Standerton (House of Assembly of South Africa constituency)

Standerton was a constituency in the Transvaal Province of South Africa, which existed from 1910 to 1994. It covered a rural area in the eastern Transvaal centred on the town of Standerton. Throughout its existence it elected one member to the House of Assembly and one to the Transvaal Provincial Council.

When the Union of South Africa was formed in 1910, the electoral qualifications in use in each pre-existing colony were kept in place. In the Transvaal Colony, and its predecessor the South African Republic, the vote was restricted to white men, and as such, elections in the Transvaal Province were held on a whites-only franchise from the beginning. The franchise was also restricted by property and education qualifications until the 1933 general election, following the passage of the Women's Enfranchisement Act, 1930 and the Franchise Laws Amendment Act, 1931. From then on, the franchise was given to all white citizens aged 21 or over. Non-whites remained disenfranchised until the end of apartheid and the introduction of universal suffrage in 1994.^[1]

Standerton, like most of the rural Transvaal, had a largely Afrikaans-speaking electorate and was a conservative seat throughout its existence. Its most notable MP by far, Jan Smuts, was first elected in the seat in a 1924 by-election, precipitated by his loss in Pretoria West during the 1924 general election. Standerton MP Gert Marthinus Claassen agreed to step down to make his seat available for Smuts, and the latter would go on to represent Standerton longer than any other seat. However, his popularity fell after World War II, and amidst his United Party's nationwide defeat at the 1948 general election, he lost his own seat.

From 1948 on, Standerton was a safe seat for the governing National Party, who never went unopposed there but generally won strong majorities. In 1987, however, it was one of many Transvaal seats to fall to Andries Treurnicht's new Conservative Party, whose promise of maintaining unconditional white supremacy resonated with Standerton's white, largely Afrikaner electorate. Jacobus Rosier de Ville, the Conservative MP elected in 1987, continued to represent the seat until the end of apartheid.

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