lation but fought no battles on behalf of the Africans.t"
The Coloured People-8
percent ofthe population-were
concentrated
in the Cape Province. They were exceptionally diverse by ethnic, cultural,
and economic criteria, Members of the Cape Town Coloured elite, Mus-
lims and Christians, were facing the fact that their status was deteriorating.
Before Union, there had been no legal discrimination against Coloured
People in the Cape Colony, and they had looked forward toa
future of
equal treatment and opportunity. After Union, legal discrimination against
Coloured People as well as Africans increased in the northern provinces
and extended to the Cape Province in the form of official regulations and
administrative actions that made it difficult for Coloured People to com-
pete with Whites in public service as well as private industry. The large
Coloured underclasses, including illiterate, poorly paid farm laborers, had
exceptionally high rates of illegitimacy, crime, and alcoholism, and many
shared white fears and prejudices about Africans.I>
The Africans-s-ec
percent of the population
of the Union of South
Africa, according to the census of I 936-had
different histories, experi-
ences, and interests. In the reserves and adjacent British and Portuguese