EXTENSION OF THE BOUNDARIES OF
MANITOBA.
On the Orders of the Day being called,
Rt. Hon. Sir WILFRID LAURIER (Prime
Minister). I beg to lay upon the table of
the House a return supplementary to the
return which was laid on the table of the
House on Monday last with respect to the
claims of the government of Manitoba for
an extension of the boundaries of that province. At the same time I move that the
rules of the House be suspended, and that
the return be printed forthwith.
3835
COMMONS
Mr. R. L. BORDEN. Might I inquire
whether the letter of the 23rd of February,
which I observe in the public press, is included in the document brought down ?
Sir WILFRID LAURIER. No; I shall
have to refer to that in a moment. In making this motion, I desire to make a statement.
I desire at this moment to call the
attention of the House to a statement which was published this morning in the newspapers
of the city, and which I understand has been published
in all the press of Canada. This statement
is made by Mr. Rogers, a member of the
Manitoba government, concerning the action
taken by myself and by my colleagues upon
an application made some time ago by the
government of the province of Manitoba,
under instructions from the legislature of
that province, for an extension of its boundaries. I may say at once that it will
be
my duty, so far as the action of the government is concerned in this matter, to give
the statement a direct, an absolute and a
categorical denial. In order that there may
be no misunderstanding, I think it is better
that I should read to the House, and therefore place upon the records, the statement
of Mr. Rogers, as I find it in the 'Citizen.'
It is as follows:
On February 13, we received a formal invitation by telegraph from Sir Wilfrid to come
to Ottawa as soon as convenient. We left on
February 14 and arrived on the afternoon of
the 16th, when we received a letter from Sir
Wilfrid at the Russell House saying that he
would be pleased to meet us at his oflice at
mid-day on Friday, the 17th.
During that interview we presented the
claims of the province as urgently and strongly
as possible. In reply Sir Wilfrid said that if
we would be good enough to remain in Ottawa
for three or four days he would again send
for us and would then be in a position to give
us an answer.
In three days' time, on February 20, a letter was
received from Monseigneur Sbarretti, asking for
a conference. This invitation was accepted and
His Excellency then presented the following
memorandum, remarking that if we would
place this on the statute-book of our province
it would greatly facilitate an early settlement
of our mission, the fixing of our boundaries,
which would be extended to the shores of
Hudson bay. His Excellency further added
that our failure to act in the past had prejudiced our claim for extension westward.
The
following is a copy of His Excellency's memorandum, containing the proposed amendment
to
the Manitoba School Act:
MGR. SBARRETTI'S MEMORANDUM.
"Add to section 125.—(b).—And when in
any city or town there shall be thirty or more
Roman Catholic children and also thirty or
more non-Roman Catholic children, or in any
village more than fifteen of each of such
classes, the trustees shall, if requested by a
petition of parents or guardians of such number of such classes, provide separate
accommodation for each of such classes and employ
for them respectively Roman Catholic and
non-Roman Catholic teachers.
3835
3836
"Add to section 49.—(b)—And when in any
district there shall be fifteen or more Roman
Catholic children and fifteen or more non-
Roman Catholic children, the trustees shall,
if required by a petition of parents or guardians of such number of either of such
classes,
provide separate accommodation for each of
such classes and employ for them. respectively
Roman Catholic and non-Roman Catholic
teachers."
DELAYING WITH A PURPOSE.
Notwithstanding Sir Wilfrid's invitation and
our interview, followed by his promise of which
he was reminded by our letter, strange to
say, up to this very hour we have had no reply
to ours of February 23. What more natural
conclusion can be arrived at than that Sir
Wilfrid is simply killing time and making
pretexts in order that the polite invitation
of Monseigneur Sbarretti could be acted upon
by Manitoba.
In this way, of course, Sir Wilfrid thinks
he can secure a political advantage for his
friends in this province. This is a palpable
political trick, which he is quite capable of
undertaking, with the view to force the local
government to do something which would be
resented by the people and by this means he
hopes to reinstate his Liberal friends in power
here. I, for one, promise to take no chances in
allowing Sir Wilfrid or any person else to take
advantage of us by any underhanded scheme
of this sort. All I ask is that every citizen of
the province should have an opportunity of
expressing his opinion by his vote as a protest
against continued delay. I deny the right of
Sir Wilfrid Laurier and Monseigneur Sbarretti
to undertake to mix up the matter of separate
schools with that of the extension of our boundaries, and I am sure that in so doing
they do not
reflect the wishes of either Roman Catholics
or Protestants in the province. It ill-becomes the ' Globe ' to make this charge against
the government of Manitoba, when the only
persons affected are Sir Wilfrid and Monseigneur Sbarretti.
LAURIER'S DOUBLE-DEALING.
We have no desire in Manitoba for double-
dealing about this or any other question. This.
however, appears to be a favourite course of
Sir Wilfrid. For example, in 1896 he signed an
official statement declaring himself to be entitled to credit for the final settlement
of the
Manitoba school question, while immediately
following we find from the correspondence
brought down in the parliament of Canada the
following extract from a letter to Cardinal
Rampolla, which he has never denied:
' It is desirable, if not necessary, that the
mission of Monseigneur Merry Del Val should
be renewed or rather continued, and that he
should be present in the midst of us for a more
or less prolonged time as the accredited representative of the Holy See.'
It will be remembered that Monseigneur
Merry Del Val was appointed Papal delegate
by His Holiness the Pope on the petition of Sir
Wilfrid and forty odd members of the parliament of Canada. The petition was presented
to
His Holiness by Mr. Fitzpatrick and further
urged by the Canadian legal representative in
London, England, Charles Russell, who was
afterwards instructed to go to Rome as Sir
Wilfrid's representative, and who, on November
26, 1897, addressed the following to Cardinal
Rampolla, secretary of state to the Pope.
3837 APRIL 5, 1905
'I have just arrived at Rome once more at the
urgent request of the Catholic members of the
government and parliament of Canada. My
instructions enjoin me to again renew to Your
Eminence the desire which I had already the
honour to express to you, that His Holiness
will be pleased to nominate a permanent delegate to Canada as representative of His
Holiness who would reside on the spot but would
be outside all local interests.'
So that by this plain arrangement a delegate was appointed who was regarded as
necessary on account of differences of opinion
which existed at that time between Sir Wilfrid
and certain of his following as to his official
signed statement declaring he was a party to
the final settlement of the Manitoba school
question. Here again, we have the hand of Sir
Wilfrid engaged in double-dealing in this matter as is evidenced by his assurance
to Cardinal Rampolla through Mr. Russell, the Canadian legal representative, who wrote
to His
Eminence as follows, presenting Sir Wilfrid's
side of the case at Rome:
We do not solicit His Holiness to sanction
as perfect the concessions obtained, but that in
His wisdom he will be pleased to regard them
as a beginning of justice.
Now, this to my mind is conclusive that Sir
Wilfrid in combination with Monseigneur
Sbarretti had hoped by their present course to
carry out the promise given through their accredited representative, Mr. Charles Russell,
in this
underhand way. In view of the foregoing,
I am sure that Sir Wilfrid Laurier owes it to
the people of this province to at once give a
reason why we are not entitled to immediate consideration and action other than
the flimsy excuse which he has already himself
created in his invitation to Mr. Whitney to advance a claim to some portion of Keewatin
which did not form part of old Canada.
It is certainly idle for any person to assume
that Monseigneur Sbarretti, occupying the position he does, would press me to make
the suggestion of terms and conditions which he did
without the full knowledge and consent of Sir
Wilfrid and his colleagues. And on the other
hand Sir Wilfrid's attitude carries with it
evidence of a full knowledge of arrangement,
as is evident by his creation of excuses for
delay as well as his failure to give reason or
cause for same, and further by his unfairness
in bringing down one side of the case and attempting to secure a prejudicement from
the
people without their having Manitoba's reply
to his minute of council of March 21, which
was received by this government on March 28
and replied to on March 31.
Can you give us your reply for publication ?
Mr. Rogers was asked.
No, because it can only be made public
through the usual channel, that of being laid
on the table of the House and Sir Wilfrid is
at perfect liberty and should do this at once.
Before I proceed any further, I may say
at once, referring to the whole tenor of
this document, that in so far as there is
a charge that there was an understanding
between Monseigneur Sbarretti and myself to have the school question considered
in connection with the extension of the
boundaries of Manitoba, there is not a shadow nor a tittle of truth in it. Mr. Rogers
uses this language :
3837
3838
It is certainly idle for any person to assume
that Monsigneur Sbarretti, occupying the position he does, would presume to make the
suggestion of terms and conditions which he did
without the full knowledge and consent of Sir
Wilfrid Laurier and his colleagues.
I assert that if Mr. Rogers states that
Monseigneur Sbarretti did press him to
make the suggestion of terms and
conditions which he says Monseigneur
Sbarretti did with my knowledge, he
states something which is not in accordance with truth. If that has taken
place it has taken place wholly without my
knowledge and without my participation,
and I never heard of it in any way whatever until last Saturday, when the matter
was brought to my notice by a telegram
from the Toronto ' Globe.' Then Mr. Rogers
goes on to say :
And, on the other hand, Sir Wilfrid's attitude
carries with it evidence of a full knowledge of
arrangement, as is evident by his creation of
excuses for delay, as well as his failure to
give reason or cause for same and further by
his unfairness in bringing down one side of the
case and attempting to secure a prejudgment
from the people without their having Manitoba's
reply to his minute of council of March 21,
which was received by this government on
March 28, and replied to on March 31.
On Monday last, which was the 3rd of
April, I brought down to this House a return to an address moved for some time ago
by the hon. member for Marquette (Mr.
Roche), asking for copies of all correspondence that had taken place between the
government of Manitoba and this government on the subject of the extension of the
boundaries of Manitoba.
The last paper upon this return was
the acknowledgment of the receipt of our
reply to the prayer of the Manitoba government. We have received since that time a
further rejoinder by Manitoba to our reply.
We did not bring it down on Monday with
the return, because we had not then received it. It arrived at the Privy Council
office only yesterday. I at once gave orders
to the clerk of the Privy Council to have
it prepared for presentation to the House
and I have to-day laid it on the table of
the House. In all this there was no evidence of any intention to conceal anything.
There was nothing to conceal, this was a
public document. Then I see by the correspondence that the order of the Manitoba
government was passed on the 31st of
March, which was last Friday. It was
sent to us on the following day, Saturday.
It could not therefore get here until yesterday morning, and as soon as it was received
by us, as I said a moment ago, I
gave instructions to have it prepared and
laid on the table of the House, so as to
form part of the correspondence which the
people of this country have a right to have
before them. Now, I pass to another statement of Mr. Rogers :
3839 COMMONS
I shall come back to this.
—February 20, a letter was received from His
Excellency, Monseigneur Sbarretti, asking for a
conference. This invitation was accepted, and
His Excellency then presented the following
memorandum, remarking that if we would place
this on the statute-book of our province that
it would greatly facilitate an early settlement
of our mission, the fixing of our boundaries,
which would be extended to the shores of Hudson bay. His Excellency further added
that
our failure to act in the past had prejudiced
our claim for extension westward.
According to this statement, it appears
that Mr. Rogers and Mr. Colin Campbell,
who were the delegates of the Manitoba
government, had a conference with Monseigneur Sbarretti, the Papal ablegate,
There has been a rumour in the press—not
in the press, but at all events, about the
corridors of this House—that this conference had been brought about by means of
one of my colleagues. I have to say to
the House, and I have the authority of my
colleague for this, that there never was any
conference brought about by him between
the delegates and Monseigneur Sbarretti,
and I have to make the further statement
that neither myself nor any of my colleagues were the intermediaries between
Monseigneur Sbarretti and the delegates of
Manitoba. If there has been such a conference how it came about I cannot say.
Perhaps Monseigneur Sbarretti may have
had previous communication with these
gentlemen; I do not know. Perhaps he
knew them and perhaps that is the reason
why he called upon them to have a conference. At all events, it is no concern of
mine. I know nothing, and I never knew
anything of it until this day, nor did the
government. What conversation took place
between the papal ablegate, Mr. Rogers
and Mr. Colin Campbell I do not know.
This is a question, perhaps, as to which
there may be something later on; I do not
know. But, I take the statement as I find
it here, and upon this statement I have the
right to make some comments which may
throw some light, perhaps, on what has
taken place. Mr. Rogers says that the
abiega-te made this remark :
This invitation was accepted and His Excellency then presented the following memorandum,
remarking that if we would place this
on the statute-book of our province it would
greatly facilitate an early settlement of our
mission, the fixing of our boundaries, which
would be extended to the shores of Hudson
bay.
As to that, I have no reason to make any
comment, because that is a thing as to
which I know nothing. Then Mr. Rogers
goes on to say :
His Excellency further added that our failure
to act in the past had prejudiced our claim for
extension westward.
3839
3840
Well, Sir, I cannot conceive how the papal
ablegate, or anybody else, could have stated
that the failure of the province of Manitoba
to amend the School Act prevented the extension of its boundaries westward and
that if such had been done it would have
facilitated this extension. I cannot conceive how it is possible that such a statement
could have been made, considering the
fact that since the month of July, 1896.
when we came into office, up to the month of
January, 1905, we never received from the
government of Manitoba a communication
asking for the extension of the boundaries
of that province. There may have been resolutions passed by the legislature, asking
for the extension of their boundaries; I do
not know. I am told that there have been,
and I have seen in the press that resolutions were passed in 1901. that resolutions
were passed also, as I understand, in 1902,
and resolutions were passed, I know, in
1905. In 1905, these resolutions were followed by executive action, they were called
to our attention, but neither in 1901 nor
in 1902, were these resolutions passed by
the legislature of Manitoba, followed by
executive action or called to the attention
of the government of Canada. This morning, when I read the interview with Mr.
Rogers, I asked myself if my memory was
at fault, and if there had been any communication sent to us, which, in the multitude
of things with which we are called
upon to deal, I might have forgotten. I inquired of my colleagues if they had any
recollection of any such communication being sent to us, and they all answered me
they had no such recollection. I then inquired from the clerk of the Privy Council
if there was anything in the archives of
the department which would show that
any such communication had been received
by us, and I received this memorandum
from the clerk of the Privy Council.
From June, 1896, to January, 1905, there is
no record in the Privy Council office of a claim
advanced by the province of Manitoba for the
extension of its boundaries. In May, 1902, there
was a protest from the Northwest Territories
against the extension of the boundaries of the
province of Manitoba.
Now, Sir, with these preliminary remarks
I shall proceed to give my version of what
took place between Mr. Colin Campbell and
Mr. Rogers, and us, when they came here
as delegates from the government of Manitoba. I shall take in the first place the
following statement made by Mr. Rogers :
On February 13th we received a formal invitation by telegraph from Sir Wilfrid Laurier
to come to Ottawa as soon as convenient. We
left on February 14th and arrived on afternoon
of the 16th, when we received a letter from
Sir Wilfrid at the Russell House, saying that he
would be pleased to meet us at his office at
mid-day on Friday the 17th.
In this statement there is nothing which
3841 APRIL 5, 1905
is not in accordance with the truth, but
it is not the whole truth. It leaves the
impression that we took the initiative of our
own accord to have these gentlemen come
from Manitoba to discuss that matter with
us, whereas the truth is, that we simply
responded to an invitation which came to
us from the government of Manitoba. I have
brought here the whole correspondence
which has taken place upon this subject. I
stated a moment ago that from the month of
June, 1896 to the month of January, 1905, we
had not received a communication from
the government of Manitoba asking for the
extension of their boundaries, and I repeat
the statement. The first communication we
received upon this subject is the following:
Department of the Provincial Secretary,
Winnipeg, Man.
January 20th, 1905.
Right Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, G.C.M.G.,
President of the King's Privy Council for
Canada, Ottawa, Ont.
Sir,—The government of Manitoba, on a motion of the legislative assembly, has to-day
forwarded to His Excellency the Governor General,
a memorial relating to the extension of the
boundaries of the province, and I am directed
to write you and request that you will be
pleased to appoint an early date for receiving
a deputation from the government of Manitoba
in relation to the matter. It would be appreciated if such a date could be named for
the
first or second week in February.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
D. H. McFADDEN,
Provincial Secretary.
To this letter I answered in the following:
terms :
Ottawa, 24th January, 1905.
Dear Sir,—I have the honour to acknowledge
the receipt of your favour of the 20th instant,
informing me that the legislative assembly has
forwarded to His Excellency the Governor General in Council, a memorial relating to
the extension of the boundaries of the province of
Manitoba, and asking to have a date fixed for
receiving a deputation from the government of
Manitoba in connection with this matter.
The memorial has not yet been received at
the office of the Privy Council. I shall bring
your request to the attention of the government as soon as possible after its receipt,
and
will communicate with you again later on.
Yours very sincerely,
WILFRID LAURIER.
Hon. D. H. McFadden,
Manitoba.
In accordance with the promise there
made, when we had received the memorial
from the government of Manitoba, I brought
it to the attention of the Privy Council, and
I was authorized to send the following telegram :
Ottawa, 13th February, 1905.
Hon. D. H. McFadden,
Winnipeg, Manitboa.
With reference to your last memorial re extension of limits, will be glad to receive
your
delegation at any time convenient to you.
3841
3842
That telegram is dated the 13th of February, and on the same day I received the
following telegram from Mr. McFadden :
Winnipeg, Man., 13th February, 1905.
Sir Wilfrid Laurier,
Ottawa, Ont.
Replying to your telegram of even date, Hon.
Messrs. Rogers and Campbell have been appointed to confer with your government regarding
extension of boundaries. They leave here
to-morrow, will reach Ottawa Thursday 16th.
Kindly notify them at Russell House as to time
and place for interview suitable to your own
convenience.
D. H. McFADDEN.
In accordance with this last telegram inviting me to fix a time and to inform Mr.
Campbell and Mr. Rogers at what time
we would be ready to receive them, I caused my secretary in compliance with their
desire, on the 16th of February to send
the following letter :
Ottawa, 16th February, 1905.
Dear Sir,—Sir Wilfrid Laurier will be glad to
receive you to-morrow the 17th instant at 12.30
o'clock in his office, Privy Council.
Yours respectfully,
(Sgd.) RODOLPHE BOUDREAU.
Private Secretary.
That was on the 16th of February, and
on the following day accordingly, there
took place at my office the interview with
the delegates from Manitoba. There had
been a subcommittee of the Privy Council
appointed to receive the delegates, and the
ministers present on that occasion were,
the Minister of Justice, the Postmaster General and myself ; I think the Secretary
of
State was present, but of that I am not
quite sure.
I take now the statement of Mr. Rogers
as to what took place then. Mr. Rogers
says :
During that interview we presented the claim
of the province as urgently and strongly as possible. In reply Sir Wilfrid said, that
if we
would be good enough to remain in Ottawa for
three or four days he would again send for us
and would then be in a position to give us an
answer.
As to the latter statement I am sorry
to say that my memory is not in accordance
with the memory of Mr. Rogers. I do not
want to make any imputation, but I flatter
myself that I have a pretty good memory
and my memory is corroborated by that
of my colleagues. What took place was
this : We heard the petition presented
to us by the delegates from Manitoba. Mr.
Rogers was the spokesman. I do not think
Mr. Campbell said anything at all, but if
he did he took a very indifferent part in
the discussion which was mainly carried
on by Mr. Rogers. He presented to us a
repetition of all the claims which are
advanced in the state paper now on the
table of the House. He asked that the
3843
COMMONS
boundaries of the province should be extended westward, northward and eastward—
westward, that it should have a part of the
new province of Saskatchewan, a part of
the districts of Assiniboia and Saskatchewan ; northward, that they should have the
territory towards the north, and eastward
towards Hudson Bay. I may say at once
that we discussed this at some length, in
fact at considerable length. When Mr.
Rogers advanced the claim on behalf of
Manitoba, that its boundaries should be extended westward and include part of the
present districts of Assiniboia and Saskatchewan, we presented to Mr. Rogers what
seemed to be a very strong objection to
that. We told Mr. Rogers in fact : that
this claim had been considered by the
government of Sir John Macdonald in 1884
and had not been granted ; that the reasons
which existed in 1884 for refusing the prayer of Manitoba were far stronger to-day
than they were then : that at that time
that part of the Territories was in its
infancy, but that at present it had
a considerable population, as advanced as the population of Manitoba.
That there was the objection further :
that the legislature of the Territories had protested against its being
annexed to Manitoba, and therefore we did
not see how it was possible to grant that
part of the prayer of the province of Manitoba. With regard to the northern portion
of the district of Saskatchewan, we said
to Mr. Rogers and to his colleague, Mr.
Campbell : we do not know that there is
any objection to granting you the upper
portion of the district of Saskatchewan ;
it is true that we understand there is an
objection raised, but it is a question which
can be discussed later on ; at all events,
we do not intend to introduce this part of
the territory of Saskatchewan into the
new provinces and we had better leave it
for further discussion.
When it came to a discussion on the extension of the boundary eastward, towards
Hudson Bay, my colleague the Postmaster
General, who was with me then, at once
took strong objections to that claim of Manitoba. He stated that in his opinion it
would not be fair to the province of Ontario
that that claim should be considered unless
the province of Ontario had an opportunity
to discuss it with the province of Manitoba.
That was on the 17th of February. I do
not remember that I said to Mr. Rogers and
Mr. Campbell that if they were to wait for
some days we would again send for them
and be in a position to give them an answer.
What I distinctly remember stating, as it
was my duty to do, was that their representations would be brought to the attention
of
the Council, and that probably they would
get an answer at an early date. More
than this I do not remember stating,
and I do not think I did. The two
Bills for the creation of the provinces of
3843
3844
Saskatchewan and Alberta were introduced
on the following Tuesday, the 21st of February. Both Mr. Rogers and Mr. Campbell
were present on the floor of this House and
heard the statement I then made. That
statement was that I had the authority of
my colleagues to say that we could not see
our way to extend the boundaries of the
province of Manitoba westward, for the
reasons which I have just given, that we had
reserved the northern portion of the district
of Saskatchewan for future action, and that
with regard to extending the boundaries of
Manitoba to Hudson Bay we were of opinion that the province of Ontario and the
province of Quebec should be consulted.
Mr. Rogers heard this statement, and, therefore, knew what was the policy of the government
on that question.
This shows one thing, that this policy of
ours was settled then and there, without interference from anybody, without participation
by anybody. We settled our own business according to our lights. We told the
province of Manitoba that we could not extend its boundaries westward for the reasons
we gave, and on that decision we
took our stand before this House and maintained it. But we stated we were prepared
to consider the claim of the province of
Manitoba for extension northward towards
Hudson Bay in connection with the claims
of the new province of Saskatchewan and
the provinces of Ontario and Quebec. Since
that time we have embodied these views in
a Minute of Council, which has been communicated to the Manitoba government.
There is no difference between the Minute
of Council and the statement I made on the
floor of this House on the 21st of February
except this, that in the Minute of Council.
after having given the matter due consideration, we take the view that there is no
reason for calling the province of Quebec to
that conference, because it is not sufficiently interested in the matter; but we declare
our readiness, immediately after the creation of the new provinces, to have a conference,
in which the provinces of Saskatchewan, Ontario and Manitoba will be represented.
That is the position in which the
matter now stands.
My hon. friend the leader of the opposition has called my attention to a letter
of
Mr. Rogers of the 23rd of February. That
letter is not in the interview as reported
in the 'Citizen,' but I found it in another
paper, the Toronto 'Star' of yesterday, and
is as follows:
Russell House, Ottawa, February 23, 1905.
Sir,—As we find it necessary to leave Ottawa
to-morrow, we desire to refer to our interview
of Friday, the 17th, respecting Manitoba's claim
for extension of her boundaries westward and
northward, when you were good enough to suggest that if we would come here for two
or
three days you would be in a position to give
us an answer respecting same. Up to the present, however, we have heard nothing further
from you, excepting your statement in parlia
3845 APRIL 5, 1905
ment on Tuesday last, when introducing your
Autonomy Bills, which we presume represents
your fixed and final decision as to westward
boundary.
In view of Manitoba's very strong claims, as
presented to you in the memorial unanimously
passed by our legislature, and supported and
supplemented in our interview, we must enter,
on behalf of the province, our firm protest
against your decision in refusing to grant the
prayer of our request, extension of our boundaries westward, and exceedingly regret
that
apparently local considerations have deprived
Manitoba of what she rightfully regards as a
most just claim.
Respecting extension northward, we most respectfully urge it on you that this should
engage your consideration and attention during
the present session.
We, of course, most emphatically deny the
right of Quebec and Ontario having further to
say in respect to the extension of our boundaries north to James bay, or that they
could advance any claim worthy of consideration that
would necessitate delay in attaching this territory immediately to Manitoba.
we regard this as exclusively a matter for
settlement between our government and Manitoba. We sincerely trust that upon further
consideration you may see your way clear to grant
the request we make on behalf of a united province.
Yours faithfully,
(Sgd.) R. ROGERS.
My hon. friend the leader of the opposition asked me a moment ago why this letter
was not included in the correspondence
that has been brought down. The answer
is, that I have not received that letter. It
is not of very great consequence in view of
the facts. It is simply a letter of protest ;
it adds nothing at all to the facts; but I
did not receive it. This morning I asked
my secretary to search and see whether or
not it had been received. I have no remembrance of having received it and it is
not on file. I have brought everything that
there is on file on this question. Moreover,
I do not think it matters very much whether
Mr. Rogers wrote or did not write that letter, in view of the interview he gave and
which was published in the 'Citizen' of the
20th of February last upon this very point.
In that interview Mr. Rogers stated to the
reporter:
Mr. Campbell and myself have been appointed
to come here to plead for what is considered
by Manitoba to be her just claims, before the
government who are the tribunal in the case,
and whose decision must be final.
When do you expect a decision ?
I presume that when the Bill which is promised for Tuesday next is brought down, it
will
represent the government's decision in the matter.
Mr. Rogers was present on the floor of
this House on the 21st of February and
heard me state the decision of the government, and therefore there was not much
occasion for him to write two days later
asking for a decision. But this point is of
no consequence. I mention it simply as a
3845
3846
reason why the letter was not included in
the correspondence.
I have only one word more to say about
the extraordinary interview of Mr. Rogers.
I will read again a statement of Mr. Rogers
which appears in the 'Citizen' under the
heading 'Laurier's Double Dealing.' Mr.
Rogers says:
We have no desire in Manitoba for double
dealing about this or any other question. This,
however, appears to be a favourite course of Sir
Wilfrid. For example, in 1896 he signed an
official statement declaring himself to be entitled to credit for the final settlement
of the
Manitoba school question, while immediately
following we find from the correspondence
brought down in the parliament of Canada the
following extract from a letter to Cardinal
Rampolla, which he has never denied.
I have only two observations to make on
this. I do not know to what Mr. Rogers
refers when he says that I signed an official
statement declaring myself to be entitled
to credit for the final settlement of the Manitoba school question. It is not of any
consequence, but I do not know what Mr.
Rogers means when he says that. In the
statement immediately following, the impression is conveyed that the Canadian government
brought down correspondence between the government of Canada and Cardinal Rampolla.
There is no such thing in
fact. The government of Canada never had
any correspondence with Cardinal Rampolla
and never brought down any correspondence, because there was none to bring
down. What is true is that in 1896 my
self and several of my co-religionists, having some difficulties in our own church,
appealed to the authorities of our own church
to settle them. There was nothing more
than that. We did it, not as a government,
but simply as men belonging to the Roman
Catholic church. We had trouble over matters of ecclesiastical policy, and we appealed
to the supreme arbiter in our church
to determine these matters. There was
nothing more or less. On this occasion I
have nothing more to say, but I thought that
under the circumstances I owed it to myself
and the House simply to make a statement
of the facts as they are.
Sir WILLIAM MULOCK. I simply wish
to supplement briefly some of the remarks
that have fallen from my right hon. leader.
The communication from Mr. Rogers contains a statement to the effect that at the
invitation of His Excellency Monseigneur
Sbarretti, he waited upon him, and that on
that occasion the Papal ablegate said that
if they would make some concessions, the
mission of the Manitoba representatives
would likely be successful. That mission
was for the purpose of having the boundaries of that province extended to the shores
of Hudson bay. It was suggested that the
difficulty in the way of Manitoba securing
the extension could, in some way or other he
removed if some concessions were made by
3847 COMMONS
the Manitoba government on the school
question. To that point I wish to address
myself for a moment. I was requested by
the First Minister to attend the meeting of the 17th of February at which were present
the gentlemen named by him. I did not know before going the object of the meeting.
I was aware that the Manitoba government had sent to this administration a memorial
requesting, among other things, the extension of its boundaries northward to Hudson
bay. The words of the memorial are literally 'northward to Hudson bay.' I attended
that meeting and there were present Mr. Colin Campbell, Mr. Rogers, the premier and
perhaps the Minister of Justice.
Sir WILLIAM MULOCK. The Minister
of Justice was not present, so far as my
recollection goes, during the time I was
there. A few minutes after I arrived Mr.
Rogers,—who was the only minister from
Manitoba who spoke—explained that his
government desired the extension of the
boundaries of Manitoba easterly to the Hudson bay and northerly. The memorial said
northerly, and when he explained that they
desired an extension easterly to Hudson bay,
so as to include territory at the mouth of the
Churchill river and the Nelson river, I at
once observed that he was asking to extend
the territory of Manitoba easterly in a direction which would perhaps interest the
province of Ontario as well. Up to that moment, when it was only proposed, so far
as
the memorial went, to extend Manitoba
northerly,—although they may have intended
north easterly to come out at Hudson bay—
it did not occur to me that the desire was to
go to the mouths of those two rivers. Therefore so soon as that object was known to
me, I said that the province of Ontario
would have the right to be heard before we
could adjudicate upon that point or form
any opinion upon it. Mr. Rogers took the
ground that the province of Ontario had no
right or claim to any territory lying north
of that province and adjacent to Manitoba's easterly limit, and therefore had no
right to be heard. I controverted that view
and explained that I could not agree to it.
He said if you will allow me I can satisfy
you that Ontario has no right to be heard.
I replied that it would be a waste of time
to try and convert me on that point and
that, speaking as a minister from the province of Ontario, I must insist upon that
province being heard before this question
is gone into.
I did not succeed in influencing the Manitoba representatives and I turned to the
premier and informed him that, as a minister coming from Ontario, I was not prepared
to discuss these questions affecting
the rights of Ontario until the government of
that province was present and could submit its case. Upon that statement I withdrew
from the meeting, and I am told
3847
3848
that the claim for extension to Hudson bay
then and there ceased for the time being. I take the ground to-day, as a minister
from Ontario, without expressing any opinion as to how the territory should be divided,
that our province is entitled to an opportunity to present its case before the parliament
of Canada deals with it. In my opinion it is quite possible to make a fair distribution,
so that Ontario may be able to acquire a deep sea harbour and Manitoba be similarly
equipped on the Hudson bay. Our territory extends to James bay but I believe James
bay is shallow and not suitable ocean navigation, whereas when you go to the west
coast of Hudson bay, you have two possible ports, one at the mouth of the Nelson river,
which with dredging may be made a very good sea harbour, and it might be regarded
by the two provinces as a fair division of territory if Manitoba were given a harbour
at the mouth of the Churchill river and Ontario at Nelson river. That was the idea
that went through my mind when I heard of this claim ; and so far as the Papal Ablegate
is concerned, the statement made in this newspaper is the first intimation I have
that he took any part in the adjustment of the boundaries of Ontario. Long before
the interview in question, I had given, so far as a minister from Ontario could do
so, a decision as the attitude I assumed on that question, and that was that until
the province of Ontario could be heard, no conclusion could be come to.
Mr. R. L. BORDEN (Carleton, Ont.) I
have very little to say in respect of what
has fallen from the Prime Minister. I am
glad to know that the Prime Minister to-day
has not adhered to that reticence which has
characterized him on similar occasions in
the immediate past, and I suppose that it
might be fair to assume, that if he had
as good a case with respect to the ignoring
of his Minister of the Interior and his Minister of Finance in regard to important
measures as that which he has made today, with regard to the matter with which
he has dealt, he would have given us an
explanation that has not yet been made
with reference to the introduction of this
Bill without even consultation with these
two gentlemen. It is gratifying to
know that although two members of
his own government could not be consulted with regard to the provisions of
this Bill, the Postmaster General has been
so strenuous in his advocacy of the rights
of his province of Ontario that the ministers of that province had to be consulted.
However, there is an old proverb that charity well understood begins at home, and
possibly the rights of ministers to be heard
with regard to important matters to be
dealt with by parliament may be extended
not only to the provincial ministers of Ontario, but to ministers of this very administration.
3849 APRIL 5, 1905
I do not know anything about the letter
of the 23rd of February which has been referred to to-day except that I received a
telegram only this morning from the attorney general of Manitoba, who evidently
had observed that this letter had not been
included in the documents brought down,
and he asked me to mention the matter to
the Prime Minister and to see that it was
brought down with the other documents.
That is the only knowledge I have with
regard to it and it is quite evident that Mr.
Rogers and Mr. Campbell were thoroughly
under the impression that that letter had
not only been sent, but had been received
by the Prime Minister. Assuming that that
letter was written and should have been
received it seems to bear out very strongly
the view which Mr. Rogers had expressed
in the interview alluded to by the Prime
Minister. He says :
Sir, as we find it necessary to leave Ottawa
to-morrow, we desire to refer to our interview
of Friday, the 17th, respecting Manitoba's
claim for extension of her boundaries westward
and northward, when you were good enough
to suggest that if we would come here for two
or three days you would be in a position to
give us an answer respecting same.
They remained here not only two or three
days, but as the letter shows until the 23rd
of February, and they departed without receiving any answer or any intimation
beyond that. But they received an intimation from His Excellency Monseigneur Sbarretti
which has been dealt with by the
Prime Minister and by Mr. Rogers in his
interview. As to that I have nothing to
say to-day nor have I anything to say
with regard to the whole situation, although
it may afford an opportunity for a little
more debate later on. It seems to me that
the explanation of the Prime Minister which
has been made in consequence of the interview with Mr. Rogers might well have been
made at some earlier date. My right hon.
friend (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) is surely not
unaware that in two very important journals, one of which at least is in very close
touch with the administration and is supposed to have been controlled up to a day
or two ago by a very prominent member of
this administration, this very reason has
been put forward. I would think that when
a distinct rumour of that kind is heralded
throughout the length and breadth of this
country it might have been well for the
Prime Minister at an earlier date to take
an opportunity of contradicting that which
he has so strongly contradicted to-day. He
knows that every prominent journal in Canada has published words which are to be
found in the Northwest ' Review,' in the
later part of February or early in March
and which are as follows :
Two days after the ' Telegram ' had trumpeted abroad the Hon. Robert Rogers' great
hopes
for the western extension of Manitoba, the
same wise and prophetic journal deplores the
3849
3850
fact that there will be no such extension in
any direction. But it omits to give the reason
thereof. The only obstacle to the territorial
expansion of our province is its iniquitous and
cruel school system. Not even the wildest corner of any unorganized territory will
consent to
saddle itself with such a tyranny. Manitoba
must be content to remain small and mean so
long as it maintains its small and mean school
policy.
That is a pretty direct statement. In so
many words it says that until Manitoba alters its schools policy it shall not have
its
boundaries extended in any direction. That
or a similar statement in the press was
brought to the attention of the House and
my right hon. friend paid some attention to
it then, but did not pay attention to it in
this connection. I have observed his words
carefully. He said there was no intention on
the part of this administration to attempt
any remedial legislation with respect to
schools in Manitoba, but I did not observe in
my right hon. friend's remarks on that occasion any suggestion that the statement
I
have read was absolutely without foundation, may I observe to the right hon.
gentleman that it might have been better
in the interests of the whole country that
some such utterance as that which he has
made to-day should have been made in consequence of the statement in the press to
which I have referred ? In a journal, controlled as it is said—I know not with what
truth—by a member of the administration
until within the last two or three days, the
same statement is made in very specific
language, and it is right to observe also
that this journal claims to be the special
mouthpiece of the right hon. gentleman
(Sir Wilfrid Laurier). He has disclaimed
that and I accept his disclaimer to the full.
He says he is not interested in that journal.
but the journal itself declares that it is the
organ of the Liberal party, and that it is
under the direction and absolute control of
Sir Wilfrid Laurier. That journal has said :
The school legislation of the little province—
That is the province of Manitoba.
—is not of a nature to attract immigrants
who people the districts. The Northwest has
its separate schools, Manitoba has abolished
them.
Every good act has its reward, every bad act
its chastisement.
Manitoba will remain lowest with her pretentious law.
A little before that the same paper says :
In proportion to her big sisters Manitoba will
count as little more than a large county.
In view of these suggestions, they are
more than suggestions, in view of these direct statements, one of them made by a
journal supposed to be under the control of
a very prominent member of the administration, and claiming for itself to be under
the absolute direction and control of the
3851
COMMONS
right hon. gentleman (Sir Wilfrid Laurier)
in view of all this, might I not respectfully
inquire whether it would not have been well
for the right hon. gentleman on an earlier
occasion than that which he has selected to
have made to the country the statement
which he has made to-day.
I have nothing to say with regard to the
position which is said to have been assumed
by His Excellency Monseigneur Sbarretti.
He is not in any sense responsible to this
parliament, he is responsible only to his
ecclesiastical superiors in authority. The
only persons who are in any way responsible to this parliament are the government
of this country, and I thought that my right
hon. friend to-day might have gone a little
further than he did go. He knows as well
as any of the rest of us, that it has been
rumoured throughout this country, not only
rumoured but stated in the public press
that there were negotiations with His Excellency with regard to education in the
Northwest Territories if not in Manitoba.
My right hon. friend (Sir Wilfrid Laurier)
did not see fit to touch that question at all
to-day and I suppose when he thinks a proper occasion arises he will deal with it,
but
in the meantime I may call his attention to
the fact that the statements to that
effect are being made in the press
of the country ; upon what authority
I do not know. All I do know is
this, that when statements made in a very
much less direct manner, and on very slight
foundation were current in 1895 and 1896,
with regard to the Conservative administration of those days my hon. friend was always
ready to come forward and ask for
ministerial explanations and if necessary to
move the adjournment of the House in
order that they might be discussed.
In view of the attitude which he saw fit
to adopt ten years ago, we might have expected that he would have gone a little
further to-day when he called the attention
of the House to these circumstances. As I
said before, the matter may perhaps require
to be discussed a little further. I was not
aware that the right hon. gentleman intended to bring it up to-day in this somewhat
extended form. If necessary, it may be
brought up and discussed on a future occasion.
Mr. W. D. STAPLES (Macdonald). I
want to call attention for a moment to that
mysterious letter of the 23rd of February.
I think I can bring testimony to show where
this letter went, and I think I can trace
it to the right hon. the First Minister's
own residence. Now, on the 23rd of February the Hon. Mr. Rogers, after writing
this letter, asked me to see that it got over
to the hon. the First Minister. I rang the
bell from room No. 6, and there came a
messenger named Julius Beaulieu, I gave
the letter to him, and he said he would
deliver it. He says now there is no doubt
but that he did deliver the letter. Surely
3851
3852
we are living in a mysterious age, mysterious things are taking place every day,
and this is one of them. I wish to call the
right hon. gentleman's attention to another
statement he made. He told us to-day that
his memory is as fresh now as it was in his
younger days. He stated that the Hon.
Colin Campbell was on the floor of the
House on the 22nd day of February when
these Bills were introduced, which is not the
case. I may add regarding that letter that
I have been down and consulted the records
in the messengers department in this building, which show that this wonderful letter
went from room No. 6, and that it was delivered to the messenger at about the time
that the messenger states, it was carried to
the right hon. gentleman's residence on that
particular day, and they show that it went
from that particular room.
Sir WILFRID LAURIER. I want to correct my hon. friend. I stated that Mr.
Rogers was here on the 21st of February,
and I am sure of that ; and I stated that
Mr. Campbell was here also, but I was not
so sure of that and that is what I said. In
regard to the letter that was sent to my
House, I think that if it was sent to my
house it must have gone astray somewhere,
because I have never seen it. I really did
not suppose that anybody would suspect that
I would make an inaccurate statement in
regard to that.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN (South York). I intend for a few moments to refer to and comment upon the statement
made here to-day.
On February 27th I brought to the attention
of this House the very question referred to
just now by the leader of the opposition,
when I read a declaration of the French
newspaper called ' Le Soleil ,' saying it was
the organ of the government, and I also read
its editorial, which declared that Manitoba
wes being punished by a denial of extension
of her western or other boundaries because
of her school laws. The right hon.
gentleman repudiated all that. He said
there was no intention of punishing Manitoba, and he made light of the statements
I made. But since then it has
come out that that newspaper was his
newspaper, at least it has never been denied,
and a colleague of his, according to a statement in the papers, transferred the other
day
a large portion of the shares he held in that
paper to a senator who is a supporter of the
right hon. gentleman. It has been shown
by other quotations from papers supporting
the government that little Manitoba was
being punished for her iniquitious school
legislation, there is no doubt about that.
Now comes the Hon. Mr. Rogers, and his
statement has been read here to-day and
remains undenied in a great many respects so far as the Prime Minister
is concerned. Mr. Rogers says that he
received a letter from the Archbishop of
Ephesus, Monseigneur Sbarretti, and there
3853 APRIL 5, 1905
is no denial of that; there is no denial of
the fact that he waited upon the Apostolic
delegate at his residence. There is another
statement that the Papal ablegate presented
to him these amendments which he desired
to be put in the school law of Manitoba,
and that is the question before the people
of Canada to-day. Did this Archbishop of
Ephesus, the delegate Apostolic to Canada,
this delegate of the Pope—did he present these amendments to one of the
ministers of the province of Manitoba ?
And what were they ? They were in the
shape of a command that members of
the government of Manitoba should stultify
themselves by making provision in the law
in Manitoba for a separate school establishment, after it had been refused by the
legislature and by the people of that country,
and after the right hon. gentleman had .refused to pass remedial legislation or to
take
any hand in securing remedial legislation
for the Catholic minority of that province.
Well, that much has been proved. What
more has been proved? What more has
not been denied here to-day ? What is
singular is that which has not been denied.
Probably the right hon. gentleman is in no
position to deny it. Mr. Rogers says :
This invitation was accepted and His Excellency then presented the following memorandum,
remarking that if we would place this
on the statute-book of our province it would
greatly facilitate an early settlement of our
mission, the fixing of our boundaries, which
would be extended to the shores of Hudson
bay. His Excellency further added that our
failure to act in the past had prejudiced our
claim for extension westward.
Now is that true or is it not ? Is it true
that the delegate of the Pope told this member of the Manitoba government that their
failure to act in the past had prevented an
extension of their western boundary, and
that if they would give him this remedial
legislation now—for it is remedial legislation that he was seeking—they would get
their request for an extension to the
north. The people of Canada want to
know to-day if that statement was really
made. There has been no denial of it today. The Prime Minister says he cannot
deny it, but the people of Canada want to
know if it is true befdre any such Bill as that
now before the House is passed. What more
took place ? There has been no denial to
another statement of Mr. Rogers, namely,
that this office of Papal delegate to Canada
was created by the hon. gentlemen Opposite,
or rather was created at their request—there
is no denial of that. It is known now to
all the people of this country that we have
a Papal delegate here at the request of hon.
gentlemen opposite and that is proved in
this very document.
Sir WILLIAM MULOCK. Mr. Speaker.
the hon. gentleman is entirely misstating the
facts if he means by 'hon. gentlemen opposite ' the government.
3853
3854
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. I did not say that.
I said gentlemen sitting on the opposite
side of the House are responsible for this
Papal delegate being here.
Sir WILLIAM MULOCK. I suppose the
hon. gentleman would feel at liberty to attend to his own church without the permission
of parliament?
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Let me read what
Mr. Rogers says. The following extract has
not been denied:
It is desirable, if not necessary, that the mission of Monseigneur Merry Del Val should
be or
rather continued, and that he should be present in the midst of us for a more or less
prolonged time as the accredited representative
of the Holy See.
The hon. Minister of Justice, as Mr. Chas.
Fitzpatrick, and the right hon. Prime Minister, as Sir Wilfrid Laurier, and forty
other
colleagues of theirs in this House made the
representation to the Holy See and the hon.
the Minister of Justice, though acting as
Mr. Chas. Fitzpatrick, asked that this delegate should be sent to Canada. The statement
is here and it is not denied.
Sir WILFRID LAURIER. The hon. gentleman can read the petition. The petition
of the Catholic members was read in this
House. '
legal agent of this government in London
was used as a missionary to go to Rome to
have this appointment confirmed.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. I do not know.
This is an extract from the letter that Mr.
Russell presented in Rome :
I have just arrived at Rome once more at the
urgent request of the Catholic members of the
government and parliament of Canada. My instructions enjoin the to again renew to
Your
Eminence the desire which I had already the
honour to express to you, that His Holiness will
be pleased to nominate a permanent delegate
to Canada as a representative of His Holiness,
who would reside on the spot. but would be
outside all local interests.
That is not denied. Then, what else follows '3 Mr. Russell, the Canadian legal representative,
wrote to His Eminence as follows :
We do not solicit His Holiness to sanction as
perfect the concessions obtained, but that in his
wisdom he will be pleased to regard them as
a. beginning of justice.
Now, that is a very important statement.
The beginning of justice took place in 1896.
The completion of justice is taking place
in 1905, when the west is to be fettered in
3855
COMMONS
regard to her school freedom. In addition I
wish to refer to another thing. Does not
the right hon. gentleman, in the view of
responsible government, in the full conception we have of responsible government in
this country and in England, consider that
he is responsible for that delegate being
here and responsible for his conduct in this
country just as much as if he were one of
his own administration, or one of his own
civil service ?
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. The right hon.
gentleman and his colleagues laugh, but
they brought that high dignitary here. He
came at their request and for all the things
that he does in connection with the politics
and education of this country the right hon.
gentleman will find that he is held responsible, and as a matter of fact he is responsible,
within the full meaning of the British constitution.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Now, we have
had it very clearly pointed out in this debate so far that the ablegate is here at
the
request of the government.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. He is here, according to Mr. Russell's statement, which
has never been denied, at the request of
members of the government of Canada and
at the request of members of the parliament of Canada, and I say, and I say it in
the hearing of the people of Canada, that
the government of the day are responsible
because all the members of the government
are responsible for the acts of the individual members of the government and every
member who sits behind them and supports
the government is responsible for the conduct of the government in this matter. We
referred to Russian rule the other day. They
have the procurator general of the Holy
Synod in Russia, and it looks now to me as
if the Papal ablegate in this country occupies the same position as a member of this
government. Any way the evidence of that
is not denied ; it has not been denied to-day.
The Papal ablegate has had an oppourtunity
day after day of denying it. For some reason he has not seen fit to deny it and unless
he does deny it, it will be taken as true
that he did have that conversation with
Mr. Rogers, that he did press the acceptance
of these two amendments upon them, that
he did tell them that if they did accept
them they would find that their boundaries
3855
3856
would be extended to the north, and that the reason that their boundaries had not
been extended to the west was because of their school legislation. This is something
that the people want an explanation of. It is something of which no explanation has
been given here to-day and if the right hon. leader of the government thinks that
this is to pass off with the explanation made here to-day he greatly misunderstands
the situation of this country. There is a political crisis in this country, there
is a feeling of unrest that hon. gentlemen opposite pretend to ignore but it is here,
it must be dealt with and there is nothing that confirms it so much as the timidity
of hon. gentlemen opposite. They are afraid to do anything. They cannot fill the vacancies
in their cabinet. They cannot send the hon. member for London (Mr. Hyman) back for
the endorsation of his constituents, they are doing everything that men who have done
wrong and fear public censure could do, but they are not discharging their duty as
they ought to discharge it.
I do not know that the right hon. leader of the government made it clear whether any
of his colleagues had been in consultation with the Papal ablegate or not, but let
us recall what took place. It is well to bear in mind that there are two faiths in
this country ; there is the Roman Catholic faith and there is the Protestant faith,
and there is such a thing as keeping faith between the two faiths in this country.
How did this Bill come before parliament as far
as we know from the discussion which has
taken place here ? The right hon. leader
of the government, the hon. Minister of
Justice, and the hon. the Secretary of State,
three co-religionists, one with the other drew
up this Bill.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Now let me make
my statement. The hon. Postmaster
General (Sir William Mulock) and the hon. the
Minister of Customs (Mr. Paterson), who
are supposed to represent Ontario opinion,
as far as we know, were not present when
it was drawn up. Then, we have the further statement that the hon. Minister of
Finance (Mr. Fielding) and the hon. ex-Minister of the Interior (Mr. Sifton), both
men
who were supposed to represent the Protestant faith in the government,–I suppose
there has been some recognition of religion
in the formation of the cabinet—were not
consulted. But, on the contrary, by some
process of stealth, it was got past them.
There is no accounting for that, but the
fact remains that legislation was actually
introduced by three members of the government, and I am not saying anything as
reflecting on their religion in any way
whatsoever, but they happen to be of one
religion, and they did not consult with their
colleagues before the Bill was introduced.
3857 APRIL 5, 1905
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. It has been admitted that the hon. ex-Minister of the Interior knew nothing about
it and the hon.
Minister of Finance says he knew nothing
about it and they both have said in the
House that practically that Bill was introduced by stealth.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Then, another
thing; by stealth it was taken past the
members of the west, by stealth it was
taken past the representatives of the government in the Northwest Territories, and
by stealth it was taken past the caucus of
hon. gentlemen opposite, so that, as far as
we know, this Bill got into this House under the circumstances which I have stated
here to-day. Now then, there is another
thing and I want to deal with these questions as they have been stated here and as
they are. I take the full responsibility for
every thing I say. There is evidence now
in this country that the right hon. gentleman is paying his political debts at the
ex—
pense of the civil and educational rights of
the people of this country.
Mr. SPEAKER. Order. That is an imputation that the hon. member should not make,
Mr. SPEAKER. I think that is an offensive imputation which the hon. gentleman
should not make.
Mr. SPEAKER. As I understand, when
you are out of order and I have directed
you to do so, you will withdraw the statement which is out of order.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. What statement
do you object to? I said the right hon.
gentleman is paying his political debts
3857
3858
Mr. SPEAKER. Order. My ruling must
not be discussed; it I am wrong the hon.
gentleman has his remedy.
Mr. WHITE. Mr. Speaker, I do not wish
to call your judgment in question, but if
the point you make is that the hon. member
for South York is out of order in saying
that the right hon. the Prime Minister is
paying his political debts, it seems to me
that is straining the rule.
Mr. SPEAKER. The hon. gentleman (Mr.
White), as I understand it, misconceives
what the hon. member (Mr. W. F. Maclean) has said. As I understood him, he
said that the Prime Minister was attempting to pay his political debts by sacrificing
the civil rights of the people.
Mr. SPEAKER. In my judgment and
under my ruling, that is an offensive statement in reference to the Prime Minister.
which the hon. gentleman must withdraw.
If I am wrong in that, he has his remedy.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Mr. Speaker, I
must bow and withdraw, and I will have
an opportunity elsewhere of saying what
my opinion is. And now, Mr. Speaker, I
want to say this, that we have government
in this country—
Mr. SPEAKER. Order, please; or I
will be obliged to name you (Mr. Sam.
Hughes).
Mr. SPEAKER. I am again in the judgment of the House, when I call a gentleman
to order who says to another member who is
speaking. directing his reference to the
Speaker : Don't let him bluff you.
Mr. SAM. HUGHES. I rise to a point of
order. I rise to take the full responsibility
in this House for what I have said. I say
that the member for South York ought not
to be bluffed by any authority in this House.
3859
COMMONS
Mr. FOSTER. What will happen if you
are named? Will he call out: 'Colonel
Sam. Hughes' ?
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. My opinion is,
and I take the full responsibility for saying
it, and I intend to say it from one end of
this country to the other, that the government of this country is to-day due to two
things. The government of this country is
to-day due to a combination between a
solid Quebec and a corporation interest in
this country, which is centred in Toronto.
And what happened here the other night in
regard to the municipal rights of the city
of Ottawa is one instance of it.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Yes ; the municipal rights of the people of Ontario were
in question here the other night, and there
was a vote of eighty against them, and
forty-one of that eighty came from the province of Quebec. And this legislation which
is brought here today, this proposal to put
fetters on the people of the west in regard
to their educational authority, is a contribution to the demand from a solid Quebec
that the people of the Northwest shall be
deprived of their educational rights. The
people of the Northwest are here asking for
educational freedom, and I do not believe
they will get three or five votes from the province of Quebec. It is evident that
the province of Quebec is going out of its way—
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. It is evident that
the province of Quebec is going out of its
way to put fetters on and manacle the people of the west and deprive them of their
rights under the constitution.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Just let me bring
out an instance that shows it. The province
of Manitoba has been denied an extension
of her boundaries at the instigation of the
province of Quebec.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. I will prove it in
this way : that a solid Quebec within two
or three members will vote for this iniquitous proposition in regard to the autonomy
of the Northwest.
3859
3860
Sir WILLIAM MULOCK. Will the hon.
gentleman allow me to put a question to
him ? Speaking of the demand of the province of Manitoba to extend its boundary
easterly to Hudson bay, does he say, or
does he not, that the province of Ontario
should be heard before such a request is
conceded ?
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. And when the
Postmaster General said that the province
of Ontario ought to be consulted in regard
to a few waste acres, what about the people of the west, and the minister from the
west, and the government of the west, not
being consulted in regard to their civil and
educational liberties ? What is a bit of
land to a man's educational rights ? What
is a bit of land to a man's freedom and
religious liberty ? Coming back to the other
issue. When the little province of Manitoba
asked for an extension to the west, 'Le
Soleil' of Quebec denied that request, and
gave as a reason—
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Let me give you
another reason which also comes from the
province of Quebec. If Manitoba were
allowed to extend her boundaries to the
west, that portion of the new territory
brought into Manitoba would have no separate schools and that portion of the Territories
which remained in the new provinces would have the right to separate
schools under this legislation.
Mr. TURRIFF. The province of Quebec
has not the first thing to do, one way or
the other, with the extension of Manitoba
to the west—
Mr. SPEAKER. I understood the hon.
gentleman to say he wanted to ask a question.
Mr. TURRIFF. I want to ask what evidence he has that the province of Quebec
would prevent the extension of Manitoba to
the west ? It is the people of the Territories who object to the extension of Maui
toba westward.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. The province of
Quebec made the statement here through
one of its members that they helped to pay
for that land in the west, and they have
as much to say about it as the hon. gentleman (Mr. Turriff).
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. I am not going
to discuss private ownership of land in this
House. Now, Mr. Speaker, I have made it
clear—
3861 APRIL 5, 1905
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. The hon. gentlemen opposite like to throw out their gibes
and their flaunts, but it is clear that if the
province of Manitoba had been extended
westward, even if it were only one meridian, it would have knocked the constitutional
argument of the Prime Minister into
a cocked hat. And if Manitoba were extended westward, that portion included in it
would be free from this separate school
clause. Now, then, I want to deal with the
solid Quebec and what they are doing in
regard to this school question. This is a
question that never should have come into
this House. It is a local question which
could be settled in a local way, and which
should not be spread out in the Dominion
parliament as a federal issue. It should
have been settled in the province ; it should
have been left to the west.
Mr. BRODEUR. Mr. Speaker, I rise to a
point of order. I do not think the hon. gentleman should discuss the Bill which is
now
engaging the attention of the House.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Then I have this
to say, that this Bill which is the subject of discussion here to-day—
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. If hon. gentlemen will have it that way, I will leave
it with them ; but I have this to say in
conclusion, that any legislation which is attempted in this House in regard to this
matter will receive whatever opposition I
can command, and the opposition of a considerable number of the members from
Ontario. The right hon. gentleman is near
the exhaustion of his supplies, and, so far
as I am concerned, I wish to tell him now
that no legislation of the character that he
has introduced without consulting the people of the west will be allowed to go through
committee or any other stage as long as I
am able to oppose it, with some others who
will be associated with me in that work.
This legislation is not in the interest of the
people of Canada. There will be meetings
held in this country from one end to the
other.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. All right. Hon.
gentlemen may make these statements here ;
but let them come out on the platform with
me, and see who will get a hearing. Let
the right hon. gentleman open a constituency
in the west if he dare. Let him put up his
candidate in Centre Toronto to justify the
statements made here to-day. Let the Postmaster General dare to face a meeting in
the city of Toronto. He dare not go even
3861
3862
into his own constituency of North York
and discuss this Bill. I will go into North
York and discuss it before his own electors.
I challenge him now to name the day and
the place in North York where he will discuss this measure with me. Or I will resign
my seat if he will resign his seat, and I
will run against him in North York. Mr.
Speaker, I repeat that I will resign my
seat in South York and run against the
Postmaster General in North York where he
had a majority of nearly one thousand.
And I challenge the member for London
(Mr. Hyman) to resign his seat, and I will
go and run against him there. I challenge
my hon. friend from Centre York (Mr.
Campbell) to do the same. That hon. gentleman would have been to-day in the cabinet
but for this legislation ; but because of
this legislation his career is absolutely
wound up, and he dare not resign his seat.
But if he does, I will resign mine and run
against him in Centre York. Yes, I will
go further : I will resign my seat, and I
will run in Oxford if the government
care to make a vacancy there, and I
will make only the one issue, the abandonment of provincial rights by this government,
which at one time professed to be
the champion of provincial rights. Later
on I intend to expand much more fully on
this question, when I suppose I shall be
more in order than I am to-day. But I
do now challenge the Prime Minister and
those who sit alongside of him. Where is
the Minister of Justice (Mr. Fitzpatrick)
who is implicated in these statements, and
who ought to be here to-day ? I expect
hon. gentlemen opposite to make a statement on this matter to-morrow. I expect
them to go to the Papal ablegate, who is
here at their request, and get from him
a statement which will clear them of the
charge made to-day. The denial which has
been made is no denial. It is not even an
explanation to the country, which today is
demanding that an answer be made to the
statement made in that letter of Mr. Rogers
and no answer is forthcoming. The people
Want to know if those two propositions were
submitted to the Minister of Public Works
of Manitoba. The people want to know if
there was a reference in that interview to
the question of the Manitoba boundaries ;
and, if it is true, they want to know what
the government of Canada intend to do.
We know what President Cleveland did
with the British ambassador. The moment
he was trapped into making a statement
which he should not have made, President
Cleveland gave him his passport. I say
that the right hon. gentleman, as a member
of the Dominion government, and the forty
members of parliament who were associated
with him, are bound to send Mr. Russell to
Rome, even at the expense of the Dominion,
to ask for the recall of this Italian priest
who has had the temerity to interfere with
3863
COMMONS
the government of this country. Hon. gentlemen may laugh ; but we all know what
King John said—and let me tell these hon.
gentlemen that this is my sentiment—that
'no Italian priest shall tithe or toll in our
dominions.' Now, there is a proposal to toll
and tithe in our dominions by an outside
influence. The Prime Minister knows that
his statement was not in accordance with
the facts when he said that there was no
intention to interfere with the Dominion
school lands. There is practically an intention to interfere with the Dominion
school lands, and there is a proposition to
toll and tithe in our domains by an outside
influence. I leave hon. gentlemen to explain this matter before the country. They
have not explained it to-day ; I do not
believe they can explain it. I challenge
them to attempt to explain it before this
House. I challenge them to come out on
the public platform and try to explain the
statements that have been made here today.
Mr. H. H. MILLER. The hon. member for
South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean) has today quoted Shakespeare. I would like to
remind him of another quotation, the words
of one Shakespearian character to another:
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician,
Seem to see the things thou dost not.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Mr. Speaker: 1
rise to a point of order. I thought, when you
were so earnest in the discharge of your
duty to protect the good name of members
of this House, that the same earnestness
would have characterized your conduct towards the hon. gentleman who has referred
to me.
Mr. SPEAKER. If the hon. gentleman
had heard distinctly, he would have heard
me call that hon. gentleman to order also.
Mr. W. F. MACLEAN. Then I must ask
the hon. the Speaker to call on the hon. member to withdraw the statement.
Mr. SPEAKER. I call on the hon. member who applied the term ' scurvy politician'
to the hon. member for South York to withdraw the term.
Mr. MILLER. I beg to explain that I
made no accusation.
Mr. MILLER. I beg to withdraw the
quotation, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. HENRI BOURASSA (Labelle). Mr.
Speaker, I have no intention of following
the hon. member for South York (Mr. W. F.
Maclean) through the rambling speech which
we have just heard. I desire simply to ask
3863
3864
hon. gentlemen opposite if they really intend
to fasten on the parliament of Canada such
a reputation that in any civilized country we
would be looked upon as not worthy of enjoying liberty of speech and representative
institutions. In Russia where there is no
such thing as representative government, no
sane, no decent man would think of getting
up before any audience of peasants, deprived of the most primary education, and
make such an onslaught on the representative of His Holiness the Pope as has been
made in this House. Why, all the civilized
nations of the world entertain relations
with the head of the Catholic church. The
Protestant government of England entertains direct and official relations with the
Pope. The Protestant government of Germany, the Orthodox government of Russia—
in fact all the governments of the world, including the government of Washington.
entertain official relations with the Pope,
and no citizen of any one of these countries
would think for a moment that it was any
discredit to his country that it should hold
relations with the highest moral authority
acknowledged by the greatest number of
men in this world at present. The hon.
member for South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean)
has challenged the Postmaster General and
other members of this government and of
parliament to go and make an election in
their respective counties and to meet him on
the public platform. But on what ground,
Sir, does he invite them to make the election ? 0n the ground of provincial rights.
He had not even the courage to say what
really was the ground on which he wanted
to make the contest. If he had stated the
true grounds on which he would care to run
an election, he would have stated grounds
which might have been of some use in
England 300 years ago but would not be
tolerated in any civilized country to-day—
the ground of no popery and no romish
domination. That is the cry the hon. gentleman would like to raise. And that is the
kind of cry, as things have been going, the
past few weeks, which the leader of the
opposition will be charged with encouraging.
That is the cry which the leader of a once
respected party in the Dominion is lending
himself to.
Mr. R. L. BORDEN. I am charged with
that perhaps by the hon. gentleman but I
absolutely deny that anything of the kind
can be taken from any word I have spoken.
Mr. BOURASSA. The leader of the
opposition has got into this unfortunate position that he is not even capable of either
standing for or against anything which is
going on in his party. He will not be
charged with being the direct author or promoter of all the offensive and silly things
which are being stated in the organs of his
party and by some members of his party,
but he will be charged with not having the
courage and the manliness of standing up
3865 APRIL 5, 1905
and denouncing such an infamous policy.
And at a moment like this, when such appeals are being made to the worst passions
of the people, the leaders of great parties
who have not the courage to stand up against
this current of opinion and check the fanaticism of their partisans, are as responsible
as if they were the authors of them. Let
the hon. the leader of the opposition consult
some of his best and most enlightened
friends. Let him have a conversation upon
this question—I will not say with the hon.
member for Jacques Cartier (Mr. Monk) or
the hon. member for Beauharnois (Mr. Bergeron), who have shown by their speeches
that they had the courage to separate from
their party upon a question like this and
stand for truth and justice and fair-play—
but I will say to the leader of the opposition : let him consult the most enlightened
Protestant members of his party, those men
who have been educated in the political
school of the late Sir John Macdonald, and
ask them if the Conservative party is following a wise and a good course in allowing
itself to be dragged down to such depths of
political infamy, as it is being dragged into
by the Toronto ' News ' and the Toronto
' World,' and the hon. member for East Grey
(Mr. Sproule) and the member for South York
and the member for Victoria and Haliburton
(Mr. Sam. Hughes). These gentlemen may
meet with some success for a little while ;
but as a French Canadian, who has gone
time and again into the province of Ontario,
I have too much respect for the good people
of that province to think that even if they
may get excited a little while by such wild
appeals, they will stand for any such policy.
The member for South York (Mr. W. F.
Maclean) has defied any member of the government to go and meet him on the public
platform in the province of Ontario. Well,
Mr. Speaker, I am ready to accept that challenge. I am ready to meet the hon. member
for South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean) or the
hon. member for East Grey (Mr. Sproule) or
even the hon. and gallant member for Victoria and Haliburton (Mr. Sam. Hughes)
even with his man Turpin behind him—I
am ready to go and discuss the issue with
these gentlemen before any audience in the
province of Ontario. I do not say that I
would gather votes ; but I say that if any
man in this House, whether French or
English-speaking, Protestant or Catholic,
Liberal or Conservative, would go and appeal to the common sense and spirit of fair-
play of the people of Ontario he would, if
not gain votes, at least get a good hearing.
And I do not hesitate to say that in the long
run, when the heat of passion had subsided,
he might even ask for some votes on such
a ground.
As regards the propriety and the advisability of the presence of a Papal delegate
in
this country, I need not speak at length. I
need only mention, as I have done, that all
governments of civilized nations entertain
3865
3866
direct official relations with the Pope. My
hon. friend the Postmaster General has
said that this government had nothing to do
with the appointment of the Papal delegate.
As a matter of fact that is perfectly true.
But even if the government of Canada had
requested the Pope to send a delegate to this
country, would that be a greater sin than is
committed by other governments at Washington, Berlin, St. Petersburg, Vienna ?
Even the present anti-clerical French government at Paris, though the official relations
have been broken off, keep relations
with an unofficial representative of the Holy
See.
Mr. BOURASSA. No, I do not think there
is an official ablegate in London. But I understand there is an accredited representative
of His Holiness there who keeps up relations between the British government and
the head of the church. But the talents of
the hon. member for South York (Mr. W. F.
Maclean) have been wasted. He should
have gone to the old country some years ago,
when, through the representative of the
British government in Rome—not the representative accredited to the King of Italy
but
the representative accredited to the Pope—
the British government entered into negotiations with His Holiness in order to bring
about a better understanding between the
Irish party and the government of England.
Even in that small section of the British
empire from which, if I know anything of
their origin, my hon. friends from South
York and Victoria and Haliburton come,
there arose no cry of dissent to that proceeding. Even the Ulster Orangemen were not
prepared to find any fault if, through the
pacifying influence of His Holiness, the Irish
people could be brought to a better understanding with the King of England. My
hon. friend from South York (Mr. W. F.
Maclean) at the beginning of the session
made a plea for greater autonomy for Canada. Sir, the people of Canada would not
be worthy of greater autonomy if one great
political party of this country, which once
held the reins of the government for years
and which may again occupy office, has no
better understanding of what constitutes
the dignity of a nation, no better appreciation of the feelings of two millions of
their
fellow-citizens, and no better sense of the
manner in which a respectable government
should conduct the business of a self-reliant
and self-respecting people, especially in their
relations with foreign powers. And if the
government of the Pope was for a time a
foreign government from a temporal point
of view, it is to-day no longer a temporal
government but only a high moral government, guiding the spiritual affairs of 300,000,000
of human beings, among which are
12,000,000 respectable, law-abiding British
subjects, including 2,000,000 Canadians of
different origins. It is unworthy of mem
3867 COMMONS
bers of this House, of representatives of a
great party, and representatives of a great
province such as the province of Ontario, to
come here and by means of innuendoes and
insinuations and accusations which they
have not the courage to make openly from
their seats in parliament, to try and excite
religious strife. I say they dare not make
these openly because when you pin them
down to the crucial point, they say : Oh
yes, you are ruled by the Pope, and you are
under French domination, but what we are
ready to discuss in this House is provincial
rights and constitutional principles. They
are prepared to lead the people of Ontario
to vote for provincial rights, but to do so
animated by anti-Popish, anti-French feelings.
With reference to the request made by
the Catholic members of the Liberal party
to the Pope for the nomination of a Papal
ablegate, I have no shame in saying that
I have taken my share in that action; I
have signed the document, and I have no
shame either as a French Canadian, a Catholic, a British subject, or a member of
this House, for so doing. Sir, knowing and
appreciating as I do the liberty I enjoy as
a British subject, under the British Crown,
I was proud to ask the highest moral authority of the church to which I belong
to send here a Papal ablegate who would
see that good and proper relations existed
between the clergy and laity of Quebec, to
see that relations between the clergy and
laity would be such that there would not
be any cause of misunderstanding such as
those which occurred at certain times in
the past. The cause which induced the
Liberal Catholic members of this House
to seek the appointment of an ablegate here
was that we could not see eye to eye with
a certain part of our clergy as to the right
way of dealing with certain political questions. And, Sir, in that respect I want
to
remind the House of the words of one of
the greatest Protestant writers and philosophers of the nineteenth century, who has
said that the Catholic church was a great
school of respect. Appealing to the head
of the church, we found justice, enlightenment, breadth of view and respect for the
rights of the people. At one time or another there was trouble between the clergy
and people of Quebec. Hon. gentlemen opposite are always talking about the priest-
ridden people of Quebec, about the clerical
domination under which the poor habitant
is resting; but, Sir, do you know that we
never stood from our clergy the kind of
sermons and political interference that has
been going on for the last month in Ontario ? For what reason did we ask the
Pope to send an ablegate out here ? Exactly to prevent what is going on now in
the province of Ontario. And this was not
the first time that an ablegate was sent to Canada. The same thing was done in 1876
and later on on the 80's. But how was it in
3867
3868
those days ? The arch-defenders of British
citizenship and of loyalty to Protestantism
never raised their voices against the relations which existed between the Catholics
of the province of Quebec and the Pope.
Why ? Because of political reasons; because in those days the people of Quebec
and the majority of the Catholic people
kept them in the fats of office. Sir, I am
sorry to see that a question which is put on
this high ground of national feeling and
fidelity to religious principle must after
all be brought to that very low placed feeling of a thirst for office. These gentlemen,
having found that their fiscal policy was of
no influence with the people, that the country had no confidence in them, thought
that
there was in this country a sufficient number of people who would still believe in
the old tales about the Gunpowder Plot, the
Guy Fawkes conspiracy, and other matters
that were taught 150 years ago, but which
the poorest schoolmaster in England would
be ashamed of mentioning, except possibly
as the remnant of a legend which existed
in the times of credulity in that country.
That may appear to be exaggerated. But
not later than a few days ago I read in a
newspaper that proposes to enlighten the
people of Canada, a statement to the effect
that the same conspiracy, the same dark
and sinister organization and the same powerful people who are now trying to shackle
the people of the west, that same power
of the province of Quebec, headed by the
hierarchy that was trying to prevent the
free people of the west from enjoying their
liberty, could be related to the same man,
to the same power and the same influences
that brought about the Gunpowder conspiracy ! I have seen that statement printed
in the columns of either the ' News' or the
'World,' because these two papers constitute a pair, and I cannot say which is the
silliest. But, Sir, even when I read such
things, printed in the twentieth century,
in leading newspapers, published in a city
like Toronto, and in a province like Ontario,
I refuse to believe that you would find a
majority of the people of Ontario who would
believe such silly talk. I cannot believe it,
and I must say that the member for South
York (Mr. W. F. Maclean), in the allusions
he has made to-day, just as in the cartoons
which are published every day in his newspaper, is simply putting on his province
the
greatest slur that could be cast on it by
any man. Sir, if I would stand up in this
House and say that the province of Ontario
is filled with a population of ignorant people, with a drown-trodden people under
the
control of the Methodist ministers, by
which you could organize any kind of conspiracy to deprive the Catholic church of
their power, to unthrone the Pope and
prevent the priests of the province of Quebec from saying mass, I would not be saying
more silly things than you read every day in three or four columns of the 'World'
3869 APRIL 5, 1905
or the 'News.' These newspapers are trying to create outside of Ontario the impression
that Ontario is one of the most ignorant places on earth. I refuse to believe
that. I refuse to believe that a majority
of the people of Ontario can be carried by
such an appeal. If any constituency in
Ontario should be opened, I would be prepared to enter it, and unless the hon. member
for South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean),
and the hon. member for Haliburton (Mr.
Sam. Hughes), with his man Turpin and
the seventeen men who took General de
Villiers and let him skip off the next morning—unless these two gentlemen would
come together and throw stones at me, I do
not think I would be prevented from speaking in Ontario, standing for the rights of
my people, for the rights of justice in this
country; standing for the good reputation
of our country, and saying that it is just
as legitimate for the Catholics to have here
a representative of the highest spiritual authority on earth, as it is legitimate
for the
government of any civilized country to have
a representative of the Pope, to have an
ablegate to look after what ? Not to look
after political questions, but to look after
the interests of the church. And what are
the interests of the church in any country ?
The interests of the church include everything which looks to the development of
the religion to which that church belongs
and all such things must be looked after by
that Papal ablegate.
I know nothing of what may have occurred between Monseigneur Sbarretti and
Mr. Rogers, and I think it is most absurd
to come into this House and ask any member of the federal House to give an account
of what may have occurred between the
Papal ablegate and a member of the Manitoba cabinet. If the hon. member for South
York was so excited over the liberties of
the people of Canada, he should have had
some friend in the Manitoba house to raise
the question and put Mr. Rogers on trial
in Manitoba, before the people of that
province, to whom he is responsible. If,
Sir, it is such a nasty thing for the Catholics to have called for an ablegate to
come
into this country to look after their own
affairs, after their own interests as Catholics, how is it that the hon. member for
South York (Mr. IV. F. Maclean) has nothing to say against Mr. Rogers. a Protestant
statesman, who comes here and entertains
relations with Monseigneur Sbarretti? If
it was a sin, and a sin for which any man
in this House should be arraigned before
the people of Canada, it it was a sin for
Sir Wilfrid Laurier, for Mr. Brodeur, for
Mr. Lemieux, for Mr. Bourassa, or any
other hon. gentleman in this House to ask
the Pope to send a representative to look
after their own affairs, then what a crime
has been committed by a member of the
Manitoba government and of the legislative
assembly of Manitoba, by a Protestant
3869
3870
statesman, in having an interview with
Monseigneur Sbarretti ? I do not suppose
that Mr. Rogers was troubled in his conscience and wanted to get absolution for
his sins. So I presume that he visited His
Excellency, acting in his official and political capacity. Therefore, if anybody must
be denounced before the Protestantism of
this country, if anybody must be denounced
before the crowds of the county of South
York, and must be burned or brought to
the scaffold, it is Mr. Rogers, member of
the Manitoba government. But, Sir, no, I
would never think of making that kind of
appeal; I acknowledge Mr. Rogers' right to
go and meet Monseigneur Sbarretti and
have a conversation with him. If the member for South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean)
and the member for Victoria and Haliburton
(Mr. Sam Hughes), would go and see Monseigneur Sbarretti and talk with him, I
think it would do them a great deal of
good—if any improvement is possible for
those gentlemen—I am sure it would do
them good. As for the hon. member for
East Grey (Mr. Sproule), I do not think
any improvement is possible with him, because I think he is desperately sincere.
But, coming back to our action in having
a Papal ablegate to be appointed, we did
it because we thought it was our duty to do
it. Monseigneur Sbarretti has succeeded
Monseigneur Falconio in the same capacity
that Monseigneur Martinelli exercised at
Washington where he has been succeeded by
Monseigneur Falconio transferred from Ottawa. These prelates have been here representing
the church, to look after the interests of the Roman Catholics of Canada.
As I have said, I know nothing of what
passed between Mr. Rogers and Monseigneur
Sbarretti, and I would advise the hon. member for South York to call on them if he
wants to know what transpired between
them. But suppose that Monseigneur Sbarretti did discuss with Mr. Rogers the rights
of the Catholics of Manitoba, suppose he
did ask Mr. Rogers to do something for the
Catholics of Manitoba, where in the name
of justice and common sense is there anything wrong in that? Here is a dignitary
of the Roman Catholic Church, sent here to
look after the interests of the people belonging to his church, and what harm is there
in his meeting another gentleman and asking him if something could not be done for
the interests of his people? Now, we have
in this city a consul from the United States,
he is here to look after the interests of the
American people living in this country and
the interests of American citizens who may
be trading in this country; suppose he finds
something in our tariff which he thinks is
prejudicial to their interests, would it be a
great sin for that gentleman to meet the
Minister of Trade and Commerce and ask
if some change could not be made? Sir,
it is about time that we should look at these
questions from a common sense point of
3871
COMMONS
view, and with greater breadth of mind.
Monseigneur Sbarretti, in discussing with
Mr. Rogers the interests of the Catholics
of Manitoba, was not only acting within
his rights, but was fulfilling his duty. As
I said, I have not the slightest knowledge of
what took place between them; but the idea
of hon. gentlemen getting up in this House
and talking about a conspiracy of the hierarchy, about the dark and sinister designs
of the church, because a member of the
local legislature of Manitoba has thought fit
to hold an interview with the representative
of the highest spiritual power in our church,
I say that it is entirely unworthy of the
dignity of a member of this House and the
representative of a free people.
Hon. PETER WHITE (North Renfrew).
I am sure that if the object of my hon.
friend from Labelle (Mr. Bourassa) was to
raise this discussion out of the rut into
which he says it has fallen, the region of
race and religion he has signally failed
in doing so ; because during all the
long years in which I have sat in parliament I do not think I ever listened to a
more inflammatory speech than that to
which the hon. member for Labelle has just
treated this House. For my own part, speaking as a Protestant and as a representative
of an Ontario constituency, I have to say,
and I think the House will agree with me,
that I have not the slightest objection to the
bringing of a Papal delegate here to superintend the religious affairs of the Church
of
Rome. For my own part I have a great
admiration for the moral teaching of the
Church of Rome, although I do not believe
in its tenets. But I do say as a citizen of
this country that when the allegation is
made that the Papal delegate, who comes
here properly enough to fulfil the purpose
for which he was brought—though the manner in which he was brought might not be
acceptable to many of us who sit on this
side of the House—though he came here
properly enough to supervise the affairs of
the church of which he is a distinguished
dignitary; but I say that when it is alleged
by the newspapers and by a leading member of the government of Manitoba, that
that gentleman has interfered in a matter
that does not belong to the domain of the
Church of Rome at all, then I say that the
people of this country, and at all events
those of us who sit on this side of the
House, have a right to complain. Now.
Sir, what are the facts in relation to this
matter? I am not here to relate the facts,
because I do not know them. I accept to
the fullest extent the statement made by
the right hon. leader of the government that
he had no knowledge of these negotiations
going on between the Papal delegate and the
representatives of the province of Manitoba;
but I say that if these negotiations did go
on according to the allegation that has
been made, then Monseigneur Sbarretti
ought not to remain in this country a single
3871
3872
hour longer than those gentlemen who secured his presence here can manage to effect
his recall by communicating with his superior in Rome. I think it is their duty, it
is the duty of those forty members of this
parliament who secured his presence here.
and especially is it the duty of the leader
of the government, at the earliest possible
moment, at once to communicate with the
head of the church in Rome and secure the
recall of that gentleman—if, I say, it be
proven that these allegations made with regard to him are true.
Now, Sir, I want to say one word with
reference to a statement made by the hon.
member for Labelle respecting the hon. leader of the opposition. The hon. member for
Labelle said that the hon. leader of the opposition had no opinions of his own, that
his opinions were simply moulded by those
who were following him in this House. I
think, Sir, it ill becomes any supporter of
the right hon. leader of this government to
make a statement of that kind with regard
to the leader of the opposition, when we
know as a matter of fact, from the mouth of
the right hon. gentleman the leader of the
government himself, that his policy with regard to those important Bills which are
now
under discussion, was changed and modified to a material degree by the pressure of
his followers in this House. Sir, I am sorry
that I have been obliged to rise upon a question of this kind. But I thought it my
duty
to do so, and I consider I hold moderate
views both political and religious. I have
no objection to any man's political or religious views. but I do think that it is
an unfortunate thing that an hon. gentleman like
the hon. member for Labelle should take
the course which he has taken here today
and that he should accuse hon. gentlemen
on this side of the House of endeavouring
to inflame the public mind in this country.
Mr. WHITE. I hear some hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House laugh.
What was the object which my hon. friend
from South York (Mr. Maclean) had in making the proposition that he made to hon.
gentlemen opposite ? He had a right to
call in question the conditions that exist
upon the other side of the House. He had
a right to express his opinion that the failure of the right hon. the leader of the
government in filling the vacancy in the portfolio of the Interior and in filling
the position which has practically been vacant in
the Public Works Department and he had
the right to assume that the failure of the
right hon. the leader of the government to
fill these positions was because he feared
public opinion in the country. It was. I
assume, because he took the ground that
the right hon. the leader of the government
fears to open any constituency in the province of Ontario, or in any of the English
speaking provinces at the present time,
3873 APRIL 5, 1905
that my hon. friend made the challenge that
he did make to hon. members on the other
side of the House. As I stated a moment
ago, I am loth to discuss a question of this
kind. 1 have no desire whatever to discuss
a question which raises distinctions of creed
or nationality. I think we ought to be as
one people throughout this country and I
may say this for the province of Ontario
to which I belong that whatever may be the
opinions of our hon. friends from the province of Quebec they will find as much liberality
and toleration in Ontario as can be
found in any part of the world.
Mr. T. S. SPROULE (East Grey). Mr.
Speaker, I did not intend to say anything
on this subject just now, but for the
frequent references to myself by the
hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa).
They were very pointed. Whether he
considered them offensive or not, to
my judgment, they were offensive and
they were uncalled for and nothing on
my part, as far as my judgment enables me to determine, would justify the
references which the hon. gentleman made
to me. He started out by asking a very
significent question : Are we like the serfs
of Russia that we have not freedom of
speech in this House ? Are we ? The exhibition we had for the following twenty
minutes is the best answer I can give to
that question, because, if there ever was
in any civilized country in the world, a desire to restrict freedom of speech the
tirades
to which he has treated this House, ought
to have induced this House not to have listened to him. Now, the hon. gentleman
went on to say that my hon. friend the
leader of the opposition (Mr. R. L. Borden)
and his party are opposing the Pope. What
justification had he for that statement ?
What word was ever said from this side
of the House that would justify that statement ? 'Not a single word that I have heard
and none that I am aware of. But, he says
that we are opposing his church. Was
there anything said in the shape of abuse
of his church ? There is no desire or intention to abuse his church, but our desire
is to give that church its rights the same
as every other church in the country and
to respect its rights as much as we respect
the rights of every other church. Then,
the hon. gentleman said : Has not every
civilized government in the world its Papal
representative, its ambassador ? He asks
the question which I can answer by telling
him that there is not one in France to-day.
Diplomatic relations have been broken off.
Then, why should the hon. member for Labell stand up and say that we are worse
than France, that we are worse than England and that we are worse than other
countries ? I could point to many countries, even Italy itself, in which diplomatic
relations do not exist between the Pope and
the government. Do they exist in the
United States ? Not at all. There is, it
3873
3874
is true, a Papal representative, but to deal
with the church, not to negotiate with the
state, and he has no relationship with the
government of the United States and does
not pretend to exercise any authority over,
or to assume the right to dictate or to negotiate with the government in regard to
matters of state. So that, in no civilized
country that he has mentioned is there a
condition known to exist which the hon.
gentleman claims is all right in this country. There are a few questions which I
think you might reasonably ask. We know
that there is a Papal delegate here. That
is a self evident fact, but we might ask
the question : Who brought him here ?
Some one has stated that it was the present government. Well, I think that was
too wide ; I would say that the Reform
party brought him here. The right hon.
leader of the government (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) does not deny that he was one of the
forty who sent an application to the Pope
to send a delegate here. We are not objecting to it and do not object to it if he
confines his duties to the work that the right
hon. gentleman told us was the work for
which he was brought here. What was he
brought here for ? What did he come for ?
The right hon. gentleman has told us what
he came for. There was a difference between us and the bishops of our church and
it was to settle disputes between the Roman
Catholic people and their clergy. If he
confines his operations to that I say we
have no reasonable ground for complaint.
He has a right to be here and remain in this
country just as long as he likes and so far
as he can succeed in readjusting the differences between the Roman Catholic people
and their bishops it is nothing that concerns
us and we do not desire to interfere with
him in any way. Has he confined his operations to that line ? This is the first time
in the history of Canada that we have had
such an ablegate. Commencing with Monseigneur Mery Del Val, the hon. member for
Labelle stated that we have had several
of them before. I believe there was one
away back in the eighties but it was
scarcely found out he was in the country
until he was out of the country. The hon.
member for Labelle does not wait to hear
any criticism that may be made of his remarks or to answer any questions that may
be asked of him. We know that he is a remarkably valiant man and that he displays
a great deal of that peculiar grace which is
indicative of courage. But he seems always to exemplify the old saying that :
He who fights and runs away
May live to fight another day,
for every time he finishes speaking he gets
up and clears from the House. He has
not the moral courage to sit there and listen
to the replies to his tirades or answer the
questions that may be asked him. Therefore,
he ought to be the last one to talk about
a lack of courage. But, what are the
3875
COMMONS
duties of this Papal delegate ? We were
told that his duties were to settle differences between the Roman Catholic people
and the church and as long as he confines
himself to those duties we have no complaint to make. It is a fact well known in
this country that in 1896 there was a difference between the present Reform party,
or
at least one portion of that party, the
Roman Catholic element of the party, and
the bishops in regard to the school question
and it was said that the Papal delegate was
brought here for the purpose of settling that
difficulty. So long as he attempted to settle that difficulty you heard no complaint
from any Protestant in this country as to
what he was doing and no complaint that
he was here. But, is he confining himself
to the interests of the church ? The hon.
member for Labelle says that he has a perfect right in the interests of his church
and
of his co-religionists to take part in anything
which is going on and in which that church
is directly interested. In my judgment he
has no right to go the distance that it is
alleged he has gone. Now, it is said sometimes. and I think correctly said, that eternal
vigilance is the price of liberty.
The history of the ages has taught that
lesson over and over again, and the maxim is
as true today as when it was first announced. The complete separation of church
and state is another principle recognized in
the history of the English parliament long
ago. That principle was adopted in constitutional government, and we are trying to
live up to it and we desire to carry it out to
the fullest extent. When we took the clergy
reserve lands from the church and
distributed them for' the benefit of the
state we asserted that principle because
we desired there should be no semblance of connection between church
and state. We declared that every church
should stand on its own footing and we have
lived up to that according to the best of our
judgment. But as I said, eternal vigilance
is the price of liberty, and when we see any
encroachment on that principle we are bound
to draw attention to it in the interests of
our constitutional rights and in the interest
of our constituents. That is what we are
doing to-day. Since the settlement of the
clergy reserve lands we have not had that
question up until today, when it comes forward again in a different way in connection
with the presence of the Papal ablegate
here. We fought against the contention of
the church in 1898, because we believed it
was the church that was making the fight
against the rights of the people of Manitoba.
The Prime Minister and his friends joined
with us in that fight, and I stood up here
day atter day and night after night to defend the rights of the people against improper
interference. I am glad to know I
had the assistance and support of Sir Wilfrid Laurier and his friends in that fight,
With his sunny ways and his diplomatic
3875
3876
ability he succeeded in arranging that trouble
and bringing about conciliation and harmony where they did not exist before. But
it was out of that incident that grew the
troubles which induced him to bring this
Papal delegate here. Is there not to-day interference by the church with the rights
of
the state ? Can we believe what appears in the newspapers of this city from day
to. day, that every time there has been a
crisis in connection with this Bill the Prime
Minister has visited that Papal delegate and
every change that has been made has been
made with his knowledge and on his advice. We are told that the Bill was submitted
to him and that the Bill was satisfactory. to him or otherwise it would not have
been introduced into this House. Then
there is the strange coincidence that on the
13th of February, the Manitoba delegates
were invited down here to consider the question of extending the boundaries of Manitoba
; on the 16th they reached here ; on
the 17th they had a conference with the
Prime Minister who asked them to remain
four or five days when they would get an
intimation as to the position of the government. They remained in obedience to that
request and though he said he denied certain statements categorically and in toto
he
did not as a matter of fact deny some of
them categorically. He does not deny that
he asked Mr. Rogers to remain here. And
what happened. On the 17th of February
they had a conference, on the 20th they were
invited by the Papal delegate to visit him,
and on the 21st the Bill was introduced. I
noticed the Minister of Agriculture coaching the member for Labelle to draw attention
to the fact that Mr. Robert Rogers and
Mr. Colin Campbell were with the Papal
delegate trying to negotiate with him. But,
Sir, they were there in answer to a respectful invitation to visit him. Did they not
show respect for the high position he occupied ? Did they not show the ordinary courtesy
which one man would show to another
when they accepted that invitation and went
there not knowing the purpose for which
they were invited. He told them that if
they would amend their law and give separate schools to Manitoba, they could have
the boundary question settled at once, but
they would not agree to that and the Bill
was introduced the very next day. The
Prime Minister said nothing about the extension of the boundaries of Manitoba when
he introduced the Bill, except to say that it
could not be done. and he did not deign the
courtesy of a reply to the Manitoba delegates. The Prime Minister has told us that
he did not remember receiving a letter from
the Manitoba delegates written on the 23rd
of February asking for a reply, and it turns
out that that letter was sent to the Prime
Minister's house. I will not say that his
letter reached the hands of the Prime Minister because it may never have reached his
hands, but at all events it verifies the state
3877 APRIL 5, 1905
ment made by Mr. Robert Rogers, that
from that day to this they have never received the reply they believed they were entitled
to. Was that the way to treat the
accredited representatives of the Manitoba
government ? Is that complimentary to the
dignity of the Prime Minister of this federal
parliament of his ministers. It is not. I
assume that the statements made in the
newspaper is correct because the First Minister, did not deny it, and the next step
was
that there was an invitation to the premier
of Ontario to set up a claim for a portion of
that territory.
Mr. SPROULE. I inferred from what appeared in the paper that by some means or
other there was an intimation conveyed to
Mr. Whitney that it was desired that he
should put up some claim. At all events
the suggestion was made in the speech of
the Prime Minister, and I have no doubt
he had friends enough to bring that to the
attention of Mr. Whitney. At all events, Ontario set up a claim and this government
took advantage of that to say : We cannot
settle the boundary of Manitoba because
Ontario has set up a claim to that territory.
Why did the First Minister say that a settlement could only be reached after a conference
between Quebec, Ontario and Manitoba ? What interest had Quebec in it ;
it did not touch the boundaries of that province in any way. However, the Prime
Minister since arbandoned that contention.
We do find however, that according to the
statement of Mr. Robert Rogers, the boundaries of Manitoba are not extended because
Manitoba will not grant separate schools ;
and we find that the provisions of the Bill
which were submitted to that ablegate—if
we can believe what appears in the press,
fasten separate schools on these new provinces for all time to come. That Bill was
only accepted by the members from the west
when some amendments were proposed,
which amendments were submitted to the
Papal delegate and approved of by him before they were submitted to parliament.
Then I ask is this Papal ablegate going
beyond his duty ? Is he interfering with
the rights of the state ? In my judgment
he is. So long as he confines himself to the
rights of his church, we have not a word to
say against him ; but we respectfully deny
the right of any dignitary representing that
church, for which we have the greatest
respect, or representing any other church,
to come here and interfere with the rights
of the state. In the name of this country
we protest against it ; in the name of constitutional government, which we represent,
we protest against it. Who has been responsible for this unprecedented act ? The
present government and their friends of
the Reform party. They brought him here,
and they have not put a single check upon
3877
3878
him, so far as we know. I need not go
into the history of his being here ; but I
want to ask one very important question.
When all these negotiations were going on
with regard to this Bill and when the knowledge that the Papal ablegate was taking
a
particular interest in it was so apparent,
where were the Protestant members of the
cabinet ? Where was the Minister of Customs (Mr. Paterson) who took such an interest
in the subject the other night? Where
was the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding),
who made such a pitiable excuse for the Bill,
and declared that government could not be
carried on in this country if it were defeated, because there would have to be a
Protestant government formed ? Where
was the lynx-eyed Postmaster General (Sir
William Mulock). the only Protestant representative on that subcommittee to which
the Bill was submitted? Where is there
any evidence that he lodged any protest
against the improper interference of the
Papal ablegate ? Where was the Minister
of Trade and Commerce (Sir Richard Cartwright)? And, lastly, where was the ex-
Minister of the Interior (Mr. Sifton), who
fought so vigorously before against interference with the rights of Manitoba ? It
is true, he lodged his protest against the
government and went out as a rebuke to
them for their improper conduct ; but to
day he is silenced, he is chloroformed. And
the other ministers seem to be chloroformed,
for we have not a word from them.
Who among them represents the great Protestant element of this country ? You can
speak freely on behalf of the other side;
but if you raise your voice as a Protestant,
it would seem as if you were almost a fugitive from justice. That is the kind of toleration
that we are treated to in this
House. It is toleration all on one side,
with no evidence of any on the other side.
Let us have a little more of it on that side.
Let charity begin at home. Let our Roman
Catholic friends show some charity and to]erance towards those opposed to them, and
then they will have very much less trouble
in this country. I do not wish to continue
this discussion longer, but I did wish to say,
and I repeat it, that we are to-day as firmly
opposed to church interference with the
state as we ever were in this country. It
must come to an end, and it must come to
an end now. What is the logical sequence
of all this ? It is admitted, and the circumstances justify the conclusion, that
Manitoba's boundary is not extended because of the interference of the Papal ablegate.
There is no doubt about it whatever.
Then, let the government say that as a protest against that interference they will
extend the boundary of Manitoba, and hereby show that the state is the supreme
arbiter in this country, and the province of
Manitoba will get its rights. Until that is
done, there will be a lingering suspicion in
the minds of the Canadian people that the
3879
COMMONS
Papal ablegate did interfere, not only with
that question, but with the other important
question that is engaging the attention of
parliament at the present time, the question
of granting autonomy to the new provinces in
the Northwest, and the educational clauses
in connection therewith.
Mr. SAM. HUGHES. Mr. Speaker, I rise
on a personal matter. The hon. member for
South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean) was this
afternoon called to order on a certain point.
After some hesitation, he obeyed the ruling
of the chair and proceeded with the discussion, when the hon. gentlemen behind the
First Minister, who are a little too prone to
make unseemly interruptions, not only to
the hon. member for South York but to
other members of this House interrupted
the hon. gentleman. He paused, when I
said to him : 'Don't let them bluff you,'
I take the responsibility of the words I
used, and I was justified in saying what I
did. My remark had no reference to the
Speaker, and I protest against being called
to order.
Mr. SPEAKER. The words as I distinctly
heard them were : 'Don't let him bluff you.'
If the hon. member now says that his reference was not to the Speaker, I accept his
statement ; but at the time it was perfectly
clear to me that the reference was to myself. I desire also to say that interruptions
are becoming a little too frequent, not only
from the side referred to by the hon. gentleman, but also from the hon. gentleman's
own side, and from himself.
Mr. SAM. HUGHES. The only interruption I made to-day was perfectly legitimate
and within my right, and therefore I must
protest against being called to order.
Mr. SPEAKER. I have accepted the hon.
gentleman's statement. The only point is
that the hon. gentleman should have called
the attention of the House to that at the
moment.
Motion agreed to.
At six o'clock, House took recess.
PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT IN THE
NORTHWEST.
House resumed adjourned debate on the
proposed motion of Sir Wilfried Laurier for
the second reading of Bill (No. 69), to establish and provide for the government of
the
province of Alberta, and the amendment
of Mr. R. L. Borden thereto.
Mr. URIAH WILSON (Lennox and Addington). Mr. Speaker, the Bill now under
discussion is one of the most important
measures that have come before this House
since I have had the honour of a seat in it,
and I feel that it is my duty to have somethings to say upon it, representing as I
do
one of the old rural constituencies of the
province of Ontario. For many years no Bill
has attracted so much public attention as
this Bill, perhaps more especially because of
the school clause contained in it. But before I come to the school clause, I want
to
say a few words about the division of the
Territory that has been made by the government. In the first place, I think the government,
before the last general election,
fully intended to divide the Northwest Territories and give them provincial autonomy,
and it seems to me that it was their duty
to have said something to the public on the
subject, so that the public would have had
some understanding of the measure, instead
of having to go it blind, as they did on that
occasion. I am quite sure that if the details of the Bill had been known to the people,
there are a good many constituencies
both in the province of Ontario and in the
western country that would have been very
differently represented in this House from
what they are now. There was some correspondence, I believe, with Mr. Haultain,
the Prime Minister of the Territories, but,
so far as I have been able to learn, there
was not one word in that correspondence
with reference to the details of the Bill.
although there was a promise that at this
session of parliament a Bill would be introduced granting autonomy to the Northwest
provinces. I am not at all disposed
3893
3894
to agree with the government in the division
they have made, creating two provinces
out of the Northwest Territories and leaving Manitoba with its present area. I think
that it is most unfair to the province of
Manitoba, which, if left as it is at present,
will be crippled for all time to come. Manitoba being the oldest province of that
western country ought to exercise its full proportion of influence in the Dominion,
which
it can never do if it is, as it were, simply a
postage stamp on the map of Canada. I
have heard accusations made against the
government—and I do not like to say harsh
things unless I am positive they are true;
but a good deal has been said about the
course pursued by Manitoba with regard to
separate schools having something to do
with her not being able to get her territory
enlarged. There is no doubt that the province of Manitoba should be enlarged and
very greatly enlarged. If the government
had considered Manitoba and the Northwest Territories together, and had formed
them into two provinces instead of three,
it would have been a far better arrangement.
Not only that, but they would not have
been unduly large if we had made two
provinces of what are now three, or will
be after the 1st July, should these Bills
carry. The two new provinces contain
500,000 miles, and if we added to them the
73,000 miles that Manitoba contains, that
would simply make 573,000 miles altogether. Divide that by two, and you would
have two provinces, each with 286,500 miles,
as compared with British Columbia, which
has 372,620 miles, Quebec, which has 351,873, and Ontario, 260,862 miles. You can
easily see, therefore, that if the government
had taken into consideration the desirability of having only two provinces instead
of
three, neither of the two would have been
unduly large. Then consider what an
amount of money would have been saved
by this means. In fact, the complaint in
this country for a great many years has
been that we have too much government
and that our people are paying too much
for government. I think it is pretty generally conceded that it would be to the advantage
of the maritime provinces to have
only one local government instead of three.
It that were the case, they would be quite
as strong, or even stronger in this House,
than they are now, as three separate provinces each with its own administration.
When dealing with the Northwest Territories, the government should have had a
view to the future and have taken warning by the experience of the maritime provinces.
Instead of having the small province of Manitoba and two other large provinces, we
could then have two fairly large
provinces. But in consequence of the policy of the government, the province of
Manitoba will always be inferior to the
others.
3895
COMMONS
I have no particular fault to find with
the $50,000 given for the support of the
government and legislature in each of the
new provinces, or the 80 cents per head
on the estimated population of 250,000. I
think perhaps that these grants are fairly
reasonable, and I do not suppose there is
a man in this House who would want to
deal by these provinces in any oher way
than fairly and squarely and with the view
of assisting them in every possible manner.
But I am entirely opposed to the policy
of the government with reference to the
lands. The lands naturally belong to the
provinces. In agreeing to pay each of the
provinces a certain amount for its lands,
we really concede that they belong to them.
The only plea I have heard why the lands
are not given to the provinces is that that
would interfere with our immigration policy. With that view I entirely disagree.
I have taken pains to find out what arrangements were made with the older provinces
with regard to immigration, and I
find that there has been no difficulty experienced in bringing immigrants to this
country and locating them wherever the
government thought best. Is it likely that
the new provinces, which will be deeply
interested in attracting settlers, would not
be as much alive to the necessity of getting in population as possibly can be the
Dominion government ? It seems to me
that the provinces could administer their
own public lands better than we can and
would be more interested in securing a good
class of settlers. I have had occasion to
speak several times with reference to the
immigration into Canada, and the fault I
have found is not that we are getting too
many immigrants, but too many of an inferior class. Only the other day, the Ontario
inspector of asylums said that in the
Brockville Lunatic Asylum, out of the six
hundred lunatics, sixty were immigrants,
or ten per cent of the whole, which is entirely out of proportion to the number of
immigrants located in that section of the
country. It is not necessary for me to go
into the details of the amounts that have
been realized by the Dominion government
from time to time on the sale of public
lands, but I will content myself with saying
that I am entirely opposed to the policy of
the Dominion keeping these lands. I think
it would be better to at once hand them
over to the provinces and let the provinces
administer them as they see fit. Let me
give here the figures showing what we have
received from the sale of lands, and 1 take
those which were given by my hon. friend
from Western Assiniboia (Mr. Scott) the
other day. They will be found in his
speech on page 3607 of 'Hansard.' From
1870 to 1880, the administration of Crown
lands in Manitoba and the Northwest cost
$1,244,499.34 in excess of receipts. In the
years 1881 to 1890 the accounts show $753,576.53 in excess of revenue. In the years
3895
3896
from 1891 to 1900 there was again an excess of expenditure amounting to $184,398.95.
In the years from 1901 to 1904,
there was an excess of expenditure over receipts of $11,733.49. Taking the whole period
from 1870 up to date, therefore, the
administration of lands in the Northwest
has cost this Dominion $687,055.25 in excess
of receipts, to which must be added refunds amounting to $329,950, making a
total of $1,017,005.25 of deficit. I fail to
see how the government arrived at the
amount they could give as a payment for
these lands. They claim that there are
twenty-five millions of acres of land to
each province, which are worth $37,500,000,
and on which of course they pay interest
from time to time until it reaches a certain amount. I do not see why the government
took it into their heads to keep
these lands when it costs more to administer them than we are getting out of them.
I hope that the government will reconsider
this question, but I can quite understand
why the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr.
Oliver) should have declared that he was
perfectly willing to accept this arrangement
provided the government kept the lands for
the settlers. We can quite understand that
position. The province gets the benefit of
the lands inasmuch as it gets the people
who settle on them, and it gets the money
besides, while we are giving away our
lands from time to time. but continuing for
all time to pay that subsidy.
There is another point. The right hon.
the First Minister based his whole argument
for submitting this legislation to the House,
especially clause 16 dealing with separate
schools, on constitutional grounds. 1f I
understood him rightly, he claimed that he
had to do this because the constitution demanded it. That is not the way, Sir, that
I
understand the constitution, and I do not
think that is the way this House understands it. Not only that but I think he used
synonymously the names 'province' and
'territory.' He used the words 'province'
and 'territory' as if they were synonyms.
I can quite understand that if these had
been provinces it might have been that we
would have had to give these rights but as
they are territories I think it is quite different. We have been trying for a good
while
to induce Newfoundland to come into the
Dominion. We have been anxious at times
for this and I think we would be glad at
any time to have her come in because that
would round off the Dominion, and it is a
province which w e very much desire to have.
if it had been a territory we would not have
had to ask their consent ; we would simply
have brought them in under the constitution.
That is what we are doing as I understand,
with the provinces in the west. We are not
obliged to ask their consent to bring them
in ; we simply pass an Act and they come
in of necessity and we give them such terms
as the constitution provides unless we see fit
3897 APRIL 5, 1905
to give them extra terms by the legislation
of this House. The thing that is important
in this matter is that whatever Act we pass
now, so far as I have understood the debate
will be permanent so far as this parliament
is concerned, and any change that is made
will have to be made by the imperial parliament. It is important, therefore, that
we
should go slowly ; and it is very important
that this should be debated from every
standpoint, because if we make a mistake
now it will be a lasting mistake. The Prime
Minister when he brought this Bill down
said that there were four subjects which
dominated all the others. The first was :
How many provinces should be admitted into
the confederation coming from the Northwest
Territories—one, or two or more ?
They have decided on two, and have apparently decided to leave Manitoba as it is,
so far as any extension west is concerned.
Then the next question was :
In whom should be vested the ownership of
the public lands ?
They decided that they would keep the
land. The only advantage I can see in their
keeping the lands is that they will be able
to use them for political influence. It will
not be any advantage to us from a financial
or any other standpoint.
What should be the financial terms to be
granted to these new provinces ?
They have been liberal, but I certainly
would not have complained of that if they
had not kept the lands and then the premier
said :
And the fourth and not the least important
by any means was the question of the school
system which would be introduced—not introduced because it was introduced long ago,
but
should be continued in the Territories.
That I think is where the premier made a
mistake ; that is where he talks of these
Territories as though they were provinces
and as though we were bound to retain these
Acts with reference to separate schools in
the Territories just as if they had been provinces. If I understood the legal arguments
which have been advanced in this House at
all, I think that does not apply. Then, Sir,
we had a speech from the hon. leader of the
opposition (Mr. R. L. Borden) on the constitutional side of the question, and I think
that every one who heard that speech and
every one who has read it will concede that
he really put the Prime Minister out of
business so far as the constitutional aspect
of the case is concerned. I fully expected
that when our leader had finished speaking
they would have put up the Minister of Justice to answer him and certainly they would
have done so if the contention of the First
Minister had been right because then the
Minister of Justice would have been able to
down our leader, but he is not easily downed.
To my great surprise they put up the Min
3897
3898
ister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) and I was
further surprised by the admissions he made.
He differed entirely from the very beginning
with his leader. He said :
My right hon. friend the First Minister has
not declared that it is not within the power of
this parliament to make a change. He has not
declared that there is any legal or binding obligation resting on the parliament of
Canada
to re-enact the clauses of the Act of 1875.
I think that is exactly opposed to what
the leader of the government contended for,
and I think that if the leader of the government had felt that he was strong in his
position after he had heard the speech of the
hon. member for Carleton who leads the
opposition (Mr. R. L. Borden) he certainly
would have answered him in like manner,
that is, he would have appointed a legal gentleman to answer the opposition leader.
I
find also that the Minister of Finance is not
in favour of separate schools. He said that if
he had his way personally, speaking for himself he would not go in for separate schools,
he would leave that word ' separate ' out of
all schools. Then he went on to tell us that
they had no separate schools by law in Nova
Scotia, and he said that this was owing to
the good fellowship that existed between
the people there, because they divided up.
Where there was a strong minority they had
their schools, they had their teachers, I believe with the same examination as those
for public schools, but although they had
not a separate school by-law they had by the
consent of the majority in that province.
I am strongly of opinion that this Bill which
has been introduced will not tend to make it
easier to have separate schools in the western provinces than it would have been to
have them without it. My own impression is
that when you try to force a man to do
something he does not want to do you will
have a good deal of difficulty in making him
do it. I understood the hon. gentlemen who
have spoken to tell us that they have had
no difficulty in the last few years with reference to separate schools. If that is
the case
I do not see why they want this enactment.
The separate schools do not appear to have
been a great success in that country anyway. I believe there are only about a dozen
of them all told, nine Roman Catholic and
two or three Protestant. These Protestant
schools are as much separate schools, I presume, as the others.
I took some notes of what was said by
the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Scott)
and I was astonished at the state of things
existing in that country. I was especially
surprised at his construing of the Act now
before the House.
We are proposing to make these people fully
responsible for their own self-government in
the important matters of education, public
works and all affairs of internal development.
The hon. member for West Assiniboia
(Mr. Scott) seemed to think that there was
3899 COMMONS
no difference between the public schools of
that country and the separate schools. Well
there seems to be a difference according to
the gentleman who spoke last night, a slight
difference at least. The hon. member (Mr.
Scott) found a good deal of fault with the
headlines that are published in some newspapers in Ontario. For instance :
A free west, a common school, provincial
rights and religious equality.
He did not seem to think that was a good
thing to publish in any part of this country.
I think they are sentiments that even he
might endorse although he may support this
Bill, if he does I am of opinion that he will
not be voting for all these sentiments. He
seems to differ with me. He says :
Articles and inflammatory cartoons under
that motto have led the innocent citizens to believe that the proposals of the government
are
entirely in the teeth of this motto. I say that
every item proposed by the government is in
strict observance of these principles. . . . .
A common school—that is just what we are
asked to vote for in this proposition ; a nonsectarian school, absolutely under state
control.
A free west—that is a reasonably free west ;
just as free as Ontario.
Now, if it is no freer than Ontario, it
has to have separate schools, because by the
constitution which we have we are bound to
maintain separate schools, but we do not
maintain them in every part of the country. I
am proud to say that I live in a town where
we do not have any separate schools. We
had a separate school a good many years
ago, but the people got tired of it, and away
back in 1875, before the law compelled us
to put a Roman Catholic on the high school
board, by common consent the town council, of which I had the honour of being a
member, asked the Roman Catholics to name
a man to represent them on the high school
board. He was put on, and I think he has
been a member of the school board ever
since. We employ a certain number of
Roman Catholic teachers in our schools,
and we have had no trouble whatever, we
have lived in peace and harmony, which
is the kind of thing I would like to see all
over this country. I think when our boys
and girls grow up and attend school together, they come to know one another,
and they forget for the time being what
particular sect each one may belong to.
They grow up to respect one another, and
to live together as Christian people ought
to live, in my judgment. A free common
school under state control is what my hon.
friend calls it. Then the hon. member for
Beauharnois asked the question :
Mr. BERGERON. What is the difference between the two schools then ?
Mr. SCOTT. Not any difference, only the one
I have mentioned.
Mr. BERGERON. Where is the separate
school then ?
3899
3900
Mr. SCOTT. It is certainly a separate school,
though it is not a religious school.
Mr. BERGERON. It may be in a different
building, but it is the same school.
Mr. SCOTT. It is the same class of school.
Now the hon. member for East Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff) spoke last night, and he
said :
The only difference is that in the first and second readers the text is a little different,
but
even these books have to be authorized by the
Minister of Education. There is no church or
clerical control in any shape, form or manner
over the Catholic schools in the Northwest
Territories to-day.
Now we have one gentleman saying there
is no difference whatever, and another gentleman admitting that there is a difference
ill the two first books that the children use.
And there may be others. Then the hon.
gentleman quoted some things, and I have
not been able to understand why he quoted
them, unless it was to obtain the good opinion of his leader ; because there is a
vacancy in the cabinet, we have no Minister
of the Interior at the present time, and as
a matter of course they will have to take
a man from the west. I do not object to
the hon. gentleman if he can get the position, but I fear he will have a good deal
of
trouble in getting elected. Now he said :
I have a communication from an important
body, the Baptist convention of Manitoba and
the Territories, the third clause of which is as
follows :
This is a scheme which will promote discord
and defeat one of the main purposes of public
school education, which is the unification of all
classes. A confederation cannot be sound in
which the elements lack the first essential of
harmony.
Now, why he should quote that communication as a reason for voting for the Bill,
I cannot understand, because if I had a communication like that sent to me I would
think that they wanted me to vote the
other way. But I noticed that after he
got through his leader went up and shook
hands with him, and I wondered whether
it was on account of the amount of scrap
book material he used, or on account of his
independence of the people he represented.
Again he said :
Another petition very largely signed contains
the following :
We, the undersigned citizens, respectfully
urge you to use all influence you may have
against the separate school clause in the Bill
now before parliament.
That is another reason why he should
vote for that Bill.
In a petition dated March 7th, from the Ministerial Association of Winnipeg, the second
clause reads as follows :
Whereas the rights of the minority are sufficiently protected by the British North
America
Act in any particular case.
3901 APRIL 5, 1905
That is another reason he gave for supporting the Bill. For myself I do not see
anything in any of these petitions that would
induce any member of this House to support the Bill before parliament at the present
time ; I think the very reverse is the
case. I said in the beginning that this
Bill had caused more contention than any
other Bill that has been before this House
since I have had the honour of a seat in
it, and I think that is true. We had notice
to-day from a gentleman in this House that
there was going to be a large number of
public meetings all over this country in
the near future. There was a large public
meeting in Toronto a few days ago, a good
many speakers took part, and I judge from
what I see reported that they were all Liberals except one, and he was an independent,
I suppose, the hon. member for North
Simcoe (Mr. L. G. McCarthy). He said he
was an independent, and I am bound to
take his word for it. The gentleman who
occupied the chair at that meeting is a Liberal, I think no person who lives in Toronto
and knows anything about the public
men there will dispute that he is a Liberal
of the Liberals. I refer to Mr. Stapleton
Caldecott. He said himself before the meeting was over that as Paul called himself,
a Hebrew of the Hebrews, so he, Mr. Caldecott, was a Grit of the Grits. He is reported
to have said :
We must make no mistake, and if we pass
the clause as brought before us by Sir Wilfrid
Laurier we should make a most tremendous
mistake. (Hear, hear). What he proposes is
open to most serious objection, and for myself,
with my previous admiration for this man, giving him my hearty service as a model
statesman, for the moment I have lost my respect
for his judgment. (Hear, hear). He has sought,
almost in an indecent manner, to thrust upon
this people a piece of legislation they will
never submit to. What have our Ontario cabinet ministers been doing in the meanwhile
?
(Hear, hear). What is the reason for their
silence ? Are we to take it that they are in
favour of the proposal ?
Well, Sir, the Minister of Customs took a
fling at that gentleman, he said he did not
think the First Minister would suffer much
because he had lost the respect of that
gentleman, but he did not respect Mr. Caldecott's judgment because, he said, a man
who knew anything about parliamentary
practice would know that if a minister stays
in a government he must agree with the
doings of that government. Well, there
was another gentleman who spoke at that
meeting, the hon. member for North Simcoe,
(Mr. Leighton McCarthy) and let me read
what he said :
Since the date of the introduction of these
Bills, there has arisen a huge wave of public
opinion, and would you believe it ? It has
reached as far as Ottawa, it was wafted there
in some particular way, it has caused much ex
3901
3902
citement—acute situations, resignations have
taken place, and rumors of more.
Now, Mr. Speaker, under that state of
things, Mr. Caldecott must not be blamed
much if he did not know exactly where the
Ontario ministers were of the opinion that
they did not know themselves exactly where
they were at first. After this Bill was introduced, any person looking over on to
the
other side of the House could see that there
was pretty general confusion everywhere,
and I think if a vote had been taken then,
we would have had no Liberal government
at the present time. But when the shepherd
got back, you know, and when they changed
the wording of the clause without changing
the meaning, as a matter of course they had
an excuse to come back. That is all it
amounted to.
Mr. CAMPBELL. Are you not sorry that
you did not have to vote then ?
Mr. U. WILSON. I know, Mr. Speaker,
that the hon. member for Centre York will
be glad at the next election if there are a
good many men in this riding who will not
have votes. You may fool them once or
twice, but you cannot fool them all the time.
You remember that the hon. gentleman got
in once on higher duties on vegetables. Then
he got out of that by saying that he could
not induce the government to do what he
wanted them to do. I do not know what
he will do the next time.
Mr. WILSON. That is about as good an
argument as the right hon. First Minister
once gave us when he said : We are here,
and you are there ; what are you going to
do about it ?
Mr. U. WILSON. We ran again and got
beaten. There was another gentleman at
that meeting, Dr. Goggin, who made a very
strong speech. Some say he is a Tory and
some say he is a Liberal. I do not know
what he was or what he is, but I will read
an extract from what he said, as follows :
I take it that we meet here to-night as a
body of Liberals, intent upon setting before
our party our views on this subject, whether
they be right or wrong. This I believe is one
of the qualifications of a good party man. We
are not here as a body of Conservatives intent
upon making capital for ourselves. We are not
here as a body of Orangemen trying to arrest
Romanism.
It is most unfortunate that the question was
ever raised. The responsibility for the state
of the public opinion now existing in the west
does not rest upon the people of Ontario. or of
any other province, but upon that fraction of
the cabinet at Ottawa who manufactured those
educational clauses for the people of the Dominion without the knowledge of those
members of the cabinet most concerned therewith.
3903
COMMONS
I ought to have said, perhaps, earlier in
my speech that I am strongly of the opinion that had the hon. Minister of Finance
(Mr. Fielding) and the hon. ex-Minister of
the Interior (Mr. Sifton) been here we certainly would not have seen the Bill we have
seen introduced into this House. I think we
never would have seen these educational
clauses in it. It seems to me that if the
right hon. First Minister had been well
advised, and I am afraid he was not, these
clauses would have been left out and the
constitution that the British North America
Act provides for these provinces would have
gone into operation without any let or hindrance from this parliament. It does seem
to me that that would have been the fairest
thing to do. We would have saved all this
discussion and all this bad feeling. We
would not have seen what we are seeing
every day here–a debate on a question that
we really ought to have nothing to do with
because we ought to be willing to give our
fellow subjects the same rights as we claim
for ourselves. I notice that the hon. ex-
Minister of the Interior, the hon. Finance
Minister and even some hon. gentlemen from
the Northwest have stated that if the decision were left to them whether there should
be separate schools or not they would not
have them, but rather than have this government go out of office, rather than have
the
possibility of a Liberal Conservative administration they would bury their principles,
have three, or four, or five years in parliament and take the chance of the people
forgetting what they have done. It seems to
me from the speech made by the hon. Finance Minister in this House that those were
the tactics which were pursued in the caucus. When this was brought before the members
in caucus they said to them : If you
vote us out there will be a general election,
you will have all the odium of this Bill and
the Tories will beat you ; you had better
vote for it and stay in.
Now, there was a pretty strong resolution
passed at this meeting. I have not heard it
read in the House up to this time. It appeared in the Toronto ' News ' on the 21st
March, 1905. I do not suppose I dare mention that name in this House.
At the mass meeting held in the Massey Hall
last evening to protest against the school clause
of the Autonomy Bill the following resolution
was moved by Mr. D. E. Thomson, seconded by
Rev. Dr. Milligan, and carried unanimously :
I do not suppose that any one will accuse
Dr. Thomson or Dr. Milligan of being
Tories. I have the pleasure of an acquaintance with Dr. Milligan and I regard him
as
a very fine man, but a great Liberal and I
am informed that D. E. Thomson is quite as
strong a Liberal as Dr. Milligan.
Whereas it is of vital importance to Canada
that the new provinces about to be established
shall be left free to shape their own educational policy in accordance with the needs
of
the future, as these shall develop ;
3903
3904
Be it therefore resolved, that this meeting
emphatically protests against the enactment of
section 16 of the present Autonomy Bills, or
any other provisions inconsistent with their
constitutional freedom in this regard ;
Be it further resolved, that, since the electors have had no opportunity to pass upon
the
principle embodied in the school clauses of the
Bills now before parliament, the government
should :
(a) Abandon the clauses, or
(b) Appeal to the country on the measure, or
(c) Defer action entirely until after the next
general election.
And be it ordered that copies of this resolution be forwarded to the Honourable the
Prime
Minister and to the city members of the House.
That is, in my judgment, a pretty strong
resolution to be passed at a public meeting by
reformers. I do not care whether they were
reformers or not, they were citizens of this
country, but the men who moved and
seconded this resolution were reformers
beyond all doubt. Then, there was Mr.
Willison, the editor of the ' News,' a great
admirer in other days of the present Prime
Minister. He wrote his life and, I have no
doubt, he gave him as favourable a character as could well be given. I do not wish
to detract from it but if he writes another
volume it will be a very different volume
from those which he has written. I have
here quite a number of extracts. I have
an extract from a statement of the Hon.
David Mills, who was the great constitutional authority of this House at one time
and who afterwards occupied a seat on the
Supreme Court bench. I have another from
a statement by Sir Louis Davies, once a
prominent member of the Liberal party in
this House, and who has also been elevated
to the Supreme Court bench. Both of these
gentlemen tell us that when the time comes
to create provinces in our great Northwest
that will be the time for them as provinces
to initiate their own school system. I will
not detain the House by reading all of these
quotations, but there are one or two that I
cannot refrain from giving. My time is
about up and I do not intend, as the speeches
have generally been long, to follow the bad
example that has been set on both sides of
the House. This is a comment by the Toronto ' News' of 11th March, 1905 :
The remedial legislation of 1896 had some
warrant in the constitution ; the present legislation has none. It is a gratuitous
seeking for
trouble which could easily be avoided.
That the antagonism to forcing separate
schools on the west should come from Liberal
sources can easily be understood. The Liberal
party is threatened with a far greater disaster
than loss of power. It is threatened with the
loss of the principles to which it owes its
vitality.
The measures now before the people were
not in issue in the general election, and parliament has no popular mandate to place
them
on the statute-book.
I daresay this was written by the gentleman who wrote the life of the Rt. Hon. Sir
3905 APRIL 5, 1905
Wilfrid Laurier, Prime Minister of Canada.
I shall not quote extracts from papers which
have been opposed to the Liberal party heretofore ; I am reading from the newspapers
which have always supported the Liberal
party, and if I had time I could read a
good many extracts from the 'Globe '—I
was going to say I could read the whole
'Globe'—denouncing the policy of the government on this question. The 'Globe,' in
its turn, has been denounced by hon. gentlemen opposite, but their denunciation is
because the 'Globe' stood by Liberal principles which the Liberal party have recanted.
Take the Toronto 'Saturday Night';
Mr. Sheppard has been for many years a
great admirer of the present Liberal leader,
and he has said a good many kind things
of that right hon. gentleman, but on the
llth of March, 1905, Mr. Sheppard wrote
thus :
No legislation is too wild, unpatriotic or indefensible to be regarded as a possibility
under
a government which repudiates its most solemn
professions, and deliberately plots to force
upon the people the thing which it came into
power pledged to oppose.
Any man who places the will of the priest of
his church above the will of the people who
made him what he is, can not be trusted. And
the hierarchy demands and exacts implicit
obedience from its subjects.
Now, Mr. Speaker, I have placed before the
House some of the views I entertain on this
subject. Personally I am strongly opposed
to separate schools and have always been.
I left my party in 1896, and voted with the
present Prime Minister for six months hoist
of the Remedial Bill, and I did that against
the strong remonstrance of my leader.
Mr. URIAH WILSON. No ; the Prime
Minister was all right in 1896, but the trouble is that he has changed his principles
since, and I can no longer follow him in
endeavouring to maintain provincial rights.
In 1895, I stood for provincial rights, and I
stand for provincial rights to-day. Ever
since I was a boy, I have heard the Liberal
party fighting for provincial rights, but the
Liberal party no longer has that plank in
its platform. We all remember the difficulties between Upper and Lower Canada
before confederation, when one province
wanted representation by population, and
the other did not. We remember the difficulties that arose until the crisis came that
we could not govern the country properly,
and a solution was sought in confederation.
Was not the understanding at confederation
that every province should be left to do its
own business and that the federal parliament should only do the general business of
the country. Why is there a change made
in that compact now ? I say Sir, that as
honourable men we are bound to carry out
the compact of confederation and to pursue
the policy which the fathers of confedera
3905
3906
tion have laid down as the principles of the
constitution of our country.
Mr. H. S. BELAND (Beauce). Mr. Speaker, I feel satisfied that however long may
be my public career in this parliament, I
shall never be called upon to address the
House of Commons of Canada on a question of greater importance than this. Let
me say at the outset of my remarks, which
I hope will be brief, that having but slight
experience as a debater, having no legal
training whatever, I being a physician, and
having but a very imperfect command of
the English language, I feel that I must
crave the indulgence of the House. This
subject is one which should be approached
with a deep sentiment of patriotism, and
with the spirit which animated the illustrious fathers of confederation when they
met to endeavour to devise a scheme under
which the people of the British possessions
in North America might live together
in union, happiness and prosperity. It
should be gratifying to every true Canadian
that in the evolution of our national history
we are in this Canadian parliament to-day
discussing a measure to create two new
provinces in our splendid Northwest domain.
The Northwest Territories were discovered
long ago by French settlers and French adventurers chiefly. Thirty years ago these
Territories had a population of only 500
white people, and it is claimed to-day (and
the claim is well founded) that these Territories are now settled by 500,000 frugal,
sturdy and industrious people, who are asking to be admitted into confederation and
to enjoy the full privileges of statehood and
self-government. The years of 1903 and
1905 will go down in Canadian history as
memorable years, because they are identified
with the introduction into the Canadian parliament of two enactments, the most important
in the history of our country—I refer to the creation of provinces in the Northwest
Territories with their untold and unimagined possibilities, and the measure providing
for the building of the National
Transcontinental Railway. When our children and our childrens' children read the
history of these years, they will feel that the
venerated statesman who leads the Liberal
party, who leads this House, and I make
bold to say, who leads this country, has
associated his name with two epoch marking events, they will feel Sir, that these
measures mark an era in the progress of our
country, and that entitle the great statesman who fathered them to rank amongst
the foremost patriots of this country of
ours.
Now, Sir, many important questions are
involved in this Autonomy Bill. And while
the question as to the number of provinces
to be created, the financial aid to be given
them. and the location of the capital, have
met with very little criticism, the land and
educational clauses of the Bill have excited
3907
COMMONS
much comment; although in my opinion
they have received, and are receiving the
warmest support of the majority of the people of Canada. Nevertheless the land clause,
and especially the educational clause, have
encountered very bitter opposition from
some quarters.
With regard to the lands, it has been
stated by the hon. leader of the opposition,
in that very able statement which he presented to us the other day, that it was important
and in accordance with the principles of the constitution that the lands of
the Northwest Territories should be handed
over to the new provinces. Mr. Speaker, I
have to take exception to that view of the
question, because I believe that it is the
part of wisdom for this government to retain control of the lands, apart from the
consideration which was offered to us the
other day by the ex-Minister of the Interior (Mr. Sifton), that, from the point of
view of an effective immigration policy, it
was not wise to have two or more governments dealing with it. There is another
consideration, and that is the following :
The moment you hand over to the new provinces the control of their lands, you leave
them face to face with two propositions,
which, I believe, are contrary to each other
—the creating of a revenue and the maintaining of an efficient immigration policy.
The new provinces, if possessed of the lands,
would naturally be deprived of the financial
aid extended to them by this government
in lieu of the lands. They would have to
create their revenue from those lands ; and
the moment you increase the price of land you hamper immigration, while you want to
promote immigration you have to decrease the price of land.
I have heard some hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House say that the provinces
of Ontario and Quebec have the control of their lands. Very true, Mr. Speaker ; but
the provinces of Ontario and Quebec should not be considered from the same point
of view as the Northwest provinces, and I will tell you why. Because there are in
those two provinces immense timber limits, from which they derive a very large revenue.
In the province of Quebec, during the last year, I think the revenue accruing from
the Crown lands amounted to $600,000-not from the sale of lands, but from the stumpage
only. The situation is not the same in the Northwest Territories.
There is another point of view from which I think we should withhold the lands from
the new provinces, that is the national point of view. In stating this opinion, I
may be taxed by some hon. gentlemen with being a Utopist ; I may be told that I am
dreaming ; but let me say frankly what I think. It is obvious to every one who observes
the Northwest Territories to-day that the loyal sentiment which prevails there is
pure, deep and large, as the stately rivers which run over the endless prairies. But
who knows what will be the immigration of
3907
3908
to-morrow ? There are to-day half a million people in the Northwest Territories ;
how many will you find in twenty or thirty
years from now ? Who can tell ? Perhaps
two million, perhaps three million, perhaps
five million, perhaps ten or twelve million ;
and as we know that the largest foreign
immigration to-day is from the United States,
who can assure this House and this country
that the control of the legislatures in the
two new provinces thirty years from now
will not be in the hands of people having
a greater interest in the country to the south
of the boundary line ? And, Mr. Speaker,
we shall have, in the control of the lands
and in the control of immigration, perhaps
not a complete remedy, but certainly a
palliative. Hon. gentlemen opposite say to
us : Hands off the twins ; let them enjoy
the greatest liberty ; give them all their
lands and the largest possible autonomy.
Well, I can assure my hon. friend from East
Grey (Mr. Sproule), whom I am glad to see
in his seat, that in that future time, if he
wishes, in order to maintain a loyal sentiment in the Northwest Territories, the services
of that Roman Catholic clergy, whom
he does not appear to like very much, they
will be found as usual ready to support,
day and night, through weeks and months
and years, the British flag.
Mr. SPROULE. I may tell my hon.
friend that, contrary to his opinion or belief, I do not dislike them by any means.
I have no feeling of dislike against them.
Mr. BELAND. I am very glad to hear it.
Coming to what is known in the country as
the educational clause of this Bill, it is a very burning question and a question
of very great importance. The agitation which has been aroused over that clause is
immense, and we all regret it. That agitation is so intense that we are that that
the provincial government of Manitoba, now on its last legs, is seeking to get a
new lease of office out of it. Well, the educational clauses of this measure have
already been discussed a good deal in this country. They have encountered very bitter
opposition from the newspapers, especially in that enlightened city of Toronto, where
even men who used to be ranked amongst the foremost Liberals have been outspoken in
their opposition to those clauses, and they have also enjoyed the distinction of being
made the subject of the censorious tongues of those who adorn the pulpits of this
country. There are many points of view from which this important question may be considered.
There is a constitutional point of view, there is the provincial autonomy point of
view ; but whatever may be the reasons invoked in this debate, the main object of
those who are making to-day a solid opposition to these educational clauses is nothing
else but political capital. Before proceeding further, I must say that I was very
much surprised the other night when I heard the eloquent member for West As
3909 APRIL 5, 1905
siniboia (Mr. Scott) state in this House that
amongst the Protestant population of this
country the opinion prevailed that the privileges of the Catholic minority had been
called for by them. Nothing could be further
from the truth. The educational privileges
of the minorities in this country were called
for, not by Catholics, but by Protestants.
They were called for by Mr. Galt, and I
will go further. I will say that the man
who had every authority to represent the
Catholic population of this country, John
Sandfield Macdonald, moved a resolution in
the parliament of United Canada asking
that the Catholic minority be left in the
hands of the Protestants of this country,
as they could rely on the good faith of the
Protestants—and what was the fate of that
motion ? It was defeated by a vote of 95
to 8.
You have heard, Sir, on this question
constitutional authorities ; you have heard
men of great legal training ; you have had
the opportunity of hearing men who are
professors in our most reputable universities ; and you have also heard men whose
profession it is to read themselves in
national and international problems. We
have had in this House on the constitutional question the spectacle of the
right hon. gentleman who leads the government differing with one or two of his
ministers, while they all adopted the
same course. We have had on the other
side of the House the spectacle of the
leader of the opposition differing in toto
from his first lieutenant, the member for
Jacques Cartier (Mr. Monk). I will refrain
from going any further into the divergencies
we have witnessed in this House regarding
the constitutional aspects of the question,
and will present on that aspect the point
of view of a layman. There are two alternatives, I believe, which confront every
member of parliament on this matter. Are
these Territories entering confederation today or did they enter the union in the
year
1870 ? You may take whichever view you
prefer, but you must adopt the one or the
other. Either they entered the union in
1870 or they are going into it to-day. If they
are going into it to-day, article 93 is very
plain :
Nothing in any such law shall prejudicially
affect any right or privilege with respect to
denominational schools which any class of persons have by law in the province at the
union.
Well, if we take the alternative that
the Northwest Territories are going into the
union to-day, it seems to me that this clause
should apply, but some hon. gentlemen, I
think among them the leader of the opposition, contend that the Territories entered
the union in 1870. If they did, what is
our position to-day ? Legislation was passed
by this parliament in 1875, in the full exercise of its powers, creating in the Northwest
Teritories a system of separate
3909
3910
schools by which the minorities were to enjoy certain privileges. In pursuance of
that
law, ordinances were passed in the Territories by which this system of schools
was amended over and over again. What
then is our position to-day ? Are we going to adopt the views of those who enacted
that law of 1875 or are we going to
repudiate them ? I think that when we
know that this parliament in 1875 passed
a law conferring upon the Catholic minority
certain privileges, and that that law has
been amended by the legislature of the Territories in the exercise of its power—and
we must admit that it was in the exercise
of its power so long as these ordinances
have not been repealed by this parliament
—I submit that when we know that, our
paramount duty is to confirm the legislation
passed both by this parliament and the
legislature of the Northwest Territories.
This is the layman's point of view. By
adopting this course we put an end to interminable judicial disputes ; and if only
the
hon. leader of the opposition had adopted
that view, as he seemed to be about to adopt
it when the Bill was first introduced into
this House, if he had left aside those elements of his party who are opposed to any
privilege being given the Catholic minority,
it he had said : I will stand with the
right hon. gentleman in upholding legislation that this parliament has passed, that
men like Sir Alexander McKenzie, Sir John
Macdonald, Sir Alexander Campbell, have
supported—had he adopted the view of
those eminent statesmen, what would be
the position to-day ? There would have
been no agitation of any importance in
this country, we would have buried for ever
the old feuds which I say have been a curse
to the nation in the past.
There are three systems of schools; first
there is the system of separate schools with
two boards, each board having the supervision of its schools, the qualification of
teachers, text books, inspection and so on.
The type of these schools is to be found in
the province of Quebec. There is a second
system of schools which you call neutral
or godless schools. The best illustration
of that system of schools is, I believe, to
be found in the United States of America.
There is a third system of schools which
may be called either separate or public
schools, which are under one single board,
and in which religious instruction is allowed, according to the wishes of the parents.
This system, I believe, is the one
which is in force in the Northwest at the
present moment. The argument of the
hon. member for East Grey (Mr. Sproule)
the other day was fairly conducted all
along the lines that church influence in
the schools was prejudicial to their efficiency. He went so far as to say that information
which he has gathered permitted
him to state that church influence, clerical
3911
COMMONS
schools, in France, for instance. had produced a people of illiterates and atheists.
He will likely be disposed to recognize that
he has been led into error. In France
there are very few atheists ; there are a
good many free-thinkers—
Mr. SPROULE. I was not expressing an
opinion on that at all. I referred to what
a French gentleman had told me was the
result of that system. I was using his
language, not my own, because I am not
competent to express an opinion of that
kind, never having visited the country and
knowing little about it.
Mr. BELAND. That is exactly what I
say, that the hon. gentleman had been led
into error.
Mr. SPROULE. I understood the hon.
gentleman to say that I had said that of
France.
Mr. BELAND. No, Mr. Speaker, I said
that by some information he had gathered
the hon. gentleman had been led into error
when he stated that in France there was
a large number of atheists. For my part,
Mr. Speaker, I am not discussing this question from the point of view of an advocate
of separate schools, nor from the point of
view of an advocate of public schools. We
are not called upon in this House to say
whether we favour the one or the other.
We are discussing a Bill which provides
for religious instruction in the schools in
the Northwest, a system which has been
adopted by the Northwest and which is in
force now. Our country is a British country, our institutions are modelled after the
institutions of Great Britain, and I am
very sorry, I deeply regret—I say it sincerely—that the great lines, the illuminated
paths which have been set for
us in the mother country, are in this
debate willingly ignored. Unshakable attachment to all things British, be they
military, be they political, be they
social, has been boasted of here, especially
by hon. gentlemen opposite. It is but a
few days since the echoes of this chamber
were disturbed by the imperialistic eloquence of my hon. friend from Victoria
and Haliburton (Mr. Sam. Hughes). In his
footsteps we have seen the hon. member
from South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean) and
the hon. member from East Grey (Mr.
Sproule), earnestly and honestly, we believe, preaching the rapproachement, closer
relations between England and Canada. It
is their contention that British institutions
are the climax of perfection for a constitutional country. Why in the name of
common sense was the British school system not good enough for them ? The
French Canadian is very devoted to British
institutions, and I make hold to say here
that if my countrymen, my compatriots in
the province of Quebec. were offered to-day
the opportunity to sever their connection
3911
3912
from Great Britain, if they were offered
independence, if they were offered annexation, if they were offered French allegiance,
I have not the slightest hesitancy to say
they would squarely refuse and remain,
faithful to Great Britain. And why, Mr.
Speaker ? Because as was said so eloquently by one of the hon. gentlemen opposite
in a debate a few years ago, Great Britain has distinguished herself at home and
abroad for that broad spirit of good faith
and toleration, for those sacred principles
of religious equality and self-government.
In England an education Act was recently
introduced providing for religious instruction in the schools, according to the wishes
of the parents. By whom was it introduced ? By men like Chamberlain, by men
like Balfour, and that legislation was assailed, and I think encountered as bitter
an opposition as this legislation is encountering to-day. Ministers of the gospel
went
as far as to say that the state was in danger, that the primary and elementary rights
were threatened, that the birth right of the
British citizen was at stake, that it was a
battle for life. The Solicitor General (Hon.
Mr. Lemieux) the other night, in the course
of a very able speech, read to this House
quotations from speeches that have been
delivered in England by Mr. Chamberlain
and by Mr. Balfour. I shall not trouble
the House by reading any more of those
speeches. I think the House will permit
me to make an allusion to a reverend gentleman in England, a minister of the Presbyterian
denomination, Rev. Archibald Lamont, of St. Paul's Presbyterian Chapel.
Here is what that gentleman said :
I have high hopes for education and for Presbyterianism and for future Christianity
as the
result of the advent of this imperfect, but substantially good, Education Bill, and,
in spite of
an unreasouing and undignified agitation against
it, an agitation to which, as I deeply deplore,
my own beloved church has thoughtlessly, but
I hope temporarily, committed herself. I fear
that in most of our Protestant churches, eloquence of speech is often more a hindrance
than help to the practical solution of far-
reaching and complex questions. It often puts
men unwittingly in a false pre-eminence, so
that the rank and file—the common people—
are misled and become martyrs by mistake.
This should be read to some of the reverend gentlemen of Ottawa and Toronto who
have thought it proper to speak from the
pulpit against the educational clauses of this
Bill. But, Mr. Speaker. this Bill has been
adopted in England, and has been in force
for a couple of years, and it has given entire
satisfaction. The impression that must prevail in the end is that some people want
more religious instruction and some people
want less religious instruction than this Bill
provides ; but, Mr. Speaker, standing here
as a representative in parliament of a country of 43,000 souls. I think it is my duty
to
uphold the constitution, and by it to confirm the privileges. be they large or be
they
3913 APRIL 5, 1905
small, that the majority enjoy in the Northwest Territories. There are some hon. gentlemen
on the other side of this House,
the hon. member for East Grey (Mr. Sproule)
the hon member for South York (Mr. W. F.
Maclean) and the hon. member for Victoria
and Haliburton (Mr. Sam. Hughes) who profess to believe that religious instruction
should be done away with in the schools.
But, Mr. Speaker, though I have great respect for their opinion,. I must say without
hesitation that if those three gentlemen
were put on one side, and on the other side
you were to show me statesmen like Mr.
Chamberlain, like Mr. Gladstone, like Mr.
Balfour, like Mr. Guizot, I would have to
throw in my lot with the great Englishmen.
Now, Sir, the claim has been made in this
House and out of it that the Liberal party
has trampled upon provincial rights and
provincial autonomy, that it has abandoned
its principles of 1896, and that now the Liberal party is invading provincial rights
and
provincial autonomy. Well, Mr. Speaker,
let me refer for a moment to what took place
in 1890. What was the position of the right
hon. the Prime Minister in 1896, when he
moved the six months hoist of the Remedial
Bill ? He said : This parliament has a
right to interfere ; the remedy lies with us,
but I think that remedy should not be
applied until all conciliatory methods have
been exhausted. Now, Sir, in 1896 we stood
for conciliation. What are we doing today ?
We are still standing for conciliation, we
stand for compromise on an honourabe
basis.
Mr. BERGERON. Would my hon. friend
allow me to ask him a question ? Did the
solution of 1896 settle the Manitoba school
question to the satisfaction of the minority?
Mr. BELAND. It did settle it to a certain
extent which appears to be satisfactory to
the minority. It may not be satisfactory
to my hon. friend, who is known to be an
ardent and devoted supporter of the Catholic
church. But to my mind, and as a means
establishing peace and harmony in this
country between the different elements, it
is satisfactory.
Mr. BERGERON. I hope I am not troubling my hon. friend. But how does he explain this trip of Mr.
Rogers and Mr. Campbell down here to secure a more favourable
settlement for the minority of Manitoba ?
Mr. BELAND. I think I can satisfy
the hon gentleman on that point. Mr.
Rogers is fond of notoriety, he desires to
make himself and his party some politi
3913
3914
cal capital in Manitoba, and he came to
meet Monseigneur Sbarretti for the purpose, in my opinion. of procuring some arrangement
by which he hoped to capture
the Catholic vote of Manitoba. I think that
the object of Mr. Rogers, in my estimation,
and I think in the estimation of my hon.
friend also, was to make political capital.
Now, Sir, who is making a claim for provincial rights to-day ? The hon, the leader
of the opposition is making, from the rock
of the constitution, as he said, a fight for
provincial rights. We had an instance the
other day of how hon. gentlemen will stand
sometimes for provincial rights when the
leader of the opposition criticised the Bill
that was introduced a few days ago by the
right hon. gentleman, and when he was asked
whether the land should be left with the
provinces or with the federal government,
he was of the opinion that the land should
go to the provinces. But then he bethought
himself, I suppose, of the strong objection,
for it was an objection, that I quoted a
minute ago, that it would perhaps interfere
with an effective immigration policy. But
I will quote his own words :
May I not further suggest that even if there
were any danger—and I do not think there is—
it would be the task of good statesmanship to
have inserted, if necessary, a provision in this
Bill with regard to free homesteads and the
price of these lands, and obtain to it the consent of the people of the Northwest
Territories.
It is no more difficult than that.
Provincial rights, provincial autonomy as
long as it serves his purpose ! But, as soon
as it does not serve his purpose, let us invade provincial rights and send a postcard,—
I suppose that is the system in vogue in
Toronto now—to every member and to
every citizen in the Northwest Territories
saying : Do you approve of that? If he
says he does, all right, and if he says he
does not, well, where will he be ?
We, of the province of Quebec, we, the
Catholic minority of this Dominion, are
bound to change our mind as to the hon.
leader of the opposition (Mr. R. L Borden).
We had always thought that he was a broad
minded Englishman, we had always thought
that he was animated by that spirit of fair
dealing and kindly forbearance that have
distinguished English institutions for the
last fifty years. The other day be pronounced upon us a beautiful eulogy. He
said that he had traversed the province of
Quebec from one end to the other and that
every man he had met there was well read,
intelligent and sociable and a moment afterwards he moved the amendment which is
now before the House. The hon. gentleman,
I am afraid, has missed his vocation. He
has missed his profession. He should have
been a surgeon because he would have made
a very skilful one. When I listened to him
I could not refrain from thinking that when
he pronounced that eulogy, when he uttered
3915
COMMONS
those words in praise of the French Canadian people he was doing the work of a
surgeon before the operation—injecting into
the tissues an analgesic before he used
the scalpel. The hon. member for North
Toronto (Mr. Foster) says that because we
have tried to invade provincial rights we
have become a disrupted and disbanded
party. But, for a moment or two let us
examine what has happened on the other
side. The moment the hon. leader of the
opposition has placed his constitutional gun
in position and the moment he has fired that
gun it has been found to be a slate gun. It
splits to pieces. The hon. member for Jacques Cartier (Mr. Monk) mortally wounded
;
the hon. member for Beauharnois (Mr. Bergeron) not quite so badly wounded. The list
of wounded grows every day. The hon.
member for North Toronto says that
the weakness of the Czar of Russia
is that he does not consult his people.
Then, I might retort : What is the weakness of the hon. leader of the opposition ?
If it is a mistake for the Czar
of Russia not to consult his people how
much greater a mistake must it be for that
hon. gentleman to turn his gun against his
own lieutenants and his own regiment ?
But, we have not heard so far in this House
from the hon. member for South York (Mr.
Maclean). He will be coming some day and
making a plea such as he made to-day in
favour of provincial rights. That hon. gentleman succeeded in the not very remote
past in making himself plainly understood
on the question of provincial rights. It was
in March, 1902. What did the hon. member
for South York say ? He was speaking in
this House and he said :
Speaking of the provinces, I have not a moment's hesitation in saying that the result
of
provincial government in Canada has been
detrimental to the progress of the country. I
say that the interpretation of the law that has
been given by the English Privy Council in regard to the distribution of rights as
between
the provinces and the federal power, has been
against the interests of the country as a whole.
That I regret. I agree with the hon. member
for Lanark (Hon. Mr. Haggart) that some day
we will have the whole jurisdiction in this parliament, and in some way we will work
it out,
and in some way we will increase the federal
power and wipe out gradually the provincial
power.
Who would believe that after what the
hon. gentleman told us this afternoon ? But,
that is not all. He said something else.
Here is what he said :
Yet we are told that there is no hope of
progress, that the main thing is to uphold
local rights. That is the doctrine of the Minister of Justice of Canada. I take issue
with
him there. The thing which the Conservative
party of this country committed itself to was
to build up a nation, with a unification of laws,
if that was possible, and that this country
should in some way try to recover the federal
power which has been lost to the provinces in
the past few years.
3915
3916
I ask my hon. friend frankly if he approves of that ?
Mr. BELAND. Well, if the hon. gentleman says he approves of that, I have nothing more to say.
The hon. member for
North Toronto did not pose as the champion
of provincial rights in 1896. He assumed
a different position then, but when he made
his speech he said he would not do it again,
and why ? Because the will of the people
and particularly the expression of the popular will in Quebec prevented him from doing
it. Do you not see, Mr. Speaker, the skill
and adroitness of that argument ? If the
hon. gentleman had only said that at the
general election in 1896 the people of the
province of Quebec went against his position,
while we know better, we could have understood it, but he mentioned also the general
elections of 1900 and 1904 as giving an expression of the people against the stand
he
took in this House on the question of provincial rights. He sought to escape the condemnation
which was placed upon the Conservative party for their bad administration prior to
that day. He affects to believe that in 1896, 1900 and 1904 the people
voted for the upholding of provincial rights.
He counts for nothing his own disastrous
financial administration. He counts for
nothing the scandals of his party during the
18 years of their regime. He counts for
nothing the stagnation of affairs, the ineffective immigration policy and especially
that in the general elections in 1900 and
1904 the people gave expression to the contentment which they felt under the progressive
policy that our great leader has
introduced into this country and which he
has maintained.
The plea for provincial rights is a myth
in this debate, cold political calculation
is behind it. Men like the leader of
the opposition, men like the member
for North Toronto (Mr. Foster) should
rise to a higher level, for no one doubts
in his heart that they do not know this
plea is unfounded. Intended as it is to
appeal strongly to the highest principles
of autonomy, of liberty, and of equality ;
it will utterly fail in its results when the
sound reasoning of the plain people of this
country is applied to it. I have spoken
longer than I expected, but I ask the House
to bear with me a few moments longer.
There have been very strong appeals made
to religious and racial prejudices in this
country. I will not refer to the circular
sent broadcast by the member for East
Grey ; I will not refer to his speech in this
House, though he uttered some very regrettable words, but I will deal for a moment
and a moment only with the Huntingdon
' Gleaner ' which he quoted. The Huntingdon ' Gleaner' I may say is a paper of minor
importance in the province of Quebec; it is
a purely local paper, and from the extracts
that the member for East Grey read to the
3917 APRIL 5, 1905
House one would be led to believe that the
Protestant people in the province of Quebec are being ill-treated. Well, here is the
answer I have to give to the Huntingdon
'Gleaner'; I shall quote the words of the
Hon. Mr. Weir, a man of high standing in
the province of Quebec, and a representative
of the Protestant people in the Quebec cabinet. Mr. Weir spoke at a public meeting
in
Montreal ; he spoke when he was not asked
to deal with the question, when he was not
solicited to say a word in reference to it.
and here is what Mr. Weir said :
I, being the son of a Scotch father and a
Scotch mother. I, a Protestant, have always
in this province seen not only our rights but
our remotest wishes respected. I challenge
any Protestant to say, that he has ever been
ill-treated. And therefore, when in the province of Ontario we see politicians and
bigots appealing to racial and religious
prejudices in order to deprive the minority of the rights to which they are constitutionally
and logically entitled, it is our imperious duty to cry shame, and to stigmatize
them.
Let me refer for a moment or two to some
of what I shall call, the exaggerations of
language in the newspapers of Ontario, and
Quebec also—for there are bigots in both
provinces. Here is what the Toronto 'News '
writes :
It is not conceivable that Sir Wilfrid Laurier,
much less the Protestant, members of his cabinet believe they are acting in accordance
with
the spirit of the constitution. That they have
submitted themselves to the will of the hierarchy of Quebec is the only reasonable
explanation of their conduct.
I will give you the answer to that from
'L'Evénement' of Quebec, an organ of the
Conservative party ; the leading organ of the
Conservative party in the district of Quebec. 'L'Evénement' writes :
No, no. It is not the free denominational
schools that Sir Wilfrid Laurier guaranteed to
the Catholic and French minority of the Territories ; it is the neutral schools which
are
slaves of the state. This is the truth, the
cruel truth, the truth undeniable and manifest.
The Toronto 'World,' the organ of my
right hon. friend—not my right hon. friend,
but my hon. friend from South York, I shall
quote from it. I must say, Mr. Speaker,
that I had great trouble in finding a clipping from the Toronto 'World' that I
could, with any sense of decency, quote to
the House, when that paper writes against
the province of Quebec. I have been looking through its columns for some time and
hardly could I put my finger upon a few
lines which would be quotable in this House,
but few as they are I will read them. The
Toronto ' World ' says :
The new provinces are to be stripped of their
public lands and compelled to submit to an educational system modelled under the artistic
direction of the Quebec hierarchy.
3917
3918
Let me give my hon. friend from South
York the answer from 'L'Evénement,' that
same Conservative newspaper in Quebec,
which writing of Sir Wilfrid Laurier says :
When one has seventy of a majority, he does
his duty or he falls on the field of honour. He
does not need to betray to remain in power.
And when ' L'Evénement ' talks of betraying, it does not talk of betraying Protestants;
it is surely talking of Sir Wilfrid
Laurier betraying Catholics. But there is
something more serious than all that. This
afternoon I heard the member for East
Grey say very plainly : it is about time that
we should have some proof of that toleration in the province of Quebec which is
so much talked of. Well, I will try to give
the hon. gentleman a few proofs of that
toleration of ours. The hon. gentleman will
admit that in the province of Quebec—
Mr. BELAND. My hon. friend who sits
beside me says that he will not admit it,
but the member for East Grey is fair, and
that being so I am sure that when he hears
what I have to say he will stand up and
declare that he was mistaken—honestly mistaken, but mistaken just the same. Let
the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sproule) listen. In
this House we have twelve Protestant members from the province of Quebec. We
have one from Argenteuil, a county in which
the Protestant population is 7,800 and the
Catholic population 8,100. The division of
Montreal, St. Antoine, represented by my
good friend Mr. Bickerdike—
Mr. BELAND. Yes, represented by Mr.
Ames, and I can still call him my good
friend I hope. In Montreal, St. Antoine, the
Protestant population is 22,000 and the
Catholic population is 24,000. The county
of Chateauguay, represented here by
my good friend Mr. Brown, has a Protestant population of 3,000 and a Catholic population
of 12,500. The county of
Compton, represented here by my good
friend Mr. Hunt, has a Protestant population of 10,500 and a Catholic population of
15,000. The county of Huntingdon, the very
county in which that newspaper which has
been quoted by my hon. friend from East
Grey is published, has a Protestant population of 6,620, and a Catholic population
of 7,200, and the Catholic majority
sends a Protestant representative to this
House in the person of my hon. friend
Mr. Walsh. But this is not all. I
want to make the proof of our toleration so convincing that my hon. friend
will feel obliged to stand up and admit it
if he wants to be fair. The county of Missisquoi, with a Protestant population of
8,000
and a Catholic population of 10,000, sends
3919 COMMONS
as its representative to this House, our good
friend Mr. Meigs. Montreal, St. Lawrence
division, which is represented by my good
friend Mr. Bickerdike, has a Protestant population of 10,000 and a Catholic population
of 30,000. The county of Pontiac, which is
represented by Mr. Brabazon, has a Protestant population of 6,400 and a Catholic
population of 16,000. Sherbrooke, which is
represented here by my good friend Dr.
Worthington, has a Protestant population of
7,000 and a Catholic populaton of 11,000.
Stanstead, which is represented by Mr.
Lovell, has a Protestant population of 9,000
and a Catholic population of 9,500. Shefford, which is represented by our eminent
friend Mr. Parmelee, has a Protestant population of 5,000 and a Catholic population
of
18,000, and I do not blame them at all for
electing that gentleman.
Mr. INGRAM. Will the hon. gentleman
allow me ? We will agree that that is the
standing of the two religious parties in the
several constituencies; but when it comes
to the vote, all the good Protestants will
vote for this Bill.
Mr. BELAND. I am not concerned with
that at all. They may vote as they please,
and I am sure the French Canadian people
will never go back on them on that account. Out of the twelve counties in the
province of Quebec which are represented
in this House by Protestants, there is only
one county where the majority is Protestant, and that is the county of Brome, represented
here by my hon. friend, the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Fisher).
Now, this may not be exactly fair; it
may indicate that we are more tolerant
than we are in reality. I will take another
point of view—that of the whole population of the province. According to the
whole population of the province of Quebec, the Protestants would be entitled in
this parliament to eight representatives ;
but they have twelve. What does my hon.
friend from East Grey think of that ? The
'Evening Telegram,' of Toronto, which
makes a specialty of dealing with the question of the tolerance of the provinces of
Ontario and Quebec, has the following :
Ontario's tolerance is illustrated in the tendency of every Roman Catholic who represents
a Protestant constituency to vote as a liegeman
of his church rather than as the citizen of his
country, upon questions affecting the aims of
the church.
The intolerance of Quebec is illustrated in
the spectacle of every Protestant representative voting with an eye to the race and
creed
prejudices of Quebec, and with vision blinded
to the principles of his own race and creed.
Ontario's treatment of the minority that is
over-represented in the government, over-represented in the legislature, is not equalled
by
the treatment which the minority receives in
any other commonwealth on earth.
3919
3920
Ontario can match her alleged intolerance
against the boasted tolerance of any people on
earth. It is an outrage that such a province
with such a record should be the recipient of
lectures on toleration from the bigots of Quebec.
Well, let us see if it is true that Ontario
can match her tolerance against the tolerance of Quebec. In Ontario the Protestant
population is 1,800,000, and the Catholic
population 390,000. On that basis the Protestants of Ontario are entitled to 72 members
in this House and the Catholics to 14
members. What is the representation in
reality ? Seventy-nine Protestants and
seven Catholics, just one-half of what the
Catholics are entitled to by their population. These are the figures, irrespective
of
parties, for they include all the 86 members from the province of Ontario.
But this is not all. Let us take the Dominion as a whole, and see how the representation
stands. According to their population, the Catholics are entitled in this
House to 87 members, and we have how
many ? Seventy-two. I hope that my
good friend who publishes the Toronto
' Telegram ' will publish these figures, which
are exact, being based on the census of
1901. That would be only an act of justice on the part of the 'Telegram,' instead
of misrepresenting the people of the province of Quebec, as it has done in the past.
I wonder, Mr. Speaker, what the average
man of Ontario thinks when he reads such
articles as are published to-day in the Toronto newspapers ? I wonder if the average
farmer of the province of Ontario has
ever been taught in his school—I hope he
has—what the Catholic clergy have done
for this country of ours. I wonder if he
has been taught that that same clergy have
rendered eminent and inappreciable services
to the British Crown during the last 140
years, especially in the acute and critical
days of early British rule in America. I
wonder if he has been taught that, if he
has been informed of the Catholic clergy's
unshakable loyalty to the kings and
queens of Great Britain since fate went
against us on the Plains of Abraham. If
the good farmers of the province of Ontario were taught that the Roman Catholic
clergy in the province of Quebec have resisted time and again temptations and inducements
to take part in agitations for
annexation; if he were taught in his early
days what education in the Roman Catholic
colleges and universities has done towards
supplying this country with men who have
gained distinction in literature, in the professions and in agriculture, and who,
every
one will admit, will stand comparison with
those of any other country; if he knew that
the great idol of Ontario, the late Sir John
Macdonald, declared on a memorable occasion in the city of London, that amongst
the most faithful subjects of Her Majesty
in Canada were to be ranked the French
3921 APRIL 5, 1905
Canadian Catholic clergy and population;
if he were taught in the schools these
things, I would have no fear for the result,
and would be confident that he would resist any malicious appeals, because he is
a moderate man and a man who ponders
well before he acts.
Mr. Speaker, I am about to close.
I have detained the House longer than I
intended, but I find I must claim your indulgence a little longer. I say it is of
vital
interest, admittedly, that the citizens of this
country should not lose sight of their rights
but it is far more important that they should
not overlook their duties. To sum up my
idea, this is the inevitable conclusion to
which we must arrive, that the efforts of
statesmen and public powers shall always be
vain and fruitless if they are not founded
on the spirit of good faith and toleration,
on that broad spirit of Christianity, vivifying hundreds of thousands of firesides
throughout this great land. That spirit of
toleration and mutual forbearance between
creeds and nationalities in the great west
as well as in the older portions of our beloved country, will alone give that social,
intellectual, moral and material foundation
without which no nation can rise to permanent greatness.
Let us not shelter ourselves under the
flimsy parapet of legal technicalities ; and
if ever doubt should enter our minds, if
our path should appear full of difficulties,
let us rise to the great responsibilities of
our office with courage, justice and a spirit
of fair-dealing. Let us ignore both the
zealot and the bigot, and plant our feet in
the solid ground of honourable compromise. Let us above all remember that this
is a land, unparalleled, perhaps, and certainly unsurpassed for its immense resources,
and its future possibilities, to which we
invite the civilized nations of the old world,
and if we desire to be a true nation, a
worthy product of the 20th century, we
must be prepared to sink and melt our individual differences in the warm rays of the
sun of justice and liberty.
Mr. J. BARR (Dufferin). As the hour
is late, Mr. Speaker, I would suggest that
the House should rise and would beg to
move the adjournment of the debate.
Mr. FIELDING. The hon. member was
not present last evening when there was,
perhaps, what I might call an understanding that we should sit later into the night.
At all events the observation was made
that in assenting to an early adjournment
last evening, we should, in order that this
debate should be advanced in a reasonable
way, work harder and sit later, and I think
that is the temper of the House.
Mr. BARR. I must of course, bow to
the will of the House. I should not attempt
to address the House on this subject, did
3921
3922
I not think it was my bounden duty not to
give a silent vote on this Autonomy Bill. In voting, as I intend to do, for the amendment
of the leader of the opposition, I do not wish to be understood as being opposed to
giving to the fullest extent provincial rights to all the great lone land of the
Northwest. But before entering upon the remarks I intend to make on the Bill itself,
I desire for a shore time to follow my hon. friend who has just sat down. I was pleased
to learn that the hon. gentleman is not a
lawyer, because I naturally supposed that
he would take pains to steer clear of the
constitutional question which has taken up
so much of our time. I think we might well
leave that question to be threshed out by
the lawyers who, so far as we can judge,
will leave it just as hazy as it was when
they entered the discussion. And after
we shall have heard all the learned arguments advanced by the gentlemen of the
legal profession on the one side or the
other, I have no doubt that we shall come
back to the same conclusion which has always prevailed in the past, and that is that
it is their duty to make black appear white
and right wrong. And as that is part of
their business, I am glad to know that I am
not a lawyer, but a doctor. But there is
one thing which I presume every hon. gentleman will admit, and that is that it is
the
duty of this House to make laws, and that,
on the other hand, it is the duty of the
courts to interpret them, and whether we
arrive at the conclusion that this Bill is
ultra vires or otherwise, I presume the end
will be that it will have to go to the Privy
Council. And as that court is composed of
human beings who are also lawyers, the
probability is that they will give a decision
according to the temper in which they are
and according as their digestion is good
or bad. We shall therefore have to wait
for their decision to decide whether this
Bill is legal or not. But I venture to say
that the free and independent elector, the
ordinary man, as he reads the 92nd clause
of the British North America Act, will have
no hesitation in concluding that so far as
education is concerned, that is a question
which has to be left to the province, with
the exception that this parliament has the
right to pass a remedial law in the event
of any province not carrying out the law as
it is in the statute-books.
My hon. friend has said we should live
in peace and harmony. We all agree with
that, we would like to live in peace and
harmony with all men in all parts of this
fair Dominion of ours, but in order to do
that we have rights and we have privileges
which we must guard and guard safely.
We must remember that the majority have
rights which they should exercise just as
freely as do the minority. My hon. friend
attempted to make a point against the lead
3923
COMMONS
er of the opposition (Mr. R. L. Borden) and
although not a lawyer he endeavoured to
insinuate that we on this side have not
succeeded in our argument and that the
legal argument of the leader of the opposition had been a failure. I shall not follow
that up beyond saying that we are all proud
of the leader of the opposition. We feel
that we have one man here who is not only
able to take care of himself, but able to
sustain the combat on any question that
comes before this House, legal or otherwise, and to hold his own with any hon.
gentleman on the opposite side. He has
proved this to be the case in the past, and
I venture to say that he will continue to
show in the future that it is still the case.
Then we have the member for North Toronto (Mr. Foster) whom I have no hesitation in
saying hon. gentlemen opposite have
dreaded in the past, but never more than
at the present time. This is shown by the
very fact that in the past on two occasions
when he was defeated, they put forth every
effort of the government, not only by their
voice and by means that are not too clear
or too fair, but they put forth their money
bags, which they sent to all parts to accomplish the work to an extent that is detrimental
to the best interests and to the morality of this country. My hon. friend who
has just sat down (Mr. Beland) tried to
make a point out of the fact that they are
more liberal in Quebec than in other provinces. They may be, looking at it from a
religious point of view, but when we look
at it from a political point of view we
must know that there are some reasons why
there are only 12 Conservatives from that
province. The Conservatives have about
100,000 votes in Quebec while the Reformers have only about 130,000, and notwithstanding
that there were only 11 Conservatives returned and 54 Reformers, proving beyond a
doubt that there was some
work going on behind the scenes that was
not of a religious nature. I might point to
the liberality of Ontario. In the Conservative government of the province of Onario,
one of the strongest governments the
province ever had, there is for the first
time as Minister of Public Works a French
Canadian, and we have as Minister of Crown
Lands a Roman Catholic, both men worthy
of the positions and we the Conservatives of
the province of Ontario were pleased beyond degree when we saw the choice which
the present premier, Hon. Mr. Whitney, had
made. I ask you to point to such liberality under any other circumstances and I
venture to say that if I had the vote here
it would be found that so far as their representatives are concerned the Roman
Catholics have received a fair share of the
vote according to their numbers in the province of Ontario, particularly in connection
with the Conservative party. In looking
over the votes we find that in all cases they
have had a larger representation in the
3923
3924
Conservative ranks than they have had in
the Reform ranks, proving beyond a doubt
that the Conservatives on all occasions have
been more liberal along these lines than the
Reformers have been in the past.
I was rather amused to see my hon. friend
(Mr. Beland) endeavouring to make a point
against the hon. member for South York
(Mr. Maclean). He struggled hard, he read
'Hansard,' and read it with all the ingenuity of one well up along that line. He read
'Hansard' to prove beyond a doubt that my
hon. friend was opposed to provincial rights,
but he did not tell you what the gist of that
argument was. He did not tell you what
question was being discussed at that time.
and of course we all know that there are
questions in connection with the rights and
privileges of the Dominion and those of the
provinces which on many occasions have
overlapped ; they have not been well defined
and great injustice has on many occasions
been done in consequence. Look, for instance, at our railways, look at the conflict
of jurisdiction in regard to charters for
joint stock companies, &c. Here they are
running from one parliament to the other
obtaining charters of different kinds when
the jurisdiction of the different parliaments
in that respect should be well defined. We
find that hon. gentlemen were discussing
matters in connection with these grievances
and that the discussion had nothing to do
with equal rights such as we are discussing
here to-night. I shall not follow my hon.
friend further along that line, but I shall
dwell now for a few moments upon the
great question of the Bill which is before
us and I might say that while the educational question is one of the most important
dealt with in this Bill, there is great
danger under existing circumstances that
the attention of the people of Canada will
be diverted from the other great questions
which must affect that country in the future
by the consideration of this one clause, and
it may not be until after this becomes law,
it may not be until it is beyond remedy, that
we will have discovered mistakes which
will then be beyond recall. I look upon the
question of the number of provinces as one
of great importance and one which cannot
be too carefully considered. It is my opinion that it would have been much better
for these provinces if we had two provinces
instead of three. It would have been much
better if the province of Manitoba could
have been extended either to the north or
west or east, and then we would have had
one province west of that, making two in
place of three. There is no doubt that Manitoba as she is constituted to-day will
be at
a great disadvantage in the future. It is
a small province of 73,000 square miles,
against two provinces of 150,000 square
miles each. I submit that Manitoba is not
receiving justice and before I have finished
I shall endeavour to show why this injustice
is being done to her. I believe it would be
3925 APRIL 5, 1905
better to have two provinces in place of
three. We know that the more populous a
province is the more expensive its administration becomes. At the present time in
those two provinces there are only half a
million people, surely not more than enough
for one province. It has been said before,
and I will say it again, that we are very
much over-governed in the Dominion of
Canada. We have more representatives in
every legislature than are required. We
have too much legislative machinery. So I
say that if there were only one province instead of two in the Northwest one-half
less
machinery would be required. Perhaps there
would need to be a greater number of representatives, but only one parliamentary
building would be required. We must remember that to-day we are laying the foundation
of what will probably become the
two greatest provinces in this fair Dominion of ours. Although they have only 500,000
at present, in less than two decades, certainly in less than a quater of a century,
there will be 10,000,000 or 20,000,000 in that
vast country, people who have come from
many parts of the world and from many
nations, mingling together and forming probably the brightest and most intelligent
people in this fair Dominion. Under these circumstances it is all important that the
foundation should be strong and well laid and
that no mistake should be made. As for
the capitals of the two provinces, whether
they are to be Edmonton or Calgary or not,
it is well to let the people settle that question for themselves.
Now with reference to the land in those
provinces. I do not agree with some hon.
gentlemen opposite who have spoken on this
subject. I believe it would be to the interest
of those provinces that they should have control of the public lands, and I believe
it
would be to the interest of the Dominion of
Canada to leave the land with the provinces.
Quebec, Ontario and all the other provinces
except Manitoba have control of their public
lands. Manitoba has not, because circumstances were very different when she was
created a province, there were only about
12,000 souls in the territory now forming
Manitoba, and they were not in a position
to manage their own affairs. But here we
have 500,000 people, very intelligent, and
comprising among them able men such as
have composed their legislative assemblies. I
freely admit that the Dominion has dealt
liberally with them, we have given on the
whole to each province, $1,124,125. That is
a large sum indeed, larger than the revenue
which the Dominion will get out of the land.
At the same time it is not sufficiently large
to carry on the administration of public
affairs as it should be carried on. I have
made a calculation of the sums we are
giving those provinces. For the support of
the government and legislature, $50,000 ; 80
cents per head on an estimated population
of 250,000, $200,000 ; interest at 5 per cent on
3925
3926
$38,107,568, as a set-off against the debt of
the other provinces which the Dominion assumed when they entered confederation,
$405,373. We are also to pay them by way
of compensation for public lands, $375,000
yearly, and we give them annually for ten
years $92,750 to provide for the construction
of the necessary public buildings. That will
be increased as the population increases.
When the population reaches 800,000 the two
provinces will have an income of $4,415,750.
Now I submit that it would be better for
the provinces to keep their land, the Dominion of Canada will not make that much
money out of the land, and the payments
we are making to those provinces will be a
burden on this Dominion which will be felt
for many years to come. I contend that
it would be better for the province to keep
the land because it would be administered
much better and much more economically
than it is at the present time. Take the
land offices in the Northwest Territories, I
submit that many of them are perfect cesspools of corruption, and I speak whereof
I
know, as I have had some dealings through
agents and otherwise with these land offices,
and my conclusion is that they are not conducted in a proper manner. For instance,
they are surrounded by heelers, by those
who have claims upon the government, and
the result is that when an actual settler
goes there, when he has picked out his land
and desires to place his name upon it, invariably he is told that it will require
some
consideration. Now if the business was properly conducted, they would be able to say
at once to that man : You can have it, or :
It is sold. But that is not the course pursued. He is annoyed, and, in many cases,
he has to settle with the claims of some other
parties. The result is hardships to the actual
settler, to the immigrant coming in to make
his home there. Many of them do not
get the land after they have gone to much
trouble in picking it out. Whilst that is
the case with the actual settler, it is much
worse with the, prospector, of whom there
are many, they are the most important class
of the community. I speak from knowledge
on this subject. Prospectors are numerous
there, they travel all over the country, hundreds of thousands of miles exploring
the
land, digging down into the bowels of the
earth to see if they can find anything that
is worth taking up. When they make application to the land office, in almost every
case, I venture to say in ninety-nine cases
out of a hundred, they are told that it is
impossible to decide whether that land is
taken up or otherwise, and they will have
to wait a few days.
The prospector perhaps spends a large
sum of money in locating the land which
he desires to obtain. He comes back in a
few days and finds three or four bogus
claims made, and if he obtains the land
by paying two or three rake-offs he is more
fortunate than the great majority of pros
3927
COMMONS
pectors that are doing business in that
vast country. They are surrounded by the
barnacles that are sticking to these land
offices like barnacles to a ship, who are
looking for a rake-off, and I say that under
these circumstances justice cannot be done.
There are in that country hundreds and
thousands of this class of men who are becoming rich year after year at the expense
of the country. Large tracts of land are
sold to speculators for very small sums.
There is a condition that they have to settle so much land, but this is not always
carried out. Different arrangements are
made and the result is that the country is
suffering because they are not settling the
land to the extent that it should be settled,
and that it would be if the land were in
the hands of the provinces. I venture to
say that there is to-day a state of corruption in that country that could not exist
for one day if the lands were in the hands
of the provinces. I venture to say, and in
this I speak whereof I know, that if a commission was issued and if an examination
were made, it would be found that the
state of affairs is much worse up there
than I have described it. It is preventing
settlement, it is preventing people from
going in there, it is preventing men who
are prepared to invest their money in endeavouring to open up that country from
making the ventures which they otherwise
would make. One of the strongest claims
that we have heard put forward by hon.
gentlemen opposite is that they should hold
these lands in order that they may control
the immigration policy. I submit that if
there is one branch of the administration
which these provinces should have in their
own hands, it is immigration. We know
that immigration may prove a curse or a
blessing. If we have immigrants coming
into this country who are not desirable,
if we have a great many immigrants who
will not make good citizens, who are physically or otherwise unfit to undertake the
duties of citizenship and who are not prepared to earn their own livelihood, then
I say these immigrants will prove a curse
rather than a blessing. It is a regrettable
circumstance that we have had so many
immigrants coming into this country who
are utterly unfit to earn a livelihood. Many
of them refuse to become citizens, and I
submit that an immigrant, let him come
from whatever country he may, if he is
not prepared to become a full-fledged citizen and to fight the battles of this country
if needs be, is not a person that any country should desire to bring in. It is a remarkable
fact that a large class of these
immigrants have been brought into this
country on more advantageous terms than
those granted to settlers from eastern Canada. I presume that one of the reasons
why such great interest is taken in this
Bill in the eastern provinces is that the
people residing in this part of the country
3927
3928
have relatives in the west, that many of
them have their sons and daughters up
there, worthy sons of the noble sires of
Ontario, Quebec and the different provinces
of this Dominion, but notwithstanding this
fact foreigners and others have been accorded advantages which Canadian settlers
cannot obtain in that new land. That is
a state of affairs, which, I submit, should
not exist. According to the returns of the
last year, we brought into this country
134,223 immigrants, of whom 17,055 were
under twelve years of age. We paid for
the inspection of these immigrants to medical men, a total of $542,126, or $3.57 for
the
inspection of each immigrant. Yet, we all
know that to-day there are hundreds and
thousands physically unfit to make their
living in this country, that they are a
charge upon the Dominion or the province
where they are, and we hear from the charitable institutions all over this Dominion
that the greater number of those for whom
they have to provide are the immigrants
that are brought into the country. We
know that many of them are affected with
contagious diseases, that many are affected
with eye diseases, that they have had
from infancy, and that if the medical examination had been as thorough as it should
have been, the state of affairs that we find
in regard to immigration could not exist.
Only a few were deported last year, proving beyond a doubt that whilst we have
paid large sums for the services of these
medical inspectors, the examinations were
not such as should have been made, and
that those who to-day are imposing the
greatest burden upon the charitable institutions are these immigrants. Under these
circumstances, I submit we have a state
of affairs which could not exist if the provinces had supervision over these lands
and of immigrant work, the provinces having much more interest in this work than
the Dominion has. Under these circumstances, I submit that it would be much
better that they should have the lands.
They could make more out of them and
they could have settlers of a desirable class
coming in under their supervision. Then,
again, I submit that the land belongs to
the provinces. It is true that the Dominion
of Canada paid £300,000 for that country,
not for the land, but for the right of the
Hudson Bay Company to hunt. Therefore, I say that the land, as I read the
British North America Act, should and does
belong to the provinces. If the other provinces require all the land they can get
in
order to make ends meet, if they require
money, and if they run in debt year after
year, how is it that these new provinces
with the amount of money which is to be
placed at their disposal, will be able to improve that country as they should ? They
have to provide charitable institutions for
that unfortunate class that is rapidly increasing in all countries, the insane. They
3929 APRIL 5, 1905
have to provide charitable institutions, they
have to build roads and bridges and incur
enormous expense, and with the money at
their disposal it is utterly impossible for
them to build up that country as they
should. If the province of Quebec is given
its lands, why should not these new provinces ? By this Bill they have nothing under
the land, they have nothing but the
free air of heaven, and I suppose the Dominion government would have grasped
that too had it the power. Quebec has
no surplus, but out of the lands of the
province they are able to give to the parent
of twelve children a bounty in land and
money.
Mr. LEMIEUX. Land or money.
Mr. BARR. Very well. We have never
advanced that far in Ontario, and I do not
think it would be worth while to offer that
inducement because there would be very
few to take advantage of it. Ontario has
her lands, mines, and minerals and without
them that province would have been starved
years ago. Every year Ontario has found,
it necessary to sell from her timber limits
and her Crown lands and to obtain large
sums out of her mines and minerals. Notwithstanding that so far as we in the opposition
during many years were concerned we
never were able to find a surplus. It is true
that the Liberal government always claimed
they had a surplus, but that surplus was
mythical as mythical could be, and when
the books are now thoroughly audited it will
be proved that not only has the province
not a surplus, but that she is millions of dollars behind. What advantage is it for
the
new provinces to have borrowing powers if
they have no security to offer ? Had it not
been that Ontario could obtain a revenue
from her natural resources years ago that
province would have been face to face with
direct taxation which is the greatest calamity that could possibly happen to any people,
province or country, and under this Bill that
calamity is bound to overtake the new provinces. Manitoba has control of her swamp
lands which in time will become most productive, and from them she derives a large
income. Why should Manitoba have the
swamp lands and the new provinces be
denied them ? I venture to say that in the
near future these provinces will be found
coming here demanding better terms and
putting up such a strong case that better
terms will have to be granted no matter
what government is in power. At this late
hour of the night I will not speak as long
as I had intended, but I shall for a short
time discuss that vexed question of separate
schools in the new provinces, which is to-day
agitating the mind of the people in this fair
Dominion as no other question has for many
years. It is a question which will live,
and which will continue to increase in importance, at all events until free and independent
electors of Canada will have
3929
3930
an opportunity to make themselves heard
on it. We have had the legal aspect of this
question discussed day after day and while
no definite decision has been arrived at, nobody will deny that if the government
had
not seen fit to insert the separate school
clause, there would have been no agitation
and the people of the new provinces could
decide on the question according to the dictates of their conscience and in their
own
best interests. It is not necessary to discuss here whether we are in favour of separate
schools or not. I am glad to say that
I am in accord with a number of those on
the other side of the House who have announced that they are not in favour of
separate schools. The Minister of Finance
has told us that he is opposed to separate
schools ; the member for Edmonton told us,
as he stated many times on the public platform that he was opposed to separate
schools. He is an old war horse who fought
for provincial rights in the past, and who
stated that he would never consent that separate schools should be inflicted on the
Northwest Territories, but now he has changed his
mind, like many others, in order to save
his party. For my part I would be sorry
to deprive any people of their just rights,
but the people of the new provinces themselves know best what rights should be
respected. It has been argued that because
we have separate schools in Quebec and
Ontario there should be separate schools
in the new provinces, but let me point out
that they have no separate schools in Nova
Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Manitoba or British Columbia. We
have Manitoba on the one side and British
Columbia on the other, free to regulate
their schools, and these two provinces
wedged in between them, with separate
schools forced upon them for all time to
come—a state of affairs which I think never
should have existed.
The difference between the separate
schools in Ontario and Quebec and those in
the new provinces in this. By the consent
of both parties, by an agreement entered
into by Quebec and Ontario, after due consideration, separate schools were established
in those two provinces in perpetuity, and
the government was embodied in the British
North America Act. That is a very different position from the position occupied by
these two provinces. When they obtained
their territorial rights they were in their
infancy; they were the wards of the Dominion government. They had no voice in
the settlement of the school question at
that time. The system was provided for in
the Bill of 1875 after much discussion, both
in this House and in the Senate. An amend
ment was moved, I think by the late Senator Aikens in the Senate, but was defeated
by a small majority. It was then that those
memorable words, of which so much has
been made, were uttered by the Hon. George
Brown, to the effect that in providing for
3931
COMMONS
separate schools in the Territorial Bill, they
were establishing them for all time to come.
He did not wish to imply that they would
have to be placed there ; but, being a farseeing man, he knew that the fact of that
provision being made would be used for the
purpose of perpetuating separate schools in
those provinces ; and it is well known that
he was always opposed to separate schools.
Now, what guarantee have we that the
separate schools in these two provinces will
continue as they are at the present time ?
I submit that we have no guarantee. We
find that the provisions of the Bill are very
hazy, so much so that lawyers might place
very different interpretations upon it ; and
the ordinances only guide the Territories,
but do not ensure the schools as they now
exist being continued for all time to come.
While no great hardship may be experienced
at the present time, it will certainly be a
hardship to the majority in newly settled
districts to maintain two weak and sickly
schools where there might be one vigorous
and healthy school. The Territories have
no guarantee whatever that these schools
will remain for all time to come as they are
at the present time. I suppose they could
change them for a system of schools similar
to what exists in the province of Ontario
to-day. According to a judgment given by
Mr. Justice McMahon some three months
ago, there are one hundred and five teachers
teaching in the separate schools of Ontario
to-day who have never passed a legal examination. This is a serious state of affairs;
and yet these teachers are going on teaching month after month. It is true they have
appealed the case to a higher court, and I
suppose it will ultimately go to the Privy
Council. These teachers are now teaching
contrary to the law, except that the late
government gave them permits to teach until a decision of the higher court could be
obtained. Many of these teachers are not
educated. It is said that many of them are
priests, who are educated ; but many are
indies and others who have had no training
whatever. The law with regard to separate
schools in Ontario has been changed in
many ways. For instance. the law provides
that all taxes paid by corporations must be
used for the support of the public schools ;
but a private Bill was passed providing that
the Sturgeon Falls Pulp Company should
divide its taxes between the public schools
and the separate schools. If that state of
affairs can be brought about in the province
of Ontario, why could it not in these new
provinces ? The Minister of Customs endeavoured to make a point against the gov»
ernment of the Northwest Territories, particularly against Mr. Haultain, when he
used these words :
Talk about Mr. Haultain not having been consulted. He was consulted frequentlym but
if he
had never been consulted or if no Northwest
member had ever been consulted, I ask what
better indication can you have of the desire
3931
3932
of the people of the Northwest Territories
than their own legislation ?
The legislation to which the Minister of
Customs referred was a law of the Northwest council, of which Mr. Haultain was
the head, particularly a law based on the
school law which was handed down to
them from this House. The law set forth
that there should be an advisory board composed of not less than two Catholics and
four Protestants. But it is only an advisory board : it is not clothed with any power
except to advise the Minister of Education,
and he can change the regulations at any
time ; so that we might have a very different
state of affairs in the near future from what
we have at the present .time. To my mind
it seems most extraordinary that the ex-
Minister of the Interior (Mr. Sifton) was
not consulted and more extraordinary still
that he himself did not make it a point to
be present at the cabinet meetings when this
matter was being decided. He well knew
that these Bills were being prepared and
he should have made it his duty to impress
on his colleagues and the right hon. gentleman the necessity of having them passed
upon by him before they were finally drafted. ln not taking this action, I submit
he
was recreant to his duty. 1 submit that he
did not do what was expected of him by
the people of the Northwest. It is indeed
extraordinary that on the subcommittee of
the cabinet which undertook to frame those
Bills, there was only one representative
from Ontario while there were three from
Quebec. Mr. Haultain. the premier of the
Territories was not consulted, and Mr. Rogers from Manitoba informed us to-day that
neither was be consulted, and we must conclude that it was decided by two or three
representatives from Quebec that this clause
No. l6 should be embodied in these Bills.
It is evident that the First Minister took
upon himself to bring down these Bills and
force them through the House without consulting his colleagues, proving beyond doubt
that we have to-day in this country a one
man government. Let us for a moment look
at the position occupied by this government
today as compared with the one they took
in 1896. In the election of 1896, the position
I admit was a unique one. The late government was endeavouring to force on this
House remedial legislation against the province of Manitoba. The right hon. gentleman.
who was then leading the opposition,
seized that opportunity to declare in the
province of Quebec that if he were returned
to power he would see that Manitoba gave
the Catholic minority of that province what
they desired. That was the stand taken by
the Quebec wing of the right hon. gentleman's party. but what did they do in the
province of Ontario? In the elections in
1896 in that province. I took a rather active
part and had the pleasure of hearing the
First Minister and the Postmaster General
on several occasions, and the arrangement
3933 APRIL 5, 1905
they entered into was this. The First Minister went up to the western part of Ontario
and entered into an agreement with the late
Sir Oliver Mowat to this effect, that if the
Reform party were returned to power—and
the signs of the times pointed that way—
Mr. Mowat would resign his seat in the local
cabinet and take office as Minister of Justice in the Dominion. Sir Oliver, being
a
canny Scotchman, was not going to take
any chances and would not resign his premiership of Ontario until it was certain
that the Liberals were returned to power in
the Dominion. Contrary to his protestations
in the past, that the provincial government
should not interfere in Dominion elections,
Sir Oliver Mowat took a very active part
in those elections, and I had the pleasure of
meeting him on several platforms. The position he then took was this. An effort, he
said, is being made by the government of
the Dominion to force remedial legislation
upon Manitoba to deprive that province of
its rights, and I ask the electors of Ontario
to look back at my past history and say
whether I have not on all occasions stood for
equal rights. Have I not, he exclaimed,
fought the battle of equal rights in years
gone by, have I not fought it in connection
with the boundary award and the license
question and fought it successfully. And
just as I fought it in the past in the local
legislature, so I shall, when I enter Dominion politics, fight for the rights. not
only
of Manitoba but of all that great western
country ; and he went on to declare that
when in the near future the territories would
be created provinces, he would see that equal
rights were extended to them. He would
never agree to separate schools or to remedial legislation for the purpose of forcing
those schools upon Manitoba or any province in the great lone land. And if the
time should ever come when he would not
have that power, he would resign his place
in the House. The Postmaster General took
the same ground. He declared on many a
platform that he would never support separate schools in the Dominion and would
never allow remedial degislation to be forced
on Manitoba. The First Minister was also
loud in his denunciation of the late government. He declared that he had stood in
this House, and was prepared to stand in
any part of the Dominion, for provincial
rights, and that he would never allow this
remedial legislation to be placed on Manitoba. He would never shackle any province
with legislation along that line. He
would never put the fetters upon any of
those provinces, he was opposed to separate
schools, he was pleased to know that they
could attend school together, that they could
go to the polls and vote together, and the
result was that all these statements had
their effect in Ontario. Seat after seat that
had gone Conservative in the past went by
overwhelming majorities to the Reform
party and the result was that in 1896 the
3933
3934
Reformers were surprised at the large vote
which they received in Ontario. They obtained it under false pretenses in the way
which I have pointed out. I ask the question how have they been able to swallow
all these principles, to swallow themselves
and to come here to-day after making these
pledges in Ontario and endeavour to force
separate schools upon this province, although
they are the very men who denounced them
in the past. I wonder how they in ten years
succeed in swallowing all these promises.
I cannot understand it unless in the words
of the poet :
An all-wise and ever-indulging Providence has
made them hollow.
In order that they their promises might swallow.
We have no separate schools in my county.
We had them on one occasion but they have
all disappeared. After a trial the Roman
Catholics found that the public schools were
much better and cheaper than the separate
schools. It has been pointed out to us in
the past that our public schools are Godless
schools ; in fact some speakers almost seem
to have the idea that as far as the Protestant religion is concerned there is no God
in that. So far as our national schools are
concerned they must remember that we had
enacted the Ross Bible from which portions
of scriptures were to be read each day. Religious instruction can be given by Ministers
of different denominations if they so
desire and if the trustees and parents desire
it and this is very often done. Under these
circumstances I submit that it cannot be
charged that these schools are Godless
schools. So far as the county of Dufferin
is concerned they do not want separate
schools, and I venture to say that that is
the case in many parts of the province as
well. I have here a resolution which was
passed in my county regretting that a provision for separate schools was placed in
this Bill. I have here also the statement
of the Minister of Public Works for Manitoba and I must say that it shows a most
extraordinary state of affairs indeed. We
find that in place of the First Minister meeting these delegates, as naturally we
would
expect, they were met by the Papal delegate. We have no objection to there being
a Papa] delegate in the Dominion of Canada so long as he confines his services to
the work of the church, but just as soon
as he interferes in our educational questions,
then I say the line must be drawn and we
have a right to take exception to his action.
It has been going the rounds for many
days that the Papal delegate met Mr.
Rogers and Mr. Campbell by appointment
and made a proposition to them. The proposition was that they should place a clause
in the Manitoba school law that where
there were in a rural district fifteen
Roman Catholic children or in a city or
town thirty Roman Catholic children separate rooms must be provided for them
3936
COMMONS
and that the trustees if they so desired it
must engage a teacher of their religious
persuasion. Now look how that would work
out; suppose there were sixty children in
the district, then one-quarter of those
would have one teacher and the other forty
or forty-five would have one teacher, yet
under that direction the trustees would be
required to pay their equal share of taxes
for the Catholic teacher who was only
teaching fifteen children. I submit that
this is a most unjust proposal and one that
should not be entertained. If that meeting was not brought about I ask why the
rumour has not been denied. I submit that
it is up to His Excellency that he should
set himself right upon it. Here are two
men holding honourable positions, standing
high in their province, men who have the
confidence of their province, and they state
distinctly that that meeting took place and
that that proposition was made. Did the
First Minister know about that meeting or
did he not ? That is the question to be
decided. If he did not know then I submit
that the Papal delegate was going beyond
his proper sphere in making that proposition
and therefore taking it in any light you
can it was an improper thing to do ; it was
wrong to make the proposition. He told
them according to this report that if they
agreed to put this clause in, it would expedite the enlargement of the province.
What does that mean ? Does it not carry
out the statements that have been made in
the past over and over again that Manitoba
need not expect any extension of territory
unless she agreed to separate schools, and.
here we have a proposition made that proves
beyond a doubt that this was the case. I
say again that we in this House object to
any interference whatever in connection
with church or state. We refuse to allow
any foreign potentate to take any part in our
legislation or to dictate how our children
shall be educated in any part of this fair
Dominion of ours.
Now in this age of the world when church
and state are being separated in France,
we in Canada are binding them together.
I submit that is a state of affairs that should
not exist. It has been said that in the
United States, because they have national
schools where no religion is taught, the
people have become unchristian, and we are
pointed to the eastern countries where state
church schools have existed for so long. I
have travelled through those eastern countries myself. I have seen the sun rise and
set in many lands, and in travelling through
them I have observed the way in which the
Sabbath was kept. and have endeavoured to
learn something of the results of the church
schools which prevail there. I found that
those eastern countries have not been going
ahead as the United States has. Spain has
had church schools for centuries, and today Spain is one of the dying nations of
the world. France has had church schools,
3936
3936
and to-day she is severing all connection
between church and state, and as a result
of establishing national schools I believe
we will see France rise amongst the nations of the world. It is true that in the
United States where there are no separate
schools, there are divorce laws, and lynchings and many other problems that are
difficult to solve ; nevertheless the United
States stands to-day among the foremost
nations of the world. As regards Sabbath
observance, it is in those countries where
church schools prevail that you will find the
Sabbath most generally violated, theatre
going and all kinds of amusements are carried on on that day. If you want to find
a
Christian nation you will find one that observes the Sabbath. Where will you find
the Sabbath as well observed as it is in
this fair Dominion of ours ? You will find
it observed just as well in those provinces
that have national schools as in those that
have separate schools. I am not prepared to
say that there is any difference. But 1 think
we can boast that we have a Christian people in this Dominion, who observe the Sabbath
better than in any other country in
the world.
Therefore, I say, that in building up this
great country we are making history, and!
we must carefully procure the greatest freedom to the greatest number of people. We
must give those new provinces provincial
rights, we must give them all the freedom
they have a right to expect at our hands.
Sir, the time will come, whether it is this
year or next year, when the free and independent electors of this Dominion will
assert themselves. We have seen petitions
coming from every part of this Dominion,
the table has groaned beneath their weight.
We have seen public meetings passing resolutions in almost every province in the
Dominion, protesting against forcing separate schools upon these new provinces. There
is an awakening amongst the free and
independent electors such as never existed in
this Dominion before, and it will go on
and increase. Exception has been taken to
the petitions that have been presented and
to the public meetings that have been held.
Sir, that is the only way in which the
people can express their opinions when
no election is going on, it is only by petitions and by public meetings passing resolutions
that they can make their voice heard.
Then we find that the newspapers from one
end of this Dominion to the other, except
in the province of Quebec, have condemned
this legislation. The 'Globe,' the organ of
the Reform party, is just as strong on this
question as the Conservative newspapers.
I venture to say that if we could have now
an expression of opinion at the polls, we
would find Reformers and Conservatives going to the polls side by side and shoulder
to shoulder in every constituency in Ontario,
3937 APRIL 6, 1905
to vote against this legislation and against
the present government. This agitation will
not die out. No matter whether the elec4
tions come on in one year, or two years, or
three years, or four years from now, this
is a live question, and I venture to say that
so far as the province of Ontario is con
cerned, even four years from now, this
government will not carry half a dozen
seats. I venture to predict that the same
state of affairs will be found to exist in!
Manitoba and in those two new provinces.
The present government will find that the
free and independent electors will drive
them out of power the first opportunity that
presents itself.
Motion agreed to.
On motion of Mr. Fielding, House adjourned at 12.35 a.m. Thursday.
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