Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XXIV, Africa

654. Telegram From the Department of State to the Embassy in South Africa¹

Washington, March 9, 1968, 2112Z.

127749. Ref: Embtel 705² and Jo’burg 328.³ For Ambassador from Palmer.

1. Vice President’s recent statements on Southern African issues,⁴ including reference “one man-one vote”, intended as strong, authoritative high level reaffirmation oft-repeated basic principles US policy, foreign and domestic, consistently emphasized by US leaders from time of Thomas Jefferson. As with all such fundamental principles, we believe they are timeless in their validity and that mankind will be the better off the earlier they are realized. This speaks for continued pressure to achieve their earliest possible acceptance. For US to appear to qualify application of principle on question of timing would undermine confidence in US attachment to principle itself.

2. At same time, there is nothing in Vice President’s remarks which precludes an orderly, phased, transitional program to achieve these objectives. His statements of principle should be read in full context his Addis and other speeches: “Important question for today is—in what direction are we going?” He sets no timetable; nor does he presume to prescribe any specific form that realization of these principles should assume in SA. Neither are his remarks at variance with position US has consistently taken in UN and elsewhere in emphasizing our support for orderly transition and peaceful solution to SA problems. We must, however, as VP has done never let South Africans forget imperatives of objectives. South Africans, in their own conscience or their own guilt, may place various connotations on this, and even rationalize their rejection of the principles involved by rejecting the timing. But timing will be determined by a complex of international and internal events and we should not ourselves seek unilaterally to define or interpret what it should be. For those liberal minded South Africans who themselves share our hopes for all inhabitants of the area, we can only trust that they take the trouble to analyze and understand US statements in correct context and fullest implications. For the less liberal, we can only hope that determined and tempered reiteration of world principles will persuade them to start moving in direction Vice President’s suggestions.

3. Comment on paras 5 and 6 follow septel.

Rusk

1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, POL 1 S AFR–US. Secret. Drafted by Palmer and Clark; cleared by Van Dyke in the Vice President’s Office, Runyon, and Jacobs; and approved by Palmer. Sent to Cape Town, and repeated to USUN and Johannesburg.
2. In telegram 705 from Cape Town, February 28, Rountree reported that a wide segment of the white population of South Africa was concerned that recent statements by Vice President Humphrey in support of “one man-one vote” indicated that U.S. policy was now directed toward early implementation of that concept, which was opposed by virtually all white South Africans; even the Progressive Party favored a gradual extension of the franchise to non-whites. (Ibid.)
3. Not found.
4. For text of the Vice President’s January 6 speech in Addis Ababa, see Department of State Bulletin, January 29, 1968, pp. 129–133.