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V. African Interests and the South Africa Act, 1908–1910

It has often been argued that British ministers in the years leading up to the Union of South Africa in 1910 were so obsessed with the principle of white self-government that they forgot their obligations to the African majority.1 The result, it is alleged, was that African interests in general were sacrificed on the altar of Anglo-Afrikaner reconciliation, and in particular betrayed in the South Africa Act of 1909. If there is a partial exception allowed—the withholding of Basutoland, Bechuanaland and Swaziland from the Union—then, it is assumed, the credit for this could not possibly be given to the imperial government. The recent article in the Journal of African History by Alan R. Booth argues that, in the apparent absence of any actual imperial policy or concern, local African tribal and missionary pressures on the high commissioner were decisive in bringing this about.