TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE CASE FOR THE TRANSVAAL. THE case for the Outlanders has been put with great force and point in the despatches and telegrams in the new Blue-book on the Transvaal. In our opinion, that case has not been overstated, and the facts are truly and fairly given. More than that, we believe that the Government were perfectly justified in publishing the contents of the Blue-book. Even the most thorough- going advocates of the Transvaal agree that we ought to put as much moral pressure as we can upon President Kruger in order to get him to yield their civil rights to the Outlanders. But how can moral pressure be exerted except by a public statement of the facts ? Moral pressure is the creation of public opinion, and public opinion cannot operate except through a knowledge of the facts. If, then, moral pressure is to be relied on, the fullest and most complete statement of the Outlanders' grievances should be made known. In order to persuade men to change and do right,—the wrong they are doing must be proclaimed. And while we think that Sir Alfred Milner has not spoken too strongly, and that it was right to publish his telegrams, we also hold that the tone and temper of Mr. Chamberlain's final despatch is to be regarded with satisfaction. It is in no sense an immediate ultimatum, but firmly and clearly marks the fact that we have taken official cognisance of the grievances of the Outlanders, and that from this time forward we shall hold the Boers strictly responsible for any ill results that may follow from their treatment of the majority of the white population of the Republic. But though not only our sympathies, but our sense of reason and justice, are on the side of tho Outlanders, we must not ignore the case for the Transvaal: That case requires to be examined not only in an impartial and careful spirit, but also in a spirit of generosity. Although we can never admit that two wrongs will make a right, or that because certain English- men in the past treated the Boers badly therefore the Boers have a right to treat other Englishmen badly now and in the future, we acknowledge that our former deal- ings with the Transvaal require us to use patience and prudence in a special degree.
The main case for the Transvaal rests upon the fact that we endowed the Republic with the right of self- government, and in effect promised not to interfere in its internal affairs. We have therefore, it is argued, abandoned the right to protect our subjects in the Transvaal. If they go to the Republic, they go at their peril. It is well known that the Boers will not yield the vote to the stranger, and hence men who want to vote and to enjoy self-government should choose some other place of residence. No one is compelled to live in the Transvaal, and he who voluntarily takes up his residence there must submit to the local institutions. People, then, who go to the Transvaal must expect no help from England, for England has no right to give it them. So runs the argument. Of course this is a possible position to assume, but it is certainly not that which has generally been taken up in this country. We have always, in the cases even of entirely independent countries, insisted on our right to protect our own citizens. We have sometimes insisted upon their being better treated than the subjects of the State in which they have gone to reside, and we have almost invariably demanded that they shall not be placed on a lower level. We have, that is, in effect said to foreign States : 'If you allow our subjects to go to your country you must treat them fairly,' and tacitly it has come to be admitted that a State must either refuse altogether to allow immigration, or else treat immigrants fairly and allow them to attain civil rights on reasonable terms. But in the case of the Boers those alternatives do not exist. The Boers have no right to exclude British subjects. When their autonomy was restored to the Boers, the right to exclude British subjects was expressly denied to them. They are bound to allow British subjects to settle in the country, and are also bound to give them equality of treatment as regards trade and commerce. Nothing was said one way or the other as to the franchise, no doubt because the Transvaal Leers, like those in the Orange Free State, were originally very liberal as to naturalisation, and the growth of a franchise grievance was not contemplated. Up till 1890, indeed, the Boers had a reasonable franchise law, and it is only since then that legislative means have been taken to keep the Outlanders without political rights. It is, therefore, evident that we have not only the right of helping and protecting our subjects which we claim in all strictly foreign countries, but also a special right conferred by the fact that the Boers have no power to refuse the right of access to their country to British subjects. They cannot,.that _is, say to British subjects : ' We do not want you here, and we forbid you to come except at your peril,' for every British subject, nay, every white man, has an explicit treaty right to enter and live in the Transvaal. But when a British subject has a right to residence, he may fairly, we think, ask his Government to see that such right of residence is not made a burden to him by unfair laws. But it will be said that to say this is to deny the right of self-govern. ment given by the Convention. In a sense, of course, that is so, but not owing to any breach of faith on our part, but to the fact that the right of entry and residence secured to British subjects is per se a denial of complete self-government. You cannot take the logical con- sequences of the verbal grant of self-government alone. You must take with them the logical consequences of the right of entry and residence which is secured to British subjects, and constitutes a derogation from the grant of self-government. To put it another way, the Boers cannot plead : We did not, and do not, want these Out- landers. We never asked them to come : what right have they to crowd us out of our country and to claim our citizenship ? It is enough that we tolerate their existence and do not drive them out of the land. Let them either go, or else be thankful for what they get.' If they were to take up such a position they could at once be reminded that the Outlanders have as good a legal right to live in the Transvaal as have the Boers them- selves. Clearly, then, it is impossible to talk as if the Boers had a right to say : We will do what we will with our own,' for if the Convention is maintained no such absolute right exists. It may, as some people believe, have been a great misfortune that the pastoral quiet of the Transvaal was broken up by the gold-seekers. The growth of a great city in the Republic may, again, be an evil on which the Boers are to be commiserated, but this does not alter the fact that the Boers could not have prevented the influx of gold-seekers, even if they would. They must take the bad with the good. It may have been a pity that they were not given an absolute right to regulate the influx of population, but since they were not, it is useless to regret the fact. One of the conditions under which the Transvaal received its autonomy was the potentiality of such an occurrence as the influx of the British gold-miners.
For good, then, or evil, Johannesburg and the Outlander population have come into existence. It remains to ask whether we, the British Government, who secured the right of entry to the Outlanders, should be justified in obliging the Transvaal to give them a fair share in the government of the country. That we have the right to take action if we deem it expedient so to do is, in our opinion, clear, for as we have pointed out, we have a better right, than we should have in the case of an entirely independent Power. Of course, it is difficult to say absolutely and in the abstract what we should do in the case of a foreign Power, but we trust and believe that if similar circum- stances existed, if a great city of British subjects had grown up on foreign soil, and if those British subjects were not receiving fair treatment, we should insist on right being done them. But if we have the right to help British subjects in the Transvaal, the question resolves itself into one of expediency as to the time and mode of action. To begin with, we ought to allow a reasonable amount of time to elapse between our warning that we in- tend to support the Outlanders and any overt act on our part. Again, we would take no hostile action unless, and until, the continuance of the Boer refusal to treat the Outlanders justly had produced actual disorder. That is, we would let the Boers see clearly what are the inevitable results of placing the majority of the white population of a country in a position of political servitude. If disorder occurred we would, as we said last week, hold the Boers responsible, and enforce that responsibility with all the force at our command.
Meantime, it may be very pertinently asked, What ought the Outlanders to do during the period in which the British Government is giving the Boers an opportunity to act with wisdom and in the spirit of justice ? They can- not stop agitating, for that would be taken as a sign of acquiescence, and yet agitation might be made an excuse for Boer obstinacy. Under these circumstances, we believe that the best course open to the Outlanders would be to organise themselves as thoroughly as possible. That is, let a Committee of respectable British subjects open a register of all British subjects who have lived six years in the Republic, and who will sign a declaration that they intend to continue to reside in the Transvaal. Let those who are on the register elect a repre- sentative body, and pledge themselves to abide loyally by its decisions, and as far as possible to act upon its regulations as if they were laws. Finally, let all these things be done openly, and without any appearance of secrecy or con- spiracy. Let, that is, the fullest publicity accompany all the proceedings. Either the Transvaal will acquiesce in this attempt of the Outlanders to organise themselves, or they will not. If they acquiesce, the Outlanders' represen- tative body, being rich and intelligent, and representing great interests, will soon accrete to itself a large share of power and authority, and will be able to give proofs that it does not desire to overthrow the Republic, that it is not hostile to the true interests of the State, and that the people in whose name it speaks are citizens who ought not to be neglected. If, on the other hand, the Transvaal Government refuses to allow such a voluntary body to come into existence, and puts it down by force, public opinion here and in South Africa will have one more proof of the justice of the Outlanders' cause. In any event, the Outlanders cannot stop their agitation, for if they do it will be used against them as a sign of indifference. We most sincerely desire that the march of events should be as slow as possible, and that our Government should be patient and generous in all their actions, but there can be no going back now. The warning has been given, and we must now press steadily and persistently forward, until the Outlanders have obtained the right to share in the government of their adopted country. That is the object, and on that our eyes must be fixed.
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