Part 9
The colonies are now in a transition state. Gradually a different colonial system is being developed--and it will become year by year less a case of dependence on our part, and of overruling protection on the part of the Mother-country, and more a case of a healthy and cordial alliance. Instead of looking upon us as a merely dependent colony, England will have in us a friendly nation--a subordinate but still a powerful people--to stand by her in North America in peace or in war. The people of Australia will be such another subordinate nation. And England will have this advantage, if her colonies progress under the new colonial system, as I believe they will, that, though at war with all the rest of the world, she will be able to look to the subordinate nations in alliance with her, and owning allegiance to the same sovereign, who will assist in enabling her again to meet the whole world in arms, as she has done before. And if, in the great Napoleonic war, with every port in Europe closed against her commerce, she was yet able to hold her own, how much more will that be the case when she has a colonial empire rapidly increasing in power, in wealth, in influence, and in position? It is true that we stand in danger, as we have stood in danger again and again in Canada, of being plunged into war and suffering all its dreadful consequences, as the result of causes over which we have no control, by reason of this connection. This, however, did not intimidate us. At the very mention of the prospect of a war some time ago, how were the feelings of the people aroused from one extremity of British America to the other, and preparations made for meeting its worst consequences! Although the people of this country are fully aware of the horrors of war--should a war arise, unfortunately, between the United States and England, and we all pray it never may--they are still ready to encounter all perils of that kind, for the sake of the connection with England. There is not one adverse voice, not one adverse opinion on that point. We all feel the advantages we derive from our connection with England. So long as that alliance is maintained, we enjoy, under her protection, the privileges of constitutional liberty according to the British system. We will enjoy here that which is the great test of constitutional freedom--we will have the rights of the minority respected. In all countries the rights of the majority take care of themselves, but it is only in countries like England, enjoying constitutional liberty, and safe from the tyranny of a single despot or of an unbridled democracy, that the rights of minorities are regarded. So long, too, as we form a portion of the British Empire, we shall have the example of her free institutions, of the high standard of the character of her statesmen and public men, of the purity of her legislation, and the upright administration of her laws. In this younger country one great advantage of our connection with Great Britain will be, that, under her auspices, inspired by her example, a portion of her empire, our public men will be actuated by principles similar to those which actuate the statesmen at home. These, although not material, physical benefits, of which you can make an arithmetical calculation, are of such overwhelming advantage to our future interests and standing as a nation, that to obtain them is well worthy of any sacrifices we may be called upon to make, and the people of this country are ready to make them.
44. _For Confederation_: (b) _George Brown_.
And well, Mr. Speaker, may the work we have unitedly proposed rouse the ambition and energy of every true man in British America. Look, sir, at the map of the Continent of America, and mark that island (Newfoundland) commanding the mouth of the noble river that almost cuts our Continent in twain. Well, sir, that island is equal in extent to the kingdom of Portugal. Cross the straits of the mainland, and you touch the hospitable shores of Nova Scotia, a country as large as the kingdom of Greece. Then mark the sister province of New Brunswick--equal in extent to Denmark and Switzerland combined. Pass up the river St. Lawrence to Lower Canada--a country as large as France. Pass on to Upper Canada--twenty thousand square miles larger than Great Britain and Ireland put together. Cross over the Continent to the shores of the Pacific, and you are in British Columbia, the land of golden promise,--equal in extent to the Austrian Empire. I speak not now of the vast Indian Territories that lie between--greater in extent than the whole soil of Russia--and that will ere long, I trust, be opened up to civilisation under the auspices of the British American Confederation. Well, sir, the bold scheme in your hands is nothing less than to gather all these countries into one--to organise them all under one government, with the protection of the British flag, and in heartiest sympathy and affection with our fellow-subjects in the land that gave us birth. Our scheme is to establish a government that will seek to turn the tide of European emigration into this northern half of the American Continent--that will strive to develop its great natural resources--and that will endeavour to maintain liberty, and justice, and Christianity throughout the land.
45. (2) _Against Confederation: Christopher Dunkin._
We are going to be called upon to spend money for yet another kindred purpose, and a large amount too--and this, as a part of this scheme. Our star of empire is to wing its way westward; and we are to confederate everything in its track, from Newfoundland to Vancouver's Island, this last included. But, between us and it, there lies the Hudson Bay territory. So, of course, we must acquire that for confederation purposes; and the plan is, that before we get it we shall have to pay for the elephant--though, after we get him, we may find him costly and hard to keep....
Disguise it how you may, the idea that underlies this plan is this, and nothing else--that we are to create here a something--kingdom, viceroyalty or principality--something that will soon stand in the same position towards the British Crown that Scotland and Ireland stood in before they were legislatively united with England; a something having no other tie to the Empire than the one tie of fealty to the British Crown--a tie which in the cases, first, of Scotland, and then of Ireland, was found, when the pinch came, to be no tie at all; which did not restrain either Scotland or Ireland from courses so inconsistent with that of England as to have made it necessary that their relations should be radically changed, and a legislative union formed in place of a merely nominal union. Suppose you do create here a kingdom or a principality, bound to the Empire by this shadow of a tie, the day of trial cannot be far distant, when this common fealty will be found of as little use in our case as it was in theirs, when, in consequence, the question will force itself on the Empire and on us, between entire separation on the one hand, and a legislative union on the other. But a legislative union of British America with the United Kingdom must be, in the opinion of, one may say, everybody at home and here, a sheer utter impossibility; and when the question shall come to be whether we are so to be merged in the United Kingdom or are to separate entirely from it, the answer can only be--"At whatever cost, we separate." Sir, I believe in my conscience that this step now proposed is one directly and inevitably tending to that other step; and for that reason--even if I believed, as I do not, that it bid fair to answer ever so well in the other respects--because I am an Englishman and hold to the connection with England, I must be against this scheme....
The real danger is not of war with the United States. It is from what I may call their pacific hostility--from trouble to be wrought by them within this country--trouble to arise out of refusal of reciprocity--repeal of the bonding system--custom-house annoyances--passport annoyances; from their fomenting difficulties here, and taking advantage of our local jealousies; from the multiplied worries they may cause us by a judicious alternation of bullying and coaxing, the thousand incidents which may easily be made to happen if things are not going on quite well in this country, and the people and government of the States are minded to make us feel the consequences of our not getting on quite so well as we might. Whether the union of the States is restored or not, this kind of thing can go on. The danger is, that either the United States, or those portions of the United States which are near us, and which are really stronger than we are, and enterprising enough and ambitious enough, and not very fond of us, and not at all fond of the Mother-country, not at all unwilling to strike a blow at her and to make us subservient to their own interest and ambition--the danger is, I say, that the United States, or those portions of the United States near us, may avail themselves of every opportunity to perplex us, to embroil us in trouble, to make us come within the disturbing influences of their strong local attraction. Now, to pretend to tell me that the United States or the Northern States, whichever you please, are going to be frightened from a policy of that kind by our taking upon ourselves great airs, and forming ourselves into a grand Confederation, is to tell me that their people are, like the Chinese, a people to be frightened by loud noises and ugly grimaces. I do not believe they are.
46. THE BRITISH NORTH AMERICA ACT (1867).
Printed in _Federations and Unions within the British Empire_, by H. E. Egerton. Oxford, 1911.
Whereas the Provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick have expressed their desire to be federally united into one Dominion under the Crown of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, with a Constitution similar in principle to that of the United Kingdom....
3. ... the Provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick shall form and be one Dominion under the name of Canada....
17. There shall be one Parliament for Canada, consisting of the Queen, an Upper House, styled the Senate, and the House of Commons.
21. The Senate shall, subject to the provisions of this Act, consist of seventy-two members, who shall be styled Senators.
22. ... three divisions shall ... be equally represented in the Senate as follows: Ontario by twenty-four Senators; Quebec by twenty-four Senators; and the Maritime Provinces by twenty-four Senators, twelve thereof representing Nova Scotia, and twelve ... New Brunswick.
24. The Governor-General shall from time to time, in the Queen's name, by Instrument under the Great Seal of Canada, summon qualified persons to the Senate....
29. A Senator shall ... hold his place in the Senate for life.
37. The House of Commons shall ... consist of one hundred and eighty-one Members, of whom eighty-two shall be elected for Ontario, sixty-five for Quebec, nineteen for Nova Scotia, and fifteen for New Brunswick.
50. Every House of Commons shall continue for five years from the day of the return of the Writs for choosing the House (subject to be sooner dissolved by the Governor-General) and no longer.
51. On the completion of the census in the year one thousand eight hundred and seventy-one, and of each subsequent decennial census, the representation of the four Provinces shall be readjusted by such authority in such manner, and from such time as the Parliament of Canada from time to time provides, subject and according to the following rules:
1. Quebec shall have the fixed number of sixty-five members.
2. There shall be assigned to each of the other Provinces such a number of Members as will bear the same proportion to the number of its population (ascertained at such census) as the number sixty-five bears to the number of the population of Quebec (so ascertained)....
53. Bills for appropriating any part of the Public Revenue, or for imposing any tax or impost, shall originate in the House of Commons.
54. It shall not be lawful for the House of Commons to adopt or pass any Vote, Resolution, Address, or Bill for the appropriation of any part of the Public Revenue, or of any Tax or Impost, to any purpose, that has not been first recommended to that House by Message of the Governor-General in the Session in which such Vote, Resolution, Address, or Bill is proposed.
58. For each Province there shall be an Officer, styled the Lieutenant-Governor, appointed by the Governor-General in Council by Instrument under the Great Seal of Canada.
60. The salaries of the Lieutenant-Governors shall be fixed and provided by the Parliament of Canada.
91. ... the exclusive Legislative Authority of the Parliament of Canada extends to all matters coming within the classes of subjects next hereinafter enumerated, that is to say:
(1) The Public Debt and Property; (2) The regulation of Trade and Commerce; (3) The raising of money by any mode or system of Taxation; (4) The borrowing of money on the Public Credit; (5) Postal Service; (6) The Census and Statistics; (7) Militia, Military and Naval Services, and Defence; (8) The fixing of and providing for the Salaries and Allowances of Civil and other Officers of the Government of Canada; (9) Beacons, Buoys, Lighthouses, and Sable Island; (10) Navigation and Shipping; (11) Quarantine and the establishment and maintenance of Marine Hospitals; (12) Sea Coast and Inland Fisheries; (13) Ferries between a Province and any British or Foreign Country, or between two Provinces; (14) Currency and Coinage; (15) Banking, Incorporation of Banks, and the issue of Paper Money; (16) Savings Banks; (17) Weights and Measures; (18) Bills of Exchange and Promissory Notes; (19) Interest; (20) Legal Tender; (21) Bankruptcy and Insolvency; (22) Patents of Invention and Discovery; (23) Copyrights; (24) Indians and Lands reserved for the Indians; (25) Naturalisation and Aliens; (26) Marriage and Divorce; (27) The Criminal Law, except the Constitution of the Courts of Criminal Jurisdiction, but including the Procedure in Criminal Matters; (28) The establishment, maintenance, and management of Penitentiaries; (29) Such Classes of Subjects as are expressly excepted in the numeration of the Classes of Subjects by this Act assigned exclusively to the Legislatures of the Provinces.
92. In each Province the Legislature may exclusively make laws in relation to matters coming within the classes of subjects next hereinafter enumerated; that is to say: (1) The amendment ... of the Constitution of the Province, except as regards the office of Lieutenant-Governor; (2) Direct taxation within the Province in order to the raising of a revenue for Provincial purposes; (3) the borrowing of money on the sole credit of the Province; (4) the establishment and tenure of Provincial offices, and the appointment and payment of Provincial officers; (5) the management and sale of the Public Lands belonging to the Province, and of the timber and wood thereon; (6) the establishment, maintenance and management of public and reformatory prisons in and for the Province; (7) the establishment, maintenance and management of Hospitals, Asylums, Charities, and Eleemosynary Institutions in and for the Provinces, other than Marine Hospitals; (8) Municipal Institutions in the Province; (9) Shop, Saloon, Tavern, Auctioneer, and other licenses, in order to the raising of a revenue for Provincial, local or municipal purposes; (10) local works and undertakings [except steamships, railways, canals, telegraphs and other works for the general advantage, or for the advantage of more than one Province]; (11) the incorporation of Companies with Provincial objects; (12) the solemnisation of marriage in the Province; (13) Property and civil rights in the Province; (14) the administration of justice in the Province [including the maintenance of Provincial courts, civil and criminal, and procedure in civil matters]; (15) the imposition of punishment by fine, penalty, or imprisonment [in order to enforce a Provincial law on any of the above matters]; (16) generally all matters of a merely local or private nature in the Province.
133. Either the English or the French language may be used by any person in the debates of the Houses of the Parliament of Canada and of the Houses of the Legislature of Quebec; and both those languages shall be used in the respective Records and Journals of those Houses; and either of those languages may be used by any person or in any pleading or process in or issuing from any Court of Canada established under this Act, and in or from all or any of the Courts of Quebec.
The Acts of the Parliament of Canada and of the Legislature of Quebec shall be printed and published in both those languages.
145. Inasmuch as the Provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick have joined in a declaration that the construction of the Inter-colonial Railway is essential to the consolidation of the Union of British North America, and to the assent thereto of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, and have consequently agreed that provision should be made for its immediate construction by the Government of Canada. Therefore, in order to give effect to that agreement, it shall be the duty of the Government and Parliament of Canada to provide for the commencement, within six months after the Union, of a railway connecting the River St. Lawrence with the City of Halifax in Nova Scotia, and for the construction thereof without intermission, and the completion thereof with all practicable speed.
146. It shall be lawful for the Queen, by and with the advice of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, on Addresses from the Houses of the Parliament of Canada, and from the Houses of the respective Legislatures of the Colonies or Provinces of Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, and British Columbia, to admit those Colonies or Provinces, or any of them, into the Union, and on Address from the Houses of the Parliament of Canada to admit Rupert's Land and the North-Western Territory, or either of them, into the Union, on such terms and conditions in each case as are in the Addresses expressed and as the Queen thinks fit to approve, subject to the provisions of this Act; and the provisions of any Order in Council in that behalf shall have effect as if they had been enacted by the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
47. THE WORK OF THE HUDSON BAY COMPANY (to 1869).
=Source.=--A Paper by Sir Donald Smith (now Lord Strathcona), read to the Royal Colonial Institute in April, 1897. The Company's territories were taken over by the Dominion of Canada in 1869.
The principal business of the Hudson's Bay Company was the purchasing of furs from the Indians, in exchange for arms and ammunition, clothes, and other commodities imported from the United Kingdom. Its prosperity depended upon good relations being maintained with the aborigines. Its officers were able to travel everywhere with freedom and safety, and could rely upon the friendliness of the red men. Advances made to the Indians for their hunting outfits or in times of scarcity were nearly always repaid. On the other hand, the Indians knew that any notes they might receive upon the trading posts, from peripatetic officers a thousand miles away from headquarters, would be honoured on presentation. The foundation of these friendly relations was confidence, and the knowledge the Indians acquired of the white man and his ways during the long administration of the Company made the transfer of the territory to Canada comparatively easy when the time for the surrender arrived. Its policy, which has been followed by successive Governments of Canada, has enabled the country to avoid those Indian wars which were of frequent occurrence in the early days of settlement in the western parts of the United States. Even in the half-breed disturbance in 1869 and 1870 already referred to, and in that of 1885, none of the Indians, with a few exceptions, could be induced to take arms against the forces of law and order. The fur trade over such an immense area was necessarily important; but at the same time, from natural reasons, it was bound to diminish in the more accessible parts where settlement in the future was regarded as possible. There was always a tendency on the part of the Indians to kill as many animals as possible, simply for the skins. They held the belief, some people say, that the more they killed the more rapidly would the animals multiply. Their motives therefore may have been conscientious, but I am afraid they were not altogether unconnected with the prospect of immediate profit. There is not much large game now in the regions traversed by the Canadian Pacific Railway, except perhaps in the more inaccessible districts between the Lakes and Hudson's Bay, and in the territory north and north-west of the river Saskatchewan. The buffalo, which used to furnish the Indian with food, shelter, and raiment, is almost extinct, and it is possible to travel over the prairie for hundreds of miles without seeing any wild animals larger than coyotes and gophers. Deer of various kinds are found occasionally, and bears still less frequently, and it may be said with truth that hunting in Canada, whether for pleasure or for trade, now entails a good deal of hard work....
In former times for trading purposes the unit of value was the beaver skin. The price of everything was calculated at so many skins, and they were the sole medium of exchange. In return for the skins the Indians received pieces of stick prepared in a special manner, each representing a beaver skin, and with these they were able to purchase anything they wanted at the Company's stores. Later on, about 1825, the Company established a paper currency. The highest note was for £1, the next for 5s., and the lowest for 1s. They were known as "Hudson's Bay Blankets," and no fears were ever entertained as to the soundness of the bank. It has been urged against the Hudson's Bay Company that it obstructed the development of the great North-West. On the contrary, it was engaged for two centuries in important pioneer work. Any corporation of the kind with exclusive privileges and rights was bound to make enemies; but no single province of Canada could have undertaken the administration or development of the country before confederation, and neither men nor money were available locally to permit of its blossoming out separately as a Colony or as a series of provinces. Whatever may have been the faults of the Company, history will record that its work was for the advantage of the Empire. The Company explored this vast territory, prepared the way for settlement and colonisation, fulfilled an important rôle in the history of Canada, and had not a little to do with the consolidation of the Dominion, and with the development the western country has witnessed in the last thirty years.
48. RED RIVER REBELLION (1870): ARRIVAL OF THE ENGLISH TROOPS.
=Source.=--_The Story of a Soldier's Life_, by Field-Marshal Viscount Wolseley. Constable, 1903.
We had looked forward to at least a pretty little field day when our line of skirmishers should enclose Fort Garry and its rebel garrison as in a net. But by early dawn next morning the whole country far and near was a sea of deep and clinging mud. There was then nothing approaching a road in the whole territory, so I had to forgo all pomp and circumstance of war in my final advance and had once more to take to our boats and the dreary oar. We were all wet through, very cold and extremely cross and hungry. A cup of hot tea and a biscuit swallowed quickly for breakfast, and all were again at the oar by 6 a.m., August 24, 1870. The rain poured "in buckets" upon us, and at places the country was under water....