(Author: Steven Katzew, Vol. 78, #2, Winter 2023)
From time-to-time fingers are pointed at the South African Jewish community generally, and in particular its institutions and leadership under various guises, for lack of sufficient resistance to the policy of systematic racial discrimination throughout the community’s core years of numerical, social and economic influence.
It is generally accepted that no quarter of community leadership ever gave adequate expression to the deep-seated resentment and indignation that many individuals and groups within the community felt towards this species of systematic racial discrimination, which came to be known as Apartheid (there were exceptions within the religious leadership, most notably Rabbi Dr Ungar and Rabbi Sherman amongst the Reform Movement and Rabbi Dr Rabinowitz, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations and Federation of Synagogues from 1945 to 1961, and less vociferously his successor Rabbi Casper and Rabbi Abrahams in Cape Town). It is also true that provocative resistance to Apartheid that posed serious threats to personal safety was restricted to a mere handful of genuinely activist Jews (it needs to be mentioned that this category of Jewish activists whose physical safety or freedom was compromised is more than likely wider than generally accepted). It is equally true, however, that there are many examples of independent Jewish alignment with all shades of movements that actively opposed racial discrimination.
For my part, I do not believe that any of these criteria constitute an accurate reflection of the true role played by the SA Jewish community in all of its component parts against institutionalized racial discrimination. Not all people are cut out to be political activists. Neither for that matter is the capacity to influence change in society the preserve of political activists or activist organizations. Indeed, one cannot grasp from cold statistics alone the endless list of activities that were engaged in by good hearted South Africans, Jewish included, which either directly or indirectly alleviated the plight of the racially oppressed and which, over time, converged with many other factors to help bring about the gradual erosion and ultimate destruction of systematic racial discrimination in the country.
Growing up in the old Orange Free State, I personally witnessed many incidences of profound softening of diehard racist attitudes when met with informal private disapproval or rejection.
Besides informal private resistance to racially discriminatory conduct, there are many examples of individuals and groups having exploited prevailing conventional options to meaningfully oppose discrimination. One such option was to stand for election to one of the non-white electoral divisions or circles (Coloured electoral division and Native electoral circle), which in different eras (even at the height of institutionalized Apartheid) were entitled to elect white representatives to the House of Assembly.
This limited franchise right conferred on certain Coloured people constituencies to elect white representatives to the House of Assembly existed from 1958 to 1970. During this time, White members of the House of Assembly held seats for Coloured voters as follows:
- Barnett, Charles (Boland Coloured electoral division 3/4/1958 – 8/2/1968).
- Bloomberg, Abe (Peninsula Coloured electoral division 3/4/58 – 1/3/1970).
- Eden, Graham Sutton (Karoo Coloured electoral division 21/10/1963 – 1/3/1970).
- Holland, Martin Willian (Outeniqua Coloured electoral division 3/4/1958 – 1/3/1970).
- Le Roux, Gabriel Stephanus Petrus (Karoo Coloured electoral division 3/4/1958 – 16/7/1963).
The first two, namely Charles Barnett and Abe Bloomberg, were Jewish.
The limited franchise rights for Blacks existed in an earlier period, during which White members of the House of Assembly held seats for Black voters as follows:
- Alexander, Ray Ester (Cape Western Native electoral circle 21/4/1954 – 27/4/1954. A banning order for being a Communist forbade Alexander from taking up her seat – she sued for and won a compensation order against the State for the wasted cost of her electoral campaign).
- Bunting, Brian Percy (Cape Western Native electoral circle10/11/1952 – 29/9/1953). Bunting took over from Sam Kahn below, and, like Kahn, was eventually expelled from Parliament because he was a Communist.
- Hemming, Gordon Kingswood (Transkei Native electoral circle 8/6/1937 – 22/3/1947).
- Kahn, Sam (Cape Western Native electoral circle 22/11/1948 – 26/5/1952). Kahn was eventually expelled from Parliament because he was a Communist.
- Lee-Warden, Leonard Bert (Cape Western Native electoral circle 1/12/1954 – 30/6/1960).
- Molteno, Donald Barkly (Cape Western Native electoral circle 8/6/1937 – 21/11/1948).
- Stanford, Walter Power, D.F.C. (Transkei Native electoral circle 1/12/1954 – 30/6/1960).
- Stuart, William Hemming (Transkei Native electoral circle 25/11/1948 – 30/6/1954).
The three Jewish Communists on this list, R E Alexander, B P Bunting and S Kahn were natural allies of their racially oppressed constituency members.
Regardless of what they stood for individually, the manifesto of each of these elected representatives in their election campaigns would have been the advancing of the rights and interests of their disenfranchised non-white constituency members. It is hard to imagine a more daunting prospect than the discharging of these manifestos in the racially charged atmosphere of the House of Assembly of the time.
My and my wife Heidi’s insurance broker, Darryl Barnett, is a grandson of Charles Barnett, number one on the list above of the elected members of the House Of Assembly of the Coloured electoral division. Darryl’s stories of his grandfather, popularly known as Tossie, as well as newspaper cuttings relating to his career, inspired this article.
The devotion of this article entirely to Charles Barnett is not intended to demean the roles played by the other Jewish member of the Coloured electoral division (Abe Bloomberg) or by the Jewish members of the Native electoral circle (R E Alexander, B Percy Bunting and S Kahn). Indeed, the latter three members of the Communist Party would have been regarded as considerably more open-minded and liberal than Charles Barnett, who by unconfirmed report of a family member was seconded to stand for the Boland Coloured electoral division by the United Party, which vouchsafed racial policies, albeit of a milder version than the then ruling Nationalist Party.
This notwithstanding, the evidence of the role played by Barnett in the House of Assembly shows that he pushed the boundaries of conventional resistance to racial discrimination to absolute limits, which over time must have in no small measure contributed to the dilution and ultimate destruction of institutionalized racism.
I have culled my information on Charles Barnett from newspaper cuttings supplied to me by his grandson Darryl. The cuttings reveal Charles Barnett’s uncommon fervour, courage and commitment to what must have been the unnerving task of trying to eke out justice for his Coloured constituency members in a forum whose starting point was the denial of their most fundamental right of all, namely, to vote on a general voters’ roll.
Information surrounding the place of birth of Charles Barnett on 24 February 1902 is sketchy. Darryl recalls being told by his father Leonard that a considerable number of years after the marriage of Charles’ immigrant parents Isaac and Rosalia, Isaac took to sheep farming in the Prieska district. Somewhere along the way, 12 children had been born to the couple before Charles, the last, arrived, nine of whom had survived. According to another source, when Isaac joined the Boer forces in the Anglo-Boer War, Rosalia was advised to leave the farm outside Prieska and make for Beaufort West with the Children. On the way, she gave birth for the thirteenth and last time, to Charles, at Pampoenpoort, a railway siding approximately halfway between Victoria West and Carnarvon.
Seemingly echoing his stark entry into the World, very little is known about Charles’ childhood and school years, besides that he had a farm upbringing, where he acquired the nickname Tossie, a corruption of the word “trossie” in “trossie druiwe”, which Charles was unable to pronounce properly.
After completing his schooling, he studied law at the University of Cape Town, qualified as an attorney in 1923, practiced at Van Rhynsdorp for a few months, and then commenced practice as an attorney in Woodstock, Cape Town.
In circa 1925/26 he married Ada Cumes (born in South Africa in 1906), and together they had three children, Leonard (Darryl’s father) and twins Paul and Pamela.
Charles’ compassion, determination and strong sense of justice soon identified him as a champion of the rights of the underprivileged, which drew clientele to his practice from the large Coloured communities close to Woodstock. His relationships forged with clients and the nature of his legal work on their behalf (often pro bono) were a natural impetus for expansion of his active private representations to public representation of the community at large. This attracted the attention of the United Party, leading to its nomination of Charles for election to the post of representative for the Coloured People of the Boland.
From the newspaper cuttings Darryl showed me, the picture that emerges of his grandfather is of a man who courageously challenged racially discriminatory legislation at its core in the cauldron of its creation. He actively engaged the steps taken in the House of Assembly to entrench and extend the tentacles of the legislation into every conceivable area of human life, including the bedroom. In a classic outburst quoted below that was reported in The Argus circa 1965 in a column titled Parliamentary Review, he inflicted a biting harangue on a proposed amendment to the Group Areas Act 41 of 1950 which, although it did not prevent the amendment, certainly left its stain. Extracts from the report are rendered verbatim in order to fully capture the atmosphere of the moment:
“‘Tossie’ really doesn’t like this Bill
With Government members all day yesterday calling in question the sincerity of the United Party’s opposition to the Group Area Bill, which was before the Assembly for second reading, Mr. Charles Barnett, the Coloured People’s representative for Boland, left no doubt about his position.
In clarion tones, ‘Tossie, ‘as everybody inside the House and outside knows him, shouted: “I abhor. it, I detest it, I loathe it, I despise it.”
…
In his protest against a clause which empowers the police to enter a home if they suspect that an offence in terms of group areas legislation is being committed in it, Mr. Barnett promised to call it the ‘Gestapo clause’ … .
This made Dr Corne Mulder, the Nationalist member for Randfontein, very unhappy. ‘You would choose a word like that’, he said indignantly.
But Mr. Barnett, refusing to withdraw it, said: ‘People will no longer be able to enjoy the privacy of their own homes without fear of the police entering to investigate.’
…”
It was rare for Jewish people in South Africa to liken Apartheid to the Holocaust, let alone into the face of Apartheid’s progenitors formidably ranged in the benches of the ruling party in the wells of the highest forum of the land. This bold public stigmatising of Apartheid by Tossie as analogous to the Gestapo, a notorious arm of the Nazi Party, singles him out as a beacon of courage in the Jewish community’s reaction to institutionalized racial discrimination in South Africa.
Indeed, his courageous stands on all forms of racial discrimination knew no bounds, illustrated in the following extract from a report in an undated cutting from the Cape Times on forced removals of Coloured communities from Ida’s Valley in the district of Stellenbosch (part of Tossie’s constituency):
“EVICTED GRANTED REPRIEVE AT IDA’S VALLEY
Sequel to March by 200 at Stellenbosch
… The Coloured families who were ejected by the Stellenbosch Town Council from Bokmaskop Road, Ida’s Valley and who have been homeless since Monday, were yesterday given a reprieve till the end of October.
…
Mr. C. Barnett, (Coloured Peoples’ MP for Boland) told the Council that at the moment their legal rights were of no importance. It was essential, on humanitarian grounds, to get the sufferers under a roof again.
…”
The following extracts from the Press on his passing are a testament to the high regard in which Tossie was held by colleagues in the House of Assembly and by members of his constituency:
The Argus 8th February 1968
“M.P FOR BOLAND DIES
The Argus Parliamentary Staff
MR. CHARLES BARNETT, Coloured People’s M.P. for Boland, died suddenly at his home in Sea Point early this morning.
The news came as a shock to his colleagues and the officials at Parliament where he was popular with all sections.
Last night Mr. Barnett was full of fun and mischief, as always, and was cracking jokes with his friends.
This morning early he woke up with severe pains in his chest. A doctor was summoned immediately, but Mr. Barnett died soon afterwards.
…
He became a city councillor in 1930, at the age of 28, and served on several committees of the Cape Town City Council.
It was his capacity to temper the most scathing criticism with fine humour that endeared Mr. Barnett to all in Parliament after he became M.P. for the Coloured constituency of Boland in 1958, after having been an M.P.C.”
The Argus 8th February 1968
“Tributes to ‘friend of Coloured’
Tributes were paid today to the late Mr. Charles Barnett, M.P. for the Coloured constituency of Boland, by Coloured leaders, who described him as a ‘great friend’ and ‘a man who was always ready to help the Coloured people with his advice and guidance.’
Mr. N.S. Kearns, national president of the Coloured ex–Servicemen’s Legion of the B.E.S.L., said Mr. Barnett was a good friend to the ex–soldier.
‘His door was always open to receive those who wanted help. I regarded him as a personal friend and on many occasions I approached him to take up matters on our behalf.’
Mr. Edgar Deane, a trade unionist and former member of the Cape Town City Council, said that the news of Mr. Barnett’s death came as a great shock to the community, who had lost a friend and an advisor.
Mrs. Sarleh Dollie, who had served with Mr. Barnett on the Cape Town City Council, said that he was a man who was always ready to plead the cause of the Coloured community.
Mr. G.E. Ferry, Mayor of Cape Town, who had been a colleague of Mr. Barnett on the City Council for 17 years, said today that Mr. Barnett had contributed greatly to the welfare of the city. ‘I feel his passing deeply and will always remember him as a fighter for the rights of the individual,’ Mr. Perry said.”
However repugnant some of his Nationalist Party colleagues in Parliament may have been, the feelings expressed on his passing in the House Of Assembly in the following article from a cutting that does not identify the newspaper (could be the Cape Times or The Argus) are extremely revealing of the conviction with which Tossie lived his life:
“House mourns dead M.P.
The Assembly today adopted a motion of condolence in the death of Mr. C. Barnett (Col. Rep., Boland) who died at his home early this morning.
Introducing the motion, the Prime Minister, Mr. Vorster, said that all members of Parliament had been very shocked to hear of Mr. Barnett’s unexpected death.
Mr. Barnett had been a friendly Member of Parliament who went through life with laughter in his eyes. He had been well liked by all.
He had served in Parliament as Coloured Representative for Boland for nearly 10 years. He had served in the Provincial Council for nearly nine years and had served on the Cape Town City Council for 31 years. He had served the interests of the Coloured people to the best of his ability and had always been willing to plead their cause inside and outside Parliament.
The heartfelt sympathy of Parliament went to his family.
HUMOUR
Associating the Opposition with the motion, the Leader of the Opposition, Sir De Villiers Graaff, said that only yesterday Mr. Barnett had been in the House. He was known by all for his sense of humour and he had tackled his most difficult task in an essentially human and intelligent way.
‘I am sure the Prime Minister will agree with me when I say that he fought fearlessly for what he thought was right and yet he made no enemies because everyone knew he was sincere.’
Although the criticisms that Mr. Barnett had made at times were very sharp, he had made no enemies because people knew he was fighting for something in which he really believed.
The House had lost a Member who had been truly loyal to the people he represented in this House.
Sir De Villiers also associated the Opposition with the sympathy expressed to Mr. Barnett’s wife and family.”
This was high praise indeed, coming inter alia from the Prime Minister, who was not known for subtlety or nicety, and who must have been a fierce opponent of Tossie on the complete opposite side of the fence. The tributes of both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, who was more a political ally of Tossie, reveal a deep respect for Tossie’s sincerity in his commitment to his causes, which carries a universal lesson of the importance of being faithful to one’s beliefs.
Tossie, little known in Jewish circles, comes across for me as an unheralded hero of the Jewish resistance to Apartheid. He strikes me as a man who found comfort in actively using his people skills, legal knowledge and self-belief for the benefit of humanity who became a shining light unto all who were fortunate enough to have made his acquaintance – the laughter in his eyes testified to by the Prime Minister, an ardent opponent, symbolizes the proverbial light that beamed from him to the nation in which his life was vested.
I cannot help thinking that more of us should have shouted out loud like Tossie.
Steven Mark Katzew is a Johannesburg-based advocate. He grew up in Virginia and attended High School in Welkom, Orange Free State, going on to study Law at Rhodes University, Grahamstown. His articles on South African Jewish sporting personalities have appeared in Soul Sport and Jewish Affairs.
