Impressions of South Africa | Page 5

undemocratic and incompetent.
If it had been representative of the whole mass of the inhabitants it
might have ventured, like the governments of some great American
cities, to disregard both purity and efficiency. If, on the other hand, it
had been a vigorous and skilful government, giving to the inhabitants
the comforts and conveniences of municipal and industrial life at a
reasonable charge, the narrow electoral basis on which it rested would
have remained little more than a theoretic grievance, and the bulk of the
people would have cared nothing for political rights. An exclusive
government may be pardoned if it is efficient, an inefficient
government if it rests upon the people. But a government which is both
inefficient and exclusive incurs a weight of odium under which it must
ultimately sink; and this was the kind of government which the

Transvaal attempted to maintain. They ought, therefore, to have either
extended their franchise or reformed their administration. They would
not do the former, lest the new burghers should swamp the old ones,
and take the control out of Boer hands. They were unfit to do the latter,
because they had neither knowledge nor skill, so that even had private
interests not stood in the way, they would have failed to create a proper
administration. It was the ignorance, as well as the exclusive spirit of
the Transvaal authorities, which made them unwilling to yield any
more than they might be forced to yield to the demand for reform.
The position in which Britain stood needs to be examined from two
sides, its legal right of interference, and the practical considerations
which justified interference in this particular case.
Her legal right rested on three grounds. The first was the Convention of
1884 (printed in the Appendix to this volume), which entitled her to
complain of any infraction of the privileges thereby guaranteed to her
subjects.
The second was the ordinary right, which every State possesses, to
complain, and (if necessary) intervene when its subjects are wronged,
and especially when they suffer any disabilities not imposed upon the
subjects of other States.
The third right was more difficult to formulate. It rested on the fact that
as Britain was the greatest power in South Africa, owning the whole
country south of the Zambesi except the two Dutch Republics (for the
deserts of German Damaraland and the Portuguese East-coast
territories may be practically left out of account), she was interested in
preventing any causes of disturbance within the Transvaal which might
spread beyond its borders, and become sources of trouble either among
natives or among white men. This right was of a vague and
indeterminate nature, and could be legitimately used only when it was
plain that the sources of trouble did really exist and were becoming
dangerous.
Was there not also, it may be asked, the suzerainty of Britain, and if so,
did it not justify intervention? I will not discuss the question, much

debated by English lawyers, whether the suzerainty over the "Transvaal
State," mentioned in the preamble to the Convention of 1881, was
preserved over the "South African Republic" by the Convention of
1884, not because I have been unable to reach a conclusion on the
subject, but because the point seems to be one of no practical
importance. Assuming, for the sake of argument, that there is a
suzerainty, it is perfectly clear from an examination of the Conventions
and of the negotiations of 1884 that this suzerainty relates solely to
foreign relations, and has nothing whatever to do with the internal
constitution or government of the Transvaal. The significance of the
term--if it be carried over and read into the Convention of 1884--is
exhausted by the provision in Article IV of that instrument for the
submission of treaties to the British Government. No argument,
accordingly, for any right of interference as regards either the political
arrangements of the Transvaal or the treatment of foreigners within its
borders, can be founded on this real or supposed suzerainty. This view
had been too frequently and too clearly expressed by the British
Government before 1896, to make it possible for any British official to
attempt to put any such construction upon the term; and the matter
might therefore have been suffered to drop, since the right to veto
treaties was explicit, and did not need to be supported by an appeal to
the preamble of 1881. The term, however, though useless to Britain,
was galling to the Transvaal, which suspected that it would be made a
pretext for infringements upon their independence in internal affairs;
and these suspicions were confirmed by the talk of the Uitlander
spokesmen in Johannesburg, who were in the habit of appealing to
Britain as the Suzerain Power. It has played a most unfortunate part in
the whole