1902-03-25

[Stage Direction]
Bill (No. 78) respecting the Trans-Canada Railway Company.-Mr. Malouin.

The MINISTER OF TRADE AND COMMERCE (Hon. Sir Richard Cartwright).: Mr. Speaker, before the Orders of the Day are called, I have a word or two of personal explanation to make. Yesterday an hon. member of this House was pleased to state in his place, that I had been guilty of making certain statements equivalent to falsifying the record, and had quoted figures from a certain document which he named, which I could not produce or verify. Sir, that is a peculiarly odious kind of charge, and I may add a peculiarly silly one; for I do not suppose that many members of this House are less likely to make statements and quote figures from a document such as the Statstical Year-book without being able to verify them, than myself. I sent word to the hon. member for Pictou (Mr. Bell) who is the party in question just now, that I was going to bring this matter up, and I am sorry he is not here. I did not expose the matter yesterday afternoon, because I wanted to see how far stupidity and party spite would drive these gentlemen ; and I also wanted to see that they should be so committed that there could be no possible quibbling and no possible wriggling out of the position in which they had placed themselves. I will proceed briefly to give the House the authority on which I made the statements I did with respect to what appears in the Statistical Year-book for the year 1889. The House will recollect that I gave certain estimates of the population of Canada in the course of my remarks on the budget, and I stated that those had been derived from the Statistical Year-book of the year 1889. The House will also recollect that yesterday it was stated in this House, that these figures were not to be found in the Statistical Yearbook, that other figures were given, and a long deduction was made therefrom. Sir, I have here the Statistical Year-book for 1889, printed for the Department of Agriculture by ' Mr. Brown Chamberlain, printer to the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty in the year of Grace 1890.' On page 116, of this valuable and veracious document will be found the following statement: In the fiscal year ending the 30th of June, 1887, the estimated population of Canada is given at 4,875,005 souls. Immediately thereafter, for the fiscal year 1888, the population is given at 4,972,101, and for 1889, the popu-Hon. Mr. FIELDING.
lation is given at 5,075,555. I call the special attention of the hon. leader of the opposition to these facts, as he appeared to be under the impression that his colleague from Pictou had been making a correct statement when he disputed the authenticity of my remarks. Sir, that is enough in itself, but there is more also. I stated besides, that these hon. gentlemen-at least, the predecessors of these hon. gentlemen- had carried out the calculation, at any rate as regards one year, and that they had produced the results of showing that in 1890 or thereabouts, the population estimated by them for Canada would exceed 5,200,000. I have here, Sir, the Trade and Navigation tables for the Dominion of Canada for the year 1890, countersigned by Sir Mackenzie Bowell, then Minister of Customs, under date of the 29th December, 1890. On page X, the total duty Collected from customs is put down at $24,014,908. On the opposite page, you will find the amount of customs duties paid per head of the population put down at $4.60. You will further find at the bottom of the page this statement:
The calculations in this column are based on the estimated population of the Dominion in each year as published by the Department of Agriculture and statistics in the statistical Year book. See Pages 116 and 180 of that book for 1889, the figures this year having been corrected to correspond with those in the said statistical Year-book.
Now, I suppose it is possible for these two. hon. gentlemen to go through the profound arithmetical calculation of dividing $24,014,908 by $4.60, and if they do, they will find by the quotient that the estimated population of Canada, according to the customs returns and the Statistical Year-book, amounted to 5,220,632. Sir, I leave the House to say who has falsified the statements in the Year-book.


Mr. A. C. BELL (Pictou).: Mr. Speaker, I regret very much that I did not hear the first part of the remarks of the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce, and furthermore that I am compelled to leave the city on the first outgoing train, and therefore have not time just now to reply adequately to what the hon. minister says. I regret that I am called away by circumstances over which I have no control, the death of a near relative, to go out of the city immediately; but on my return I will deal with this matter, and I trust that the question may be settled satisfactorily to the House and the country.


Mr. R. L. BORDEN (Halifax).: Mr. Speaker, I am not aware that I stated to the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce that I quoted from the Year-book of 1889. It does not appear from what the hon. gentleman himself says that he has any fault to find with the Year-book of last year or that of the previous year, which were the Yearbooks I referred to. The statistics of these

Year-books are set out in the returns which have been laid on the Table of the House by members of the government in the past two years, and they were the very statistics to which X had reference. X therefore insist that the figures which I quoted and on which I relied, are figures furnished by this government to the country and paid for by this government out of the country's money, and figures which any member desiring to address the House has a perfectly legitimate right to rely upon. If I had told the hon. gentleman that I was quoting from the Year-book of 1889, the observations which he has made might have some relevance; but as he knows that that was not the Year-book to which I referred


The MINISTER OF TRADE AND COMMERCE.: I had nothing to say to the hon. gentleman. I referred to his friend from Fictou.


Robert Laird Borden: But the hon. gentleman did iu the course of his speech refer to my having relied on figures on which he said I should not rely at all. He turned with a great wave of his arm to his followers, and said ' I thought so,' because I used figures which he and his colleagues printed and paid for out of the public moneys of this country, and because I placed some slight reliance upon them. Perhaps 1 should not have done so, considering the record of hon. gentlemen opposite in the past. Possibly I should apologize to the House and the country for having placed the slightest reliance on any figures which these hon. gentlemen furnish to the House and the country. But in my simplicity and ignorance as a young man in public life, I thought that when the hon. gentleman and his colleagues placed these figures before the House, we might place some reliance upon them. The hon. gentleman with great force and eloquence has pointed out that I had no possible right or reason to do so, and I accept his word with regard to that. If there is any consolation in all this to my hon. friend for having administered the reproof which he did to myself and the hon. member for Pictou, I am sure that as far as our side of the House is concerned, he is entirely and perfectly welcome to it.


The MINISTER OF TRADE AND COMMERCE.: I beg to state to the hon. gentleman that his friend from Pictou deliberately charged me with falsifying the record. That is what I called attention to, and, if he possessed any sense of honour, he would withdraw the charge.


Robert Laird Borden: I draw attention to the fact that the hon. gentleman is falsifying the record which his own colleagues presented to the country.


The MINISTER OF TRADE AND COMMERCE.: I am not. [DOT]
56}



WAYS AND MEANS-THE BUDGET.

[Stage Direction]
House resumed adjourned debate on the proposed motion of the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Fielding) :
That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair for the House to go into committee to consider of the Ways and Means for raising the Supply to be granted to His Majesty ; and the proposed motion of Mr. Borden (Halifax) in amendment thereto.
['I beg to move the adjournment of the debate.']
Mr. T. O. DAVIS (Saskatchewan).: Mr. Speaker, when the House adjourned last night, I was alluding to the resolution which the hon. leader of the opposition has placed in your hands, in which he professes to outline the policy of the Conservative party on the question of the tariff. I said that as far as I was concerned, I might be very dense, but I would like a little more information from the hon. gentleman as to what he meant by adequate protection to the industries of this country. I pointed out that adequate protection might mean almost anything- that while the hon. member for Centre Toronto (Mr. Brock), who represents the woollen industries in this House, might consider 50 per cent adequate protection to the woollen industry, the farmers who sit on, the opposition side of the House might think 15 per cent adequate protection. The people in the North-west are as much if not more interested in the tariff question than the people of any other section of this country, and what we would like is a definite statement from the leader of the opposition as to what he would do if his party got into power. We would like to know whether he would repeal the preferential tariff. That is one thing we in the west are interested in. It has enabled us to get woollen goods at a much lower price than before on account of the 33} per cent preference, which has been a great relief so far. I would like to know also from the hon. leader of the opposition whether he proposes to increase the duty on agricultural implements, on which this government materially reduced the duty. We would be glad to know what the hon. gentleman would do in regard to these and a number of other prime necessaries of life ? The hon. gentleman's followers would then be in a position to go round and tell the people exactly what the hon. gentleman's resolution meant. The hon. gentleman has pointed out that if the duty were increased on certain commodities, the result world be to build up certain manufacturing industries, which would be a benefit to the agriculturists in the older provinces, inasmuch as they would provide a home market for their products. But we in the west have to export everything we produce beyond what we consume ourselves, and find a market for it outside of the shores of this Dominion. We have to send our wheat, our butter, our cattle, and everything else to the English market; whereas we have to pay a duty on everything we consume, whether under a

protective tariff or under a revenue tariff. We have a revenue tariff to-day, and we do not complain of that, because we know that we have obligations to the nation and we have to bear our share of the taxation. We are willing to do that, and do it cheerfully; but we think the line should be drawn somewhere. When the present tariff was brought down in 1897, a great many of our people in the west were a little dissatisfied, because they thought it should have gone a little further in the direction bf tariff reform; but when the matter was pointed out to them, and they realized the advantage they got from the preference, our people were satisfied with the tariff as a revenue tariff. But we are told that there are rumours in the air that there is likely to be an increase in the tariff in the near future. I have heard nothing that would lead me to believe that there will be anything of the kind. My hon. friend from Alberta (Mr. Oliver), in addressing the House a few nights ago, read from the speech of the Minister of Finance a passage which led him to believe that the government did intend in the near future to increase the duties on certain commodities. Here is what the Finance Minister said, and I do not see anything in it to cause any alarm lest he should raise the tariff :
We do not propose to make any changes in the tariff this session. I do not for a moment claim that the tariff is perfect. I think, that, on the whole, it has proved a very good tariff. Indeed, when we recall the circumstances, under which our tariff revision took place, when we remember the very complicated and difficult problem with which we had to deal,'.ve may well congratulate ourselves upon our t uecess in devising a tariff so well adapted to the requirements of the country, a tariff under which Canada has prospered in a greater degree thau in any period in her history. I have occasionally pointed out the desirability of a reasonable measure of tariff stability. Nothing would be more likely to unsettle business than a practice of 'ntroducing frequent tariff changes. Hence, we have resisted applications for many small changes and we think it well to do so to-day. But I would not have it understood that this view can always he held.
I suppose that last phrase is what agitated my hon. friend from Alberta (Mr. Oliver) : 'I would not have it understood that this view can always be held.' Then the Finance Minister proceeded to say :
As time passes, conditions change in our own country and it will be well for us to take note of this, so that we may adjust the tariff accordingly. Nor is that the only reason that might require some change. Conditions arise in other countries of which we are obliged to take account. We do not propose that we shall stand still and that this tariff shill remain unchanged, but we think the time is not opportune for making changes at present.
That is all the Finance Minister said with regard to the revision of the tariff. And there are no doubt many things in the tariff that could be improved. For instance, some of our manufacturers are


Thomas Osborne Davis: paying thirty-five per cent on their raw material while they are only getting twenty-five per cent protection on their manufactured products. Such a case is a very fit subject for revision. Take again the article of oatmeal. The raw material is taxed more than the manufactured product. This year, owing to Providence having given us a great harvest, our people do not require to buy any oats, but sometimes we have to buy them from the United States, and under our tariff our millers are practically prevented from making the manufactured article. A revision is therefore necessary in the item of oats. A revision of the tariff might be made, which would not increase the amount of taxation on the people in any part of the country. Take the article of coal oil. We are paying at present something like five cents a gallon on all the coal oil consumed in this country. As this subject has already been warmly discussed, I do not propose to go into it at any great length now, but when we consider that in order to benefit some 10,000 people, who are directly and indirectly living out of the coal oil industry, the balance of the population of this country, or 5,300,000 people, is taxed at the rate of five cents a gallon, it is evident that there is need here for revision. It is evident that the knife might be applied to this item, and that the taxation taken off coal oil might be added to some other article in order to protect some other industry, requiring more assistance. So long as you do not increase the general amount of taxation which the people have to pay, there is no objection to you re-adjusting the tariff. We do not care if you take the duty off some commodity which our agriculturists and labourers have to use, and add it on to those consumed by the wealthy. If, for instance, you leave the duty as it is on the coarser grades of woollen manufactures made in this country, which are the only ones that our people can manufacture at a profit, and raise the duties on the finer qualities worn by the rich, there would be no objection on the part of the west. But we do not want the duties raised on the ordinary classes of goods we have to use. We are paying our share of taxation and strongly object to paying anything more.
I listened a few nights ago to the speech made by the hon. member for North Norfolk (Mr. Charlton). He made two speeches in this House, as he found one was not sufficient to explain why he had gone back on the faith of his fathers and the faith he had professed during the last fifteen years. I remember in days gone by, before I was in active politics, I used to read the speeches of my hon. friend with pleasure. I used to lie in bed reading them ; I was so proud of them I used to repeat his stories too, they were such good stories. When he was discussing the balance of trade the other night and trying to convince the House that it would be a good thing to cut off our nose

to spite our face-or, in other words, because the Americans have a high tariff we should raise our tariff against them in order to get even-I was reminded of a story which he used formerly to tell illustrating that very point. He told us about a farmer, in the old days, when we were selling barley to the United States, who started out with a carload of barley for the American market. At the boundary line he met a gentleman with a lot of gold braid around his hat who asked him where he was going. I am going, replied the farmer, across the line with a carload of barley. You cannot cross with that barley, said the officer, before you give one third of your load as duty. The Canadian farmer protested, but in vain, he had to hand over the one-third and was not very well pleased- He crossed the line and* sold the balance which remained to him in the American market, and with the proceeds he bought some nice American buggies with which he started home. When he came to the line again, he was very pleased to see his own native soil, and the first man he met was a Canadian customs officer, with the badge of office around his hat. The Canadian told this customs officer what awful robbers the Yankees were, how they had mulcted him of one third of his load, and the Canadian officer gave him every sympathy. He said :	Yes, that is perfectly
ture, these Yankees are villains, but we will get even with them. I will take half your buggies from you, and in that way we will get square. That is the story which our hon. friend from North Norfolk used to tell with great gusto, but he has lately seen new light. Well, Mr. Speaker, I am not at all interested in the balance of trade as the hon. gentleman puts it. To my mind when people have something to sell, they should sell it in the best market they can find, and when they have something to buy they should buy it where they can get it the cheapest. If they can sell their grain in England at a better price than in Germany, they should do so ; and if they can buy in the United States cheaper than somewhere else, they should give the American market the preference. Surely the hon. member for North Norfolk will not maintain that when we have to get certain raw material from the United States, we ought to impose a duty on that raw material coming into this country, and for the reason forsooth that the Americans charge a high tariff on other commodities which they require from us.
Now, if the hon. gentleman should go before a British audience and discuss this balance of trade question in this way, what would he find ? He would find that the people there would not listen to a doctrine of that kind ; for every person knows that the people of England have to buy raw material from the United States, and, to put on a duty with the idea of getting even with the people of the United States would be
merely to work against their own interest. I was going to say that, though we from the west do not take up a great deal of time in discussing questions in this House, yet I notice that whatever question is discussed, nearly every gentleman who rises to take part in the debate speaks of the great west and of the great future of the west. The west has a great future. When you consider that we have there only four hundred thousand people all told, including the people in the cities and towns and people in every line in business, and that these four hundred thousand people have produced in one year one hundred million bushels of grain and a vast amount of wealth in the shape of cattle, dairy produce and so on, making a total of over $60,000,000, I think, hon. members of this House will agree that we have become a factor in the affairs of this country, and one that must be considered whatever question may be taken up. And, when it comes to the question of taxation, the voice of the west will have to be heard. As I have said, we do not expect anything unreasonable ; we expect to pay our portion of the taxation necessary to meet expenses of the country. We are practically satisfied with the tariff as it is now. But, if it comes to anything like an increase, I am afraid there is apt to he some grumbling in the country west of Lake Superior. I think I could show by figures, if time would permit, that the tariff is a reasonable one and one under which our industries may prosper. But, when the manufacturers, the woollen men, or the leather men, or the machine men, come asking for an increase of duties, they must remember that the people do not feel called upon to submit to taxation for their benefit. The leader of the opposition (Mr. Borden, Halifax), the other night closed his remarks with a great flourish about wanting a policy of Canada for the Canadians, i agree with the hon. gentleman. The only difference between the leader of the opposition and myself is that he wants a policy for the minority of Canadians, and I want a policy for the majority of Canadians.
This tariff was accepted by the people of the west as a revenue tariff. Hon. gentlemen opposite have changed their position on this tariff question so often, that it is pretty hard to put your finger on them. When the tariff was first brought down they raised a howl and declared that we were going to ruin all the industries of the country. Though we then gave a preference of only 121 per cent to Great Britain, they predicted that the country would go to the dogs under the new tariff. But when, after a year, they found the country prosperous to a degree it had never attained before, when they found that the mills, instead of being closed were running day and night, and the working people, instead of being out of employment, were earning 20 per cent more wages than when the Conservative govern-

ment were in power, they changed their ground and said :	Oh, this is the national
policy ; you have only continued the old tariff ; you have done nothing to help the country, but have simply continued our policy. I have already pointed out that Mr. Foster, the Finance Minister of the late government, and the man who, while he sat in this House, spoke for the Conservative party on fiscal matters, tried to prove, not only in this House but through the press that we had only reduced the tariff by the one sixteen-hundredth part of one per cent, and that the preference was a sham because we had first increased the tariff and then taken off a slice-in fact he tried to show that it was the same national policy. But when they found in the election of 1900, that the country took no stock in their cry of stolen clothes, we find them changing their position again, and now the leader of the opposition comes down with a policy of adequate protection to the labour, agriculture products, manufactures and industries of this country. I have already shown that a resolution like that means anything or nothing, as you choose to take it.
As showing how the country has prospered, I think it would be easy to point out in what way practical relief has been given to the people-speaking particularly for the people of the west-under this tariff, thereby causing a prosperity such as has never been known in this country before. This tariff, brought down in 1897, and in operation ever since, has been the means of reducing the taxation upon the people to the extent of 810,000,000. Hon. gentlemen opposite talk about the expenditure, and say that we are spending an awful lot of money. So we are spending an awful lot of money. But if we did not get the money in we could not spend it. In order to make a fair and reasonable comparison between this government and the late government on this point, you must consider not merely the expenditure, but also the revenue in the two regimes. Under this tariff, as I have said, over $10,000,000 have been saved to the people within the last five years. That means that this government, by taking the shackles off trade and allowing goods to come into the country more freely than before, have not merely reduced the taxation of the people by $10,000,000 but have been the means of placing over $50,000,000 a year in the treasury, as against $36,000,000 which was the amount when the hon. gentlemen opposite were in power. If you take the importations of last year, you find that a saving of nearly $4,000,000 was made by the people as compared with what they would have paid under the old tariff. Exclusive of coin and bullion and of Indian corn, which was simply imported and exported, the duty on the total importations last year made an average rate of 16 90 per cent, as against a rate in 1896, which


Thomas Osborne Davis: gentlemen opposite have time and again challenged the government to show what they have done to improve Canada's exports, what they have done to bring about this measure of prosperity that we enjoy to day. I say they have done a great deal to bring about this measure of prosperity for the very reason that they have adopted up-to-date methods in running the affairs of this country. They have done as any business man would do in his business, they have made our capabilities known, they have advertised our wares, they have advertised our produce in the English market and other markets, and in that way they have been able to find new markets and to enlarge the old ones for the producers of this country. That is one of the reasons why our export trade has swollen to its present enormous proportions. Let me show you how our exports have grown :
Exports-Canadian Produce to Great Britain.
1897		$69,533,852
1898		 93,065,019
1899		 85,114,555
1900		  96,562,875
1901		 92,857,525
In 1897 the exports of animals and then-produce and agricultural products the produce of Canada, were .$47,000,000. In 1901 they amounted to $66,000,000. Canadian butter to the amount of 10,413,131 pounds was sent to Great Britain in 1897, whereas in 1901 we sent 15.602.445 pounds. For the year 1900 we sent 24,317,436 pounds. Cheese in 1897, 163,942,649 pounds, in 1901, 195,125.317 pounds. Eggs in 1897, 6,939.496 dozen, in 1901, 11.273.452 dozen. Bacon in 1897, 59,552,464 pounds, in 1901, 102.709.560 pounds. Beef in 1897, 363,53$ pounds, in 1901, 8,819,213 pounds.
Now as regards foreign trade, I present a summary statement showing the progress and prosperity of the country under Liberal rule indicating the wisdom of the Liberal fiscal policy.
Statement showing the foreign trade of Canada by five-year periods that is to say, the five years from 1897 to 1901, inclusive, being the last five years of the Conservative administration :
Aggregate foreign trade, 1897-01. .$1,651,726,204 Aggregate foreign trade, 1892-96.. 1,193,453,797
Increase In 5 yrs., Liberal rule.$ 458,272,407
Imports for consumption, 1897-01_______$758,085,924
Imports for consumption, 1892-96_______ 567,617,947
Increase in 5 yrs.. Liberal rule...$190,467,977 Exports produce of Canada, 1897-01. .$756,090,015 Exports produce of Canada, 1892-96.. 522,299,289
Increase in 5 yrs., Liberal rule. .$233,790,726 Exports produce of Canada to Great
Britain, 1897-01	$437,133,826
Exports produce of Canada to Great
Britain, 1892-96	 294,859,222
Exports produce of Canada to United
States, 1897-01	$252,103,818
Exports produce of Canada to United States, 1892-96	 179,306,963
Increase in 5 yrs., Liberal rule..$ 72,796,855 Exports Canadian mine to all countries, 1897-01	$104,078,270
Exports Canadian mine to all countries, 1892-96	 32,080,247
Increase under Liberal rule.. ..$	71,998,023
Exports Canadian fisheries to all
countries, 1897-01	$ 52,955,091
Exports Canadian fisheries to all countries, 1892-96	 51,291,152
Increase in 5 yrs., Liberal rule.'.$ 1,663,929 Exports Canadian	forests to all
countries, 1897-01	$145,465,322
Exports Canadian	forests to all
countries, 1892-96	 126,063,954
Increase in 5 yrs., Liberal rule..$ 19,401,368 Exports Canadian animals and their produce, and agricultural products,
the produce of Canada, 1897-01______$368,230,911
Exports Canadian animals and their
produce, and agricultural products,
the produce of Canada, 1892-96.... 254,751,545
Increase in 5 yrs., Liberal rule. .$113,479,266 Exports Canadian manufactures, 1897.1901	$ 62,143,520
Exports Canadian manufactures, 1892 1896	 39,561,961
Increase in 5 yrs., Liberal rule..$ 22,561,371 Statement showing the increase in foreign
trade from 1896 to 1901 under Liberal rule,
as compared with the increase from 1878 to
1896 under Conservative rule :-
Aggregate foreign	trade,	1896	$239,025,360Aggregate foreign	trade,	1901	
386,903,157
Increase under Liberal rule, 5 yrs.$147,877,797
Average increase per annum.. ..$ 29,575,559
Aggregate foreign	trade,	1896	$239,025,360Aggregate foreign	trade, 1878	
172,405,454
Increase under Conservative rule,
18 years	$	66,619,906Average increase	per	annum..	..$	3,701,106
Imports for consumption, 1896 .. ..$110,587,480 Imports for consumption, 1891 .. .. 181,237,988
Increase under Liberal rule,5 yrs.$ 70,650,503
Average increase per annum.. ..$ 14,130,101 Imports for consumption, 1896 .. ..$110,587,480 Imports for consumption, 1878 .. .. 91,199,577
Increase under Conservatives, 18 years	$	19,387,903Average increase	per	annum..	..$	1,077,106
Exports produce of Canada, 1896.. ..$109,915,337 Exports produce of Canada, 1901.. .. 177,431,386
Increase under Liberal rule, 5 yrs.$ 67,516,049
Increase in 5 yrs., Liberal rule $142,274,604 Mr. DAVIS.
Average increase per annum.. ..$ 13,503,209
m

Exports produce of Canada, 1896.. ..$109,915,337 Exports produce of Canada, 1878.. ..	67,989,800
Increase under Conservatives, 18 years	$ 41,925,537
Average increase per annum.. ..$ 2,329,197
I think that all goes to show that this country has been progressing fairly under the rule of my hon. friends who now occupy the treasury benches, and I think, that, while it may be that hon. gentlemen opposite are not satisfied with the government of the day, it has been shown that whenever an opportunity has been given the electorate to pronounce upon the policy of the government, they have intimated that they are entirely satisfied with the manner in which the affairs of the country are being conducted at the present time. There is no doubt that there are hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House who are not satisfied. They are in the cold shades of opposition and they cannot be expected to enthuse over the immense trade of this country as they might have done if their leaders in the past had adopted the astute methods of the present administration and had thereby brought about a similar condition of prosperity, because, by reason of advertising our goods in foreign markets and adopting a proper trade policy the government has, in large measure, brought about this state of prosperity. 1 do not say that the government of the day causes the rain to fall or the sun to shine. No government can do that, although hon. gentlemen opposite used to make the claim in the days of the old national policy that the Conservative party made the hens lay big eggs. This may be ancient history, but in the hays of poor old Alex. Mackenzie, when the times were hard and there was a great depression in the United States and all over the world, these hon. gentlemen did not make any allowance for this condition of affairs, but they told the people that through Mr. Mackenzie's bungling and stupidity this state of affairs had been brought about and they, said if you pat us in we have a panacea for all the ills that man is heir to in the national policy. We do not claim, as I have said before, that the government can make the rain to fall or the sun to shine, thus causing the crops to grow, but the government can do a great deal by assisting to open up the country, by improving the transportation facilities, by giving the people lower freight rates and in various other ways, and a great deal has been done in these directions by the present government.
A good deal has been said by hon. gentlemen opposite with reference to the expenditure of the country. I do not want to take up the time of the House in discussing this question which has been threshed out very thoroughly already, but, I may say that we are quite willing to compare the record of this government with
the record of its predecessor in the matter of expenditure. How do we make that comparison ? The only proper way to get at that is to find the difference between the expenditure and the revenue. The receipts of this country have increased from $38,000,000, in round numbers, in 1895, to over $52,000,000, which we expect to get during the present year. Hon. gentlemen opposite say : Yes, that is very true, but you are taxing the people more. The census has shown that the increase of population does not warrant that increase in expenditure.
I have already shown that we are taxing the people less than hon. gentlemen opposite did because we have taken $10,000,000 out of the people less than would have been taken if the old tariff had been in operation. But, neither this government nor any other government ever taxes the people. The government never goes to each man's door and collects the taxes from him. The very fact that the revenue was increased from $38,000,000 to $52,000,000 is the strongest possible proof of the value to the country of the policy of the present government. It goes to show that the government has brought prosperity to the country and for that reason money is flowing into the public treasury. But, if the government were to raise the rate of duty 5 per cent, instead of the money going into the treasury to be spent in the interests of the people in proper public improvements, it would divert it into the pockets of a few manufacturers for the benefit of a few individuals. The policy at present in operation has brought about the present satisfactory state of affairs. Why are we getting this $52,000,000 V We do not send tax collectors round to the people's doors to collect the taxes. We are getting this revenue because the people are taxing themselves, because the people are able to tax themselves, because, under the policy of this government, the people have been able to buy luxuries for their families that they were not able to buy under the national policy, because, they are able to dress their families as they never dressed them before, because they are able to buy articles that under the national policy they never were able to buy. If a man is now able to buy two binders, where before under the national policy, he had to cut his crop with a cradle or a scythe and these binders are imported he pays more taxes. If he buys two ploughs with which to cultivate his land, if these ploughs are imported he pays more taxes. If he buys two dresses for his wife, where he had hard work to buy one when the Conservatives were in power and if the goods out of which these di-esses are made are imported he is paying more taxes. If hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House were able to show that the money has not been properly expended, then, * it would be a fair proposition, but, the proper time, as has been pointed out here before, to do that is when the esti-

the Tay canal, the St. Charles Branch, the, Langevin block and the Curran bridge; but I need not go over all these cases, because the House knows all about them.
Now, Mr. Speaker, I think I have takeu up enough of the time of this House. I have spoken at greater length than I intended. In conclusion, I want to refer to what .1 consider the proper policy for this country to pursue. Instead of manufacturers coming down here and asking the government for more protection, we should turn our attention to the opening up and developing of the vast heritage which we possess beyond the great lakes, and I am glad to see the government doing this to a large extent. In that way we would be furnishing a market for our manufacturers at our own doors. At the present time people in the west are consumers of the greater part of the things which are made in eastern Canada. Your travellers and agents are going all over that country buzzing like flies around a honey pot. They find that $50,000,000 or $60,000,000 of cold cash which our people get for their produce is worth looking after. Therefore, I say that the judicious expenditure of more money on immigration and on improving the transportation facilities to open up that country, is the proper policy to adopt. If the gentlemen who are hunting for a little more protection would work as hard to make a success of their business as the farmers have to do, they would not be coming down here harassing the government for more protection. The farmers have to work day and night to make their farms pay. They do not come down to Ottawa harassing the government for more protection ; but these gentlemen, if their machinery gets a little antiquated, or if they get a little old themselves, do not buy new machinery, but come for more protection. I remember a little story, of a gentleman who came down here on a delegation that wanted more protection for woollen goods. A gentleman said to him:
4 You get 23 per cent protection against English goods, and you have besides the freight between Great Britain and Canada, which is equivalent to 3 or 4 per cent more; why are you not satisfied ? ' He said : 'We cannot compete with the manufacturers in the old country.' ' Why ? '
' Because our machinery is not as good.' He was asked :	' W'hy not put in new
machinery ? ' He said : ' I am too old.'
It was easier to come down here and ask for more protection than to put in new machinery. The true policy in the interest of this country is to open up and develop our North-west Territories, and in that way provide an enlarged market for our manufacturers. We are getting producers into that country at the rate of 50,000 a year.
I am quite satisfied that this year we" will get 75,000 if not 100,000 people in there, and these people are bringing in large


Thomas Osborne Davis: amounts of money. They are not poor people who are coming from the United States, but are well-to-do people. If we spend $500,000 to bring in 75,000 people, and they bring into the country $10,000,000 of money and goods, they are increasing the wealth of this country to that extent. If we spent $1,000,000 on immigration, and brought in 150,000 people, and they brought in with them $20,000,000, that would be a good policy for this country.
Hon. gentlemen on the other side say that we are not getting in the proper class of immigrants. Well, I am in a position to know more than do these hon. gentlemen who talk so flippantly. I have personal knowledge of the fact that we are bringing in the proper class of immigrants. These immigrants are producing millions of bushels of wheat. Why, there is a little town in my riding, which five years ago was a wilderness, and in that town there are five large elevators this year, and the export of wheat from it was something like a million bushels. That is the kind of people which my hon. friends opposite are so fond of abusiug- poukhobors, Galicians, Germans and other foreigners. What we want is men willing to take off their coats and go to work. We do not want gentlemen with eye glasses. They may be very desirable in the clubs, but in our country we want men who will tear up the prairie and produce wealth, who will take off their coats and apply their muscles to the plough. And that is the class of men we are getting, and the money spent on immigration is tlie best expenditure that we are making in the interests of the country, and if we were to increase that expenditure, we would be adopting a wise policy.
Then take our transportation facilities, we must have some other method of getting our stuff out of the country. The other day I was taken to task by the Minister of Public Works because I said that the canal system had outlived its usefulness. Well, that system may be all right to relieve the congestion of traffic, but it is not to be compared with railways. We are told that our canals are valuable because were it not for them, our railway rates would be much higher. We are told that the railway rates are regulated by the rates on the canals. It is a sad admission that we should have spent some $90,000,000 on canals for the purpose of regulating our railway rates. It seems to me that we ought to have devised some system of regulating these rates without having had to spend $100,000,000 for that purpose. What we want is a continuous line of railway which can be operated twelve months in the year and double tracked if necessary. East year four hundred thousand people in the west produced 100,000,000 bushels of grain. We are going to get people in there at the rate of 100,000 per year, and in eight or ten years the production in that country will be increased to 400,000,000 or 500,000,000 bushels, which will have to he carried

to the seaboard, and that cannot be done over our canals when they are frozen up six months in the year. What we want is to be able to put our wheat on the car and run it through to the seaboard. There has been too much money spent trying to compete against nature. We have been spending millions of dollars in Montreal trying to create an artificial port-trying to make an ocean port out of something that was never intended to be so by nature. If half- that money had been spent on the port of Quebec in providing proper facilities there, where we have a port that can float the largest ship that will be built in the next twenty years, and if we had a railway running from the centre of the territories right into that port, from which our produce could be shipped twelve months in the year, you would not hear anything about the car shortage that we hear so much about at present.
Then we have to take into account the depreciation in the value of wheat and the charges for interest and insurance, when it has to be stored over during the winter, which must amount to at least 6 cents a bushel. There is also this further point to be considered. If we have to depend wholly on our canals, we will have to store an immense quantity of wheat in the elevators at the head of Take Superior, and when navigation opens in the spring and we throw that on the markets of the world, down goes the price, so that the farmers will be out, not only the loss in storage and insurance, but also the depreciation in value on account of such an immense quantity being thrown on the market.
What we want is a continuous line of railway from the west to some ocean port, and Quebec is the proper place. This would enable us to send our commodities to a port which could be kept open twelve months in the year, and in this way we would stimulate the production of grain and other products in the North-west, and thus not only increase the trade of that part of the country but the trade and wealth of the whole Dominion. This government has still a large domain of public lands at its disposal, notwithstanding the 70,000,000 acres which our lion, friends opposite gave away to railways. Notwithstanding their extravagance in this respect, we have still left millions of acres of fertile land, the property of the people of this country, and by providing proper transportation facilities, by opening up and developing the country, by getting immigrants in there, we will increase the value of our own public domain to sucli an extent that we will have sufficient in ten years to pay the whole public debt of the country. That is if we keep these lands ourselves and do not give them away to railway corporations. What we want is to get settlers into that country, and if we are not spending enough money at present on immigration, we should spend more. If five and a half million people in round figures are paying
now $52,000,000 or $53,000,000 into the public treasury, and 5,000,000 more west of the lakes, and you will double the revenue and thus furnish the means to pay the interest on any amount of money to be spent in developing this country.
I wish to say a word or two on railway subsidies. I have heard lion, gentlemen opposite condemn the system of railway subsidies and advocate government ownership of railways. That policy of government ownership is a new fad put before the people of the west, but I submit that we need only turn our attention to the government railway which we are now operating to show that such a policy is not practicable. If the railways of a country could be run by the government outside of politics, no doubt that would be a good thing, but with our present experience of an expenditure of over $50,000,000 on the Intercolonial Railway, without ever getting back a cent of interest besides being obliged to operate the road at a loss, I do not think it would be wise on our part to extend that experience. Even if it were shown that the people along the line of that railway are getting the benefit in the shape of cheaper rates, that would be some compensation, but that is not shown. It is not proved that our government railway is carrying freights or passengers at cheaper rates than other lines. And yet still the country has to face a heavy deficit in the operating of that line besides not getting any interest on the capital investment. These lion, gentlemen who advocate government ownership point to Australia. Well, I do not know much about Australia, having never been there, but I find that the per capita expenditure of that country is $3.8 per head as against $10 in Canada. How comes it that these people have to pay $38 per head.


Hon Mr. ROSS (Victoria, N.S.).: Because they own the railways.


Thomas Osborne Davis: Then we do not want to own any railways, if such ownership is going to entail a rate of taxation amounting to $38 per head. But there is such a thing as regulating the railways without government ownership. I do not think that it is advisable for a government to run railways, but it is high time that the government had control over them and forced them to treat the people as they should. In every state of the American union there is a railway commission which controls the railways, and there is besides the Interstate Commission which settles all disputes between the states. But on this side of the line, although our exports are greater per head than on the other side, we are still without any means of controlling our railways, and I hope the government will take action for the appointment of a railway commission. We are told that the Railway Committee of the Privy Council attends to this matter. No doubt, Mr. COMMONS
Speaker, that has been a very-efficient body during the last five years.
Take for instance the railway rates on coal oil. In that case the committee did their duty to the people. I know that in other cases they have proven themselves to be an efficient court. But this country is growing, new transportation companies are being started, we are going ahead by leaps and bounds ; and the time has come when we must have somebody, as they have in England and in other countries, to regulate the traffic on the railroads of this country. I pointed out in this House last session, that, west of Lake Superior we were paying double what they were paying in the east as a local rate. We do not expect, in a country like that where there is little local traffic, to get a rate as cheap as in this part of the country. But we do expect fair treatment, and I believe that we cannot get that fair treatment until we get that railway commission. There are a hundred and one things for that commission to deal with. The cattle-guards question for instance, should be under their control. Such a commission should take means to find out the kinds of cattle-guards in use in the United States and other parts of the world, learn which is the best form of cattle-guard and make a recommendation to the government accordingly. This done, the government would be in a position to legislate intelligently upon this important question. Then there is the question of shortage of cars. There is an evil which we have felt very keenly in the west this year. For, after all, the. grain bill has nothing to do with it. I do not blame the railroads for the shortage of cars altogether. We raised two crops in one year in that country, and it was not to be expected that any railroad could take that out of the country in a month or two. But what I do complain of is that the railroads discriminate against the farmer and small dealers in favour of the elevator man and the man who was in a position to ship large quantities of grain. But the railroad people say that they did this in the interest of the country, because cars in the hands of big shippers were loaded more quickly and so there was less delay and, on the whole, more grain was shipped out than could have been shipped out if the cars had been given to the farmer. It may be that there is something in that argument. But I have known cases where the railroad has refused point blank to give a man a car. These things need to be inquired into and regulated. And the sooner the government take steps to appoint a commission to control the transportation companies, the better it will be for all concerned. Another thing that the commission should do is to see to it that a uniform system of book-keeping is adopted by the transportation companies, so that the public may know exactly how much capital these companies have invested in their enterprises. Nobody wants capitalists to put Mr. DAVIS.
,
money into railroads without getting a fair return. But we want to know how much they have put in, so that we may know what is a fair return. They may say that they have, for instance, $65,000,000 worth of stock, but we may know that that is half water, and still they are paying five per cent on the whole, and, in order to do that, charging rates which, we contend are too high. The commission should be empowered to examine the books of every transportation company, to ascertain how much money has been invested, and allow them to charge such rates as will give a fair return.
Mr. Speaker, I have taken up more time than I intended to. I hope and believe that, in the season now opening, we are to have a great influx of population into the western part of this country. I hope that, in dealing with all the questions I have spoken about, the government of the day will recognize the fact that we are ' getting a big boy now ' in the west, and that, when it comes to questions of taxation and other things of that kind, our interests must be consulted. When delegations of manufacturers come for increased duty, or delegations of promoters come for subsidies for Georgian Bay canals and other works, the government must take into consideration that their friends, and not their friends only but the people, the great producing people of the west, are interested in these questions and that the position and interests of those people must have consideration at the hands of the government of this country.


Mr. A. E. KEMP (East Toronto).: Mr. Speaker, considering the marked ability with which this debate has been conducted by lion, gentlemen on both sides, it would be presumptious in me to think that I could add any interest to it by any remarks of mine at this stage. At the same time, I feel that I should not be doing justice to myself if I did not express my views on certain public questions which have been before the House for the last few days. We are trying in this country to solve various problems according to the light that is thrown upon them, considering the whole field of our trade and commerce and our fiscal arrangements, and also the field of foreign trade and commerce. My hon. friend (Mr. Davis) who has just resumed his seat has charged the leader of the opposition with not stating what changes he would make in the tariff. That hon. gentleman (Mr. Davis) himself has ventured to state, in respect of certain items, just what, in his opinion, the tariff should be. It seems to me that the way to frame a tariff is to take evidence from various quarters, and, after carefully weighing it, and considering it from every point of view, to decide what each tariff item should be. We are a great confederation, and I hope that this confederation of ours is bound together by bonds as strong as those which unite the various

states of the United States of America. And I hope that the policy which will guide us in the future in determining these various questions regarding our trade policy, will be one which will result in benefit to the people taken as a whole. In dealing with this question we must take into our earnest consideration our geographical position, our national position and our sentimental position. Sentimentally, I take it, we are pretty well agreed that the country will remain British and that we need not go into any discussion as to that. Geographically, however, I have no hesitation in saying, if there were no sentiment in the question, that, after a few years, we would become a part of the United States. I do not think there is any intermediate line-either we are to be British or we are to be American, and I believe we are to remain British. But we have to ask ourselves the question : Are we in a position to grant to our people, through legislation, as much as possible, those material blessings with which the people to the south of us are favoured. I say we are. Unfortunately, however, for a long term of years we have been witnessing conditions which have been very distasteful to us, which have grated upon our finer feelings. Our pride has risen in us, and we have as it were set our teeth, when we have witnessed what has been going on in this country for the last fifty years. I refer to the exodus which has been talked of in this House under the administration of various governments. We have not faced the question as we should have faced it. We have been living alongside this agres-sive people to the south of us who have studied our trade conditions and have decided what will be in their best interests, and have proceeded to put upon their statute-book laws which were very much against our interests and very much in favour of their own. It seems to me that, in considering this matter, we have not taken advantage of our opportunities. When we discuss this question in this House, we would not like every observation we make to reach the ears of our friends to the south of ns.'
We are sorry to have to face the present situation, I very much regret for myself that I have to admit that this country has been a breeding ground for the United States for many years past. We are a young country with great natural resources, and with a people eminently fitted to develop these resources. We have hitherto occupied in this country a position similar to the position which the thickly populated nations of Europe have occupied, for Canada, as well as they, has had to witness great numbers of her population going into the United States. In the European countries, however, population has been overcrowded, and there has been reason for the large immigration to the United States, a reason which does not exist in Canada. There is room enough here for every one of our sons born in this country, and in view of the
heavy losses we have sustained by immigration I think the time has come when we should make a determined effort to prevent that drain upon our population. We educate our young men in this country, and as soon as they come to years of maturity they flit away to the United States. Our universities, I am sorry to say, contribute to the same result by the high class education which it gives them. As soon as our young men go to the United States they immediately are sought for to fill the highest and most important positions in that country. It is evident that young Canadians are of more value to the United States than the men who come to that country from Europe. I say that we are becoming weary of witnessing this kind of thing. There is no doubt that our young men who go to the United States are more highly prized than the men from any other nation in the world, owing,
I presume, to their home training, and to the surroundings in the midst of which they were brought up in Canada.
Now, the United States seem to know, as shown by their legislation, what is in the best interest of the American people ; but we cannot say that of our own legislation hitherto. I think, Mr. Speaker, the time has come when we should set ourselves to the task of looking after our own interests, and of retaining our population at home. I admit that the task is a very serious one, and requires careful study, but I think that it is quite possible to improve our condition. In discussing this question we must consider it on broad national grounds. I have no sympathy whatever with those petty and sectional considerations which are sometimes imported into the discussion of our public questions. I believe, Mr. Speaker, that there is a feeling of friendliness existing throughout this country from the Atlantic to the Pacific, among all sections of our population. We are a great confederation, and we are bound together by bonds which will not and cannot grow any less in the future. The business men in the industrial centres of Quebec, such as Montreal, Quebec, Three Rivers, St. Hyacinthe and Sherbrooke, are found extending their operations from one end of this Dominion to the other, trading with business men in the far west, and with business men of Ontario and the maritime provinces. In fact the commercial interests of the people in all sections of this country are intermingling and becoming mutually more dependent on each other. We all desire to develop the great Northwest of which my hon. friend from Saskatchewan (Mr. Davis) has spoken with such marked ability this afternoon. We are bound to develop the North-west, and we must ask our friends from the North-west to assist us in developing the east. I am sure that their loyalty to our common country will lead them in the future as it has in the past, to see that it is only by a common policy that our common interests can be subserved and the whole country developed.

During the budget speech the hon. Minister of Finance gave us the usual statistics regarding our foreign trade and the figures of receipts and expenditure. These figures were very interesting. I was somewhat astonished at the liberty which the Minister of Finance took in some of his statements. It seems to me he was taking great liberty with an over ruling providence in failing sufficiently to attribute our prosperity to the productiveness of the soil, and the development of our natural resources during the last few years. The first matter to which I shall refer in reference to the budget speech is the manner of bookkeeping as applied to our public accounts. A great deal has been said about surpluses. I understand a surplus from a business standpoint, the same as a business man would understand it. I do not think people in general understand what the Minister of Finance was trying to make out when he spoke of the question of surpluses ; but I notice that the press of this country who support the government have tried to make a great deal of credit for the government out of this question of surpluses. In discussing this question I do not propose to deal with consolidated revenue, capital account, or matters of that kind ; I am simply going to draw attention to what our income and receipts have been during the last six years, and to compare them with the income and receipts during the last six years of Conservative administration. I propose to take these figures, because they comprise ail the moneys which we have received and that have already been used. Now, as comparisons are in order, I would like to direct the attention of the House to these figures : Total income or receipts, 6 years.
1891		$38,579,310
1892		 36,921,871
1893		 38,208,608
1894		 36,374,883
1895		 33,978,129
1896		 36,618,590

Referring to the hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Borden, Halifax)

	*



value of $8,096,092, which is 10 cents a head of the population of the United States, while we are taking of such farm products from the United States $19,147,732, or $3.48 per head of our population. My object in giving these figures is to draw attention to the fact that our present trade conditions must be considered if we are to develop this country in the way in which we hope to. In this connectign I would like to draw attention to the industrial development in the United States. At the National Reciprocity Convention held at Washington last year, it was pointed out that the manufactured products of the United States amounted to $13,000,000,000, and that they exported of that $412,000,000 or from 3 to 4 per cent. In 1890, ten years previous, the manufactured products of the United States amounted to $9,000,000,000, and they thus had increased in the ten years 45 per cent. If the industries of the United States go on increasing in that ratio which is quite probable, then in another ten years instead of having a total production of thirteen billions they will produce nineteen and a half billions. It therefore becomes an interesting question for us as to what is to become of their surplus output. Our geographical position towards the United States would lead one to suppose that if they have a surplus which they are bound to get rid of, Canada is the easiest and most likely place in which they will try to find a market. I do not need to-day to give illustrations of what we mean when we refer to this question of slaughtering American products in Canada. I have only to refer to the illustration which the hon. member for Brant (Mr. Heyd) gave to this House in reference to the article of shears, which any gentlemen by referring to ' Hansard ' can see for themselves. I need not take up the time of the House discussing this question, because it already has been dealt with, but I will emphasize the fact that we must consider this question very seriously, and we have come to a time, when, I believe we must take prompt action in order to protect our own industries and our own people from the over production of the United States. We do not fear United States competition under equal conditions. We want Americans to come and locate their industries in Canada, but we do not want them to carry on operations against Canada from across the border, where they are not liable to the laws of this country, and where they do not contribute to the revenue of this country and do not help in any way to /make of Canada a great and strong nation. Before disposing of this question in reference to trade, I would like to refer to certain words contained in the first presidential message of Mr. Roosevelt in reference to the attitude of the United States so far as they are concerned, in protecting their home market. He said :
It is most important that we should maintain the high level of our present prosperity. We have now reached the point in the development of our interests where we are not only able to supply our own markets, but to produce a constantly growing surplus for which we must find markets abroad. To secure these markets wo can utilize existing duties in any case where they are no longer needed for the purpose of protection, or in any case where the article is not produced here and. the duty is no longer necessary for revenue, as giving us something to oiler in exchange for what we ask. The cordial relations with other nations which are so desirable will naturally be promoted by the course thus required by our own interests.
I need not repeat what was said by the late President McKinley in bis remarkable speech at Buffalo, and which was referred to by the hon. leader of the opposition, but I would like to read an extract which is a characteristic one so far as the Americans are concerned, and which appeared in the ' Implement Age,' August 15, 1901, published in Philadelphia :
It is safe to assume that, under the present condition of affairs in Canada, some tariff agreement which would make the road into Canada er sier for our manufacturers would be greatly to the advantage of this country, as we could not only hold our ground but invade Canada with our manufactures. In proof of this claim it may be stated that for the nine months ending with March, 1901, we sold implements and machinery to British North America to the value of $1,368,000, while Canadian manufacturers sold nothing in such lines in this country. If the tariff should be reduced our manufacturers would no doubt increase their sales in Canada while Canadian manufacturers would be unable to meet the American manufacturers in the United States markets under any kind of tariff.
In reference to the question of protection in our own country, we have heard from the Minister of Finance that the policy that we should pursue was the policy of teaching Canadians to use Canadian goods. That is a very nice theory indeed, but it is a very impracticable one. I have heard it often spoken of before, but when I consider the great competition there is between merchants, how anxious every merchant is to get something a little different from his neighbour and to buy a little cheaper; when I realize how little attention the merchant pays to mere sentiment in his dealings, and how he proceeds to supply himself with these articles which are most suitable to his trade regardless of where they are produced; when I think of this, I am not inclined to put much faith in the policy outlined for us by the Minister of Finance. I believe that in the whole consumption of this Dominion of Canada there would not be $50,000 worth a year of goods sold on account of a sentiment of that kind. Therefore, so far as that peculiar sentiment is concerned, we need not pay much attention to it, although no doubt the recommendation of the Minister of Finance is a very loyal utterance, and one which I would be


Albert Edward Kemp: glad the people of this country would adopt. I do not think, however, that there is any reason to' hope that our people will buy Canadian goods simply because they are Canadian goods.
The hon. member for North Norfolk (Mr. Charlton) is also responsible for this statement, that we could produce, of our imports from the United States, about $65,000,000 worth of manufactured products. Now, I am not sure but what that is a little larger sum than we could hope to produce.
I think perhaps that of the imports of the manufactured goods into this country from the United States, we might reasonably produce upwards of $40,000,000 worth, and if we produce $40,000,000 worth of manufactured goods in this country more than we are producing now, I submit that it would give employment to a great many more people, and to that extent there would be fewer people to emigrate to the United States and find homes there.
I have also heard the statement made by an authority on this subject, that if that amount of goods were produced in this country affording employment to the extra number of people required to produce them, there would be a consumption of farm products in Canada to the extent of $11,000,000 worth more than at present.
1 regret that I cannot believe that the exodus to the United States has been stopped or indeed diminished to any great degree. From information which I have had from various parts of the country, I am told that the exodus is still going on, and those whom I know in the United States and who formerly lived here, tell me that the exodus is continuing.
The hon. member for Saskatchewan (Mr. Davis) was very anxious to know what the government are going to do with regard to the tariff. He was trying to find some proof that the tariff was not going to be raised. I do not see any reason tyhy the hon. gentleman (Mr. Davis) should be alarmed. He has the Minister of the Interior (Hon. Mr. Sifton) and the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Hon. Sir Richard Cartwright) with a policy on this question, and on the other hand he has the Minister of Public Works (Hon. Mr. Tarte) with an entirely different policy from his other two colleagues. But as there are two ministers against one, they ought be able to win the day, and leave the mind of the hon. member (Mr. Davis) at peace as to the tariff. We will not deal with the other members of the cabinet as to their attitude on this question, because we have not been able to get from them a definite announcement of their opinion. But, Sir, the time has come when we should have a cabinet which would have but one opinion as to our fiscal policy. The time has come when different members of the cabinet should not advocate different policies in different parts of the country. The crisis is too serious 57 J	'
for that. We have alongside of us a nation which is trying to get hold of the business of this country; a nation which pays no attention to the economic theories which were discussed by the hon. gentleman from Saskatchewan. The Americans disregard such theories, but they aim at practical results; an example which I hope this country will follow in reference to our fiscal legislation in the future. Let me refer to an observation which was made by the Prime Minister-an observation which was made by him recently on more than one occasion-namely, that we have turned our face from Washington. It seems to me that is a very remarkable statement for the Prime Minister to have made in view of his past record. At the same time I was glad to hear him say it, because it will be better for this country if we do to some extent turn our face from Washington. At the same time I am prepared to believe that there are certain questions of difference between this country and the United States, which it should be the duty of our statesman to have settled. I remember In years gone by, before hon. gentlemen who are now in power occupying the treasury benches, that they were never tired of telling the people of this country that if they came into power they would settle all these questions. I have here a copy of the Liberal platform of 1893, which has been given to me by a good Liberal. He has been studying it and reading it all these years, and it is almost worn out; but I think I can make out from it what was said in those days by hon. gentlemen opposite, who were then in opposition, about the government going to Washington :
That no sincere effort has been made by them to obtain a treaty, but that on the contrary it is manliest that the present government, controlled as they are by monopolies and combines, are not desirous of securing such a treaty ;
That the first step towards obtaining the end in view is to place a party in power who are sincerely desirous of promoting a treaty on terms honourable to both countries.
While I have this remarkable document in my hand, I would like to refer to another statement in it, in regard to economy and expenditure:	*
We cannot but view with alarm the large increase of the public debt and of the controllable annual expenditure of the Dominion and the consequent undue taxation of the people under the governments that have been continuously in power since 1878, and we demand the strictest economy in the administration of the government of the country.
Now, with regard to having turned our faces 'away from Washington, we have been told only within the last few months that this is the policy of the present government. Therefore we may take it for granted that the various questions still in dispute between this country and the United States

are not going to be settled, and that no attempt is going to be made to settle them. The ' Globe ' of August 19, 1898, said :
It is ten years since the last international conference was held on this side of the Atlantic and on that occasion, although Mr. Chamberlain. Mr. Bayard and the other conferees laboured faithfully to settle the Atlantic fisheries difficulties, the settlement was contemptuously tossed aside by the Senate of the United States. The present conference assembles under happier auspices than the Fisheries Commission, because the relations between the United States and Canada are distinctly cordial instead of being dangerously strained as they were in 1888.
The Anglo-American entente also is an element that can scarcely be left out of the calculation in estimating the probable result of the gathering.
Now, we have the fact before us that the conditions were peculiarly favourable to the present government for procuring a settlement of the various questions pending between the two countries. What were those questions ? They were the following :
1.	The Behring Sea difficulty-fur seal fishery.
2.	Reciprocity in trade.
3.	The Atlantic and Pacific coast fisheries.
4.	The Alaskan boundary.
5.	The bonding privileges.
6.	The preservation of fish in contiguous waters.
7.	The maintenance of naval vessels on the great lakes.
8.	The alien labour law.
9.	The wrecking laws.
10.	Transit of merchandise.
11.	Mining rights.
12.	Definition of marking of frontiers.
13.	Conveyance of persons in custody.
Now, Mr. Speaker, if. the government take the ground that none of these questions are capable of solution, I submit that we must question very much their ability as negotiators. I hope, however, that the government, if they cannot solve all of these questions, will at least take up some of them and dispose of them during the term of their administration.
As we have turned our faces away from Washington, I think we should at the present time turn them towards Germany, which is discriminating against this country in trade matters. During the last day or two I noticed a press despatch saying :
A special to the ' Herald ' from Washington says :-Secretary Wilson is preparing to enforce retaliatory measures against Germany. He is formulating regulations for the exclusion of any products of that and any other countries which are preserved or in which boracie acid has been used.
This is the direct result of the decree issued by Emperor William prohibiting the importation of American meats upon which boracic acid has been employed as a preservative. The Department_of Agriculture holds that boracic acid is not injurious, and it is satisfied that German action is due to the pressure of the Mr. KEMP.
Agrarian party. As the secretary pointed out in his memorandum to the' Department of State, there are many articles of German exportation which this government can exclude for clear sanitary reasons. These include German wines and German malt liquors.
Thus, you see that the moment Germany or any other nation in the world, attempts to discriminate against the people of the United States, the United States government proceeds to act. But Germany has been discriminating against this country for the last three or four years, and all that this government have been doing apparently is taking the matter into their consideration. We ought to be in a position to do something to bring Germany to time. She is discriminating against our wheat as compared with that of the United States to the extent of 50 per cent, against our rye 40. per cent, against out oats 50 per cent, and against our peas 40 per cent. Our exports of wheat and other products to Great Britain show a decline. Why should we not be able to take advantage of the German market upon the same terms as the United States where we would find a market for those products which in volume are declining in the British market ? Why does the government not make some effort to have Germany remove this discrimination ? I contend that in this matter we occupy a very humiliating position, and I hope that the government will take steps to place Canada in a right attitude towards Germany or any other nation that attempts to discriminate against our trade.
A good deal of discussion has taken place in reference of the preferential tariff in favour of Great Britain. I would like to show the House exactly what benefit this preferential tariff has been to Great Britain. In 1901 our total imports from Great Britain, dutiable and free, amounted to $43,104,297, of which there came in under the preferential tariff $25,905,721. Now, if there had been no preference it is safe to estimate that we would have brought from Great Britain at least two-thirds of that amount, or $17,270,481, in any case, which leaves as the extra amount which we bring in because of the preference, $8,635,240. If we deduct from that amount those goods which are not British, but which are manufactures of Germany, Belgium and other European countries, and into which a moderate or ' substantial portion ' of British labour has entered, estimated at $3,635,240, we have left only $5,000,000, the product of British labour, which we actually bring in from Great Britain as a result of the preferential tariff. The government in their wisdom saw fit to change somewhat the conditions under which British goods under the preferential tariff would come in, and I contend that the Order in Council of June 13, 1898, is of such a loose character that it enables the goods of various European countries to come into this country under the preferential tariff.
1801 MARCH 25, 1902 1802


Mr. WRIGHT.: How does the hon. gentleman ascertain the amount of goods imported from England that have been partially made in Germany ? Mr. KEMP. I am making an estimate, which I think is a safe one. I believe that if there were no preference, we would import two-thirds of what we now bring in, which would be $17,270,481 as compared with $25,905,721. It is impossible for any one to calculate what the hon. gentleman asks, but I think that the estimate I have made is a safe one. I do not think there can be any doubt that our woollen people have suffered under the preferential tariff, and that some relief should have been given before this. The United States import about $14,000,000 worth of woollen goods annually. This Canada of ours imports about $10,000,000 annually. The American people therefore import to the extent of about twenty cents per capita while in Canada we import to the extent of $2 per capita, or ten times as much. There is no reason why these goods cannot be produced here, and it seems to me that if we are truly loyal to the British empire and to this country we will strengthen our own industries and in so doing strengthen the whole empire, for it can be no benefit to Great Britain that we should destroy an industry in this country when in so doing we do not appreciably affect any interest in Great Britain. But hon. gentlemen opposite want to know if we mean to do away with this tariff. Well, my policy would be to make every thing we possibly can in this country, to give to Great Britain a substantial preference over her competitors in such things as we do not produce, and allow no foreign goods whatever to come in under the preferential tariff. I do not believe that what the Minister of Interior told us last year meets with the approval of this country. He said : When we give a preference, if it is to be at any one's expense, it is at the expense of the manufacturer and workingmen of Canada. We go a little further, and say that it is the policy of the Liberal party of Canada to reduce the duties and to remove to some extent the burden of the excessive tariff which was imposed on imported goods by the late Conservative government. What have we gained by this preferential tariff ? We have gained the discrimination of Germany against us. We have thrown our workingmen out of employment to some extent. True, we have got the clauses in the German and Belgian treaties denounced, but up to the present of what advantage has that denunciation been to us ? It may be in the future, but so far it has been of no benefit to this country whatever. I would advocate a reciprocal preference in trade matters between the different parts of this empire on entirely broader lines than those which exist at present.	Let me draw attention to a press despatch * which appeared coming from London to the ' New York Post ' a day or two ago : So far as concerns the preferential tariff proposals now coming from Canada and Australia, , lesigned to make the empire more or less a ;rade unit, in view of the coronation conference in June, it is understood that the cabinet is inclined to agree to submit the whole question to a Royal Commissi in, upon which the colonies shall be represented. I wish to point out that the idea of a royal commission is one which unanimously gained the approval of the chambers of commerce that met in London in 1900, and the British government has been strongly pressed to appoint this commission. If the right hon. the Prime Minister can accomplish nothing further, when he attends the intercolonial council in Great Britain, I hope he will at least advocate the appointment of a royal commission, composed of home and colonial delegates, to consider this question of preferential trade. I think that we ought to join hands with Australia in trying to work out reciprocal trade giving preference to the products of the empire. I believe that in the future Britain's trade policy will be considered upon the true basis of expediency. I believe that she will have to do something, and what we want to do is to make ourselves more independent of other countries, as an empire, in trade matters. We should place ourselves in closer touch with the 400,000,000 people of this British empire. We should stand shoulder to shoulder in matters of trade as well as in matters of war, and make it our object to keep British capital and labour within the empire. In discussing this preferential tariff we always come to the question of the debt of gratitude which we owe Great Britain and how we should repay it, and hon. gentlemen opposite tell us that this preference was given Great Britain because of the support she has given us by her army and navy, and in every other respect. That brings ipe to the question of the colonial conference, and it seems to me that the attitude of the government in that respect is a very peculiar one. I have here a copy of the cablegram sent on the 23rd January to His Excellency the Governor General by the Colonial Secretary, in which the Colonial Secretary asked that certain questions be discussed at this colonial conference. The cablegram reads as follows : It is proposed by His Majesty's government to take advantage of the presence of the premiers at the coronation to discuss with them the questions of political relations between the mother country and the colonies, Imperial defence, commercial relations of the empire, and other matters of general interest. These are the questions which the Colonial secretary was desirous of having discussed. The Governor General's reply was : Referring to the several questions mentioned I in your despatch of 23rd January, the only one

which, in the opinion of my ministers gives promise of useful discussion ;s that of the commercial relations between the various sections of the empire.
The British 'people must have been greatly disappointed when they found that this government will not even discuss the question of defence. The government state very clearly that that is a question which they do not intend to discuss. I would like to ask the right hon. the First Minister how it is possible for him to consider the question of preferential trade within the empire or of getting a preference for our products in Great Britain, if he is not prepared to discuss the question of defence, and if he takes the position that Canada will do nothing for herself in that respect ? Not only " must the British people be disappointed, but our own people feel humiliated at this attitude of the government. We know that Cape Colony and Australia have been assisting in Imperial defence. I do not say that we should follow the example of any of these colonies. I do not say that we should tax our people for the purpose of the British navy. I do not say that we should bind ourselves to do whatever the British parliament might tell us to do. But I contend that we have come to that period in our history, as a nation, when we should be willing to assume some of the burdens which other nations have to assume with regard to their own defence. How can we, with the population which we have to-day, expect to escape the responsibilities which other nations liave to assume ? Do we expect to enjoy all the advantages of being a part of the British Empire and share none of the burdens ? Do we expect the British navy to continue to protect our shores while we simply do nothing to help ourselves ? I think this is a question which we should face in a manly way, which we should be willing to discuss openly in this House in order to come to some conclusion. This country is practically, in the matter of defence, in the same position as the most helpless, recently acquired colony of Great Britain. We are not doing anything in the direction of coast defence or of building up a navy of our own, and I submit that the figures I have shown with respect to the operation of the preferential tariff are not a sufficient return to Great Britain for the advantages she is giving us. We find Great Britain overwhelmed with responsibilities and taxation, and I believe that if we had been obliged to go through a similar experience to that which the people of South Africa have been undergoing, if this country had been attacked by a foe, Great Britain would have done as much for us, and more than she has done in South Africa. The time, I consider, has come, when we should consider our relations with respect to this question. We are a part of the British Empire, and the question to my. mind is this : Are we going to remain a Mr. KEMP.
part of the empire or to become absorbed by the United States ? There is no medium course. And I think that the consensus of opinion in this country is that we shall remain British. I believe that the people of this country from one end of it to the other, unanimously are in favour of British connection, so strongly in favour of it, that they will not listen to any other course. I do not wish to take up the time of this House in discussing this question at any great length at this time. But I think that the Premier should tell us, before he goes to this colonial conference, what his ideas are with respect to this question of defence. In looking up ' Hansard,' I find that the Prime Minister, in 1892, stated in this House :
I have again and again repeated that the goal of my aspirations is the independence of Canada, to see Canada an independent nation in due course of time.
I would be the last one to accuse the Prime Minister of harbouring any such sentiments at this day. I do not think that it is possible for any public man in Canada to hold such sentiments. But, in view of our peculiar trade relations and of the attitude of the United States with regard to us, in view of the fact that the question of defence has been suggested by the Colonial Secretary for discussion, we should have a pronouncement by the Prime Minister before he goes to London, upon the question of our political relations to the mother country, and upon that of defence. Yesterday I asked a question with regard to the contingents which had been sent to South Africa, with the object of finding out which contingent we had assumed the cost of transporting, arming and equipping and which we had not.	I will read the question and the
answer in order that the House may understand my object in referring to them now :


Mr. KEMP asked :: 1.	Did the government arm, equip and transport by land and sea, at its own expense, the various contingents of troops which were despatched to the seat of war in South Africa, to assist in subduing the enemies of the King ?
2.	If not, what are the different conditions respecting arming, equipping and transporting the several contingents ?
3.	If the government did not, at its own expense, arm, equip and transport any one or more of the contingents, what was the reason for such action ?


The PRIME MINISTER (Rt. Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier) :: 1.	The government did arm, equip and transport, by land and sea at its own expense, the two contingents of troops which were despatched to the seat of war in South Africa, from Canada, in 1893 and 1900.	,
2.	The arming, equipping and transporting of all other corps were carried out at the expense of the Imperial authorities, as proposed by them.
3.	The reason is that the government deemed it in the public interest to act as they did, and if the hon. member is not satisfied with

that course, it is open to him to affirm by motion, the policy which, in his opinion, ought to have been adopted.
I am a comparatively new member of this House, and may not know as well as the right hon. gentleman the rules of debate. But, I knew it was open to me to proceed to take such a course as the Prime Minister pointed out. But, without having before me the particulars which he has given, it would have been a rash tiling for me to bring about a discussion of the subject in this House. Therefore, I asked the question in order to ascertain the facts so that I might judge what my course should be. My opinion is that it is quite clear that, in respect to this matter, we have done very little and that we should have done very much more.
I think it was a reflection upon our soldiers who were sent to South Africa to put them absolutely in the position of mercenaries. These men would never have gone to South Africa to flglit for any other flag except that under which we live. They went there to assist in protecting the flag and in subduing the enemies to the King. The government put them in the position of mercenaries, and that, I say is a reflection upon them which they did not deserve. I hope that when the cheque comes out paying the government for the transportation of these men from the inland parts of Canada to the seaboard and equipping them, that the cheque will be returned, and that we shall assume our fair share of responsibility. Consider what New Zealand has done. The little colony of New Zealand has sent to South Afriea more troops than we have sent. It is, proposed to send to Great Britain, with our premier when he goes, a body guard of nine hundred soldiers. When those soldiers go through the streets of London, it is not unlikely that the people will draw a comparison and say : The British government, of course, are not paying for these troops, but they are paying for the troops that the Canadians have sent to South Africa. It is unfortunate to find that we can send to London such a body guard of our soldiers-and I am glad that our representatives will have such a noble body guard, and that we should refuse to pay the petty amount, the paltry amount required for the last contingent sent to South Africa. What is the position of Australia ? It might be interesting to the House to hear the expression of the Prime Minister of Australia with regard to the relations between Australia and the empire. Speaking at a recent gathering at Melbourne, Premier Barton voiced the opinion of Australia on the subject of British unity. He said :
It was not true that this country would not remain a part of the British Empire, or would not be so loyal a part of it if it advanced in its democracy. The tendency of the British Empire was clearly toward the advancement of individual liberty. In taking up arms for the empire the states had acted with alacrity and
brilliance. Did it mean a subservient adherence to old forms and traditions inconsistent
! with British liberty V Not a bit of it. Did it mean that we were becoming an independent country not only in thought, but in action and would forget those from whom we sprang ? No. It meant neither a grovelling subserviency on the one hand nor an ill-considered, unthinking resort to a separate republicanism on the other. The truth was that the Australian character laid down its own lines of demarcation, and Britain's attitude to her colonies since the one great mistake at the end of the eighteenth century was to help them to realize their aspirations for freedom.
' Now, while I am prepared to say that we should not give away any of our liberties, and while I am as strong a believer as anyone in retaining the rights we have under the British North America Act, and while I would not leave it to the British parliament to say when and where and how we should serve, the time has come when we should consider to what extent we are going to help to defend ourselves and to defend our own commerce. We should take a strong, a manly stand, upon that question. Australia has a navy. She is now spending $20,000,000 upon new ships and $5,000,000 annually on maintenance. Cape Colony has done something along the same line, as well as Natal. The people of Great Britain spend no less a sum-not in war time, but before the South African war broke out-than $5.40 per capita on the army and navy. The people of the United States spend about the same amount, or about $5.50 per head. If we spent in proportion to the amount spent by Great Britain or the United States, we should have an expenditure of about $30,000,000 for defence. We actually spend about 40 cents or 50 cents per head. Every civilized nation in the world spends from $2 to $5 on arms and defence. On the basis of our export trade, as compared with Great Britain, if we spent at their rate, we should spend about $25,000,000 annually on defence. We need not go into any such extraordinary expenditure, and I am not giving these figures for the purpose of showing that we should. I do say, however, that we should to some extent start the nucleus of a fund for the purpose of building up a navy of our own, and taking such steps as may in some degree protect ourselves and protect our commerce, that we may occupy a more manly position within the empire than we do at the present time.
Mr. Speaker, I do not propose to occupy the time of the House any longer; but before resuming my seat I would like to refer to one more matter. The Prime Minister said in Toronto that there was nothing to reform; he has also said that there were no burning questions in this country. Now, I would like to submit for the consideration of the government some burning questions which I think the government might well take into their consideration, with the view
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of developing the country and acquitting themselves of their responsibilities. There is the question of the exodus; there is the question of defence; there is the question of purity in elections; there is the question of purchasing supplies and doing public works by tender; there is the question of strictest economy in the administration of the affairs of the country; there is the question of reduction in freight rates on farm and other products; there is the question of building up our foreign trade in the ratio of that of the United States; there is the question of improving our transportation facilities so that our produce may go out via Canadian instead of United States ports; there is the question of inducing Germany to stop discriminating against our farm products; there is the question of framing our trade policy so as to give more employment to our own people and thus keep them in this country; we require a definite and aggressive trade policy based upon the necessities of the country; and we should endeavour to frame such a policy within the British Empire, based upon reciprocal trade preferences which will bring us into closer touch with its 400,000,000 inhabitants, and render us more independent in trade matters than we are at the present time. We should also endeavour to settle the various questions in dispute between Canada and the United States. Sir, I submit these are matters that may be considered as burning questions, and I hope the government will consider them as such. It is not necessary for me to say that I shall support heartily the amendment submitted by the hon. leader of the opposition ; and I do not see why such an amendment as that should not commend itself to many hon. gentlemen on the opposite side of the House.
At six o'clock, the House took recess.
After Recess.
House resumed at eight o'clock.


Mr. R. F. SUTHERLAND (North Essex).: Mr. Speaker, while thus far I have not burdened the House at any considerable length, I, nevertheless, like the last speaker (Mr. Kemp), have some little hesitation after so much ground has been covered and so many very excellent speeches have been made in attempting for the first time to participate in a budget debate here. 1 believe it is the duty of all new members of this House for a time, at all events, to endeavour to watch the operations and business of the House, in order to attempt to get well acquainted with the duties that a representative of the people should be acquainted with in order to properly discharge the service which he should render to the country. During last session and this, there are two things which I have been attempting to do as weh as I was able.


Albert Edward Kemp: One was to observe the conduct, the capacity and the operations of the members of the government behind which I sit in order to ascertain, how, in my humble judgment, they were discharging their duties which would be properly discharged by them, and another was to ascertain just what was the nature, the character of the criticism which leading members on the opposite side of the House evinced from time to time. If I were to judge from the criticisms I have heard from the other side of the House I would have commenced by this time to believe that this government was not the government that I had supposed it to be. I well recollect in 1896 that when the right hon. leader of the government (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) was called upon to select a government, with what joy, with what satisfaction and confidence the Liberal party throughout the length and breadth of Canada, and also, I believe a great many of the independent Conservatives throughout the country, looked over the personnel of that government. They expected from their record, from their business capacity and ability, from their integrity and honesty that the government would take hold of the affairs of this country with a good grip, with an honest desire to serve the country and with a great deal of business capacity. After watching them for four or five years from outside this House and at long range, and during the past year from inside of this House at close range, the only opinion that I have been able to form In connection with the matter is, that toe government has answered the expectations that the Liberals of this country had in 1890 when it entered upon its career, and I believe, also, has lived up to the expectations that many Conservatives formed of that government at that time. On the other hand, if I were to express the opinion which I had formed from an observation of the criticisms of the leading members on the other side of the House during last session and this, it would be to the effect that they seem rather more to confine their attention to matters of small moment, to items of small detail, than to dealing with the large questions that the members of the'government deal with from time to time. For example, just within this session, on a certain evening, an item was up for consideration amounting to $5,000, and we were shortly engaged in a debate upon that item. The minister in charge gave his word, in view of the criticism of the item, that not one dollar of the $5,000 would be expended until he had an opportunity of looking into the matter and deciding whether it was an expenditure that should be made. While that was his representation to the House, hours were taken up after he had made that statement in a continuance of the debate upon the question of that particular item, although items of very large concern were passed without any comment at all.


Mr. HENDERSON.: Mr. Speaker, is this quite in order ?


Mr. SPEAKER.: I am afraid the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sutherland, Essex) is referring to a previous debate which is contrary to the rule.


Robert Franklin Sutherland: Possibly I may be doing so in going into the details of that matter, but, as a matter of general comment, that has been the opinion I have formed from observing the criticisms of hon. gentlemen opposite during the past session and during this session. Now, while I have tried, as I think, to examine and follow the record of the government as carefully as possible, I have also sought in the best way I could to examine the amendment which the hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Borden, Halifax) moved some few days ago. Although, gentlemen who have participated in this debate from this side of the House, almost without a single exception, have asked speakers on the other side of the House to come down to details, and to something definite in regard to what their leader meant and to what they meant, not one of them up to this time has ac-ceeded to that request. We are told in this amendment that the present tariff is unsatisfactory, but I do not know in what respect hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House consider it unsatisfactory. Not one of them has come down to details upon the matter at all. We are told also that the trade of the country needs for its development a policy of adequate protection, but what are the items of protection, what are the particular commodities upon which this duty is required, are unknown up to this moment. It does seem to me that the legal ingenuity and political sagacity of the hon. leader of the opposition have been used for the purpose of framing an amendment which is almost unintelligible and which would leave him all sorts of scope in the future, and in so far as its being a declared policy of a definite character is concerned, it is quite the reverse, and one which does not lay down any definite policy at all. It has been stated from time to time in this House and in the country that this is a country of wonderfully different classes; that we have a great agricultural class in one part of the country, a great mining industry in another part of the country, a great fishing industry in another part of the country and the needs of these industries and of the people from one end of the country to the other are diverse. It does seem to me that no policy can have any great force, or be of any great benefit to the country, that does not recognize that the first principle which should characterize that policy must be one of moderation, one of general application rather than one by which a particular interest, or a particular class, would be benefited to the disadvantage and detriment of
other great classes in the community. It Seems to me that if there is one thing that characterizes the policy of the present government more than another, it is that mark of moderation and regard for the interests of all classes. If I were asked what was the character of the industries of this country, I would naturally say that they are, agricultural, manufacturing, mining, lumbering and fishing. There is another great interest, that of the labouring classes, and I shall show in a few moments that this government has not been at all slow to recognize the duty it owes to the great labouring interests, and that from time to time it has done many things which are for the particular benefit and in the interests of that great class. If we look for a few moments over these various great industries to which I have adverted, we will ascertain the condition of our commerce as represented by the exports from this countfy in 1896 and again in 1901. If we look at the exports of animals and their produce we find that they amounted to $37,000,000 in 1896, while in 1901 they have increased to $50,000,000. If we look at agricultural products we find that in 1896 the exports were $17,000,000, and in 1901 $38,000,000. If we look at manufactures we find that in 1896 the exports were $10,000,000, and in 1901 $17,000,000. If we look to the exports in connection with the mining industry we find that in 1896 they were $8,000,000, and in 1901 $40,000,000. The only industry which, in a comparison between these two particular years, 1896 and 1901, does not show a marked increase, but rather a slight diminution, is the fishing industry, the exports of which in 1896 amounted to $11,000,000, and in 1901 to $10,000,000. But we all know that that industry is marked by great fluctuations. We know that, for example, in British Columbia for several years there has been great falling off in the catch of salmon, but we know also that the largest catch of salmon the country has ever seen will be that of the year we are in. What I want to try to make out is, that this policy is a general policy working for the interest and advantage of all classes as shown by the fact that each and every of the great Industries of the country during these past five or six years, has shown a steady, a gradual and a very large increase. So that, instead of this policy being one for one particular class, it is a policy in the interests of all classes. There is another point which is very akin to this. One would expect for five or six years, in order to ascertain whether this policy was a general policy, a moderate policy and one in the interest of all classes, that if you apply these tests which are ordinarily applied to ascertain whether a country is prospering or not, whether the policy that is in vogue has worked in the interest of the country; that if you apply these tests, some at all events of the tests

will show that the country was or was not prospering under that policy.
The first of these tests is as to a general and steady increase of trade. If we apply that test, then unquestionably the policy inaugurated in 1896 and continued to the present has been satisfactory and useful to the country. If we apply the second test: That of an increasing population, I do not think that any one that listened to the speech delivered by the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Hon. Sir Richard Cartwright) during this debate, can come to any other conclusion but that for the last five or six years while this government has been in power and while its policy has been in force, the depopulation of the country which was occurring during the Conservative regime has been gradually ceasing, and that a great change for the better has come over the country in that respect.
Again let us apply the test as to whether the value of lauds has been increased. I doubt if there is a single member of this House who has had any practical knowledge, who cannot say that in his vicinity the fact is patent that land values are steadily going up for the last five years, while prior to that they were practically at a standstill. Again, if we look at the savings of the people as evidenced by their deposits in the savings banks, has it not been- made apparent time and again that the people of Canada are rapidly becoming wealthy and are putting by far more of their earnings as savings, than they ever did before. Again, I have no doubt that many of the hon. gentlemen in this House can testify, as I can myself, that the liabilities which existed upon the property of the Canadian people are largely being reduced under the present condition of things. If I were to speak from my own knowledge I could name many cases in the county from which I came where farmers have during this year come in and paid off as much as $1,000 or $1,200 of the mortgage which was upon their lands for many years, that is evidence that the agricultural classes are now prosperous as never before and that the result of that prosperity is enabling them to wipe out the mortgage incumbrances which had been upon their lands for many years. Again, take the business failures of this country. Any one who studies the records of these failures in Canada for the past five years will see that the number of failures and the amounts involved in 1896, were far greater than they are at the present day. That tells in favour of this government as do all these other tests of prosperity which I have applied. Therefore, as 1 say, applying to this general moderate policy which the government inaugurated in 1896 and has persisted in, up to this day-with such slight changes as were rendered necessary from time to time-applying any or applying all of the tests which are ordinarily applied to show whether the policy of a government which Mr. SUTHERLAND (Essex).
has been in operation for a reasonable number of years, has been successful or not ; then undoubtedly the policy of this government has proven to be eminently successful. The hon. member for Grey (Mr. Sproule) in the course of his speech asked the question : What has this government done to promote the prosperity of this country ? I shall endeavour to tell him. There is one thing that the prosperity of a country depends upon as does the prosperity of an individual, and that is reputation and credit. These are qualities which stand as high and are as useful to a country in its operations, as they are to a private individual in his business. Reputation and credit are necessary to the private individual in the conduct of his business, and they are also necessary to a government which frames measures for the welfare of a country. We cannot perhaps answer this question, free from any partisan bias, but we may go across the sea and ask, what was the credit and what was the reputation of Canada when the Conservative government went out of power in 1896. We know that in 1896 that great newspaper, the London ' Times,' said
Here in the mother country, there is only a feeling of deep regret for the wrong done to the fair fame of the oldest of her daughters.
And the London ' Chronicle ' said in 1896 :-
It is no longer possible to doubt that corruption in its worst form is rampant in a large portion of the Canadian civil service.
Now, after six years, I ask hon. gentlemen opposite, can it be said with the slightest degree of truth that that is the reputation of the Liberal party, of this government, or of Canada in the year 1902. I have given you definite and positive evidence that outside of this country and among our kin across the water, that was the reputation which Canada unfortunately had in 1896.
I submit that if this government had done nothing more than to wipe out that stigma which rested upon the people of this country, they have done very much to secure our thanks, and they have done much also to promote our prosperity.
What has this government done for the country ? I think that the speech made by the Minister of Trade and Commerce served a very wise and very useful purpose in showing what this government has done for the good of Canada. In periods of prosperity like this, and when we are swimming along in a very happy and progressive way, we sometimes are prone to forget what were the conditions which existed in other days ; and when the Minister of Trade and Commerce pointed out, that prior to 1896 there was an era of deficits which has been replaced by an era of surpluses; that there was an era of stagnation in trade which has been replaced by a period of enterprising progress ; that there is more

181f
work for the working men now than there was in those days ; that wages are higher now than they were then ; that the great agricultural industry and other business was at a low ebb then as compared with now ; I say that in pointing out those things and drawing a contrast between the conditions that exist now and the conditions that existed then, the Minister of Trade and Commerce served a very good purpose. Hut there is another thing which the people of a country are apt to forget and which it is well perhaps for public men to advert to from time to time. We are too apt to forget the services this government has rendered to, the country ; the practical legislation which it has introduced and the various other beneficial administrative acts which the government has performed during the past five or six years. With the permission of the House I shall for a moment call attention to these. In considering whether the government has served the people wisely and well, and whether it merits the criticism that has been levelled against it by its opponents, it is well that we should look to its record and see whether the ministers of the Crown have lived up to the ideal we had of them in 1896, as a cabinet of business men who would govern the country on business principles. Here are some of the things which this government has applied itself to, and which in my judgment it is entitled to a good deal of credit for. There was the settlement of the Manitoba school question ; There was the reform of the tariff and the reduction in taxation ; there was the preferential tariff introduced ; there w"as the development of transportation facilities; there was the abolition of Canadian quarantine on cattle exported to the United States ; there was the development of cold storage facilities ; there was the fostering of agricultural interests ; there was the adopting of a vigorous immigration policy ; there was the reduction in the postage rate ; there was the inauguration of increased postal facilities ; there was the reduction of the post office department deficit ; there was the government loan secured in the British market on most favourable terms ; there was the denunciation of the German and Belgian treaties ; there was the fact that Canadian government securities were listed in Great Britain ; there was the extension of the Intercolonial Railway to Montreal ; there was the development of the iron and steel industries in Canada ; there was the establishment of creameries in the Northwest Territories ; there was the establishment of the assay office in Vancouver ; there was the maintenance of the principle that government lands should be held for the settler alone ; there was the preparation of ' better trade statistics than we ever had before ; there was the principle of a fair wages to labour ; there was the establishment of the department of labour ; there was the publication of the ' Labour Gazette;'
there was the introduction of a form of conciliation for the settlement of labour disputes ; there was the abolition of the sweating system on government contracts ; there-was the development of the Yukon on the principle that the Yukon must pay for the Yukon ; there was the establishment of cold storage for the preservation of bait for the fishermen of the lower provinces ; there was the appointment of an officer to prevent the infraction of Alien Labour Laws ; there was the construction of the telegraph line to the Yukon ; there was the extension of the government telegraph line to the Straits of Belle Isle ; there was the attempt to prevent the discrimination of rates by railway companies ; there was the large purchases of food stuffs made by the British government in Canada. I submit that the recital of these various things done, works accomplished and legislation enacted by this government shows a record that has not been equalled by any previous government that Canada ever had.
I have sought in a few words to show that no policy can be effective in this country, whether in respect to trade or anything else, except a policy which is moderate and which js not confined to any one class, but is for all; and I am bound to say, in respect to another matter which the hon. gentleman who has just preceded me spoke of, the leader of this government and the government itself have made a record of which they may well feel proud. During the progress of this 'debate a great deal of attention has been directed to the United States and its people. There is no doubt that the United States is a country peculiarly favoured, having a splendid range of natural advantages and products, an immense population which has flowed to their shores, and another thing which we are often apt to forget, a great deal of British capital to assist in developing the resources of the country. AYe are sometimes told in this House' as well as elsewhere in the country that we have reason to fear an influx of capital from the United States. Did the people of the United States ever take that attitude towards the influx of British capital ? On the contrary, was it not gladly received in the United States, and was it not one of the most potent influences in the development of all the industries of that country ? And if at the present time we see signs of United States capital coming into Canada, and if in the future we are to see more, as I am satisfied we shall, we may say that in this respect at all events we desire the fullest reciprocity that we can have with the United States. Just as they gladly received British capital into-their country, we should gladly receive United States capital to assist in building up this country.
The people of the United States have afforded us an example in another respect. which we may well imitate. AVliatever their

mous quantity of contracts which they had secured. The owners of that concern, who within the last few years have come into this country and set up that establishment and already have it on a splendid business basis. I might take you to Windsor and Sandwich, where you would find a similar state of affairs. For instance, at Sandwich there is the J. H. Bishop Fur Company, which has been established as a new concern, an offshoot from an establishment at Wyandotte, Michigan. That concern has been established since 1896. I have it on the authority of their manager that their business has steadily grown from the day the establishment was started. Far from not prospering under this government, it has prospered constantly and steadily. I might refer to one or two industries in the city of Windsor, which were running along in a small way up to 1S96 but which, since that date have developed so largely that old buildings have had to be enlarged, old plants discarded and newer and larger plants installed, while a larger number of employees have been kept busy. This will give some idea of the condition of the manufacturing industries in that part of Canada. I am satisfied that the great bulk of the manufacturers in this Dominion believe that the incidental protection which is given in connection with the revenue tariff of this government enables them to get along very well and to prosper, notwithstanding what hon. gentlemen opposite say to the contrary.
There is another question I would like to speak about for a few minutes, and one which is attracting a great deal of attention, and that is the transportation question. One would think, at times, that this was a comparatively new question, and that the statesmen of this country were only now commencing to realize the importance of it. It is hardly that. Many years ago, this question was agitating the minds of statesmen both on this side of the line and on the other. For example I will read some words which might well have been used by the Prime Minister of this country to-day or the Minister of Finance or the Minister of Public Works instead of having been used years ago, as they were. In 1865, which, as you will remember, was the last year before the abrogation of the reciprocity with the United States, the Board of Trade of the city of Detroit, which is just opposite the city in which I live, called a great convention to discuss certain matters. The board of trade passed a resolution which they embodied in the letter calling delegates together. It was stated that the object for which the convention was called were commerce, finance and communications of transit from the west to the seaboard. And the president of the Detroit Board of Trade in welcoming the delegates to that convention used the following words in connection with the transportation question :


Robert Franklin Sutherland: Communications of transit between the Great Lakes and the sea-board is of vital importance to the North-west. The continued prosperity of the great west demands additional outlets to the sea-board and to the markets of the. world for its agricultural, mineral and other products, which will crowd every outlet as fast as constituted.
Again he says :	.
Any measures which can be devised to ensure the west cheap and speedy transportation of its products to tide water will promote the immediate prosperity of the people east and west.
And again :
But. as the natural outlet of the Great Lakes the navigation

that is of the St. Lawrence.

is capable of being improved to give a safe
and clear depth of fourteen feet to tide water, which to the future of the great and growing west is imperative.	.
The president elected by these delegates used these words :
Gentlemen, when I stand here and look to the resources of the illimitable west, capable of sustaining one hundred millions of men here, and also capable of feeding another one hundred millions of men on the European continent, 1 ask you to multiply the facilities for placing this grain on the European markets at a price below what it can be grown there. Do your best; this mighty west will crowd these avenues to the sea-board to place this food in the eastern markets.	[DOT]
Such were the words of the men of that day. No doubt, these Americans were speaking, at that time, more particularly of their own great North-west. But times have changed, and we know that not only the trade of the North-west of the United States but the immense trade of the North-west of Canada is commencing to come down this great natural outlet to the sea. In my opinion, those who are taking this question up-and the government and the Minister of Public Works have been taking it up, and the hon. member for South Lanark (Hon. Mr. Hag-gart) made an excellent speech on it last year as did also the present Minister of Justice (Hon. Mr. Fitzpatrick)-should advocate every reasonable expenditure to make the outlet from the St. Lawrence and down to the ocean as speedy, as rapid and as cheap as possible. These men are doing a great work for the present and even a greater work for the future of this country. I agree also with something said by the hon. member for Cape Breton (Mr. Johnston) the other night. Speaking of the deficit in connection with the Intercolonial Railway, and referring also to the administration of the cangl system, the hon. gentleman said in effect: We in the maritime provinces are willing that you should go on and administer the canals of Ontario, we are willing to go on with that expenditure believing it to be the complement of the Intercolonial Rail-

way and railway transportation to the sea.
I agree that that is the principle which must actuate us in this country, whether we ate from the west or from the east, whether we are from British Columbia, the North-west, Ontario, Quebec or the maritime provinces. We must be prepared to yield a little to one another, we must be prepared as the Finance Minister so aptly put it, to bear one anothers burdens in this country. It is in that way that the country will be able to prosper and progress as it has done in the last four or five years. A part of this transportation question is the railway rate question. I am glad to welcome the statement of the Minister of Railways that we are on the eve of having a railway commission in this country, or are seeking to have it. I do not imagine for a moment that a railway commission will cure all the ills of which we complain in connection with railway rates. It is not possible, in a country like this, for that to be accomplished. But, if a few men, wisely selected and having opportunities to study the matters, apply themselves care-/ fully and systematically to that question, there is no reason, as I see it why they should not gain information that would enable them to make much better practical arrangements than those existing at the present time. I am glad that the government appointed a man to go all over the country and get as accurate information as possible in this direction. In my section wo have a condition of affairs in relation to railway rates of which we think we have a right to complain, and I am glad the government are taking hold of the matter. We complain that Windsor and nil that district of Essex county is being discriminated against by some of the railways as compared with Detroit. One would naturally expect that if manufacturers or farmers wished to ship their products from the city of Windsor or from that section of the county of Essex, to the interior, they would be given a lower rate than on goods shipped from Detroit, for, it naturally costs something to transport merchandise across the Detroit river. Yet the fact was brought out by investigation held by this government officer, and also by the investigation held by the Windsor Board of Trade, that, in many directions the people of Windsor and locality have to pay a higher rate for the transportation of their commodities than do the people of Detroit or, for that matter people at points a good deal further in the interior of Michigan. A gentleman who is in a position to speak with authority on the fruit trade said :
The rate on a American fruit on a long haul is often less than for a short haul over a Canadian line, thus neutralizing the effect of the import duty. Peaches can be shipped from Grand Rapids, Michiganthat is about a couple of hundred miles, I think, from Detroit



to points east of Toronto at a lower
rate than from Leamington, Ontario.
That is a condition of things that we do not like to see and are desirous of having modified, if possible. Again I quote a statement made by the secretary of the Windsor Board of Trade in connection with this matter :
The most serious case of individual discrimination presented to the notice of the board is of a manufacturing company doing business in this city. This company contends that manufacturers and shippers in the east get rates coming this way from 20 to 40 per cent better than from Windsor to points east ; that this discrimination enables the Montreal and Toronto business concerns to do business right in this county upon an equality with locdl manufacturers, while the excessive rates east prevents our entering their market and doing business at a profit.
Now that is a condition of things which I think ought not to obtain. In the same report I read this :
What we in this locality have to protest and do protest most emphatically against is the absolutely unfair and unjust discrimination which exists as between the shippers of the United States and Canada (notably as between Detroit and Windsor) in favour of the former. The question of water competition does not enter here, being common to both.
I am very glad that the government are alive to this matter, and are seeking to get at the facts in order to apply a remedy, if one can be found and applied. I believe they desire to establish a railway commission, and if we are to have one, it will do much to remedy some of the things we complain of.
I notice in the speech of the hon. gentleman who preceded me, he said that the exportation of wheat from Canada in 1896 was greater than in 1901. Well, perhaps that is correct, the exact figures being 9,-
919,000	bushels in the former year, and 9,-
739,000	in 1901. The difference is so small that the argument is rather disingenuous. If we look at flour exports and see the enormous increase which has occurred, one would see where much of our wheat goes to. In 1896 our export of barrels of flour was 186,716; in 1901 that exportation had run up to 1,118,700; showing that while the exportation of wheat was almost stationary, there was an enormous advance in the output of flour which came from the same commodity.
Now from time to time I have read during the past three or four years the glowing accounts which the Minister of Finance has been giving us of the present and future outlook of this country, and I am very glad to note that such is the case. I am reminded of a little story which illustrates my views in the matter. It is said that a certain clergyman was writing a sermon one day, and after he had proceeded a certain distance he penned this sentence: ' I never see a young man with fine physi-

que, and with all his splendid possibilities standing out before him, but I am struck with great admiration.' It is said that the moment after he had penned this sentence he was called away, and immediately after his young daughter came in, and with that curiosity which the fair sex possesses as well as we, she went and looked at what her father had written, and when she saw these words :	* I never see a young man
with fine physique, with all his splendid possibilities standing out before him, but I am struck with great admiration,' she wrote below : ' Those are my sentiments, father.' So when I heard the Minister of Finance speaking of the splendid condition of this country, and of its splendid possibilities and prospects for the future, I felt, and I am sure hon. gentlemen opposite feel the same way, if they would express their real sentiments, that I could join with him and say :	' Those are my sentiments.'


Mr.   E.@: HACKETT (Prince West, P.E.I.) In rising to make a few observations on the question before the House I need make no apology. The question we are discussing is one of very great importance to the people of Canada. The question of the fiscal policy of this country, and our trade relations with the nations of the world, is certainly one of the very highest moment, and it behooves every representative of the people to express his views upon it. I am not going to follow the hon. gentleman who has just resumed his seat in the very lengthy speech he has made. tie commenced by talking about the amendment moved by the leader of the opposition, and closed up by quoting from a sermon by some minister in times past It will be impossible for me to follow him all through. He commenced by saying that the leader of the opposition had moved an amendment to the motion made by the Minister of Finance, that he could not understand. He said he did not know what was meant by the amendment, that he did not know what particular industry required protection. That is the statement he made. The amendment moved by the leader of the opposition means this :	That adequate protection
ought to be given to all the industries of Canada, and that the markets of Canada should be preserved for the Canadian people, keeping in view the fact that we are prepared to grant preferential trade within the empire. But if the hon. gentleman requires any information as to what particular industry Is suffering in Canada, all he hsis to do is to sit down beside the Minister of Finance for a short time, and he will tell him what industries are suffering; because we have seen in the newspapers, and it is known to be a fact, that during the last month delegation after delegation has waited upon the minister asking him to make changes in the tariff, and assuring him that the present tariff has been found very unsatisfactory and requires amending Mr. SUTHERLAND (Essex).
at an early date. Not only has this taken place the present year, but last year also, delegations came to Ottawa with the same object. Yet the hon. member for Essex (Mr. Sutherland) does not know what particular industry requires protection.
The hon. gentleman went on to refer to the great prosperity of Canada under the policy of this government. He spoke of the savings of the people, and he said: Look at the savings banks, look at the amount iu the chartered banks where the savings of the people are deposited, and you will see clear evidence of the great prosperity of the people of Canada. Sir, as an old member of this House, I remember many years ago when the people of Canada were putting their earnings in the savings bank, and when we were told by the hon. gentlemen opposite, then sitting on this side of the House, that these savings showed want of confidence on the part of the people in the business of the country, that people would not be placing their savings in these banks if they could employ them in any other industry in which they had confidence. But now we find these gentlemen pointing to these savings of the people as an evidence of the great prosperity of the country. It is an easy matter for them to change front, they have changed their base so often that it has become easy for them to do so.
Another thing the hon. gentlemen referred to was the surpluses. That is another old story. We were told in those days, especially by the present Minister of Trade and Commerce, that surpluses showed bad statesmanship; they showed that the gentlemen who were conducting the business of the country could not make a fair estimate of expenditure and revenue; that they were taking from the people millions of dollars every year that should have remained in their pockets, and they had failed to take a clear view of the situation.
Hon. gentlemen opposite say now : What a great thing it is to have a surplus ! They did not say that ten or fifteen years ago. The hon. gentleman speaks of their policy when they have no policy. They are opportunists of the worst kind and change their views on every question in connection with the affairs of Canada. He referred also to the exodus being checked. What figures did he give us to show that emigration had been cheeked ? I can only speak for the province of Prince Edward Island and I will tell him that there has been a larger exodus of men and women from that province since this government came into office than ever before. That will be shown by the census returns. I believe we had a fair count down there, but it has been shown by the lack of growth of population within the last ten years that this exodus has not been checked by the policy of the government. I was pleased, however, to find that the hon. gentleman gave credit in one particular to

the Liberal-Conservative party, and that was in regard to the building of the great Canadian Pacific Railway. He told us that that was a great work of national defence and he said that that great work was carried through in the interests of affording transportation for the products of the west and that it was a work of national importance as a means of defence. I remember, Mr. Speaker, that I was a member of this House and that the proudest thing I ever did-I am proud of it to-day and I am getting pretty well advanced in years-was when I voted for the building of that great work which was inaugurated and carried through by that great statesman, the late Sir John A. Macdonald and the Liberal-Conservative party and opposed by hon. gentlemen who are now sitting on the treasury benches. That great statesman was the means of building that great highway through Canada binding with bands of steel this country from ocean to ocean. He was the man who was the means of opening up the whole of the great North-west country and he carried this great work to a successful conclusion beating down the opposition of these hon. gentlemen as well. He built that railway. Day after day, in the House of Commons,
I remember, in 1880, when the most factious opposition was offered to the building of that great highway when bogus syndicates were formed and brought here to make offers that could not possibly be carried out, that the Liberal-Conservative party, under the leadership of that great statesman Sir John A. Macdonald, having as his first lieutenant Sir Charles Tupper, Bart., in spite of this opposition, carried through that great work of which the hon. gentleman now speaks as being a work of national importance. Hon. gentlemen opposite opposed it to the utmost of their ability and by every means possible. They opposed it but the good sense of the people of Canada, having every faith and confidence in the leadership of the right hon. Sir John A. Macdonald, supported him in carrying through his great enterprise in face of the opposition of these hon. gentlemen. I do. not think I need refer any more to what was said by the hon. member for North Essex.
In connection with the tariff policy, I wish to say here, Mr. Speaker, that I have referred to my being here and voting for the Canadian Pacific Railway. Another proud moment of my life was when the question of the national policy was introduced by the Liberal-Conservative party under the leadership of Sir John A. Macdonald and of Sir Leonard Tilley in 1879. That policy was the policy of this country after having experience of hon. gentlemen opposite who occupied the treasury benches from 1873 to 1878, during which time every industry in this country was depressed, when everything was going to ruin, when every man in the country had no confidence in his neighbour, when there was no confidence in busi-58
ness, and when the business men of the country approached the hon. Minister of Finance, now the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Hon. Sir Richard Cartwright) and asked that the government should do something for them, he said : We are flies on the wheel; you can go some other place and we cannot do anything for you. Sir John A. Macdonald introduced his resolution in the session of 1878 and it became the law of the land in 1879. Under the national policy protection was given to every industry in the Dominion of Canada, the farmer, the miner, the lumberman, the fisherman-all classes of the people were protected by that policy and that policy has a place deep down in the hearts of the people of Canada to-day. I tell the hon. Minister of Finance (Mr. 'Fielding) and the right hon. leader of the government (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) that their government would not exist for twenty-four hours, unless the fundamental and underlying principle of protection was in their present tariff. Now, speaking of this question, they say that they have a revenue tariff. It is a revenue tariff, but the old national policy was also a revenue tariff. It protected the industries of the country and it brought in sufficient money to meet the expenditures of the country and maintain the public works. While hon. gentlemen have in many ways emasculated the national policy, while the preferential tariff, which has not been of any advantage to Canada, which allows goods, manufactured in foreign countries by foreign labour, to be brought into competition with the workingmen of Canada, closing up the mills of Canada, while they have emasculated that policy, while they have reduced the protection, they still maintain in their policy, protection to certain industries. I ask them why, when the hon. Minister of Finance was waited on by a deputation of woollen manufacturers, he should not have paid some attention to their requests. Why should he allow this great industry, employing thousands of men in Canada, to suffer, and pay no attention to the request of the people engaged in it. I saw, a few days ago, reading in a paper, that a woollen mill established by Lord Strathcona and Lord Mount-Stephen in Cornwall had been closed and that a hundred men had been thrown out of employment and forced to seek employment in a foreign land. They were allowed to go away and the request of the woollen manufacturers was not listened to. The mill was Closed and the people employed in it had to seek homes in a foreign clime as a consequence. As to the protective features of the tariff, the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce the other evening, when the hon. member for East York (Mr. Maclean) was referring to the tariff, and speaking about the tariff being a protectionist tariff, retorted :	You do not know the
difference between a protectionist tariff and a revenue tariff. It was a very nice state-



ment to make. There are certain features of this tariff that are strongly protectionist, and if 'you give protection to one industry you must give it to all the rest of the industries. I find that flour pays a duty of CO cents per barrel. That is for the purpose of protecting the milling industry in Canada. I remember when the duty was placed on flour in 1879 the government were told that they were taxing the bread of the poor man. In the province of Prince Edward Island large importations of flour are made because we do not raise sufficient wheat to supply bread to the people. We were told there, and even in this House as well, that we were imposing a tax upon the working men, that this was one of the prime necessaries of life, but, in answer to that, we told these hon. gentlemen that we could raise sufficient wheat in Canada to make bread for the people of Canada. It was protected and encouraged by the imposition of this duty and instead of our people in Prince Edward Island receiving the rotten maggoty flour they used to get in former days from Boston and New York, they now receive fresh Canadian flour.


Mr. ROSAMOND.: And it kept you in good health.


Mr. HACKETT.: It kept us in good healtli and made us strong. We also find in this tariff of the Liberal government, another feature of the old tariff that has not been eradicated, and that is the duty of two cents a pound on pork. When Sir Louis Davies, who has lately been promoted to the Supreme Court of Canada, was a member of this House, although he posed as a tree trader, yet he favoured this duty of two cents a pound on pork because it was going to protect the farmers of Prince Edward Island against the corn-fed pork raised in the United States. He posed as a free trader in everything else but he supported the Conservative government in its proposal to put a duty of two cents a pound on pork. I regret that my hon. friend from South Brant (Mr. Heyd) is not in his seat, because I want to tell liim that during my long experience of fifteen sessions in this House, I never heard such an amusing speech as his. He was walking upon the edge of a precipice not knowing what moment he might fall into the abyss below. He commenced by telling us that he was a free trader, but by and by he turned around and said he wanted protection on buggies so as to prevent cheap American buggies competing with the buggies made in Canada. Here was this free trader, this quasi protectionist; this man who will vote for the government whether they have a policy of protection or free trade; here he was standing up Hi the House and advocating an increased duty on buggies. I am a protectionist, and if the government find that our workmen in Canada cannot compete with the cheap buggies made in the Mr. HACKETT.
States, then I hope they will increase the duty; but it is entirely inconsistent for a gentleman who pretends to be a free trader and who supports what he calls a revenue tariff government, to make such a statement in this House.
Let us look for a moment at what was done in the case of printed cotton on which this government has imposed a protective duty of 35 per cent. Printed cotton had a 30 per cent duty under the old tariff ; but this revenue tariff government, this free trade-as-they-have-it-in-England government, increased the duty from 30 to 35 per cent. Why was that done ? It was done to benefit the printed cotton mills at Magog, and it was done knowing that the product of these mills would by the preferential tariff come into competition with printed cottons imported from England, and so the duty was increased by 5 per cent. But they did not do the same thing in the case of woollen goods. They allowed the woollen manufacturers to be slaughtered while under the special protection of the Minister of Public Works (Hon. Mr. Tarte) the duty on printed cotton was increased.
The hon. gentleman from Cape Breton (Mr. Johnston) made a long speech last night principally about the Intercolonial Railway and coal. He was endeavouring to defend by some means or other the conduct of the government in having a deficit last year of $500,000 on government railways; but he principally spoke of coal. We find that there is a duty on bituminous coal of 53 cents per ton. If the hon. gentleman (Mr. Johnston) be in his seat at the present time, I would like to ask him if he wants to have that duty removed ? Is it there for revenue or for protection ?


Mr. KENDALL.: Revenue entirely.


Edward Hackett: Revenue entirely ! And we were told in this House by the Liberals that when the Conservative government imposed a duty of 53 cents a ton on coal they were robbing the workingmen of Canada. But this government has large surpluses, and yet they go on exacting from the poor people of the country 53 cents a ton on coal entirely for revenue purposes, as the hon. member (Mr. Kendall) says. Surely the hon. member does not seriously mean that.


Mr. COCHRANE.: He made a mistake.


Edward Hackett: Yes, he made a mistake. I understand this coal business just as well as the member for Cape Breton does. Let me tell him that the sale of coal in Nova Scotia amounted to 771,259 tons in 1879, the year the national policy was put in force. A duty was placed on coal then, to protect that industry because it had been languishing for years, and as a result of that protection the sale of coal in the province of Nova Scotia increased from 771,259 tons in 1S79 to 2,071,938 tons in 1891.

If that increase had gone on in the same ratio up to this date, the sales of Nova Scotia coal would be just as large as they are to-day. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Johnston) was pleased to compliment the Minister of Finance on what he had 'done for the province of Nova Scotia in this respect. That gentleman (Hon. Mr. Fielding) entered into an agreement with the Whitney people, called the Dominion Coal Company, and by that agreement he received into the treasury of the province of Nova Scotia a royalty which was placed on the coal mines

Hon. Mr. ROSS (Victoria, , N.S.) He received a higher royalty than was charged to other mines.


Edward Hackett: Oh, yes, that strengthens my argument. He was getting more money and that was what he was after at the time, but he placed the coal mines of Cape Breton in the hands of this American monopoly and they are shipping coal to-day to supply the gas companies in Boston and vicinity at the low rate of something over $1 per ton, and they are carrying it thousands of miles along the Atlantic coast for that price. They are doing it at a loss, of course, and the consumers of coal in the maritime provinces are in consequence obliged to pay $1 per ton more for their coal than they were paying before this monopoly got hold of the mines.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: Would the hon. gentleman allow me to put a question ?


Edward Hackett: Certainly.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: Admitting that the price of coal in Nova Scotia is 50 cents or 31 too high, which company of all the companies in Nova Scotia to-day supplies the people and the government at the lowest rate ? Is it the Dominion Coal Company or the other concerns ?


Edward Hackett: Mountains or reached the Pacific Coast, except for the great enterprise displayed by the government of Sir John Macdonald and the men who built that railway. The Mackenzie government were building the railway across the prairie at the rate of 100 miles a year; but Sir John Macdonald grasped the whole question . He knew the millions of acres of fertile lands which were lying untilled in that great country, untrod by any creature but the buffalo and the Indian. He saw that that country would become the happy home of millions of people, and he brought about the building of that great railroad. The hon. member for Saskatchewan should be the last man in the country to compare the expenditure of those days with the expenditure of the present government, because he cannot point to a great public work which has been constructed by them during their tenure of office.
Then, what was done in connection with the Intercolonial Railway by the late government, those progressive gentlemen who were then carrying on the affairs of Canada. Those who had to travel over it had a good railway from Moncton to Riviere du Loup ; but from that point to Point Levis, a distance of 120 miles, we had to pass over a rickety railway owned by the Grand Trunk Railway. The late progressive government of Sir John Macdonald purchased that part of the Grand Trunk and made it a part of the Intercolonial Railway. We have that also to show for the expenditure of those days. Then, we have another great work connected with the great transportation system-that is, the Sault Ste Marie canal, which was built by the late government on Canadian soil, to avoid the necessity of Canadian ships having to pass through the American canal. In addition to that, they went on improving the canals of Canada and thus making it possible for the products of the west to reach a market by the best means possible.
The hon. member for Cape Breton (Mr. Johnston) last night said to us : For 18 years you were in power, and you did nothing to increase the facilities for the people of Prince Edward Island, and nothing was done to develop the great coal and steel industry of Cape Breton. What are the facts? I would be ashamed, if I were in the hon. gentleman's place, to make such a statement as that. I see the hon. gentleman's colleague, and I am sure he will agree with me. The late government, under the leadership of Sir John Macdonald and having Sir Charles Tupper as its minister of railways, built a railway from the straits of Canso to Sydney ; and if there has been a boom of late years in the coal and steel industry of Cape Breton, it has been largely due to the building of that railway.
The manufacturers of Sydney have this accommodation from Sydney to Port Mul-grave on the north-east side. It promoted transportation as far as it could be done on Mr. HACKETT.
Prince Edward Island and yet this hon. gentleman, who comes from the country, said that nothing had been done in those eighteen years to develop the resources of the country. I would be ashamed, if I were In his place; to make any such statement.
I find also that the public debt has been largely increased. We were told by hon. gentlemen opposite, when in opposition, that the public debt was altogether out of proportion to the population, and -that if elected to office they would reduce it. What do we find ? We find that notwithstanding the pledges of these hon. gentlemen and notwithstanding the surpluses which the Minister of Finance has had during the past four years, our public debt has been increased over 810,000,000, and next year the Finance Minister tells us he will increase it $6,000,000. So that we have the public debt increasing by leaps and bounds in spite of the great surpluses that we have been enjoying.
I wish to say a word in connection with the transportation question. That is one of the most important before the country to-day, and one which must be grappled with in the near future by this government. Should we have another harvest in the west such as we had last year, unless some preparations be made for moving it out of the country, there will be a congestion of freight and great loss to the farmers. I am therefore in full sympathy with anything that can be done for the purpose of facilitating transportation from the fields of the North-west.
But I propose to diverge for a moment in order to speak of a local matter, in which 1 am interested, as representing a portion of the people of Prince Edward Island. The Minister of Trade and Commerce (Hon. Sir Richard Cartwright) is not in his seat, but I see his colleague the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Fisher) there, and I would remind him that we were promised [DOT] last year direct steam communication between Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton for the purpose of conveying the products of the Island to the markets of Cape Breton. The sum of $5,000 had been previously voted for that line of steamships, but that sum was found insuflicieut, and last session a subsidy of $10,000 was voted. The people of Prince Edward Island naturally expected to have regular steam communication last year, but during the busy season, when every facility was required for the export of produce, no steamer visited our shores, and it was only in December that a boat was provided to call at the island and take a load of freight. That steamer carried away a cargo amounting to nearly one-quarter of a million dollars worth of all kinds of produce. Had she made regular trips in the summer season, 1 have no doubt that she would have had full cargoes all the time. I would urge on the government to have a direct line of

steamers put on the route next year, fitted up with cold storage, and X am sure that Prince Edward Island, although not very large in area, is entitled to as much consideration as the people of the North-west.
But there is another matter to which I would call the attention of hon. gentlemen on the treasury benches, and that is the fast Atlantic service. We know that before Sir Charles Tupper left office, a contract had been arranged with a wealthy corporation for the purpose of providing this fast Atlantic service between Canada and Great Britain. That contract was never completed because hon. gentlemen opposite, when they came to office, were averse to carrying out the arrangement entered into. Instead of that they allowed years to pass, during which they experimented with bottle-necked and all kinds of steamships, and did nothing. Six years have passed and we are still without this fast Atlantic line. I would ask permission to bring to the notice of the government, and especially the Minister of Finance, the resolution passed by the Maritime Board of Trade during last summer. This board of trade is composed of gentlemen from each of the different boards of trade in the maritime provinces. The Boards of Trade of Halifax, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island-each sends its delegates in annual session to this Maritime Board of Trade. That board is therefore composed of active, up-to-date business men, who see the necessity for this fast Atlantic service, and the following resolution was passed by them at their meeting at Chatham, New Brunswick, in August last:
Whereas, the construction of the Intercolonial and Canadian Pacific Railways was considered in the light of great national undertakings for the development of the foreign and international trade of Canada, and
Whereas, the vast and rapidly-growing development of the trade and resources of our country under these great transport facilities confirms the wisdom of parliament in pledging the revenues of the country in aid of their construction, therefore
Resolved, that in the opinion of this board our national pride is affected and our commercial prcgress retarded in consequence of the delay in our federal government in establishing this fast atlantic service, and further,
Resolved, that in the opinion of this board there is a sufficient guarantee in the magnificent results which have followed the construction of our railways to warrant the government in carrying out the completion of our national transportation facilities by pledging the revenues of our country to an extent sufficient to carry , out without further delay the establishment of the fast Atlantic service, and further
Resolved, that a copy of this resolution be forwarded to the federal government, the several boards of trade in Toronto, Montreal and Quebec; also the members of parliament from the maritime provinces. I
I want to bring these resolutions to the notice of the Minister of Finance, who comes from the maritime provinces himself
and knows the gentlemen composing this Maritime Board of Trade, and I trust he will pay attention to this resolution passed by them at their annual meeting.
My hon. friend from King's (Mr. Hughes) delivered the other evening his maiden speech in parliament. I have nothing to say with regard to the manner of his delivery, but I must say that the matter was entirely wrong. He spoke of the increase in our imports and exports, and attributed the whole of that increase to our present tariff. Sir, the hon. gentleman was entirely mistaken when he attributed our good harvest, our successful mining and lumber operations, the good catches of our fishermen and everything else good in Canada to the policy and administration of the government. He said :
How can any reasonable man say tbat the operation of the tariff is unsatisfactory, under which the trade of the country has increased $150,000,000 in round numbers in five years.
The hon. gentleman forgot to thank Divine Providence for the bountiful harvest we have had. He forgot to thank the late government for having built the Canadian Pacific Railway and developed that western country. He forgot also to thank the people of Canada who. by their energy and industry, unassisted by this government, produced that large quantity of goods which were exported from Canada. The hon. gentleman had no recognition for any of these influences, but he gave the full credit for everything to the government. He spoke of the increase in exports and also of our success in making cheese. He says that cheese had increased in quantity and value. A large increase lias taken place in the export of cheese. But, so far as the province from which the hon. gentleman comes is concerned, he has nothing to thank the government for in that. Before this government came into power the late government had sent Professor Robertson, and he had established cheese factories all over Prince Edward Island. And these cheese factories were in operation and the people were reaping the benefit of them before this government came into power. Can the hon. gentleman show that this government has found a market for a pound of cheese for which there was not a market under the late government. Then the hon. gentleman spoke of eggs, and said that there had been an increased export in this line. If he were in his seat, I would ask him to tell me if anything had been done by this government to cause the hens to lay a dozen eggs more than they did, or to find a market for a dozen eggs more than could be sold before. Before the McKinley tariff, we had a market for our eggs in the United States, paying a 'duty of five cents a dozen. That was increased to fifteen cents a dozen, a prohibitive duty. Mr. Foster, the Finance Minister of the government of that day, said that we must find a market for our

eggs, and the government sent agents to England to open a market there. And lion, gentlemen opposite, then sitting on this side of the House, scoffed at the idea of his being able to transport eggs three thousand miles to England and put them on the market In good condition. But the government of that day succeeded in opening that market and the hon. gentlemen now on the treasury benches are getting the benefit of what was done by their predecessors, they having done nothing themselves. But the hon. member for King's, Prince Edward Island, did not refer to the most important question in the eyes of the people of his own province, and that is having a representative of that province in the Cabinet. These hon. gentlemen can speak of eggs and butter and everything ejse, but they have not a word to say with regard to this important question of a seat in the Cabinet for Prince Edward Island. One singular thing about that is that when the hon. member for West Queen's (Mr. Farquharson) whom I see in his seat, ran his election, one of the reasons held out why the people should vote for him was that he was to have a seat in the Cabinet. It was said that this was a government of premiers, and the hon. gentleman, as a premier of the province, was naturally entitled to a seat in this Cabinet. A few days before the election, the ' Charlottetown Patriot,' the organ of the government, the pocket organ of the hon. member for West Queen's had something to say on this subject. At this time, the friends of the hon. gentleman were appealing to Conservatives to let him in without opposition on the ground that this would strengthen his chances. This is what it said :-
Again, the fact that Premier Farquharson goes o Ottawa without opposition will do much to strengthen his claim to a cabinet position and apart entirely from political leaning, this is what every voter in Prince Edward Island desires. It would be detrimental to our interest if this province were left without a cabinet representative, but difficulty in securing representation will of necessity be encountered. In sending the strong jst man available, one who if elected by acclamation is consequently acknowledged strong by both political parties our claims from that standpoint will be greatly strengthened.
The hon. gentleman was not elected by acclamation ; but this editorial shows you how the editor of that government organ regarded this matter at the time. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Farquharson) is here, and occupies a comfortable seat and is not yet in the Cabinet. I think that is very unfair. The day before the election Mr. Dobell was killed in Englandt and it was placarded in front of the ' Patriot ' office that Mr. Farquharson would go into the Cabinet, Mr. Dobell being dead. The hon. gentleman is not yet in the Cabinet. The government is very unfair to the hon. member to keep him looking over the wall so long. He sits there apparently very placid, but he Mr. HACKETT.
must be murmuring to himself ' so near and yet so far.'
Another point to which I wish to refer is that of bonusing the sugar industry in this country. Several applications have reached me asking me to bring this important matter before the House. Down in Prince Edward Island, Mr. Callaghan, a strong Liberal traversed the province, held public meetings, received subscriptions in the form of agreements to set apart and cultivate land for the production of the beet, for the purpose of creating there a beet sugar industry. It appears that the plant for this industry will cost at the beginning a very large amount of money and the people of Prince Edward Island are asking that the promoters should be granted a small vote for the first two or three years, to enable them to carry out their scheme. But, from the budget speech, it appears that the government will do nothing. The Finance Minister tells us that the Ontario government are bonusing the beet and sugar industry in that province, I would ask the Minister of Finance what benefit it will be to -the farmers of Prince Edward Island that this bonus is being given to the province of Ontario ? We want the government to assist the farmer. We know that the payment of steel, iron, silver-lead and other bounties already promised will have the effect of adding $50,000,000 to the debt of the Dominion. Why should not the farmer be given a share of these bonuses ? A very silly remark was made the other evening in this debate to the effect that a bounty should be extended to the farmer for their potatoes, oats, and other products. That, of course, is nonsense. The farmer does not want it. But when the farmer sees a valuable industry that could be created in the province and asks assistance from the government in the same way as it has been given to the steel men and silver-lead people, they feel that they are entitled to consideration. And it is very unfair to the farmer to deprive him of his rights. Who will pay these enormous bounties on steel and silver-lead ? The farmers of Canada. It is the farmer who has his stakes deep down in the soil, whose home is here and who expects to bring up his family here who pays the taxes from which those bonuses come. Yet, while demanding these bounties from him for the benefit of other industries, the government refuses absolutely a bounty in this industry which the farmer believes to be of great advantage to him.
Now, I wish to refer for a moment to the , amendment moved by the leader of the opposition. It is a reasonable and fair amendment. The Minister of Trade and Commerce said it was an old friend, and he recognized it. He is a friend of this old friend. It was that old friend that drove him out of power, and this new friend is going to do the same thing. This is an amendment asking for protection for the

agriculturist, for the manufacturer, for the lumberman, for the fisherman, for the miner, for all the classes and all the people of Canada. Therefore, it is an amendment that is going to be accepted by the people of Canada. We have on this side of the House a leader that we are proud of. The hon. gentleman Is present, I do not want to flatter him; but, Sir, he is young Canada, he represents young Canada. He is progressive, we are proud of him as a man, and as an able man, and he is going to lead in the near future the government of this Dominion. The people of this country will understand who their friend is, and, Sir, ere long you will find those treasury benches occupied by the gentlemen who are now sitting on this side of the House.
Sir, we have in this Canada of ours great natural resources of which we as a people should be proud. We were left by our fathers a precious heritage which it is our duty to develop. We were left, through the statesmanship of Sir John A. Macdonald, the immense prairies of the North-west purchased from the Hudson Bay Company, Those great fields, those fertile prairies are capable, as I said before, of supporting millions of people; and you will find there before twenty years, Sir. Speaker, when many of us will have passed away, millions of prosperous and happy people. To bring that about the great North-west must be properly developed, the east and the west must join together and work for the upbuilding, of all parts of this confederation. We have also the richest mines in the world, mines in the development of which we have scarcely touched the fringe, yet mines yielding gold, silver, coal, iron and other metals in rich profusion. We have forests and the finest lumber in the world, as yet untouched by the axe of the woodman. We have in addition, surrounding our shores on the east and on the west, the most valuable and extensive fisheries in the world. Having those great resources it behooves us as a people to go on united and work together as one man. We may have our differences in politics. What we need, if we are going to make Canada a great nation, is to strike at the root of corruption that is now prevailing in this government, and to install an honest government in this country. We have the freest institutions in the world, where almost every man has a vote. We have an intelligent population composed of the descendants of the best races of the old world, the Englishman, the Scotchman, the Frenchman, the Irishman, the German, and men of other nationalities of the continent of Europe. Having that great heritage and that intelligent population, why should we not hope in the near future to see Canada take her place amongst the great nations of the world ?


Mr. HENRI BOTJRASSA (Labelle).: It is not my intention to follow the hon. gentleman in that lengthy portion of his speech which was devoted particularly to the interests of the island province from which he comes. It is not my intention either to go into a lengthy discussion of the merits of free trade or protection. It is astonishing to me, Sir, that every year the budget of Canada is discussed in this House, we have to listen to long arguments presented in what I might call an academic form, setting forth the theoretical merits of the policy of protection or the policy of free trade. On one side we hear hon. gentlemen telling us how the policy of free trade has built up England, and that therefore it is one that we should adopt. On the other side hon. gentlemen expatiate on the advantages that the United Stites have derived from a policy of protection. It seems to me it is about time that we, instead of looking either to England or to the United States for a trade policy, should confine our attention to our own interests, and to an inquiry as to what policy would best suit our special conditions. We are told by one party that we should be free traders because England is free trader ; we are told by another party that we should be protectionists because the United States are1 protectionists. But it' strikes me that the defenders of both systems seem to disregard the fact that these two entirely different systeiQS have both proved eminently successful in the two countries where they are respectively in force. Free trade has been a good policy in England because it was the policy that suited the conditions of England at the time it was adopted; and protection has been a good policy in the United States because it suited the conditions of that country at the time it was adopted. The same inconveniences that are pointed to in the United States by the defenders of a free trade system as resulting from a protectionist policy, have also manifested themselves in free trade England. The concentration of wealth, the undue development of manufacturing industries, the movement of population from the country to the city, have taken place in England just as they have taken place in the United States. Therefore, I am obliged to come to the conclusion that many public men in this country lack confidence in their own country, they seem to be always looking abroad to discover a policy.
For myself, I have never concealed the fact that I am a protectionist iu Canada; not because I believe that a system of protection in itself is superior to a system of free trade. In theory I am a free trader, and were I living in England I would stick to the policy of free trade. But protection is forced upon us, not because it has been advocated by so many theorists and economists, but because it is indicated by our circumstances. I fully realize the force of the argument made in this House that under a policy of protection the consuming

population of Canada, to a certain extent, contribute to the enrichment of a small number of men; in other words, that the large consuming classes of Canada contribute to enriching the Canadian manufacturers. This is not a question of personal interest in my case. I represent a county composed almost entirely of consumers ; and certainly regret when I see the people of my county contributing so large an amount of money for the enrichment of a small number of men. But certainly I prefer to see our people give their money to enriching Canadian manufactur-t ers, than to see it go to the United States, to Germany, to England, or to any other foreigu manufacturers. When we pay our money to Canadian manufacturers it remains in this country, and goes to swell the capital of Canadians, the capital available for the development of Canadian industries, of Canadian mines, of transportation facilities within our own country, to the employment of Canadian labour. X fully sympathize, from a theoretical point of view, with the argument made by the Minister of Trade and Commerce that it would be foolish for us to complain that foreign goods are allowed to come into this country and to be sold at a cheaper price than Canadian goods. But I am alive to the fact that should we leave our doors open and allow foreign manufacturers to make a slaughter market of Canada, the consequence would be the closing up of our own manufactories ; and after that result had come about, the consuming classes in Canada would be left entirely in the hands of those very monopolists who have been created by a policy of protection in the United States. So I say I would rather stand a little protection iu Canada in order to get competition with American trade, than to buy American goods a little cheaper for some time and to put our consumers entirely at the mercy of American monopolists.
I say that I would rather stand a little protection in Canada to get competition against the Americans than pay a little less for four, five, or six years for American goods and then be left entirely in the hands of American monopolists. If I have to choose between two monopolies, X would rather choose the monopoly that would be developed in my own country and which will help to develop the resources of my own country, than, for the purpose of saving a little money for a few years, bring nearer to the fate of the people of this country the day when the whole of this country will be left in the hands of foreign monopolists.
The sooner we realize on both sides of this House that the policy of protection is not a question of choice for the Canadian people, the better it will be for us. The moment lion, gentlemen on the other side of the House realize that the policy of protection was forced upon their party by the popular sentiment and the moment hon.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: gentlemen on this side of the House realize that the same popular sentiment has forced them to stick to that policy, the better it will be for the people of this country. I am told that the day is coming when the United States will be free traders, or freer traders. Well, let that day come, and I am the first man to say, when we can afford to lower our tariff, when we can afford to stand the competition of American manufacturers, when the American manufacturers themselves stand the competition of the foreign world. Let us open our ports. But,when we are a nation of 5,000,000 which has so much to do yet to develop its natural resources alongside of a nation of 80,000,000 of people, we cannot take upon ourselves to say that we are going to inaugurate upon this continent a policy that will have for its result to give that nation of 80,000,000 of people full control of trade on the American continent.
Now, Sir, I fully agree also with the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir Richard Cartwright) that a protection policy is apt to give rise to more causes of corruption on the part of the government, and I find myself in this strange position that I am standing here to defend the policy, and the virtue of the government against one of its own members. I admit that the policy of protection may be a cause of temptation to the government, but, are we going to be told by one of the members of the government that the virtue of the government is so weak that it cannot stand the policy that is imposed upon it by the will of the people ? The hon. gentleman has referred to the causes of the corruption of the previous government. No doubt the Conservative government, in the last years of its regime, was corrupt, and it is for that reason that the people changed it. But, all the examples which have been given by the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce, pointing to the corruption of their predecessors, were owing to causes arising, not from the application of the fiscal policy, but owing to the construction of certain public works. Public works, also, are causes of corruption and may be causes of temptation to the government. Is this government going to abandon the construction of public works in this country? Are we going to abandon the development of the improvements of transportation, are we going to abandon the policy of deepening the St. Lawrence channel, and of diverting our trade which is going through American means of transportation, because the construction of great public works may be causes of corruption ? I have more confidence than that in the virtue of the men that the people put at the head of their affairs; and I hope that in carrying out what is the will of the people to-day, as far as the fiscal policy of the country is concerned, as well as in carrying out the big works which have been imposed on them by the interests of the country,

the hon. gentlemen now In power will have the courage to face the situation-though at some times, I quite admit, it might be a little hurtful to the old fighters who have proclaimed principles which they are debarred from applying to stick to that policy.
There is one point, however, upon which I cannot agree with the Minister of Finance (Hon. Mr. Fielding), and that is as to the stability of the tariff. I quite agree with the hon. gentleman that once the tariff has been changed it should not be changed without proper reason, but, though I am a protectionist for the time being, though I am not a free trader on principle, I am not a protectionist to the point that X think our tariff should remain without being changed. Having, I confess it very humbly, no principle upon this question, being a protectionist because I think the policy of protection is imposed upon us by circumstances, I say that our tariff should change according to circumstances-not according to slight circumstances, but I think the government should be alive to the fact that when the circumstances change which impose upon us a higher tariff, they should not be afraid to raise the tariff, and that when circumstances, on the other side, impose a lowering of the tariff, they should not be afraid to lower the tariff if necessary. We are told of the tremendous results that have been produced in the United States by protection, and of the wonderful achievements of the policy of free trade in England. But, there is another country with which I am going to make a comparison and to which X will point as a good example of a country where a varying tariff policy is the cause of great prosperity. The outside trade of France has not increased very much, but the stability which is marked in the outside trade of France, is also marked in the balancing of capital within the country itself, which, to my mind, is the greatest sign of prosperity. I do not care how many millions of dollars worth may be manufactured, I do not care how many millions are gathered in the banks in one country, I do not care what the figures may show as to the richness of one country or the other : I say the most prosperous country is that in which money, capital and energy are most equally balanced between the greatest number of people living in that country, where you can point to every community, to every city, to every town and to every village and say that there is prosperity. Foreign trade with France is certainly not as big as the English trade or the American trade, or even the German trade, but France stands to-day as the only country where the servant girl, where the farmer, where the little merchant, has always a Jittle money in hand, not only to look to the future of the family, but to lend money to the government when money is needed. After the Franco-Prussian war, when France was bound, after one of the most disastrous wars that ever occurred in
any country, to pay an indemnity of 5,000,000,000 francs, twice the total sum was subscribed by the men on the street. Every public loan that has been made in France for the last thirty years has been entirely, and more than entirely subscribed by her own people and by what would be thought elsewhere the poorer classes who always have a few hundred francs and who are able to lend money to their own government. Therefore, I say, that we should be prepared, according to circumstances, either to raise, or to lower, our tariff when we know that one industry or the other for the general good of the country requires it.
Now, Sir, I will come to the second part of the resolution moved by the hon. leader of the opposition which pronounces in favour of preferential trade within the empire.
I quite agree with the opinion expressed by the hon. member for Russell (Mr. Edwards) that the only feature in our present policy which appears to be on free trade lines is in fact the most protective feature in it, and the most protective feature we have had in our fiscal policy for some years back. The only difference is, that as it stands now, it does not mean protection in favour of the Canadian manufacturer at the expense of the Canadian consumer, but unfortunately it turns out to be protection in favour of the English and German manufacturer at the expense of the Canadian manufacturer, Take the case of the woollen Industry and it goes even further than that. It enables the English manufacturer who cannot compete with the German manufacturer, to import from Germany into England articles manufactured to nine-tenths of their value in Germany, finishing them in England and shipping them to Canada under the preferential clause. Such goods included in the total trade figures of Great Britain, thus getting the benefit which we give to British trade and in reality forcing the deluded Canadian consumer to reduce one-third of his duty in favour of one of the countries that is most inimicable towards Canada. I have inquired a great deal for the last ten months from business men of various kinds, and I find that in the case of many articles that used to be imported from Great Britain at a certain price, the British tradesman or manufacturer, beginning to feel the difference in price caused by the preferential clause has raised his price to our merchants ; or rather, he has abolished the discount which he used to give Canadian buyers for cash. Hence, the benefit which should be given to the Canadian consumer because of the preferential tariff is in fact given to the British or German manufacturer. I therefore hold that the Canadian consumer gets very little benefit from the present preferential clause as it stands.	.
When that provision was introduced in the tariff of 1897 I voted for it gladly, lie-cause. although a protectionist, I am a free

trader to the extent that I would like Canada to trade with ns many countries as possible on the principle laid down as the basis of clause 17 of the Tariff Act of 1897 ; and hence X then approved of it entirely. But we have changed that policy year after year. What was the principle of clause 17 of the Tariff Act of 1897 ? It was that every country that would offer to Canada any trade advantages similar to those we offered them would be received by us under the preferential clause and that we would gladly trade with them. But afterwards came our fit of sentimentality ; we have changed that clause, and we have said to the entire world : We are so devoted to Great Britain ; we are so loyal, that we are willing to trade only with the mother country, and we shut our doors to the rest of the world.' Now, Sir, I claim that this was a retrogressive policy. I claim that the policy of the future, for some time to come at all events, is going to be a policy of protection for every country, but it will take from the theory of free trade the very principle which was at the bottom of the doctrines of Cobden :	That freedom of trade being impossible between individuals, the greatest freedom of trade possible will be attained between nations. However, as the hon, member for Pictou (Mr. Bell) pointed out, it is impossible to get to that degree of freedom of trade and to that reciprocal policy between different nations unless one nation has something to offer to the other. We had something to offer ; we still have something to offer if we want to ; but, if we are ready to offer anything to foreign nations and to take something from foreign nations we must stop saying that we are so loyal, and that we are so British-much more so indeed than any Englishman or any Scotchman is in the old country because there they open their ports to every nation in the world. We must stop making ourselves the laughing stock of the whole world, the British people included ; and we must begin to say : We are a common sense nation, we will trade with every people who are ready to trade with us-with the English first because they are the easiest people to trade with, but after that, ready to trade with any reasonable nation that has something to offer us and to which we are ready to offer something.
Take the case of Germany. Hon. gentlemen on the other side have expressed great indignation because Germauy has taken from us the advantages she used to give us and that she is now giving to Great Britain. Well, Germany has simply acted as any common sense country and any common sense business man would act. We had, under clause 17 of the Tariff of 1897 a provision which would have enabled us to trade with Germany or with France or with any other country, but now we have taken that provision out. We have said to


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Germany : We will not have anything to do with you. We have said the same thing to France, and to Italy, and to every country with which we could trade and that would be ready to trade with us. We have said : We only want to trade with Great Britain ; like the child who at the first little noise runs to hide itself under its mother's apron. We are retrograding in our national aspirations, and so far as that is concerned I cannot agree either with the policy of the government or with the policy of the opposition. We have said that we had opened to a certain extent our doors to Great Britain, because Great Britain opens her doors to us. Do we really believe that the Canadian people ignore the history of the trade policy of Great Britain ? It is true that the ports of Great Britain are free to our trade, but they are equally and to the same degree free to the trade of every country on earth, whether that country be friendly or inimicable to Great Britain. As the hon. member for Bussell (Mr. Edwards) properly said : Great Britain has not adopted this policy of free trade in order to make a display of loyalty- the people of Great Britain are too intelligent and too business-like to do that. They have opened their ports to the trade of the world because it was a policy that suited them ; and at the time they abolished the corn laws, there was a flame or indignation in the colonies and especially in Canada, and some of the political ancestors of the hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House signed at that time an annexation manifesto because the British people did not see fit any longer to tax themselves in order to take our wheat. Any fiscal policy that Great Britain has adopted was adopted in the interest of the people in Great Britain. They have done their duty in that respect, and I stand here as a constant admirer of British policy because the British people have always common sense enough to frame their policy for themselves.
But I say, Sir, that the best way of proving our loyalty to Great Britain, to the British government, and to the British people, is to show them that we are as intelligent and as patriotic as they are, and that we will frame our policy not to suit or to please the British manufacturer, but in order to please and to suit and to benefit the Canadian people at large. It is all very well to say that England is the only country that admits our goods free, and that therefore we should give to England a trade advantage which we will not give to any other people; but I will take the very argument that was made here by the Minister of Trade and Commerce on that point. Figures have a value only when you take into consideration their relative position in any problem. A country may admit our goods free, and yet not be as favourable to us as another country which taxes our goods, but taxes those of some other country at a higher rate. I do not know what the gen-

eral tariff rate in Germany, is; but suppose Germany has a general or maximum rate of 50 per cent, and grants us a minimum rate of 35 per cent. I say that Germany would be treating us with greater favour than Great Britain does when she admits our goods free, and admits with the same freedom American goads, German goods and French goods, most of which, having the advantage of closer communications and much larger markets at home, are in a much better position to be sold cheaply in Great Britain than our goods.
Now, we are told that our trade has increased immensely in Great Britain. X am glad of it, proud of it. But is that really because we have granted a preference to British goods ? Sir, if our exports to Great Britain have developed so largely, it is due to a considerable extent, I am glad to say, to the intelligent efforts of the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. Mr. Fisher). It is because we have sent a better class of goods and have shipped them in better order. The English consumer has too much common sense, and understands his interest too well, to buy bad butter and bad eggs because they come from the loyal colony of Canada. He will buy butter, and eggs, and flour, and anything else that comes from Canada, as long as he gets these things as good and as cheap as he can get them elsewhere ; and the moment that he can get them cheaper and better elsewhere than he can in Canada, he will buy them elsewhere, as he has done in the past.
But there is another consideration-we know it from the authorities on British industry and British politics, British industry is to-day passing through a very trying crisis. Will it last, or is it only temporary V We do not know ; but we do know that British production in manufacturing is going down all the time, while British trade is increasing. What does that mean ? It means that Great Britain is becoming less a manufacturing country, and more a trading country. Great Britain is doing to-day more business as what I might call the foreign traveller of other nations than she is doing from her own industries. Out of the many millions of our exports that go to Great Britain-I found it out when in England last summer-a large proportion go to the European continent, where the intelligent traders have the skill to sell them as British goods, and we do not get the benefit of selling them as Canadian products. We imagine that we are selling all these products to England, whilst we are selling a considerable proportion to France, Germany, Belgium and Holland, and at the same time we are deprived of the opportunity of going to those countries and saying to them : ' You take so much from us and we take so much from you, let us trade together.' All this because we are more loyal than the King of England and the people of the British Islands.
Sir, to my mind the great danger of our present position is that we do not rely enough upon our own strength. For a certain time, as the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce said vei-y properly, the Conservative party had a great inclination to look to the United States as their example. At the same time the Liberal party may have had some inclination to look to Great Britain as their example. But even at that time there was much more national feeling in the political parties of Canada than there is now. Have the hon. gentlemen on the opposition side forgotten the day when their great leader, and one of the greatest statesmen of this country, Sir John Macdonald, when accused of discriminating against Great Britain and British connection, said,
' So much the worse for British connection !' Have the hon. gentlemen on the government side forgotten that when the leader of the government was accused of sacrificing British interests in favour of American interests, he said : ' I do not mind where the money comes from ; I prefer the American dollar to the British shilling.' I do not know what is passing over this country, but it seems that for some years we have been acting as if we regretted that our manhood was coming to us, and wanted to go back to our childhood. We are afraid of relying upon our own strength as Canadians. We talk of our great resources and of having a policy for Canada ; but when the time comes for applying such a policy, both parties are so much afraid of being accused of disloyalty that they will go back on their records of the past 50 years.
I am a great admirer of the British people ; and after a visit which I made last summer to England and which I enjoyed greatly, I came back with still greater admiration and sympathy for the British people. The reason is that they are a proud and strong people, and they like a people who are proud and strong. We may get a great many paper compliments for the policy we have adopted, but we do not get any greater esteem than we did when we said to John Bull : 'We are a worthy son of yours, but we are looking to our own interests first and last.'
I was very much surprised yesterday to hear the hon. member for Pictou (Mr. Bell). With good, common sense argument-in which, like myself, be gave a good deal of credit to both parties and some blame to both-he proved that it was to our interest to trade all over the world, and a. great mistake to stake our policy upon the preference for Great Britain ; and then he concluded by saying that it would not be proper for the people of Canada to repeal the preference. I am prepared to go further and say that the moment we find that the preference policy does not suit us, we should repeal it.
The time is coming when both parties in this country will come to their cool senses. That wave of extraordinary poetical loyal-

-he was, ordinarily, an opponent of the government

-in its resistance to the retrogade policy which is involved in the proposal of the hon. member.
But, of course, a few months later, this same gentleman exclaimed, speaking of the colonies-not of the colonies asking for any preference, not of the colonies asking for fair treatment, but of the colonies shedding their blood and giving their men for the
defence of the empire

These independent, self-governing communities have shown not merely by eloquent words or by enthusiastic cheers, but by spontaneously sending forth thousands of their sons to fight and to die for their fatherland-that our empire is one and indivisable, and that if ever it should be in peril from stress or storm it can summon to its defence a vast army of men of every class and creed and clime	
Our determination is to maintain our colonies, and to link them to each other and to us by even closer ties	
-but not to the point of giving us one atom of the favour we give to the British people. I could quote hundreds of extracts of this kind, but I do not think it is necessary.
This last summer, after our repeated proofs of devotion to the empire, the same

question, or rather a question involving the same principle, was brought up in the British parliament. It was brought up by Mr. Fowler, the member for West Bradford, in the form of a proposal that the duty on sugar imported from the colonies should be reduced by 33J per cent, thereby granting to one colonial article the same rate of preference that we have granted to so many British products. And this is what he said :
Canada had carried out a proposal which had extorted enthusiasm from this country ; and he submitted that, in view not only of what Canada had done but of what Australia was capable of doing, the Chancellor of tha Exchequer should make a serious attempt to consider the question of an inter-empire preferential tariff. If our colonies were prepared on certain questions to meet us, ought we not to he prepared to meet them ? ... . The time was ripe for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to respond in a sympathetic spirit to the proposals of the colonies	
And what did Sir Michael Hicks-Beaeli reply to that sympathetic appeal ? This :
In pursuance of the same policy, Canada might ask that a duty should be imposed on our corn and flour imported not produced in Canada, and similar claims might be advanced on behalf of Canadian timber, Australian wool, and meat from New Zealand, and so on, through all articles preference would be claimed
for colonial produce	If, on the
other hand, we refused to foreign nations the treatment extended to our colonies, what would happen ? We had an export trade with foreign countries double the amount of the trade with our colonies, and were we prepared to risk the loss of this trade by declining to give foreign countries in return for the same concessions the treatment we gave to the colonies ?
There, the principle was laid down straight that Great Britain was not ready to make any sacrifices of foreign relations in favour of her colonies. Then Sir Howard Vincent arose and said :
They owed an enormous debt to Sir Wilfrid Laurier for the boldness with which he had advocated, these proposals and for his firm attitude during the general election last year	
And Sir William Harcourt said :
They all recognized the zeal and valour with which the empire across the seas had sent their forces to aid in this war ; but the taxation for the war would not fall upon them, but upon the petty population of 40,000,000 who occupied little England. And the proposal was that the workingmen, on whom this taxation would fall, were to have an additional burden put upon them in order to give relief to those who did not pay the taxes	
And Mr. Henniker Heaton said :
If the Chancellor of the Exchequer could see his way to agree to the amendment the greatest enthusiasm would be felt	A
motion such as that which w'as now before the committee would promote kindly feeling towards England, and its rejection, after such a sacrifice as Canada has made, would cause Mr. BOURASSA.
great disappointment in that part of the empire. It would be thought that we did not care about the colonies when dealing with questions of taxation.
But the Chancellor of the Exchequer replied :
He felt strongly the kindliness and good will shown by the action of Canada. But, greatly as he valued that kindness, he thought the action itself was of far more importance than the actual effect it would have upon a great industry.
What was the result ? In 1897, after appealing to the House, the motion was withdrawn. In 1899, after the Jubilee, but before our proofs of loyalty had been given in the war, that motion was defeated by a vote of 192 to 37. But after the development of the feeling of reciprocity, after the feeling of love growing up among the members of the empire had produced such good and great results, the representatives of the British people crushed the motion in favour of the principle of any advantage being given to the colonies by a vote of 366 to 16. Sir, that has been the result of the development of love of the mother country for the colonies. And we are told now that we should not stand up in the Canadian parliament and say that we have at least one-tenth the feeling of pride in our own country that the British representatives have in theirs ! I think that is but a poor way to prove to Great Britain that we have profited by her example.
The Prime Minister of Ontario was in the old country last winter, and, with his eloquence, with his skill, with his wide knowledge of Canadian affairs, he spoke at a great number of meetings in England. One of the questions he took up was this question of the preference, and another was the question of immigration to Canada. The hon. gentleman has put in pamphlet form and published within the last few weeks some of his addresses in England. It is very amusing to bring together a few paragraphs to see how the expressions of opinion coming from a colonial representative are received in the old country when, on the one hand he expresses a desire to help Great Britain, and, on the other hand, a desire of being helped. Speaking in London on the 25th of July, Mr. Ross said :
I do not think we can keep a standing army for the defence of the empire, but I believe we can contribute something for a naval reserve. We have 50,000 fishermen who, with a little training, could be drawn on liberally for the navy.
Mr. Ross is an acute politician : he knew this would not affect very much his province, and he was ready to grant 50,000 fishermen from Quebec and the maritime provinces to prove our love towards Great Britain. But a few days later, speaking at Manchester on the 31st of July he said :-
I say to you here in Manchester that we are willing-I think we are willing-in Canada to

impose a duty of 5 per cent on all importations from any foreign country, excepting the colonies of the empire, the money to be applied as a war tax or as a defence fuud for the defence of the empire. Will you reciprocate that ? Will you impose a u per cent tax on all imparts from foreign countries, excluding the colonies, as a defence fund for the defence of the empire ? Surely that is a practical basis.
And from the meeting came the cries : No ! No ! Sir, when the colonial statesman was offering freely our blood, was offering freely the arms, and strength, and energy of our youth, his words were accepted graciously ; but when he asked the British people to grant us, not anything comparable with that youth, not anything comparable with the gift we were asked to make, when he simply asked them to impose a small rate of duty, 5 per cent, of which they would get the benefit as a defence fund for the empire, the answer he gets is, no, no. That is imperialism as it is understood on the other side.


An hon. MEMBER.: Why talk so much about it ?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Why ? In order to make the Canadian people understand what is the real aim of the imperialist party in Great Britain, to show that by sacrificing the blood and the money of this country we are simply playing into the hands of politicians who are trying to make the British people shut their eyes to the iniquities in South Africa.
Sir, there was also the question of the embargo on Canadian cattle to which I referred some days ago. Here is a question upon which we do not ask for a great sacrifice from the British people ; we simply ask that the British government should not wilfully brand our cattle throughout the whole world as being poisoned. The Minister of Agriculture has brought the correspondence before the House. Much of it was brought down in previous years ; but I find here that the hon. minister submitted to the Privy Council of Canada a report in which he made what X may call a summary of the whole, question.


Mr. COWAN.: Read it.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: No, it is too long. It is laid on the Table of the House and the hon. member can read it. It might help him to understand many things that he does not understand now. As I said on a previous occasion, the Minister of Agriculture made a splendid campaign in England on behalf of Canadian interests, a campaign of which I was to some extent a witness, because I had an opportunity of speaking with a good many Englishmen, traders and stock raisers, who told me of the most intelligent and persistent efforts made by the Minister of Agriculture. I see that before going to England he had a report adopted by the Privy Council in which I read this :
The minister recommends that urgent representations be made to the Imperial government that the present embargo placed on Canadian cattle by the United Kingdom is not only a serious detriment from a financial point of view to * the Canadian cattle trade and the farmers and stock raisers of Canada, and to the purchasers of beef, cattle and stackers in the United Kingdom, but that !t is a most unfair and unjust aspersion on the health and reputation of Canadian cattle. It is a publication to all the markets of the world to which Canadian cattle could be exported that in the opinion of the authorities of the United Kingdom it is dangerous to import Canadian cattle. The minister also observes that were this justified by the facts of the case, or the condition of our cattle during many years past, no exception could be taken to it, but with the knowledge of the foregoing facts he desires to press most strenuously the equity and policy of removing Canada from the schedule.
Therefore not only was the case presented to the British public by the Minister of Agriculture, but it was presented officially to the British government by the Canadian government. What was the reply ? In a letter from the Board of Agriculture communicated to this government by Mr. Chamberlain, this is what I find written by Mr. Elliott, secretary of the Board, under date of June 12, 1901 :
The requirement that imported animals must be landed at a foreign animals wharf for slaughter there, is now a statutory one of general application to all imported animals alike, irrespective of any question of the particular country from which they arrive, as will be seen by reference to the Diseases of Animals Act, 1896. The flee importation of animals into the United Kingdom is therefore no longer permissible in the case of any country, nor have the board any power to relax the requirements above referred to, or to differentiate between one country and
another in that respect



it is not probable that parliament would
support, nor could the board propose, the modifications or appeal of the Act which was passed five years ago after full consideration and discussion at the hands of those concerned.
Well, Sir, now we are told that because in 1896 the British parliament passed a statute, it must stand for all time to come, sacred as the Bible. But the other day when it was found that the British government could not accept, sailors from the colony of Newfoundland for their navy, owing to some obstacle in the constitution of the colony, they said they would remove the obstacle, not only from Newfoundland but from all British colonies, so that in future the British government could come into all the colonies and get sailors for their navy. Bnt when it is a question of removing from a British statute a clause which is an unjustifiable slander upon Canadian cattle, and an impediment to the trade of the loyal Canadian people-no, it is a British statute, it is sacred and cannot be touched ! Are we going to stand that treatment ? We are told we should not stand the treatment that is given to us by Germany. Sir, Germany is a foreign

country. We have not shed our blood for Germany, we have not paid any money to Germany, we have treated Germany like a foreign country, we have asked Great Britain to disallow a treaty made with Germany. But, Sir, the British people have received a little help from the Canadian people. British statesmen, and especially Mr. Chamberlain, were very proud to be able to say upon public platforms in England that the people of the colonies were helping them, that the Liberals of England had no right to denounce the South African war because the whole Canadian people was at the back of England. But when it comes to a question, not of granting us any favours, but of simply doing us justice, when we ask them not to treat us as aliens, the answer is:	No there is the British
statute. And the British Board of Agriculture will not even take the trouble to ask parliament to repeal an unjust law.
I need not refer to the Alaskan boundary question, I have talked sufficiently about that. Shall I refer to the question of immigration into Canada ? Here is a question upon which the British people are as much interested as we are. Mr. Ross wrote in the month of September last a very eloquent letter to the British people, published in the ' London Times,' in which he said it was in the interest of the British people to direct British immigration into the British colonies. He pointed out that during the last ten years, out of 726,000 emigrants, 520,000, or 72 per cent had gone to the United States, while only 90,000, or 13 per cent had gone to British North America. In order to induce the British government to take a hand in the matter he pointed out the advantage, from the military point of view, that she would derive in the future, and he said :- Canada would furnish a basis for the food supplies of the empire, and an admirable recruiting ground for the army and navy. Moreover (and this is of great importance), with an addition to our population of such persons as would naturally emigrate from the United Kingdom, the attachment of Caaadians to the empire would be greatly and permanently strengthened.
From the general feeling in this country, one would think that this would bring a very enthusiastic reply from the great English organ. Well, it said that it was desirable that the British emigrant should go to the British colonies. But, it said :
Bis going to the United. States rather than to the Dominion, to South Africa, or to Australia is probably much less an affair of the flag than it is of latitude and longitude. South Africa is closed for the present, though we all hope that before long new openings and brighter prosnects will be found there. Australia is a long way off, while the American continent, is, by comparison, close at hand. Canada, as we krow, is not 'Our Lady of the Snows,' but nothing can alter the fact that the United States lie south of the Dominion nor its influence on the stream of emigration. If Canada were a part of the United States, or if the British flag waved undisputed from the Arctic ocean to the


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Gulf of Mexico, the stream of European emigration would probably still flow mainly to the middle latitudes of the North American Continent. No improved 'teaching of the geography and resources of the British Empire' can alter the fundamental fact that temperate zones best suit the people of these islands.
As you see, in the case of South Africa, the present state of the war was shown as the only obstacle in the way of the British emigrant going there ; and in the case of Australia it was the long distance that might be shortened by improved means of transportation; but, as far as Canada is concerned, our case is that it is because we are not a temperate country. That is the greatest encouragement received from that great organ of public opinion, when the Prime Minister of one of the provinces tried to attract British emigration to that province. But, tljere is a higher authority as to the climate of our country. When those Welsh emigrants wanted to come to Canada and when they appealed to the master of the empire, the great prophet who rules over the destinies of this whole empire, who has framed the policy of the colonies for the last four years, the reason given by Mr. Chamberlain why these Welsh emigrants should not come here was that they would require too many woollen clothes ! But when it came to a question of emigration to South Africa, to a point where the British government want settlers to go and take the places of these people who had been deprived of their farms, of those people who have been slaughtered, that was the purpose that was to be achieved. Their British blood was wanted to serve Mr. Chamberlain's purpose, and what the British government was not ready to do for the loyal colony of Canada, for the loyal colony of Australia, or for the loyal colony of New Zealand, the British government was ready to do for South Africa. What did we read in the Toronto ' Globe ' of 2nd July last ?
Advices received from England intimate that the consent of the Imperial government has been given to a scheme lor state aided emigration to South Africa. This news will be received with much regret in Canada and the other colonies which are looking to the British Isles for settlers to occupy and till their vacant lands. After the sacrifices which the colonies have made in blood and treasure to help the mother country, it seems but a poor return for the latter to throw its mighty influence into the scale in favour of emigration to South Africa. Canada has a special reason to feel annoyance.
But, as long as we feel only and we do not give more evidence of our feelings than we have done for the last four years the result will be nil. It is useless talk to go on telling the British government and the British people : ' You may do what you like, you can rely upon us; you can get everything from us. If you do anything against us we will enter a little protest outside of parliament, but both parties are so loyal that no one will dare to stand up in the

Canadian parliament and tell you the truth.' The British government are a very practical and businesslike government: as long as our annoyance is intimated only through newspaper articles, you may rest assured that our men and our money will be well received, but that we will not get anything more satisfactory in the way of help towards immigration, towards the removal of the embargo on cattle, towards anything, not of favour, but of equal treatment and justice.
Now, 1 come to the question of Chinese and Japanese immigration. It is not my purpose to go into the merits of the question. The hon. member for Vancouver (Sir. Smith), the other day, dealt lengthily with the question. He gave us the argument that there was nothing contrary to Imperial policy in dealing with that question. He quoted a letter from Mr. Chamberlain tQ the Governor of Tasmania, written in 1898, saying that it was the undoubted right of every British colony tos adopt the immigration policy as they saw fit. But, Sir, Mr. Chamberlain has written many letters since that time. Now, the Imperialistic feeling has developed. The result of the South African war has been felt. What is the result ? On the 19tli of August last, the London ' Times,' published a letter from a gentleman from British Columbia, Mr. David Falconer, editor of the * Outlook,' in which I find :
Sir Wilfrid Laurier, our premier, has said that he thinks British Columbia is entitled to a larger share of the head tax on Chinamen, but, that nothing can be done to stop the emigration of the Japanese for 'Imperial reasons.' Yet, notwithstanding this opinion of Sir Wilfrid's, it seems incredible that Great Britain will deliberately permit the progressive and loyal peoplg of any of her colonies to be plundered by an industrial Mongolian invasion for 'Imperial' or any other reasons if the matter he placed clearly before her.
Now, in an article published on the 2nd of September, the London ' Times ' discussed the statement of Mr. Falconer, that the people of British Columbia were united on that point, and the ' Times ' added :
But, if it were so, we should still urge our Canadian fellow countrymen to give a more patient hearing to the 'Imperial considerations' of which Sir Wilfrid Laurier has spoken In connection with this question than Mr. Falconer seems inclined to do.
I suppose most of the members of this House know that in the commonwealth of Australia the parliament has adopted, not a prohibitive law, but a law putting such a test upon the Mongolian emigrant that he is practically excluded. There was a good deal of protest, too, from the British government. Mr. Chamberlain wrote to the "overnor of Australia, Lord Hopetoun, ask-in" the Australian government to change their policy. The Australian go /eminent replied, that they would try to do so, but the moment the Australian parliament was
called together, the leader of the opposition, Mr. Reid, denounced the Australian government in such terms that they had to go back to the resolution and carry out then-law. Even then the influence of the British government was felt. The motion in favour of prohibition was pressed, and it was defeated only by five or six votes. It was defeated because the Australian government asserted that should it be carried it would be disallowed by the King, a proceeding which has not been adopted for a long time by the British Crown. At first the Australian government tried to make it apply to all emigrants by imposing an English language test, but at the request of the labour party, they framed it in such a way as to apply only to Asiatics. Protests were entered by the Japanese government and a letter was sent by Mr. Chamberlain to the Australian government saying that the Japanese government were threatening to cancel the mail contracts between Australia and Japan, but, the Australian government stood by its law and it is in operation now.
What happened here ? As early as the month of October last, not three weeks after the Bill had passed in British Columbia, Mr. Chamberlain wrote at once to the Canadian government to look into the matter. I must say that the Minister of Justice recommended the disallowance of the law, but it was not disallowed immediately, and on the 22nd of January, 1901, Mr. Chamberlain wrote to Lord Minto :
Downing Street, January 22, 1901.
My Lord,-With reference to :ny despatch No. 25 of even date respecting the British Columbia Immigration Act, 1900, I have the honour to request that you will invite the serious attention of your ministers to the question of the competence of a provincial legislature to pass such legislation.
2.	It is understood from press reports that the Act is of a restrictive nature, based on the Natal, and having regard to the general principles on which the British North America Act is based, it would appear that such a measure is ultra vires for any legislative body In Canada other than the Dominion parliament.
3.	The whole scheme of the British North America Act implies the exclusive exercise by the Dominion of all 'national' powers, and though the power to legislate for the promotion and encouragement of immigration into the provinces may have been properly given to the provincial legislatures, the right of entry into Canada of persons voluntarily seeking ouch entry is obviously a purely national matter, affecting as it does directly the relations of the empire.
I have the honour to be, my Lord,
Your Lordship's most obedient servant,
(Sgd.) J. CHAMBERLAIN.
Now, Sir, we have the principle laid down in tills whole question in dispute between Imperial rights and provincial rights. In 1894 the Imperial government acknowledged, in their treaty with Japan, that every British colony had the undoubted right of excluding Japanese immigrants if it choose to



do so, and that It was a power appertaining to every colony. Now, eight years later, we have the Colonial Secretary writing to a free colonial government telling them that they should take from one of their free provinces the right to say on what principle the basis of the population of that province should be fixed, because it might affect imperial interests. To-day it is a question of Japan. Suppose that to-morrow it is in the interest of the British government to make a treaty with China in order to check what may be considered by England as a hostile invasion of Russia in China ; are we, in Canada, going to pay for that ? Are we going to let the Chinese come into Canada because Mr. Chamberlain may choose to make a treaty with China ? Every time that the British government have a treaty to make with a foreign country, are we going to be told that we have not the right to legislate as to the kind of people that will form the basis of the poulation that will live in this country and that will partake with us the advantages of citizenship in Canada ? Who is going to say what the nature of the population of this country shall be ? Is it the people of England or is it the people of Canada ? I say, Sir, that every provincial government of this country should have the right to say who will enter that particular province and live in that province. I am not discussing the question of Japanese or Chinese immigration in itself;
I am simply discussing the principle whether the British government has the right to decide what our constitution means, and what it does not mean. Up to this date we have been told that the great safeguard of our rights was in the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, and that whenever a constitutional question was raised we had only to apply to that high tribunal which has no concern in our politics, and that our constitution would be interpreted by that body in the light of the principles of the British constitution. Sir, every time that our liberties are confided to the hands of judicial Englishmen I have no objection, because I know the generosity and the breadth of mind of the English judicial tribunals ; but I say that the interpretation of our constitution should not be left in the hands of the politicians in England who may have some political objects to serve, and who to serve their purposes might try to exercise an influence on the politicians of Canada. There is one body constituted in the British Empire to interpret the British constitution all through the empire, and it is not the Colonial Secretary who should have the right to dictate to any colonial government how the laws passed by any free province should be treated because they may perchance affect the interests of the British government.
I did not expect to speak at such length upon this question, and I would like to ask if the government will consent to an adjournment of the debate.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: 


The MINISTER OP FINANCE (Hon. W. S. Fielding).: If the hon. gentleman (Mr. Bourassa) is likely to occupy much more time I suppose so. It was understood, however, that other speakers would follow him this evening. We thought we might sit until twelve o'clock, but if the hon. gentleman feels there should be an adjournment I do not think we can refuse it, though I would much prefer we should sit until midnight.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I expect to occupy
about three quarters of an hour to-morrow.


The MINISTER OF FINANCE.: If the hon. gentleman is not to finish to-night I suppose we might as well adjourn.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I beg to move the adjournment of the debate.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, and debate adjourned.
On motion of the Minister of Finance, the House adjourned at 11.20 p.m.
[Stage Direction]
Wednesday, March 26, 1902.