Such moderate non-white groups as the African National Congress, the South African Indian Congress, and the African People's Organizahon were banned or limited, and their leaders (including Nobel Prize-winner Albert Luthule) were banished to native reserves, placed under house arrest, imprisoned, or executed. The Anglican and Roman Catholic churches had many of their leaders imprisoned or exiled, including the Anglican bishop of Cape Town.
Newspapers, magazines, and motion pictures were under strict censorship, and many foreign publications and authors were barred from entering South Africa. Authors, journalists, painters, sculptors, and other people in creative work were placed under strict control.
For the natives, things were even worse. Half of their children died before they were a year old. The most widely publicized example of police action against them was the Sharpville Massacre of 1960, when a non-violent protest against government policies was broken up by police, who killed 69 natives and wounded 180.
This is the background of Paton's novel, although it was published in 1948, when conditions were relatively good in South Africa, before the Nationalists came into power.
