Canada and South Africa

CANADA AND SOUTH AFRICA A PLEA FOR INTER-DOMINION HISTORICAL STUDY HE movement to achieve closer political, economic, andsocial relations between the British Dominions may be said to have, in the last two years,proceededapace. Now that the term "British Empire" is comingto be discardedin favour of the more universally acceptable "British Commonwealth of Nations," stressis laid, and rightly so, quite as much on the necessityfor channels of intercourse and co-operation directly connecting Dominion with Dominion, as on the need, now lessurgent, becausein large part provided for, of suchconnectinglinks between the Dominions and the Mother Country. In the eighties, opponentsof the Imperial Federation movement ventured to doubt whether the Dominions caredvery much for oneanother,however warm might be their affections towards Great Britain. Such doubts were largely the product of ignornace. "Canada," complained a settler at the Cape somesixty-five years ago,• "stands aloof from us; we consciouslyfeel every mile of her immensedistance ." But, in 1022,the prospects of co-operationare decidedly hopeful. A steamshipservice,subsidized by the Canadiangovernment , plies direct betweenCapetown and Montreal, a Canadian assistant trade commissionerhas been stationed at Capetown, and a great mass of information as to the economicwants and products of the Union has been made available to Canadian farmers and manufacturers? In South Africa, comparison of the figures of Union exports to Canada, which dropped from nearly half a million sterlingin 1919 to a paltry œ200in 1920, directed public attention to the need for getting into touch with Canadian importers. Whilst so much attention is being paid to economicrelations, it may be doubted whether the cloudsof ignorancewhich overshadow the respective ideals, political, social, and educational, :EasternProvinceMonthly Magazine,Jan., 1857. :Observations of the Timesof Natal, April 9, 1921, on the report of the Canadian assistant trade commissioner. 114 CANADA AND SOUTH AFRICA 115 of the two Dominions, have beento any marked degreedispelled. In war time, the organizationof historicalscholarshipin America, for purposesof universal enlightenment, drew attention to the fact that there was a sphereof public servicefor which the trained historian was peculiarly well capacitated.• Unhappily, the obstaclesin the way of inter-dominion historical study have so far proved well-nigh insuperable. It is as much as a professorof history in the Dominions can do to keep in touch, by periodical visits, with the current of historical thought and research in England. It is but rarely that he finds himself in a position to visit another Dominion. In consequence,Canadian history comes in for but scanty treatment in the syllabuses of South African universities. The average candidate for a degree has a competentknowledgeof the impact of British policy uponCanada; but of the domesticproblems of that great Dominion, of the history of the Canadian people, his ignoranceis colossal. And yet the history of Quebeccontainsa veritable embarras derichesse for the South African student, wrestling with the problems of race domination and nationality. On the other hand, what more profitable subjectfor a thesisfor Canadian studentscould be found than "The Working of the Provincial Council System in South Africa"? Divergent as have inevitably been the paths of development of the two countries,it is possibleto trace a current of sympathy between the two bodiesof colonistsso variously situated, with, every now and then, a genuine throb of keen, public interest. Such an interest was evoked at the Cape by the publication of the famous Durham Report. The possiblebearing of the Report on the political destiny of the Cape settlerswas freely discussed in the nascentpressof the Colony.2 Commentingon Durham's statement that a great portion of the business of the Canadian assemblies was parish business, the SouthAfrican Commercial Advertiser complainedthat, in contrastwith Canada, "the parish businessof the Cape was conductedby the Imperial Government ."a Capefeeling,on the other hand, wasinclinedto be selfcongratulatoryas regardsthe comparativedifficulty of the racial questionin the two countries. The multiplicity of racesat the •Hubert Hall, in History, vol. 3, pp. 98-99; ContemporaryReview, May, 1916• p. 603. 2TheSouthAfrican Commercial Advertiser, May 8, 1839,announced its intention "to draw somepractical inferencesfor the use and benefit of this colony." SCommercial Advertiser, May 15, 1839. 116 TIlE CANADIAN HISTORICAL REVIEW Cape was held to be an advantage, as affording a safeguard againsttyranny by one section. There is a note of sympathy...