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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 November 2008
Modern Malaysian constitutional history can largely be analysed in terms of the fortunes of three federations: the Federated Malay States (1896), the Federation of Malaya (1948) and the Federation of Malaysia (1963). The last two are recent enough to fall within the domain of contemporary history. Still, it is possible to suggest that they share at least two characteristics with the first. To begin with, each assumed a highly centralized form of administration at the same federal capital of Kuala Lumpur. Protests over such centralizing tendencies led in the original case to the ‘decentralization movement’ from c. 1920 to c. 1940, and in the third instance to Singapore's separation from the Federation of Malaysia in August 1965. Secondly, all three federations witnessed controversies before their final inauguration, and political conflicts thereafter. The F.M.S. was born only after two Colonial Governors had reported in favour of the proposal, and discontent among the Malay rulers was partly responsible for the decentralization movement just mentioned. The Federation of 1948 was partly a British attempt to arrive at a modus vivendi with the Malay nationalists after the post-war Malayan Union scheme proved abortive, and it was attended by a Communist revolt and growing nationalist demands for self-government. The Malaysian Federation was the product of a ‘Battle for Merger’ (to use Mr Lee Kuan Yew's phrase), and created or exacerbated internal social and political tensions in addition to arousing Indonesian hostility.
2 For a general summary of Swettenham's career, see the article by Sir Richard Winstedt in the D.N.B., 1941–1950, 1959, pp. 855–7.Google Scholar Three recent and noteworthy contributions to Swettenham studies are: Cowan, C. D. (ed.), ‘Sir Frank Swettenham's Perak Journals, 1874–1876’, in Journal of the Malayan Branch, Royal Asiatic Society, 24, 4, 1951;Google ScholarGullick, J. M., ‘Kuala Lumpur, 1880–1895’, in JMBRAS, 28, 4, 1955;Google Scholar and Allen, J. de V., ‘Two Imperialists: A Study of Sir Frank Swettenham and Sir Hugh Clifford’, in JM(alaysian)BRAS, 37, 1, 1964, pp. 41–73.Google Scholar
3 Cf. Swettenham, F., British Malaya, London, 1906, p. 272, and the appendix to the 1920 and subsequent editions;Google Scholar and Footprints in Malaya, London, 1942, pp. 104–5.Google Scholar
4 See Wright, A. and Reid, T. H., The Malay Peninsula, London, 1912, p. 136;Google ScholarHall, D. G. E., A History of South-East Asia, London, 1955, p. 482;Google ScholarKennedy, J., A History of Malaya, London, 1962, pp. 236–7;Google ScholarMoorhead, F. J., A History of Malaya, Vol. 2, Kuala Lumpur, 1963, p. 181;Google ScholarRyan, N. J., The Making of Modern Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, 1963, p. 132;Google Scholar and Miller, H., The Story of Malaysia, London, 1965, p. 133.Google Scholar
5 Chew, E., ‘The First State Council in the Protected Malay States’, JM(alaysian) BRAS, 39, 1, 1966, pp. 182–4;Google Scholar and ‘Post-Mortem on a Straits Proconsul’, Journal of the Historical Society, University of Singapore, I, 1966/1967, pp. 14–19.Google Scholar
6 British Malaya, p. 252.Google Scholar
7 This inversion of roles was recognized by Hugh Low, the Resident of Perak, in a letter to the Straits Governor of 28 May 1878. Cf. Cowan, C. D., Nineteenth Century Malaya, London, 1961, p. 251et seq.; and the second of my articles, cited in footnote 5.Google Scholar
8 Cf. Sadka, E., ‘The State Councils in Perak and Selangor, 1877–1895’, in Papers on Malayan History, ed. Tregonning, K. G., Singapore, 1962;Google Scholar and ‘The Colonial Office and the Protected Malay States’, in Malayan and Indonesian Studies, eds. Bastin, J. and Roolvink, R., Oxford, 1964, p. 187.Google ScholarSee also a minute by de Robeck, 9 August 1883, on Gov. Straits to Sec. State, 280 of 4 July 1883, C[olonial] O[ffice Records, Series] 273/121; Public Record Office, London.Google Scholar
9 British Malaya, pp. 247, 250.Google Scholar
10 In chapter 4 of my unpublished thesis, cited in footnote I.Google Scholar
11 Swettenham apparently forgot his own contribution to the reduction of distance difficulties through the construction of roads and railway lines. That correspondence was carried on regularly is attested by the number of the Selangor Secretariat files now housed in the Malaysian National Archives.Google Scholar
12 British Malaya, pp. 248–50.Google Scholar
13 Ibid., p. 251; cf. his Footprints in Malaya, p. 104.
14 Cf. Thio, E., ‘The British Forward Movement in the Malay Peninsula, 1880–1889’, in Papers on Malayan History, ed. Tregonning, K. G..Google Scholar
15 Speech at the Royal Colonial Institute on ‘The Straits Settlements and British Malaya’, 10 June 1884, in P[roceedings of the] R[oyal] C[olonial] I[nstitute], 15, 1883–1884, p. 293.Google Scholar On the Rembau episode, see Lovat, A., Life of Sir Frederick Weld, Pioneer of Empire, London, 1914, pp. 357–63.Google Scholar
16 Speech cited in preceding footnote; P.R.C.I., 15, p. 294.Google Scholar
17 Ibid., p. 281.
18 Swettenham, F., About Perak, Singapore, 1893, pp. 18, 76. In his over-eager proposal to replace the over-mighty Resident with a central Controller, he failed to perceive the objection that the latter's authority was liable to the same abuses as the former's. Quis custodiet custodem ipsum?Google Scholar
19 Minutes by Lucas, 8 October 1885, and Herbert, n.d., on Low to Colonial Office, 5 October 1885 (CO 273/138). Lucas, who was a friend and champion of Swettenham, wrote lengthy minutes on many Malayan questions of the period. He later became known as an ‘Imperialist’ of the Chamberlain school, rose to be the first head of the Dominions Department (1907–11), and was the editor and part author of The Historical Geography of the British Empire.Google Scholar See the Cambridge History of the British Empire, 3, Cambridge, 1959, p. 766;Google Scholarand Who was Who, 1929–1940, 1947, p. 832.Google Scholar
20 This memorandum, with Birch's covering note of 30 November 1906, is preserved in the S[wettenham] C[ollection]: 41/67, Malaysian National Archives. Two arguments in favour of Swettenham's dating are: (1) the memorandum's enclosure in a Perak file numbered 4/89; (2) the scheme's exclusion of Pahang, which was perfectly natural, as that state had accepted a Resident only in 1888. It also appears from textual comparison with later schemes that this one belongs to an earlier period, and 1889 is a good guess.Google Scholar
21 Speech on ‘The Malay Peninsula: Its Resources and Prospects’, in P.R.C.I., 23, 1891–1892, p. 33. A copy of this paper was sent by Maxwell to the Colonial Office (see CO 273/178).Google Scholar
22 In the Pahang Annual Report of 1891 (Parl. Pap. C.6858 of 1893, pp. 98–9).Google Scholar
23 Problems of Greater Britain, London, 1890, 2, p. 189.Google Scholar
24 Memorandum on Pahang, November 1892 (CO 273/185).Google Scholar
25 Ibid., minute thereon by Lucas, 24 November 1892. Cf. footnote 19 above.
26 Sec. State to Gov. Straits, Confidential, 19 May 1893 (CO 273/185).Google Scholar
27 Sec. State to Gov. Straits, Confidential, enclosed memo. composed by Lucas, March 1893.Google Scholar
28 Despatch cited in footnote 26.Google Scholar
29 Gov. Straits to Sec. State, Confidential, 30 June 1893 (CO 273/188).Google Scholar
30 Ibid., minute thereon by Lucas, 16 August 1893.
31 British Malaya, p. 272. For a concise discussion of this controversy, wholly favourable to Smith's viewpointGoogle Scholarcf. Cheng, Siok Hwa, Sir Cecil Clementi Smith as Colonial Secretary and Governor of the Straits Settlements (Unpublished B.A. Honours exercise, University of Malaya, 1959), pp. 40–3.Google Scholar
32 See Lucas to Swettenham, 8 November 1906 (SC: 8/21); and Smith to Swettenham, 10 November 1906 (SC: 15/28).Google Scholar
33 Notes on Some of the Statements in Sir Frank Swettenham's Book, ‘British Malaya’, London, 1909. Copy in the National Library, Singapore.Google Scholar
34 Ibid., p. 5.
35 Cf. his view, cited above, footnote 18; and British Malaya, p. 275. However, it must be noted that Swettenham had been willing, in the last resort, to concede this point.Google Scholar
36 Smith, op. cit., pp. 3–4.Google Scholar
37 Smith to Swettenham, 26 October 1906 (SC: 20/33).Google Scholar
38 On 31 March 1896, after Swettenham had read a paper before the Royal Colonial Institute, Sir Hugh Low remarked during discussion time that ‘the federation scheme… I believe is almost entirely due to Mr Swettenham …’ Sir Cecil Smith, the chairman of the meeting, did not contradict him. See P.R.C.I., 27, 1895–1896, p. 301. In another paper read before the same Institute on 9 December 1902, Hugh Clifford declared that the federation of the protected Malay States was ‘largely’ Swettenham's conception, P.R.C.I., 34, 1902–1903, p. 45. W. H. Treacher also expressed the view that Swettenham had founded the F.M.S., but admitted that his recollections were a little hazy (letter to Swettenham, 8 November 1906, SC: 4/17).Google Scholar
39 Cf. footnote 20. The scheme of December 1894 was prepared for Smith's successor, Governor Sir Charles Mitchell (copy in SC: 42/68).Google Scholar
40 Lucas to Swettenham, 1 November 1906 (SC: 3/16).Google Scholar
41 Footprints in Malaya, pp. 104–5. It could be argued with some plausibility that Swettenham's influence on Lucas and Smith accounts for the similarity of the latter two's federation proposals; but it could be objected that Lucas and Smith were also influenced by other Straits and Residential officials, and that there were points of difference in their schemes.Google Scholar
42 In Smith's letter to an unnamed friend, dated 21 February 1910 (copy of extract in SC: 7/20), he said that he would not be sending Swettenham a copy of his Notes, as he was tired of prolonging the controversy.Google Scholar
43 British Malaya (1929 and 1948 edns.), p. 363. See my comment in footnote 35.Google Scholar
44 Ibid., p. 364.
45 Footprints in Malaya, p. 106.Google Scholar
46 Cf. Tregonning, K. G., A History of Modern Malaya, London and Singapore, 1964, p. 164, fn. 3.Google Scholar
47 ‘A Proposal for the Better Administration of the Malay States now under British Protection’—the original pencilled memorandum (with covering minutes) and two typed copies are preserved in the SC: 2/14.Google Scholar
48 Ibid.. Swettenham underlined those phrases in his Proposal which appeared later in Smith's confidential despatch of 30 June 1893.
49 Maxwell, who was then Straits Colonial Secretary, naturally favoured the retention of the general supervision which the Singapore Secretariat exercised over the Residents. See a letter from Maxwell, to Fairfield, Edward, 14 November 1893, in file with Gov. Straits to Sec. State, Confidential, 30 June 1893 (CO 273/188). Fairfield, the Asst. Under-Secretary of State in the Colonial Office, was Maxwell's spokesman on Malayan issues. Cf. Sadka, article cited in footnote 8 on ‘The Colonial Office and the Protected Malay States’, p. 186, fn. 1; and (on Fairfield himself) C.H.B.E., 3, pp. 745–6.Google Scholar
50 P.R.C.I., 37, p. 312.Google Scholar
51 Footprints in Malaya, pp. 106–7. He ridiculed ‘one of the established customs of Whitehall’ in sending out to Malaya ‘a newcomer who knew nothing’ about the country, a newcomer who ‘nursed his instructions for about eighteen months before he reported in favour of Federation’.Google Scholar
52 Minutes by Lucas, 16 August 1893, and Fairfield, 17 August 1893, on Gov. Straits to Sec. State, Confidential, 30 June 1893 (CO 273/188).Google Scholar
53 Minutes on Ibid. by Buxton, 20 November 1893, and Meade, 9 December 1893.
54 Minute on Ibid. by Ripon, 15 December 1893.
55 Cf. footnote 51 and British Malaya, p. 272.Google Scholar
56 For the date of Mitchell's arrival, cf. The Singapore and Straits Directory 1904, Singapore, 1904, p. 52.Google Scholar
57 Gov. Straits to Sec. State, Confidential, 1 May 1895 (CO 273/203).Google Scholar
58 Published in book form as About Perak on 30 September 1893 (see especially pp. 77–8). His views on federation were severely criticized in a review of the book in the Pinang Gazette, a Straits newspaper which had championed the confederation of the Colony with the Native States since March 1893 (cf. its issues of 30 August, 5 October and 28 December 1893; British Museum Newspaper Library). But its influence, like Maxwell's, was ephemeral.Google Scholar
59 Cf. footnote 39.
60 Pahang Annual Report, 1893 (Parl. Pap. C.7546 of 1894, pp. 109–10).Google Scholar
61 Maxwell to the Colonial Office, a confidential memo. on ‘Federation of Native States’, dated 20 March 1895 (CO 273/211), written after Maxwell had left Malaya to assume his appointment as Governor of the Gold Coast.Google Scholar
62 See the minutes by Lucas and Fairfield, 30 May 1895, Buxton, 3 June 1895, and Ripon, 4 June 1895, on the despatch cited in footnote 57; the telegraph of assent was sent on 6 June 1895, by Ripon and not Chamberlain (as is wrongly stated by Swettenham, British Malaya, p. 272).Google Scholar
63 Enclosed in Gov. Straits to Sec. State, Confidential, 13 August 1895 (CO 273/205).Google Scholar
64 See Gov. Straits to Sec. State, Confidential, 24 June 1895 (CO 273/204) and 7 August 1895 (CO 273/205), each with enclosures by Swettenham, describing his missions and their favourable reception. The swiftness of his mission is reminiscent of Sir Harold MacMichael's mission to the Malay Rulers of late 1945 to secure their assent to the Malayan Union scheme. This scheme the nonagenarian Swettenham condemned as a betrayal of earlier British pledges (cf. his introduction of April 1946 to British Malaya, 1948, pp. v–xiii).Google Scholar
65 Cf. Perak Government Gazette, 23 09 1895, Notification 427.Google Scholar
66 Mitchell to Chamberlain (Private), 12 November 1895 (Chamberlain Papers, JC 9/6, University of Birmingham Library; microfilm extracts, University of Singapore Library).Google Scholar
67 Ibid.
68 Chamberlain to Mitchell (Private), 18 December 1895 (Chamberlain Papers, ibid.).
69 Cf. Perak Government Gazette, 3 July 1896, Notification 393.Google Scholar
70 Ibid., issue of 19 June 1896.
71 Gov. Straits to Sec. State, 302 of 4 July 1896 (CO 273/216).Google Scholar
72 British Malaya, p. 273.Google Scholar
73 In his Report on the F.M.S. Durbar of 1897. Lucas had also used these terms interchangeably in his memorandum of March 1893 (cf. footnote 27). Of course, strictly speaking, ‘federation’ turned out to be a misnomer. See Emerson, R., Malaysia: A Study in Direct & Indirect Rule, New York, 1937, pp. 137–8.Google Scholar
