THE SETTLEMENT AND PUBLICITY AS TO THE PAST. T HERE is
one aspect of the settlement in South Africa which we trust will not be left out of sight. That is the need for publicity as to the past. We want to bear the real truth told about the *bole system of government pursued in the past by the Transvaal. The world in general probably imagines that such publicity is sure to be secured when the war is over, but we do not feel so certain. Though the first im- pulse in the official mind on finding out the truth as to the darker side of the action of the Boer oli- garchy may be towards publication, there will be many very strong influences at work in favour of a policy of hushing up matters. In the first place, there will be the want of any regular machinery for setting forth the past and for uncovering traces which have no doubt been very carefully covered. The soldiers and civilians will be so busy with the work in hand, the anxious and laborious work of reconstruction, that without special instructions they are not likely to trouble their heads very much about the past misdeeds of the Boers. In addition to this there will be the very natural feeling that there is something ungenerous, something low and ungentlemanly, in raking into a people's past. The Boers have been beaten in a fair fight and there is an end. Let bygones be bygones. Besides these open and very human excuses for not going back on the past, there will be others no less strong. There are thousands of men, not only in the Transvaal, but throughout South Africa, who before the war were in various ways involved in the ignobler side of the Boer Government, and these men will fight desperately against any exposures which might expose them. They are just now professing themselves willing to take the British side, and it will doubtless seem very important to accept their loyalty without too stringent an inquiry. Hence it is sure to be urged that it would be most unwise to disturb things by telling the truth about either them or the men with whom they have social or business connections. Take the case of certain Cape politicians who may have had relations with the Boers before, or even during, the war, who have been sitting on the fence in fact, but who are most anxious now to get down on the British side. We shall be told that it would be far better to lose an oppor- tunity for the justification of the war than to prevent the easy descent on to our side for men who now wish to pose as if they have always been British at heart. Next, there will be a certain number of Johannesburg capitalists who will very much prefer that the true story of Transvaal Government finance shall never be told, and who will work their hardest against a policy of publication. Though we fully realise that the bulk of the British and American capitalists at Johannesburg acted most fairly and openly, and rejected all attempts to square them — they might have done much better for themselves materially had they accepted Mr. Kruger's terms—there was no doubt a section who had monetary dealings with the Boers which will not bear the light. These men will move heaven and earth to draw a veil over the past. There is yet one other influence in favour of hushing up to be mentioned, and that the strongest of all. The chief foreign Powers, we may be sure, will let it be understood that they would prefer that the diplomatic history of the Transvaal, and the dealings of the Executive with them, shall be left alone and not given to the world. To a certain extent it will no doubt be right to respect such foreign protests, but if the pressure extends beyond the reasonable request not to create international episodes, we do not think it should be regarded.
In our view, the Government must steadfastly resist these influences directed against suppression, and must, instead, insist that everything that tells what the Boer Government really was must be given to the world,— after, of course, every possible precaution has been taken to avoid the use of doubtful material, for there must be no production of bogus evidence nor the faintest suspicion of any unfairness. What we must do is to justify the war not only to the people of this country and the Empire, but to the whole of South Africa. To a certain number of Dutch Afrikanders the Boer Government is still a kind of ideal. When they hear the true story, and realise how like President Kruger, with his bribes, his financial concessions, his spies, and his agents provo- cateurs, was to Napoleon III., they may reasonably be expected to abandon a good deal of their sentimental regret for the lost cause. We do not want a class of romantic Dutch Jacobites to grow up in South Africa, and nothing will prevent this more effectually than letting it be known what "Krugerism " really was.
It is not of course for us to say how and where the proofs as to the nature of the Transvaal Government are to be found, but we may indicate the directions in which investigation should take place, and the kind of in- formation which should be published. Personally, and if it were not thought too great a departure from pre- cedent, we should like to constitute a small special Com- mission, consisting of three men whose honour and good faith could be absolutely trusted, and two of whom had also local knowledge, and ask them to report on the dealings of the Boer Government with (1) financial con- cessions and public money ; (2) the Orange Free State ; (3) the Afrikander Bond and the Cape Colony poli- ticians ; (4) the natives within their own borders ; (5) the natives outside, such as the Basutos ; (6) the Judges and Courts of Law ; (7) the liquor ques- tion ; (8) the administration of the police, ordinary and secret ; (9) the Press, and the exercise of public opinion. A Commission composed, say, of Sir William Conyngham Greene, who knows the subject profoundly from the official side, of Mr. FitzPatrick, who knows what the Boer administration was like from the social and commercial side, and of some impartial English "Q.C." able to advise as to the rejection of evidence which ought not to be used, would, we believe, if given free access to all papers now in the possession of the Government, or which may be acquired by them, produce a picture of adminiitrative methods such as would astonish the world. But if such a formal investigation is too much to ask for, we may at least expect the Government to shake itself free from the official conventions that usually forbid the publication of documents on the other side, and frankly put at the disposal of the public all the in- formation it acquires as to the inner workiuga of the Boer oligarchy. We do not want this or that covert allusion, as, for example, to the Proclamation alleged to have been prepared for circulation among the Basutos, or hints as to the corruption of the Boer Executive such as have been given from time to time. We want the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth whomever it may affect, and however inconvenient and disagreeable it may be in the narrower political sense. Be the conse- quences to individuals what they may, let us know the facts, and refuse to allow to any one the protection of silence.
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