Pass laws

Glen Grey Act (1894) Natal Legislative Assembly Bill (1894)Transvaal Asiatic Registration Act (1906)South Africa Act (1909)Mines and Works Act (1911)Natives Land Act (1913)Natives (Urban Areas) Act (1923)Immorality Act (1927)Native Administration Act (1927)Women's Enfranchisement Act (1930)Franchise Laws Amendment Act (1931)Representation of Natives Act (1936)Native Trust and Land Act (1936)Native (Urban Areas) Consolidation Act (1945)Immorality Amendment Act † (1950)Population Registration Act (1950)Group Areas Act (1950)Suppression of Communism Act (1950)Native Building Workers Act (1951)Separate Representation of Voters Act (1951)Prevention of Illegal Squatting Act (1951)Bantu Authorities Act (1951)Native Laws Amendment Act † (1952)Pass Laws Act (1952)Public Safety Act (1953)Native Labour (Settlement of Disputes) Act (1953)Bantu Education Act (1953)Reservation of Separate Amenities Act (1953)Natives Resettlement Act (1954)Group Areas Development Act (1955)Riotous Assemblies Act (1956)Industrial Conciliation Act (1956)Natives (Prohibition of Interdicts) Act (1956)Immorality Act (1957)Bantu Investment Corporation Act (1959)Extension of University Education Act (1959)Promotion of Bantu Self-government Act (1959)Unlawful Organizations Act (1960)Indemnity Act (1961)Coloured Persons Communal Reserves Act (1961)Republic of South Africa Constitution Act (1961)Urban Bantu Councils Act (1961)General Law Amendment Act (1963)Separate Representation of Voters Amendment Act (1968)Prohibition of Political Interference Act (1968)Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act (1970)Bantu Homelands Constitution Act (1971)Aliens Control Act (1973)Indemnity Act (1977)National Key Points Act (1980)List of National Key PointsInternal Security Act (1982)Black Local Authorities Act (1982)Interim Constitution (1993)Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act (1995)In South Africa, pass laws were a form of internal passport system designed to segregate the population, manage urbanisation, and allocate migrant labour. Also known as the natives law, pass laws severely limited the movements of not only black African citizens, but other people as well by requiring them to carry pass books when outside their homelands or designated areas. Before the 1950s, this legislation largely applied to African men, and attempts to apply it to women in the 1910s and 1950s were met with significant protests. Pass laws would be one of the dominant features of the country's apartheid system, until it was effectively ended in 1986. In South Africa, pass laws were a form of internal passport system designed to segregate the population, manage urbanisation, and allocate migrant labour. Also known as the natives law, pass laws severely limited the movements of not only black African citizens, but other people as well by requiring them to carry pass books when outside their homelands or designated areas. Before the 1950s, this legislation largely applied to African men, and attempts to apply it to women in the 1910s and 1950s were met with significant protests. Pass laws would be one of the dominant features of the country's apartheid system, until it was effectively ended in 1986. The first internal passports in South Africa were introduced on 27 June 1797 by the Earl Macartney in an attempt to prevent natives from entering the Cape Colony. The Cape Colony was merged with other states in the region to form the Union of South Africa in 1910, under the UK. By this time, versions of pass laws existed elsewhere. A major boost for their utilisation was the rise of the mining sector from the 1880s: pass laws provided a convenient means of controlling workers' mobility and enforcing contracts. In 1896 the South African Republic brought in two pass laws which required Africans to carry a metal badge. Only those employed by a master were permitted to remain on the Rand. Those entering a 'labour district' needed a special pass which entitled them to remain for three days. Pass laws date “back to 1760 in the Cape when slaves moving between urban and rural areas were required to carry passes authorizing their travel”.:181 The pass laws, “had entitled police at any time to demand that Africans show them a properly endorsed document or face arrest”, hindering their freedom of movement. This meant that it restricted where they could live, which in turn, this “tied them to their white employers, underpinning a system of cheap labour and humiliating subjection”. Their implementation over time arose from two contradictory needs. Pass Laws have been due to two specific white needs. The white population in South Africa utilised these laws as “an ‘exclusionary’ need to obtain political security by controlling and policing the number of Africans in “white” areas, and an “inclusionary’ need to ensure a supply of cheap labour within these areas”.:181 The legislation and practices associated with the pass Laws have changed over time. As these demands and beliefs changed, so did the rights of the black population in South Africa. When the pass laws were implemented at the turn of the century, they “encouraged the flow of labour into ‘white’ agriculture and industry and to redistribute labour into geographical areas where it was needed”.:182 This process would last until the 1950’s, when the government opted to change the paradigm. This meant, “from 1950 onward the emphasis of the pass laws has been overtly exclusionary and directed to ‘relocating’ Africans from ‘white’ areas and containing them within the Bantustans”.:182 Therefore, there has always been a tension between the white and black community in South Africa. This stemmed from the “efforts to use the pass system to balance white needs for security and labour”, while also creating laws that would allow for the control of the “African employment, housing, access to land, and citizenship”.:182 Due to these laws, “over 17,745,000 Africans have been arrested or prosecuted” between 1916 and 1984.:181 The policing of Africans has allowed for the whites to maintain dominance over the black population for the greater part of the 20th century. Not only did the focus on how to control change over time, but also who to control. Initially and “historically the use of passes in South Africa as a form of labour control applied only to men”. This happened because “whenever attempts were made to extend the system to black women, mass protests quickly resulted”. There vociferous opposition to the pass laws are of no surprise, considering the “fact that black women in South Africa have traditionally taken a more active role in mass popular protest”, in comparison to men.:1 The biggest manifestation was a phenomenon that occurred “during the 1950’s when black women throughout the nation fiercely resisted official efforts to make them carry passes for the first time”.:1 The history of the application of pass laws towards women was intertwined with the belief that it would benefit the black female population. The “municipal authorities argued that passes for women were necessary to combat illegal brewing and prostitution”.:77 They hypothesized, that if woman could prove that they made an honest living with a legal employment then they would not be allowed to resort to illegal activities since they would be evicted.:77 This proved to be a futile system since it was easier for the women in illegal practices to get around the laws than the home-based workers.:77–78 Regardless of the reasons and the people that these laws affected, they could never be truly justified, and could only be seen as a scheme to control the black population in South Africa. As the years past by, pass laws would be used less and less to prosecute people. There was a “decline in pass law prosecutions over the period 1968-1981”, which is not surprising considering “the new forms of tight influx controls”.:201 There had been a radical change when the Riekert Commission recommended “that ‘unlawful occupation of accommodation by persons’, together with ‘unlawful employment’, be grounds for ‘repatriation’ of persons from white area”, which meant that they changed their enforcement to “being taken off the streets and into housing and factories”.:201 Pass laws were repealed in 1986. The Natives (Urban Areas) Act of 1923 deemed urban areas in South Africa as 'white' and required all black African men in cities and towns to carry around permits called 'passes' at all times. Anyone found without a pass would be arrested immediately and sent to a rural area. It was replaced in 1945 by the Natives (Urban Areas) Consolidation Act, which imposed 'influx control' on black men and also set up guidelines for removing people deemed to be living idle lives from urban areas. This act outlined requirements for African peoples' 'qualification' to reside legally in white metropolitan areas. To do so, they had to have Section 10 rights, based on whether The Black (Natives) Laws Amendment Act of 1952 amended the 1945 Native Urban Areas Consolidation Act, stipulating that all black people over the age of 16 were required to carry passes, and that no black person could stay in an urban area more than 72 hours unless allowed to by Section 10. The Natives (Abolition of Passes and Co-ordination of Documents) Act of 1952, commonly known as the Pass Laws Act, repealed the many regional pass laws and instituted one nationwide pass law, which made it compulsory for all black South Africans over the age of 16 to carry the 'passbook' at all times within white areas. The law stipulated where, when, and for how long a person could remain. The document was similar to an internal passport, containing details on the bearer such as their fingerprints, photograph, the name of his/her employer, his/her address, how long the bearer had been employed, as well as other identification information. Employers often entered a behavioural evaluation, on the conduct of the pass holder. An employer was defined under the law and could only be a white person. The pass also documented permission requested and denied or granted to be in a certain region and the reason for seeking such permission. Under the terms of the law, any government employee could strike out such entries, basically cancelling the permission to remain in the area. A passbook without a valid entry then allowed officials to arrest and imprison the bearer of the pass. These passes often became the most despised symbols of apartheid. The resistance to the Pass Law led to many thousands of arrests and was the spark that ignited the Sharpeville Massacre on March 21, 1960, and led to the arrest of Robert Sobukwe that day.