The fight for equality

Various stamps are intimately linked with the development of apartheid, an institutionalised system of racial segregation and white supremacy practised in South Africa during the 20th century. Colonial administrations in territories now comprising the modern post-colonial nation state of South Africa introduced successive ‘Pass Laws’ segregating and controlling populations and their movement along racial lines.

Enslaved Africans in Cape Colony had legally been required to carry passes authorising travel between rural and urban areas since 1760. Shortly after returning from his historic Embassy to China, George Macartney was appointed Governor of Cape Colony (figure 1). On 27 June 1797 he established South Africa’s first internal passport system as an attempt to control the movement of