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CANADIAN POLITICS

J. RO BBRT IvO NG

WITH SPEECHES

BY THE LEADERS OF REFORM AND PROGRESS

IN CANADIAN POLITICS AND

GOVERNMENT

ST. CATHARINES, ONT.

THE JOURNAI. OF ST. CATHARINES, I.IMITED

I 903

\Entered according to Act of Parliament of Canada

in the year 1903, by J. Robert Long,

at the Department of Agriculture.

INDEX.

Page
CHAPTER I.

Party Government 1

CHAPTER n.
Freer Trade vs. High Tariffs 6

CHAPTER HI.

Results of the National Policy 14

CHAPTER IV.
The Farmer and the National Policy 21

CHAPTER V.
The Conservative Campaign Book 25

CHAPTER VI.
Is High Protection Coming 32

CHAPTER VII.

Six Years. Under Liberal Rule 36

CHAPTER VIII.
Principles of Liberalism 44

CHAPTER IX.
Canada's Eve of Prosperity 48

CHAPTER X.
Why High Tariffs are Advocated 54

CHAPTER XI.
The Liberal Party, a Party of Reform 57

CHAPTER XII.
High Tariffs a Destructive Force 63

ii INDEX

CHAPTER XIIT.
The Imperial Trade Policy 66

CHAPTER XIV.
Canada's Western development 72

PART II.

SPEECHES.

CANADA'S GREATNESS.

Right Honorable Sir Wilfrid Laurier 79

A GREAT COUNTRY TO GOVERN.

Hon. Alex. Mackenzie 83

THE SOURCES OF WEALTH.

Sir Richard Cartwright 87

VALUE OF THE FRANCHISE.

Hon. Edward Blake 90

CANADA; PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE.

Sir Oliver Mowat 99

CANADA'S DESTINY.

Hon. R. Harcourt 118

THE EVILS OF PROTECTION.

Hon. David Mills 124

MANITOBA SCHOOL QUESTION. I

Right Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier 133

THE BOURASSA MOTION.

Right Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier 186

INDEX ill

THE IDEAL PARLIAMENT.

Hon. D. C. Eraser 140

THE TWO POLICIES.

Sir Richard Cartwright 143

EARLY STRUGGLES OF REFORMERS.

Hon. Alex. Mackenzie 157

IMPORTANT ASSETS.

Hon. J. M. Gibson 167

THE PREFERENTIAL TARIFF.

Hon. Wni. Paterson 170

THE FUTURE OF CANADA.

Hon. Geo. W. Ross 177

STABILITY OF TARIFFS.

Hon. W. S. Fielding 188

DALTON McCarthy on protection 193

SLAVERY x\ND PROTECTION.

G. W. W. Dawson, ex-M. P 194

THE NATIONAL POLICY AND THE FARMER.

J. N. Grieves, ex- M. P 196

THE LIBERAL PARTY.

Sir Richard Cartwright 202

THE NATIONAL POLICY.

Hon. David Mills 206

FARMERS AND THE TARIFF.

Hon Sydney Fisher 214

QUALITIES OF A GREAT STATESMAN.

Hon. Geo. W. Ross 217

THE CONSERVATIVE POLICY.

Hon. Alex. Mackenzie 233

PREFACE.

One of the Greek philosophers has written "All
who have meditated on the art of governing mankind
have been convinced that the fate of the empire de-
pends upon the education of the youth." Cicero says
"Be a pattern to others and all will go well; for as a
whole city is affected by the licentious passions and
vices of great men so it is likewise reformed by their
moderation."

Just as a nation will be affected by the incompet-
ency and evils of a bad administration so will it be-
come great and prosperous by the good and wise leg-
islation of its administrators, and since an adminis-
tration is but a I'eflex of the people how very impor-
tant it is that the people read, think and act for
themselves and those who are to partake of their
names and their blood.

Though I may not be able to inform men more
than they know, yet I may by this work give them
occasion to think, hence this volume is particularly
written to educate and inspire the young men of Can-
ada upon whose good or bad performances of public
duties depends the future greatness or weakness of
our country.

Although it may be charged that I have been led
by the indiscreetness of party passion, I must say that
I never engaged in a work in which I desired to be
more accurate, or in which I have been more solici-
tous to terminate with honor and dignity.

vi PREFACE

The protection of the liberty of Canadians is a
duty we owe to ourselves who enjoy it and to gih*
posterity who will claim at their hands, this the best
birthright and noblest inheritance of mankind.

Living in the possession of peace and happiness
and liberty, under the guidance of a mild and benefi-
cent religion; protected by impartial laws and the
purest administration of justice; under a system of
goverrunent which our present experiences lead us to
pronounce the best and wisest that has ever been
fr£iined and which is the admiration of the world,
shall we not as loyal Canadians, true to our forefa-
thers, to ourselves and our posterity, exert every
honorable and legitimate effort to perpetuate the
same?

That this volume will contribute to some extent
in that direction the author earnestly hopes.

CANADIAlsr POLITICS

CHAPTER 1.

We are told by a certain class of people that there
is no necessity for party organization in Canada, but
when it is understood that nearly all the good that
has been achieved by parliaments has been attained by
party combinations and connections, readers will ad-
mit that party government is a necessity and will
exist so long as there are people to be governed.

Now what is a party?

A party is an instrument, and an instrument is a
thing ordained for a certain end. It is like a tool
that the mechanic uses; it is no use in itself, but it
is of use in the hands of those who wield it-.

We have before us two instruments in the hands
of the people. We have the Liberal instrument and
we have the Conservative instrument. Both of these
purport and profess to be instruments for attaining
and working out the public good.

Now what is the public good?

Where are you to look for it?

We are not to look for it in promises and anticipa-
tions, not in the mere froth of light phrases and san-
guine minds, but in the light of experience, in the his-
tory and traditions of our country.

(I)

CANj ADIAN POLITICS.

iclua'ls,' ih'e Conservative party of 8

of one set of indiv-
party of another, and we are
to look at these two sets as we would look at the
tool, and see for ourselves which has done the oest
work. If your verdict finds favor with the Liberal
party and its principles, then it becomes your duty to
commit the future care of your province and country
to a Liberal administration; if your verdict finds fa-
vor with the Conservative party and its principles,
then it becomes your duty to commit the future care
of your province and country to a Conservative ad-
ministration. We are also to look at these two par-
ties and see which of them has carried out the best
and most enlightened measures for the benefits -^f the
people and whose principles are at the present time
best constituted to meet the needs of the hour and
the needs of future generations so far as we can see.
Before proceeding with the records of these parties
it will be well to impress upon the reader what im-
portance attaches itself to the representation of a
constituency in our Houses of Parliament, Scarcely
any higher honor can be conferred upon an individual
than to be selected from among his fellowmen to rep-
resent and guide the destinies of a great and free
people. Scarcely any duty can be more sacred than
to elect men to Parliament to perform the work of a
great and growing country, and upon whose good or
bad performance of that work will depend the light-
ening or the aggravating of the burdens of life for
ourselves and our children through generations yet
to come.

CANADIAN POLITICS. 3

We say therefore to the tens of thousands of young
men who stand every year upon the threshold of man-
hood and who are called upon to make their choice of
the parties with which they shall cast their lots and
their activities, consider these grave responsibilities
to the best of your ability; with that judgment which
will enable you to discharge your public duties in con-
sonance with your convictions of what is best in the
interests of the public good.

Let us take the policies adopted by these two
political parties and contrast their promises with
their results.

The policy of the Conservative party, under the
leadership of the late Sir John A. Macdonald, an-
nounced prior to the general elections of 1878 would

Abolish business depression.

Stop the exodus.

Turn the balance of trade in our favor.

Tax British goods in bulk less than foreign.

Give the farmer a home market.

Develop our mineral wealth.

Obtain reciprocity with the United States.

Reduce the debt to $100,000,000 by 1890.

Place a million people in the Northwest by 1891.

Cause the erection of tall "chimneys and give em-
ployment to thousands of men, who, it was claimed,
were forced to seek employment in the United States.

The policy of the Liberal party, adopted at a
national convention of Liberals at Ottawa, in the
m.onth of June, 1893, embodied the following resolu-
tions:—

4 CANADIAN POLITICS.

"That the tariff should be so adjusted as to make
free, or to bear as lightly as possible the necessaries
of life, and should be so arranged as to promote freer
trade with the whole world, more particularly with
Great Britain and the United States.

"That having regard to the prosperity of Canada
and the United States as adjoining countries with
many mutual interests, it is desirable that there
should be the most friendly relations and broad and
liberal trade intercourse between them.

"That a fair and liberal reciprocity treaty would
develop the great national resources of Canada, would
enormously increase the trade and commerce between
the two countries, would tend to encourage friendly
relations betw^een the two peoples, would remove many
causes which have in the past provoked irritation and
trouble to the Government of both countries and'
would promote those kindly relations between the Em-
pire and the Republic which afford the best guarantee
for peace and prosperity:

"That any treaty so arranged will receive the as-
sent of Her Majesty's Government, without whose
approval no treaty can be made.

"That this convention deplores the gross corrup-
tion in the management and expenditure of public
monies, which for years past has existed under rule
of the Conservative party, and the revelations of
which by the different parliamentary committees of
enquiry have brought disgrace upon the fair name of
Canada,

"That we demand the strictest economy in the ad-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 5

ministration of the government of the country.

"That the sales of public lands of the Dominion
should be to actual settlers only, and not to specula-
tors, upon reasonable terms of settlement, and in such
areas as can be reasonably occupied and cultivated by
the settler.

"That in view of the fact that the Dominion
Franchise Act has since its introductory c^ost the Do-
minion Treasury over one million dollars, and that
each revision involves an additional expenditure of a
quarter of a million dollars, and that its provisions
are less liberal than those already existing in many
provinces of the Dominion, it is the opinion of the
convention that the act should be repealed and we
should revert to the Provincial Franchise.

"That to put an end to the Gerrymander acts it
is desirable that county boundaries should be preserv-
ed in electoral divisions, and that in no case should
parts of different counties be put in one electoral div-
ision:

"That the constitution of the Senate should be
amended so as to bring it into harmony with the
principles of popular government."

The merits of these two policies we shall discuss
further on in this work.

CHAPTER II.

It is our purpose now to discuss the principles of
freer trade and those of high tariffs, which have long
been, and still are, the real issues between the two
parties. We will first review the experience of England
under both of these systems and compare her position
and conditions with the position and conditions of the
United States, which has always been a highly pro-
tected country, because these two countries, being the
two great factors in commerce will serve to illustrate
by figures, and conditions which we all know to exist,
the results of their respective policies.

Under the most stringent system of protection
ever known in Great Britain, the growth of British
exports, commencing with the year 1805, with $190,-
000,000, in 1825 was $194,000,000, a net increase in
twenty years of $4,000,000, or at the rate of $200,-
000 per annum.

Under a somewhat reduced protective tariff as to
manufactures, but with duties ranging from 20 to 30
per cent., British exports increased from $194,000,000
in- 1825 to $237,000,000 in 1842, a net increase in 17
years of $43,000,000, or at the rate of about $2,500,-
000 per year.

After protection to manufactures had been substan-
tially abandoned in 1842, but while protection to ag-
riculture and shipping continued, exports increased

(6)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 7

rapidly, rising from $237,000,000 in 1842, to $289,-
000,000 in 1846, or to the extent of $52,000,000, a
greater gain in four years than had been achieved in
thirty-seven years of protection.

With further removals of restriction on British
©xchanges; on food products in 1846, and in shipping
in 1849 the increase in the value of British exports
was rapid and continuous, rising from. $289,000,000
in 1846 to the enormous amount of $1,432,000,000 in
1880, to $3,315,000,000 in 1893.

The total increase of British exports and imports
during its last thirty years of protection was
as nearly as real values can be ascertained, about
$346,000,000.

The like increase in the first three years of f^'ee
trade was $2,400,000,000, or seven times as large as
under the thirty years of protection.

Between the years 1816 and 1840, under the
restrictive system, a period of twenty-four years, the
total increase of British tonnage was only 80,000
tons. In 1848, the last year of British Navigation
Laws, the aggregate tonnage was 3,000,000 tons.
In 1858 it was 4,651,000, an increase of 1,257,000 in
ten years. In 1878 it was 5,780,000 and in 1880 it
was 6, 574,000.

Previous to the repeal of the British Corn Laws
the wealth of Great Britain increased at a slower rate
than population.

Since 1849 the increase of the population has been
in the ratio of about 33 per cent., the wealth 130 per
cent. In 1841 the capital of British Savings Bank

o CANADIAN POLITICS.

was $120,000,000, in 1880 it was $388,000,000. In
1850 there w^re 920,000 paupers in England and
Wales, and in 1893, notwithstanding* the population
increased about 33 per cent, there were but 803,000
paupers. In 1850 there were 51,000 convictions for
crime and in 1893 there were but 9,797„

While it is true that the United States has become
a great and powerful nation under the system of pro-
tection, its effect upon the great masses of the people
has been most disastrous. Large manufacturing es-
tablishments in every part of the country are fre-
quently standing idle or working on short time,
their workmen serving at reduced wages, while strikes,
lockouts, riots, murder and bloodshed fill the pages of
her annual records. Large numbers of her people are
without employment, their wives and children are
begging for bread through her streets, and honest
men in their efforts to secure employm^ent are being
imprisoned for vagrancy.

But, lest the reader should suppose that I am, for
my own ends, misrepresenting the real condition of
the people of that country, I desire to give you the
most unimpeachable testimony in the shape of an ex-
tract from a speech delivered in Congress by Mr.
Ward, an eminent American politician who dared to
speak of the situation in the United States as fol-
lows:

"We are all familiar with the accounts of unparal-
leled and increasing destitution among our own work-
ing population. Let not repetition dull our minds so
that we cannot see, nor steel our hearts so that we

CANADIAN POLITICS. 9

cannot feel, the force of facts so often told and so
well authenticated.

''Multitudes of temperate, industrious, and well-
trained mechanics, and of young women of honour-
able independence of character and sensitive about re-
ceiving charity in any form.' or shape, have lost all
hope, and in the depths of destitution and despair are
begging to- be saved from lingering death from hunger
by being sent to places intended for the reception of
vagrants and criminals.

"The representatives of the Boston Board of
Trade assert that the people of Massachusetts are
deeply impressed, as are many others in all parts of
our country, with the fact that difficulties and deprec-
iation are besetting every branch of industry. These
formidable disasters are not confined to the great
cities, but even in the smaller manufacturing towns,
also, are found people seeking for work, and the gen-
eral cry is: 'It is our trade relations that are wrong
and unsound; what have you to suggest to lift us out
of the slough of despond?'

"In this prospect are the facts as we now find
them to be thrust aside as if of no moment, in the
present depressed condition of our trade and man-
ufactures? Year after year the plight of our laboring
men throughout the country, and especially in the
regions dependent on manufactures and commerce, has
grown worse and worse. Year by year since 1872
the attractions presented to the laborers of Europe
have sensibly diminished, until in the last fiscal year
the immigrants to ©ur shores were less by nearly

lo CANADIAN POLITICS.

three hundred thousand than they were four years
a^o, the actual reduction within that time having
been from 437,750 to 169,986. These new comers go, it
is to be supposed, to friends who are ready to receive
them, chiefly in those parts of the country least
affected by the prevalent distress."

Need I say that a perpetuation of the present
fiscal policy of the United States will sooner or later
shatter the foundations of its political systems; that
unless a revolution of ideas, tempered by education
and worked out through the ballot, soon overtakes
that country it will be plunged into deadly turmoil,
from which it will take years to recover. By nothing
short of a complete change in its fiscal policy can the
m^^ischiefs that have been done by an unwise and med-
dlesome policy be corrected. This is not a matter of
doubt. The daily records and the tendencies of the
time afford ample proof that a revolution is inevit-
able. Not only must this obnoxious system be abol-
ished by the United States, it must be abolished by
the nations of the world, for until this hindrance to
trade created by hostile tariffs is removed, the time
will never com'e when the intelligence and the true in-
terests of nations will overcome the motives and pas-
sions which plunge them into war and the pestilence
and famine which follow in its trail.

The imposition of heavy duties on foreign manu-
factures simply taxes the consumers in the country
where this tax is levied. But, says the advocate of
high tariffs — we will increase our industry and manu-
factures by this duty. How, I ask, are we going to

CANADIAN POLITICS. ii

do it? We simply take the duty, or taxes, from the
consumer and give it to the other, the producer.
There are only two results, as plain to be seen as the
light of day. The first is that we have products to
export and having a high tariff against us we find
ourselves with an over production; secondly, we lessen
the home demand for we have put obstacles in the
way of the consumer in buying, the same as we have
in the way of the producer selling. What is the re-
sult? Our industries are in trouble, for being forced
into an unnatural activity they produce more than we
can consume, the home market becomes glutted, we
have no foreign market to relieve us, our labor is
only employed half the time and our wages are cut
in two.

While I readily concede that we cannot have free
trade, we can have freer trade and the more we re-
duce our taxation, the more freedom we extend to in-
iustry, the better the market and the more stable
will be our institutions. Industry, having little
restriction as to market, would have all the develop-
ment of which it is capable, which would enable it ta
acquire a maximum of stability.

Freer trade, or a reduced system of taxation, is
therefore an economical ideal, and should absorb the
interest of all loyal and enthusiastic Canadians. We
build telegraph and railway lines and we welcome the
extension of steamship lines and other means of inter-
communication with the nations of the world — to ex-
tend the sphere of exchanges. We recognize in these
systems a powerful instrument in destroying the diSr-

12 CANADIAN POLITICS.

tances to the profit of the exchanges from city to
city and from people to people. Now, is it wisdom
to impose upon ourselves great sacrifices to multiply
the ways to facilitate the exchanges and on the other
hand to maintain a high tariff system to interrupt
them? Such a flagrant contradiction must eventually
impress all minds. Either we must cease the construc-
tion of the agents of civilization or we must continue
to reduce our tariffs. We must see that high tariffs
have brought nothing to the people, that they have
robbed them of their natural rights and that it would
be an excellent operation to substitute for them, rev-
enue taxes. Sir Robert Peel took this position as the
basis of his financial policy and the budgets of Great
Britain whose accounts showed a continual deficit be-
fore the reforms of Peel afterwards presented, as I
have already shown, in the preceding chapter, a regu-
lar surplus.

The abolition of the high tariffs to a moderate
tariff would enable the nations of the world to trade
freely with each other, would increase the commerce
enormously and would gradually make them become
like one grand nation. Their commercial interests
would multiply on such a scale, their natural know-
ledge and intercourse would become so intimate that
standing armies would be dissolved and labor would
reap its just reward. Is not commerce the handmaid
of freedom and civilization? Why then should nations
build barriers against that commerce?

Until high tariff systems are abolished slavery will
be but half abolished. Emancipation will be but half

CANADIAN POLITICS. 13

completed, while millions of men, born to be free and
equal, possessing the ballot, exercise their power in
supporting policies and fads that deprive them of
their liberties. In our fiscal systems, as in our laws,
there should be order and security, that the lowest as
well as the highest, the poor as well as the rich
should be protected. That is liberty, the liberty for
which our fathers fought and fell, and this is the lib-
erty we can demand today through the ballot box and
which it is the duty of every man to defend in every
extremity.

CHAPTER III.

Let us now see how the promises of the fathers
of the National Policy contrast with the experiences.
Instead of reducing the debt of $140,362,069 in
1878 to $100,000,000 by 1890 as this National Pol-
icy was to have done, the records show that it was
more than doubled during these years. The exodus
was to have been stopped and tall chimneys were to
be erected all over the country and an all absorbing
n:karket would be created for the farmer, "Our work-
men," said Sir John Macdonald, "can be fully em-
ployed if we encourage our manufacturers, they will
not go over to the United States to add wealth and
strength to a foreign country and to deprive us of
that strength and wealth." In his resolution in 1878
he said: "Such a policy will retain in Canada thous-
ands of our fellow countrymen now obliged to expat-
riate themselves in search of the employment denied
them at home." But what are the facts? Instead of
stopping the exodus, we find it increased. The Gov-
ernment's records show that during the ten years
1881 to 1891, 886,000 immigrants came into Canada.
Allowing the natural growth to be expected from our
own population during the same period we should
have added some 604,000 to the returns of 1881.
These two totals would have shown an increase in
1891 of 1,490,000 over the returns of 1881. But
what do the census takers discover? Why, that 980,-
(14)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 15

000 persons born in Canada were residents of the
United States and that about one million and a half
children had been born unto these residents since they
had become citizens of that country.

But what were the conditions of the workingmen
under this system that Sir John Macdonald said
would ''fully employ the thousands of our fellow coun-
trymen who were now obliged to seek employment in
a foreign country?" Were they afforded employment
here?

Let us consult two of their organs in that respect,
two newspapers whose editoral columns, full of praise
for the National Policy, in their news columns tell of
the deplorable conditions which existed during its
regime:

Toronto World. — "The City Engineer's Department
is besieged every day with men seeking work, some
of whom become abusive when they are not given it.
Deputy Engineer Rust stated Saturday that the de-
partment is doing all it can to furnish employment,
but there is very little civic work going on, outside
the Island waterworks and the Rosedale ravine drive.
All the men applying for work are sent to the fore-
men, who put their names upon the list and they re-
ceive work as their turn comes."

Toronto News. — "The problem of finding work
for the unemployed of this city is beyond solution by
the municipality, and if anything is to be done to re-
lieve the distress of the thousands of worthy and hon-
est people who do not know which way to turn for
the commonest necessaries of life, the Government of

i6 CANADIAN POLITICS.

the Province must lend its aid. During the past few
years the City Council has appropriated sums of ten
and twenty thousand dollars for relief work, but this
was only a drop in the bucket.

"It did not to any appreciable extent relieve the
strain. An expenditure of ten thousand dollars meant
only five or six dollars for the head of each family
that was in need. And even this amount spent in
useless work (as most of it was) was taken from tax-
payers wiio were suffering almost as severely as the
unemployed.

"The aldermen have not set the question aside with-
out giving it consideration, for time and again it has
been discussed with an earnest desire to find a remedy.
For a period of two years Aid. Shaw and Aid. Lamb
investigated every scheme that was suggested, and
made enquiries from every source of information
within their knowledge in an endeavor to inaugurate
some plan that would bring about the desired result.
But they failed, as anyone else who attempts to solve
the riddle from a municipal standpoint.

"The city has not got the money for the work,
and moreover, the city is not in any sense responsible
for the congregation of unemployed in its limits.
Thousands of those who are seeking aid from the
civic department have been residents of the city for
only two or three years. They have no claim on the
charity of the taxpayers. They came from surround-
ing towns when times became hard, and they got out
of work, with the hope that in the larger community
they would have a better chance to find something to

CANADIAN POLITICS. 17

do. In doing so they have made the cpmpetition that
BQ-uch keener for those who have been living here for
many years. If the city services had to provide only
for old residents, there would not be so much distress.
It is the ingathering of the needy from every direction
that renders the situation acute.

This being the case the matter becomes one for
the Government of the Province to deal with. Seven-
eighths of those who are in want are — and have been
nearly all their lives — inhabitants of this Province,
and the other eighth were brought here from Great
Britain and Ireland with public funds. The responsi-
bility of doing something for the relief therefore rests
upon the Government."

Are these not powerful arguments against the
National Policy? Conservative newspapers of the city
of Toronto asking the Provincial Government to re-
dress wrongs perpetrated by the Federal Government
who '^brought from Great Britain and Ireland with
public funds" these unemployed! But that is not all.
Here is another tale of woe from the Monetary Times
of Toronto: —

''The employees of the Zoeliner furniture factory.
Mount Forest, some 46 in number, married men and
householders, have petitioned the council of the town
to take into consideration, and if possible, adopt
some means by which work at said factory may be
resumed and employment offered them."

Bo we read of such conditions today, under a re-
duced system of taxation? Is Canada not progressing
more rapidly under a freer system of trade than ever

i8 CANADIAN POLITICS.

before? And is it not reasonable to expect that with
a still freer trade policy, her development would be of
a still more pronounced character? But strides in the
matter of reducing tariffs must be gradual. They
must come, and come they will. The sense of the peo-
ple of the civilized nations of the world, will even-
tually demand the abolition of high tariffs.

Business depression would be abolished under the
operation of the National Policy. But was it?

Taking the quarterly summary shown by the re-
ports in the Monetary Times, given by the com-
mercial agency of R. G. Dun & Co, ending March,
1896, we find a terrible list of failures. This report
says: "One hundred and twenty-five merchants owing
an average of $7,000 each and one hundred and eleven
grocers and provision dealers, owing in all $350,000,
have made assignments in the past three months.
Fifty-seven dry goods dealers, forty-five hardware
dealers and forty-four shoe merchants owing between
them close upon a million and a half dollars, have
come to grief in the same period of time." The
total number of failures in this short space of time
aggregated 738, owing $5,475,000 and showing as-
sets of no more than $4,258,000. In the month of
March, this same com.mercial agency reports that 109
chattel mortgages were given by farmers in Ontario in
one day. The balance of trade which was to have
been turned in our favor, one of the predictions, and
one of the promises of the National Policy advocates
was turned against us during its regime to the ex-
tent of $200,000,000.

CANADIAN POLITICS. 19

The development of mines did not materialize and
instead of a population of one million people in the
Northwest it is notorious that there were less than
two hundred and fifty thousand, so that on the whole,
contrasting its promises with the results, Canada's
experience with high tariffs has been a sad and deplor-
able one.

Not only did its system create trusts and monop-
olies, but it decreased the value of farm and other
properties; it impeded our national progress; it dis-
criminated against the mother country; it oppressed
the masses of the people; it enriched the. favored few,,
and made possible, curruption on a very great scale,,
so much so, that corruption perpetrated under its sys-
tem has been the greatest blot upon the fair name of
Canada; to wit — the McGreevy conspiracy and the
Langevin-Caron reptile fund, the Curran Bridge Scan-
dal, the Tay Canal Scandal, the St. Charles Branch
Railway Scandal, the Little Rapids Lock Scandal, the
Galop Rapids Channel Scandal, the Printing Bureau
Scandal, the Fredericton and St. Mary's Bridge Scan-
dal, the Caraquet Railway Scandal and others that
need not be mentioned.

A lucrative home market was promised to the
farmers, but here again its operations failed. Never
during our whole political history were farm products
sold at prices so low as from the year 1884 to 1894,
when wheat declined 31 per cent, per bushel, barley
24 per cent, per bushel, oats 15 per cent, per bushel,
rye 24 per cent, per bushel and peas 22 per cent, per
bushel. Protection therefore proved a failure to the

lO CANADIAN POLITICS.

farmer, whose only hope lies in a freer trade policy
giving him access to the markets of the world, par-
ticularly those of the United States.

CHAPTER IV.

The question is often asked why farm lands de-
creased in value. They decreased for the same reason
that other stocks decreased — because the profit, after
the expenses of working them was paid, was so small.
Compare the returns from farm lands with the profits
upon capital diverted by the protective policy into
manufacturing industries. Remember that not only
were the farm lands starved for want of money at a
low rate in interest for their improvements, but in ad-
dition to being thus deprived of the use of the capital
of the country, the farmers were obliged by hi^h pro-
tection to pay the high rate of profit upon the capital
invested in the tariff-fed manufacturing industries. For
this reason the following comparison of profits will
have great interest for the farmers and the great
masses of our people whose welfare is bound up with
that of the farmers.

According to the census of 1891 the manufactur-
ers' condition in that year was as follows:

The capital invested amounted to $353,837,000

Value of product 475,446,000

Cost of raw material 255,983,000

Cost of labor 99,763, OGO

Number of hands 367,000

Am.ount of profit after deducting raw

material 219,463.000

Amount of profit per hand employed ... 596

22 CANADIAN POLITICS.

Average wage paid each hand 272

Net amount of profit, deducting mater-
ial and wages, per hand o24

Manufacturer's profit on capital, 34 per cent.

Take the farmer's investment for the year 1892
according to the Ontario Bureau of Industries-
Capital invested $979,979,000

Value of crop

products ... $110,563,000
Value of live-
stock sold or
killed for sale 32,454,000

Gross, value of products $143,017,000
Less:

Cost of seed $12,050,000

Cost of feeding

animals sold or

killed for sale 16,000,000

28,050,000

Net proceeds of the farms $114,967,000

There were at this time 241,000 farm holders in
the Province. It would require the labor of another
man on an average on each farm which makes 482,-
000 hands. Divide the net proceeds by thig number
of hands and you have the sum of $238, which is the
amount made per hand on the farm that year. Tha
average wage fo-r farm hands was $253 a year. The
owner of the farm thus made out of his land $15 less
than the wages of the laborer he employed to assist

CANADIAN POLITICS. 23

him. The manufacturer on the other hand made $324
profit on every hand employed by him.

Surely this is sufficiently convincing to demon-
strate the inequality of the operations of high tariff
systems. Surely the men of this country whose posi-
tions demand close, honest toil, and upon whose liber-
ty and success the wealth of this country, and its pro-
gress largely depends, will see from the above the fal-
lacy of a system at once so full of convulsions, con-
tradictions and absurdities.

Not only is the farmer confined to the home mar-
ket under high tariffs, but the product of the manu-
faxjturers is also confined to the home market, the
products of the factory being so costly that it can-
not relieve itself by exportation, for in foreign mar-
kets it cannot compete with other non-protecting
nations. Protection is evil and pernicious in princi-
ple and the evil has grown until by combination it
yet seeks to defy the efforts of honest men to abolish
it. There is only one true policy for the nations of
the world — tariff for revenue. The experience of Eng-
land affords ample proof of this; and yet It is appar-
ent that some will not see it, for men are selfish and
men are ignorant and the selfish act upon the ignor-
ant and bewilder them. There is no meanness to
which those who gain by tariff obstructions to trade
will not stoop to continue a system by which they
profit at the expense of the consuming public. Why a
few men, protected under a high tariff system, shouhi
exercise the most base and abominable despotism over
millions of their fellowmen, why innocence should

24 CANADIAN POLITICS.

have been, and still is, the victim of such oppression,
why industry should toil for rapine, why the harm-
less laborer should sweat for the benefits and the lux-
ury and rapacity of tyrannic depredation — in a word,
why millions of people gifted by God with the ordin-
ary endowments of humanity should groan under a
system of such despotism is more than is comprehen-
■ive.

CHAPTER V.

I have before me the campaign book of the Con-
servative party, used in the contest of 1896, entitled
"Political Pointers for the Campaign." Among the
various articles written to deceive the innocent man
who accepts ready made ideas, and the ignorant who
will refuse to weigh a criticism on its merit appears
the following:

"There is not a thing produced in this country,
from a pen-knife to a railway car, that has not been
cheapened since the adoption of the National Policy.

"A revenue tariff," they say, "is always paid by
the consumer. If you buy goods not produced in Can-
ada you pay the price of such goods in the country in
which they were made with the freight and duty ad-
ded." They do not go on to say that even then that
article reaches your hands as cheaply as it can be
purchased here. They do not go on to say that even
though that article could be produced here at the
same price as it could be bought in that country, it is
sold here at exactly the same price the foreign article,,
after duty and freight paid, would cost. Nor do they
go on to say that this amount of money representing
the duty and freight paid on the foreign article rep-
resents so much money taken from the consumer and
put into the pockets of the home manufacturer. They
do not go on to say that labor was comparatively as.
cheap her© during the N. P. regime as it was in for-
125)

26 CANADIAN POLITICS.

eign countries, and that thousands of idle workingmen
were always ready to compete against those who were
fortunate enough to be employed, which had the effect
of still cheapening labor.

On page seven of this same book, under a heading
''What Tearing down Tariff Fences Mean," we read:
"A Grit friend said to us the other day that the
object of the party to which he belonged, when they
got in power, was to break down our tariff walls or
fences. Now, fences, are for two purposes. They are
to keep things out or to keep them in, one or the oth-
er. The fence around the wheat field is to keep stock
out, the fence around the pasture field is to keep
st^ock in. What does tearing them down imply? That
all the range stock outside will get into our pasture
and that our cattle will share the range with them.
Now, it would be quite right to suppose that there
is not enough grass on the range for the cattle that
are out there already, and we are justified in assum-
ing that the grass inside our fences is better and the
cattle sleeker and richer in condition than those out
on the range. If we equalize these things and let
these hungry cattle from the range into our enclosed
fields, we woundn't have as much grass for own stock
as we had before. Can our Grit friends see the
point?'*

But where is the point?

Let us just reverse the illustration. We will sup-
pose that inside that fence the pastures are bad, as
they were during the N. P. regime; that there is not
room enough within it sufficient to enable the cattle

CANADIAN POLITICS. 27

to make themselves "sleeker and richer in condition
than those outside the fence and on free range," would
you not "equalize these things" and let these hungry-
cattle in the enclosed range out into the free range
that they might enjoy sufficient to make them sleek-
er and richer?" Can our Conservative friends see the
point? We read elsewhere in their book that:

"The family circle is a charmed circle. Home and
hearthstone are sacred words. Unity and exclusive-
ness, mutual aid and mutual defence are universally
recognized safeguards of the family. The nation is a
great family, entitled to all family privileges, and
should guard her interests sacredly. Twenty-nine cen-
turies ago Solomon wisely said: "In all labor there is
profit," and as a family must labor or earn more
than it expends, or it will cease to thrive, so must a
nation produce more than it consumes, or it will de-
cline in power and become extinct. A family has the
right to protect itself against poverty by laboring to
provide for its own necessities, and a nation has the
right to prohibit the free importation and sale of
cheaply-made foreign merchandise, the result of which
is to force her own citizens into idleness 9.nd poverty.
No family need be degraded by admitting improper
persons to its- circle, and no nation need be degraded
by fostering pauper labor and degraded labor systenis.
The only safeguard is the enactment and enforcement
of wise industrial laws."

With eighteen years' lease of power in which it was
supposed the National Policy would have given the
country such tariffs as would entitle her to all "fam-

28 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ily privileges," why were some of its claims not
made a mLonumLent to its principles?

''A nation must produce more than it consumes"
is one of the arguments pointed to in this article.
What! a protected country produce more than it can
consume! Is this not one of the strongest arraign-
ments the advocates of a freer trade systenk could make
against high tariffs? Yet the advocates of the Nation-
al Policy attempt to deceive the people by this
statement. Such an argument is absurd. Unless w©
have a foreign market to relieve us of rmore than we
can consume what is the result? Stagnation, closed
factories, business depression, low wages, idle men,
beggars, tramps, suicides, theft, crime, and over
crowded jails would be inevitable.

I agree with the author of the Conservative cam-
paign book that unless a country can produce more
than it consumes it will decline in power and become
extinct, but it is impossible for a country to prodace
more than it can consume ' and keep its people em-
ployed unless it can find a foreign market to n^Uev^e.
it of the over production.

I also admit that a family has the right to pro-
tect itself against poverty by laboring to provide for
its necessities. This is wisdom, but I deny that it is
right to protect one class of the community who are
few, to the detriment of the masses who consume the
products of the few. I deny the imputation that a
reduced system of taxation would result in forcing our
own citizens into idleness and poverty. The condit-
ions of the Canadian people who are today enjoying

CANADIAN POLITICS. 29

prosperity under a reduced system of taxation, is the
strongest testimony to its advantages, the strongest
condemnation against the system, which, during its
regime, did force our citizens into idleness and poverty.

I further admit that "no family need be degrafled
by admitting improper persons to its circle," that
"no nation need be degraded by fostering pauper la-
bor and degraded labor systems." But is it not a
remarkable fact that considering the Conservative
party was in power for eighteen years and that it
was in a position to frame a policy that wiould "en-
force wise and industrial laws by prohibiting pauper
labor and degraded labor systems," into our markets,
it remained for the Liberal party to enact such legis-
lation? In the closing pages of their campaign book
they say:

"A self-evident truth is one which needs but to be
stated to be accepted by candid, unprejudiced minds.
We hold the following to be self-evident.

"If the Canadian people purchase from the United
States ten million dollars worth of goods, Canada
gets the goods and the United States get the ten
million dollars in cash, but if we buy the same goods
from Canadian producers, then Canada has both the
goods and the money and is ten million dollars better
off than by the former transaction."

But if under a more favorable system of tariffs we
could sell ten million dollars worth of our goods to
the United States, ten million more than we are sell-
ing today, would Canada not be better off by reason
of that sale? And if our exports can be made to in-

30 CANADIAN POLITICS.

crease under a favorable treaty with that country in
a like proportion as they did during the twelve years
treaty extending from 1854 to 1866, would it not be
a wise thing for us to obtain such treaty? During the
twelve years that treaty remained in operation our
exports to the United States nearly quadrupled, rising
from $10,473,000 in 1854 to $39,950,000 in 1866.
With the increased population of that country and
the many resources we have but recently discovered
and with our immense industries, is it not reasonable
to expect that such a treaty, or a freer trade policy
would greatly stimulate our exports and our indus-
trial trade?

Is it not a more probable conclusion that a mar-
ket affording us opportunities of meeting the wants
of seventy millions of people would be more beneficial
to the producers of this country, than our markets of
five millions would be to the producers of the United
States? And who will deny that the brain, the brawn
and resources of this country are in any degree inferior
to those of the American Republic? Who will deny our
administrators are not equally as competent to pro-
tect the interests of the great masses of our people
as were the administrators of Great Britain, whose
chief glory lies in its trade policy, dating back from
the time of Peel? I say the Canadian people are
quite competent to use the resources at their com-
mand and to use them wisely and well, and when the
Conservative party speak of self-evident truths, why,
I ask, do they stop at half-told truths? Why attempt
to deceive the weak and innocent with the idea that the

CANADIAN POLITICS. 31

policy of the Liberal party is to throw open our mar-
kets to the world without nations of the world open-
ing up their markets to us? The Liberal party has
never committed itself to such a suicidal policy.
The policy of the Liberal party is tariff for revenue,
reciprocity, equal rights to all, special privileges to
none; a policy that must commend itself tio the hearts
and consciences of all right thinking men.

CHAPTER VI.

I have just clipped from the Toronto World of
«ven date, March 22, 1902, the following article under
headlines "Protection Coming:'*

"There is no mistaking the strength of public
opinion in favor of raising the tariff so as to afford
effective protection to Canadian industries. Those
who are in favor of protection need not waste their
time imploring Sir Wilfrid Laurier to introduce the
necessary legislation. We imagine that he perceives
the force of public opinion, and that he has arrived at
the conclusion that, if he does not accede to the pop-
ular demand, he will find himself replaced by a leader
who will. One of the certainties of the future seems to
be that Canada will have a tariff arranged on the prin-
ciple prevailing in the United States. The country is
not in favor of retaliation with the United States or of
the so-called tariff for tariff. What is demanded is a
tariff that will give to Canadian workmen the busi-
ness that rightly belongs to them; that will develop
native industries that are now stagnant because of
our improvident legislation in favor of foreigners.
The important point today in the issue is that the
government realizes the force of public opinion, and
sees that something must be done. The cabinet is
divided, while the country is almost unanimous in
favor of protection. The only debatable point is as
to the method by which protection shall be secured.

(32)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 33

If the government has the nerve to cast aside its free
trade theories, and to adopt the protective principle,
we may secure protection from it. If, however. Sir
Wilfrid cannot shake off his old-time prejudice against
the National Policy, and if he refuses to accede to the
popular wish, then he and his government will have
to go. If the tariff is not put in shape by the pres-
ent government, protection will be the issue at the
next general election. The country will not have to
wait long, in any event, for a protective tariff. What
Sir Wilfrid will probably try and do is to make a
compromise, trying to please both free traders and
protectionists. In this, however, we anticipate he
will fail. As far as the World is concerned, we prefer
to see Sir Wilfrid bow to public opinion, and intro-
duce the necessary legislation, but we are not so
much concerned about it as we were sOme time ago,
because we perceive that, within two or three years
at the most, Canada will have a tariff that will pro-
tect her interests just as effectively as the IMngley
tariff protects the interests of the people of the Uni-
ted States."

Now let us look at this article closely and expos^
its fallacy, a fallacy that will no doubt succeed in de-
ceiving many of the innocent World readers. Publics
opinion is not in favor of raising the tariff as the
World says. The opinions expressed by th« Conserva-
tive press and the few Conservative members is not
to be mistaken for public opinion — these opinions rep-
resent a very small proportion of the people of this
country which is evidenced by the overwhelming ex-

34 CANADIAN POLITICS.

pressions of public opinion in the last two general
©lections when Sir Wilfrid Laurier and his trade prin-
ciples were substantially endorsed. Return to a sys-
tem similar to that prevailing in the United States I
Never! I say public opinion will never re-adopt a
tariff that proved so disastrous' to Canadian progress
during the last ten years of its operation. Public
opinion, expressed by the future men of Canada, v/ill
never endorse a principle similar to that prevailing in
the United States, where greedy, grasping monopolies
and trusts oppose and crush the masses of the
people, and under whose system strikes, riots, mur-
der and bloodshed are inseparable from their daily
records. The young men of Canada will not accept
ready made ideas as their forefathers did. The young
man of the future will read, learn, think and act for
himself; he will see wherein lies the strength and
greatness and glory of Great Britain and he will ob-
serve the conditions of the people of the United
States, and by this observance he will never revert
to the principle of protection which the World says is
coming. Will the World undertake to show instances
where Canadian workmen are today deprived of that
business that rightly belongs to them? I ask any pub-
lic man in what period in the history of Canada were
' workingmen better paid or when they were more
steadily employed than during the past six years. I
ask every citizen to look back upon the condition of
our country during the last ten years of the National
Policy regime, and review the condition of the work-
ingman, the farmer and the merchant during that

CANADIAN POLITICS. 35

time. Any person who has been observant during
those ten years has observed that thousands of our
workingmen were walking the streets in vain search
for employment; that scores and hundreds of able
bodied, willing workers were tramping the country
roads and begging for work and bread. They have
seen our industries closed for weeks and months dur-
ing those ten years. They have seen hundreds of mer-
chants make assignments; they have seen the deprecia-
tion of their properties; worse, far worse, they havo
experienced its results and know what a return to
such conditions mean.

I deny that the cabinet is divided on the question
of freer trade and high tariffs. The differences exist-
ing— if there be any real differences, is not on the
question of freer trade and high tariffs, but a ques-
tion of how best to continue the administration of
those reforms in the speediest manner and with due
consideration to the needs of the best interests of the
whole people. There are many iniportant consiiera-
tions in relation to the question of our tariffs. To
make a sweeping reform at one stroke would create
an uncertainty that would cause a commercial wnd
industrial depression for some time, hence the wisdom
of gradual reductions, that will eventually create an
equality of all men under a permajient tariff that
shall be constituted a means of revenue sufficient to
conduct an economical, and a progressive adminis-
tion.

CHAPTER VII.

The progress enjoyed during the past six years
has been phenomenal. It was not thought possible
that in six years such a wonderful change would take
place. The men who have so wisely guided the co'urse
of the state ship during these few years deserve the
highest enconiums. The clear, precise and accurate
mode that they have observed throughout their whole
course, the great attention they have paid to the ob-
ject for which they were appointed deserves the warm-
est praise. Their policy has given an impetus to the
workingman, the merchant, the farmer and the manu-
facturer alike. It is not necessary that figures should
be published to show the general prosperity that is
felt and shared today by the Canadian people. Every
m.an knows it and enjoys it. Every factory, every
store and every industry feels it. Every city, town,
village and hamlet; every farmer and every mechanic
feels it. The banks, railroads, financial and insurance
companies show it. The church, the Sabbath school,
the public schools — all testify to this prosperity. At
no period in her history has the trade and commerce,
the industry and progress of Canada made such rapid
strides as during the past six years, and while I do
not say that Providence has been inseparable from
the advantages achieved from natural causes, I say
that the government of Sir Wilfrid Laurier is primar-
ily responsible for the development of trade, the pro-

(36)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 37

motion of immigration (which is one of the most ef-
fective means by which the burden of taxation upon
the people may be lightened, every settler in the west
contributing increased revenue towards the general
taxation and the consequent prosperity and develop-
ment of the country); the preferential tariff, (insuring
enlarged markets to the farmers of Canada); the
adoption of ocean cold storage systems, (which enab-
les the farrmer to ship his products in good condition
to the markets of England); th© building of the
Crow's Nest railway, (which is rapidly opening up
new territories rich in coal and minerals, and in af-
fording transportation to our vast regions of gold in
the Yukon) and the purity of administration. And
while the government has demanded the strictest acon-
omy where economy was wise and possible, they have
abandoned cheap labor and sweat shop methods.
Workmen and artisans employed on public works,
whether under the direct employ of the department or
in the employ of contractors, must be paid the union
scale of wages. Did the Conservative administration
enforce such regulations in behalf of the workers?
No! But the record of scandals identified with their
public works and contracts show that the contractors
did exceedingly well. Did the Conservative party in-
troduce the Alien Labor Law that was necessary to
protect the workmen against cheap pauper labor and
degraded labor systems? No ! Records of labor unions
during the regime of the Conservative party at Ot-
tawa abound with testimony to the contrary. It re-
mained for the Liberal party to introduce effective

38 CANADIAN POLITICS.

legislation that would protect the home market from
competition with the labor markets of the world.

It remained for the Liberal party to establish a
department of labor, where in disputes between capital
and labor the workingmen may take their grievience*
in confidence and look for an effective settlement.

It remained for the Liberal party to reduce the
postage rates and give us Imperial penmy postage and
to introduce the many reforms necessary to make tn©
postal department modern, efficient and almost self-
sustaining, and when it is considered that this iiaa
been done without decreasing the salaries of the em-
ployees, it demonstrates the qualities of administra-
tion which characterize its management.

It remained for the Liberal party to settle that
problem which for years baffled the skill of the poli-
ticians, the press and clergy, the Manitoba school
question. It remained for the Liberal party to check
the exodus that was to have been checked by the f/i-
troduction of the National Policy in 1878. Instead of
an exodus we now have a very large and most satis-
factory influx. A few lines from the columns of well
known publications will enable the reader to better
understand the situation. The Toronto Evening
News, of March 3rd, 1902, reprints the following ar-
ticle from the columns of the New York Sun: —

"The men of Wisconsin, Minnesota, the Dakotas,
Iowa and Nebraska understand the possibilities of th#
great prairie and forest country of the Northwest,
and although it is alien territory they are crossing
the boundary by thousands with their farm equipment

CANADIAN POLITICS. 39

and house utensils to possess themselves of land. Tlie
spring migration already has reached the total &f
10,000. It is estimated that before the twentieth
year of the century 2,000,000 Americans will have
settled in the Canadian Northwest. The flag that flies
over them will be a British flag. If they prosper they
will be permanent residents, and when crops are good
— and they are good almost every year in the Cana-
dian West — how can these sturdy farmers fail to pros-
per?"

The Toronto World of April 9th, 1902, says:
"The most pleasing fact in the history of Canada
at the present time is the influx of settlers into Man-
itoba and the Northwest Territories. The optinaistic
predictions of six months ago are now being realized.
Settlers are trekking towards the Northwest in in-
creased numbers daily, and before very looig there will
be a veritable rush of immigrants. The formation ' of
big land companies and the raising of tihe price of
land from $3 up to $7 and $8 an acre are sufficient
indications of the great movement toward Canada
that is now under way. The prairies of Canada are
practically the only agricultural lands in North Amer-
ica that have not been taken up. The United States
has exhausted its resources, and the people of this
country are now turning with greedy eyes toward the
Dominion of Canada. It looks as if we were about to
experience such a rush as characterized the opening up
of Oklahoma and the other Indian reservations. In
whatever direction we look, Canada is naaking sub-
stantial progress. The next decade will effect a won-

40 CANADIAN POLITICS.

(Jerful change in this country. As much progress will
be niade during that time as has been made during the
preceding 50 years."

The Medicine Hat News (March 20) says: — "The
influx of settlers to the Canadian West is simply won-
derful. At Medicine Hat we are in a position to size
up the great in-coming, especially of Americans, as
we see here daily, trainload after trainload of would-
be settlers, bringing with them carloads of miscellan-
eous effects — 'horses, cattle, implements, household
stuffs. The exodus, this time from the States into
Canada, shows that the undeveloped riches of Wes-
tern Canada are becoming known, and Canada is com-
ing into her own. The rush of settlers is unpreceden-
ted, and is taxing the railways to the limit to handle
the business in connection with other trade. One set-
tler, on his way to Northern Alberta, talking to The
News reporter at the depot one day last week, said
he had been held for one whole week at Minneapolis
along with some others, being unable to get his car-
load of stuff through. The policy of the Northwest
Government and the C. P. R, of shipping grain over
the Soo road to Minneapolis and Duluth, and bring-
ing back carloads of settlers on the return trip, is
one which is working both ends for Canada."
The New York Tribune says editorally:—
"The Boston Transcript prints a despatch from
Minneapolis declaring that at the present rate of emi-
gration from the northwest to central and western
Canada two million Americans will be in the Domin-
ion at the end of twenty years. While this would

CANADIAN POLITICS. 41

seem to be an overstaten:kent, there is no doubt that
a large number of Americans are crossing the line, at-
tracted partly by the abounding richness of western
Canada and partly by the liberal inducements offered
to immigrants by the Canadian Government. The
Provinces and Territories of Manitoba, Assiniboia,
Alberta and British Columbia, not to speak of Sas-
katchewan, Athabasca and Yukon, could easily sup-
port a population of seventy-five million people.
The wheat fields of Manitoba and Assiniboia are
already famous, and they have as yet hardly began
to be cultivated. There are no finer cattle ranges in
the world than in Alberta, while there is an apparent-
ly inexhaustible supply of minerals and coal in Brit-
ish Columbia and Yukon, Saskatchewan and Atha-
basca are as yet unorganized, but In spite of their
high latitude their agricultural possibilities are known
to be very great.

"Including the great districts of Keewatin and
Mackenzie, the chief industries of which are hunting
and trapping, this great empire of Western Canada
has an area of 2,144,796 square miles, with a popula-
tion, according to the census of 1901, of only 656,-
464, of whom 436,464 are in Manitcfl^®, and British
Columbia. For years the Canadian Government has
been making every possible effort to induce immigra^
tion to western Canada, but thus far with little suc-
cess, as these figures show. But the tide appears to
be turning at last. The well-authenticated reports of
the country's fertility and mineral richness are bring-
ing many desirable settlers from Europe, and, what

42 CANADIAN POLITICS.

at first sight seems most curious, Americans have be-
gan to pour in, ten thousand settlers having already
crossed the line this spring. Previously many Amer-
icans went to the region around Edmonton, in Al-
berta, and they are all prosperous. It is not at all
impossible that in a few years, therefore, this portion
of Canada will be largely settled by Americans. As
to whether they will remain Americans there is a dif-
ference of opinion. The thick-and-thin American 'pa-
triot' maintains on a priori grounds that they will.
But those who have talked with Americans who have
been settled for some time in western Canada declare
that, as a rule, they think it better to identify them-
selves with the country of their adoption. And as
Americans like to see immigrants to this country do
that, they cannot blame Am.ericans in Canada for
doing it. But in any case, the influx of a large nunv-
ber of Americans in Canada is a most important and
interesting fact."

What a different picture this presents to that we
have seen under the regime of the National Policy!
Our former sons who were exiled during its operation
returning to enjoy the freedom of the old flag! Am-
erican citizens, who were long oppressed by the iniqui-
tous tariff system, of their country coming into Can-
ada by the tens of thousands to enjoy the freedom
guaranteed to all who take up homes under the best
system of government ever instituted; a system of
government that is fast becoming the envy and ad-
miration of the nations of the world.

What this movement means to Canada we can only

CANADIAN POLrffOS. 45

conjecture. This great inpouring of settlers will creat*^
an unparalleled demand for the goods these people re-
quire, that they, and their children, may be housed,
clothed, fed, educated and amused. The situation sug-
gests a problem which merchants, manufacturers and
transportation companies must solve within the next
few years. Should the present influx continue, and
there is every reason to believe that it will, the pop-
ulation of Canada, when the next census is taken, in
1911, will doubtless total 10,000,000 souls.

The people of Canada have every reason to feel
proud of the progress they are making; they are to be
congratulated on having exercised their discretion ia
favor of an administration that is gradually intro-
ducing the reforms advocated during, the days ita
members occupied the ''opposition benches," and we
may with confidence look forward to the time when
the errors that had intruded themselves into our na-
tional politics, previous to 1896, will be swept away.

CHAPTER VIII.

Ever since the present government has been elect-
ed the press and leaders of the Conservative party
have been engaged in an effort to convince people that
the Liberal party of Canada is a disunited party;
that there continuously exists a spirit which tends to
disrupt the ministry and plunge our industries into
disorder and ultimate ruin. Nothing could be more
absurd. The spirit of unanimity which exists between
the ministers and the members of the Liberal party,
and the good will that exists between the progressive
people of this country is of the most harmonioois and
desirable nature. Differences of opinion on some ques-
tions affect, m.ore or less, all organizations, but when
a, great question appeals to the good and wise judg-
ment of the partj^ that has for its object the upbuild-
ing and advancement of the national prosperity, when
movements that have for their object the oppression
of the people of the Dominion of Canada, it is seen
that the Liberal party is strongly united.

Our ministers have shown their courage and Tir-
tuous resolutions of administering the government by
means more honorable and more permanent than cor-
ruption, and it is confidently believed, that the gi aat
masses of the Canadian people will replace their con-
fidences, to an overwhelming degree, in the declara-
tions of the men who have so invariably proven them-
selves to be their friends.

(44)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 45

It is no exaggeration to say that every ict intro-
duced by this party has had for its object the pros-
perity of the Canadian people, which is manifest in all
the departments of trade and industry and in the com-
fortable and independent conditions of the people. In
fact, true Liberalism has no other purpose than that
there shall be freedom of labor and of all the liberties
which pertain thereto. Its first principle consists in the
pursuit of the guarantees of liberty. It does not admit
that men are bound, when they associate themselves
and create a political society, to sacrifice some por-
tion of their individual liberty. Its idea of the social
contract is quite different; Liberalism regards it as an
association of all in order to assume each has indiv-
idual liberty. To lay with one hand the power • of
governmient on the property of the citizens, and with
the other bestow it upon favored individuals to aid
private enterprise and build up private fortunes is
none the less robbery, because it is done under the
forms of law and called taxation. This, Liberalism
says is not just legislation, it is but a decree under
legislative forms. Liberalism says there can be no
lawful tax which is not laid for a public purpose, for
the purposes of carrying on the governmeint of the
country in all its branches under an efficient and
economic system. Any tax that is levied for any
other purp)Ose than the raising of revenue for public
purposes is not, constitutionally, a tax, and what-
ever governmental exaction has not this basis, is
tyrannical and unlawful. Liberalism is more. It is the
consciousness which a freeman has of his right, and

4^ CANADIAN POLITICS.

of his duties as well, hence a Liberal is the man who
demands liberty, even for his opponents. It means
that men shall think, recognize and practice; that all
men are free and equal; that judicial authority shall
be exercised with equality to high and low, rich and
poor; that taxation shall be levied without special in-
terests or privileges tending to the advantages of one
over the other — ^In a word, that all men shall have
equal opportunities for enjoying the fruits of their
labor.

These are the basic or fundamental principles of
Liberalism, and are the principles that have always
dominated the Liberal party of Canada. From the
time when it was not permitted to a Protestant
clergyman to perform the sacred rites of the holy
bonds of matrimony in this country until the present
day; from the time when it was not permitted to a
young man to exercise the duties of citizenship, when
only wealth qualified him to be an elector. Liberalism,
championed by leaders whose names adorn the pages of
our histories, has had for its purpose the freedom and
liberty of all classes, and we are Indebted to these
noble and inspiring leaders for the enjoyment of liber-
ty guaranteed us by the legislation that has, from
year to year^ been of an advanced and enlightened char-
acter. It was for such liberties as this that our
grand old sires stood shoulder to shoulder in defence
of their rights and we who inherit it at the cost of
their hardship and their blood, would indeed be un-
grateful were we to turn our backs upon our benefac-
tors—the great Liberal party of Canada. This does

CANADIAN POLITICS. 47

not mean, however, that men should become slaves to
the Liberal party, for when the time comes that any
leader or set of leaders of this party falter at intro-
ducing, defending and enforcing impartial laws; when
they falter at exercising the purest administration of
all branches of our public service, then it will become,
our duty, as Liberals, to replace those leaders by men
loyal and true to the traditions and principles of the
Liberal party. And if the Liberal party should at any
time forget its principles, if it should at any time ad-
vocate any wrong, or perpetrate, or tolerate any acts
of heinous misgovernment, then it will become the
duty of the people — the whole people — ^^to rise and con-
sign them (as they did the Opposition in 1896) to
political destruction, rather than that they should
bring reproach upon their good name as a party, or
upon our common country.

CHAPTER IX.

In an editoral appearing in the Mail-Empire ©f
March 24, 1902, headed, "The Free Trade Outburst,"
the writer says: — "The great question which this is-
sue raises is whether Canada is to go forward or to
go behind. We do not believe this country can pro-
gress under free trade." Who is it that is advocating
free trade? From where is such an outburst coming?
Certainly not from the I^iberal party. Certainly not
from the Conservative party. Then where? Simply
through an attempt by the Opposition to cajole and
deceive innocent electors. It has been shown over and
over, time and again, that the Liberal party are not
committed to free trade. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, speak-
ing at Quebec in 1896, clearly defines this argument,
He says: — "We are told by way of reproach that we
are going to introduce free trade as they have it in
England. I am sorry, for my part, being a freetrader,
that we cannot have free trade as they have it in
England; but while we cannot have it, we intend to
have, and must have a revenue derived from customs
duty, but with this difference between the Conserva-
tive party: The Conservative party agreed that the
main basis of revenue must be derived from a customs
tariff, but we disagree on that point. They levy their
duties, not to raise revenue, but to favor special in-
terests. Our object will be to raise revenue from cus-
toms duties, but to favor the whole Canadian people
(48)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 49

by taxing everybody equally; by placing an even bur-
den on all shoulders, making the difference only that
those who are wealthy should pay more, and that
those who are poorer should pay less and by making
raw material, as far as possible, free. We have not
to travel from protection to free trade, but from pro-
tection to a revenue tariff. This is the aim and pur-
pose that we have in view. Taxation is an ©vil. But
I do not come her© as a demogogue to tell you that
there must be no taxation. Taxation is an evil and
is to be used sparingly, but every civilized man must
pay for government. We can deal with protection
without causing disturbance of any kind whatever."

There is no resolution on record to show that th«
Canadian Liberals are committed to free trade. The
Mail-Empire knows this, but it clings to the idea that
men, to be Conservatives, must be deceived, hence
the frequent publication of half-told truths, or no
truths at all. We have then, seen that the great ques-
tion is not a question of protection and free trade,
but a question of whether this country shall *'go for-
ward or go behind,"

Is it necessary that in order to maintain support
for party candidates, with a view to electing a suffi-
cient number of them to give them power at Ottawa,
methods must be adopted whereby the cunningness and
bewilderment of half-told truths will play upon the
minds of the ignorant and innocent to accomplish
that end? Is it necessary and is it honorable 10 pro-
mulgate ideas calculated to serve certain ends at the
expense of the man whose lack of education, whost

50 CANADIAN POLITICS.

lack of interest, whose weaknesses make him the vic-
tim of a system that deprives him of his natural
rights that the few who profit by his innocence and
weaknesses should enjoy the fruits of his toil? "The
present experience indicates that we must protect both
our agriculturalists and workmen," says the Mail and
Empire. The present experience does not indicate any
such argument. Agriculturists and workmen were nev-
er better protected, never enjoyed better conditions
than they enjoy under the present system. Agricul-
turists were never paid better prices for their products
and workmen were never so scarce, nor were wages
ever so high as they are now. Just one instance in
support of my contention, taken from one of today's
papers, March 24th, 1902, reporting the advance in
milk made by the Toronto Milk Producers Association
to effect that the advance fixed by this association "is
due to the prevailing high prices for grain and hired
help."

We also see in the Evening Telegram of April 1st,
1902, that "the local passenger officials for the Grand
Trunk and Canadian Pacific Railway report that the
receipts for the months of January, February and
March are forty per cent, heavier than at any other
similar period of time in their history." Are these
indications that the agriculturists and workingmen
desire to return to the system of depression that pre-
vailed during the" regime of the policy defended by the
Mail and Empire?

If the farmers and workingmen were not better
protected today than they were under Conservative

CANADIAN POLITICS. 5i

administration, grain products and hired help would
not be at a ''prevailing high price," and the receipts
of the railways would not show such large increases.
What reader can recall such conditions during the
days of the Natiorial Policy? Who could pick up the
daily papers during the days of its operation
and observe the demand for artisans, mechanics and
farm laborers that fill the columns of the daily papers
of the present time — that have been characteristic of
their advertising columns during the past five years?
But why say more in reply to the Mail and Empire
article, for on looking over The Toronto World of even
date, (April 1st, 1902), we see, under the headlines,
"Canada's Eve of Prosperity," that the Mail and Em-
pire is unconsciously answered tjy a paper of its own
political complexion: — "Evidence accumulates on all
hands of remarkable business activity throughout the
Dominicn. There is no indication whatever that the
present era of prosperity has reached its climax. On
the contrary, everything seems to point to an indef-
inite continuation of the good times whi'ch have been
with us for a few years back. The extraordinary de-
mand for houses in Toronto is a reliable measure of
the business activity that prevails throughout the
country generally.

"It is said there are 1,500 families who are not
occupying houses of their own simply because there
are no houses for them to occupy. By the time these
are supplied there will be 1,500 others wanting
houses.'*

What strong testimony to the prosperity of which

52 CANADIAN POLITICS.

I have spoken, and how prominent it stands in con-
trast with the reports quoted in the early part of this
work, from the same paper.

But that is not all, the World further says —
"The C. P. R. will spend millions in improvements,
the Canadian Northern will proceed with the exten-
sion of its transcontinental line, the country between
the C. P. R. and Hudson Bay will be made accessible
by railways, and various other railway enterprises in
our northern latitudes have been laid out and will be
undertaken in the near future. Canada has just made
a decent start in the exploitation of her northern
areas. Hon. J. H. Ross, Yukon Commissioner, states
that there is plenty of room for four transcontinental
lines through Canada, and he would not be surprised
if the Canadian Northern in time extended a branch
to the Yukon. The settlement of Manitoba and the
Territories is only one feature of our many-sided in-
terests. We have coal and iron industries in the far
east, pulp and paper mills in Northern Ontario- and
Quebec, nickel mines at Sudbury, a great industrial
development at Sault Ste Marie, increasing mining
activity in British Columbia, the gold mines of the
Y'ukon, and water powers all over.

"The growth of the Dominion ought to proceed
very rapidly in the immediate future, and everything
points to this growth being continuous for many
years to come. The position of the city of Toronto
in this new development ie assured. It will be bene-
fited in direct proportion to the development of the
country generally. Toronto is financially interested in

CANADIAN POLITICS. 53

not a few of the big projects now under way all over
the Dominion, and she must of necessity share in th«
general prosperity of the country. Mr. Ames, presi-
dent of the Board of Trade, made a true forecast
when he said that Toronto would have a population
of half a million before many realized it. The build-
ing companies might safely enlarge their operations
in Toronto."

Now, how can Conservative newspapers and honest
politicians, in face of all these facts, ask the cit-
iz5ens of this country to return to the conditions of
1878 to 1896? Well do they know that such a step
would be nothing short of a great national crime.

CHAPTER X.

"But," the young man asks, "if the principle of
freer trade be at once so plain and comprehensive, why
do these newspapers and politicians of Conservative
persuasion cling to, and advocate the high tariff sys-
tems?" The reason is obvious. The personal prosper-
ity these manufacturers enjoyed, the immense prof-
its made on their products by reason of high tariffs,
and the large sums of money received from the manu-
facturers by the Conservative organizations during
the operation of high tariffs for corrupting the elec-
tors to support their policy makes it plain that they
should cry aloud for a continuation of it. It is a
matter so plain and palpable that any man of ordin-
ary intelligence should be able to see it,

iLet us hope then, that the selfish and sordid mo-
tives of these advocates be no longer an influence in
our national politics, and that the interests of the
masses of our people will never again suffer by reason
of a system of high tariffs. Let no deception or flat-
tery from the lips of these advocates succeed in en-
snaring the sympathy and influences of the youth of
our land. Let the records of the past and the exper-
iences of the present be the guide that will direct us
in the discharge of our public duties. Let us never
falter at the call of duty. The highest patriotism
consists in applying true principles to all things, in
the education of our youth, and the moulding of pub-
(54)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 55

lie opinion, in such a manner that the social and po-
litical future of our country may be guaranteed
secure.

Let national progress henceforth be Canada's
watchword. With her natural resources, waterways,
water powers, fisheries, forest, mineral and agricul-
tural wealth, with excited industries running day and
night, with increased and increasing comforts for all
classes of people, an enviable system of education,
freedom of worship, confidence and unanimity, the Can-
adian people are destined to occupy a proud, happy
and foremost position among the people of the earth.
This is no idle boast, for with the good sense of the
people of this country determkined to endorse the per-
petuation of Liberal principles in our system of gov-
ernment, we have the absolute guarantee that we will
occupy a foremost position among the nations of the
world.

With this object before us, I believe the young men
of this country will oppose every effort to reinstate a
system that attempts to obtain revenue beyond that
which is required for reasonable needs of government.
I believe the young men of this country will under-
stand the duties required of them in their political re-
lation to the well being of their common country;
that they will always be ready to fulfill those ditJcs.
I believe the young men of this country realize that
they are living, and must act on a broad and conspic-
uous theatre either for good or for evil to their com-
mon country. I believe that the young men of this
country will feel that in the common welfai^e, in the

56 CANADIAN POLITICS.

common prosperity, in the common glory of Cana-
dians they have a stake of value not to be cal-
culated. I believe these young men will act for them-
selves, for the generations that are to follow them;
those who ages hence will bear their names and who
will feel in the political and social condition the con-
sequences of the manner in which we have discharged
our political duties.

CHAPTER XI.

The Liberal party being a party of reform, and
committed to the work of reforming the many errors
which had, previous to 1896, crept into our system of
government, will not be true to its principles if it
does not continue to do all that can be done. The
need for reform will never cease so long as this world
is peopled by sinners or controlled by sordid motives,
so that it rests with the Liberal party of the future,
as in the past, to give the people such reforms as the
necessities of good, honest, sound principles of gov-
ernment demand. In following up the history of the
Liberal party in Canada, one is impressed with the
close analogy between the movements it supported
(and by which it divided from the Conservative par-
ty) of a similar character, although on a larger scale,
in the history of British politics. It may be that the
interchange of opinions between Canada and the Em-
pire had something to do with maintaining the uni-
formity of political cleavage on kindred subjects, or
it may be that the emigrant to Canada carried with
him British politics. At all events it is some source
of gratification for the Liberals of Canada to know
that the great movements they inaugurated and to
which they consecrated all their energies were move-
ments similar in kind and principle to those which re-
ceived the support of the great Liberal statesmen of
England. When a Canadian on the floor of Parliament
(57)

58 CANADIAN POLITICS.

or in public declares that no government should
make religious opinions a test of citizenship, it might
be gratifying to know that such views werie entertain-
ed by Lord John Russell, John Bright, W, E. Glad-
stone and all the Liberal lights of the last century.
Similarly, when a demand is m»ade for greater freedom
of trade, for the extension of the franchise, the pro-
tection of the elector at the ballot box, the sovereign-
ity of the people in all matters pertaining to govern-
ment, purity in the administration of public affairs,
the personal integrity of the representatives oi the
people, these and kindred measures of vast importance
to the state have been the watchwords of the Liberal
party in Great Britain since the great revolution,
and have occupied the thoughts of our ablest and
puiest statesmen, notably those representing the Ijib-
eral party. The historical perspective then of Cana-
dian Liberalism is most satisfactory as well as in-
structive and would repay fuller investigation.

The Liberal party first asserted itself in Upper
Canada by boldly protesting against the tyranny of
the "Family Compact" and by demanding (1) the ex-
clusion from office of all appointees of the Govern-
ment; (2) the entire control of all the revenues of the
country; and (3) the responsibility of the executive,
i.e., the Government, to the people's representatives
in Parliament. One of the earliest champions of these
reforms was Wm. Lyon Mackenzie, who as a member
of iParliament, and, as a journalist, had ample oppor-
tunities of calling public attention to the grievances
from which relief was desirable. Although Mr. Mac-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 59

kenzie did not conduct the agitation for the reforms
which he demanded, at all times with becoming mod-
eration, yet he drew very distinctly a line of separa-
tion between the progressive policy of true Liberalism
and the claims of Conservatives of that time by "di-
vine right" to occupy all the public offices and to hold
the reins of the Grovernment, with public consent when
they could, and without public approval when they
dared.

After the Union of 1841, the distinctive character
of Liberal principles was represented by Mr. Robert
Baldwin, who will always be remembered as the stur-
dy champion of responsible Government. Mr. Baldwin
held that all ai^pointments to office should be made
by the Governor-G'eneral on the recomnw^ndation of
his advisers, and that a Government that could not
command a majority of the members of Parliament
should at once give place to a Government having a
majority.

Another question that at a very early period ac-
centuated the difference between the two political par-
ties was the secularization of the Clergy Reserves.
The Liberals believed in the complete separation of
Church and State. The Conservatives in Canada,
like the Conservatives in England, believed in a State
Church, and for years the Anglican Church was the
only Church in Canada that drew upon the Giovern-
ment for its support. The established Church of
Scotland demanded assistance from the state, on the
ground that it had legal recognition in Scotland, and
was latterly recognized as entitled to state aid. The

6o CANADIAN POLITICS.

secularization of the Clergy Reserves in 1854 was ow-
ing to the efforts of the Liberal party, and if the par-
ty is only true to its past history, it will never con-
sent to any entangling alliances between Church and
State in the interests of any denomination whatso-
ever. If the Liberalism of Canada teaches one thing
m.ore distinctly than another, it is that all men,
irrespective of their religious opinions, have equal
rights and privileges before the law.

Coming to our own time we still find the Liberal
party the champion of liberty. It was the Liberal
leaders of 1864 and '67 who championed the cause of
Confederation, and although the late Sir John A.
Macdonald is called the father of the act and is por-
trayed as the leading spirit of the body which was del-
egated to make the constitutional changes incidental
to the act, it was Sir Jo'hn A. Macdonald and his
government who opposed the motion for a confedera-
tion of the ijrovinces. On the fourteenth day of April
in the year 1864 his vote is recorded to the effect
that there were no constitutional changes necessary,
and that due credit may be given to the real cham-
pion of the act, let me say that Sir John A. Mac-
donald is no more the father of Confederation than'
James II was the author of the Petition of Right.
Sir John dissented from the views held by a majority
of tho committee to whom the question was referred
and declared himself in favor of a legislative union of
the provinces. The next day we find his government
defeated. It was then that the late Honorable George
Brown, at that time leader of the Liberal party, said:

CANADIAN POLITICS. 6l

* 'Gentlemen, you may keep your places in the Govern-
ment if you like; we have a majority in Parliament;
we have defeated you; but we are Avilling to let you
remain in your places if you only give us the con-
stitutional changes that you said yesterday were not
needed." It is on record that Sir John and his
friends saw the necessity of giving these Constitution-
al changes, and it is further on record that when
Lord Elgin, one of the noblest and best of our gov-
ernor-generals, took an honorable course in sustaining
his constitutional advisers, that the black flag was
hoisted at Brockville; that their mob in London pelt-
ed him with rotten eggs, and that in Montreal they
burned the Parliament buildings. It is further on rec-
ord that Honorable George Brown told them "not to
be afraid," "you will get your places," said he; "w©
want our principles carried out in the Government and
if yoii are willing to ,be our tools In this as you hav»
been in everything else in the legislature of the coun-
try, we will vote to sustain you in place and power."
They did so, and, although Sir John A. Macdonald
and his followers, the day before, voted that the
changes were not needed, they agreed to carry them
out.

But what reform have the Conservative party not
opposed? They opposed representation by population,
the trial of election petitions by judges, simultaneous
polling, the ballot, the Ontario Franchise Act, (there-
by excluding the thousands of eligible young men from
exercising their franchise in Dominion elections), the
County Boundaries, (by introducing the Gerrymander

62 CANADIAN POLITICS.

Act); remedial legislation in the Manitoba School
Case; these, and many other reforms, led by the Lib-
eral party, have been opposed by the press, the rank
and file of the Conservative party. To stand still,
to keep what they have; to allow no innovation, no
reform, which had its origin with the early aristoc-
racy of England still seems to be the essence of their
political principles.

CHAPTER XII.

Now I think I have been successful in demoastrat-
ing to the reader that high tariff is not a produc-
tive, but rather a destructive force; that vhere is such
a thing as political economy; that a high tariff sys-
tem is merely a ''legal" means of robbing the
ppor for the enrichment of the rich. Has the i)clicy
of England been of a temporary character? Was it
only applicable to conditions when Peel made such
great reforms? No! The policy of the iiiberal party
has been dominant in England for fifty years and
under the system of free and freer trade sh© has be-
come mistress of the waves, the richest and strongest
of the nations of the earth. Her policy is a science.
Fellow electors, the future of Canada is an important
question and you are asked to approach its consider-
ation free from the influences of party passions. You
are asked to look upon the two parties as two sets
of tools and see for your own satisfaction whicli set
has done the best work. I have carefully endeavored
to place before you in plain and simple words the
policies of the two parties, the results of their oper-
ations, and have also been careful not to allow any-
thing but facts to appear in this work. What I have
written has been stated from a purely patriotic mo-
tive. I have had no intention to deceive. It is a
crime for our writers and politicians to attempt to de-
ceive. No man has a right to believe error, let

(63)

^4 CANADIAN POLITICS.

alone attempt to spread deception. It is every man's
duty to seek and to apply true principles to all things.
Acting on false political views your actions effect oth-
-er people, hence the necessity of acting wisely and
well. Young man, the future is before you! Respon-
sibilities great and grave will fall upon you, responsi-
bilities that will be for good or for evil. The element
that must win your support must be the traditions
and inspirations of the past, the inspirations of the
present and the future. If, in the Conservative party
you find those elements that inspire, that appeals to
the enthusiasm of sound patriotism you will link
your destinies with that party. If in the Liberal par-
ty you find those elements that inspire, that appeals
to the enthusiasm of sound patriotism, then you will
link your destinies with the Liberal party. Searchiaig
the records of the public men of the Conservative par-
ty you will find that while some of them were able
statesmen they were compelled by the necessities of
their organizations to be constant drags upon the
wheels of progress, a hindrance to the moral influ-
ences of the whole country. You will find that their pol-
icy has always been years behind the sentiments, the
needs and aspirations of the people. Contrasting their
public declarations with the results of their policy we
find the situation one full of discouragement and
drawbacks to the inspirations of youth— of the youth,
of man and country.

Searching the records of Liberal leaders you find
inspiring sentiments from the fact that the greatest
"heart, the greatest mind, the greatest character, the

CANADIAN POLITICS. 65

greatest achievements were found in the father of
modern Liberalism, which has made for him the first
and most enduring fame among the statesm-en of the
world. I refer to the late Right Honorable William
Ewart Gladstone. Turning to the history of our own
country we read the records of Baldwin, Brown, Mc-
Kenzie, Blake, Mowat, Hardy, Ross and Laurier.
What are the inspirations we receive from their lives?
Why, the inspiring sentiments of free soil and free
men. These were the defenders and promoters of
the liberties we in Canada today enjoy as free citiz-
ens of the greatest colony in the British Empire.
These are the men who have steered the ship of state
through great storms and put her safely iinto port.
Is there a finger that can point to one political crime,
to one grave political sin, committed by any of these
leaders? Faults they certainly have had, lest we
should think them of more than human construction,
but it is a glorious tribute to the organizations of
the Liberal party that their leaders have always been
men of firm, patient, high minded and progressive
ideas and ideals, men whose steadfastness of purpose
and whose patriotic inspirations have given to them
the namie of statesmen, whose examples it were honor-
able for any man to follow, and whose policy appeals
to the hearts and consciences of all people. In conclus-
ion, permit me to say that there is no better way of
fulfilling our whole duty to ourselves and to our
country than to be guided, moved and governed by
Liberal motives and principles.

CHAPTER XIII.

No country in the world has, during the past
five years, occupied a more prominent position by
means of trade development than Canada. Since the
present government brought down its tariff bill of
1897, which is equivalent to a reduction of 10^ per
cent off the total duties, or taxation, imposed by the
Conservative government preceding, Canada's devel-
opment has indeed been truly remarkable and it is
only within the past few months that this marvelous
change has been realized by the people.

In seven years the trade of Canada has grown
nearly 100 per cent, which is twice the growth that
has been attained by any other country in proportion,
during that time.

This growth and development is the best answer
Canada gives to the impressions created by men like
Andrew Carnegie, Esq., who has said that Canada's
only hope lies in her becoming a part of the United
States, and that our national development has been
altogether too slow.

When it is understood that our population barely
reaches five millions and a half people, that our an-
nual trade exceeds four million dollars, that we have
some two million, four hundred thousand square
miles of territory that yet awaits habitation and
which will be made more or less productive, these pes-
simists will perhaps begin to look upon our future
(66)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 67

with hopefulness. In fact Canada has made such
rapid and substantial progress that she no longer
looks abroad for trade favors. The days when Cana-
dian ministers went on their knees for favorable
treaties with the Washington government and with
the governments of other countries have passed. We
find we have all the characteristics and resources of
the great nations within our own borders; that we
have the brain, the energy, the courage, the ambition,
the mioney and the men, and with these, why should
we seek favors abroad? With these national suffi-
ciencies Canadians will henceforth rely upon their own
sentiments of loyalty and will in all probability let
those nations desirous of trading with us make the
approaches. The policy of the present government has
made provisions for the development of the various
industries and interests, so that it will not be neces-
sary for us to seek treaties. Our statesmen have
been careful to make pur position secure in this direc-
tion, hence there is no reason for alarm at th^ inde-
pendent attitude we have assumed. On the contrary
it will do much towards keeping our name at the top
of the page on the book of fame, and will be the
means of better enabling the world's great statesmen
to place a value upon the trade and commerce of the
Canadian people. While retaliatory legislation is not
a Liberal principle there are Liberals who claim that
it is the duty of a government to protect its people
by prohibiting other countries from unloading its sur-
plus goods upon theon. It was this spirit that prompt-
ed Colonial Secretary Chamberlain to make the an-

68 CANADIAN POLITICS.

nouncement, in his Birimnghani speech, that has at-
tracted such great attention. While it is doubtful if
the people of England will submit to a deviation
from its present free trade policy, which has brought
them from idleness and starvation, there are many-
free traders who believe that a short experience with
a protective tariff would forever settle the agitation,
insofar as the great body of consumers are concerned.

That manufacturers, the advocates and defenders
of the tariffs and special class interests would profit
by the adoption of Mr. Chamberlain's policy we read-
ily concede, but it is doubtful if the real producers of
England's wealth, the artisans and agriculturists
would benefit thereby. Grant, the latter would receive
an increased price for their products by reason of their
inability to supply the home den^and, will anyone
dare say that the increased taxation would not
leave them infinitely poorer than they are today?
Then how can the colonies of Great Britain honorably
entertain trade propositions, the operation of which
must prove a burden to that class of people the col-
onies would object to burden at home? If the colonies
are to be loyal, they will not adopt tariffs, or prefer-
ences, that will stimulate their growth at the expense
of the naasses of England. Canada, at least cannot
sacrifice her honor and her dignity by entering into
fiuch an arrangement, which would prevent her trad-
ing with the world and the world from trading with
her.

The arrangement of an Imperial trade policy would
no doubt stimulate our trade in the direction of the

CANADIAN POLITICS. 69

motherland and the other colonies, but can Canada
afford to impose burdens upon her people by entering
into an Imperial trade policy, the effect of which will
be to increase the tariffs against all other countries,
with whom we must trade more or less? Can Canada
afford to limit her export trade to British markets?
Separated as we are, by great distances, can we af-
ford to put insurmountable barriers in the way of
trading on equitable terms with the United States
when the Government of that country is prepared to
enter into negotiations with us? Would the adoption
of an Imperial trade policy enable us to develop as
rapidly as we would with freedom to trade with the
world? Begone the thought that equitable trade re-
lations with the United States would absorb our loy-
alty to the motherland! The loyalty of Canadians is
not measured by dollars and cents. It is bound by the
ties of blood and love which no consideration or
temptation can sever. We cannot therefore, see why it
is necessary to adopt a trade policy that would be
detrimental to the interests of the masses of England,
in order to make secure a unity of the colonies with
the motherland. Have we not, by the giving of our
sons, and of our blood, amply demonstrated our loy«
alty to the service of our late beloved Queen and our
King? I say Canadian loyalty is not to be purchased
by the temptations of wealth or treaties; it is the loy-
alty of a dutiful and obedient son to his parent and
that loyalty can no more perish than the Empire it-
self. Canadians do not forget the history of England
and can ill become a party to an agreement that \\iil

70 CANADIAN POLITICS.

reduce the bread earners of that country to the con-
ditions existing there before the reforms of Peel, when
her idle and starving masses were actually existing
upon grass, and even carrion for food. It would be
disloyal for Canadians to accept the policy of ambi-
tious leaders without fully estimating its consequences
and when we review our own experiences we can read-
ily understand the injustice that the adoption of Mr.
Chamberlain's policy would inflict upon England's
people.

That the recent troubles in South Africa have led
Mr. Chamberlain to espouse this policy few will deny,
but is it likely that a great industrial nation like
England will be persuaded to starve itself in peace,
for fear of being starved in time of war? Will it not
rather call for a policy of free trade, peace and
plenty?

There are, no doubt, many men over there, and
here, who favor Mr. Chamberlain's policy — patriotic,
able men, including members of parliament; but are
they not enthusiasts in what they regard as a good
cause, and will they succeed in impressing upon the
British government, the British parliament and the
British people the views they entertain — for it is quite
probable that this will be the issue in the approach-
ing British elections. Should the promulgators of
this policy succeed, protectionists must not take it
for granted that it is a declaration against the prin-
ciples that have long guided and governed the Eng-
lish people, for I do not believe that any government,
where the liberty of -its subjects and the freedom of

CANADIAN POLITICS. 1i

exchange has occupied a stronghold in the political
economy of a nation, will live one term in office. A
qiiestiotti of such vast importance however, cannot be
disposed of in a day or in a work of this extent, but
be the issue what it will, there is no doubt the peo-
ple will rally to the support of the principles of true
Liberalism, which form the brightest pages in British
history.

CHAPTER XIV.

We are told by a certain class that with the I'apid
development of the great Northwest, we have a ser-
ious problem before us. These people tell us that the
incoming of the farmers and farm laborers from all
parts of the world will create sentim<ents of hostility
that will threaten the stability of our systems. That
the rapid development of the West promises some
strange possibilities is a situation to which our ablest
men are not indifferent, but the Canadian people have
no fear for the results. Many of these new comers, we
admit, are unacquainted with the laws and customs of
our people, but where even handed justice and human-
ity forms so integral a part of national greatness, as
it does wherever floats the flag that rules the world,
there is no reason to fear any serious result. Myny
of these new comers speak a foreign tongue, but their
children are becoming educated in our schools, in our
own language, and as. they become educated, so will
they become loyal and useful citizens, while their
children will have become worthy subjects of the
country and its institutions.

How could it be otherwise? Does not the educa-
tion our systems afford consist in training children
to labor with steadiness and skill, and in doing as
many useful things as possible, and in the best man-
ner? And with the examples of industry, sobriety and
frugality characteristic of th€ Canadian, how can

U2)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 73

these examples fail to become natural to the children
of our new comers? Therefore, let us welcome the
able bodied sons of the world to our great northwes-
tern lands, and let us not forget that every immigrant
placed there represents the transfer of so much fixed
capital from the country he left to* this, the country
of his adoption. But, I ana asked, "How is it possible
for the government at Ottawa to keep eastern and
western Canada together, divided as it is by hun-
dreds of miles of uninhabited country, and with but
one great line of railway; is it possible to keep these
two sections together? Ridiculous! We have at this
moment every hope for the early construction of a
second transcontinental line of railway. A third line
extending trouh Port Arthur to Vancouver, is now
under construction, while branch lines are being con-
structed in many directions through this western sec-
tion. The present uninhabited stretch of country will
become settled with the construction of these railway
lines and we shall have, in a few years, magnificent
cities, towns, villages and agricultural communities
where today stands the primeval forest and the lone
and mighty rocks and mountains in which dwell min-
eral riches that no man can compute. It is only
within the past five years that a population of
10,000 souls has been placed upon the very lands
that were looked upon as valueless, 10,000 souls
whose happy, prosperous homes give emphatic denial
to the pessimism of the class who today would im-
pede our progress for fear of "changed conditions."
Are not our administrators capable of grappling with

74 CANADIAN POLITICS.

these problems, and is capital not always looking for
opportunity? Too long, have the views of these pessi-
mists prevailed — but Canada has moved ahead. The
ancient clock has struck another hour and on its face
are found the words, "we are determined to advance."
What this determination means fifty years hence we
know not. Perhaps a population of 40,000,000 peo-
ple, the wealthiest, happiest and freest people in the
world! We know of no country on earth possessing
the natural resources we enjoy, no country with the
timber wealth of Canada, no country with such ex-
tensive wheat fields, no country with the mineral
wealth. No better water powers are found in the
world, no systems more free and yet secure, where
the safety of the person is as secure as his property,
and where the right to worship as conscience dictates
is accorded to every subject.

Too long have we underestimated the great possi-
bilities of our country. It is only within the past
few years that our administrators have become awal-c-
ened to the extent of our resources and to the possi-
bilities of a national development. They knew too lit-
tle of our agricultural, mineral, forest and manufac-
turing possibilities. They did not consider the impor-
tance of our fisheries, which give employment to
thousands of men. They did not see the value of our
northwest lands when they gave away to a private
corporation, some 25,000,000 acres, which is, at the
present time, selling at from $5 to $50 per acre and
upon which are settled thousands of happy, contented
people. They did not look upon the distance from

CANADIAN POLITICS. 75

the Atlantic to the Pacific as likely to be covered
with prosperous homes, where schools and churches
would be sustained, here and there thickly settled vil-
lages, towns and cities, adding wealth to our country
and contributing their equal share of taxation to-
wards the efficient and economical administration of
government. They did not consider that we would be-
come competitors with the agricultural and manufac-
tured products of the world, in the halls of learning
and lof legislatures, but we have accomplished all these
things, and more. Our sons have shown their courage
and sterling qualities upon the battlefields with the
greatest soldiers of the world and have taken second
place to none, and while we do not hope for national
greatness through the strength of an army and a
navy, through the records of bloody battles and the
bravery of battle scarred heroes, we cannot but men-
tion thes'e things, for we simply desire to show that
in whatsoever Canadians have undertaken, wherever
they have gone, they have shown equal capabilities
and judgement with the sons of any nation. Every
country has a past — has a history. Canada too, has
a past and a history — but more than all — she has a
future, and to the developn^ent of that future let us,
as Canadians, stand shoulder to shoulder, determined
to make that future secure, full of strength, stability
and glory. Let us seek and apply true, manly princi-
ples to every phase of discussion that confronts our
social and political welfare. Do not let us and our
children suffer for want of proper judgment and wise
action on our parts. Let us grasp the situation with

76 CANADIAN POLITICS.

courage, determined to play our part in the upbuild-
ing and advancement of our national excellence on
lines that will make our posterity as proud of us
as we are of such men as Cromwell, Peel, Cobden,
Bright, Gladstone, Baldwin, Mackenzie, Mowat, Hoss
and Lauricr. With our destiny in the hands of such
leaders of men we have no fear for the future and can
safely trust our national development to m.en with
character, ideals and capabilities such as these great
men possessed. Every age produces the man if he can
but be found. Let Canadians therefore be true to
themselves, to one another, and we shall become a
great and powerful nation of the happiest people the
world has ever known.

PART II.

SPEECHES BY THE LEADERS OF
REFORM AND PROGRESS IN CANADIAN
POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT.

CANADA'S GREATNESS.

Speech of the Right Honorable Sir Wilfrid Laur-
ier, at Quebec, August 1897, on his return from the
Jubilee Ceremonies at London: —
"'Mr. Mayor, Ladies and Gentlemen: —

How can I find words to express to you the sen-
timents of gratitude which fill my heart at the sight
of this immense audience come from all parts of the
country to offer me sincere congratulations. How can
I find words to tell you what are the feelings which
fill my soul as a Canadian and how proud I am of
my nationality, of my country, in face of this au-
dience, in face of this panorama which I have under
my eyes and which has no rival, I am sure, in any
part of the world.

"Gentlemen, if I may believe the terms of the ad-
dress, the voyage which I have just made in England,
in France, in Europe has found some echo in the
hearts of my fellow countrymen. Let me tell you
without any hesitation that the finest part of that
voyage, and perhaps I can say without boasting has
had some success, that the finest part of that voyage
is the return.

"I loved my country when going away, I love it
a hundred times more on my return. I was proud of
my country before having seen the countries of Eur-
ope, and now that I have seen the most famous of
those countries I am a hundred times more proud
than I was of Canada, my native country.
(79)

8o CANADIAN POLITICS.

I have seen the hills of Scotland, I have seen
the fields of England, adorned with woods luxuriant
in richness; I have seen the fertile plains of France,
covered with grain and vine; I have seen the moun-
tains, the lakes, the villages of Switzerland, famous
for their beauty, eternally young, celebrated espe-
cially because they were the cradle of liberty in Eur-
ope, at the time when liberty was unknowm. I have
seen Italy, I have seen the plains of Lombardy, those
plains which Bonapart showed to his soldiers and
which he pointed out to them as the finest in the
world; I have seen the hills of Tuscany, with their
feet bathed in the azure waters of the Mediterranean,
while on their sides the vines and the olives stretched
up to- the most inaccessible heights.

Gentlemen, we must recognize it, heaven has been
prodigal in its gifts to these countries, but let m«
tell you that however fine they m.ay be, Canada is
still finer. I have seen London, with its immense
wealth; I have seen Paris with its incomparable ar-
tistic beauty, I have seen Rome with all its treas-
ures: well, neither London, nor Paris, nor Rome, not
even in Rome, though it be the capital of the relig-
ion to which I belong, have spoken to my soul like
the rock of Quebec, when I perceived it on my re-
turn.

Every country has a history, we also have a his-
tory. The volume of our history is not as pageant
as theirs, but page for page, it is as well filled, and
further, if these countries have a history, if they have
the past, we have the future, and it is towards the

CANADIAN POLITICS. 8i

future that my soul, that all my faculties are direct-
ed, and it was always with my eyes fixed on Canada
that each time I spoke in England or in France, I
sought, I found my inspiration.

Gentlepien, I am not one of those who make
patriotism consist in prolonging old struggles to eter-
nity. I am not of those who believe that Providence
united us here, men of every race, to continue the
fights of our fathers. I am one of those who believe
it is necessary to be inspired by the past in order to
find there the source of national unity. I have the
pride of my origin. I have proclaimed it a hundred
times. I have the pride of my civil status as a Brit-
ish citizen, and particularly have I the pride of the
aspirations which I entertain for the future of Cana-
da our common country. I have defended its cause as
best I could. I have pleaded its cause with the Im-
perial authorities. I assuredly do not attribute to
myself the victory, but I say that victory crowned
our efforts. Our liberty is more complete today on
my return, than it was the day of my departure. We
did not have commercial liberty as complete as we
ought to have it, there were treaties which spoiled our
efforts, treaties which prevented us from making the
arrangements, and treaties of commerce which we
w-ished. There was the treaty with Germany and the
treaty with Belgium, the denunciation of which we
asked for y©ars and years. These treaties were use-
ful to England and England hesitated to denounce
them, because in denouncing them, in doing away with
them, England made a sacrifice of its commercial in-

82 CANADIAN POLITICS.

terests. Well, gentlemen, at the request of our insis-
tence England consented to make that sacrifice and
gave up its own interests to preserve th,ose of Can-
ada.

"You have made allusion to the honors conferred
upon me by Her Majesty, the Queen of England, and
by His Excellency, the President of the French Re-
public. Those who are acquainted with me know that
personally these things however worthy of respect,
and they are infinitely so, have no supreme value in
5^y eyes. If I heeded only my democratic sentiments
I perhaps would have acted differently from the way
I did, but under the circumstamces of my life, I have
put aside my own personality to consider only what
I believe to be my duty towards my country, and if
there are a few more letters at the beginning or at
the end of my name, be certain that these titles do
not add anything to the value of my aianie as I receiv-
ed it from my father and mother. If there are crosses
and decorations on my breast, it is always the same
breast which beats beneath them, it is always the
heart of a son of the people born among the people,
who never so far has forgotten his origin and who
never will forget it either.

A GREAT COUNTRY TO GOVERN.

Speech of Hon. Alexander McKenzie at Colborne,
July 6, 1877:—

It rests with the Liberal party not merely to
initiate such legislation as the party as a whole de-
mands, but it rests with individual members of that
party to give their special consideration to such
particular views as they may hold; and our real dan-
ger is not in advocating, as individuals, measures
which the party as a whole have not yet learned to
value and respect, but in pursuing our hobbies so far
that we detach ourselves from the main body on the
march, and so expose our flank to the enemy's fire.
Let us as Liberals combine together; let us at such
meetings as this discuss the public measures that may
be or should be introduced, and the policy that ought
to be followed. If we cannot carry all the particular
measures we want, let us carry such as we can carry,
going on step by step and keeping together.

"But as soon as we open our ranks and divide
into sections, the enemy will pour in his fire and ac-
complish the destruction of our party. I ask any
Conservative to name a single measure of reform
which that party initiated.

I ask them to name a single great reform which
they did not oppose, until they found that the Liber-
al party were going to carry it over their heads, and
then they turned round and voted for such portions

(83)

84 CANADIAN POLITICS.

of these measures as they thoug^ht they rr^ight vote
for without harm to themselves. Their real aim. and
their object is to oppose all reform; to stand still; to
keep what they have; to allow no innovation, no re-
form. They used to consider the word "reform" as
synonymous with "license," and regard every new
measure as a mischievous innovation; and we used to
have to fight our way as Liberals step by step in this
new country, where every man has a hold on the soil,
until at last they were compelled to give the franchise
to almost every man in the community. Such has
been their policy: it is their nature and belongs to
them; it is the part they have to play in the body
politic. They are like an enemy behind a citadel of
error and darkness, and when the invading army of
Reformers have crossed the trenches and forced a pas-
sage to the heart of the citadel, they are amazed to
find that the whole garrison have deserted their works
and are fighting on the other side.

We have a great country to govern, and we have
no doubt great measures to deal with in the near
future. We have half a continent in the Far West
under our control, to be filled up with industrious
people. Few countries have a more niagnificent des-
tiny before them than have the people of Canada. We
have to vindicate the rights of the people of British
origin, owing allegiance to Britain's Queen, and be-
lieving our system of responsible government is more
democratical, more like true liberty, than the boasted
Republicanism of the United States. We have it in
our mission to vindicate that system of government;

CANADIAN rOLITlCS. 85

to carry it over the whole of this continent, and car-
ry with it as we will, as we have in the prairies of
the Far West, equal rights and ample justice even to
the red aborigines of the country of which we have
taken possession.

Let us not falter 'under these circumstan^cos; let
us not waste our who'le time in seeing whether Sir
John Macdonald is the worst man living, or Alexan-
der Mackenzie the wickedest on the face of the earth;
let us devote ourselves to principles; let us defend
policies. If our policy is not right, let our Conserva-
tive friends announce a clear and definite policy; let
them disown their old leaders and disavow their acts;
let them adopt son^e name by which we may know
them,, and if their policy is the best, by all means
adopt it, and let me and my colleagues go. This
country 'is large enough and its people intelligent
enough to furnish men capable of governing the coun-
try if both the Government and the Opposition were
swept from their places. But if you consider that we
have to the best of our power, and with a fair meas-
ure of success, carried out a policy which you have
already stamped with your approval, all I can say is
that we shall continue to devote our earnest and care-
ful attention to the promotion of the interest of the
farming community, which is a large and important
one in this country, as well as of all the other classes
that go to make up our population. We may look
forward to such a measure of prosperity as will at
once settle up our waste regions, people our older

86 CANADIAN POLITICS.

counties more fully, and give life and energy to our
manufactures and all branches of our foreign trade.

To these things we ought to devote ourselves
with increasing assiduity, and I have no doubt that
we shall be able at once to vindicate our system of
government on this continent and to pursue uninter-
ruptedly the career of progress that is before us,
showing to the world that our political system is one
that insures the perfect and equal prosperity of all
classes of Her Majesty's subjects.

THE SOURCES OF WEALTH.

Speech of Sir Riohard Cartwright at Colborne,
July 6, 1877:—

I don't want to flatter you, or depreciate the
good that other classes may do to their country, but
I do desire t^o point out that in this present time and
day there are but three great sources of wealth in
Canada — our farms, our forests, our fisheries and our
ships; and that although others may be and are im-
portant in their degree, that at present these are the
things from which our wealth mainly comes, and that
in regulating the policy of this country we must look
first and foremost to see how far any policy will
affect the welfare of the men who are actually en-
gaged in adding to the real and substantial wealth of
the country.

And although I gi^ie full credit to the value of
the services which the commercial classes afford, I
also deem it my duty, in so far as my poor voice and
influence can do so, to call attention to what I be-
lieve is just now more or less of an evil throughout
Canada, and that is the unfortunate tendency that
exists among the most promising of our agricultural
population to forsake the honest and respectable pur-
suit of agriculture for the doubtful aaid precarious
gain which they can extract from overcrowded occupa-
tions common in towns and cities, and from ill-paid
professional work. I think we should be very much

(87)

88 CANADIAN POLITICS.

better off on the whole if we had fewer shopkeepers,
fewer physicians, and fewer lawyers, and more farmers
and more artisans. These are the men who produce
the real wealth of the country, and as an intelligent
friend of mine said to me some time ago, "I see they
are talking about comanercial distress in this coun-
try. I can tell you that our real commercial distress
is that we have three meai trying to do one n^an's
work." I believe this is very near the truth, and
that in this respect perhaps the system of education
which we now poss'ess, and of which we are justly so
proud, is possibly somewhat defective. I would deem
it the best result of our educational system if its
eff'ect be not to make our young men less but more dis-
posed to honest toil, and so better able to utilize the
great wealth which still remains unheeded and imde-
veloped from one end of our country to the other.
Depend on it that for a very long period to come
Canada will prosper or decay according us the yeo-
manry of Canada prosper or decay.

One thing more: it is worth your while to bear
in mind how great the perils will be which will most
assuredly environ the highest political interests of this
country if you turn our legislative halls, as has been
the case to some extent in the United States, into
organizations employed in carrying on a system of
lobbying tor the purposes of obtaining legislation de-
signed to make the few rich more rich, but the many
poor yet poorer than today. That has not been suf-
ficiently weighed by those who are so cannestly ex-
horting us to readjust our tariff, and introduce a pro»-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 89

tective system under which everybody is to grow
rich at everybody else's expense. I repeat, that con-
sequence has not been sufficiently weighed, and had
these people done as they should have done — watched
the course of events in the neighboring Republic, and
seen how much of the corruption — of which these very
m!en are never willing to cease talking as regards Am-
erican affairs — ^how much of this depends upon and i»
directly due to the unfortunate fiscal policy of the
United States, I think that lesson alone would have
gone far to disabuse the minds of the people of Can-
ada of any hankering that they might have after a
protective system. Moreover, if there be any who be-
lieve that Sir John Macdonald and Dr. Tupper, were
they replaced in power, would be able to carry out
their promises, would be able to give the protection,
of which they talk, let them remember that Sir John
has been prudent enough under all circumstances nev-
er to commit himself by any possible vote, or by any
resolution which could not be contrived to read both
ways.

Sir John is a very able man, and Sir John never
showed his ability more than in this, that, although
he was spurred — I niight almost say kicked — on from
behind, he never would commit himself in the House
of Commons by anything like a thorough advocacy O'f
the so-called protective system. Sir John was far too
clever a man to be able even to appear to believe in
the doctrines which ho was ad\ocatinf^, although he^
perhaps, would not appreciate the com.:)liment quite
in the spirit in which it is offered.

VALUE OF THE FRANCHISE.

Speech of Hon. Edward Blake, Teeswater, Septem-
ber 24, 1877:—

I am glad to know that the Ontario franchise
has lately been much improved. One of my sugges-
tions, in a speech in 1874 which evoked some discus-
sion, has found its way into the statute book. A
class of our population, which as I thought was en-
titled to the franchise by its intelligence and by its
real though unrecognized stake in the country, but
which by its practical exclusion from the benefits of
the income franchise was deprived of its right, has
received it under the Farmers' Sons' Franchise Act of
last session. The true tests of the franchise to my
mind are citizenship and intelligence. I don't think
we can uphold the franchise of any of the Provinces
as perfect; but the nearer we can approach to the
practical adoption of the rule that every good citizen
possessing a reasonable share of educated intelligence
shall have a vote, the nearer shall we approach to
w^hat is my idea at least of the true basis of the fran-
chise. I rejoice that the men of this Province are ad-
mitted to the franchise while still young. I have
alwaj^s believed that the exercise of the franchise is
in itself a very great educator, and that those who
were about in a few years to wield by their votes
their country's destinies should be initiated into the
discharge of that duty while yet their votes,, though
(90)

CANADIAN POLITICS. ^r

powerful, do not predominate. Being thus called on
to take an early and active interest in the politics of
the country, they will be the better fitted for the dis-
charge of the duties of citizenship when they in their
turn shall form a majority of the electors. I con-
gratulate the young men of Canada upon the right
which has been recognized as theirs. I trust and be-
lieve that they will use it wisely; that they will use
it as true Canadians ought — for the intorosts of this
country in which they were born, in which they ex-
pect to live and die, and which holds within its bounds
what is most dear to them, whether of substantial or
immaterial things.

It soon became apparent that the Election Law
did not secure the trial and punishment of offenders
against its provisions, and that a long series of pen-
alties on the statute book was but a solemn farce.
We have, therefore, passed a law making it the duty
of the judge, on finding a prima facie case of breach
of the Election Act, to try the supposed offender early
and summarily without a jury, and to inflict on the
convict imprisonment as well as fine — ^not fine alone,
because, the mere infliction of a fine might be no pun-
ishment to a wealthy man, and does not involve the
disgrace which attaches even to a short term of im-
prisonment, I believe that those who have hitherto
either recklessly or corruptly broken ^he law will be
afraid to break it now, and that we will find our-
selves on the approaching occasion nearer a purer
election than before. It becam^e apparent that the
law was defective also in that it did not provide suf-

92 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ficient means for the prosecution of enquiries into cer-
tain cases where yet corrupt practices probably pre-
vailed, and we have accordingly made provision by
that direction which a Parliamentary Commission may
issue for a full enquiry into cases in which}, by the
judge's report or otherwise, it appears that the inves-
tigation before him was stopped by the action of the
parties, and that there are grounds for believing that
further enquiry would be desirable. By these means
the breakers of the law will be discovered, and it will
be in the power of Parliament, if the corruption shall
appear widespread and an example become necessary,
to resort even to the extreme a.nd somewhat arbitrary
step of delaying or declining to issue a new writ.

You know that I have for some time favored a
change in the present system of representation, be-
lieving that it involves injustice, inequality, and
chance to an extent not creditable to this country,
and which would not be endured but that long habit
and practice have blinded us to its obvious defects.
* You are aware that I did not think the subject ripe
for Parliamentary Action; and I should not myself
have presented it at present to the notice of the
House. Some progress has, however, been made in
that direction. A Select Committee was struck last
session, at the instance of a member whose illness un-
fortunately prevented the prosecution of the enquiry;
but I suppose it will be resumed next session, and I
venture to believe that if that enquiry be prosecuted,
facts will be disclosed which will tend to the forma-
tion of a sounder public opinion an the subject, and

CANADIAN POLITICS. 93

which will at any rate show that the present system
is so defective as to require amendment. Another de-
mand of a very different character has been made
from, very hig^h quarters, namely, that we should al-
ter the law as to undue influence. Now, the basis of
our representative institutions is that our elections
shall be free. Each of us is called on to surrender his
share oi control over the common affairs to the ma-
jority, upon the ground that this surrender is neces-
sary, for not only can we reach a decision; but also
the hypothesis, without which the demand would be
quite unjustifiable, that, all having a common inter-
est, and each man speaking freely for himself, the
view of the majority is more likely to be sound — is
more likely accurately to represent what would be
beneficial to the conmaunity than the view of the min-
ority. This is the ground-work. Now, that ground-
work wholly fails if the vote be not the expression of
the voter's own opinion, but the expression of some-
body else's opinion different from his. If, instead of
its being his opinion, it be the opinion of his em-
ployer, his landlord, his creditor, or his minister,
why, it is not his vote at all, it is somebbdy else's,
and we have not submitted ourselves to the free voice
of our fellow-countrymen, but possibly to the voice of
a very small minority, who have determined what the
voice of the larger number is to be. Thus the whole
basis of our representative institutions would be dis-
troyed if we permitted the opinions of our employers,
creditors, landlords, or ministers to be forcibly sub-
stituted for our own. For this reason, besides the

94 CANADIAN POLITICS.

penalties which are enacted against the exercise of
undue influence, we have declared that the vote of any
man so unduly influenced shall be null and void, and
that elections carried by such undue influences shall
be annulled. I cannot, if a landlord, say to my ten-
ant, "Now, tenant, I shall turn you out at the end of
your term if you do not vote for my candidate."
Though I may have a legal right to turn him out at
the end of the term, yet I cannot give the intimation
that I will, on this ground, exercise this right. If I
do, the vote is annulled as not free. I cannot, if a
creditor, say to my debtor, 'T will exact that debt
at once if you do not vote as I wish," though I may
have a legal right to exact my debt. I cainnot, if an
employer, say to my employee, "You shall leave my
employment at the end of the current term unless you
vote with me," though the law may not oblige me to
retain him in my service. It has been found necessary
in all these cases to prevent the relations to which I
have referred from being made the means of unduly
influencing the vote, in order that this great cardinal
principle of our Constitution — the freedom of each man
to vote according to his own opinion — may be pre-
served intact. True, the landlord, and the creditor,
and the employer have each the right to' speak and
persuade by arguments, and the confidence placed in
them may be such that the voter's opinion may be
changed; but between the argument, the persuasion,
the confidence which may conduce to a change in the
mind and opinion of the voter, and that coercion
which compels him to vote contrary to his miind on

CANADIAN POLITICS. 95

the threat of some loss or penalty, there is a broad
and palpable distinction, and that is the distinction
which the law lays down. Now, if there be a form of
religion under which the minister is supposed to have
the power, by granting or refusing certain rites, or
by making certain declarations to affect the state of
the voter after death, is it not perfectly obvious that
the threat of such results to the voter unless he votes
in accordance with the opinion of the minister, might
be infinitely more potent than any of the other
threats which I have named — the exaction of a debt,
the ejection of a tenant, or the discharge of an em-
ployee? And would not such a threat be obnoxious to
just the same objection?

I am far from implying that politics should not
be handled on Christian principles. Whatever difficul-
ties and differences there may be as to Christian dog-
ma, there is, fortunately, very little difference con-
cerning Christian morals. We are, fortunately, all
united in this country in the theoretical recognition —
however far we may fail in the practical observance —
of the great doctrines of Christian morality which are
handed down to us in the Gospel; and I believe it is
on the basis of those doctrines that the politics of
the country shall be carried on. Dim indeed would
be our hopes, and dark our expectations for the fu-
ture, if they did not embrace the coming of that glor-
ious day when those principles shall be truly, fully
and practically recognized — if we did not look forward
to the fulfillment of the promises that "the kingdoms
of this world shall become the kingdoms of the

96 CANADIAN POLITICS.

Lord,'* and that nation shall not make war against
nation, neither shall they learn war any more;" if we
did not watch for the time when the human law of
self-interest and hate shall be superseded by the Div-
ine law of self-sacrifice and love. But while we hope
^md strive for the accomplishment of these things, we
must not forget the lessons of the Great Teacher and
iExemplar, When interrogated upon secular things —
when asked as to rendering tribute to Caesar, He
said, "Render unto Caesar the things that are Cae-
sar's, and to God the things which are God's." H«
l^id down the principle, and He left the people — th«
querists — to make the application. So again when He
was called upon to settle a dispute between two
brothers about an inheritance. He said: "Man, who
made Me a judge or divider over you?" Such was the
view He took as to the duty of a minister, as to the
work of the pulpit; and while I do not hesitate to say
that to all ministers I Wiould freely accord the right
as citizens of voting, of expressing their opinions, of
arguing and persuading, and influencing if they please,
my own opinion is that the pastor of a flock divided
on politics will be much more likely to retain the full-
est confidence of all the members of that flock, and
so to discharge effectually his great task, if he ab-
stains from active interference in those political
aiffairs on which there is and will be great division of
opinion among them. But, sir, it has been argued in
some quarters that the free exercise of one form of
religion amongst us is impaired by this la>v. That
wouM indeed, if true, be a serious thing. But if it

CANADIAN POLITICS. 97

were true, we would still be bound, in my opinion, to
preserve the fundamental principle of the freedom of
the elector. No man, any article of whose creed,
should make him a slave would be fit to control eith-
er his own destiny or that of free men. A slave him-
self, he would be but a proper instrument to m.ake
slaves of others. Such an article of religion would
in a word, be inconsistent with free institutions, be-
cause it would not permit that liberty of opinion in
the individual, which is their very base and corner
stcme. But we are. not confronted with that difficulty.
The public and deliberate utterances of high dignitar-
ies in more than one Province of Canada have shown
that the assertion is unfounded, and have recognized
the right of every elector to vote according to his
conscience; and the recent statement — communicated to
the public through Lord Denbigh — of the; head of that
Church, shows that the United Kingdom, where the
law as to undue influence is precisely the same as
ours, is perhaps the only country in Europe where the
professors of thatj religidn are free to practice it. If
this be the case in the United Kingdom, it is so here,
and it is not true that there is any form of religion,
the free and full exercise of which is impaired by the
preservation of the great principle to which I have re-
ferred. I trust, then, that the ill-advised pretensions
which have been set up will be abandoned; but should
they be pressed, I take this opportunity of declaring
that for myself, whatever be the consequences, I shall
stand by the principle which I have laid down — and
shall struggle to preserve — so far as my feeble pow-

98 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ers permit — to each one of my fellow-countrymen,
whatever his creed, the same full and ample measure
of civil freedoan which he now enjoys under these laws
which enable him and me, though we may be of
diverse faiths, to meet here on the same platform, and
Aere to differ or agree according to our own political
convictions, and not according to our religious faith
or the dictation of any other man, lay or clerical.

CANADA, PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE.

Speech of Sir Oliver Mowat at the Cente-nnial
proceedings, Niagara, on July 16, 1892:
May it please Your Honour, Ladies and Gentlemen: —
I am glad to take part in a patriotic celebration
in the old town of Niagara, so rich in historical and
patriotic associations. That proclamation issued by
Governor Simcoe at Kingston a hundred years ago
this day was the first step in the political history of
the Province, and was doubtless an event of intense
interest, as it was of great importance, tp the white
population of the Province at that time.

That population was small — 10^000 souls only, as
some estimate. These early settlers of Ontario were
distinguished for industry, courage, and a sense of
religion and its duties. Take them all in all, they
were a noble ancestry, of whom a country may well
feel proud. Whether their loyalty was a mistake and
a misfortune as some elsewhere aver, or whether, on
the other hand, it is to be rejoiced over, as the peo-
ple of Canada have generally always felt, there can
be no denial that it was at all events a profound sen-
timent on their part. According to their view, in
allowing this sentiment to guide their conduct they
were acting on principle and performing duty. They
were as fond of the good things of this life as their
neighbors were. They were as much attached to their
houses and lands, their goods and their chattels, as

(99)

loo CANADIAN POLITICS.

others were, and as desirous of success in life for
themselves and their children. But when the provin-
ces in which they lived ceased to be British provinces
and became parts of a new nation hostile to the old,
they forsook all the material advantages and pros-
pects which they had in their old homes, and follow-
ed the flag of Britain into the wilds of Canada, pre-
ferring the privations and hardships and poverty
which might be their lot there rather than to live un-
der the flag of revolution. The material sacrifices
which they made at the call of what they believed to
be duty and right, as well as just sentiment, consti-
tute a glorious record, and that record has influenced
the sentiment and conduct of the Canadian people
ever since. Those early settlers had been born British
subjects; they loved the British name; British sub-
jects it was their determination under all temptations »
to remain, and on British soil to live out their lives,
whatever the determination should cost them.

In 1812 there came to Canadians and Canadian
sentiment a new trial. Great Britain was engaged in
a great European war, and a majority of the people
of the United States of that day deemed the occasion
fitting and opportune for adding Canada to the Un-
ion, by force if necessary, or by persuasion if the in-
habitants would be persuaded. They offered to Cana-
dians freedom from British domination; but Cana-
dians had no grievance against the fatherland. Such
of the United Empire Loyalists who still lived had
not changed their minds since they came to Canada.
Their sons and the newcomers into the country shared

CANADIAN POLITICS. loi

the old preference for British connection, and all
sprang to arms to defend the land of their choice at
the peril and in many cases at the loss of their lives.
That feature in human nature which prompts men
thus to fig-ht for theii;j country, even to the- death, is
one of the noblest in our psychology. It is a neces-
sary incident of a national spirit. As a Canadian, I
feel proud of the display of that spirit which Cana-
dians have made at every stage or their history. I
am glad to know that it exists still. I am jvleased
with the illustrations of it which we have had in our
volunteers, God bless them! as well as on the part of
our people generally when they have had opportunity.

I am glad to know that Canadians of the pies-
ent day as a body are not disposed to say to the
sturdy, self-sacrificing men who were the first settlers
of our Province, that they were blunderers in the sac-
rifices which they made of property and prospects and
material instances generally, and in so many instan-
ces, of life also. I am glad to know that Canadians
of this day have as a body no inclination to undo the
work of those noble founders of our Province. As
Canadians we, too, are glad that by reason largely of
their fidelity we are British subjects here in Canada,
and we live here still on British soil. We are British
subjects, and we have at the same time a special love
for Canada. We feel a special interest in Canada's
welfare. Since the time of the pioneers the constitu-
tion of the country has been greatly developed in fa-
vor of the residents.

A century ago it was thought best that several

102 CANADIAN POLITICS.

colonies of British North America which remained loy-
al to the empire should have separate Governments:
and at first separate legislatures were established,
while the Imperial authorities, with the approval of
the colonies, retained in their own hands the executive
power and a veto on colonial legislation. But, as the
population advanced and as the- colonists acquired ex-
perience in the limited amount of self-go verniuent
which the Imperial Act of 1791 secured to them, larg-
er powers and popular control over the executive
became necessary or desirable, and were from time to
time obtained, until the Confederation Act of 1867,
which was passed at the request of the principal North
American Provinces, formed them into one great To-
minion, under a constitution framed in all respects by
their own representatives, the representatives (f all
political parties.

For half a century now the policy of the father-
land has been not to interfere with our affairs, ex-
cept to the extent that we ourselves ask; and we have
all the self-government that through our representa-
tives we have ever asked, or that the Canadians as a
people have hitherto desired. The fatherland has also
given to us without money and without price all the
Crown lands in British North America outside of the
Provinces, as well as the Crown lands in the Prov-
inces, amounting to millions of square miles — the
Crown lands outside of the old Provinces having lieen
given to the Dominion as a whole, and the other
Crown lands to the several Provinces in which the
lands lie. Thus Canada has now an area of 3,610,000

CANADIAN POLITICS. T03

square miles — about equal to the United States, in-
cluding Alaska, and nearly as large as the whole con-
tinent of Europe, the seat of so many great nations.
Our own Province alone is larger than the aggregate
areas of the New England States and New York and
Pennsylvania. Half a million square miles of Cana-
dian territory is well timbered land or prairie land,
and is suitable for the growth of wheat — a larger
wheat-growing area than there is in the United States
or in any other country in the world. Another mil-
lion square miles of territory is fairly timbered and
suitable for grasses and the harder grains. As a
wheat-growing country, our own Province equals or
excels every State of the neighboring Union, and in
Manitoba and the Canadian Northwest the wheat
grown is the finest in the world. Canada is also un-
equalled for raising cattle. Our fisheries, timber and
mines are other sources of wealth from which consid-
erable profit is derived now, and untold riches will
result in the future. Canada is also unsurpassed in
the adaptation of its climate and soil for raising and
maintaining a vigorous and active papulation, and
this is the most important consiaeration of all.

Such is Canada; and this great cou/ntry, won in
the last century by British blood and British treas-
ure, has by Britain been confided to its present popu-
lation for development and use.

It is pleasant to know that until the last ten
years of its history Canada advanced faster in pro-
portion than the States of the American Unioai as a
whole, or than most of the individual States did. As

I04 CANADIAN POLITICS.

to the causes of there not having been like progress
during the last decade, we Reformers ascribe the fall-
ing off to the N. P., or so-called National Policy, and
the high taxation. Conservatives argue for other
causes; but this is not an occasion for discussing the
question between us.

It was in this great and growing country — this
Canada, so extensive in territory, so rich in resources
and so abounding in advantages for the future devel-
opment— that most of its present inhabitants were
born; and it is the land of adoption to the rest of its
population. In view of the relations of it to us all,
aind in view of the history of the country and of what
is now known of its immense possibilities, there have
grown up among its people, alongside of the old at-
tachment to the British name and British nation and
of the pride felt in British achievements in peace and
war, a profound love for Canada also, a pride in Can-
ada and hopes of Canada as one day to become a
great British nation; British, whether in a political
sense in connection or not with the United Kingdom
of Great Britain and Ireland; British because Britain
is the nation of the birth or origin of most of us, and
has the profoundest respect and admiration of all;
British because Canadians retain more of British in-
stitutions and British peculiarities than are possessed
in other lands; British because of most of its people
being more attached to Britain and more anxious for
its well-being than they are with respect to any other
of the nations of the world. As a native Canadian I
am glad to know that this sentiment is not confined

CANADIAN POLITICS. 105

to natives of the old land who reside here, but is the
sentiment of their descendants also. It is not birth
which alone is the groundwork of national sentiment.
Following the example of our fathers, we who are
Canadians by birth lovingly call the old lands
"home" as they did; and those old lands are as dear
to most of us as they were to our fathers who were
born there. But we are Canadians none the less on
that account, and we love Canada none the less. In
my early days I used to mourn over the little Cana-
dian sentiment which there was then among Cana-
dians, whether by birth or adoption; but a gradual
change has been going on in this respect, and Cana-
dianism is now the predominant sentiment among by
far the largest proportion of the Canadian people.

The future of this Canada of ours is a matter of
great interest. What shall it be? We have no griev-
ance against the mother country making us desire
separation from it on that account. What led to the
American revolution was a practical grievance inflict-
ed by the then ruling classes. It was chiefly the tax-
ation of the colonies for Imperial purposes by the Im-
perial Parliament which made the colonies rebel.
They rebelled reluctantly, and but for that practical
grievance and all that it implied there would at the
time have been no rebellion. But, however content
loyal Canadians may be with our present political po-
sition in the empire, people of all parties, both at
home and here, are satisfied that our political rela-
tions cannot remain permanently just what they are.
As the Dominion grows in population and wealth.

io6 CANADIAN POLITICS.

changes are inevitable and must be faced. What are
they to be? Some of you hope for some sort of Im-
perial Federation. Failing that, what then? Shall
we give away our great country to the United States
as Sonne, I hope not many, are saying just now? Or,
when the time comes for some important change-,
shall we, as the only other alternative, go for the
creation of Canada into- an independent nation? I be-
lieve that the great mass of our people would pre-
fer independence to political unioai with any other
people. And so would I.

As a Canadian, I am not willing that Canada
should cease to be. Fellow-Canadians, are you? I
am not willing that Canada should commit national
suicide. Are you? I am not willing that Canada
should be absorbed into the United States. Are you?
I am not willing that both our British connection and
our hope of Canadian nationality shall be destroyed
for ever. Annexation necessarily means all "'hat. It
means, too, the abolition of all that is to us prefer-
able in Canadian character and institutions as con-
trasted with w^hat, in these respects, our neighbors
prefer. Annexation means at the same time the trans-
fer from ourselves to Washington! of all matters out-
side of local Provincial affairs. Ontario's will is pow-
erful at Ottawa. No Government has been in power
there which had not the suppoTt of a majority of On-
tario's representatives; and no Dominion Covemment
would stand for a month without that support. If
things do not go there as we Reformers should like,
it is because Ontario, through its own representatives.

CANADIAN POLITICS. lor

has not so willed. But at Washin^on the influence of
our 2,000,000 or 3,000,000 of people would be noth-
ing, though Ontario's representatives would be unani-
laous. If we want free trade now we have only to el-
ect representatives favouring it, and free trade we^
may have. If w^e want not free trade, but a revenue
tariff, we have only to send to Ottawa representatives
favouring a revenue tariff, and a revenue tariff we
shall have. But in case of annexation to the United
States, Canadians might be unanimous for either pol-
icy, or for any other policy, and their unanimity
would amount to nothing unless a majority of the-
65,000,000 of other people should also favor it. By
annexation we should thus practically be giving up to
our neighbors forever the absolute, uncontrolled and
uncontrollable right of dealing throughout all time
with our federal affairs as our neighbors might deem
for their own interest, whether their interest were
ours or not; our interest or our opinion as opposed
to theirs would not be of the slightest moment. Even
a question of peace or war with the fatherland would
be decided by others. The war might be most unjust,
as other wars have often been; our children and our
money might be taken from us in the prosecution
against the nation of our affections of an unjust war,
the outcome, perhaps, of hatred or jealousy.

Then, again, if the question of mere material ad-
vantage were the only question for us to consider,
it is at least doubtful whether the masses of our peo-
ple would, all things considered, derive any material
advantage from the sacrifice of ourselves and our

lo8 CANADIAN POLITICS.

country to our neighbors. It is easy enough to show
that but for the United States tariff there are impor-
tant articles for which our producers would just now
realize larger prices in the United States markets
than they realize elsewhere. No one can be sure that
this would always be so. Further, it is as certain as
anything of the kind can be, and it would be blind-
ness to ignore the fact, that, though the farmers in
the United States have no McKinley Act to prevent
their having free access to the markets of all their
States, yet these farmers as a body do not appear
to be in better circumstances than our own farmers
are, if they are in as good. Their farms appear to be
as extensively and oppressively mortgaged as ours
are, if not more extensively and oppressively. In a
word, farming in that country at this moment, with
all the advantages of a free market in all the States,
does not appear to be paying better than farming
here, if as well. Nor can I discover that their me-
chanics and labourers are, on the whole, more com-
fortable than our own.

So many of our people cannot get employment;
but I see from the newspapers that hundreds of
thousands in the United States are in the same posi-
tion. Further, the last Dominion census shows that
there are 80,480 persons of United States birth living
among us. Many thousand persons of United States
birth must thus have found in our population of 5,-
000,000 attractions for themselves and their families
greater for business or other things than in the 63,-
000,000 of their own country. And these American

CANADIAN POLITICS. 109

residents are not the scum of the American people.
Quite the contrary. They are more than equal to the
average of their countrymen in their own land. They
belong, as a rule, to the most industrious, active, in-
telligent, law-abiding and church-going class of our
population. If a still larger percentage of Canadians
have gone to the United States, for their life-w^ork or
otherwise, it is to be remembered that a country yet
new, but with a population of nearly 63,000,000
must present more openings for Canadians than
Canada with a population of but 5,000,000 can
have for American citizens; not now to speak of those
other causes for the recent Canadian exodus, as to
which our two political parties differ. Don't let any
of our people who happen to be feeling the pinch of
adverse circumstances assume in a hurry that people
in other lands are on the whole better off than their
own people.

I am told that some of our ambitious young men
are attracted by the idea of political uniotn, as open-
ing to them political positions outside of Canada; but
they should remember that, on the other hand, politi-
cal union would increase in perhaps a larger degree
the competitors for political positions in Canada.
The political positions in the Dominion, which are
open to British Canadians only — the Legislative As-
semblies, the Dominion House of Commons and Sen-
ate, the offices of Dominion Ministers and of Provin-
cial Ministers and of Provincial Lieutenant-Governors,
not to speak of many others — ought surely to afford
ample field fof* our young men, whatever their ability.

no CANADIAN POLITICS.

But it is in the masses of the people that 1 am
most interested. Almost any national or other im-
portant movement may be a material benefit to a
few, and yet be no material benefit to the many. The
late war in the United States between the North and
the South did great good in abolishing slavery. The
war cost several hundred thousands of lives and many
hundreds of millions of dollars. It made millionaires
of a few, and it added to the worldly means of a
good many others, but it is at least doubtful wheth-
er the masses of the Northern people since the close
of the war have enjoyed any increase of material ad-
vantage from the results of the war, however imjior-
tant those results may be in some other respects. So
it is quite probable that a few Canadians would be
benefited by that annexation to the United States
which they are desirous of bringing about; but wheth-
er the masses of the present Canadian population, as
distinguished from the few, would have vany adequate
return for the sacrifice of their allegiance, of their na-
tionality, of their national aspirations, and of the
advantages which in various ways they now possess,
is quite another question. I do not believe they
would.

I speak to you against the annexation of our
country to the United States, believing aversion to
it to be the feeling of all or almost all wihom I am
addressing, as it is my own feeling; but I speak with-
out one particle of animosity toward the United
States. Some of my most esteemed friends are na-
tives and citizens of that country, and but for the

CANADIAN POLITICS. m

animosity of their nation toward our fatherland I
should hold the whole people in most affectionate
brotherhood. Like the people of Ontario, they are
English-speaking people. They come from the same
mother nations that we do. There is much that is
common to us in literature, in laws and in religious
faith. They are, in an important sense, our brothers,
and I shooild be glad to promote the freest intercourse
with them, in every way. But I don't want to belong
to them. I don't want to give up my allegiance on
their account, or for any adytantages they may offer.
As a Canadian, I don't want to give up any aspira-
tions for Canadian nationality as the alternative of
political connection with the fathe-rland. I cannot
bring myself to forget the hatred which so many of
our neighbors cherish towards the nation we love,
and to which we are proud to belong. I cannot forget
the influence which that hatred exerts in their public
affairs. I don't want to belong to a nation in which
both its political parties have, for party purposes, to
vie with one another in exhibiting this hatred. I
don't want to belong to a nation in which a suspi-
cion that a politician has a friendly feeling towards
the great nation of the origin of the most of them
is enough to ensure his defeat at the polls.

Some good men seem to fear that Confederation is
unworkable, because so many bad things, as we Re-
formers think them, have been done at Ottawa since
1878. But, looking at those facts from our own Re-
form standpoint, let us recollect that what we regard
as the worst acts are parallelled, by what has taken

112 CANADIAN POLITICS.

place in Federal or State Governments and Legisla-
tures to the south of us. We may not look merely at
instances there in which, happily, corruption or wrong
has been defeated or punished, but must look to the
far more numerous instances in which corruption or
wrong has triumphed. There would be no advantage
to Ontario in jumping out of the frying pan into the
fire. My thinking badly of what has been done at
Ottawa does not prevent my appreciation of our con-
stitution, nor my aspirations as a Canadian national-
ist; and for several reasons from our own Reform
standpoint. One reason is, that this Province of On-
tario is itself to blame for the existence of the obnox-
ious Ottawa Government, if obnoxious it is. Our
trouble as Reformers has been that, unfortunately as
we think — fortunately as some who hear me think —
we were not able in 1878, and have not been able
since, to convince a majority of the constituencies,
(we hope to convince them) that they should return
to the Dominion Parliament Reformers and not Con-
servatives.

Some of my brother Reformers in Ontario think
Confederation unworkable for good because of Que-
bec. I wpuld submit for their consideration that we
have no right to assume that to be so until we find
Quebec maintaining a party in power after the chief
Province of the Dominion has ceased to support ^ it by
a majority of its representatives. There is not t^e
slightest reason for supposing that a larger propor-
tion of the people of Quebec are in favor of the "Na-
tional Policy," or are against unrestricted reciproci-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 113

ty, that the people of Ontario, and these two matters
at present are the principal points of legislative dif-
ference between Reformers and Conservatives. I am
satisfied that there is no danger of Quebec's placing
itself in antagonism with an Ontario m.ajority of the
members of the House of Commons. The result of the
late general local election in Quebec is an, instructive
fact. Mr. Brown's success in getting the consent of
Quebec in 1864 to representation by population in the
House of Commons is another fact which ought to re-
lieve the , fears which many entertain as to what Que-
bec may or may not do.

Another thing should be noted by any, whether
Reformers or Conservatives, who may be led to look
on annexation as the only way of escape from what
they think still greater ills. Annexation, if it ever
comes, is not going to come soon, is not going to
come in time to relieve any of our people frpm the
present depression. Many drawbacks and difficulties
would have to be overcome before annexation could
become a fact, if it were ever to become a fact. We
have failed so far to get a majority for even unre-
stricted reciprocity, and there would be immensely
greater difficulty and delay in getting a majority for
annexation. Very many are, like myself, prepared for
the one measure who are with all their hearts against
the other. There can be no annexation unless and un-
til a decided majority of our people want it, and this
will not be unless and until their present loyalty is
driven out of both political parties; nor until the
people of Quebec, the people of the Mari'time Prov-

114 CANADIAN POLITICS.

inces, the people of the new Western Provinces and
the people of Ontario are prepared for direct taxation
for the support of their local Governments. Unre-
stricted reciprocity we might have at any time that
a majority of our Dominion representatives should go
for it on terms to which our neighbors would agree;
but for so mighty a transaction as the absolute trans-
fer of half the continent to another nation for all
time, much more would be necessary than a bare and
perhaps accidental majority of the members of the
two Houses; much greater assurance than such an
act as that would be demanded, and needed, that the
mass of the people really and deliberately desired the
transfer; and if that should be ascertained and made
beyond question, there would have to be long nego-
tiations for carrying so important a matter int)o ef-
fect. My point here is, that whatever may be said
for annexation, if immediately attainable, the agita-
tion for it is no remedy for any class of present suf-
ferers.

If we are not for annexation, our clear policy as
Canadians is for the present to cherish British con-
nection whatever else any of us may be looking for-
ward to in our political and national future. Cana-
da is not yet prepared for independence. If, as a peo^
pie we want it, if anything like the same proportion
of our population wanted it as did of the American
colonies at the time of the revolution, and if this were
made to clearly appear in a constitutional way, the
fatherland would, beyond doubt, give its consent.
Naturally it would be given for our independence much

CANADIAN POLITICS. 115

more readily than for annexation to another power,
even though that other were not an hostile power.
Consent to either measure would be given reluctantly
and regretfully on the part of probably most British
electors, and would probably be given willingly on the
part of som^e. But the Provinces of the Dominion are
not sufficiently welded together to form Canada into
an independent nation. There is something of a ^ Can-
adian spirit in e^iery one of the Provinces, and there
is reason for the hope that the Canadian spirit will
be constantly growing stronger in them all. Mean-
while, our great Northwest is being occupied by im-
migrants to it from the older Provinces of the Do-
minion, and by those immigrants from Europe who
for whatever reasons, prefer Canada to the United
States. But, outside of the constitution, the strong-
est ties which up to this moment bind the Provinces
together are their conmaon British connection, their
common history as British colonists, the common
status of their people as British subjects, their com-
mon allegiance to our noble Queen, who has lived
long enough and well enough to obtain the respect
and admiration of all the civilized nations of the
world. These elements of unity are valuable helps for
one day consolidating the Provinces into a nation,
but they are not sufficient for this purpose yet. If
any of us desire Canada to become in time an inde-
pendent nation, if any of us are for Canada first, if
we prefer our own people to any other people, if we
prefer our own institutions to those of other people,
if we prefer, as many of us do, the character and the

Ii6 CANADIAN POLITICS.

sentiments and the ways of our own people to those
of any other people, if we do not wish that as a po-
litical organization our dear Canada should be anni-
hilated, if we do not wish to be ourselves parties to
its receiving its death blow as a nation, our proper
course is plain, the course of us all. Conservatives
and Reformers alike. It is to cherish our own institu-
tions, to foster the affections of our people toward
the fatherland, to strengthen their appreciation of the
greatness and the glories of the empire, to stimulate
their interest in its grand history m the cause of free-
dom and civilization, and to give now and always to
the Dominion and the Provinces the best administra-
tion of public afifairs that is practicable by our btst
statesmen and best public men, whoever they may be.
Some point to the McKinley act as a reason why
Canadians should transfer their country to the Uni-
ted States, and statesmen and politicians in that
country are said to have been advised to adopt a. pol-
icy of peaceable but vigorous coercion as a sure means
of getting over Canadian objections to annexation.
A policy of coercion by McKinley Acts and like means
•would be a policy of insult as well as of injury. In-
dependently of all other considerations, self-respect
would forbid our permitting such a policy to be suc-
cessful. Coercion by such means is as little defensi-
ble on any moral grounds as coercion by war amd
conquest. I hope that the leaders and thinkers of our
political parties in the Dominion will find means of
neutralizing the evils of any attempted coercion. The
^vils meanwhile, would not be great as compared

CANADIAN POLITICS. Ii7

with what was readily borne for conscience sake by
our Canadian forefathers and predecessors, and I
know that their spirit is not wanting in their sons
and successors at the present day.

No, I do not want annexation. I prefer the ills
I suffer to the ills annexation would involve. I love
my nation^, the nation of our fathers, and I shall not
willingly join any nation which hates her. I love
Canada, and I want to perform my part, whatever it
may be, in maintaining its existence as a distinct po-
litical or national organization. I believe this to be,
on the whole and in the long run, the best thing for
Canadians, and the best thing for the whole American
continent. I hope that when another century has
been added to the age of Canada it may still be Can-
ada,, and that its second century shall, like its first,^
be celebrated by Canadians, unabsorbed, numerous,
prosperous, powerful and at peace. For myself I
should prefer to die in that hope rather than to die
President of the United States.

CANADA'S DESTINY.

Speech of Hon. R. Harcourt, Minister of Educa-
tion at the Centenary celebration, Toronto, Septem-
ber 17th, 1892:—

We can all join enthusiastically in the celebration
ceremonies of today. I say all of us, since, while
those who are fortunate enough to be able to claini
this Province as their birthplace may have a special
reason to rejoice in our celebration, all others who
have made this land their home by choice will none
the less because of that fact rejoice in its prosperity,
and welcome its every sign o*f progress. Somie there
are who think that our people are not as patriotic as
they should be, and that we should therefore lose no
opportunity to instil into the minds of our youth a
spirit of earnest, broad and healthy patriotism. Those
who thus camplain point to our neighbors to the
south of us as an illustration of a people who in
season and out of season, in their schoo'ls and col-
leges, yes, from their pulpits even, as well as in their
press and in their literature generally, unceasingly
strive to diffuse a love and a loyalty and attachment
to- their £orm of government and all their institu-
tions. In their school books this aim is never lost
sight of, and in some degree the patriotism they
evoke is both narrow and obtrusive. Only such his-
torical facts are kept prominently in view as will kin-
dle in their youth the fire of patriotism. The record-
(ii8)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 119

ed speeches of their public men from the days of their
first President, when they dreamed of a great repub-
lic yet to be, until now, while they show sharp dif-
ferences and reveal the acrimony of warm debate
touching the party questions of the hour, tend all
one way in this matter of love of country and of
home. The spirit of pessimism as to their country's
high destiny has never had a lodgment even tempor-
arily in the minds of our cousins across the line. So,
too, with their pulpits and their press. No oppor-
tunity is lost'. The flame of patriotism never flick-
ers. Statesmien, orators, ministers of the Gospel,
teachers, editors make love of their country their
warmest theme. Although we occasionally notice, as
partly the result of this fervid patriotism, a natiooial
blindness on their part as regards the rights of other
peoples, or, at best, a tardy recognition of such rights,
we all commend their loyalty to country. Some one has
said that it is by a happy illusion that most men
have a tendency to think their own country the best.
May we not in this Province indulge in this thought
without any illusion? With boldness we can invite
comparison with other lands as regards all those
elements which make up national protsperity and hap-
piness. An invigorating climate, vast and fertile re^
gions, capable of richly supporting: a large popula-
tion, a country extending from ocean to ocean, and
stretching over seventy degrees of longitude, untold
wealth of forest and of mine, magnificent lakes and
mighty rivers- — all these are ours, and as crowning

I20 CANADIAN POLITICS.

blessings we enjoy in a singular degree an immunity
from all pestilences such as tornadoes, earthquakes
and famines, which blight less favored lands. Our
humblest citizen has guaranteed to him fullest rights
of person and of property. We have liberty without
license, a benign religion, with great vari'ety, it is
true, as to forms, practice and profession— ^inculcat-
ing, however, in its every form, truth, honesty, so-
briety and love of man — everywhere exerting a wide
and elevating influence. A good education is easily
within the reach of all, and the door to preferment
opens on equal terms to the son of the poor and of
the rich. Colleges and universities, of which other
countries might well be proud, maintain high stand-
ards, and open their doors invitingly to all classes
and to both sexes. Our great educational facilities,
unsurpassed nowhere, must in time contribute in an
increasing degree to the material developm-ent of the
country and the prosperity and happiness of our peo-
ple. Our newspapers, city and provincial, reaching
almost every home, well managed and ably edited,
exert a powerful influence and contribute largely to
the education of the masses. Our school system rec-
ognizing the importance of the mercantile and me-
chanical pursuits, m.akes special provision for the men-
tal training of those intending to follow these occu-
pations. We have a School of Agriculture, with a
comprehensive and practical course of studies, which
has already accomplished much in clearing the way
for more profitable and scientific methods of tillage.
In a somewhat slow and modest way as yet we have

CANADIAN POLITICS. 121

been developing both art and literature, and not a
few Canadian artists and writers have won honor and
distinction abroad. This centenary celebration in-
vites us to recall the past, and reminds us that we
have been making history, and that our country has.
grown steadily, safely and rapidly. In some channels
and directions more rapid progress can be claimed
for other lands, but we must not lose sight of the
fact, as clear as any which the page of history teach-
es, that slow growth and gradual progress are ever
the surest, and that northern nations, while slower
than others in their historical development, have of-
ten in a marked degree assisted in swaying the des-
tinies of the world. We have a history of which we
need not be ashamed. One hundred years have come and.
gone since Governor Sim^coe (whose features are pre-
served in stone, carved on the outer walls of these
handsome buildings) founded Upper Caffiada as a dis-
tinct Province. During the winter of 1794-5 he took,
up his residence near where we now stand, and bus-
ied himself in planning for the future of this large
and prosperous city, the history of which from that
early day until now, with its safe, marked and unin-
terrupted progress, fills so prominent a chapter in the-
history of the Province. Decade after decade witnesSr-
es adviancement and progress in every part of the*
Province. We find, for example, dotting the wooded
shores of some of our northern lakes, inviting, pop-
ular pleasure resorts, where in those early days the-
Huron and the Algonquin tribes fought as only In-
dians can fight for victory and supremacy. And^

122 CANADIAN POLITICS.

looking backwards from the vantage ground of this
our centenary year, we can point to many other
transformations equally complete and pleasing. If we
cannot in our history point to a glitter of startling
occurrences, we can do what is far better — we can
show a gradual, steady progress in everything per-
taining to the comfort, happiness and prosperity of
our people. A Legislature, thoroughly representative
of a vigorous, earnest people, has session aftei? ses-
sion passed laws timely and prudent, safeguarding
our rights of life and property. What country can
show legislation more advanced or leading up to bet-
ter results than ours? In what land do we find a peo-
ple enjoying more fully than we do the rights of self-
government, or where is there a people more fitted to
be entrusted with that precious right? Our laws have
been well administered. Our courts of justice have
won the unlimited confidence of the people. May we
always have upright and learned judges, men of prob-
ity and culture who regard the unsullied ermine as
dearly as they hold their lives. We can thus look
backward with pride and satisfaction. What can we
say as to our future? What of our destiny? Our des-
tiny under a kind Providence will be just what we
make it. It rests in our own hands. We miay, in the
face of all our great advantages, mar it if we will.
As it is with individual destiny, so it is with nation-
al destiny. We are largely the architects of our own
fortunes. We have laid, as I have shown, deep and
safe and broad, the foundations for a bright future.
Imbued with the healthy sentiment which has pre-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 123

vailed in tlje motherland for centuries, attached to
the forms of government, cherishing her precedents
and traditions, we have passed from childhood to
youth. We are approaching n^anhood and its
strength and vigor must depend upon ourselves.
What is needed, then? We must appease interprovin-
cial jealousies; we must modify mere local patriotism;
We must cultivate an increased national feeling, and
show in every way we can that we have crossed the
line of youth and pupilage. If our public men will be
true to themselves, and govern us with wisdom and
foresight and high statesnaanship, and if our people
will be intelligent, honest and vigilant, then we will
enjoy a degree of success to which no limit can be
fixed.

THE EVILS OF PROTECTION.

Speech of Hon. David Mills at Windsor, October
6th, 1877:—

This, question, gentlemen, of free trade and pro-
tection is not a new question. It is a renewal upon
our soil of the conflict between the exclusive spirit of
a past age, and a more generous spirit of the pres-
ent. It is the renewal of a conflict between know-
ledge and ignorance — between science and a short-
sighted and selfish empiricism. It was fought in Eng-
land during the first half of this century, and the
prosperity which has attended the adoption of an en-
lightened and commercial policy there has more than
justified all the predictions of its most zealous ad-
vocates. In no country in the world has an exclus-
ive fiscal policy had so full and fair a trial, and under
such favorable conditions as in the United States.
From 1860 until the present time a system of taxa-
tion has been pursued there which promises to make
everybody rich at nobody's expense. The murders,
the acts o-f incendiarism, the riots, the strikes and
the destruction of property which have taken place
of late form a conclusive answer to those who say
the system has been successful. In that great coun-
try, where nature has been so lavish of her gifts to
man, where more than half the land within its set-
tled limits still remains unoccupied and unreclaimed —
in that country, capable of sustaining an agricultural
(124)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 125

population of one hundred millions in affluence, there
exists ac this moment an amount of misery and suffer-
ing, of destitution and want, amongst the poorer
classes of the urban population, which well-nigh beg-
gars description, and which can only find a parallel
in the worst governed countries in Europe. Six thous-
and millions of dollars of taxes have been xaken by a
protective policy from the consuming population of
the United States and given to the manufacturers
since 1860. This immense sum has been taken from
those to whom it rightfully belonged under the au-
thority of an Act of Congress, with the view of mak-
ing the nation rich and prosperous. Nevertheless, you
find at this moment those on whose behalf it was lev-
ied and upon whose behalf it was bestowed still con-
fessing their inability to stand without the aid of the
Government props — still calling upon the Government
for further taxation in order that their business may
be prosperous. An illustrated paper some years ago
represented Horace Greely offering a boy a jack-knife
fgr a dollar, and saying to him, "this knife is worth
30 cents, but if you will give me a dollar, and other
people will do the same for fifty years, then I will be
so rich that I can make jack-knives for 30 cents,
too." Such establishments are very costly charitable
institutions, and they are intended to make the many
poor in order that the few may become wealthy.

Many of you have read of the privileges enjoyed by
the aristocracy of France before the revolution; but,
I ask you, what abuses, what special privileges, of
the ancient regime were more outrageous, were more

126 CANADIAN POLITICS.

hostile to every natural sense of justice, than those
conferred upon certain classes of industry in the Unit-
ed States? An attempt has been made by legislation
to increase their capital, not by legitimate profits
upon the products of their labour, but by forced ben-
evolence levied upon the farmers and artisans, by
which the wealth of the one is increased and the oth-
er diminished.

The protectioaiists tell you that it is important
to keep our young men in Canada, and that it is im-
portant also to induce others to immigrate. It is
well to observe whether protection has had this ef-
fect in a very marked degree elsewhere. The total
immigration into the United States, from 3 820 to
1870 inclusive, was 7,800,000. Of these, upwards of
six millions were ordinary laborers, 900,000 had been
tenant or proprietary farmers before coming to Am-
erica, less than 800,000 were mechanics, and not
more than 120,000 o-f these were engaged in branches
of industry that were protected under the tariff of the
United States. So that if it were admitted that those
120,000 were brought to the American Republic in
consequence of the fiscal policy, that is Lut one in
70 of the immigrant population. In the year 1870,
387,203 immigrated from Europe to the United
States, but of this immense number only 6,960, or but
one in 56, were trained to those pursuits which were
protected industries under the tariff. It is clear, then,
beyond question, that the restrictive policy pursued by
the United States has exercised no perceptible in-
fluence upon the immigration to that country. Nor

CANADIAN POLITICS. 127

has it exercised any perceptible influence in prevent-
ing the population from going abroad. The popula-
tion leaving the New England States and going into
the agricultural States of the West to engage in ag-
ricultural pursuits is larger than the population that
has left Canada for the same purpose. Our opponents
tell you that as a result of restriction you are to have
a home market — that the. labourer will comm.and high-
er wages, that the cost of transportation will be dis-
pensed with, and that although something more will
have to be paid for what is produced, something nnore
will be received also for what is given in exchange. It
m^ay be that men will argue themselves into a belief
of a statement of this kind, but an examination of
the facts shows how unfounded it is. There never was
an imposter who did not in time become the victim of
his own imposition.

Men whose immediate interests point in a partic-
ular direction and who have neither the time nor the
inclination for generalization, may be brought to re-
gard such absurdities as true, but they will not bear
one moment's honest scrutiny. Did you ever hear of
a manufacturer seeking to discourage the immigration
of the class of artisans whom he employs? If you
have, that is more than I have done. He asks that
the product of labour, and skill, and capital shall not
be brought from abroad to compete with him. He
asks that the Government shall prefer him to the con-
sumer and compel the consumer to pay him a bou<nty.
He says that if you do this his foreign competitor will
leave his own home, bring his labour, skill and capital

128 CANADIAN POLITICS.

into Canada, and that prices will be as low with pro-
tection, in consequence of home competition, as they
were before without it. Do you think he is governed
by any such motive? Do you think he would urge up-
on the Government the adoption of a restrictive pol-
icy if he believed the immediate consequences would
be such as thus described? Not he. It is because he
does not believe these representations; it is because,
if he has studied the subject, he knows that neither
labour nor capital is likely to flow from abroad to
rival him. He knows that his competitors will be in
most cases discontented workmen and small capital-
ists at home. He has the start of them. He does not
•fear them, and he hopes to realize a fortune out of
tne consumers before any serious result can follow the
adoption of the policy which he advocates. It is just
as necessary in the interest of the community to ex-
clude the foreign mechanic and artisan as to exclude
the product of foreign capital and labour. The one
effects the price of labour as much as the other effects
the price of merchandise. Every skilled labourer from
abroad who settles in Canada becomes a competitor
with every other engaged in the same pursuits who is
already here. The labourer in the cotton factory, in
the woollen factiory, or in the car-shop — and I may
also say in the field — has precisely the same interest
in the exclusion from the country of his brother-la-
bourers that the , employer has in the exclusion of for-
eign products. It must, then, be clear to you that
be'tter wages and better times for the working popula-
tion is not the impelling motive of those who are call-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 129.

ing for protection; and until Sir John Macdonald and
his partisans earnestly set themselves to work, as
friends of the working man, to put down immigration
to this country, they can hardly be regarded as sin-
cere in the professions they make.

One of the most important things for you, gen-
tlemen, to ^bear in mind — important because it is fre-
quently lost sight of — is that the system of taxation
proposed by our opponents will take from the pockets
of the people an enormous sum of money which will
never find its way into the public treasury. The
whole theory of financial reform in England, from
the close of 1818 down to the retirement of Mr. Glad-
stone from office, has been that a Govennment should
aim to tax the people only to the extent that the money
finds its way into the public treasury. Under this
policy, what is paid differs but little from what is re-
ceived, and the w^aste of taxation is reduced to a
minimum. The policy in England, therefore, is to tax
oaily a certain class of imports which are not likely
to affect the prices of others that are not taxed; or,
if they do, then an excise duty is put upon the home-
produced article of a similar kind, so as to give the
State the benefit of the increased value given to it by
the increased import duty. To make more clear the
idea which I wish to convey to you, lot me take
the case of alcoholic liquors. We put a tax upon
those which are imported, the effect of which is t?iat
those manufactured at home, such as beer and whisk-
ey, can be sold at an advanced price. If we put no
excise duty upon them, this advanced price goes to

I30 CANADIAN POLITICS.

the brewer and the distiller. So that, without an ex-
cise duty, those who consume whiskey and beer would
be paying a tax which would not find its way into
the public treasury, and the brewers and distillers
would in that case enjoy incidental protection — that
is, they would pocket a large sum of money which
would not be legitimate profit upon their business,
but a necessary incident of a tax mposed by the
Government upon an imported article. Now, if the
Government put 17^ per cent, upon broadcloth, the
importer must add 17^ per cent, to the original price,
and the sum is the primary cost of the article to him.
This gives to the manufacturer in this country an op-
portunity of adding 17^ per cent, to the price of the
article he produces. The tax on the foreign article
goes into the public treasury. The tax on the home
article goes into the pockets of the home producer,
and even under our present tariff this sum amounts to
several millions a year. The system is essentially
vicious and unjust. If we are not at present able to
vput an end to it, I t^ust 'we are able to take care
that it shall not be further extended. There is
one thing I do know, that when the consuming pop-
ulation of this country fully understand this subject,
they will make short work of the system; they will
see that men who are anxious to acquire fortunes
shall learn to rely on their own judgment as to the
wisdom of their investment, and on their own indus-
try, economy, and prudence for success.

I shall not detain you further by a discussion of
the subject of tariff. It was my purpose to have

CANADIAN POLITICS. 131

spoken upon the acquisition of British Columbia, upon
the acquisition of the Northwest Territories, and upon
the policy of our predecessors in dealing with tihe law
relating to controverted and simultaneous elections.
I shall do this elsewhere in the country. I have said,
however, enough to show you that we understand our
, mission — that we know our duty, and intend to dis-
charge it in the public interest — that we have so far
acted in accordance with our honest convictions of
right, and have done nothing to give us cause for
thinking that the public confidence has been with-
drawn. We recognize the fact that this Union has
been established to promote the prosperity of its peo-
ple, and to secure the colonization of the immense
territories of the Northwest which we control. We
know that without the development here of a national
spirit and a national feeling, we can have no future
assured. Mr. Wedderburn, in speaking once against
the colonization of the country north of the Ohio Riv-
er, said he hoped every man settling on the contin-
ent, not less than the merchant who for a time may
reside at Stockholm or St. Petersburg, would look to
the British Isles as his home. I say the very oppos-
ite of this. I hold that it is the duty of every man
who intends making Canada his home to prefer her
to every other land, and to do all he can to make
her great and prosperous. The man who comes here
from the British Isles must leave his country behind
him, as well as the man who comes from the contin-
ent of Europe and from the neighboring Republic.
Each country of the United Kingdom has its distinct

132 CANADIAN POLITICS.

nationality. Canada, if she is ever to have a place or
name in the annals of the nations, must have hers
also; and it is a duty that every immigrant owes to
this country that he shall become Canadian in senti-
ment and feeling. I do not ask that he shall forget
the great deeds and the great men of his native land,
it is impossible that the memory of great wrongs suc-
cessfully resisted, and the great triumphs manfully
achieved, can be forgotten. There are great men and
great actions upon which the dust of ages never falls.
But our period of childhood has gone by, and man-
hood or imbecility must succeed. It is our duty as a
Government to develop the growth of this national
sentiment — to throw our people more largely upon
their own resources — to give freer play to their habits
of self-reliance — to trust to their intelligence, their in-
dustry, their virtue, and their courage, the future of
Canada.

MANITOBA SCHOOL QUESTION.

Speech of Right Honorable Sir Wilfrid Laurier on
the Rem^edial Bill, Manitoba School Question: —

"Sir, in the face of this perilous position, I main-
tain today, and I submit it to the consideration of
gentlemen on both sides, that the Policy of the Oppos-
ition, affirmed since many years, reiterated on more
than one occasion, is the only policy which can satis-
factorily deal with this question — the lOnly policy
which can remedy the grievance of the minority, while,
at the same time, not violently assaulting the right
of the majority and thereby, perhaps, creating a
greater wrong. This was the policy, which, for my
part, I adopted and developed the very first time the
question came before this House, and upon this policy
today I stand once more. Sir, I cannot forget at
this moment that the policy which I have advocated
and maintained all along has not been favorably re-
ceived in all quarters. Not many weeks ago I was
told from high quarters in the church to which I be-
long that unless I supported the School Bill, which
was then being prepared by the Government, and
which we have now before us, I would incur the hos-
tility of, a great and powerful body. Sir, this is too
grave a phase of this question for me to pass it by
in silence. I have only this to say: Even though I
have threats held over me, coming, as I am told, fromi
high dignitaries in the church to which I belong, no
(•33)

134 CANADIAN POLITICS.

word of bitterness shall ever pass my lips as against
that church. I respect it and I love it. Sir, I am
not of that school, which has been long dominant in
France and other countries of continental Europe,
which refuses ecclesiastics the right of a voice in pub-
lic affairs. No, I am a Liberal of the English School.
I believe in that school, which has all along claimed
that it is the privilege of all subjects, whether high or
low, whether rich or poor, whether ecclesiastics or
laymen, to participate in the administration of pub-
lic affairs, to discuss, to influence, to persuade, to
convince, — but which has always denied even to the
highest the right to dictate even to the lowest. I
am here representing not Roman Catholics alone but
Protestants as well, and I must give an account of
my stewardship to all classes. Here am I, a Roman
Catholic of French extraction entrusted by the con-
fidence of the men who sit around nie with great and
important duties under our constitutional system of
government. I am here the acknowledged leader of a
great party composed of Roman Catholics and Pro-
testants as well, inj which Protestants are in the ma-
jority, as Protestants must be in the majority in
every part of Canada. Am I to be told, I, occupying
such a position, that I am to be dictated the course
I am to take in this House, by reasons that can ap-
peal to the consciences of my fellow Catholic mem-
bers, but which do not appeal as well to the
consciences of rrky Protestant Colleagues? No. So
long as I have a seat in the House, so long as I oc-
cupy the position I do now, whenever it shall become

CANADIAN POLITICS. . 135

my duty to take a stand upon any question whatever,
that stand I will take not upon grounds of Roman
Catholicism, not upon grounds of Protestantism, but
upon grounds which can appeal to the consciences of
all men, irrespective of their particular faith, upon
grounds which can be occupied by all men who love
justice, freedom and toleration.

THE BOURASSA MOTION.

Right Honorable Sir Wilfrid Laurier's speech in
the House of Commons, March 13, 1900:—

Sir, I understand much better now than I did be^
fore what is the reason which has impelled my ; hon.
friend to take the position which he has taken. My
hon. friend is opposed to the war; he thinks it is un-
just. I do not blame Mm for holding this view. We
are a Brit^ish country and a free country, and every
man in it has the right to express his opinion. My
hon. friend has the same right to believe that the
war is unjust that Mr. John Morley, Mr. Courtney
and many other Liberals in England have to hold the
same belief.

But if my hon. friend is of opinion that the war
is unjust, for my part I am just as fully convinced in
my heiart and conscience that there never was a just-
er war on the part of Great Britain than that war.
I am fully convinced that there never w^as a more un-
just war on the part of any man than the war that
is now being carried on by Presidant Kruger and the
people of the Transvaal. I have not the slightest hes-
itation in saying this.

If the relations between Great Britain and Cana-
da are to be changed, they can only be changed by
the will and with the consent of the people. I am not
going to say that the will of the people should be
ascertained by a plebiscite, for I believe the well

(136)

CANADIAN POLITICS. I37

known methods of the constitution are more appro-
priate.

But the argument of my hon. friend is, that by
taking the position we did, we have changed the re^
lations, civil and military, which now exist between
Great Britain and Canada. I altogether repudiate
that doctrine, and I cannot conceive upon what ar-
gument it can be based. I listened carefully to my
hon. friend, and I admire him in many ways, but I
did not understand the argument on which he based
his doctrine that by sending a military contingent to
South Africa we have changed the political relations
existing between Great Britain and Canada. He went
further. He asserted, and still more insinuated than
asserted, that in doing what we did, we had been dic-
tated to by Downing Street, that we had been con>-
pelled to act by the strong hand of Mr. Chamber-
lain. He rather insinuated also that in passing the
resolution we passed last session, expressing our sym-
pathy with the Uitlanders, we were rather coerced by
the will of Mr. Chamberlain. He rather insinuated
that the resolution which we then introduced had been
framed by an agent of Mr. Chamberlain. Well, Sir,
the fact is that nobody saw that resolution except
the hon. leader of the Opposition, who received it
from me after it had been adopted by council.

No sir, we were not forced by Mr. Chamberlain, or
by Downing Street, and I cannot conceive what my
hon. friend meant, when he said that the future of
this country was not to be pledged by this govern-
ment. When and where did we pledge the future of

138 CANADIAN POLITICS.

this country? We acted in the full independence of our
sovereign power. "What we did, we did of our own
free will, but I am not to answer for the consequences
or for what will take place in the future. My hon.
friend says the consequence is that we shall he> called
upon to take part in other wars. I have only this to
answer my hon. friend, that if it should be the will of
the people of Canada, at any future period to take
part in any war of England, the people of Caffiada
will have to have their way.

But I have no hesitation in saying to my hon.
friend that if as a consequence of our action today,
the doctrine were to be admitted that Canada should
take part in all the wars of Great Britain and con-
tribute to the military expenditure of the Empire, I
agree with him that we should revise the condition
of things existing betwe«en us and Great Britain. If
we were to be compelled to take part in all the wars
of Great Britain, I have no hesitation in saying that
I agree with my hon. friend, that sharing the bur-
den, we should also share the responsibility. Under
that condition of things, which does not exist, we
should have the right to say to Great Britain: If
you want us to help you, call us to your councils; if
you want us to take part in wars, let us share not
only the burdens, but the responsibilities and duties
as well. But there is no occasion to examine this
contingency this day.

And did we do anything wrong, after all, and can
my hon. friend complain of our action when we sim-
ply put it in the power of these young men who

CANADIAN POLITICS. 139^

wanted to go and give their lives in order to promote-
what was to them a sacred cause, to go to the front?
Mr. Speaker, it seems to me that if ever there was
an occasion when we should have no voice of dissent
in this House, it is the present occasion.

I greatly admired the speech of my hon. friend,,
though I am far from sharing his views. But I call
upon him to remen^ber that he belongs to a patriotic
family, as he said to us today.

I call upon him to remember that the liberties,
which we enjoy are largely due to his own family.
But if we have liberties on one side would he not ac-
cept some duties on the other side? Would he not
accept some obligations on the other side? Shall the
sacrifice be all on one side and none on the other?
The obligations all on one side and none on the
other?

We were not compelled to do what we did; but if
we chose to be generous, to do a little more than
we are bound to do, where is the man living who.
would find fault with us, for that action?

THE IDEAL PARLIAMENT.

Speech by Hon. D. C. Eraser at Hamilton, 1896.

The ideal Parliament is a Parliament of the peo-
ple, where a man feels that the greatest honor that
can be conferred on him is the untrammeled trust of
a free people who expect it to do its duty honestly;
who expect him while there to' guard well their trust
and see that not a dollar shall be taken from the peo-
ple of the country save what is necessary for the pur-
poses of the people, and that when it is taken it
shall be economically and honestly expended. Now,
let us see, judged by these standards, whether we- have
such a Grovernment and such a Parliament in Canada,
just now. Refererice has been made to the Parliament
we have. Let me distinguish between the Parliament
we have and the Parliament we ought to have. I
join with Mr. Tarte in saying that next election is to
be fought between the people of Canada and a cor-
rupt and imbecile Parliament. For you can plainly
see, gentlemen — and there is not a Conservative in
Canada who knows what a Parliament should be,
but knows that the blush of shame has been brought
to the cheeks of the people by the corruption and in-
competency of the men in power — that the issue is
already made. We learned at school that an English
Parliament— and this is an English Parliament— was a
conserviative body, a selection from the people, com-
bining all that was honorable in public life. What

have we seen at Ottawa of late?
(140)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 14^

Why, we have of late had resignations every day,
sometlnies two of them. At one tirae seven Ministers
were out; there was an array of opposing forces and
a humiliating capitulation. Several returned, but
one didn't, because there was a greater in his place.
Is that what you send men to' Parliament for? Is
that a representative body? Why, they have just
enough ability to deceive, not to govern. They are
devoting themselves to selfish ends, trifling with pub-
lic interests, and scheming and looking only to what
may bring them votes. As to the fiscal policy I wish
to speak very plainly in Hamilton. In 1878 some
men talked as if they possessed the power of calling
from the earth below and the heaven above the means
of making Canada a prosperous country. They were
to abolish hard times, to keep plenty by taxation, to
keep our own people all in the country and to bring
back those who had left it; to give good wages and
steady work to all who wished it. Any men who
think they can do anything for the benefit of the
whole people of the country save to give them the
greatest possible freedom to make the best use of their
capacities and powers are not worthy the, name of
statesmen. Leave it alone, and then you will have
the greatest natural expansion of heart and brain, of
progress and power; give to every man that freedom
of opportunity which is the birthright of every Brit-
ish subject and you do the citizen the best \service.
Do not attempt to produce prosperity by legislation
against trade. Any Government assuming to do what
our Government pretends to do assumes a power only

142 CANADIAN POLITICS.

resting in the Creator. They put up barriers to pre-
vent God's good things coming from one country to
another and then ask you to admire their wisdom
and thank them for producing plenty. There are
thousands of Conservatives today, who, were they to
express their views in honest words would tell you
that this humbug and sham was palmed off on them
as the one thing needed to make this country and
its people great and prosperous is just such a sham
and humbug as the Liberals warned thorn, it would
prove to be.

THE TWO POLICIES.

Speech by Sir Richard Cartwright at Fergus, July
7th, 1877:—

Eveiy man knows that a Government, whether
good or bad, must be anxious that the country as a
whole should be prosperous and contented; and if we
honestly believe it in our power by legislative action
to restore prosperity to the homies of Canada, it
stands to reason we would be most anxious and de-
sirous to do so at once. But if we are unable to see
that the remedies that have been suggested would
fairly meet the disease, we may at least claim that
you should believe that we are honest in our convic-
tions when we refuse to use those remedies, inasmuch
as no persons, as I said, would profit as much as the
Government by the cessation of hard times and the
return of prosperity. Now, gentlemen, in connection
with these hard times very different policies and many
different explanations of their origin, and (as might
be expected) very widely different remedies, have been
proposed by the heads of the two political parties in-
to which Canada is now divided.

It may be well for me to spend a few words
reviewing briefly, first, the two' policies which are pre-
sented by the two political parties; secondly, the ex-
planations which are given of the present distress;
and, lastly, the remedies which each side suggests for
its cure. There is one policy of which I am myself
(143)

144 CANADIAN POLITICS.

the exponent here today, which holds that all taxes
are a necessary evil — an evil which every people must
endure, but oine which no Government is justified in
inflicting except for the good of the whole public.
There is another policy which holds that the more
taxes you lay on a people the richer they become.
There is one policy which holds that the tariff should
be framed for revenue purposes, and for revenue pur-
poses only, and another which holds that the astute
statesman will so frame the tariff as to enrich a few
monopolists at the expense of the whole people. There
is one policy for the people and one policy for a small
fraction of the people, and, as might be expected, you
have one set of men who steadfastly deny that it is
possible for you to grow rich by ever so persevering
a system of taking money out of one pocket and
transferring it to another; another set who maintain
that Canada is to grow wealthy by doubling every
man's wages and by trebling the prices of all that
those wages can purchase. There is one policy which
may be defined as a policy of truth, of justice, and of
common sense, and another which may equally well
be defined as an appeal to every false sentiment — to
every ignorant prejudice — to every selfish instinct.
There is one which may be called a revenue policy,
and another which is called — I think miscalled — a i>ro-
tective policy, though I cannot see at all that it pro-
tects even those whom it proposes to protect. The
first of these is the policy of the present Government,
and the latter is the policy of the present Opposi-
tion. I might add, only that Dr. Tupper might take

CANADIAN POLITICS. 145

it as a personal matter, that one is the policy of the
true physician, and the other is the policy of the
quack.

The explanations offered for the present distress,
the severity of which I do not at all deny (it is a
lamentable fact which we must all admit and de-
plore), are almost as diverse as the policies which
have been enunciated. Now, there are soone of us —
old-fashio(ned fossil Tories like myself, for instance —
who entertain such absurd, old-fashioned notions as
to belie^ne that if a community is unfortunate enough
during a period of three or four years to spend a
good deal more than they earn, and at the same
time, from unforeseen misfortunes, to earn a good
deal less than they expected, they will be likely to
fall into circumstances of pecuniary distress. Now,
the people of Canada during a period of three or four
years did, from causes which I need not now enumer-
ate, import something like ten or twelve millions a
year more goods than it was judicious for them to
buy, and it is equally true that during the same per-
iod, from some unforseen misfortunes, the people of
Canada earned upon an average some six or seven
millions less than they expected to earn. If you add
these sums together for a period of four years, you
will find that, one way and another (in all probabil-
ity), for I am now putting the thing in a general way
and not pretending to minute accuracy — we spent in
those four years about forty or fifty millions more in
purchasing goods than we really could afford. Well,
unluckily, at the same time our purchasing power was

146 CANADIAN POLITICS.

reduced by about twenty or thirty millions, or, in
other words, we were some eighty millions poorer
than we expected to be at the expiration of that per-
iod; and, at the same time, not only were some of our
best customers very badly hurt by the com'mercial re-
action, which extended over almost every civilized
country as well as ours, but it is also true that many
of our people had transferred themselves from fairly
productive pursuits to others which at the best can
only be called distributive. Now, my position is this,
that this unfortunate distress, which, as I have said,
extended over pretty nearly the whole civilized world,
was produced by a combijiation of the causes I have
named, and not by any which a Government could
control. If this explanation, whose only merit is that
it is plaim and simple ,and true, does not satisfy you,
there are sundry others to be given more in accord-
ance with the gospel as expounded by Sir John Mac-
donald and Dr. Tupper, which, so far as I am able to
ascertain what they mean — and it , is not always an
easy task as regards their speeches in the House of
Commons or at the meetings of their supporters — is
this, that Canada some four or five years ago, in a
fit of temporary insanity, parted with her true guides,
philosophers and friends, in the persons of these hon.
gentlemen, and hence the outpouring of Divine wrath
upon her unfortunate people; hence came wars and
rumours of wars; hence bad harvests; hence commer-
cial reactions; hence every sort of ill that human flesh
is heir to, including, I presume, earthquakes in South
Aimerica, and tidal waves in the Pacific, all of which,

CANADIAN POLITICS. 147

as you know, ha^ie occurred in unwonted abundance
since Sir John went out of office. At any rate all
these things were subsequent to, and therefore neces-
sarily consequent on that event — at least if Dr. Tup-
per is to be believed. And, lest there sihould be any
im justice done to Dr. Tupper, I will read from Han-
sard his explanations of these unfortunate circum-
stances, as given in the House of Commons last ses-
sion:—

"We have had a period of seven years of our na-
tional existence of unexampled prosperity, and no
country in the world presents a more brilliant exam-
ple of what a country did achieve in such a short
period as seven years. This has been followed hy
three years of adversity. But, sir, we have these two
periods, a period of unexampled prosperity, and that
which the hon. gentleman rightly characterized a few
evenings ago in this Parliament as one of deep dis-
tress. Now, sir, we not only have ' these two periods,,
but we have them separated by a sharp line of demar-
cation, and that lioie marks the change in the Gov-
ernment of this country."

I have only three objections to make to that
statement. One is a slightly important one, and that
is that it was not true that we had seven years of
unexampled prosperity. During the first three years
of Sir John's Administration the imports and revenue
were almost stationary. Our imports in 1867 were
seventy-one millions; in 1868 they were sixty-seven
millions, and they had reached only seventy-two mil-
lions in 1869. In 1873-4 they had fallen again from

148 CANADIAN POLITICS.

the figure they had reached in 1872-3 by about three
millions; in other words, his seven years' unexampled
prosperity shrink into three when you come tO' apply
the ruthless test of figures, though I admit that that
is a trifling inaccuracy compared with some state-
ments that emanated from the same source.

In the next place, if Dr. Tupper thinks that pros-
perity is a proof of the goodness or the badness of a
Government, I ask him on the first opportunity to
explain to an intelligent Ontario audience kow it was
that the period of 1857 to' 1867, when Sir John had
almost absolute control, was not a period of unex-
ampled prosperity, but was one marked by deep dis-
tress and heavy and prolonged deficits. Wihen he ex-
plains this I shall be happy to follow him with a
counter refutation of his doctrines.

Leaving Dr. Tupper and Sir John to arrange this
little problem at their leisure, I dare say it will not
surprise you to find that the remedies we propose
are still more widely apart than are our several ex-
planations of its causes. It is not our fault that our
remedy, like our explanation, is of a very plain and
prosaic character. We do not believe that we can
obtain prosperity by acts of Parliament. We be-
lieve that the people of Canada have spent a good
deal more than they should have spent, and have
earned considerably less than they should have earn-
ed, and I am sorry to have to tell you that, under
the "circumstances, very much of this distress is en-
tirely unavoidable, and that there is one vv-ay out of
it, and only one. The people of Canada can only

CANADIAN POLITICS. I49

grow richer by the exercise of greater frugality and
hard work. I know well that this is not a pleasant
doctrine, and I have no doubt that I would be better
received in certain quarters if I were able to say
that all the people had to do was to sit still and be
made rich by legislative interference. But I know
of no government on earth that can possibly deliver
a free country from the consequences of its own fol-
lies and misfortunes without the active co-operation
of the people themselves. We may deplore the exis-
tence of these consequences and try to alleviate them;
but the remedy lies in the hands of the people com-
posing the community from one end of the country to
the other. Now, I propose to examine in some little
detail some of the arguments advanced by the advo-
cates of protection.

I would say, in the first place, that I fully recog-
nize the difference that exists between the two classes
which may be said to compose the protectionist body.
There are certain protectionists who are moderate and
reasonable in their views — who, as far as I uoider-
stand their position, are hardly protectionists at all
in the proper sense of the term, but who very natur-
ally and reasonably feel much aggrieved at the unfor-
tunate policy which the Government of the United
States has persevered in for so many years. This is
quite a distinct and different thing from the ordinary
protection as advocated by the other persons of whom
I speak. When I speak of protection generally, I wish
it to be understood that I refer to the second and
first of these classes— not that I am able entirely to

I50 CANADIAN POLITICS.

agree with many of my friends who advocate those
particular views of protection, but because there is a
wide and sharply^defmed line of demarcation between
these two classes. I think it is highly <iesirable that
you should give this question the most careful and
serious consideration.

What I desire to do is this. I desire, first of all,
to show what protection will cost this country; next,
the number of people amongst us who may fairly be
said to be benefite'd, even for a short time, by a pro-
tective policy; and lastly, to show something of the
ultimate moral and political effects that would result
from the adoption of a so-called protective system. I
lay it down as a maxim that in every free country
where free government is properly understood, no
Government is justified in imposing any taxes unless
it be for the benefit of the whole people. That is a
principle for which you have long fought and have
successfully carried out, and are doubtless prepared
to maintain. If the protectionists can show that the
additional taxes they propose to impose are for the
benefit of the whole people — are, in other words, just
taxes, they will then have made out their case; but
the onus must rest on them, or on any man who pro-
poses to impose additional taxes, of showing that
these taxes are necessary and just, a^nd in the public
interest.

In dealing with this subject, then, I wish to call
attention to what protection really and actually
would cost the people of this country. I do not mean
to say that the m.anufactures which now exist, and

CANADIAN POLITICS. 151

which in spite of the hard times are in many quar-
ters continuing to flourish amongst us, cost anything
like the sum that other manufactures which require
a still heavier tariff would be likely to cost. Prob-
ably most of our genuinely successful manufactures
would be carried on without any tariff at all; and I
am very strongly of opinion that if any man in Can-
ada finds himself unable to manufacture an article
without receiving a protectiooi of 17^ per cent, or
more, that man will prove to the people of Canada
a tolerably expensive luxury. It is computed by stat-
isticians in England and the United States, that
every hand— man, woman, or child— employed in fac-
tories produces on an average very nearly $1,200
worth of manufactured goods per year. Now, 17^
per cent, on that sum amounts to no less than $210
per annum, and therefore it is perfectly clear that in
any manufacture started here requiring protection to
the extent of 17^ per cent., for every hand so employ-
ed the people of Canada in some shape or other pay
a tax of $210, and a considerably higher amount if
the tariff is increased. It has always appeared to my
mind, in the case of new manufactures requiring a
tariff additional to our present duty, that they are
but a dubious gain to the country; and when peo-
ple talk, as they are now doing, about readjusting
the tariff, I want to put it plainly before you what
that readjustment would do for you; how many
hands it would employ; and lastly, what it might
probably cost. In 1876 we imported in all about
ninety-four million dollars worth of goods. Of this

152 CANADIAN POLITICS.

amount, after careful calculation and examination, I
am inclined to think—although the best computation
must necessarily be but an approximate one— that it
would be possible if we imposed a sufficiently heavy
protective duty to manufacture something like thirty
million dollars worth of goods within the country.

Applying that rule that I ^ have just laid down, it
follows that the manufacture of these goods would
employ some 25,000 hands— not full-grown men, but
factory hands generally. I have to observe that the
goods that can be manufactured are goods from which
we derive the greater part of our present revenue, and
that therefore the first difficulty that would meet you
would be that, whereas we get in round numbers
about $6,000,000 of Customs duties on goods im-
ported into the country, you would lose that duty,
and would have to make it up by direct taxation,
which, while pressing heavily on the whole communi-
ty, will press more severely upon the farming com-
munity in particular. That represents a portion, and
perhaps not the largest portion, of the loss which
would be sustained, inasmuch as all the deputations
that waited upon me on the subject, and with whom
I had conversation, admitted that, in order to carry
out that readjustment on a large scale, the present
tariff would have to be at least doubled; in oth r
words although by a certain readjustment some thir-
ty millions of dollars might be added to the produc-
tion of Canada, and some twenty-five thousand people
employed in producing the amount of goods, you
would have to pay at the very least twelve millions

CANADIAN POLITICS. 153^

of dollars for the luxury of seeing them made in Can-
ada, or at the rate of about $400 or $500 per head
year by year for every one of the hands who would
be employed.

As for the plea that this would bring population
into our country, I may say that the experience and
example of the, United States shows conclusively that
that wooild not be the effect, but that there w^ould h&
instead simply a diversion from the ranks of the
farming community and of the artisans dependent on
them to those of factory hands, and that the produc-
tive power of the country would be lessened by what
these twenty-five thousand hands would have produc-
ed. I don't deny that it is possible by a certain re-
adjustment of the tariff to give employment to a con-^
siderable nuraber of additional factory hands, but I
distinctly assei't that you would not increase the
productive power of the country, and besides, in ad-
tition to the present heavy weight of indirect taxes,
you would have direct taxation in a very onerous
form levied upon you, and you would be obliged to
pay as much again in order to maintain these manu-
factures which these gentlemen say can only com.e in-
to existence under such a tarifl as I have described.
Now, to take up the next branch of the tiuestion.
Suppose that we made this gigantic change— suppose
we reversed our whole fiscal policy, and compelled the-
people of Canada to pay ^$12, 000, 000 per year for
the support of some twenty-five thousand factory em-
ployees, what portion of our people might expect to be
benefited thereby? As to this question, I have no bet-

^54 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ter statistics to give you than those in the census re-
turns of 1871. They are not entirely accurate, but
it is reasonable to presum'e that the various classes
of our population have increased in about the same
ratio therein disclosed. Those of you who have paid
attention to this subject will know that out of the
three and a half mrllions of people residing in Cana-
da in 1871^ something like one million were then
employed in various more or less renumerative pur-
suits. They were divided as follows — 500,000 were
put down as agriculturists, although the number
Should have been 100,000 more, because among the
unclassified list were probably no fewer than 100,000
^who were really agricultural laborers. Then came the
very large so-called ''commercial" class, 75,000; pro-
fessional men, 39,000; domestic servants, 60,000; and
finally what is known as the "industrial class," 213,-
000.

Now, God forbid that I should say that this Gov-
ernment or any Government should overlook the in-
terests of even the one-fiftieth part of our popula-
tion, or refuse to see justice done to the smallest class
in the community. If they show their claims to be
just, I shall be the first to give them that justice to
"which they are entitled; but Heaven forbid also that
for the sake of this one-fiftieth part of the population
we should do a rank injustice to the other forty-nine-
fiftieths. Now let us consider a little in detail what
our friends the manufacturers really ask of us. I
have had a good deal to do with manufacturers my-
self, and am pretty largely concerned in the prosper-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 155

ity of that interest, and I know that there has been
very consi'derable distress among that class.

I am extremely sorry for this, not only in my
heart, but in my pocket also; but I cannot help ask-
ing these men, "What do you wish us to do?" Do
you ask that the Government of Canada should lay
it down as a maxim that we are to relieve you from
the results of even unavoidable misfortunes, or from
your own mistakes? If you lay down that policy, to
what are these things to grow? It would simply
come to this, that every time there was a commercial
crisis, every time the markets were glutted or the
farmers had bad harvests, the Government would
have to step in and afiord relief. In other words, if
the misfortunes of one class of the people were made
good at the public cost, the misfortunes of all other
classes would have also to be m-ade good. If manu-
facturers are to be relieved at the public expense
from the consequences of mistakes or misfortunes, why
should not farmers also be relieved out of the public
purse if their harvests are bad? If commercial men
are overtaken by a crisis they must also be relieved,
and if professional men do not obtain a sufficient
number of clients they would have to be maintained
at the public expense. Nay, why should not distress-
ed politicians also come in for relief? You laugh, but
why not? Where are we to stop in this doctrine of
universal protection? There is a third point involved,
which has perhaps not been touched upon sufficiently,
but it is one which every Canadian should consider
well.

156 CANADIAN POLITICS.

You have to consider what will be the consequence
of the future protective policy in its moral, social,
and political aspect. I said a year ago, when dis-
cussing this subject on the floor of Parliament, that
there is one reason which weighed with me very much;
and I pointed out at that time that although it could
be shown that the adoption of a protective system
would enrich a few, it would enrich that few only. It
would make a few rich men millionaires, while it
would make poorer the great bulk of the community.

EARLY STRUGGLES OF REFORMERS.

Speech of Hon. Alex. Mackenzie at Kingston, June
27th, 1877:—
Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: —

I feel somewhat as Paul felt when he was permit-
ted to speak for himself, because I believe, as he be-
lieved, that I am at least before an upright judge; and
I am quite sure that the words I address to you, and
which are addressed generally to the people of Cana-
da, will find a hearty response among a vast major-
ity of the people of this country. I know full well
how difficult a task the Premier of this country has
to perform.

We have a country vast, in extent, vast In its terri-
torial magnitude, vast in respect to its sectional
views, and in its diversity of creed and race; and it is
a task which any statesman may feel great difficulty
in accomplishing, to harmonize all those interests,
and bring a genuine feeling of union to bear upon the
prosperity of the country which he has to govern.
Under the most favorable circumstances any one
would feel necessitated to ask occasionally not merely
the indulgence but the forbearance of friend and foe
alike in a country like this.

But since the day that my colleagues and I as-
sumed the reins of office we have been met with one
continuous strain of coarse fund systematic abuse,
which appears to have reach-ed its culminating point

(157)

158 CANADIAN POLITICS.

at the meetings held by the Conservative leaders
throughout the country at the present moment. But,
sir, I am not very much surprised at that, for I rec-
ollect very well the events which were developed in
the earlier days of the history of this country.

I was astonished, however, to find that Dr. Tupper,
a few evenings ago, in pronouncing the highest eulogi-
ums upon his leader, Sir John Macdonald, called that
hon. gentleman the well. known champion of civil and
religious liberty. Why, sir, in the presence of raany
grey-haired men, the hon. gentleman must have ap-
peared as the personification of the tyrant — as the
sum and aggregate of civil and ecclesiastical bigotry
and sectional domination. Who does not remember
when the hon. gentleman was one of those who bat-
tled, not for the religious equality that was spoken
of but for religious inequality? Who does not remem-
ber our early struggles forty years ago, when we strove
tp wrest the public domain from the hands of one de-
nomination? Who does not recollect when Presbyter-
ian and Methodist clergjTiien were sent to gaol be-
cause they dared to perform the ceremony of mar-
riage? The hon. gentleman, who is now introduced to
the public of Canada for the first time as the cham-
pion of civil and religious liberty, was one of the de-
fenders of that system; one of those who strove to
perpetuate in our country the dominancy of a creed
if not of a race. I spent my earliest days in the
political agitation incident to these struggles; my
first political meetings were held in behalf of that
cause which has been ridiculed by one of its princi-

CANADIAN POLITICS. I59

pal opponents as being characterized as its champion.

Well do I remember the struggle we had in those
days for our rights, and how at last, in December,
1847, we succeeded in electing that noble man, Hob-
ert Baldwin, with a band of Reformers strong enough
to place him in a position to become First Minister
of the day, and settle once for all the question of re-
ligious equality, in spite of the opposition of Sir
John and his party. I know that in a young coun-
try like this, passing affairs rapidly shape themselves
into history, public events fast recede from view, and
the vast majority of those whom I now address had
no part in the struggle to which I have referred. But
I refer to it now merely to say this: That the Re-
formiers of this country will remeraber — those who were
not alive at that time by reading, and those who
were alive by having been in the midst of these events
— with gratitude that it was the great leaders of the
Reform party who first gave perfect civil and relig-
ious rights to the people of Canada. It has been ask-
ed what is the difference between the parties at the
present moment.

We are told by a certain class — certainly not a
very numerous or a very influential o-ne — that there is
no necessity for party organization in Canada, be-
cause all that separated parties in bygone times has
been settled; that the questions that then divided us,
now divide us no more. That no doubt is true to a
certain extent; and it is also true that the men who
first settled all these questions are the men who are
most likely to administer the Governnient in accord-

i6o CANADIAN POLITICS.

ance with the principles of those great measures
which were disposed of by the Reform party under
Mr. Baldwin and his successors. And it becomes
highly necessary that the party lines which separated
the Qcmservatives and the Liberals in the olden times
should continue to exist, although I am far from say-
ing that any political party can be justified in carry-
ing conflicts so far as to injure the prosperity or
prospects of the country. Political warfare ooight
always to be respectable, and I can honestly say on
iDehalf of those whom I lead, and I think I can also
claim it for myself, that we have made every effort
to make those party conflicts in which we have been
engaged as respectable and as moderate as it was
possi>ble to do. It is true we may have occasionally
to speak pretty strongly of the conduct of our politi-
cal oppoments, but I have yet to learn that it is ne-
cessary in party battles to impugn the motives of
political opponents, or to question their veracity, or
to pour forth a stream of coarse abuse such as has
been indulged in by that well-known gentleman, Dr.
Tupper, and his associates.

Let me refer for a moment to the position in
which these gentlemen left the country. Sir John
says that we succeeded to office on his resignation in
1873, and he resigned, he says, because he doubted if
he had a sufficient majority to carry on the Govern-
ment successfully. Sir John simply resigned at the
last moment, because he found that if he had gone to
a vote he would have been defeated in a House of
his own choosing, for many of the men elected under

CANADIAN POLITICS. i6l

his own auspices withdrew their cooifidence, and would
have voted him out of ofRce on findioig of what he
had been guilty. He had not the moral courage to
face a vote, and now he proclaims tio the country
that he was an ill-used man because he was obliged
to resign.

I have been very much amused at the way in
which the hon. gentleman and his colleagues refer to
the events of 1873, and to the circumstances which
were proved on oath by their own statements as to
the bribing of the electors in the elections of 1872,
and the receipt of $360,000 of Sir Hugh Allan's
money for the direct purpose of corrupting the elec-
torate of this country. Why, sir, Dr. Tupper coolly
talks of this as a misrepresentation, a mere misunder-
standing, and Sir John says he was defeated because
of the circulation of foul slanders against his fair
fame. So that it would seem that we are to be
obliged to have another Royal Commission issued in
order to show whether the evidence taken on oath by
Sir John's own Government was incorrect ,cr not. It
seems it was all, a mistake to suppose that Sir Hugh
Allan contributed money for the purpose of corrupting
the electors.

True, Dr. Tupper says in one speech that Sir
Hugh Allan gave a handsome subscription to the elec-
tion fund, and Sir John received it in the samfe spirit.
That is the way in which the affair is spoken of. I
do not wish to say a single word disrespectful to
Sir Hugh Allan; but I believe if there is a business
man in Canada who n^ore than any other understands

i6fi CANADIAN POLITICS.*

his own business, that man is Sir Hug-h Allan. He is
a prosperous merchant and has done a great deal of
good to Canada in organizing his fine steamship line,
and I wish him abundant success in that and his oth-
er enterprises. But I sincerely venture to hope that
he will not mingle in politics — at least I hope that he
and Sir John will not mingle in politics tog-ether.
He is a Scotchman, a shrewd business man, possess-
ing many of the characteristics attributed to his typi-
cal fellow-countrymen. You have all heard the old slan-
der which Dr. Johnson first uttered against Scotchmen
— that farthings were first coined for the purpose of
enabling them to contribute to charitable objects. I
don't believe that myself, but I do believe that if
there is a Scotchman in Canada who knows the val-
ue of the farthing better than another it is Sir Hugh
Allan; and I don't think he was likely under the cir-
^cumstances to g^ive to Sir John and his colleagues a
sum nearing $200,000, and to expend on his own
hook — to use. a somewhat vulgar phrase — $160,000
more, merely to secure the success of the Conserva-
tive party, as Dr. Tupper says. That gentleman calls
it a handsome subscription, and asks: "Did not Mr.
Cameron, Mr. Cook, and other Reformers spend large
amounts on their own elections?" Perhaps they did,
but they did not spend Sir Hugh Allan's money; they
did not receive money from any public contractor who
was to get a contract in consequence of having con-
tributed the money. We have Sir Hug-h Allan's own
sworn evidence, in which he states that he cared noth-
ing for either of the political factions struggling for

CANADIAN POLITICS. 163

the mastery in this country, but he thought that Sir
John Macdonald and Sir George Cartier were the men
he could deal with, so he courted them assiduously
and made a handsome subscription to their election
fund. And now we are told that it was all a mis-
take, and that Sir John Macdonald was ejected from
office because of foul slanders. I hear someone in the
audience say that that story is worn out. I don't
think it is. It will never be worm out while Canada
has a history; and it will be a black day for this
country if it is ever worn out.

When we assumed office we did so when a black
cloud was hanging over the country, one which ob-
scured the fair fame of Canada in sight of every civ-
ilized nation, and was watched alike by the people of
England and the United States as belonging pecul-
iarly to the people of Canada. It rested with the new
Administration to dispel that cloud, and induce the
people of the United States and Europe to believe
that I all the public men o£ Gaffiada were /not tainted
with the same sordid and corrupt motives which led
to the commission of that great crime.

We had to contend with other difficulties at the
time. The hon. gentleman claims for himself, in one
of his recent speeches, that while he reigned, peace,
prosperity, and loyalty prevailed all over the Domin-
ion. Why, sir, when we came into office we found a
rebellion at Red River barely quelled; we were in pur-
suit of the men whom the unanimous voice of Cana-
da had branded as miurderers, and to whom Sir John
Macdonald gave $4,000 of the public money to enable

i64 CANADIAN POLITICS.

them to escape. Then he attacked Mr. Blake and my-
self because we offered a reward for their apprehen-
sion in the Legislature of Ontario, and said that it
was our fault that Riel escaped, and he "only wished
to God he could catch him." I don't wonder a very
great deal that the peop)le up in the Northwest rose
up in insurrection at the treatment they received.
What did this "champion of civil and religious lib-
erty" do on this particular occasion?

He sent out Mr. William Macdougall with a ready-
made cabinet to take possession, as if they had been
the conquerors of the land, without asking the peo-
ple what their opinions were as to the mode or na-
ture of the authority under which they were to be
placed. The people, not very unnaturally, objected to
being presented with this ready-made Cabinet, and
though Mr. Macdougall got within sight of the land,
he was never able to put his foot on it. The measures
of the Government at that time, as Mr. Macdougall
says in his famous pamphlet, went to show what they
could do to punish those who had objected to their
course. We were told the other day that Sir John
Macdonald had "bent his energies to draw the North-
west Territories."

Mr. Macdougall was a member of Sir John's Gov-
ernment, and he ought to know. He says in his
pamphlet: —

"I am disclosing no secret of the council-room when
I affirm that in September, 1868, except Mr. Tilley
and myself, every member of the Govemmient was
either indifferent or hostile to the acquisition of the

CANADIAN POLITICS. 165

Northwest Territory. When they discovered that a
ministerial crisis respecting the route of the Intercol-
onial Railway could not be avoided by an imimediate
agreement ,(and immediate action) to secure the trans-
fer of these territories to the Dominion, they were
ready to act. On the same day that Sir John A.
Macdonald and Mr. Campbell surrendered the inter-
ests of Ontario to Quebec and Mr. Mitchell, and threw
eight millions of dollars into the sea, I carried a
proposition to send a deputation to England with
full power to close negotiations for the purchase of
one-third of the American continent as an ofYset. '

We have Mr. Macdougall's evidence to show that
these people were altogether opposed to this act; and
we have also his own testimony to the fact that he
was sent out there merely to enable the Government
to get rid of him. He says: "as to the fact itself — in
spite of your disloyal intrigues and the 'parish poli-
tics' of your allies in the East; in spite of Jesuitical
plots in the Northwest and Ministerial connivance and
imbecility at the Capital;" and so on. I give you this
evidence to show you that instead of the country be-
ing at rest, it was in a state of turmoil, that instead
of these men being entitled to be classed as super-
loyal, they imbrued the country not merely in finan-
cial difficulties, but in political difficulties of the
gravest possible character; that instead of seeking to
open up the Northwest, they opposed it. When we
came into office we found these great questions un-
settled. We were obliged to maintain a regiment of
soldiers in Manitoba to keep the people quiet. In the

I66 CANADIAN POLITICS.

east there was a strong feeling of discontent. There
were everywhere indications of a war of races and
interests. And we had not merely to 'deal with all
those difficult questions, but we had to punish the
guilty, and at the same time to do it in such a man-
ner as would show to those who had taken the part
of these men in the Northwest that we were not do-
ing it for the purpose of indicating a hostility to
either their race or their creed.

You will remember that the ill-usuage sustained
by the half-breeds of the Northwest at the organiza-
tion of the territory created a deep, strong feeling of
sympathy among the French Catholics of Lower Can-
ada. They believed that Riel was a victim, and to
some extent that was true. But Riel and his friends
had to be taught that they had not merely violated
the law of the land in taking possession of the gov-
ernment of any portion of the country, but had vio-
lated it in unlawfully and feloniously taking the life
of one of Her Majesty's subjects.

All • these matters had to be dealt with by the in-
coming Government; and when we consider that along
with these difficulties we had to contend with the
effects of these men's great political crime, in its
bearing on our financial position, immigration, and
otherwise to speak to the rest of the world and main-
tain the fair fame of Canada, I think I can claim
that we pursued as moderate a course as it was pos-
sible to do, and that our success has been beyond our
expectations.

IMPORTANT ASSETS.

Speech of Honorable J. M. Gibson at the Centen-
ary proceedings at Toronto, September 17, 1892: —

We are a happy and contented people. Our agri-
cultural resources, modes and methods are equal to
those of any other country today, and the best proof
that could be given in substantiation of this you have
had in your city for the last two weeks in the shape
of the Industrial Exhibition. The educational system
of the country has already been alluded to, and pos-
sibly may be further referred to by my friend and
colleague, the acting Minister of Education. We have
reason to be proud of our educational system — and
I shall not be charged with boasting in asserting
that our system of education, as a whole, will stand
favorable comparison with that of any other country.
The administration of justice happily gives rise, and
has for a long time past given rise, to little or no
complaint. The people are satisfied. The integrity of
our judges is never impugned. We have a good system
of jurisprudence and practice, and what was formerly
known as a distinction between law and justice has,
under the legislation of the last twenty years, entire-
ly disappeared, and lawyers will soon fail to appreci-
ate any difference between law and equity. Then,
Sir, we have the best — I was going to say the best
Government in the world— but I will not say that,
because some of my friends here think my testimony

(167)

i68 CANADIAN POLITICS.

is not admissible on that point; but I believe you will
all agree with me that we have the best Premier in
the world, at all events. The fact that he has en-
joyed for a longer unbroken period than any other
man power as the head of a Goviernment, with the
full confidence of the people, is ample substantiation
of the truth of my statement. By way of set-off, per-
haps I may say also that we have a most efficient
and the best equipped leader of an Opposition any-
where to be found. All, however, will cordially unite
in the hope that both Sir Oliver and Mr. Meredith
will long be spared to occupy positions of usefulness
in this country. While great progress has been achiev-
ed in the past, the present seem to be days of accel-
erated progress. We appear to have accomplished as
much in the past twenty-five years as was accomplish-
ed during the previous seventy-five years. What shall
be the experience of the next century in our country's
history? What shall our children's grandchildren have
to say when celebrating another centennial anniver-
sary on the 17th of September, 1993, as they look
backward and take a view through the intervening
years of us as we are and what we are doing? Let
us hope, at least, that however mediaeval and un-
enlightened our present modes and methods may ap-
pear to them, they may be justified in according to
us, their ancestors, some measure of praise for the
honesty and earnestness of purpose with which we are
working out the problems of our day, and some trlb-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 169

ute of praise and honour for the loyal and patriotic
impulses in connection with our aspirations for the
future of this country, which we all love so well.

THE PREFERENTIAL TARIFF.

Speech of Hon. Wm. Paterson in House of Com-
mons, March 30, 1900:—

I want to speak in reference to the increased trade
of the country. I do not think I would be making an
outrageous claim if I should say that a large part of
the increased trade is due to actions that have been
taken by this Government and Parliament. I think
there is no one in this country who, looking abroad
and seeing the evidences of prosperity on every hand,
will not be ready to admit that times are now more
prosperous than they ever were before. These hon.
gentlemen ask us sometimes: What have you to do
with better times? There have been better times in
all the countries under the sun, they will tell us.
What have you done in reference to them? Well, Sir,
times are better. I will tell you one reason why I
think they are better: Trade in order to be prosper-
ous must be confident, and there must be confidence
prevailing throughout the country. There must be
confidence in our public men; there must be know-
ledge that the affairs of the country are guided by
men in whose charge they may be safely entrusted.
If in the country there is a Government divided
against itself; if you find in the cabinet men who can-
not pull together; if you find , one minister charging
another with writing anonymous letters to His Ex-
cellency accusing him of dishonorable acts; if you find
(170)

#
CANADIAN POLITICS. 171

one member of the Government standing up in the
name of seven others and declaring that the man they
swore to serve under as Prime Minister was virtually
incapable of carrying on with any measure of success
the government of the country; if you witness scenes
like that, handed down to history through the migh-
ty agency of the press, how could the people have
confidence in the country or in such a goviernment.
Sir, no matter how anxious a Canadian niight feel
for the prosperity of his country, he must, despair of
its future, when he saw the leading men of Canada
taking up such an inglorious position in the very
halls of the Legislature. These scenes were witnessed
here and the people did (not forget them; and when
these men were dispossessed of power, confidence was
restored, and I believe that was one of the great fac-
tors in starting that prosperity which ever since has
gone on increasing day after day. One of the lion,
gentlemen opposite ventured to shout something
across the floor as I was speaking, but it seems to
me if I were in his place I would keep very quiet,
when things of this kind have to be alluded to in or-
der to answer arguments presented from the opposite
side of the House. These gentlemen on the other side
have asked us: What have you to do with the pros-
perity of the country, and I answer them: That the
turning out of power of men guilty of the acts I
have described, and the return to power of the pres-
ent government was one of the greatest factors in our
prosperity. This government, whrn it came to office^
recognized that the surest way to secure prosperity

^72 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ior the country was not to handicap its commerce any
-more than the revenues required, and with due regard
to existing industries. This government recognized
that if you have a largely increased trade you in-
crease the wealth of the people, you enable them to
buy and consume more goods — ^both the goods of your
own manufacture and goods imported from other
countries. Has not the result of our policy been that
an impetus has been given to every department of
trade. I point you to increased imports and I point
you to the vastly increased volume of trade that is
swelling and expanding to an extent calculated to
cheer the heart of every Canadian. On the other
hand, I point you to- the prophesies of gentlemen op-
posite that our policy ineant throwing men out of
work on to the streets, and I point you to the fallacy
of that prophesy. I state here today, and the manu-
facturers of this country are ready to confirm it, that
never in our history have Canadian factories been so
pushed to supply their orders as they have been since
the Liberal tariff was introduced in 1897. The people
of this country are a people that any country, might
well be proud o'f, and all they want is a chance to
develop their energies and to manifest their ability
and enterprise. What do we want in Canada? We
want markets for the products of our people, and we
are finding them in large measure in other countries
of the world, even for our manufactured goods. Live
manufacturers will tell you today: We want people in
the country, we want consumers for what we make.
Sir, the policy of the Government is to give them

CANADIAN POLITICS. 173

consumers, to populate the country more rapidly than
ever in the past, and to put money in the pockets of
the people with which to buy goods whether made in
Canada or other countries. That is the policy we
have endeavored to follow up, and in reference to our
domestic commerce, as well as our foreign trade,,
every one knows that they never attained anything
like the volume they have attained at the present
time.

I have been dealing with the existing reduction on
the products of Great Britain coming into this coun-
try, showing the benefit which Great Britain already
has; and all I can say is that if this House will sanc-
tion the proposition of the hon. Finance Minister,
great as has been the reduction of the taxation that
the people have saved during the past year there will
be the added benefit that they will secure from the
further cut which he proposes shall go into effect on
the 1st of July next. Now, Sir, I think that is a
benefit not only to Great Britain, but to the Cana-
dian people. I do not put our preferential tariff on
the ground alone that it is a benefit to Great Britain.
It is a benefit to Great Britain, but it is to be remem-
bered that it is also a benefit to ourselves. If there
were no other result from it than the reduction of
taxation obtained by the people, then. Sir, it would
be a carrying out of the pledge that we gave to the
people that we would reduce their burden of taxa-
tion. While we give that advantage of 25 cents on the
dollar to England over every other nation on the
earth, and give it gladly, it is also for our benefit.

174 CANADIAN POLITICS.

because the goods we receive from Great Britain come
to the consumer at that much lower price. More than
that, when Great Britain's competitor sends in sim-
ilar goods, the consumer gets the benefit of the pref-
erential tariff, while at the same, time the revenue
gets the advantage of the higher tariff which stands
against the foreigner.

But, Sir, I have more than that to say. I am a
citizen and an admirer of Great Britain, and while I
desire the unity of the empire, there is a bond of
trade between ils, and the more trade we do with the
mother country, the closer will be the ties which will
bind us together; and these ties have been wonderfully
strengthened by our preferential tariff. Hon. gentle-
men opposite may talk as long as they please; but
what avails their puny mouthings against this prefer-
ential tariff as of no avail to Britain, when the Eng-
lish press, the greatest and mightiest press on the
face of the earth, is unanimous in declaring that that
was a boon granted to Great Britain, and that it did
bind the colonies and the mother country m^ore close-
ly together? Do these hon. gentlemen think that they
can make the Canadian people believe what ihey say,
that this preferential tariff is a delusion and a snare
and a fraud, in face of the fact' that Her Majesty's
secretary of State for the Colonies sent to this coun«-
try his thanks, declaring that it did), and would knit
together the colonies and the mother country more
firmly than ever they have ever been in the past.
Why, Sir, the very words of the Colonial Secretary,
telegraphed to this country congratulating the Govern-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 175

ment on this tariff, were incorporated in a motion
that was moved by my hon. friend from Halifax (Mr.
Russell), and the Tory party in Parliament to a man
voted it down; and now they are emphasizing their
position somewhat more forcibly and distinctly by
the amendment which they have moved. We are glad
of it. Now we know that while we stand by the pref*
erential tariff, while we stand by the old land and
that which benefits her as well as our own people,
we stand opposed by a party who by their acts are
now pledged, if they come into power, t,o repeal the
preferential tariff and go back to the old state of
things. The people of this country will have- to pro-
nounce on that question, and I venture to say that
when their verdict is rendered, it will be a verdict
such as they have already given in unmistakable
terms, as far as we can judge from public utterances
which we have listened to, and from private conver-
sations which we have had with the people, that one
of the best and wisest policies ever adopted by the
Canadian Parliament was to give that preferential
treatment in our markets to the products of the
mother country.

I have said that the reduced duties are for our
own benefit, if they were nothing more, if you left
Great Britain out of consideration. But, Sir, this
preferential tariff has done more for us, as we believ-
ed it would. We believe we have got what these hon.
gentlemen say we ought to get, and what they say
they are going to get by an Act of the British Par-
liament, or else they are going to destroy the prefer-

176 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ence which we have given to the English people. We
have today, by virtue of our preferential tariff — there
is no doubt about it in my mind — a decided prefer-
ence in the British market. If it is not>a legal pref-
erence, it is a preference through the, good will of the
British consuming public themselves, who by this
preferential tariff had their hearts drawn out towards
Canada as they never had before. Why, Sir, if it
were nothing more than an advertisement it is worth
all that we paid. Paid? We paid nothing for it, be-
cause in reducing the duties, as I say, we were simplj^
reducing our own burdens. But, Sir, we have had a
market in Great Britain to an extent such as we nev-
er enjoyed before — a market which is going on increas-
ing and what has been the result? Wealth to the
great agricultural class of this country, which means
wealth and prosperity to every man who dwells in it.

THE FUTURE OF CANADA.

Speech of Hon. Geo. W. Ross, Premier of Ontario,
delivered at Wihitby, November, 1899:—
Mr. President, Members of the Executive, Ladies and
Gentlemen:—
I thank you very sincerely indeed for this very
complimentary address. You have estimated my tal-
ents and attainments, I fear, far too high. True, I
have had a lengthened experience of public life in con-
nection with the House of Commons and with the
Legislative Assembly. While I do not think in my
judgment I have reached that lofty pinnacle on which
through your kindness of heart, you have placed me,
I thank you, nevertheless, for the kind words you
have spoken of my career. I sincerely trust that you
will find the Liberal party continuing to uphold the
honor of the country with the same earnestness and
zeal under my leadership as it has done under the
leadership of my predecessors. I have not an easy
task before me. Those whom I follow were such men
as the Hon. Edward Blake, Sir Oliver Mowat, and
the Hon. A. S. Hardy, men of talent, of great exper-
ience and of high character, and to follow in their
footsteps is no easy task. Allow me first to express
my sincere regret on the retirement of my predeces-
sor, the Hon. Mr. Hardy, who for twenty-six years
was a conspicuous figure in the Legislative Assembly
of his native Province. Mr. Hardy was pre-eminently
(177)

178 CANADIAN POLITICS.

a Canadian, with a strong strain of United Empire
Loyalist blood in his veins — a very good strain, as
we all know, by which to make Canadian blood, if
possible, more thoroughly British. Mr. Hardy gave
the full vigor of his namhood to the service of his
country, and as the administrator at different peri-
ods of three important portfolios, established beyond
cavil his capacity as an administrator and as a leg-
islator. For sixteen years I had the honor of being
associated with him in the Government, and I can
truthfully say that for resourcefulness, regard for the
public interests, and integrity as an officer of State,
he deserves to rank with the best men ever called to
serve Her Majesty as one of her executive councillors.
The failure of his health is not a loss to the party
simply, but a great public loss, a loss to Ontario, a
loss to Canada. To hold hin^ in grateful remember-
ance as a large-hearted and progressive public ser-
vant should be the duty not only of every Liberal in
the Province but of every Canadian who appreciates
loyalty and fidelity in the discharge of public duties.
On the retirement of Mr. Hardy and by right of
his advice I was called by His Honor the Lieutenant-
Governor, to form a new Government. To be called
to the leadership of the Liberal party of a great
Province like Ontario is no ordinary distinction, and
yet when I reflect on the high standing and pre-emin-
ent abilities of my predecessors you will not charge
me with using terms of self-abasement when I say
that I would readily have allowed the honor to pass
by were it not for the assurances of my colleagues in

CANADIAN rOLITICS. I79

the Government and in the H.ouse that the call was
one which commanded their heartiest approval. And
now, having formed a Government, as required by the
constitution of the Province, I may say without any
undue feelings of exultation that the wider public
opinion, which I was unable to consult at the time,
has, with a unanimity and cordiality far beyond my
expectations, justified my more immediate advisers in
the support so kindly proffered at the outset. More
than this, I have reason to believe that many who
consider themselves comparatively free from the ac-
knowledged obligations of party ties look upon my ac-
cession to the leadership with considerable favor.

You have already been infornifed through the public
press of the composition of the new Government. I
say new Government, because in a business sense, with
one exception, every portfolio has been changed. You
have a new Attorney-General, a new Commissioner of
Crown Lands, a new Commissioner of Public Works,
a new Provincial Secretary, a new Treasurer, a new
Minister of Education and a new leader of the Gov-
ernment. The only man whose portfolio was not
Changed was the Minister of Agriculture. His long ex-
perience in that deparm^ent, his eminent fitness as a
practical farmer and his administrative ability ha^Te
pointed him out as the best available man for that
position, and we have taken him accordingly. I
thank you today for the very cordial nomination of
Mr. Dryden as the candidate in South Ontario, and I
believe he will be elected.

As to the personnel of the new Government, very

'^8o CANADIAN POLITICS.

little may be said. They are all, or nearly all, train-
ed legislators and eminently successful in their var-
ious spheres of life. The Hon. Mr. Gibson brings to
his position legal attainments that command the re-
spect of the whole profession. The ability with which
he administered the two departments of the public
service which he previously held is a guarantee of
success in his new position. The Minister of Educa-
tion, the Hon. Mr. Harcourt, as a teacher, inspector

. and a graduate of our Provincial university, as well
as by experience as a Parliamentarian, cannot fail to
be acceptable to our teaching profession and the pub-
lic generally. The Commissioner of Crown Lands, the
Hon. Mr. Davis, has shown in the successful manage-

.. ment of his own business and as Provincial Secretary

? that he is a man of judgment and capacity.

With regard to the Ministers who hold a portfolio

^ for a first time, a word or two will suffice. Hon. Mr.
Stratton, the new Provincial Secretary, has held a
seat in Parliament since 1886, and has taken an ac-

:tive part in discussions in the House and in commit-
tee work. As a business man he has been most suc-
cessful and will undoubtedly prove an able and honest
.administrator. The other new Minister, the Hon.
Mr. Latchford, to whom I have assigned the portfolio
of Public Works, though new to Parliamentary life,
has for some years been regarded as fitted for the dis-
tinction just conferred upon him. Of Irish extraction,
Canadian born, educated at Ottawa University, able
to speak French or English with facility, a trained
lawyer and sl man of high character, no one who

CANADIAN POLITICS. i8i

knows him will doubt his fitness for his new position.
My only regret in calling him to the Government was
that it involved the retirement of Mr. Harty from the
active duties o-f a department which he filled to the
complete satisfaction of his colleagues and of Parlia-
ment, and from which under no circumstances would
he be permitted to retire did his health warrant his
continuance in oftice. That his ripe judgment and
business aptitude might not be entirely lost to us, I
have asked him to retain his seat in the Cabinet, and
I am glad to be able to say" that he has assented to
this request.

As to myself, one of the greatest regrets I have
in assuming the leadership of the party is that it
necessitated my severance, directly at least, from the
educational work, from which I have taken so much
pleasure, and in which, in one form or another, I had
been engaged from my early experience as a teacher in
a log schoolhouse down to the day I was called upon
to form a Government. If I did not repay the log
schoolhouse, while Minister of Education, for what
it did for me, I hope to square the account before my
leadership comes to a close.

From this jtreliminary statement you have an idea
of how a Goviernment is forn:ked, and what a simple
matter it is when constitutional usages are strictly
followed to transfer the Governixkent of the country
from one leader to another, and to rearrange the
whole Cabinet. There was a time in the history of
Canada — thanks to the Liberal party that it is now
almost ancient history — when such changes could not

i82 CANADIAN POLITICS.

have been accomplished without the most perilous
agitation.

I think we should address ourselves and apply our
surplus means to the development of the country —
first to the development of New Ontario, and second-
ly to the development of old Ontario. For instance,
if we can afford it, why not give Mr. Dryden more
money for the educational work that is carried on
by means of Farmers' Institutes, county fairs, dairy
schools and agricultural colleges. Little Belgium,
much smaller than Ontario, has several agricultural
colleges, Belgium, Denmark, and all the central div-
isions of Europe know that their existence depends
practically upon instruction in agriculture and in the
education of the artisan classes. If our finances war-
rant it, why not increase our grants to these institu-
tions, and why not increase our grants to the public
and high schools, and our grants for the improvement
of roads, and so on? We live in a progressive period.
No true Liberal, no true Canadian, will now stand
idle with folded hands, neglecting to pay attention to
the development of this couintry; and I propose that
the Government, so far as our means will allow, shall
apply . their/ energies, so long as tjhey may have the
confidence of the people, to the development of the
Province.

Why do I say that? Ontario is today the first
Province of the Dominion. It has more weight in the
councils of the Dominion than any other Province
because of its population and its wealth. Do you
want Ontario to shrink into a minor position in the

CANADIAN POLITICS. 183

councils of the Dominion, or do you want it to hold
its present status? All my colleagues are natives of
this Province, or nearly all. We are all of the opin-
ion that if the Dominion is to prosper, then Ontario
should prosper all the more, and be the first Prov-
ince, and lead the other Provinces for all time to
come in wealth, political influence and educational ac-
tivity. That is the position we propose to take.
Now, looking at the map of Ontario, what do you
find? You find that Ontario contains 140,000,000
acres, or in round numbers 200,000 square miles. Of
that area only 23,000,000 acres, or 45,000 square
miles are occupied. In other words, only one-sixth of
the area of the Province today is actually in the
hands' of individual owners, leaving practically five-
sixths in the hands of the Crown. Only 12,000,000
of the 140,000,000 acres of land in Ontario are under
cultivation today. Actually, we have scarcely touch-
ed the fringe of the great agricultural wealth which
this Pro'vince possesses. I think it is our duty to see
that these latent resources are made available for set-
tlement, are placed within the reach of our sons and
daughters, and developed. Some years ago we found
that our young men were going to the United States.
There are today a million Canadians in the adjoin-
ing Republic. Of these the greater number were na-
tives on Ontario. Today we are sending our sons to
the Northwest and to British Columbia, but to that
I do not so much object, so long as they remain un-
der the flag. But do we, the people of Ontario, not
owe it to ourselves that we make reasonable provis-

i84 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ion for the settlement of our sons within our own
Province, and thus reap the benefit which is brought
about by its development?

We want to feel more and more the growing re-
sponsibilities upon us — shall I say the growing respon-
sibilities upon the Dominion of Canada, of which On-
tario is the most important part? W. T. Stead says
in his character sketch of Cecil Rhodes that some men
think in parishes, some men think in nations, and
some men think in continents. I want the people of
Ontario to think as a part of the British Empire, as
an integral part of the great empire, whose flag we all
recognize, and of whose Queen we are loyal subjects.
Let me say that one of the most pleasant features of
my administration as Minister of Education is this
fact: that I believe I was able to instil into the half
million of school children of the Province a greater
love for Ontario, for Canada and for the empire than
they previously entertained. That was done in two
ways. When I' came in as Minister the history of Can-
ada was not studied in our public schools, except in a
desultory way. I made instruction in Canadian his-
tory compulsory. The history we had was purely a
history of the Province. I organized a committee and
placed myself in comraunication with the Superin-
tendents of Education in all the Provinces, whereby
we get a history of the Dominion not only in the
schools of Ontario but in those of every Province
from the Atlantic to the Pacific. I do not want the
people of my native Province to be parochial.

We must rise to a conception of the magnitude of

CANADIAN POLITICS. 185

our position as Canadians. Canada as owner of half
a continent is destined to have a future, the bril-
liancy of which and the success of which no one can
anticipate. Why, at the beginning of this century the
population of the United States was only 5,000,000.
Scarcely a hundred years have flown away, and to-
day their population is estimated at 75,000,000. In
20, 30 or 40 years what will the population of Can-
ada be? It will be just what our energy in develop-
ing the latent resources of the country, in encourag-
ing settlement and in improving the social condition
of the people will make it. And shall we in the Prov-
ince of Ontario lag behind and be unfaithful to our
duty in this great competition? I would that all Can-
adians would realize the great possibilities that lie
before them. Another thing I did in the same line
as that already indicated was to establish Empire
Day, so that on the day preceding Her Majesty's
birthday nearly one million children assemble in the
schools of Canada — not of Ontario, mind you — and
give attention to the history of Canada and to her
relations with the British Empire. We have not,
shall I say, enough confidence in ourselves. We have
not confidence enough in ourselves as Canadians. We
are looking to the United States, to the Washingtons,
Websters and Lincolns and seeking in these names the
elements of greatness, forgetting that on Canadian
soil we have their equals in the Browns, Baldwins,
Blakes and Mowats of the present day. Let us dis-
play our loyalty to our own men. Let the children
of Canada know that Canadian soil will produce men

i86 CANADIAN POLITICS.

equal to any other soil. We think of the great ex-
panse of the United States, forgetting that we have
a still greater expanse. We talk of the constitutional
development of England, forgetting that we have
made even greater development constitutionally than
England. There is no land more free, there are no
institutions more stable, no people more intelligent
than ours. No premier of any country can properly
indulge in greater feelings of pride than I can indulge
in, in being the first Minister of this great Province.

If there is any one feeling in my heart stronger
than another it is that I — a native Canadiam, educat-
-ed in her schools, trained in her institutions, having
the confidence of a constituency for twenty-seven
years, and now apparently having the confidence of
the whole Province — shall devote all my energies, not
simply to the development of the country, but to the
moral improvement of the people. "Righteousness
exalteth a nation," Tennyson says that the limit of
a man's greatness is the limit of his moral percep-
tion. You cannot make a people nobler in character
or purpose than they are in heart or conviction. Let
us strengthen the moral foundations of this country,
let us purify elections, where they are impure — not
^lectio^ns only, but let us do whiat we caln fo purify
the whole atmosphere of the country. The way to do
this is not by making farcical pretensions as to our
virtues, but by living noble, manly lives, as Cana-
dians, and showing to the^ world and those who come
into contact with us that we have convictions found-
ed on the principles of morality. The result will be

CANADIAN POLITICS. 187

to secure for Ontario its pre-eminence as the home of
an intelligent, well-educated people. The Government
will, without any pretensions, without any blowing of
trumpets or any exhibition of virtues, go to w^ork as
straightforward, honest mben, develop the country, on
the lines I have indicated, and we trust to show to
the younger m<en that w^e are not unworthy of their
confidence.

STABILITY OF TARIFFS.

From Speech of Hon. W. S. Fielding, House of
Commons, March 23, 1900:—

The policy of this Government in tariff matters
has been from the beginning a policy of moderation,
a policy of prudence and of caution. There are those
who said that we were under obligation to make
sweeping changes, but these were not our friends. The
policy of the Liberal party, as laid down in the great
convention in the city of Ottawa, in 1893, was that
we should initiate a policy of tariff reform which
would have due regard to all existing conditions,
without doing injustice to any interest. We have
adopted that policy, and carried it out in the letter
and the spirit. Step by step, desirable changes have
been made. In the step we take we are satisfied
that we shall create no disturbing influence and injure
no industry in Canada, but shall meet the reasonable
expectations of the people of Canada for a further
measure of tariff reform. I desire to point out that
with a-n overflowing treasury, the people have the
right to expect a reduction of taxation. We propose
to give them a reduction, and to give it to them on
lines which will create the least disturbance and en-
courage to a larger extent our trade with the moth-
erland. If we take the largest classes of goods im-
ported from England, and the highest rate of duty,
(i88)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 189

say 35 per cent, and apply to that the rcductioai I
now propose of 33 1-3 per cent, or one-third of the
total duties, the 3.5 per cent, is brought dowai to 23
1-3 per cent.

I submit that as things are today in Canada that
is a fair revenue tariff, and I do not think that the
advocates of tariff reduction would ask us to go, on
that class of articles, below the rates we have now
named; and inasmuch as tariff stability is very desir-
able, and inasmuch as confidence in business is the
secret, to a large extent, of prosperity, I want to
say to all concerned, that I regard that rate of 23
1-3 per cent, as a reasonable tariff, with which, I
think, the country will be satisfied,, and I do not an-
ticipate a reduction on that class of articles for a
reasonable time in the future.

There is a subject to which I wish to make a
brief allusion, and it is one not wholly unconnected
with that which I have been discussing. There are
vast sums of money in England in the hands of the
trustees, Iwho have , to invest it in the best classes of
security. Unfortunately for Canada, we have never
been able to obtain the admission of our securities in-
to that trustee list, and the consequence has been that
whenever we placed a loan on the market, although
trustees might have been willing to invest the vast
sums in their hands in Canadian securities, they could
not do so, because the English law did not allow it.
The desirability of admission to the trustee list has
long been recognized. For the last fifteen years, the
matter has been agitated by the Government of Cana-

I90 CANADIAN POLITICS.

da. The hon. leader of the Opposition (Sir Charles
Tapper), when he filled the important position of
High Commissioner, gave a great deal of attention to
the subject, and I know from my inquiry at the time
and from information I have since obtained, that my
hon. friend laboured hard to accomplish that great
boon for Canada, the admission of our securities to
the trustee list. But, my hon. friend failed, as all
others had. Many things, however, which were im-
possible for Canada a few years ago, have become
possible under the better conditions that have arisen.
A year ago, realizing as fully as my hon. friend did
the desirability of obtaining admission to the trustee
list, I went into the subject very carefully, and pre-
pared a full report upon it, urging, as no doubt, my
hon. friend did, in his day, that Canada ought to
have her securities recognized as among the best on
the English market. Negotiations were carried on
for some time through the intervention of our present
High Commissioner, who has laboured hard, and has
done great service to Canada in that, as in every
other respect. I have now the satisfaction of an-
nouncing that the difficulties have been overcome, and
that by arrangement between Her Majesty's Govern-
ment and the Canadian Government, legislation will
be introduced into the Imperial Parliament this ses-
sion, while I shall have the honour of submitting a
Bill to this House also, dealing with the subject, and
when these two Bills, purely formal in their character,
are adopted, the securities of Canada will be admitted
to the trustee list from which they have hitherto been

CANADIAN POLITICS. 19^

excluded. My hon. friends, the leader of the Opposi-
tion, and the ex-Minister of Finance, both of whom
are thoroug"hly familiar with this question, will real-
ize, I am sure, the great importance of this concession
which we have obtained from Great Britain: but to
those who may not be so familiar with the subject,
let me say that the difference between the selling price
of a security admitted to the trustee list, and one
shut out from that list, is from two to three points.
I do not think that the hon. leader of the Opposition
or the ex-Minister of Finance, will differ from me in
that estimate. I think that at a later stage, we shall
derive even more than that difference, because under
the influence of this important step, the securities of
Canada will approach very nearly the value of British
consols. But, if we calculate at the moderate esti-
mate of 2 per cent, on the loans which Canada will
have to place in England in the next ten or twelve
years, the saving will not be less than two and a
half million dollars to the Canadian treasury.

Let me put it another way. The gain that we
shall make by this action of the British Governinent
in coming to the assistance of Canada will be, in ac-
tual cash, equal to every penny we spend for the send-
ing of the Canadian soldiers to South Africa.

1 regard this as a matter of very great conse-
quence to the finances of Canada, and those who are
acquainted with our financial affairs will fully agree
with me in that opinion. Now that this important
question is about to be settled, I desire again to say
how much we are indebted to Lord Strathcona for

192 CANADIAN POLITICS.

the assistance he has afforded in this matter. And
I should do less than justice if I did not say also
that to our excellent deputy Minister of Finance, Mr.
Courtney, a large share of that credit is due.

And, now, Mr. Speaker, my task is done. It is,
I trust, an agreeable statement which I have been
able to present to the Parliament and the people of
Canada this day. It is th^ story of very prosperous
times; of a strong financial position; of a country
that has been able to pass through the recent finan-
cial stringency without the need of borrowi>ng a dol-
lar; of a country that has not a dollar of floating
debt today; of a country with an overflowing treas-
ury under a reduced customs tariff; of liberal grants
for every useful public service; of great public enter-
prises, for the present and future needs of Canada,
carried on with comparatively insigtnificant additions
to the public debt; of a people occupying a vast coun-
try stretching from ocean to ocean, nearly all of
whom are today busy, prosperous, contented and hap-
py; of a people who bear cheerfully every obligation
that comes upon them for the maintenance of their
own public service, and who have found their devo-
tion to the Throne and person of their sovereign so
quickened by the inspiring events of recent years that
they gave freely of their blood and of their treasure
in defence of the honour of the empire in lands that
are far away. May we all realize what a goodly land
it is in which we dwell, and may we all remember
with grateful hearts the blessings which. Providence
has showered upon this Dominion of Canada.

D ALTON MCCARTHY ON PROTECTION.

There is not a manufacturing Industry In this
country in which there is not an unc^er standing be-
tween the men engaged in it by which they regulate
the output and fix the prices, and there is virtually
no competition. What is the result? The result i&
that you are paying an enormous tax on what you
bring into the country; that goes into the Treasury.
The duty that your merchant pays to the customs
house officers goes into the Treasury. He adds it to
the price of his goods, his profits to that, and it
comes out of the pockets of the people; but, if you
deal with the home manufacturer you pay him the
same price as if he had paid duty, when he has not
paid anything, another 35 per cent, goes into his-
pocket and not into the Treasury, at all. I came to
this conclusion a year ago, that I was no longer go-
ing to remain an advocate of the N. P., and saw
what was going orn. I could not unless I was blind,
help seeing it, and I saw from the public documents
the enormous output of these manufacturers.

Speaking at Creemore, D' Alton McCarthy, Q.C.,
s.aid: — "1 was, as you all know, a National Policy
man, and now I tell you I am for as much free trade
as we can get. We would be all the better if we could
have it as it is in England. But that is impossible,
and so 1 say that what this country needs now is
to get dow^n to a tariff for revenue.*'
(193)

SLAVERY AND PROTECTION.

Extract from speech in the House, in 1895, by G.
W. W. Dawson, ex-M. P.: —

Sir, this tariff has robbed us of our liberty. It
is almost as bad as slavery. What is the difference
between slavery and protection? Very slight indeed.
Slavery is a system under which I am deprived of my
right to choose a market for my labor, under which
I am robbed of my wages, under which my muscles*
and brains are used to benefit my owner, and under
which my life is spent in toil to his wealth. Now,
what is protection? It is a system under, which I am
fettered in the choice of a market for the products of
my labor, under which I may not exchange the fruits
of my labor w^here I choose, and under which I have
got to exchange them by such channels as are pro-
vided for me by those who have enacted this iniqui-
tous law, called protection. I am robbed of a portion
of my wages to swell the extortionate profits of those
who have combined to compel me to pay this tribute
to them. Slavery and protection are designed by sel-
fish man to benefit and enrich the classes at the ex-
pense of the masses of the people.

Protection has oppressed the masses to the enrich-
ment of a few. Sir, it is said by hon. gentlemen that
this is not so, that we have no people of great
wealth in this Dominion, but that the wealth is dis-
tributed evenly among all the people of the country.
(194)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 195

I give in evidence against these hon. gentlemen the
words of the late Sir John Abbott, who. In speaking
in the Senate, 1891, said in the debate on the salary
of judges: —

"I remember when a man could live in this coun-
try for one half the amount he could live on now;
when the fortunes which judges in the attempt to
maintain their social rank had to compete with, were
not one-tenth, nor one-hundredth part of what they
are now. It is not so long ago when the sight of a
millionaire would have attracted crowds in the
streets. Now there is not a town in the country
where you could not find men who are several times
millionaires."

Where did these men get their millions? From the
pockets of the people. Who are these millionaires?
They are the sugar refiners, the cordage manufactur-
ers, the cotton men, the tobacco manufacturers, the
owners of distilleries, and the owners of other pro-
tected industries. These are the men who have become
millionaires, with whom the judges can no longer
compete in the attempt to maintain their social
position in the land. Under protection, these men
have only to sit still, many of them, and wealth will
flow in upon them without any effort on their part.
Some of them today would outrival Solomon in his
glory, and yet they toil not, neither do they spin.

THE NATIONAL POLICY AND THE FARMER.

Speech by J. N. Grieve, ex-M. P., on the Budget,
in the House of Commons, 1895: —

What has the National Policy done for the far-
mers of Canada? We know something of the lavish
promises made for the National Policy prior to its
introduction in 1879. We know that the National
Policy, it was promised, would increase the value of
farm lands and would increase the value of farm pro-
ducts. We were told that the National ,policy was to
provide a home market for the farmers. We were told
that the National Policy was to keep our young mon
in our own country, secure for them steady employ-
ment, and give them a fair day's wage for a fair
day's work. Let me ask, Sir, has a single one of
these prophesies been fulfilled? Have farm lands in-
creased in value? I know fron^ my own knowledge
that in my section of the country farm lands have
largely depreciated in value during the last ten or
fifteen years. I am within the judgment of every
member of this House when I say that in that period
farm property has depreciated at least from 25 to
40 per cent. Sir, I do not intend to confine myself
to individual cases that could be shown throughout
the different sections of the country, but I will show
by figures which have been prepared by the Ontario
Government that farm lands generally have very
largely depreciated in value. We know, Sir, that in

(196)

CANADIAN POLITICS. i97

1878 the Conservative party in Canada and the Con-
servative press as well, took the ground that the
National Policy was to increase the valtie of farm
lands. We know, Sir, that in 1878, not only many
of the manufacturers, but many of the labouring men
and many of the farmers of this country forsook their
political allegiance, and their former political friends,
and voted for the party that promised to increase the
value of farm lands and the value of farm products.
1 take as the basis of calculation the reports of the
Ontario Bureau of Industries for 1893 and 1894.
Now, Sir, how have these predictions been fulfilled?
These documents are official, being published by the
Legislature of Ontario. I find from them that the
value of farm lands in the Province of Ontario in
1883 was $655,000,000, and in 1894, $587,246,000,
or a reduction of $67,754,000. But there are other
things that must be considered in making the calcula-
tion. Between 1883 and 1894 1,760,000 acres of land
♦ were cleared in Ontario. Hon. gentlemen may say
that the value of this land would not add to the de-
preciation. We know that on an ordinary farm of 100
acres or 200 acres, a piece of bush of 20 or 25 acres
does not depreciate the value of the farm, but rather
enhances its value. But those 1,760,000 acres of land
which were cleared in those ten years were lands in
new districts. The ordinary cost of clearing land is
$15 or $20 an acre. I will put it at the lowest price,
$15, and you will have a value of $29,400,000 that
must be added to the amount of the depreciation. In
1883 there were in Ontario 213,000 farmers 'and in

198 CANADIAN POLITICS.

1894, 243,000, an increase of 30,000. Hon. gentle-
men may say that this shows the growing, prosperity
of the country. But it must not be forgotten that a
large number of our farmers were young men who
went into the new districts opened up by the Provin-
cial Government. We know that during the last ten
years many townships ha^e been surveyed and opened
for settlement in the Eainy River, Port Arthur, Bruce
Mines, and other districts. The lands so taken up
were formerly in the hands of the Government and
assessed as Government lands previous to 1883, but
after that time they passed into » the hands of the far-
mers and their value has to be added to the value of
farm lands in the Province, in 1894. If we take all
these three items together — the ultimate loss, the
cleared lands and the value of the farms — we find that
$97,154,000 is the amount of depreciation of farm
property in the Province of Ontario during those ten
years. That is not all. There have been many per-
manent improvements made in those ten years. Far-
mers have been putting up buildings, such as new
houses and new barns, they have been removing stones
and stumps, they have been doing much in 1:he way
of underdraining, open draining, and so forth; and all
these must be taken into account in calculating the
depreciation in the value of farm lands. I think I
am within the mark when I say that the depreciation
in the value of farm lands in the Province of Ontario
in the ten years from 1884 to 1894, amounted to no
less than $140,000,000 or $150,000,000. Now, Sir,

CANADIAN POLITICS. 199

did the Conservative party in 1878 promise that they
would increase the value of farm lands? Did they
promise that they^ would raise the prices of farm pro-
ducts? Sir John Macdonald himself, who was the
leader of the Conservative. party at that time, speak-
ing at a large meeting in the city of Toronto, said: —

"If you desire this country to prosper; if you de-
sire this country to rise out of the slough of despond
in which it has sunk; if you desire to see manufac-
turers rise; if you desire to see labour employed; if
you desire the emigration of our young people stop-
ped; if you desire to bring back those who have emi-
grated; if you desire to see the value of land rise;' if
you desire prosperity, you will support the National
Policy/'

Mr. Speaker, I say that not one of those prophes-
ies have been fulfilled. I do not for a single moment
say that this is entirely due to the workings of the
National Policy; but I have every reason to believe
that it is in a great measure due to the fact that the
products of our farms have been shut out to a large
degree from our best markets. While it is undoubted-
ly true that England is the principal, if not the only
market for our wheat, cheese, beef and light horses,
and is a strong competitor with the United States
for our surplus hay, sheep, hog products, oats, but-
ter, apples, honey, and so forth, yet it is an admitted
fact that the country to the south of us is the great
market for our barley, lambs, heavy horses, poultry,
eggs, peas, beans, potatoes and other roots, and
many other products grown by the farmers of Cana-

200 CANADIAN POLITICS.

da. In order to prove that the stateirkents that I
have just made are substantially correct, I think it is
only fair to the House that I should givie the figures,
as gleaned from the statistical Year-book of 1894.
During the year we exported horses to England to the
value of $400,507, and to the United States horses to
the value of $480,525. It should be observed that the
class of horses we are exporting to England are well
bred horses sent out there for military purposes and
for saddle and driving purposes, a class of horses
which it is almost impossible for the great mass of
the farmers of Canada to raise; but the class of hor-
ses we have been shipping to the United States are
heavy draught horses which are used on drays and for
heavy working purposes, the class of horses that have
been in the past and are at the present time easily
raised by every farmer in the country.

Now, while England undoubtedly stands supreme
as the great market for the world's produce, the
United States is the principal market for a very large
percentage of what is grown upon Canadian soil, and
had Canadian shippers equal advantages in placing
their products on the American market as they have
on the English markets I do not hesitate to say that
our exports to the United States would, in a very
few years, increase by 50 or 75 per cent. It is a won-
der to me when we consider the very high tariff ex-
isting between the two countries, that we are able to
keep up the immense violume of trade that we do be-
tween this country and the United States. Will hon.
gentlemen opposite pretend, with these facts before

CANADIAN POLITICS. 201

them, that there is any chance of our obtaining as
good a market outside of Canada i'n any other coun-
try as we can in the United States for many of the
articles I have enumerated, and which we have to soil?
Are we likely to get as good a market elsewhere- for
our barley, horses, lambs, small fruits, eggs, poultry,
hay, and the many other articles we have to sell, and
for which there is, practically, an unlimited demand
in the United States. Is it any wonder, Mr. Speaker,
that the farmers of Canada, through their different
organizations, are crying out for relief? They have a
right to get relief, and. Sir, in my opinion, there is
only one way in which their relief can be obtained,
and that is by a frank and free interchange for the
products of the soil between the two countries, or, in
other words, the right to sell in the best and most
convenient market, and the right to buy in the same.

THE LIBERAL PARTY.

From a speech by Sir Richard C art wr light at Lon-
don, September 19, 1900.

It is not by what it has done during the last
four years that the Liberal party will be judged in
the future. If it is to maintain its proper position
in the land, the Liberal party must be a progressive
party, prepared with other measures and with ' fiesh
effort on their part to develop not merely the mater-
ial but the social welfare of the people of Canada.
We have not been forgetful of our duties in that re-
spect. We are prepared to aid and assist to every
reasonable extent all enterprises that present a fair
prospect of fruitful return to the people of Cafliada.
Owing to the fostering care of the Government we
see at one end of Canada, in Nova Scotia, heretofore
a comparatively unprogressive portion of our coun-
try, a huge iroTi industry, which will in all probabil-
ity give employment soon to 20,000 families. At the
other end, in our own province, we see great enter-
prises in the neighborhood of Sault Ste Marie, which
will in all probability give employment to an equal
number of families at this end of the Dominion. We
see, further, numerous and extensive industries fronii
one end of Canada to the other, starting up and de-
veloping, not fostered by high tariff, but which are
legitimate to the country. The Government are most
desirous of promoting also sound relations between
(202)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 203

the two great classes of employers and employed and
by their legislation have provided courts of concilia-
tion, through the medium of which labor difficulties
can be adjusted and expensive strikes avoided.

It is true that our present legislation is still ra-
ther tentative and is rather to be looked on as the
germ of a better system than its full realization. But
no man who has paid any attention to the enormous
misery and far-reaching social dangers that are con-
tinually arising from strikes, especially in the United
States, (and of which there are samples enough this
very year) can fail to appreciate the immense impor-
tance of prowding some important tribunal in which
both parties can feel confident, and before which they
can state their respective grievances and place their
cases fairly before the general public. I speak with
knowledge when I say we have had already very good
cause to show that the battle is half won when we
can induce the disputants to meet and hear what
each other has got to say. It is not by legislative
interference, but by an appeal to the mutual good
sense and desire for fair play on the part alike of
employers and employed that we can hope to bring
about a genuine friendly sentiment between those who
are eating off the same loaf, and whose interests
rightly understood are not diverse but identical, and
it is by the force of an intelligent public opinion, and
not by the bayonet, that the Government of Canada
desire to keep good order among our people. To
what extent the industrial development of Canada
may come to depend on the right solution of this

204 CANADIAN POLITICS.

problem, only those who are aware of the immense
injury which has resulted to British trade from the
perpetual recurrence of strikes of one ^ort or another
in the United Kingdom, and who know how perilously
near the two parties have com<e to a state of civil
war in many sections of the neighboring republic, can
form an adequate judgment.

As regards our relations with other countries and
especially with our motherland and with the people of
the United States, we recognize that it will be our
*duty and our privilege, without relinquishing our
right of self-government and without in any way com-
promising our autonomy or loading down our people
with burdens too heavy to be borne, to do what in us
lies to solidify and unite the various portions of the
Empire nor have the least fear that Canada in the
future will play aught but a most important part in
any project which can be devised looking to that end.
While as regards our neighbors to the south of us,
even if we cannot ,(for the present) establish better
trade relations with them than we now possess we
can at least by all fair and honorable means cultivate
a good understanding between them and ourselves and
in so doing as I have so frequently pointed out con-
fer a most substantial benefit both on our people and
on the empire of which we form a part.

Lastly and perhaps most important task of all
it will be the special duty and objects of the Liberal
party so to administer the Government of this Do-
minion as to extinguish once and for all, I trust,
those appeals to y)rejudice of class and race which

CANADIAN POLITICS. 205

elsewhere have borne such fruits of evil and which in
Canada of all places it is simply suicidal in a na-
tional point of view to foster or encourage. These,
sir, are the aims which the Liberal party should set
before it in the future, and I think that what they
have done in the past affords every reasonable guar-
antee that they will not fail to promote them by
every reasonable means in their power in the time to
come.

Gentlemen, so far as I know I have laid the facts
before you plainly and simply. I have given you the
authority on which I have made them. I repeat again
all that the Government asks, all that the Govern-
ment desires, is fair play and a fair hearing, and all
that they 5 specially request of their friends here and
their friends in the rest of the country is that they
shall investigate for themselves the truth of the state-
ments which the members of the Government have
made through my mouth and the mouths of others of
my colleagues, and if they find, as I believe they will
find, that every statement we have made is one that
can be substantiated by the records, or one of which
you can obtain reasonable proof by looking around
you and seeing the condition of the country, then I
think we may fearlessly claim that on our part we
have done our duty towards you and that you will be
doing your duty and promoting your own interests,
by renewing your lease of power to us.

THE NATIONAL POLICY.

Speech by Hon. David Mills, at London, October
6, 1877:—

The leaders of the Conservative party are calling
aloud for the adoption of a "National Policy." They
ask that the trade of Canada shall be kept for Cana-
dians. They tell you that we have adopted a policy
by which the people of this country are compelled to
pay yearly several millions into the treasury of the
United States. I deny the correctness of this allega-
tion. I affirm that one more unfounded was never
made. I say that the theory embraced in the asser-
tion of these gentlemen is refuted by the experience
not only of Canada, but of every country that has
had a foreign trade. In addressing the people at Fer-
gus a few weeks ago, I showed from our trade and
navigation returns, extending over a period of twen-
ty-two years, that the prices received by the Cana-
dian farmers for the products sent to the American
market were not, nor could they be, affected by the
taxes imposed by the United States. What makes up
the value of an article? The cost of the original ma-
terial, the value of the labour spent upon it, the
profits, and, if it is taxed, then this also must be
added, and all these things are elements which go to
constitute the price paid by the consumer. There is
no such thing as production at a permanent loss

where there is no Government interference. It is con-
(206)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 207

trary alike to experience and common sense. We have
suffered incomparably less than our neighbors during
the crisis which in this country seems happily to
have closed, but which in the United States is still
most severely felt. I say we have suffered incompara-
bly less than they have; and the reason is not from
any superiority in our natural advantages, but be-
cause in our system of taxation we have departed less
widely from the doctrines of political economists than
they have done. It is satisfactory to know that the
discoveries in political science, no less than the dis-
coveries of physical science and in the industrial arts,
admit of practical application. It is gratifying to
know that they are rapidly finding their way through
the ordinary channels of public opinion, are correct-
ing popular errors, are reforming the laws by which
the people are governed, are breaking down the arti-
ficial barriers which separate indepen-dent States com-
mercially; nor are they void of their beneficial results,
for they at last come home to every family that is
sober and industrious in the forms of increased secur-
ity to- life and property, increased intelligence, and
increased comforts. The prophesies of ruin which our
opponents have recently indulged in, as a consequence
of our fiscal policy, are being falsified by the return-
ing prosperity of the country, just as similar predic-
tions hajve been falsified in Greait Britain, and in
every other country where free trade has been estab-
lished by able men, and denounced by political charl-
atans.

I dare say, gentlemen, you have observed tiiat

2o8 CANADIAN POLITICS.

sometimies a man with a very limited amount of in-
formation, and with little or no professional skill,
undertakes to practise medicine. The country is new,
the people are poor — are unable to judge accurately of
his attainments. They employ him when they are ill,
and, being temperate in their lives, having growv
strong by industry and manly exercise — in spite of his
treatment they recover. He acquires a reputation for
knowledge and skill which he does not possess. He is
jealous of the regular practitioner, denounces his
book-learning, and endeavors to keep him out. Those
on whom he has long imposed, for some time longer
continue to listen to him. Another generation, how-
ever, is growing up. They have had better opportun-
ities than their fathers — they are less simple-minded,
they take the exact n^asure of the man of herbs with
medical instincts. They know he is a quack, and they
do- not conceal their knowledge. He struggles hard
against this opinion, and complains of being persecu-
ted, but having spent the greater portion of his life
in deceiving people into believing him what he is not,
it is too late for him to begin now that study by
w^hich alone he could be qualified to become what he
desires the community to consider him; and the place
from which he has fallen he can never regain. We
have had in Canada the same type of political doc-
tor. You see two o-f them leading the Conservative
party. They have, lost their position and their prac-
tice. They are offering the people again their quack
nostrums. But the times have changed. A new order
of things has been established, with which this class

CANADIAN POLITICS. 209

are out of joint; and they struggle hard, but vainly,
agaiij^st the public verdict. They still have faith in
buncombe. They still hope that the public taste for
being humbugged will return. They are prepared to
embark on any sea of speculation, however untried;
they are prepared to engage in any venture, however
wild or visionary, if perchance they miay regain their
old places. They are ready to appeal to any preju-
dice or sugjgest amy policy, no matter how mischiev-
ious it might prove, if the result only were favora-
ble to their wishes.

Our opponents advocate what they call a "nation-
al" policy. We also advocate a national policy; and
I shall endeavor to sliovv^ you before I conclude my
observations that the fiscal and political policy of the
present Government, and of the Reform party, is
alone entitled to that appellation. Does any man in
his senses believe that a few cents' taxes upon bread-
stuffs, and a tax upon other agricultural products
coming from the United States into this country,
similar to that imposed by Congress upon the pro-
ducts of Canada, would be of any advantage to us?
We have, as I have already stated, an immense mer-
cantile marine, for which we are anxious to find em-
ployment. It is growing up without protective tar-
iffs and without Government interference. It carries
the products of Canada to every quarter of the globe
where a suitable market can be found. It affords to
capital a profitable Investment, and to many mechan-
ics and artisans remunerative employment. It en-
gages the services of many thousands of our people

2IO CANADIAN POLITICS.

fond of adventure, and who are obliged to encounter
those storms and perils of the sea by which the mind
not less the body is invigorated, and by which hab-
its of self-reliance ,are acquired. Is this source of
wealth and prosperity of no consequence? Are those
who invest their capital in ship building and ships —
are the hardy mariners who man them — to be elimina-
ted as of no account in the elements of natural
growth and national prosperity?

I need not discuss the effect of a retaliatory pol-
icy upon the prosperity of the agriculturists of this
country. As an agriculturist living in a neighboring
county, the climate and products of which are similar
to your own, I shall oppose to the utmost of my abil-
ity a policy that would prove in the least degree in-
jurious to the farmers of Canada. You may depend
on this, gentlemen, that the Government who impose
a tax upon imports, to that extent at least tax their
own people. During the past four years we imported
from the United States cereals to the value of $55,-
000,000, and we exported thither to the value of
$34,224,620, or we imported into Canada $20,822,-
754 worth more than we exported to that country.
Now, were we damaged by this excess? Would it have
been a wise thing on the part of the Government to
have imposed a tax that would have kept this ex-
cess out? I say no. I say our people are engaged in
this trade because they found it profitable. Let me
ask for a moment to consider what we did with this
surplus which we imported. We imported wheat and
flour from the United States in these four years in

CANADIAN POLITICS. 2II

excess of what we scait there to the value of twenty-
nine niiillions of dollars. We sent to England forty-
two million dollars worth of breadstuffs during the
same period, twenty-nine millions worth of which
were the product of the United States, and thirteen
millions worth the product of Canada. The American
wheat which we imported and sent to England would
have gone there through American channels had w©^
imposed an import duty upon it, and those Canadians
engaged in the milling and carrying trades have made
more than three times the gain they would have done
had we adopted a policy of exclusion.

There is one product in which I am told you have
a special interest— I refer to the production of corn.
I will take the year 1874 as an example, because the
prices then were more nearly a mean average, taking
several years together, than were the prices of 1876.
Well, in 1874 we imported into Canada 5,331,000
bushels of corn, at about 43 cents per bushel; 2,657,-
000 bushels of this were re-shipped to Europe at
about 61 cents a bushel, that is, at a profit of 18
cents a bushel, or $447,180 on the whole transaction.
Now, the country is richer by nearly half a million
dollars in consequence of the importation and expor-
tation of these 2,657,000 bushels of corn. Let me
consider for a moment whether we have gained or
lost by the two and three-quarter millions of this
corn consumed at home. If we take but three quar-
ters of a million of bushels as the quantity that has
been consumed by lumbermen and farmers, you have
an equal quantity of peas and barley displaced — peas.

212 CANADIAN POLITICS.

however, more largely than barley. The mean
average difference for the past four years between
corn on the one hand, and peas and barley on the
other, is about 30 cents per bushel, or upon three
quarters of a million of bushels $300,000— a total
gain to the country each year upon the corn imported
of $777,180. Let me ask you, gentlemen, how much
corn do you export from your country in a single
year? If your farmers were to produce on an average
100 bushels each more than they consumed — and •'^his
is far beyond what they do in the most favored corn
■growing district on the continent — and we were to
give you a protection of ten cents per bushel, it would
only amount in all to $50,000. But I am told that
you find it much more advantageous to use your corn
in the production of pork than to send it abroad, and
that less than 50,000 bushels are shipped from your
country; so that the taxation suggested w^ould give
you less than $5,000 additional profit. If this corn
was consumed in the country it wo'uM not add a
farthing to the national wealth; and if it went abroad
how could any duty help you? for the price which the
dealers could afford to pay would depend on the for-
-eign market, which could not be affected by any tax-
es imposed by us. I would ask you in all seriousness,
do you think that the Canadian Parliament would be
justified in putting a tax on corn which would give
to each farmer in Essex one dollar a year more than
at present, when by so doing they would entail upon
the country an absolute loss of three-^^uarters of a
million of dollars, not including the loss sustained by

CANADIAN POLITICS. 213

a necessary reduction of the excise. But no such ad-
vantage as the one I have m-entioned could possibly
accrue to you from such a tax. The indirect conse-
quences resulting from any disturbance of a prosper-
ous and profitable trade would injure you much more
than any such restriction could help you. Providence
has wisely constituted the world in such a way that
men are mutually dependent upon each other. No
merchant would be helped by having his customers
beggared; and no more can one portion of our people
be made permanently wealthy and prosperous by the
impoverishment of those with whom they are indissol-
ubly united. I say, then, gentlemen, that the system
O'f taxation recommended to your consideration by
our political opponents is not entitled to the appella-
tion of a national policy.

FARMERS AND THE TARIFF.

From speech by Hon. Sydney Fisher, in the House
of Commons: —

The policy on behalf of the farmers of the two
great political parties is entirely different. The Tory
Government offered by protection to provide a home
market for the farmers, and failed.

They offered by a system of duties to raise the
price of farm products, and failed.

They took ill considered plans of doing something
which the farmiers were much better able to do for-
them.selves, and failed.

They proposed in the last days of their power,
when making their last appeal to the electorate, to
establish a system which one of the best of their
own agricultural representatives has since categori-
cally condemned.

It was no wonder that in 1896 the farmers con-
demned them.

Since 1896 Sir Charles Tupper is appealing to the
farmers because he says he would get preference for
them in the English m»arket and thereby give them an
advantage ovier their competitors.

The Liberal Government have pursued an entirely
different course. They have provided effectively those
facilities for transport which our trade requires. They
have given the instruction necessary to the farmers to
show them how best to prepare their products for the
markets of the world.

(214)

CANADIAN POLITICS. 215

Both by legislation and administration they have
provided the necessary machinery to facilitate and
improve production in Canada.

By arrangements with the United States they
have obtained access for our cattle to that market,
and above all and more important than all, by the
preference they have accorded the motherland in the
markets of Canada they have secured an appreciation
of Canada, its people and its products, amongst the
English consumers such as never existed before.

Si]* Charles Tupper demands of England that she
should do somyething contrary to her whole well es-
tablished and wonderfully successful fiscal system,
something which her leading statesmen have declared
it is impossible to consider. Even suppose it were,
in the dim future, to become possible, the Conserva-
tives themselves acknowledge that it is in the future
and not in the present.

The Liberal policy has already secured for Canada
a preference in the English market, which is one of
the main causes of the fact that today our products
are going to England in enormously increasing quan-
tities, and our farmers are there receiving prices which
they never received before.

Today Canadian butter, Canadian cheese, Cana-
dian fruits and Canadian flour are being asked for
and searched for by the English consumer.

Under the Conservative Administration the same
articles were being sold in the English markets under
other names and false brands.

This is an advantage not for the future, not to be

2i6 CANADIAN POLITICS.

obtained by a struggle against the will of the whole
British nation, but an advantage which has been so-
cured with the hearty good will of these people, ol)-
tained at the same time that we have received a cor-
dial appreciation as an integral part of the Empires
and have shown that we are, through weal or woe.
in times of war as well as peace, an aid and a com-
fort to the motherland instead of demanding from
that motherland a sacrifice which it must hurt her to
give.

QUALITIES OF A GREAT STATESMAN.

Speech by Hon. G. W. Ross, at Massey Music
Hall, Toronto, February 5th, 1895:—

Amiong one of the heresies of my early youth was
the impression (how it was formed I can hardly tell)
that the Province of Ontario never received full jus-
tice in the old Parliament of Ontario from the Prov-
ince of Quebec. For that reason I looked with some
little suspicion upon the impartiality of the represen-
tatives of Quebec when they came to deal with mat-
ters affecting the interests of Ontario. Allow me to
say now, and say it without any reservation whatso-
ever, that in the Hon. Wilfrid Laurier's career not a
single circumstance, so far as I know, has occurred ta
justify such a preconception. On the contrary, hi&
public utterances as well as his speeches in the House
of Commons have unmistakably shown his determin-
ation to do full justice to the Province of Ontario
even against the views of a majority of the represen-
tatives from his own Province and in cases too,,
where local popularity might be obtained by an op-
posite course. As a notable instance of his rectitude
and impartiality in this respect, let me cite his con-
duct w^ith regard to the Boundary Award. You will
doubtless remember that during Mr. Mackenzie's ad-
ministration, arbitrators were appointed to determine
the Western limits of the Province of Ontario, the un-
derstanding being that their report should be subject
to the approval of the House of Commons and the
(217)

2i8 CANADIAN POLITICS.

legislature of Ontario. As the Mackenzie <:«overnment
was defeated before the House of Commons had an
opportunity of confirming the award it remained for
Sir John Macdonald to advise Parliament with regard
to its vtalidity. Contrary to expectations, Sir John
MacDonald refused to submit the award for ratifica-
tion although repeatedly urged to do so by the Local
Legislature. Naturally enough his action aroused a
great deal of public feeling, particularly in the Prov-
ince mostly interested, for to us in Ontario the con-
sequences involved were of the most serious character.
To refuse to ratify the award was to refuse the pos-
session to Ontario of 100,000 square mili^s of terri-
tory declared by the arbitrators to be ours, and when
we remember that this territory was as large almost
as the area of the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Ireland, larger by 40,000 square miles than Eng-
land and Wales, ten tim s as large as the State of Mass-
achusetts and twice as large as the State of New York
it will be seen how much was at stake. It was a terri-
tory worth fighting for, and the Government of Ontar-
io did fight for it. What position did Mr. Laurier
take in that issue? Did he listen to the representa-
tions fron^i his own Province that to confirm the
award would be to increase the preponderance of On-
tario both as to territory and representation in the
Councils of the nation? Or, did he look upon the
question as one of abstract justice, irrespective of
consequences? Let us hear what he said. Speaking in
the House of Commons on the 4th of April, 1882, he
used the following words: —

CANADIAN POLITICS. 219

"I have no hesitation in saying this award is
binding on both parties, and should be carried out in
good faith. The consideration that the great Prov-
ince of Ontario may be made greater I altogether lay
aside as unfair, unfriendly, and unjust. This is not a
question of expediency, it is a ;question of justice. I
do not grudge to Ontario the extent of territory de-
clared to be hers under this award, and which does
not constitute even the whole of what she is entitled
to, according to the opinion of one of the most learn-
ed and industrious oi my countrymen. The eternal
principles of justice are far more important than
thousands or millions of acres of land, and I say let
us adhere to those principles of justice and in doing
so we will have the surest foundation for security on
every occasion."

I commend to the citizens of Ontario the noble
stand taken by the learned leader of the Liberal party
on a question so deeply affecting the interests of On-
tario, and taken many years before he had any ex-
pectation to be the leader of a great party. There
was no truckling for local support, no studied effort
to evade a great issue, but on the contrary a broad
statesmanlike and manly declaration that be the con-
sequences what they may, the principles of justice
should prevail. We thank him for his manly utter-
ances and we rejoice in the honest motives which in-
lipired him to espouse the cause of our beloved Piov-
ince.

The year following another question arosei Sir
John Macdonald had cast a covetous eye upon the

220 CANADIAN POLITICS.

large revenues received by Ontario from the Licenses
System. No doubt he also thought that the control
of the liquor traflic involved a certain ajnount of
political influence which he could use to his own ad-
vantage. Although the Privy Council had declared
that the sale of intoxicating liquors was within the
jurisdiction of the Province, Sir John MacDoaald in-
sisted that the Dominion Government had the right
to issue tavern licenses and accordingly he prevailed
upon his then friend, Mr. Dalton McCarthy, to intro-
duce a License Act. As this was a Liquor Bill the
discussions upon it were not so dry as on the Boun-
dary Award referred to. To the Province of Ontario,
it was however, of the greatest importance, from var-
ious standpoints.

There were involved in it revenues amounting to
$300,000 a year, so far as the Province of Ontario
was concerned, and another $300,000 a year so far as
the municipalities were concerned — more than half a
million in all. They had enjoyed these revenues for
many years, and they could see no reason why they
should be deprived of thenk. And, more important,
there was the federal principle involved, because if the
licensing power could be taken from the Provinces
what would prevent themi taking away the control of
education, and other powers entrusted to the Prov-
inces, until the whole fabric of Confederation should
fall to pieces? What position did their leader take on
that question? Did he take the position of his fellow-
citizens of Quebec of the Conservative party? Let
him speak for himself. In the House of Commons, on

CANADIAN POLITICS. 221

the 18th of March, 1884, he said with regard to the
right of the Provinces to legislate respecting licenses.
"In my humble judgment, this is an infringement
upon the powers of the Provinces. It cannot be oth-
erwise; and I ask the attention of those who value this
Federal system, when I enquire if the object of the
amendment is not, in» the end, to deprive the Prov-
inces of the right which legitimately pertains to them
today. It is a step towards legislative union. Every
successful attempt made on the floor of this parlia-
ment to deprive any Province of any power now ex-
ercised by that Province, however insignificant that
power may be, is a successful step in the direction of
legislative union." And, said Mr. Ross, he might
have added, subversive of Confederation. That was
the stand Mr. Laurier took on that question, and he
thanked him for it, as a believer in Confederation. If
they made any break in the autonomy of Provincial
rights the whole fabric of Confederation would fall,
and their only guarantee for the system was that the
House of Commons should not use its tremendous
power to the derogation of the powers of the Prov-
inces, small or large.

Mr. Laurier's course on these two questions — the
Boundary Award and the License Laws — indicated
pretty clearly his integrity of character and his res-
pect for the fundamental principles of our federal sys-
tem, and had I nothing else to offer, I have no
doubt you would deem them a sufficient basis for
your confidence. They are not, however, the only
grounds for which he is entitled to our esteem. Not

222 CANADIAN POLITICS.

only has he advocated a policy which is sound con-
stitutionally, and which has been confirmed as a mat-
ter of law by the decisions of the Privy Council, but
Mr. Laurier represents all that is best in Canadian
and British statesmanship. Let us not forgot in these
days of National Consolidation and 1 trust also of
national unity the part played by the sister Province^
of Quebec in the history of Canada, for every person
familiar with the events of the past fifty years knows
that we owe a great deal to the sympathy and intelli-
gence and legislative ability of our sister Province.
Fifty years ago, when the foundations of responsible
government were being laid, who was it clasped hands
with Robert Baldwin to carry out the plan sketched
so ably by Lord Durham, was it not Lafontaine, the
hero of the French in Lower Canada? Who clasped
hands with George Brown to help him Carry out this
grand policy of Confederation, was it not Sir George
Cartier? And a distinguished French-Canadian, M.
Etienne Tache, had declared that it would be a
French-Canadian who would fire the last gun in de-
fence of British connection. We should recognize the
loyal attachment of our Quebec friends to the princi-
ple of good government; we should recognize that
peace would not be attained by a cleavage of races
and creeds, but by establishing unity and harmony in
all. Mr. Laurier's own record in Canadian political
history had been in accordance with these anticedents.
In 1874 he had supported the introduction of the vote
by ballot into all elections for Dominion purposes.
For four or five years he had supported Hon. Mr.

CANADIAN POLITICS. 223

Mackenzie in his policy of economy and rectitude. In
1878 he had, as now, upheld a revenue tariff as the
proper fiscal system for Canada. In 1882 he opposed
the gerrymander, by which some of the ablest men in
Canadian public life had their seats assailed. In 1883
he had opposed the taking of the licensing power from
the Pro'vinces. In 1885 he had opposed the Dominion
Franchise Act. Later on he had been the consistent,
earnest advocate of purity in the House of Commons,
and in these particulars, he had set forth the best
qualities in the continuity of Canadian government
with the British s;^stem and in connection of the best
qualities O'f Canadian with English statesmanship, and
in this connection also h© could point to Mr. Laurier
and his utterances. In 1887 at the Academy of Mus-
ic in Quebec Mr. Laurier used the following lan-
guage:—

*'What is grander than the history of the great
English Liberal party during the present century? On
its threshold looms up the figure of Fox, the wise, the
generous Fox, defending the cause of the oppressed,
wherever there were oppressed to be defended. A lit-
tle later comes O'Connell, claiming and obtaining for
his co-religionists the rights and privileges of British
subjects. He is helped in this work by all the Liber-
als of the three kingdoms — Grey, Brougham, Russell,
Jeffrey and a host of others, such as Bright, Cobden
and Gladstone. Then come, one after the other, th«
abolition of the ruling oligarchy by the repeal of th»
corn laws, the extension of the suffrage to the work-
ing classes, and, lastly, to crown the whole, disestab-

224 CANADIAN POLITICS.

lishment of the Church of England as the state relig-
ion in Ireland."

What a comprehensive expression of fealty is here
given to the best qualities of statesmanship. He men-
tioned Fox; what did he learn from him? In 1774,
when the Quebec Act was under discussion, Fox laid
down the principle, which he regretted, had not been
at once adopted, that if England was to maintain
her connection with her colonies for any length of
time it would b^ only^by delegating to them a ;large
measure of self-government. Had the English Govern-
ment taken Fox's advice it might have been spared
the Revolutionary War and subsequent declaration of
independence, and Canada might have been spared a
rebellion in Ontario and Quebec, and would have got
responsible government sooner. Mr. Laurier mention-
ed Burke; what had he learned from him? In Burke's
speech to the electors of Bristol these words were
found: —

"I have held and ever shall maintain to the best
of my power, unimpaired and undiminished, the just,
wise and necessary constitutional superiority of Great
Britain. I never mean to put any colonist or any hu-
n>an creature in a position not becoming a free
man."

Mr. Laurier had illustrated well that night how
thoroughly he had learned this noble lesson from
Burke. From O'Connell he had learned that the in-
tegrity of the British constitution depended upon jus-
tice being done to Roman Catholics as well as to
Protestants, and in giving to each their legitimate

CANADIAN POLITICS. 225

share in the responsibilities and privileges of govern-
ment and administration. What had he learned from
Lord John Russell, the champion of the Reform Bill
of 1832, who revised the constituencies of Great Brit-
ain and did not gerrymander one? He taught that the
people of England had a right to be heard upon ques-
tions of government, and that there should be a just
distribution of political power and responsibility; and
Mr. Laurier had learned the lesson well. He learned
from Brougham that the safety of democracy depend-
ed upon the spread of education, and that free
schools should be established all over the country.
From Jo'hn Bright he learned that the commerce of
England, fettered by restrictive tariffs, was weak and
halting in comparison with the magnificent sweep of
that commerce when the fetters were removed,
^hat had their leader learned of William Ewart Glad-
stone, the noblest Roman of them all— of whom it might
be said as Tennyson said of Galahad, one of the^
knights of the Round Table, "His strength was as the
strength of ten, because his heart was pure." From Mr.
Gladstone he had learned that the masses have rights
as well as the classes; he learned that conciliation is a
stronger motive power than coercion; that "corrup-
tion wins not more than honesty." And with these
lessons in his heart our friend comes and asks for our
confidence. We shall give it. They sent their young
men from Canada to Oxford to study the classics and
for philosophy to the, great German universities, they
sent their artists to Italy. To the grand old mas-
ters of Englaind they should go for their lessons in

226 CANADIAN POLITICS.

free and representative government. If they sent their
young men to that school they would raise a genera-
tion of statesmen who would put an end to impurity
in the administration of public affairs; sound, econo-
mic principles would prevail, which would unfetter
this young giant from the shackles of trade restric-
tion and they would enter upon an era of prosperity
for Canada. Mr. Laurier is of another race from me.
He speaks English with a French accent, but some of
us speak it with a Doric accent. But as that, was the
language of Paradise we have kept the- accent. But
Mr. Laurier was a Canadian — a broad, strong Cana-
dian. There was a species of Canadians with so little
vertebra that it was impossible to tell whether they
were vegetable marrow or vegetable oysters. Some
men were like Boston chips, so shriveled up that it
was impossible to tell what manner of men they were
under the garments the tailors had put upon them.
Mr. Laurier was not that kind of a Canadian. His
words spoke for him. In a speech delivered at Somer-
' set on the 2nd August, 1889, immediately after his
assumption of the leadership of the party after Mr.
Blake's retirement, he said: —

"For my i)art I may say that as long as I shall
•occupy a place in the confidence of my party, as long
as I shall fill a seat in the Legislature, and as long as
by word and example I can preach this doctrine, I
shall devote my political life to spreading among my
fellow-countrymen the love of our national institu- '
tions. I know that the task is a greiat one and that
I dare not hope to carry it to a successful issue my-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 227

self. The most I can do is to trust that I may ad-
vance it a step, but at least the work is worthy of
our efforts. And for my part, when the hour for final
rest shall strike, and when ir\y eyes shall close forev-
er, I shall consider, gentlemen, that my life has not
been altogether w^asted if I shall have contributed to
heal one patriotic wound in the heart of even a single
one of my fellow-countrymen, and to thus have pro-
moted even to the smallest extent the cause of con-
cord and harmony between the citizens of the Domin-
ion."

Three lines m.ore from a speech delivered by Mr.
Laurier when proposing the toast of "Canada" be-
fore the National Club: — "Gentlemen, I once more
propose the toast of 'Canada.' Let us resolve that
never shall we introduce into this country the dis-
putes and quarrels which have drenched Europe in
blood; that in the country order and freedom shall
forever reign; that all the races shall dwell together
in harmony and peace, and that the rights of the
strong shall weigh no more in the balance with us
than the rights of the weak."

I like these sentiments. They have the genuine
ring, "Harmony and peace," the key of the sit-
uation. Without harmony what chance has our fair
Dominion in its struggles for the supremacy of the
northern half of this continent. It is by "Har-
mony and Peace" that this great Confederation
can be welded into a union, one and inseparable. It
is by "Harmony and Peace" among its inhabitants
that the true spirit of patriotism can be cultivated.

228 CANADIAN POLITICS.

The dwellers of the sea in far-off, beautiful Acadia;
the industrious inhabitants of Quebec; the sturdy yeo-
manry of Ontario; the settlers of the prairiois of the
Northwest; and the gold sc'ckers of Columbia must
all unite in harmony and peace if the Dominion of
Canada is ever to secure for itself a place among the
nations of the world, and we believe the sooner a Lib-
eral government is installed at Ottawa the sooner
they would enter upon a better day when a spirit of
pure harmony would prevail throughout the whole
Dominion. Mr. Laurier says: — ''Let us resolve that
never shall we introduce into this country the dis-
putes and quarrels that have drenched Europe in
blood." A noble resolve, 'worthy of the man, and it
is to be hoped worthy of the country on whose be-
half it should be made. Have any of you forgotten
the terrible struggle of a few months ago between the
reactionary forces of intolerance and the higher forces
of liberty of conscience, in which the people of Ontar-
io engaged with an intensity characteristic of the
dark ages. What a reflection upon our enlightened
institution, was the fact that in a thousand garrets
with lights turned low, hundreds of men assembled
from time to time and pledged their souls' salvation
to ostracize their Roman Catholic fellow-citizens and
deprive them of all civil and political promotion.
Even the Legislative Assembly of this great Province
was invaded by the evil spirit of sectarianism, and
grave men who should regard every public question
in a judicial spirit shrieked forth their husky calumn-
ies against their fellow-citizens, and some with Ryer-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 229

sonian recklessness were even prepared to cry "havoc
and let slip the dogs of w^r." The public atmosphere
was filled with such sulphurous fumes that even Me-
phistopheles himself was in danger of prostration. Po-
litical opinion like the witches' cauldron in Macbeth
gave forth the most offensive oders. But the end had
not come. The bigot who told the people of Ontario
that Protestantism was in danger, like the weird sis-
ters who lied to Macbeth, was found to be lying to
the people of Ontario, and as Birnara W,ood mo^^ed
upon Dunsinane to the overthrow of Macbeth, so the
fresh, unshaken confidence of Ontario moved upon the
seared ranks of intolerence and under the leadership
of their gallant chief, their own Macduff— Sir Oliver
Mowat — they had dealt the murderous usurper, the
false exponent of Canadian opinion such a crushing
defeat on the 26th of June last as to render him
helpless and harmless for all time to come. That this
spirit may never be favored with a resurrection should
be the prayer of every true Canadian.

By way of contrast let us consider how British
statesmen look upon the question as regarding the
personal opinions and religious convictioos of their
fellow subjects. Let me give you one illustration^ — a
somewhat tragic one — within the range of our exper-
ience. Three months ago Sir John Thompson went to
England to be sworn as a member of the Privy Coun-
cil. There was no question as to his nationality or
his creed; he was a man of great perseverance and of
great ability, and. Her Majesty rejoiced to honor such
men. Conservatives and Liberals rejoiced at the lion-

230 CANADIAN POLITICS.

or paid him. They remembered him as the boy in his
father's printing office, as the reporter in the gallery
of the Local Legislature, as the law student in his of-
fice, as the judge on the bench, as the arbitrator at
Paris, as the leader of the House of Commons, and
they rejoiced in his prosperity, rejoiced that a Cana-
dian was so honored. There was but one feeling of
admiration for the wisdom of Her Majesty's Privy
Council in summoning such a man to her councils,
That was the way it w^as looked upoin in England.
Death came all too soon.

Leaves have their time to fall,

And flowers. to wither at the north wind's breath.
And stars to fade, but all.

Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O! death.

The great man in whose advancement Liberals
and Conservatives alike rejoiced, died within the cit-
adel which he had captured by the strength of his
own right arm. A death miore tragic the novelist
could hardly conceivie. The dead statesman is borne
away by the officers of Her Majesty's household and
in a chamber in that historic castle he lies within his
coffin, but not forgotten. Her Majesty, the head of
the Protestant faith is not forgetful ^of the loving ser-
vice of a subject, Roman Catholic though he was, and
with her own hand places upoin his coffin a niejnorial
wreath of affection and esteem that all her loving sub-
jects the world over may know how deeply she ap-
preciated the services which he rendered to his coun-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 231

try and to the Empire. God bless Her Majesty for
this loving, noble, won^anly act of hers, for to be
womanly is to be queenly in the highest sense of the
term. Where is the Canadian recollecting her sym-
pathy with Canada in the hour of its bitterest be-
reavement who will not hereafter sing with intensest
loyalty:

Send her victorious,

Happy and glorious.

Long to reign over us,

God save the Queen. '

And yet, I fear, that although Sir John Thomp-
son was honored thus by the Queen, there have been
times in the history of Toronto when he could not
have been elected for No. 1 Ward, so greatly does the
spirit of religio'us intolerance overwhelm every other
motive of action. Let us hope, however, that we are
on the eve of a better day. Let us hope that the re-
spect paid by Her Majesty to one of our people, ir-
respective of nationality or creed, will give us a high-
er conception of what we owe to Canadian citizen-
ship and of the spirit which should animate e^ery
elector, both in private life and at the ballot box.
The Liberal party through their leader proclaims to
the people of Canada a gospel of Canadian brother-
hood irrespective of racial or denominational differ-
ences. The gospel he proclainns is the refrain of that
angelic message of peace on earth good will to men,
first heard on the plains of Bethlehem. It is the echo
of Wolsey's words to Cromwell, "Let all the ends

232 CANADIAN POLITICS.

thou aimest at be thy Country's, God's and Truth,
then if thou fallest, oh, Cromwell, thou fallest a glor-
ious martyr." It is the bugle cry of humanity whose
echoes roll from soul to soul forever and forever.
That gospel, if rightly understood, will overthrow
corruption wherever it exists, will abolish all prefer-
ences, all special advantages which a false '<:arifC is
calculated to give, will do justice to all parties a,nd
all ^creeds, w^ill break down all party differences which
are calculated to retard the prosperity of the coun-
try, will promote that righteousness which exalteth a
nation and will bind in bonds of perpetual friendship
the provinces to each other and the whole co the
great Empire to which we so happily belong.

THE CONSERVATIVE POLICY.

Speech of Hon. Alex. Mackenzie at Clinton, July
5th, 1877:—

I see before me many of the grey-haired veterans
who have settled this country, and I see also a multi-
tude of the faces of young persons whom. I desire to
indoctrinate to son.e slight extent with the general
views which I have of the policy of the Conservative
Governme-nt which existed before our own, and of the
policy of the Conservative leaders of the present timie.
You will all remember that in 1867 Sir John Macdon-
ald, Mr. Howland, Mr. William Macdougall, and a
few other choice spirits were making a tour through
the country, telling the people there was no further
occasion for continuing the lines which had separated
the two political parties in the past, and asking tihem
to join in a grand union of parties having only one
purpose in view — that of governing the country wisely
and well.

So, cried they, let us cast aside our late designa-
tions of Tory and Grit, and let us use them no more
for ever. Well, sir, a small proportion, probably
about five per cent, of the whole electorate, believed
in this profession, but it soon turned out that these
no-party professions were used simply to obtain a
temporary majority by what we may very fairly term
a catch vote. I knew at the time that it was utterly
impossible for these men to carry out their professions
(233)

234 CANADIAN POLITICS.

of no-party allegiance with which they came before the
public.

No sooner were the elections over than the misera-
ble representative — the only representative at the
time — of the Liberal party in the Cabinet was sent
about his business on the pretext of being made
Lieutenant-G oTternor of Manitoba, and the Cabinet be-
came a purely Conservative one; for Alexander Morris,
one of the most decided Conservatives in Canada, the
present Lieutenant-G overnor of Manitoba, was select-
ed to fill Mr. Macdougall's place as the representative
in the Cabinet of the Liberal party at that time. In
1872, as soon as they managed to get a term of ad-
ministration, the union and progress principle was
cast adrift, and they hoisted the party flag again^ and
their sole aim and object became apparent.

That object was not, as they had falsely alleged
in 1867, to secure the perfection of our system of
government, but simply to endeavor to get and keep
themselvies in power. Their sole object in coming be-
fore the country now is to oust the present adminis-
tration and put themselves in their places. In Eng-
land it has been known that the Government would
resign, and the other party, feeling that there was
nothing to justify them in assuming the reins of Gov-
ernment, would decline to do so. This has happened
once and again within our lifetime.

But the question with these gentlemen is not what
principles are to be defended in Parliament, or what
the Conservative party is to do when it gets into of-
fice; the first question with them is to get there, and

CANADIAN POLITICS. 235

then they will trust to chance and circumstances to.
enable them to meet the obligations of the moment.
Now, sir, you will remember this,, that the Liberal
party remained out of office for twenty years, and
they accepted it upon such conditions as w;ould not
merely give them office,, but the hope of carrying out
their principles.

In 1864, the Lifberal party defeated Sir John Mac-
donald's Government. One day Sir John spoke
strongly against all constitutional changes on princi-
ple; he said there was no necessity for any change
whatever, and he refused his assent to any change..
This was on the 14th of April. On the 15th his Gov-
ernment was defeated, and then, sir, we said to him,
"If you choose to adopt the constitutional changes^
that we have prepared for your needs ten years ago,
you can retain your office — only give us our princi-
ples." And they did it. They would do anything on
earth — they would revelutionize this country; they
would sever its connection with Great Britain, in
fact, I believe in my heart there is nothing that the
principal Tory leaders are not prepared to adopt as
a policy — provided it serves to keep or get them into
office. And what has been their course this year, and
indeed for the last two years? It has been one of
uniform contemptible denunciation of their opponents,,
with no object in view, without having any principle
at stake, but simply an endeavor, first, to unite alt
the Conservative party together; and, secondly, to
detach, if they can, some of my supporters in Parlia-

236 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ment or in the country, so as to enable them to reach
office.

I have read their speeches, one after another, and
except their violent denunciations of myself and my
colleagues as incompetent, as blunderers, as traitors,
as fraudulent men, as everything that can be conceiv-
ed to be bad, there is absolutely nothing in them but
intimations that they should have such and such a
majority in such and such provinces at the next elec-
tion, and that they are sure to get in power within
the next few months. I believe, and I have always
believed, that it would be most disastrous to the Lib-
eral party to remain in power one morr^nt longer
than they can keep their principles and carry them
into effect by practical legislation. And although I
do not pretend to be lacking in a feeling of pride in
the position I have received at the hands of the peo-
ple of Canada, I do say that I would take infinitely
more pleasure in sitting on the furthest back bench
of the House of Commons as a purely independent
member of Parliament than to occupy the first of the
Treasury benches if compelled, in order to occupy that
seat, to propound a policy at variance with my pre-
vious utterances to the great party wnlch I have the
honour to lead. Sir, I hope there is still left in this
^country such a thing as high-mindedness in political
life. There is such a thing amongst the public men in
England, whom it is our humble desire to imitate —
those who govern the empire of which we form a part.
There was such a spirit in such men as Disraeli and
Palmer St on and Derby, and who will doubt its ex-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 237

istence in the minds of such great political leaders as
Gladstone and John Bright. I had an opportunity,
two years ago, of mixing with these men, and listen-
ing to their debates, and of noticing the decorum
which characterizes all their utterances; and I observ-
ed the entire absence of the extreme democratic vio-
lence which pervades the would-be aristocratic class
O'f this country. But, sir, until we learn to use our
own pjOlitical system and our own Parliamentary life
with a view — to use my own words uttered in 1874,
and which I reiterate now— to elevate the standard of
public morality in this cou;ntry, you will never find
that the great political parties which must manage
the Government in this country have reached or can
occupy properly the places the country has assigned
to them.

I am glad to know, not only by the presence of
this vast multitude today, but from what I have
learned at other gatherings, that there are indications
everywhere over the country that the policy which has
been pursued by our own Administration in the past
has commended itself to the people of Canada. I may
refer to what happened the day before yesterday. Dr.
Portin, who was speaker of the House of Assembly
of Lower Canada, was the member for Gaspe. I knew
him well, as a very worthy gentleman, though when
we were in Parliament together he sat on the side op-
posite to me. He was unseated for Ijribery at the
election — not by himself, but by his agents. A new-
election was ordered, and Mr. Fortin,, who was for-
noierly elected almost without opposition, was opposed

23^ CANADIAN POLITICS.

by our friend Mr, Flynn, of Quebec, a man who has
the disadvantage of not living in the county, but who
was elected by hundreds of a majority. Mr. Speaker
Anglin has been again elected member for Gloucester
by a majority of 350, notwithstanding all the abuse
which has been heaped upon him, and the gross in-
justice with which he has been treated by the Conser-
vative press. Every kind of means is being used by
our opponents which they hope will help them in car-
rying the elections. In Lower Canada the Liberals of
that Province' — I mean the political Liberals — 'have
been denounced by the supreme ecclesiastical author-
ity there, and the Opposition hope that this will pre-
vent the free exercise of the franchise by the electors
of that Province.

Then in the county vacated by my honourable
friend the Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Pelletier, the
Liberal candidate, was defeated by a small number,
his defeat being doubtless due- to this same influence
and agency; but a few weeks later, when that agency
was removed, one of our own friends was re-elected
for the Local Legislature in the same county — thus
indicating that, instead of there being a reaction in
favor of the Conservative element in political life, the
reaction has set in the other way, and that there is
no shadow of a doubt of the main Provinces of the
Dominioai retaining almost, if not entirely, the lela-
tive positions which they now occupy.

I was not surprised at our losing some counties
since the general election. We then elected about
three-fourths of the whole House, or at all events 133

CANADIAN POLITICS. 239

or 134, while the total number was 206; and we knew
that some soats which were carried might be lost to
us on a future occasion. The total result since the
general election is that we lost thirteen seats, and the
Opposition party four, leaving a difference of nine,
from what it was at the general election.

I know very well that with the great Province of
Ontario, if there is any difference it is simply because
such causes as those I have alluded to have prevailed,
namely, that the Conservative party are determined
to reunite on their late leader, no matter what may
have been his sins, no matter what are his proclivi-
ties. They are determined again to unite on him, to
let him carry their banner as of old, hoping that his
personal popularity and the great ability which dis-
tinguishes him as a public man will enable him to re-
cover and retain his old place. That is a matter
which will rest with the people of this country them-
selves. I am not disposed to boast, because boasting,
like scolding, accomplishes little.

But I am merely disposed to say this — that I
have not only entire conffdence in the people of my
native Province, but in the public opinion of the coun-
try, which I believe to be sound over the greater part
of the whole of this Dominion. But, sir, whether they
shall succeed or not, whether that wave which they
call a Conservative reaction shall bear them into
office or not, it makes no difference whatever to the
policy of the Liberal party. Our policy is to carry
out our views when we are in the Government, and
when we cease to be able to do that then we will be

240 CANADIAN POLITICS.

willing to pass out, as my friend Mr. Mowat did in
1864.

He and his friends had a majority in the House;
it is true it was only a majority of some one or two,
but still it was a majority. The Opposition was ra-
ther factious, as the same Opposition are now, and
the consequence was that they had votes of want of
confidence every day; in fact we had them for break-
fast, dinner and supper. It was impossible for one O'f
us to go out and wash our faces for fear we would be
voted out during our absence. But Mr. Mowat and
his colleagues, rather than submit to this kind of con-
stant torture, resigned their seats and let the Conser-
vatives com© in. A month afterwards they were de-
feated, and then they adopted the Liberal policy, and
gave us anything we wanted if they were only allow-
ed to retain their places.

A good deal has been said of late regarding the
commercial depression which has existed over the
country for the last two or three years; and in that
respect the Liberal party has undoubtedly been most
fortunate.; We came into power ait the moment that
Mr. Tilley, the Finance Minister of the late Govern-
ment, had announced his belief that the importations
of the country could not be kept up, and that more
taxation w,ould be necessary next session.

We came in at the time that our moneyed institu-
tions were feeling the strain imposed by the inability
of dealers to sell their lumber and manufactured goods
and by the general want of prosperity which pre^failed
alike in Great Britain and the United States. And,

CANADIAN POLITICS. 241

sir, we had to contend with these and other difficul-
ties. My friend Mr. Mowat has alluded today to some
of the causes of the prosperity which existed from
1867 to 1873, but he did not mention the one great
fact that during that period the sum of nearly $17,-
000,000 had been expended on the Intercolonial, and
on the Ontario railways not less than about $20,000,-
000.

These enormous sums being circulated through the
country gave a temporary and fictitious prosperity
to many branches of trade, and when these heavy ex-
penditures ceased, those branches were the first to
feel the depression. The G'overnment were then the
fir Ft to have the blame thrown upon them for having
accomplished something like an injury to the country.

Some people appear to think that the Administra-
tion had some object to serve in producing a depress-
ion; but it must be very obvious that not only our
prosperity as individuals, but as a Government, is
bound up in the prosperity of the country and that
we are bound by our interest as well as by our duty
to do all in our power to promote that prosperity.
When our manufacturers made a demand for more pro-
tection, it was in vain that w^e pointed out the fact
that in the United States, where protection was
adopted as a principle, the result was that prices were
much higher, money was much scarcer, and labour
worse paid than in Canada. It was in vain that we
pointed to the interest of our working classes, as they
are called; though the truth is we are all workingmcn

242 CANADIAN POLITICS.

in this country; we have all to live more or less by
the exercise of our industry.

But on behalf of the great mass of our working
population we pointed out that according to official
statistics in the Dnited States the prices \ of labour
rose from 1860, when their protective system began,
to 1873, when an agitation of a decided character
sprang up against it, exactly sixty per cent; that is
to say, a man who received $1 before received $1.60
then, while the prices of commodities entering into
household consumption rose 92 per cent; so that the
working man who has to buy his clothes, his food,
his tea, and everything required by himself and his
family, would have to pay 32 per cent, more than the
increase in the price of his labour. In other words he
was a loser to that extent. We found at Philadelphia
last year that we could hire all the men we wanted
in that great city for 90 cents to $1.10 greenbacks
per day, while at Ottawa we had to pay $1.25 in
gold to our workmen. But the manufacturers, many
of whom were our own political friends, were under
the impression that a system of protection would not
only benefit them, but the farmers as well, by opening
up a home market for agricultural produce.

Well, sir, it is an utter delusion. It is utterly im-
possible that the prices for farm products can be rais-
ed here except by a rise in the markets of the world,
and these are controlled by England. I remember
making a tour in the Western States a few years ago,
just before I assumed office. I not only made a tour
on the railway, but I drove a good deal across the

CANADIAN POLITICS. 243

country. I found on inquiry among the farmers of
Iowa that while we were getting $1.15 in gold for our
wheat they were getting 87 cents in greenbacks; and
in the matter of cattle we were getting nearly 40 per
cent, more than they were, on account of the long
transportation. They found these raUs so unprofita-
ble that they alraost ceased production. At the same
time I met a clergyman who came from that country
every year to visit his friends in London, and he
could pay his passage both ways and have something
over on the difference between the cost of a suit of
broadcloth in Canada and in Iowa. I found that
every agricultural machine was about 50 per cent,
higher there than here, and with regard to boots and
shoes and many other articles the same was true. I
tell you this system of protection for protection's
sake is a fallacy and a mistake, and the effect
it would have upon such of you as are farmers would
be, that you would get nothing more for your pro-
duce, and you would pay perhaps 50 per cent, more
for everything you have to buy. I have to appeal to
the great farming community of this country. I know
I cannot sustain myself or the Administration except
with their help and support.

I have to appeal to the manufacturers as well. I
pointed out to them a year ago, when they came to
me, that it was quite possible we could benefit them
by excluding all other manufactures of the kind man-
ufactured by themselves, thereby enabling them to
charge their own prices; and when they say that they
would still be able to sell at their own prices, one

244 CANADIAN POLITICS.

naturally asks: "If you can, why do you ask for pro-
tection?" As to the effects of protection, I would in-
stance the shipping interest of Great Britain.

Up to 1860 — at which time the British tonnage
laws were repealed, and the laws of navigation chang-
ed to throw open the comrnerce of Great Britain to
the whole world — because there was freedom of com-
merce in the United States' marine, their ships push-
ed far ahead, and even threatened soon to overtake
our boasted British pupremiacy on the ocean. But
after the restrictions were removed in England — after
a man was allowed to build a ship of such a shape
as he pleased and go where he vv^ished, this open com-
petition had such an effect that the British marine
bounded forward, and it is now double what it was at
that time, and is so far ahead of the United States'
marine that the latter is not worthy to be mentioned
in comparison with that of Great Britain. In 1873
the foreign trade of the United States at the Port of
New York was in the proportion of 73 per cent, of
American bottoms, to only 27 per cent, of those of all
other nations. Last year, under the operation of the
system of protection which now prevails, there were
twenty-one per cent, of American bottoms, seventy-
per cent of British bottoms, and about ten per cent,
of those of all other nations. I mention this as a
simple illustration of the effects of protection.

A great trade has sprung up lately in exporting
cattle to England, that being the determining market
as to the price of beef as well as of grain. A large
number of farmers, distillers and brewers are import-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 245

ing young and lean cattle from the Western States
and then exporting them. A large amount of corn is
being imported, and it would confer no appreciable
benefit on our farmers to have a duty on that article,
while it would have the effect of stopping a great and
lucrative trade. I will give you an illustration which
is taken from the experience of my friend Mr. Rymal,
who is himself a farmer. He took fifty or siixty bush-
els of barley to the Hamilton market and sold it for
$1.50 a bushel. (I assume a price.) He bought the
same quantity of corn for some fifty cents per bushel.
He took the same number of bushels of corn back as.
of the barley he had brought to market. He had from
it food for his cattle and had some $20 in cash be-
sides. That is an illustration from which you will see
plainly what would be the effect of protection upon
the agricultural interest, and what is the effect of al-
lowing our farmers to buy in the cheapest market and
sell in the dearest.

Nothing would give me greater pleasure or satis-
faction than that I should be able to make everybody
rich by protection, provided nobody had to pay for
it. But it will occur to you,, and to every one who
considers the subject, that it is utter nonsense to talk
of finding a royal road to wealth.

Wealth is only obtainable by industry, and we
are not such fools as to sell peas or any other arti-
cles to the United States if we can sell it for a high-
er price in England. Our produce will naturally go
where the highest price prevails. Prince Edward Is-
land sells all her oats to England. We send a good

246 CANADIAN POLITICS.

deal to the United States. We send a larg'e quantity
of peas to the United States, as well as our surplus
wheat, tho'Ugh Dr. Tupper says we do not grow
enough wheat for our own consumption. While I do
not admit the accuracy of that, suppose we do not,
what would happen? We would be compelled to buy
some flour and wheat in a foreign market, and he
thinks it would be a great benefit for us if we were
compelled to buy som^ for our own consumption and
pay taxes for it when we got it. That is his logic.
Look at the matter as you please, and you will find
that ; the only true road to- national wealth for, the
farmer, for the mechanic, or for the manufacturer, is
to remove all restrictions from trade that it is pos-
sible to remove.

I am old enough to remember the time when the
great anti-corn law agitation was carried on in Eng-
land. I have heard George Thompson and his com-
peers, Cobden and his friends, at meetings, denounc-
ing these corn laws, which imposed a duty on wheat
and other grain though they could not raise enough
for their own maintenance, and I remember that the
farmers were almost rioting in some districts, believ-
ing it would be ruinous to' them if the duty were
abolished. The fact is that they became very much
more prosperous since than they had been before. At
that time the average rent in England and Scotland,
if not in Ireland, w^as about £2 sterling, and when I
was in the old country in 1875, I found that the same
farms rented for £3; and farm S( rvants who had for-
merly been receiving £10 or £12 sterling and board.

CANADIAN POLITICS. 247

were now receiving from £20 to £24 and board, and
their houses were very much improved.

In fact, when the protection was removed, the
whole agricultural interest seemed to bound forward
into a state of greater prosperity, which affected land-
lord and tenant alike. If we are true patriots, we
have to work, not for the benefit of one class, but
for the benefit of the entire interests of the country
which we have in our hands, and it would be an evil
day for Canada if the attention of our farmers were
diverted from its proper functions by their endeavor-
ing to make money by vainly obtaining a duty in the
shape of protection to cereals. It could not be done
except in the single article of corn. As regards the
manufacturers, as I have already told them, they
rfkight for a moment get a higher price after the duties
were increased, but the effect would certamJy be to
introduce disorder and disorganization into our whole
trade system.

You have now a 17^ per cent, tariff for revenue
purposes, and if we impose more you will get a high-
er price for your boots and shoes, machines, etc. But
we must have a revenue, and as we could (not raise it
on a higher tariff, you would be obliged to pay prop-
erty taxes or a poll tax to make up the deficiency.
There would be nothing left for us but to appoint an
assessor to go round and make a direct levy on the
people, and that is something which, I fancy, none of
you would like to see. Apart altogether from the
question of its wisdom as a fiscal policy, I am sure I
have only to mention it to show that it would be

248 CANADIAN POLITICS.

neither palatable nor convenient to you that such a
system should prevail for raising a revenue. I am
aware that in some counties some gentlemen are very
fond of calling themselves the farmers' friends. I be-
lieve Mr. Farrow figures in this county in that capac-
ity. Dr. Orton proposes protection as a panacea for
all the ills that farmers' flesh is heir to, and I re-
member once giving great offence to that gentlemian
by saying that I thought he knew a good deal more
about calomel than he did of what was good for the
interest of the farmers. I am afraid these self-styled
farmers' friends are rather suspicious gentlemen, and
that they fancy that our farmers are a very simple
lot o'f people. They are like the demagogue out West,
who appealed to the sympathies of the farmers be-
cause, as he said, he was a farmer himself, his father
was a farmer, and so was his grandfather. "In fact,"
he said, "I might say I was brought up between the
rows of corn," when some irreverent fellow in the
crowd shouted out, "A pumpkin, by thunder!" I
don't w^ant to call anyone names — but I'm half inclin-
ed to think that these two gentlemen, who so loudly
proclaim themselves as par excellence the farmers'
friends, will be found, if you only probe them, to be
but very sorry specimens of a certain kind of vege-
table. I think you will see that, to put it mildly, this
remedy of theirs has a very suspicious look about it.
They say, "Don't the Americans put so many cents
a bushel on our wheat? Why not put as much on
theirs?"

I say "Yes, by all means, if you can only get it."^

CANADIAN POLITICS. 249

I am willing to tax the Americans as much as you
please, if you can only collect the tax after it is im-
posed. We tried it once, and the result was that a
number of loads of wheat came in before the change
in the tariff was known, but after that they avoided
our shores, sent their wheat to England through
other channels, or in bond, and so the entire amount
we collected in about a year and a quarter was only
about $120,000, and the next year we should have
got nothing. Our canal traffic would be injured, and
the mills which are built all along the frontier for the
milling of United States wheat would be left idle. A
miller asked me at Newmarket why we didn't give the
same protection to flour that we gave to other manu-
factures, and I said: "Simply because it would be of
no use to you. Your flour is sent to England, or to
any other place where it can be sold."

"Now, suppose a duty were imposed that would
enable you to go to the Lower Provinces (where they
raise no grain worth mentioning, and no wheat), it
could only be got in this way. The fishermen in Nova
Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island
have a considerable trade with Portland, Boston and
other towns in the United States. They sell their
fish and bring back flour, generally as ballast, carry-
ing it for 10 or 15 cents per barrel. If we were to
impose a duty of 25 or 50 cents on flour it would
destroy these people's trade in time, which amounts
to perhaps 40,000 or 50,000 barrels per year. To the
extent of that duty on the flour which goes by Boston
and New York our millers might get the advantage

250 CANADIAN POLITICS.

and no more, and that, if spread over the millers of
this country, would afford them perhaps one-ninth of
a cent per barrel on the flour made m Canada." But
even if it did afford them more, how can you go to
work and tax the people's bread in the Lower Prov-
inces unless you allow them to tax something else-
where?

They tried last year to carry a tax on coal. ' I
asked a manufacturer in Goderich, who is not a polit-
ical friend of mine, how much he could get his coal
delivered for at his establishment. He said $3 per
ton; but if he had to take his coal from ^tlova Sco-
tia he could not get it delivered below $7 per ton.
Yet it was deliberately proposed that the great Prov-
ince of Ontario should tax itself, injure its manufac-
turers, and starve out the people in our cities who
use coal, by imposing a duty on that article.

As soon as you begin a system of protection for
protection's sake, everybody must be protected, and
then the country will be so much the worse off by
doing the work of collection. Whatever policy is
adopted in these matters, it should be one which
affects all persons alike, and does equal justice to all
classes of the community, whether farmers, mechanics
or manufacturers. But there is another phase to this
question. I have said to the manufacturers, "Gentle-
men, if you are determined to have protection as a
system, that system must extend over all."

"There are mechanics coming in thousands from
England to Canada and the United States, and if you
^are to have protection on the articles you make, we

CANADIAN POLITICS. 251

must have protection for our labour. We must not
lower the price of wages while we raise the price of
your manufactures. You must go the very founda-
tion, and protect our labourers as well as others."
I now propose to refer to two or three statements
made by Sir John Macdonald at some of the recent
Conservative gatherings. There is nothing, I am sure,
which tells more upon the public than to find disin-
terested conduct on the part of Ministers and public
men generally; and when Sir John said that not one
of his colleagues ever accepted lucrative offices while
they were ministers of the Crown, he made a state-
ment which mo doubt commended itself to the people
to whom he spoke. Sir John says: —

''Sometimes they disappeared from ill-health,
sometimes they could not secure their elections, and
sometimes because eld age had come upon them-; but
I don't now remember a single one of my colleagues
who sought a refuge for himself in a public office
after having been honoured with a seat in the Cab-
inet . ' '

Now, if this statement had been strictly correct,
it might have been a matter upon which they might
indulge in a little self-congratulation, though, for my
own part, I can see no reason why distinguished mem-
bers of the Cabinet should not fill impprtant offices
in the country. But let us see how his statement tal-
lies with the truth.

Mr. William Macdougall was a member of the Gov-
ernment since 1867, and he was appointed Lieuten-
ant-Governor of Manitoba. Mr. W. P. Howland was

252 CANADIAN POLITICS.

a member of his Cabinet, and he was appointed Lieu-
tenant-Governor of Ontario. Mr. Archibald was a
member of his Government, and he was appointed
Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba, and afterwards of
Nova Scotia. Alexander Morris was a member of his
Government, and he was appointed Chief Justice of
Mamitoba, and afterwards Lieutenant-Governor of
that Province. Christopher Dunkin was a member of
his Cabinet, and he was appointed to a seat on the
Bench. Joseph Howe, a member of his Administra-
tion, was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Nova
Scotia. Sir Narcisse Belleau, a member of his Gov-
ernment, was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Que-
bec. Mr. Hugh Macdonald, a member of his Cabinet,
was appointed a judge in Nova Scotia. Mr. Tilley
was a member of his Government, and was appointed
Lieutenant-Governor of New Brunswick; and Sir Ed-
ward Kenny, another of his colleagues, was appointed
Administrator in Nova Scotia. When Sir John Mac-
donald ventures before any audience in Canada to
make such a statement as that, he must not only
have a very bad memory, but he must fancy his hear-
ers know nothing of the political history of their
country. I have given j^ou a list of ten Cabinet Min-
isters who were appointed to office, being at the rate
of two per year while they were in power.

What has been our record im the same respect dur-
ing the four years we have been in office? We appoint-
ed Mr. Dorion Chief Justice of Quebec; Mr. D. A.
Macdonald, Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario; Mr. Four-
nier, a Judge of the Supreme Court; Mr. Ross, Col-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 253

lector of Customs at Halifax; Mr. David Laird, Lieu-
tenant-Governor of the Northwest; Mr. Letellier,
Lieutenant-Governor of Quebec. We have made six
appointments in four years; they have made ten in
five years; so that they made at the rate of two per
year — we made at the rate of one and a half per year,
of the very class of appointments which he condemns.
Now, I don't condemn it.

I think, for example, it was extremely fitting that
such a man as Mr. Dorion should oe made Chief Jus-
tice of his native Province. I think he was n^ore en-
titled to such honour than any man then in public
life. His name I can scarcely mention without a feel-
ing of reverence, for if ever I had a sincere affection
for one of my own sex — I have had an affection for the
other — I had that affection for Mr. Dorion. A man so
pure-minded, so religious, so devoted to his country,
so disinterested, I have never known In my whole
political life, and, sir, even this man has been assailed
over and over again in the grossest and most virulent
style by the leaders of the Opposition. Mr. D. A.
Macdonald was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of On-
tario. He was a distinguished Catholic, a native of
Glengarry, where his grandfather was born. It was
supposed by some people that because he was a Ro-
man Catholic his name should be received with dis-
favor; but I am proud to say that no man could have
more successfully performed the duties of his off:ce
than he has done, and that no one deserved his office
better. So with the rest of the appointments I have
named. I might name others made by them before

254 CANADIAN POLITICS.

Confederation, but during the time Sir John was
either Premier or a leading man in the Government.

They appointed Mr. Draper a judge, Mr. Vank-
oughnet a judge, Mr. Morin a judge; Mr. Morrisson
and Mr. Sherwood were made judges, and Mr. Spence
a Collector of Customs. All these gentlemen were
members of Conservative Administrations, so that we
have here a list of sixteen of such appointmtents as
those to which Sir John referred, and all made with-
in a comparatively short space of time. And yet Sir
John told you the other day that he did not remem-
ber a single member of his party who had accepted a
lucrative office after being a Cabinet Minister,

At another meeting Sir John undertook to jeer
at the legislation of the Reform Government, and Dr.
Tupper very coolly told the people that the measures
we passed were measures that they had prepared and
left in their pigeon-holes when they left office. Well,
I can but say that the only thingss that we found in
their pigeon-holes — and we found them in very great
abundance — were appointments to office, made after
they had lost the confidence of Parliament. They did
not leave a single measure of any kind, prepared or
partly prepared, from which we derived a particle of
benefit.

I may tell you that instead of leavimg measures
partly prepared, they seemed to have occupied their
time during the year before they went out of office—
and when they must have known that a cloud was
hanging over their heads and likely to burst upon
them with extreme violence — in preparing every con-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 255

ceivable sort of scheme for keeping themselves in
power; and during the last month of their regime,
when they found they had no hope of remaining in
power, they created offices by the score and by the
hundred.

You will find in the records that are published,
that on the last day before they had given up the
ship they had made many appointments, aind they de-
liberately altered the date of the letters to make them
look as if written upon the 6th instead of the 7th.
Did this getntleman who never appointed one of his
Cabinet to office remicmber when he made that state-
ment that on the 22nd of October, i873, the very day
on which Parliament met, he appointed one of his col-
leagues, Mr. Tilley, to a Lieutenant-Governorship?

That the Government hung on for two weeks after
that time, but the appointment remained, and that
the very day they went out, Mr. Tilley, after telling
the House that he intended resuming the debate next
day, got his commission and walked off — a Lieuten-
ant-Governor?

Mr. Hugh Mac'donald at the same time had his ap-
pointment as a judge in Nova Scotia; he kept sitting
in the House with Mr. Tilley, though, like him, he
knew his appointment was made. The only thing ne-
cessary was the signing of the commission, and it
was signed the same day. Yet the leader of these two
gentlemen tells us that for the life of him he cannot
call to mind a member of his Government who ac-
cepted an office! Sir John says that for long years
he was occupied in introducing the civil and criminal

256 CANADIAN POLITICS.

laws which were to govern the country; that many of
these laws* the then Opposition strenuously and fac-
tiously opposed; and that many of our laws are but
copies of old legislation.

Well, this is a pretty extensive statement — ^even
for Sir John Macdonald. I can only say that a
great many of the laws which he says he spent long
years in elaborating were copied by the clerks in his
office, with some slight amendments from English
laws. None of the laws to which he refers were orig-
inal, but they were merely copied into Dominion
statutes. Up to the time that aJny particular law
was changed, the old laws prevailing in the Province
of Canada continued to have force, and as soon as
they were enacted in the Dominion books they became
Dominion statutes. What he did was simply ^ o in-
troduce the old statutes, making such amendments as
were necessary in the new state of affairs. He says
we opposed him "factiously and strenuously." Well,
if he is to hold any more meetings I would like him
to take the journals of the House and the reports of
the debates with him, and show the public from the
records a single one of these laws that we opposed
factiously and strenuously.

Let him point out one that we opposed at all.
Why should we oppose criminal laws which we must
have? Instead of doing anything of the kind, we de-
voted ourselves as an Opposition to cementing the
new system, and I was repeatedly complimented, as
Mr. Huntington and other members of the House will
remember, as the "distinguished member for Lamb-

CANADIAN POLITICS. 257

ton," because I assisted them when some of my col-
leagues were not very strongly disposed to do so.
The statement is utterly devoid of truth; it is just as
far from the facts as his statement that we used their
measures, and that we did not repeal any of them.

When we came into ofhce we found that four com-
missioners were conducting the affairs of the Intercol-
onial Railway, one on a salary of $4,000 a year, and
the others on a salary of $3,000 a year, one of them
being a member of Parliament. I introduced an Act
at once to abolish the Commission and make it a
duty of the Minister of Public Works to conduct the
Intercolonial Railway as a public work of Canada,
and we saved by that means the sum of $10,000 per
year.

So we passed laws relating to the Military Col-
lege, we amended the Libel Law, passed the new
Building Societies Act, the Registration of Shipping
Bill, and the Supreme Court Bill. Let me say a word
OT two about the last named of these.

Sir John said at some meeting that he had pre^
pared the Supreme Court Bill. He never prepared a
Bill of any sort about the Supreme Court, but he
did pay a Toronto Judge $500 to prepare a Bill,
which we did not accept, though we had as good a
right to use it as they, seeing that the country paid
for the Bill. That law was promised several times,
but they never were strong enough or determined
enough to pass it. They had an Opposition to it in
Lower Canada which they could not overcome. We
passed it at once, thus providing in a broad, patriot-

258 CANADIAN POLITICS.

ic sense for a final Court of Appeal In our own coun-
try, instead of sending litigants to England, where
many of our ccniparatively poor people had been
ruined, and where the rich had almost a., certainty of
winning against the poor suitors. Sir John and his
friends factiously opposed the measure. They tried
to prevent it being made a final Couit of Appeal, and
at one of his meetings last year, thinking he had the
secret ear of the Colonial Office, that he could move
the strings in England, he told the people that a lit-
tle bird had whispered to him that our Act would be
disallowed.

But that little bird is something like some Tory
leaders. It could not, or does not, always tell what
is exactly true. Our Act has not been disallowed,
but, on the contrary, it is the admiration of English
and Canadian lawyers for its completeness, and it has
been eminently successful in its operation.

I forgot to tell you how often an Election Law
was promised by the late Government. They mention-
ed it in the speech from the Throne about five times.
They introduced one once, but it was such an abor-
tion that none of their own friends would have any-
thing to do with it, and the brat was quickly put out
of the way.

They promised repeatedly to introduce an Insol-
vency Act. They got Mr. John Abbott, a prominent
man on the Conservative side, to introduce one, the
Ministry conveniently shirking responsibility in the
matter of getting one of their supporters to intro-
duce the Bill. Whon they had succeeded in carrying it

CANADIAN POLITICS. 259

they said, "Well, didn't we do that splendidly?"
They say we only amended the Insolvency Law. They
had none to amend. The law did not in any sense
belong to them, and they are trying to assume the
parentage of a respectable infant, when they had mur-
dered their own. We promised the Bill, we introduc-
ed it at once, and passed it, assuming the responsi-
bility ourselves, though I am bound to say it is an
extremely difficult matter to satisfy the public on a
question of insolvency.

Sir John received an ovation from the working
men on the strength of a law which he passed, and
which he claimed was to save them from a great deal
of annoyance, but they found that instead of protect-
ing them it resulted in their persecution; but Mr. Irv-
ing and Mr. Blake prepared a Bill, which was amend-
ed last session, and which provides for the same free-
dom of contract between man and master as in any
other case. Then we have a law relating to corrupt
pra'ctices at elections, such as will have the effect of
securing purity of election.

So with the question of extradition. That has
been in the hands of Mr. Blake, and, as you all know,
there is no man in Canada more competent to deal
with such a subject. Our Act of last session is the
first complete Canadian Act on the subjbct of c:x tra-
dition, and it will effectually prevent the evil of mak-
ing the United States a harbour of refuge for the
criminals of this country, and the evil of making
Canada the resort of runaw^ay criminals from the
other side of the line.

26o CANADIAN POLITICS.

If you look at the journals of the House, you will
also see that the subject of maritime jurisdiction on
our lakes has also been dealt with by some of the
lawyers; for our inland marine was subjected to cer-
tain inequalities which were not felt by our ocean
marine, which was governed by the British Admiralty
laws.

We also dealt with fire and life insurance, and
many other subjects of more or less importance. We
are quite willing to submit our legislation (o the in-
telligent consideration of the people of Canada.

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LlyBlURv
BERKELEY

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