Political dissension had been accompanied by ecclesiastical strife. Practically all the burghers were members of the Dutch Reformed Church, but the Cape synod of that Church had disapproved the trek and the emigrants had been left almost without ministers. They were, however, deeply religious in a narrow Calvinistic fashion, and in all their settlements built a church even though without a minister. Their literature was almost confined to the Bible ; many of them looked upon themselves as the chosen people on a new pilgrimage, so that church affairs filled an important part in their lives. After much controversy it was decided in 1853 that there should be no incorporation of the Transvaal churches with the Cape Synod; for one thing the Transvaalers objected to the legal equality of blacks with whites permitted in the colonial churches.
1858-59 another cause of dissension arose. There was already in some strength among the burghers the sect of Doppers, who contended that while hymns were good spiritual aids in private devotion, they should not be sung in church, not being (like the psalms) part of holy scripture. In 1858 the Rev. D. Postma, of the Separatist Reformed Church of Zwolle, Holland, became minister at Rustenburg and at once gained the support of all the Doppers. At a general assembly at Pretoria in Jan. 1859 Postma refused to use hymns, and Kruger and other laymen gave notice that they had left the Hervormde Kerk (the Dutch Re formed Church) and proposed to form a new church. Efforts at compromise failed and later in the year the Separatist (Dopper) Church was formed. Its official title is Christlijk Afgeschiedene Gereformeerde Kerk. During the civil war Kruger got the con stitution altered so that a member of any Reformed Church might hold full political rights.
From the first, whatever their internal dissension, the Trans vaal Boers had vast territorial ambitions; at an early stage they even put forward a claim to all the land north of the Vaal from ocean to ocean, and they repeatedly and persistently tried to get an outlet to the sea. One of their earliest claims, made a few weeks after the signing of the Sand River Convention, was to the land of the Bechuana, and Andries Pretorius asked the British to close the "lower road," that is the route to the far interior opened up originally by the missionaries, Moffat and Livingstone.
This request was followed (Aug. 1852) by a raid on the Bakwena Bechuana—who were said to be harbouring a chief who had looted Boer cattle. In this "punitive expedition" Livingstone's house at Kolobeng was looted, and some 200 to 30o women and children carried off by the Boers. The struggle for Bechuanaland thus begun lasted for nearly 4o years, ending in the discomfiture of the Boers (see BECHUANALAND).
The action of the commandos against the Bakwena brought against the Boers the charge of slavery, and the apprentice law passed by the volksraad in 1856, it was alleged, practically legalized slavery. It must be remembered that when the Boers first emigrated to the Transvaal, slavery had been but recently abolished in Cape Colony; Potgieter and others of the V oortrekkers may have been slave-owners, but slavery as such was not recognized in the Transvaal. The organized native tribes with whom they had dealings were usually required to produce a "labour tax" in kind ; that is, the chief had to furnish labourers to perform specific work. There was no great hardship in this. But many farmers on the borders of the old Cape Colony had had a habit of kidnapping Bushmen children and others and "ap prenticing" them together with other apprentices obtained in a more legitimate fashion. This reprehensible habit persisted among the Boers in the Transvaal—among whom were many bad char acters who had no claim to be farmers and who were not all of Dutch blood. The apprentice system was in existence in other parts of South Africa, and almost inevitably led to abuses. The Apprentice Law of 1856 in the Transvaal was an effort to mend matters. It provided safeguards against misuse of power; that it had to be repeated three or four times showed how its provisions were disregarded. The apprentices were usually small children, exchanged for goods by their parents "picked up starving" on the veld, "orphans" (a plentiful supply), young persons obtained from tribes fighting one another; children, in short, obtained in any fashion; in 1864 Martinius Pretorius is reported as asking the Landdrost of Zoutpansberg to buy him half-a-dozen little Kafirs at a time when the Swazis were raiding. The worst feature of the system was that there was a regular traffic in apprentices. This practice, forbidden by the law, made of apprentices goods and chattels. Thus the charge of practising virtual slavery was justified. Towards the natives in general the Transvaalers adopted an attitude of modified indifference; they had their locations and could manage their own tribal affairs as long as they provided the farmers with the needed labour; missionaries among them were tolerated; but the Boers made no attempt to produce a civilized class of African. But they adopted very stern measures against misdoers. Thus in 1854 to avenge the murder of a party of Boers (including women and children) M. Pretorius led a commando against the chief Makapan, many of whose people, who had taken refuge in caverns, were smoked or starved to death and many others shot while attempting to escape. This chastisement kept the tribes quiet for years.