Note Back to Main Text — Chapter I

But what we are really concerned with is the nature of the opinions upon the central question of South African administration which Frere put forward at this critical period. With these before us, the most elementary acquaintance with the events of the last ten years will suffice to indicate the profound degree in which his knowledge of South African conditions surpassed the knowledge of those who took upon themselves to reverse his policy. What, above all, Frere realised was, that a point had been reached at which the whole of South Africa must be gathered under the British flag without delay. He had noted the disintegrating influences at work in the Cape Colony and the strength of the potential antagonism of the republican Dutch. The annexation of the Transvaal was not his deed, nor did either the time or the manner in which it was done command his approval. But he asserted that British rule, once established there, must be maintained at all costs. With this end in view, he urged that every responsibility incurred by England in the act of annexation must be fulfilled to the letter. Utilising the information which he had gained by personal observation during his visit to the Transvaal in 1879, and availing himself of the co-operation of President Brand, of the Free State, and Chief Justice de Villiers, in the Cape Colony, he drafted a scheme of administrative reform sufficient to satisfy the legitimate aspirations of the Boers for self-government without endangering the permanency of British rule. It included proposals for administrative and financial reforms framed with a view of reducing the cost of government to the lowest point consistent with efficiency, for the reorganisation of the courts of law, for the survey of the proposed railway line to Delagoa Bay, and full details of a system of representative government. This measure he urged upon the Colonial Office as one of immediate necessity, since it embodied the fulfilment of the definite promises of an early grant of self-government made to the Boers at the time of annexation.[8]