JNF-The-Working-Class-Struggle-of-Half-a-Century

Under the banner of the St. Kitts Agricultural and Commercial
Society, the forces of opposition placed candidates in the field for the
first general election. Having lost the battle over the right to vote, they
were desperate to defeat the purpose of the representative form of Government.
Their uneasiness was augmented by the fact that an end had
been put to the unbridled ruling power which they had enjoyed from the
year 1878 when the territory was brought under the Crown Colony System
of Government.
The picture had changed. The ancestors of the bulk of voters had been
the personal property of the early planters and other privileged classes,
and had been socially despised and subject to distressing human degradation.
In 1937 descendants of these chattel slaves were to be voters
taking part in choosing the Government of the country with relatively
equal weight to the former master. This was too much for the privileged
classes to accept. The authority they wielded freely for fifty-nine
years was to challenged. They were determined that political power
must not split from their hands.
The Voice of the People
Why did the power of the ballot strike terror in the adversaries of the
working masses in 1937? What prompted a planter and Legislative
Council member to associate Representative Government with the introduction
of “ the worst elements of Haitian politics” in St. Kitts?
The answers suggest themselves when we look at the composition
of the Legislative Council at that time. The Council was comprised
of the Administrator and fourteen other members, all chosen by him in
consultation with the Governor and with the approval of the Secretary
of State for the Colonies in London. Seven of these fourteen were Officials
- Heads of Government Departments and the other seven were
Unofficials who were usually planters and merchants. No one was appointed
to represent the vast majority of the population.
The Governor actually selected persons who would support his
policy. On this point the Closer Union Commission of the 1932 said in
its report, The Governor has the power with certain reservations in the
last resort to carry any measure even if the whole of the Unofficials are
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