The Day of Sir Wilfrid Laurier Part 6

In this period the two most important steps towards co-operation were the appointment of a Canadian High Commissioner in London and the beginning of the Colonial Conferences.

The first step was taken on the initiative of the Macdonald Government in 1879. It was found necessary to appoint a Canadian representative in London both to act as amba.s.sador at large in dealing with European states, and to serve as a link between the Canadian and British Governments. The latter purpose was especially significant. In the days of {139} colonial subordination the governor-general had served as the only needed link. His duty was to govern the colony in accordance with the interest and policy of the mother country, and in carrying that out he was responsible to the British Government. Now he was becoming the representative, not of the British Government, but of the king, who was king of Canada as well as of the United Kingdom, and, like the king, he governed by the advice of the responsible ministers in the land where he resided. This change in the governor-general's status marked the ending of the old colonial relationship. The appointment of a commissioner to represent to one free government the wishes of another free government was one of the first steps in building up the new relationship.

The initiative in the second step came from the United Kingdom. A change was now apparent in the att.i.tude of many Englishmen upon imperial questions. The present value of the colonies, their possible greater value in the future, and the need of all the help that could be had from them, were coming to be the leading articles in the creed of many fervent thinkers. The Imperial Federation League, founded in London in 1884, gave {140} vigorous expression to these views; and its Canadian branch, formed at Montreal in the next year, to be followed by local branches from sea to sea, exercised a strong influence on the current of Canadian thought.

The new desire to bind the colonies closer was largely due to the revival of protection and of imperialism both in the United Kingdom and in foreign countries. Alike in trade and in defence, colonial aid was by many coming to be felt essential. Abroad, protection was in the ascendant. Cobden's prophecy of the world following Britain's example in free trade had not been fulfilled. France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy, Russia, the United States, were rearing higher tariffs, threatening to shut out British goods. Even Canada and Victoria had done likewise. Moreover, France and Germany and the United States were becoming formidable rivals to Britain, as they turned more and more from farming to manufacturing. It was little wonder that a section of English opinion began to sigh for protected markets, for retaliatory tariffs to force down bars abroad, and for a revival of the old preference or monopoly in the markets of the colonies.

Defence, too, a.s.sumed a more anxious {141} aspect. The nations of Europe were entering on a mad scramble for empire, for colonial possessions overseas. Russia pushed steadily westward to the Pacific and south to the gates of India. France sought territory in Africa and in Asia, Germany in Africa and the Pacific, Italy in Africa.

Nationalism had gone to seed in imperialism. Long prevented by internal dissensions from competing with England in the acquisition of territory, the nations of Europe, now that national consolidation had been largely effected, turned to follow her example. England could not logically object to their desire for territory or to their plans for larger navies. Her Palmerstons and Disraelis had boasted of the might of the empire on which the sun never set; her Froudes and Seeleys were singing the glories of the 'expansion of England'; the man in the street felt the manifest destiny of the Anglo-Saxon to rule the 'lesser breeds'; while the American Mahan had made clear the importance of sea-power and had pointed the means to the end so glorified. None the less the rivalry was felt uncomfortable, the more so as these nations did not follow Britain's free-trade policy in their new possessions, and sometimes manifested a lack of {142} scruple which boded ill for future peace. And so from some quarters in Britain came the demand for colonial contributions to the Army and Navy, or failing that, for some form of imperial federation which would set up a central parliament with power to tax and to control.

In August 1886 an influential deputation from the Imperial Federation League waited upon the prime minister, Lord Salisbury, and asked him to summon a conference of all the colonies to discuss the idea of setting up a federal council as a first step towards centralizing authority.

The prime minister expressed his doubt as to the wisdom of discussing political changes which, if possible, were so only in the distant future. Believing, however, that there were other subjects ripe for discussion, he took the momentous step, and called the first Colonial Conference.

Every self-governing colony and several crown colonies sent representatives. Canada sent Sir Alexander Campbell, lieutenant-governor of Ontario, and Mr, later Sir Sandford, Fleming, the apostle of an All-Red Pacific cable. Lord Salisbury, in opening the proceedings, referred to the three lines upon which progress might be made. The German {143} Empire evidently suggested the ideas which he and others had in mind. A political federation, like that of Germany, to conduct 'all our imperial affairs from one centre,' could not be created for the present. But Germany had had two preliminary forms of union, both of which might be possible, a _zollverein_ or customs union, not yet practicable, and a _kriegsverein_, or union for purposes of mutual defence, which was feasible, and was the real and important business before the Conference.

In the weeks of discussion which followed the Canadian delegates took little part except upon the question of the cable which was at Sandford Fleming's heart. Australia agreed to make a contribution towards the cost of a British squadron in Australasian waters, and Cape Colony agreed to provide some local defence at Table Bay. Sir Alexander Campbell referred to the agreement of 1865 as still in force, denied that the naval defence of Canada had proved burdensome to Britain, talked vaguely of setting up a naval school or training a reserve, and offered nothing more. The Conference did not discuss political federation and touched only lightly on preferential trade. As the first of a series, and for its {144} revelation of the obstacles to proposals for Germanizing the British Empire, it proved more important than for any positive achievements.

In the stand thus taken the Canadian delegates adequately reflected the feeling both of the general public and of the leaders of both parties in Canada at that time, alike as to political defence and trade relations.

As for political relations, the only proposal for change came from the Imperial Federationists. The idea had some notable advocates in Canada--Grant, Parkin, Denison, M'Carthy and others. But many of them advocated it simply because it was the only theory of closer imperial relations then in the field. At first it was too hazily pictured to make clear the extent to which the Canadian and other parliaments would be subordinated to the proposed new central parliament. When faced with a concrete plan, few Canadians were eager to give up control of their destinies to a parliament in which they would have only one-tenth of the representation. The responsible politicians did not at any time endorse the scheme. Sir John Macdonald, as a practical man, saw at once a fatal objection {145} in the sacrifice of Canadian self-government which it involved.[3] Some of the members of the Imperial Federation League urged with plausibility that political federation would bring the colonies new power in the shape of control over foreign policy, rather than take old powers away, but Macdonald much doubted the reality of the control it would give. Nevertheless the Imperial Federation League and its branches did useful educational work. Owing to differences of opinion among its members it was dissolved in 1893, but was revived and reorganized two years later as the British Empire League.

Nor was Canada greatly interested in questions of defence. In the sixties and seventies, it is true, the larger colonies had agreed, with some reluctance, to a.s.sume the increasing share of the burdens of defence made necessary by the increasing control of their own affairs.

{146} Gradually the British troops stationed in Australia, New Zealand, and Canada (save for a small garrison force at Halifax) had been withdrawn, and their places taken by local militia. But as yet it was understood that the responsibilities of the colonies were secondary and local. As a result of long discussion, the British House of Commons in 1862 unanimously resolved that 'colonies exercising the right of self-government ought to undertake the main responsibility of providing for their own internal order and security and ought to a.s.sist in their own external defence.' The duty of the United Kingdom to undertake the general defence of the Empire was equally understood; the Committee on Colonial Defence (1860), whose report led to the adoption of this resolution, agreed that since 'the Imperial Government has the control of peace and war, it is therefore in honour and duty {147} called upon to a.s.sist the Colonists in providing against the consequences of its policy,'--a position affirmed by Mr Cardwell's dispatch of June 17, 1865.

Given the fact and theory of political relationship as they existed in this period, this compromise was the natural result. Under the old colonial system the empire was Britain's, governed for its real or fancied gain, and imperial defence was merely the debit side of colonial trade monopoly. The myth that Britain had carried on her wars and her diplomacy for the sake of the colonies, which therefore owed her grat.i.tude, had not yet been invented. True, the day had pa.s.sed when Britain derived profit, or believed she derived profit, from the political control of the white empire, yet the habits of thought begot by those conditions still persisted. If profit had vanished, prestige remained. The Englishman who regarded the colonies as 'our possessions' was quite as prepared to foot the bill for the defence of the Empire which gave him the right to swagger through Europe, as he was to maintain a country estate which yielded no income other than the social standing it gave him with his county neighbours. As yet, therefore, there was no thought in official {148} quarters that Canada should take part in oversea wars or a.s.sume a share of the burden of naval preparation. When an English society proposed in 1895 that Canada should contribute money to a central navy and share in its control, Sir Charles Tupper attacked the suggestion as 'an insidious, mischievous, and senseless proposal.' He urged that, if Canada were independent, 'England, instead of being able to reduce her army by a man or her navy by a ship, would be compelled to increase both, to maintain her present power and influence.' He quoted the London _Times_ to the effect that the maritime defence of the colonies was only a by-product of that naval supremacy which was vital to England's very existence as a nation, and cost not a penny extra, for which reason the control of the fleet must always remain unconditionally in the hands of the responsible government of the United Kingdom.[4] Sir Charles, too, was wont to stress the strategic importance of the Canadian Pacific Railway as Canada's contribution to the defence of the Empire. His arguments had much force, but they were obviously the product of a time of transition, {149} uneasy answers to the promptings of the slow-rising spirit of nationhood.

Action, or inaction, corresponded to words. In 1885, when Britain was waging war in the Soudan, New South Wales offered to raise and equip a regiment. The secretary for war at once spread the news of this offer through the other colonies. Sir John Macdonald's only reply was to offer to sanction the raising of troops in Canada, the whole cost to fall on Great Britain. The offer was declined with thanks. A company of voyageurs, largely French-Canadian, however, was recruited in Canada, at Britain's expense, and did good service in the rapids of the Nile. Sir John Macdonald did not, of course, proclaim Canada's neutrality in this war, any more than Hincks and MacNab had done in the Crimean War, when hired German troops garrisoned Dover and Shorncliffe.

Canada simply took no part in either war.

But, if political federation and inter-imperial defence thus fell on deaf ears in Canada, the question of trade relations received more serious attention. In urging the Pacific cable and a service of fast steamships on each ocean, Sandford Fleming had hit upon the line along which progress eventually was to be made. {150} Tariff preferences, inter-imperial reciprocity, began to be discussed. As early as 1879 Sir John Macdonald, on finding in England much dissatisfaction over his high taxation of British imports, proposed to give British goods a preference if the United Kingdom would give Canada a preference in return. Thus, on the ruins of the old colonial system imposed by the mother country's edict, would be built a new colonial system based on free negotiation between equal states. In view of Britain's rooted adherence to free trade, nothing, of course, came of the proposal. Ten years later there was in England some discussion of protection or 'fair trade,' and in Canada, during the elections of 1891, the idea of an imperial _zollverein_ was rhetorically mooted as an alternative to reciprocity with the United States. Three years later still (1894) the second Colonial Conference met at Ottawa, on the invitation of the Dominion Government. The object was to arrange treaties of reciprocity in trade between the various colonies, to serve until such time as the mother country should renounce her free-trade errors. There were many forceful and eloquent speeches, notably one by Mr, now Sir George, Foster, and a resolution was {151} pa.s.sed in favour of an Imperial Customs Union. But, save for a limited arrangement with New Zealand in 1895, no definite result followed.

The policy of the Liberal Opposition in Canada in respect to inter-imperial trade may be briefly stated. Mr Laurier's first speech, as leader of the party, at Somerset, in 1887, has already been mentioned. There he declared that if commercial union with Great Britain were feasible, he would favour it. But he had more hope of commercial union with other British colonies, which had protective tariffs. Two years later, speaking at Toronto, he referred to the obvious difficulties in the way of commercial union with Britain itself. 'I would favour with all my soul,' he said, 'a more close commercial alliance of Canada with Great Britain. But, sir, if there is any man who believes that any such an alliance between Canada and Great Britain can be formed upon any other basis than that of free trade, which prevails in England, that man is a Rip Van Winkle, who has been sleeping not only for the last seven but for the last forty-four years. The British people will not to-day go back upon the policy of free trade, and Canada is not in a position at the moment, {152} with the large revenue which she has to collect, to adopt any other tariff than a revenue tariff at best.' That free trade among all the British communities would some day be to their advantage, and that it would come in time, he stated elsewhere, but added that it could not for many years be a practical issue.

A notable step forward was taken in 1892. Hitherto Liberal and Conservative alike had been considering the trade question chiefly from the standpoint of the producer, seeking fresh markets by offering in return concessions in the Canadian tariff. Now the Liberals, and the M'Carthy wing of the Conservatives, began to speak of the consumer's interests. The reduction of the tariff would be more important as a relief to the consumer than as a means of buying markets abroad for the producer. Instead of waiting for the distant day when Great Britain should set up a tariff and give Canada reciprocal preference, the Liberals now pressed for giving an immediate and unconditional preference on British goods. A resolution to this effect, moved in the House of Commons by Mr, now Sir Louis, Davies, was voted down by the Conservative majority, but it was to bear notable fruit later.

[1] _Confederation Debates_, p. 44.

[2] See p. 131.

[3] 'During the last few years of his life, when asked if he were an Imperial Federationist, he would reply somewhat after this fashion: "That depends on what you mean by Imperial Federation. I am, of course, in favour of any feasible scheme that will bring about a closer union between the various portions of the Empire, but I have not yet seen any plan worked out by which this can be done. The proposal that there should be a parliamentary federation of the Empire I regard as impracticable. I greatly doubt that England would agree that the parliament which has sat during so many centuries at Westminster, should be made subsidiary to a federal legislature. But, however that might be, I am quite sure that Canada would never consent to be taxed by a central body sitting at London, in which she would have practically no voice; for her proportionate number of members in such an a.s.sembly would amount to little more than an honorary representation. That form of Imperial Federation is an idle dream. So also, in my judgment, is the proposal to establish a uniform tariff throughout the Empire. No colony would ever surrender its right to control its fiscal policy."'--Pope, _Memoirs of Sir John Macdonald_, vol. ii, p. 213.

[4] Address on Canada and her Relations with the Mother Country.

Newcastle-on-Tyne, November 21, 1895.

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CHAPTER VIII

THE END OF A ReGIME

Abbott and Thompson--Tariff reform--Manitoba school question

The strain of a winter campaign proved too great for Sir John Macdonald's weakened frame. On June 6, 1891, died the statesman who so long had guided the destinies of Canada. All Canada felt the loss. No one else voiced the common judgment with such discrimination and generosity as did the leader of the Opposition. Speaking in parliament a few days later, Mr Laurier declared:

Sir John Macdonald now belongs to the ages, and it can be said with certainty that the career which has just been closed is one of the most remarkable careers of this century.... I think it can be a.s.serted that, for the supreme art of governing men, Sir John Macdonald was gifted as few men in any land or any age were gifted--gifted with the highest of all qualities, qualities which would have made him famous wherever exercised, and which would have shone all the more conspicuously the larger the theatre. The fact that he could congregate together elements the most heterogeneous and blend them into {154} one compact party, and to the end of his life keep them steadily under his hand, is perhaps altogether unprecedented. The fact that during all those years he retained unimpaired not only the confidence but the devotion, the ardent devotion and affection of his party, is evidence that besides those higher qualities of statesmanship to which we were daily witnesses, he was also endowed with those inner, subtle, undefinable graces of soul which win and keep the hearts of men.

As to his statesmanship, it is written in the history of Canada....

Although my political views compel me to say that in my judgment his actions were not always the best that could have been taken in the interests of Canada, although my conscience compels me to say that of late he has imputed to his opponents motives which I must say in my heart he has misconceived, yet I am only too glad here to sink these differences, and to remember only the great services he has performed for our country--to remember that his actions always displayed great originality of view, unbounded fertility of resource, a high level of intellectual conception, and, above all, a far-reaching vision beyond the event of the day, and still higher, permeating the whole, a broad patriotism--a devotion to Canada's welfare, Canada's advancement, and Canada's glory.

Sir John Macdonald had been prime minister of the Dominion for twenty of its twenty-four years. In the next five years the Conservative party had four different leaders {155} and the Dominion four prime ministers. The first was Sir John Abbott, who had lived down the memory of his early views in favour of Annexation and had become 'the confidential family lawyer of his party.' A little over a year later, ill-health compelled him to resign in favour of Sir John Thompson, an able and honest administrator, who grew in breadth of view with experience and responsibility.

All Abbott's astuteness and Thompson's rigid uprightness were soon required to deal with the revelations of rotten politics which presently claimed the country's attention. It had long been believed that the department of Public Works, under Sir Hector Langevin, was a source of widespread corruption, but it was not until Israel Tarte, a member of the House of Commons and a _bleu_ of the _bleus_, made charges to that effect during the session of 1891, that the full measure of the evil was understood. In the investigations and trials which followed it was made clear that huge sums had been extracted from contractors in the service of the Government and used in wholesale bribery. These revelations, as a London newspaper remarked, 'made Tammany smell sweet.'

But the public indignation at these proofs {156} of the sinister side of the Government's long hold on power was weakened by similar charges brought and proved against the Liberal Government of Quebec, under Honore Mercier. The lieutenant-governor summarily dismissed Mercier, the Church set its face sternly against his ministry, which it had erstwhile approved, and the people of the province voted him out of power (1892). The effect on the public mind of this corruption at Ottawa and Quebec was an apathy, a lowered standard of political morality, since it gave point to the common saying that 'one set of politicians is as bad as another,' by which good men excuse their unpatriotic indifference to public affairs.

The Conservative party, and the whole Dominion, suffered a further loss in 1894, when Sir John Thompson died suddenly at Windsor Castle. Sir Mackenzie Bowell was chosen as his successor.

Meanwhile the fortunes and the spirit of the Liberal party rose steadily. Mr Laurier's position as leader strengthened as each year gave proof of his steadfast character, his courage, and his political sagacity. He gave his time and energy wholly to the work of the party.

During these years he addressed {157} hundreds of meetings in Quebec and Ontario, and made tours to the maritime provinces and through the West to the Pacific.

The convention of Liberals from all ends of the Dominion, which met at Ottawa in 1893, had given fresh vigour to the party. At that convention, as has already been noted, emphasis was placed upon the need of lowering the tariff. It was urged that the tariff should be made to rest as lightly as possible upon the necessaries of life, and that freer trade should be sought with all the world, and particularly with Great Britain and the United States.

It was about this time, too, that D'Alton M'Carthy, who was mellowing in religious matters and growing more radical on other issues, voiced a demand for a reduction of customs burdens and for the adoption of maximum and minimum schedules, the minimum rates to be given Great Britain and British colonies and foreign countries which offered equivalent terms, and the maximum rates to be applied to countries like the United States which maintained prohibitive tariffs against Canadian products. The Patrons of Industry, an organization of farmers which for a few years had much power {158} in Ontario, also demanded tariff reform. Even the Government went a little with public opinion and lopped away a few 'mouldering branches' in 1894. Thus the tariff remained an issue during the last five years of the Conservative regime.

A more burning question, however, was the revival of the old contest over provincial rights and denominational privileges. This was the offspring of the Equal Rights agitation, which had spread to Manitoba.

In August 1889 Joseph Martin, a member of the Manitoba Cabinet, following D'Alton M'Carthy at a public meeting, announced that his government would establish a non-sectarian system of education. A few months later this was done.

When Manitoba entered Confederation, in 1870, there had been no state-supported system of education. Roman Catholics, Anglicans, and Presbyterians maintained denominational schools, supported by fees and church grants. The settlers were about equally divided between Catholics and Protestants. The Manitoba Act, Manitoba's const.i.tutional charter, gave the new province in most respects the same powers as the older provinces. The province was given control of {159} education, subject, first, to the provision that no law should be pa.s.sed prejudicially affecting any right or privilege, with respect to denominational schools, which any cla.s.s of persons had by law or practice at the union, and subject, secondly, to an appeal to the federal authorities from any provincial act or decision affecting the rights of any minority, Protestant or Catholic. In 1871 a school system much like that of Quebec was set up. Protestant schools and Catholic schools were established, and each was granted half the provincial appropriation. Later, as the Protestant population grew relatively larger, the amount was divided in proportions corresponding to the number of pupils in each cla.s.s of schools. Now, in 1890, this system was completely swept away and replaced by a single system of state-supported schools. At first it had been the intention to make them entirely secular, but in the end provision was made for some non-denominational religious teaching. Any Catholic who did not wish to send his children to such a school would be compelled to pay for the support of a school of his own, besides paying taxes for the general school system.

The Catholics, first under Archbishop {160} Tache's firm but moderate guidance, and later under Archbishop Langevin's crusading leadership, demanded redress. The provincial authorities would not change their policy. It was thought that the const.i.tution provided ample protection for a religious minority deprived of its rights. The provision was three-fold. First, the Dominion Government might disallow the offending act. But the Dominion Government saw fit not to exercise this right, preferring to leave the matter to the courts, if possible.

Secondly, there was the provision of the Manitoba Act forbidding the province to take away any rights as to denominational schools possessed by any cla.s.s of persons at the union. Test cases were brought and elaborately argued in the courts. The Supreme Court held that the privilege of paying only for one's own denominational schools existed at the union, and had been infringed. The Privy Council reversed this judgment, holding that Catholics were still free to support schools of their own, and that this was the only privilege which they had before possessed.

There was still a third string to the bow--the appeal to the governor-general in council, the Dominion Government, to pa.s.s remedial {161} legislation. Here again the Supreme Court and the Privy Council differed. The Supreme Court held, but not unanimously, that no right of federal intervention existed; but the Privy Council maintained, as the last word in the case, that the Dominion had power to intervene.

This decision put the question squarely before the Bowell Government.

It was a difficult situation. An administration drawing its chief strength from Ontario, and headed by a prominent Orangeman, was called upon by the Catholic authorities to use its powers to compel a determined province to change its policy or, in default, to pa.s.s a federal law restoring the minority's privileges. But Bowell and his colleagues soon made their decision. Early in 1895 the province was ordered in uncompromising terms to restore to the minority its former rights and privileges. The legislature declined, on the ground that the old system was inefficient and disruptive, and urged the federal authorities to investigate school conditions in Manitoba, past and present, before taking the fatal step of coercion. But, after a commission had failed to induce the province to yield, the Bowell Government announced that at the next parliamentary {162} session (1896) a Remedial Bill would be introduced and pa.s.sed.

On the eve of the meeting of parliament for this last historic session came the startling news that seven of the members of Sir Mackenzie Bowell's Cabinet, chief among them being Mr Foster and Sir Hibbert Tupper, had revolted against their leader. The revolters urged the supreme need of forming the strongest possible administration in the crisis, and to that end demanded the resignation of the prime minister.

Bowell bitterly denounced the 'nest of traitors,' and sought to form a Cabinet without their aid, but the strikers picketed every possible candidate. Finally a compromise was reached by which the bolters were to return under Bowell's leadership for the session and Sir Charles Tupper was to take command at its close.