Jacobus Wilhelmus ("J.W.") Sauer (1850 – 24 July 1913), was a prominent liberal politician of the Cape Colony. He served as Minister in multiple Cape governments, and was influential in several unsuccessful attempts to enshrine equal political rights for black South Africans in the constitution of the Union of South Africa. He was also a strong early supporter of women's rights and suffrage.
Government service in the Cape Colony
Little is known about Jacobus Sauer's early life. He was the son of a landdrost in the Orange Free State, and attended South African College School before practicing as an attorney for several years in Cape Town.
He was first elected to the Parliament of the Cape of Good Hope under the Molteno Ministry in 1875 to represent the constituency of Aliwal North, and served continuously until 1904. He was then re-elected to serve from 1908 until his death. In total, he sat in the Cape Parliament for over twenty years. At the beginning of his career, he was greatly influenced by the pragmatic and racially inclusive policies of early Cape parliamentarians such as Saul Solomon, and he adhered to the principles of this "Cape Liberal Tradition" for the remainder of his life.
The Cape Colony had recently acquired a sizable Xhosa population in its expanding frontiers. Initially, due to their inaccessibility in the remote frontier mountains, most rural Xhosa people of the Cape failed to register as voters. In the 1880s, Sauer engaged himself in an intense campaign to mobilise and register the Xhosa voters, who light-heartedly dubbed him with the nickname of "Government Sauer". In 1883, he invited the Xhosa politician and journalist John Tengo Jabavu to stand for Parliament in Cape Town, but Jabavu declined.
Sauer was also a strong supporter of women's suffrage and the local Cape Women's Enfranchisement League. On 4 July 1907, together with fellow MPs Dr Antonie Viljoen and James Molteno, he supported the Cape's first parliamentary attempt to give women of all races the vote.
As a politician he was described as "solid, cautious and well-balanced", and although English was not his mother-tongue, he was described as a strong and forceful orator. His lifelong political alliance with John X. Merriman led to them being dubbed as "political Siamese twins", with Sauer's down-to-earth practicality complementing Merriman's erratic excitability.
Sauer was a minister in the governments of the Prime Ministers Thomas Scanlen (1881–84), Cecil Rhodes (1890–93), W P Schreiner, (1898-1900), J X Merriman (1908-1910), and in the national government after union.
In 1876, early on in his political career, he broke with Prime Minister Gordon Sprigg after taking issue with Sprigg's discriminatory "native policy". However he returned to government in 1881 as "Secretary for Native Affairs" in the cabinet of Prime Minister Thomas Scanlen.
He was invited to form a government after Sprigg's second Ministry collapsed in 1890, but declined.
Opposition to Rhodes and leadership of the South African Party
Sauer was appointed to serve as Colonial Secretary in Cecil Rhodes's Ministry, but after the "Logan Scandal" in 1893 revealed the degree of corruption in Rhodes's business dealings, he left Rhodes's cabinet and, with help from several powerful political allies, brought down Rhodes's government. Though Rhodes succeeded in reforming his government, Sauer consolidated the liberal opposition to Rhodes as the new "South African Party", which among other things stood for free trade, multiracial government, compulsory education and an excise. Sauer was elected as the party's first leader.
He opposed Rhodes for the rest of his career, with the powerful support of John X. Merriman and John Tengo Jabavu, and made no secret of his opposition to the "Imperial interest" in the Cape Colony. Together with Merriman and future parliamentary speaker James Molteno, he even attempted to abolish the rights of Rhodes's Chartered Company. He famously attacked Rhodes in 1894 for Rhodes's statement that the Xhosa were to be treated as "poor children", unfit for franchise.
Anglo-Boer War
At the time of the Second Boer War, Sauer was accused of fermenting pro-Boer sentiment among the Cape Dutch, though in fact he repeatedly tried to persuade his constituents to abstain from the ongoing struggle against British rule. His brother however, was convicted of being a rebel for the Boer cause and imprisoned.