Ordinance 50

Ordinance 50 of 1828 was a law issued by the British colonial government of the Cape Colony that lifted several legal restrictions that had been imposed on the Khoisan and other Coloured people. The law removed the requirement for non-white people to carry passes, afforded freedom of movement, allowed them to choose their employers, and own land. This in effect affirmed that they were entitled to the same legal rights as other free inhabitants of the colony. ^[1]

The ordinance was brought about after lobbying by the London Missionary Society, which had lobbied against White mistreatment against the Khoisan and Coloured inhabitants by documenting evidence of abuse and inequality against non-whites and supplying them to Britain. The law could not be repealed without permission of the imperial government in London, and was the foundation of the tradition of non-racialism under the law within the Cape Colony. As slavery was abolished in 1834, and the Cape Colony expanded after the Xhosa Wars, so too did those who fell under these protections.^[2]