The Trial and Error Period of Parliamentary Colonial Policy (1848 : 1870)

Abstract

The RR. 1854 and the C.S.: In 1848, a liberal constitution was promulgated for the motherland in which the colonial government was withdrawn from the King’s personal care and subordinated to the Parliament. This meant that the colonial constitution laid down in the socalled Regerings Reglementen (R.R.) had to be framed by Parliament. It took the Parliament six years before she had completed her first R.R. of 1854 and that in spite of earnest reports which had reached her about starvation in two districts of the residency of Sema-rang. Later authors have attributed the starvation to the excessive claims of the government sugar-culture on the sawahs and labour of the population. The extent of the starvation-stricken aera seems to have been exaggerated. Nolst Trénité (77) points out that only two isolated districts were ravaged. Burger (24, p. 160) denies that the C.S. was the cause but attributes it to heavy government requisitions of “heerendiensten” (servile labour) for other purposes like road building, etc. Of course, such services had always been demanded and the building of a fortress especially always was a catastrophe to the population.