Show Is the vast british empire breaking up by J WILLIAM C UTLEY DG ING GEORGE Vs V s silver bubl kingland KEn lee now at its height in england gland has formed an in if world wide ansti aution tor for propagandizing the unity and extent of the brit sh empire no one certainly questions its ex extent tent but there are those among the pollyl cal cai economists of the day who at least suggest that the far flung realm shows signs of breaking apart and when the real test comes it if it eer ever does they may be right recent developments in south at af rica have again made people ask whether the british empire Is break ing up writes fred clarke english educator and former representative of the union linion of south africa at geneva in current bistor history y magazine with out attempting to answer that question one can have no doubt as to the im of the status of the union act which received royal assent on june 22 1934 this new law has a bearing on the whole future of brit ish imperial unity the status act contains the first deft nite official reference of the crown to the union as a sovereign independent state its accompanying seal act gives the exclusive right of use of the great seal and little seal heretofore held by the ling king to the south african min aisters for more than a quarter of a cen tury south africa pol has been torn bitterly between two political fac eions as directly opposed as our new dealers and rugged individualists they were led by general smuts right hand man of general botha in the union government which arose a few years after the south african war and general hertzog a minister in the botha cabinet who was removed in 1912 two years after the cabinet was formed general smuts and his faction open ly considered the union a definite part of the empire with british cht Ilza illation tion and culture dominant hert zog sympathizers held out against the complete social cultural and political domination of the boer population by the british and have always striven to make the union a separate and independent nation present status of the union has been effected as a sort of pol compromise between the wo two generals and their respective parties the union Is undeniably independent now with merely allegiance to the crown the string politically taing it to great britain and the two parties have fused into one they get together it Is interesting to note that the coalition of the parties came about because their differences became so bitter after england went yent off the gold standard in 1931 1031 that party leaders decided that unity and compromise would be the only means of averting hopeless internal political strife im agine mr roosevelt and say mr hoo 1100 ver getting together before a pol campaign and straightening out their differences difference si I 1 general hertzog Hertz s nationalist party which was in power in 1931 preferred to keep south africa on the gold stand ard believing that england had stepped off only temporarily and that maintaining the standard would help to stabilize a leading industry of south africa afrim gold mining other interests suffered badly and general smuts south african party accused the in cum bents of pampering the political interests always prone to tabe take the op cosite line from the empire jeopardize iz lz ing the interests of the union in gen oral eral thereby it was conceded that if general smuts could force an election at that time he would have more than an even chance of winning but that he could not do so without stirring up general smuts the smoldering embers of racial con flirt 1114 between boers or rather the present sent day and britons va th animosity that had been adm bably subdued in the preceding decades by wise government to youth of south africa really goes the credit for coalition young men of both parties know the sentimental and romantic racial d mere ly as historical traditions not as real loyalties and convictions it was they whose insistence that these d t f ferencek feren ces be wiped out once and for all impressed ile tl e nation with the necessity for taking up the real business at hand that of administering good government As a result of the coal the status act satisfactory in the main to both parties was effected boers in appos tion the roer in south africa has ion opposed the out and out pol dom r ance of the union by london as pro posed by the briton for fear of los aug ii his ident ta t south africa Is a WA to VOW 11 N 0 lasda f aa so UTHE TI A U ahoe 0 I 1 IV 11 I 1 pf i IN 41 a D ORANGE FREE I 1 too UT 1 0 N T tr ST r e 0 C p 1614 ca 06 region of two separate and powerful cultures and its people speak two languages there Is of course the english with which we are more or less familiar and there Is the dutch offspring afrikaans the new deal for south africa pad pact fles lies both factions by fostering both cultures education Is administered in both newspapers and magazines are published in both languages that the status act with its adais slon of south africa s virtually absolute independence applies as well to all of the british dominions Is im plied piled in the fact that it includes in its preamble the balfour declaration ob tallied by general hertzog when he headed the nationalist government of 1924 this calls the dominions au an tono communities within the british empire equal in status in no way subordinate one to another in any respect of their domestic or exter nal affairs though united by a corn coin mon allegiance to the crown and free ly associated as members of the brit ish commonwealth of nat ons further removing british political dominance from the dominions was the statute of westminster which was passed by the british parliament in 1931 it closely allied the consal tut lonal ional development of the other do minions of the empire with that of the union of south africa the bal four declaration and the statute of westminster are mastera aces of phraseology which carried soothing balm to both south african factions the status act Is the application of them to the south african constitution two important concessions are made to the dominions in the statute of westminster it gives the dominion government power to amend repeal or modify any british act which has been incorporated in the law of the dominion it further states that no british law may be applied to any do minion million unless that dominion has requested the appi appl cation and consented to it really independent the status act itself declares that no british legislation shall be consid ered in effect in the union of south africa until it Is re enacted reenacted by the south african parliament the chef ch et executive Is defined as the king who shall act upon the advice of his south aar can m n in south africa the ling kings s represent active Is the governor general neither he nor the k ng have any powers of veto or reservation of a bill the gov arnor general may however simply re turn a bill with his op nion for further consideration it if he thinks it wise the king does not retain the biwer power to name the prime minister and to d s solve parl ament the case of war would be the real test for with the clearly worded status act the union of south africa can now decide for itself whether or not to remain neutral if the empire enters a war says clarke it might even secede altogether though not apparently by legal proc ess some commentators in england as well as in south africa feel dis by these possibilities but equal status necessarily implies them and legal barriers would be flimsy de tenses against the strong pol pres when the time of crisis comes it will be remembered that when england entered the world war there v was as widespread d assens on in 1 south africa and even serious cons in some cases clarke goes on neutrality and secession are po lotical issues to be determined in the light of all the facts when the ques tion arises they are not to be determined ter mined in advance as some of the die dle hard lawyers seemed to demand by any constitutional legislation especially leg station under such docu doeu ments as the balfour declaration and the statute of westminster the ties that B nd the abol tion of the prerogative pow er of the ling king aroused the anguish of the pro british faction in south africa this faction claimed that in the time of crisis the L k ng was the executive head of the entire british empire and that he could act as he saw fit in case of a crisis ip in order to keep the realm from falling apart general smuts was able to convince h s followers that tor for centar es no such prerogative it if there was one had been exercised and that the question was not one of law but of politics of course what the economists who cite the status act as evidence that the british amp re is disintegrating fall to ION show Is that political power or legal power are not the real bands which hold the empire together experience has taught us that in time of war nations do not act on the literal in terp of the law the ties that bind are more substantial in the case of the british imperial dominions they are the advantages of free trade with in the empire and the protection of the british fleet the union of south africa would be an easy mark indeed for an invading force were it not for the protection of the greatest fleet in the world it Is extremely doubtful that the union would ever want to for sake such a protection with its constitutional status now more clearly defined than ever before the union of south africa is ready it self to begin expanding it would I 1 ke to annex the adjacent protectorates of land swaziland and land which are now governed under the dominions office in london when the union was formed in 1909 1900 the con ution provided for the eventual in elusion of these territories the r populate on however Is 90 99 per cent black and they were left out of the original union and kept under dl london protection because of the treatment they had received at the hands bands of the boers who made up a large share of the union population when last year prime minister hertzog announced to great brita britan n that the union of south africa was ready to act dimmed abely to include the protectorates h s act drew an in stant appeal from chief general hertzog khama of land british ad ministration to the protectorates hag has not been all that it might be but na tives and native sympathizers believe that it Is better than the disc which might harm them at the hands of the boers native chiefs balk unionists claim that there are no selfish reasons for annexation for the union has plenty of land and plenty of economic d without taking on that of the native areas Basu toland Is tremendously overcrowded and con dit ons among the blacks are deflor able the union would move the sur plus population over to the vast ex pauses of land where the population Is scarce and would give the blacks land and irrigate it the natives and their chief are afraid of this the reason is that the company ltd owns about 1325 OW acres in land they fear that the blacks might be exploited in dust nally here that the grazing graz ng land which has been held out to them as a home land for the surplus union blacks might be seized by the surplus whites of the union neither do they like the present na tive policy of the union the native under the protectorate of the union according to the manchester guardian has found that his freedom of movement Is I 1 in ted by restrictive pass laws his status as a worker Is degraa ed by the color bar act to one of per manent economic inferiority he sees his fellows through the union corn coin belled by the native service contract act to relinquish settlement and to wander in search of work he sees them barred by the native land act from acquiring land even if despite all obstacles athey they acquire means to do so with the constitutional differences straightened out between black and white in the union and with the ris ing of a new generation wh ch does not feel so bitterly the ty of the whites and the blacks it Is held that the government under smuts and hertzog means well by the natives 0 western newspaper union |