution, though upon principle it would seem that they are. These South African Constitutions were drafted by simple men in an untechnical way, so that many legal points obvious to the minds of English or American lawyers were left untouched, and have now to be settled either on principle or according to the will of what may happen to be the predominant power for the time being. It is, perhaps, better that they should remain in abeyance until public opinion has grown more instructed and has had fuller opportunities of considering them.

Small as is the white population of the Orange Free State, its geographical position and the high average quality of its citizens secure for it a position of great significance in South African politics; and the attitude it might take would be an important factor in any dispute between the British Government and the Transvaal Republic. The troubles of December, 1895, drew it nearer to the Transvaal, for the Free State Boers have strong political sympathy with their northern kinsfolk. They were, at the time of my visit, far from approving the policy of mere resistance to reform which President Kruger has taken up; and seemed quite indisposed to support the Transvaal if it should take any course at variance with its treaty engagements.[66] To this topic I may have occasion presently to return. Meanwhile I pass on to describe the native State which lies nearest to the Free State, which has been most closely connected with its fortunes, and which in one respect furnishes a parallel to it, having been of late years the most quiet and contented among native communities.


                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

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