From 1910 to 1961 the Union of South Africa was a self-governing country that shared a monarch with the United Kingdom and other Dominions of the British Empire.

[5] The Statute of Westminster 1931 further increased the sovereignty of the self-governing Dominions, and also bound them all to seek each other's approval for changes to monarchical titles and the common line of succession.

The preamble to the Statute of Westminster 1931 established the convention requiring the consent of all the Dominions' parliaments, as well as that of the United Kingdom, to any alterations to the monarch's style and title.

These legislations limited the succession to the natural (i.e. non-adopted), legitimate descendants of Sophia, Electress of Hanover, and stipulated that the monarch cannot be a Roman Catholic and must be in communion with the Church of England upon ascending the throne.

However, the United Kingdom and the British Dominions agreed, via adopting the Statute of Westminster, not to change the rules of succession without the unanimous consent of the other realms, unless explicitly leaving the shared monarchy relationship.

Like all nations, you have hard problems to solve in the aftermath of war; but statesmanship has not failed you in the past 100 years, and I am confident it will guide you steadily towards a just and contented relationship between all dwellers in your many-people land.

As in other British Dominions, the governor-general appointed the leader of the largest political party in the lower house of Parliament as prime minister.

After the granting of royal assent, the Clerk of the House of Assembly was responsible for enrolling two copies of the act, one in English and the other in Dutch, in the records of the office of the Registrar of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of South Africa.

In 1957, due to growing republicanism, the Crown was either removed from the badges of the defence force and police,[22] or replaced with the Union Lion from the crest of the country's coat of arms.

[25] In 1860, Prince Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the second son and fourth child of Queen Victoria, became the first member of the royal family to visit South Africa.

Later, in 1901, the then Duke and Duchess of Cornwall (later King George V and Queen Mary) visited South Africa during an extensive tour of the British Empire.

[34] Strijdom stated that the matter of whether South Africa would be a republic inside or outside the Commonwealth would be decided "with a view to circumstances then prevailing".

[36] On becoming Prime Minister in 1958, Hendrik Verwoerd gave a speech to Parliament in which he declared: "We stand unequivocally and clearly for the establishment of the republic in the correct manner and at the appropriate time".

[37] In 1960, Verwoerd announced plans to hold a whites-only referendum on the establishment of a republic, with a bill to that effect being introduced in Parliament on 23 April of that year.

[42] The League, founded by Arthur Selby, the Federal Party's chairman, launched the Natal Covenant in opposition to the plans for a republic, signed by 33,000 Natalians.

[43] On the day of the referendum, the Natal Witness, the province's daily English-language newspaper warned its readers that: "Not to vote against the Republic is to help those who would cut us loose from our moorings, and set us adrift in a treacherous and uncharted sea, at the very time that the winds of change are blowing up to hurricane force".

The 1949 London Declaration prior to India becoming a republic allowed countries with a different head of state to join or remain in the Commonwealth, but only by unanimous consent of the other members.

The governments of Pakistan (in 1956) and, later, Ghana (in 1960) availed themselves of this principle, and the National Party had not ruled out South Africa's continued membership of the Commonwealth were there a vote in favour of a republic.

[48] However, the Commonwealth by 1960 included new Asian and African members, whose rulers saw the apartheid state's membership as an affront to the organisation's new democratic principles.

Julius Nyerere, then Chief Minister of Tanganyika, indicated that his country, which was due to gain independence in 1961, would not join the Commonwealth were apartheid South Africa to remain a member.

[50] In response, Verwoerd stirred up a confrontation, causing many members to threaten to withdraw if South Africa's renewal of membership application was accepted.