The Reid Commission: How Five Commonwealth Jurists Drafted Malaya's Constitution

When Malaya’s leaders and the British government agreed, in early 1956, that independence should come by August 1957, they had a problem that a deadline could not solve on its own: the new country had no constitution. Rather than write one themselves, they handed the job to five jurists — none of them Malayan — and asked them to design, from the outside, the legal machinery of a state they would not live in.

That panel was the Reid Commission. The document it produced in 1957 became, after revision, the Constitution of the Federation of Malaya — and, with amendments, the constitution Malaysia still runs on today.

Where the Commission came from

The Commission did not appear on its own. In January and February 1956, an Alliance delegation led by Tunku Abdul Rahman met British ministers in London. One of the outcomes of that conference was an agreement that an independent commission should be appointed to recommend a constitution for a self-governing Malaya.

The Commission was formally constituted on 7 March 1956, with the approval of Queen Elizabeth II and the Conference of Rulers. It took its informal name from its chairman, Lord Reid — a serving British Lord of Appeal in Ordinary.

Who sat on it

The Commission had five members, drawn from four Commonwealth countries. Deliberately, none was from Malaya: the intention was a body seen as independent of the local political contest.

Member	Country	Background
Lord Reid (chairman)	United Kingdom	Lord of Appeal in Ordinary
Sir Ivor Jennings	United Kingdom	Constitutional scholar; Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge
Sir William McKell	Australia	Former Governor-General of Australia
B. Malik	India	Former Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court
Justice Abdul Hamid	Pakistan	Judge of the West Pakistan High Court

Canada had also been asked to nominate a member. Its nominee withdrew on medical grounds and was not replaced, leaving the Commission at five.

What it was asked to do

The Commission worked to a written brief. In substance, its terms of reference asked it to examine the existing constitutional arrangements across the Federation and to recommend a federal constitution for the whole country as a single, self-governing unit within the Commonwealth — one based on parliamentary democracy with a bicameral legislature, and drawn up with regard to the position and dignity of the Queen and of the Rulers.

Alongside that formal remit, the London settlement had set out several guiding requirements the constitution was expected to reflect, including:

• a strong central government, with the states and settlements keeping a measure of autonomy;
• safeguards for the position and prestige of the Rulers as constitutional monarchs of their states;
• a constitutional head of the whole Federation, to be chosen from among the Rulers;
• a common nationality for the Federation; and
• the safeguarding of the special position of the Malays and the legitimate interests of the other communities.

These instructions matter, because much of what people later described as the constitution’s “bargain” was in fact written into the Commission’s brief before it drafted a single clause.

How it worked

The Commission did not draft in isolation from Malayan opinion. It met in Malaya between June and October 1956, held 118 meetings, and invited submissions from the public and from organisations. It received 131 memoranda in response — from political parties, the Rulers, communal associations, trade bodies and individuals.

Out of that process came a report, dated 21 February 1957, setting out a draft constitution with an accompanying commentary explaining the reasoning behind each major choice: the federal–state division of powers, the office of a supreme head elected from among the Rulers, citizenship, fundamental liberties, and the position of the Malay community.

The one formal dissent

The report was not unanimous on every point. Justice Abdul Hamid appended notes of reservation, differing from his colleagues on several questions. The best known was his recommendation that Islam be declared the religion of the Federation — a provision the majority had been more cautious about, but which was ultimately included in the constitution as adopted.

From report to constitution

A commission report is a recommendation, not a law. After the Reid report was published, its draft was scrutinised by a local Working Party made up of representatives of the Rulers and of the Alliance government, together with senior British officials — the High Commissioner, the Chief Secretary and the Attorney General. That body reviewed the draft, adjusted a number of provisions, and produced the text that would actually be enacted.

The revised constitution was given legal force through parallel instruments. In the United Kingdom, the Federation of Malaya Independence Act 1957 received Royal Assent on 31 July 1957, providing for Malaya to become an independent country within the Commonwealth. On the Malayan side, the constitution was brought into operation so that it took effect as the supreme law of the new Federation on 31 August 1957 — Merdeka Day. What had begun as a drafting exercise by five outside jurists ended as the founding law of an independent state.

Why the Reid Commission still matters

Almost every recurring debate in Malaysian constitutional life traces back to decisions framed in 1956–57: the balance between federal and state power, the office of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong elected from among the Rulers, the terms of citizenship, and the provisions on the special position of the Malays and the religion of the Federation. Understanding those debates begins with understanding that they were shaped by a commission working to a fixed brief and a hard deadline — and then finalised by a local Working Party before they became law.

The Commission’s report is also, simply, a primary document: an open record of how a plural society tried to write down, in advance, the rules by which it would govern itself.

What’s next

• Read how the drafting fitted into the wider handover in Merdeka: how 31 August 1957 actually happened.
• See the constitutional argument the Commission was reacting to in the Malayan Union and the Federation of Malaya.
• Understand the institution the Commission was asked to safeguard in the nine royal houses of the Malay states.
• For the later expansion of the federation, see the formation of Malaysia in 1963.

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This article is classified as sensitive (3R+1: constitutional matters) under NegaraKu.md’s editorial policy, because it deals with the drafting of the Federal Constitution and the position of the Malay Rulers. It is written to be strictly descriptive and is held in draft pending human sign-off before publication.