A number of internal cabinet problems arose during the Prime Minister's tenure. In particular, the dispute over a tariff reform showed the different interests within the government and ultimately led to the resignation of Orthodox advocates of a free trade policy such as Colonial Minister Joseph Chamberlain .
Further problems arose in South Africa , which was subordinated to the British Empire after the victory in the Second Boer War . The British government tried to rebuild South Africa's economy, which had been destroyed by the war. An essential point of these efforts was the commissioning of the gold mines in Witwatersrand , the most profitable mines in history and at the same time a main reason for the war. The government decreed that white workers would be too expensive to employ and that colored workers would be reluctant to return to the mines. For this reason, the Balfour government decided to recruit 63,000 contract workers from the Chinese Empire .
However, this was deeply unpopular, as especially in the western world, especially in Great Britain, the opinion of the yellow danger was held, which saw immigration by Chinese as hostile. At the same time, at that time poverty and unemployment was widespread among the lower classes of British workers.
On March 26, 1904, there was a demonstration of 80,000 people in Hyde Park against Chinese immigration to South Africa. The parliamentary committee of the trade union confederation TUC ( Trades Union Congress ) then passed a resolution stating:
“... that this meeting was composed of all classes of London citizens to vigorously protest against the government's act of allowing Chinese contract workers to immigrate to South Africa under conditions of slavery. At the same time, the meeting calls for this new colony to be protected from the greed of capitalists and the British Empire from humiliation. "
'That this meeting consisting of all classes of citizens of London, emphatically protests against the action of the Government in granting permission to import into South Africa indentured Chinese labor under conditions of slavery, and calls upon them to protect this new colony from the greed of capitalists and the Empire from degradation. '
This ultimately led to a loss of the majority and fears of losing the general election scheduled for January 1906 . Thereupon Balfour resigned on December 5, 1905 and was replaced by Henry Campbell-Bannerman , who formed a government of his Liberal Party . In the general elections in January and February 1906, all but three politicians of the Balfour cabinet were not re-elected, including Balfour himself.
↑ Melanie Yap, Dainne Leong Man: Color, Confusion and Concessions: The History of the Chinese in South Africa . Hong Kong University Press, Hong Kong 1996, ISBN 962-209-423-6 , p. 510.
^ Official program of the great demonstration in Hyde Park, Richardson: Chinese mine labor in the Transvaal . Parliamentary Committee of the Trade Union Congress, London 1904, pp. 5-6 (accessed January 27, 2011).
Governments of the Kingdom of Great Britain and the United Kingdom
.jpg)
