CO885-(18-19) — Page 408

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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case we might yet find partial uniformity in

C uniform machinery of administration throughout all the component parts. Uniformity in admin- istrative principles should be specially aimed at,' is a dictum of a Natal magistrate, quoted on page 11 of the Natal report; but we want uni- formity in practice as well as principles. There are large establishments for the benefit of natives - in the different South African States, Others will be able to speak of them, how far they are adequate and efficient; but I have already quoted (page 13, above) from the two South African reports to show that there seems to be an opening for improvement, and I take it that it might he possible to suggest to the South African Giovern- ments, in connexion with federation, the advisa- bility of unifying these Establishments and forming a regular graded service for the whole of South Africa, with classes and tests and a well-defined career similar, though on a different scale, to the Civil Service of India.* 1 very mach suspect that for a long time to come the best safeguard of the native races in South Africa will be found not so much in political status as in a strong administrative service. The whole cost of such a service might be a Federal charge, or we might follow the analogy of the Federated Malay States and, while making the higher posts or some of them federal posts, let the different States bear the charges of all the minor appoint- ments within their borders.

If such a servire is at all feasible it would go far to produce uniformity. The next point is

(e) Want of continuity.

This could only be met by making the pro- posed service to some extent at any rate- independent of the Legislatures. One long step to this would be a Civil List Act, from which the service, or at any rate the more important posts in it, would be paid, so that the salaries and other charges would not be voted on the annual estimates,

However difficult it might be to procure ac- ceptance of such an Act, it seems to me that it The would be must defensible in principle. special circumstances of South Africa, in which, though there is self government, the large majority of British subjects are not citizens, require a special organisation and seem to justify reverting to the analogy of the English Civil List in its old form. The King was assigned so much money and out of it he paid judges, ministers and so forth. It is intelligible and not illogical that the High Commissioner should in the same way be granted for a long term of years a specified sum from which the South African native service would wholly or partially be paid, and that that service, or the heads of it, would be directly responsible to him and not to the elected Legislatures. If some such system could be worked out, we should have the con- tinuity desired we should have the personal

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* See Colonial Office Paper, Natal No. 65, Confi- dential Memorandum by Mr. 'Shepstone on Natal Affairs," 28th November, 1874, last paragraph.

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factor which is considered requisite with natives; and we should have also the final control which, in the case of natives, I have tried to contend, is. better exercised from a distance than on the spot, though not removed to England, at any rate removed from the different local centres.

Whether anything of the kind is possible at all others who know South African" questions better than do will be able to say. There 'would, I should imagine, be the greatest difficulty in inducing the Cape Colony to part with its separate organisation and separate control. But assuming that anything of the kind could be even partially attempted, there are two obvious objections. The first is that it would emphasise the principle-which, as already stated, seems to me at the root a vicious principle of separate treatment for natives. The second is that there might be constant danger of conflict between the two authorities in the same area the High Commissioner and the Colonial Government and Legislature.

The first objection, that the principle of separate treatment for the coloured race will be emphasised by a special and a separate adminis- tration for that race, cannot be answered except on the scure that it is not intended to be a per- manent measure for all time and that, while natives are being safeguarded by a separate administration, they will still be qualifying, as far as laws will allow them, to be citizens,

The Natal Report (p. 11, par. 35) will give us

a text which partially applies:-

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"The administration of native affairs must, if it is to be successful, have a self- contained constitution of its own, based on the autocratic principle of control.” and again (p. 13, par. 40) :—

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To obviate the disadvantages in- herent in a political-system which we approve for ourselves, but which is not in its essentials adapted to a people yet under the patriarchal system, Parliament should be urged to grant a charter to the administrative side of the government within such limits us will be indicated, enabling it the more effectually to con- trol and improve the natives, made in the same way as a township can be better governed by a Municipality than by the central authority of the country. It is no part of this proposition to divorce native administration from the general government of the country, and the bogey ery of an imperium in imperio need not therefore be raised. Neither should it be denounced as visionary or empirical, for it can be supported by both experience and analogy, In addition to Munici- palities, all incorporated societies control their own affairs within, the terms of their constitutions, and so does our own railway department, which is merely

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