The Separate Representation of Voters Act No. 46 was introduced in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

on 18 June 1951. Part of the legislation during the

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

era, the National Party introduced it to enforce racial segregation, and was part of a deliberate process to remove all non-white people from the voters' roll and revoke the Cape Qualified Franchise system. This act was declared invalid by the Supreme Court when challenged in the case of ''Harris v Minister of the Interior 1952(2) SA 428(AD)''; this gave rise to the

Coloured vote constitutional crisis The Coloured vote constitutional crisis, also known as the Coloured vote case, was a constitutional crisis that occurred in the Union of South Africa during the 1950s as the result of an attempt by the Nationalist government to remove coloured v ...

. The government, however, was able to circumvent the court's decision by increasing the number of Appellate Division judges from five to eleven, and increasing the size of the Senate from forty-eight to eighty-nine. These changes enabled the government to successfully introduce the South Africa Act Amendment Act No 9 of 2 March 1956, effectively overturning the Supreme Court's decision and revalidating the act. This amendment was repealed by the Republic of South Africa Constitution Act 32 of 1961. This case was one of many where South Africa's parliamentary sovereignty enabled the passing of laws without being subject to judicial review on substantive grounds. The judiciary was bound therefore leaving the legislature and executive to act independently from the third arm of government. Arguably this silencing of the judiciary allowed the Apartheid state to become further entrenched in the legal sphere of South Africa. The act as a whole was repealed by section 4 of the Separate Representation of Voters Amendment Act No 50 of 27 March 1968. This act introduced the Coloured Persons Representative Council, consisting of forty elected members and twenty nominated members. This council could make laws on finance,

local government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of public administration within a particular sovereign state. This particular usage of the word government refers specifically to a level of administration that is both geographically-l ...

education Education is a purposeful activity directed at achieving certain aims, such as transmitting knowledge or fostering skills and character traits. These aims may include the development of understanding, rationality, kindness, and honesty ...

, community welfare and pensions, rural settlements and

agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people t ...

which affected coloured people. A bill could only be introduced when approved by the Minister of Coloured Relations, as well as requiring the approval of the white Cabinet. This act was repealed in 1983 by section 101(1) of the Republic of South Africa Constitution Act No 110, which enacted the

South African Constitution of 1983 The Constitution of 1983 (formally the Republic of South Africa Constitution Act, 1983) was South Africa's third constitution. It replaced the republican constitution that had been adopted when South Africa became a republic in 1961 and was in f ...

and its

Tricameral Parliament The Tricameral Parliament, officially the Parliament of the Republic of South Africa, was the legislature of South Africa between 1984 and 1994, established by the South African Constitution of 1983, which gave a limited political voice to ...

References

Chronology of Apartheid legislation 1850s-1970s from South African History Online

External links

* Copy of th
Separate Representation of Voters Act, Act No 46 of 1951
from the DISA library of the

University of KwaZulu-Natal The University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) is a university with five campuses in the province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. It was formed on 1 January 2004 after the merger between the University of Natal and the University of Durban-Westville. ...

* Copy of th
Separate Representation of Voters Amendment Act, Act No 30 of 1956
from the DISA library of the

Apartheid laws in South Africa 1951 in South African law Election legislation Election law in South Africa {{statute-stub