South Africa and Apartheid

As Africans were moving to self-rule elsewhere on the continent, whites in South Africa were determined that they were going to maintain their way of life, which to them meant maintaining power, in other words, the whites would continue to deny power to the majority Africans. Whites in South Africa -- of British and Dutch descent -- were roughly 20 percent of South Africa's population. Asians (mainly Indians) were roughly 2 percent. Blacks were about 70 percent, and those classified as coloreds (of mixed race) were about 8 percent. Many of the more conservative whites -- largely farmers of Dutch descent, saw God as having given them their lands in South Africa, and they saw no reason to give up ruling themselves.

White farmers had become dependent upon blacks as cheap labor, and manufacturers were also using blacks for cheap labor. South Africa had become urbanized, with 50 percent of the black population living in cities dominated by white governments, many of the blacks there working as semi-skilled labor in manufacturing, blacks operating machinery having replaced the white master-craftsmen of previous generations. The labor of black people had become a mainstay of South Africa's economy, but with wage discrimination. A law had been passed creating what was called a Civilized Labor Policy, which protected the wage levels of white workers and left employers free to hire blacks at wages as low as possible. And there was the Bantu Act of 1953, which took schools away from missions and assured that whites would receive an education that was different from and superior to that of blacks.

The movement of blacks in the urban areas had exacerbated race relations, and in 1948 the most conservative of white political parties, the Nationalist Party, won the national election -- elections in which only whites participated. The Nationalist Party was predominately rural and consisted largely of those of Dutch heritage, and it was the most adamant in maintaining a separation between whites and the other races in South Africa.

They set out to more than maintain the separation of the races; they tried to turn back the clock and undo what appeared to them to be unacceptable integration. Blacks were working in white owned factories, other white businesses and in white homes. But they were largely segregated into black enclaves in the cities and had their own facilities and doors of entry to public places along with other restrictions that were common in the South in the United States. But still there was too much integration for the Nationalist Party.

New laws restricted blacks living in cities. They were forbidden to own their own homes in urban areas. They had to rent less than satisfactory housing from local administration boards. The old apartheid dogma that blacks were "temporary sojourners" in the cities was applied. Those who had worked for the same employer for ten years or for different employers for fifteen years were allowed to continue living in cities and towns, and all others were regarded as migrant workers who had to have special work permits, which were to be renewed every year.

So called black spots in South Africa's cities were wiped out. This included neighborhoods where people of different races had been living beside one another peacefully -- the black suburb called Sophiatown and the heart of the Colored community in Capetown (District Six). Blacks were now obliged to carry passbooks, open to inspection by any policeman or agent of the government whenever asked. Blacks had to acquire special permission for travel to various activities. Those no longer allowed in the cities, including the old and no longer useful, were to be forcibly removed to areas outside the cities designated as reserves for blacks -- dusty places with abject poverty and far from what blacks considered home.

Every square inch of South Africa was designated as belonging to a racial grouping, and blacks were removed from villages and lands where generations had lived and worked fields they believed they owned -- to be replaced by whites.

The response to the Nationalist Party's policies by blacks was increased agitation. An organization called the African National Congress turned to boycotts, strikes and civil disobedience. In the early fifties they began their Defiance Campaign, together with some of the South African Indians. The government arrested 8,500, which outraged many more, and tens of thousands mobilized for defiance.

In 1956, the government indicted 156 opposition leaders, including Nelson Rolihiafia Mandela, leader of the African National Congress. The African Nation Congress issued what it called a Freedom Charter, asserting that South Africa belonged to all who lived in it, "black and white," and which called for universal suffrage and those individual freedoms found in the U.S. Bill of Rights.

The British government was less than thrilled over the new repressions in South Africa, and a white majority approved a new constitution that in 1961 made South Africa a republic. South Africa's government had hoped to remain within the Commonwealth, but with criticism from other Commonwealth nations South Africa withdrew from that association.

By now, the Communist Party of South Africa, originally all white, had joined with blacks and Asians against the repression. Already the Party was banned, by the Communism Act of 1950, which denied people the right to function peacefully in the political party of their choice. But as usual with such suppressions the Party worked underground. Blacks joined the Party, and the government and police had another charge against its non-white opponents.

In March, 1962, while posturing righteously against the Communists and perpetrators of rebellion, government forces created what became known as the Sharpeville Massacre. In the black township of Sharpeville, south of Johannesburg, police fired on a crowd of about 10,000 that had gathered in front of a police station to protest against pass laws, the police killing 67 and wounding 186, including 40 women and 8 children, most of them shot in the back while trying to flee.

The Sharpeville massacre added to the other repressions made white rule more precarious, but the government continued on course and outlawed the African National Congress and the Pan-Africanist Congress, forcing these two organization underground. For awhile, only black labor activists were making protests, but the African National Congress was developing a military wing in its organization, called the Umkhonto. In 1963, diligent government forces discovered Umkhonto's headquarters and found there the leader Nelson Mandela. They arrested Mandela and others, and in 1964 Mandela was sentenced to life imprisonment.

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