Reid Commission (1956-57)
This page covers the five-member commission that produced the draft constitution for an independent Malaya, the bargains written into its report, and the places where the constitution actually adopted in 1957 — after a tripartite Working Party revised the draft — differed from what the commission recommended.
what happened
The Reid Commission was appointed in 1956 to recommend a constitution for an independent Malaya. Its five members reported on 21 February 1957 with a draft constitution; that draft was one stage in the process, not the constitution enacted at independence.
On the special-position provisions, the Commission recorded that it found permanent communal privileges difficult to reconcile with parts of its terms of reference. It recommended that existing preferences continue for a substantial period and then be reduced and ultimately cease; for quotas, draft Article 157 proposed a review after 15 years, after which the legislature could retain, reduce or discontinue a quota. The recommendation was therefore for review, not automatic expiry.
The report's majority did not recommend a state-religion clause, while Justice Abdul Hamid appended a dissent proposing one. It also recommended enforceable fundamental rights, Malay as the national language with English retained as an official language for ten years, and limits on preventive detention.
Following objections, a Working Party of colonial officials, representatives of the Rulers and Alliance representatives revised the draft before independence. The enacted Article 153 contains neither the Commission's 15-year quota period nor a review clause. It now also names natives of Sabah and Sarawak alongside Malays, and Article 153(1) requires the Yang di-Pertuan Agong to safeguard both their special position and the legitimate interests of other communities.
The historical significance of those changes remains contested. Raja Aziz Addruse and Helen Ting infer a protective and time-bound original understanding; Abdul Aziz Abdul Rahman argues that removing the fixed period and placing Article 153 in the permanent body showed an intention for it to last; Andrew Yong regards the relocation as decisive. These are named interpretations of the drafting record, rather than conclusions settled by the Commission report alone.
the working
What the sources say
established
The commission was agreed at a London conference in January 1956 attended by representatives of the Malay Rulers, the Chief Minister and three other ministers, and the High Commissioner and his advisers, which also agreed that independence should be proclaimed by August 1957.
Surendra Ananth · Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 (Colonial No. 330)
established
Its five members were Lord Reid (a British judge, chairman), Sir Ivor Jennings (Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge), Sir William McKell (former Governor-General of Australia), B. Malik (former Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court) and Justice Abdul Hamid (West Pakistan High Court).
Surendra Ananth · Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957
established
The members were appointed "in the name of Her Majesty The Queen and Their Highnesses the Rulers", and the terms of reference required recommendations for a federal constitution "based on Parliamentary democracy with a bicameral legislature", including a strong central government with states enjoying a measure of autonomy, safeguards for the Rulers' position, a constitutional Head of State chosen from among the Rulers, "a common nationality for the whole of the Federation", and "the safeguarding of the special position of the Malays and the legitimate interests of other communities".
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Surendra Ananth
established
The commission held public and private hearings between June and October 1956 and reported on 21 February 1957, with a draft constitution attached; the report was published in London by HMSO as Colonial No. 330.
Surendra Ananth · Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957
established
The Alliance (UMNO, MCA, MIC), which had won 51 of 52 elected seats in the July 1955 federal election, submitted a joint memorandum to the commission on 25 September 1956; on 27 September 1956 Tunku Abdul Rahman told the commission orally that the Malays' special position should be reviewed after 15 years.
established
The commission recommended that fundamental rights be guaranteed in the constitution and enforceable by the courts, and expressly declined to include non-justiciable "principles or aims of policy", saying any such guarantee "would be illusory because it would be unenforceable in law".
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Surendra Ananth
established
The report identified four existing safeguards of the Malays' special position: Malay land reservations, quotas for admission to the public services, quotas for certain business permits and licences, and preference in scholarships, bursaries and other educational aid.
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Andrew Yong
established
The commission wrote that it found it "difficult... to reconcile the terms of reference if the protection of the special position of the Malays signified the granting of special privileges, permanently, to one community only and not to the others", and recorded that both the Alliance and the Rulers had used language pointing away from permanent communal privilege.
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Raja Aziz Addruse and Helen Ting
established
Its recommendations were made "on the footing that the Malays should be assured that the present position will continue for a substantial period, but that in due course the present preferences should be reduced and should ultimately cease so that there should then be no discrimination between races or communities".
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Andrew Yong
established
On quotas, the report (draft Art. 157) recommended that no new quota or preference could be created, that existing quotas be obligatory for 15 years, that unfilled Malay quota places be filled by other qualified applicants rather than left vacant, and that "after 15 years there should be a review of the whole matter", with the legislature then deciding to retain, reduce or discontinue any quota.
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Surendra Ananth
established
On land, the report recommended (draft Art. 82) no further Malay reservations subject to two qualifications, leaving each state to reduce its own reservations at an appropriate time, and declining to give the Federation overriding powers because land is a state subject.
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Surendra Ananth
established
A majority of the commission declined to recommend a state religion clause, recording Counsel for the Rulers as saying it was "Their Highnesses' considered view that it would not be desirable to insert some declaration... that the Muslim Faith or Islamic Faith be the established religion of the Federation".
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Surendra Ananth
established
Justice Abdul Hamid appended a note of dissent arguing that the Alliance's unanimous recommendation should be accepted, proposing wording that "Islam shall be the religion of the State of Malaya, but nothing in this article shall prevent any citizen professing any religion other than Islam to profess, practice and propagate that religion", and listing more than a dozen states with comparable clauses.
Note of Dissent by Mr. Justice Abdul Hamid · Surendra Ananth
established
The report also recommended Malay as the national language with English retained as an official language for 10 years, and that preventive detention be illegal except under emergency legislation, with no citizen detained beyond three months without a favourable report from an advisory board appointed by the Chief Justice.
Report of the Federation of Malaya Constitutional Commission 1957 · Surendra Ananth
established
After the report drew objections, a tripartite Working Party was appointed to examine it, made up of four colonial government officials (chaired by High Commissioner MacGillivray), four representatives of the Malay Rulers and four Alliance representatives including Tunku Abdul Rahman and Abdul Razak; it held 23 meetings between 22 February and 27 April 1957.
established
The Working Party did not carry the commission's 15-year quota period and fixed review into the constitutional text, and the special-position provision was moved out of the temporary and transitional part of the draft into the permanent body of the constitution, where it became Article 153.
established
The review was dropped from the constitution but not from the government's stated intention. Constitutional Proposals for the Federation of Malaya (Cmnd. 210) recorded that the commission's 15-year review "was given careful consideration but it was not considered necessary to include such a provision in the Constitution. It was considered preferable that, in the interests of the country as a whole, as well as of the Malays themselves, the Yang di-Pertuan Agong should cause a review of the revised proposals to be made from time to time." No review clause of any kind was written into Article 153.
established
Contrary to the commission majority, a declaration on religion was included. Constitutional Proposals for the Federation of Malaya (Cmnd. 210) recorded that "there has been included in the proposed Federal Constitution a declaration that Islam is the religion of the Federation", adding that this "will in no way affect the present position of the Federation as a secular State, and every person will have the right to profess and practice his own religion and the right to propagate his religion", subject to state law restricting propagation among Muslims. In the current constitutional text, Article 3(1) reads: "Islam is the religion of the Federation; but other religions may be practised in peace and harmony in any part of the Federation."
established
Other Working Party changes to the draft included re-wording citizenship by registration to confer some government discretion, replacing permission to use Chinese and Tamil in the legislatures with permission to use them for non-official purposes, enhancing the role of the Conference of Rulers, and giving dual nationals one year to choose one nationality.
Surendra Ananth · Constitutional Proposals for the Federation of Malaya
established
Citizenship by operation of law rests on qualifications listed in the Second Schedule rather than on a general retrospective birthright, Article 14(1) providing for citizenship by operation of law for persons falling within those Schedule categories.
established
Article 153 no longer reads as it did in 1957. It is now headed "Reservation of quotas in respect of services, permits, etc., for Malays and natives of any of the States of Sabah and Sarawak", and Article 153(1) provides: "It shall be the responsibility of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong to safeguard the special position of the Malays and natives of any of the States of Sabah and Sarawak and the legitimate interests of other communities in accordance with the provisions of this Article." The duty to safeguard the legitimate interests of other communities sits in the same clause as the duty to safeguard the special position.
Federal Constitution · Federal Constitution (reprint as at 1 November 2010)
established
The reference to the natives of Sabah and Sarawak was not in the 1957 text. The words "and natives of any of the Borneo States" were inserted after "Malays" in Article 153(1), (2), (3), (6), (8) and (9) by the Constitution (Amendment) Act 1971 (Act A30), in force from 10 March 1971, and replaced by "the States of Sabah and Sarawak" by Act A354 in 1976. Clauses (8A) and (9A) were also inserted by Act A30.
established
Article 153(2) directs the Yang di-Pertuan Agong to exercise his functions so as to reserve for Malays and natives of Sabah and Sarawak "such proportion as he may deem reasonable" of federal public service positions, scholarships and educational or training privileges, and of permits or licences for trades or businesses where federal law requires one. Article 153(7) provides that nothing in the Article operates to deprive any person of a right, privilege, permit or licence already accrued to or held by him. The Article fixes no proportion and sets no end date.
Federal Constitution · Federal Constitution (reprint as at 1 November 2010)
established
Article 153 is referenced elsewhere in the constitution as it now stands: Article 38(5) requires the Conference of Rulers to be consulted before any change in policy affecting administrative action under Article 153, and Article 10(4) permits Parliament, when restricting freedom of expression in the interest of security or public order, to prohibit the questioning of any matter protected by Part III or by Article 152, 153 or 181. Article 10(4) was not part of the 1957 text: it was added by Act A30, section 2, in force from 10 March 1971.
Federal Constitution · Federal Constitution (reprint as at 1 November 2010)
where accounts differ
The parts nobody agrees on
contested
Whether Article 153 was meant to be temporary is disputed. Raja Aziz Addruse and Helen Ting argue the special position was originally a protective measure for a then socio-economically disadvantaged community rather than a permanent constitutional feature, pointing to Alliance leaders' own request for a 15-year review.
contested
Against that, Abdul Aziz Abdul Rahman, writing for the Malay National Consultative Council, argues that the deliberate removal of the 15-year limit and the entrenchment of Article 153 in the permanent part of the constitution is "more than sufficient to justify the contention that Article 153 was intended for the long term".
contested
Andrew Yong argues the relocation of the clause was the decisive change, because quotas could thereafter "be continued or revived indefinitely by the Government of the day unless there was a constitutional amendment", and that the specific 15-year review was replaced by vaguer language about review "from time to time".
alleged
Yong further states that MCA representatives did not grasp the implications of moving the clause into the permanent part of the constitution until June 1957, when the text was all but finalised; this is his characterisation of the negotiation rather than a finding drawn from the Working Party record.
uncertain
Surendra Ananth, drawing on Joseph M. Fernando's monograph, reports that the Malay Rulers preferred to keep the commission's 15-year periodic review because removing it would render the equality guarantee in Article 8 illusory, and that the Alliance position prevailed; the Rulers' internal reasoning rests on Fernando's reading of the archival record.
contested
Accounts of who objected to what after the report differ in emphasis: Surendra Ananth records Malay organisations objecting that citizenship by registration or naturalisation should be discretionary, Chinese groups objecting that jus soli was not made retrospective, and UMNO objecting both to the 15-year cap and to the absence of an official religion. Each is his summary of the 1957 reaction rather than a settled finding.