The South African General Election, 1953¶
T.W. Price (1953). The South African General Election, 1953. Parliamentary Affairs. Oxford Journals (per download footer).
| Type | journal article |
| Scope | Wider apartheid literature |
| Method | descriptive quantitative |
| Period studied | 1948–1953 |
| Regions | Union of South Africa, South West Africa, Cape Province, Transvaal, Natal, Orange Free State |
| Themes | politics ideology elections, origins segregation |
| Citation key | price1953 |
Argument¶
Price reports on the April 1953 general election, which returned Malan's Nationalist government with a much larger majority. He argues that the 1948 Nationalist victory came from a platteland resurgence magnified by the electoral system, not from a majority of votes. In 1953 the Nationalists again held power with a minority of votes. The shift in actual voting allegiance was slight, and the gain in seats came from delimitation that favoured rural seats and from six new South West Africa seats. The article is a contemporary narrative and analysis, supported by seat tables, delimitation quotas and poll figures.
Evidence and method¶
Official election results and seat counts for 1943-48, 1948 and 1953. Delimitation Commission quotas by province. Constituency turnout percentages. The author's own observation of the campaign and polling days. Vote totals are estimated by crediting an unopposed candidate with 6,000 votes and the other side with 3,000.
Place in the debates¶
- Causes of the 1948 Nationalist victory (see White electoral politics, delimitation and party systems). Rejects the rumour that ex-servicemen and cost-of-living discontent decided it. Attributes it to a platteland resurgence plus peri-urban seats filled by migrants from the platteland.
- Electoral-system bias and the Nationalist 'mandate' (see White electoral politics, delimitation and party systems). Argues that the delimitation system, which loads town seats and unloads country seats, gave the Nationalists a seat majority from a minority of votes. He regards the claim to a mandate as unsupported.
Findings¶
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Smuts lost office in 1948 despite winning a large share of the votes, because of the electoral system. (p. 2)
although Smuts was out as the result of the vagaries of the electoral system, he had received nearly sixty per cent of the votes cast
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The Cape's disadvantage in delimitation arose because only European voters counted in the calculation of seat quotas. (p. 4)
The Cape Province invariably finds itself prejudiced in this, as in the preceding calculation, particularly as only European voters can be taken into account in calculating proportions and quotas.
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Delimitation in 1953 weighted rural votes more heavily than urban ones, giving the Nationalists a structural advantage. (p. 5)
In general, therefore, four "platteland" votes were made equal to five town votes.
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The six South West Africa seats created in 1950 strengthened the government's working majority. (p. 3)
six new Nationalist members came to Cape Town to give the Government a sale working majority of ten to twelve.
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The Nationalists campaigned on apartheid, Afrikaner nationalism and fear of external and radical threats. (p. 6)
The Nationalist Party took its stand on apartheid and Afrikaner nationalism, raising the cries of Mau-Mau, United Nations, Communists
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Turnout in 1953 was a record, and rural turnout was higher than urban turnout. (p. 10)
The average for the whole country was 87.8 per cent; thirty-six constituencies polled over 90 per cent
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The 1953 result gave Malan a secure majority, though still short of a two-thirds majority. (p. 9)
taking into account the three Native Representatives, this gives the Malan Government a solid parliamentary majority of twenty-nine
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Voting allegiance barely changed between 1948 and 1953, and the Nationalist gain in seats was out of proportion to the gain in votes. (p. 11)
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The Nationalists won about 61 per cent of the seats on at most 45 per cent of the votes. (p. 11)
widi not more dian 45 per cent of die votes, gained 61 per cent of die seats, while die Opposition, widi at least 55 per cent of die votes, gained only 39 per cent of die seats.
Evidence ledger¶
Sources used¶
| Source | Kind | Period | How used |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1953 South African general election results (constituency-level votes, seats, polls, deposits) | election returns | April 1953 (with 1948 comparisons) | Establishes seat totals, votes by party and province, turnout, lost deposits and the gap between vote share and seat share. |
| 1948 general election results | election returns | May 1948 | Baseline for party seat strengths and the claim that Smuts won nearly 60% of votes yet lost office. |
| Report of the Delimitation Commission, January 1953 | commission or official report | sittings July 1952; report January 1953 | Supplies provincial seat allocations and voter quotas with maximum/minimum numbers, and the finding that rural seats were unloaded and urban seats loaded. |
| 1947 delimitation of constituencies | commission or official report | 1947 | Provides the previous quotas and seat allocations against which the 1953 changes are compared. |
| South Africa Act (incl. Section 40 and amendments on delimitation) | legislation gazette | 1909, amended before 1953 | Defines the delimitation procedure and the 15% loading/unloading power underlying the rural over-representation argument. |
| South West Africa Representation legislation and 1950 SWA elections | legislation gazette | 1949-1950 | Explains the six new Nationalist seats from SWA that increased the Government's working majority. |
| Party strengths in the House of Assembly at dissolution, February 1953 | parliamentary debates | 1943-1953 | Shows the shift in Government and Opposition majorities across 1943, 1948 and 1953. |
| Author's own aggregation of votes and seats by party and province (convention: unopposed candidate credited 6,000 votes, other side 3,000) | other | 1953 | Estimates national vote shares to show the Nationalists gained 61% of seats with at most 45% of votes. |
| Observation of the campaign (meetings, broadcasts, canvassing, polling day, counting) | newspapers periodicals | March-April 1953 | Provides narrative description of campaign issues, slogans, turnout scenes and counting progress. |
New data¶
A provincial table of 1953 votes and seats by party (Nationalist, United, Labour, Independent), with unopposed seats credited by convention, compiled from the official returns to estimate national vote shares.
Inference¶
Quantification: Descriptive tables.
Descriptive political narrative combining official election returns and delimitation figures with the author's contemporary observation; the argument compares 1948 and 1953 seat and vote totals and compares provincial quotas to infer that rural loading distorts representation. No statistical modelling.
Key claims¶
| Claim | Basis | Strength |
|---|---|---|
| The 1948 Nationalist victory reflected a platteland resurgence rather than a swing among ex-servicemen or economic discontent. (p. 258) | Constituency-level pattern of 1948 seat changes described by the author; no survey or voter data cited. | Asserted |
| The delimitation system (loading/unloading) systematically over-represents rural constituencies, giving the Nationalists a formidable advantage, about four platteland votes equal to five town votes. (p. 262) | Delimitation Commission 1953 quotas and report, Section 40 of the South Africa Act, and the 1953 results. | Partial data |
| The Nationalists won 94 seats, a parliamentary majority of 29, though the Government received no more than 45% of votes against at least 55% for the Opposition. (p. 268) | Official 1953 returns aggregated by province, with the author's convention for unopposed seats. | Systematic data |
| The actual change in voting allegiance between 1948 and 1953 was insignificant; Nationalist votes rose by under 80,000, probably owing to the larger Afrikaans-speaking youth cohort. (p. 268) | Comparison of 1948 and 1953 vote totals; demographic explanation asserted without data. | Partial data |
| Turnout was a record 87.8% nationally, with higher polls in rural districts and over 90% in South West Africa, undermining the Delimitation Commission's rationale for loading. (p. 267) | Constituency poll percentages from official 1953 returns. | Systematic data |
| South West Africa was over-represented, with one SWA vote worth two to three Union votes. (p. 262) | Delimitation quotas and SWA constituency sizes; no figures shown in the text. | Asserted |
| The United Party retains majority support, including nearly all English-speaking voters and about thirty per cent of Afrikaans-speaking voters, but is prejudiced by the electoral system. (p. 268) | Aggregate vote tables; the language breakdown is asserted without survey data. | Illustrative or anecdotal |
The author's caveats¶
The author notes that unopposed seats were credited with conventional vote totals (6,000 and 3,000), which is 'somewhat weighted against' the unopposed United Party seats.
Gaps in the evidence¶
The claims about voting by language group, the causes of the 1948 result, and the demographic explanation for Nationalist gains lack voter-level data such as surveys or a language breakdown of the roll. A constituency-by-constituency table of registered voters versus votes would test the loading argument better; the official returns and Delimitation Commission report existed then and could be tabulated. Sources are cited only in passing, with no references to specific reports or files.
Replicability: Data poorly documented.