John Paterson (Cape politician)

In 1854 he was elected to the first Cape Parliament as one of the two members for Port Elizabeth (together with Henry Fancourt White). From the beginning of his political career he made the secession of the eastern part of the Cape Colony a priority. He felt very strongly that the Xhosa people of the eastern Cape frontier were a severe threat to the colonists' safety and that this threat was not helped by the Cape government's relaxed attitude to the frontier.[4] The Cape Town parliament at the time was also dominated by liberals such as Saul Solomon who prevented the settlers of the eastern Cape from cheaply exploiting African labour. Deprived of cheap African labour, Paterson then moved a resolution to import indentured "coolie labour" from Asia to work the farms instead, but the government blocked that motion too. Altogether, Paterson felt that the distant and overly-tolerant Cape government was "...the root of all the troubles with the kaffirs...".[5]

His proposed solution was a view which he held for the remainder of his life - that the white eastern Cape deserved a greater degree of separation, or to become the seat of the Cape's parliament and government. In this, he differed from the radical members of the "separatist league", who were based further east in Grahamstown, were led by Robert Godlonton, and who proposed absolute and immediate separation. He also angered Godlonton's Grahamstown clique by his blocking of their Kowie harbour proposal, which he saw as potentially taking shipping activity away from Port Elizabeth. The separatist movement began a gradual decline due to a growing fear in the Midlands around Port Elizabeth and Graaff-Reinett that if they attained separation then they would fall under the domination of Grahamstown.

He resigned from politics in 1858 due to his wife's fatal illness.

In 1859 he made a business trip to Britain where he had a great deal of family and business connections, and he even made a bid for a seat in the British parliament, which he eventually decided against.

In 1862 he founded Standard Bank, now one of the largest banks in southern Africa. However he later suffered several business failures and declared bankruptcy in 1867.[6]

In 1872, the Cape attained self-rule (or "responsible government" as it was known) and an economic boom ensued as the new locally elected government began vast infrastructure projects across the country. Paterson, financially uplifted by the economic boom, re-entered politics.

Paterson was elected to the Cape Parliament again in 1873. The enormous growth in the economy was fueling a competition between the ports Cape Town and Port Elizabeth, for the expanding inland trade. Paterson therefore returned to his fight for a moderate form of separation - so as to avoid dominance by either Cape Town to the west, or Grahamstown to the east. In other developments, he put forward bills for a local government system, and for a division of public money according to customs and land revenue, but both bills were defeated.

Paterson and his political ally John Gordon Sprigg comprised the core of the opposition to the first Cape government, together with the renegade independent John X. Merriman (who soon joined the government). Paterson's strongest critic was the liberal Saul Solomon, who ridiculed Paterson's ideas.

Paterson's role in the "Eastern Cape Separatist League" also brought him into a direct showdown with the strong-willed Prime Minister of the Cape, John Molteno – a firm proponent of regional and racial unity in the Cape[7] – who reacted in May 1874 by passing the Seven Circles Act. This re-drew the borders of the Cape’s subdivisions, abolishing the last legal remnants of the East/West distinction. Together with Molteno's policy of drawing ministers from the Eastern Cape into his government, and the general rising prosperity of the whole country, this effectively crushed the separatist movement. Paterson fought the Bill bitterly, but nonetheless kept his seat in parliament as a member of the opposition once it was passed.[8] He went on to become the primary critic of the Molteno Ministry over the following years, even when the official head of the opposition John X. Merriman joined Molteno's unity government.

Not always popular, Paterson's views, and especially the way in which he delivered them, often provoked considerable hostility in parliament.[9] This all too frequently left him isolated and unable to do more than temporarily obstruct government projects.[10]

Starting in 1874, the British Secretary of State for the Colonies, Lord Carnarvon, having recently federated Canada, began a project to impose the very same system of confederation on the very different states of southern Africa. This was to consolidate European control of southern Africa and bring about a united policy towards the Black African inhabitants. Lord Carnarvon also expressed an interest in making Paterson the next Cape Prime Minister, in order to bring this about.[11]

John Molteno, Cape Prime Minister and Paterson's lifelong political opponent.

There was little local enthusiasm for the project, and its timing was particularly unfortunate – coming when the various southern African states were still simmering after the last bout of British imperial expansion. However Carnarvon was determined, and appointed Henry Bartle Frere – an autocratic imperialist with little experience of southern African politics – as governor, with instructions to implement Carnarvon's confederation. Molteno turned the confederation idea down flat, saying it was impractical and badly timed, but Paterson saw an opportunity to ensure that his eastern province gained autonomy (albeit within the proposed confederation), and that he himself could win the position of leading it. In a series of letters between him and Carnarvon (The Confederation Despatch, 1876), Paterson discreetly offered the British Colonial Office his support against the Molteno government in exchange for vague promises of a future leadership position. Paterson also made a public call for a British invasion and annexation of the Transvaal Republic, for the future confederation.[12] When Molteno, by now furious with Paterson for what he saw as a betrayal of the Cape's independence and democracy, made it clear that he was willing to resign but not to endorse confederation, Frere used the authority of the British Colonial Office to suspend the elected Cape government and assumed direct control in 1878 (appointing Gordon Sprigg as his puppet Prime Minister, instead of Paterson who was at the time considered too divisive a politician for the job). Paterson, disappointed, then travelled to London as a representative of the potential new Eastern Province, while Frere launched his invasion of Zululand in 1879 before being recalled to London to face charges of misconduct.

The confederation scheme was dropped, having by now spawned a trail of wars across southern Africa – including new frontier wars against the Xhosa and the Pedi people, the Anglo-Zulu war, the Basuto Gun War and later the First Boer War.