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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
C.O.885
19 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- | COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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and expressly excluding from the franchise, without any reservation, natives and half castes.
It is noteworthy that the constitution embodied in the Imperial (Commonwealth of Australia) Act of 1900, which is therefore an integral part of Imperial legislation, provides in Clause 25 that, for the purpose of assigning each State its quota of members, “if by the law of any State all persons of any race are disqualified from voting at elections for the more numerous Houses of Parliament of the State, then, in reckoning the number of the people of the State or of the Commonwealth, persons of that rare
resident in that State shall not be counted."
In New Zealand, natives are citizens both in theory and in practice, though not (except in the case of half custes) on equal terms with the whites. Half castes are given the alternative of voting either as Europeans for a white represen- tative of the district in which they live, or as Maoris for Maori représentatives of the race. Full blooded Maoris, vote for one out of four Maori representatives who speak for the race in the Lower House. There are two Maoris out of 38 in the nominated Legislative Council, and four Maoris out of 80 in the House of Represen- tatives (a mumber which is not far removed from the relative proportions of the population).
In South Africa the position is, as regards direct representation of the natives of South Africa, that, except ut the Cape, it is practically non-existent."*
In the Cape Colony the natives have been admitted to the franchise on equal terms," and this Colony has an appreciable though small number of native voters, In this Colony there are special native Acts as to land, &c.. but the citizenship is open to natives, and this has been the case ever since representative institutions were first given to the Colony. The first elected legislature met in 1854.
In Natal there are special qualifications for natives as regards the franchise, but natives are practically excluded from the citizenship, though not, it would seem, excluded by law.
The
In the Transvaal and Orange River Colonies the new constitutions exclude natives. franchise is confined to adult white male British subjects. In Rhodesia the law is the same as in the Cape Colony, but in 1903 there were only 51 native against 5,200 white voters.
Native Populations in the Crown Colonies and Protectorates.
I think it is safe to say broadly that, in the Crown Colonies, the natives are in principle, and to a large extent in practice, as much or as little citizens as the white men.
Where there is an elected Legislature, there is, as far as I know, no difference made between
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• See pp. 66-69 of [Cd, 2399].
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