The executive power in each province is invested in an officer appointed by the Government and styled provincial administrator. He holds office for five years. The administrator is assisted by an executive committee of four persons elected from among its own members, or otherwise, by the provincial council on the pro portional representation principle. The administrator and any other member of the executive committee, not being a member of the council, has the right to take part in the proceedings of the council, but has not the right to vote. The provincial councils have not the right to make laws, but ordinances, which must require the assent of the governor-general in council.
Under British influence in South Africa the law has been modi fied by legislation and by judicial decisions, and there now exists hardly any material difference between the law of England and of South Africa. The law of contracts, of torts, the mercantile law, the law relating to shipping and insurance are practically identical; and even the criminal law is virtually the same. The constitution of the courts is based on the English judiciary, and the rules of evidence and procedure are practically the same. All serious cases of crime are tried before a judge and jury, with the same for malities and safeguards as in England, while minor offences are dealt with by stipendiary magistrates. In criminal cases a verdict of guilty must be unanimous. In civil cases either party may demand a jury, a privilege which is seldom exercised; the verdict of the majority here prevails.
The most marked difference between the English and South African systems of law is, as might be expected, to be found in the law relating to real property. In South Africa there is a rigid and universal application of the principle of registration. The title to land is registered, in all cases; and so, with a few excep tions, is every servitude or easement, mortgage or charge upon land. There is no law of primogeniture. There is absolute free dom of testamentary disposition in the Cape province, and in some other parts of South Africa. By the Roman-Dutch law, and in the absence of any ante-nuptial contract to the contrary, there is a complete community of property between husband and wife, subject to the sole control of the husband. The courts have, how
ever, the right to interfere in case of any flagrant abuse of this power. Ante-nuptial agreements must in all cases be publicly registered. By the common law gifts between husband and wife during marriage are void as against creditors. This rule cannot be evaded even by ante-nuptial agreement. Divorce is granted to either spouse for either adultery or malicious desertion.
Historical.—Before the Union of South Africa was accom plished in 191o, the self-governing Colonies (Cape Colony, Natal, the Transvaal and Orange Free State) maintained defence forces of which the Cape Mounted Riflemen were regulars, the remainder either volunteers or police forces, supplemented by rise clubs and associations. Acting on the advice of Lord Methuen, commanding in chief, the British troops in the country, the various colonial governments took such steps as were possible before union to secure uniformity in military training and organization. After union the question was taken up seriously by the Government in which General Louis Botha was prime minister and General Smuts the minister of defence, who introduced in 1912 and passed the first Defence Act, under which the first defence forces of the Union of South Africa were raised. A military college was at once established at Bloemfontein to train the staff officers for the new forces which came into being early in 1913. All citizens of military age were then registered, and they volunteered almost unanimously to join the new citizen forces, which were soon to prove the salvation of the country in a rebellion of which the embers were still hot when the World War broke out in August 1914. The story of South Africa's participation in that conflict is told elsewhere. Including about 28,00o coloured and native labour personnel, the Union sent about 221,50o (including over 8,700 officers) in military units to the various theatres of war, the ma jority serving in West, in Central and in South-west Africa, which was wrested from Germany by a South African Army about tio, 000 strong under General Botha. Two other South African Gen erals formerly in arms against Great Britain (J. C. Smuts and Van Deventer) were successive commanders-in-chief of the opera tions in East Africa. The South Africans' total war casualties numbered nearly 19,00o, of which 14,25o occurred in France, where over 14,050 were killed, wounded or missing and only 194 taken prisoner.