Jan Smuts

Jan Smuts
Smuts in 1934
2nd Prime Minister of South Africa
In office
5 September 1939 – 4 June 1948
MonarchGeorge VI
Governors‑General
Preceded byBarry Hertzog
Succeeded byDaniël Malan
In office
3 September 1919 – 30 June 1924
MonarchGeorge V
Governors‑General
Preceded byLouis Botha
Succeeded byBarry Hertzog
Leader of the Opposition
In office
4 June 1948 – 11 September 1950
MonarchGeorge VI
Prime MinisterDaniël Malan
Preceded byDaniël Malan
Succeeded byJacobus Strauss
Personal details
Born
Jan Christiaan[1] (or Christian) Smuts[2]

(1870-05-24)24 May 1870
Bovenplaats, Cape Colony
Died11 September 1950(1950-09-11) (aged 80)
Irene, Transvaal, Union of South Africa
NationalitySouth African
Political party
SpouseIsie Krige
Children6
Alma mater
ProfessionBarrister
Signature
Military service
AllegianceSouth African Republic
Union of South Africa
United Kingdom
RankField Marshal
CommandsSouth African Defence Forces
Battles/warsSecond Boer War
First World War

Field Marshal Jan Christian Smuts, OM, CH, DTD, ED, PC, KC, FRS (baptismal name Jan Christiaan Smuts, 24 May 1870 – 11 September 1950) was a South African statesman, military leader and philosopher.[1] In addition to holding various military and cabinet posts, he served as prime minister of the Union of South Africa from 1919 to 1924 and 1939 to 1948.

Smuts was born to Afrikaner parents in the British Cape Colony. He was educated at Victoria College, Stellenbosch before reading law at Christ's College, Cambridge on a scholarship. He was called to the bar at the Middle Temple in 1894 but returned home the following year. In the leadup to the Second Boer War, Smuts practised law in Pretoria, the capital of the South African Republic. He led the republic's delegation to the Bloemfontein Conference and served as an officer in a commando unit following the outbreak of war in 1899. In 1902, he played a key role in negotiating the Treaty of Vereeniging, which ended the war and resulted in the annexation of the South African Republic and Orange Free State into the British Empire. He subsequently helped negotiate self-government for the Transvaal Colony, becoming a cabinet minister under Louis Botha.

Smuts played a leading role in the creation of the Union of South Africa in 1910, helping shape its constitution. He and Botha established the South African Party, with Botha becoming the union's first prime minister and Smuts holding multiple cabinet portfolios. As defence minister he was responsible for the Union Defence Force during the First World War. Smuts personally led troops in the East African campaign in 1916 and the following year joined the Imperial War Cabinet in London. He played a leading role at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, advocating for the creation of the League of Nations and securing South African control over the former German South-West Africa.

In 1919, Smuts replaced Botha as prime minister, holding the office until the South African Party's defeat at the 1924 general election by J. B. M. Hertzog's National Party. He spent several years in academia, during which he coined the term "holism", before eventually re-entering politics as deputy prime minister in a coalition with Hertzog; in 1934 their parties subsequently merged to form the United Party. Smuts returned as prime minister in 1939, leading South Africa into the Second World War at the head of a pro-interventionist faction. He was appointed field marshal in 1941 and in 1945 signed the UN Charter, the only signer of the Treaty of Versailles to do so. His second term in office ended with the victory of his political opponents, the reconstituted National Party at the 1948 general election, with the new government beginning the implementation of apartheid.

Smuts was an internationalist who played a key role in establishing and defining the League of Nations, United Nations and Commonwealth of Nations. He supported racial segregation and opposed democratic non-racial rule. At the end of his career, Smuts supported the Fagan Commission's recommendations to relax restrictions on black South Africans living and working in urban areas.

  1. ^ a b Root, Waverley (1952). "Jan Christian Smuts. 1870–1950". Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society. 8 (21): 271–73. doi:10.1098/rsbm.1952.0017. JSTOR 768812. S2CID 202575333.
  2. ^ "Great Contemporaries: Jan Christian Smuts". The Churchill Project. 1 December 2017. Retrieved 18 May 2021.