1917-09-10

WAR TIME ELECTIONS ACT.


[Stage Direction]
CARRIED.	[DOT]
Sir ROBERT BORDEN moved:: That the orders of the day he now read.


Sir WILFRID LAURIER:: Will the right hon. gentleman state the reason for the motion.


Robert Laird Borden: The reason is
that we desire to proceed to Order No. 22 on Government orders.


Wilfrid Laurier: The Franchise
Act?


Robert Laird Borden: Yes.


Wilfrid Laurier: It is a very
important measure. We have no objection on this side.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, and Orders of the day
read.
Robert Laird Borden: That the House do now proceed to Order No. 22 on Government Orders, resuming adjourned debate on the motion of Sir George Foster for the second reading of Bill No. 133, the War Time Elections Act.


Mr. KNOWLES:: I beg to-


Mr. SPEAKER:: This motion is not debatable.


William Erskine Knowles: By the unanimous consent of the House, I might briefly state my position in regard to the Private Bill which appears On the Order Paper, for the relief of Albert Edwin Gordon.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: The motion does not afford debate.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Sir GEORGE FOSTER moved:: That the debate upon the second reading of Bill No. 133, the War Time Elections Act, shall not be further adjourned.
The motion of Sir George Foster was carried on the following division:

Messieurs:
Armstrong (Lambton),	Morphy,
Bennett (Calgary),	Morris,
Bennett (Simcoe),	Northrup,
Best,	Paul,
Borden (Sir Robert),	Reid,
Boys,	Robidoux,
Bristol,	Roche,
Burnham,	Rogers,
Clements,	Schaffner,
Cochrane,	Scott,
Doherty,	Sevigny,
Donaldson,	Sexsmith,
Edwards,	Shepherd,
Foster (Sir George),	Stevens,
Glass,	Stewart (Hamilton),
Guthrie,	Sutherland,
Hanna,	Taylor,
Hazen,	Thompson (Yukon),
Henderson,	Thornton,
Lalor,	Tremain,
Lewis,	Walker,
Maclean, (York, O.),	Wallace,
McLean	Webster,
(Queens, P.E.I.),	White (Sir Thomas),
Meighen,	-

Messieurs:
Jameson,	Lachance,
Nicltle,	Kay,
Kemp,	Robb,
McCurdy,	Maclean, A. K.,
McLeod,	Carvell,
Marshall,	Neely,
Middlebro,	Pardee,
Morrison,	Molloy,
Munson,	Boyer,
Merner,	Martin,
Smith,	Ross,
Stanfield,	Macdonald,
Steele,	Bureau,
Stewart (Lunenburg),	McKenzie,
Thoburn,	McCrea,
White (Renfrew),	White (Victoria)
Wilson,	Wilson,
Wright,	Verville,
Weichel,	Lanctot,
Sutherland.	Papineau.


Mr. A. K. MACLEAN:: I was paired with the hon. member for Shelbnrne and Queens (Mr. McCurdy). Had I voted, I would have voted against the motion.


Mr. BURRELL:: I was paired with the hon. member for Stratihcona (Mr. Douglas). Had I voted, I would have voted for the motion.


Mr. DEVLIN:: I voted, understanding
that the member for Ottawa (Mr. Fripp) had another pair. I understand now that I have remained paired with Mr. Fripp, and I should like to recall my vote.
Chisholm,
Copp,
Devlin,
Ethier,
Fortier,
Gauvreau,
Graham,
Hughes (Kings, P.E.I.) Knowles,
Kyte,
Lapointe
(Kamouraska,)
Laurier (Sir Wilfrid), Lemieux,
Loggie,
McCraney,
Marcil (Bonaventure), Michaud,
Murphy,
Oliver,
Pacaud,
Proulx,
Pugsley,
Sinclair.-23.
PAIRS. Messieurs:


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: The hon. gentleman cannot recall ihis vote.


Mr. NEELY:: I was paired with the hon. member for East Elgin (Mr. Marshall). Had I voted, I would have voted against the motion.


Mr. BALL:: I was paired with the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Turgeon). Had I voted, I would ,have 'voted for the motion.
Ministerial.	Opposition.
Armstrong (York, O.),	Nesbitt,
Alguire,	McMillan,
Ames, Sir Herbert,	Delisle,
Arthurs,	Truax,
Ball,	Turgeon,
Barnard,	Achim,
Bowman,	Brouillard,
Boyce,	Cardin,
Brabazon,	Demers,
Bradbury,	Cruise,
Burrell,	Douglas,
Chabot,	Beland,
Champagne,	MacNutt,
Cockshutt,	Charlton,
Clark, Hugh,	German,
Cromwell,	Tobin,
Crothers,	McCoig,
Davidson,	Carroll,
Elliot,	Marcile (Bagot),
Forget,	Bickerdike,
Fripp,	Devlin,
Green,	Buchanan,
[The Speaker.]


Mr. ARTHURS:: I was paired with the hon. member for South Bruce (Mr. Truax). Had I voted, I would have voted for the motion.


Mr. BRADBURY:: I was paired with the hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Cruise). Had I voted, I would have voted for the motion.


Mr. DOUGLAS:: I was paired with the hon. member for Yale-Cariboo (Mr. Burrell). Had I voted, I would have voted against the motion.


Mr. TURRIFF:: I was not paired, and I intended to vote for tihe motion, but I was not paying attention when the vote was taken.	i .


Sir EDWARD KEMP:: I was paired with the hon. member for Huntingdon (Mr. Robb). Had I voted, I would have voted for the motion.


Mr. CROTHERS:: I was paired with the hon. member for West Kent (Mr. McCoig). Had I voted, 1 would have voted for the motion.


Mr. ELLIOTT:: I was paired with the hon. member for Bagot (Mr. Marcile). Had I voted, I would have voted against the motion.


Mr. GREEN:: I was paired with the hon. member for Lethbridge (Mr. Buchanan). Had I voted, I would have voted for the motion.


Mr. DAVIDSON:: I was paired with the hon. member for Cape Breton (Mr. Carroll). Had I voted I would have voted for the motion.


Mr. McKENZIE:: I was paired with the hon. member for Lunenburg (Mr. Stewart). Had I voted, I would have voted against the motion.


Mr. KAY:: I was paired with the hon. member for Kingston (Mr. Nickle). Had I voted, I would have voted against the motion.


Mr. THOBURN:: I was paired with the hon. member for Sherbrooke (Mr. McCrea). Had I voted, I would have voted for the motion.
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Sir George Foster (Minister of Trade and Commerce) for the second reading of Bill 133, The War-Time Elections Act.


Mr. J. H. SINCLAIR (Guysborough):: This Bill if passed will not do me any harm.
I stand to gain by it. The proposal to enfranchise the female relatives of the soldiers will probably increase my majority by a considerable amount. I have no alien citizens in my constituency, but there are Conservatives there who are fair-minded and who like to see fair play, and, if I judge them rightly, they will resent this measure. It is not giving away any secret to say that that is the feeling generally on this side of the House. We on this side of the Chamber feel that, in the step that is being taken now, the Government have over-reached themselves. There is a feeling in this country that a man should take a .fighting chance. He takes it in western Canada, and, he takes it in eastern Canada. Among the school boys in the province
from which I come the desire for fair play is almost a passion, and there is always a feeling of contempt for the man who takes a mean advantage, the man who hits below the belt.
The danger of this measure is that it lends itself to fraud. While our party stand to gain in some particulars, we stand to lose in others. The administration of this measure in some cases, no doubt, will fall into the hands of dishonest officials. The provisions of the Bill, so far as I have been able to learn, are complicated and intricate. Permit me to make a proposal, Mr. Speaker, that you should scrutinize this Bill from first to last and give me your honest opinion about it. I confess when I read it, and when I discovered the complicated provisions relating to the tied ballot which has been abandoned in western Canada, I believe, for some years, because it was notorious for the frauds brought about under it. When I saw the extraordinary power that was given to irresponsible local enumerators, and tl\e provisions relating to the soldiers' grandfathers and the Syrian Christians, I felt in my own mind: for God's sake, what kind of franchise are we going to have in this country if the Secretary of State (Mr. Meighen) continues to tamper With it, twist it and bedevil it, as he has been doing for the last two or three weeks. It reminds me, Mr. Speaker, of the German buccaneers in Southwest Africa, whose plan was to fight the British forces in the present war by poisoning all the wells. The title of the Bill is "The War-Times Elections Act." Let me suggest to the Secretary of State that he change the name, and call it "The War-Times Prussian Jun-!<er Act." The idea behind this measure is military autocracy. We, oft this side of the House, I am proud to say, stand for democracy. If hon. gentlemen opposite want autocracy, why go to all this trouble to get it. They can get it without resorting to such a measure as this. All they have to do is to hold up their hands, lay down their arms, and the Kaiser will give it to them. Military autocracy is the same wherever you find it. British military rule or Canadian military rule is not one whit better in its aim than German military rule.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


John Howard Sinclair: It is only a question of degree. We had military rule in Britain long ago. We had it in Ireland in the days of Oliver Cromwell; the memory of it exists in Ireland yet.


Mr. MURPHY:: They have it there yet.


John Howard Sinclair: We had it in .Scotland in the days of the "big killing/' when my countrymen and the countrymen of other gentlemen in this House were shot like wild beasts in the glens and hills because they insisted on their right to worship God according to the dictates of their own conscience. Thank God these days are past in the old land, and they are also past here, and, notwithstanding the puny efforts of hon. gentlemen opposite, they will never return. But it becomes necessary for ue. at this late date, 1917, to reassert the doctrine that every man has a right to have a say in the election of the representatives of the people; to have a voice in the determination of who shall govern the country in which he lives.
This Bill contains three main provisions. First, it disfranchises about a million women who live between the Ottawa river and the Pacific coast. The women of these five provinces are now entitled to vote. That is in direct violation of a resolution of this -House, moved by the Prime Minister; it is in direct violation of what every man in this House and in this country understood to be the pledge of the Prime Minister. Why was it done, Mr. Speaker? It would not have been done if the Government could profit by abstaining from it. This Government have scoured the world for votes; they have given votes to men who never saw Canada, who never set foot in Canada, and probably never will. The only explanation of their conduct in dis- [DOT] franchising the women of Canada in these five provinces is that they believe they will vote against the Government. I do not need to refer to the self-denial and fortitude of the women of Canada and the way that they have helped to carry on this war. I do not need to say that the women of Canada deserve better treatment at the hands of this Government.
The second provision of the Bill enfranchises the female relations of soldiers, both East and West. I heartily agree with that provision of the Bill. The only objection that can be made to that provision is that it is class legislation; it is not fair to those who have been left out, practically all of whom have made great sacrifices for the cause for which we all stand.
The third provision of the Bill is the most important one; it disfranchises men of alien birth. I submit that this provision is a vicious one; it is a breach of faith on the part of the Government of this country. We invited these people from northern Europe to come to Canada. We

promised them land; we promised them the rights of citizenship; we promised them protection under the flag. We boasted that we had such a thing in this country as British fair play. We assured them that Canada was the home of liberty and the refuge of the oppressed from every land. They took us at our word-and what are we doing now? We are branding them as outlaws and as perjured traitors. After three years residence and good behaviour, they came forward to take the oath of allegiance in order that they might become naturalized British subjects. Thi- is what they promised:
I do sincerely promise and swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King George V as lawful sovereign of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of the Dominion of Canada, dependent on and belonging to said kingdom, and that I will defend him to the utmost of my power against all traitorous conspiracies or attempts whatsoever which shall be made against his person, crown and dignity, and that I will do my utmost endeavours to disclose and make known to His Majesty, his heirs or successors, all treasons or traitorous conspiracies or attempts which I shall know to be against him or any of them, and all this I do swear without any equivocation, mental evasion or secret reservation. So help me, God.
They took that oath, and we have the testimony of hon. gentlemen who have lived among them that they have kept it faithfully. We are now preparing to break our promise to them,-and in doing so we put ourselves in the same position as that taken by the German Kaiser. What will President Wilson say about this action on the part of the Canadian Government? He has sent out a clear call to the young men of the United States. He has taken high ground; he has summoned half a million men to the colours. What for? To establish the great principle that every free man has the right to help select the government under which he is to live. He refuses even to negotiate with a government that does not hold, office by the voice of the people.
I object to this measure, first, because it is designed to serve party and not public ends; second, because it is despotic and unjust in so far as the disfranchisement is concerned. If the Government of this country, assisted by closure and backed up by a political machine called the Senate, can disfranchise one class of the people, what is to prevent them from taking a like step in regard to any other class that is suspected of being hostile to the Government? Why not, Sir, disfranchise every maS who joins a labour union in this country? There is no reason why the Government should

not do that. That is what is in their hearts and minds; they only lack the courage to do it. They have not done it because they dare not do it. Do the gentlemen composing -this moribund Government think that the Galicians and the Moravians have no friends? Let me say to hon. gentlemen opposite that the hatred of tyranny is in the 'heart of every free man, and, once kindled, it has to be reckoned with. It was to vindicate this principle that we fought the South African war.
Going back to the history of that event, you will find that British intervention was justified on one ground, and on one ground alone. That ground was that British settlers in South Africa were not allowed to have a say in the election of representatives of the people. President Paul Kruger, in 1899, did what our modern-*


Wilfrid Laurier: Kruger.


John Howard Sinclair: -Paul Kruger of Portage la Prairie is attempting to do in 1917. Kruger denied to British subjects in South. Africa the right to vote until they had been in the country a period of twelve years. In the year 1899 he introduced the Transvaal Franchise Act, which was on all fours with this measure. You would suppose from reading this Bill that the Secretary of State had obtained his inspiration from Kruger's Franchise Act; The only difference is that this Bill is more oppressive. Kruger required a residence of twelve years; this Bill requires a residence of fifteen years-indeed, eighteen years, because a man has to be three years in the country before he can take the oath of allegiance. The Transvaal Franchise Act denied to all citizens who were not burghers or Boers the right to vote. The enfranchised Englishmen, or TJitlander, as he was called, could become a burgher after twelve years' residence. The Government of Great Britain protested against this long period of probation. The Uitlanders themselves protested. There was great excitement in the Transvaal, in the Cape and in England. Great indignation was expressed at the injustice that had been perpetrated. Large meetings were held in the mining districts of South Africa; an immense delegation was appointed to wait on President Kruger. They put forward every possible argument; They appealed to him as a Christian and as a sf&tesman and as a man. But he was immovable. The London Times published . at the time the short, defiant speech that Kruger made on that occasion in reply to the delegation. It was as follows:
Burghers, friends, thieves, murderers, newcomers, and others:	Go back and tell your
people that I shall never give them anything.
I shall never change my policy; now let the storm burst.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: What does the Kruger from Manitoba say?


John Howard Sinclair: I am glad to say that the burghers were not all of one mind. A party in South Africa led by Joubert stood for moderation and fair play. In an eloquent speech, he opposed the Franchise measure.
He said:
If you pass this you might as well obliterate from the arms of the republic the motto that unity makes strength.
But Kruger had his way; the law passed; the storm burst, and it broke against the shores of Canada- My right hon. leader who was at that time the Prime Minister of this country sent out a call to. the young men of Canada, and 8,000 of them answered the call -and went to that distant part of the Empire to fight for the flag. Some of them never came back. At Paardeburg, the Modder river and other places on the lonely veldt of South Africa you will today see little wooden crosses marking the graves of some 200 Canadians who perished in that struggle. They gave their lives in defence of the' principles for which we stand here to-day. Did they throw away their lives? Will any man say that those men died in vain? I make the statement, Mr. Speaker, without fear of successful contradiction, that this Bill is a direct insult to their memories. This House of Commons at that time, by a solemn resolution, unanimously condemned in anticipation the attitude of hon. gentlemen opposite- This -resolution, which w-as moved by Sir Wilfrid Laurier, seconded by Mr. Foster and unanimously adopted, read:
1.	Resolved, that this House has viewed with regret the complications which have arisen in the Transvaal Republic, of which Her Majesty is suzerain, from the refusal to accord to Her Majesty's subjects now settled in that region, any adequate participation in its government;
2.	Resolved, that this House has learned with still greater regret that the condition of things there existing has resulted in intolerable oppression, and has produced great and dangerous excitement among several classes of Her Majesty's subjects in her South African possessions;
3.	Resolved, that this House, representing a people which has largely succeeded, by the adoption of the principle of conceding equal political rights to every portion of the population, in harmonizing estrangements and in producing general content with the existing system of government, desires to express its sympathy with the efforts of Her Majesty's Imperial authorities to obtain for the subjects of


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Order.


John Howard Sinclair: -and bind him hand and foot before venturing to attack him?


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Order. The hon. gentleman's time 'has fully expired.


Mr. J. W. EDWARDS (Frontenac):: Mr. Speaker, it is not my intention to occupy more than -a very few minutes in regard to the question now before the House. This matter divides itself into two parts, namely, the giving of the franchise to certain women in the country and the disfranchising of certain men in the country. I do not agree with the hon. member for Guysborough (Mr. Sinclair) when he says that this Bin disfranchises one million women in this country. We cannot disfranchise those- who do not possess the franchise. We cannot take away from them that which they do not possess. Therefore, I say that his remark in that regard is entirely erroneous. The hon. gentleman saw fit to draw attention in his remarks to the fact that the vote was being given to certain men who, he said uever lived in Canada and perhaps never will live in Canada. In that, he referred to those British subjects, who, living in the United States, saw fit to don the uniform and go overseas to fight in this great war in our behalf. I think the hon. gentleman's opposition to the extension of the franchise to those men will not be received with acclaim by many people in this country. Even in his own constituency, I doubt very

much if lie will find many to agree with him in his opposition to the granting of the franchise to those brave men who have gone overseas to do for us what a number of people in this country have shown no disposition to do for themselves. The hon. gentleman has referred to Krugerism, Kaiserism, Prussianism and the Boer war. He was very strong in his expression of disapproval of Krugerism. Might I remind the hon. member that his attitude to-day is somewhat different from the attitude of his party at the time Kruger defied Britain in South Africa? The attitude of his party at that time was one of standing still until the sentiment of this country forced them to take action, and it was only under that compulsion that they sent some troops to South Africa to put down Krugerism, and even then they sent them on the C.O.I). principle. The hon. gentleman says that the men who gave their lives in South Africa died for principles for which they on that side of the House stand. He might have added to that that they died for the principles for which we on this side of the House move. That is the distinction between the two parties: They "stand" and we "move." They stood in the matter of the war in South Africa until the people made them move. They have stood in the matter of this war; and so far as they are concerned, if we are to judge from their present attitude, there would have been very few Canadians overseas, had hon. gentlemen opposite been in power in this country instead of the party which is in power.
As to the granting of votes to women, might I remind hon. gentlemen opposite of what took place in this House away back in 1895, when Mr. Davin, then member for Assiniboia, moved, on the 8th of May:
That in the opinion of this House, the privilege of voting for candidates for membership thereof should be extended to women possessing the qualifications which now entitle men to the electoral franchise.
That motion was opposed by the right hon. gentleman who now leads the Opposition, who moved in amendment that:
The question of woman suffrage is one which, like other questions concerning the suffrage, more properly belongs to provincial jurisdiction.
In other words, he shifted the whole responsibility to the provinces, and raised the issue whether there should be a provincial or Dominion franchise for Federal purposes. In the course of his remarks on that occasion, he said that so far as the province of Quebec was concerned, there

was no sentiment in favour of granting the franchise to women; the sentiment, on the contrary, was just the other way. He said:
I am not sure that the granting of the franchise to women would be altogether an unmixed evil. I am not sure that it would tend to the harmony or to the improvement of domestic life which after all is the proper centre of woman's influence. ... Whether the suffrage is applied to women or to any other class, it is largely a question of education, largely a question of social disposition, largely a question of habit. Let the provinces decide the question. There may be provinces where from the education of the people, from their social habits, it might be conducive to the general good of the country that women should be admitted to the franchise. As to the province from which I come, I must say that it is not prepared for woman suffrage. .	.	.
'f the proposition were made in the local Legislature of Quebec to confer the suffrage on women, I am quite sure it would be voted down at once. Speaking for the province of Quebec, I am certainly right in saying that women do not feel it an injustice that they have no right to vote on any political question.
If, therefore, this Bill went the length the hon. member for Guysborough says it should go, and granted the franchise to all women, it would be disapproved of more heartily by the right hon. gentleman who now leads the Opposition than if it granted only a partial franchise to women. In other words, if all the women of the province of Quebec and other provinces were to be enfranchised, instead of only some of them, as under this Bill, the grievance of that province, if it is a grievance at all, would certainly be much greater.
This measure proposes to give to certain women in this country a voice in the selecting of the next Government of this Dominion. Why should the franchise be extended to these particular women, rather than to all women in this country? Will any person say that the women who have worked for the Red Cross and other patriotic societies, making comforts for the soldiers, should be put on the same footing, even though some of them have worked night and day almost, with the women whose relatives are overseas? I believe there will be no outcry from these women themselves, because their sisters whose relatives are overseas are to be given the right to vote.
But there is another reason why these women whose husbands and sons and brothers are overseas should be selected for this honour on this occasion. They have an especial interest in the selecting of the next Government which will control the destinies of this country for the next four or five years. They have an especial in-

terest in seeing that the honour their men have won for this country is not put to shame by a Government which would be controlled by the anti-British and foreign element in this Dominion. That, I say, is their right on this occasion. What injustice is being done to the foreign element, the alien enemies in this country, in excluding them from the franchise? One can understand that men of Austrian or German birth might feel very diffident about enlisting and going to the front, possibly to fight against their own cousins and brothers in this great struggle. But if these men of alien enemy birth are not prepared to assume their full share of responsibility as citizens of this country, they certainly should not ask for all the privileges that go with citizenship in this country. Citizenship is not a one-sided affair. It grants certain privileges to a man, but it also entails the assumption of certain responsibilities, and it seems to me that in view of the struggle that is going on in Europe at the present time, no injustice is being done to those men who have so far shown little or no disposition to take part in that great struggle, by excluding them from the franchise. What right have men to call out in the name of liberty, who have made no effort to maintain that liberty? What right have men to call out in the name of democracy and democratic government who are not prepared to fight to maintain democratic government and democratic principles? What injustice is being done to any man who has shown no disposition to uphold the principles of democracy on which the government of this country is founded, by refusing him a say in the election of a government in this democratic country?
The next election will be entirely different from any other election ever held in this country. There will be no fiscal issue before the people. The only issue will be: Shall we place in power in the Dominion of Canada for the next four or five years a government that is in sympathy with British institutions and prepared to keep faith with the boys who have gone overseas, or a government chosen from a party who have shown by their conduct that they are not in sympathy with British institutions, and that they are not prepared to keep faith with the boys overseas and back them up with the reserves that are required? That is the question for the people of Canada to decide in the next election. It will not be a question of tariff or of fiscal policy. The

question will be: Shall this country be controlled for the next four or five years by men who are in sympathy with British institutions and democratic principles and prepared to do their part in maintaining them, or shall it he controlled by men backed up by the anti-British and foreign element in this country who so far have shown, not only no disposition to maintain the principles which hon. gentlemen opposite so loudly acclaim in this Chamber, but in many cases have shown a disposition to block all progress along the line pt maintaining those principles as they should be maintained, and a disposition not to back up our men ait the front. Therefore, for these reason, I give my hearty support to this measure.
Right Hon, Sir WILFRED LA DRIER: Mr. Speaker, in all federated countries it was for a long time a much discussed question as to what power should regulate the franchise. Two ideas were advanced, one that the franchise should be regulated by each legislative body, whether it w*as the local body or the central body. The other that there should be only one franchise, as there was only one country to be represented, and what division there was, was not in the people but in the nature of the power which was entrusted either to the local body or to the central body. After long discussion, the prevailing idea was that there should be only one franchise, and that whether the people were represented in the local legislatures or in the central Parliament it should be only the same electorate that should act. The American constitution, indeed, on this point is very definite. The second article reads:
The House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several states, and the electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State Legislature.
So, in the United States, the franchise is regulated by each of the 45 States of the Union. There is no franchise for Congress, but the members of the Congress are elected by this franchise which exists in the several states of the Union. Our Constitution did not go that far, but it provided, by article 41, that until the Parliament of Canada had otherwise legislated, the franchise as it existed in the year 1867 in each one of the provinces, should be the franchise upon which the House of Commons would be elected. That state of thing continued until the year 1885,
4 p.m. when this Parliament enacted a franchise for itself, which fran-

chise existed until the year 1897; and I ask the judgment of every man in this House, either on this side or on the other side, as to whether the Dominion franchise which existed from 1885 to 1897 ever gave the same satisfaction as the provincial franchises had given before the year 1885. From the year 1897 up to the present time, the franchise for this Federal House has been the provincial franchise, and I think I may say, again placing myself under the judgment of every man in this House, that the provincial franchise has given full satisfaction.
If I understood aright the speech delivered by the Secretary of State the other day, when he moved the second reading of this Bill-and I think I did understand it aright -he rather agreed with the principle of maintaining the provincial franchises for election to this House of Commons. But though he agreed in principle that the members of this House should be elected under the franchises in each province, he proceeded to stab the provincial franchises in three particulars.
In the first place the franchise which exists in the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and British Columbia, make no distinction at all between class and class-it gives the franchise to every British subject. My hon. friend by this Bill, however, provides that an important class of His Majesty's subjects shall be denied the privilege which they are now enjoying in each of those provinces.


Mr. MEIGHEN:: Will my right hon.
friend permit me? I know he does not wish to mis-state the case. It is not at all true that the provincial franchise laws in the West make no distinction of race, and that all British subjects have the right to vote. As a matter of fact, they do make distinctions of race, and all British subjects have not the right to vote.


Wilfrid Laurier: In Manitoba,
there is no distinction whatever. Every man who is a British subject is a voter. If that is not the case, what is the use of this Bill? Why does it provide that British subjects, who have become British subjects after the 31st day of March, 1902, shall no longer be electors after this Bill becomes law? That is one thing to which I object.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order-


Arthur Meighen: In the province of Saskatchewan, Chinese subjects have not the right to vote.


Wilfrid Laurier: If my hon.
friend will permit me I will say: that is
very specious reasoning. Chinese and Japanese are not voters., but the Germans and Austrians are voters, and they have been voters from the time they were naturalized. The object of my hon. friend is to take away from these men of foreign origin the rights and privileges of British subjects, which have been freely granted to them by the provinces I have mentioned-
That is what I blame my hon. friend for to-day. He is introducing a new principle and violating the franchise granted by his own province of Manitoba to these men. And, for what reason? Because, forsooth, they are of foreign origin. Because they may have been born in Germany, or Austria, or Turkey, they -are. not supposed to be able to give an unbiased verdict upon the questions before the country. Well, for my part, and I speak frankly, I do not admit that doctrine. I do not admit the doctrine that when a man leaves Europe- whatever may be the part of Europe whence he comes

and comes to this country, when he swears allegiance to His Majesty the King, when he becomes a citizen of Canada, when he builds a home for himself and for his family, I am not prepared to believe that if a conflict arises between the land of that man's birth and the land of his adoption, that he will go back upon the country to which he as sworn allegiance.
I can well believe that if there be men of German origin who have forsaken Germany and who have become British subjects in -this country-having made their homes here and established their families here-that they may be suffering agony at this time, but I am not prepared to believe that they will turn traitor to the land of their adoption in favour of the land of their birth. They have given up the land of their birth because conditions were not satisfactory to them, because they were living under tyranny, because their Government would not respect its pledges; and they came to a land which they were taught and were told would hold sacred whatever promises or pledges it made to them. If you tell me that in a conflict between Germany and Great Britain these men will turn traitor to the land in which they have enjoyed freedom and happiness, . I am not prepared to believe it. There may be cases here and there of men who will do so, but that the great mass of such people would, is something I do not believe. The men who came to Canada from Germany are very few. The great bulk of immigration did not come from the Empire of Germany. There are some German settles in the

Galicians, Bukowinians, and Rumanians, that these different races will be disposed to come to this country, when they know that Canada has not kept its pledges and promises to the people from foreign countries who have settled in our midst, and when they know that in the United States there was never any attempt to curtail or interfere with the rights as American citizens which immigrants to that country were granted. It seems to me that in this condition of things there is a thought which will make Parliament pause before proceeding further with this Bill. This is not a Liberal measure, it is not a Canadian measure, and it is not a British measure. It is a retrograde measure and a German measure. The position taken by the Government cannot be justified. If you want to have the true intent and meaning of this Bill, you must go beyond the Bill itself, because within the four corners of the Bill there is no justification which could induce any man on the other side of the House to vote for if For my paTt I hope that it is not too late to ask Parliament to pause, and to consider the -bad precedent which it is establishing, which must be far-reaching in its consequences. I ask my hon. friend to reflect, upon this. The measure is such that it must have serious consequence. If it be said in Canada that the pledges which we have given to immigrants when inviting them to come to this country to settle with us, can be broken with impunity, that we will not trust these men, and that we will not be true to the promises which we made to them,, then I despair of the future of this country. I could not expect that in future we shall have the same measure of satisfaction that we have had in the past in our efforts to induce immigration, if we follow such a principle.
I again call to the attention of my hon. friends on the other side the comparison which will be made between the treatment which is accorded to immigrants in the United States, and the treatment which is accorded them by the Canadian authorities. Look at the action of the American Congress, when that country came into the war. The Congress made more preparatipn for war in six months than we did perhaps, in three years. They looked over the whole field and covered it, but they never thought of disfranchising anybody, even when the country was overrun by German spies, when German spies were engaged in treachery and trickery, when they were trying to dislocate even the production of munitions. When such were to

be found everywhere and anywhere, the American Congress did not, for a single moment, think of depriving the. German settler of the rights and privileges which he had received as an American citizen. Is that not the course which we ourselves should pursue? Should we not follow the example of the United States in this regard, rather than introduce legislation of such a retrograde character as this?
I am sorry to have to take the position which I have taken on this point. I have been supporting the Government on the war policy up to the present session. I am sorry that the occasion arose during this session when I had to discontinue my support of the Government on a measure of great importance. I am sorry that I have to again dissent with the Government on this measure. But I believe-and we shall all be judged some day by our actions here-that in this instance the Government is taking a step which will cause serious injury to the country, and, therefore, Sir, actuated by these sentiments I beg to move:
That this Bill be not now read a second time but that it be resolved that the abridgment by this Parliament of the electoral franchise now enjoyed in any province of the Dominion by any class of His Majesty's subjects would be contrary to the peace, order, and 'good government of Canada.


Right Hon.   S@: Mr. Speaker, in the limited time at my disposal I shall not be able to follow my right hon. ..friend (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) in all that he has said. It may, however, be worth while to point out that he is seriously astray in some of his assertions. ' It is not true, although he asserted that it was, that all naturalized British subjects in the four western provinces have the right to vote; that can be demonstrated to him by the production of the provincial statutes bearing upon the question. He seemed to be under the impression, also, that women who have gone overseas as nurses with the Canadian Expeditionary Forces have not the right to vote. He emphasized this by declaring that in some cases they have been under fire. I beg to assure him that all members of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, whether men or women, have the right to vote at the forthcoming election. Not only is that the case, but, as I am reminded by the Secretary of State (Hon. Arthur Meighen), the female relatives in this country of such women also have the right to vote at the- election to be held in the early future.
My right hon. friend has taken issue with the opinion of the law officers of the Crown

as to the construction of the Dominion Elections Act. He asserts that all women on the provincial lists have the right to vote at Dominion elections. I can only say to him that the Minister of Justice (Hon. C. J Doherty), the Solicitor General, and all the legal authorities whom the Government consulted on this question, entertain an opinion directly opposite to that for which my right hon. friend stands sponsor. He will realize that under the circumstances wo are bound to take the opinion of the law officers of the Crown, and of other eminent legal authorities to whom I have alluded, rather than his own.
My right hon. friend has called to his aid the example of the United States. No federal election has been held in the United States since that country became a belligerent; therefore he has nothing to offer to us from the example of the United .States. Nor can he offer anything to us from the example of the United States until he is able to point to their action under conditions similar to those which confront this country at present. He omitted altogether in his statement any reference to the well known fact that Australia has given us an example of legislation of precisely the same character as this, except that here we have not gone as far as Australia has.
My right hon. friend has seen fit, for what reason I do not know, to disparage this country by stating that the United States have done more in four or five months-I suppose he meant proportionately-than this country has done in three years. I desire to take the most emphatic issue with my right hon. friend on that point. I do not understand the motive which led him to make such an assertion, having regard to 'his responsibility as a public man and to the position that he occupies in this House and in this country. I desire to draw no comparisons. I fully realize the splendid effort that the United States is making in this war; I have heard many accounts of it in recent days. There is no doubt about the fact that they are making a magnificent effort; they are going into the war in a splendid, whole-hearted way', with a view to achieving the victory which we all desire. But I should like to tell my hon. friend-if he does not know it, he ought to know it-that if the United States had made proportionately the same effort in this war that Canada made in the first two months after the war broke out in 1914, she would have raised within six weeks after she entered the war an army
of 500,000 men, and within two months she would have had that army on the ocean en route to France.
With regard to the whole question, I should like my right hon. friend to realize that this is a war-time election which he has forced on this country. So far as the disqualification of aliens of enemy nationality is concerned, there are some considerations that he has not taken into account. Does my right hon. friend seriously propose that we should put aliens of enemy nationality under the Military Service Act and send them to the front line of trenches in France and Flanders to fight men of their own kin, men of their own blood, men, perhaps, with whom they were brought up in the days gone by? If my right hon. friend says that we should call upon them to- pronounce judgment upon the issue of this war in this election, will he shrink from declaring that they ought to be subject to the same military service as other citizens of Canada? If he takes the one position, it seems to me that he must take the other. He has taken care, however, not to put that forward, for reasons which are very obvious. It would be unnatural to send these men to the front to fight those of their own flesh and blood. Indeed, it would be cruel to do so, because the naturalization which they have obtained in Canada does not follow them after they leave the limits of this country, and if they were sent to the front line trenches and were captured by the German or Austrian troops, they might he shot. Would any man say that under those circumstances we should force these men into combatant military service; that we should send them into the front line of battle to fight against their own flesh and blood? Moreover, if we were disposed to take that extraordinary course, what result would follow? The military authorities at the front would not permit us to do. so. I have not one word to say against the loyalty to Canada of these men. Throughout this war they have conducted themselves, on the whole, in a reasonable and orderly manner. But no one can doubt that the ties of blood mean something to them, as they do to us. No one can doubt that these men do have a certain sympathy with those of their own kin who are fighting against our troops in the trenches beyond the seas. While on the whole there might not he the danger which is apprehended by the military authorities, who would undertake to say that in some individual instance a man's intense sym-



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pathy for his. own flesh and blood might not overcome hie loyalty to hie adopted country? If that occurred in one, two, or three instances, what would be the result? If my right hon. friend had seen some of the telegrams that I have read in regard to what happened to some of the New Zealand troops overseas eighteen months ago, he would, perhaps, realize that considerations of this kind are entitled to more weight than he has been disposed to give them.
If I have made good my point that it is absolutely impracticable for ns to force these men into combatant service, to send them into the front line trenohek to fight against their own flesh and blood, what follows? What is to be the issue in this election? The issue in this election is to be upon Canada's part in this war, upon the necessity of sending reinforcements to our men overseas who are holding there the first battle line of Canada. The question is as tO' maintaining Canada's effort. If these citizens, by their origin, by their early environment, by the ties of kinship, by their natural sympathies, cannot be forced into the front line to fight, for precisely the same reason they ought not to be called upon to pronounce judgment upon the issues which [DOT]will he to the fore in this election. They do not want to be forced into combatant service; more than that, I have reason to believe, from statements that have come to me from most reliable sources, that a large number of these men will be grateful for exemption from compulsory military service on the one hand and for not being called upon to pronounce their judgment in this election on the other. For the same reason that they do not wish to be sent to the front line to fight against their own kindred, they do not wish to be forced into the disagreeable alternative of pronouncing a. judgment in which, on the one hand, there is a question of their devotion to their adopted country and to its national purposes, and on the other hand, there is the force of ties of kinship and sympathy towards those who are fighting against us. These considerations apply equally to German-speaking citizens from Russia, whose origin, kinship and sympathies are subject to the same observations, although technically they were citizens of an Allied nation.
My right hon. friend has developed a very deep and sudden sympathy for granting the franchise to the women of this country. I had understood, even until the middle cf the present session, that my right hon.
£Sir Robert Borden.]
friend was not very sympathetic to that proposal, and that some of his followers had much difficulty in persuading my right hon. friend that he should come to their view. He starts out on the assumption that the women of Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia are entitled to vote at federal elections. I take direct issue with him on that point. I say they are not entitled, under the present law, to vote at federal elections. Therefore, when my right hon. friend argues that we are depriving those women of a vote to which they are presently entitled, he is speaking without the book, if we rely, as we are entitled to rely, upon the opinions of the law officers of the Crown and of all authorities whom we have consulted on that question. I should further like to point out to my right \hon. friend and to those on the other side of the House that the question of conferring the franchise on all the women of Canada is surrounded with certain difficulties and complexities which, in my judgment, cannot be solved within the four remaining weeks which comprise the lifetime of this Parliament. In receiving the franchise, women assume an equal status with men in directing and controlling the Government of this country. That is the logical and inevitable consequence of their gradual emancipation from the days when the personality of a woman was absolutely merged in that of her husband, and when women were regarded as not entitled to any voice either in the affairs of the country, or even with regard to their own property. They were denied the right to make contracts. They were not looked upon in the same light as were men in the direction of the affairs of the State, or even in the direction of their own personal affairs. We have emerged from all that. We are emerging now to the point at which the women of this country must be entitled to the same voice in directing the affairs of the country as men, and so far as I am concerned, I commit myself absolutely to that proposal:	But I say,
that in working it out, it is necessary to take into account certain considerations. I happen to know that the women of this country themselves are very much alive to those considerations. The consideration is this: that the citizenship of a married woman is not dependent, under the law of this country, upon any individual application on her behalf for naturalization, but her citizenship-with one trifling exception which became law for the first time ini 1914

is dependent upon the citizen-

ship of her husband. The result of that is this: After the 1st day of January next no man is entitled to naturalization in this country unless he shall -have resided in this country for five years. The law up to the -present time has required -a residence of three years. But if a woman from the Balkan states or elsewhere comes into this country, and after a three weeks' or three months' residence, marries a man who is a native-born or naturalized British subject, she at once becomes -a British subject herself. Therefore, unless some safeguard is provided, the alien woman who marries a native-born or naturalized British subject would become entitled to the franchise with no residence at all, or with a residence very far -short of that required of men. Every hon. gentleman will realize that such a result would require pretty careful examination and study by Parliament. I say again that the women of this country are very much alive to that consideration, -and delegations of women from both East- and West have pressed it upon my attention. What is the remedy for that condition? The Tem-edy, it seems to me, is this: If a woman is to have -an equal status with a man in the franchise and in determining the direction of public affairs in this country, is it not reasonable that a woman shall have an equal voice in determining what her citizenship -shall be? If she is entitled to -a full voice in the direction of public affairs she is entitled to an equally full voice in deciding what her citizenship shall be. What is the law at the present 'time? A woman who has resided in Canada all her life marries an -alien in this country, and what happens? She loses her British citizenship. That is not a fair result if we are to grant the franchise to women. Suppose we should grant the franchise to all the women of Canada to-morrow and leave the naturalization law as it is -at present. Then any British-born woman, any woman born within the limits of this Empire, resident in Canada, who might marry an alien, would immediately lose her right to vote because her citizenship would become the citizenship of her husband. Therefore, we must consider the provisions of the naturalization law, and w-e must give to -alien women who come into Canada a right to individual^iaturalization, which they cannot have under the law as it is to-day.
My right hon. friend will say: Why not do that at the present session? ,1 say: It is
impossible, in view of the brevity of the time remaining at our disposal, to give that question the attention and to surround the measure with the safeguards necessary f-or that purpose. Let us remember that -in 1914 -a very earnest, and, I think, -an effective attempt was made for two purposes, One was to have a uniform naturalization law passed in the Mother Country and in every great Dominion of the Empire. The Other was to increase the length of residence in various Dominions of the Empire for the purpose of naturalization -and to make such naturalization effective throughout -the Empire. The law which was passed in 1914 in Great Britain was passed by this Parliament as well. It was .passed, -also, by the legislature of the colony of Newfoundland. I -am not sure whether it was enacted in any of the .other self-governing Dominions. I think it was passed by one other, but I am not certain. It is not apparent that if we are to amend our naturalization law, as seems to be necessary, in order that women may have the right individually to determine their citizenship, we must -have some negotiation, we must give careful consideration to the purpose of uniformity which inspired the Imperial Conference of 1911, to -take -steps along this line? We have a naturalization law which is in precisely the same terms as that in force in the British Islands and in Newfoundland, and possibly in some other Dominions. The purpose is to -have that Naturalization Act uniform throughout the whole Empire and to make it effective throughout. It is impossible for us to accomplish the purpose which, I think, is necessary, and which, I believe, the women of Canada consider necessary, in the few weeks yet remaining in the life of this Parliament.
W'hat have we done under the circumstances? We have determined that we shall give to all the women of Canada who have immediate relatives serving in the Canadian Expeditionary Force the right to a voice in this election. Who shall deny them that right? It is based upon precisely the- same principle as that which guided this Parliament in determining the qualifications under the Military Voters' Act, because men to-day serving in the Canadian Expeditionary Force have a right to vote at the impending election who would not have that right if they had not joined that force. The principle upon which we . have proceeded is, as the Secretary of State properly expressed it the other day, the principle of service and of sacrifice.
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There are other and additional considerations. Three hundred thousand men of the best that Canada can produce have joined the Canadian Expeditionary Force and gone overseas to fight for our liberties and our institutions. Is any hon. gentleman in this House inclined to minimize the influence which those men could exert during the coming election if they were personally present in Canada? Is not some regard and some importance to be attached to that consideration? But there is more than that. It will depend entirely upon the military operations as to how many of these men will have the opportunity to vote, and it is beyond question that many thousands of them by reason of the service in which they are offering themselves for the supreme sacrifice will not have that opportunity. But there is more than that. Thirty thousand of them lie buried in France and Flanders, and is it not right that the immediate relatives of these men should have some voice to speak on their behalf when the issues at the next election come to be determined? There are also some thousands of them prisoners in Germany, undergoing hardship and privation, to whom it is impossible to give the opportunity to vote at the impending election. Is it not right that some one in this country should have the opportunity to speak on their behalf? There are thousands of these men in the British or allied forces who were residents of Canada and would have had the right to vote at the next election except for this war and the service they are giving.
I deem it right that some person in this country should have the right to speak in their behalf.
I say that this proposal to extend the franchise to the immediate relatives of soldiers at the front is not only a fair and reasonable proposal, but I go further and say that it would be most unfair and unjust if some one did not have the right to speak on their behalf. These are the reasons and the considerations which have impelled the Government to propose this measure to Parliament. The voice of those who are serving Canada overseas, of those who have fallen, of those who have died in order that Canada might live, of those who lie in German prisons, that voice we are endeavouring to preserve and give effect to by this measure.
Mr. W. A. BUCHANAN (Medicine Hat):: Mr. Speaker, I understand the Prime Minister to say that the introduction of this Bill was largely brought about by the refusal to extend the life of Parliament. I 
was one of those who- voted against the extension of the life of this Parliament, and also one of those who voted in favour of the Military Service Act. I also represent a constituency where there are a number of people who belong to the nationalities that will be deprived of the franchise by this measure. When I voted for conscription, when I voted against the extension of the life of Parliament, I realized that I would have 'to face these people and explain my position. But I was satisfied and I am satisfied still that I could appeal to them and present reasons for the attitude I took and get their support. But now, with a measure of this character before tne House, I cannot go to them and appeal for their support. I have appealed to them ever since this war commenced on behalf of the Patriotic Fund and other patriotic causes; I have explained to them why we are engaged in this war; I have pointed out to them that we were fighting for freedom, liberty and justice, fighting for the national honour and for the pledged word. Now I cannot go back to them and say: "I have urged you to support this cause and to be loyal to this country," and then defend a course that would mean that I, a member of this Parliament, had broken the pledged word of Canada to these people when they became citizens of this country. That is my position. I do not think it is fair for this Parliament to charge that every man of German or Austrian, birth in this country is disloyal. I know men who- are not of those nationalities ; some of them \ are Canadian-born; yes, and some of them are British-born, and. they have not displayed any great loyalty to this country or to our Allies since this war commenced. Why should they also not be deprived of the franchise?
I read a certain paper day in and day out, and have done so since this war commenced. It is the greatest exponent of the cause of the Allies on the American continent, if not in the whole world, and it is published by a man who was born in Germany; I refer to the New York Times. There is another paper published in the city of New York, the New York World, founded, I think, by a man of Austrian birth, and published to-day by his son, which is a'lso ,#n exponent of the cause of the Allies. And who did the President of the United States depend upon to carry his selective draft measure through the House of Representatives at Washington? When the Democratic leader in that body, a man,

I think, not of foreign birth at any rate, refused to promote that measure in the House of Representatives, the ranking Republican, a man of German extraction, if not a German-born, a Congressman from California, directed the measure through that House. And is it fair in this' Parliament of Canada, where v?e maintain we are fighting for freedom, liberty and justice, and where we have given these people the rights of citizenship, that we should stamp upon every one of them who came to this country and became citizens since 1902 the mark of disloyalty, and say that they are not prepared to do their part as citizens of this country? I say, no.
This measure is largely directed against the people who are living in western Canada, against the people who have become citizens since 1902. The settlers of German birth in Ontario who came prior to that are left with the franchise. Now if I remember rightly there have been more expressions of disloyalty amongst some of these people in the province of Ontario than there have been throughout the whole West since this war commenced, and still you are leaving these people in Ontario and the older parts of eastern Canada with a vote, and taking away from the new settlers in western Canada the rights we guaranteed them as citizens. These people have been urged to Temain loyal and respect our laws from the commencement of this war, and most of them have done so.
I publish a newspaper in the southern part of the province of Alberta. My ambition has been to create a national senti ment amongst all our new citizens. In my newspaper and during the opportunities I have had as a public man I have done all that I could to promote a virile Canadian sentiment. I was today looking over the report of the Commissioners of the Royal Northwest Mounted police for the year 1916, and in nearly every instance the officials connected with the Royal Northwest Mounted Police say they have had practically no trouble whatever with the foreign-born element in western Canada.
I was speaking at the commencement of my remarks of the attitude taken by myself as a western member on the question of conscription, but my position is far easier than that of many men from western Canada who voted for the Military Service Bill. Compared with some western members who voted for conscription, I have very few of the foreign element
in my constituency. These hon. members [DOT]knew they had these people in their constituencies, but they voted for conscription nevertheless. It was a very drastic war measure, but these men broke with their party and supported it, although they knew that back in their constituencies there were hundreds and thousands of foreign-bom citizens. I would refer to the hon. member for Humboldt (Mr. Neely), the member for Saltcoats (Mr. MacNutt), and the members for many other constituencies, who are in a far different position from myself.
Still, this Government practically repudiates the independence of the western Liberal members who stood up for the Selective Military Measure in this House, and who broke with their party on that question, and they introduce a measure which practically says they have no confidence in many of our constituents.
I want to say that hon. gentlemen on this side of the	House who
voted for this measure have confidence in their constituents, no matter to what race they may belong. So far as I am concerned, as a member of this House who supported conscription, if I am to go before my constituents again, I will tell them, whether they are foreignrborn, Canadian-born or British-born, that I supported conscription because I thought it was right, and that they can only elect me on the understanding .that I will continue to support conscription and maintain the law in force until the completion of the war. That is my position. The attitude the Government is taking at this time is most unfair, and it is a slap in the face to every western Liberal member who supported this Government on conscription.
We left our party and we took the position we did for the national advantage, because we looked upon the measure as a war measure. This Government is adopting the present measure not as a war measure and not for the national advantage, but for the advantage of the party they represent. I would like to say, that, if we are going to build up a united Canada,	if we	are	going to bring
people into this country and promise them the rights of citizenship, we must adhere to the pledged word we have given them. We must let them know that while we are fighting autocracy, while we are fighting a nation that broke its word to another nation, we as Canadians, living under the British flag, are going to adhere

to our word. If we trust these people, and if we let them understand the position of Canada and the position of the Allies, I think we can appeal to them and that they will stand loyally by us. Hundreds and thousands of them came away from their home countries because they objected to the form of Government, and because they were oppressed. Seeking relief, they came to Canada. They may not be anxious to support militarism of any kind in this countt-y-as a matter of fact, many of them are opposed to war-but at the same time, many of them are opposed to the position taken in this war by the countries from which they came, and to the part those countries are taking in the war.
There is another feature of the Act to which I wish to refer briefly. The right to vote has been given to women, on the ground of war service or war sacrifice. 1 heartily approve of that feature of the Act. but I agree with many others who have spoken, from this side of the House at any rate, that war service or war sacrifice has not been confined solely to the women who allowed their loved ones to go across the *sea and participate in the war, and probably sacrifice their lives for us. There are many women throughout the length and breadth of the country, in the cities, in the towns, in the villages, and in the farm homes, who have sacrificed much of their time, who have sewed and knitted and contributed for patriotic causes. In
5 p.m. my judgment that element of our population should have been included in this Act, and they could very well have been included. If it is war service the Government is anxious to recognize, and if it is the friends of the Allies they 'want to recognize, why do not our friends from the province of British Columbia advocate that the franchise should be given to the Japanese and the Chinese there? They are our allies. They are fighting for us at the present time. If you are going to deprive a certain element of our population of their franchise-


Mr. GLASS:: Does my hon. friend recommend that the' franchise should be given to the Japanese?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


William Ashbury Buchanan: The Government would have as much right to do that as they have to disfranchise those citizens of Canada who took the oath of allegiance to this country, and who promised to he loyal and obedient citizens. If this were a question of war service, I believe, so far as the provisions 
relating to the franchise for women are concerned, the Government should have been more generous, and should have included all the war workers. What have we to say about those women who have been working in the munition factories since the war commenced? What have we to say about the young women who are giving their time driving automobile trucks around the city of Ottawa, for instance, for patriotic purposes? Are they not serving their country, and are they not making sacrifices? Why should they not be recognized? To my mind it is only absolutely fair that they should have recognition.
Certainly the next of kin of our soldiers have a right to be recognized, but it would have been a happy thing for this Parliament to have extended the privilege to every woman who has played her part as a patriotic citizen since the war started. I believe we can only create a proper spirit of unity throughout this country by placing trust in the people we have brought here and to whom we have given the rights of citizenship. We cannot create unity by looking upon them with suspicion, and by depriving them of the rights we guaranteed them when they became citizens, because in doing so we practically contradict the position we have' taken as a participant in this war. We have always held the ground that Canada was in the war for great principles, one of which was respect for the pledged word and the maintenance of national honour. We cannot expect to have the loyal support of our citizens if we abandon that principle, and refuse to recognize our pledged word.
I also object to the measure because it does not give a sufficiently broad franchise to the women of this country, and I will oppose it on those grounds.


Arthur Meighen: There is a disposition on the part of opponents of this measure to describe it as a disfranchisement measure, and to ascribe to it peculiarities which they seem to think are traditional with the Tory party.
It is no disfranchisement measure, except in a very small and limited sense. On the contrary its enfranchisement features so far transcend its disfranchisement features that, taken in all, it is in comparison to our population, the widest extension of the franchise ever passed by a British community.
The hon. member who has just sat down (Mr. Buchanan), for the sincerity of whose opinions I have the most profound respect, appears to be labouring

under the apprehension that in this measure there is some rebuke to those hon. gentlemen opposite who supported the Government on the question of conscription. For the life of me I do not understand by what process of reasoning he arrives at that conclusion. The vote of no hon. member in this House would have been more welcome to the Administration of the day than that of the hon. member for Lethbridge, if he could have brought himself to the conclusion that this measure was right. Our only motive in introducing this measure is to safeguard the franchise of this country in a perilous crisis, in the interests of the Canadian people, and for no party advantage at all. I would like to know what party advantage can come to members on this side of the House by the passing of this measure which would not accrue to the hon. member for Lethbridge on exactly the same score. If it hurts us, it hurts him if he goes to his electors as a conscrip-tionist. If it benefits'us, it benefits him, if he submits himeslf to his constituents on that subject. His views differ from ours as to the merits of the measure. For his views I have respect. But I would ask him to review the sentence in which he ascribed to us motives of animosity and of repudiating or rebuking conscriptionist Liberals on the other side.
I opened with the assertion that this was the widest measure of enfranchisement proportionate to population ever passed by a British community since the first Reform Bill. We disfranchise, it is true, a number of citizens. That is quite correct. We disfranchise them temporarily while this war lasts. The number of disfranchised is estimated by the hon. member for Saskatoon (Mr. MoGraney) as about thirty thousand; my own judgment would place it higher, but there is no way of getting at anything like the exact figures. But we enfranchise, of those who would not get the vote at all if this measure were not passed, not less, in my judgment, than 400,000, perhaps 500,000 or moie of the population of this country. Thus an estimate of 470,000 net addition to the electorate as a result of this measure if it passes Parliament is not far out of the way.
The Bill has two features. I take the first feature in my initial argument, the enfranchising feature, which gives the franchise to the near female relatives of the soldiers overseas. That is objected to by the hon. member for Lethbridge (Mr. Buchanan) on the ground that it is not strictly the line of service that is recognized, that there is a service on the part of womankind beyond the service of the woman whose husband, or brother, or father is fighting overseas. I agree that there is such a service, but the extent of service and the character of the sacrifice which the woman makes who works in a munitions factory, or knits, or sews, is not the same as that of the woman whose husband's, or whose brother's, life is in peril. The hon. member for Lethbridge takes very good care-and he does so advisedly and wisely, in my judgment-to speak no word that could be construed as committing him to the unlimited enfranchisement of women in this country at the present time. He wants to make the line of all service the line of franchise. How are we to tell, how could it be made practicable, to add to those whose near relatives are overseas those who knit and sew and attend Red Cross meetings and visit the afflicted? Could we ever draw .such a line and establish it by legislation? He knows it is impracticable. He knows that we have to take a broad and general line, even although cases of individual injustice arise. We cannot enfranchise by individuals; we must enfranchise by classes. We draw the line where it can easily and clearly be drawn, at those who make the greatest and the highest sacrifice, and we say that, for the purposes of this war, that line is the most logical, the most defensible. Some line has to be drawn; no better line than that can be drawn.
It is argued as well that we throw a slur or cast some ignominy on those who do not enjoy the franchise under this Bill. I cannot agree with this reasoning. They were compared, in the language of the hon. member for Saskatoon (Mr. McCraney), to the negroes of the southern states. Why, it is only two or three months since, in this House, we were favoured with a resolution moved by the hon. member for St. John (Mr. Pugsley) that for the franchise of Canada we should adopt the provincial franchise, twith female voters, 'which would have enfranchised the women of five provinces and refused the franchise to those of the other four! Were the women of the other four under his proposal to be likened to the negroes of the southern states? Not at all; but they would have been, if the reasoning of the hon. member for Saskatoon is correct.
We said at that time that Whatever franchise was adopted for women should be Canada-wide, and should be enjoyed through all the provinces; and that prin-

eiple is embodied in ibis Bill. We favoured that motion, provided there were such limitations as Parliament ishould afterwards deem to be fitting. These are the limitations, and let those who dispute the justibe or logic of these limitations suggest others to the members of this House. The reasoning of the Prime Minister this afternoon is conclusive. We could not go to the extent, under existing conditions, of enfranchising all the women of Canada. To do so would give no special representative vote to the overseas soldiers-in lieu of what an election now denies them. The women of Canada did not ask for the enfranchisement at this time of all the women. They have approached members of this Government and have protested against such a wide enfranchisement, because they felt that under the conditions of this war, with our heterogeneous population, the votes of those foremost in the women's suffrage movement would be defeated ' by the votes of those scattered throughout our country w'ho are affected by sympathies not at all the same as those which actuate the great bulk of the women of this country.
The Bill denies qualificatioh for the period of this war to those of alien enemy birth *who have been naturalized since March 31, 1902, and to those of alien enemy blood, born in other countries and speaking the language of an alien enemy. It is contended vigorously on the part of the right hon. leader of the Opposition (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) that this is un-British, that it is a breach of a pledge given by this country, ana that, whatever the consequence, we must not do this thing. I should like to know where that pledge is printed, where it was given. I have never seen it. I have seen pledges given to immigrants; they are embodied in Orders in Council. There have been pledges given exempting certain immigrants from military service in this country. Those pledges we respect. Any pledge given we respect. But no pledge has ever *been given to immigrantsi in this country that is repudiated by this Bill.


William Erskine Knowles: When any man is naturalized and becomes a naturalized British subject, is he not given a pledge to the effect that "he is, within Canada, entitled to- all political and other rights, powers and privileges to which a natural-born British subject is entitled?"


Arthur Meighen: Yes, but it adds that at the same time they must assume all our obligations. Does the hon. member say

that, under that, there cannot be a limitation of the franchise? If so, how does he justify the Government of Saskatchewan, which he supports, and which disfranchised British subjects, naturalized, coming from China?


William Erskine Knowles: What has that to do with this?


Arthur Meighen: If there is a pledge, is not that pledge violated by that Act?


William Erskine Knowles: Let us grant, for the sake of argument, that the legislature did very wrong.


Arthur Meighen: I have not heard the hon. member complain of that legislature doing wrong in this matter. Why? Because he never until to-day interpreted naturalization in such a way.


William Erskine Knowles: A pretty weak argument.


Arthur Meighen: The rights of British subjects here are rights given under the law of Canada. The law of Canada must be dictated by the needs of the hour, foT the safety of Canada. Does the hon. member say that in British Columbia there has been a breach of faith because for years past, if not since the birth of that province, they have refused the franchise to British subjects naturalized by the very same certificate, the Japanese and men of alien birth? Is it a breach of faith that those two provinces have done this for years? There is not a shadow of a breach of faith.


William Erskine Knowles: I understand we were
discussing whether Canada was breaking its pledged word, and I read the naturalization form from the Act.


Arthur Meighen: Let the hon. member
say that two provinces of Canada have dishonoured their pledged word since those two provinces were created. He will not say it; he knows it is not true.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: Were those people naturalized?


Arthur Meighen: Certainly.


David Bradley Neely: By the provinces?


Arthur Meighen: By the Dominion.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: They had no
political rights.


Arthur Meighen: Now we have a beautiful political distinction drawn by the hon. member for Halifax (Mr. A. K. Maclean), and approved by the hon. member for Renfrew (Mr. Graham), that the pledged word of this country given to immigrants in Canada may not be vio-

lated by the Dominion Parliament, but may be violated by provincial legislatures. Is the pledged word of Canada not of any moment to provincial legislatures? Does it mean nothing to them? The pledged word of this country is not violated any more by their legislation than it is by this -Parliament now? There are others who were disfranchised in this country. They had not been likened to negroes before. Judges have no vote. Many British-born people have no vote. It is true this is the widest measure of the kind that has yet been placed on the statue book. It is abnormal. But we live in abnormal times. Hon. gentlemen opposite say these people have obeyed the law, and are all right. It is true that, in the main, they obey the law, and there has been little exception, all things considered, to the manner in which they have lived up to their obligations as citizens, but is it seriously argued by those who know these men coming from Germany and Austria, naturalized within the last fifteen years in Canada, are animated by the same sympathy in this war, as animates us, that, as a class, are anxious for Britain to win this war, and that they look upon the dread issue of this struggle in the same light as we? Let me put a case to hon. gentlemen opposite, and to the leader of the Opposition (Sir Wilfrid Laur-ier). Let me assume that one of the hon. gentlemen opposite goes abroad, in order to better his condition in the world. He goes to some European land. He takes up his abode there, and enters on a homestead. In order to get his patent, he has to take out naturalization papers in three - years. After he is there a few years, a war breaks out between that country and his native land. He looks across, and finds his own brothers, and perhaps his own children, perhaps his father, his very next of kin, fighting in the armies of his native land, against that of his adopted country. Does any one want to seriously state to this Parliament that tsuch a man would look upon the issue of that struggle as would his neighbours of the blood of his adopted land? Does any one suggest he would be animated by the same desire for the triumph of the army of his adopted country, as would those next door to him, who were of the blood of that adopted land? Human nature is human nature in us all, and is human nature in the German and Austrian in Canada. Would the right hon. gentleman want to be conscripted in that country to
fight against his sons at home? Would he expect to be loaded down with the obligations of that war, as would his brothers fighting on the other side? I do not think he would. I do not think he would complain if relieved of those obligations in that country, he was refused a say in the direction of that war.
Is it true that in South Africa there were complaints, because at no time, tho-ugli . they took a large measure in the obligations of the country, were British subjects entitled to the franchise. But who that wants to be reasonab'e, would contend for a moment that, if the Transvaal had been at war with Great Britain, and if, during that war, and for the purposes of that war alone British subjects by birth naturalized in the Transvaal had been refused the franchise, that that would have been looked on as a breach of faith by us? Does any one conceive such an argument? Not at all. Th-e franchise of peace time i-s founded on peace service and the franchise of war times is founded on war service. It is said by hon. gentlemen opposite, " Oh, we are as anxious to win this war as you are. This election is only being fought on the question of the best method to pursue to win the war." If the election has to be fought on the best method to pursue to win the war, why do-es the leader of the Opposition express so keen a desire to get the opinion of those who- do not want to win the war at all, who cannot be expected by -all principles of human nature to welcome the prospect of their brothers being slaughtered that our sons and brothers may triumph.
It is strenuously argued that this is a breach of faith? Did Australia commit a breach of faith? Is Australia blackened by the crime of Germany, because Australia deemed, under the circumstances of -this war, that, as the obligations of war were lifted from the immigrants of alien enemy birth in that country, the privileges of the franchise mutt be lifted as well? Does any one say that the crime of the " scrap of paper " must be laid -at the do-o-r of Australia? Such a thing never was suggested in the Australian House. A similar measure wider in its terms than this Bill, passed the Australian Parliament, almost without protest at all, and they disfranchised every man of alien enemy birth, no matter when he came to the country.


Mr. MARCIL (Bonaventure):: Why do
you start with 1902 in dealing with these people?


Arthur Meighen: Unless we went back indefinitely, unless we disqualified those wh.o-


Charles Marcil: Is that what Australia did?


Arthur Meighen: She went back indefinitely.


Charles Marcil: If you followed the Australian precedent in one respect, why not follow it right through?


Arthur Meighen: Because we think they went too far. Would the hon. gentleman go as far as they went? We strike a middle line. Australia disfranchised those who came to that country, no matter when they came. We say that if men have been in this country so long that one can reasonably expect that they have become, as it were, engrafted in the tree of Canada, that they feel as we feel, though perhaps not to the same degree, still to some safe degree, then we believe they are entitled to assume the war obligations of this country, and entitled to assume the franchise in war time.


Charles Marcil: Is there any precedent in England for war-time franchise?


Arthur Meighen: They have had no wartime election-there is no precedent irt England of a party forcing a war-time election.


Charles Marcil: Are elections not being held continually, all through the war, in England?


Arthur Meighen: A few by-elections, but no general elections, and Great Britain is 95 to 98 per cent British-horn,, while we have a very substantial proportion of alien enemy birth.
It has also been vigorously asserted-although I do not know that we should be troubled by it, because there has never been an important measure introduced in Parliament with regar^l to which the same thing has not been asserted-that this is a partisan measure, designed to re-elect this Government. I desire to remind particularly the hon. member for Saskatoon (Mr. McCraney), and the hon. member for Medicine Hat (Mr. Buchanan) that the same thing has been asserted just as vigorously, just as consistently, and indeed, infinitely more strenuously with regard to the conscription measure of this Government. From one end of Canada to the other, those who do not want to further help the soldiers in France state that the reason we desired to

pass such a measure was that we wanted to get back to power.
The argument now is based on the theory laid down by the hon. member for iSaeka-toon (Mr. McCraney), that those we enfranchise will support us, and that those we disqualified will oppose us. They charge repeatedly against us that such is our belief. If it is true-and apparently it is true, if hon. gentlemen opposite are right-that the majority of the women, of (this country whose near relatives are overseas, those who spend their days in anxiety and their nights in f tears, will support us, and that those who, of all our population, are likely to favour the enemy, will reject us, then, in the name of the Government which has been striving for three years to fight that enemy, I accept the compliment.
I do believe that the majority of those in the trenches will support the Administration. I do believe also that the majority of those whose near relatives are overseas fighting the foe would rather support this Administration than support one formed by the leader of the Opposition. I further believe that those at the other end of the electoral thermometer, those whose sympathies, whose very heart-strings, are by nature tied to the enemy, are much more likely to support the leader of the Opposition than to support us. But I do not believe that that is an argument against this Bill; I do not believe that Liberals and Conservatives generally throughout Canada, or even those who are disqualified temporarily during war time, will oo regard this measure. I have received communications from rften who will be disqualified by this Bill-from men with whom I had had not the slightest communication on the subject until the Bill was brought down. I have received a communication from one of the leading members of a disfranchised community in the western country, in which he commended the Government for the action taken, saying that it removed the whole community from the embarrassing position in which it was placed by reason of the war We have been waited upon by representatives of communities of aliens; the Government has been urged that this stop be taken. Representations to this end have been made by Liberals who want to see this war carried on; who do not want to see Canada slink from the field. I know that instinctively the Liberal mind-and instinctively our own mind, because our own mind in. the best sense is liberal-does not

like the idea of disfranchisement. We should be glad if it were not necessary; yet I know scores of persons, who though at first resisting this measure or any measure of this kind, have since made the declaration that they believe the measure essential and right, and that they will support it. These words apply particularly to Liberals; if any hon. gentleman opposite desires me to name them, I shall be glad to do so at any time. I think that the great bulk of Liberals in this country who are anxious to go on and not to- go back will. support the measure that is now before the House.


David Bradley Neely: Mr. Speaker, I should be failing in my duty if I did not res-e-nt with every particle of strength in my being -the uncalled for, unjustifiable, unrighteous insult offered to a laTge number of the people whom I~repre-sent by the proposals embodied in this Bill and by the statements made by the Secretary of State (Mr. Meighen) upon its introduction. Like other members of this House, I recognize the ability as a debater of the Secretary of State-some say he is a hair-splitter-but I never saw him make such a shamefaced performance as he did when he introduced this Franchise Bill the other day. It was the utterance of a man who was ashamed, Sir, of what he was doing. I give him credit-


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Order. The hon. member should resume his seat when the Speaker rises. The hon. member is certainly exceeding the rules of debate; I would ask him to take more cognizance of them.


David Bradley Neely: I shall have to keep myself within the rules-, but I may tell you frankly, Mr. Speaker, that when several hundreds of my constituents, as loyal a people as there are in Canada, are being insulted by the Secretary of State, I find it very difficult to observe the rules of debate and of parliamentary procedure. I should like to know wherein I make an unfair comment when I say that in my judgment the performance of the Secretary of State when he introduced this measure was that of a man who was ashamed of what he was doing.
Mr. SPEAKER; The hon. member uses unparliamentary language w-hen he addresses that remark -to the Secretary of State. He is at liberty to characterize the measure as he wishes, provided 'he uses parliamentary language. But !he is not in order when he applies such a remark to the Secretary of State.


David Bradley Neely: Well, I have -said what
I had to -say on that point, anyway. If you are willing, Mr. -Speaker, I will pass on to the next.
Sir -GEORGE FOSTER: I think that my hon.' friend, having said something of a member that he should not have said, and having been called to order for doing so, should have withdrawn the assertion.


David Bradley Neely: Mr. Speaker, whil-e I am
willing to accept your ruling in -respect to anything that I have said, I do not want any lecture from the Minister of Trade and Commerce as to what is right and what is wrong in parliamentary procedure.


George Green Foster: Mr. Speaker, I
ask that the-


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Order. I took the statement of the hon. member for Humboldt as a withdrawal, -and consequently I did not ask for a retraction in terms.


David Bradley Neely: One of the chief reasons
put forward by the Secretary of State, for the disfranchisement of a certain class -of people in this country was that it was in the interests of the safety of the State, that such a course should be taken. Does that not mean that a certain class of citizens in Canada are not to be trusted with the franchise? If a certain class of the citizens of this country cannot be trusted with the franchise at this time, then my hon. friend had better include -in 'that class-after all, the election is to be held upon the question of method as to winning th-e war-the thousands of British, English, French, Scotch, -Canadian-born in this country who, if a referendum on conscription were submitted to the people to-morrow, would vote against any such measure. If only men who come within the jurisdiction of the Military Service measure are to be given the franchise, then a large number of the members of this Hous-e would be disfranchised. Every man over forty-five years of -age would be disfranchised.
Mr. PU'GSLEY: Even the Solicitor-General.


David Bradley Neely: Those were the reasons given-considerations of loyalty and the question of military service. If disloyalty means nothing more than voting against this Government because they have brought m a measure of compulsor-y service, my hon. friend will find, -before the election is over, that there are tens of thousands, aye, hundreds of thousands of people in Canada


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Mr. GRAHAM:: In these two statements, coupled with the "hear, hear" of the hon. gentlemen who hope to profit politically by this Bill, is the proof that the Bill was introduced solely for partisan purposes, and that neither nearly nor remotely has it anything to do with the winning of the war. On the contrary, its effect will be to retard much of the noble effort which has heretofore been put forth by people in the Dominion of Canada who are not sufficiently fortunate to have members of their family at tlie front. There are four classes affected

by this Bill: aliens of enemy origin; men who do not believe in war; women who are enfranchised; women who are refused the franchise. The women who are refused the franchise are put in the same class with the men who do not want to fight, and with the alien enemy; and the Government can give us all the sophistry it chooses as to why these women are not given the right to vote, but it still remains sophistry. The Government does not believe that these women would vote for them in an election, and	that is the	reason
why they are not given the franchise. This is in line with the argument of the Solicitor General. Let me take up, first, those of alien enemy origin. The situation is this. The Government says to the man who has remained truly loyal under very severe conditions: "We will place upon your-brow . and upon the brows of your children the brand of disloyalty and treachery, and the shame of it will follow you as long as you live, while we who have remained loyal because this is our mother country and it is easy for us to be loyal, will smite our breasts and thank God we are not as other men, or even as those aliens who remain loyal under present circumstances." The reward the Government proposes to give to those men who remain loyal under present trying conditions is to deprive them of the citizenship which has been guaranteed to them. I ask hon. gentile-men is that an incentive to loyalty? Does it tend .to breed patriotism among newcomers to this country? Will it impress upon the mind of the newcomer the fairness of British institutions? Will it show that we are the exemplars of the purest liberty under the sun? It gives a directly contrary impression, and I say now that this act of the Government will do more to cause unrest and to create misgivings -among those who come from foreign lands to Canada than anything that has happened since Confederation. And, further, it will do more to retard immigration into Canada than anything this Government or any other Government could do. The Prime Minister went through the West on a laudable tour, making patriotic speeches. We all read those speeches, and thought they would have a good effect. The men to whom they were addressed, as well as their wives, listened to these speeches carefully, and were undoubtedly impressed. What do we find now? The men who listened to those patriotic words spoken throughout our 
western country-the men who came to the head of -this Government, the Prime Minister of Canada, to gain from him knowledge of the freedom for which we were fighting, knowledge of the genius of our constitution, knowledge of those rights which come to every man who takes up citizenship under the Union Jack-these men went home, and profited by tho.se words. They did their best for the cause, rejoicing in the freedom which they had. And now they are branded as traitors, without any explanation or reason being given to this House ar to the country. This Bill not only disfranchises men of -alien enemy origin who have come to this country since 1902, but it disfranchises many men in the province of Ontario, who have been -among our very best citizens for the last thirty or forty years, men whose taxation for carrying on the war is great, men whose wives have laboured early and late, men who have sacrificed much, and -som-e men whose -sons are at the front. If this other clause had not been put in-	_
Some hon. MEMBERS :	" If."


George Perry Graham: Let me explain what I mean, because objection will be immediately taken to this-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: 


George Perry Graham: I will clear up the
point in -a moment. There are men in this country who came from other lands, took up their residence .here, and for twenty years they have been voting in Canada. Hon. members in this House can call them by name. They are good citizens, and they believed they had the right to vote. That right of citizenship was never questioned by either side of politics. When this war -broke out, they discovered that, although they had been voting for many years, they had never gone through the formality of becoming naturalized. Being loyal citizens, and to show that they were true to the Union Jack and the British Empire, they immediately took out their naturalization papers. But they have only been naturalized two or three years. And although they have been building up this country, paying taxes land raising their families although they are a credit to the country, by this Bill they find themselves disfranchised, and marked among their neighbours as men unworthy to he trusted with citizenship.
I want to know if that is going to have a good effect on the people by whom they are surrounded, or on the people in the coun-

tries from which we expect to get immigration in the future.
Now, as to conscientious objectors. It may be said, and it is said, that these men seldom vote anyway. That they do not care to take part in political strife, and that to deprive them of their franchise is not a very serious matter. For a man to refrain from exercising a right because he wishes to is one thing, but to be deprived of that right by statute is a very different thing; and the man, even although he has not voted, and his son who has voted, will resent for all time to come the interference of this Government which says to them that they are not entitled to exercise the franchise for the election of men to represent them in Parliament and to spend the public revenues to which they contribute. Taxation without representation is one of the things that was fought against at the time of the Family Gompact. We had thought in this country that it had been driven from our shores for all time to come, and it has been the pride of the Canadian people that equal rights have been given to every man, no man being asked to pay taxes unless he is allowed a full voice in the expenditure of those taxes.	Here
are a class of men who contribute largely to the revenues of the country, a class of men who never harm anybody, friendly, peaceful-and they are to be told nbw: You cannot exercise your franchise, and your son cannot exercise his franchise, and in the years to come your son and his sons and daughters will be pointed out, will have the finger of scorn pointed at them throughout the Dominion of Canada as men who, in a crisis in this country, were deemed unworthy to be allowed to exercise the franchise if they had so desired. I say it is an unfair thing, it is a bad business; and although the Secretary of State said this afternoon that he believed the people of Canada would support the Government in this measure, I tell him I believe that he is all wrong, because what is deeply imbedded in the British heart is fair play to everybody and the maxim that everybody is innocent until proven guilty. But this Government undertakes to say that men who are as innocent [DOT]-why, they did not even pretend to make a charge against them-are to be declared guilty without a charge made against them, guilty of a lack of intelligence and integrity such as to unfit them to exercise the franchise. The Von Hollweg of this Government will have to stand side by side with 354
the man who said that a treaty is but a " scrap of paper." The Secretary of State this afternoon argued around that very carefully, as he is capable of doing. But the fact remains that, through ithe Department of the Secretary of State, certain guarantees have been given to men coming to this country, so long as they behave themselves, and one of those guarantees is that they can exercise all political rights. In dishonouring this guarantee, this Government has done just what the Prussian Government did in violating the treaty with Belgium.
Now I come to another class, the women who are enfranchised. The women who are enfranchised, the Secretary of State declares, would number about 500,000; and in palliation of the offence of depriving other citizens of their rights, he declared that the number disfranchised is so infinitesimally small as compared with those enfranchised, that it is not much of a crime after all. Sir, it is not by size or by numbers that the Act will be judged by the people of Canada; it is the principle behind the Act which will bring condemnation on this Government. If only a few were to be disfranchised, then the argument of the Secretary of State that it was necessary to do so for the safety of the State, has no foundation whatever. If the number is so infinitesimally small that it will make no difference in the election, then his argument must go by the board. But he believes, or I think he believes, that this number is so distributed among certain constituencies that it will have the desired effect politically, although in the aggregate the number is not very large. Now, ae to the women who are enfranchised. I am fully in accord with enfranchising women who are closely related to the men who have gone to the front; but I am not in favour of disfranchising those who have no relatives to go to the front but who have done everything they could. The Secretary of State argued that it would be so difficult to get these other women on the list that you would have to make a distinction somewhere; some women you would not dare to put on the list-I have not heard any one say who they were as yet. But I do know that the poor washerwoman who is contributing her fifty cents a week to the Patriotic Fund and has no male relatives to go to the front, is doing all that in her lies for this country, and she should not be deprived of any privilege given to any other women in the Dominion of Canada. In th; - connection, the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir Gporge Foster) has stood on the platform with myself



i592
on many occasions on behalf of patriotic funds. He has said to the women and to the men: You who cannot go to the front and have no relatives to go to the front can do all that in you lies at home, and your duty will be as fully performed by doing those things as if you were a man and went to the front yourself. To that appeal, made eloquently, as only the Minister of Trade and Commerce can make an appeal, the women of Canada have nobly responded. Day after day, night after night, hour after hour, have they toiled-women in the Red Cross, the Daughters of the Empire, women of other associations, women not attached to any association, knitting by night, sewing by day, preparing comforts for the sons of others, for our sons who are at the front- and, forsooth, this Government says to the woman who is fortunate enough to. be represented at the front: We are going to let you have the vote, but this other woman who has done her part nobly, as did the woman of old, she shall have no voice or lot in the government of this eonntry. Thousands of women have contributed generously to the Red Cross Fund. Many of these women have not representatives at the front; they regret it just as much as any person else can; but they have taken up the burden of the work, they have performed it nobly and well-and this Government, forsooth, draws the line in front of them andi says: You cannot have any voice in running the affairs of this country. I cannot understand the frame of mind that brings men to that conclusion. I have listened carefully to the excuses given for not placing these women on the voters' list-I have yet to find any reason given, they have been mere excuses -and I come back again to this point, that the women who have provided bandages for the boys at the front and have seen them soaked by party heelers as they went through; the women who provided comforts for the boys at the front, and have seen them diverted to other uses across the sea, are so down on this Government that the Government is afraid to trust them with the franchise.


George Henry Bradbury: That is a dirty statement.


George Perry Graham: I repeat that the bandages were soaked in party patronage and rake-off before they got to the soldiers. That has been proven, and I can give the House further evidence of it, if it is desired. The Secretary of State said he believed all these women who were given votes would vote for the Government. I tell him now that he

will find himself mistaken in regard to that. The women of this country know something about the management of public affairs. They want honesty in administration, and if ever there was a time in the history of Canada when the women have taken a deep interest in our affairs, it has been during the past two or three years. They have given up their sons to this cause; if they have no sons to send, they have given up their energy, their effort, their work and their money to aid the Allies. They are watqhing the conduct of public affairs; and the Government will find when the election time comes that, although this Bill has been brought in for party purposes only, the effect expected to be gained will not be gained, but very much the reverse.


An hon. MEMBER:: Perhaps the hon. gentleman may run into the Senate.


George Perry Graham: I may say that I have not been trying to run into the Senate yet. I will run wherever there is a fight, because the Government never lets me run without a fight, whatever pledges they make beforehand.


Mr. W. H. BENNETT:: I have had the honour of having the nomination in one riding for twenty-six years, and stayed there. I have never been run out.


George Perry Graham: I bad the honour of helping to lick the hon. gentleman once. I know that. I should like to direct my attention to the hon. Minister of Finance (Sir Thomas White). He has been asking the people to save, and they have been saving. The reward he gives to people for saving is that he becomes a party to a Bill to deprive them of their rights as citizens. Through the Food Controller, the Government has been asking the women of Canada to curtail expenditure. The encouragement to these people, in return for their economy, is that they shall not be allowed to vote unless they comply with certain conditions, which many of them cannot comply with. I want to know what effect that is going to have on the future enthusiasm of these women for war work. I said that this Bill, if it became law, would militate against the progress of the war, and I repeat that statement. The thousands of upright women, rich and poor, who have been labouring hourly, daily, weekly and yearly, in order that success might come to the Allies, find themselves now confronted with the rebuff, the rebuke, the stigma, by this Government, that though they have done all

this they are not entitled to the franchise but must be classed with alien enemies and men who do not want to fight.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: The hon. gentleman's
time is more than up.


George Perry Graham: I seldom break the rules of the House, and I will not try to break the rule now. I will try and conclude in one word, although it may be a long one.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Not very long.


George Perry Graham: We ask immigrants to
come to this country. On the success of immigration to Canada depends our ability to meet the financial stress that will come upon us, and this Government has done more by this Bill to cripple us financially than anything that has happened since this Parliament opened.


Mr. W. F. MACLEAN:: I am in favour
of the Bill now before the House, for several reasons. First, I arn in favour of it on its merits; and second, I am in favour of it because of the necessities of the war. We have had during this session three important war measures before the House. We have passed the conscription Bill, imposing military duties on all our men of a certain age, because of the necessities of the war. We tried to secure enough men by the voluntary system. We found it impossible to secure them, and, of necessity, we had to pass a conscription law. We owe it to the men who have gone to the front, to pass such a measure, and we also owe it to the men who have died at the front. The great historical precedent for our sending men to the front is that of the Greeks, when they fought for their liberty over 2,500 years ago. 'The people of ISparta sent 300 of their fighting men to Thermopylae, and every one of the 300, with only one exception, was buried on that field of honour, and, to their military glory, a stone was erected, and on that stone was the inscription: Go stranger, tell the Spartans that we lie here, having faithfully observed their commands. Instead of 300 men we have left 30,000 on the warfields of Europe; and we owe it to them to pass this law of compulsory military service. We passed it of necessity. Now, we are passing two other measures, a law to secure the votes of the soldiers, and providing how that vote is to be recorded, and now this law in regard to franchise. Both of these laws were rendered necessary because of the refusal of Parliament to ask for an extension of its life. I am in favour of the Bill now under discussion both because of the additions it makes to the voting population and also because of the restrictions it makes. As to the additions: For many years I have expressed the belief that women of this country should have the vote. The women of England have been given the franchise, or the proposal is coming up soon. It is more or less limited,-but they are giving them votes. The opportunity comes at a time of necessity to give the women votes, and we are giving them votes in two cases. We are giving votes to the women who are serving at the front, and we now propose to give votes to the women who are kith and kin to the men who are serving at the front. No mistake will be made to give the vote to a portion of the women of our country. Great problems will have to be solved in Canada, as a result of this war, and nobody will have a better right to be consulted, as to the settlement of those problems, than the women of this country. They are in every way fitted to exercise the franchise, but it will take some time to settle the question of how the rights of all are to be guarded, as pointed out by the Prime Minister. But the great fact is that we are enfranchising a 'lot of women of this country. The matter is urgent, and has to be put through in a short time. We may not include all the women, but once it is started as it has been started in England, limiting it to those of thirty years of age and imposing other conditions, it will make progress in future. The provinces of Canada have given women votes in a number of cases. The likelihood is that the United States will have a federal franchise applicable to wo mein. They will isoon have it in Great Britain, and we are starting it now. No mistake is being made in giving votes to women.
I am in sympathy with the disfranchising of quite a number of people in this country. There is a good deal to be argued for the side of the case presented by the hon. gentlemen who preceded me. But, although it is true that we ought to give votes to those who become citizens of Canada, there may be times when necessity compels us to revise our attitude on that question. The hon. gentleman refers to Bethmann-Hollweg and men of his school. I may point out that because of the intrigues of these men, because of the necessity of our acting in self-defence, because of the ex igencies of the occasion, we have to limit this franchise as we propose to limit it

The ^national security, particularly when, it is in jeopardy, is a matter of supreme importance. The necessities of the occasion count for more than even the pledges we may have given in regard to political rights; as a war measure we may 'have to restrict rights that may have been conceded. Many people in 'this country, Liberals and Conservatives-I speak from no partisan point ox view-see the real national necessity of limiting the votes of these persons of alien enemy birth who have already got their citizenship. No great injustice will be done to them. Even though there may be an injustice, having regard to the knowledge we have of German and Austrian intrigues, I do not think that a great error will have been committed. I believe that the American republic, before their people come to vote, will insist upon some kind of federal law defining what shall constitute citizenship in the United States and stating to whom the vote shall be allowed. The Americans are having a great experience just now. They have not told us yet what revelations have been made to the President and his Cabinet at Washington concerning the ramifications of German intrigues. We are getting a taste of it now in the revelations that have been made in Great Britain. That being the case, the national safety demands that the franchise of these people shall be limited. Australia has taker, actum in this respect, not because of any hostility to the people who came there and helped them to settle the country, but for a national reason; for the safety and welfare of the Commonwealth. They are not denounced for doing that; neither should we be denounced for taking this action in a *case of supreme importance.
I have pointed out that we have been compelled to take this step as a war measure and because the Opposition saw fit to oppose the extension of the life of this Parliament. We had to pass the measure of conscription, having regard to our national needs; but the passing of two other measures, the one for giving the soldiers opportunity to vote and the other the provision for the regulation, extension and limitation of the franchise, would not have been necessary had an extension of the life of Parliament been made. Moreover, we would not have needed these two measures if Parliament had had what it ought to have-the right to regulate the length of its own life. I believe that Australia has that power; but we have not. One of the questions to be settled in this Parliament in the future will be the right of the Can-
[Mr. W. P. Maclean. 1
adian Parliament to regulate the length of a parliament. You cannot settle in a short time this question of citizenship; the question of to what extent a man shall be given the right to vote, the question of what limitation shall be attached to the franchise, having regard to the effect upon it of the operation of naturalization laws. Because necessity compels us to extend the franchise in some directions and to limit it in others, it does not follow that we are doing any injustice to a large number of the citizens of the country, but it does follow that we are doing something for the security of the nation and for the protection of the liberties of the people. You cannot take chances on a supreme issue of this kind; you must do what you think is right. This measure is a war measure; it is for war-election purposes. The Bill is justified, to my mind, 'and 1 think it certainly will be *suppoi'ted by the people whom I represent. I have no fear of the addition of a large number of women to the voting strength of this country. They will discharge their duty from thd highest ground of patriotism and from no partisan point of view. I am willing to leave the matter to them.
You talk about national unity in this country, and the necessity for it. How is national unity to be expected? National unity will be attained only if we observe some of the things that we have neglected hitherto. One of the first things necessary for the creation of national unity is a federal franchise. Sir John A. Macdonald was the first man who laid that principle down in Parliament. I often heard him speak on that point; from the first time I heard him I have believed in the principle, and I have asserted it in this House. I am ijather an old member now; I was in the House at the time we abandoned federal franchise and substituted the provincial franchise therefor. I never agreed with that course, and I do not agree with it yet; I believe in a federal franchise. Moreover, as I have said, I am confident that the American people will be compelled to adopt a federal franchise. Another thing that you must have in order to effect national unity-the Americans are coming to it-is federal enforcement of federal law. We run too much in this country in the direction of provincialism; we have to acquire more and more the nature of nationals.
We have to believe in the federal enforcement of federal laws. We have to become accustomed to look to the federal power for the defence of national and pub-

lie rights. We are now going through that experience. We are finding out that, in acting on the old lines that we followed for fifty years we were not acting quite in the right direction. We are retracing our steps and coming back to the views held by the old leader of the national policy in the old days. He believed also in a national franchise, and we are coming back to his view; and we shall make no mistake if we have a national franchise. We shall make no mistake if we enfranchise the women. We shall make no mistake if we declare that under the necessities that this war has imposed on us, we are going to revise and rewrite the law in regard to naturalisation. We have been too free in regard to our naturalisation law, and it must be rewritten. If there is anything that the war is teaching us to-day, it is this, that there must be a limitation in regard to naturalisation because of our experience of German and of Austrian ideas of integrity in connection with this war. We would have had no necessity for these two Acts at this session, if we had taken measures to extend the life of Parliament probably until the war was over. But,' that not having been done, the duty is imposed upon this Parliament to take steps upon the first opportunity to give this Parliament a power that the Australian Parliament has, and a power that we are fully competent to exercise, the power to settle in our own House how long Parliament ought to continue. We should not be cribbed, cabined and confined in that respect. We are a nation, and we are to-day that portion of the North American continent that is leading this continent in the defence of the great public rights that began to be recognized at the establishment of the commonwealth in England and that have come down through all these years. While for a time we may be charged with interfering with citizenship or with breaking a pledge, I do not think we are quite breaking a pledge. As a friend pointed out to me this afternoon, often when a man in this country is summoned to sit on the jury, a case will come up for-trial in which a friend of his happens to be the person to be tried. In such a case the court very properly says to that citizen:	You
must not try this case because you are an interested party. In this case we are saying to certain people of alien birth: Inasmuch as you are closely related to the man who is being tried here-and the Kaiser and all his works are to-day on trial because of his assaults on libertyyou must stand aside on this trial. We do not deprive that man of his rights, hut we say: On this occasion it is not fitting that you should be a juryman or a judge, and the citizen is the juryman or the judge to whom we are appealing in the coming election. While there -may be some ground: for the argument that has been made that: we are limiting the rights of people whom-we have invited to this -country, still if we are doing that, we aTe- not doing it because we want to deny them- their rights, so much as because we are determined to save the nation in this hour of its extreme peril. The women of this- country are, with us in this respect. Whether they will vote for us I cannot -s-ay, but I do say we are- making no mistake in recognizing the principle of "Votes for Wo-men." We are in this country recognizing the principle of public ownership, and now we are recognizing the right of the women of this country to vote. The women, certainly the women of my own province, will not resent the fact that the measure has not been made a broad one at the beginning. As was pointed out this afternoon, it will take time to- settle the extent of the women's vote, and we shall have to very carefully revise the laws of naturalisation. This measure, to my mind, is both a progressive one and one of necessity, and that being the case, I intend to vote for it and to justify my vote whenever I am called on to do eo outside of this House. I believe the majority of the people o-f this country are in favour of this law, not from any partisan point of view, but because of its fairness and because the necessities- of the war compel us to en-^ct i-t.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend (Mr. W. F. Maclean-) has promised us that if he is ever called upon, outside of this House, to justify the vote he proposes -giving o-n this- measure he will be able and prepared to do so. Certainly he did not this evening give any reasons in justification of his vote. Therefore, probably the- first opportunity he will have of making that justification will be outside of this Parliament. The substantial utterance he made this evening in support of this Bill was that national interests were in jeopardy unless this -measure was enacted. It would have better become that hon. gentleman had he attempted to give to this House his reasons for believing that national interests were in jeopardy. If national interests are in jeopardy, then probably this measure is justifiable, but when an hon. gentleman states that the
o536

justification of this measure is that national interests are in jeopardy, it is his duty to give to the House at least a few reasons as 'to why he believes that to be the case. He gives, as a reason in justification of his vote in favour of this measure, the fact that the life of Parliament was not extended. We very nearly had an election in the fall of 1914, and my hon. friend was then in favour of an election. In that event, there wag not and there could not have been a Franchise Act of this character. I remember reading the Sunday edition of a paper published by my hon. friend in the city of Toronto in the spring of 1915 to the effect that in a few days Parliament would be dissolved and there would be an election.


William Findlay Maclean: If there had been an election, it would not have done any harm.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: In that event there would have been no opportunity to enact a measure of this kind. Therefore, in the two principal points my hon. friend attempted to make this evening in support of this measure, namely, that the national interests were in danger and that the Government was refused an extension of Parliament, he has signally failed in making good his statements. The Bill before the House proposes to disfranchise arbitrarily a portion of the people of this country. It proposes to enfranchise another section of our population who are defined in the Bill and who are principally relatives of those who have enlisted for service overseas. I have no difficulty in reaching a conclusion as to what should be my duty in the premises. This legislation is objectionable in principle, and I deny that there is anything in the world to justify its introduction or its enactment. Public sentiment in this country is not behind this legislation. There is practically no sentiment in favour of it to-day, and there will be less as time proceeds, I have reference to disfranchising clauses.
I submit that reason and justice clearly point out the duty of members of Parliament in connection with this Bill. A proper regard for the future of this country and for our good name among the nations and peoples of the world compel one to oppose the measure. It is not founded upon any principle of a substantial character, and I repeat what others have said, that it violates without cause an implied compact made between the State and a number of our citizens. It does violence to principles and traditions long established and long

cherished in all British countries. I believe it will be regarded as an act of injustice to-day, and that it will leave a legacy of distrust to a great number of people who will come into Canada in future years, which distrust will not easily be extinguished. Further, I believe it will perpetuate in the after-war politics of this country political incidents which should be forgotten. In our western country you will find one particular party, during political campaigns, appealing to the alien-born population for support upon the ground that another party during this war disfranchised aliens, and at the same time the other political party will be engaged in denying that allegation, which will be merely an encouragement to false testimony. Or if not doing that, they will be giving other reasons, and the result will be that many war incidents will be perpetuated. I believe, it is much better that they should end with the ending of the war. I maintain that history will adjudge the act contemplated by this Bill as a blot upon our national career. And, unfortunately, it comes at a time when we are writing glorious and imperishable pages of our history, which will be the future epics of this young nation. We have solicited to our shores the citizens whom wc now attempt to deprive of one of the rights of citizenship. In their native countries before	their	departure,	we	haveheralded	the	glories of	our	institutions.	These	immigrants	have	comehere, and no	one to-day	is	called
upon to defend them against any acts of sedition or treason or infidelity to their vows of citizenship. In this Western hemisphere, some day when the war is over, we will need more European settlers, as our economic future and salvation depends upon that. Many of the class whom we are now disfranchising by this Bill will be coming to this country, not directly from Europe, but from the United States, and I doubt if we shall not welcome them. Now I ask you, Sir, will this proposed Act fortify their faith in our political institutions? Is it worth while? Will it protect anything that is in danger to-day? What did my hon. friend from South York (Mr. W. F. Maclean) mean when he said that national interests were in jeopardy?


William Findlay Maclean: If Germany succeeds where would our country be?
iMr. A. K. MACLEAN: Did he say what he meant, or did he mean what he said? We have heard members of the Government give reasons in support of this

legislation, and we have bad an opportunity of reading the Bill, and I say that in this Bill the Government do not mean what they say, or they do not say what they mean. It reminds me of the collision between two cross-eyed waiters in the dining room, which caused a downfall in china. One of the waiters said to the other, " Why don't you look where you're going," and the other replied, " Why don't you go where you're looking." If the Government meant to make this a war franchise based upon war services, they should have said 9 p.m. so in the Bill, and if they meant something else they should admit that they did not say what they meant.
The Solicitor General denied most violently this afternoon that there was any violation of an implied contract between the State and the citizen in disfranchising the citizen, and he referred to the fact that in the province of Manitoba Chinamen, though naturalized as British subjects, have never been given the franchise. I apprehend a distinction between that case and the one under discussion. In the one case the State has seen fit to withhold the franchise from a certain class of people but in the other case the State has seen fit to give the franchise. It is now proposed to take away the franchise from these people without showing cause. If the franchise is to be taken away from them, I say let cause be shown, and if it is impressive, if jt is substantial, just and right, then we upon this side of the House will acknowledge it.
To a large extent, this is a practical question. Let us see how many people it will affect. Will it affect such a large number of people that in the national interests their names should be removed from the franchise roll? If but a small number of the people will be affected, is it good business on the part of this country to enact it? If national interests are not involved and are not in jeopardy, by continuing the franchise to our alien-born, is this legislation really worth while? In that respect, therefore, this is a practical question. Now, how many foreign-born people are there in this country who will be affected by this measure? Some hon. gentlemen have already given the figures. I wish to repeat some of them, and I think it important that we should keep this in mind. In considering this Bill the people of Canada will naturally inquire, in the first instance, how many people of the enemy class there are 'in this country, and secondly, what is their	record as citizens during the
war.	In many	of the provinces
there is practically no German or Austrian
population. The foreign-born population of Nova Scotia is >about four per cent, and New Brunswick three per cent. Of the population of Prince Edward Island 99.4 is Canadian-born. The German and Austrian population of the province of Quebec is almost negligible. In the province of Ontario there is a large German population, the descendants, in the main, of settlers who came from Pennsylvania over one hundred years ago. In 1911, there were in the province of Ontario 7,871 German males over twenty-one years of age bom in Europe, of whom 5,143 were naturalized. There were 10,420 Austro-Hungarians of twenty-one years of age, of whom 1,049 were naturalized. In other words, the number in the province of Ontario is almost negligible, and that may be said of the province of British Columbia as well. It is in the three prairie provinces that we find the vast majority of alien enemy population. According to the figures given to the House on Saturday evening last by the hon. member for Saskatoon (Mr. McCraney), there have come into the prairie provinces since 1900, 157,000 of the class we propose to disfranchise and he estimated that there would be about 30,000 of that class entitled to the franchise to-day. I think his estimate was about correct. According to the census, of 1911 there were in the prairie provinces 21,145 German males over 21 years of age, of whom 12,007 were naturalized. In the same provinces there were 57,750 Austro-Hungarians, of whom 23,846 were naturalized. This shows that in 1911 there were about 35,000 naturalized persons of the alien enemy class over 21 years of age in these provinces. There may have been additions since then, but on the other hand there would be subtractions to take .into consideration. Therefore, I consider the estimate given by the hon. member for Saskatoon to be substantially correct.


George Henry Bradbury: It is double now.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: I doubt very much if it is double now, because the number naturalized since 1911 has been very small indeed. True, there would be a certain number, but I. deny the right of my hon. friend to say they have doubled.


George Henry Bradbury: I am speaking from knowledge of my own county, and I say they have doubled.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: Canada is a little larger than the county represented by my hon. friend. In 1911 there were 12,007 Ger-

man males over 21 years of age naturalized in Canada. I doubt if the number has grown very much since. There would not be more (than 5,000 or 6,000 Germans who would be voters in the western provinces,' and I doubt if there would be as many as that. If that is correct, is it worth while violating so substantial a principle for the purpose of disfranchising that small number of electors, unless better cause can be shown for such an act. It must be remembered, also, that more than one-quarter of the German population in the Canadian Northwest came from the United States, a substantial number of whom were born in that country, and possibly their disfranchisement might be the cause of some international dispute, not of a serious nature, I grant you. I ask the Minister of Trade and Commerce, is this legislation worth while, for the sake of disfranchising such a few Germans, who may possibly be very good citizens, and a great number of whom may be quite sympathetic towards the cause of the Allied powers? The Germans in tills country are different from the Germans in the British Isles, whom the Solicitor General says the British authorities deemed it not expedient to call upon for military service. Most of the Germans in this country came from the United States. The fact that they are settled upon the land and ciioose to come into this country to engage in an occupation of that character at once marks them ias a type of people different from those who went from Germany to secure occupations in Great Britain. It is well known that the racial affinities of much of the Austrian population, which is [DOT]the larger portion of the alien enemy population, are with the Russian people, and they are not known to be very sympathetic towards the Austrian Empire. If our political institutions were endangered by permitting these people to exercise the franchise, if these people of alien enemy origin were known to be hostile to Canada, to the British Empire and to the cause for which we now fight, if they showed acts of hostility in that direction; and if they were there ;n substantial numbers and so distributed that they could affect the result of an election in a number of constituencies, there might he something to be said in support of disfranchising them. It is not, however, necessary to defend them upon this score, because we have the favourable word of the Solicitor General upon this point. In introducing the Bill the other day, he said-
I am quite free to admit that taken all in all those who come from alien enemy countries have, in the main, during- the progress of the war, conducted themselves satisfactorily within lines of obedience to the laws of Canada.
And I thought he was rather apologetic in introducing the Bill. He did not unequivocally affirm his conviction as to the fairness of the Bill. He expressed himself in this way:
It does not seem unreasonable that they should not exercise, during the war, that control of our destinies which is vested in the franchise.
Those were not strong words; they did not indicate a strong and intense conviction in the merits of the Bill. He simply thought it was not unreasonable. I am told my 'time is up, and unfortunately I must come to a stop before covering the ground I expected to cover. I hope, however, at another stage of this Bill to have an op portuuity of concluding my remarks.


Mr. HUGH GUTHRIE (South Wellington) :: As I do not expect to be in the House when the vote is taken on this question, I would like to state my views in regard to the Bill now before the House. I voted for closure in regard to this measure, and on three or four occasions on Saturday night I voted against motions which I viewed as dilatory motions, only intended to retard the progress of the Bill, having *regard to the fact that we are coming towards the close of the session. I am a supporter of the principle of the Bill, and, if I stand alone on this side of the House, I shall so vote if I am here when the vote is taken upon the second reading. In my judgment, the matter practically comes down to three questions. First, is the proposal to give the next of kin of soldiers serving overseas, or who have served overseas, a correct one? After listening to a good many speeches here to-day, I have come to tlie conclusion that there is no very great difference of opinion on either side of the House upon this question.


Charles Murphy: There is a lot of difference.


Hugh Guthrie: If there is a lot, I have not heard it voiced during the course of this debate. I rather concluded from what I heard that there was almost a consensus of opinion in regard to allowing the female next of kin of the soldiers abroad to vote at the coming election. I do not believe that it will be possible to poll anything like the full soldiers' vote. I do not believe that you can poll the votes of men actively en-

gaged upon the firing line, of the votes of men who are prisoners of Germany, or the votes of hundreds of men who,are suffering pain and torment as the result of recently inflicted wounds

certainly you will not poll the votes of the thirty odd thousand men who have given their lives in this cause. For that reason, I am convinced that the proposal in this Bill to allow these men to be represented at the ensuing election is a proper one, and if it does not receive the support of both sides of the House, in my humble opinion it should receive it.
The next question raised by the Bill is that of disqualification. Upon this there seems to be rather a decided cleavage, those on your left taking the ground that it would be wrong, even as a war-time measure, to disfranchise men who have been granted the rights of citizenship in this country; And I agree that under ordinary conditions >
it would be nothing short of an outrage so to deprive them. But we must realise that we are not living under ordinary conditions, and extraordinary conditions require extraordinary measures. I have not had experience with what has been termed in this debate the alien vote which is resident in the Northwest. By that I mean that class of people who have within the last fifteen years come to Canada from enemy countries and who have become naturalized citizens of Canada. I do not know them nor do they know me. But I am going to talk perhaps a little more candidly about some former residents of Germany whom I do know; and I do not know that there is any necessity to mince words on. an occasion of this kind. I live in a county next to the county of Waterloo, and I believ-e from what I know and from what I have heard, and from what people in my -county know, that the foreign-born German population of the county of Waterloo are not in sympathy with the objects of the Allies in the present war. I do not believe that in my county there are more than fifteen ot twenty men who will he affected by the disfranchisement clause of this- Bill; but I believe there ate -a large number in the adjoining county of Waterloo who will be disfranchised. I will give an instance. I have held meetings in Waterloo during the course of the present war, several of them patriotic meetings, Red Cross meetings, enlistment meetings. One I have clearly in my mind. It was held in the riding of North Waterloo, at Elmira. There was an audience of about 300 people in the small hall, almost -all German either
by birth or descent, the majority no doubt Canadian-born. I made my plea on behalf of the Patriotic Fund. My reception was rather frigid, but perhaps I did not put the case as well as I might have put it. However, at the conclusion of the meeting, a gentleman on the platform came to ine and said: You must excuse us Mr. Guthrie, but take for instance myself; we are six brothers in my family, and five of us are in the Kaiser's- army, and, he said, where should my sympathies be? Well, it was a very pertinent question. I could tell from the -man's- manner where his sympathies were, and it was only human nature when you come down to the last analysis. I put the case to -myself-a Scotch-Canadian, suppose I were living in Germany to-day, unmolested by any law in Germany, where would my sympathies be? Entirely with the Allies. I believe that the highest responsibility cast on -any citizen of this or any country is the duty of defending his country, and the highest privilege which the citizen- can enjoy is the privilege of casting his fran-chis-e. On the one hand, you have the responsibility. But the aliens or the naturalized aliens in this country whom this Bill seeks to disfranchise are not permitted to defend- this country, even if they so desired. Whether it is a military regulation of the British Government I do- not know, hut I have been informed that men of enemy birth are not permitted to serve in the ranks of the allied armie-s.


An hon. MEMBER:: Fifty have gone from Ottawa.


Hugh Guthrie: I believe some have gone from. Ottawa and some from my county, hut I can tell you of some who- went from Ottawa and my county, and that was the German reservists. My hon. friend says "not here." I have an instance, -and I know it is correct, because a brother of mine has- -been chaplain in an Ottawa regiment. A German prisoner brought in seriously wounded, when my brother was called to him, turned to my brother and said: "Hello, Dr. Guthrie; I used to go to your church in Ottawa." And that man told; my brother when he left Ottawa for the front. I believe there were a number of German reservists in Canada, and I believe that in m-any cases these were men who had taken the oath of allegiance to this country. We have had no serious outbreak in Canada-thank God for it-and I hope we m-ay not; but if one reads the United States papers day by day he will -see that the German people in that country have

been carrying out a most ingenious propaganda against the United States and in favour of Germany ever since the United States entered into the war. If that is so there, is it not likely to be so here? If the sympathy of the German residents of the United States is with the Central Powers, will the sympathy of the German people in this country not also be with the Central Powers? It is only human nature, and on that basis you have to deal with it. I do not believe that the men whom this Bill seeks to disfranchise will take serious offence in regard to it. I believe they will welcome it; I do not believe they want to be put in the delicate position of having to vote under the circumstances which affect them at the present time in Canada. No one believes this to be a permanent arrangement; this is purely and simply a war arrangement to avoid any difficulties which might arise, and for that reason I think it is proper that that portion of the Act should pass.
The only other point I see in the Bill is in regard to the women who are not enfranchised by this measure, certainly a very large number. I am a supporter of woman franchise for the whole of the Dominion of Canada, and I have not a doubt that, had there been time, that proposal might have been included in a Bill for the coming general election. But time has been otherwise occupied. We have been here month after month, and perhaps not a great deal has been accomplished; but certain it is that the House has been kept busy, aye very busy, early and late; and there has not been proper time to introduce general enfranchisement for the women of Canada. Five provinces, so far as their provincial affairs go, have placed Acts on their statute books to give women votes in provincial elections. Four provinces have not done so. Whether in these four provinces the great preponderance of opinion is against extending the franchise to women, I do not know. Certain it is .that the country is about divided, half and half, in regard to women's votes. I think that this question of the enfranchisement of the women of the whole-of Canada may well wait a year or two until matters of stern necessity with which we have now to deal have been successfully settled. I see no hardship in the Bill, no wrongful discrimination, and I have made up my mind to support it.


Mr. BICKEKDIKE (Montreal, St-Law-rence):: It is not my intention to deal with

the Bill generally. I wish to confine myself principally to the clause by which we disfranchise some half a million of the very best women in Canada. I would not ask that any one opposed to the Allies, such as Germans, Austrians or Bulgarians should have the right to vote in this country, but I claim that every honest, loyal citizen in Canada should have the right to vote. Why should we discriminate to that extent? I think it would be well to state to the House what the law of New Zealand is. The section reads:
Every adult person who has resided for one year in New Zealand and who has resided in the electoral district for which he claims to vote during- the three months immediately preceding his resignation on the roll of the district, and who is a British subject either by birth or naturalization, or a half-caste, is entitled (subject to the provisions of this Act) to be registered as an elector and to vote at the election of members of Parliament for that district.
Every man and woman in New Zealand 21 years of age, who is a loyal British subject, has the right to vote. In the small country of Finland there is only one Chamber consisting of 200 members. The system of voting is known as direct and proportional. The Finns have equal suffrage, and some 18 or 20 women are members of the House. I certainly welcome this Bill, in as far as it permits a large number of women to vote at the next general election, but it does not go far enough. It is narrow, it is drastic, and savours largely of kaiser-ism. I must take exception to the clause restricting and limiting the votes of women in Canada, and insist on that clause being amended, so as to give to all women who are truly loyal British subjects, if they choose, the right of voting. I say that a serious injustice will he perpetrated if the Bill becomes law as it stands. Why should there be any discrimination against one form of national service and other forms of service equally honourable, equally indis-pensible to the prosecution of the war? For the first time in this country, a Bill has been introduced which ignores workers for the Red Cross, and the win-the-war nurses, the different patriotic fund workers, Belgian relief workers, and tens of thousands of women engaged in the munition factories who will, under this measure be denied the right to vote. This Bill should be amended so as to confer equal political rights on women. We should give the loyal women of Canada the same political rights and privileges as are enjoyed by the men, with power to fill any office at the constitutional disposal of the Crown; and furthermore, to

Become candidates, and if elected to take their seats in this House of Commons. Then, and only then, -will the reforms so long advocated in this House by a numbef of the members become law. Penitenitary and prison reforms ably advocated by the hon. member for Frontenac (Mr. Edwards), reform in the liquor traffic by our good friend from Bonaventure (Mr. Marcil), and last, but not least, abolishing of the death penalty in Canada. You are depriving of the vote by this Bill five hundred thousand truly loyal Canadian women, who have been doing all this good work ever since the war commenced. It is, to say the least of it, an autocratic, undignified measure and unworthy of any government of this great Dominion. I cannot understand how any government resort to such a subterfuge under the guise of a war-time election Act, and I hope that the right hon. leader of the Government (Sir Robert Borden) will accept my suggestion, and amend this clause. If he does not do so, I am sure he will regret it for years to come; and on the other hand, if he accepts my suggestion he will be able to look back upon this measure with pride, pleasure and satisfaction.
I must quote what President Wilson has just said in a message to the people of the state of Maine. It is an evidence that all over the civilized world Women are going to get the vote, and get it soon. He said:
May I not express through you my very great interest in the equal suffrage campaign in Maine? The pledges of my party are very distinct in favour of granting the suffrage to women by state action, and I would like to have the privilege of urging all Democrats to support a cause in which we all believe.
We are going very far away in this Bill from our democratic principle. I remember, in my young days, we used to say we were democratic-yes, "democrats to the hilt"-but there is nothing of a democratic nature in this Bill. The opinion of the people of Vancouver on this feature of the Bill is indicated by the following newspaper despatch:
Vancouver, September 7.-The Vancouver Trades and Labour Council last evening passed a motion protesting against the manner in) which the Dominion Government intends to extend a part franchise to women, and calling upon Premier Borden to give all women of the Dominion full privileges at the polls with men.
We have the following communication from Winnipeg:
Winnipeg, September 8.-"I am absolutely opposed to it," declared R. A. Rigg, secretary of the Trades and Labour Council, in referring to the new franchise legislation. "The country is falling into the grip of autocratic rule. The last semblance of democracy is vanishing. If
they continue along the lines they are now following, autocracy will undoubtedly be firmly established in this country."
In Montreal several associations have had meetings, and resolved on sending petitions to the Government and have passed resolutions opposing the Bill as it stands to-day. I will refer to one case. The People's Power League and Equal Suffrage League met last Thursday night, and the following is a report of the proceedings:
The resolution submitted by the Equal Suffrage League deprecated the idea of differentiating between one form of national service and other forms of service equally honourable and equally indispensable to a successful prosecution of the war, and that for the first time in this country a Bill has been introduced which ignores workers for the Red Crqss, Red Cross Nurses, Patriotic Fund Committees, Belgian and similar relief funds, also the tens of thousands of women engaged in munition factories, etc., who are denied the vote. It was also pointed out that many undesirable analogies will develop, and that it does not take advantage of the present psychological moment to confer upon women equal political rights with men, and that the British House of Commons and the United States have made no such distinctions in their recent franchise legislation.
It was, therefore, resolved, "That this meeting implores the advisers of the Crown to withdraw their Franchise Bill and draft immediately a measure that will invest women with the same political rights and privileges as are shared by men, with power to fill any office at the constitutional disposal of the Crown."
Here is one of the statements made at that meeting:
As regards the votes given to all female relatives of soldiers, nobody would grumble with that if adult suffrage for all women were established. But a slur is cast on every woman [DOT] who may be without soldier relatives, and she is declared unfit to exercise' the franchise! Why? What is the spedial reason for singling out a special class of women voters? It is not any frank recognition of woman suffrage, but as Mr. Meighen says, "to give added strength to the vote of the soldiers of Canada." Thus to 400,000 soldier votes will be added from half a million to a million soldiers' relatives' votes -a special class that no doubt the Conservative Government feel can be specially appealed to by being told the ridiculous rubbish that the soldiers at the front will be deserted if they do not all vote Conservative.
I appeal to the Government on behalf of these women who are doing so much good work. I will cite two concrete cases with a view to touching the heart of the Secretary of State, if I can.


An hon. MEMBER:: It cannot be done.


Robert Bickerdike: I know a woman in Montreal with whom the Solicitor General also is very well acquainted. I have personal knowledge of the facts in this matter, because I have a son who is a major

in the 87th Grenadier Guards, a regiment which was raised by my hon. friend's cousin, General Meighen. The lady to whom I refer, who has no sons, gathered around her a number of workers in Montreal, and they sent 6,000 pairs of socks, all knitted by these loving hands, to that regiment. Is it fair to deny the vote to these women, who have been doing real service for the boys at the front, the sons of other mothers? I say that it is unjust, unreasonable, unpatriotic. In addition to the 6,000 pairs of socks, they sent over one hundred thousand soldiers' comforts of one kind or another. The Government did not pay for these; the ladies collected the money and sent the articles to the front. I submit that such women are entitled to the vote. Another woman had three daughters, and when the war broke out the very first thing ' she did was to say to them: come with me. Thereupon she and her daughters started working night and day collecting money for the Bed Cross and Patriotic Funds. Has that woman not a right to vote? I do hope that the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State will reconsider the drastic measure that they have submitted to the House, and will decide to treat all the loyal, earnest and patriotic women of Canada as they should be treated.


Samuel Francis Glass: Mr. Speaker, we scarcely expected that this Bill would meet with the unanimous consent of members of the House. I have almost come to the conclusion that it is practically impossible for the Government to introduce any measure or to suggest any legislation that would be entirely satisfactory to the members of the Opposition. It hais been said that "only the dead are satisfied; they would not be if they were conscious of their dissatisfaction."
The hon. gentleman who has just resumed his seat (Mr. Bickerdike), with other members of 'the Opposition, has paid great attention to the word "democracy," and has endeavoured to show by various means how in this measure democracy is being assailed. The very foundation of democracy requires that equal rights demand equal service. If we are seeking an exemplification of equal service as we should have it we shall not find it in the attitude of the Opposition during the whole course of this session; indeed, during the whole course of the war. The late Elbert Hubbard at one time defined democracy as follows:
1.	A form of government by popular ignorance.

2.	The fool's paradise.
3.	Any political system where male votes are a substitute for brains.
He had this further to say about the word democracy:
The word is from the word abracadabra; demo, lungs, and crazy; hence, to rule by caloric.
Democracy is defined in the Standard dictionary as follows:
The political system in which government is directly controlled by the people collectively through elected representatives.
Nicholas Murray Butler, in his work "True and False Democracy," defines both. He says :
Jealousy of power honestly gained and justly exercised, envy of attainment or possession are characteristic of the mob, not of the people; of a democracy which Is false, not of a democracy which is true. False democracy shouts every man down to the level of the average. True democracy cries all men up to the heights of their fullest capacity for service and achievement. The two sides are everlastingly, at war. The future of this nation as the future of the world is hound up with the hope of a true democracy that builds itself on liberty.
My hon. friend hag shown a. very keen interest in the unfortunate position of the women of our country, who, he says, as a result of this Bill, will be deprived of. the franchise. It was clearly shown this afternoon that what woman has never had she cannot lose. She has not had the franchise in this country go far-but I re-echo the sentiments that various hon. gentlemen have expressed: the franchise should be extended to women throughout the whole Dominion. The time will come when this privilege will be extended to all our women. How does woman view this measure? I have before me a copy of the London Free Press in which .are given interviews with several women. Amongst others, there is an interview with Mrs. Gordon Wright, a prominent leader in all social work, who is practically known internationally, and who has devoted a great deal of hex time and energies to women's work throughout the country. Mrs. Gordon Wright is the sister of Hon. Newton Wesley Rowell, leader of the Opposition in the provincial legislature. She was interviewed in reference to this measure, and this is her reply:
Mrs. Gordon Wright, sister of Mr. N. W. Rowell, leader of the Provincial Opposition, holds the strongest views on the subject, and considers that the proposals of Premier Borden are only just and reflect the greatest credit on the party.
"I think that it is perfectly right that only these women who have endured the anxiety of having soldier relatives at the front should

vote," she said, in reply to a question as to whether or not she considered that the Bill should he extended to all women, particularly such women as have no male relatives eligible for soldiers.
"X think that the Bill ought to go further and disfranchise all the men who ought to be at the front but who are not there. No slackers should be allowed to vote," she concluded.
Other women in the city were interviewed, and some of them expressed similar sentiments. Hon. gentlemen have said there is an object in this enfranchisement of women. Of course there is an object. That object is to do justice to the large vote of those soldiers who are at the front, and who will never have an-opportunity of exercising the franchise; and, as has been stated today, to do justice to the memory of those 30,000 soldiers who have made the last sacrifice, who are silent, who cannot express their views at this time, to the thousands of those unfortunate prisoners at present in Germany enduring hardships and trials, to the wounded, sick and suffering in the hospitals, not only in France and Great Britain but even in our own country, and to those who, by reason of the horrors of this war and the consequent strain on their nerves, have become insane, and who are now confined in hospitals for the insane in this country as well as in the Old Land. Do we not owe a tribute to the memory of those? Do we hot owe a duty to those who are still enduring hardships, who- will not 'be able in this election to exercise their personal influence? Should we not, therefore, endeavour to carry out the aims and objects for which they are fighting?. Hon. gentlemen opposite do not offer any serious objection to the granting of the franchise to the female relatives- of the soldiers, but they say: There is a purpose in not extending that franchise to the rest of the women. Certainly there is a purpose. It would be eminently unjust to those who have lent their sons to fight in defence of their country, to those who have male relatives at the front, if the benefit of the votes of the female relatives of soldiers should be neutralized'by the extension of the franchise to those women whose sympathies are not along the same lines. It is for this reason I can see a certain advantage in restricting the franchise at the * present time to those women who have relatives serving at the front. The Secretary of State (Mr. Meighen), in introducing this Bill, pointed out those who would be deprived of the exercise. of the franchise in this election. He said:
There are as well many thousands who are enlisted overseas, not in the Canadian overseas forces, but in the British forces. These men, though under the Military Voters' Act, they have, X understand, been given the right to vote, will inevitably in the main find it impossible to exercise that right. There are, besides, many thousands more who before the war were reservists in Canada-and some who were not reservists-who are to-day fighting in Europe or other continents the same battle in which we are engaged, but who are doing so as members of the Allied armies. They have not the -legal right to vote; if they had it, they could not possibly exercise the franchise. An election is to be held at a time when the most deserving, the bone, sinew and virility of our country, are only partially at least enabled to take part in the contest by way of voting. There are also thousands who have fallen in battle, whose voices are stilled. There are, besides these, some thousands who are prisoners of war. Their voices also are silent; under no imaginable circumstances could they take advantage of the Military Voters' Act.
Further oil he pointed out-and this was referred to by the Prime Minister this -afternoon:
Nor can we forget what is a more potent fact still; that each and all of the men overseas are stripped of the influence which under normal circumstances -they could exert among their
Hows in an election contest.
It has been painted out that, i-n so far as the alien vote is concerned, it affects more particularly those portions of Canada that we know as the western provinces. As has been showtn, -there -are some 12,007 German voters out of a total male population of 21,145 naturalised Germans, and that there are 23,846 Austro-Hungarian voters out of -a total male population of 57,750, or a total of 35,853 voters. If we had adopted the principle adopted by one of the western provinces, of classifying these men together and giving them three representatives, the same as they did with the -soldiers, they would not be -a great factor or influence in the politics -of this country or in this House. This Government is pursuing a wiser course, as I am more thoroughly -convinced after hearing the remarks of my hon. friend from South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie), who speaks from his knowledge and experience of the fact that alien enemy reservists, who had taken the oath of naturalization of this country, had responded to -the -call of their mother country and had returned in order to fight against our soldiers in the trenches. We have read the record in the press of a German who was taken prisoner, who was a Canadian citizen from one of the cities of Saskatchewan. He- was a naturalized British subject, a German who had taken the oath of allegiance

and who, to all intents and purposes, had accepted the conditions of nationality in this country. Yet he was taken prisoner from the German army at the front. We cannot get away from these facts which are presented to us. If there he one, if there be two, if there be a dozen, there is no reason why 'there may not be thousands of such men, and there is every reason to presume that those people of the same nationality, who were reservists and whose sympathies are naturally on the side of the country of their birth, would find that their affection for their native land was stronger than their affection for their .adopted country. Because we believe that, these men are not to be allowed to be conscripted into our army. Then upon what ground can these men who can give no service to the State in an emergency of this kind claim the right to vote under the extraordinary conditions which we have to face at the present time? My hon. friend has said that this is not a winrthe-war, but a win-the-election Bill. Personally, I do not see any great distinction, because winning the war, so far as Canada is concerned, means putting forth our maximum effort in order to bring the war to a successful conclusion, and I conceive that a government under the leadership of my right hon. friend who is now leader of the Opposition (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) would adopt a policy calculated to bring about results the very reverse of that.
I just wish to quote from the report of a meeting which was held in Calgary on May 17 last, at which Premier Sifton was one of the principal speakers :
Premier Sifton declared at the openingmeeting of the provincial election here last night that all subjects of alien birth who were naturalized before August 4, 1914, and who had In no way committed any offence against the laws of Canada since, would have the right to vote in the Alberta election.
There was a meeting of five or six thousand electors, many of them being soldiers who had returned from the front. Sergt.-Major Guill-foyle, one of the returned soldiers, was given ten minutes to address the meeting, and he at once asked the Premier why he had not taken action towards disfranchising all Germans and Austrians in the province. His question was the signal for shouting and applause among the soldiers in the audience.
The veterans claimed Canada was still in very real danger from these men, who were far more numerous than was generally believed, and who were now to have the right to vote.	.
The Premier, he said, had the opportunity during the last session of the Legislature to bring in a Bill disfranchising the Germans and Austrians, but he did not do so. Turning to the Premier on the platform, he said:	"I Sm-

peach you as failing to do the right thing for the country in this, and challenge you that you cannot make a reply that will be satisfactory to the citizens of this city."
Regarding the changing of the law affecting the franchise to subjects of alien birth, the premier said the proposal that this should he done was not made till it was too late for the legislature to take it up, and it was a matter with which only the legislature could deal.
I quote this to show that in that part of the country where the majority of these alien enemies are to be found, the soldiers who have lived side by side with them, and have therefore a better opportunity of judging them than we have here, find that they are not reliable.
I shall support this measure because 1 believe that its purpose is in the best interests of this country. Its purpose implies that Canada will continue with all her might and main to support our soldiers at the front till this wa-r is brought to a finish. I believe it would be a great injustice to the memory of those who have made the supreme sacrifice, if
10 p.m. those of alien birth in this country were allowed at this particular time to exercise the franchise and to ' use their influence while our men are engaged in the vital duties they are performing at the front.


James McCrie Douglas: There are quite a number of objectionable features in this Bill. As far as the question of -enfranchising the wives and daughters, and sisters of the soldiers is concerned,
I heartily support that particular provision of the Bill. I wish it had gone further and that the Parliament of Canada had enfranchised every woman who is, a British subject, following the lead which has been given in that direction by the western provinces.
The feature of the Bill to which I object most strongly is the disfranchisement of what- is called the alien enemy in this country. In the province from which I come, and in the constituency which I represent, there is a large number of so-called alien enemies, and from my knowledge of these people I take issue with any hon. gentleman on the other side of the House who states that these men are alien enemies in the strict sense of the word. I have watched their conduct ever since 1914; I have come in contact with them, and I say that in no act that I have ever seen has there been any justification for the charge that the Austrian and German in western Canada is disloyal. He certainly give? voice to no such utterances as I have heard in eastern Canada, and if the basis of this

franchise is- war service, I think a great many of the people in the eastern portion of Canada should be disfranchised before these so-called alien enemies in the West. We have tremendous natural resources in Canada; we have a wonderful country, which needs, above everything el-se, population. We have embarked upon a comprehensive scheme ' for inducing people to settle with us and become citizens. We have offered every inducement, and our policy had be-en successful up -to the beginning of this war. We have induced great numbers of people from all parts of Europe and the United States to come over and assist in making this a great country. We have given pledges -to these people that, provided they would settle among us and behave thems-elves-, Parliament would grant them the franchise and every other privilege a British citizen enjoys. That has been the secret of the splendid record of Great Britain as the most successful colonizing nation in -the world. Britain has never attempted coercion in -any country which she has conquered. She has never attempted coercion -against any people whom -she has induced to come and settle within her borders. From my knowledge of these people whom it is proposed to disfranchise, I know they hav-e been a very important factor in the upbuilding of this Dominion, and in the prosperity of the western part of the Dominion. They have proven most excellent -settlers, most peaceable neighbours, and a very honest, industrious and frugal people, who are transforming the country from a wild state into one of the most prosperous -and productive sections in the whole Dominion.
We have endeavoured to get these -men here on- the promise that if they came they should enjoy all the privileges which we give to- the native-born- Canadian or the native-born Britisher. And now, through no fault of theirs, with a stroke of the- pen, we are depriving them of this privilege. We are branding them in a way -as outcasts, and casting a reflection upon their loyalty, which, as some one remarked here this afternoon, will not be wiped out in- this generation, hut will probably be carried down for fifty years to come. From the point of view of unity, this is a most serious thing to do. In Western. Canada particularly, our population is necessarily of a very cosmopolitan character. We -are endeavouring by every means to unite the different nationalities into one common citizenship, and I take the view that we have succeeded
very well in my province. We have only one system of schools, and the German, the Ru-thenian, the Galician and the Pole has to send his children to our schools. They have to learn English, and, to give them only due credit, they are most excellent linguists. Within a very short time after arriving in the country they become quite proficient in the language. They are falling into our customs, they are doing as we do, they are dressing as we drees, and! they are assimilating themselves- in every way to the pattern of the Canadian people and are becoming excellent citizens. My hon. friend from East Middlesex (Mr. Glass) quoted an -article from a newspaper stating that Premier Sifton of Alberta had made a speech in CalgaTy which had not met with the reception it might have received from some returned soldiers in that city. I happen to know Sergeant Guillfoyle, who -spoke after Premier Sifton, and from my knowledge of *him I would not give credence to one word he said, no matter on what subject he wa6 speaking.


Mr. R. B. BENNETT:: He was only willing to die, that is all. He offered to die.


James McCrie Douglas: A great many men offered to die-


Richard Bedford Bennett: But, he was in France.


James McCrie Douglas: -I am sorry to say my bon. friend from Calgary (Mr. R. B. Bennett) was not one of them.


Richard Bedford Bennett: He did not put a
uniform on for a s-um-mer, and draw pay.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Order.


James McCrie Douglas: As far as Mr. Guill-foyle's energies in connection with the provincial campaign were concerned, L think he only lasted a short time when he was forced to resume his position in some oth-er walk of life. He is an agitator. He certainly tried to defend -his country, and pro-ably did everything he could along that line. Still he was not a pronounced success in an election. Mention has been made here of what the foreign-bom people have done in the matter of contributions to the Patriotic Fund. L took part in a meeting east of Edmonton last year, where the population was entirely, of Austrian birth-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Is that the meeting you attended in uniform?


James McCrie Douglas: No, I attended that
meeting in civilian clothes. The other meeting was not a Patriotic Fund meeting.

An lion. MEMBER: Cheap stuff.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: Order:


James McCrie Douglas: I want to tell the House that those men responded splendidly to the appeal for contributions to the Patriotic Fund, and that the constituency of Whitford, represented in the provincial house by an Austrian, contributed more to the Patriotic Fund than any other constituency in the province of Alberta. Those men were most anxious to enlist. My hon. friend from Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) made the statement that one-half of the 218th Battalion was made up of men of Galician or Austrian birth. I have personal knowledge of the facts, and I think my h.on. friend is quite within the mark in that statement. To show the earnestness with which these men endeavoured to enlist, I might say they nearly all had to perjure themselves in order to become members of that battalion. They had to swear they were Russians, yet to my own knowledge the majority of those men never saw Russia, came from Austria. Still, they were so eager to go and fight against Austria that they enlisted claiming they came from Russia. The 192nd Battalion from the Crowsnest Pass, was largely made up of the same class of people, taken from the mines of Blairmore district, and that south-west country. So that the charge that these men were not prepared to do their duty and take the full responsibility of citizenship is absolutely unfounded. If they had been given an opportunity of enlisting and joining our forces under the volunteer system, we could easily have had a full battalion of men of that race.
I was much struck with a statement I read just recently, showing the feeling with which this question of blending and making a cosmopolitan community of blended people was viewed by no less a person than General Smuts, Speaking in London quite recently, he said:
We want to create a blend out of various nationalities. We want to create a new nation, and that is the South African nation. If we succeed in doing that we shall achieve a nation not standing on one leg, but on various legs. We shall have a nation which will embrace various traits. You will have a people all blending into one. It is only by bringing! about a union like that, and by mailing the different racial types of people work together, respect each other, co-operate with each other, and understand each other, that you will bring into being a unanimous people which will take the broadest and largest view of the problems with which it is confronted.
These sentiments breathe the spirit of broadness, and show that the idea of
[Mr. Douglas.!
cementing the people and nationalizing and colonizing is deep in the heart of that great Boer general, who not many years ago was fighting against Great Britain, and who today occupies one of the most responsible positions in South Africa. I understand the Prime Minister was at conference with this same general, and that those expressions were voiced at that conference, yet we find the Prime Minister coming back to Canada and at this late stage of the session bringing down a Bill which will have the very opposite effect to that voiced by General Smuts, an effect which will create discord and disunion in this country, >at a time when feeling is running high, when everything should be done to minimize differences and quiet people rather than the reverse. I regret very much that at this time of tremendous stress, when people's nerves are on edge, there is introduced into this Parliament a measure which is going to create such dissatisfaction and feeling, because of the fact- that an absolute injustice is being done to a large part of the population of this country.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Mr. Speaker, the time at my disposal is very short. I must, in the first place, make complaint against the Government that this Bill was only two hours under discussion when the closure was applied. It is a Bill of far-reaching and great importance, and I think we should have been given at least a day in which to discuss it before the application of closure. Instead of that, one-half the members of this House had no opportunity to speak upon the Bill under the ordinary rules. We reached the discussion of the Bill at ten o'clock on Satuday night, and at a quarter 'to twelve the closure was applied. [ submit, therefore, that no great freedom or opportunity was given to the representatives of the people to deal with this most important question.
With you, Sir, I come from a province where the greatest possible freedom has been given to the people in connection with the exercise of the franchise, and where every opportunity is given to the electors or to any people entitled to he electors to have their names put upon the list; and the greatest possible hesitancy is exercised in depriving any of them of the right to the franchise, after their names have been placed upon the list. In the province of Nova Scotia we were accustomed to the amplest provisions for putting names on the list, and if necessary striking off the

names of those who had no right to vote. One has practically every day from the 20th of January to the 5th of March for putting names on and the same period for striking names off at the Revisers' Court, which is held annually on the 5th of March in each year; and if any person has reason to complain of the conduct of the revisers he has a right to appeal to the Sheriff's Court in each county, the provisions for that appeal being found in sections 25 to 23, both inclusive, of chapter 4 of the Revised Statutes of Nova Scotia, 1900. The revisers are appointed by the representatives of the people in the municipal councils of the different counties in the province, and are thus answerable to the public for their conduct, and are subject to penalties for any malfeasance of office as will appear from sections 39 to 42, both inclusive, of chapter 4 of the Revised Statutes of Nova Scotia, 1900. Subsection B of section 40 reads:
Every reviser who neglects to revise any of the lists of voters for the revisal section of which he is a reviser, or wilfully transmits to the clerk of the municipal district any incorrect list of voters, shall he liable to a penalty of two hundred dollars.	, f
Subsection (2) of section 40 provides that each day a list is delayed shall be a separate offence.
Section 41 provides that every sheriff who wilfully neglects any duty imposed on such sheriff by this chapter, or places on a list of voters the name of any person not properly qualified, or strikes off any such list the name of any person properly qualified, shall be liable to a penalty of two hundred dollars.
And although the Act, that is, the Franchise Act for Nova Scotia, does not provide imprisonment for any of those offences, yet the general law, as found in subsection B of section 48 of chapter 161 of the Revised Statutes of Nova Scotia, 1900, provides as follows:-
(b) That in default of payment of the said penalty, compensation, or sum of money, and costs, if any, forthwith or within a limited time, the defendant be imprisoned in the manner and for the time mentioned in the said statute or law, or for any period not exceeding three months, if the statute or law authorizing the conviotion or order does not specify imprisonment, or does not specify any term of imprisonment, unless the said sums with the like costs and expenses are sooner paid.
If these officers do not discharge their duty, they are subject to the serious fines, or to imprisonment. I find that the Act now before this House provides no such penalty, although the officers who are to
be appointed are not to be appointed directly by the Government or by any person who has responsibility for their actions.
I wish to point out, in the earlier part of my remarks, that the Naturalization Act of Canada gives very strong inducement for people coming into Canada to become naturalized. The provisions of our Naturalization Act afford ample protection to the foreigners who may become British subjects under the provisions of that Act. Section 24 of chapter 77, Revised Statutes of Canada, 1906, reads as follows:-
An alien, to whom a certificate of naturalization is granted shall, within Canada, be entitled to all political and other rights, powers and privileges, and be subject to all obligations, to which a natural-born British subject is entitled or subject within Canada, with this qualification, that he shall not, when within the limits of the foreign state of which he was a subject previously to obtaining his certificate of naturaJlization, be deemed to be a British subject, unless he has ceased to be a subject of that state in pursuance of the laws thereof or in pursuance of a treaty or convention to that effect.
I read this to show that the Act which is now before the House does not propose to repeal this Naturalization Act, and the Naturalization Act gives to every man who comes into this country and qualifies for naturalization every privilege of a British subject. The contract is made with him by this House, by the Senate, and by the King, that when he comes here and is naturalized, he is, to all intents and purposes, the same as ourselves, and that right is secured to him by statute. The men whom we are dealing with here, so far as we have evidence, have done their duty, but we are not keeping our part of the contract. It is an old saying that " The subject who is truly loyal to the chief magistrate will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures." In this case also the old saying applies, that whatever we sow the same shall we reap. The Canadian people, in giving this party power, have sown the wind and they are. certainly, in this' particular Act, reaping the whirlwind. I submit that when we think of the practices and performances of the party now behind the Government and of the Government itself since 1911, we must not he surprised that we have this action of theirs and this Act before the House. When we recall, Sir, that in 1911, while the party of hon. gentlemen opposite professed to be super-loyal and were waving and flapping the flag and yelling loyalty all over the country, men of that great party were financing a paper and a speaker in the



province of Quebec who were not devoting much of their time to loyalty, we must not be very much surprised at what we find on this occasion.
We have been told by the Secretary of State that there was only one qualification for voters in this country and that the franchise could only be properly exercised by those giving service in the war. I submit that that statement is absolutely unconstitutional. In this country the powers and privileges of Parliament, and the functions which the representatives of the people are permitted to perform, are divided into two sections, one section to be dealt with by this Parliament, and the other by the local legislatures. The powers of the Dominion Parliament are set forth in section 91 of the British North America Act which reads:
It shall be lawful for the Queen, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate and House of Commons, to make laws for the peace, order and good government of Canada, in relation to all matters not coming within the classes of subjects by this Act assigned exclusively to the Legislatures of the provinces ; and for greater certainty, but not so as to restrict the generality of the foregoing terms of this section, it is hereby declared that (notwithstanding anything in this Act) the exclusive legislative authority of the Parliament of Canada extends to all matters coming within the classes of subjects next hereinafter enumerated, that is to say:
The public debt and property; the regulation of trade and commerce; the raising of money by any mode or system of taxation; the borrowing of money on the public credit; postal service; the census and statistics ; militia, military and naval service and defence ; the fixing of and providing for the salaries and allowances of civil and other officers of the Government of Canada; beacons, buoys, lighthouses and Sable Island; navigation and shipping; quarantine and the establishment and maintenance of marine hospitals; sea coast and inland fisheries; ferries between a province and any British or foreign country, or between two provinces ; currency and coinage ; banking; incorporation of banks and the issue of paper money ; savings banks ; weights and measures ; bills of exchange and promissory notes ; interest ; legal tender; bankruptcy and insolvency; patents of inventions and discovery; copyrights ; Indians and lands reserved for the Indians ; naturalization and aliens; marriage and divorce; the criminal law, except the constitution of the courts of criminal jurisdiction, hut including the procedure in criminal matters ; the establishment, maintenance and management of penitentiaries; such classes of subjects as ar^ expressly excepted in the enumeration of the classes of subjects by this Act assigned exclusively to the Legislatures of the provinces.
Those are the many subjects which the people of this country are given the right to deal with by their representatives in this House. But we are told by the Solicitor
[Mr. McKenzie, j
General that all these subjects must be put to one side, and that the people of this country have nothing to say as to the class of representatives they will have to represent them, and they must only have men who give all their time and attention to questions of the war, and not to anything else. I submit that there is no justification as far as the Government is concerned, for introducing this new Act, and making these wide departures from the old condition of things that existed before the war or that existed up to the time that the Government received' the extension of one year. I submit to you, Sir, that, if this Government had declared to the people of Canada, when they asked for the extension of one year, that they were going to intro. duce a drastic measure like this, no sane man who had anything to say in granting that extension wouldhave consented to it but would have held them down to the proper procedure. H'ad that been done the people, before this date, would have had an opportunity of passing judgment upon the Government. We profess to be fighting for freedom. Indeed, we -are fighting for freedom, and for the establishment of the rights of the common people. Why, then, are we called upon to commit this very high act of tyranny, which is before this House? The proper rule is that, as far as the vote is concerned, there should he one vote for one man. That has been the practice in this country, and that is the practice in recent years in England, although there have been abuses of that principle for many years in that country. We depart from the traditions and principles of British institutions in disfranchising our fellow citizens and depriving them of the right and privileges which they have freely enjoyed. We are all for the war, for the King and for the flag. Where is the candidate going to be found from whom we have to expect any danger should he find his way into this House? The only danger that we have to protect ourselves against is that members may find their way info this House who will not be as true and as loyal to the subject with which we have to deal a>s ourselves. I have not heard a hint that any provision is to be made as to the class of candidate we shall have, and the blow is struck at the poor people, who should have the right to poll their votes in support of the institution which we are so proud to possess.
Why is there such fear about a change of membership in this House? The Government now have passed all the legislation

that they can possibly hope for. They have the War Measures Act, they have the War Profits Act, they have the Income Tax, the Soldiers' Vote Act, Conscription Act, Canadian Northern Act, the Quebec and Saguenay Act, the Overseas Militia Act, the Minister of Militia's Act, the Under Secretary of State's Act-every Act that the mind of man can think of they have 'within their power. I hope and believe that they have no part or parcel in the Acts of the Apostles. With all this machinery, -why fear to face the people? Let them give a proper vote, and allow the people to pass judgment on tlie conduct of this Government. We scorn, Sir, the political methods of the Turk ox the Mexican.	How ar^ they worse
than we are, if we follow the principle laid down in this Bill in our dealings with those who have come into our country and whom we have made British subjects.	If there is anything
wrong with the men in the West, or in other parts of Canada, who may exercise the franchise under the old conditions, we have no evidence of it. This Government has been delighted ter appoint commissions for every conceivable act that could possibly be thought of. They were always switching aside to some commission anything and everything that they should decide themselves. But here is one of the biggest issues that has been dealt with, or can be dealt with, by the Government-the question whether or not these people had the right to vote-and instead of sending a man to ascertain the true facts, or making any investigation, they simply pass judgment wit-n-out any evidence, condemn those men unheard, deprive them of their rights without giving them! the slightest hint? or reason a-to why the thing is being done, except that, as has been pointed out by the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver), it is thought they may vote Liberal. The soldier who fights for his country is doing his duty, and is doing it well, and he is certainly entitled to the first rank of citizenship. But he is not doing any more than his duty, and, as a citizen, as far as the vote is concerned, there is no law and there never was a law in any British country where a soldier or any citizen, no matter how admirable he may he, was given more than one vote. We have the foundation of the principle in our constitution, that the King can do no wrong. That fortunately is still true, but it is a sad thing to believe in this country the same cannot safely and truthfully be said of those who advise the King.
355i
The Government promised those men full rights of citizenship if they came into this country, but the trouble is, sad to Telate, that those promises were ignored; and, as I have already stated, without the slightest notice and without the slightest opportunity of defending themselves the people are being deprived of that right.


Avard Longley Davidson: I rise to a point of order. I wish to call attention to the fact that the hon. gentleman is reading his speech.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I have a few notes, and I am passing over them rapidly. I think it is rather a email business to deprive me of the right to refer to notes.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: The hon. member is
acquainted with the rule. Under the rule a member is not permitted to read his speech, but is allowed to refer to notes.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I will be pleased to pass my notes over to you, Mr. Speaker, to show you that they are simply notes. I am sorry to say that it is a Novia Scotian who takes exception to anything of this kind, for the first time in 14 years I have been in this House; but I can only say that the mantle falls on deserving shoulders.
I was going to say, certain emissaries went forth from this country to the West to ask certain gentleman to cast their lot- with this Government, -and come under the Tory yoke. But, -as they would not submit to the Tory yoke; as they would not come within the thraldom of Toryism, the next thing was to subject them to this law; to have them gagged, pilloried, outlawed. That is what is being dome by thi-s Bill. The Government says, sometimes boast-fuVy, that they are willing to submit themselves to the judgment of the people. Their courage in offering to submit themselves to the judgment of the people is -akin to that of the man who boasts of going into the lion's cage after he has had -all the lion's teeth -removed, his 61aw-s cut off, and his eyes gouged out. That is the courageous manner in which the Government proposes to go before the people. They say that they will win -the election; they boast -about it. Well, if they win it, it will he because of their having -seized their antagonist and tied his hands behind him. That is the extent of the courage iand bravery of hon. gentlemen opposite in offering -to -submit themselves -to the people -and in- -boasting of their expectation to secure the majority of the votes.
I warn the Government that in dealing with the foreigners as they propose under

this Bill, they are striki. g & blow at the principle of freedouj. Me ly of these men, when they came here, w re led to believe that British justice, Britis ; fair-play, British privileges, prevailed in tl is land, and that they woula have the advantages of all these. When it is known that tyranny rules, the stream of immigration into this country will be diverted to other channels. We have .heard a great deal of Canada becoming an adjunct of the United States. I submit that no stronger step could be taken than has been take- by the Government towards making this country an adjunct of some country in which freedom has not been flung to the winds. If an improper spirit develops in this country after this measure is passed, hon. gentlemen opposite will know what brought .about that condition, .and they will have themselves to blame. We boast of onr freedom, of our spirit of fair play, of our treatment of the people ,who come amongst us. Then why brand as cowards those people who come to our country at our invitation, to whom we have extended the right hand of fellowship, whom we have welcomed under the benign and munificent folds of the British flag? Shall we brand these people as men who are unworthy of confidence? I hope that it is not too late to save our good name, to stand steadily upon the rock-bottom principles of freedom, fortitude and fidelity, to be true .and firm for our God, our King and our country.
Mr. ARTHUR B. COPP (Westmorland): It will be admitted, Sir, that no legislation coming before Parliament is of deeper interest to the people than legislation dealing with their franchise. It is the duty of every citizen to go to the polls when the occasion demands and exercise the franchise which it is his privilege to enjoy. The people, therefore, are watching carefully and with a great deal of interest the Bill that is now before Parliament. This measure is composed of practically two parts; one, the disfranchisement of a certain number of electors; the other, the enfranchisement of a .certain portion of the population. The Secretary of State, when introducing this measure, stated that one of the purposes of the Bill w.as to disfranchise certain persons of alien enemy birth, practically all of whom resided in the western provinces. Personally' I have little if any knowledge of these people. I was particularly Impressed with the very careful, logical and thoughtful remarks made with regard to those people by the member for Sask-

atoon (Mr. McCraney). I am sure that nobody would charge that hon. gentleman with making a partisan speech on this subject; he spoke. as he felt. He referred to the people of that western country who -some many years ago, others not so long ago-took upon themselves the duties of Canadian citizenship. He said that they had conducted themselves as loyal and patriotic citizens during the whole of the time that they had been in this country, including the past three years, while the war had been in progress.
The Secretary of State said that one of the reasons why he introduced this measure was because a large portion of the population in the western provinces desired that they should be disfranchised in order that they might not have to vote in the forthcoming election. They stated, he said, that if they had the franchise some question might arise as to their loyalty. That was the only reason advanced by the Secretary of State for the disfranchisement of these people.' Well, any elector who feels that way can Tefrain from voting; it is not necessary to take from him the right to exercise the franchise.
My hon. friend says that this is a wartime measure; that the Act will operate only during the period of the war and the period of demobilization thereafter. But, however much we may regret it, we are forced to the conclusion that this is an election-time measure, not a war-time measure. Some'few weeks ago my hon. friend introduced a Bill for the extension cf the term of Parliament for another year. Seme hon. gentlemen on this side, as well as some on the other side, did not see eye to eye with the Government on the question of the further extension of Parliament, and because the resolution was not adopted unanimously the Government immediately started .to prepare for an election. A. Bill was then drafted and brought before the House, known as The Military Voters' Act, the purpose of which was to give to soldiers in Canada and overseas the right to vote. No one one this side of the House objected to the principle of giving to the soldiers who were fighting our battles every opportunity of casting their vote. I am sure that the Minister of Justice (Mr. Doherty) who had charge of the Bill will give at least some gentlemen on this side credit for assisting the passage of that Bill and endeavouring to make it as workable as possible.
A few days ago the hon. gentleman who introduced the measure now under con-

sideration was promoted to the higher position of Secretary of State. Certain newspapers supporting hon. gentlemen opposite expressed the view that his promotion was necessary in order that he might be enabled to look after the elections that were soon to be held. Well, he has started in very well to look after the election. The nekt Bill introduced was this one respecting the franchise, disfranchising in some cases and, enfranchising in others. I shall not take up the time of the House by discussing the disfranchisement of a certain class of the population. That part of the measure has been discussed very fully and very carefully by hon. gentlemen who have more information on the subject than I have. But I wish to refer briefly to the proposed enfranchisement of female relatives of soldiers who are at the front. I have never been a strong supporter of woman suffrage. I have never had objection to extending the franchise to the women of any province if I was convinced that the women in that province actually desired the franchise. I had some experience in the local legislature of my native province, and up to the time that I left that assembly and came here I had not been convinced that the majority of the women of New Brunswick actually desired the franchise.
I realize that there was a certain number who did. The legislature was waited upon by women from certain sections asking that the franchise be extended to the women, but I never felt convinced that the majority of the women desired that franchise, because in New Brunswick-and I presume the same is true of a number of other provinces-the women have a limited franchise in regard to municipal and civil elections, and very few of them, in those elections go to the polls and exercise that privilege. I do not believe they would show any more interest in casting their votes for provincial or Dominion representatives. But, so far as I am concerned, as soon as the women of the country desire that franchise, I am iprepared to give my assent to any franchise that may be extended to them. I realize as fully as any other man in the Dominion can realize the very great responsibility and burden that has been assumed by the women of Canada during the progress of this war, and I want to say, on behalf of those women who are not being given the privilege of the franchise under this Bill, that not only are they just as entitled to it as those who are receiving it under this measure, but it would be
in the interest of the women of Canada if the whole female population were given that privilege instead of only those who are related to the soldiers at the front. If you go into the rooms of such' associations as the Daughters of the Empire, the Red Cross or the Council of Women, you will find women working together, women who have worked together for three years in the interest of the soldiers at the front, and who are doing all they can in every way to give assistance and sustenance to our boys, and it does not seem right, just, equitable, fair or in the interest of British fair play, to say: We are going to give the vote to ten or twenty of those women out of one of those societies, who have been sitting around the table day in and day out-and almost, I believe, on the Sabbath, working for our soldiers,- and we are going to refuse to allow fifty others of those women to vote, l^ot only is that unfair, but it will have this effect. Instead of those women being drawn closer and closer together in the interest of the work in which they are so heartily and so sincerely engaged, a certain amount of dissatisfaction will be created amongst them, and the women who are not given the franchise will feel that they are not being accorded fair treatment by this Parliament in that regard.
I understand that, in some of the western provinces, if not in all of them, a list is made up by the enumerators as is provided for by this Bill. Therefore, they will not be subject to the same inconvenience that will arise in my province in which we have not that form of making up our lists. In New Brunswick we have always voted on the provincial lists. It was a very simple procedure, and a great deal of dissatisfaction will arise amongst the people of the different provinces who are not accustomed to these enumerators and this method of making up the lists. Very great care must be taken to ensure that a fair list is made up and an opportunity afforded to every person entitled to be placed upon that list to go before an enumerator, whoever he may be or wherever he may hold his court of revision, and that no unfair advantage is taken by any person for or on behalf of any particular candidate. The question of the franchise is a serious one in this country, one in which the people are very deeply interested, and one that cannot be passed over lightly or dealt with in a trifling way. It is a serious matter to interfere with that right of the citizens of this country, a right which they have enjoyed for so many years, a right which they will naturally
5612.

look forward to enjoy. Those of us who have had the misfortune to run many elections realize the dissatisfaction that is aroused in the mind of a voter when he comes to the poll and finds his name inadvertently loft off the list. He would sooner lose $100 than find when he comes to the poll that he has through inadvertence been disfranchised, and he will make more commotion, and more feeling will be aroused, over that one little thing than over other things far more important.
The Secretary of State told the House and the Country this afternoon that they were disfranchising a certain portion of the population of this country because he and the Government believed that those people would vote against the Government when it appealed to the country. He told us, on the other hand, he was enfranchising a certain other portion of the population composed of three or four hundred thousand women relatives of soldiers who had gone to the front, because he believed they would vote for the Government. So far as the rights of the citizens are concerned, it does not seem to me to be of very much importance whether they are to vote for the Government or against the Government. Personally I am not afraid to take my chance; I am willing to take a gambler's chance and trust my election or my defeat to the women who will be added to the list of the constituency of Westmorland. If we are to judge by the scores, the hundreds of letters that have come to me and to other members of the different constituencies through out this Dominion, from the mothers, wives and sisters of the soldiers who have gone to the front, who have had to wait month after month, and some of them over a year without receiving the fair treatment they deserve to receive and should receive at the hands of this Government which is responsible for the machinery for carrying on the different operations in connection with this war, the Secretary of State need not compliment himself too warmly or congratulate the Government too fervently in regard to the result of the votes of the women whom he has enfranchised throughout Canada on account of their being relatives of soldiers at the front.
In conclusion, I do hope and trust that the Secretary of State, who fathers this Bill, will see his way clear to extend the franchise not only to the female relatives of soldiers who have gone to the front, but to all women in the Dominion over twenty-one years of age who are British subjects. The women of this country are working

nobly and well for the Red 11 p.m. Gross, the Patriotic Fund, 'and other organizations for the comfort of the soldier, irrespective of whether they had husband, son, or brother at the front, because they realize that every man who has gone 'to the front and is fighting for King and country is just as much related to them in a national way as if he was their own brother, or husband, or son. I sincerely trust that the Government will reconsider that provision of the Bill and extend the franchise to all women of the Dominion within the limits I have mentioned, who amply deserve this consideration.


Mr. MARTIN (SainVMiary's, Montreal) (Translation):: British subjects by naturalization-yes, provided that that naturalization confers upon them the status of British subjects throughout the world. Our Naturalization Act and the very statutes read here this evening confer upon the Austrians and the Germans in Western Canada "the status of British subjects only within Canada. They were not British subjects throughout the world. They were not British subjects in the United States. They are only British subjects in so far as Canada is concerned. We have just passed and placed upon the statute books of this country a Military Service Act, by which we have provided that we will take men compulsorily for the service of the State, and in so taking them the statute means taking them for the first line of Canadian defence in the trenches'of France and Flanders. Across the Atlantic, out of Canada beyond the three-mile limit, these naturalized persons cease to be British subjects. They .are not British subjects on the shores of France and Flanders. Therefore, at that moment, when they pass beyond the three-mile limit, that dormant alien nationality will revive, and they will again become Germans and Austrians. They are no longer Britons. Ceasing to be Britons, if they were taken prisoners in the front-line trenches, they would be shot as traitors, because they owed military allegiance to Germany and Austria. These men are disfranchised, therefore, by the law of their own country with respect to tins great war. Our law has declared whom we will take compulsorily to fight our battles overseas. The only men who can be taken-and we provide that when taken they are for that very reason given the franchise are our nationals. The minute these men cl alien birth pass beyond the three-mile limit their nationality revives, and once more they are citizens of their own state. But my hon. friends ask why they are not drafted into the armies overseas. I will tell 'you why. Because, under international law, no alien can be made to fight for the state in which he lives. Under international law Britain cannot take an Austrian or a German out of Canada, land him in France, and compel him to fight her battles. These men are aliens when they have passed beyond the three-mile limit, they are no longer Canadians, no longer British citizens, and under the canons of international law we cannot take them to fight our battles there. That is the reason why, under the Army Act of 1881, aliens are not permitted to fight 4n the forces of England except, I think, 
one in fifty. These men cannot fight, therefore, and so long as they remain in Canada they cannot be drafted by Germany or Austria; but onee they pass out of that limit, then, under the treaty powers, under our very Act of Naturalization, and under the Aot of the Imperial Parliament of 1870, which we copied, these men are no longer citizens of this State; they are Austrians and Germans; and as. such they cannot exercise their franchise in. this country. That is the story, and that is' the .reason why the great principle is being applied here that only nationals shall vote on national questions. And, nationals being only those men who are British by birth or naturalization-using the word "British" in the broad sense in which it is used in the new Naturalization Act which will be the enactment common to all the British Empire-these men. are not British subjects. As the great issue in this war is not only the life of this Dominion, but the life of the great Empire which we call the British Empire, and as nationals only must vote for the life or death of the Empire, it follows that these men, not being nationals, not being British subjects beyond the boundaries of Canada, may not, in Canada, exercise their franchise.
We have not rested at that, we have gone further. We have said that in this case where there is an obligation for military service, these men shall not be liable for that obligation unless they exercise the privilege of the franchise. ,On the one hand we deprive them of the franchise; on the other hand we release them from the obligation- the release from the obligation here, the deprivation of the franchise there; the release from obligation is part and parcel of international law. For this compulsory service they are required beyond the boundaries of Canada, and their latent nationality reviving they become aliens-Germans, Austrians-and as such they are deprived of the franchise because they cannot meet the obligation, not being British subjects in the broad and true sense in which that word is used. It is said that this is a political right and that under the certificate of naturalization they are entitled to all the political privileges that we are entitled to. That is true, and one of the political privileges that attaches to every man, if he be French Canadian, English, Irish or Scotch, it matters not, is that he may or may not have his name placed upon the register of voters. The same power in the legislature of Quebec

t
that deprived the officials of the federal Government of the vote in Quebec, that gave them a lesser status of citizenship, that deprived them in Nova Scotia of the vote under Mr. Fielding-that same power exercised in the federal domain is part and parcel of the political life of the country, and all that is meant, by the acceptance of political rights, privileges and powers under the Naturalization Act is that they accept what Parliament gives them in common with everyone else-nothing more or less. Any one who studies the statutes and studies history will find that that is the case. But there is another reason that it seems to me would be sufficient, if all other reasons failed, and that is that we in this country are at war and those who know, great historians and philosophers,'have told us that the tie of blood is the strongest of all. A great historian, some of whose writings I read the other day, said:
I put the motives of men thus, in order of their strength:
(1) Blood, that is race or nationality. (2) Patriotism or love of land and country. (3) Interest or the means by which man lives in trade and commerce. (4) Religion, which is the life and refectory of his soul but as a motive uncertain and incalculable in its influence, and (5) Politics, including all constitutional questions which are merely the means or instruments for attaining these ends.
So that blood ranks first in the motives influencing the minds of man. And I say to the hon. member for Strathcona (Mr. Douglas), notwithstanding what he has said, that there are hundreds of men who have left my province of Alberta, reservists for the Austrian and German armies, and hundreds remain there to-day who would go if they could-only the strong arm of the law prevents them from leaving for that purpose. To say that these men who would, if they could, use their rifles against our fellow Canadians shall have the right to vote against the man, one of the thirty thousand who died, is contrary to every principle of-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I say more that these men would be the first to say that is so. I have talked with some of them; I know something of their views, something of the opinions of these intelligent German reservists who have come to this country to make a home, and they tell me that the tie of blood is strong upon them, the call of the Fatherland, the call of the homeland, the call of brothers and fathers and cousins fighting in the German and Austrian armies. I talked to one the other day whose
uncle was an Austrian general. This man told me that the tie of blood is strong upon them; that they will keep quiet, that they will do nothing wrong, but will try and behave themselves-but the call, the insistent call of the blood is ever upon them. And these men should never be permitted to say whether or not our soldiers in the trenches are to be reinforced by their fel-law-Canadians. Such a condition must not, cannot be permitted to exist. Indeed, I believe that the great cry that will go up from the men and women of this country will be that this measure does not proceed far enough, that it will still permit some who are called by the call of the blood, the tie of kinship from overseas, to vote in this great election as the ties of kinship guide them and not as the call of patriotism to Canada should influence them. That is the story, and that is all there is to be said *about it.
1 heard the hon. member for Strathcona assail the word, the pledged word, of a sergeant-major who had gone from Calgary, a gentleman who went to the front and has returned wounded and retired from service. It ill becomes a man who all last summer wore the uniform of the Canadian Army Service Corps and drew the pay of his rank, to reflect upon that man who offered his life for this country. It is time that	sort	of thing	was
stopped, that that sort of arrant hypocrisy was no longer heard. I say by all the reasons that influence men's minds,_ by the influences that have swayed men in days gone by according to. all the great lawgivers from Uhe time of Moses even until to-day, those only who are nationals should decide our national existence and our national life or death. I know the men of whom I speak, and I do not blame them; I enter into their spirit; I think I know something of what they feel and how strong the call of their fellows is upon them, and that call, strong as it is, should be the cal] that deprives these aliens of the franchise in this country.
So far ias the enfranchisement of women is concerned, there is no man who will not say that the women of this country, by giving their husbands and fathers and sons in this great war, have earned the right to poll their vote on this great issue. No man will deny it. When you think of the long delays, the weary nights, the great anxiety, the teans, the strain that they have gone through while their loved ones have been at the front, who will deny them the right

to vote. And who, at the same time, will say that a broad and general provision of women's franchise should be enacted when a conflict of citizenship is upon us, when jarring and disturbing elements of nationality are on us, when fine distinctions that must be adjusted alike by the Imperial Parliament and parliaments overseas yet are unsettled-when all these vast problems are upon us, who would say that a general measure of enfranchisement of women should be given? Only those who desire to make a little political capital against their opponents.
But what of Canadian men and women, men who love their country more than their party, and women who place higher value upon the great sacredness of the ballot than upon the mere way of exercising it? They know, feel and believe that in a time like this there must be a dividing line somewhere and that dividing line has been found on the ground of personal sacrifice, thereby indicating that those who have given this service and made this sacrifice shall be those who exercise their franchise at this time. Let us not deceive ourselves. We are in the midst of the greatest of all conflicts. We struggle against spies in our own land. Spies have been discovered out in the western country. They have been found in western battalions, and have met their death as such in the early morn. There were reservists in the streets of Calgary a few weeks before the war broke out. They disappeared and are now prisoners of war with us. We are told of a German from Lethbridge being taken prisoner in .battle. Hundreds of men of that character were there. These men left our land after having lived amongst us and exercised their privileges as fellow citizens and are now shooting at our brothers .and relatives at the front. No member in this House should say that those men should have a vote, and men who would do the .same thing under similar circumstances, are not to be given the franchise. I will close what I have to say in the words of that great apostle, to whom my hon. ^friend from North Cape Breton (Mr. McKenzie) referred-" For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.."


Charles Murphy: How
desperate the position of the Government is-


Some Hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Charles Murphy: How desperate the
position of the Government is has not only been made plain by "the loud laugh that speaks the vacant mind," on the part of hon. gentlemen opposite who have just indulged in such unbecoming laughter, but also by the fact that-the Government for its defence has had to go outside its party ranks and call in, as its champion to defend this measure, an independent member who .sits on that side of the House. A little later in my observations I will refer to one or two things my hon. -and eloquent friend has said.
Synchronizing-as the Minister of Finance would say-with the application by the Government of closure to the second reading of this Bill, was the presence on the floor of this House this afternoon of Lord North-cliffe, the gentleman who led the intrigue that broke up the Liberal party in England, that deposed Mr. Asquith from the premiership of Great Britain, and placed Mr. Lloyd George at the head of a small tout select and powerful autocracy that sits outside Parliament, and which, as time goes on, deprives Parliament more and more of its hard-won- rights and privileges. Every student of reqent political history will recognize the, appropriateness of Lord North-eliffe's first visit to the Canadian Parliament coinciding with the occasion upon which the Government of the day resorted to the drastic measure of closure to force the second reading of the alleged Franchise Bill which is designed not to elicit an expression of the people's will but is deliberately designed to thwart the expression of the people's will. If the time at my disposal were not limited to 20 minutes, I might be tempted to indulge in a few observations as to the near or remote connection of Lord Northcliffe with certain recent political happenings in Canada, more particularly in the newspaper line. That, however much as I regret it, is an indulgence that I must postpone until another occasion.
Whether regard be had to the provisions of the Bill itself, or to the manner in which it has been introduced and forced upon the House, it is safe to say that the thought uppermost in the minds of the people of this country who are watching the despotic course of the Government is the one expressed in the old adage, "Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad." On Thursday of last week, my hon. friend the Secretary of State (Mr. Meighen), in explaining this Bill, said that war service would be the basis of war franchise. In the very next Breath he made it clear

that war service is not to be the. basis of this war franchise, because the Billf while giving votes to the wives, widows, mothers, daughters and sisters of the soldiers overseas, denies the vote to the thousands, of Canadian women who. do not happen to have relatives overseas, tout who have rendered magnificent war service at home, in making munitions, in providing comforts and food for the soldiers, in Red Cross worlr. in Belgian relief work, and in the innumerable activities of the Daughters of the Empire, and of the Women's Canadian Clubs. All these women are to be denied the right to vote by this Government's Bill, although in five of the provinces they have such right under the Provincial Franchise Act, which this Bill adopts, but only after it strikes off the names of those women who otherwise would have their franchise preserved. This point cannot be made too clear. For the purpose of emphasizing it, let me refer to a question and answer reported in the proceedings of this House of September 6th, 1917, at page 5729 of Hansard.
Sir Wilfrid Laurier:	Am I right in this:
that while the women of Ontario and the western provinces have to-day, under the laws of those provinces, the right to vote, they will, with the exception of those who are qualified as the relatives of men who have enlisted, not have the right to vote in this election?
Mr. Meighen:	That is correct.
In view of this statement, in justice to the thousands of Canadian women who have rendered war service of incalculable value, how hollow is the pretense of my hon. friend the Secretary of State when he said that this Bill was an attempt on the part of the Government to repair an injustice. This Bill repairs no injustice; it does actual injustice to thousands of loyal, law-abiding Canadians, of whom the women I have mentioned are only one class.
Let us consider another class for a few minutes.. It has toeen stated over and over again in this country, and by none more loudly than by hon.. gentlemen opposite and their supporters through the country, that Canada's participation in this war is against the Kaiser and kaiserism, and not against the German people.
But, Sir, this Bill is directed not against the Kaiser and kaiserism, but against the German people themselves, who are resident within the boundaries of Canada. Once this game of disfranchising the foreigner whom we bring 'to our shores and to whom we guaranteed equal citizenship 'and equal rights with ourselves - is begun, where, I ask you, is it likely to stop? A moment's reflection will show how vicious is the step
which the Government is taking in this Bill. As you are quite well aware, the Allies of to-day may be the enemies of tomorrow; all history proves that. To-day we propose in this Bill to disfranchise the Germans, Austrians, Hungarians and Bulgarians in Canada because they are of enemy country origin. If in the next war Belgium, Russia, Italy, Sweden, Norway and the United States are opposed to Great Britain, then to be consistent we will, in the case of a war-time election, have to disfranchise all the Belgians, Russians, Italians, Swedes, Norwegians and Americans within our borders. It is quite obvious, therefore, that by introducing this measure the Government has at one stroke succeeded in embittering our foreign-born citizens whom we now propose to disfranchise, land lin implanting suspicion .and distrust in the minds of those other citizens whose turn may come next.
The member for Calgary (Mr. R. B. Bennett), in his eloquent address of a few minutes ago, said that in the discussion of this question it was absolutely necessary to keep separate the questions of franchise and citizenship. I accede to that suggestion, but I want to point out that that does nott extricate the Government from the difficulty into which it has got' itself by introducing this Bill. Neither, I submit, does my hon. friend's reference to the disfranchising of certain oiviil servants in. .the province of Quebec by the provincial Government help this Government Sue iota in connection with this measure. That has nothing to do, for instance, with the case of the Mennonites, who aTe .affected by the BUI before the House, in 1873 ox 1874 we 'entered into a .solemn treaty with those people. We brought them to Canada under the express provision, in what they rightly claim to be their bill of rights, that they were to have the use of their language and to be exempt from military service. In the original Bill of rights they were guaranteed the other right of citizenship, that of the franchise, when they should become naturalized. In the Bill before us we tell these people that if they exercise the franchise they are not exempt from military service, and to that extent we break faith with those whom we brought to Canada under the solemn compact entered into in 1873 or 1874. My hon. friend's argument in reference to citizenship and to franchise, so far as he proposes to apply it to certain residents of the western provinces, is refuted by the fact that the 218th Battalion, which was raised

and sent to the front from my hon. friend's province, was, I am told, composed in large part of Austrians whose services this Government was glad to accept.
On Saturday last two notable speeches were delivered in this discussion., one by the member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) and the other by the member for Saskatoon (Mr. McCraney). They told how this Bill would affect certain groups of citizens in the western provinces from which they come; their speeches were most interesting .and most illuminating.
Let me illustrate for a few minutes how this Bill affects another group of citizens who reside here in Ottawa. I am informed that there are about 1,500 Germans in this city and that several families among them settled here nearly fifty years ago. In times past many of these men joined local regiments here, notably the .Governor General's Foot Guards, the 43rd Regiment, and the Ottawa Field Battery. It appears that these Germans were told that the oath of allegiance which they took on joining these units gave them the right of citizenship. In any event, they exercised these rights for years without question or hindrance. In more recent years, however, these men discovered that they had been misled, and the majority, I am told, have been naturalized within the last fifteen years. These men, with the exception of those who have sons, grandsons or brothers overseas fighting in the ranks of the Allies, will be disfranchised by the measure which is now before the House. Naturally, that will raise feelings of deep resentment in the breasts of these men, all the deeper in view of their conduct since the beginning of the war. In the first year of the war an agitation based on ignorance was started against these people in Ottawa. It was about the time of the sinking of the Lusitania, and some of the agitation centered around that tragic event. But these Germans, while law-abiding people, are not inclined to lie down under an injury. They held a public meeting under the auspices of the St. Paul's German Lutheran church in this city, and they passed a resolution which I shall take the liberty of reading to the House. As published in the papers of May 18, 1915, that resolution was as follows:
Whereas members of this congregation have been resident in Ottawa and vicinity for nearly half a century and it is now more than forty-one years since they built their first church for divine worship at the corner of King Edward avenue and Wilbrod street in this city;
[Air. Murphy.]
And whereas during the whole period of their residence in this city the members of this congregation have lived on terms of amity and good will with their fellow-oitizens and are sincerely desirous that these amicable relations should continue to exist;
And whereas certain false statements designed to prejudice the members of this congregation in the eyes of their fellow-citizens have lately been published with reference to certain events of the present deplorable war, and it is deemed advisable to refute these statements by unanimous and official action on the part of the congregation ;
Now, therefore, be it resolved as follows:
That as Canadians and British subjects by birth or naturalization, we recognize and profess no other loyalty than that which we cheerfully render to Canada and the British Empire;
That as citizens we claim the right to share at all times in the trials and sacrifices of this Dominion, and, having regard to our numbers and financial means, we have willingly assumed our share of the burden which such a right imposes in the present struggle against the demon of militarism ;
That we condemn as a deliberate and inhuman crime the sinking of the Lusitania and the employment by the Germans of other methods of warfare which are equally unjustifiable ;
That we deplore the great loss of life entailed by the employment of such un-Christian methods, and we pledge ourselves anew to further assist Canada and the Empire in the task of destroying the military autocracy which has so long menaced the peace of the world;
And be it further resolved that copies of these resolutions be sent to His Worship Mayor N. D. Porter and to the city newspapers.
Signed by the vestry on behalf of the congregation,
Aug. Garske,
Fred. Kritsch,
Robt. A. W. Hupp.
Ottawa, May 17, 1915.
That is not all. My further information is that approximately fifty of these men enlisted and went overseas; that four have been killed in action; that two have died of wounds; that 'several others have enlisted and were later discharged as medically unfit. I am told also that no class of our citizens have contributed more frequently and more generously to patriotic and charitable objects connected with the war than this same group of German Canadians. It is natural that the men of this group who are to be disfranchised should be incensed against the Government. They ask: If onr vote is to be taken away, if we are to be denied a voice in saying how and by whom Canada's participation in this war shall be conducted, then will the Government, after the war is over, also exempt us from taxation levied on account of the war? That is a question this Government will have to answer, and that is only one of the many different questions they will

have to answer because of the introduction of the measure now before the House.
If this Bill is unjust in many respects, it is ludicrous in some others. Let me cite one of the latter kind. Section 3 of the Bill provides that:
Any deputy returning officer, either of his own motion or at the request of any agem or scrutineer, after carefully explaining the meaning of paragraphs (g) and (h) of section 67 of this Act

By way of parenthesis, I may say that I have seldom heard of a deputy returning officer who was competent to explain the provisions of a statute, and they will be less "likely to he able to do it at this election because they will be appointed by hon. gentlemen opposite.
.-may put to any person claiming to vote at an election the following questions:
"Are you a naturalized British subject who was born in an. enemy country within the meaning of paragraph (g) of section 67 of the Dominion Elections Act; or who was horn in Europe and whose natural language or mother tongue is a language of an enemy country, and, if you are either, when and where were you naturalized?"
Imagine the condition of the poor alien voter when such a question is fired at him. Subsection 2 says:
If such person refuses to answer fully such questions, or by his manner shows that he was born in an enemy country-
Could folly further go?


Mr. PUGSLEY:: His manner?


Charles Murphy: Yes, the deputy returning officer is constituted a judge of manner. If the unfortunate voter should, for instance, have been so unlucky as to have eaten for breakfast something that did not agree with him and his countenance gave outward indication of inward pain, the deputy returning officer would be justified in saying that he was born in an enemy country and was, therefore, not entitled to vote. The possibilities under that section of the Bill are enormous. That provision of the Bill would do justice to the genius of a Barmaby Rudge.
As a last word, Mr. Speaker, as I have heard the tap of your gavel, I.. would like to emphasize tihe warning given to the Government by my hon. friend from Edmonton, the hon. member for Saskatoon and other hon. gentlemen representing western constituencies. The feelings of resentment aroused by such a Bill as this will not, .as those hon. gentlemen have said, subside for a generation. A German chancellor once said tihat a certain treaty was but a " scrap of
paper." By this Bill this Government proposes, in effect, to adopt that dictum as a basis for its legislation and to declare that all the treaties made by Canada with those citizens whom this Bill disfranchises were merely scraps of paper. To such a proposition no fair-minded Canadian can subscribe, and for that reason above .all others,
I intend to vote against this Bill.
Mr.. L. A. LAPOINTE (Montreal, St James):	Mr. Speaker, I do not intend to
take up very much time of the House in expressing my opinion on the Bill now before us for consideration. The more this War-time Elections Act is studied, the more it seems to me- and it is	admitted-that	it ought
to be called " The Voters' Manipulation Act," or " An Act of Expediency to Win an Election." For .instance, I feel that to be the case when I see the sweeping disfranchisement of a great number of our law-abiding citizens. That will occur in the city of Montreal in which there are quite a number of those people who are accustomed to living with us, who pay their taxes and who are good citizens. They, however, will be deprived of their vote by whatever enumerator the. Government may choose, at the proper time, to name. This Bill is going to do a great deal of injustice to those people. In Montreal, there are two or three divisions in which those law-abiding citizens consider they are entitled to and ought to have a right to vote. I am speaking specially for Montreal, because it seems to me that the city, of which I have the honour to represent a division, has the right to fair play, because in Montreal there are many of those people who are carrying on business and who are interested in industries of all kinds, and they should be encouraged instead of, iis is being done by this Bill, discouraged by being deprived of the right to express their opinion as to who shall represent them. Wliy cannot the election take place just as well with the old lists, instead of leaving it in the powf>r of one man in a division to select whom he likes, because when he comes on a name in the list that begins with a " K " or has the diphthong " ce " or the ending " vy " and so on, he may say that man must be a stranger, and immediately that man's name will be struck off. Who is going to be the judge of that? The enumerator. One can see the possibilities when one realizes how this gentleman will be appointed, and that, no 12 m. doubt, he will not be a friend of the Liberal party. The Sob-

cit-or General said in regard to that class which he is going to disfranchise that, on the whole, it was a class of the population that had conducted itself in a satisfactory manner during the war, but immediately after he had given them a good character, he disfranchised them. I do not know what his idea is on that point. He said that it might be found undesirable to enlist them for combatant service. That is not the question before us at the present time. We find that he is wrong in that regard also, because many sons and other relatives of this class of our population are fighting in France for Canada to-day. We have not hesitated to make full use of such men and to accept their services, but it so happens that in various parts of western Canada-and this is the point I wish to make -there are constituencies in which naturalized aliens form the bulk of the population, and these constituencies have always had the natural habit of voting Liberal. The Government knows that, and particularly the Solicitor General. The Bordeu Government, therefore, hoists the Union Jack and declares that any man who would vote Liberal shall not be allowed to vote at all, if it can be prevented. Their idea is that it would be treason to allow a man who had been naturalized for a less period than fifteen years to say whether he would prefer a Liberal or a Conservative to represent him in Parliament. Fortunately the real issue in the coming election will not be patriotism versus treachery, but we can form an idea how the election will be fought from the way the Government puti forward this extraordinary franchise Bill. Let me give a brief quotation from the Morning Albertan:
The Franchise Bill is one of the worst pieces of legislation ever brought to the attention of the Canadian Parliament. It is bad in principle, and scandalous in detail. It has no principle in fact, except that of giving an advantage to the party in power. It disregards sacred obligations made by the nation to loyal Canadians.
That is exactly my own idea. This Bill is framed to favour the .Government in the West.
As to granting the vote to the mothers and wives and daughters and sisters of soldiers, there is nothing to grumble about. But why not have adult suffrage for all women in this Dominion? Is not the Government, in this Bill, casting a slur upon every woman who may not have a soldier relative? Such a woman is declared by this Bill to be unfit to exercise the franchise? Why is that? What is the reason for singling out a special class of women voters? Is not 
the Government's action in granting the vote to some women a frank recognition that woman suffrage must come? The Solicitor General the other day said that this provision was intended, "to give added strength to the vote of the soldiers of Canada." Does that mean that the votes of the rest of the women of Canada would not add strength to the vote of the soldiers? Why does the Government discriminate in this way? The rest of the women of Canada are just as ready to help in the cause as those who have soldier relatives at the front, and I do not see why they should be discriminated against. There is no precedent for such an extraordinary provision, which singles out a certain class of women and says that they shall have the right to vote, but no other women. So far as I am concerned, I would advocate the giving of the vote to all women.
I am sorry that the Government, having gone this far, did not go all the way.
I ain in receipt of a letter from the Quebec Provincial Woman's Christian Temperance Union, as follows:
May 15, 1917.
L. A. Lapointe, Esq., M.P,.
Ottawa.
Dear Sir,-On behalf of the Quebec Provincial Woman's Christian Temperance Union, composed of over 2,500 members, I am writing to ask you when the resolution re woman's franchise comes up in the House, that you will vote in its favour.
Our organization since its formation in this province in 1883, has always stood for women having the vote, so that they may help in the success of our country.
Yours sincerely,
(Sgd.) E. W. McLaehlan.
To which I replied as follows:
May 22, 1917.
Quebec Provincial Women's Christian Temperance Union,
Quebec, P.Q.
Madame,


Mr. EDMOND PROULX (Prescott):: I did not intend to take part in this debate, but after hearing some of the speeches and the explanations of this measure, I thought it was my duty to protest in the name of the women of my constituency, as well as in- the .name of the few aliens there, who will be disfranchised. I was never a very warm advocate of woman suffrage. When the subject came before the House last year, I spoke against the granting of the 356
vote to women. But if we adopt the principle of giving them the vote, I do not think ' Parliament should -stop -at giving it to women who are relatives of soldiers and not grant the same privilege to women in the provinces which have already adopted woman suffrage. Earlier in the session the Prime Minister criticised the position taken by my right hon. leader, who wanted woman suffrage to be extended only to the provinces where they had been given the franchise by the provincial legislature. The Prime Minister expressed the opinion that all the women of Canada should have the franchise. Now, however, he has departed from that policy, and wants to restrict the franchise to the relatives of soldiers. I admit that the relatives of soldiers deserve the right to vote, and I am in favour of granting it to them, but as some of my hon. colleagues have already said, there are many women in- this country who have done great work for the war, in the way of knitting socks for the soldiers and other patriotic work-we have frequently seen ladies in the galleries of this House, knitting socks for the soldiers while listening to the de-bates-and do you not think. Sir, that these ladies should have the right to vote? They spend their days and part of their nights, working for the soldiers. Not all the women of this country are blessed with sons who could be sent to the front, but are they not deserving of the consideration of this Parliament, and are they not deserving of the right to vote? Would they not exercise the franchise as intelligently as those who have relatives at the front? This measure is discriminatory. It is not fair. It is not a British measure. The Prime Minister and the Secretary of State have told us that in this measure the Government is adopting the provincial franchise. That statement is not entirely correct, because in five of the provinces the franchise has been given to women by the provincial legislatures, irrespective of whether they have relatives at the front or not, whereas this measure restricts it to women who have relatives at the front. This measure also departs from the provincial franchise in the preparation of the lists. According to our electoral law, we use the provincial lists, which are made by the municipal officers who are impartial and1 independent of party politics. By 'this measure the lists made by the municipal officers are to be only partially adopted. The lists will be partly made by enumerators who will he appointed by the Government who will be partisans of the Government and who will have large



discretionary powers. They may refuse to place men on the lists on the pretext that they are aliens, or that their mother tongue may be alien, whereas the main reason for leaving them off is that these enumerators may suspect they will cast their votes for the Liberal candidate.


Mr. NICKLE:: They have an appeal, have they not?


Edmond Proulx: There is no appeal. There are appeals in regard to the lists made in cities and county and district towns of over 9,000 population, but in the other municipalities, which are in ihe majority, there is no appeal. The list made by the enumerator will be final, although, if a man is not on the list, he can go to the polling booth and cast his vote if he is prepared to swear he was omitted from the list and has the right to vote. You know, Mr. Speaker, that persons who are not. on the list would not care to go through the ordeal of taking an oath in order to be entitled to cast their votes. In any event, even if they do vote, it does not count until it is established before the judge that they had the right to vote. It is only on a recount that these votes would be counted. Austrians, Germans, and others from enemy countries or whose mother tongue is that of an enemy country may have come here years ago. They came at the invitation of the Government. They have settled in our Northwest, they have cultivated the land and developed the country, they have taker their naturalization papers and have beer, assured that they will be granted the privileges of British citizenship. These people have not been guilty of any sedition or disloyalty. If they were, certainly this Parliament would have the right, and would have more than the right, the duty, to deprive them of the franchise.
I was surprised to hear the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) say that the Germans of Ontario, as a rule, were disloyal. I think that my hon. friend has exaggerated the situation. There may be a few who are disloyal. But if he got a frigid reception at one patriotic meeting, that does not say that they are disloyal or guilty of sedition. We say that blood is thicker than water. Their blood is not British blood or French blood; their blood is the blood of people who are at war with France and England. The hon. member cited one particular instance, but we must not judge a whole nationality by one instance.
Besides depriving those people of their franchise, I maintain that this Act is going

to create disunion and discord in this country. Even the people who are not deprived of their franchise, because they were naturalized before 1902, will resent the insult which is offered to them by this measure. This is a disrupting measure. May I quote, to substantiate my statement, an article which appeared in the Toronto Globe of last Saturday. The Toronto Globe is not very partial to the Liberal party. For some time it has favoured the Government rather than the Opposition. It has supported the Government very strongly on the Military Service Bill and other measures since the beginning of the session. The Globe saysr-
A Disruptive Measure.
The War-Time Election Act is a surrender on the part of the Government to the machine element of the party. It strengthens the suspicion that manipulation of the franchise is a punishment for those western Liberals who refused to enter a National Government under the leadership of Sir Robert Borden. It is asserted that when the western men were in Ottawa the Prime Minister told them that any Act of disfranchisement would be personally repugnant to him. But, as in many other instances, he has been too weak to withstand the pressure from certain of his colleagues.
As a practical means of winning a Federal election the Act is futile and clumsy. The last census showed that the proportion of Canada's voting population designated as "foreign-born" was only 6.62 per cent in 1911. The influx of settlers into the country since then, and the efflux of English-speaking men during the past three years of war, possibly may have increased that proportion to ten per cent, and only a portion of this number is of enemy origin. For the sake of eliminating a fraction of the total vote the Government would inflict a gross injustice on law-abiding members of the community.
The Act proposes to disfranchise two classes of people in Canada. All conscientious objectors to the war would be prevented from voting at the next general election, and all citizens of alien enemy birth or near extraction. That means that German Mennonites and the Douk-hobors would be ruled out in the first class, and probably the members of the Society of Friends, whose loyalty has never been questioned, and that all the Ruthenians, Austrians, Hungarians, and Germans who live in the northerly districts of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba would largely compose the second class.
Few of the German population of the West have come directly from Germany to Canada. The majority of them have been classed among the immigrants who have crossed over the line from the United States. One-third of the so-called American settlers in the West are of Teutonic origin. Many of them, although born in Austria or Germany had become thoroughly Americanized before coming to this country, but they are disfranchised in the present Bill.
At no time since the war began have the Austrian or German people of the West given the authorities any trouble. The very act of disfranchising those foreigners who have been naturalized, especially the Ruthenians, who have entered most generally into the political

life of the West, will tend to solidify them, and even arouse hostility towards constituted authority. This Act will make enemies out of thousands of men and women who have become Canadians in spirit and outlook. The mere loss of their ballots will not mean much to one political party or the other, but the enactment of a hostile law by the Government of Canada, which made a contract of citizenship with them when they entered the country, will create a potential animosity which the Dominion can ill-aiford to invite.
The Dominion Government has thrust the responsibility of making Canadians out of the new peoples from other countries upon the provinces. In the case of the young provinces of the West that duty has been particularly onefous during the past twelve years. Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba were confronted with the problem of assimilating the hordes of new settlers which descended upon them between the years 1902 and 1914. The coming of the war stopped the influx of new citizens from Europe, and made a breathing spell in which the West was able to recover itself from the rush of immigration days. The schools, colleges and universities of the West have done great work in meeting the urgent national demand for education. On the other hand, the different nationalities from Europe have had a beneficial effect upon the life of the western plains. Professor W. C. Murray of the University of Saskatchewan, in an address at Saskatoon two years ago, said:	'The life of this
province is being greatly enriched by the artistic, literary and musical gifts which they and their people are bringing to us. We of Canadian birth do not realize to the full how much Saskatchewan owes to European culture. Every musical festival, each convention, be it grain growers, homemakers or municipalities, but deepens the conviction that their high character is due to the training and culture of Britain and the continent of Europe." Interference at this time with the important process of assimilation, which is being directed so conscientiously by the educationists of the western provinces, will do untold injury to the life of the whole Dominion.
The proposed disfranchisement Act is also a breach with the best traditions of the British Empire. Let the politicians at Ottawa take thedr cue on this question from that great patriot. General Smuts, whose speeches stirred London so deeply last spring. Speaking on the future of South Africa, he set down the soundest of Imperial principles when he said: "We want to create a blend out of various nationalities. We want- to create a new nation, and that is the South African nation. If we succeed in doing that we shall achieve a nation not standing on one leg, but on various legs. We shall have a nation which will embrace various traits. You will have a people all blending into one. It is only by bringing about a union like that, and by making the different racial types of people work together, respect each other, co-operate with each other, and understand each other, that you will bring into being a unanimous people which will take the broadest and largest view of the problems with which it is confronted."
In this fiftieth anniversary of Confederation it would be a poor monument indeed to place among the laws of Canada, one which would be calculated to subvert rather than perpetuate the idea of a Canadian nationality.
356J
1 submit that the character of this measure cannot be better characterized than by this article of the Globe. This Bill also deprives the conscientious objectors of the right to vote. These people, Mennonites .and Dukhobors, came here on the invitation of the Government. They had objections to military service, and left their countries ot origin on account of military service, and they were granted this privilege by Orders in Council .passed by the Government in 1873 and 1898. And now this Government wants to break faith with these people ami to deprive them of their vote. The Minister of Justice (Mr. Doherty) does not seem to take great interest in this measure; he seems to have left it entirely in the charge of the Secretary of State (Mr. Meighen), which leads me to believe that this measure is brought into this House for the purpose of wresting the West from the Liberal party, and preventing a majority of Liberal members from being elected in the western provinces. The Government know that if they want to stay in power they must get a majority in the West. They know that Quebec will give a strong majority for the Liberal party, as Ontario may give a strong majority for the Conservative party, that the Maritime Provinces together may give a majority to the Liberal party, and if the Government want to stay in power they must certainly get a majority in the western provinces. The larger number of aliens reside in those provinces, and the Government wants to prevent those people from voting for the Liberals, as a large number of them have done in the past. Those people have not been guilty of any sedition or disloyalty, and some of them, according to the statements of my hon. friend from Saskatoon (Mr. McCraney) and my hon. friend from Strathcona (Mr. Douglas) contributed largely to the Patriotic Fund, some of their sons have gone to the front, and some have offered, their 'services, but have been refused. A great many of these people, Galicians, Ruthenians and Bukowinians, are Slavs and are not of Teutonic origin. Their sympathies are with Russia and the Allies in this war, rather than with the Central Powers.
Although only a few in my constituency will be deprived of their votes, I thought it was my duty to protest. Even if one of my constituents were deprived of his vote, I would be lacking in my duty if I did not rise and protest against the measure, which I can only Characterize as un-British. There

was a war in South Africa seventeen years ago, and this country sent seven or 'eight thousand soldiers to that country, and spent half ia million dollars to vindicate for the British subjects in South Africa the right to exercise their franchise. When the Government of the Transvaal wanted to deprive the British subjects who had resided there for twenty years of theiir right to vote, England declared war against the President of the Transvaal, ;and the colonies came to the rescue. England spent hundreds of millions of dollars, and many thousands of British soldiers died on the field of battle, and some hundreds of Canadian soldiers lost their lives, only to vindicate the right of British subjects to exercise the franchise. Now they want to disfranchise citizens who came here fifteen years ago, who have been loyal to the British flag, and it is only for one purpose-to get them back into power.


Mr. G. H. BOIVIN (Shefford):: Since the stirring incidents of Saturday evening, I have had occasion to read over in French and English the Bill which is at present before the House, and the principle of which we are discussing upon the second reading. I have searched in that Bill to find a good point, and have heen>
unable to find any. I find that the Bill as drafted is an insult to British loyalty, and to the great majority of the people of Canada. First, it is an insult to the majority of the people of Canada because this Government, in introducing this Bill, brands a certain portion of our population as absolutely disloyal to the Crown: they have served faithfully and well for the past 15 years. The Secretary of State, in introducing the Bill at page 5725 of the Unrevised' Hansard said, speaking at that time of the aliens who are naturalized citizens of Canada, and who are being deprived- of their vote:
Not only is it unfair to them that they should be asked to decide the destiny and the vigour of a war against their brothers in Europe,' but it is unfair to the rest of the papulation that they should have the right to so decide.
How could they, by their vote, decide the vigour of the war which is being waged against their brothers, unless, Mr. Speaker, that statement means that in voting for a Liberal candidate and the Liberal party they will be doing less for the British Empire and for the war than if they voted' for our good friends on the other side of the House? What right has the Secretary of State, or any man in this House, to brand the Liberal party as disloyal? Have not our members on this side of the House given

just as freely and just as willingly of their eons, and of their flesh and blood, to the defence of the Empire?


Mr. LALOR:: No?


Georges Henri Boivin: Have not the Liberals from one end of Canada to the other enlisted just as freely as the Conservatives? Do hon. members on the other side contend that the Conservatives are the only people who have enlisted in this war? The difference between the two parties i-s this; that if the Liberal party is returned to power during the coming election, the war will be continued as it has been waged since the beginning. The soldiers of Canada will be members of a volunteer army fighting with vigour and enthusiasm, hoys who are willing to fight for their King and country, and if the Conservative party is returned to power, what shall we see? We shall see a conscript army where you will have to be prodding the soldier in the .back with a sword to make him fight. That is the difference between the two parties. The policy of the Liberal party has 'been laid down and published in the press of this country, under the signature of my right hon. leader Sir Wilfrid Laurier, who tells us, not that he wishes to relax in any way the part that Canada is taking in this war, but that he desires to consult the Mother Country, and to apply the energies of Canada in the way which will do the most good to the Mother Country. He promises a vigourous recruiting campaign, and he assures the people of Canada and of the Empire at large that Canada will maintain her position in this war as a free and autonomous colony of the British Empire. The Liberals cannot be branded as disloyal. They have contributed generously to the Patriotic Fund, to all the different relief funds which have been working throughout the country, and it is from the Liberal side of this House that the statement has been made, and that motions have been made which have been turned down by the other side, that the people of Canada, as .a whole, and the Government of Canada should not rely on public charity to look after the welfare of the wives aand children of soldiers who are fighting for us on the other side of the ocean, but that this patriotic duty should be performed by the Government itself. I feared that I misunderstood the Secretary of State, and I kept on reading his remarks.
I find the following words a few lines further down.
It is because of the reasons I have mentioned, namely, that those who cannot in the nature of things be absolutely divorced in sym-

pathy or sentiment from the peoples from whom they come should not be permitted, in justice to the rest of the population, to exercise a measure of control over the destinies of the war against those p'eoples, because it would be unfair to them to ask them to go to the polls and vote on an issue which decides to a degree the vigour, the purpose and the destiny of that war.
I dissent emphatically from that statement. I find coupled with that another statement, as follows:
It is also because war service should he the basis of war franchise. The two should go hand in hand-the obligation and the privilege.
The hon. gentleman says that war service should be the basis of war franchise; war service by whom? If he had said that war service in so far as the elector is concerned, should be the basis of war franchise, I would agree with him. But that is not the position which he takes. He does not say that the women of Canada who have worked faithfully during three or four years, day and night, knitting socks for the soldiers, collecting funds for the patriotic and red cross work, are entitled to the vote. No-; that is not service in the eyes of the Secretary of State. What he considers to be service is to stay at home, draw money from the Patriotic Fund, draw money from the Government, spend the separation allowance-and then vote; that is what he considers to be service. He bases the franchise of the woman, who remains at home on the service of the soldier who has gone across the ocean and is fighting on the other side for Canada and the Empire. He ignores the service which is rendered here at home. He ignores the service rendered by the wife of the munition worker-the man who for the past two or three years has been going day in. and day out to these munition plants, where the gases, which have practically ruined vegetation for miles around, have the same effect upon the human system as they have upon nature-he ignores the services of the wife who ministered daily to the wants of ' the husband as he came home from the munition plant, being well aware that he was dying a slow death for Canada and for the Empire. Yet this woman is to be deprived of the vote, and this man who is working in the munition factory will be deprived of the vote if he happens to be an alien who became naturalized in Canada within the last fifteen years.
The member for Calgary (Mr. R. B. Bennett) brought up what he considered to be
a new phase of the question; he gave us a definition of the word "nationals." The Conservative party always have to be coupled up with some other organization. When it is not the nationals, it is the Nationalists; when it is not the Nationalists, it is the nationals. To-day they are coupling themselves up with the nationals. What, after all, is the definition of a national? A man who is naturalized here in Canada? A man who is the possessor of a Canadian naturalization certificate? No; a man who can be obliged to go and fight on the other side; a man who will perform active military service. If the Government wish to be consistent, why do they not disfranchise every man who is too old to fight? These aliens who have been in this country since 1902 have done their share in this war. They have contributed very generously in certain cities of Canada to Patriotic and Red Cross Funds and to the Belgian Relief Fund; those who have not contributed in that way have felt the pinch of the high cost of living due to the war. After paying directly and indirectly-for several years their share of taxation for the carrying on of the war,, they are told that they have not the-right to vote. The Government borrowed! . every dollar they could raise in Canada at five per cent; then they crossed tothe United States and paid six per cent to the Americans, to get money to pay the interest charges on the money which they had borrowed at home. The aliens in Canada of alien birth are helping to pay these charges: yet they are not to have the right to vote. Where is the good old British motto of "No taxation without representation?" These men are being taxed, yet they are to have no right to decide who shall govern this country. What about the statement concerning "the scrap of paper?" When we entered this war Liberals and Conservatives alike on recruiting platforms ir. the province of Quebec-and I dare say in every part of Canada-referred often tothe action of the German Government in-violating the neutrality of Belgium; of tearing up the treaty of years gone by, which was considered by them as a mere "scrap of paper." What about the promises made to these aliens who came into Canada in 1902-promises made by the Minister of the Interior in every administration, by the present leader of the Opposition when he was Prime Minister, by the present Prime Minister? According to the promises made, these people were to enjoy the privileges if.

"British subjects in Canada. The present leader of the Opposition has kept his word; ho is respecting his promise; he is voting and acting accordingly in the House of Commons. But because it suits the convenience of hon. gentlemen opposite to deprive these people of their votes; because they fear that they may vote for the Liberal party; because they fear that these people will consider that they can obtain more economic advantages in this country by voting for the Liberal party, the Government will deprive them of the vote. They might well have reflected: We have done so many things which were wrong; wc have spent the money of the people so ruthlessly since we have been in power, that we feel sure, even though we deprive these aliens of their votes, that we shall still not have enough votes to win the election; we will, therefore, give votes to the soldiers, not. only to the Canadian soldiers, but to those who never lived in Canada, never paid a cent of taxation in Canada, and do not know anything about the administration of this country. They are fighting for the Allies, the same as the British, French and American soldiers; but they happen to be enlisted in the Canadian army, and we will give them the right to vote; we will give them the right to put their votes where they want to put them, in whatever constituency they may choose; but we will take the vote from the alien who has paid taxes for years.
It is evident that the purpose of bringing down this legislation was not that of winning the war, but that of winning the forthcoming election. The proof of that is the statement which I have already referred to, that service should be the basis of war franchise, and that war service should be interpreted as relationship with the soldier who happens to be fighting for us on the ether side of the ocean. If that is the way service is to be measured, it is only fair to argue that the sister who happens to have two brothers fighting on the other side of the ocean should have two votes, because she is giving more service to the country than the sister who has only one.
Another conclusion would, perhaps, be that those who have given their sons in death to the Empire, whose sons have sacrificed their lives for their King and country, should have more votes than those whose relatives have come back with only one arm or with only one hand. That would be a logical conclusion, if we are going to accept the argument taken by the

Solicior General, who says that service is to be the basis. If service of the man overseas is to be the basis and not the service of the person at home, it would be just as logical to say that the minor children oi the soldiers should vote-I am frank to say that it will require the votes oi 1 a.m. the minor children to win this election for the Conservative party, and I am very much surprised that this provision has not been included in the Bill. The Government were anxious enough to include anything and everything. Why did they not include in the Bill a provision by which the minor children of our .soldiers could vote, and by which the Conservative local candidate would be appointed tutor to those minor children to see that they voted right? That would be about as reasonable as the Bill which is now before us. That is not all. People, if their names do not happen to be upon the list as made by the enumerator of the Conservative party, must take an oath that they have a right to vote. I am afraid the Solicitor General has made a mistake in drawing up the formula of the oath that appears in this Bill. He should have stipulated that a man, before he is given the right to vote, must solemnly swear and affirm that he will vote for the Conservative party. That has not been done. It should have been done; otherwise I fear the Conservative party, by introducing this measure, will be hurting the fair name of Canada by discouraging immigration for years after the war without doing any good to itself and certainly without doing any good to our common country.


George Perry Graham: I	was paired with the
Minister of Finance	(Sir Thomas White).
Had I voted I would have voted for the amendment.


Edmond Proulx: I	was paired with the
hon. member for Peterborough (Mr. Burn-	
ham). Had I voted I would have voted for the amendment.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I was paired with the the hon. member for Lunenburg (Mr. D. Stewart). Had I voted I would have voted for the amendment.


David Bradley Neely: I was paired with the hon. member for East Elgin (Mr. Marshall). Had I voted I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. BUREAU:: I was paired with the hon. member for South Perth (Mr. Steele). Had I voted I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. REID:: I was paired with the right hon. leader of the Opposition (Sir Wilfrid Laurier). Had I voted I would have voted against the amendment.


Robert James Ball: I was paired with the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Turgeon). Had I voted I would have voted against the amendment.


James Arthurs: I was paired with the hon. member for South Bruce (Mr. Truax). Had I voted I would have voted against the amendment. '


George Adam Elliott: I was paired with the hon. member for Bagot (Mr. Marcile). Had I voted I would have voted against the amendment.


Avard Longley Davidson: I was paired with the hon. member for South Cape Breton (Mr. Carroll). Had I voted I would have voted against the amendment.


William Pugsley: The hour is late, but there are a few minutes left to us before the guillotine will fall and we shall be deprived of the liberty of further expressing our views on the second reading of this Bill. I desire to give notice that before the conclusion of my remarks, I shall move, seconded by Mr. Sinclair,
That the said Bill be not now read a second time, but that It be resolved that in the opinion of this House it is not desirable, as provided by the said Bill, to disfranchise large numbers of the people of Canada who have taken the oath of allegiance, have been guaranteed the rights of citizenship in the name of His Majesty the King, and who have not failed to discharge all the obligations of citizenship.
And further that It be resolved that any measure granting the franchise only to a limited number of women, as proposed by the Bill, is contrary to the public interest and fails to recognize the splendid patriotic work which has been performed by the women of Canada generally during the present war.

There are one or two matters with which I should like to deal, and more especially with the observation of my hon. friend the member for Calgary (Mr. R. B. Bennett), who put forward the extraordinary proposition that there was no obligation whatever upon the part of the Government, as representing His Majesty the King, either to confer or to continue the right of franchise upon British subjects who had become such by reason of their having been naturalized. I was surprised at that statement of my hon. friend. In support of it he quoted certain language of one of the Lord Justices of England, but I am quite sure that that language must have been used with reference to a statute of the province of British Columbia whose authority was then in question; because, so far as the Parliament of Canada is concerned, no one would ever question its legal authority to take away from any citizen of Canada the right to exercise his franchise. That is within the power of Parliament, just as a provincial legislature in the exercise of the exclusive power conferred upon it by the British North American Act can deprive a citizen of his property without any compensation. But that I would' say would be tyrannical, an arbitrary and an unjustifiable exercise of its power; no one would say that it was just or equitable for a provincial legislature, though it -may have the power to do so, to deprive a man of his property without compensation. Now all that we say here is that the Parliament of Canada passed a law under which it provided certain means by which an alien may become a British subject, and it provides that when the conditions of naturalization are all fulfilled, by residence, by the necessary affidavits, and by the action of the court after public notice, the alien who so becomes a British subject becomes entitled to all the .political and other rights, powers and privileges which belong to a natural-bom British subject. Those are the words of the statute. Section 24 of the Naturalization Act, Chapter 77 of the Revised Statutes of Canada, says:
An alien to whom a certificate of naturalization is granted shall, within Canada, be entitled to all political and other rights, powers and privileges, and be subject to all obligations to which a natural-born British subject is entitled or subject within Canada.
What words could be stronger or more emphatic? My hon. friend from Calgary seemed to distinguish in some way between political rights and the right of franchise. But Parliament does not limit the right of
[Mr. Pugsley.j
the naturalized British subject to political rights, but gives to him all the political rights, powers and privileges of a natural-born British subject. Now when these citizens of Canada became naturalized, they became British subjects within Canada with the same rights, powers and privileges, and subject to the same obligations, as natural-born British subjects. That is the privilege which the Canadian Government and the Canadian Parliament have held out to all people in all parts of the world. They have said through their legislation, if you come to Canada and qualify by reason	of residence,	and by theauthority of the 'Court- before which you appear	you become	a	naturalized
British subject, then in the future no distinction will be made between you and the man- who is a natural-born British subject. Surely, Mr. Speaker, when the certificate of naturalization was given to these citizens declaring that they should have under the Canadian statute all the political and -all the other rights, powers, and privileges which a natural-born British subject enjoys within Canada, that was a promise, a guarantee of the rights of citizenship, which ought not to be taken away so long as a naturalized citizen discharges the obligations which he assumed under section 24 of the statute, namely, that he should bear all the obligations borne by a natural-born British subject.
Now it is not pretended that these citizens whom it is proposed to disfranchise have not performed their obligations, but ;t is said that as they are exempted from military service, therefore it is in the interest of the State that the franchise should be taken away from them. That might be an argument if these men had come and asked this Parliament to exempt them from military service, but they have asked nothing of the kind.
No evidence has been submitted to this House of any desire on their part for military exemption, but this disfranchisement applies to every one of these naturalized military subjects who . are above military -age, and who are exempt from military service. Let me -ask yo-u, Sir, in the name of justice and fairplay, if, because you exempt from military service a young man between twenty and thirty-five, residing iin Canada, it is any justification to take away the franchise from thousands upon thousands of men of the same race who are upwards of the age of thirty-five who cannot be called upon under the Military Service Act to perform military duty. Where is the justification for it? Is it not all a

pretense when those gentlemen come before this House and say that is the ground upon which they put it? If that is the ground, why did they not limit the disfranchisement to those young men of alien enemy origin who are exempted specially by the statute from military service? Surely these men, who have reached the age of thirty-five years and are given the guarantee of all the rights, political and otherwise which appertain to the natural-born British subjects, are entitled to retain their franchise just the same as British-born subjects who have attained the .age of thirty-five, in neither case is there any liability for military service, both classes are by law British subjects, the one is a natural-born British subject the other is a naturalized British subject. They are both declared by law to have the same political Tights, powers, and privileges. And so I ask you upon what principle of justice shall one be treated differently from the other? I say it is all a pretense, and I shall tell you why I say so. There was an assurance-and I have every reason to believe it because I have it on very high authority- that if our western Liberal friends who were in favour of conscription would come in and help to form a union government this measure of disfranchisement would not be introduced. I have the proof in the procedure before this Parliament, and it is that there was no exemption of those naturalized British subjects [DOT] in 'the Military Service Act. They were to be liable to serve, just as the British-born were liable to serve, but when the union government fell through, after the piteous appeals which those gentlemen upon the other side were making to our Liberal friends in the West, confessing to them in effect that they had so lost the confidence of the people that they felt they could not successfully carry on the war, and urging and beseeching our Liberal friends in the West especially to join them in the formation of a union government, they come down with this disfranchisement Bill and put in this Bill relating to the franchise the extraordinary provision, which they omitted entirely from the Military Service Act, exempting those naturalized British subjects from military service. They put it in this Franchise Bill because the Military Service Act bad passed before the union government scheme had fallen through. Then they propose to disfranchise this large class of citizens, and in order to make it appear that there was some justification for 'it, they exempt a portion of these
men from military service. I am satisfied that the hon. gentleman sitting upon the treasury benches, and ithe hon. gentlemen behind them who have forced them in caucus to bring down this measure, have been justly charged with the fact that this Bill is to enable them to win an election. Some gentlemen of the Government say: "Well, suppose that is so; if it is we axe proud of it, if it is likely to enable us to win -an election." Well, a burglar may try to break in and steal, and he may he foiled in his purpose, and so gentlemen who would steal an election from the honesit voters of the country may be foiled in their purpose. The only offence charged against these people is that .the gentlemen who occupy the treasury benches think they are actuated by Liberal principles. Liberalism means liberty and freedom, and when the people realize the attempt which is being made -to commit ia great outrage upon -a most deserving portion of the population, I think they will resent it and punislh those who are the authors of such an infamous measure. In the election -the Italian navvy working on the railroad or working in the trenches will have a vote, but the men out on the western prairie, the naturalized British subjects, who -are affected by this Bill, who came to our western country nineteen years ago-because this Bill goes back that far-settling in the province of Saskatchewan, out upon the lonely prairie, in a district where there was no railroad, -no hamlet, a long distance fro-m all the comforts of civilization, those men who have -spent the best part of their lives there building up homes for themselves and their families, and who have taken -a splendid part in producing what is needed for 'the Empire during this war, are deprived of their vote. Those men who have real substance in the country, men who have been working to build up the country are -to have no right to -say how the country shall be governed during the next five years.
My hon. f-riends upon the other side try to make the country believe 'that this is but a war-time measure, only to last during the wiar. Have they * put in this Bill a clause that there shall be a dissolution of Parliament after the war is over? Not -much. If they are elected under this Bill, they will be able to hold office for five years after the election, and will be able to administer all the general affairs of the country, whether arising out of the war, or connected with the war, or otherwise.

Let me call your attention to the provision of the Bill referred to in this proposed amendment, the provision relating to women. The amendment I propose moving declares that any measure granting the franchise only to a limited number of women, as proposed in the Bill, is contrary to the publie interest and fails to recognize the splendid patriotic work which has been performed by the women engaged generally during the present war. I desire to express my entire agreement with hon. gentlemen upon this side of the House, as well as upon the other side, who have said it is eminently proper that the near relatives of those who have gone to the front should receive the franchise in the coming election. But, let us consider, for a moment, upon what it is based. It is not, .and cannot be, based upon the service which is given by men at the front. If it were, as my hon. friend from Shefford (Mr. Boivin) pointed out, the vote could not be given equally. I instance a case which comes within my own knowledge. A very dear friend of mine has three boys who have been at the front since the war broke out. These boys have only one sister, only one female relative. It would not be fair,, as the hon. member for Shefford has said, that there should be only one vote to represent those three boys. I know another case of one man who has gone to the front, and whose six or seven female relatives will have votes under this Act. Surely if the franchise was given on the theory that it is for the service of men at the front, that would he a very unequal representation, because in the one case there are .seven ladies voting representing one man, and in another one lady representing three men. Sir, it is based and must be based upon the service which the women themselves have Tendered to this country, based upon the sacrifices which they have made in parting from their sons, their husbands, their brothers. It must be based upon service, and it can be based upon notning else. Their service to the country has been great. Their sacrifice has been great, and every member will agree that it is manifestly proper that their services should be recognized and they should be given the vote. But while that is true, is it just that the women of the country who have performed such splendid service during this war should be deprived of the opportunity equally with the others of saying how this country shall be governed for the next five years? Upon what ground is it based? The women generally of this 
country have, as my proposed amendment states, performed splendid service. Will it be said that they have not shown that they are entitled to the franchise just as much as the men of this country are entitled to it? Can it be based upon the ground that the issues in the next election are simply to be issues connected with the war? I saw the other day that a prominent gentleman, in British Columbia took that ground. He referred to the Canadian Northern Railway Bill at a publie meeting, and said that in ordinary times the action of the Government in putting that Bill before Parliament would induce the people to say that they had brought ignominy and shame and disgrace upon this country; but, he said, because the war is on I must vote for them and support them. But that is not going to be the view the people of this country generally will take. They will say that the hoys at the front must be supported; that every possible effort should be made to win the war. But the question will be, who will take part in the governing of the country to enable the war to be won? Many questions will come up for the consideration of the electorate; some will take one side, others the other side. And let me say to my hon. friends, that they must not expect the people, the electors at large, will not desire to take all these questions into consideration. They will look, .and properly look, at the way in which this Government has managed the affairs of this country, both matters connected with the war and other matters of administration, during the years tlvey have been in power, and will determine whether or not it is in the best interests of thfe country to longer entrust the administration to their hands.
You say I have but one minute longer, Mr. Speaker? I shall avail myself of that one minute to say that I think it is a most reprehensible thing that, on a matter of such enormous importance as the disfranchising of thousands and thousands of the electors of this country, the conferring of the franchise upon a portion of the women of this country, we should have, on the very first day of the discussion upon the second reading of this Bill, the application of the closure, so that reasonable and fair opportunity for discussing this measure is refused. The question is so important that a very much larger time ought to be giveu to it. The people of this country are entitled to be informed. Hon. gentlemen think that because we cannot convince them we lhave no right to speak. I trust that, through the press, our voices will go beyond

be heard by the great court of the nation, toe court to which hon. gentlemen opposite and we must soon appeal and submit our case. And I ask, is it not contrary to all reason and fair play to the people of this country that a measure of this enormous importance should be pressed through by closure on the very day succeeding* t6e motion for the second reading, which is the first opportunity given in this Parliament for a full and fair discussion? Is it treating the people of this country fairly? I submit that it is not. This country is many thousand miles in extent. There are, 1 venture to say, thousands of people in Canada who have not yet heal'd of the contents of this Bill; men engaged upon the farms, men who receive their newspapers only weekly, men who have many other subjects to engage their attention. It takes days for thejn to learn what is going on in this Parliament, even to leam what is going on, to say nothing of getting particulars of the proposed legislation.
I will not trespass for one single instant upon the time of the House; but I desire to say that I do believe, and I think it will be the verdict of the people of this country, that never in the history of Cam ada has there been, and I trust that never again in the history of Canada will there be, a measure so unjust, a measure so objectionable in its character, a measure so incapable of defence from every reasonable standpoint, as the measure which is now before the House.
Mr. LEMIEUX and Sir GEORGE FOSTER having risen together:


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: The hon. member for
Rouville asked if I would see 'him next, and I have to do so.


Hon. RODOLPHE LEMIEUX (Rouville):: This measure is certainly the most important that has come up before Parliament for many years, and, as my friend the member for St. John (Mr. Pugsley) has just said, it means the disfranchising of thousands and thousands of Canadians, full-fledged British subjects. I only regret that we have to discuss this question at this late hour and under such circumstances. Some years ago, in reading an account of the sinking of the Titanic in mid-ocean, I was struck with the last words uttered by the captain of the ship, ffhose who were saved on that memorable night said that they heard the voice of the captain telling his crew: Be British. These were the last words uttered by that gallant captain, so the confines of this room and that we shall
faithful to the best traditions of Great Britain on the sea. Sir, it seems to me that the captain of the ship of state could give us to-day some words of the same nature. But as I see the Tory ship sinking on the eve of a general election, I am afraid that the voice of the captain is uttering other words than those of the gallant captain of the Titanic. He is telling his crew to be Prussians and to be Hunnish. This measure is most unjust, most unfair, and most ungenerous. A Bill such as this would delight the heart of any junker in Germany. It would be hailed with pleasure, with enthusiasm by General Caranza or, if he were living, by General Huerta, in Mexico.
We have been told this afternoon, in very-eloquent terms, the causes of the war in South Africa. The hon. gentleman from Guysborough (Mr. Sinclair) told us what. happened in the Boer republic when the franchise was refused to the British subjects. I had intended to quote from the first chapter of the book which had a great circulation at the time of the declaration of war against the Boer republic, entitled "The Transvaal from Within," by Sir Percy Fitzpatrick. I shall not quote from it, because my hon. friend gave us the causes of the war in South Africa and the reasons why men from all parts of the British Empire went to South Africa, in order to stand by the men of British birth who were refused their rights by the President of the Boer republic. Let me, however, quote the memorial signed by the president of the Reform Committee in the Transvaal Republic. The great grievance, indeed the most conspicuous grievance, of the British subject in the Transvaal was the refusal by the Boer Government of the franchise. The memorial says:
Our great effort, however, was the petition for the franchise with the moderate terms of which you are all acquainted. The petition was signed by more than 38,000 persons. What was the result? We were called unfaithful for not naturalizing ourselves when naturalization means only that we should give up our original citizenship and get nothing in return, and become subject to disabilities.
Further on the memorial says:
We have now only two questions to consider :-[DOT]
Says Mr. Leonard, chairman of the Transvaal National Union, summing up the grievances of the British subjects:
-(a) What do we want? (h) How shall we get it? X have stated plainly what our grievances are, and I shall answer with equal directness the question, ''What do we want?" We want:	The establishment of this republic as
a true republic; (2) a Grondwet or constitu-

tion which shall be framed by competent persons selected by representatives of the whole people and framed on lines laid down by them -a constitution which shall be safeguarded against hasty alteration; (3) an equitable franchise law, and fair representation; (4) equality of the Dutch and English languages.
Sir, in South Africa the British subjects,, being refused their franchise, revolted and called the Britons from all parts of the British Empire to come to their rescue, and they came to the rescue tor that very purpose. I remember the occasion when the resolution was presented to the House of Commons. I was then one of the budding members of that Chamber. I had been elected in 1896, and that resolution was presented by the then Prime Minister (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) and seconded by the present Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir George Foster) in 1897. My hon. friend from Guysborough (Mr. Sinclair) quoted from the speech delivered by the then Prime Minister of Canada the resolution which was adopted unanimously by the members of the House. But there is another speech which should arrest the attention of the hon. gentlemen vho sit at your right, Mr. Speaker, the members who belong, to the Orange lodges. I remember the speech delivered on, that occasion by one of the most eminent of the Orange leaders in Canada. I refer to the late Clarke Wallace, father of the present member for Centre York, who used the following language:
British subjects have been deprived of the rights of citizenship which Great Britain has given in every land where her flag has waved. We in Canada have given a conspicuous example of that because here the fullest measure of freedom and liberty has been given to those who are not British born. We may perhaps say that greater freedom has been given by Great Britain than by any other nation to those not native born, because we have been examples of the great liberality with the most successful and satisfactory results. I desire to add my, word of commendation to the resolution proposed by the right hon. leader of the Government (Sir Wilfrid Laurier).
Here is the language of a gentleman who, in his day and generation, was the most-eminent member of the Orange Order, and he stood in his place in Parliament and supported the leader of the Government and his friend the present Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir George Foster). He stood by them, because the franchise had been refused the British-born in South Africa by Paul Kruger. I wish that the men who belong to the Orange lodges would follow in the footsteps of the late Clarke Wallace, and remember the timely words he uttered on that historic occasion.

The present Government sitting to your right, Mr. Speaker, is only there on sufferance. The life of this Parliament has been extended, and I regret, Mr. Speaker, having assented to that extension. I was under the impression that that extension was granted last year to carry on the war, as was stated at the time, but what has happened? The Government, despite the pledges that were given by its members, forced through, first, a conscription measure, thus sowing the seed of disunion amongst a united people. The Government	has-how shall I say it-
Siftonized a deal of stupendous magnitude by this Canadian Northern transaction, adding six hundred millions toi the national debt of Canada. And now the Government comes at the end of this session with a Bill, not of enfranchisement, hut of disfranchisement, making of the most solemn pledges and of our naturalization laws so many "scraps of paper," so that, at the next general election, Hun-like, yes, Kaiser-like, they may hack their way through the constituencies of Canada. My hon. friend from St. John (Mr. Pugsley) expressed 'surprise that closure had been used on this occasion. I am not surprised that closure has been adopted. The instrument is worthy of the occasion. This is class legislation, and reactionary legislation. The Tory Government is reverting to mediaeval times, when foreigners were only tolerated in so-called civilized countries, and were hardly recognized .as human beings.
We hear the suggestion at almost every turn:	cease to be Liberals; forget your
party ties and your party relations; be Canadians; >be British, so that we may win the war. Yet a most un-British, a most unCanadian measure is proposed by the Government, to serve, under the cover of patriotism, the most selfish party ends of the Tory party. This Bill emphasizes more than ever the essential and radical difference between Liberalism and Conservatism. Gladstone was a great reformer in the sense of extending the franchise; as a matter of fact, any one who has read the history of the Mother Country knows that the Reform Bills were introduced and passed by "Liberal governments as they were opposed by Tory oppositions.' The great Gladstone has given to the following definition of Liberalism and Conservatism :
The principle of Liberalism is trust in the people, qualified by prudence; the principle of Conservatism is mistrust of the people, qualified by fear.

I am prouder than ever of my Liberalism and of the guiding principle of my political faith; trust in the people. The present measure introduced by the Government shows exactly where the Tory party always stands. The Tory party stands for privileges, for class legislation, for mistrust of the people, qualified by fear of the electorate. The old conception of society was a conception of classes. Human beings in the old days-not so very old after all; in the beginning of the last century-were graded and standardized; certain privileges were reserved to certain groups. The first Reform Bill was introduced by an ancestor of one of the great Governor Generals, Lord Grey; others came later from G adstone and from leaders of Liberal and Radical governments. These Reform Bills were so many steps towards, equal rights.
* Sir, we have brought to Canada immigrants from all parts of the world. We have advertised Canada as the land of the free. We promised the immigrants equality of rights. They were living in Europe in their native lands in a state of serfdom; we gave them freedom as they came within our gates. The nationalities spread over the famous and historic Balkan peninsula have been living in serfdom, some under the yoke of Austria, others under the yoke of Turkey. Do you think that the men who lived in serfdom in those countries have any regard for the masters whom they left, for the yoke from which they were freed? As I read the other day a passage from a very interesting book on immigration, it dawned upon me that it was not possible that a Galician, for instance, although an Austrian subject, would have any regard for Austria; that on the contrary, having sworn allegiance to His Majesty the King and become a full-fledged British subject settled in the great far West, the possessor, indeed, the proprietor of 700 acres of land-would always side with Canada ano Britain in preference to Austria. Speaking of the Galician, Mr. Woodsworth, in his excellent book on immigration, "Strangers within our Gates," says:
He is ambitious. He is eager to become Canadianized. He does not cling to a language which is rich in words that express sorrow and despondency and misery, and meagre in those that express aspiration and joy and hope. Above all, he yearns to get on the land and to own some acres of his own. A Roman Catholic priest tells of conducting a Galician and, his wife to a quarter-section he had helped them to secure for homesteading. The man could hardly believe that the land on which he stood was, on certain conditions, to be actually his own.


George Perry Graham: I	was paired with the
Minister of Finance	(Sir Thomas White).
Had 1 voted, I would have voted for the amendment.


Edmond Proulx: I was paired with the hon. member for West Peterborough (Mr. Burnham. Had I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.


John Dowsley Reid: I was paired with the right hon. leader of the Opposition (Sir Wilfrid Laurier). Had I voted, I would have voted against the amendment.


George Adam Elliott: I was paired with the hon. member for Bagot (Mr. Marcile). Had I voted, I would have voted against the amendment.


Jacques Bureau: I was paired with the hon. member for South Perth (Mr. Steele). Had I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. DOHERTY:: I was paired with the hon. member for Bonaventure (Mr. Marcil). Had I voted, I should have voted against the amendment.


James Arthurs: I was paired with the bon. member for South Bruce (Mr. TruaxL Had I voted, I would have voted against the amendment.


Robert James Ball: I was paired with the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Turgeon). Had T voted, I would have voted against the amendment.
Main motion for the second reading of the Bill agreed to on the same division reversed, and Bill read the second time.
On motion of Sir George Foser, the House adjourned at 2.15 a.m. (Tuesday.)
Tuesday, September 11, 1917.