Petition to the House of Commons, from J. Tengo Jabavu and thirteen other signatories, July 13, 1906 (Published in The Aborigines' Friend)

"The petition of the undersigned British subjects, natives of South Africa resident in the Cape Colony, humbly showeth: --

"1. Your humble petitioners, native residents in the Cape Colony, are loyal British subjects who, under the equitable franchise established by the grant of a constitution to the said colony, have long enjoyed the right for which they are fully qualified to vote at popular elections, and have admittedly exercised that right to the advantage of its great native population and of the whole people of that colony.

"2. Your humble petitioners fear that in the constitution proposed to be granted to the Transvaal and Orange River Colonies South African natives, though in justice they are entitled to special consideration, may, as some desire, be singled out for exclusion from all popular elections merely on the ground of their colour, however well qualified they may be to exercise the franchise.

"3. Your petitioners strongly sympathise with natives in the said colonies, and may in the exercise of their lawful avocations desire to emigrate to those colonies, as they have every right as British subjects to do, and they consider that any exclusion from the franchise on account of colour alone would be an unmerited degradation of all natives, an injustice to them, and a deep injury not only to them but to the whole of the inhabitants of South Africa, a departure from the constitutional principles of the British Colonial Empire, and the taking away of an indefeasible right conferred upon the new colonies by the acts which annexed them to the Empire.

"4. Your humble petitioners fear also lest the grant of constitutions to the new colonies, by which a portion of their inhabitants should be excluded from the electoral franchise on the ground of colour alone, would establish a new departure in South African British colonies, and give a fulcrum and an attempt to deprive coloured men not only of a privilege due to them in the Federal Union which is much sought after, but of those which they hold in the Cape Colony itself.

"5. Your humble petitioners hope, for the above-stated reasons, that the natives of the new colonies now resident therein or who may emigrate thither may not be handed over to Governments to be created by a Constitution now to be granted without such reservations as may secure to them a progressive measure of representation through the franchise.

'The humble prayer of your petitioners, therefore, is that your Honourable House may devise such measures for their relief as to your Honourable House may seem wise and fitting.

"And your humble petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.

"J. Tengo-Jabavu, Editor Imvo"

And thirteen other signatories

Source:

Karis, T & Carter G. M. (1972). From Protest to Challenge: A Documentary History of African Politics in South Africa, 1882-1964, Volume 1: Protest and Hope, 1882-1934. Stanford University: Hanover Press.

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