A merry dance
Despite the breadth of the apartheid laws prescribing separation, there remained many areas of human and social interaction that were not covered by law. The city centres of South Africa were racially mixed. There were separate counters for the races in the post office and other government offices, but not in shops in most cities.
The law did not prohibit persons of different races from attending church services (although an attempt was made to do this) and from most forms of social interaction. Some organisations, such as the Institute of Race Relations and the Christian Institute, were open to all races. Foreign visitors often expressed surprise at the amount of racial mixing in shops and hotels in the major cities, in professional life, in church life and in interracial bodies.
The police believed that the law went further than it did, as was illustrated by a strange personal experience. One cold winter night shortly before midnight, I received a call from a friend who had been at a racially mixed dinner and dance party in Johannesburg organised by a group of radical clergy. At 11.30pm the police had disrupted the party and arrested them on the charge of interracial dancing. They had been taken to John Vorster Square, the police headquarters, and I was asked to secure their release on bail.
I drove down to John Vorster Square and asked the desk officer why my clients were being held. “There were blacks and whites dancing together, and this is against the law,” he said with disgust.
“There is no such crime,” I said. “Of course there is,” he replied and went off to consult his colleagues. Half an hour later, after consulting a lawyer, he returned. “You are right,” he said angrily, “but we are charging them instead with breaking the curfew law, which prohibits blacks from being in white areas.”
“But, officer,” I replied, “the curfew only comes into force at midnight and they were arrested at 11.30.”
Very reluctantly, and angrily, he was obliged to release my clients, who later sued successfully for wrongful arrest.