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An Ageing Anachronism: D.F. Malan As Prime Minister, 1948–1954

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An Ageing Anachronism: D.F. Malan As Prime Minister, 1948–1954 An Ageing Anachronism: D.F. Malan as Prime Minister, 1948–1954 LINDIE KOORTS Department of Historical Studies, University of Johannesburg This article tells the behind-the-scenes tale of the first apartheid Cabinet under Dr D.F. Malan. Based on the utilisation of prominent Nationalists’ private documents, it traces an ageing Malan’s response to a changing international context, the chal- lenge to his leadership by a younger generation of Afrikaner nationalists and the early, haphazard implementation of the apartheid policy. In order to safeguard South Africa against sanctions by an increasingly hostile United Nations, Malan sought America’s friendship by participating in the Korean War and British protection in the Security Council by maintaining South Africa’s Commonwealth membership. In the face of decolonisation, Malan sought to uphold the Commonwealth as the preserve of white-ruled states. This not only caused an outcry in Britain, but it also brought about a backlash within his own party. The National Party’s republican wing, led by J.G. Strijdom, was adamant that South Africa should be a republic outside the Commonwealth. This led to numerous clashes in the Cabinet and parliamentary caucus. Malan and his Cabinet’s energies were consumed by these internecine battles. The systematisation of the apartheid policy and the coordination of its implementation received little attention. Malan’s disengaged leadership style implies that he knew little of the inner workings of the various government departments for which he, as Prime Minister, was ultimately responsible. The Cabinet’s internal disputes about South Africa’s constitutional status and the removal of the Coloured franchise ultimately served as lightning conductors for a larger issue: the battle for the party’s leadership, which came to a head in 1954. Malan sought to secure the succession for his favourite, N.C. Havenga. However, he was outmanoeuvred by J.G. Strijdom and his allies. Malan’s retirement marked the end of an era, while Strijdom’s victory heralded a regional and generational shift in power. The men who took power in 1948 seemed a grim lot. Their leader’s unsmiling façade and thick black-rimmed glasses created an aura of austerity – or gravity – depending on which side of the ideological spectrum one stood.1 Judging from their photographs – and the harshness of apartheid legislation – the Afrikaner na- tionalist leaders created the impression of men who were united in their deter- mination to implement the policy of apartheid in order to protect Afrikaner na- tionalist interests. Rob Morrell succeeded in capturing this stereotype: ‘The South African government was made up of men – Afrikaans-speaking white men. They 1 For an account of Malan’s private life, which belies the stern facade, see L. Korf, ‘Behind Every Man: D.F. Malan and the Women in his Life, 1874-1959’, South African Historical Journal, 60(3), Sept. 2008. 108 Figure 1: D.F. Malan as he has been cemented in the public mind. 109 espoused an establishment masculinity which was authoritarian, unforgiving and unapologetic.’2 This article seeks to chisel away at this stereotype by providing a warts-and-all account of D.F. Malan’s leadership of the first apartheid cabinet. Apart from H.B. Thom’s biography of D.F. Malan,3 there is no scholarly ac- count of the inner workings of the Malan cabinet. While Thom did not deny the collisions behind the scenes, he did not allow them to detract from his heroic image of Malan, which he had set out to establish in the opening chapters of his book. An entire chapter was devoted to proving that Malan was a true Afrikaner – by virtue of factors such as his ancestry, his religiosity and his love of the Afrikaans lan- guage, history and culture.4 Thom also went to special lengths to portray Malan as a committed republican – and remained mum on Malan’s spats with the hard-line republicans of the North, who saw through his lip service to the republic, which he regarded as a mere form of governance.5 Thom can be credited with an even- handed treatment of Malan’s opponents, as he sought to elevate Nationalist quar- rels to high-minded differences of ideological opinion, which never descended to the level of personal animosity.6 With regards to the use of archival sources, Thom’s research was limited to the D.F. Malan collection in Stellenbosch, the A.L. Geyer collection in the Cape Archives and a few notes which the former editor of Die Burger, P.A. (Phil) Weber, chose to place at his disposal.7 The passing of time and the Orange River has ena- bled this study to utilise the P.A. Weber collection in its entirety, as well as the J.G. Strijdom and N.C. Havenga collections in the State Archives in Pretoria and the H.F. Verwoerd collection in the Institute of Contemporary History Archive (INCH) at the University of the Free State. The excavation of these collections places D.F. Malan and his cabinet in a completely different, albeit more prosaic, light. Thom’s treatment of Malan and the Afrikaner nationalists formed part of a broader trend in Afrikaner nationalist historiography, which focused on Nationalist cohesion and provided a rather uncomplicated account of the party and its leaders. The erstwhile Institute of Contemporary History’s voluminous publications on the National Party (which do not reach beyond 1948) also acknowledged National- ist infighting, but tried to smooth it over as far as was possible – and, like Thom, clouded its descriptions with flowery prose.8 2 R. Morrell, Changing Men in South Africa (Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press, 2001), 17. 3 H.B. Thom, D.F. Malan, (Cape Town: Tafelberg, 1980). 4 See the chapter entitled ‘Afrikanermens’ in Thom, D.F. Malan, 41-57. 5 Thom, D.F. Malan, 18-22; L. Korf, ‘D.F. Malan: A Political Biography’ (D.Phil thesis, University of Stellenbosch, 2010), 197-203, 350-355. 6 Thom, D.F. Malan, 155-187. 7 See the references in Ibid., 206-225, 288-307. 8 See the five volumes O. Geyser and A.H. Marais, eds., Die Nasionale Party Deel I: Agtergrond, Stigting en Konsolidasie (Pretoria: Academica, 1975); J.H. le Roux and P.W. Coetzer, Die Nasionale Party, Deel 2: Die Eerste Bewindsjare, 1924- 1934:I (Bloemfontein: Instituut vir Eietydse Geskiedenis, 1980); le Roux and Coetzer, Die Nasionale Party, Deel 2: Die Eerste Bewindsjare, 1924-1934:II (Bloemfontein: Instituut vir Eietydse Geskiedenis, 1980); Coetzer and Le Roux, Die Nasionale Party Deel 4: Die ‘Gesuiwerde’ Nasionale Party, 1934-1940 (Bloemfontein: Instituut vir Eietydse Geskiedenis, 1986); Coetzer, Die Nasionale Party, Deel 5: Van Oorlog tot Oorwinning, 1940-1948 (Bloemfontein: Instituut vir Eietydse Geskiedenis, 1986). The same trend was followed by the Institute’s two-volume biography of JBM Hertzog, le Roux, Coetzer and Marais, eds., Generaal J.B.M. Hertzog: Sy Strewe en Stryd (Johannesburg: Perskor, 1987) which overlaps with the volumes that trace the history of the National Party. The C.R. Swart Collection, which is an indispensable source in studying the history of the National Party, is utilised by these authors. However, once the documents in the Collection begins to trace Hertzog’s descent into senility, and its role in his and Malan’s failed attempts to reunite their parties in 1939-1940, the Collection and its contents are, tellingly, ignored completely. For an account that does make use of these documents, see L. Korf, ‘D.F. Malan: A Political Biography’, 387-400. 110 Other accounts of Nationalist infighting after 1948 belong to the realm of popular literature and memoirs. Ben Schoeman’s My Lewe in die Politiek9 is the only published account by a member of the Malan cabinet itself. Publications by journalists such as Piet Meiring, Ons Eerste Ses Premiers,10 Schalk Pienaar’s Ge- tuie van Groot Tye11 and Alf Ries and Ebbe Dommisse’s Broedertwis12 lend colour to the years that followed, but do not contain the balance, detail or context that a dedicated exhumation of archival documents would provide. Such a history has yet to be written. Since the 1970s there has been a movement to demythologise twentieth-cen- tury Afrikaner nationalism, both by Afrikaner and non-Afrikaner historians. Dun- bar Moodie’s The Rise of Afrikanerdom13 attempted to identify various schools of thought within the broad nationalist movement in the era 1934–1948, while histo- rians such as Herman Giliomee,14 André du Toit,15 Albert Grundlingh16 and Sandra Swart17 have been producing a steady stream of studies of Afrikaners which dis- mantle the nationalist narrative of yesteryear, and works such as those produced by Saul Dubow also challenge perceptions of white homogeneity.18 This article seeks to join this tradition through its unromanticised portrayal of the Afrikaner national- ists. It adds its voice to Deborah Posel’s groundbreaking study that revealed early apartheid to have been anything but a systematic policy. Posel substantiated her assertion by examining debates about apartheid, contradictions in the Sauer Report and the implementation of the policy at an organisational level.19 Based on my ex- amination of the Afrikaner nationalists’ private collections, I concur with Posel’s argument that the implementation of apartheid by Malan’s regime was haphazard and not, as many believe, based on a blueprint in the form of the Sauer Report. It is clear that the nature and contents of the apartheid policy were related to the balance of power within the National Party. When, after Malan’s retirement, the leadership shifted from the south to the north, the northern Nationalists possessed more power than before to shape the policy according to their ideals.
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