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British and Transvaal laws and constitutions : a comparison
DURING the late General Election, Mr. Herbert Spencer, writing to the Right Hon. Leonard Courtney with reference to the war, made the suggestion that « A Comparison should be made between the constitution and doings of the socalled Boer oligarchy and the oligarchy which existed in England prior to the Reform Bill of 1832, and it should be widely circulated and emphasised." Evidently, Mr. Spencer's idea was that such a comparison would show that the Boers were at least as advanced as regards their " constitution and doings " as was the Great Britain of 1832. But there is absolutely no necessity to go back seventy years in English History to find a parallel for the Transvaal of to-day, and the fact that such an assumption should be made by a man of Mr. Herbert Spencer's eminence is striking testimony to the general ignorance which prevails in this country regarding the little Republics with which we are so unhappily at war in South Africa
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