try,
and so the honorable Minister in that way will not only lose the tax,
but the country will lose the benefit of the profits also."
After
attacking the Nationalists' restrictive immigration laws in a voice
that became suddenly angry, Oppenheimer turned to the subject of
Verwoerd's policy toward the Native. Verwoerd had announced, in one of
his speeches, that there were to be no new industrial townships created
in the Witwa-tersrand, and therefore no more "black spots" to worry
segregationists. Henceforth, he had thus implied, mines must be found
that were tactfully located near the borderline between white and black
communities, but nobody was to worry about any consequent slowing down
of industry since there is "already enough industrial ground open on
the Witwatersrand to be sufficient for all possible requirements for
ten years or more." Oppenheimer had some angry fun with that, making
the House laugh several times, and he made a few hits at the chronic
trouble faced by all employers in South Africa, where Native workers
are kept out of all but the lowest-paid, least-skilled jobs.
It
was an extraordinarily interesting performance—one that has perhaps not
been necessary for a politician in any other country to put on since
the days when Hitler was just coming into power in Germany. Oppenheimer
was speaking against a party of determined, dangerously ignorant
people, on behalf of a far more sophisticated, liberal group. He was
addressing both these groups, and he had to hit a balance between their
standards so that the message not only attacked on the Nationalist
plane, but attracted and held the attention of the United party. In
apparently succeeding he sounded like what
