Federal ion
SIR,—With the Southern Rhodesian referendum on the question of federation iinmediately upon us,. I with many of your readers will be feeling that last-minute powerlessness to alter a probable decision
in its yet at the same time wondering whether any last-minute words to the electors in question will, or will not, do any good.
I realise it is no good communicating to Salisbury at the last minute, as the matter is in the hands of God. But as a clue to a rightful attitude in the -next months, would your readers think the following message was on the right lines, which I had intended to send signed by Members of both sides at Westminster ? "If a civilisation is truly superior, and secure in that superiority, then surely it need not be arrogant or unkind. If the majority of Africans are still, according to their culture, our children, let us at least not make them into psychological problems by an attitude we would not show to our own families.
" We recognise that this racial problem exists even in England, and it is not only settlers overseas who produce it; we recognise too that there is less excuse for it here, where we are not swimming in the sea of the majority nor administering new farms in pioneer mood nor building up businesses in growing towns in a new country.
" We submit that you are running into trouble if. you cut off from the Europea'n way of life—in hotels. trains. public meeting-places and homes—those Africans who are truly educated, and it is surely to be recognised that they are not merely a minute proportion of your African communities. We imagine that the majority of you citizens of Southern Rhodesia are determined to vote for Federation on Thursday. Whether this he in fact the case or not, we feel it to be our duty to show our realisation of the fact that, Federation or no Federation, you have a race problem of the greatest magnitude which a Mother „Country of your own stock, though far in the distance, can help you over, and ought to he able to help you over.
"We emphasise firstly the importance of putting the educated African on your own level; that you will otherwise lose him under- ground into vicious movements; and that, furthermore, the aspiration - towards true partnership, as expressed in the Federal Scheme, has this as its prerequisite. The reason why we ask you at the last minute to reconsider your decision- is that we consider from recent personal experience that in the present mood of Africans to prcweed with Federation, short of such improvements in the individual territories con- cerned, will be to court a dangerous deterioration in race relations.
" What we speak of requires, in the first place, not legislation but a change of heart, and we recognise that this change of heart must not only take place between Lake Tanganyika and the Limpopo but in suburban-villas in London and the great homes of England in the deep country. We ask you to think of us as not proud in advising bu\ aware that none of us have yet properly sorted out this question of human relationship especially in a multi-racial society."
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