When the Union of South Africa was formed in 1910, the electoral qualifications in use in each pre-existing colony were kept in place. The Cape Colony had implemented a “colour-blind” franchise known as the Cape Qualified Franchise, which included all adult literate men owning more than £75 worth of property (controversially raised from £25 in 1892), and this initially remained in effect after the colony became the Cape Province. As of 1908, 22,784 out of 152,221 electors in the Cape Colony were “Native or Coloured”. Eligibility to serve in Parliament and the Provincial Council, however, was restricted to whites from 1910 onward.
The first challenge to the Cape Qualified Franchise came with the Women's Enfranchisement Act, 1930 and the Franchise Laws Amendment Act, 1931, which extended the vote to women and removed property qualifications for the white population only – non-white voters remained subject to the earlier restrictions. In 1936, the Representation of Natives Act removed all black voters from the common electoral roll and introduced three “Native Representative Members”, white MPs elected by the black voters of the province and meant to represent their interests in particular. A similar provision was made for Coloured voters with the Separate Representation of Voters Act, 1951, and although this law was challenged by the courts, it went into effect in time for the 1958 general election, which was thus held with all-white voter rolls for the first time in South African history. The all-white franchise would continue until the end of apartheid and the introduction of universal suffrage in 1994.[1]
History
Stellenbosch, like the rest of the Western Cape, started out as a safe seat for the South African Party and over time gradually became a safe seat for the National Party. Its most notable early MP was John X. Merriman, the last Prime Minister of the Cape Colony, who notably had fought to apply the Cape Qualified Franchise across South Africa, and was one of few MPs to vote against the Natives Land Act, 1913. Merriman was in his seventies by the time he represented Stellenbosch, and stood down at the 1924 election, but the SAP continued to hold the seat for one more term before losing it to the NP in 1929. Bruckner de Villiers, Stellenbosch’s first Nationalist MP, was among the 19 Nationalists who joined D. F. Malan’s Purified National Party, but this was evidently a bridge too far for Stellenbosch’s electorate, who narrowly elected United Party candidate Henry Allan Fagan over him in 1938.
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