1928-03-26

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 46, respecting the Nipissing Central Railway Company.-Mr. Lang.
56103-107J
Bill No. 66, respecting a certain patent of Douglas J. Martin.-Mr. Clark.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. A. N. SMITH (Stormont) moved the second reading of Bill No. 71, to incorporate the St. Lawrence River Bridge Company.
Mr. STEVENS:: Explain.


Mr. SMITH (Stormont):: The object of
this bill is to incorporate a company to build a bridge a little above Brockville across to Morristown, New York. Last year there was before the house a bill similar to Bill No. 70, to incorporate a company to build a bridge at Gananoque. That bill has been brought up again this year. The Department of Railways and Canals objected last year to that bridge and I do not know what their present attitude is. As I say, the bill I am promoting is for a bridge between Brockville and Morristown. There is no vehicular bridge across the St. Lawrence river between Montreal and Niagara Falls, a distance of over four hundred miles.


Henry Herbert Stevens: In the last two years we have had a veritable epidemic of proposed bridges across international waters. I am not opposing this bill. I should like to make it perfectly clear that the fact that, in regard to a bill of this character, one takes the stand that there are involved conditions affecting the public interest, is no reason for anyone to say that we are opposing the bill as a private bill. But I think, in view of the large number of structures of this kind that are being proposed, there should be some declaration of public policy on the part of the government regarding matters of this nature. These bridges are proposed to be built across international waterways, yet last year and this we are giving seven or eight private companies very wide powers in regard to these matters and we are creating more bridges and establishing conditions which it will be very difficult for parliament to deal with later on.
Another point is this. These bills in my judgment have been in error sent to the private bills committee. Again I am drawing attention to this as a matter of procedure and not as a matter of criticism of the private bills committee. This bill and similar ones ought to go to the railway committee. They have to do with transportation and traffic; they have to do with the Railway Act; the Railway Act is invoked in some of them. I do not know whether it is invoked in this particular bill. Expropriation procedure under the Railway Act has been invoked and

Niagara Falls Memorial Bridge
to my mind these bills should go to the railway committee. Furthermore the government should be prepared to declare before the committee and parliament what its policy is in regard to bridges across international waterways.


Hon. J. D. CHAPLIN (Lincoln):: I should like to inquire from the promoter of this bill whether a similar bill for the United States portion of this bridge has been before the New York state legislature. That legislature, I understand, has now risen, and if that bill has not been passed there, what object is there in pressing this bill? What disposition has been made of the bill before the New York state legislature?


Arnold Neilson Smith: This is for a
bridge across navigable waters and is dealt with by the United States congress, rather than the state authorities. A similar bill is before the United States congress at the present time.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and referred to the select standing committee on railways, canals and telegraph lines.

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed, from March 20, consideration in committee of Bill No. 14, to incorporate the Niagara Falls Memorial Bridge Company-Mr. Pettit-Mr. Johnston in the chair.
Mr.   CHAIRMAN@: When the committee
last considered this bill, all the clauses had been adopted, and the question is now on the preamble.
On the preamble.


Mr. ARTHURS:: Before the committee adopts the preamble, as no doubt it will, I would suggest to the government that all of these bills that are international in character should be sent to the committee on international and industrial relations, instead of to the private bills committee.


James Dew Chaplin: I gave notice on the 21st of March, Mr. Chairman, to amend this bill by striking out in clause 7 all the words after the word " approaches " in the twentieth line up to and inclusive of the word " approaches " in the twenty-third line, and substituting therefor the following:
From a point between the Upper Steel Arch bridge and the Lower Steel Arch bridge to be determined and approved by the Board of Railway Commissioners for Canada.


The CHAIRMAN:: I have a copy here of the three amendments that have been proposed, but as the committee have adopted
IMr. Stevens.]
all the clauses of the bill, these amendments cannot be considered at this time, but may be moved on the third reading. The question is now on the preamble.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Before the preamble
carries, I wish again to emphasize what I said a moment ago in regard to another bill. There seems to be a good deal of misunderstanding on both sides of the house' regarding the objections that have been raised to this and other similar bills. I want to make clear that it is not a question of objecting to this as a private bill, or objecting to those who are asking incorporation as a private company. That is not the point at all. The point at issue is that the work suggested in this bill is a very important work over international waters. Up until last year or very recently there have been comparatively few of these bridges 'built, and it is not sufficient to say, because years ago we allowed private companies to build bridges, that therefore we as representatives of the public should pay no more attention to it and let any company that desires to build a bridge do so. The very presence of this and a number of other similar bills indicates to us, if we are at all thoughtful, that the time has come when the whole question of spanning these international waters should occupy the attention of parliament, and some definite policy should be determined upon and adopted by parliament. The responsibility for doing that rests at the moment with the government. I am not saying this in criticism of the government; I am merely pointing out a condition which has arisen, and indicating what to my mind and to the minds of a great many others is the duty of parliament, and ineidently at the moment the duty of the government as the leaders of the house, namely, to make some investigation and some determination of what the public policy of Canada is to be on the question of bridges crossing international waters. For instance, some of these waters are navigable. In this particular case I do not think the waters at this point are navigable, and the bridge probably will be so high that it will be clear of all navigation. But there are other waters that are navigable, and underneath the bridges over these1 waters will have to pass all the lakes traffic. This is a stupendous responsibility that we are taking at the present time in allowing bridges to be built across international waters on which passes the whole traffic of the great lakes, and we are doing it, as we also did it last year-I say this with all respect-rather lightly and rather frivolously. I know that my utterances the other day were misunderstood. It was thought per-

Niagara Falls Memorial Bridge
haps that I had some prejudice against this bill or against the member introducing it. But there is no such thing. I have nothing but the kindliest feelings towards the sponsor of this bill, as I have towards the sponsors of other bills that are introduced into this house. My point is that we are dealing here, through the medium of private bills and private companies, with something that should be a subject of public policy.


Mr. ROSS (Kingston):: May I ask why this bridge is to be called the memorial bridge?


Mr. PETTIT:: I explained that the other
evening and also before the committee. It is called "memorial" because of the hundred years of peace between the United States and Canada, and also in view of the jubilee year of confederation which has just passed.


James Dew Chaplin: I just want to put myself in the same category with reference to this bill as my hon. friend from Vancouver Centre, who has just spoken. It appears to me that the government of this country should take some stand regarding matters of this kind. Before I sit down I intend to show what the attitude of the state of New York is on similar proposals. When this bill was before the committee on the last occasion, the hon. member for Welland (Mr. Pettit) told us that so far as he was advised, the counterpart of this bill in the United States had not been defeated. I can tell him now that that bill has gone where lots of good coloured people go; it has gone to limbo. We are proposing to pass in this house a bill that is opposed by the state of New York, is opposed by the province of Ontario, is opposed by the parks commission on the Canadian side, and opposed by the state reservation commission on the other side. I do not think we will get anywhere with this bill. I just want to put before the house and before the committee a statement from the governor of the state of New York in reference to bridges, not only at Niagara, but also on the St. Lawrence. The committee will see that the state of New York has a policy on this question. I shall not read the whole of it, but just a couple of sentences.


Mr. CAHILL:: Read it all.


James Dew Chaplin: Oh no, there will be
enough time taken up without my reading it all, and if I read it all it would not be good reading for those people who are always calling out "Carried!" That is for my hon friend. On March 31, 1927, Governor Smith of New York state declared:
I think the time is past when the state should incorporate companies of this kind
Such bridges should be built either from public funds or through an agency such as the port authority of New York, authorized to issue bonds at a low rate of interest and limited in tolls to the amount necessary to retire and pay interest on the bonds. Experience with private bridges is that they result in large profits to stockholders and other private parties and the maintenance of high tolls.
He also said:
Private bridges of this kind bring with them approach and traffic problems which in the end fall on the state and the municipalities, and what looks at first like a purely private business proposition becomes a public problem of traffic and planning affecting all the surround ing territory. Obviously, these related prob lems which go with such a structure can onlj be properly solved by a public authority.
I have just signed a measure setting up a public non-profit-making bi-state authority, similar to the port authorities of New York and Albany, to build the Champlain bridge, and also a measure providing for a study of a Niagara port and frontier authority, which, if it is established, will have the power to plan just such bridges as this without private profit and solely in the public interest. I think this project and similar bridges, such as the Grand Island bridges, can wait until a public authority is established for the purpose. I see no more reason for a franchise to a private corporation to build a bridge over the St. Lawrence than I do for a franchise or a license to a private corporation to develop the state's water-power on that stream.
That, Mr. Chairman, is the policy of the state of New York. What I anticipated has happened: the counterpart of this bill has been thrown out by the legislature of that state. In view of this, why on earth should we pass a measure giving authority to build a bridge half way? This bridge has been up in the air for some time. It started by trying to get on top of one of the other bridges; and under this bill the promoters are asking for authority to place their structure within 250 feet of the other bridge. Is that something that this parliament should authorize? I submit, Mr. Chairman, that you had better think it over again.


An hon. MEMBER:: Where do you want the bridge?


James Dew Chaplin: My hon. friend need not say veiy much. His bridge on the St. Lawrence will probably fail the same as this one.


[Stage Direction]
Preamble agreed to.
On the title.
John Frederick Johnston: Shall the title carry?


James Dew Chaplin: On division.
Title agreed to on division.
Bill reported.
St. Clair Transit Company



ST. CLAIR TRANSIT COMPANY

Mr. SPEAKER:: I have been asked to revert to the first number of private bills. Bill No. 23. If there is unanimous consent this bill will be now taken up.
The house resumed from March 19, consideration in committee of Bill No. 23 to incorporate the St. Clair Transit Company- Mr. Goodison-Mr. Johnston in the chair.


John Frederick Johnston: When this bill was last before the committee we were considering clause 4.


Sir GEORGE PERLEY:: Mr. Chairman, when this clause was before us a few days ago I made some comments on the fact that it provided for shares of no par value. I know that is becoming a rather common practice by many large corporations, but it seems to me it is not proper in the case of a public -company of this description. I think that a corporation which proposes to build a bridge for public use at an expenditure of a large sum of money should have a substantial capital. If this section were agreed to the shares would be of nominal or no par value, and the promoters could sell them at any price they pleased. I think we ought to adopt the old practice of having a specific amount of capital provided for this enterprise, divided into shares of $100 each. Therefore in accordance with the notice I gave of an amendment for this purpose which appears in votes and proceedings of March 21, I beg to move:
That the whole of section 4 be struck out and replaced by the following:
4. The capital stock of the company shall be two million dollars, divided into shares of one hundred dollars each, and may be called up by the directors from time to time as they deem necessary.
I think this amendment will be to the advantage of the company, because I suppose they intend issuing a large amount of bonds as provided for in this bill. If so, they must have some substantial capital behind them.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Mr. HEAPS:: Mr. Chairman, I notice that in bill No. 14, which is similar in character to this measure, there is a clause providing that Canadian labour and Canadian materials shall be used as far as practicable. I desire to add as section 22 the following:
The employment of labour in the construction, maintenance and supervision of the said bridge shall be subject to the terms and conditions of the fair wage clauses set forth in the order in council No. 1206 of June 7, 1922 and any amendments thereto, and so far as it may be practical to do so, Canadian materials and labour must b* used in the construction

of the said bridge, and a certified statement shall be sent weekly to the Department of Labour giving the names and addresses of firms supplying materials and the quantity thereof.


John Frederick Johnston: The same point arises
here as was under consideration previously. Notice of motion of this amendment should have been given, but if the hon. member obtains the unanimous consent of the committee the clause may be added. Otherwise notice must be given regularly. Is it the unanimous wish of the committee that the motion be presented?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.


John Frederick Johnston: I am afraid the hon.
member will have to give notice.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I give notice that at the
next sitting I shall put the motion.
Motion stands.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Sections 5 to 7 inclusive agreed to.
On section 8-Powers.
Mr. COOTE:: This section provides that
the bridge shall not interfere with navigation. Is provision made for proper supervision of the construction by governmental authority to ensure that such interference will not take place? This is an important point.


Mr. CANNON:: The plans will have to
be approved by the governor in council.


George Gibson Coote: Is that provision in the
bill?


Lucien Cannon: Yes, in section 10. Moreover there is the general law providing for all such questions.


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: What provision is
there in regard to the time of commencement and completion of the work?


Lucien Cannon: My hon. friend might
read section 19.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Sections 9 to 11 inclusive agreed to.
On section 12-Power to issue shares as paid up stock in payment of acquired properties.
Mr. IRVINE:: In the votes and proceedings of the 22nd instant I gave notice that I intended moving an amendment to this section, as follows:
That all the words after the word "directors" in the eighth line of section 12 be struck out and the following substituted therefor:-
"but no such issue or allotment of shares as fully or partly paid up shall be valid or binding yrwn comDany

St. Clair Transit Company
(a)	Unless before any such issue or allotment of shares shall have been made as fully or partly paid up otherwise than in cash, the company shall have filed in the office of the Secretary of State a contract in writing, duly executed by the parties thereto, setting forth the considerations other than cash for which the company is about to issue and allot such shares as fully or partly paid up; nor
(b)	Unless in each and every case in whch the company shall allot or issue shares upon the footing that the whole or some part thereof shall be credited as paid for a consideration other than cash, such consideration shall be received and credited by the company at not more than its then actual value;
(c)	And, in case the foregoing provisons of this section are not complied wth, the holders of the shares so issued shall be liable to the company and to its creditors to the amount of the par value of the shares held by them respectively."
In support of this amendment I would point out that this company is hereby undertaking a public service, and while I do not believe that parliament intends preventing a reasonable return on investment, it is our duty, I take it, to see that the legislation giving this bridge company its legal authority to operate should properly safeguard the public interest. Stock manipulation in particular should be carefully guarded against. The substance of the amendment I have just moved will be found in the English Companies Act, and it protects the public against manipulation of stock, at least to some extent. I have much pleasure in moving the amendment, seconded by the hon. member for Athabaska (Mr. Kellner).


John Frederick Johnston: The notice of motion
which appears in the votes and proceedings in relation to this amendment indicates the hon. member's intention to move it on the third reading. I do not know whether that fact properly precludes its acceptance at the present time.


Mr. CAHAN:: The notice does not say
on the third reading. The notice in connection with the other bill refers to the third reading, but this notice does not.
Mr. IRVINE; In connection with Bill No. 14 I gave notice of a motion substantially the same as the motion my hon. friend (Mr. Heaps) has moved. It was not necessary, therefore, that I should move it in connection with clause 4.


George Halsey Perley: As I read the
notice in connection with bill No. 23, the reference is to section 4; there seems to be no notice regarding section 12.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: It provides that all the
words after the word "directors," in the eighth line of section 12, shall be struck out "and the following substituted therefor."


George Halsey Perley: That is right.


John Frederick Johnston: The notice I have says, on the third reading. There is another notice here having regard to section 4.


William Irvine: You will observe that section 12 of Bill No. 14 and section 12 of Bill No. 23 are identical, and I propose to move the same amendment to each of these bills. An hon. gentleman has just moved an amendment to Bill No. 14 which does practically what my amendment is intended to do, and I cannot move that amendment until the bill comes up for third reading. In the other case, however, this notice of motion is not confined to the third reading of the bill.


John Frederick Johnston: Did my hon. friend give notice of the motion which he has just made with respect to Bill No. 23?


William Irvine: Yes. If the chairman will look in the votes and proceedings for Thursday March 22, he will observe the notice on the second page.
Upon the yeas and nays being called for:


John Frederick Johnston: In my opinion the nays have it. I have been asked to read the amendment again, although I thought everyone heard it read by the hon. member who moved it.


William Irvine: I object to that; I think we all know what the amendment is.


John Frederick Johnston: I think the hon. gentleman's objection should be sustained.


Mr. NEILL:: I rise to a point of order. We do not know what we are voting on.
Yeas, 58; Nays, 58.


John Frederick Johnston: The result of the vote is a tie, and in order to leave the question open and give another opportunity to have the amendment moved on third reading, I will vote against the amendment.
Amendment negatived.


William Irvine: I rise to a point of order. Some hon. gentlemen opposite voted who were not in the house when the question was put.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: If my hon. friend refers to me, I did not vote.


John Frederick Johnston: I think the point is not well taken. We are now in committee, while the point raised by my hon. friend would apply to the house with the speaker in the chair.


Mr. DUNNING:: Mr. Chairman, I did not vote for the reason that I did not hear the amendment read. The hon. member for
St. Clair Transit Company

Wetaskiwin refused to allow me to hear it read, so I did not vote. Possibly he might have received my volte if he had been, a little more generous in allowing me to hear what he moved.


James Arthurs: As a matter of fact the question was read twice, apparently to allow certain hon. gentlemen to vote.


John Frederick Johnston: I think I should not allow that statement to go unchallenged. The clerk assistant came to the table and appealed to me to have hon. gentlemen resume their seats; he became mixed up because they did not resume their seats when he finished counting the row.


William Irvine: Do I understand that without giving notice I will have the liberty of moving this amendment again on the third reading of the bill?


John Frederick Johnston: Yes.


Lucien Cannon: If you give notice.


Mr. BOYS:: Under the rule I do not believe that can be done. The rule distinctly states that unless notice has been given in respect of the third reading, an amendment oannot be made. The proper course would be to refer the bill back to the committee, with instructions to make such an amendment. I think in fairness to the hon. member he should be told now that he should let this stand as a notice of motion in amendment that he will move on the third reading of the bill.


John Frederick Johnston: If the committee are agreeable this will stand as a notice of motion.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, I submit that the committee cannot authorize that amendment to be moved on the third reading unless notice is given.


George Halsey Perley: The hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George is quite right. If the hon. gentleman wishes to move an amendment on the third reading he should give a new notice which should appear in the votes and proceedings.


William Irvine: Then I will give a fresh notice of motion.
Section 12 agreed to.
Section 13 agreed to.
On section 14-Tolls chargeable.


James Dew Chaplin: I have had occasion already to point out to the house and to the committee in connection with these bills that the approval of tolls is to be made by the

governor general in council. I have also pointed out already that ini some cases for thirty years-


An hon. MEMBER:: Louder.


James Dew Chaplin: If you will make less noise with your conversation you will be able to hear me. For thirty years the governor in council has failed to do its duty.


Mr. STEWART (Edmonton):: I rise to
a point of order, Mr. Chairman. I resent that imputation. I asked my hon. friend the other night if there had ever been a reference to the governor in council and he replied none had been made.


James Dew Chaplin: That is no point of order. It is a statement of fact.


Charles A. Stewart: That is the statement of fact.


James Dew Chaplin: The bill itself declares
that the owners of the bridge must get their tolls approved by the governor in council. What I stated before and state again is this -the governor in council failed to approve of one set of tolls. That is plain now, and that is what I wish to convey to the house.


Charles A. Stewart: That is
quite a different statement.


James Dew Chaplin: No other authority than
the federal government has to do with this bridge, and they have to approve of these tolls. In the other charter that was being sought, the Solicitor General, at my suggestion, inserted some words that made it necessary for the people who owned that charter to get the government's approval. In the other bill he also put in the word "previously". Why does he not do the same thing here if the desire is to pass a bill that is going to be of any value? We have had experience before of the failure of the governor in council to do its duty.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Lucien Cannon: If my hon. friend will
allow me-it might shorten his speech-the word "previously" is in the clause.


James Dew Chaplin: Will the Solicitor General be kind enough to show me where the word "previously" is in that section?


Lucien Cannon: If my hon. friend will
read the clause he will find it there.


George Gibson Coote: Turn on the light, then the hon. member may be able to see it.


Charles Avery Dunning: That will not help him


James Dew Chaplin: Does my hon. friend saj it is in clause 14?

St. Clair Transit Company


Mr. GOODISON:: It is the second word
in line four, section 14.


James Dew Chaplin: It is not in the copy of
the bill that I have.


Lucien Cannon: I suggest that my hon.
friend get a copy of the reprinted bill.


Mr. MANION:: Where are the reprinted
bills? There are none in our file.


Lucien Cannon: In the reprinted bill the
word "previously" appears. The two bills were amended in order to meet my hon. friend's own suggestion.


James Dew Chaplin: The Solicitor General is
quite right.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 15 agreed to.
On section 16-Assets and liabilities of amalgamated companies.
An hon. MEMBER:: Give us some light.


James Dew Chaplin: You will not get much
light on this bill.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Sections 17 and 18 agreed to.
On section 19-Time for commencement and completion of bridge.
Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I want to call attention to
a peculiar provision in connection with this section-that, if within the time limit the bridge is built only one-quarter of the way across the river, the powers granted the company cease except as regards that part of the undertaking which has already been completed. It strikes me as a very peculiar provision with regard to the building of the bridge across an international river, but I presume no amendment can be made at the present time without notice.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to. *
On section 20-When property, etc., to be conveyed to the Dominion.
James Dew Chaplin: I should like to have an
explanation of these words:
When the corporate obligations and stock of the company and of any of the companies mentioned in sections fifteen, sixteen, seventeen and eighteen of this act, with which this company shall join or unite in the construction of said bridge, have been retired, in the manner prescribed in their by-laws, then such bridge and the approaches thereto and all appurtenant structures, property, property rights and franchises, so far as the same are located within the United States, shall be conveyed by the said company, its successors and assigns, without cost or expense to the state of Michigan
as the legislature of said state may designate, and so far as the same is situated within the Dominion of Canada shall be conveyed, without cost or expense, to the Dominion of Canada-
Does that mean any addition to the capital stock in the way of money, or does it mean the actual cost of the stock transfer? What does it mean?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: As I pointed out before when a similar bill was before the house this clause is a perfect farce. Not only is it farcical but it is deceptive. It says that at some time the mortgage bonds outstanding may be redeemed by means of receipts from tolls, and the stock may be retired by means of these receipts, and then, when this is accomplished the American part of the bridge shall be conveyed to the state of Michigan and the Canadian part to the Dominion of Canada. Now what are the conditions? First this company, under this clause, may pay up its entire capital of $2,500,000 under a provision whereby it can transfer any asset of any value to the company and issrue therefore its stock as fully paid up. Therefore the $2,500,000 of capital stock in this company may, under the advice of any competent legal counsel, be issued for practically no actual value at all -a thousand dollars or one hundred dollars, or some nominal value, will pay up the stock. Then there is another provision in the bill that the stock must be paid off at the price fixed by the by-laws of the company. That is, assuming that each share of $100 par value was actually paid up in cash, the directors, by their resolution and of their own will, may provide that the stock which costs $100 in cash, even if paid up in cash, shall be redeemed at $100, $200, $300, $400 or any price they see fit. So that the proposal now held out that this public utility undertaking, after it has earned sufficient to redeem these mortgage bonds, and after it has earned sufficient to retire its capital stock, shall be handed over and become the property of the Dominion of Canada, is entirely farcical and deceptive, because it leads to the impression that, after the actual cash invested in the bridge is paid off out of the tolls of the company, it would then become the property of the Dominion government. Then to further mislead, it seems to me, those who drafted this bill have added at the end of section 20:
Provided always that the period for payment of the obligations of the companies and the retirement of their capital stock and any extension thereof and the provision of the companies' by-laws in respect thereof shall have been previously approved by the governor in council.
16S4
St. Clair Transit Company

If it were made clear that the by-laws which indicated the price at which the stock was to be redeemed should be approved by the governor in council, there might be then some semblance of restraint upon the price which would be set upon the stock by the by-law; but this clause merely relates to the period for payment. That is, the company may make by-laws with respect to the period for payment, and that such by-laws must be approved by the governor in council. But bylaws dealing with the prices to be paid are not, under that act, subject to the approval of the governor in council. I called attention to that fact before. I cannot propose an amendment now; but it seems to me that this whole clause should be struck out; that we should not be parties to a farcical and deceptive section such as is inserted in this bill, which offers no opportunity to the government to exercise a proper discretion, and which really holds out the suggestion that this bridge will one day become the public property of the Dominion of Canada, while it rests entirely with the directors of the company to designate and fix the price at which it shall become the property of the Dominion.


Lucien Cannon: How could the directors
fix the price of their stock?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: By by-law.


Lucien Cannon: If my hon. friend will
read the section he will see that all these bylaws are subject to the approval of the governor in council.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Which section?


Lucien Cannon: The section the hon.
member is discussing.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: No. I will read it again.
Any person who can read English intelligently will doubt the construction placed upon it by the Solicitor General. The clause reads:
Provided always that the period for payment of the obligations of the companies and the retirement of their capital stock-
That is dealing with the period of time.
-and any extension thereof and the provision of the companies' by-laws in respect thereof-


Lucien Cannon: That is exactly what I
said.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: [DOT]-in respect thereof-
That is in respect of that period and nothing else.


Lucien Cannon: Not at all. It is in respect of the retirement.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: If it is to be in respect of
the retirement, it should be made clear.


Lucien Cannon: It is clear.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: It is not clear. I would
suggest that any court that has this section before it will declare that the words "in respect thereof" apply back to the word "period," and whoever drafted that, in my opinion, intentionally made it apply to the period and not to the by-laws fixing the price, in order that it might deceive the unwary reader of the section to which I have made reference. If it is to apply to the by-laws in reference to the terms on which retirement of the stock shall be made, that should be expressed in clear English.


Lucien Cannon: Notwithstanding the limited intelligence which my hon. friend has been kind enough to credit me with-


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I was not reflecting on
the hon. member's intelligence.


Lucien Cannon: -if any members of the committee will read the clause, they will see that the words-
By-laws in respect thereof-
-must be used in connection with the words previously used. The words before the word "bylaws" govern not only the period, the point which my hon. friend has stressed, but also the retirement and indeed the whole matter of the retirement. The clause states that any by-law passed by the company in connection with both the period and the retirement will be subject to approval by the governor in council. My hon. friend has mentioned that this clause is drafted in such a way as to deceive parliament. I have great respect for my hon. friend; but the committee which examined this clause was satisfied with it, and I am quite sure none of those who sat on the committee had any intention of being deceived or of enacting any legislation which was against the public interest. It is easy for my hon. friend to use strong language; but I would ask members of the committee to examine this clause with care and caution and they will come to the conclusion that the clause is not as bad as my hon. friend would have the committee believe it to be.


William Alves Boys: Supposing the by-law is not approved by the governor in council, what is the effect?


Lucien Cannon: If it is not approved, it is not valid; it has no force.


William Alves Boys: That being so, there would be no by-law under which the country could ever become the possessor of this bridge.

St. Clair Transit Company


Lucien Cannon: Except that the governor in council has the power, not only to approve any tolls which are to be charged before they are chargeable and collectible, but to revise the tolls so that should the company keep on doing its business, without having any intention of turning over the bridge to the country, the governor in council has absolute power to see that no tolls are collected by the company.


William Alves Boys: We are not at the moment discussing the tolls. There is in this bill a clause that seems to be important from the standpoint of the country. Under clause 20 the country may some fine day become possessor of this bridge. The first part of the clause states:
When the corporate obligations and stock of the company and of any of the companies mentioned in sections 15, 16, 17 and 18 of this act, with which this company shall join or unite in the construction of said bridge, have been retired, in the manner prescribed in their by-laws-
Supposing the manner prescribed in the bylaws is not satisfactory to the governor in council, the country would never get the bridge. I suppose the last five or six lines are inserted as a saving clause, but I submit that, instead of having a saving clause, it affords no relief, because if the provisions of the bylaw are not satisfactory to the governor in counoil, the by-law under which acquisition might take place would never be approved. Therefore the whole matter, instead of to some extent being in the hands of parliament, is absolutely in the hands of the company. The only relief is under the last few lines of the clause. The position is that the company may pass a by-law providing for acquisition, but because of the action of the governor in council, the by-law is not valid and therefore we have no legislation which will result in acquisition. I submit that there should be inserted in this clause some provision which, apart from the arbitrary exercise of authority on the part of the directors will give the country some power and authority over this bridge, which cannot be nullified. If this clause continued-
If the by-law of the company is found unsatisfactory to the governor in council, the governor in council shall have power to make such amendments as it may think appropriate in the premises.

that would afford some relief. As the matter stands now, the whole thing is in the hands of the company. They could pass an extreme by-law which would never be approved and the country would never get the bridge.


Lucien Cannon: My hon. friend forgets
one essential feature. If the company passes
a by-law such as he has described, unacceptable to the governor in council, the governor in council will not accept the by-law. The governor in council, however, has an absolute power controlling the tolls, and the governor in council can, through that power, put the company in such a position that it will have either to turn over its property to the government or operate the bridge without charging any tolls. What would be the interest of the shareholders of the company to continue doing business on that basis?


William Alves Boys: Does my hon. friend suggest
to the committee that the only way of getting relief is by coercive measures? Surely that is not the way to handle the matter. We have an opportunity to put this right now. Let us do it in our legislation. Do not let us do it by saying to the company:	If you
do not do what we want, we will take you by the throat; we will deprive you of tolls which at the time we thought were reasonable; we will give you only half the tolls. Surely it is our duty to deal with the matter now when we have it in our hands. One of the strong arguments before the committee was that this was not a profit-making proposition; that they wanted only reasonable tolls sufficient to pay off the indebtedness, and that ultimately the bridge would become the property of Canada and the United States. If the proposition made by the Solicitor General is the only answer, it is a very weak one, namely, that if you do not do what we want, we will take you by the throat and bring you to time.


Lucien Cannon: Sanctions to legislative
enactments are always an infringement of private liberty. How can yoU] give any sanction to legislation without in some way restricting individual liberty? Every sanction to a law is coercion.


Robert James Manion: The Solicitor General
argues that this clause has the meaning which is desired by hon. members on this side who have spoken. If the clause has that meaning, as he claims, what objection can there be to making that clear? Surely parliament is not for the purpose of putting up all kinds of protection for private corporations, and no protection for the people of Canada and for the government. Let us make the clause clear, so that its effect, as claimed by the Solicitor General, will be absolutely understood, not only by the house, but by the courts of Canada, if the question should ever be taken to the courts. I appeal to the Solicitor General, in justice to the people of Canada, to make this clause absolutely clear. He says that it means what hon.
St. Clair Transit Company

members on this side desire it to mean; they say that it does not. I was not in for the whole debate previous to this, but surely it is a fair demand to make that the clause shall be absolutely clear so that no mistake can be made in regard to it. That seems to be an absolutely fair and honest demand to make of the government on behalf of the people of Canada.


Lucien Cannon: I submit that the clause
is clear. My hon. friend might try and agree ivith the other hon. gentlemen on his side who have spoken in order to bring forth an argument that we can well understand. My hon. friend says he speaks on behalf of the public generally. The hon. gentleman who spoke before says that we should not coerce a private company.


Robert James Manion: I did not say I was speaking on behalf of the people, although I do speak for them just as much as my hon. friend the Solicitor General. My point was that the Solicitor general says that this clause is clear. My friends on this side, who are both lawyers, say that it is not clear. Then what objection has the Solicitor General to making it clear? That is what I would like to know. If, as he claims, it has the desired meaning, why not make that so clear that an ordinary layman like myself could make no mistake about it?


William Alves Boys: I am not arguing that it is
not clear. Quite the reverse. I say that it is very clear that the country has no relief whatever under the provisions.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I wish to say in reply to
the Solicitor General, for whose opinion I have great respect, that having read this clause in the clear light of day, which is coming in now, there is no doubt in my mind that a court will construe the words "and the provision of the companies' bylaws in respect thereof" as referring solely to the period for the payment of the obligations of the company and the retirement of their capital stock; and any extension thereof. That is not an extension of the capital stock; it is an extension of the period for the retire-met of the capital stock, and I venture to say that if it came before a court of law my hon. friend would argue that case from my point of view with very great success indeed.


George Hamilton Pettit: I think it is perfectly plain that the different clauses of the bill make the location of the bridge and its plans and tolls all subject to the governor in council. Then under this clause the payment of its obligations and the retirement of its stock, and the provisions of the companies' bylaws 
with respect thereto, must first be approved by the governor in council.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Sections 22 to 25 inclusive agreed to.
Preamble agreed to.
Bill reported.

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk).

Mr. RYCKMAN:: 1.	Does the treaty of 1909 between His Majesty the King and the United States of America relating to boundary waters, under articles 3 and 8 or any other provision thereof, give to the government of the Dominion of Canada power to conclude an agreement with the United States relating to works, improvements or obstructions in the St. Lawrence river (known commonly as the St. Lawrence Great Waterways Development), without the approval of the parliament of Canada?
2.	If such power exists, will it be exercised without such approval first obtained?
3.	Has the International Joint Commission, established under the said treaty, any jurisdiction or authority to decide finally any question relating to such works, improvements, or obstructions in favour of the United States, and against the position taken by the Dominion of Canada in the event of possible disagreement between the two countries?
4.	If so, what are the powers of the said commission in that behalf?


Hewitt Bostock: In my opinion this question is irregular. Bourinot says:
While explanations of the intentions of the government or of a minister may be asked, their opinion on a matter of policy or of law is not a proper subject of inquiry.
In my humble judgment this question should be redrafted.
Question dropped.


J OLIETTE POST OFFICE BURGLARY
[Stage Direction]
On the question being called:
Mr. MANION:: 1.	Regarding the burglary of the post office at Joliette on February 29th last through which $1,200 was lost, is it true that the door was opened with a key?
2.	Is it so that the safe or vault was opened by means of the combination?
3.	If so, who among the employees knew this combination?
4.	What move is being made to punish those concerned?


Robert James Manion: It has been pointed out to me by the Post Office Department that if this question is answered at the present time it will, as the matter is now under investigation,

Questions
cast reflections on those who may be innocent. As I have no desire to do that, I will for the time being drop the question.
Question dropped.


GUION ISLAND LIGHTHOUSE INSPECTOR
Mr. MacDONALD (Cape Breton South):: 1- Who was inspector of construction of the Guion island lighthouse?
2.	By whose recommendation was such inspector appointed?
3.	What remuneration was paid to him for his services?


Mr. CARDIN:: 1.	Alex. McKinnon, Gabarus, N.S.
2.	D. D. Boyd, St. Peters, N.S.
3.	$313,60.


MATANE-STE. ANNE DES MONTS MAIL SERVICE
Mr. CAHAN:: 1.	Who has the contract for the carrying of mails between Matane and Ste. Anne des Monts, Quebec?
2.	When was the present contract made?
3.	Were public tenders invited therefor?
4.	If so, who put in tenders therefor and what was the amount of each tender?
5.	Is the person who now holds the contract a British subject?
6.	If so, how long has he been a British subject?


Mr. VENIOT:: 1.	Frank Pezzullo.
2.	Contract awarded on 15 July, 1924.
3.	Yes.
4.	Francois Dechaines, Ste. Felicite, $6,500, tender (subsequently withdrawn); Eudore Roy, Cap Chat, $7,000, tender (subsequently increased to $8,000); George Dion, Ste. Anne des Monts, $8,000; Francois Imbault, Matane, $8,000; Romeo St. Laurent, Matane, $8,700; J. B. Tremblay, Grosses Roches, $9,000; Edmond Leclerc, Ste. Anne des Monts, $9,000, tender (subsequently reduced to $8,500); Pierre Gendron, St. Gerome de Matane, $9,400; F. Pezzullo, Matane, $9,800, tender (subsequently reduced to $7,500); Jos. D. Pelletier, Cap Chat, $9,974, tender (subsequently reduced to $8,800); Roch Roy, Petit Capucines, $9,993; Charles Gauthier, Cap a la. Baleine, $10,000; Norbert Pelletier, Jr., Cap Chat, $10,440; Hormisdas Otis, Matane, $11,500; Sylvio Ross, Dalibaire, $11,500; Arthur Bonneau, Petit Capucins, $11,998; Victor Sylvestre, Ste. Felicite, $12,000; Henrie Tremblay, Jaco Hughes, $13,000; Mrs. Felix Savard, L'Anse a la Croix, $13,000;.
5.	and 6. No information.


CAP CHAT-WHARF
Mr. CAHAN:: 1.	Has the Department of Marine and Fisheries or any other department of government made a contract for the construction of a wharf at Cap Chat, county of Gaspe, in the province of Quebec?
2.	With whom was said contract made?
3.	What was the amount of the contract?
4.	Who has supervised the expenditures?
5.	What amount has been paid to the contractor to date?
6.	If no contract was made for the construction of this wharf, what amount has been expended thereon by the government to date?
Mr. ELLIOTT (for Mr. Cardin);
1.	A contract has been awarded for an extension to the wharf.
2.	Ludger Lemieux, Limitee, Ste. Marie, Beauce, P.Q.
3.	Approximately $31,800 (unit prices).
4.	Inspector of construction, Urbain Cretien, Cap Chat, under direction of district engineer P. E. Amiot, Rimouski, P.Q.
5.	Nil.
6.	Answered by No. 1.


SUGAR LOAF-POSTMASTER
Mr. JOHNSTONE:: 1.	Who is now the postmaster at Sugar Loaf, Cape North, Victoria county?
2.	How long has the present postmaster held office?
3.	By whom was he recommended?
4.	What are his qualifications?


Mr. VENIOT:: 1.	Alex. D. Wilkie is acting postmaster.
2.	Temporarily in charge since 20th December, 1927.
3.	By retiring postmaster, Wilson J. Gwinn.
4.	Satisfactory up to the present.


QUESTION PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN
[Stage Direction]
iiuribinnj HU W rJK
Mr. WHITE (London):: 
UNOPPOSED MOTIONS FOR PAPERS
Mr. HANSON:: For a copy of all correspondence, memoranda, writings, accounts, and other documents, in any way relating to the work done on the bhippigan wharf, and warehouse at Shippigan, Gloucester county, New Brunswick, during the summer of 1927.
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Natural Resources-Prairie Provinces


JAMES J. MACDONALD
Mr. MacDOUGALL:: For a copy of all correspondence, reports, telegrams, and other documents relating to the misconduct, suspension or dismissal of James J. MacDonald, postmaster at Birch Grove in the county of Cape Breton.


NATURAL RESOURCES OF PRAIRIE PROVINCES
Hon. J. W. EDWARDS (Frontenac-Ad-dington) moved:: That, in the opinion of this house, in the best interests of confederation, and the economic development of western Canada, the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta should be granted^ their natural resources free from restrictions within the legislative competence of the parliament of Canada with provisions for the maintenance and administration of school lands and school land endowment funds for educational purposes according to the laws of the respective provinces, but in compliance with the letter and spirit of the constitution, and that the claims of these provinces to compensation for loss for lands and resources alienated, and the claims of any other provinces in connection with this subject should be investigated with a view to satisfactorly and equitable adjustment.


Ernest Lapointe: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a point of order which, I think, is of interest to all the members of the house in connection with an important matter of procedure. The hon. gentleman who moves this resolution gave notice, according to the rules of the house, on Thursday, January 26, 1928, as Your Honour may see by reference to the votes and proceedings of that day, the very first day of the opening of the house. The resolution remained on the order paper until Wednesday of last week, when it appeared with a material alteration. The words,
but in compliance with the letter and spirit of the constitution.
which up to that date appeared in the resolution before the words,
with provisions for the maintenance and administration of the school lands endowment fund_, according to the laws of the respective provinces,
were transferred and inserted after this passage, thus changing substantially the meaning of the resolution.
I do not complain of this change, I think the new resolution is better than the old, and it is more acceptable to me, but I submit that, according to the rules of the house, this alteration could not be effected without giving due notice in the votes and proceedings. On this point permit me to quote to Your Honour, Bourinot. At page 299 he says:

A motion on the order paper must be in accordance with the notice of the votes; and, should a member desire to substitute another, or alter its terms, he must first obtain the leave of the house.
The hon. mover of the resolution should have given notice of the alteration. And the new resolution, as altered, should appear on the order paper after the other resolutions which would have precedence over it.
Mr. C. H. 'CAHAN (St. Lawrence-St. George): Mr. Speaker, I remember an occasion when a resolution of mine, which I had written out, was misprinted in an important particular. I called the attention of the Clerk of the house to the fact that it was a misprint, and on the following day due correction was made. In this case certain words, by mere accident apparently, have been printed in one part of the paragraph that should have been printed in the other, and I have no doubt that the hon. gentleman who is moving the resolution intended it to be in its present form. Therefore it seems to me the alteration might be regarded as a misprint which the hon. member should be allowed to correct and still retain his place on the order paper.


Ernest Lapointe: 
Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Until I hear the discussion of it my opinion is that I shall have to support the resolution in its present form. I would not have voted for it in its earlier form.


Ernest Lapointe: Hear, hear.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: But I still think, from the explanation I have heard, that the alteration is a mere' accident, and I think that when such a misprint is made the house should be very tolerant and not insist on a technical objection of this kind.


John Wesley Edwards: Mr. Speaker with respect to the resolution as it is now framed, I feel encouraged by the statement made by the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Cahan) that it is now in such form as to be acceptable to him. I am also glad to have a similar intimation from the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe). That is certainly making progress. Perhaps the Minister of Justice thinks that others may be favourably disposed towards the motion to such an extent that it might carry; therefore he interferes on a point of order to prevent its discussion.
The members of this house, sir, were prevented from discussing this question in the

Natural Resources-Prairie Provinces
session of 1926 by a double-barrelled arrangement under which the government referred the question to the supreme court for a declaration as to the validity of certain legislation and also prevented discussion by a government resolution. In the session of 1927 the house was also prevented from discussing this important matter because it was still sub judice. Therefore I am not surprised at this further exhibition of want of courage on the part of the government in raising what seems to me to be a very minor objection.


Ernest Lapointe: I think my hon. friend should limit himself to the point of order.


John Wesley Edwards: Well, I suppose I will have a further opportunity sometime of paying my compliments to the hon minister.


Ernest Lapointe: It will be reciprocal.


John Wesley Edwards: I am very
glad to see that he is a little touchy on the point. Now, Mr. Speaker, I submit that the intention of the motion and what it deals with is not materially affected by the addition of the words, " school lands Those words are added, I admit, but I consider they must necessarily be incorporated in the words following, namely, " school lands endowment fund ". Also, the addition of the words, " for educational purposes" is implied with respect to the administration of the school lands of the respective provinces, which everybody knows are for educational purposes and never for anything else. I see no material difference in the resolution as now framed and as it stood when first introduced. There are precedents for the acceptance of such a motion in its changed form; I am quite sure that statement is correct. I believe a change was made1 in a motion introduced two or three years ago by my hon. friend from Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens), and the motion thus amended came up within forty-eight hours after the change was made. Moreover, it was allowed to be debated. In this matter hon. members have had five or six days' notice of the motion in its present form. You, Mr. Speaker, called the motion last Wednesday and I allowed it to stand; perhaps the time was not opportune to debate this point of order until the motion was actually put. I submit that the house has had ample opportunity to consider it. This is not a case of springing something on anyone; it is not a matter of giving forty-eight hours' notice; hon. gentlemen have had six days' notice of the motion in the form in which it now appears. The motion has been on the order paper in this form since last Wednesday and I urge that I be given the right to proceed to discuss it. However, I am in the hands of the house.


Henry Herbert Stevens: May I point out, Mr. Speaker, that it has not been an infrequent practice on the part of hon. members to correct or change motions, and the present motion has been but slightly altered. The change consists very largely in a correction which, I think I can say, was called to the attention of my hon. friend-a correction regarding the words referred to which should have been inserted in the first instance in the order in which they now appear. It has not been the practice of the house to refuse hon. members the privilege of changing their motions in such a manner. As my hon. friend has observed, I changed a motion two or three years ago. I did not do so with any intent to deceive the house but in perfect good faith, and after consultation with some of the officers having to do with these questions. There was no question then about my right to make the change. As I say, it is not as if something were being done to mislead the house, as for instance in the case of changing a record; it is simply a question of adjusting a motion which was put frankly on the order paper several days ago. The motion in its present form has been on the order paper several days, and while the rule cited by the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) might be stretched to bear the interpretation he gives it in his point of order, I submit that the house would find it hopeless to carry on its business if every rule were construed strictly technically. For example, a question arose the other day on a point of order regarding the right of a member to speak. Every member has a right to speak on every bill, and, in committee as often as he likes; he may speak also on the second and third readings of the bill. Suppose, however, every member exercised that right, is it not obvious that the business of the house would be, seriously delayed? I submit, therefore, that in the absence of a definite and specific rule of a mandatory character the ordinary practice followed in the house should govern in this case.


Alan Webster Neill: I
can cite a precedent of quite recent date which appears to be apt. A few weeks ago I put a notice of motion in the votes and proceedings and ultimately it reached the orders of the day. It appeared one day and was left off the next. On inquiry I was 'old that this was due to the fact that there ivas a new rule under which a member may have only one notice of motion on the order paper at any time, and inasmuch as I had a motion already in my name the second one was invalid. I said that I would get another member to father the second resolution; he
1690	COMMONS
Natural Resources-Prairie Provinces
put his name to it instead of mine and this was thought acceptable. It could not be said that the substitution of one member's name for another at the beginning of a motion was a material alteration in the motion itself. I was satisfied with the statement that the next day the motion would appear in the other member's name, but afterwards I was informed by the Clerk, who in the meantime had consulted the authorities, that it would be necessary for the other member to give the ordinary notice in the votes and proceedings in the regular way. That was done and the motion was in consequence delayed to that extent. This, I think, is perfectly parallel to the question now under dicussion.


George Halsey Perley: With all respect to my hon. friend I must question the aptness of his illustration. Last year we provided that a member might have only one notice of motion on the order paper at one time. The reason was that sometimes at the beginning of the session a member would put half a dozen different motions on the order paper and thus block the way for other members. The new rule was intended to give everyone an equal chance. In this case, however, it seems to me that the Minister of Justice is stretching the rule too far. We all know that mere verbal changes in notices of motion have been made ever since we were members of this house and no question has been raised. The notice of motion which the hon. member for Frontenac-Addington (Mr. Edwards) wishes to move at the present moment is drawn in the exact terms of a resolution passed by the Conservative party at its convention in October last, and only inadvertently did the motion as originally worded fail to conform with that resolution. We alt have known of notices of motion, changed verbally, having been allowed to_ remain on the order paper. If the point raised by the Minister of Justice is regarded as well taken it will mean that any motion which is altered immaterially will be placed at the bottom of the list, and I submit that this will constitute a rather stringent interpretation of the spirit of the rule. I have no doubt that the hon. member consulted the Clerk, as most of us have done in similar circumstances, and I submit to you, Mr. Speaker, that he be allowed to go on with the motion.


Lucien Cannon: We should ask ourselves two questions: first, whether there is a rule covering this case-and there is a rule, standing order 45-and, secondly, whether the motion standing in the name of the hon. member for

Frontenac-Addington (Mr. Edwards) is the same notice of motion which has appeared on the order paper for some considerable time. If it is the same notice of motion the arguments brought forward by hon. gentlemen opposite apply; if it is not the same notice of motion then standing order 45 must apply and a new notice be given. And this new notice of motion must be treated as if it were a new notice in relation to some other question, and must occupy on the order paper the rank which in that event it would have received. Is this notice of motion now on the order paper the same notice of motion which was first put on the paper by my hon. friend at the beginning of the session? I humbly submit, Your Honour, that it is not. What are the changes? They are two in number. By the first change the notice of motion now before the house applies not only to public school funds but also to school lands and that is not a matter of small moment; it is a change of some importance. The second change is that the words, "In compliance with the spirit and letter of the constitution" in the first notice of motion applied to federal legislation alone, while in the new notice of motion those words apply to both federal1 legislation and provincial legislation. Undoubtly those two changes have been made in the resolution standing in the name of my hon. friend.
The third question is whether these changes are material or whether they result simply from a misprint, and I would say that in my opinion if you add to a resolution words which extend its scope from public funds to public lands you introduce a material change. I also submit that if you wish to say that the spirit and letter of the constitution will apply not only to one set of legislation, that is federal legislation, but also to provincial legislation, which will include the legislation passed in three western provinces, you introduce a material change. The best argument in support of my contention lies in the words of the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Cahan), who preluded his remarks by saying that we were simply facing a misprint. He afterwards added that as a consequence of the changes introduced by the hon. member he, who would have voted against the resolution as it stood in the first instance, would now support it.
So, Your Honour, believing that these changes are material, I submit that standing order 45 applies.


Mr. L. J. LADNER (South Vancouver):: Rule 363 provides:

Natural Resources-Prairie Provinces
A modification of a notice of motion standing upon the notice paper is permitted, if the amended notice_ does not exceed the scope of the original notice.
I submit that the scope of a resolution is not limited to the substance or to the words.


Ernest Lapointe: My hon. friend is not
reading a rule; he is quoting the words of May.


Henry Herbert Stevens: He is quoting an authority.


Leon Johnson Ladner: I am reading from an
authority which is accepted by most of us as being equal to May.


Lucien Cannon: If the scope is not extended, my hon. friend is perfectly right.


Leon Johnson Ladner: I can only handle one
point at a time, and at present I am reading rule 363 from Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms.


Charles Avery Dunning: It is not a rule.


Leon Johnson Ladner: It is a reference which
I think should have some meaning in our procedure. After having compared the original notice of motion with that now before U3, my contention is that the alterations in the form of the motion, in the wording as well as in the addition of the words "school lands," taking the scope of the notice of motion into consideration, still keep it within that scope. Then I refer the Solicitor General to reference 391:
No motion of which notice has been given shall be made in a form differing from that of the notice, except with the unanimous consent of the house or upon a regular renewal of notice.
I submit that those two references were never contemplated to include alterations of such little importance, as far as the subject matter is concerned, as those alterations in the notice of motion given by the hon. member for Frontenac-Addington (Mr. Edwards). Certainly if we are to be tied up in knots by technicalities of this kind many of the proceedings of the house, not only of private members but of the government as well, might be seriously hampered.


Hewitt Bostock: Do any other gentlemen
desire to speak on the question?


John Wesley Edwards: I would like to add one word, with your kind permission. I am not at all deceived by the arguments of the Solicitor General, which have some point to them. The very fact that the Solicitor General, the Minister of Justice and the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George all say 56103-108
that the changes are material must be taken into consideration, of course. However, I still adhere to my former statement that I do not think they are material to the objects plainly indicated in the resolution. I understand the object of the government all right; they are running true to form in trying to prevent a discussion of this matter.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


John Wesley Edwards: I mean
exactly what I say. I have just this to say, Mr. Speaker: He who fights and runs away will live to fight another day.
Hon. CHARLES A. DUNNING (Minister of Railways and Canals): Before you give your ruling, Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind the house that tihe hon. member for Frontenac-Addington is not debarred from doing what he wishes -to do in a proper way under the rules, but by doing it in this manner he succeeds ini gaining precedence over twenty other hon. members of the house who have resolutions on tlhe order paper and who have a right to discuss those resolutions before my hon. friend -can discuss his resolution, he having altered his notice of motion since it was placed on the order paper.


John Wesley Edwards: That is true if the statement preceding it is held to be correct by Mr. Speaker.


Charles Avery Dunning: The hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George plainly stated that he -could not support -the resolution as it first appeared, but that in its present form he could support it. Surely tha-t is evidence that a very material change has taken place in the resolution. I suggest that the question is one of the rights of the other members of the house who have on this order paper regular notices of motion which they have a right to discuss in advance of the resolution proposed by my hon. friend.


Hewitt Bostock: What is the rule of the house? Standing order 45 reads as follows:
Forty-eight hours' notice. . . .
In Great Britain only twenty-four hours' notice is required, but in Canada it is forty-eight hours.
.... shall be given of a motion for leave to present a bill, resolution or address, for the appointment of any committee, or for placing a question on the order paper, but this rule shall not apply to bills after their introduction, or to private bills, or to the times of meeting or adjournment of the house. Such notice shall be laid on the table before six o'clock, p.m., and be printed in the votes and proceedings of that day.

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Natural Resources-Prairie Provinces
I saw this motion when it was first printed in the votes and proceedings, and I saw it again on Saturday as it now appears on the order paper. I found a modification in the motion-in fact I think I discussed the other day with the hon. member himself (Mr. Edwards), not the question of the modification because I had not perused it at the time, but something in connection with the motion). My attention was not drawn to the alteration. It is true that according to paragraph 363 of Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms, as stated by an hon. member, a modification of a notice of motion may be permitted. That paragraph reads as follows:
_ A modification of a notice of motion standing upon the notice paper is permitted, if the amended notice does not exceed the scope of the original notice.
The above reference is taken from May, 13th edition, page 234, where the following is found:
A modification of a notice of motion standing upon the notice paper is permitted, if the amended notice does not exceed the scope of the original notice.
The next sentence however reads as follows:
If a motion is proposed, which differs materially from the terms of the notice, it can only be made with the consent of the house, or upon a renewal of the notice.
If the consent of the house was unanimous there would be no objection, I suppose, to the hon. member for Frontenac-Addington proceeding, because when the house give unanimous consent in a matter involving the rules, that becomes the law of the house. In this case there is not unanimous consent; objection is taken. Is that objection well founded? In other words is the motion on the order paper at the present time the same as the one of which notice was given in the votes and proceedings? I may say that the wording is such that I had to read the two motions over several times in order to discover where the difference was.
There are two reasons, in my humble judgment, why this proposed resolution as now redrafted is beyond the scope of the notice given in the votes and proceedings.
First, by stating that provision should be made for the administration of "school lands" in addition to school lands endowment funds, the mover has materially changed the conditions on which the proposed grant of their natural resources should, in his opinion, be made to the interested provinces.
Secondly, the words "but in compliance with the letter and spirit of the constitution," were placed in the first draft so as to apply

to the granting of the natural resources to the prairie provinces; whilst in the second draft these words have been moved further down and made to apply to the administration of school land endowment funds for educational purposes. There is a material difference between the two propositions.
The difference is such that the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Cahan)- who is a lawyer of outstanding ability known not only in Montreal but throughout Canada, and I may say North America-said that, if the original motion which appeared in the votes and proceedings was moved to-day he would vote against it but that in its latter form he would support it. I am only making this reference to show that evidently there has been a material change in the resolution. However, if the house were willing to give unanimous consent to the hon. member for Frontenac-Addington, personally I would be pleased to listen to the debate. But strictly speaking, and according to the rules of the house, this motion is out of order.
I will quote in support of my ruling, May, 13th edition, page 234; Blackmore, page 212; Redlich, second volume, pages 216 and 217, and a footnote; and Bourinot, 4th edition, page 299. Bourinot is very clear on the matter. He says:
A motion on the order paper must be in accordance with the notice in the votes; and, should a member desire to substitute another, or alter its terms, he must first obtain the leave of the house.
Under the circumstances I cannot do otherwise than rule that the point of order is well taken.
May I say this to hon. members:	All the
authorities state that when an alteration is proposed to be made to a motion the mover should inform the Speaker himself. In the present case I was informed only by what I read on the order paper. It is true that as regards technical changes a member may address himself to the Clerk or one of the officials who draft motions for members, but when a material change is made I should be informed of it. By failure to do this the hon. member loses his turn whilst if he had notified me the other day I would have told him at once that such alterations involved the loss by him of his place on the order paper.


John Wesley Edwards: If you will kindly permit me, Mr. Speaker, I should be very sorry if you thought for a moment that there was any intention on my part to manifest any disrespect towards you.

International Peace*-Miss Macphail


Hewitt Bostock: I do not say that disrespect enters at all into the question.


John Wesley Edwards: I really did not consider the change to be material. However, I conform to your ruling at once, and I will ask the Clerk to strike the motion off the order paper.


Hewitt Bostock: Does the hon. gentleman wTant to drop the motion?


George Halsey Perley: Is there anything else to do?


Hewitt Bostock: Is it the pleasure of the
house that the hon. gentleman have leave to withdraw his motion?
Motion withdrawn.


INTERNATIONAL PEACE
[Stage Direction]
Miss AGNES C. MACPHAIL (Southeast Grey) moved:
That, in the opinion of this house, the time has come for the establishment of a government department for the promotion of peace and international understanding.
She said: Mr. Speaker, in rising to speak to this motion asking for the establishment of a department to work for peace and international understanding, I assume that all hon. members in this chamber are anxious to bring security to our country, and that any differences we have in the matter relate to the methods to be employed in bringing about peace rather than to any doubt as to the desirability of securing peace. I conclude that we all want to have security at home and friendship abroad. At one time almost everyone, possibly indeed everyone, had confidence in military preparedness and war as methods of bringing about security and of settling international differences. But I think that no one will now deny that that confidence in military preparedness and in war which used to be so complete has been very much shaken. Still while some to-day have simply scrapped the old way and have found a new method, and are relying upon the development of good will as the greatest security that we could find, there are others who, while they have not perfect confidence in war or in preparedness for war, still think of these methods as the best to adopt. Then there are others of our citizens and of citizens of the world who stand between the two ideas and are not quite sure in which faith to rely. The last war with its frightful loss of life and treasure caused all of us to think of this subject as one of very great importance. Not 56103-108i
only did Canada lose sixty thousand of her very best men, but the world lost ten million of its best men, and if we are going to view this question from the point of view of humanity we must consider that loss of ten million young men a dead loss and one that will cause concern to every citizen in the world, including the citizens of Canada.
The cost of the last war was greater than that of any previous war, although all wars and all preparations for wars in the past have been exceedingly costly. So great has been the cost of preparing for and carrying out wars that in the first twenty years of the twentieth century, fourteen countries spent the fantastic sum of $61,000,000,000 in preparation for and carrying out war. England alone to-day spends on war or preparation for war fourteen shillings out of every twenty shillings of her national expenditure. The United States spend 82 cents out of every dollar on war or preparation for war. The total debt of the United States prior to th* war was $1,125,000,000 and to-day it stands at between $18,000,000,000 and $19,000,000,000. How much greater even that that-and that is a terrific increase-must be the increase in the debt of such countries as France and Germany because of the war? In Canada the exact figures are not available, but certainly more than fifty cents out of every dollar of our national expenditure go to pay for wars past and preparation for wars to come. Some claim-and they may have figures to substantiate their claim, but I do not have them under my hand-that two-thirds of every dollar of Canada's expenditure goes for this purpose. When one thinks of these figures, the amount of money involved alone, one thinks of what the spending of this money for the good of the people could have done. I have not any doubt at all that had the one fantastic sum I mentioned of $61,000,000,000 been spent to bring knowledge, a high standard of living and happiness to the common peoples of the world, wars would by now not be necessary. The house, however, may not agree with me in that. More and more people are coming to believe, and even people in high places are stating quite fearlessly, that they believe security must come by means other than military preparedness. There are many statesmen one could quote, but I am going to confine myself to very brief quotations. The first one is Field Marshal Sir William Robertson, who was Chief of the Imperial General Staff from 1915 to 1918. That is, he was a military man trained in military tactics, and indeed he must have been a very successful one to have filled that position in those stressful yearn
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In speaking of war-I am quoting from The U.F.A. of December 15, 1927, and this report appeared also in the daily press of a few days previous-he said:
War has become a wholly detestable thing, and is almost, if not quite, as disastrous to victors as to vanquished.
Never in history were preparations so complete or so widespread as during the fifty or sixty years previous to 1914, and yet never were wars so frequent as in that period.
A little later on in the same speech he is reported to have said:
Every man and woman should energetically support all efforts made for devising some more sensible and humane way of composing international differences than the destructive and futile methods upon which reliance has hitherto been unsuccessfully placed.
That is the only conclusion I can reach after a military career covering on Sunday next, a period of exactly fifty years.
So that this great British gentleman, who had been trained in a military school for fifty years, comes to the conclusion, speaking first, I suppose, for British men and women, and afterwards for all men and women, that they should set themselves to the task of finding some other and better way of settling international disputes.
Every one was sorry and grieved at the death quite recently of Field Marshal Haig. I wonder if we are willing to honour his memory by heeding his words. On one occasion he said:
I urge you to a crusade having for its object the freeing of the whole world from the devastating scourge of war.
I might mention too such outstanding work for a new international spirit as was done in Great Britain by E. D. Morrell, now gone, and as has been done by Lord Robert Cecil, Ramsay MacDonald and the Right Hon. Arthur Ponsonby. These are all men of high standing in British public life and they all take the stand that we shall not get security through military preparedness; that we are simply wasting money, and that military preparedness cannot bring about the thing we are seeking for, namely, security at home and goodwill and friendship abroad.
Whatever may be the opinion of members of this house as to the degree of military preparedness necessary, or as to the advisability of disarmament, I think every hon. member will agree that such things as ignorance, suspicion and fear must be got rid of before we can have permanent peace. While it is true that other things cause war, these three, ignorance, suspicion and fear, leave the common people of all countries the prey to the propagandist in the hours of crisis. It makes them willing to bear these crushing burdens of
UVliss Macphail.]
debt caused by armaments, because, through lack of knowledge, they are led to believe that they must endure this staggering taxation in order to bring security to themselves in their own country. We have not in Canada, and indeed not to any extent anywhere in the world, studied constructively the art of making peace or the technique of peace. I think the technique of war has been studied by some of the most astute minds in all countries; but had the same amount of energy, had the same wealth, had the same knowledge of the psychology of the people been used to promote peace as has been and is yet being used in Canada to promote preparedness for war-because I am afraid it is still being done -we would to-day be far on our way towards the settlement of international disputes by some method other than war, and it would be true to-day that the institution of war in Canada would not be the respected institution it is.	No one can doubt that in
Canada the institution of war is a most respected one which the " best people " like very much. I have noticed that these people, when questioned, do not admit it; but in following the votes of money and the comments in the house on the subject of war, one cannot help concluding that the institution of war is still a respected one. I view this condition with alarm.
I do not however question the patriotism of those people in the house and in the country who believe that that is the way to be a patriotic citizen. I grant quite freely that they are patriotic people and they are working for what they believe is the best thing for their country. I simply question their wisdom, not their patriotism. On the other hand, often in the past in this house, the patriotism of people like myself and those who think with me has been questioned. They think we are not patriotic, that we do n.ot love our country. One might ask, what is patriotism? Surely it is loyalty to a group; but sometimes we forget that we owe loyalty to many groups. We cannot have too much loyalty, either absolutely or in comparison with the loyalty of other peoples. But we can have too much loyalty to one group, forgetting the other groups to which we also belong. We are more and more coming to know that everyone of us belongs to that group which is known as humanity, and that we do owe a very great loyalty to that largest group of all-humanity. For Canadians, for a Britisher, for a citizen who is a member of the British commonwealth of nations, it should not be difficult to build a larger loyalty out of our present loyalties, because

International Peace-Miss Macphail
our loyalties have grown to include not only our own country and the mother country, but a group of countries winch cover a large part of the surface of the earth. Surely then we ought to be willing, and mentally and spiritually able, to take the lead in the world in developing a still larger loyalty that will not stop until it has included the whole shrinking world. It is worthy of note, too, that patriotism is not an innate thing; it is cultivated, and it will be just what we train it to be. If we train the children and the young people of this country to view patriotism as a very much bigger thing than we have thought of it in the past, then within one generation, if we set about it with decision and a desire to win, we shall have a new patriotism, which, while not making light of the love of our own country, will expand to cover the needs of all countries.
Canada's position geographically makes her a country that is important in the history of the world at this moment. Geographically we belong to one continent. Politically we belong to another continent. There is no good reason why we cannot be the interpreter of the one continent to the other. Then, too, the Canadian mind is used to a large framework. Canada is a large, if not too thickly populated, country, and the Canadian mind can move with ease from Halifax to Vancouver, surely with much more ease than the European mind can move over the same distance. That should make it easy for us to give the world a lead in learning to cover mentally a larger space. The international mind is really nothing more than a mind that does not stop at the borders of one's own country, but bridges that gap that lies between one's own country and other countries, and bridges it sympathetically.
Canada is young. As countries go, we are merely a youth, and youth always looks to the future. In looking to the future, and not to the present, we must all realize that we need to build the security of the world on something more stable than military preparedness. We have had since the end of the great war a very great many memorials to the brave who gave their lives in the service of their country during that awful conflict. My own personal opinion is that many of the memorials which are supposed to lead us to think of the service and love and devotion of those who died simply glorify the institution of war. I think that the formation of a peace department would be a fitting commemoration of tLe devotion and sacrifice of the 60,000 Canadians who died, if we remember what was said during the war and directly after, fignting a war that
was to end war. We have at the front of this building a tower which is called a peace tower. I was greatly interested in going through it and looking over it carefully, and my conclusion was that it is a very equisite piece of work, but that it is misnamed. No one who looks over it carefully can call it a peace chamber. It so clearly, one might almost say so brazenly, though beautifully, glorifies the institution of war. That sort of thing will never lead the young men and young women of Canada to think of new methods. It will simply lead them to think of the glory of the old; and it is not a fair way of putting the thing up to the young people of Canada, because the truth of war is not told, only the glory of war, not the misery, not the death, not the disease, not the broken hearts, not the shattered lives. Nothing of that is told at all; it is just the glory of war. I wonder who named the tower the peace tower. It is a queer idea of peace. A name will not bring us peace, I am sure of that.
Canada since the world war has been drawn more and more into world currents. There is an evidence of that in our appointing ambassadors to the different countries of the world. We have also been given a place on the council of the league of nations. All these things show that we are, whether we like it or not, becoming citizens of the world. But up until now very little of anything has been done by the Canadian people or the Canadian government to prepare Canadians for the new responsibilities which are ours. A department of peace would act as a focus or centre for peace thinking and peace activities. While there are some engaged in peace thinking and peace activities at the present time in Canada, they are scattered, and they have no help from-well, I will leave it at that: they have no help. They are the rank and file of the people, many of them, and it is hard for them to get the knowledge they desire. There has been no lead given in peace activities in Canada, with one or two notable exceptions which I shall mention later.
I believe that under the British North America Act the Dominion government has jurisdiction over war and peace in so far as control rests in Canada. It is therefore the business of the Dominion government, rather than of the provincial governments to help the people to find some new way of settling international disputes. Canada has a long and indeed a very honourable history in the settling of disputes through conciliation, and the most noted of all is the Rush-Bagot treaty which was made at the end of the war of 1812-
1696	COMMONS
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14. Ia the histories which I studied and from which I taught this treaty was given some prominence. To be exact, I think some sixteen pages were devoted to the history of the war and two paragraphs to the peace, but still two paragraphs was something. They told, and told sympathetically, of the importance of the Rush-Bagot treaty, which disarmed the border line between Canada and the United States, which from that time on has been an example in peaceful settlement to the whole world. But in the new histories now used in Ontario, a copy of which I now hold in my hand, as many pages are devoted to the war, but there is not one single line devoted to the Rush-Bagot treaty; it is not even mentioned. I am not familiar with the history texts used in the other provinces, but the children in the schools of Ontario reading these histories do not know anything about the Rush-Bagot treaty, do not know anything about the greatest incident of that period of the history of United States and Canada, because no one will doubt that the peace treaty was much more important than the war. This treaty shows that Canada in the past has been interested in finding new methods rather than relying on the old. In the case of the Rush-Bagot treaty we prepared for peace, and we had peace. I think that is logical. The old idea that if you prepare for war you will have peace is a fallacy. If you prepare for war you will have war, and if you prepare for peace you will have peace.
The International Joint Commission, which has been in existence for some seventeen years and has settled over twenty differences between Canada and the United States, has been mentioned twice, just lately, in far-flung parts of the world. I am quoting from an editorial that appeared in the Citizen of March 1, 1928:
Recently Charles Evans Hughes spoke of conciliation between Canada and the United States at the Pan-American Conference in Havana, where he submitted the plan of the International Joint Commission as a model method of maintaining peaceful relations between neighbouring countries. A few days later, the League of Nations security committee at Geneva listened with keen interest to a description of the working of the commission. The Canadian member of the committee Dr. W. A. Riddell, told how this model scheme of conciliation has worked successfully in dealing with over twenty cases in the last seventeen years. He recommended the adoption of simlar permanent boards of conciliation between other nations whose frontiers adjoin.
The editorial continues:
Dr. Riddell urged that security could be increased more by disarmament than by miltary measures.

I want the government to tell us if Dr. Riddell was speaking on their behalf. If so, are not the words which he used in Geneva and the action of the government in straight contradiction? If it is true that security comes through disarmament, then why is it that our military estimates have been increased from eleven million dollars in 1925 to eighteen million dollars this year? An explanation is due the country. The hon. Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) recently addressed the Ottawa branch of the League of Nations Association and gave expression of his views. He said:
The only way of securing peace is by what is usually called moral disarmament, and that moral disarmament can be obtained only when a strong public opinon, the opinion in the shops, in the factories, on the farms, in the universities, in the schools, when opinion everywhere is deeply and intimately convinced that war is a calamity and the worst of all calamities.
These are noble words, and I feel that the hon. minister believes in their truth. So I am going to suggest to the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) that for the good of Canada and the good of the world 'he request the Minister of Justice and the Minister of National Defence to exchange portfolios. I anticipate the Prime Minister will say that he does not want to form a new department. Personally I am quite willing to accept a department of defence through security and goodwill, with the bon. Minister of Justice at its head, if he is allowed to do what he wants to do. In looking over the personnel of the cabinet I have often been puzzled to discover who are the military members. Who are they? They all look so peaceable that I am amazed at what is happening. It is quite clear that some of the ministers are pushing things from the military side. There is no excuse-if there is, I shall be glad to hear it-for the increase in our military estimates, and for the aggressive development of war psychology in the Dominion.
I do not wish dogmatically to lay down what a department of peace might do, but I hope I shall not tire the house too much by offering a few suggestions as to the work of such a department. I would have suggested by resolution a peace bureau either in the Department of External Affairs or the Department of Secretary of State, but I did not wish it to be shoved off into a corner while a department to bring security through military measures was given a better place. Already we have a full-fledged department of war, although I notice that in the debate on the motion of the hon. member for Wetaski-

International Peace-Miss Macphail
win (Mr. Irvine) the Minister of National Defence said that his department is not preparing for war, but for peace; that really he is a minister of peace. I am glad to hear it, but in the face of the activities of his department I regret to say there is nothing on which I can rest my belief, much as I should like to accept his declaration.
A department of peace should be twofold in character. First, it should have general supervision of an extensive program for peace throughout Canada. Secondly, it should cultivate friendly relations with other countries by promoting our knowledge of other people with regard to their cultural, moral and social achievements. This would be very interesting to Canadians, and we have very much to learn along this line. Then, too, it should encourage the work of international institutions, including the League of Nations, and make known their work to our people, so that we would be made acquainted with all the machinery that has been set up in any part [DOT]f the world for finding new methods of settling international difficulties. I think that such a department should also study the causes of war, and by frank discussion present evidence revealing the wastefulness and ineffectiveness of war. It might also make clear to our people some of our own mannerisms that offend the sensibilities of other nations. I do think we have a British superiority complex which must be very offensive to other nations, and cannot be making any contribution to the harmony'of the world. This department would quite naturally work in cooperation with all agencies that wanted the data and other material which it would collect. It would develop the will to peace through education by working with peace societies, schools, churches, labour associations, women's, farmers' and social clubs, and any other Canadian agencies whose efforts in the direction of peace could be made more effective by such co-operation. The department could also prepare a list of speakers, who, while not employed by the government, could, through the department, be made available for addressing public meetings-speakers who were authorities on some one phase of this great question. Our government departments issue booklets, pamphlets, posters and films, and there seems to be no good reason why a department of peace could not use the same means to make known to the Canadian people the truths regarding peace and war.
And how little money it would cost the government to make a gift of books for the promotion of peace. These books could be issued to our public and school libraries. We have Rhodes scholarships in this country.
We might establish peace scholarships on a somewhat similar plan, allotting a scholarship to each province. The Rhodes scholarships I think are confined to young men, but I would want these peace scholarships available to young women as well. The winners of these scholarships would go abroad each year to study along lines which would make them better world citizens and at the same time better citizens of Canada.
It has occurred to me-I do not claim any originality for the idea-that we might very well establish a yearly peace award for the best work done in the cause of peace. This award I suggest should be given by the government and might be confined to Canadians or be made open to the citizens of any country. The award would not be confined necessarily to the greatest contribution scholastically to the peace of the world, but to the best work to this end along any line.
We have a military college where young men are prepared to be warriors. Why not establish a college to train young men in promoting peaceful understandings throughout the world? This would be far better work and those engaged in it would become mucn better citizens, with all respect to the graduates from the military college. Then instead of making grants for the training of cadets in summer camps-and but for these grants the cadet movement would not continue for another five years-the government might use the money to much better purpose for the establishment of summer schools to promote the study of international friendship. I imagine a great many Canadians would be glad to get together for a few weeks to secure a better understanding than they possess today of the problems of the world. In fact I should think that the work of this department would be very interesting; it would be unlimited, adventurous and wholly positive rather than destructive as is military training at the present time. Such a department would call to the highest in us; it would call out our mental and spiritual attributes, challenging them, rather than the physical, which is on the lowest possible plane.
My words this afternoon may seem quite futile; all words on this subject may seem futile. But what are disarmament conferences, even conferences of the League of Nations, conferences to promote good will, unless they are backed by a conviction on the part of the peoples of the world, the common people, the rank and file of the nations? It is my opinion- it may or may not be right-that the common people of Canada, certainly the farmers, and I believe the common people generally, are exceedingly concerned that the government,
1698	COMMONS
International Peace-Miss Macphail
and we working together with the government, shall strive to find1 some new way of settling international disputes. The common people are sick of war; they are tired of the glorification of it. The swank that goes with it to-day does not carry much force in the country. In international politics, as in everything else, the misfortune is that our aim is too low. The real crime after all is low aim, and by aiming high the government or any international body will call out the latent idealism of the common people. And after all the latent idealism of the common people is the greatest force for peace in the world to-day.
In closing I would ask the government not to consider the matter lightly, because it is not a trivial subject; it includes within itself all others and is the most important subject facing mankind' to-day. If we do not find some new way there is nothing surer than that, if we keep on for another twenty-five years as we' have been going since 1918, we shall have another war whether we like it or not. Nothing can prevent it if we keep preparing for war.
Mr. T. W. BIRD (Nelson):: I have very
much pleasure in supporting the motion. Sometimes when we try to appraise the fruits of the great war our hearts ache at the seeming dearth of results, but I think we shall all agree that one fruit of the war of a moral nature was of extreme value to us, and that was the reaction in the minds of people everywhere against the very idea of war. That, to me, is the most solid result of the war, but apart from that I cannot see anything except results which are almost too pathetic to mention. That, however, was a solid gain-the reaction of civilization against the very conception of war. But that reaction was of a diffuse character, existing in the minds of people as a fleeting sentiment, tending as the years have gone by to evaporate. With succeeding years, as I apprehend, it will tend to disperse more speedily until the only substantial fruit of war will have vanished. I think it is the duty of every civilized people somehow before it is too late to crystallize that widespread sentiment against war into something that will make it effective. This is the duty we owe to our brave men who to-day sleep beneath a foreign sod. There is nothing on earth we can do for them but that-to bring this idea to a focus.
_ We all agree that the spectral evil of war is largely psychological in character. As Emerson once said, it is a thought that has created these armaments and it is a thought that will disperse them. But how is this 
thought to emerge which is going to displace the devilish thought that created war? There is no other way of creating that thought except by the organized effort of a nation's intelligence, and it is our duty, especially as legislators, to see that .that superseding thought shall make itself felit. It cannot be done by spasmodic effort; it cannot be done by the efforts of individuals; it cannot be done by the churches alone. They are all doing their best. The only effective effort can be made by a nation in its organized capacity, by parliament.
There are very many practical ways in which a government bureau of some kind could bring the nation's sentiment with respect to war to bear effectively upon world peace. In the first place such a bureau might very well undertake to purge the sources of our information in regard to international matters. The press of the world has many very outstanding qualities which we all admire, but as a medium of international information it has ceased to claim the trust of intelligent people. The necessities of war are responsible very largely for this psychology on the part of the people and the feeling that they can no longer trust the ordinary channels of international information. One thing we all regret is the fact that the various agencies by which international information was conveyed to us during the war received an almost fatal moral twist. The supposed necessities of war impelled the authorities to use the press not to enlighten but to drug the people. I remember two or three years ago going through the archives of Canada and seeing under a glass cover a medal representing the sinking of the Lusitania. I was given to understand that this medal had been actually struck by the German people during the war to commemorate that atrocity. Some time afterwards, however, travelling on the train, I fell into conversation with a gentleman who at one time had occupied a prominent position in the government of Canada and he informed me that the medal had been struck for propaganda purposes. Whether or not that is true we know that during the war the intelligence of the people was drugged by very similar methods, so the privately owned press no longer has the confidence of intelligent people with respect to international matters. It seems to me that a government organization could fulfil a very useful purpose in cleansing the channels of information with respect to international affairs. As we all know, an increasing interest is being taken in the possibilities of the radio, and I am sure the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) himself is not slow in sensing the great

International Peace-Mr. Bird
possibilities of that method of dispensing information. Here, right to our hands, is a means almost providential whereby the government, through a proper organization, could keep the people from one end of Canada to the other accurately informed upon current international affairs. Thus there would be gradually created a thought which would ultimately displace the diabolic thought which will otherwise very soon lead to another world catastrophe.
Another means of activity which might vety well be made use of is education. While that is not especially a function of this government, through various means of co-operation I think such a bureau could be made useful in working with the provincial educational authorities to expurgate our school books of those elements which build up in our children a phy-chology with regard to war which in all ages has proved to be as tinder waiting for the opportune spark. One of the things wdiich has been and is being wrongly taught in our schools is the subject of history, and I think we can all remember to our regret the twist which our minds received during the elementary period of our education with regard to important facts in history. Personally, I was always taught that France was the traditional enemy of England, and that every school child in England had that fact drilled into his consciousness. I was also taught that Germany was the traditional friend of England, and that teaching remained in the British school books until 1914. With respect to almost everything of an international character, our children have received the wrong slant; history has been taught inaccurately, perhaps not with respect to the facts but certainly with respect to the emphasis. Wrong emphases have been placed, and the expected result has been achieved. I was reading the other day about that famous incident in history when King Charles I lost his head in 1649. That fact has entered into our school books and our system of education to an extent of which it was not worthy. On the other hand, just four years earlier an Englishman introduced into English agriculture that very humble vegetable the swede turnip, but do you think English school children ever heard anything about the introduction of the swede turnip? They heard about the head of Charles I but the turnip was worth a great deal more than the head of that king, because the head of King Charles I brought nothing but trouble to English politics, while we are told that the swede turnip in succeeding years was the means of helping England win the battles of Waterloo
and Trafalgar. I just mention that to illustrate the manner in which history has been twisted for purely chauvinistic purposes, and I think a bureau of this kind could very well start to work in co-operation with our provinces to correct some of these false ideas. I wish I had time to enter into that phase of the question a little more fully because I believe it lies at the very roots of the menace of war.
Let me refer very briefly to another job Which faces parliament, and to deal with which parliament should have a proper agent.
I have already referred to this false patriotism which has grown up in Canadian hearts and which, to our sorrow, very frequently finds its characteristic expression. Viscount Cecil recently said that the prime causes of war were, first, a traditional officialism, and secondly, chauvinism, or a false and narrow patriotism. Chauvinism is not confined to any one class; it is something of which we are all guilty in a greater or less degree and it is something of which our hearts and minds must be purged before the world can be made safe against the menace of war. I sometimes think of the way in which we make use of our national anthem, that hymn which means so much to the British people;
I think sometimes we carry things a little too far through our habit of using that hymn upon many occasions and for many purposes in connection with which its use was never intended. I am also afraid that our national flag is many times used in a manner unworthy of its glorious symbolism. That flag should not be the symbol of anything narrow, anything national in the chauvinistic sense. What is the flag of which we are so proud? That flag represents a Roman gibbet thrice superimposed upon a square of coloured bunting. WTe all know what took place on that Roman gibbet; we all know of the scene that was enacted there, and we have no right to make that the symbol of a narrow nationalism, because it was the symbol of a universalism, the spirit which is against war and for human co-operation. I see no hope for the future of civilization if we allow our patriotism to become narrow. We have a great many Canadian poets still living, and there is a great opportunity for some of them to write something for Canada, perhaps not to supersede the hymns we already have, but to represent the spirit of Canada as that spirit has been maintained since the great war; something to represent the broad outlook of the average Canadian with regard to world affairs. As it is, I should rather have a single line of one of the lyrics of Lampman, Campbell, Scott, or any of our

International Peace-Mr. Evans
Canadian poets, than a lot of the doggerel that passes as patriotic song. After all, I want my children to get something of the spirit that some of our own poets have put into their simple lines that speak of the Canadian spirit as it has grown up amongst the beautiful objects of Canadian scenery. There is a great scope in Canada for building up the type of patriotism that will be an example to the wide world. We have all the conditions, both material and moral, which will make for a new type of feeling with respect to our country.
Such a bureau, if I may so term it, would have the effect of declaring what Canada's moral attitude is on the question of peace. Simply because here and there you have sentiments eloquently expressed does not mean to say that we as a people have taken a moral stand on the question. We heard a lot before the war about the will to power, an attitude that had got beyond mere sentiment and ideas and had embodied itself into a national attitude. It is fully time that we Canadians should cease to talk sentimentally about peace, or even go further to expound our ideals about peace, and that we should assume once and for all a moral attitude on the question-that we should have the will to peace. And how can we do it unless we organize the wealth of intelligence we have at our command?
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Mr. JOHN EVANS (Rosetown):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to support this resolution because I believe the time has come for Canada and the empire to find means of preserving peace by outlawing war in place of the old method of being prepared for war as a means of national safety. The time is now ripe for the outlawry of war and violence, and this nation cannot spend a few thousand dollars any better than in fostering the idea of peace by educational methods and propaganda that will in the end reach the hearts and minds of the common people to the extent that governments will have to change their minds in regard to preparation as a means of national security. War again, if carried on by any nation which has no scruples about winning by any means whatsoever, will be more likely to win in the future by the slaughter of the innocents than by contests between trained armies. This fact alone should, I think, make it imperative to educate 
the electors of all countries rather than attempt to bring about the outlawry of war by governments who are more than likely to represent the big interests, the money lenders and others interested in big business.
The fact is that war has been robbed of its glory by mechanization. The glamour of battle no longer exists. War is nothing more now than butchery on a wholesale scale, and the common people, women and children as well as men, are the sufferers. For this reason it ought to be considered the logical thing to do to outlaw the whole business of war. The flame of war is fed by national budgets and it is time that Canada worked to douche that flame and lead in the cause of peace through education. Our estimates to-day are illogical in face of the position that we have taken on the League of Nations, and I hope that we shall consider this. The position is so illogical as to be untenable. What we want to do now is to remove as far as possible all machinery that makes for war and create instead an institution to foster peace. I believe Canada is in just such a position that any move on her part in this direction will have an effect on other nations, and, being a part of the British Empire, we may well by this means set an example that will be a precedent to other nations and will help to move forward the cause of international cooperation.
According to the Free Press of Winnipeg of September 7 last, an associated press cable from Geneva states that a concerted attempt to revise the Geneva protocol stands forth as a possibility in the League of Nations. Van Brooklands of the Netherlands actually introduced a resolution calling for a revival of the principles of that protocol, with the serious discussion thereof, to the end that an attempt be made to outlaw war. Canada has nothing to fear in moving in this way. Our civilization has reached a point of advance by which we may measure the degree of its peril when its survival depends on the willingness of the great masses of the citizens of all nations to stand loyally together as comrades in this great venture. I look upon the League of Nations to-day as the symbol of that great outstanding fact. Co-operation has become a world-wide necessity of the present age. The downfall of civilization is the alternative to co-operation, according to the opinion to-day of many great men writing in the greatest journals and magazines. H. G. Wells says that it is a race between cooperation and ruin. The progress of civilization does not consist, as some would have us believe, in a gradual advance to a point

International Peace-Mr. Ralston
of safety. It consists rather in a growing perception of the common risk, and a growing willingness on the part of the common people in all countries to face this together. Cooperative effort of the nations is needed and it calls for leadership and valour to initiate and take part in a movement such as this resolution calls for. I am glad to see that the common sense of the people of Great Britain and the United States has prevailed on both governments to cut down on their war expenditures for this year.
Civilization has advanced scientifically, we must admit, and it has advanced behind the shelter of big guns, but we are face to face now with the time when big guns will not avail to protect civilization. We have to face the fact that the advance of our civilization will be along lines of co-operation, or, to give it a clearer definition, a sympathetic feeling for the rights of all others through co-operation. The advance of civilization and the safety of mankind lie in the unity of that great resolve to co-operate, and it is time now that we in Canada went forward in the cause of peace and education. No other nation on earth to-day is so advantageously situated to establish a system of education that will wean the viewpoint of the common people away from preparedness through great armaments and great guns to a system of education and co-operation.


Hon. J. L. RALSTON (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, I want to occupy
the attention of the house for only a very few minutes, and it is because the mover of the resolution (Miss Macphail) in her address has felt it necessary to discuss along with this resolution the matter of national defence. I thank the hon. member very sincerely for the suggestion she has made as to the exchange of portfolios, but apparently I am not, according to the evening newspapers, likely to achieve such an exchange; so in view of the fact that I am still in the position to which I have been called by His Excellency, I want to say just a word or two with regard to the general subject matter, and more particularly as it concerns my department.
The hon. member opened by stating that there were three different classes in the world, and three different opinions held, with regard to the matter of national security. One was the class which regarded armament as being the only method of achieving national security; another was the class which looked altogether towards peace and disarmament as the only method of attaining that end, and the third class was made up of those who were irresolute between those two opinions.
She did, I think, leave out what I consider to be a very important class, the one to which I myself belong, and that is the class which believes in both those methods as a means of achieving national security, namely, that we must seek to maintain our national position by taking all reasonable means to preserve our security against attack by force, and at the same time work along the lines which she and others have suggested to bring about the situation where defence forces will not be needed. I believe that two-fold view is the position taken my many countries of the world to-day. I believe that it is the position of Canada. I believe that is the position of many men and women who, from the bottom of their hearts-just as deeply as my hon. friend does-feel that war is anything but a glorious thing, that war is the last resort, that war is one thing we want to get rid of just as quickly as possible. But while they are striving in every way possible to get rid of war, they realize that we live in a practical world, a world where we must take reasonable steps to maintain national security even while we seek to attain our ideals of international peace. The effect of our ministers preaching the gospel in the city of Ottawa Sunday after Sunday is not I think effaced by the fact that we have to maintain a police force which protects those ministers, and once in a while might have to protect the church as well. That is the attitude I take with regard to these matters, and it has been and will be my endeavour, so long as I occupy the portfolio of defence, to stress the second phase of the work of preserving national security just as much as the first, and to contribute in any way I possibly can to a removal of the causes of war. But when we remember that as far back as the sixteenth century there was a scheme for the confederation of Europe which was to do away with war; when we remember the holy alliance entered into in the early part of the nineteenth century, the conferences of Berlin and Vienna, and the Hague conferences-a great forward step in the peace of nations-and that war nevertheless came, it seems to me we still have to maintain national security by way of defence forces to a moderate degree. Perhaps the most concentrated and sustained effort ever made in the history of the world has been made in the last ten years in an endeavour to do away with this monster, war, and I do believe that the nations to-day have their attention focused on that objective more than ever before; but at the same time defence forces have to be maintained until that object is achieved.	.
1702	COMMONS
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I want to allude just for a moment to the reference of my hon. friend who moved this resolution to the matter of an increase in the defence estimates. I know I shall have an opportunity later, when the house goes into committee to discuss this matter more fully, but I want to remind the house now that the defence estimates as laid on the table to-day, covering the militia and naval services, amount to less than one million dollars more than estimates for these same services in 1913-14 and in 1914-15. I want to remind the house also of this, that the dollar in 1913-14 purchased and provided a good deal more in the way of Clothing and equipment and supplies than the dollar does to-day. In 1913-14 there were trained at camp and at headquarters over 60,000 men, while the estimates this year provide for the training of something like 33,000 men. In 1913-14 we provided, I think, for sixteen days training in a number of the services; to-day we are providing for twelve days training. So I can assure my hon, friends that more is not being done than seems to be absolutely necessary if we are to maintain even a modest and efficient defence force.
My hon. frined the mover of the resolution deplored the fact that sufficient attention was not being paid in this country to the promotion of peace. I thoroughly agree that the education of the people of this country, of the everyday people like those of us who are here, is most desirable. Everything possible should be done to bring to the knowledge of the citizens of this country what is sought to be accomplished in connection with the league of nations; in connection with the Washington conference, which was continued in Europe last summer; in connection with the preparatory commission which is now considering the matter of disarmament; in connection with the Locarno pact; in connection with the Geneva protocol, which was mentioned by my hon. friend a few moments ago-it is eminently desirable that all these things be brought to the attention of our people.
One reference made by the mover of the resolution is of interest particularly to members of this house and to citizens of this country generally. She deplored the fact that in the peace tower which surmounts this building we have nothing but things which glorify war. I feel sure that my hon. friend has visited that tower, and I hope that all hon. members have seen it. If they have not, I feel they owe it to themselves, as well as to the memory of those who are commemorated there, to see it. I want to say to you, Mr. Speaker, that I do not think there can be

found in this country or elsewhere anything which has less of the glorification of war than the interior of that chamber. As one enters it, one is struck by the beauty but also by the solemnity and the sadness of the place. Facing you as you go in is the altar stone presented by the people of England, on which will rest nothing to glorify war, but a book in which will be inscribed the names of some sixty-four thousand citizens of Canada who gave their lives, and over that altar will be burning perpetually a light in their remembrance. On the wall you will see panels depicting different scenes, in the war. Very little to glorify war will be found there. One picture I remember represents Ypres, the ruins of the Cloth Hall in the foreground, with the personnel trekking their way to the front line-no glory, nothing but weariness, nothing but stress and strain. The next scene is one of trench life, and hon. members of this house know enough of that or have heard sufficiently vivid descriptions of it to make it unnecessary for me to dwell on it. Next is a village from which are coming refugees, and through which is passing a Highland battalion on its way up to duty in the front line.	Next a working party
engaged in the dismal task of digging trenches; next Sanctuary Wood, of sacred memory to Canada, with St. Eloi craters and ruined houses; next, the basilica of Albert with the leaning statue of the virgin; next the tower of Mount St. Eloi partly destroyed; next Passchendaele, with its mud and misery; next a picture of the medical corps at work with ambulances and stretcher cases, and at last a representation of ships returning to Canada leaving behind them a field of crosses watched over by a soldier resting on his arms reversed. Nothing very much suggestive of the glories of war, but something which my hon. friend might well use in any address she makes to point to the horrors of war, and to strengthen the desire and prove the necessity of getting rid of it as quickly as possible. True, one of the windows represents the call to arms; but another represents the assembly of remembrance; the third represents the thing for which my hon. friend is looking,-the dawn of peace. I say that that memorial tower has more in it perhaps than many sermons and many addresses that might be delivered at peace conferences to influence people to find as quickly as possible a method to achieve the result which not only my hon. friends who spoke a few minutes ago seek, but which we all seek. And then, as if to express the very antithesis of glorifioa-

International Peace-Mr. Manion
tion' of war, I find under a window this moving inscription from Kipling:
Nor was their agony brief, or once only imposed on them. The wounded, the war-spent, the sick received no exemption; Being cured, they returned and endured and achieved our redemption.
The sentiment of the resolution and the spirit back of it appeals, I think, to us all. The only question is how best the object can be attained. Towards that object not only our friends who have just spoken, not only this country, but practically all the countries of the world are working, and it is the duty of those of us in Canada to give the heartiest support we can in furthering that work, in doing our best to spread abroad among the nations our desire for peace, our desire that international questions may be settled by reason and not by force, and to educate our boys and girls and our citizens generally to look towards the day when arbitration, conciliation and co-operation will be accepted as the recognized means of maintaining national security.


Robert James Manion: Mr. Speaker, my main reason for taking part in this debate is that unfortunately, and I know unfairly, some of our friends in the house have a tendency to suggest, if not to state expressly, that those of us who realize conditions as they exist in the world to-day, who realize that something in the shape of a national defence force is necessary, and who advocate a certain degree of national defence, are therefore advocates of war and believers in militarism. I think, sir, that suggestion is unfair, because it seems to me that it may be said, in one broad sentence, that every sane man and woman abhors war. Anyone who has seen war at close range must realize something of the horrors of that catastrophe. Long before I ever had that personal experience I did have an abhorrence of war, and even as a child I remember wondering why civilized nations that had long ago outlawed duelling -the idea that men might settle their personal disputes by guns or rapiers-could not in some way outlaw war. To-day there is a strong feeling among the civilized nations of the world that that outlawing of war should take place; but the fact remains that we cannot by ideals rule the world as a whole, that, for example, there are some tens of millions of Russians and hundreds of millions of Chinese who are not as civilized as we are, and of -whom we do not know in what direction they may happen to march if they choose to march.
In view of that fact, and of the further fact that throughout the world to-day there are
leagues and counter-leagues; that there are countries, such as Poland for instance, who fear they may be attacked by their eastern or western neighbours; that to-day Baltic and Balkan nations are quarrelling more or less among themselves, and that another such incident as the Sarajevo murder might plunge the world into a war in which we might be forced to take part-in view of all these things,
I say our sanest course is to preserve something in the shape of a nucleus for national defence. To charge that those who believe in such a course advocate war is just as ridiculous as to assert that because you believe in a police force you therefore advocate murder, arson, robbery, rape and all other crimes that a police force is maintained to prevent.
When we look at the clouds upon the European horizon, when we remember that we did not want war in 1914 but were forced into it by circumstances over which we had no control, I say it is only right that we should have something in the shape of a national defence force. I do not believe in great armaments. I am entirely of the opinion so well expressed by Sir Edward Grey in the story of his life, a life dedicated to the prevention of war in every possible way. He was the most able and most outstanding peace lover in the parliament of Great Britain, a man who for twenty-five years did everything in his power to prevent war, and yet who at last in 1914 realized that England could not keep out of the struggle that was then impending, and so joined those members of the cabinet who believed that Great Britain should uphold the sanctity of treaties and help the world against aggression by Germany. After all that experience Sir Edward Grey does take the attitude that great armaments inevitably lead to war. I entirely agree with him. But no one can charge that Canada is leading the way towards great armaments, for this country, whether under our party or the Liberal party, has simply preserved the nucleus of a defence force. That is a necessity for any self-respecting nation. I think Canada spends on her defence force the lowest amount of probably any country in the world.


James Layton Ralston: Per capita.
Mr. MANION; That is what I mean. As to the principle behind the resolution, of doing everything we can to bring about "moral disarmament," as expressed by the Minister of Justice, that condition whereby there will not be wars between nations and our sons will not be forced to become cannon fodder, I am behind it wholeheartedly, because if there is anything that is abhorrent to parents it is the thought that their

International Peace-Mr. Manion
children, instead of growing up into good, quiet, peace-loving men and women, may be killed in a war precipitated by some incident in Europe over which we have no control. Parents hate the mere idea of war more intensely than do their fellow-citzens who are not so fortunate as to have children to educate and cherish. God forbid that there should ever be another war in which Canada will have to take part; I hope such a misfortune will never befall us. At the same time a nation like this must, in my opinion, preserve something of a nucleus of defence around which may be built up, should such an unhappy event ever overtake us, a force adequate for the defence of the country. It is easy to express the hope that we shall never again be obliged to participate in a war; no one cherishes this hope more sincerely than I. But we have not yet reached that utopia in which the nations of the world have absolutely outlawed war. I am entirely in favour of the principle underlying the resolution, but I believe that we can accomplish just as much towards peace by means of the voluntary associations that exist today and by the advocacy of peace on the part of all those engaged in public life, to whatever side of politics they belong.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am very glad that so far
the discussion hhs maintained a tone of toleration. We are perhaps coming to the point where we may discuss matters of this character without accusing one another of hypocrisy, of lack of patriotism or of having some ulterior motive in view. But I think we should be very clear in our thinking on questions such as this. Undoubtedly we all desire peace; we may begin on that assumption. And I am sure there is no one in favour of this resolution who thinks of accusing the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston), or the hon. member for Fort William (Mr. Manion), or anybody else of desiring war. That is not the point at issue. Rather, we are challenging the assumption that the way to secure peace is by force of arms or military defence. That is an arguable point. The hon. member for Fort William points out that the time has come when we no longer permit duelling as a means of settling personal affairs; it has been ruled out. And there is a bill before the house at the present time, presented by the senate, which will make it next to impossible for any of us to keep arms in our homes even though we may have the most pacific intentions. Further, we are certainly not permitted to wear side arms or to carry

concealed weapons, nor have we done so for a number of years.
All the arguments that may be brought forward for the retention of armed forces on a national scale used to be brought forward for the retention of personal arms for the sake of personal defence. But we have passed beyond that stage and have recognized that it is not conducive to peace that individuals should be allowed to bear arms. I take it that we are advancing very rapidly to that same position in relation to international affairs. The hon. member for Fort William suggests that all the nations are not as civilized as we are. I am not quite so sure of that. He also urges that we ought to be armed in order to be protected against the Chinese. I ask him, do the Chinese ever invade any other country?


Mr. BROWN:: They did in former times.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am not aware
of it.


John Livingstone Brown: What about the Mongolian invasion of Europe?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am fairly familiar with the history of the east and I cannot recall the Chinese ever having invaded other countries; I am not going back to the Mongols, who overran China. I do not think we need prepare to fight the Chinese. The hon. member suggested also that we should be prepared against an attack from the Russians. Now it is only within the last few weeks that the Russians have made proposals for a general disarmament; and what have we said? We have said, to use the English phrase, "You are talking with your tongue in your cheek, because you have not given up your arms." Surely what we say to the Russians may be applied equally to ourselves: we cannot very well talk general disarmament until we are prepared also to disarm.
I confess that the motion of the hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss Macphail) may seem rather idealistic, and perhaps that is the worst charge that can be brought against it. But on the other hand it may equally be said, it seems to me, that the attempt to secure peace by force of arms is a policy of stupidity. It has been tried century after century, it has cost countless millions of lives and countless treasure, and it has been proved absolutely futile. It has absolutely failed as a method of achieving peace. Surely we all recognize that fact. Then why not try something else? It has sometimes been s^id that it is necessary to keep an army to put down the rising flames of discontent and to bring

International Peace-Mr. Woodsworth
order out of international chaos. Well, if one fire extinguisher has failed repeatedly to work, why should we forever rely upon it? If it has failed again and again in times of crisis, why not try some other kind of fire extinguisher? It could not be worse than the last.
I am happy to associate myself with the member for Southeast Grey in the advocacy of her resolution even though it may appear somewhat idealistic. Suppose we heard that Germany or France or Japan were proposing to take action along this line: I am sure we should all consider it laudable. But if we heard that some Russian or German militarists in Europe frowned upon such a resolution, our comment would be-that shows the power of militarism in those countries. Why can we not have imagination enough to understand that our action will be construed in much the same way and that the moral effect of action along the lines suggested by the resolution will far outreach any small material expenditure that may be involved? I suppose the government, like all governments, want to be assured that they are acting in harmony with public opinion. I think I can say that, large sections of public opinion, in this matter at any rate, are far in advance of governmental action. I do not for a moment suggest that the mere organization of a department of peace will prevent war; I should not like to be so understood. Fundamentally, wars in these modern days arise from economic conflicts, and the best intentions of the best departments we may set up will not in themselves prevent future wars. We shall have to make fundamental economic changes before we can obviate war. But there is not the slightest doubt that the ignorance, suspicion and fear to which the hon. member for Southeast Grey has referred are played upon in the time of crisis. The powerful interests which are able to use the machinery of the great powers are able to play upon national sentiment, on the ignorance of one nation or the other, on the fact that we have opprobrious names for people of nationalities other than our own. Thus war can be readily engineered. It seems to me that if we had some agency of this kind it would go a long way at least to retard the onrush of war.
The Minister of National Defence suggested that there was nothing in the peace tower to glorify war. I do not intend to enter upon a discussion of that point, because I fancy a matter of that kind depends very largely upon one's personal reactions. The minister did quote from some passage, however, in which it was suggested that these fallen soldiers had " achieved our redemption." That is the
very point at issue. However heroically our men died at the front I cannot concede that this is true. I am willing to give the soldiers all credit for their heroism, and I will go as far as anyone in trying to see that those who came back get fair play because they were called to take that heroic position. But I absolutely refuse to say that they achieved our redemption or the redemption of the world. On the whole the war was a ghastly failure; it absolutely failed to achieve any of the high objects which were held before us at that time, and I think we should frankly admit that situation. I know very well there are some who are very sensitive with regard to that matter, men and women who have lost their loved ones at the front; they feel like asking, "Well, was their sacrifice in vain?" Personally I do not think any act of heroism is altogether in vain,


James Layton Ralston: Will my hon, friend permit a question? Does he think the achievement of the covenant of the League of Nations was a failure?


James Shaver Woodsworth: No, the achievement of the covenant of the League of Nations was not altogether a failure; I would say that to a very large extent it was a reaction brought about by the horrors of war.


James Layton Ralston: It grew out of the war, did it not?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I would not say so.


James Layton Ralston: Does my hon. friend know that it is part of the Peace treaty?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes. There were a great many forces in the world developing along that line. Again, of course, this is a matter of judgment, but I cannot help believing that the cause of peace would have made just as rapid progress had it not been set back by the terrible experience of those four years and the years immediately preceding the war.
The Minister of National Defence has introduced the matter of the estimates. It is undoubtedly true that compared with many European countries our expenditure per capita is low, but at the same time I would point out that in relation to the other expenses of Canada the cost is high. I hold in my hand a little pamphlet on Canadian taxation which I received the other day, published by the Citizens' Research Institute. I think the items contained herein are correct. The total jxpenditure for the Dominion of Canada outside "trading operations" is given as 8329,382,561, or a per capita total of $35.08. Now let us see how that amount is distributed.
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international Peace-Mr. Woodsworth
The debt charges, which are very largely due to the Last war, take $14 out of that $35.08; military and naval expenditures, including soldiers' civil re-establishment, pensions and so on, amount to $6.46. For provincial subsidies the amount is $1.33; subsidies and subventions, mail and steamship services, 11 cents; public works, including maintenance, rent of public buildings, lighthouses, ocean and river service and so on, $1.90; railways, canals and highways, with the exception of the deficits on the Canadian National Railways, 44 cents; administration of justice, 71 cents; immigration and colonization, 28 cents; agriculture, fisheries and mines, $1.04; lands and parks 45 cents, or a total for all these latter items of only $6.26.


James Layton Ralston: Would my hon. friend read the item to which he has referred as the military item.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The military and naval item, as I said, includes soldiers' civil re-establishment, pensions and so on.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am not trying to mislead the house in any way.


James Layton Ralston: I thought my hon. friend referred to the army alone.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am trying in this instance to show the enormous amount spent either directly or indirectly in connection with military expenditures in contrast with the amount spent on other items. That is my purpose.
Now, I think we have gone a little far afield in this discussion. The resolution asks that a department be established for the promotion of peace. Nothing was said, except by way of comparison, by the hon. member for Southeast Grey with regard to our national defence estimates; that has been introduced since. The Minister of National Defence takes the ground that he is quite willing that peace should be promoted. Since he is willing that we should work for the promotion of peace, I ask him if he is willing that we should give for this purpose even one-tenth of what is spent for the army and navy and air force? Is he willing to give for the promotion of peace one-tenth of the $19,000,000 which is being expended specifically for those three forces? I am not entering into the rather academic question whether or not we should maintain a certain armament while we attempt to promote peace, or whether or not it is possible for us to promote peace while retaining an army. Leaving that aside for

the moment, since the minister is, I have no doubt sincerely, in favour of peace education, is he willing that we spend one-tenth-yes, this year even the one-hundredth part-of what we are spending now upon the army and naval and air forces on a department to promote peace? Is that an unfair or an extravagant thing to ask? The member for Fort William says:	Leave it to voluntary
agencies. Would he suggest that the defence of the country be left to voluntary agencies? I do not think so. The Minister of National Defence will agree that if we are to have efficiency we must have things organized; if we are to really do good work we must have resources at our command. If the question of peace is to have its due place in the minds of the people of Canada, and in the world at large, we must be prepared to dignify it by giving it a place side by side with our other governmental activities.
I was glad that the member for Southeast Grey suggested one line of activity that may readily be carried out. I remember three or four years ago having the pleasure of introducing to the Prime Minister and the Minister of Justice a deputation of university students, who came asking that the government enter into a plan of establishing a certain number of international scholarships. Their idea was along the lines suggested by the member for Southeast Grey, that we might send some of our best men abroad to study affairs in Europe and Asia, students who would learn something of the various peoples and their conditions, and come back and give us the result of their knowledge and experience; and on the other hand that we in Canada should invite people from other nations to send us, some of their brightest young men, to study at our universities, investigate our national affairs, and go back to carry their new viewpoint to other parts of the world. A great many members of this house are very much afraid of Russian communism. I do not intend to enter into that question-I do not happen to be a member of the communist party, nor am I particularly sympathetic with a great many things in their program- but there is at least one thing they are doing that I think is worth}'' of emulation by other nations. They have established in Russia, I am told, a great university, a sort of international university; to that institution they invite a considerable number of the brightest students from all the countries of Europe, who for two or three years are given free tuition in order that they may understand the Russian system and go back to spread that knowledge throughout the world. Some of the members of this house think that is a

International Peace-Mr. Woodsworth
dangerous proceeding; I am speaking merely of methods. Can we conceive of any better method than that? Why should we not adopt some such plain of having students come to us from other countries to learn what the spirit of the Anglo-Saxon people is, and to tell our own people something of what they find in other countries, and thus help to allay the prejudices which now exist? I do not think those proposals are extravagant, and I do not concede that they are altogether too idealistic.
I am glad that there has been established an institute of Pacific Relations. I am glad that a few men went over the seas to Honolulu last year, including I believe Sir Arthur Currie, to study the Pacific problem. I think it was a splendid thing to do. I should like to put that movement on a more permanent basis, to enable such conferences to be held much more frequently and the results of them to be much more widely diffused. All this kind of thing could be done if we had some sort of department, or a bureau in one of the existing departments, specifically charged with doing this kind of work; and further, this work placed in charge of a man who is enthusiastic for peace and who has a broad vision of what is possible in the world today.
We must try to realize the changes that have taken place in recent years. In the old days each state was largely independent. The attitude was that of keen rivalry, and the only court of appeal was that of war. At that time undoubtedly the policy was preparedness- preparedness along military lines, preparedness along psychological lines-because we regarded all strangers as enemies. Did you ever think, Mr. Speaker, that every stranger is a potential friend or a potential enemy? Which he will be in practice depends very largely on the way we regard him. It is easy enough to look out on the world and see all these nations encircling us as glaring enemies. But it is also possible to look out on the world and realize that other nations are potential friends of ours, and willing to enter into friendly co-operation with us. In the old days peace was simply an armed truce, and the only way we could think of maintaining peace was by defensive alliances. But to-day all that is changed. We have already developed economic interdependence. There is a growing sense of the world's solidarity. In the scientific world we have stepped over international boundaries. Any great medical achievement in one country is rapidly carried to other countries, and we rejoice in it. Culture is becoming international; literary, artistic and religious movements sweep rapidly over international 56103-109
boundaries. But there is a development that has not been so clearly understood, and that is that class and group conflicts are also worldwide in character. To-day the great industrialists and financiers have their interests in different parts of the world, and hardly recognize international boundaries. The great financiers are international in their outlook. In fact, labour man as I am, I would say it is not impossible that the development of international finance may one of these days prove to be the very surest way of effecting some sort of world solidarity. The process is going on; but I ask, are we in our political institutions keeping pace with the economic and scientific developments going on round about us? We still maintain our narrow nationalistic institutions. I do not want to do away with our national culture or anything of the kind, but I ask that our national institutions adapt themselves to the new condition; that instead of being isolated from other nations we remember that the old economic barriers have broken down; that we must co-operate with other nations and in so doing change our methods as well. Instead of relying on being fully armed against other people we should cultivate an understanding and interpretation of different points of view through which alone we shall be able to solve the complicated economic problems that come to us in our larger world relations.
I hope that we shall not be diverted in this discussion by the question whether or not we should sweep away to-day all our national defence. I do not want to discuss that at this time; there will be other oportunities. I should like to concentrate on the motion of the hon. member for Southeast Grey and ask that we proceed now to institute something in the nature of a department of peace.


An hon. MEMBER:: Time.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, I believe my time has nearly expired.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Go ahead.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am about to close. I ask that we proceed to institute something in the nature of a department of peace; and I think that the Minister of National Defence, if I may appeal to him, would not be very-inconsistent if he would accept my suggested proposal that one one-hundredth part of the expenditure now being made for the army and the naval and the air forces be devoted this year to such a new department. If I might appeal to the Prime Minister, I should like to urge that it would be no mean ambition for Canada that we, situated as we are beside a peaceful neighbour, should set the

1708	COMMONS
International Peace-Mr. Woodsworth
pace in this matter. We are already occupying an exalted position in the assembly and council of the League of Nations. We are already making our voice heard over there for peace. But let us not use empty phrases. Let us implement what we say at Geneva by endeavouring actually to carry out an educational propaganda at home. We are in a position to take a lead along that line. The very fact that we have so relatively small a military establishment to maintain makes it possible for us to extend along other lines, and there could be no fitter time than the present for doing so. I should like to think that the jubilee of confederation, of which we made so much less than a year ago, might be celebrated in some way that would leave tangible results-results that would mean much to the world at large. Whether or not all are prepared to go the whole way in the matter of national disarmament, at least let us set up such a department as is proposed and thus pay real tribute to the principle that lies behind the resolution.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, inasmuch as the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) has made an appeal to me to say a word on behalf of the government and more particularly has emphasized the importance of Canada taking a lead in these matters which tend towards peace and the promotion of international understanding, this might be an opportune time for me to make what few remarks I had thought of making in the course of this debate. May I first of all say that any resolution brought into this house and having as its objective the great purpose of promoting peace and international understanding, is certain of a sympathetic reception at the hands not of one political party but, I believe, of all parties in this chamber? The debate which has thus far taken place would indicate that such is the case, and I think the hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss Macphail) who has introduced the resolution, may feel assured that whatever differences of view there may be as to the particular method which she suggests as the one to be aimed at immediately for the promotion of peace and international understanding, there is no difference of view as to the desirability of the large objective being attained in the most effective manner possible.
We are indebted to her for having emphasized anew the importance of ridding the world, if that is possible, of a war mentality and substituting therefor a peace mentality. But that is not a work that is a matter of days

or years; it is perhaps the largest educational effort in which mankind as a whole can be engaged. We cannot emphasize too often the horrors of war, the losses of war, not only the material losses but the losses to nations and to the world in human life, in morals and in all that we hold dearest in civilization. But it is important, when speaking on the subject of war, its futility, awfulness, and hideousness, that we distinguish between those who are responsible for provoking wars and the services of those who seek to defeat their efforts. That distinction is not kept sufficiently in mind. In the course of the debate one might gather from some of the remarks that have been made, that there were in this chamber those who believed that war was something that some were prepared to endorse, something that, in a direct or indirect way, had been endorsed by the nations that took part in the recent war, and that because nothing good, as has been said, comes out of war, that therefore the efforts of those who sought to oppose the forces which were responsible for the war in the first instance were of themselves of no account. If we pause for a moment to consider the situation and to realize the distinction that should be drawn, when we come to speak of war, between those who are responsible for provoking war and those who seek to overthrow and overturn the forces that bring about war, we shall realize that in the recent great international world strife, had the situation not proven to be what it was on the part of those who opposed the forces responsible for war, we would not this evening be spending our time in this house of parliament debating the question at all. I believe as firmly as I am standing here that if the peoples of the British Empire, Belgium, France, Italy, the United States and the other allied and associated countries that participated in the war had not taken the part which they did, had not opposed the enemy as they did oppose him, there would not be in these countries to-day men and women in a position to stand up and become the advocates of the merits of peace. We should all be in the position of nations that had been overcome by a people who held with respect to peace and progress a point of view diametrically opposite to the one which we hold. We must distinguish, in discussing war, between the forces that are responsible for war and those whose aim and purpose it is to prevent those forces from getting control. I remember very well a passage that appears in one of the writings of that celebrated scientist, Pasteur, and which to my mind vividly portrays the situation:

International Peace-Mr. Mackenzie King
Two contrary laws seem to be wrestling with each other nowadays: the one, a law of blood and of death, ever imagining new means of destruction, and forcing nations to be constantly ready for the battlefield-the other, a law of peace, work and health, ever evolving new means of delivering man from the scourges which beset him. The one seeks violent conquests, the other the relief of humanity. The latter places one human life above any victory; while the former would sacrifice hundreds of thousands of lives to the ambition of one. Which ot these two laws shall ultimately prevail God alone knows.
The great scientist who uttered those words expressed a profound truth, namely, that through the whole of human society there run these two contrary forces: those who are striving for the preservation of peace, health and work, and those who are following some law of blood and of death, and who are ever ready to make conquest serve ends which are their own. These laws are in conflict with each other and unless those who are prepared to support the law of peace, health and work, are ready to support it by means that are effective enough to overthrow the force of blood and death, then the latter and not the former will triumph. This truth I think it is essential for us to keep in mind when we discuss the question of war and preparation for war.
May I say to the hon. member for Southeast Grey that the one exception I have to take to her resolution is that I think it takes too limited a view of how the great objective vvhich she has in mind is to be attained, too limited a view of how peace and international understanding may best be promoted. I say that instead of one department of the government being established for that specific purpose, every department of the government should have the promotion of peace and international understanding as its aim. Every department, bar none, should have as its aim the promotion of peace and international understanding, and not only every department of the government, but I would add the government as a whole and parliament as a whole. It is not a business merely for one department of the administration; it is a part of the supreme duty of all. May I say that even in regard to the Department of National Defence,
I make no exception; its duty, I maintain, is to help make war impossible. It is not a department of national offence; it is a department of national defence. Defence, not offence, is its object. It is a department that aims not to promote or develop in any way any conception of war, but rather to take such measures that, if the time should ever come when we shall again be compelled to make further sacrifice because of those who hold
an opposite view to those of us, who cherish peace ideals, we shall be in a position effectively to maintain and hold our own. May I say with respect to the minister in charge of the administration of the Department of National Defence, that when it became my privilege as well as my duty to advise His Excellency the Governor General as to whom he should call to take control of that department, I advised His Excellency to call the hon. member who now sits for the constituency of Shelburne-Yarmouth (Mr. Ralston). Why? Because I believed that he had a record second to none o,f gallantry in the defence of his country, and also because I believed that having gone through that great war from its beginning to its close, and having served as he did on the field of battle, there was no man in this country who was likely to be more understanding and more sympathetic with the men who had fought on the battlefield or who would be more anxious to avert another war, and further because I believed that in the administration of the affairs of the Department of National Defence he would see to it that any measures that were taken would be of a character that would be effective for the purpose in view, and would be carried out above all else in a manner that would serve the highest interest of his fellowmen and of this country.
My hon. friend from Southeast Grey pays the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) a compliment and says that she would be content to have him at the head of the Department of National Defence. May I remind her that under the British system of government the cabinet is a unit in all matters of policy, and whether the Minister of Justice sits where he sits to-day as Minister of Justice, or were to sit as the head of the Department of National Defence, the policy of the government would still remain as one, and he along with others would be jointly responsible exactly as he is to-day. As a government we have a collective responsibility for the policy of national defence.
I do not wish to-night to go into the question of the estimates. My colleague the Minister of National Defence has already indicated to the house certain features, but I might repeat in one word what he has said, namely, that if we confine the comparison to the militia and the naval forces, the amount which we are asking parliament to provide this year is the equivalent of what was being asked prior to the period of 1914. Will anyone in this house suggest, having the knowledge we all have of the development of aerial navigation and the possibilities of aerial attack and aerial defence, that it is not wholly essential

Mackenzie King
International Peace-Mr. that this country, in common with all other countries of the world, should develop an air force? Is there anyone who has followed modern scientific development or has attempted to forecast the possible developments that will take place in the agencies of communication and transportation who does not feel that the air force is likely to play a part second to none in the future? I believe that this parliament will say that a country like Canada, with the vast distances which we have here to traverse, and incidentally to defend in case of attack at any time, is justified both for military and civil reasons in paying very special attention to the development of air forces and aerial navigation and that the addition which parliament is being asked to vote in that connection will be voted with good grace.
There is, I believe, an additional amount to pay for the cost of two new torpedo boat destroyers. If these destroyers were to be an addition to the present equipment of the naval forces, I would say that there might be some ground for taking exception to that expenditure, but actually they are in the nature of replacements of two vessels that are practically out of commission, and the alternative of the government, if we were not to drop this service altogether, was either to borrow vessels from the old country, or purchase our own vessels and ourselves own and control what we feel to be essential. I believe the members of this house will feel that Canada will wish to pay for her own vessels, and to control and manage them herself, and be under no obligation to any other government than her own for what she does in that regard. That covers _ the essential features with regard to any additional outlays from the point of view of national defence.
Now take 'the other departments of the government, and here again I wish to emphasize to my hon. friend that every department of the government is vitally interested in the promotion of peace and international understanding. Take, for instance, the departments that have to do with the development of our natural resources. How far are these resources likely to be developed in time of war? We have had an opportunity to judge, and we know that every department of government that has been concerned with the economic development of the country suffered during the period of the war, and it is to their interest to try in any way they possibly can to prevent war developing. The Department of Agriculture, the Department of Marine and Fisheries, the Depart-

ment of the Interior and Mines, the Department of Immigration and Colonization, the Department of Trade and Commerce-all these departments are interested in seeking in an active way wherever they can to promote international understanding, because their relations are more or less of an international character, particularly those which are concerned with the development of our commerce and our trade.
Then there are other departments of the government which in a primary and immediate way have to do with the development of peace. I >am still trying to point out to my hon. friend that I am entirely sympathetic with the object she has in view, that I even sympathize with her view that there should be a department of the government to devote attention to these matters, but I contend that one department of the government specially given over to the promotion of peace and international goodwill cannot compare with the broader conception, which is to my mind the essential one, namely that all departments of the government should keep that great objective very much in view.


Miss MACPHAIL:: If that is a better way of bringing about permanent peace, if what is everybody's business is the business that is best done, which is not a fact, the logical thing to do would be to disband the Department of National Defence and let all the other departments work together in the interest of national defence.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: 
Abraham Albert Heaps: If the Prime Minister will
permit me, will he agree to that very form of arbitration in regard to international disputes?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am coming
to that; my hon. friend is running ahead of me a little. I am trying to point out that
the Department of Labour has inculcated in
the minds of our people the wisdom of using the method of conciliation, arbitration and investigation, as contrasted with the method of coercion, as the most effective means of bringing about justice in industrial disputes. That is in large part the work of the Department of Labour, and that work has influenced not only the people of this country but the peoples of many countries with respect to matters with which their lives are intimately associated.
Now, may I answer my hon. friend? If the method of industrial conciliation, arbitration and investigation has proved a better method to bring about industrial peace than the method of coercion-the principles being identical, the reasons being the same in all particulars-I say that this same method applied to international relations ought to succeed infinitely better than the method of force and coercion. The fact that in Canada we have demonstrated so effectively the importance of industrial conciliation, arbitration and investigation in bringing about and maintaining industrial peace and industrial justice, gives a reason why, as a country, we should seek to do exactly what my hon. friend said in the course of her remarks we should do namely, lead the other nations forward in the same path. For my part, and speaking as a member of the government, I wish to say in regard to international questions that Canada stands, and has stood, for the promotion of conciliation and arbitration as a means of settling international differences. In my reference to the Department of Labour I hope I have made clear to my hon. friend what I have in mind about the limitation that I see with respect to her resolution, which suggests one department of the government for the purpose of having primarily as its objective the promotion of peace and international good will.
I say that every department of the government should have that objective in view, and that we have already gone much further along that line than is generally conceded.
But may I go a step further? There is another department of the government which, I believe, even more than any I have mentioned, has had specifically in view the promotion of peace and international good will, and that is the Department of External Affairs. That is one of the most recently created departments of the government service. The objective of that department in practically all its work is that very thing- the endeavour to maintain and to further as far as possible friendly international relations and in different ways to promote international understanding. My hon. friend in
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International Peace-Mr. Mackenzie King
her remarks this afternoon said she thought it all-important that we should seek to develop an international mind. Here again I am in entire accord with her point of view. I think an international mind is obviously the objective we should have in view in dealing with questions that affect not only our own country but other countries as well. If my hon. friend will look at the report of the Secretary of State for External Affairs she will see there a list of the number of conferences at which Canada has been represented. All these conferences tend to further the objective she has in view. At each one of them Canada's representation has helped to bring to the fore the Canadian point of view, and to contribute towards that ideal of international understanding which her motion seeks to promote. Before going over the list of the conferences, let me mention one that will come first to the minds of every one present.
This government and this parliament have identified themselves in a very real and immediate way with the League of Nations. Now, the League of Nations stands for the promotion of peace and international understanding. If it does not stand for that it does not stand for anything. Everything we do in connection with the League of Nations we are doing along lines that are promoting the very objective the resolution before the house is intended to promote. For years past Canada has been represented each year at the assembly of the League of Nations; in addition to that a member of the administration of this country has been the president of the league. Canada to-day is represented on the council of the league by a minister of the crown of its government. So I say to my hon. friend, Canada is doing the very thing that she suggests and that my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre suggests should be done by this country, namely, taking the lead in these great matters that make for international understanding. From the part which we have taken in the League of Nations we have certainly set an example to this continent of the desirability of nations sharing in international relations calculated to lead to a better international understanding. Were there a department dealing especially with the promotion of peace and international understanding, the work of the League of Nations would be referred at once to that department. To-day that work is carried on through the Department of External Affairs.
Associated with the League of Nations is the International Labour Conference, another organization which co-operates with the league ior the purpose of promoting international
'Mr. Mackenzie King.]
understanding on such great questions as standards of working and living conditions and of organization in various branches of national life which tend to place the nations more upon an equal footing and to remove those differences which, in such large measure, are responsible for international friction and international unrest. We have gone wholeheartedly into the work of the International Labour Office as well as into all branches of the work of the league, and this, I submit, is a sign of the development which has taken place in recent years and which should be emphasized when we are discussing the position Canada is taking on these questions.
Let me now refer to some of the conferences that have been held: the International Economic Conference, the Naval Disarmament Conference, the Imperial Educational Conference, the Conference on Communications and Transit, the International Horticultural Congress, the International Conference on Weights and Measures, the Imperial Agricultural Research Conference, the International Radio-Telegraph Conference and the Congress of the International Statistical Institute. I confess that each time the government is asked to send some member or members of the public service or some other representatives to one or other of these conferences the question arises, are we justified in asking parliament to vote the amount required to meet the expense? And how do we justify our action in coming to parliament for the purpose? We justify it on the very ground on which my hon. friend this afternoon supported her resolution, namely, that it is important that this country, in common with other countries, should make its contribution, with respect to matters wherein it may be able to lend aid or provide information which is likely to be helpful. We have therefore, as opportunity has arisen, consciously and deliberately sought to further this means of creating an international spirit within our own country and of making our contribution to international problems as they have presented themselves.
I might mention another direction in which we have endeavoured to promote peace and international understanding. We have undertaken to establish legations in different countries. Last year, as hon. members know, we opened a legation at Washington. We were opposed to a considerable degree in our endeavour to do this; we were told that we were making a mistake; it seemed to be the impression in some quarters that we were pursuing an unwise course. That fortunately was not the view of the House of

International Peace-Mr. Mackenzie King
Commons as a whole. The legation has been opened and has now been in existence for over a year. The house will agree, 1 think, that the decision to have a personal representative of this government and country at Washington, with a personal representative of the United States in Ottawa, has gone a long way towards furthering international good will between the two countries. In being about to take a similar step with regard to one of the countries of Europe and another country in the orient, we are but proceeding in an identical direction. We are endeavouring by personal contact to make more intelligible to the citizens of other countries on other continents the point of view of the Dominion of Canada respecting matters of concern to ourselves and to them. In this particular, I submit, the government is furthering the main objective of the resolution now under consideration..
I might go further. I might point to another instance-indeed, it was mentioned by my hon. friend this afternoon-in which this Dominion, in conjunction with the neighbouring republic, has set an example of the means by which peace and international understanding can best be promoted. We have between Canada and the United States an International Joint Commission to which, over a period of twenty years or more, have been referred many questions any one of which was liable to create discord between the two countries. If we omit the first two questions which were referred to that commission and on which there was not a unanimous finding, it may be said, I think truly, that on every question referred for its consideration-and these questions have all presented considerable difficulties-there has been a unanimous agreement on the part of the commissioners, an agreement which has served to prevent anything in the nature of friction developing between this portion of the British Empire and the United States. The work of the International Joint Commission represents, on the part of this continent, a contribution to the civilization of the world of greater significance than the peoples of the world have yet begun to imagine. We, on this continent, have shown conclusively that the processes of investigation, of conciliation and of arbitration can be effective not only as a means of promoting peace, but also as a means of curtailing materially the expenses incidental to any preparation for possible war.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Does the Prime
Minister really think that the commission would have been as effective if there had been forts along the border or warships on the lakes?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am inclined to think that what has made the whole organization effective is the fundamental idea underlying it, just as is the case with respect to the Industrial Disputes Investigation Act. There remains, through strikes and lockouts, in industrial disputes the possible use of force and coercion but the superiority of the principle of conciliation and investigation has .clearly demonstrated itself. As a saying of Cicero has it: Oh, great is the power of truth which of itself so easily defends itself. I believe it is the recognition of this principle which has led to the success of the International Joint Commission: the process of investigation has been instrumental in bringing to light the essential facts and information in every case, and the justice of every finding has thereby demonstrated itself.
A great deal more should be made of the work of the International Joint Commission. As the hon. member for Southeast Grey observed this afternoon, greater note should be taken of the significance of the Rush-Bagot agreement. I agree entirely that the men who were wise enough to limit armaments on the great lakes and to prevent competitive arming on the part of this country and the United States have saved this continent vast sums of money and possibly averted a war as a consequence of such competition. I believe that as time goes on, as the example of this continent becomes better known in other parts of the world, forts will be dismantled elsewhere and their places taken by tribunals of arbitration such as we have found so effective here.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The Prime Minister realizes, of course, that in our case it was not a matter of dismantling forts and abandoning ships. In order to be perfectly fair, should he not take that fact into account? My question if I may repeat it, was this: Would these two countries have been so successful in arbitration if we had had armaments to fall back upon in the event of arbitration failing?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I do not wish to evade the question, the importance of which I fully realize. But it is an extremely difficult question to answer. As to what might have occurred had armaments been maintained, no one can say. What I said a moment ago was that, had there been on this continent international competition in arms and armaments, we might have had a war. On the other hand, I am not prepared to say that notwithstanding the armaments, if the idea of international arbitration had presented itself, its superiority to armaments as a means of settling international difficulties would not
1714	COMMONS
International Peace-Mr. Mackenzie King
have been apparent. At all events, we on this continent have an object lesson as to the importance of that method of dealing with international difference.
Here again I might say how heartily I agree with the hon. member for Southeast Grey in stressing the importance of directing attention to all these matters through every possible agency. Her remarks might well be addressed to every educational department of every province in the Dominion. The hon. member for Nelson (Mr. Bird) asked if a department of the kind she had suggested could not co-operate with the provincial governments to have presented in the text books a different view from that which exists to-day. I doubt very much whether the provincial governments would be prepared, in matters pertaining particularly to their educational departments, to listen to suggestions from the federal government. They desire to keep these matters within their own purview, but I would say that every influence that can be exerted and every force that can be brought to beaT upon these departments of education should be exerted to see that ideals of peace and international goodwill such as we cherish are set forth as much as possible in the text books used in our schools.
I have pointed out that the resolution of my hon. friend suggests something altogether too limited to gain the great objective she has in view. As I have already said, I think every department of the government should have as a supreme aim in all its activities the furtherance of peace and international goodwill. May I now say to her that assuming the administration were to establish a new department to-morrow with the object she has in mind, there would remain back of that department what is back of the work of every other department of government, namely the purpose of the administration itself. It is not by the name or the organization of a department that anything can be effected with respect to international goodwill or the furtherance of peace; the vital point is the spirit and attitude on the part of the government in administering the affairs of the country generally. As I proceed I intend to say a few words which I hope will be sufficient to illustrate what I mean, but just now I want to make, if I can, that one idea clear, namely that back of all the affairs of administration lies the1 general point of view of those who are guiding the affairs of the country. If that point of view is a militarist or jingoist point of view, you may have all the departments in creation and call them by whatever names you wish without, so far as the promotion of peace is

concerned, effectively working towards the end you have in view. If on the other hand you have an administration actuated by motives of peace and international goodwill, an administration seeking at every turn to further ideals of peace and international understanding with respect to all matters which may develop, whether in the departments or on the floor of parliament, then the name of the particular department which you may have comes to be something wholly secondary in importance.
I should like now to give an illustration. I think my hon. friend was in the house in 1922 and will recall the communication which came to this country with reference to a certain disturbance whioh had arisen in the near east. This country was advised that the British government had decided to resist the inroads of the Turks upon Europe, and we were asked whether or not Canada was ready to join with the British government in that policy, and also if we intended or were willing to be represented by a contingent. As I have said, that communication came to the country first; it came to the government after the country had been advised of it. That is a phase of the incident to which I need not refer at the moment beyond recalling it to the minds of hon. gentlemen. However, the point of the communication was that the cabinet of Great Britain had decided to take that action and we were asked as a Dominion, along with the other dominions, whether we were ready to send military and naval forces to join in resisting this inroad of the Turks upon Europe, upon Greece I think in particular. What was the position taken by this government at that time? We replied that before committing Canada to any participation in another European war we would wish to summon parliament, have all the facts of the case presented and allow parliament to decide whether or not contingents or naval forces should leave our shores to participate in another war. What was the attitude of hon. gentlemen opposite at that time with respect to the position we took? We were met with the charge that we had not responded as we should have responded to the call; we were told that the moment we received that call the answer of the administration should have been "Ready, aye, ready" and that we should have made it plain that we were prepared to send contingents to Europe. It so happens that the facts have since come to light more clearly than they were perceived at the moment the government received the communication. What are the facts as they have come to be known to the world? In brief, they

International Peace-Mr. Mackenzie King
are that the British cabinet as a whole had never considered the communication which was sent to the government of Canada and which was published broadcast in the press at that time. Not only the British cabinet as a whole had not considered that appeal, but leading members! of the government and leading public men in England took the position that it was one of the most dangerous appeals that had ever been made by any government in any part of the world. More than that, we were told that but for the action of Canada in taking the position which she did at that time in asking that the facts be first brought out and that the parliament of Canada should have its say before contingents were sent abroad, a second great European conflict might have taken place.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Some hon.
gentlemen opposite question that statement; let me give them my authority for what I say. I thought that point had come to be generally conceded, but if hon. gentlemen opposite are in any doubt I will give them the words of one or two British statesmen of whose verdict I think they will approve. I intend to quote two gentlemen, each of whom has been prime minister of Great Britain, each of whom has since passed away, but each of whom though being dead, yet speaks to us through his utterances as recorded. "What were the words of the late Andrew Bonar Law, who if I recall correctly was a member of that very administration? I quote from an English newspaper, the Newcastle Journal of November 8, 1922, in which reference is made to a speech by the late Mr. Bonar Law. These are his words in regard to the so-called Chanak incident, and with respect to the communication sent at the time to the dominions:
Towards the end of September a manifesto suddenly appeared in the newspapers. I read it with amazement. There was no consultation with the dominions, and this extraordinary manifesto was issued with the knowledge of three or four members only of the cabinet.
To suddenly throw, as a bolt from the blue, this appeal for help when not one of the dominions had the remotest idea that there was any idea of it, and when it was well known that their help could not come in time to be of any assistance in the crisis, was to risk, in my opinion one of the greatest assets of this empire. It was to take a risk with our dominions which no wise man would have taken, and which, I think, was not more foolish than it was wrong.
Then I have here the words of the late Lord Oxford and Asquith. What did he say, as reported in a Canadian Press cable to Canada
of October 8, 1922, which appeared in most of our daily papers? This report of his Bpeeeh at Dumfries on the evening of October 7th, 1922, reads as follows:
"There is every reason to believe," said Mr. Asquith, "that a week ago to-day this country, single-handed, was on the brink of an unnecessary war."
Then referring to the manifesto he said:
"All this strident rhetoric, this flag-waving and bugle-blowing, were wholly inexplicable unless the prospect of war, at any rate, was well in sight."
Mr. Asquith said he could not remember a more illtimed and discreditable incident in the whole of his public life. The effect was what might have been expected:	The French and
Italians, who were holding the neutral lines with the British, were withdrawn.
"In our great dominions," said Mr. Asquith, "were statesmen sagacious enough-let us be thankful for it-who before they committed their countries to war, required more information as to what they would be fighting for and as to how and why it had become necessary to fight at all."
May I remind the house that at the time
the manifesto was issued, Australia and New Zealand each signified their intention of sending forces to join with the British forces in the event of war. and that Canada alone stood out in seeking information and asking that her parliament be advised before the people of this country were committed to participation in another war. I quote further from the report as follows:
Referring to the question of the freedom of the straits, Mr. Asquith said the Black sea powers, particularly Russia, had just as much concern therein as Great Britain had. Moreover, the Kemalists themselves declared they were quite willing to accept the principle of the freedom of the straits. He said he saw no reason why they should not mean what they say. "What an issue that would have been to let loose the hazard of the horrors of war," Mr. Asquith exclaimed.
"Let no one be simple minded enough," said Mr. Asquith, "to suppose that the hostilities would have been confined to Chanak. Such a war would probably have involved the greater part of the Asiatic continent nearest Mesopotamia and Palestine, and possibly Egypt and other countries, with the possibility of an infinite repercussion throughout the Moslem world."
Then may I give to my hon. friends opposite the opinion of one who I think was well informed at the time, but who no one for a moment will say is an advocate of the present administration, much less of myself. I refer to Lieut.-Colonel John Bayne Maclean, of MaoLean's Magazine. What did that paper have to say with reference to this matter? Colonel Maclean, the editor, under his own name, in the issue of MacLean's
1716	COMMONS
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Magazine of November 15, 1922, published an article headed:
"Did Canada Stop Near East War? Refusal to Take Precipitous Action Saving Factor; Sane Thinking Essential to Peace."
The second paragraph of this article reads:
We were recently asked by cable to answer at once by cable that we were ready to embark on another and greater war.
Some men, not Canadians, who have unusually good sources of world-wide information, whose judgment is generally sound and whose views are held in hgh esteem, are positive that had our Premier succumbed to the Lloyd George-Churcliill demands, preceded as they were by propaganda and scheming for Canadian participation, the British Empire would undoubtedly have been at war now with Turkey, Russia and perhaps India, Afghanistan, Persia, and God knows who else or what the end would have been.
That was the opinion at that time of Colonel Maclean, and he had sources of information which I do mot hesitate to say from what I have since learned were pretty reliable. The view which he there expressed I have been told in Great Britain on very high authority was not very far from the mark as to what might have followed had Canada not taken the position which she then did.
I wish to say to my hon. friend that if this incident proves anything, it proves above all else that the spirit and the purpose and the attitude of an administration on this great question of peace and international understanding is more important than any of the lesser matters of departmental administration or departmental propaganda. The Chanak incident is only one of a number of incidents which have come up in the course of recent years, and all of which have served to disclose the essential importance of the attitude of an administration.
Take the treaty of Lausanne a year or two later. This government was confronted with a request to ratify the treaty of Lausanne. If we had accepted the view that our opponents took at the time we would have signed a treaty in the negotiation of which we were not represented, which had not been signed by any representatives of Canada authorized by this government or parliament, p.nd we would have now been committed to the obligations growing out of that treaty. We took the position that not having been asked to participate in the negotiation of that treaty and not having been represented, neither should we be asked to sign the treaty nor this parliament be asked to approve of it, which would be essential for its ratification.
Let me go a step further. This administration in 1926 having these matters in mind,

brought into this house a resolution to the effect that with respect to all treaties in the future, especially those that involved military or economic sanctions, no government of Canada should have the power to commit this country without first bringing the treaties to parliament and having them approved there. I say to my hon. friend that these larger policies are the all-important essential factors in seeking the promotion of peace and international good wiU.
Let me read the last paragraph of a resolution which I introduced into this house on June 21, 1926 and which was subsequently passed. It refers to a resolution of the imperial conference of 1923:
This house approves of the procedure proposed for the negotiation, signature and ratification of treaties and conventions, and considers further that before His Majesty's Canadian ministers advise ratification of a treaty or convention affecting Canada, or signify acceptance of any treaty, convention or agreement involving military or economic sanctions, the approval of the parliament of Canada should be secured.
In other words, our method of promoting peace and international understanding with respect to these very large affairs which come before the nation in its international dealings, is to lay down the doctrine that before this country shall be committed to obligations under a treaty involving military or economic sanctions, that treaty shall first of all be submitted to and approved by this parliament. These are policies that transcend the work of government departments; they reach down to the work of parliament itself.
I may say to my hon, friend that within the last few months the government was asked, with respect to a treaty that was being negotiated between Great Britain and Egypt, whether we would become a party to that treaty. The terms of that treaty are known, they have been published. They involved military sanctions, and they contemplated military alliances. What was the reply of the government to that question? It was that we did not believe that so far as Canada was concerned the parliament of Canada would approve such a course; that if Britain and Egypt could work out a treaty as between themselves along the lines proposed, well and good; but that so far as Canada was concerned, we did not feel that it was in the interests of the British Empire itself or in the interests of the larger peace which it was hoped the treaty would serve, that this country should be asked to become a party to it; and the British government immediately accepted our view in reference thereto.
I say to my hon. friend that questions of international relations have to be considered

International Peace-Mr. Bourassa
more and more as they arise, and depend for their solution, whether from the point of view of peace or from the point of view of war, largely on the view of the administration in office.
May I say this as a last word to my hon. friend: it is because great policies of the kind can be worked out only by administrations that in matters of this nature are strong enough to hold their own, that I appeal so strongly to her and to those about her to see the wisdom of and at all times to realize the importance of having men and women who feel and think alike on these great questions, economic questions and questions of peace and war, so unite their forces that in matters of this kind they may find themselves in the position 'where they will have the final word.


Mr. HENRI BOURASSA (Labelle):: Mr. Speaker, to my great regret, I have missed most of this debate. All that I have heard is a part of the remarks of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woods-worth) and the observations of the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King). With a good deal of the remarks made by the right hon. gentleman I fully agree; but it does not seem to me that he has conclusively answered the object of this motion. As to the inspiration of the policy pursued heretofore by the right hon. gentleman and his colleagues, they are without doubt sincerely peaceful. The right hon. gentleman has a fine record of a peaceful policy ever since he took office, and no doubt what he has gained in the confidence of the people of Canada is largely due to that fact. It is certainly so in the province of Quebec. But the fact that a government has peaceful designs, the fact that an administration has in certain matters of international policy given evidence that it is not prepared to be dragged or to drag the country into war ventures or into dangers of war, does not do away with the position taken by the hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss Macphail).
The Prime Minister is right when he says -and this is nothing new; it has always been that way-that throughout the world there is a current of thought working for peace and a current of thought working for war. The question is: Are governments, and parliaments, and peoples, to take practical, effective means at this time to help the current of peace, in order to counteract the influence for war when the next danger of war comes? This after all is the position. The Prime Minister says that the hon. member for Southeast Grey has minimized the importance of the question. because she suggests the creation of a certain department to promote peace. He
says that all departments of government are interested in preserving peace. But likewise, all departments of government are interested in seeing that the trade of the country is carried on properly. Nevertheless, a department of trade has been created in order to give better assistance to matters of trade and the public interest in trade. The same thing is true in regard to public works, agriculture, labour, and so on. A war department has also been created in the past, and it is still maintained in spite of the peaceful disposition of mind of the government. The Prime Minister thinks there is a strong argument in the fact that the department is called the Department of National Defence. But all the war policies of all countries were prepared under pretence of defence.
The Prime Minister has spoken of the spirit which prevailed prior to the last war. He has vaguely divided the world as between countries bent on war and countries resisting the spirit of war. I think the right hon. gentleman must have known the state of affairs in Europe better than is indicated by his remarks on this point. He should have known -and that was the tragedy of the situation- that in every country in Europe, in Germany as well as France, in Russia as well as Italy, the immense majority of the population, the immense majority of the trading people, the farming people, all people of good will to whatever class they belonged, were opposed to war. But they were led gradually, by the false policies which had been prevalent during the twenty-five years prior to the war, to the conviction, justified or unjustified-I am not passing judgment on that point now-that their country, each of them, was threatened with an attack one of these days, and therefore, that their government was justified in arming the nation to the teeth so as to be prepared to stand the test when war came. It was as true in Germany as in England, in France as in Italy, in Russia as in Austria. But in every one of those countries there were a few people who were bent on war and who worked steadily on two or three factors of war. One of those factors was that sense of fear which Mr. Bertrand Russell so well described during the war as being the mam moral cause which brought most of the countries into the whirlpool. The second was economic rivalry between the various nations. It brought some people in England to this view, for example, as I was told by a high-minded Englishman at the beginning of the war: "We are bent on destroying Germany because she is getting better than us at our own game." Then there was the spirit of national hatred and rivalry which was care-

International Peace-Mr. Bourassa
fully worked on by warmongers, whether they belonged to diplomatic circles, to war organizations or to trade associations. Prejudice was raised in Germany against Russia, in France against Germany, in England against Germany, in Russia against Germany, so that many people of Germany came to have a feeling that they were "encircled" by all the peoples who surrounded them and that their government was justified, nay, was compelled, in taking the first opportunity to strike a blow. I do not say that those suspicions were equally justified. But this was the growing state of mind in Europe, as I could follow it, from time to time, during the fifteen years that preceded the war. I could see the war wave rising steadily in every one of those countries, in England and France as well as in Germany and Italy. It is a falsification of history and popular psychology to pretend that the world was and is divided between nations who want war and nations who want peace. No. There are in every country causes which make for war and causes which make for peace; and it is the highest duty of every government to its own nation and to humanity to take whatever means may be in the hands of political power to strengthen the elements of peace in every country and to minimize the dangers of war. Each country can do that by itself, within itself, and not for its neighbours. We in Canada cannot render either the German, English, Italian or Polish peoples more peaceful than they are; but perhaps we can do something to end here what was done during the war for the purposes of war. Perhaps we can do something to demilitarize or demobilize the minds and souls of the youth of Canada. Perhaps we can accomplish something to develop ideas of peace, to appeal to the highest ideals of humanity as well as to the most selfish interests of any class in this country by demonstrating to them that war is hell, as General Sherman described it, that it is destructive of every moral, social and political principle of order that makes up a nation.
I take the motion presented by the hon. member for Southeast Grey as offering to the government of Canada, responsible as it is for the welfare of the people at large1, an opportunity to help those forces of peace to work for the benefit of the future generations of this country. This generation will probably escape the next war, but if we do not take advantage of the present currents of thought in this country, as elsewhere, to strengthen the forces of peace, the next generation will be caught in the turmoil of war, just as the past generation was caught. Was there any sensible man living in the fall, let us say, of 
1913 in Canada, who imagined that this country would be drawn into the horrors of war within little more than six months? When both parties and all members of parliament appealed to their electors in the previous election, would any single one of them, no matter to what party he belonged, have dared appeal to the people and tell them that in the next parliament, without coming back to the people for a war mandate, they would squander the money of the people of Canada and shed the blood of the youth of Canada in torrents to wage war in Europe? Where is the man, be he Tory or Grit, French or English, who would have dared appeal to the people of Canada during the elections of 1911 upon a war policy? But thanks to the same kind of propaganda to which the right hon. the Prime Minister has referred in connection with the small incident at Chanak, war causes were so manipulated in this country, as well as in every country in Europe for the few months, not to say years, that preceded the war-for many years in Europe, and for several months in Canada-that when the time came, people did not know the real causes of the war, did not know the real causes of rivalry between the two great coalitions in Europe. They simply believed what they were told, and they gave their blood and their treasure-to what purpose? To help one set of nations in Europe get the better of another set, until the next time when the first set, or some new coalition, might have its chance again. That has been the story of Europe for the last four centuries, and so long as the governments in every country in the world do not devote themselves to the work of salvation which the hon. member for Southeast Grey advocates for Canada, it will be the same story over again. Are we going to preserve the' youth of this country from being drawn into the next war as happened to our youth in the last war? Shall we not now take the measures to arouse all the forces of education and enlightenment, and enlist the goodwill of all classes of people, so that when the next time comes, if the government of that day is peacefully disposed, as the Prime Minister is, it will be approved in its refusal to share in the war, or if it is disposed towards war, will be prevented from dragging Canada into the struggle?
The right hon. gentleman has spoken of the work accomplished by his own department. Well and good; but he will permit me, I trust, to tell him that no matter what department of external affairs he may have, no matter what may be the number of the representatives of Canada accredited to gov-

International Peace-Mr. Bourassa
ernments abroad, history should teach him that wars have been made by diplomats even more than by military men. Heaven knows I am anti-militaristic enough; but you must give the devil his due. I really believe that, some acting from a high sense of honour and others from a lower sense of selfishness, military men in the last century have been less responsible for wars and the horrors of war, in which they were mainly the executioners of politicians and diplomats, than those diplomats and politicians themselves. You may have ministers plenipotentiary accredited to all the countries of the world; but if you have not prepared your foreign policy in advance by the proper education of public opinion in your own country, then, when the next crisis comes, when the next time comes to stampede public opinion and the government of this country into a war, your ministers plenipotentiary will be war agenlts, just as some of tlhe ambassadors of Russia and France, of Germany and England were in the ten years which preceded the last war.
With regard to the distinction between war preparation and peace preparation, I must confess that I cannot stop at the point where the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre stopped this evening. Of course I understand his position. He wanted to remain within the precincts of the resolution; but if we are really sincere when we say that we are bent on peace, when we proclaim that we do not want to be dragged into wars in the future, we must here and now, as the right-thinking and the practical-acting pacifists are doing in every other country in the world, reverse the old Roman maxim, Si vis pacem, para bellum; and as Christians who believe in the God of peace, we must at last, after two thousand years of affronted Christianity, proclaim: Si vis pacem, para pacem. Governments should devote at least as much energy and as much propaganda to creating a public opinion in favour of peace as they do to winning an election upon this or that point of fiscal policy or upon the building of a particular branch line of railway. If we are really sincere in our proclamations of the love of peace, we must work for peace, we must organize for peace, and we must create the machinery to help the people who are working for peace.
In the matter of education, the right hon. gentleman has said, and quite properly, that the provincial governments would not like the federal government to impose-I do not think he used that word, but that was the effect -upon them a policy of peaceful education. But did this or any other government stop at the idea of helping provincial governments
in the matter, for instance, of road building? Did it ever stop at helping the provincial governments in promoting health? Health is essentially a matter relating to the person, a matter of concern to the municipal and provincial organizations; and yet we have carried on and are still carrying on propaganda for the maintenance of health, and we are helping the provincial governments in that regard. Why? Because this government is loaded with a national responsibility for the welfare of all the people of Canada. Well, if it is proper for this government to help provincial governments in keeping the people of the various provinces, who are the people of Canada at large, in good health, why should it be improper' for this government to help provincial governments in a propaganda for peace? It is not necessary that schools of peace be established; but if such a department as the hon. member for Southeast Grey suggests were established-not necessarily involving a new portfolio, because I think we are already afflicted with too many of them; I think the Prime Minister and all previous prime ministers have sometimes found the number of portfolios too great, though at certain times they have not enough; and if it were not for the fact that we have so many provinces we could divide the number of our ministers into two and perhaps govern this "huge" country better with six or eight ministers, which would be about the same as they have in the United States with their population of 120,000,000, -why could not the Prime Minister himself, with his peaceful disposition, and with his fine record in the diplomatic world and in inter-imperial relations since 1921, take advantage of the proposal of the hon. member for Southeast Grey and create within his own department a subdepartment for the promotion of peace? That in itself, if advertised to the world, and advertised to the British world first, would have that very effect upon the general tendency of the policies of the various British countries which the Prime Minister's attitude on the Chanak affair had in one single instance. Moreover, magnified as it would necessarily be by the megaphone of the English press, it would reach the League of Nations with a far more potential voice than the simple announcement of the adoption of any policy by our representative there.
Talking of matters of fiscal readjustment, for my part I have lauded, and I repeat my laudation,, the attitude taken by Senator Dandurand when, on the proposals prepared by Sir George Paish for the establishment of fiscal peace, he stated that the government of which he is a member was the first and the

International Peace-Mr. Bourassa
only one since the war that had worked towards the reduction of fiscal tariffs. Likewise, if the government of Canada could announce at the next meeting of the council of the league that it has established, under the direction of the Prime Minister of Canada, in the very department which has to deal with interimperial and external affairs, a special department having for its avowed object, proclaimed by the parliament of Canada, the education of our people in thoughts of peace, of purposes of peace, of policies of peace, it would go a much longer way than the remarks made by the right hon. gentleman that the Minister of Labour and the Minister of Trade and Commerce and the Minister of Agriculture are all peaceable men devoted to works of peace. Of course, everybody knows that. But this would be a new departure and a striking one. You may say that it would be only advertisement and bluff. But we have to take democracies as they are. In the old days, policies, especially international policies, were made by those few men selected from the classes that produced the diplomats of the old school. In those days any definite policy was transmitted from generation to generation, and it developed more or less scientifically in chancelleries and embassies behind closed doors. Now you have to take democracy as it is. It was pretended during the last war that Canada was called upon to shed the blood of five hundred thousand of her sons in order to save democracy. Now that you have made democracy safer than it was before, or otherwise, are you going to take it into your confidence? Are you going to lend the instrument of government to help the democracies of the world save themselves from the ventures imposed upon them by unscrupulous diplomats, by warmongers and by individuals who for the sake of increasing their dividends are prepared to cover the earth with blood, as was done in the last war? Therefore, either from the point of view of national interests or of our inter-British relations-I will not use the word interimperial, because when we talk about peace, the very words, imperial and imperialism, are hateful, and as a matter of fact are contrary to peace-I say, if in the development of our national spirit, in the development of our inter-British relations and in the development of our new-rising relations with the world, we want to make our mark, how can we do it? Shall it be by our great civilization? No; let .us be modest. Shall it be by the development of our artistic work, by the superiority of our literary genius? No; again I say, let us be modest. In this respect we are still at least fifty years behind the

country to the south of us and many centuries behind those great seats of civilization in Europe. But in our primary state of development-a young nation scarcely out of the cradle, but full of resolve to itself and to its future generations in its desire to help the cause of humanity at large-we can modestly but firmly demonstrate that in what we are doing we are working for peace.
The right hon. gentleman has referred to our peaceful relations with the great country to the south of us; and well he did. But I must confess that I am somewhat tired of that theme, for I have heard it so many times in the last fifty years. Why not now make something practical out of it? It has been demonstrated for over a century that a small nation, containing at present no greater population that the cities of New York and Chicago together, could live at peace with its neighbour to the south, the most powerful now of all nations on earth. The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre has put a very proper question to the Prime Minister. Does the Prime Minister believe that our relations with the United States would be what they are if they had not been absolutely disconnected with any war design or preparation? The question was absolutely accurate, and the answer is obvious. Your International Joint Commission, or any joint body of lawyers or diplomats or engineers, would never have accomplished anything between the two countries if the American government and the American people, with their pride and their democratic spirit of dominance, had thought: Here is a peaceful body, but behind it there is a single fort. The United States have ceased looking upon Canada with a feeling of enmity from the time they first found out that the British government and the British nation, as has been told repeatedly by some of their leading statesmen, would never spend a pound sterling to defend Canada from the United States, and that the people of Canada were courageous enough, as well as modest enough, to take the situation as it was and to deal with their American neighbours in the best manner possible. We have been able to deal fruitfully with the United States since we have demonstrated to the world that we will not and cannot fight against that nation.
Well now, is it not the natural outcome of that long standing lesson, a century old, that we should now tell the world that what we have done in the cause of peace on the North American continent we are prepared to do in maintaining the peace of the world, the pax mundi-first, through our association with

International Peace-Mr. Bourassa
other nations that commune with us in the same principles of government, in establishing peace between ourselves, in imposing, if necessary, a peaceful policy upon the warmongers of London, but also in imposing upon ourselves a peaceful policy in our relations with the rest of the world? It is there that I think my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre remained within the mark.
I have thought over these matters for many years; I have discussed them with some of the most enlightened and thoughtful men of Europe and America, and I have come now to this deep-seated conviction,-that the only manner in which Canada can assure its peace, as far as anything human can be assured, is by disarming totally and absolutely as against the world. There is no powerful country on earth that we could resist with such armed forces as we could muster unless we had help from the United States. I have been taken to task very often for having stated this view, but I may well shelter myself under the authority of every foreign secretary of the king of England for a century past. Every time I have been in London during the last twenty-six years I have interrogated some of the men who had upon their shoulders, or who had had in the past, or would have in the future, the responsibility of peace or war for that great nation; and every one of them without exception, Conservative, Liberal or Labour, has always told me:	"In regard to
the United States there is no change of policy in England; there cannot be; we must rely upon the Monroe doctrine for the preservation of what remains to us of British possessions in America. And far better for you Canadians to realize it."
Secondly, we should take advantage of that situation and proclaim to the world, at Geneva and elsewhere, that when we talk peace we mean peace, when we talk disarmament we are ready to disarm, and when we discuss arbitration we are prepared to arbitrate every time. Let us proclaim to the world that we are determined on every occasion to resort to peaceful arbitration on the principles of justice and equity. It may be contended that this has failed sometimes. Well, it may fail once in a while. But do you suppose that you will secure greater benefits from arbitration and run the risk of war to any less extent by talking peace and at the same time preparing for war, upon however small a scale? Why continue the childish policy of a defence too weak to protect Canada against any conceivable enemy and at the same time just strong enough to inculcate in the national mind, through cadet organizations and through
military training, a military spirit which will be ready to assert itself when the next war breaks out?
I respect the views of all sincere men. I respect the views of those who believe that Canada should participate in all wars in which the empire may be engaged. Such people are imperialists rather than Canadians, but I respect their views just the same. I even respect the views, illogical though they are, of those who style themselves as Canadians and hold that Canada should make herself a close partner in all the quarrels and all the ventures of England, just or unjust, as once was said in this house by the Right Hon. Mr. Fielding. As I say, I respect the opinions of all such people. At the same time I am bound to say I rely more upon the policy which enabled Canada to emerge from that half defined state in which she struggled for so many years previous to confederation-the safe policy that shaped the course of this Dominion in matters relating to Canada and Great Britain on the one hand and Canada and the United States on the other, the policy proclaimed by Macdonald and Cartier at the opening of confederation. And what was that policy? It was this: that for all practical purposes Canada was a neutral country. Some people are scandalised when we speak of Canada's neutrality. But this parliament has erected on the grounds on which this house stands a monument to one of the founders of confederation, D'Arcy McGee, whose motto or, to use a modern Americanism, whose slogan when he appealed to the people of Canada hon. gentlemen may remember. He opposed tooth and nail the militia bill presented in 1862 by the Cartier-Macdonald government, who were defeated on the issue. He said, "If we want to help Canada and the British Empire the only way by which we can do so is to proclaim our neutrality to the world and have it understood not only by British governments but by every foreign country as well." The same principle was propounded in Washington, two or three years ago by Mr. Johnson, the leader of the Labour party in Dublin. And it is the policy which eventually will be accepted.
I had the advantage of meeting in London last year some gentlemen who have much to do in influencing public opinion in England, and they are exceedingly anxious to have this idea generally accepted. Without having the impertinence to make the statement publicly, they desire that the dominions should proclaim their wish to stand neutral in every crisis in which their territory is not directly attacked. By this means not only would there


Henry Herbert Stevens: Mr. Speaker, in the brief time remaining I should like to say a few words on the resolution now before the house. I have been in my seat since three o'clock listening to every word uttered on this subject; I listened with a great deal of interest to the mover of the resolution (Miss Macphail), and as she and those who immediately followed her proceeded to unfold their views, I found myself almost entirely in harmony with what they said. With some details, some observations, perhaps I could not exactly agree, but with the spirit which actuated the speech of the hon. member and those who immediately followed her I found myself in comparative

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harmony. So far as the resolution is concerned I see no great objection to it. Perhaps only one part of it might be called into question, and that is the practical side, the question of the actual establishment of such a department of government. That feature might be discussed, but as to the motive behind the resolution there can be no difference of opinion.
My hon. friend who has just taken his seat (Mr. Bourassa) and who in a three-quarters of an hour address made a most impassioned plea, suggested toward the close of his remarks that he had persuaded himself that he alone was standing against an embattled world, including everyone around him, with perhaps one or two exceptions, resisting some attempt to turn Canada into a gory monster looking for war. I think my hon. friend intoxicates himself with the intensity of his feelings. Of course one must admire his eloquence, but frankly, as far as the question of peace is concerned-peace in this house, in this country and in the world as a whole-I think his contribution was not remarkable for its peaceful nature. I ask him and this house most seriously to consider this fact. Twice during his address of three-quarters of an hour-


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Forty minutes.


Henry Herbert Stevens: No, three-quarters of an
hour. Twice in that length of time he indicated that the last war was preceded by months of careful propaganda as far as Canada was concerned; by years of such work in the ease of England1, and by many, many years in the case of other European countries In language which could not be mistaken he indicated that those in control of affairs in England and in Canada were responsible for taking 500,000 of Canada's sons and placing them at the disposal of warring powers in Europe. He added these words, "the warmongers of London." Did the hon. member do even fair justice to the then leaders of the British government, the late Lord Oxford and Asquith, the Prime Minister; to Sir Edward Grey, now Earl Grey, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs; to Sir Robert Borden, the leader of the Canadian government, or to the late Sir Wilfrid Laurier? 1 well recall the session of seven days in August, 1914, when the members of parliament of Canada were called to Ottawa, meeting not in this chamber but in the old chamber on the site of the present building. In his quiet, dignified and cultured manner, and obviously moved to the depths of his heart, Sir Robert Borden presented to the house the facts behind the action taken by his government. I 56103-110
recall the late Sir Wilfrid Laurier, that venerable figure, rising in his place on this side of the house. Who will say that either of those two gentlemen were warmongers?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Mr. Speaker, I must
protest-


Henry Herbert Stevens: Will my hon. friend allow me to finish? Who will justify the contention that either of those great leaders or the leaders to whom I have referred in England willed the war? No one will say it.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I rise to a point of order. No hon. gentleman has the right to put in my mouth statements or sentiments which were not at all in my mind, and to which I did not give expression. I did not make the slightest connection between the word "warmonger" and any of the leaders of any country, including Canada. I said that governments were carried away and stampeded-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Surely my hon. friend
does not wish to make another speech.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I wish to prevent any
hon. gentleman from falsifying my statements.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I am not going to
occupy my time protesting against that interjection. I simply asked this house to consider carefully whether any man, I care not who he is, is justified in casting aspersions upon the leaders of Great Britain and the leaders of Canada. After all, it is the leaders of the country who lead, and my hon. friend repeatedly said that they were led into this and they were led into that, and that the result of the leading was the sacrifice of 500,000 of Canada's sons.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: That is right.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The hon. member says
that is right. I ask again, is it a contribution to the spirit of peace to pillory these men, the great men of our own country and of Great Britain, men who stand among the greatest in the world? Knowing them as I do and as hon. gentlemen opposite know them, I cannot see how anything can be said but that they were men who willed peace and not war. I shall not follow the remarks of the hon. gentleman further.
I also regret the latter part of the address of the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King), although with the major portion of his remarks I am heartily in accord. I found myself, as I think others around me found themselves, desirous of according to the right hon. gentleman that meed of credit and

1724	COMMONS
International Peace-Mr. Stevens
praise which a courageous and frank statement deserves. But my right hon. friend spoiled it all by two references in the latter part of his speech, in the first of which he introduced a matter which I think had been better left out of this discussion. Until that time I think we all had been earnestly seeking to find some formula, if I may use the word, through which Canada could express to the world in a sensible and proper way its peaceful desires. Then the Prime Minister introduced, as an illustration of his position, the question of the appointment of Canadian ministers in Tokyo and Paris. That places us at a disadvantage; we are unable to debate that question here, although we intend to debate it later. There are phases of that question which offer room for marked differences of opinion, and I am sorry indeed that it was introduced at all.
I was even more sorry when the Prime Minister raised that controversial question of the Turkish crisis of 1922. He read despatches from British papers, quoting the words of Bonar Law and Lord Asquith, and I think there could have been no other object than to attract to himself in relation to this incident the notice of the world-years later, when we are far removed from the incident and safely past it-and to show that it was he and his decision alone that prevented the outbreak of a new European war. Again that is a subject which might be open to controversy, but I do not wish to enter into a discussion of these subjects to-night.
With the exception of those two references and some of the statements made by the hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa), I find myself very largely in accord with what has been said. However, I wish to say a word or two with regard to some of the suggestions which have been made, particularly looking to the practical side of the question. Eor instance, a good deal of emphasis has been laid upon the desirability of establishing some method or setting up some machinery for educating the people of Canada. The hon. member for Labelle, the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, the hon. member for Southeast Grey and others, have laid stress on that point. But I notice that all this emphasizes the fact that public opinion is opposed to war and prone to peace, and would stand by the principles of peace if it were not led astray by its leaders. Now there is no need, to my mind, of educating the people of Canada to peace. We are a peace-loving people to-day. The hon. member for Labelle did give utterance to one very obvious truth, and it was this:	What public man
could go before the people of Canada and
fMr. S'evens.l
make an appeal on war policy? He would get no support; that is obvious. The people of Canada need no educating in the desirability of peace. And so I would point out that it is not so much the expenditure of public money to educate the people to a sentiment of peace that is required; it is an intelligent direction of our affairs along peaceful lines. The question arises, are we doing that? I rather compliment the Prime Minister upon a large portion of his remarks directed to this end. We have, as a nation, unquestionably directed the general trend of our public administration along peaceful lines. The very fact that for a hundred years we have lived in absolute peace with our neighbours to the south is without doubt one ofthe outstanding illustrations to modern civilization of how two nations can live at peace. Furthermore, to carry on Canada's century-old national trend to deal with international affairs by a process of arbitration is undoubtedly an expression of the genius of the people of this country.
Another suggestion was made that Canada should disarm. I want to call the attention of hon. members .to the fact that Canada is not now armed in the sense that a nation is armed. We ought to keep that clearly in our minds. It is obvious to one who gives a moment's thought to it that we have no armament. On neither of our shores have we any batteries of artillery. We have a couple of small ships that serve for little'more than coastguard vessels; I doubt if they can effectively carry out that purpose. Our forces are insignifioant. But we must also bear in mind that just so long as there are people in the community who will resist the law, any government-it matters not what government it is or what its stripe may be-must have some arm or force or power, call it police force if you like, to enforce its laws. Whether that is done by a police force or with the support of a very moderate militia establishment does not make very much difference, but you must have some support of that character. I will deal in a moment with the theoretical side of the question.
The hon. member for AVinnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) suggested that we should promote an exchange of students. I direct the attention of the house to the fact that we are carrying on that work now, and carrying it on very effectively. Canada does exchange students with France and with Great Britain-I do not know whether we do so with other countries, but we certainly do with those two-and in that respect we are carrying on a very useful work.

Report oj Civil Service Councils
The hon. member pointed out that science and art had overleaped, as he said, international boundaries and' were themselves international. Certainly they are-so is commerce and so is finance. It is because of the establishment of a growing confidence between nation and nation that these things are becoming more and more international rather than matters limited and peculiar to various nations. And so the great cause of peace, if you like to call it that, is progressing. Progressing how? Progressing along lines established by commerce, by art, by science, and I hope and trust-in fact I am sure-by a moral sense of responsibility, among nations, and among men, which is underlying it all.
It seems to me that we have lost sight of one thought:	Peace will never be brought
about by propaganda. Take the member for Labelle-and I am sorry that he has left his seat. It would be a considerable time before he and I couldi agree upon some line of propaganda for a peace society or a peace department for Canada. I submit that it is an impracticable thing. I could not agree with his premises; he would not agree with mine. It is not so much a question of education or propaganda. Peace is based upon a will for peace, just as war comes out df a will for war. This country is not saturated or impregnated with a desire for or rather a will for war. Our people of all classes have absolutely the will for peace, and as long as we can give expression to that in our legislation, in our administration, in our public sentiment, so long shall we promote the cause of peace.
One other thought, sir, and then I take my seat. You will never bring about peace- and I say this with the greatest of sincerity and with the utmost reverence, not in any sense for the sake of show but rather from a deep conviction of its truth-you will never get peace in this world by philosophical dissertations about it, by propaganda. There is only one method I know of and that is by promoting the principles of the Prince of Peace; that is the way in which peace will be brought to the world. And while undoubtedly we are very often guilty of a disregard of these great and sacred principles, I find there is a great conflict in my own mind, and I know there is in the mind and the heart of almost every man and woman I meet, in endeavouring to reconcile these principles of peace with the problems of everyday life. It is very easy and veiy simple to give utterance to platitudinous arguments and expressions about peace, but it is a very different thing to harmonize these ideas with one's
56103- -110i
duty day by day in the administration of public affairs or even in the direction of one's private life.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Tuesday, March 27, 1928