Foreign News: South African Flag

What was described as the last racial issue in the Union of South Africa was last week removed when Prime Minister James Barry Munnik Hertzog and former Prime Minister Jan Christiaan Smuts, now leader of the opposition in the House of Assembly (lower House) at Cape Town, agreed that henceforth the Union Jack should be flown from official buildings in all large towns. In addition a new South African flag, in every respect co-equal with the Union Jack, was decided upon. (

The new national flag consists of three broad horizontal stripes of orange, white & blue. In the white stripe, from left to right, are a small Union Jack, an Orange Free State flag, and a Transvaal Vierkleur flag, the latter two being republican emblems. The three flags occupy one-third of the white stripe or one-ninth of the whole flag and embody five colors: red, white, blue, orange, green.

Both the Union Jack and the new South African flag are the official national flags. In English-speaking parts of the Union, they may be flown together; in Dutch-speaking parts, they may be flown separately. This to overcome the sensibilities of British Africanders and Boer Africanders. The flag dispute in South Africa has been the cause of violent recriminations between the Boer and the British population. A dozen emblems have been suggested— only to be fiercely denounced by one side or the other. The Dutch (Boers) would have none of the Union Jack, seeing in that emblem a sign of their defeat by the British; the English-speaking section would no more tolerate the republican flags, unless the Union Jack were an integral part of a new national flag, seeing in their presence a movement designed to set up a republic, thus seceding from the British Commonwealth of Nations.

Premier Hertzog, once a violent republican himself, counseled moderation to both parties and eventually succeeded in effecting a compromise acceptable to each side. Ever since the last Imperial Conference, which created George V King of the Union of South Africa, General Hertzog has held that the legitimate aspirations of the country and a free and independent unit in the Commonwealth had been met. But he was bitterly attacked by both sides in his stand on the flag issue.

General Smuts had a no less difficult task, for the tide of public opinion was running fast, fast enough to promise civil war. A Boer himself, he is yet a keen, sincere imperialist, believing that the manifest destiny of the Union lies in membership in the Commonwealth. While firm for a flag that would embody the Union Jack, he nevertheless urged moderation upon his followers and it was through his tact and diplomacy that he obtained important concessions from the Government and so was able to induce his South African Party to accept the compromise.

After the compromise had passed a second reading—which virtually assures its final passage—in the House of Assembly, the Deputies trooped into the tea room where they found a monster “peace cake”, dedicated to Minister of Justice Tilman Roos. On its sugar-coated top, in pink icing, were the names of all the Cabinet Ministers. Soon; laughing and munching, the Deputies sank their flag differences in chaff and good-humored badinage.