114 



LOT s<'l Til AFRICA. 



Coal IB mined in the Witwatersrand district and 

 in ih- extern part of the Transvaal. In 88 mines, 

 emploting :*0 whites an 

 toniwere produced in 1900, valued at 



. cop|-r. and lead hare been found, but min- 

 - not now carried on. Tin i* * m al- 



luvial driinsita in Swaziland, the product Imvi- 

 cmwwl from 80 tons in 1808 to W 



revere 434 milea of railroad in operation, 884 

 mile* in proceat of const ru ; :>i n.iles pro- 



: in S.|.i..inU-r. IHSC,. P0a4 travel 



Ihthe rail- 



r.wi-U of Cape Colony hat been continued by the 

 C|*. Government, by agreement with the Booth 

 .in Republic, through Germiston i 



'rom where it crnase* the Yaal river and 

 ,|H- Town. The railroad from 



Natal hat been built through to Johannestarf ami 

 Delagpa Bay Railroad, which has 

 for 205 miles from the Portuguese 



u-undarv to Pretoria, has been in operation since 



l.lte. Of the Slatie line of 11M miles -VI 

 have been completed. 

 re are 1,952 miles of telegraphs in the re- 



\ on-titutional Conflict. A constitutional con- 

 flict arose out of the decision of th<* Hi-hCourt in 



u*e of Brown >. hr. I.- \.U. delivered on .Ian. 



S 97. The plaintiff, an American \ 

 had staked out gold claims within what had been 

 i as public diggings, luit when he applied 

 for the licenses. : >rmed that the proclama- 



tion had been withdrawn, and this wa- -ul>se(|uent- 



irm.-d by a resolution of the i Volksraad. < me 



o'f the judges held that the resolution had n, / />st 



efTeet. and clid not extinguish Brown's rights 



acquired under the proclamation before it was re- 



. Chief-Justice Kotze and Justice Amcshoff 

 found for the plaintiff on constitutional grounds. 

 The (iov.-rnment attorney contended that the sec- 

 ond proclamation, after it had been confirmed by a 

 resolution of the Yolksraad, could not be brought 

 into question, and quoted a statute of 1890, accord- 



which the legal validity of any law or reso- 



i dulv promulgated can not be Questioned in a 

 law. The Chief .Justice laid down the 

 proposition that a mere resolution of the Volksraad 

 can not alter a law that has been properly passed, 

 and the further doctrine that neitner a Taw nor a 

 resolution has binding force in so far as it is con- 

 trary to the Gr>< < >n-t it ut ion of the Trans- 

 raal. This doc-trine, derived from the principle- of 

 th. K'.man Dutch law and the analogy of the t'nit- 

 itution. was new in 1 1 1.- Transvaal, 

 directly contradicting a previous opinion given bv 

 the chief .Justice in a similar ease in 1884, and it 

 was regarded by President Krflger and by hr. 



-. his State Secretary, and Dr. Coster, the At- 



> -General, a* an encroachment on the p 

 of the Volksraad, which had itself enacted the 

 Grumitrrl in the same manner as all other laws, 

 drafted a bill setting forth that the Y.,lk*- 

 raad is the supreme power in the state, that its reso- 

 lutions have the force of law. that it has power to 

 alter the '/ruri'/i/w.that courts of justice are bound 

 to respect and enforce whatever it has enacted or 

 may enact, that the power of the court* to test laws 

 or resolutions by the Grundwet has not existed and 

 does not exist, and therefore enacting that exi 

 and future laws and resolutions shall be acknowl- 

 edged by courU of justice, which shall have no 



fuse to apply any law or resolution of the 

 Yolk-mad on the ground that either in form orsub- 

 stance it is contrary to the Grundteef ; further, pn- 



.:iu r a f..rm of oath for all future judges, by 

 which they shall declare that they will riot an 

 to themselves the testing power;' providing that a 



judge who does SO is guilty of malfeasance in ofliee; 



and empowering th< dent toask the pres- 



ent judges whether the\ deem it in accordance with 



their oath and duty to dispense justice according to 



_: and future la\\- and n-olutions ,,f the 



. to th.-inselves the 



testing power, and furthermore empowering him to 

 di>!in>-lli from whom he ; 



ti\e or ansatisfactory answer <! no an-\\rr at all. 



The judge* addressed ft letter to tin- President in 

 which they coll. d that the pro] 



measure was a violation , .1 the Independence* 

 High Court, and urging him to postpone action un- 



til the on: -e->ioii of the Volksraad. In 



si.ite of their remonstrance the President pj 

 the \'olk>raad to puss the hill immediately, arguing 

 that Cecil Khodes ami other enemies of tfic K. -pub- 

 lic had been kept at bay for years only by \ 



;. 'solution-, and that if tlie su|>remacy of the 

 Yolk>raad were undermined the convention with 

 Knu'land might be broken and then war would eii- 



The bill was pa-sed on l-'cb. 'J". and the ! 

 dent put the procribcd interrogatories to th. 



demanding an ans\\.-r h 17. Sir 



Henry de N'illiers. Chief Justice of Cape Colony, 

 went "to Pretoria and arranged a compromi 

 which the judge- undertook for the present not to 



be coii-lilut ionality of laws and resolutions of 

 t lie Yolksraad by the |>r>\ i-ioii- of the (i run din f ]\ 



the promise of the President that he would intro- 

 duce without delay a measure providing th.. 



only be altered by special legi-lation 

 in a special manner, similar to the provisions of the 

 i trange l-'ree stati- Constitution, and that guarantees 

 for the independence of the judiciary should be in- 

 sert. -d in the (rnunlmf. The President requested 

 the Yolksraad toaprnjint a committee to act in con- 

 junction with t he (iovernment in draft ing propo-als 

 for a revision of the Grundmf and a codifieati.n of 

 all existing laws. 1 >ut the judges would not aei-ept 

 this as a fulfillment of his promise, which v- 

 draft one himself, with their a i-tance and as speed- 

 ily as practicable. In deference to their remon- 

 strance the President agreed that tin- revision of the 

 firnnilin-f .should precede codification, which would 

 be a task of two or three years. The committee of 

 the Yolksraad invited the judges to appoint 

 of their number to advi<e with other ex'; 

 the procedure of revision. chief-Just ! K-.t/eand 

 one of his colleagues declined the invitation, on t lie 

 ground that the experts whom they were a-ked to 

 confer with were t lie authors of the bill attacking 

 the independence of the judiciary. JuL 



row ski. and Ksser were willing to give 

 assistance to the commission. 

 The ntlanders. It is estimated that tin 

 of gold already discovered in the Tnu. 

 kin L'700.000,000 of the metal, an. 1 still 

 mines are located every month in the Lydeiiburg, 

 Xoutpansi>erg. and Barberton di-ti : and 



iron exist in inexhaustible miantitie-. Tie 

 may not c..mpete with the Welsh tor use on 



perhaps on freight -tcaim-ps in the 

 Indian Ocean, but it is good enough for rail 

 and iron foundries. The healthy climate and pro- 

 ductive soil of the Traan-vaal "are suflicjent. with 

 its extraordinary mineral resources, which include 

 also silver, lead." copper, and other ba-er mii<- 

 to attract a large immigration, to which gold mining 

 has given only the first impetus, and make it in time 

 the most populous state in South Africa. It- 

 production has been of late years the chief support 

 of Cape Colony and Natal as well a- of its own in- 

 habitant. Tlie rievances,,f the fit landers on the 

 litiTid are often at direct variance with the inl- 

 and sentiments of the governments and people of 

 the British colonies. For instance, to enable the 



