1905-04-04

Mr. DUNCAN ROSS (Yale-Cariboo) moved :: That the petition of John Hendry, presented this day, praying to be permitted to lay before the House the petition of the Vancouver, Victoria and Eastern Railway Company, praying for an Act to extend the time for the commencement and completion of their railway, notwithstanding the expiration of the time for receiving petitions for private Bills, he now-read and received and referred to the Select Standing Committee on Standing Orders.


Mr. T. S. SPROULE (East Grey).: Before that motion is adopted, I wish merely to draw attention to the fact that this .petition comes in at an extremely late date, and after the time for the presentation of petitions and introduction of private Bills has been twice extended. When an application of that nature is made, some exceptional reason should be given why the House should depart from its well-understood rule. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Duncan Ross) has given no reason whatever.
Mr. DUNCAN ROS!S. Mr. Speaker, in 1897 an Act was passed by the provincial legislature of the province of British Columbia incorporating the Vancouver, Victoria and Eastern Railway and Navigation Company. In 1898 an Act was passed by this parliament declaring the works of this company to be works for the general advantage of Canada. In 1902 and 1904 extensions of time for the commencement and completion of the work were granted by this parliament. Since then some fifty miles of tbe railway has been constructed and arrangements are now being made to complete tbe road. In tbe course of making tbe necessary financial arrangements, the question was raised whether the charter rights of the company had not expired because of a certain omission in the legislation secured in this parliament. In order to remove this doubt-and tbe question was never raised until two or three days ago-the Vancouver, Victoria and Eastern Railway Company come to this parliament and ask for the legislation necessary to that end. It is purely a technical matter. But the working of the company and the financial arrangements now about to be completed will be affected unless this legislation goes through.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Bill (No. 4) to 'amend the Railway Act, 1903.-Mr. W. F. Maclean.
Mr. A. LAVERGNE.: 



KASLO AND LARDO-DUNCAN RAILWAY COMPANY.

Mr. W. A. GALLIHER (Kootenay) moved:: That the petition of Robert Irving, presented this day, praying to be permitted to lay before the House the petition of the Kaslo and Lardo-Duncan Railway Company, for the passing of an Act to extend the time for the completion of their railway, notwithstanding the expiration of the time for presenting petitions for private Bills, be now read and received and referred to the Select Standing Committee on Standing Orders.


Rt.   H@: Explain, please.


William Alfred Galliher: I must admit, with reference to this matter, that probably the default was due to the solicitor of the company. Mr. Irving is the manager of the company. They obtained an Act of incorporation, and have already expended on construction something like $200,000, and they now ask to have the time for completion extended. If the petition was not presented within the time limit that is due to an oversight on the part of the solicitor, and it seems to me that the shareholders should not on that account be precluded from deriving any benefit from the moneys they have expended, as will be the case if this petition be not granted.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Would tbe time for completion expire before next session?


William Alfred Galliher: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

Mr. ROBERT MACPHERSON moved:: That the petition of Robert Irving, presented this day, praying to be permitted to lay before the House the petition of the Kaslo and Lardo-Duncan Railway Company for the passing of an Act to extend the time for the completion of their railway, notwithstanding the expiration of the time for presenting petitions for private Bills, he read and received forthwith and referred to the Select Standing Committee on Standing Orders.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

Mr. R. L. BORDEN.: I observe that are-turn brought down giving copies of petitions and memorials from tbe legislative assembly of Manitoba and the executive of that province regarding the extension of the boundary of Manitoba contains an order of the Governor General in Council of tbe 21st March, 1905. I would like to ask my right hon. friend whether there has been any reply to that Order in Council from the executive government of the province of Manitoba.


Sir WILFRID LATJRIER.: A reply from the government of Manitoba has been received this clay and will be brought down to-morrow.


Robert Laird Borden: Would the right hon. gentleman have any objection to a motion passing for the printing of these documents as well as other documents in that connection which may be brought down? *


Wilfrid Laurier: To-morrow, when I bring down the other paper, we can make a motion.



PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT IN THE NORTHWEST.

[Stage Direction]
House resumed adjourned debate on the proposed motion of Sir Wilfrid Laurier for the second reading of Bill (No. 69) to establish and provide for the government of the province of Alberta and the amendment of Mr. Borden thereto.
Armand Renaud La Vergne: At this stage of the debate, Mr. Speaker, I shall not pretend to review the whole of the discussion which has taken place in this House on the Bill now before us, nor shall I attempt to deal with all the clauses in that Bill. I propose' to confine my remarks to that part of the measure which has created so much sensation, not only in this House, but in the country as well. I refer to the clause dealing with education. Having listened very faithfully to the debate which is taking place, I am of the opinion that the views which have been expressed on both sides, even those most opposite to my own, have been given in good faith and with but one object in view, the betterment of this country of ours.


Robert Laird Borden: Hear, hear.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: The view that I take of this matter may be a.very weak one, but it is held in all sincerity and frankness; and in giving expression to it I trust that I shall not say anything likely to hurt the feelings of any one. You will understand, Mr. Speaker, that it would be much easier for me to address yourself and the House in my native tongue, but as I want my words to be understood, especially by those of my hon. friends who do not enjoy the advantage of understanding the beautiful French language, I shall endeavour to use the language of the majority. And if my English is not of the first quality, I ask you, Sir, and this House, for your kind indulgence.


Robert Laird Borden: Your English is very good.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: I must ask you further not to forget that I have been educated in one of those very inferior schools of the-province of Quebec.
If ever, Sir, there was a right well established, if ever there was a right based on justice and equity, it is the right of the Catholics of the Northwest to their separate schools. That is a right which comes to them naturally, constitutionally and politically. By virtue of natural law, it is the right of the parent to bring up his children in the way he thinks best calculated to make them good Christians and good citizens, and it is the parent who is finally responsible for the education of his children. That is so true that a simple eompar-sion will make itself evident to hon. members opposite. Suppose, for instance, that my hon. friend from East Grey (Mr. Sproule') or my hon. friend from South York i Mr. W. F. Maclean) should have no children and I should have six.
Mr. tV. F. MACLEAN. I have children.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: I am simply putting an hypothetical case for the sake of argument, but as I apparently was not very well posted regarding the capacity of my hon. friend, I shall take instead the hon. member for Victoria' and Haliburton (Mr. Sam. Hughes). Suppose these hon. gentlemen had no children and I had six, does it not belong to me and not to them to decide how my children shall be educated?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: How many have you got?	.


An hon. MEMBER.: He is only beginning.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: I am a French Canadian and it will be all right. . Is it because my hon. friends are in the majority that they can impose on me, against my conscience, their views, and dictate to me how I shall have my children educated? The child is not the property of the state, but of his parents, and it is they who have the right to decide how he shall be brought up and to have him brought up according to the dictates of their conscience. Hence we have seen outside the organization of the state, private societies or associations such as schools. The family constitutes a private society, at the head of which is the parents, and for the protection of which public society has been established. The civil society has been instituted for the protection of natural law, not to annihilate it; and for the public society to deny the right to existence of these private societies would be to destroy its own foundation, because both derive their source in the same principle, the sociableness of mankind.
It Is on that instinct of sociableness, always manifesting itself, that confederation has* been established. The British North America Act defines the principles on which the different provinces have rested that principle and their agreement to it.
The British North America Act defines the I principles upon which the different provinces i have entered into that compact and their

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agreement to it. This compact is eminently synallagmatic, providing for mutual and reciprocal obligations and common duties. In the British North America Act lies the common ground on which the different provinces formed the confederation which is now the Dominion of Canada. But, Mr. Speaker, that confederation was not looked upon at first favourably by some of the provinces. fears were expressed on behalf of the minorities in the various provinces, [DOT]especially by the Protestant University of Quebec, and inducements had to be held out to the minorities in order to gain their consent. Let me quote to you some of the promises that were made to the provinces, from which you can judge what was the idea of the fathers of confederation. Hon. D'Arcy McGee, who I understand was one of the fathers of confederation, speaking, I believe, in 1864, said :
The minorities east and west have really nothing to fear, beyond what always existed, local irritations produced by ill-disposed individuals. The strong arm, the long arm of the confederate power will be extended over them all and woe to the wretch on whom that arm shall have to descend in anger for any violation of federal compact.
Well, Sir, inducements nud promises of that kind were relied upon, and the various provinces agreed to form a confederation. They passed some resolutions and then went to the imperial parliament and obtained what is now termed the British North America Act, which is the constitution of Canady. That Act defines the powers of the central government, and the exclusive powers of the provinces. Among the latter is jurisdiction in the matter of education, but a jurisdiction which is not exclusive, but is limited by the terms of the British North America Act itself. My hou. friend from Lincoln (Mr. Lancaster) the other night said that section 91 defined the powers of the central government and section 92 defined the exclusive powers of the provinces ; and when he was asked by my hon. friend from St. John and Iberville (Mr. L. P. Demers) if jurisdiction over education was contained in section 92, he was obliged to admit that it was not. There is a special section of the British North America Act, section 93, which gives to the provinces jurisdiction in the matter of education, but one whch is limited by the terms of the section itself, subsections 1, 2, 3 and 4. Now we are told that in order to ascertain the meaning of any statute we must go back and inquire what was the intention of the legislators. Well, when this Act was passed in the British parliament, the mover, Lord Carnarvon, then Secretary of State to the colonies, made a statement which was quoted last uight by my bon. friend from Cape Breton (Mr. D. li. McKenzie) ; but I may be permitted to read it again, because I consider it very pertinent. Coming to section 93 the mover said :


Armand Renaud La Vergne: four lordships will observe some rather complicated arrangements in reference to education. I need hardly say that that great question gives rise to nearly as much earnestness and division of opinion on that as on this side of the Atlantic. This clause has been framed after long and anxious controversy in which all parties have been represented and on conditions to which all had given their consent.
There is not a word here of Quebec or Ontario.	<
The Roman Catholic minority of Upper Canada, the Protestant minority of Lower Canada, and the Roman Catholic minority of the maritime provinces will thus stand on a footing of entire equality.
Well, Sir, on the 22nd of February of the same year the Earl of Shaftesbury presented a petition to the House of Lords on behalf of the Protestants of the province of Quebec, asking that their rights be protected under the British North America Act that was then passing through parliament. What was the answer of Lord Carnarvon ? Here 1 will call upon my hon. friend from East Hastings (Mr. Northrup) to make good his promise when he said that if we could show him some words in which we are in honour bound to give separate schools to the Northwest, then he would be in favour of them. I call the attention .of that hou. gentleman to these words I am about to quote, and then ask him to keep his pledge. Lord Carn-, arvon, on the 22nd of February, in answering the Earl of Shaftesbury, said :
Hence the House would perceive that it was almost impossible for any injury to be done to the Protestant minority. The real question at issue between the Protestant and Roman Catholic communities was the question of education, and the 93rd clause, after long controversy, in which the views of all parties had been represented, had been framed. The object of that clause was to guard against the possibility of the members of the minority suffering from undue pressure by the majority. It had been to place all these minorities, whatever religion, on precisely* the same footing, and that, whether the minorities were in esse or in posse.
Now is uot that the case of the Northwest which was then a minority in posse and did not then form part of the confederation ? Thus the Roman Catholic minority in Upper Canada and the Protestant minor* ity in Lower Canada and the Roman Catholic minority in the maritime provinces would all he placed on a footing of precise equality. Now, Sir, the time has come when the pledge made by Lord Carnarvon in the House of Lords, when he was speaking of minorities, must be kept, and when we ought to do them the justice that was promised iu the House of Lords. The hou. member for North Toronto (Mr. Foster) made a very eloquent speech a portion of which I will quote :
Now, Sir, I never was a separate school adherent, I never believed in separate schools as against national schools. In 1896 I stated my

belief, as I state it now ; I knew it was not politically to my advantage, I knew" it was not politically to the advantage of the Liberal-Conservative party:; but, Sir, without thinking of ulterior things, I said to myself;
There is the constitution, there is the pronouncement of the highest judicial tribunal in this empire, there is the minority coming with a grievance and having the right to appeal to the Dominion government and the Dominion parliament, the only pow'er that has jurisdiction to right their wrongs ; I said to myself : I believe it is right, I believe in the policy of attempting to carry out the constitution.
Well, Sir, why does not the hon. member for North Toronto still believe in the constitution ? I have always understood that a man who had principles and who believed in his principles stuck to them and tried to convince the people that they were wrong and not be convinced by the people that he was wrong. I think the hon. member for North Toronto has been long enough in politics and has been long enough in this parliament not to allow himself, when he believed that he had the right view of the question, and when he believed in the right of tin minority, to be convinced that he was wrong even by a thrice expressed opinion on the part of the people, especially so, when during the elections of 1900 and 1904, that question was not in the least talked of. My hon. friend from Ottawa (Mr. Belcourt) was quite right the other day when he said that the hon. member for North Toronto changed his mind because he found that his former view was not to his political advantage and it did not pay. These are the principles of hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House. They have principles but they cannot stick to them. They do not believe in any thing that: does not pay and is not to their political advantage. It is not the statesmen who try to enlighten the mob, but it is the mob that tries to enlighten the political statesmen of the Conservative party. We have an expression of opinion by the highest tribunal in the British empire ; we have on this question the opinion of the judicial committee of the Privy Council which was given in the Manitoba case. We have the opinion of Lord Herschell, and I hope that the hon. member for North Toronto who has been much longer in politics than I have and who ought to know better than I do will pay some attention to that opinion and that he will be convinced that the correct view of this case is not to be found in the expression of public opinion on such a question as this. Lord Herschell, speaking in regard to the question of the jurisdiction of the provinces in the matter of education, said :
Before leaving this part of the case it may be veil to notice the arguments urged by the respondent, that the construction which their lordships have put upon the 2nd and 3rd subsections of section 22 of the Manitoba Act is inconsistent with the power conferred upon the legislature of the province to exclusively
make laws in relation to education. The argument is fallacious. The power conferred is not absolute, but limited. It is exercisable only ' subject and according to the following provisions.' The subsections which follow, therefore, whatever be their true construction, define the conditions under which alone provincial legislatures may legislate in relation to education, and indicate the limitations imposed on, and the exceptions from, their power of exclusive legislation. Their right to legislate is not indeed, properly speaking, exclusive, for in the case specified in subsection 3, the parliament of Canada is authorized to legislate on the same subject. There is, therefore, no such inconsistency as was suggested.
Mr. Speaker, when the Northwest Territories entered the union they came under the principle of the British North America Act which Is the basis of confederation and which is the principle upon which all the sovereign states have met to form this confederation. This was the principle and It was so well understood that when a law was passed relating to separate schools in the Northwest Territories it met, in the House of Commons, with little if any opposition. The men of that time, the Blakes, the Mackenzies, and Sir John Macdonald understood perhaps better than our hon. friends to-day what was the spirit of the constitution because they were closer to it. Were there any doubt left In the minds of hon. gentlemen about the right of the Catholics of the Northwest Territories to their separate schools the law of 1875 should remove it immediately. That lawr, which I need not read to the House, as has been said by my hon. friend from Beauharnois (Mr. Bergeron), is the law of to-day. That law was passed under the provisions of section 93 of the British North America Act, it is the law of to-day and the meaning of the British North America Act is that when separate schools have been established they have been established for good. Why was it that the law of 1875 was passed ? Was it not passed at the request of the Protestant minority in Manitoba, under section 93 of the British North America Act, to make clearer and to relieve any doubt there may have been relating to the rights of the Protestant minority of the west ? When that law was passed by parliament, the Protestant minority as It then existed believed that the Northwest Territories would be a second province of Quebec and that the French Catholics would have a majority there. That is so clear that you cannot find any speech against it, not even a speech by George Brown himself, and I defy hon. gentlemen opposite to show me one single article In the Protestant papers of that time against the law of 1875. What was the a ttitude of the ' Globe ' then ? Can we find a single word in the ' Globe ' of 1875 against the law which gave separate schools to the minority of the Northwest Territories? Nor, can we find a single word of protest in the ' Mail.' which, I believe, is the organ of the Conservative party to-day. Well Sir,

when this law was passed in 1S75 to protect the rights of the Protestant minority of the Northwest Territories it was passed without any obstruction from the Catholic majority of the west, and if it was passed with tue complete acquiescence of the Catholic majority of the west why should our Protestant friends of the west to-day be any more narrow-minded than the Catholics were in 1875 ? Why should they not stand to-day as we stood in 1875 ready to give to our Protestant fellow-citizens what was their right and what we claim to be our right to-day, because we are now in the minority ? I suppose, that our hon. friends on the other side of the House will want to know when the Northwest Territories enter confederation, and I suppose that the old war cry that we have heard very often in this discussion, without, it seems to me any reason, will be again heard that we are making an attack upon provincial rights. Well, Sir, my view is that the Northwest Territories are not yet members of the confederation of Canada. We know that they have not the rights of a province in the matter of education, that we have absolute and unlimited jurisdiction as far as the Northwest Territories go, and I think I can fairly say, Mr. Speaker, that the Northwest Territories in the matter of education or in any other matter have not even the colour of a right. The question has arisen : When do they enter the union, or when do they become a party to the compact formed in 1867 between Ontario, Quebec. Nova Scotia and New Brunswick ? Was it in 1870, or is it to-day or will it be to-morrow ? Mr. Haul-tain, the premier of the Northwest Territories says that the Northwest Territories entered the union on the 15th July, 1870. One might ask by virtue of what law did the Northwest Territories become a party to the contract which implies the possession of all the powers which were conceded to the other provinces by the imperial parliament in 1867, only by a fiction of international law. But, let us for the moment accept the argument of Mr. Haul-tain, let us suppose that the Territories [DOT] entered the union in 1870 ; by the terms of the British North America Act, separate schools having been established in the west since by the federal government which was the competent authority, and that law having been ratified by the legislature of the Northwest Territories, separate schools were established for ever and we cannot now abolish them. That, is not my opinion only. I would not give my own legal opinion on such an important question, but in stating this, I give the opinion which was expressed by Sir Charles Hibbert Tapper in 1896. Speaking on the Manitoba school question in 1896. he quoted find endorsed what Hon. Mr. Mills said in the House of Commons on March 8 1875 :
The British North America Act favours the Catholic population. It provides that any pro-Mr. A. LAVERGNE. *
vince having separate schools before confederation should have them for all time, and also that any province not having them at the time of. the union, but receiving them at any future time, shall receive them as a right which can never be taken back.
Well, Sir,. is not that the case in the Northwest Territories to-day ? In 1896, Sir Charles Hibbert Tupper was quoting the Hon. D. Mills, on the Northwest Territories Act of 1875. and we know the Hon. David	Mills was a high
authority.	If we take Mr. Haultain's
opinion, not even this federal parliament, bound by its constitution and the Act of Confederation, can abolish the schools which were established after the so-called, entrance into the union by the Act of 1S70. My hon. friends on the other side may say that the British North America Act refers only to the provinces and that the word ' legislature' in section 93 does not mean the legislature of the Northwest Territories, but if they take the trouble to read the Canadian Interpretation Act, they will see that ' province ' means the Territories of the Northwest and the district of Keewatin, and, they will see that the ' legislature ' means not only the legislature of the provinces, but the legislature of the Northwest Territories and the Orders in Council passed relating to Keewatin.
It is true the British North America Act is an imperial statute, but is one worded by Canadians, passed on Canadian resolutions.
In the province of Quebec we were at first greatly impressed by the leader of the opposition as being a broad-minded man and a man above prejudices. He came to our province and bis first words were addressed to the people in the French language, and that incident endeared him to the heart of the French Canadian, but, Sir, when the leader of the opposition had to show that he was really tlie leader of his party, never was more applicable the saying about a French statesman' : ' Je suis le chef, il faut bien que je les suive.' When the hon. gentleman had to show himself as the leader of his party, we thought, judging by his short record of the past, we would see him occupy his position in public life with the mantle of Sir John A. Macdonald covering'his shoulders. But we were disappointed. Was it too broad for his shoulders ? I cannot say, but I know that the hon. gentleman has changed the mantle which Sir John Macdonald wore as the leader of the Conservative party ; he has changed that broad mantle for a narrower one ; one which may not be dignified by the name of mantle, but which perhaps might be better described as the short pea jacket of the old Tories that was worn by Sir Allan Macnab. However that may be, we have the consolation of seeing that the old Tory jacket is perhaps a little too [DOT] short for the hon. member for Carleton,

judging by his seeming uncomfortableness during this whole discussion. The hon. gentleman has told us that he has not been pressed by his followers into assuming his present position, and we must accept his word for it. It would appear then that the hon. gentleman has acted a little bit of the role of a Czar, which we have heard so much about from the hon. member for South York (Mr. Maclean), the leader of the opposition has acted like the dictator which those who read the Toronto j World ' saw described in its columns the other day.


Mr.  W. F.@: MAC I, E AX. I hope you read it.


Mr.   A.@: LA VEItGXE. Certainly, but 1 take an antidote afterwards. The Canadian House of Commons bears the same relation to the legislature of the Northwest, as the imperial parliament bore towards the Canadian colonies in 1867. These Territories were acquired by the right of conquest, and with them this parliament acquired the power to legislate for their future welfare, but, did the Northwest Territories really enter the union in 1870, as is claimed by Mr. Haultain ? Canada was not then treating with independent sovereign provinces, as in the case of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and British Columbia. There was no compact with these Territories, there was no synallagmatic contract, but merely the taking possession of a portion of territory. That western country had no power to treat with us ; the claims'of the half-breeds that they had that power were not listened to, It would be fairer to say that since 1870 the Northwest belonged to the union, but was not a party to the compact entered into in 1867. The Territories in 1870 were given a provisional constitution it is true, but it was a transitory constitution without provincial rights and there was an acknowledgment of our sovereignty. It was even argued, here, that the Northwest Territories had not the right to send members and senators to the Dominion parliament, and I need not quote the speech of the Hon. Mr. Mills in 1875 to that effect. But, Sir, the surest proof that these Territories are not a part of the union is that they have not autonomy, and that today, without their consent, their domain is 'being divided into two new provinces. Even take the Bill as presented to this House and you will see that the date of the union is at'the time of the passing of this Act.
We have heard a good deal about provincial rights in this House. May I ask, where are the provincial rights that are wronged in this matter ? Where are the provinces that have provincial rights ? They do not yet exist, and even were there any provinces existing to-day their rights in the matter of education would be limited in
matters of education as are the rights of any other province in the confederation by the British North America Act. Canada has now to deal with her own property, and so we are going to create new provinces and to give them a constitution. I say, Sir, that it is most important that we should give them a constitution which shall be in accordance with the spirit of confederation, and in doing so we must not forget that these lands of the Northwest have been acquired, not by Protestant Canada, but by the Canadian confederation, French and English, Protestant and Catholic. And, Sir, in view of the condition of certain minds in the country and in view of the agitation, fomented by certain narrow spirits it is most expedient that in giving these Territories autonomy there should be a clear and precise declaration as to what is confederation and what is the spirit of the British North America Act-not a milk and water declaration, but a declaration, clear and precise as the principle on which union has been established, so that the question may be settled for ever, so that the government of these provinces shall be protected, not only against agitators from the outside, but against itself.
We have been told, (Sir, many a time that we should trust the majority. This might be true in Quebec, but considering what has been done in the Territories since 1875 how can we trust the majority there ? 1 need not quote the ordinances passed in 1892, or the ordinances passed in 1901, for we have the speech of the Minister of Finance and we have the speech of the ex-Minister of the Interior-a man who ought to know-in testimony that separate schools in the Northwest exist only in name and not in fact. The Minister of Finance has told us that from the hour of the opening of the school in the morning until half past three in the afternoon the separate schools and the public schools in the Northwest Territories are exactly the same. Let me quote the opinion of Archbishop Tach6 on this point :
More astute than the Manitoba government, the one of the Territories has left the Catholics their existence, but he has robbed them of what constitutes their special character, and assures their liberty of action.
Now, as to what separate schools ought to be, I shall cite the opinion of Lord Watson. He is a highly educated man, a man learned in the law, a man tolerant and broad mind- [DOT] ed and his opinion ought to be worth something to us at this juncture. En passant, I may say that I wish our hon. friends opposite would read a little more as to what is going on in Great Britain and a little less as to what is going on in the United States, if they want to form a correct view on Canadian political or social issues. Is it not strange to see the loyalists on the other side of the House being taught the British spirit

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and the British constitution by what are called the rebel and disloyal members from the province of Quebec, yes Sir, taught British principles by the very men who have been arraigned in the Toronto * World ' as being disloyal to British institutions. I wish that the hon. members on the other side of the House had a little more of the British spirit and the British training that we French Canadians have in the province of Quebec. If they had, Sir, you would perhaps hear a little less of their cries about loyalty and see in them a little more of the true spirit of loyalty. Lord Watson, speaking of the idea of denominational schools in the minds of Roman Catholics said :
I rather think that the original idea of denominational schools is a school of a sect of people who are desirous that their own religion should be taught in it, and taught in their own way-a doctrinal religion ; and not only taught because religion is taught in a non-sectarian school, but, in the view of those who founded denominational schools originally, ,the theory was that their views of religion and teaching of their religion should permeate and run through all the education given in the school-that, whether it were rudimentary science or anything else, there should be an innoculation of the youthful mind with particular religious views.
We have seen that from the hour of opening in the morning until half-past three in the afternoon the schools in the Northwest are practically non-sectarian or neutral schools. Well, Sir, with regard to neutral schools, I will give you, not the opinion of any narrow and illiterate French Canadian, but the opinion of men on the other side of the Atlantic whose reputation has extended over the world, and men who belong to the Protestant sects. Mr. Guizot, a Protestant, and a historian of some note, a Frenchman, but not a French Canadian, says :
Popular education must he given and received m a religious atmosphere so that religious impressions and habits penetrate the child from every where. Religion is not an exercise or study to which one assign-, a given hour or place. It is a law, a law which must make Itself felt constantly and everywhere and which only at that price has a salutary action upon soul and life. That is to say that in primary schools religious influence must be habitually present. If the priest is defiant or isolates himself from the teacher, if the teacher considers himself as the independent rival, and not the auxiliary of the priest, the moral effect of school is lost.
Lord Derby writes :
The secularized school is the realization of a mad and dangerous idea.
Sir Robert Peel said that such a system violated the right of conscience. Mr. Gladstone, whose opinion I hope will be received with respect on the other side of the House, said :
_ Any system which places religious education in the background is a pernicious one.


Mr. A. LAVEROXE.: Is not that the system that we have had in the Northwest since 1892, when the attempt was made to abolish the system of separate schools ?
Now, Sir, what do we Catholics ask for ? We have not the intention of robbing our fellow-citizens belonging to different creeds of the smallest piece of their school rights ; but we claim ours loudly, as must do free citizens, and with the calm and confident conscience of Christians. And, Sir, if the Catholics have a right to their schools, why should we not give those schools effectively to them ? The question is not as to the merits or the demerits of separate schools ; yet in passing I may give in a few words some idea of the character of the separate schools of Quebec. I shall not speak at length of the results of the neutral schools of the United States. I may say this, however, that we have seen in that country divorces increasing, the race difficulty increasing, the fight between capital and labour increasing, murders increasing, and religion diminishing. I do not want to insult gratuitously the United States as hon. members on the other side of the House put it ; but, Sir, have we not a right to be proud of our Canadian institutions when we compare them with the institutions of any other country, especially those of the country that is closest to us, and in the ijght of the facts which have been put before the public in the United States themselves ? I said that religion was decreasing in the United States, and I can prove that, not on any Canadian authority, but on tbe authority of the New York ' Telegram,' which in 1896 said that the number of adherents of all the churches in the United States does not exceed twenty-three millions, that is, one-third of the population. Well, Sir, if that is the way the United States have succeeded -with the system of Godless schools, do you not think that we have a right in this country to guard our fellow-citizens against the same system being imposed upon them?
The hon. member for Bast Grey (Mr. Sproule) said it was his own business whether he thought religious teaching in the schools was right or wrong. I am proud to say that I am in favour of religious instruction in schools. Very different from the attitude of the hon. member for East Grey was the opinion of a Methodist, Dr. Ryerson, which was quoted at Cornwall on August 31, 1878, by no other than Sir .John A. Macdonald, whom I hope the hon. member for East Grey will not go back upon. This is what be said of Dr. Ryerson :
He has stated that the Separate School Bill did not injure common schools, hut had widened the basis of education.
Well, Sir. if Sir John A. Macdonald could state that tbe Separate School Bill of 1875, had widened the basis of education. I do not think the public school has widened the minds of our friends on the other side of the

House. Wiih regard to the system of schools in the province of Quebec, I must say that when we look at the facts and results of those schools, we have nothing to be ashamed of. I think our system of schools can compare with any other system in the Dominion of Canada. If I remember rightly, the system of schools in the province of Quebec took the first prize at the World's Fair of 1S93 at Chicago, and I think it was awarded some medals at the World's Fair in Paris in 1900 ; and I may say this, in answer to a reverend gentleman-I think it was Dr. Salton-who, speaking in Ottawa, said that the morality of Quebec was lower than that of any other province of the Dominion.
Let me give you a few statistics, showing the proportion of convictions in each province. In British Columbia we had one conviction to every 5G inhabitants; in the Northwest Territories one in every 77 ; in Ontario one in 114 ; in Manitoba one in 115 ; in New Brunswick one in 144 ; in Nova Scotia one in 154. And in that fearfully backward province of Quebec, we have only one conviction in every 17G inhabitants. May I then be permitted to say that our province can not be so very far behind in the race, judging by the statistics under this head. Then if we take the expenditure since 1900, w-e find that the province of Quebec is, in the matter of expenditure on public education, far ahead of any province in the Dominion. If my hon. friend denied that, I have the figures right here. But I shall not weary the House by going into them. I may say too that the number of illiterates has decreased in the province of Quebec in a proportion far greater than in any other province of the Dominion ; and I am sorry to say that in that province, where we have abolished separate schools, the province of New Brunswick, the number of illiterates has increased. If my hon. friends from East Grey (Mr. Sproule) or South York (Mr. Maclean) will go to the province of Quebec, as we are not afraid to go to the province of Ontario ; if they would go before the public of that province as my hon. friend from La-belle (Mr. Bourassa) has gone before the public of Toronto and Kingston and other places in Ontario-if they would come to my poor riding-they would see there schools where the pupils are not all stupid. They would see a few presbyteries where the priests are not totally illiterate but men of culture and learning, who take an interest in the education of their province. If the hon. member for South York would only come to the province of Quebec, he would see that we have there 5,000 primary schools, 600 superior primary schools, 3 normal schools, one engineering school, 3 schools of agriculture, also institutions for the blind, the deaf and the dumb-I hope my hon. friends opposite would go to one of these institutions and be treated for the first of these diseases. These are facts which any
province would be proud to put' before the parliament of Canada. But those hon. gentlemen would sooner shut their eyes and appeal in their newspapers to public passion than take the opportunity to obtain a little enlightment.


Mr. W. F. MACLEAN.: I would like to ask the hon. gentleman if I ever made any
reflection on the public schools of the province of Quebec.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: I am not charging my hon. friend with having made any such reflections in this House, but I say that he ought to go to the province of Quebec and learn something about educational matters in this country of ours.


William Findlay Maclean: Will the hon. gentleman let me say that I spend nearly every summer in the province of Quebec and have often been in those presbyteries to which he has referred. I have met the reverend gentlemen in charge of them, and have found them to be such as my hon. friend says they are, so that he is giving me no enlightenment on that subject. He is instead putting me in the position of having said tilings which I did not say.


Louis Lavergne: I do not know whether my hon. friend wishes here to escape responsibility for the brutal cartoons published in his newspaper the Toronto 'World' -cartoons in which the province of Quebec is represented as an illiterate Indian and the people of the Northwest as most intelligent, civilized, and claiming they are white men. What does that mean if it does not mean that the inhabitants of the province of Quebec are of mixed origin ? Sir, I would be prouder to have in my veins the blood of the noble red man than the blood of some hon. gentlemen opposite who write in the Toronto ' World.' I would wish that every British colony and every province of this Dominion were peopled by inhabitants of as pure an origin and with as pure blood in their veins as the French inhabitants of the province of Quebec. I would wish that they could trace as good a genealogy as any inhabitant of that province is able to trace, not only in this country but in the country of bis forefathers. The cartoons published in the Toronto 1 Globe ' are bold, brutal, stupid and as untrue as they are stupid. It appears now that my hon. friend from South York would lead us to infer that he does not approve of those cartoons, but I do not know that he has ever gone back on them.
But supposing the schools of the province of Quebec were as bad as they are described by hon. members opposite and by some people who write in the Ontario papers, I say that if we have a system of schools in the province of Quebec at all we have a right to-day to be proud, because after the treaty rf Paris in liG3, when the last ship for Fiance took away from our shores the r obility and the rich people and left be-

hind the poor peasants, ruined by war, left with a debt from France of 20 million irants, a whole cloud of adventurers came to this country and_continued on the ruin of the poor settlers who were left behind. Then contrary to the Act of capitulation and the treaty of Paris, the Catholic institutions were taken away from the French people. The system of schools we had then were taken from us. I should like to give my hon. friend a history of the school system in the province of Quebec if it were possible to enlighten him, because although he tells us he has spent much time in that province, it is quite evident that he has not learnt much. From 17G0 to 1800 the French Canadian refused to participate in the schools then existing, because it was against their conscience to do so, and I consider that their ignorance was a glorious one. In 1800 there was a school system established for which the French Canadians were taxed; the Royal Institution.'in which the money was given to the Protestant schools and to them only. Again the French Canadians refused to attend those schools, because it was against their conscience to do so, and they remained in their glorious ignorance. In 1824 we had the first schools worthy of the name, but as there was no public mouey given them, they could not work very well. In 1837 our rights were still not recognized and the Protestant minority had still control of the public funds. In 1841 the first move was made towards giving our people a schools system which they could support, and in 1846 we had our separate school system established, and our French Canadian people could go to schools where their rights were recognized and which they could attend without a blush of shame. Considering that we started our school only in 1846, we have made marvellous progress and to-day our system is at the head of the whole confederation.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Is that so? I understand the hon. gentleman to say that their school system is at the head of the confederation to-day, and I assume that refers to the intelligence of the people.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: If my hon. friend would take the trouble to look into the reports of public instruction of Quebec he would learn many things which he will never see in the Orange ' Sentinel.'


Thomas Simpson Sproule: May I ask the hon. member, if I am not improperly interrupting him-and I do not wish to do that-to explain one point ? He speaks of what he calls the superior educational system of Quebec. And, if I followed him closely, this system has been in operation since 1846-that is, for two generations at least. How is it, then, that in spite of the excellence of the system, statistics show that while the number of those who can read and write is, in the province of Manitoba, 72 per cent ; in Prince Edward Island. 75 Mr. A. LAVERGNE.
per cent ; in New Brunswick, 70 per cent; in Nova Scotia, 72 per cent; and in Ontario, 80 per cent, Quebec has only 67 per cent-only 67 out of every 100 people who can read or write ? These figures do not indicate that this system has succeeded very well in doing: away with illiteracy in the province of Quebec.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: I am very glad that my hon. friend (Mr. Sproule) has asked me that question. I will try to enlighten him r little further. I said that our system of schools in Quebec was started in 1846. But it was not in full operation until 1855. And then, as my hon. friend from Labelle (Mr. Bourassa) has rightly put it, the people . were for a long time very cautious about the schools. They had long been tyrannized over, and they saw in the schools, as they thought, an instrument to rob them of what they held dear-their language and their institutions. Therefore, it was only slowly and with great caution that they accepted the work of the schools. But in 1855 the system was at work almost as completely as it is to-day. As to overcoming illiteracy, we have made greater progress in Quebec than in any other province. Let me give the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sproule) the figures.
In 1871, in Quebec, there were of illiterates -people who could neither read nor write- 35-93 per cent of the population. In 1891 only 29-05 per cent of the population were illiterate. Thus in the twenty years we have made progress to the extent of 6-89 per cent. In Ontario, in 1871, there were 7-90 per cent of the people who could neither read nor write. In 1891 this had been reduced to 7-05 per cent, showing progress to the extent of only 0-85 per- cent. In New Brunswick, where there are no separate schools, they had, in 1871, 14-45 per cent of illiterates, and in 1891 the proportion was 14-99 per cent, or an absolute retrogression to the extent of -54 per cent. I do not say that we lead confederation in the proportion of our people who can read or write ; but I do say that we lead in the progress that we have made in extending the blessings of education.
Hon. gentlemen opposite tell us that we should have in the Northwest a national system of schools. Sir, do you call it a national system of schools which is opposed to the conscience of 40 per cent of the nation ? Do you call those national schools against which 40 per cent of the nation have fought for more than a century ? I say that what these hon. gentlemen call national schools are anti-national schools, because they are forced upon 40 per cent of the people against their will ; I say that what you call free schools are the exact reverse of free, because they deny the liberty of the individual and make him a slave in the hands of the state. The hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Foster) told us that in the province of Quebec a Protestant boy was obliged to go to a Catholic school. But

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is it not a fact that where our Protestant brothers are in the majority in any part of the province of Quebec they can have a separate school of their own ? Is it not a fact that, even though in any district they may be in the minority, they can establish a separate school if they have the certain small number required by the law ? And is it not a fact that even where the Protestants have not the legally required number, the French Canadians are broad enough to allow their Protestant brethren to have schools of their own ? But is it not a fact -and I wish the hon. member for North Toronto were here to answer-that where-ever the Catholics are in a majority in any district in the Northwest, they have not the right to establish a separate school, but are obliged to go to the public schools ? The treatment meted out to the minority in Quebec and in the Northwest Territories cannot be compared. Sir, it is as bad to force the Catholic to send his child to a school where no religion is taught as to force him to send that child to a school where a religion opposed to his own is taught. That is the Catholic doctrine ; I wish that my hon. friend would understand it once for all. We object, not only to being obliged to send Catholic children to Protestant schools, but to being obliged to send them to schools where no religion is taught.
Sir, as a French Canadian who has studied and learned something of British institutions, and who is loyal to the institutions given this Dominion by the mother country, because he has studied them and believes in them, I may ask my hon. friend from North Toronto what is British liberty if the Catholics are not allowed to have their own schools ? Is not that political liberty the pride of Englishmen, inclusive and widely tolerant ? Is it a selfish and narrow liberty, in some sort Protestant and privileged, and which is only a means to better shackle some of the people with the heavy chains of an intolerable despotism? Where is the British liberty, I ask these hon. gentlemen, if the minority, because it is a minority, cannot enjoy the liberties which were promised them in the name of the Sovereign, and which have been formally declared in the mandates of that Sovereign ? Sir, if this House were to follow racial appeals, the appeals made to prejudice by the hon. member for East Grey, it would only serve to remind us that we were the vanquished in 1759.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I desire at once and flatly to contradict the hon. member (Mr. A. Lavergne), and to repeat, what I have said before, that I never made an appeal to either race or religion. I call upon the hon. member to withdraw his statement.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: I expected that denial, and now I am going to prove what I have said. There is a newspaper called the ' Sentinel ' published in Toronto. It claims to be the organ of the Orange Order,
with which, I understand, the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sproule) has something to do. Of course, I do not wish to say anything against the character of my hon. friend (Mr. Sproule). In the province of Quebec, it is true, that he has a bad reputation, I must say ; but we who know him know that he is a good man, and know that he would not hurt a fly. But in my province we are often asked : ' You know the member for East Grey better than we do ; is it not true that the Yellow Pope has certain Peter's pence and is obliged to earn his money, and that is why he is so violent against the Catholics and the Romish Church. In this organ of the Orange Order -the ' Yellow Hierarchy,' as my hon. friend from Labelle (Mr. Bourassa) calls it-in its issue of March 16th, 1905, I find Brother D. Pritchard, grand treasurer, quoted as follows :
I hare always been an advocate for public schools, believing that by the national schools more than by any other means we may hope to build up a united people. One school and one language taught in the same should be the motto of every loyal Canadian.
And he adds, the English language is to be the one to be taught. Well, Sir, what does that mean ? Does it mean that the French language, which is an official language in Canada as well as the English, is to be abolished by the Orange order when they get into power ? I can make nothing else out of it. On February 23, 1905, the Reverend Brother Hughes-no, not Reverned Brother Hughes, M.P., at a banquet in Brantford, gave the history of the Orange movement and its fight against the Romish church, and asked all the members to maintain their principles, even if the occasion demanded that they fought for them. Well. Sir, I do not say that a man has not a right to fight for his principles, but I am not quite sure that the hon. gentleman means a con- , stitutional fight. I am afraid that he is appealing to the Orange lodges to fight another battle of the Boyne. Well, here is something more. If there is one right of a British subject which has been claimed by the hon. member for East Grey on many occasions during this session, it is the right of petition. After the province of Quebec began to petition like British subjects for the maintenance of separate schools in the Northwest, the 1 Orange Sentinel ' of March 23. 1905. contained the following, under the title, 'The glove is thrown down':
After saying that ' it was Quebec assuming to dictate to the Dominion, or rather is the arbitrary and intolerant ecclesiastical oligarchy dominating Quebec, making a supreme effort to tyranize the democracy and the Protestants in Canada,' it says :
The gauntlet will be taken up, the fight will be accepted. For our own part wre are right glad that it has been precipitated Just now. Sooner or later it had to come, and the sooner the better for all concerned. Sooner or later

thsre was bound to be a struggle-a fight to a finish

It goes on to ask the Protestants to unite and destroy Rome and Quebec. Now, Sir, is not that language an appeal to racial prejudices ? Is it not an appeal to religious prejudices ? Is it not designed to set race against race, creeed against creed ? Sir, we saw in the paper which is the organ of the organization of which the hon. member for Bast Grey is the Grand Master, language such as I have quoted, and am I not right therefore in saying that the hon. gentleman, if not in this House, at least in his paper, has made appeals to racial and religious prejudices.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I never had any interest in the ' Orange Sentinel ' to the value of one cent, and I have no more relationship to it except as a member of the Orange order, than the hon. gentleman hmself. Does the hon. gentleman think it proper and fair to hold the member for Bast Grey responsible for the sentiments of every one who writes in the ' Orange Sentinel ' ? The hon. gentleman made a personal charge against me.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: He first made a charge against me, now he has transferred it to some one else. May I ask the hon. member for East Grey if he, as Grand Master of all the Orange lodges of Canada, has repudiated their organ, the * Orange Sentinel ' ? Is not the ' Orange Sentinel ' the written expression of the deliberations of the Orange lodges of the Dominion of Canada ? Is not the ' Orange Sentinel ' the organ of the Grand Master of the Orange organization as well as the organ of private members ? I did not know that it had been repudiated by the Grand Master, and I want to know if the grand master- repudiates it to-day.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: May I ask the hon. gentle man if he and his friends have repudiated the course of the Toronto 1 Globe ' lately in regard to the Autonomy Bill ?


Armand Renaud La Vergne: I repudiate it entirely. My hon. friend has no right to answer one question by asking another. I have answered the hon. gentleman frankly and clearly, and I ask him to answer me in the same manner. I said I repudiated the course of the ' Globe,' and I want the hon. member for East Grey to say with' equal frankness if he repudiates the ' Orange Sentinel.'
Mr. SPROUIiB. The member for East Grey is not attacking the ' Sentinel ' for what it said.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: I cannot know whether the yellow pope speaks ex cathedra or not. Well, Sir, not only are we the subjects of racial appeals, but we are called upon to remember that we were vanquished in 1759. When I was reading the history of Canada not long ago I came across the Mr. A. LAVERGNE.
story of a French Canadian, Du Calvet, who was arrested in Quebec in 1781, and was imprisoned without a trial. When I was reading his words I was reminded of the course of the 1 Orange Sentinel ' in taunting the French Canadians with having been vanquished in 1759. Here are the words of Du Calvet. written in London in 17S1 :
How sad it was to be vanquished ! If it only cost the blood which is shed on the battle field, the wound would be very deep, very sore, it would bleed many years, but time could cure it. But to be condemned to feel perpetually the hand of the conqueror pounding on your shoulder, but to be perpetually a slave, under the power of the most constitutional sovereign, of the freest people on earth, it is too much.
Sir, that is the position in which hon. gentleman on the other side wish to place us to-day. That is the position in which their yellow papers wish to place us to-day. But I want to remind hon. members opposite that in this compact of confederation we are not slaves but partners. In the compact of confederation we took our part, and in that compact the French Canadians are treated as partners. We have been loyal to British Institutions and we have been loyal to the Canadian constitution. We claim the right to be treated as fellow-citizens, as compatriots.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: We have no desire to treat you otherwise.


Armand Renaud La Vergne: The hon. member for North Toronto said that when this law was passed war would begin in the Northwest. These hon. gentlemen are always ready to accept the opinion of the majority when that opinion As against separate schools, hut when that opinion is in favour of separate schools then they talk of war and rebellion against the sovereign authority of this parliament. I say that if separate schools were withheld from the people of the Northwest it would be an injustice done against the Catholics of the Dominion, an injustice which is not deserved by the Catholics and French Canadians of this Dominion.
But, Sir, what can we do then ? We can make a constitutional fight. You never heard the members from Quebec of the hierarchy, or the priests of Quebec talking of war and rebellion. You have never heard from the pulpits of our churches the speeches which have been made in other churches or in lodges. We submit to the law. We may oppose the law, we may conduct a constitutional agitation against it, but you never heard on our side talk of war or rebellion because the majority was against us. We respect the majority, but it is strange to observe the attitude of hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House. When they have the majority with them they claim that the majority has every right, but when the majority is against them they say that they will make war against the

t ;r
majority. There is only one right that I do not recognize in the majority and that is the right to bring compulsion to bear upon me in a matter of conscience. If there are three or four men against me I say they have no right to endeavour to force me to do something which I feel that I cannot conscientiously do. Therefore, I say in conclusion that in view of all the facts we should give to the minority in the Northwest Territories their rights generously, not the shadow of justice, not the mere form of liberty. We are told that there are only ten or twelve separate schools in the Northwest Territories. Well, Sir, I claim that if there was only one separate school in the Northwest Territories we should just the same render justice to the minority in respect to that one school. Is it that the principle of liberty and of right is to be decided on the ground of the strength of those claiming it to obtain and maintain it ? I say that we should give right to those to whom it is due and not only to those who have the strength to maintain their rights. If there were only one separate school in the Northwest Territories we would be obliged to do the minority justice the same as if there were a hundred separate schools. -But, there is more than one and there would be even more than there are to-day if by the ordinances of the Northwest' Territories the Catholics were not forced to send their children to the public schools. If the ordinances which have been adopted in the Northwest Territories prevent Catholics from constituting separate schools, I think it is unfair and unjust to use that as an argument against them and to say that there are not enough separate schools and tfiat therefore we should not render them the justice to which they are entitled. Give generously to the minority in the Northwest the right which are due them. Give them these rights first, because by^so doing we are carrying out the principles of liberty. Give them these rights because we owe some gratitude to the proving of Quebec. And here, I will call the attention of the House to a statement which I am sure my hon. friend from Bast Grey (Mr. Sproule) will not deny. On the 12th July. 1902, which is a great day, Mr. Robinson who was then the member for West Elgin, speaking to the Orangemen in St. Thomas, Ontario, said:
We know that the French of Lower Canada have kept this vast Dominion to the British empire ; for if these Frenchmen had not been faithful to this country you Orangemen listening to me would not have room enough to stand here together.
If this opinion could be expressed to the Orangemen standing togeher, I say this country should do justice to the min-'[DOT]ority of the Northwest 'Territories and should in this way signify its great gratitude to the hierarchy which is not the awful spec-120
tre it lias been painted in the Toronto 'World,' but which is the hierarchy which has kept its people faithful to the British Grown on many an occasion as my hon. friend from Labelle (Mr. Bourassa) has said. I wish to take the part of my hon. friend from Labelle who has been attacked in the Ontario papers lately and to say that he belongs to a family which has always been loyal to the British Grown. When the English Protestant minority of Quebec in 1776 did not know which way to turn, when as we say in French, they did not know whether to cry ' Yive la Ligue ' or 'Vive Le Roi,' the great grandfather of my hon. friend was on the side of the British Crown and against the American rebels and with another French Canadian, La-mothe, he carried despatches from Montreal through the American lines to the English general in Quebec. A uother of my fellow-countrymen, Bouchette, brought the English governor into the besieged city of Quebec. Ever since those days in 1760 when Canada was ceded to the British Crown we have kept our compact faithfully, and I maintain that we have a right to claim that justice [DOT] should be done to us as we have deserved. In finishing my speech, which I cannot help but feel has been too lengthy, I desire to make a comparison. Not far from here is the great river St. Lawrence which separates us from the Anglo-Saxon Republic to the south. Sweeping past the foot of the hill upon which this building stands is the Ottawa river which separates the French province of Quebec from the English province of Ontario. These two rivers converge near the city of Montreal and for a long time their waters run together without mixing. On the one side we have the dark coloured waters of the Ottawa river and on the other the silvery, bright waters ot the (St. Lawrence. They float together to a common destiny. Is not that the image of this Dominion of ours ? We have two nations floating together, not mixing the one with the other ; on the one side the French race, on the other side the English nation, on the one side the Protestant creed, on the other side the Catholic creed. Well, Sir, could we not model this country after these beautiful rivers of ours ? Could we not together float away to a common destiny without mixing, without amalgamating the one with the other, and if we do I predict for this country, which is my country and to which I am as loyal as any man, a glorious destiny and in the name of nations a glorious immortality.


Mr. SAM. HUGHES (Victoria and Hali-burton).: Mr. Speaker, I must compliment the young member for Montmagny (Mr. Laver-gue) on the very able address which he has given to the House. I must bear testimony to the fact, Sir, that not only do our French Canadian people speak their own language



*with purity, but ouce they become masters of the English language they place at a disadvantage those of us who can speak but one language.


Mr. BOURASSA.: You will have to go to a separate school.


Samuel Hughes: Not at all.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Yes, if you want to be on an equal footing there.


Samuel Hughes: I am sure that cur young friend was educated in a national school. If the same harmony could be maintained in regard to the affairs of this country as that wrhich has been manifested by our young friend in regard to the English and the French languages, the people of Canada might look forward to a great future for this Dominion. Unfortunately we find that gentlemen who speak that language, who are of that grand race, a race with which I claim kindred just as much as hon. gemiemen who sit on the other side of the House, displaying a different spirit outside of u: s House. If these gentlemen would be moderate and show the same spirit on the platforms and hustings in Quebec and up and down the side roads of that province, and if they would confine themselves to the same tone as that in which they address this House it would augur well for the future of this country. One would imagine from the remarks of the young speaker, that we were discussing the province of Quebec. I understand that these Bills with which we are dealing are for the purpose of erecting two new provinces in the Northwest of the Dominion of Canada and that the province of Quebec has nothing to do with this any more than any other province in the Dominion. No attack is being made on the rights and liberties of the province of Quebec ; these rights and liberties are guaranteed by the articles of conquest and by the Confederation Act.
The question now before the House, simmered down to a nut shell is as to the authority, the duty, the policy of this parliament to enforce separate schools on the Northwest Territories. The right hon. the leader of the government told us that this was a question of the constitution, but his colleagues have told us that it is not a question of the constitution in any sense whatever. One of the ministers ventured to think that vested rights should be considered but that plea was abandoned when it was found that although the Roman Catholics have had every facility for years to establish separate schools there are only ten such separate schools as compared with over 1,000 public schools in the Northwest Territories. Therefore, the question .simmers itself down to one of policy. Now, let us suppose for a moment that it was our clear duty under the constitution to establish separate schools, would our best method be to proceed with Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
a bludgeon in the shape of this Act of parliament held over the people of the Northwest to force separate schools upon them V Would it not be better to omit from this Bill altogether any provision with regard to separate schools, and leave it to the people of the new provinces to carry out the constitution, for until the first meeting of the legislative assembly of the new provinces the Act of 1875 will be continued in force, and would remain in force unless repealed by the assembly. Sir, when the Bill now before the House becomes law it will force on the people of the new provinces the full enactment of the School Act of 1875, and nothing but mischief can result. If the Prime Minister is right in his argument, that by the constitution we are bound to give the new provinces separate schools, then the provinces cannot repeal this law and it will stand for ever on the statute-books. If the Prime Minister has any confidence in his contention, why should he not withdraw his educational clause altogether from the Act and avoid all the bickering, the heart burnings, the contentious spirit that permeates the Dominion of Canada to-day. If it is a question of policy, and we maintain that it is, then coercion-I think that is the proper term to use in relation to this clause-coercion is not in conformity with provincial rights ; it transgresses the principle of provincial rights at the very outset. This is not good legislation, as I shall prove from the Prime Minister's own lips. It interferes with the rights of man as well as with the rights of provinces, but over and above all this question of coercion there stands another issue. The Prime Minister has instructed the House on some of the principles of the Roman Catholic religion ; he has told us that in addition to the pure question of religion there is the great question of dogma which enters into the notion of those that hold that faith. With the question of religion, with the relationship existing between a man's conscience and his God I have nothing to do. I never allowed any other man to interfere in the relationship existing between my conscience and my God, and I never insulted any man by interfering with him in that respect. But in relation of the question of dogma, that is the business end of the proposition, and when any church corporation-be it Methodist, Roman Catholic, Presbyterian or any other-just the same as any railway corporation comes before the people of this country for legislation, it is the bounden duty of every man who commands his own self respect to deal with it, not on the sentimental issue, not to bow down before the cry that the church is behind the organization ; but to deal with it on the basis of what is right and what is wrong, and considering what is in the best interests of the Dominion of Canada and of her entire people. On these lines I purpose dealing with this question. Taking it as a

[DOT]question of dogma, as one who does not want to grow up in enmity with his Roman Catholic neighbour ; as one who does not want to pass through the world with the people divided on creed lines, I maintain that when we coerce the provinces to accept these separate schools, we are retarding for ever the wheels of progress and the up-building of the national life within these provinces. I do not think the union of church and state is for the best interests of humanity. The nations of the old land have given it up, and why this young country should adopt the fads and practices that have been discarded in Europe is beyond my comprehension. I am opposed to this parliament forcing on any province, against its will, a union of church and state. By the enactment of this law, this parliament is placing a blanket mortgage on the two provinces of the Northwest which will remain on them to the end of time and which can never be paid oft. I object in general terms to this legislation. It is contrary to the spirit of a free parliament ; it is contrary to the spirit of a free people. I am afraid that I shall not be able to bring to bear on this great question the deeply sanctified and the emotional Christian spirit displayed by the Prime Minister ; nor the stern, defiant, aggressive militant Christianity of the Minister of Justice ; nor the humility and the contrition the holy-dread and sackcloth-and-ashes demeanour of the Minister of Finance ; nor the fervid sanctimoniousness and brotherly love of the Minister of Customs ; nor the speculative religion-


Mr. FITZPATRICK.: Who wrote that for you ?


Samuel Hughes: I composed that myself after observing the exhibition made by the ministers. I may say, Sir, that I got it in a reflective mood, and after the beautiful exhibition of Christian spirit and brotherly love displayed here one evening by the Minister of Justice, I went home and reflected and this is the result.


Charles Fitzpatrick: You should reflect often er.


Samuel Hughes: Perhaps so. The Minister of Justice on that occasion displayed on the floor of parliament all the old time characteristics of the Champlain street youngster, and he displayed them to the great edification of the people of this country. Nor, Sir, can I bring to bear on this question the speculative opinions of the Postmaster General, who has had such an ample training working hand in hand with the Protestant Protective Association organization of the province of Ontario throughout the length and breadth of many constituencies. Nor can I bring to bear on this subject the illogical fanticism or the sparkling distortion of established facts displayed by the hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa). I shall endeavour to discuss these questions 120*
without any appeal to prejudice, but simply on the basis of what are the facts, and what is for the best interests of the people of the Territories which are being erected into two provinces, and for the best interests of the people of the whole Dominion of Canada.
Now, I trust that the Prime Minister will excuse me for bringing to his mind some of his old speeches. In this connection, I may say that the young gentleman from Mont-magny (Mr. Lavergne) struck the Prime Minister a very heavy blow beneath the belt when, in referring to the hon. member for North Toronto, he said that a man of principles always stuck to his principles, and never wavered. While saying that, he looked across to this side of the House, but I am satisfied that the Prime Minister, in his heart of hearts, felt that the reflection was upon himself and his friends on that side of the House, who have been 'everything by turns and nothing long,' and who have never kDown where they stood on questions of principle. On March 3, 1896, the right hon. Prime Minister, as reported in ' Hansard ' at page 2737-8 addressing the leader of the government of that day said :
The hon. gentleman is aware-more than anybody else, perhaps, he ought to be aware-that in a community with a free government, in a free country like this, upon any question involving different conceptions of what is right or wrong, different standards of what is just or unjust, it is the part of statesmanship not to force the views of any section, but to endeavour to bring them ail to a uniform standard and a uniform conception of what is right.
I heartily commend these words to the Prime Minister to-day. What are the facts in regard to this question ? The Hudson Bay Territory was taken over by the imperial authorities and transferred by them to the Canadian authorities. I shall not enter into a description of those vast territories and their latent resources, and the great wealth that lies there to be developed.	These are all well known to
all the members of this House. Those territories were united with the Dominion of Canada, and in that Act of union, although it was known and intended that they were sooner or later to be erected into provinces, there was no mention of separate schools. They were given a constitution by the Dominion parliament, and, inasmuch as the few people living in the territories spoke the French language, the people of Canada allowed them to have their own schools. That, and that alone, was the reason why those schools were given to thos? people without any serious opposition. My hon. friend from Montmagny is in error in saying that it was thought at that time that those territories were going to become French and Roman Catholic. It was understood that there would be a large French settlement in the province of Manitoba ; but with regard to the territories, the understanding from one end of the Dominion to

tlie other,-and our friends in Quebec knew it, and they know it to-day,-was that they would become settled by a large Englishspeaking population. That was one reason why our French friends at that time claimed that the boundaries of Manitoba should be enlarged, so that it, being regarded to a large extent as a French province, would have more room for development ; but the expectation was that the new territories would become English. They were given separate schools more on the ground of language than of creed. The teachers in those schools were principally the priests of the various localities. There were only five or six hundred families in all the territories.
A comparison has been drawn between the separate schools of the province of Quebec and those of the province of Ontario. We are told that the English minority in the province of Quebec were granted certain privileges. Let me tell the hon. member for Labelle and the hon. member for Mont-magny that the concession in the province of Quebec was not to the English minority, but to the French Roman Catholic majority. At the time of the conquest they were granted the rights and liberties that had been won under the auspices of the gentleman under whom my good friend from East Grey (Mr. Sproule) gets the credit of serving, whose memory he reveres-William Prince of Orange. It was William Prince of Orange who gave to the British nation the liberties they enjoy to-day ; and when Quebec capitulated, the liberties which had been guaranteed to humanity of all creeds and all races were given to the people of the province of Quebec, and have been religiously observed from that day to the present time. And let me tell the hon. member for Labelle and the hon. member for Mont-magny that if any one undertakes to deprive our French Canadian fellow countrymen in the province of Quebec, of the slightest liberty that has been granted to them under the British constitution, my good friend the member for East Grey is sworn to marshall his boys and go down to their relief, not to their injury.


Mr. BUREAU.: Hear, hear.


Samuel Hughes: So that my good friend from Three Rivers (Mr. Bureau) need not have any nightmares about the orangemen from the province of Ontario. When Ontario and Quebec became parts of the Dominion of Canada, each had its own separate school system established by law. *When New Brunswick became part of the Dominion of Canada, it had its own school system established by the votes of its own people. When Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island came in, each had its own school system established by the votes of its own people. The Northwest Territories occupy an entirely different position. They came into the Dominion away back in 1870. They had no school system anterior to the Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
union. The school system that was given to them, was given without a vote by a human being in those territories, and that system has been continued ever since ; the only difference being that when they became organized and were represented in this parliament, their representatives had a voice in the making of the laws which applied to them. At the present time we are not uniting those territories to the Dominion of Canada ; we are only transforming them into provinces, and the people of the whole of Canada have the making of their charter, not the people of the territories themselves. What we contend is that in granting them their charter, we must apply the British North America Act, so far as it relates to the establishment of provinces.
That is the point of difference we make between the union of the Territories as such with confederation and their entry into it as provinces. There is no union of the Territories, as provinces, with confederation. They came into confederation as Territories, and their creation as provinces is merely a development. I chanced to be in the Northwest during the months of December and November when the question of the new autonomy Bills was being discussed. As I passed along, I heard mention of mysterious trips taken by the First Minister here and there throughout the country, but not taken where he could consult his Finance Minister or his Minister of the Interior or his following in the House or Mr. Haultain and his cabinet in the Territories. It was understood then that there was question of a clause being put into the measure creating the new provinces, fastening ut>on. these provinces separate schools. Last December, when that probability was mentioned to the followers of the right hon. gentleman in this House, they scoffed at the idea. They said that he who had been the champion of provincial autonomy in 1896, who had declaimed then against the coercion of Manitoba, who had advocated the policy of hands off Manitoba, was not likely to consent to anything which would fetter these new provinces and prevent them from working out freely their own destinies along the lines be had laid down with regard to Manitoba in 1896. In that year of 1896, I considered it my duty to oppose the Bill of my own leader (Sir Charles Tupper) just as I opposed the resolution of the right hon. gentleman, and I opposed both on the ground that I would vote against any attempt to coerce Manitoba. On that occasion I took a unique position and have seen no ground for changing any of the sentiments I then uttered. I took the ground then that the province of Manitoba should be free, that the people there were eminently well fitted to work out their own destiny, and should not be fettered or hampered by the federal power in that work ; and I would have supported the right hon. gentleman on that occasion, had his resolution tallied with his professions in the country. But his declaration to the

province of Quebec then was :	Put me in :
power ancl I will give tlie minority in Manitoba greater privileges than they can possibly secure from a Tory government. I will give them a Bill that will be of some service ; while in the provinces of Manitoba and Ontario, the cry of himself and his colleagues was :	Hands off Manitoba ; no
coercion of free men in the west ; we must never bow to the Roman Catholic bishops of the province of Quebec ; but must show ourselves free men. Much as I wished to follow my right lion, friend on that occasion, there was such great divergence between the position he took in Quebec and that which he took elsewhere that I was pot prepared to give him the opportunity of coercing Manitoba and consequently . voted against his resolution as I did against the Bill of my own leader. The stand 1 then took was that if the people of that province wanted separate schools, let them establish that system themselves ; but if they did not. I was determined to defeat any attempt to place upon that province the burden of separate schools against its will.
We may very well ask whence comes this demand for this clause in the Bill. X have pointed out that the moment those Territories become provinces, they have the Act of 1875 on their statutes. Supposing the educational clauses should be withdrawn entirely from this measure, the Act of 1875 will still remain. Therefore if the contention of the First Minister be right, if the Act of 1875 is the constitution in those Territories to-day and will be the constitution of those provinces when created, what has he to fear ? If on the other hand, the contention of my hon. friend the leader of the opposition is correct and it will be within the powers of those provinces to abrogate that law if they choose, why insist upon embodying it in this Bill. The Act of the First Minister is, I submit, irritating, illegal and unconstitutional.
The right hon. gentleman did not consult his Finance Minister in relation to the financial clauses nor did he consult his Minister of the Interior with regard to the educational clause. He did not consult the men behind him with regard to this measure. I am told that he did not dare to call his party together in caucus and consult them. Whom then did he consult? Is there any truth in the rumour that my right hon. friend had for his adviser a gentleman who does not owe allegiance to the Dominion and that he takes trips to the shores of the Itideau and there receives his inspiration ? I have not the slightest fault to find with any church-either the Church of Rome or the Methodist church which is my own or any other-for taking all it can get from weak-packed politicians. Any church will do that. We have seen in the province of Ontario, Protestant churches taking sops from the provincial government and giving in return their support to the government. We have
seen the hierarchy of Rome do the same thing-and I make use of that word in the same sense as hon. gentlemen in that church use it. The churches are just the same as electric companies and railway companies and other corporations. They will take all they can get and ask for more. It is not the hierarchy of Rome but the leader of the government and his colleagues whom the people will hold responsible, and it is they who wall have to stand the consequences. For my part I do not blame the churches for taking all they can get from weak-backed and weak-kneed politicians.
In his speech introducing the Bill now before the House, the right hon. gentleman alluded to the separate schools in the United States, and I must say that, as an old public school teacher, my blood boiled when he referred to that system iu the United States in the way he did, and incidentally condemned public schools the world over. In the past the right hon. gentleman was more less inclined to look to American institutions. In the old days we had him and his followers looking to Washington until they got turned down, and I am satisfied that whatever may be or may have been his Views with regard to that great nation in the past, he will not dispute one word I am about to quote from a well knowm authority regarding the value of the public schools of tliat country. But before doing that, I may take the liberty of quoting what Mr. Morley, a friend of the right hon. gentleman, says in tlie 19tli Century of the great American republic. In a recent issue of that review, Mr. Morley says :
Of a democracy originally British, the most astonishing and triumphant achievement so far has been the persevering absorption and incorporation across the Atlantic of a ceaseless torrent of heterogeneous elements from every point of the compass into one united, stable, industrious and pacific state with eighty millions of population, combining the centralized concert of a federal system with local independence, and uniting collective energy with the encouragement of individual freedom. How does this stand in comparison with the Roman empire, or Romanish church, or the Bysantine empire, or Russia, or Charles the Great, or Napoleon ?
These are the words of Mr. Morley about the great republic to the south of us-a republic which has taught the world how to mould together the different elements of various nationalities. In that country are to be found nationalities from Europe, who have been under the rule of parochial schools as well as those who have not been brought up under that System, and by means of the welding influence of the American public school system all these various peoples have become consolidated into one compact nation.
These are the people that have been made by the public schools of the United States. Now I will take the liberty of giving : from the addresses of some of the presidents

of the United (States certain brief quotations to show what the chief magistrates of that republic have thought of public schools. I do this not to attack the religion of any body of people, for the question of dogma has nothing to do with religion. If any man is interfered with in the free exercise of his religion, that interference should not for a moment be permitted. If in a matter of conscience any one were to attempt to interfere with the right hon. Prime Minister, I would be ready to resent that interference and to put the one interfering in his proper place. But,, if the Prime Minister says :	This is my dogma and you
must bow to it, and if we do bow to it, what limit can we place upon demands of this kind ? Why, we should see repeated over and over the humiliating spectacle of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) who says: we must yield because forty-one per cent of the people demand it. And next month they may demand something else, and so on ; we must yield again and again upon the plea that it is a question of dogma, until the liberties which our ancestors suffered so much to gain for us are taken from us at the behest of men who are more anxious to hang on to office than they are to stand by a principle. Martin Van Buren, the eighth president of the United States-1837-1841-said :
The national will is the supreme law of the republic. In no country has education been so widely diffused. All forms of religion have united for the first time to diffuse charity and piety, because for the first time in the history of nations all have been totally untrammelled and absolutely free.


And James K.: Polk, eleventh president- 1845-1849-said :
No union exists between church and state, and perfect freedom of opinion is guaranteed to all sects and creeds. Who shall assign limits to the achievements of free minds and free hands under the protection of this glorious union ? No treason to mankind since the organization of society would be equal in atrocity to that of him who would lift his hand to destroy it.
'These are the sentiments of that president oi the United States in relation to the great public school system that, even at that time, half 'a century ago had raised the downtrodden and disinherited people of Europe who were flocking to the shores of the United States and made them what the 'Almighty intended they should be, not slaves, but creatures made iu the image of God and ready to take a part in the upbuilding of a great nation.


Mi. LEMIEUX.: Does the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam. Hughes) believe that Salisbury and Gladstone were wrong and these presidents of the United States right ?
Mr. 'SAM. HUGHES. I am readv to discuss Salisbury and Gladstone, and Balfour Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
and Chamberlain too. These men take conditions as they exist. But Great Britain is developing. Besides, Britain is a more densely settled country than Canada. The circumstances are entirely different


Mr. BRODEUR.: Why should that make a difference ?


William Findlay Maclean: The Liberals of England do not like religious schools.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I would like to ask the hon-. gentleman (Mr. Sam. Hughes) if he thinks that England is behind the United States ?


Samuel Hughes: England is behind the United States in the matter of education, undoubtedly. England is the mother of nations ; it is to her we owe the great federations of the world, the application of the principle of central control in common matters with local control in local matters. The United States is the next nation, and, in spite of great drawbacks


Rodolphe Lemieux: England is the greatest nation in the world in spite of what the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam. Hughes) says.


Samuel Hughes: That is an entirely different sentiment from the one which the hon. gentleman (Mr. Lemieux) expressed in Quebec in 1896, when he stood before the French Canauians and said : Are you going to vote for Tapper and the Tories, who spent $3,000,000 for guns, and who are ready to send your sous to fight Britain's battles abroad ? That is what the hon. gentleman said, and it was proven in this House.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I do not know what the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam. Hughes) refers to, but if he speaks of the Transvaal War

Mr* SAM. HUGHES. No, I speak of what the hon. gentleman (Mr. Lemieux) said-in the election campaign of 1896. Let me recall to his mind what he said-I know it almost sounds as if he were irresponsible at the time. The then member for Sher-luooke standing in this House, pointing his finger at the hon. gentleman (Mr. Lemieux) said : Instead of being here preaching loyalty you ought to be behind the prison bars for treason. This he said to the Solicitor General (Mr. Lemieux) in my own hearing, and in that of many members now in this House. And what was the reason ? Because the hon. gentleman had appealed to the prejudices of the people of Quebec saying :	Will you vote for Tupper and Tories,
who spent $.3,000,000 of the people's money to buy rifles, and who will send your sons to fight Britain's battles ?


Rodolphe Lemieux: My hon. friend (Mr. Sam. Hughes) is wholly astray. I never held any such language. I never met the hon. member for "Sherbrooke (Mr. Worth-

ington) in that campaign. But I did meet the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Foster)


Samuel Hughes: I refer to Mr. McIntosh, who formerly represented Sherbrooke in this House.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I never met Mr. McIntosh on the platform. I spoke once in the county cf Sherbrooke


Mr. BENNETT.: Hear, hear.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Yes, I spoke once in the county of Sherbrooke. And if the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Foster) then, I think, the member for King's, New Brunswick, were here, I would ask him to corroborate what I say. I spoke in English, but I never used such language as the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam. Hughes) attributes to me. 1 would not dare to speak in that way in the province of Quebec-I should be afraid of being stoned by my fellow-countrymen if I did so. But I am sorry to see an ultra loyalist placing Great Britain behind the United States. It is the first time I have heard the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam. Hughes) say such a thing.


Samuel Hughes: I was not stating what I heard myself. I said that the former hon. member for Sherbrooke, Mr. McIntosh had pointed his finger at the present Solicitor General and told him from his place in this House that, instead of being here and preaching loyalty he should be behind the bars of a jail for treason. These are matters for them to settle among themselves. I will proceed with the quotations I was giving from the presidents of the United States on the subject of common schools and public education. Millard Fillmore, the thirteenth president-1850-1853- said :
Our common schools are diffusing intelligence among the people and our industry is fast accumulating the comforts and luxuries of life.
And Andrew Johnston the seventeenth president-1805-1860-said :
Here more and more care is given to provide education for every one born on our soil. Here religion, released from political connection with the civil government, refuses to subserve the craft of statesmen, and becomes in its independence the spiritual life of the people. Here toleration is extended to every opinion, in the quiet certainty that truth needs only a fair field to secure the victory.
Let me commend the words of this distinguished president to the right hon. Prime Minister (Sir Wilfrid Laurier). These words of the different presidents show that, step by step, as tbe great republic advanced, as it became broader, stronger and more inclusive, it was able to assimilate more of the disinherited masses of Europe, even in their ignorance and tilth. And there is one cause for this regenerative power of the United
States, a power that no other nation has been able to show. That power was due to tbe public school system of the United (States. Ulysses S. Grant, the eighteenth president-1S69-1877-said :
We are blessed with peace at home, with facilities for every mortal to acquire an education ; with institutions closing to none the avenues to fame, or any blessing to fortune that may he coveted ; with freedom of the pulpit, the press, and the school.


Rutherford B.: Hayes, the nineteenth president-1877-1881-said :
To education more than to any other agency we are to look as the resource for the advancement of the people in the requisite knowledge and appreciation of their rights and responsibilities as citizens, and I desire to repeat the suggestion contained in my former message in. behalf of the enactment of appropriate measures by congress for the purpose of supplementing, with national aid the local systems of education in the several states.
The sanctity of marriage and the family relation are the corner-stone of our American society and civilization. Religious liberty and the separation of church and state are among the elementary ideas of free institutions.
They develop the individuality of the citizen, and we find in the history of the United States a struggle between tbe individual man on one hand and a control by corporations on the other. Benjamin Harrison says:
The masses of our people are better fed, clothed and housed than their fathers were. The facilities for popular education have been vastly enlarged and more generally diffused.
Another testimony to the upbuilding of a g'reat people by the free public school, where Roman Catholic and Protestant, Jew and Gentile children sit side by side in tbe schools, never asking the question to what creed each belongs or what relationship exists between each one's conscience and his God, but all working together as Americans, or as Canadians, shoulder to shoulder iu achieving the great destiny that is ahead of us. Wm. McKinley said:
A grave peril to the republic would be a citizenship too ignorant to understand, or too vicious to appreciate, the great value and beneficence of our institutions and laws, and against all who come here' and make war upon them, our gates must be promptly and tightly closed. Nor must we be unmindful of the need of improvement among our citizens, but with the zeal of our forefathers encourage the spread of knowledge and free education.
Our hope is the public schools and in the university.
I may say that at the time these words were uttered a movement was going on ' hostile to the public schools, such as the movement we find now going on in the Dominion of Canada, and it was against this movement that Pres|ident McKinley raised a warning voice, saying to people who came from foreign lands that they,

must observe tbe institutions of the United States of America. President Roosevelt *the other day-and lie cannot be charged with being an enemy of any church-one of the most tolerant and broad-minded gentlemen who have ever been honoured with the position of chief magistrate of the United States says :
We have no room for any people who do not act and vote simply as Americans, and as nothing else. Moreover, we have as little use for people who carry religious prejudices into their politics as for those who carry prejudices of caste or nationality. We stand unalterably in favour of the public school system in its entirety. We believe that English, and no other language, is that in which all the school exercise should be conducted. We are against any [DOT]division of the school fund and against any appropriation of public money for sectarian purposes. We are against any recognition whatever by the state in any shape or form of state-aided parochial schools. But we are equally opposed to any discrimination against or for a man because of his creed.
We all say 'amen' to that.
We demand that all citizens, Protestant and Catholics, Jew and Gentile, shall have fair treatment in every way ; that all alike shall have their rights guaranteed them. The very reasons that make us unqualified in our opposition to state-aided sectarian schools make us equally bent that in the management of our public schools, the adherents of each creed shall be given exact and equal justice, wholly without regard to their religious affiliations ; that trustees, superintendents, teachers, scholars, all alike, shall he treated without any reference whatsoever to the creed they profess. The immigrant must learn that we exact full religious toleration and the complete separation of church and state. He must revere only our flag ; not only must it come first, but no other flag should even come second. He must learn to celebrate the fourth of July instead of St. Patrick's day. Those (foreigners) who become Americanized have furnished to our history a multitude of honourable names ; those who did not become Americanized form to the present day an unimportant body of no significance in American existence. Thus it has ever been with all people who have come hither, of whatever stock or blood. The same thing is true of all churches. A church which remains foreign, in language or spirit, is doomed.
These are the words of President Roosevelt, and I commend them to tbe First Minister. I believe that in bis heart of hearts these are tbe sentiments of tbe First Minister, and at one time I believe they actuated him, and that even now, if he allowed his better judgment to rule him, he would rise up and give utterance to those sentiments. Now, Sir, having given these quotations from some Protestant authorities. I will come to an Irishman-tile Minister of Justice will prick up his ears a little-'for the gentleman I am going to quote is editor of the organ of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, a paper published in the city of Chicago. He is a distinguished Roman Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
Catholic citizen of Chicago, by the name of Hon. John F. Finerty, a member of Congress, I believe, or a senator, and I commend his utterances to the Minister of Justice, because he speaks in the interest of the country rather than in favour of a church; I commend his sentiments to the Minister of Justice who has been junlc-etting around at the expense of Canada, going to Rome and elsewhere in the interest of a section of the people of Canada, and I am satisfied that the tolerant and broadminded sentiments of Mr. Finerty will appeal to that bon. gentleman. And I may say in passing that I see our good friend has sold his stock in the 'Soleii,' which has been telling the people of Canada that there will be no compromise on this school question. So we may expect that he will not take the extreme interest in that subject henceforward that lie lias in the past. Mr. Finerty says:
In brief, then, we say to all whom it may concern : Let American institutions severely alone, and do not kindle the flames of a bigot hell in this grand country by seeking after the unattainable.
These are the words of Mr. Finerty, speaking in the city of Chicago to the people of the United States. I will read them again:


Rodolphe Lemieux: Does the hon. gentleman know that Mr. Finerty belongs to the Clau-na-Gael?


Samuel Hughes: I am merely saying that even an extreme man like Mr. Finerty, and a member of the Clan-na-Gael- I do not know whether he is, I am not a member of the order, so I do not know; the hon. gentleman possibly knows-and I accept him as authority upon that point-I am merely saying that though he may be a member of the Clan-na-Gael, he holds these views on this great question, and I quote them as the views of a broad and tolerant citizen of the Roman Catholic faith in the United States :
In brief, then, we say to all whom it may concern :	Let American institutions severely
alone, and do not kindle the flames of a bigot hell in this grand country by seeking after the unattainable. Always bear in mind, that the vast majority of the American people, of all creeds, will stand by their country, her constitution, her laws and her institutions. Any evasion of either by any outside force whatever will mean war. What man, what set of men would be fatuous enough to bring such a curse upon this land ?
Continuing Mr. Finerty says:
We believe in the American non-sectarian public school.
These are the words of an Irishman and -I take the word of the Minister of Justice -no, the prospective Minister of Justice, the present Solicitor General-that Mr. Finerty is a member of the Clan-na-Gael:

We believe in the American non-sectarian public school, and we believe in educating the youth of all races side by side, so that they may grow up as friends, trusting each other, not as enemies suspicious of one another. We believe it would be a fatal mistake to have the American public schools run, or controlled, by ecclesiastics of any creed. As it stands, the Catholic, the Protestant, the Dissenter, the Jew, and the Confucian drink at the same deep fountain of knowledge. All have their separate religious instruction where it properly belongs -in the church, the temple and the Sunday school. If the latter is not provided by any particular church, the fault lies with the church, not with the state, the parents or the children.
These are tlie views of a prominent Irish Roman Catholic of the city of Chicago, the editor of the organ of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, and, as the Minister of Justice says, a member of the Clan Na Gael Society. When General Grant felt that he was at death's door, when the fatal disease that was wearing his life away had made itself manifest, and when he knew that his hours were numbered, he issued a mandate to the people of the United States. I shall give it to the right hon. First Minister :
I suggest for your earnest consideration, and most earnestly recommend It, that a constitutional amendment be submitted to the legislatures of the several states for ratification, making it the duty of each of the several state's to establish and for ever maintain free public schools adequate to the education of all the children in the rudimentary branches within their respective limits, irrespective of sex, colour, birth-place or religions ; forbidding the teaching in said schools of religious, atheistic, or pagan tenets ; and prohibiting the granting of any school funds or school taxes, or any part thereof, either by legislative, municipal or other authority, for the benefit or aid, directly or indirectly, of any religious sect or denomination, or in aid or for the benefit of any other object of any nature or kind whatever.
As this will be the last annual message which I shall have the honour of transmitting to congress before my successor is chosen, I will repeat or recapitulate the questions which I deem of vital importance which may he legislated upon or settled at this session. First, that the states shall be required to afford the opportunity of a good common education to every child within their limits ; second, no sectarian tenets shall ever be taught in any school supported in whole or in part by the state, nation, or by the proceeds of any tax levied upon any community ; third, declare church and state for ever separate and distinct, but each free within their proper spheres.
Were those sentiments to be uttered in the Dominion of Canada, we would find some hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House raising the cry of intolerance against those who gave voice to such sentiments. These are the sentiments which have made the United States a nation that it is to-day. The perversion of these sentiments, as it has been carried out in practice in European countries, has kept the people hewers of wood and drawers of water to the aristocracies of those lands.
Speaking of perversion and the cry of intolerance, I do not charge the hon. member for Cape Breton (Mr. McKenzie) with any intentional perversion, but in quoting my hon. friend from Qu'Appelle (Mr. Lake) last evening, I think he put a wrong construction upon his words. My hon. friend from Qu'Appelle had said :
I intend to claim the privilege of briefly putting on record the views which I hold with regard to this question. After nearly twenty-two years residence in the Northwest Territories, I believe firmly that the public school system as at present administered is the one best suited to the needs of the country.
Then the hon. member for Cape Breton went on to say :
He says that he has had twenty-two years experience in the Northwest, that he has seen many changes and that this law which is now on the statute-book has given satisfaction to that country.
I do not know whether the hon. member had read the speech of my hon. friend from Qu'Appelle, but what my hon. friend from Qu'Appelle referred to distinctly and clearly was the public school system and not the separate school system. I believe from what I know of the hon. gentleman that he would uot wilfully misrepresent my hon. friend.


Mr. SCOTT.: Has my hon. friend (Mr. Sam, Hughes) ever heard from any quarter of the Northwest Territories a protest against the existing school system there '!


Mr.   SAM@: HUGHE'S. The people took the school system as it was provided for them iu the Northwest Territories. They never had an opportunity of expressing any opinion in regard to it. The separate school system of the Northwest Territories has been provided for them by the people of the eastern provinces, and I can tell the hon. gentleman that I have heard, and he has heard, and will hear, protests against the authority and tyranny of this parliament in attempting to dictate to the Northwest Territories.


Thomas Walter Scott: If my hon. friend will permit me, I will say that he cannot get tlie hon. member for Qu'Appelle to say that there is any protest against, or any dissatisfaction in the Territories with the school system.


Samuel Hughes: My hon. friend from Qu'Appelle gave utterance the other night to his views on this question, which I may say are very much more satisfactory to the people of this country than the utterances of the hon. member for West Assini-boia. The right hon. leader of the government went on to speak of crime in the Dominion of Canada. I am not going to take that up. Unfortunately, there is too much crime both in Canada and in the United States, but by a strange coincidence the very day on which my right hon. friend made that statement I saw on the bulletin

board a notice of two murders in the Dominion of Canada. You can scarcely take up a paper without seeing that in some part of this Dominion some poor unfortunate wretch has, in a fit of passion, committed murder. Considering that there is such a lack of respect for institutions, such a lack of respect for professions and such a lack of respect for public honour, the mystery to me is that there is not more crime than that which is committed in the Dominion of Canada. Speaking of divorces, I was a little surprised" that the right hon. First Minister should touch ou that question. He knows very well that the cost in the Dominion of Canada is a barrier to divorces. He knows that the facility in this country is not as great as it is in many states of the union for divorces. He knows that in Canada mediation very often comes in. Friends of the persons concerned and church dignitaries step in and prevent a consummation of divorces ; and he knows that if there is one thing that characterizes Canada, it is the goodness of the women of Canada in forgiving- the derelictions of duty on the part of the men. I am sorry to say that there is some cause for divorce in Canada, and that, if the good women of this country wished it, they might have an opportunity of securing just as many divorces as they have in the United States. Then the right hon. First Minister read us a lecture on unity and harmony in his own gentlemanly wa5r. He is always gentlemanly. He always throws down the gauntlet and leaves his radical friends behind him to create an agitation while he stands and looks on with calm and placid demeanour, regretting, of course, the excesses of his followers, and cries intolerance against those who oppose him. But we remember the conduct of the right hon. gentleman and his friends in 1885, which has been referred to by other hon. gentlemen in this House, when the right hon. First Minister himself threatened that if he had been on the banks of the Saskatchewan he would have shouldered his musket, because of the supposed wrongs of the half-breeds of that country. A lot of land grabbers and land sharks, knowing that the half-breeds had obtained their scrip in Manitoba after the first rebellion, knowing that these halfbreeds had gone out and settled in certain other spots in the remote west and were claiming scrip again, and desiring to get control of that scrip, they kept urging them to raise a row and make a demand for the issue of the scrip. The government of that time, after consultation with the bishops and clergy of the Roman Catholic Church, they being the best educated men of that country in that time, and after consultation with the officers of ,the mounted police, determined, on the advice of and by the request of these officials and clergy," to issue no more scrip. They said : No ; we will not issue scrip again. You will sell your scrip for a bottle of whisky, you will sell Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
it for a dollar or two, and at the end of the week you will be as poor as you were before ; but we will give you your scrip on condition that you settle on the land. Thi& was done at the request of the authorities of the church and the police. The only excuse they had for rebellion was that when they did settle on the land they wanted the old river survey instead of the mile-square survey proposed by the Dominion government ; and from that hour to this these gentlemen have been unable to find one cause for rebellion other than as to the _ particular form the survey should take. But the right hon. the Prime Minister said on that occasion that if he had been on the banks of the Saskatchewan he would have shouldered his musket and fought for the liberties of the people.


Rodolphe Lemieux: He would not have written letters home about it.


Samuel Hughes: The Prime Minister was reported as having said that. The hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa) in his speech referred some fifteen or twenty times to the question of rebellion. Let me inform the Solicitor General that some of us who have done a little talk of rebellion have not been afraid and are not afraid to back up our opinions by facing the music ; we do not simply stand away off in the province of Quebec at a safe distance from danger and do the talking and writing.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam Hughes) must have known my brother who served Canada and the empire in South Africa, came back with his medals, but he did not write any self-glorifying letters from the battle fields.


Samuel Hughes: I am glad there are some loyal men In the family of the honourable gentleman in Quebec.


Mr.  D. D.@: MeKENZIE. Can the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam Hughes) point out a single man in the province of Quebec who is not loyal ? The hon. gentleman has taken the responsibility of saying that he was glad to know there were some loyal men in Quebec ; does he know any disloyal men in Quebec ?


Samuel Hughes: Does my hon. friend come from Quebec? I think he comes from Cape Breton.


Mr.  D. D.@: MeKENZIE. I come from Cape Breton, and I am a Canadian, Sir, and I hope I am broad enough to treat my fellow Canadians everywhere with respect.


Samuel Hughes: My hon. friend wants to know if you can tell us what Is the law on the subject. The hon. gentleman (Mr. D. D. McKenzie) did not give us all his brief last night, and perhaps he wants to deal with that aspect of the case now.


Mr.  D. D.@: MeKENZIE. I will be very pleased at any time to deal very briefly with the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam. Hughes).


Samuel Hughes: We find the First Minister, not satisfied with these inflammatory cries in the province of Quebec, coming to the province of Ontario and seeking to inflame the public of that province along other lines when he cried: 'Hands off Manitoba; down with Tupper and his Tory friends,' and all that sort of thing. And yet he stands up here to-day preaching unity and harmony while at the same time he throws into the arena of Dominion politics the greatest fire brand that has ever for the last thirty years been thrown before the people of Canada. My hon. friend from East Grey (Mr. Sproule) has been charged with being intolerant. Why, Sir, I have been surprised at the tolerance displayed by that hon. gentleman in his speeches in this House and in his speeches out of the House. He has displayed a spirit of Christian fortitude-if I nmy use the term, although I am not much of a judge in this line-he has displayed a spirit of tolerance which I commend to my friends on the other side of the House.	[DOT]
It is not my intention, Sir, to discuss the constitutional aspect of the question. The leader of the opposition dealt with that phase, and no gentleman of any standing-in law on the other side of the House or in the country has dared to lay a finger upon his argument. Minister after minister arose and they practically had to admit that the contention of the leader of the opposition in his interpretation of the law was absolutely correct. Our good friend the Prime Minister claimed that he stood on the rock of the constitution, but after the leader of the opposition got through.with him it turned out that the right hon. gentleman had landed on a mud bank. It is the leader of the opposition who stands on the rock of the constitution and who in doing so proclaims his adhesion to the principles of equity an d justice and fair play for all. The leader of the opposition gives to every free man settling in the Northwest Territories a fee simple deed to liberty; the leader of the government would blanket mortgage the charter of every settler. The leader of the opposition reposes confidence in the people and shows his faith in his fellow man; the leader of the government mistrusts the west; mistrusts the people of Canada and he places a handicap on these new provinces for the placing of which he has no mandate from the electorate. The leader of the opposition regards his commission from the freemen of Canada as a sacred trust and grants to each of his followers full liberty to vote as he chooses on this question; the leader of the government refused to place this issue before the electors at the last election, for he ignores the people of Canada. The leader of the government also ignores the territorial government led toy Premier Haul-tain, who not long since had his policy on this question endorsed by the people of the west. The leader of the government ignored the ex-Minister of the Interior, the responsible minister from the district, for he consulted only the Minister of Justice and the Postmaster General. The leader of the government ignored the Minister of Finance in relation to the great financial issues involved, and he hastened the Bill into this House so as to get the party committed to it while the minister was on his way from a foreign land. The leader of the government ignored even his party caucus, because he knew he dare not consult it; he ignored his colleagues in the cabinet, consulting only the gentleman who had the manipulation of the affairs from the beginning; he trampled -the commission of the people of Canada under his feet and cast to the winds his boasted love of the English constitution, believing that his followers would meekly vote as he commanded.
At six o'clock, House took recess.
After Recess.
House resumed at eight o'clock.


Samuel Hughes: Sir. Speaker, I am delighted to see that there is one good representative of the cabinet present (Hon. Sir. Prgfontaine) to take charge, I presume, of the business before the House. Before recess I was pointing out that the leader of the opposition stood on the principle of equal rights and equal laws for all, and special privileges for none, whereas the leader of the government took the position that it was the duty of this parliament to coerce the new provinces in the matter of education-in other words, to establish in those provinces a union of church and state. The maxim of the leader of the opposition was: Is it right, is it just, is it fair to those splendid people in the west, for this parliament, representing as it does all Canada, to seek to enforce upon them the will of people who have nothing whatever to do with the schools in that country, who should have nothing to do with them, and who are not justified under the laws or the constitution in interfering with them ? The leader of the government takes for granted, as is stated in the press and hinted at in the addresses of hon. gentlemen opposite, that the excitement over this question will soon pais away, and that in a few weeks all this discussion will be forgotten. Let me tell the First Minister that down deep in the hearts of his countrymen, those who support him as well as those who oppose him, is the conviction that he has made the mistake of his lifetime-that he has destroyed the high opinion in which he was held by a great many of the people of this country, who had absolute faith in his struggles for liberty in 1896 and on other occasions in the history of this country.
The Minister of Justice in replying to the leader of the opposition, abandoned the ground of the constitution and the ground of vested rights, and stood simply on the

37S8
foundation rock that forty-one per cent of the people of this country demanded these schools and were going to get them. Let me tell the Minister of Justice, in the first place, that not forty-one per cent, and I believe not ten per cent, of the people of this country demand this class of schools. Similar assertions are sometimes made in the United States by gentlemen who hope by that means to advance their own political ends, to the effect that a large percentage of the Roman Catholic people of the United States are in favour of parochial or separate schools instead of public schools. I shall take the liberty of quoting to the House, not my own authority, but the authority of one of the cleanest and best Roman Catholic priests that has ever graced a pulpit. I refer to the Reverend Jeremiah Crowley, of the city of Chicago, who says :
Catholic public school opponents declare that at least one-third of the American people favour their position. I deny it. I am morally certain that not five per cent of the Catholic men of America endorse at heart the parochial school. They may send their children to the parochial school to keep peace in the family and to avoid an open rupture with the parish rector ; they may he induced to pass resolutions of approval of the parochial school in their lodges and conventions ; but if it ever becomes a matter of blood not one per cent, of them will be found outside of the ranks of the defenders of the American public school. If a perfectly free ballot could be cast the Catholic men of America for the perpetuity or suppression of the parochial school, it would be suppressed by an astounding majority. The plain Catholic layman knows that the public school is vastly superior to the parochial school in its methods, equipment and pedagogic talent. They know', too, that the public is the poor man's school. They know that the public school prepares, as no other can, their children for the keen struggle of American life and the stern duties of American citizenship.
Bishop Spaulding, a high dignitary of the Roman Catholic church in the United States says :
Fifty years ago there wTas a great difference of opinion amongst Catholics in this country about the religious (parochial) school. Unfortunately the clean prelates and priests of * fifty years ago ' were whipped into line, and the unpatriotic amj, ruinous course of attacking the public schools prevailed.
I have some expressions of opinion also from gentlemen occupying very good positions in the Dominion of Canada as to whether forty per cent of the people of Canada are in favour of separate schools. I quote from an article in the Woodstock ' Daily Express ' of Wednesday, March 8, 1905, written, I am informed, by a Roman Catholic, the editor of the newspaper being himself of that faith. I may say that a contributor to this paper had criticised the action of the government in relation to these Autonomy Bills and that the ' Catholic Record ' of London, Out., had attacked him, and this is the Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
reply of the Roman Catholic editor of the * Express
What the freely expressed opinion of Roman Catholics would he with reference to separate schools is a matter of speculation^ and our contributor has as muqji right to his opinion as the editor of the 'Catholic Record' has to his. The very fact that Roman Catholic ratepayers are not invited to express an opinion preparatory to the establishment of a separate school may be interpreted as meaning either that their opinion is not considered of^ any great value, or that the bishops are afraid to trust an appeal to it. If our contributor was so very far wrong in his opinion, why is it that Roman Catholic ratepayers are not consulted about- the establishment of separate schools ? Why is it that in so many cases they are permitted no more say in the management of separate schools than is necessary to give an appearance of compliance with the law ? Why is it that the bishop deems it necessary to invoke the spiritual powers of a church to compel support and attendance ? Why are Roman Catholic ratepayers not allowed the use of the ballot in the election of trustees ? Why are the trustees, in some cases at least, not allowed to act after they are elected ? Is it bigotry to draw attention to these facts ? It seems to us that the ' Catholic Record ' would he showing more respect for intelligent Roman Catholic sentiment by dealing squarely w'ith the facts than by imputing motives. [DOT]
Further on the ' Express ' says :
The state has assumed the responsibility of providing for the education of the people up to a certain point. To discharge its obligations properly the state should guarantee that the schools should be free and open to all, Protestant and Catholic, Jew and Gentile.^ The state does not interfere with any religious denomination ; it leaves all free to teach what doctrines they will and how they will ; the denominations, on their part, should leave the state free in the matter of secular .education. The duty of a state is to encourage the children of all creeds and races to grow up together, as Canadian citizens. Surely it is not bigotry for a public journal to work for the removal of differences, dissensions and prejudices in a country whose destiny depends on the^ ability and willingnes of all her people to live and work together in harmony.
These views of Roman Catholic writers in the province ci Ontario refute the utterance of the Minister of Justice made before this House in tones of defiance, that forty-one per cent of the people of this country demand these schools and are going to get them. Let me tell the Minister of Justice that a percentage of the people of the United States of America, away back in 1861, decided that they would have certain rights, and they sought to enforce their will by arms ; they sought to disrupt the union ; but the union to-day is stronger than it ever was. And let me tell the Minister of Justice that he cannot get forty-one per cent, or even a corporal's guard of the people of this country to follow him in any racial and religious cry, or in any racial or religious struggle in order to plant separate schools in the Northwest of Canada.

Should he undertake it, the result will he that Canada will be bound together more closely just as the United States has been, since the great civil war, than it ever was before. The Minister of Justice will find that he has not caused the slightest tremour in the hearts or minds of the people by threatening rebellion and the destruction of the constitution, as he did when he said 41 per cent of our people would have their way in this matter or there would be trouble. The hon. the Minister of Finance slid oil the rock of the constitution and took to the water, as my hon. friend from Jacques Cartier (Mr. Monk) has pointed out.


William Humphrey Bennett: He got thrown in.


Samuel Hughes: Yes, he was thrown in but clung to' the cabinet, and when he stood up in this House and made the plea he did, he presented the most abject, pitiable spectacle it has ever been my privilege to witness in this parliament, and this is the sixteenth session I have had the honour of occupying a seat in it. Just fancy the man who made the welkin ring from one end of the Dominion to the other in 1896 against any interference with the province of Manitoba, who has been quoted often in this House as against any coercion of any province-just fancy this man, when brought face to face with the issue of his own creation, renouncing every shred of principle he then stood for. Shall I quote his language V I really do not think it necessary, and I do not like to see it any oftener than I can help in the pages of ' Hansard.' But what was the pitiable plea he made ? Oh, he said, if we don't accept this clause the First Minister will have to resign and we will be all out in the cold. That was the sum and substance of his remarks. Why, the whale and Jonah were not in it compared with the hon. gentleman and his principles. The whale merely swallowed Jonah, but the Finance Minister swallowed both himself and whatever principles he ever had. He pointed out that in Nova Scotia the Roman Catholics were handsomely used by the Protestant majority, but in the next breath he turned around and said we cannot trust the people of the Northwest to do the Roman Catholic minority in those new provinces what is being done to that same minority in the province of Nova Scotia. That was the result of the hon. gentleman's logic. I might remind him of an old expression taken from the same authority as he quoted from :
The man who sells his freedom in exchange for broth shall make eternal servitude his fate.
Both the Minister of Justice and the Minister of Finance practically threatened civil war when they stated that because 41 per cent of the people of this country wanted to control the schools in a certain way, forsooth we must yield to them. Where would government begin and end if such a principle were to be recognized ? It would have
been a thousand times better for the Minister of Finance if he had quietly remained on the ocean until this matter was finally settled, and still kept to the water, rather than have made the exhibition he did in this House. How a minister who has sworn to give advice to His Majesty's representatives according to the dictates of his conscience can remain in the cabinet after publicly enunciating the principles he expressed here, passes my comprehension. Had that hon. gentleman done his duty, the First Minister would very quickly have found a way out of the difficulty. Had he stood to his guns with the solid province of Nova Scotia at his back and supported by the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Sifton) with the solid Northwest behind him, the First Minister would never have dared to resign and go to the country, but would at once have removed the difficulty and left the people of the Northwest free to deal with their own schools. Had he adopted the motto taken from his own favourite author, he would have been by long odds the most popular man in this country. If he had taken the motto .
Freedom sternly said :
I shun no pang,
No strife beneath the sun,
Where human rights are staked and won.
He would have been master of the administration to-day in place of meriting the contempt of every member of the House of Commons. Personally I have always been opposed to the introduction of religion into politics and have always endeavoured to keep the two apart. But at times religious contentions have been forced on us, as I shall point out later in answer to the hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa). In the province of Ontario we have had, on the question of separate schools, an agitation, prompted by differences, to have the improper amendments made to our school law removed. I stood up in that fight and we won and prevented these improper amendments being perpetuated and put into practice in our province. I remember well pointing out that if every adviser of Sir Oliver Mowat were a member of the Roman Catholic church, it did not matter so long as he was chosen on the ground of fitness and ability, but that no one should be chosen for a cabinet position simply because he happened to be an Irishman or a Scotchman or a Frenchman or an Englishman and a member of a certain church. Let ability be the test, I contended, and there would be no trouble. But on all these matters, there are demagogues who take advantage of national and religious prejudices, men who have no qualifications or fitness for public office other than that they handle the Irish vote in this locality, or the French vote in another locality, or some other, votes somewhere else ; and these are the men who have gained ascendency in the Liberal party

from tlie days as far back as 1837. It is this class of politicians who create these religious and racial agitations throughout the country, hoping thereby to gain a prominence which they cannot achieve in any other way. But it is not necessary for the men of any race or religion iu Canada to resort to that kind of thing. There are plenty of Irishmen, Scotchmen and Frenchmen and men of every nationality who can command the respect of their fellow' countrymen without resorting to such pernicious methods. We had another exhibition of these methods in the person of the Minister of Customs (Mr. Paterson). On one occasion, when speaking in the city of Brantford, that magnificent voice of his was raised to such a pitch that just as the audience left the building, the roof fell in. Well, the only resemblance between the Minister of Customs of to-day and the Minister of Customs of years gone by is that sonorous voice of his. It was heard in Ontario in 1896, when he exclaimed in stentorian tones: Hands off Manitoba ; down with Tupper and the Church of Rome ; v'e will never be ruled by the Bishops of Rome ; let the free men of the west show their independence. The newspaper speeches and posters of hon. gentlemen opposite reeked with this sort of thing.	j.
And he stood up here saying in effect: Pity the sorrows of a poor old man who wants to hold on to office ; who has been for thirty-two years in the saddle-I think that was what he said-with the First Minister, and has learned to love him. Well, these are great constitutional reasons why two provinces of this Dominion should be tied hand and foot for all time to come. In some of his speeches, the hon. gentleman was wont to quote those grand old words from Junius, which the Toronto ' Globe ' years ago adopted for its motto :	' The
subject who is truly loyal to the chief magistrate will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures.' But there was not a word of independence from him the other night. It was only : Let me hold down my job in the custom-house ; keep the ship together and keep her off the rocks ; I have been thirty-two years in the saddle with the Prime Minister, and I love the dear old man; and I am not fit for much else. Let me tell the hon. gentleman that the rule of life is that men go down and give place to others. In politics, as in every walk of life in which there is struggle, men disappear. But the sun rises and sets and the men are soon forgotten. Had these hon. gentlemen stood to the constitution there would have been no danger of the Prime Minister going out of office on this question, no danger of the government being broken up. On the contrary, it would have been much stronger than it is to-day. Had they done this, the acting Minister of Public Works (Mr. Hyman) would not have been afraid to face his electors ; Centre Toronto would not Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
have gone by default; the government would not have been obliged to dangle jobs before the eyes of their partisans from the Northwest Territories; and, as I am reminded, the tomato man of the party, the member for Centre York (Mr. Campbell) could have been made Minister of Agriculture and need not have been afraid, on this account, to face his electors. Not a constituency in the country but would have supported the government on this subject. Men come and go ; members of this House appear and pass. Aud when every man who has occupied a place in this House shall have passed and been forgotten, the principles that are being discussed to-day will live ; the principles-or lack of principles-that are being fastened upon the people of the new provinces will remain to remind the future generation of those
Patriots self-bound to the stake of office.
Martyrs for their country's sake,
Who fill, themselves, the hungry jaws of fate
And by their loss of manhood save the state.
Now, Sir, we all admire the open fearless dare-devil rather than the sneak ; we admire the man who holds up a train or, flying the black flag, orders the merchantman to heave to, but we despise the man who slinks around by the back door to commit some petty theft. Therefore, it was a refreshing thing to see the ex-Minister of the Interior (Mr. Sifton) stand up and to hear him boldly and brazenly admit that the whole policy of the government was wrong, that there was no question of the constitution in it, no question of vested rights or control by this parliament, nor could there be any question of policy, for it was a wrong policy. He said in effect: I do not believe in separate schools, but I want to keep the old aggregation together, and I will see them through. I have not before me the oath of office taken by that hon. gentleman (Mr. Sifton) as a member of parliament-he had the decency to resign his position in the cabinet before he made the speech to which I have referred-but I would recommend him to walk into the clerk's room and read it. And if, in the light of that oath, he can reconcile his speech and his vote, he will prove himself able to turn a shorter corner than I think he can.
The hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bour-assa), who is now conveniently out of the House, is credited with having written certain articles for ' La Nationaliste,' warning the ex-Minister of the Interior of his duty to support the party, and warning him that if he persisted in wrecking this government some very unpleasant things would be brought before the public. It is the duty of this House to know what it is the hon. gentleman (Mr. Bourassa) referred to. We want him to stand up in this House, to show himself brave for once in his life, and let the public know what was meant by this threat that brought the ex-Minister of the Interior so quickly back into line. I
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Mr.   J@: 2, 1904. This organization had just been perfected, and is throwing itself into the arena of politics. In this same work, this Roman Catholic priest says :
I love my church, and for this reason I am fighting these organizations in it.
This gentleman comes to the front and boldly proclaims the object of this movement-the same movement I presume that we find ill Canada, with a similar object in view.


Mr. L. P. DEMERS.: That is what the hon. gentleman does not demonstrate.


Samuel Hughes: The fact is that priests and prelates hope to establish in the United States a Catholic party modelled after the Centre party in the German Reichstag, and to make the Catholic societies the nucleus of such a party.
And he points out :
They think they can work it out in this way : Set afoot a movement for a division of the school fund. That movement to mean anything must exert itself in securing pledges from candidates for the legislature. Neither Republican nor Democratic candidates will give such pledges.
I will not go into details, but I will say that these gentlemen are openly


Louis Philippe Demers: That is in the United . States.


Samuel Hughes: Well, the same game is going on here.
There is an open, notorious and virulent hostility of priests and prelates at home and abroad towards the public school.
Then he goes on and shows what their tactics are.
1.	Bringing of the public school into contempt by characterizing it as * Godless,' ' vicious,' ' a sink of corruption.'
Have we heard any arguments like that in this House ? I think we have.
2.	The securing for the Catholic parochial schools the largest possible share of the public school tax funds.
Have we heard anything of that kind in this House ? I think we have.
3.	The encouragement of other sects to start sectarian schools and to demand public moneys in payment for the secular education of the children.
4.	The securing of a Catholic majority on public school boards and on the teaching staff of the public schools in the hope of being able thereby to lower the tone of instruction and discipline in the public schools and thus bring the public schools into disfavour.
5.	Securing the employmnt of nuns and monks as public school teachers.
And so on, page after page. I eommend the book to hon. gentlemen opposite. It is written by Rev. Mr. Crowley, of Chicago, and if our hon. friends will send for it he Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
will he delighted to send it to them. He says :
A hurricane of hate is brewing. I love the Catholic church, and to save her from destruction in America I write this book.
This is from the pen of Mr. Crowley himself.


Mr. J. J. HUGHES.: The hon. gentleman is in very good company. The man he is quoting has no authority whatever to speak for any one but himself. It is not worth while to take much notice of what the hon. gentleman says, but he is really making statements that have no foundation in fact when he says that that man has authority to speak for anybody.


Samuel Hughes: I am merely telling what this gentleman says, and I challenge my hon. friend, and he may hunt from now till the morning of the resurrection, to point out one solitary objection to this gentleman, either to his personal or his ecclesiastical position, which will reflect upon his character. Now, we are told that in Canada this does not apply. I will read an article from the Bobcaygeon ' Independent, ' whose editor is a Roman Catholic, and who says :
Mr. Laurier, in forcing the separate schools on the northwest, cannot he thoroughly aware of what he is doing. The moment that Bill passes a movement will be inaugurated for the annexation of the Northwest to the States A break-up of confederation, and annexation means an end of French domination and a clean sweep of separate schools.
This is from a Liberal and a Roman Catholic, the editor of the Bobcaygeon ' Independent,' in the province of Ontario.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Is that an authority for the hon. gentleman ?


Samuel Hughes: He is a very good authority.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I am informed that he is a pro-Boer.


Samuel Hughes: Well, he is in good company. I am told that my hon. friend the Solicitor General was a pro-Boer. I am told that my hon. friend the member for Montmagny (Mr. A. Lavergne) also expressed himself in very strong terms against the action of the British government in the South African war ; and other hon. gentlemen opposite have very strong views in favour of the Boers-anything so long as they can hit the British empire. Now, Sir, I stated to-day, as one of the offences of these gentlemen against the Dominion of Canada, that they had destroyed all respect for public principles in this Dominion. We have seen them on the trade question, we have seen them on every question, box the compass to suit their own purpose, in various ways they have proved themselves true opportunists, with the result that the public

conscience in tlie Dominion of Canada to-day is at the lowest stage it has ever been in the history of Canada.
Public sentiment is gone, honour is practically gone, and now they are endeavouring to disrupt and smash up our public school system and when any hon. gentleman stands up and opposes them the cry of intolerance is raised. If a man stands by his rights and opposes these iniquities, why he is intolerant. These are the charges that are made by certain hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House from time to time. More' than that, we have seen the hon. Postmaster- General (Sir William Mulock) stand up and in place of replying to the argument advanced by my friend from North Toronto (Mr. Foster) read a lot of rigmarole stuff, debates in other Houses and adverse criticism of my hon. friend the ex-Minister of Finance and we have seen that sort of thing going on day after day in this House. We had the hon. member from Ottawa (Mr. Belcourt) the other night standing up adversely and unfairly criticising my hon. friend from North Toronto and bringing in arguments that had no force or effect and no bearing on the question before the House. That has been the policy of these hon. gentlemen throughout. They do not meet argument with argument or fact with fact, but seek like ink fish to cover the trail by Improper references. This is not a question of what is right; it is simply a question of what is expedient. Abandon your principles, look to your pocket and position no matter who is injured. These are the maxims of the hon. gentlemen opposite. Pay no attention to the pledges given to the people. They are made to be broken. The maxims of the government are simply trampled under foot. The principles for which freemen have fought in all ages are taken as naught. Secret intrigue takes the place of free discussion and free conference among the members of the government and among the members of the party. Is there a minister in his place to-night who can stand up and conscientiously say that he was consulted about that clause ? A great party following the principles of constitutional and responsible government and yet, besides a paltry little committee of the cabinet, not one member of the government, not one of their following in the House, not one member of the territorial legislature and not one of the members from the west, although only fresh from the country, is consulted as to this clause, although it is said that we are living under constitutional government, Why, the Czar of Russia, surrounded by the grand dukes, would not attempt to pass that sort of legislation. It is worse than taxation without representation which caused the American war. Now, the policy laid down by the First Minister, as well as the second or amended clause, imposes the will of other portions of Canada on the western freemen. It imposes it in 121
defiance of the constitution of the country and it establishes a principle of federal interference in purely provincial matters which has always been avoided in connection with the government in Canada heretofore. It establishes separate schools in the Northwest Territories and perpetuates the union of church and state in that great country.
Now, we have heard our hon. friend from Labelle (Mr. Bourassa) point out, in the course of his speech, a great many things, some of them nonsensical and many of them very untrue and incorrect. I shall take the opportunity of running through a few of the choice extracts from his speech. In one of these he makes an appeal to the Englishspeaking majority in this country and says: Consider what the French Canadians in the past have done for the development of this country. He makes the same mistake as tile hon. member from Montmagny (Mr. Lavergne) of believing that we are dealing with the province of Quebec, or that the whole Dominion is the province of Quebec, or vice versa, -the province of Quebec is the whole Dominion. Let me inform him that the province of Quebec is only a portion of the Dominion, and a very small portion, although a very important one. He says that:
Sir, when the English settlers of His Majesty were still on the banks of the Atlantic and had not crossed the Ohio and the Missouri, French Canadian priests, French Canadian traders and settlers had opened up that country.
Slightly exaggerated, but let me tell that hon. gentleman that had it not been for the schools which he is advocating to-day and the system which he is endeavouring to perpetuate in this country the continent of North America would largely have been under the control of the French people today. Anterior to the date referred to by him free Frenchmen had planted colonies in Brazil, in the coast of Florida, Georgia and tlie Ciirolinas, prosperous colonies of free Frenchmen, but these colonies were blotted out by the connivance of the French government engineered by the same system that he wishes to perpetuate in the Northwest Territories, and the label over the graves of the thousands of men who were massacred in co.ld blood was this: ' This is not done as to Frenchmen, but as to Lutherans.' Had it not been for the interference of an organization such as he is endeavouring to force on the west the whole continent of North America would have been colonized by free Frenchmen-the word 'French' means free-and we would not have had the improper struggles that are now dividing this country. I commend these notions to my hon. friend from Labelle. Another point he dwelt upon was this- I shall not take up his reference to rebellion to any great extent-but he spoke about twenty times in reference to rebellion-the rebellion in the Northwest Territories of 1885, the rebellion in Manitoba-and he seemed to regret that there did not spring



up another rebellion in 1892. Take the rebellion of 1885; as I explained this afternoon, when the government wanted the few settlers at the village of Batoche to take the square mile survey in place of the long survey a rebellion broke out. This bon. gentleman claims that rebellion was justified, and he regrets that he did not bring on a rebellion in Manitoba at the time the Manitoba Act was passed abolishing separate schools there. There are occasions when rebellions are just. I think the people of the Northwest Territories fully appreciate their position and that they will make it rather warm for the right hon. First Minister and the government of Canada in connection with this Bill, first by a constitutional agitation, and then, if it is found out that this government, in spite of the constitution, are determined to insist upon forcing this clause upon them, 1 think it would be advisable for them to take the management of their own schools for their own ends.
Further on the hon. member for Labelle says:
When you speak of the liberty granted to the Roman Catholic to go into a non-sectarian school, there is no such a thing as liberty.
I have shown by expressions of opinion from the best Roman Catholics in the United States and Canada and from some of the finest Roman Catholics in the province of Ontario, that he is not talking for the Roman Catholic people of either Canada or the Unite d States, and I shall give him one extract further from the Rev. J. O'Donovan -another gentlemau and Roman Catholic Irishman, by the way-who takes the ground that public schools are what the people want. He says :
But the statement that state secular education has this effect has never been proved. In fact when one tests it by one's own experience in the immediate circle of one's acquaintances the assertion proves baseless. Several of my friends were educated in non-Catholic schools and colleges without the slightest injury to their faith.
I do not know the gentleman who writes this artiale


Mr. A. JOHNSTON.: Ask the member for Jacques Cartier and he will tell you all about him.	.


Samuel Hughes: I have this to say, however, that if this gentleman were not what he should be the public would mighty soon know all about him. The hon. member for Dabelle (Mr. Bourassa) goes on to say :
When, by any measure in this House or in any provincial parliament you force a Roman Catholic to send his children to a non-sectarian school, you are committing an act of injustice just as direct, just as much against the conscience of the Roman Catholic, as if you would force the Protestant minority in the province of Quebec to contribute to Roman Catholic denominational schools.


Samuel Hughes: 
Louis Philippe Demers: If my hon. friend will permit me, to-day that stock may be in the hands of Protestants, and to-morrow it may he in the hands of Catholics ; and where would you be if there were not a law to distribute the taxes proportionately ?


Samuel Hughes: There is a certain date fixed by statute in the province of Ontario on wbicli it is determined where the taxes shall go.


Louis Philippe Demers: In this instance it is not a partnership of persons, but a part-

nership of interests, in which anybody may have a share in the stock. In the case of a partnership of persons, you would take into consideration the religion of the persons, but not in a partnership of interests.


Samuel Hughes: I am only pointing out that in the province of Ontario, were this stock held by people of the Roman Catholic faith, every dollar of taxes on that stock would go to the support of separate schools.


Louis Philippe Demers: Yes, but any stock can be sold to any person.


Samuel Hughes: And any business can be sold just the same. In the Montreal ' Gazette ' of March 25, 1905, I find that a gentleman of the name of Alderman Deser-res rose and said :
I have secured from the city comptroller, a statement showing the following proportion of commercial property owned in the city:
Roman Catholics	$	634,900
Protestants	 5,577,800
Neutral	 21,522,420
The amount which the Protestant business houses have to pay to the neutral fund exceeds by $4,900,000 that paid by the Roman Catholic business houses. This sum at 40 cents a hundred dollars, gives a sum of $19,600, which divided pro rata according to population, gives the Roman Catholic schools the sum of $16,200, which according to the claims of my fellow alderman should belong to the Protestant panel.
I am merely pointing out that the Protestant majority of the province of Ontario have been unjuutly charged-not that we care anything about it-with being intolerant, I assert that the laws in Ontario are more favourable to the Roman Catholic minority there than the laws of Quebec are to the Protestant minority of that province.
If my hon. friend from Labelie were to remove from his speech ail that he says about rebellion, toleration and intolerance, there would be a very little left of it. He makes the mistake of supposing that the privileges of the English-speaking people of Quebec were granted to them. On the contrary, the concessions were granted to the French people of that'province, as England always grants concessions to any people in any country where she has the management of affairs-the right to use their language and the right to observe whatever religion they choose to follow. These concessions the British government granted to our French friends in the province of Quebec, and all honour to her for so doing. And, should any attempt ever be made to deprive our fellow-countrymen of the province of Quebec of the right to use their own language or their right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own consciences, they may rest assured that my hon. friend here (Mr. Sproule) would be one Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
of the first to go down and resist any such injustice to them.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Hear, hear.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


Samuel Hughes: I do not want to hurt the feelings of my good friend from Labelie. His history, of course, was absurd. All through his address he talks as if the people of Quebec, and they only, owned the Northwest. The French Canadians in the province of Quebec, toleration, intolerance- these are the stock-in-trade arguments of the hon. gentleman. He says :
I may remind my English-speaking friends that three centuries before there was anything like English civilization, Catholic Spain had covered the world not only with physical power, but with civilization and enlightenment-with schools of higher education and primary education and with a knowledge of all human sciences that were available at that time that no nation has since surpassed.
Let me tell the hon. gentleman that Spain has not been in existence for more than five hundred years. Prior to that time Spain was made up of a lot of free republics, and later free monarchies.


Louis Philippe Demers: What date ?
ill-. SAM. HUGHES. At the close of the fifteenth century. It was not through the schools of Catholic Spain that the arts and sciences and learning were maintained there, but through the schools established by the Moors in the old Iberian peninsula, before the dark ages swept over Europe. The hou. gentleman is entirely wrong in his history. Another mistake made by the hon. member for Labelie was in speaking of the United States, where, he said :
People recognize that what must save the United States from the social plague which is going to involve all nations between the crushing burden of capitalism and the equally crushing burden of standing armies, is the influence of the- Catholic Church on the working classes.
Well, if the hon. gentleman wants to belittle his Roman Catholic co-religionists, it is none of my funeral ; but let me tell him that I would hesitate a long time before I would offer to the Roman Catholic people such an insult. In the United States there are only 10,000,000 Roman Catholics to 70,-000,000'who are not Roman Catholics, and if the hon. gentleman says that these 10,000,000 are going to lead the anarchical, socialistic and revolutinary movements, he is paying a poor compliment to the people of that faith.
I would not dream of insulting the Roman Catholic people in any such way. Let me tell him that what is going to save the United States is her free public school education, given throughout the length and breadth of that great nation, and not any church or system of separate schools. He says that never in the province of .Quebec
3805 -

or in any part of the country in which Catholics have any control, do we find the display of passion and prejudice we are now witnessing among those who advocate public schools against separate schools. Well, I do not believe in quoting newspaper against newspaper or speech against speech, but you can take every minister of this government and you can quote any speech of Ms one year against another speech the following year, any time within the last fifteen years. And no papers have been more active than papers supporting the government in the province of Quebec- which X presume are Roman Catholic papers -in exciting religious and race antagonism. You will find them excelling in charging all sorts of intolerance against the Protestants of Ontario, and you will find men like the hon. member for Labelle going through that province and appealing to the fanaticism and prejudices of that magnificent people. I have every faith in that people, but we must admit that they are not as well posted in public affairs as they should be. I regret that we have no Chapleau in the province of Quebec to-day to set the people right and counteract the schemes of lion, gentlemen opposite. I remember when the late Sir Joseph Chapleau stood in the province of Quebec and faced the demagogues of ithe Liberal party, led by the late Mr. Merc-ier, who sought to inflame the public mind of that province in connection with the Northwest rebellion and other matters. I regret that to-day there is not one to take the place of that great statesman and stem the torrent of fanaticism which is being spread throughout that province by the demagogues of the Liberal party. But I am confident that the good sense of the Quebec people will yet assert itself and that in a short time they will realize how they have been misled and told fairy tales in connection with the treatment of that province by the British people., When the people of Quebec find out how they have been bamboozled and humbugged by men like the hon. member for Labelle, they will place no more faith in that type of man, but stand by principle rather than appeals to prejudice.
When Lord Aylmer was Governor, these was an address presented to the Iving which was signed by a number of French and English-speaking people.


Rodolphe Lemieux: What book are you reading from ?


Samuel Hughes: From McMullen's History of Canada, a very good authentic work.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Hear, hear.


Samuel Hughes: Lord Aylmer said :
To be stigmatized as a foreigner, said he, while treading -the soil of a British colony,
sounds strange to tbe ears of an Englishman. Those who make use of the term should be emphatically told, that in every quarter of the world where the British flag flies every British subject is always at home.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Hear, hear.


Samuel Hughes: Mr. John Neilson, who was the publisher of the Quebec ' Gazette ' and the ' Nestor of Reform ' in Lower Canada, was stigmatized by the Liberal leaders as a foreigner because he refused to endorse the treasonable sentiments of Mr. Papineau and those who signed the ninety-two resolutions. This is what he said of the ninety-two resolutions :
But they have not only usurped authority which was not given to them, and produced all the consequences before stated ; they have excited to sedition, rebellion and treason. Their 92 resolutions of last winter are a long declamatory address to the passions and prejudices of the majority of the people, whom they formally designate and class in these resolutions as of French origin, in contradistinction to British or foreign origin. They grossly insulted and falsely accuse individuals, public authorities, and whole bodies of men, in aid of their attempted usurpation on the established constitution and the rights of their constituents. They tell the people that they have been subject to a long series of injustice and oppression under the British government.
Just like tbe appeal of tbe hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa). We have exactly the same whine made by demagogues appealing to tbe people, we have bad this for nearly a century, and it is about time sojme one undertook to educate tbe people.


Louis Philippe Demers: Does tbe bon. gentleman contend that tbe people of Quebec bad then no grievance ?


Samuel Hughes: I contend that tbe people of Lower Canada then were infinitely better off than corresponding people in any other part of the world.
Mr. I,. P. DEMERS. That is not an answer.


Samuel Hughes: Tbe people of Eng-and at that time had not tbe liberty of government they have to-day.
They tell the people that they have been subjected to a long series of injustice and oppression under the British government-that allegiance and protection are correlative obligations-refer to the example of the United States-and finally threaten to seek a remedy elsewhere, if their demands are not granted by the British parliament. If there is a man of unsophisticated mind and common honesty, who has read or will read the 92 resolutions, and say, before God and man, that such is not the bent and character of these resolutions, then I will consent that these latter allegations against the members of the late House of Assembly should be taken as not proven.
These were tbe opinions of a Liberal who had fought shoulder to shoulder with these

. 3808
gentlemen in the province of Quebec in the olden days. The object of these gentlemen, Sir, in those days was agitation just as it is the object of these demagogues to-day. The hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa) endeavoured to prove the other day that the agitation in favour of independence or the establishment of a republic was not due to Papineau. But in the heat of debate in 1835, Mr. Papineau forgot his ordinary prudence and avowed himself a republican in principle. He said :
The time had gone by when Europe could give monarchies to America. On the contrary the time is now approaching when America will give republics to Europe.
This is the sort of stuff our good friends in the province of Quebec have been fed upon all these long years, and unfortunately the plain truth, except at very brief intervals when men like Ohapleau stood well to the front, has never been placed before them.


Rodolphe Lemieux: In the good city of Toronto does my hon. friend not know there is a gentleman *named Goldwin Smith who advocates political union between Canada and the United States?


Samuel Hughes: I have never said that we have not gentlemen in the Englishspeaking provinces who profess these sentiments, but what I do say is that when men like Goldwin Smith come to the front and advocate such doctrines, they are answered by gentlemen who speak and write the English language. But when men advocating such theories go through the province of Quebec, our friends bow before them and wait for a reaction to set in when the people of that province will find out for themselves the true facts of the situation. Speaking of the agitation in favour of- toleration and the rights of the people and all that sort of thing, the historian points out on page 44 that indignation meetings were held in various parts of the province at which violent resolutions were passed, and at these meetings Mr. Papineau was the chief orator, and was escorted by his countrymen from one district to another.
Again the hon. member for Montmagny (Mr. A. Lavergne) as well as the hon. member for Labelle, dilated at length on the injustice of the Britishers after they had conquered that country. I wish to point out, and to prove, that the British people used the people of the province of Quebec exactly as they have used the people of every country they have conquered, they used them as liberally as the people themselves wished to be used, and finally the imperial government gave to the people of Quebee liberties that they had never asked for and did not want. This historian says :
Before the conquest Canada was'a purely military colony, and subjected like France, to a Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
despotism of a most exacting and imperious character. While the custom of the Parisian tribunals, and the edicts of the French monarch, formed the statute law of the country, its administration -was confided to a governor and an intendant, who, unchecked by a public press, and having the patronage of the whole colony completely at their disposal, usually acted upon the caprice of the moment, and were generally to set public opinion, such as it was, completely at defiance. Having thus means to provide for the more educated, they either silenced or enlisted on their side every person of influence. The common people, steeped in the grossest ignorance, and oppressed by feudal exactions submitted without a murmur, from long habit, to the arrogant claims and pretensions of their seigneurs and also of the public officials. The meanest officer of the government was regarded with the most slavish fear, and his mandate promptly obeyed, while their superiors were generally looked upon by the habitants as almost beings of a higher order in creation to themselves. By these they were treated with the greatest severity. In the law courts, as we have already seen, the torture was frequently applied, while, by the military authorities, they were compelled to serve as soldiers without pay, and in every condition of life taught that the one cardinal virtue was a blind and implicit obedience to those in power.
This was the condition of this splendid people when the British government took hold of the province of Quebec in 1763, as portrayed by an eminent French clergyman at the time.
The people, ignorant, and what was worse, contented in their ignorance, looked upon their own laws and customs as equally admirable and excellent, and, like the Chinese, regarded the rest of the world, France alone excepted, as ' outside barbarians.'
Then there is the testimony of clergymen and others writing about the country. I will quote only one of them-the Duke de Rochefoucault :
No Canadian has just grounds of complaint against the British government. They acknowledge they are better treated now than ever, but they love the French-forget them not, long after them, hope for their arrival, and will always love them. In their estimation a Frenchman is a being much superior to the native of Great Britain. The farmers are a frugal set of people, but ignorant and lazy.
These are the words of a Frenchman, writing of these people after a visit to Canada forty years after the British conquest. Then an American writer of that time, the distinguished scholar Silliman, says :
It is questionable whether any conquered country was ever better treated by its conquerors than Canada ; the people were left in complete possession of their religion, and the revenues for its support, as well as their property, laws, customs and manners, and even the defence of their country is no expense to them.
Then what becomes of the cry of these hon. gentlemen, that the people were ground down under the heel of the British govern-

ment and the British aristocrats ? No country has ever been more justly treated than was French Canada under the British government. Here is another extract that will show the conduct of the British government:
The impolitic desire of the home government to preserve the French element distinct from the British, as a safeguard against future revolution, completely destroyed this prospect

Referring to the amalgamation of the two peoples.

and precipitated the consequences it sought
to avoid, aside from preventing the gradual amalgamation of the two races. For a brief space, however, the British inhabitants were lulled Into -security by the moderation of the French Canadians. .
So, it was the British government themselves who first insisted upon these people taking an active part in the management of their own affairs.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Has my hon. friend (Mr. Sam. Hughes) lost sight of the little rebellion that took place in Upper Canada ?


Samuel Hughes: I have not come near the rebellion in Upper Canada yet, or near the rebellion in Lower Canada either, but I am gradually coming to it.
But no sooner had the French Canadian leaders become fully aware of the nature of the power with which they had been invested, than they gradually excluded persons of British origin from the House, until only some three or four remained.
And this was under the progenitor of the hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa). And that hon .gentleman has the hardihood to stand up in this House- and preach about the tolerance of the French Canadian people. Thank fortune that they have been tolerant. But it does not belong to the Liberal party or the family of Papineau to boast of tolerance.
The French, instead of the English, now became altogether the dominant language, and assumed the aggressive in the most decided manner. If a person of British origin aspired to political influence, he had to cast aside every predilection of birth and education, connect himself wholly with the French Canadians, and also learn their language.
This, Sir, under the rule and management of the progenitor of the hon. member for Labelle. Yet that hon. gentleman will get up and prate about the tolerance shown by the French Canadian people. As I have said, French Canadians are a toiera'nt people, but the family of Papineau has no share or part in that tolerance.
Prior to the formation of the Papineau party, no systematic attempt had been made to excite the prejudices of the masses against the natives of British origin.
Another factor against the hon. gentleman. And further on :
Nor is there any ground whatever for the supposition that the conduct of the French Canadians during the war with the United States arose from a feeling of loyalty to Great Britain.
Now, I just want to make it clear that the hon. gentleman is a pure agitator and that he has not given this House or this country in his addresses, from one end of it to the other, the facts of the conduct of a certain wing of the Liberal party of Lower Canada towards the English-speaking people of this country :
But, although the French Canadians were apparently the Liberal party of Lower Canada, owing to the manner in which they advocated reforms in question of a purely British character, while at the same time they clung tenaciously to almost every abuse of French origin, the citizens of the other race were the real reformers. The very constitution itself, the first great measure of reform was the result of their solicitation

So these Britishers could not have been so bad. They had to force these liberties upon the French Canadian people.


and the fact of the province having been
divided was not owing to them, as the able protest, at the bar of the House of Commons, of Lymburner clearly shows, but to the blind infatuation of the imperial government. They were foremost in all great public measures of utility, in the building of steamboats, in commerce, in agricultural improvements, in liberal educational measures

And yet, the hon. member for Labelle contended that' the British government had kept these people in subjection and in ignorance, when the facts show that the British government had to force educational measures upon them.

in the social elevation of the industrial
classes, and thus kept full pace with the progressive spirit of the age. The great majority of the French Canadian population, on the other hand, clung to ancient prejudices, to ancient customs, to ancient laws, with the unreasoning tenacity of an uneducated and nonprogressive people.
These are the words of the historian X have quoted and they cannot be contradicted or gainsaid. I want to point out that what the province of Quebec has always wanted was a free man, a man who would stand to the front and lead that magnificent province and that splendid people and let them know the facts as to the splendid treatment meted out to them by the British government in the days gone by.
This was under the regime of Papineau, the grandfather, I believe, of the hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa). Speaking of toleration, the writer says :
In order to check the settlement of the eastern townships by British immigration, it was persistently refused to make grants for roads therein, for the administration of justice, for registry offices, or even to permit of their parliamentary representation.

Why, I am satisfied that half of our French Canadian fellow-countrymen before me never knew that such tyranny had been practised towards the English people in the province of Quebec by the ancestor of the hon. member for Labelle. They did not know that it was possible that men who now go round prating of tolerance could have had any connection with such tyrannical acts.
While Papineau and his followers were declaiming against the tyranny of being taxed without representation, they deliberately disfranchised for years 80,000 English-speaking settlers in the Eastern Townships region, lying between Salmon River and Lake Memphre* magog; and who, until 1830, had no voice whatever in making the laws by which they were governed or in expending the taxes which they paid. And when parliamentary representation was at last reluctantly conceded them, it was so hedged ahout by restriction and adverse conditions as to be of little comparative value. In some cases when English-speaking electors could not he otherwise obstructed in the exercise of their franchise, polling places were established at distances ranging from thirty to fifty miles from their settlements.
So an elector had to travel, under the benign rule of these gentlemen, from thirty to fifty miles in order to record his vote. Is there a French Canadian before me who knew that such exactions were practised upon the British people of Quebec ? I trust that when the hon. member for Labelle again traverses the province of Quebec, seeking to inflame the honest peasantry of that province, he will be met by honest French Canadians themselves who will tell him that he is not taking the proper course, who will tell him to go back home and remain there and give up his demagogueism. Another point:
They made immigration from the British islands

Mark you, that is the Papineau party, the party of toleration.
They made immigration from the British islands a standing grievance, maintained that they alone had the right to the soil, continued their wretched mode of agriculture, save in the limited area where the example and success of good Scotch farming had led them to make some improvements, disliked all nations hut France, and, as a safeguard against the innovations and language of neighbouring Anglo-Saxon people, would, were it possible, surround themselves with a Chinese wall of exclusiveness.
The conduct of the hon. member for Labelle to-day shows that he is a direct lineal descendant of liis ancestor. Now, Sir, I find here a description of Papineau, and in many respects it resembles the hon. member for Labelle to-day :
It is evident that Papineau, the great master spirit of the crisis, had never carefully gauged the probable results. He was a brilliant orator, hut no statesman ; a clever partisan leader, hut a miserable general officer ; a braggart in the forum, a coward in the field. He excited a Mr. SAM. HUGHES.
storm which he neither knew how to allay nor direct. Nor had Papineau the excuse of youth to plead in extenuation of his folly. In 1837 he was 38 years of age, a period of life when the intellect stands at its meridian. In height he was of the middle size; a man of good presence; with features of a Hebrew caste; while his heavy dark eyebrows shaded, in a higher arch than usual, a keen lustrous eye of quick and penetrating glance. He appeared to he formed by nature for the eloquent agitator, but not for the wise or prudent legislator ; to act upon the passions and prejudices of his ignorant or unreflecting countrymen, not to make them happier, wiser or better. Familiar with French literature and all the old lore of La Nouvelle France, he appealed to the feelings and prejudices of his countrymen with irresistible effect, and completely carried them captive by the force of his.oratorical and conversational powers. But while Papineau thoroughly understood the people of his owe province he knew very little of the people of Upper Canada; and appeared to be wholly ignorant of the feeling of loyalty to the Queen and constitution which then ran like a deep undercurrent beneath their political squabbles.
There we have a description of the province of Quebec under the rule and subject to the agitation of the great Papineau family. I trust we will never again see in the province of Quebec, or in the Dominion of Canada, other agitations started by these gentlemen. The hon. member for Labelle has inflamed the minds of the people in the province of Quebec, and has attempted to justify himself by preaching the same stuff in other provinces. He recently spoke in the city of Toronto, and I was asked by a gentleman who heard him if it was not scandalous .that such things could have been allowed in the province of Quebec as had been described by the hon. member for Labelle ; he really believed the statements that the member for Labelle had been making. I want the people of this country to know what the facts were under a Liberal agitation in the province of Quebec, and that, in place of their having any just complaint against our English-speaking fellow-countrymen, the reverse was the case under the agitation carried on by Liberal leaders in the province of Quebec in the old days. I trust these days will never return.
Now, Sir, I have disposed pretty well of the various points which it was my intention to discuss. I have endeavoured to show that the people of Ontario are tolerant. I have shown that the government practically admit now that they have no case under the constitution for their school clauses of the Autonomy Bill, that they are simply* governed by policy. I have shown that by putting this law on the statute-book without these educational clauses inserted the separate school law of 1875 will remain the law in the new provinces. Then if, as the Prime Minister asserts, the constitution gives them the right to separate schools, that law must remain on the statute-book ; but if the constitution does not demand that separate schools shall be per-

petuated, then it rests with the free will of the legislatures of the Northwest either to perpetuate the present system or to change it. It stands to common sense that if the law is as mild and as gentle and as inoffensive as hon. gentlemen opposite say it is, no legislature in the new provinces is going to step in and take away from the people the small measure of separate schools that is given them under that constitution. Remove the objection and you preserve the self-respect and honour of the people of those great Territories ; perpetuate coercion, and you bring about a struggle in every province of the Dominion, because the people of the province of Quebec are by no means a unit in favour of coercion. They have shown in 1896 that they are not in favour of coercion, and if you give them an opportunity. I believe they will show again that they are not in favour of coercion no more than are the people of Ontario. There is not even a suggestion of tyranny and the freemen of Quebec will not hesitate to record their votes against tyranny just the same as the freemen of Ontario. I have no further desire to discuss this matter until it reaches the committee stage but I would appeal, as I appealed in the earlier part of my address, to the right hon. Prime Minister to remove this coercive clause. If his contention is right he has all he wants in the Bill without the coercion at ali. If his contention is wrong I want to point out to him that the Act of 1875 will be part of the laws of the new provinces until the legislatures meet and change it and it must be supposed that the Roman Catholic minority in these Territories will have a far greater chance of succeeding by the kindly means I have outlined than they will by attempting coercion of that country.


Mr. J. G. TURRIFF (East Assiniboia).: Mr. Speaker, as the Bill now before the House deals particularly with the part of the country that I come from, and as I represent one of the largest and most populous districts there, I do not feel that I would be justified in casting a silent vote on this measure. I would therefore ask the indulgence of this House for a short time-and it shall be a very short time-while I give the reasons why I intend to give this Bill my full and hearty support. I do not intend to follow the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sam. Hughes) who has just spoken through his long and rambling speech. He has gone all over the United States, he has gone all over the British Isles, he has gone through the provinces of Ontario, Quebec and Manitoba and he has dealt with almost every subject under the sun except those subjects which are mentioned in the Bill which we are now discussing. I intend to discuss the subjects which are mentioned in this Bill. During the discussion that has taken place, so far I have noticed 1
on the part of almost everybody who has spoken a desire to make this a school question. I do not wish for one moment to minimize the importance of the school clauses of this Bill. On the contrary, I would say that they are very Important. The education of the youth of any country is of the first importance, but this is only one of the subjects dealt with by this Bill and there are others of equal, and to my mind as a representative of that western country of even greater importance. Mr. Speaker, I notice that hon. members from other provinces, especially from the province of Ontario, seem to take a tremendous interest in that particular question. I am very glad to see that hon. members do not treat this question from a local standpoint, but I would think that when the people of the Northwest Territories are satisfied It ought to be pretty good ground why the people of the other provinces should also be satisfied.
Some time ago, before this Bill was read a second time, the hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. R. L. Borden) was very anxious to have the matter discussed, and so was the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Foster), and we "heard a great deal about dissension in the government ranks from the hon. member for North Toronto. But, Mr. Speaker, we do not hear very much about that now. Why ? Because the right hon. Prime Minister of this country (Sir Wilfrid Laurier), Is coming before the country and before this House with this Bill with practically a solid support behind his back. _ We do not hear anything about dissension now simply because when the hon. leader of the opposition came down to the second reading of the Bill he was not able to say that he was leading the opposition. He said that he was leading himself and that was all he was doing because every hon. member behind him was going his own way. The members from the Northwest have been criticised, and criticised very severely, especially before the second reading of this Bill, by the hon. member for North Toronto. We were told we were simply a flock of sheep, that we were dumb, that we had been muzzled, that we had been told by the right hon. Prime Minister to get out of the House so that we would not be called upon to say anything

This was before the second reading of the Bill. He apparently was fishing for information and on that occasion he seemed to be endeavouring to show lion* members on the other side of the House how better he could fish than the hon. leader of the opposition who was sitting beside him. He criticised us very severely and while he was calling us dumb followers I could not help thinking that it would have been well for him if some kind friend had put a muzzle on him on some occasions in the past so that he would not have been in the position that he is in to-day of having his old leader in the other House giving the

correct record of some of the things that had taken place and putting him in the very awkward position before the people of the country of having given an incorrect statement of the facts. On that occasion he also told us that he had great pity fbr the Northwest Territories-no Minister of the Interior, not a friend in the government and all the members from the Northwest dumb and muzzled. Within five minutes after making that assertion he made the assertion that the terms granted to the Territories by these Bills were so good, were so liberal, were so magnanimous that they would bring every other province knocking at the door of the Dominion for better terms. If the Northwest Territories had not any member in the government and had not any friends in the government and if the Northwest members did not do anything to help the Territories, they have not fared very badly according to that bon. gentleman.
On that occasion he was very anxious that the portfolio of the Interior should be filled and, Mr. Speaker, I just want to say that he is not half as sorry as the members from the Northwest Territories are that the bon. member for Brandon (Mr. Sifton) is no longer the Minister of the Interior. Why ? Simply because we members from the west know better than any other class of men in this country just what the Northwest Territories and what Canada has lost by that bon. gentleman not being a member of the government. I had the pleasure of going to that western country in 1878, just in the month that Sir John Macdonald came into power, and I know what the conditions were. We know what their rule was for eighteen long years. We saw the Canadian Pacific Railway built through that country, we saw thousands and millions of dollars expended, we saw thousands and thousands of workmen brought into that country and we saw hundreds of thousands of dollars expended per annum in bringing in immigrants. What was the result ? The government of Sir John Macdonald spent money with a lavish band in bringing in immigrants but they passed laws and regulations of such a nature and carried them out in such a manner that they drove the people out of the country. That was the result of their administration for eighteen long years. But, in 1896 a brighter day dawned for Canada and especially for the Northwest Territories and if ever the right hon. leader of the government did one good day's work for Canada he did it on the day that he appointed the Hon. Clifford Sifton as the member of his cabinet representing the Northwest Territories. What has taken place since that day about eight years ago ? The whole history and the whole development of that country have undergone a change and you would not know the west now comparing it with what it was eight years ago.
Just to give an instance that can be readily understood by every hon. member of the Mr. TURRIFF.
House, I may say that at that time we had four members iu this House from the Northwest Territories. In 1901, when the census was taken, we were entitled to six members, and I have no doubt that the House of Commons here thought they were doing a very generous act, as in fact they were, when they gave us ten members instead of six. But, if we had representation by population in this House the Northwest Territories would be represented by not ten members but by fifteen. Whatever advantage has been obtained for the Northwest in the past has been brought about largely by the active and energetic work of the ex-Minister of the Interior. And, Sir, I am sure I will meet with the approval of every member from the west when I say, that nothing would please us better than if it could happen that the Hon. Mr. Sifton were again to take up his portfolio. I believe every member from the west will agree with me that we have not another man who is in the same class as he is, as regards ability for carrying on that work in the west and benefiting the country generally.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh.


John Gillanders Turriff: The hon. member for South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean) may point over to this side of the House, but I venture to say that neither the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) nor the hon. member for West Assiniboia (Mr. Scott), or any other man from the west will for a moment disagree with me, when I say, that there is no other man in the Liberal party, or in the Conservative party either, in the west, or in any other part of Canada, who is able to take the place of Mr. Sifton as a representative of the west-not even the hon. member for South York. (Mr. W. F. Maclean).


Mr.  W. F.@: MACL'EAN. Why is he not here to-night to accept your compliment ?


John Gillanders Turriff: I would say further, that the hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Sifton) is too young a man and too able a man that Canada should lose his services. It is our hope, we Liberals at all events, that the country will be able to avail itself of his services before long, and that in the interests of the whole Dominion of Canada we shall long retain him. When the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Foster) was recently fishing for information, he talked about dangling the portfolio of the Interior, and sena-torships, before the members from the Northwest in order to get their support for this Bill. Let me tell him that there is no member from the west who is not supporting this Bill on its merits, and the hon. gentleman (Mr. Foster) went very far astray when he made the assertion to -which I have referred. But, of course, he ought to know ; he has been in the government and he has been out of the government and he went back into the government and he probably

is in a first-class position to say that cabinet positions are the price for men supporting certain measures ; but in the present instance X can tell him that such a thing does not exist.
In dealing with the provisions contained in this Bill, I shall first take up the question of the division of the Territories into two provinces. When we had our first interview with the Prime Minister, and I was asked whether I favoured one or two provinces, my reply was that I favoured two provinces. But I want to say, with all due respect to the Right Hon. Sir Wilfrid Lau-rier, that even if he to-day wanted to extend the province of Manitoba west, he could not do it and there is nobody else in this country who can do it. The people in the Northwest Territories-in eastern Assiniboia especially, and my constituency runs for 144 miles along the boundary of Manitoba- would not tolerate it. Talk about agitation -there has been no agitation whatever in the west over this school question, but if this government or any other government or any power on earth tried to coerce us into the province of Manitoba, you would see an agitation that wTould be remembered. The first mistake that was made in defining the boundaries of the province of Manitoba was made by the Conservative government. These gentlemen opposite now endeavour to put the blame on this government or on the leader of this government for not extending the province of Manitoba, but the real blame rests with the government of Sir John A. Macdonald. During the years between 1884 and 1890 many of us were in favour of extending Manitoba away up west to Moosejaw, and the matter was discussed not only among the settlers, but among the more prominent politicians of that territory. When a brighter day dawned in 1896, and wre thought that possibly we would be able to have this mistake of the Conservative government remedied, as well as a great many other mistakes of theirs, the matter was discussed very fully in the west, and a year or two afterwards the Prime Minister of Manitoba was invited to East Assiniboia to discuss the question. A meeting was held at Indian Head and Mr. Roblin advocated his case, and Mr. Haul-tain, one of his own political friends, took the other side. And, because the Hon. Mr. Roblin got the worst of the debate he lost his temper a little bit, and with some of those characteristics of his that we in the west are familiar with, he undertook to threaten the people of East Assiniboia and the .people of the Northwest as to what would happen if we did not agree to join the province of Manitoba. He told us that if we persisted in remaining a part of Manitoba, tnen Manitoba would regulate our freight rates and would not allow us to build railroads across that province, thus endeavouring to coerce us into joining with Manitoba. On that occasion, for ever was lost the chance
of the eastern portion of the Northwest Territories joining the province of Manitoba, because we would not be coerced then and we will not be coerced now. That was, however, only a sentimental reason. We objected to being annexed to any province which would elect as prime minister a man who harboured the thought, that because we did not agree with him he would coerce us by increasing our freight rates and preventing us from building railroads. But, if we objected on that ground, we objected ten times more to being annexed to a province which would elect a premier, who having harboured such a thought had not any more sense than to give expression to it. There is another and a far greater reason why we object now to being annexed to the province of Manitoba, and it is this : We in the Northwest Territories are being formed into new provinces, without any debt, and we are getting a large debt allowance. [DOT] The province of Manitoba had in 1898 liabilities amounting to about $7,000,-C00 ; but since that time those liabilities have been increased to nearly $30,000,000. The province of Manitoba has given guarantees to one railway company alone to the extent of between $19,000,000 and $20,000,000. So that it would be absurd to suppose that the people of the Northwest Territories would desire to join with the people of Manitoba, with these great liabilities resting upon them.. Even during the last session of the Manitoba legislature guarantees amounting to some' $2,000,000 or $3,000,000 were given to the same railway company, one of which was for terminals in the city of Winnipeg. Did anybody ever hear of such a thing in the Dominion of Canada before ? You may search the legislation of any other province in the Dominion. and you will not find such a thingJ I noticed in the Bill that passed through the legislature that there was also a guarantee of bonds for $10,000 a mile on an old track seven miles long running into a gravel pit from one of the branch lines of the same railway. These are the ways in which the province of Manitoba is piling up its. liabilities, and this is the reason we would not listen to the proposition of that province to enlarge its boundaries westward. So that if the province of Manitoba is not enlarged towards the west, it is not the fault of the Prime Minister of the Dominion. The members from the west are prepared to take the responsibility of standing in the way of that extension. A little while ago two of the Manitoba ministers were down here, and one of the reasons they gave why Manitoba should have all the country north was that it had always governed that country. That is not a proper statement of the ease. It is true, the Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba had jurisdiction there ; but he was paid out of the Dominion treasury for all the expenditure in connection with

that unorganized territory. They also claimed that the magistrates ot Manitoba had jurisdiction there. They had ; but the magistrates of the Northwest Territories had equal jurisdiction. The people of the Northwest have no objection to the province of Manitoba being extended to the north. In fact, they think that right and proper, and will not stand in the way. But if the province of Manitoba wants to get all the territory to the north of Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec, and if the people of Ontario and Quebec are satisfied that their hinterland should go to Manitoba, well and good ; there will be no objection raised by the people of Saskatchewan. But a portion of the old district of Saskatchewan has been left out of the proposed province of Saskatchewan, and has 'been left in the unorganized territory, and oil that territory we have not relinquished our claim. There arc a number of settlers there who have a right to be consulted ; and we propose when the time comes, to make a claim to have our province extended to Hudson bay. We also want a port on Hudson bay. The Territories have far more interest in the Hudson bay route than the province of Manitoba can have. If you take a point in the centre of the wheat-growing portion of Manitoba, you will find that it is as near to navigation on Lake Superior as it is to Hudson bay ; but when you take the centre of the wheat-growing portion of tile Northwest Territories, you will find that a line drawn from there to Port Arthur or Port William is nearly double the length of a line from the same point to a port on Hudson bay. Not that I think it makes much difference whether that port happens to be in the province of Manitoba or in any oilier province. I do not agree with the remarks made by the premier of Manitoba on that subject at all. At the same time, that part of Hudson bay is nearer to our province ; and as there is an immense coast line there, there will be plenty of room for each of the provinces-Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec and Saskatchewan- to have a good sea frontage on Hudson bay.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: It' I understand the hon. member correctly, he is showing the importance to the Northwest Territories of having a port on Hudson bay. The Bill does not provide for that; and yet I understood tlie hon. gentleman to say that the people of the Northwest were perfectly satisfied with tlie Bill.


John Gillanders Turriff: What I said was that a part of the old district of Saskatchewan had been left out of the new province of Saskatchewan ; it has not been given to Manitoba, but has been attached to" the unorganized district of Keewatin ; and, when the time comes, which was foreshadowed by the Prime Minister, when Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba and Saskatchewan will be


John Gillanders Turriff: consulted, we will make our claim to have our boundary extended to the shores of Hudson bay.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Why do you not do it now ?


John Gillanders Turriff: For one reason, because we are running this thing now. When my hon. friend, after doing penance for another ten or fifteen years, may come back to power, he will have the pleasure of doing things as he has done in the past.
Mr. iSPROULE. Not if he has lived on the pap of office, as the hon. gentleman has done under the present administration.


John Gillanders Turriff: Well, I lived for five years under a government salary, and I never worked as hard in my life as I did during those five years, and I never in my life earned money better than I did then. What is more, I gave good value for the money that was paid me. I was paid $3,000 a year for doing well the work that the man appointed by the hon. gentleman's government was paid $5,000 for doing badly. I did more work in one year than he ever did in five. It comes with ill grace from the hon. member to accuse me of living on government pap. I never lived on government pap. I worked for my money. I was offered the position and refused it ; I was offered it a second time and accepted it; and I resigned it of my own free will, and against the wishes of the Minister of the Interior.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: A man who writes his own certificates of character is extremely modest.


John Gillanders Turriff: The hon. member for Marquette (Mr. W. ,T. Roche) took a fling at (lie ex-Minister of the Interior because he had not said anything about the extension of tlie boundaries of Manitoba. The ex-Minister of the Interior knows better than the hon. member for Marquette that the rights of the province of Manitoba are absolutely safe in the hands of the right hon. gentleman who leads the government at the present time, and that it was not necessary for him to have anything at all to say about that. The other day, when the hon. member for Calgary (Mr. M. S. McCarthy) was criticising the government for the manner in which it divided the country into two provinces, he claimed that the line of division should have been sixty miles further east. It seems to me that my hon. friend is a great deal more anxious to favour the district of Calgary than to get a proper dividing line. He said himself that the only difference in the areas was about 8,000 square miles, whereas if you put the dividing line sixty miles further east the difference would be
75,000	square miles. Well, I do not think that if you were to try for a month, you would get a more reasonable and fair di-

riding line than tlie fourth meridian. It is a well-known line, and in that respect more acceptable than any of the lines between the different ranges. One of the reasons advanced by my hon. friend was that this dividing line.would not include all the ranching country in the western province ; but, Sir, the ranching country extends right down to the province of Manitoba. I have in my own constituency, within thirty or forty miles of Manitoba, dozens of men who have made their living the last fifteen or twenty years in ranching- men who do not grow any grain, but depend solely on the raising of cattle, and whose cattle are let loose all summer and branded just as they are up in southern Alberta. So that if the hon. gentleman wanted to make the western province wide enough to take in all the ranches, he would have had to bring it down to the borders of Manitoba. In addition, let me say that, from my knowledge of the country, gained in the course of twenty-seven years' residence there, during six years of which I was Commissioner of Dominion Lands, the two new provinces are about as nearly equal as any one could wish, not only in area, but in their capacity for supporting population. To prove that, all I need say is this, that the different railway companies which had the right to select railway lands all over that country, have selected 13,000,000 of acres in the proposed province of Saskatchewan and 12,000,000 in the proposed province of Alberta ; and, from my own knowledge, I know they would have selected a good deal less in Saskatchewan and more ill Alberta, were it not for the fact that there are more railways under construction in the new province of Saskatchewan than in its twin sister Alberta, so that the lands in the former, though in some respects not as good as in the latter, are on that account more saleable. In the two provinces, therefore, the area of grain-growing land is about equal. In addition, we must not lose sight of the fact that the province of Alberta has the greatest deposit of coal of any country in the world. I do not think that even British Columbia has as great coal deposits as are to be found in Alberta. Wherever you go into the Rocky mountains, from the American boundary right up to the Peace river pass, vast deposits of coal have been discovered. Right in the Crow's Nest pass there are seams of from ten to seventy feet in thickness of bituminous coal, and for hundreds of miles we find large deposits of coal right up to Edmonton, the Peace river pass, so that outside the agricultural wealth of that country, you will have in the years to come large settlements growing up all along the Rockies owing to the coal industries there. All along the Rockies, especially north of the main line of the Canadian Pacific Railway, there are also thousands of miles of valuable spruce and fir now beginning to he exploited, so that in a few years that country will
be able to supply all the timber required by the settlers in the prairie country and in the east. So that, although the proposed province of Alberta may have from 0,000 to
8.000	miles less of area than its twin sister Saskatchewan, the deficiency is more than made up by its coal deposits and timber limits. In making this comparison, I am not taking into consideration the great Peace river country. I do not know personally what that country may be. I have heard reports good and bad about it ; but I want to say this, that after an experience of twenty-seven years, I have come to the conclusion that there is no one part of the Northwest, from the boundaries of Manitoba to the Rocky mountains, which does not turn out better than expected the more we learn about it. I have found that to be the invariable result. In that district where I have lived many years, the Moose mountain country, I remember fifteen years ago the people of Manitoba said you could not grow any wheat, because it was too dry, yet there is no finer wheat-growing- country in the Territories to-day. Why, in the first few years of grain-growing around Regina, there was more wheat sown than was reaped, and yet there is to-day no finer wheat country than the immense plain around that city. Only ten years ago, if I were asked myself if wheat could be grown in southern Alberta, I would have said no ; but what is the case to-day ? We have thousands and thousands of acres of the finest wheat-growing there every year. In fact, all over the country you will find that the more you learn about it the better it turns out. There are vast stretches in the new province of Alberta which, a few years ago, were looked upon as suitable only for ranching, but which will be producing good crops of wheat every year within a very short period. In that whole country of Saskatchewan and Alberta there is not an acre, generally speaking, which, if not adapted for wheat-growing, is not good for cattle or the grazing of horses, so that there is practically not a waste acre in all that country.
I should like to say a few'words on the financial question. That, I notice, is a matter which has scarcely been touched by hon. members opposite, but which is nevertheless of great importance to us in the Territories. In my opinion, the government has started us out very fairly. In fact, thq hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Poster) said that all the other provinces would be knocking at the door of the federal administration because of the good terms we had received. On that point I do not agree with him, because, in my judgment, we are being given pretty much the same terms as were granted the other provinces. Each of our new provinces is to get $50,000 for civil government. The province of Ontario gets $80,000, Quebec $70,000 and the lower provinces, with the exception of Prince Edward Island, get $50,000 each. So that I do not see any

ground for complaint in that respect. We get a debt allowance on our population the same as is given the other provinces, so that there is no ground of complaint there. We get a per capita allowance of 80 cents on our population up to 800,000. There might perhaps be some criticism of that arrangement, because the lower provinces, Manitoba and British Columbia only get a per capita grant up to a population of 400,000, whereas Ontario gets it based on a population of 1,400,000 and Quebec on a population a little less. These two provinces get it on the population they had when they entered confederation. I do not think, however, that there can be any reasonable ground for criticism because our limit of population has been increased to
800.000	while some of the other provinces had theirs left at 400,000. They came into confederation some thirty-seven years ago, and it has'taken all these years for them to get up to the limit of population. Nova Scotia is the only province of the three that has passed the limit, and it is only by a narrow margin. So that the limitation of population on which we receive 80c. per capita will be reached in our province in very much less time than thirty-seven years; in fact, we expect that in a few years we shall have reached that population. I, for one, have never been able to understand why this limit has been placed on any of the provinces; I cannot see whv that 80c. per capita should not be paid to each of the provinces on their aetua1 population. Every additional inhabitant coming into these provinces pay, roughly speaking, $10 yearly into the revenues of the Dominion government; and I do not know any good reason why 80c. of that should not go back to the province for the carrying on of provincial work, and if, in the future the other provinces shall make a demand on this government to have that per capita grant paid on their actual population, I should think they would be within their rights, and also that the Dominion would be perfectly justified in granting that demand. And I am sure that the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan would take exactly the same view in asking that the per capita grant be made on the actual population of each province. I believe that in this matter there is not much to complain of. Now, as to what we get in lieu of our lands -which, I suppose, is what the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Foster) was referring to. I, for one, am perfectly satisfied with the arrangement made. I think it is a better arrangement than to have handed over the lands to the provinces. That was made clear by the hon. member from Edmonton (Mr. Oliver), who showed with absolute clearness that the ideas of the two governments, the provincial and the Dominion, would be absolutely different, that if the lands were handed over to the provinces they must use them for the purpose of producing immediate revenue, whereas by


John Gillanders Turriff: keeping the lands in the hands of the Dominion government they would be used rather to fill up the country and not necessarily for the taking of the last dollar out of the lands. But, if the Dominion government should decide to change their policy and dispose of the odd sections, keeping the even sections absolutely for the poor man's homestead, if they should decide to sell the lands for instance, as they sell their school lands, they will eventually accumulate a fund from these lauds the interest on which will pay the subsidy they are giving to the provinces in lieu of the lands. So, it appears to me, it is a goo d arrangement for the province and a good arrangement for the Dominion. It is a particularly good arrangement for the provinces iu this respect, that the revenue is a net revenue, the provinces have no expenses in connection with the administration of the lands, and it is a revenue that grows with the increase of population. We only get the full revenue from the lands when wo have a population of 1,200,000 in each of these provinces. So, having it in this shape, I think the people of the Northwest can congratulate themselves upon having received fair and handsome treatment at the hands of the Dominion government, and that the Dominion government has also made a bargain that is absolutely justifiable. I am pleased to say that there has been very little criticism in connection with this phase of the matter. One thing I might point out is that there is no danger of the public domain, the source of revenue, being-squandered. Now, I would not for a moment allow that the people of the Northwest Territories are not as well able to look after their own affairs as are any other people in the Dominion. But there is this fact that we must all acknowledge-that in the past the different railway companies have managed to get bonuses and guarantees out of practically every province in the Dominion. I cannot say how it is in Prince Edward Island, but I know how it is in every other province in the Dominion. Take, for instance, the province of Manitoba. As I said a little while ago they have gone security for between $19,000,000 and $20,000,000 for one railway company alone. That railway may be all right, but we know what the history of railway companies has been. There Is always a chance of that liability being called upon. We know what British Columbia has done in giving away large tracts of land and coal and timber bonuses to railways. We know what the lower provinces and Quebec and Ontario have given in cash or guarantees. And we know that the Northwest Territories have been for years getting hundreds of miles of railways throughout its length and breadth without the cost of a single dollar to the province in any way ; and if the people of the Territories will have -the sense to stand firm and not give any grants to the railway

companies they will get the railways built just as well and just as quickly and just as nearly where they want them as if they were giving guarantees or cash bonuses to the railway companies. So, these provinces are starting out with everything in their favour, and here I wish to say that the government as conducted in the Northwest Territories for many years past by Mr. Haultain has been in every respect a good and satisfactory government for the Northwest Territories. And I have no doubt that whoever may be called upon to carry on the government in the new provinces will carry it on in the same' manner; but, not owning their own lands, they will not have the same temptation, and they will not have these magnates after them every day trying to get bonuses and guarantees as would be the case if the provinces were the owners of the public lands. I notice now that hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House are very anxious to hand over the lands to the governments of the new provinces. But what has been the record of these hon. gentlemen? When the province of Manitoba asked for its own lands, these gentlemen refused. If they were so anxious to conserve the lands of the Northwest Territories for the people of these Territories, why did they give away to railroads millions and millions of acres of those lands? I do not say so much about the land grant given to the Canadian Pacific Railway, for in those days it was difficult to get a road built through that part of the country, because we did not know it as well as we do now. But, since then, millions of acres of lands in the Northwest have been given away as bonuses for the building of railways in Manitoba. If hon. gentlemen on the other side are so anxious as they appear to be to conserve the lands of the Northwest Territories for the people of those Territories, why did they act in that manner? It comes with a bad grace from hon. gentlemen opposite to talk of handing over the lands to the people of' the Northwest when they themselves gave away millions of acres of the choicest of our lands to railway companies. We in the Northwest Territories, in addition, must pay our share of the cash bounties given to railways in every part of the country.
Now, I said when I started that I would be only a short time, and I am going to try and keep my word. I wish now to deal very briefly with the school question. As I said before, I think this question has been given a great deal too much prominence. And I want to say that I believe the reason why we have an agitation of any kind is absolutely from the lack <yt knowledge on the part of the people in the east of the class of schools which we have in the Northwest Territories.
I believe if every Protestant clergyman in Canada and every newspaper editor knew the class of schools we have to-day in the
Northwest Territories, this agitation would cease. We have heard this question discussed week in and week out, I have listened to it hour after hour, and it has all been about separate schools. Well, Mr. Speaker, I am aware that among Protestants we have been accustomed for the past fifteen or twenty years to think of a separate school as something very bad. But whatever the separate schools may be in Ontario, or may have been in the province of Manitoba, or in the Northwest Territories in former days, we are not dealing with that class of schools at the present time. Bet us deal with separate schools such as they exist in the Northwest Territories at the present day, and I am satisfied that if their true character were known this agitation would drop at once. But I do not think that is the object of a good many, it is not the object of some hon. members on the other side of this House, their object is to keep up the agitation in order to make some political capital out of it. As one hon. gentleman opposite said to me the other day : You fellows came in on this question before, and we are coming in on it now. And judging by the actions of hon. gentlemen opposite, it looks very much as if he were right.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: If that logic is correct, the government is going to burst up.


John Gillanders Turriff: That is what one of the hon. gentleman's own supporters said.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: And the hon. gentleman says it looks as if he were right.


John Gillanders Turriff: I said it looked as if the hon. member for East Grey and his friends were keeping up the agitation for that purpose-that is what I meant to say.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I desire to tell the hon. gentleman that there is not one word of truth in that. The hon. member for East Grey stood exactly for the same principle in 1896, and fought in company with gentlemen who occupy the Treasury benches to-day for the same principle, and he is standing by it still.


John Gillanders Turriff: I know this, that the hon. member for East Grey has gone out of his way to agitate the people in the Northwest Territories.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: That is not so.


John Gillanders Turriff: I know he has had printed petition forms sent out to the Northwest Territories to be signed and sent back to him, in opposition to separate schools.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: No, not at all.


John Gillanders Turriff: Well, he mentioned separate schools in those petitions.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Not a word. Allow me to correct the hon. gentleman, there is not a word in them about separate schools.


John Gillanders Turriff: Well, that is exactly what I object to, that the hon. gentlemen

have not the courage to come out and say what they mean, they are hiding behind the rock of the constitution, so that when an election comes on they can go into the province of Quebec and say : We voted against the government because the government was not going far enough, was not giving you the separate schools you were entitled to under the constitution ; then they can go into the province of Ontario and say : We voted against the government because we wanted to leave the new provinces the power to do what they pleased, as the member for Jacques Cartier (Mr. Monk) said the other day, so that they may wipe out the last vestige of the rights given under the Act of 1875. That is what I object to-these hon. gentlemen have not the courage to come out openly and say what they mean. We, on this side of the House, say what we propose to do, and if we are doing wrong we can be punished for it. But bon. gentlemen opposite don't want to take that position, they want to hide behind the constitution.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: What did his leader say about standing on the constitution ? What was he hiding behind ?


John Gillanders Turriff: Yes, my leader said he was standing on the constitution, the leader of the hon. gentleman said he was standing on the constitution, while the hon. member for Jacques Cartier said the constitution was altogether a different thing from what his leader had described it. Mr. Haul-tain says the constitution means something else ; and our friends opposite quote Mr. Christopher Robinson's opinion which shows a still further difference. Now, I do not pretend to know anything about constitutional law, and the only difference between myself and the great lawyers on the other side of the House is that while I do not know anything about constitutional law, I am well aware of the fact. Now, Sir, there has not heen a single word said by hon. gentlemen opposite about separate schools iu the Northwest since this discussion started, and I propose to say something about them. I know what they have heen for a long time back. Over twenty years ago I was a member of the Territorial legislature when the first school ordinance was passed in 1884, passed under the Northwest Territories Act of 1875. Previously. to 1892 we had a system of separate schools, the same kind of schools they had in the province of Manitoba. Those schools were not satisfactory,; everybody knows that; they were not even satisfactory to our Roman Catholic friends and ratepayers. They were not satisfied with the class of schools given them, and were as anxious to have them changed as anybody else. In the year 1892 the local legislature, under Mr. Haultain, changed the old system, and from that year up to the present day there lias not been one word of protest heard against the schools from the people of the Northwest Territories, Mr. TURRIFF
no protest has been made either to the local legislature or to this government. If that school system had not been satisfactory, do you think, Mr. Speaker, there would not have been an agitation ? Don't you think the Northwest people would have been appealing to this House ? The people of the Northwest are accustomed at all times to kick vigorously when they think that things are not right.
The people of the Northwest Territories are accustomed to kick very vigorously to the Northwest legislature if things are not right, and I want to say again that since 1892, since the present law was passed, there has never been a word of complaint from Protestants or Catholics or from the Northwest government in any shape or form, or any statement that the law was not a good one. I say that the law as it exists in the Northwest Territories to-day-and it is the only law that we are putting in force-is the most satisfactory law that you can get, because we have proof of it in the fact that it has been in force for thirteen years without ever a complaint having been made. What does that law give them ? As tbe hon. member for Jacques Cartier (Mr. Monk) stated the other day, if church schools were what were given to tbe Roman Catholics in the Northwest Territories by the Act of 1875, there is only a small vestige of them left, and for this reason : That the separate Catholic school in the Northwest, or the public Catholic school-it does not matter much which -is to all intents and purposes a public school. It is exactly the same as a public school. The teachers of the Roman Catholic separate school must attend the same normal school and get the same certificates exactly as the teachers in the public schools. The school has to be inspected /before (any grant can be paid, by a public school inspector. The only difference is that in the first and second readers the text is a little different, but even these books have to be authorized by the Minister of Education. There is no church or clerical control in any shape, form or manner over the Catholic separate schools of the Northwest Territories to-day. They are all under the control of the local legislature, every one of them, and the only difference-and it is not much of a difference either, because the public schools have the same right if they choose to use it-is that between half-past three o'clock in the afternoon and four, they may impart religious instruction. Now, I am going to ask in this Canada of ours, in this British colony, in this country that is supposed to take its institutions from our mother 'country, front that mother country where they are liberal and broad-minded, if there is a Protestant amongst us who would say that he would do away with the right of our Roman Catholic friends in their own schools to teach their children and

to give them religious instruction if they so desire for half an hour after half past three o'clock ? I represent a constituency, which, while it is not the largest in area, is one of the most populous districts in the Northwest. In my district they have 234 schools, and I do not believe there is one per cent of the people in that country who will object or ever did object to their Roman Catholic fellow citizens giving half an hour's religious instruction in their own schools if they so desire. When this matter is explained to the people of the Northwest Territories, when they understand that no change is being made, that this is simply carrying into effect and continuing the existing state of affairs that they have brought about by the ordinances that they have themselves passed and that they have worked under for the last thirteen years, when they find out that this is all that is being done, you will not be able to get up an agitation against the continuance of that state of affairs. I want to say here that personally I am not in favour of separate schools. 1 think it would be better if all the children went to the public schools, but these separate schools in the Northwest Territories are so near public schools that I do not tjiink it is worth while making any trouble over it. It must be remembered that this is not a Catholic country, that it is not a Protestant country, but that it is a country in which Catholics and Protestants live together and in which there are nearly as many Catholics as Protestants, and I say that it would be beneath the generosity, to put it on no other ground, of the Protestant majority, after making the school a good school, a public school in every respect, to turn around and say :	Because we have
fifty-eight per cent of the population and you have only forty-two per cent we will not allow you even to impart half an hour's religious instruction to your children after half past three, before they go home. A great deal of the argument that has been addressed to the House from the other side lias been against separate schools. I do not wish to make very much use of the arguments presented by hon. gentlemen from this side of the House, but I think the point made by my hon. friend from Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) is worth emphasizing, and that was that if there was any objection to separate schools by hon. members on the other side of the House, why have they not during the last twenty years come forward and had the Northwest Territories Act of 1875 amended ? It was open to hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House, but no, they had nothing at all to say about it, they left it exactly as it was, but now, when action is being taken in the Northwest, they come forward with the argument against separate schools, not the schools that exist in the Northwest Territories, because we have no ecclesiastical 122
i or clerical schools there, but they bring forward all the arguments that can be to separate schools in other parts of Canada, and they argue as if they applied to the Northwest Territories, and as I said before all for the purpose of trying to get into power in this question and for no other purpose whatever. The schools we have in the Northwest Territories, I will venture to say, are absolutely satisfactory to 95 per cent of the whole population, both Catholic and Protestant. As I stated the other night when my hon. friend from West Assiniboia (Mr. Scott) was speaking, I held thirty-nine meetings during the campaign. At every one of these meetings the question of provincial autonomy was discussed and a number of these meetings were held in the school-houses and at no meeting from the beginning to the end did any man, Roman Catholic or Protestant, mention the subject of separate schools. Why ? Because they were perfectly satisfied with the school system that exists. Just to show the House that many of the people there are not aware of the fact that there are any separate schools-there are only nine Roman Catholic separate schools in working order in the Northwest Territories today-since the question' has been up for discussion I received a letter from a prominent	gentleman in my constituency asking me to vote against separate schools and for the continuance of th* present satisfactory system of schools that exists in the Northwest Territories. I may say, further, that the only separate school that is in working order in my constituency out of over 200 is almost at this gentleman's door. It is near his own town where he lives. So, you will see that the school system we have in the northwest Territories is absolutely satisfactory to the people there. I know the argument is made :	Why not
trust the people of the Northwest ? Well,
I would be very glad to do that, because I think that they would not change the system we have. Mr. Haultain has stated that if he were a dictator to-morrow he would not change the system. When Mr. Haultain prepared his draft Bill what did he do ? Mr. Haultain proposed in that draft Bill to give the Roman Catholic minority separate schools as they existed under the Act of 1875 and prior to 1892. He put that down in plain black and white in his draft Bill, and no gentleman on the other side of the House can contradict the assertion. After preparing that Bill, Mr. Haultain appealed to the country, and he was returned because the people of the Territories were satisfied with the school system. When Mr. Haultain passed his ordinance in 1892, he was not at all certain, (and other members of the legislature shared his uncertainty! that the passage of the ordinance did not exceed his powers. However, the fact that the law of 1892 has since remained in force



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is some evidence that it was not passed in excess of the powers conferred on the legislature. At all events the school law of the Territories as it exists to-day Is absolutely a school law that has been given to the people by their own representatives in their own legislature. It has been absolutely satisfactory, and if the people of Canada, especially the people of Ontario, knew just exactly what that school system is, there would be no complaint against it. I ask the people of Ontario to leave it to the people of the Northwest, and if the people of the Northwest, through their local legis-. lature and through their members in ibis parliament are satisfied with the existing conditions-and I think these conditions are about as nearly right as you can possibly get them-then, what necessity is there for the people of Ontario agitating the question ?	,
We have heard a good deal about education in the province of Quebec. I was born and brought up and lived in that province until I reached the age of manhood. What education I received in school I received at a public school in a small Scottish settlement surrounded by French Canadians and Roman Catholics for a hundred miles east and west. To that school down there we paid our own taxes, we paid not one cent of taxes to any other school, and the Roman Catholic majority left us absolutely free to do just as we liked. I don't forget that.
Thomas Walter Scott: You had autonomy ?


Ur TURRIFF.: Yes, the Protestant minority had full autonomy there. There was the greatest tolerance towards us ; intolerance I never saw in any shape or form in that province. Would it not be very small on the part of us Protestants because we are in the majority in the Northwest Territories. that we should not give some freedom to the Roman Catholic minority. The member for west Assiniboia has pointed out that when the Act of 1875 was passed in this parliament its intention was as much to protect Protestants as to protect Roman Catholics. because at that date uobody knew whether the majority in the Northwest was going to be Protestant or going to be Roman Catholic. And, because the Protestants now happen to be in the majority, are we going to deprive the Roman Catholic minority of the protection which the federal parliament in its wisdom gave to the minority ? Although the Act of 1875 was passed by a Liberal government it was assented to unanimously by every member of the Conservative party then in opposition. I am not well versed in constitutional law, but there is this that cannot be denied : that from 1875 to the present day the Roman Catholic minority have had the right to have separate schools in the Territories. I believe that their rights were diminished by the ordinance of Mr. TURRIFF.
1892, but at all events the minority have had the right to separate schools from 1875 to the present time. Would it be fair or would it be reasonable on our part ; when we have made these schools practically public schools, when we have eliminated all clerical and church control, when we have made these schools in every respect equal to the public schools, when we know that there our Roman Catholic children will get the same sound education they get in the public schools ; would It be fair, would it be generous to wipe out,-as the hon. member for Jacques Cartier has said-the last shred of the rights of the minority conferred upon them in 1875 ? I claim that it would be neither just nor fair, and in saying this I am voicing the sentiments of my constituents with possibly the exception of an odd man here and there, and that only because during the last month or so efforts have been made to make the people believe that we are now fastening a system of separate schools on them. If I understand the matter aright, what we are doing is fastening a system of public schools on the Territories, and we are making it clear that if the Conservatives come into power ten or fifteen years from now, they will not be able to do to the Territories what they tried to do to the province of Manitoba. The hon. member for Victoria (Mr. Sam. Hughes) said that the class of immigrants coming into this country were chiefly noted for ignorance, dirt and tilth, I have had something to do with the immigrants coming into Canada for the past few years, and I know whereof I speak. 1 presume the hon. gentleman did not refer to the immigrants from the British Isles or from the United States, but I can say


Thomas Simpson Sproule: The hon. member (Mr. Turriff) is doing the member for Victoria an injustice. The member for Victoria (Mr. Sam. Hughes) referred to the immigration coming to the United States for years and years, and he pointed out what the system of schools in that country had accomplished in the fusion of the races.


John Gillanders Turriff: I would be the last man in the House to misrepresent a member, and especially in his absence. As I could not hear the hon. gentleman very well from the seat which I occupied, possibly I may have misunderstood him, so that I shall not speak further on that point. Now, Mr. Speaker, I have taken up more time than I intended, but in conclusion I wish to say that I would ask hon. gentlemen opposite not to push this agitation further. If hon. gentlemen opposite think that we Liberal members from the west do not represent the sentiment of tin: people of the Northwest Territories though I claim that we do, I make this proposition to them. The Hon. Mr. Haultain is working in unison with them, is trying to help them out in every way, is doing his utmost to make this a party question in the Northwest. Let them get Mr. Haultain to call his legis-

la turf: together and test the feeling of the people of the Northwest Territories on this question. If he calls the legislature together, either as it stands at present, or with the vacant seats filled, I venture to say that he will not have a majority when he tries to make a party question out of this matter.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Could not the hon. gentlemen's friends make a better test than that by appointing a Minister of the Interior and sending him back for re-election ?


John Gillanders Turriff: The hon. the First Minister said the other day in my hearing that he would appoint a Minister of the Interior within three months ; and when that time comes, if he chooses one of the members from the Northwest Territories and he goes back for re-election, I promise you that, whoever he may be, he will come back here with a larger majority than he had on the 3rd of November last.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Let them hold this Bill until that election takes place, and see what the public sentiment is in the west.


John Gillanders Turriff: Do not be a bit alarmed about it; you will get plenty of it before you are through.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: The storm centre of alarm is further west to-day.


John Gillanders Turriff: We heard a great deal of talk like this in connection with the Grand Trunk Pacific. We were told in my constituency that we were not going to be able to save our deposit ; but what was the result ? Seven of the Liberal members on this side of the House from the Northwest have each an average majority of over 1,200 votes.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I would ask our hon. friends on the other side of the House to drop this agitation. Come down to common sense, and let us deal with the Bill that is now before parliament.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Would it not be well to give that advice to the Toronto ' Globe ' ?


John Gillanders Turriff: Let us get on with the work of the country. Let us start these new provinces without hampering them with an agitation such as hon. gentlemen opposite are trying to work up. Instead of that, let us leave them to devote their time and energies to developing the great natural resources that Providence has blessed them with, and in a short time you will see them two of the greatest and most populous, liberal and broad-minded provinces that exist in the Canadian confederacy.
Mr. URIAH WILSON moved the adjournment of the debate.


Mr. FIELDING.: In assenting to the motion, I should like to be permitted to make a remark. Although we have had numerous speeches on this question, I am advised that there are still more numerous speeches to follow, a very large number of members 122*
desiring to address the House. If that be the fact, we are likely to have a protracted debate even under the best conditions, and I j think it will be necessary for us to work a * little harder and sit a little later. Therefore, I hope that if a motion like this is hereafter made at this early hour, it may not be pressed, but we may sit a little later and get the debate finished.


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Motion agreed to, and debate adjourned.
On motion of Mr. Fielding, House adjourned at 11.20 p.m.

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Wednesday, April 5, 1905.