1936-06-19

[Stage Direction]
Mr. A. E. MacLEAN (Prince) moved that the recommendations contained in the first report of the joint committee of both houses on the printing of parliament, presented to the house on Wednesday, June 17, be concurred in.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Minister of Justice) moved1 the second reading of Bill No. 96, to amend the criminal code.
He said: I intend to discuss this bill on the second reading because of the principle involved in its main provision, namely, the repeal of section 98 of the criminal code. The repeal of that section was in the platforms of all the political parties during the recent election campaign, except the one led by my right hon: friend the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett).
Mr. BENNETT:: Except the one that got the fewest votes.


Mr. LAPOINTE (Quebec East):: This in itself is an indication of what the public feeling was with regard to this statute. If the vote is analyzed it is obvious that the repeal of that section has been recommended by a tremendous majority of the electorate of Canada, all those who elected members of parliament that do not sit as supporters of my right hon. friend. It was an issue everywhere. In my own province the candidates supporting the then government made it the main topic of their campaign. As a matter of fact, my right hon. leader (Mr. Mackenzie King) and myself were represented as friends of the disorderly elements in Canada, and cartoons were profusely distributed, some of which I even showed to the house in the debate on the address. The repeal of section 98, I may add, was one of the planks of the Liberal party's platform, one of the fourteen points, and this is another instance of the redeeming of a pledge, which has given birth to the present bill.
May I first give to the house a brief history of this enactment. During the war, in Canada as well as in other countries engaged in the struggle, there were, under war measures acts here and' elsewhere, special rules, special regulations and special orders which were in themselves infringements of the liberty of the citizen. I do not complain about that, because in times of war such measures have to be

3898	COMMONS
Criminal Code-Mr. Lapointe (Quebec East)
resorted to. But it must be done in such a way as to safeguard the liberties and the rights of private citizens. At all events, after the war was over, these enactments disappeared from the administration of other countries, but they were replaced in Canada in 1919 in section 98 of the criminal code. Hon. members will recall an agitation in Britain about that famous war time act called Dora-Defence of the Realm Act-which was finally repealed. The same thing happened everywhere. I call attention to some of the provisions of order in council P.C. 2384 of the Dominion of Canada, enacted under the War Measures Act.


Mr. CAHAN:: Of what date, please?


Ernest Lapointe: This one is dated September 25, 1918. In this order in council the provisions of section 98 are recited almost word for word, but always with this qualification at the end of every section of the order, "while Canada is engaged in war." You find that in section (b) of the order in council, which speaks of associations or organizations the purpose of which is to bring about any governmental, political, industrial or economic change-almost identical with the phraseology of section 98, but with these additional words: "while Canada is engaged in war." You find the same thing in section 3-"any person who, while Canada is engaged in war, shall act or profess to act as an officer of any such unlawful association." Section 4 says that anyone who has "at any time since the beginning of the present war been a member," and so forth; and if it be proved that since the beginning of the war he "attended meetings of an unlawful association" and so forth. Then section 6 refers to anyone who knowingly permits a meeting in his building, and so forth. These are virtually the same provisions as are included in section 98, with the addition of clauses for the purpose of reaching those in Canada who would impede the success of the war or refuse to obey the military laws of Canada during the war, and things of that kind, which seem to have been put in the order for the purpose of getting at those who refused to submit to military service or to conscription. These of course have disappeared. The order in council was for two purposes, for military service and for the purpose mentioned in the present section 98.
In 1919, after the war, following the troubles that occurred in Winnipeg, the government of the day appointed a parliamentary committee to consider amendments to the criminal code, and that parliamentary committee brought in the report upon which section 98 was based. It has even been stated that this was unanimous. The former minister of justice,
[Mr. E. Lapointe.)
in the debate in this house in 1933, said that the report had been adopted by a majority of one. He even stated then that I was one of that majority, which was absolutely wrong, because I was not even a member of the committee. The late Hon. Charles Murphy was a member of that committee, and when the question was discussed in the House of Commons he spoke as follows-his words are in Hansard of 1919, page 3291:
There was in the committee a very sharp division of opinion as to the necessity of amending the criminal code, and there was a further division of opinion whether, in the event of the committee being of opinion that the criminal code with reference to sedition and seditious propaganda should be amended -in view of the numerous strikes and the general unrest throughout the country-this was the proper time to make such a report to the house and to induce a discussion of matters that would inevitably be discussed by reason of that report and of any action that might follow the introduction of that report. It was on the latter ground principally- coupled with the fact that an opinion prevailed that the present criminal code was ample to cover the class of cases to which the attention of the committee was directed 

that a portion of the committee, including myself, shared the view that this was not the proper time to introduce such a report as that, the adoption of which has now been moved hy the Solicitor General.
However, section 98 was then enacted. Since then continuous attempts have been made for the repeal of that section. It is suggested occasionally, and it was suggested in the debate of 1933, that these applications come from disorderly elements. May I say that they come from all classes of the community, and more particularly from organized labour in Canada. The Trades and Labour Congress of Canada at every annual meeting has passed a resolution asking for the repeal of this section. While I was minister of the former government, whenever a delegation of the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada met the government of the day, the request was urgently pressed that section 98 should be repealed. All the railway brotherhoods, such as the engineers and conductors, have been asking the same thing. No one was more persevering in that demand and more eloquent in presenting it than Mr. Tom Moore, who was then president of the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada. Mr. Moore has, I believe, the confidence of everybody in Canada, including my right hon. friend and other hon. gentlemen opposite, who never missed an opportunity to appoint him to a responsible position where labour or social workers should be represented. I have myself presented to the house on four or five occasions a bill for the repeal of this section.

Criminal Code-Mr. Lapointe (Quebec East)
On two occasions the bills passed this house unanimously, and on the other occasions the debates were mild as regards the way they were conducted; but the bills were rejected by the other house.
What are the reasons for the repeal of section 98? First, we believe it is dangerous to perpetuate in peace time enactments which are war time measures and designed to meet special emergencies due to some extent to the natural panic which exists in time of war. The danger is mainly because of the precedent which'it creates. If it can be done, if we can put aside the ordinary rules of law on a matter of this kind, why not put them aside on other matters as well? And this creates a precedent that might be harmful under other circumstances. There are things in that section which are not susceptible of defence. To say that the police may authorize any private citizen, on mere suspicion, to search my home or the home of anyone in Canada because they suspect they may find literature which is objectionable, is contrary to all principles of law the world over. It is mere suspicion. I think everyone will agree that the separation of powers is a necessary guarantee in the administration of justice. It is not right that the police, who are entrusted with the duty of carrying into execution the orders of the court, should become the court itself. The police are clothed with some judicial powers when they are permitted to authorize any private citizen to search premises for the purpose of finding literature. This cannot be defended.
This has given rise to many incidents which certainly cannot be considered as fair. In western Canada during the war under the provisions of a similar order in council people of foreign language saw their bibles confiscated because they were printed in a language which the police could not understand.


Mr. HEAPS:: And bibles in the English
language were confiscated also.


Ernest Lapointe: I did not know that, but it makes the matter so much worse. A man was arrested because he had in his possession a copy of Plato's Republic. In the United States, under a similar provision, a man was arrested because he had in his possession some literature that happened to have been written by Thomas Jefferson, who was one of the authors of the declaration of independence and later president of the United States. When the man told that to the officer who arrested him the officer replied, "Well, we will take care of you now and we will get that man Jefferson afterwards."
This shows the objection there is to a change of this kind in our legal system with regard to crimes. During the debate in 1933 I charged that this invasion of private homes had taken place during the course of that debate, and the then Minister of Justice agreed, but said it had happened only once. Well, once is too often; it should not have happened at all. If the provision was taken advantage of only once surely that is an additional reason for striking it out of the statute.
May I refer also to the presumption of guilt which appears here. A man is seen at a meeting of one of these so-called illegal associations, and he is presumed guilty. If he does not prove that he is not guilty he is liable to be sentenced to gaol for twenty years, and apart from that there are other objectionable features. It is prohibited, under possible penalty of twenty years, to import any book in which there may be something which defends revolution. Some people were afraid that the reading of a book in which the war of independence between England and the United States was justified would render them liable to imprisonment for twenty years under this section. I took the trouble to look up the legislation of a great many countries, and I did not find in any country provision for imprisonment for such a long period. Even under the war order in council the maximum penalty was five years, but because of that panic in 1919 a man who merely had a book in his possession might be sent to gaol for twenty years.
There is no sense of proportion in an enactment of this kind. I showed that provision to an eminent professor of law of the university of Paris only two months ago. He said to me, "This is a blot on the statutes of any land," and it is. We have said that we must protect ourselves against disorderly elements. I repeat what I have said many times before: We have in the criminal code, which is based on the common law of England, all the provisions which make English law and British justice sufficient to meet all emergencies. The common law relating to sedition is already in our criminal code and always has been. Section 133 says:
133. Seditious words are words expressive of a seditious intention.
2.	A seditious libel is a libel expressive of a seditious intention.
3.	A seditious conspiracy is an agreement between two or more persons to carry into execution a seditious intention.
Then section 134 states:
Everyone is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term of not more than twenty years-
3900	COMMONS
Criminal Code-Mr. Lapointe (Quebec East)
That is the same as in England.
-who speaks any seditious words or publishes any seditious libel or is a party to any seditious conspiracy.
This crime of sedation has 'been discussed in Great Britain on many, many occasions. The commissioners who wrote the English draft code inserted a definition of some kind as to what constitutes sedition and what constitutes seditious words or seditious intentions. But after prolonged debate in the British .parliament it was decided* that it would be better to keep the word "sedition" not defined expressly but rather left there to meet all occasions and to apply to all cases where order is disturbed* or where there may be danger in the land. When our own criminal code was enacted the same debate took place. There were some who wanted to define the offence of sedition more specifically but the parliament of Canada of that time, in its judgment, thought it better to follow the English practice and to remain with the common law operation in that regard.
May I read what constitutes sedition in the English and Empire Digest, 15th volume, at page 633:
An intention to excite ill-will between different classes of Her Majesty's subjects may be seditious intention; whether or not it is so in any particular case must be decided upon by the jury after taking into consideration all the circumstances of the case. Sedition embraces everything, whether by word, deed, or writing, which is calculated to disturb the tranquillity of the state, and lead ignorant persons to subvert the government and laws of the empire.
Where in a prosecution for uttering seditious words with intent to incite to riot, it is proved that previously to the happening of a riot, seditious words were spoken, it is a question for the jury whether or not such rioting was directly or indirectly attributable to the seditious words proved to have been spoken.
A meeting lawfully convened may become an unlawful meeting if during its course seditious words are spoken of such a nature as to produce a breach of the peace, and those who do anything to assist the speakers in producing upon the audience the natural effect of their words will be guilty of uttering seditious words as well as those who spoke the words.
Then at page 634:
Held:	guilty of sedition and unlawful
assembly; a speech urging the people to form themselves into unlawful associations, and inciting the insurrection, unlawful assemblies, breaches of the peace, and the forcible obstruction of the execution of the law is seditious, the circumstances of the time being such that the public peace is likely to be thereby endangered. A meeting convened to hear such a speech is an unlawful assembly so far as those are concerned who are parties to calling it or attending it for that purpose.


Richard Bedford Bennett: What court was that?
fMr. E. Lapointe.]


Ernest Lapointe: This is the King v. Jones (1848), 6 State Transactions, N.S., 783. But it is the same thing throughout the history of criminal law in England. There is a multiplicity of decisions to the same effect. In Halsbury's Laws of England, second edition, volume 9, sedition is defined at page 302:
Sedition is a misdemeanour at common law consisting of acts done, words spoken and published, or writings capable of being a libel published, in each case with a seditious intention.
Where the words are oral the offence is called the speaking of seditious words; where the words are written, the offence is called the publication of seditious libel; where two or more combine for the furtherance of a seditious intention the offence is called seditious conspiracy.
At page 303:
Every person is guilty of the common law misdemeanour of speaking seditious words-
And this applies to us.

who speaks and published words with a seditious intention.
Every person is guilty of the common law misdeameanour of seditious libel who publishes matter contained in anything capable of being a libel, with a seditious intention.
There the punishment is fixed at not exceeding two years. What I find in those decisions is rather that in Great Britain it has to be something constituting an overt act, not merely an opinion which people might hold. It is not until it is transformed into an overt act which might be dangerous to the peace of the state that it becomes an offence. The principle in that regard cannot be better expressed than in the words of Thomas Erskine in his celebrated speech on the trial of Thomas Paine. He said:
His opinions were adverse to our system- but I maintain that opinion is free, and that conduct alone is amenable to the law.
May I also quote what Macaulay said in his Essays on Hallam:
To punish a man because he has committed a crime, or because he is believed, though unjustly, to have committed a crime, is not persecution. To punish a man because we infer from the nature of some doctrine which lie holds, or from the conduct of other persons who hold the same doctrines with him, that he will commit a crime, is persecution, and is, in every case, foolish and wicked.
I wish I had with me the words of a court in India where seventy people were convicted for seditious conspiracy. The chief justice took the pains to say:
These men are not punished for their opinions; the are punished for the deeds and the actions which they committed.
Coming back to Great Britain, the only exception, if it is an exception, was in 1934

Criminal Code-Mr. Lapointe (Quebec East)
when a special act was passed called the Incitement to Disaffection Act. This applied only to propaganda to seduce members of His Majesty's forces from their duty or allegiance to His Majesty. It was specially provided therein that the possession of any document could not be held as a presumption of guilt. The crown or the prosecution had to establish the guilt of the accused persons. And yet this apparently inoffensive legislation was challenged in the House of Commons and even in the House of Lords during the session of 1934, and anyone who wishes to consult the debates of the British parliament will find that no question was so extensively discussed as this one. There was strong opposition to anything which was a change from ordinary laws, for instance with regard to search warrants, although there was nothing there which could be compared to section 98. Nobody could be authorized merely by the police to go and search the home, but it was then stated that it was the thin end of the wedge and against all principles of British justice that this should be done. I mention that just to show how strong the feeling is in Great Britain with regard to the liberties of the subject.
May I say here and now why I propose to add a few words to section 133. I do not think they are necessary, but it is merely to make it clearer that nobody can by words or writing preach the use of force to bring about governmental changes. I do it because in some of the judgments the courts seem to have required that it must be proved that the words or the teachings were strong enough to lead to disturbance of order and trouble. This is merely to make it absolutely clear that nobody should be allowed to teach the use of force to bring about change of government in Canada.
I have said that war regulations should not be converted into peace statutes. The order in council which I have quoted shows that the liberties of the citizens were infringed. In time of war this has to be done, but to do it in time of peace is a precedent which should not be created. Liberty is like the air; we appreciate its value more when we are deprived of it. To govern is to foresee. After all it is possible that there may come a government with views and ideals different from those entertained by hon. members opposite and by myself, and they could use the precedent so created to prevent the freedom of the people in other directions. I remember reading two years ago about a prominent socialist in the British parliament who sat on the extreme left of the movement -as a matter of fact he was expelled afterwards from the labour unions-who said he was in favour of the then very restrictive orders in council prompted by the government because they would be precedents to be used by a socialist government in England for the purpose of doing away with the supremacy of parliament. Precedents are dangerous, and if this thing could be done in the present instance, surely other governments could use the same methods in other instances. The citizens of Canada and those of Great Britain have the right to be free in their own homes. It has been stated often that an Englishman's home is his castle; even the king cannot enter there without due process of law. This condition must be preserved in Canada as well as in England.
I come now to another phase of the matter. Those who hold the views I hold on this question have been and are being charged with friendship towards the communistic element. I am not a friend of the communists, and those who say that know I am not. I abhor, I hate the teachings and ideals of communism. But I want to fight them in a successful way, and I believe the way to fight them successfully is by argument, by attempting to have social justice everywhere and sound policies of administration. In 1934 I had the honour of being invited to take part in an anti-communistic campaign in Montreal. Obviously those who were in charge of the social work had a little more confidence in me than some of my opponents seem to have. On that occasion I used this language, which I shall translate:
To ensure our political stability as well as our economic stability, to victoriously repel the attacks of the trouble makers we must rely not so much on the criminal code, the officers of justice and the gaols as upon the personal dignity, the individual effort and the social cooperation which are the substance and soul of a free nation. The adepts of the strong manner to the contrary notwithstanding ideas, whether they are good or bad, cannot be killed with guns or machine guns. There must be an enlightened acceptation of the changes to make and the reforms to accomplish to take away the weapons which certain abuses and certain mistakes have placed in the hands of the enemies of order.
The Reverend Father Levesque, one of the most energetic social workers in Canada, spoke at the same meeting as follows:
Indeed it is good, even necessary, to attack communism in the front line by unmasking its errors, stigmatizing its vices and unveiling its nefarious consequences. But far more sure is the old strategy which endeavours to block the progress of an evil, to suppress the causes which determine the birth of that evil and finally its development. Communism was born of the misery of the people, and if our people sink in misery we cannot prevent
3902	COMMONS
Criminal Code-Mr. Lapointe (Quebec East)
them from turning towards the apostles of Moscow, as though they were saviours. Thence the necessity of just and fair social reforms.
Sir, peace, prosperity, decent living conditions and religious and moral ideals will fight communism or wrong ideals with a greater degree of success than -will concentration camps, arbitrary imprisonment and oppressive laws. A few days ago I was reading these words of an American university president:
No radical has ever been made in the United States by radical propaganda. The people who make radicals here are those who refuse to recognize the reality of change.
May I add that perhaps we are at fault in that regard, too, and that conditions which permit a small group of men to get together with a little sum of money, which with the help of privileges and of protective laws and insufficient social legislation became $15,000,000 after a few years, are productive of communism. Communism cannot implant itself in a country like Canada unless we refuse to give to our institutions a spirit of social economy and political justice. The Canadian labourer is not a communist. If he is given the choice he will always choose free labour, with a prospect of gain and his freedom, rather than being part of a huge mass where neither he nor his labour is free.
May I ask any fair-minded man in Canada whether section 98 has prevented any person from being a communist? I have been told there are some who claim they are communists because of section 98. But there is one ipatent fact: A man named Tim Buck was sent to gaol because of a breach of section 98. The government which enacted the legislation was responsible for his release after he had served only half his term. The first thing he did upon release was to hold meetings in Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa challenging any person to arrest him again and saying that he would' continue the fight. What good did that do? As a matter of fact he ran for parliament. Did section 98 prevent communist candidates from appearing against other candidates in the last election? If the section is useless, why keep it? Laws that are not favoured by public opinion do not achieve any good, and as an instance of that I would refer to the late prohibition laws in- some of the provinces. I never found as much antagonism on the part of Canadians to that legislation as I did when two years ago I took part in a debate at the University of Toronto conducted along parliamentary lines. The debaters were divided, as Conservatives and Liberals, and of course there were men who belonged to the communist, fabian and fascist groups. At the
[Mr. E. Lapoinfe.l
opening of the debate they were considered to be on my side. I was conducting the debate for Liberalism, with two young university students, and there were three university boys on the other side attacking Liberalism. One of my partners unfortunately said something that did not please my partners behind me who were not straight Liberals, and they rose and crossed the floor to the other side. I had to exert myself to get them back in order that we should have a majority vote, and we did have a majority in the end, but what struck me was the discussion on section 98, and the interest that all the university men there took in that provision. Nobody excused it. The Conservative debaters tried to fasten it on the Liberals and claimed that we were responsible for it, and1 I think it was so everywhere. How can you keep on the statutes a provision which is friendly to nobody and which everybody repudiates?
May I also call attention to this fact. Why should there be talk only of communists when it comes to this question? The fascists, the nazis in Germany, are just as violent when it comes to change of government as the communists. There is no question of that. Let me tell you, Mr. Speaker, that I am not in favour of the German or the Italian concentration camps any more than I am in favour of the Russian ones. They are all bad' when it comes -to preventing people from expressing their views. In those countries criticism of the head of the government is treason. Well, I would not like to have those conditions in Canada, and I think that we have in the criminal code, under the sedition sections, quite enough to meet the fascists and the nazis as well as the communists; for I include them all in my reprobation.
May I call attention, Mr. Speaker, to some who who do not like section 98? May I tell them they are also included in the hate of some people who -are the protagonists of the strong methods. At the present time in the city of Detroit there is a new order called the Black Legion, which wants to have its ideas prevail by force -everywhere, even to the extent of killing people, if necessary, and they want to do it not only to the communists but to the Catholics and the Jews as well. No, Mr. Speaker, liberty is the theory and the doctrine on which our nation has been based and predicated, and we must not do anything that will remove any guarantees we have that our citizens will not be subjected to any prosecution without the ordinary and due British process of law.

Criminal Code-Mr. Woodsworth
Benjamin Franklin said once, and I agree with this idea, that those who are ready to sacrifice liberty for the purpose of achieving some temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. British justice, which holds every man innocent until he is proved guilty, is the surest safeguard against excesses, whether coming from communists or fascists, or an arbitrary dictatorship, whether from the left or from the right. We submit this legislation, Mr. Speaker, not 'because we sympathize with the revolutionaries but because we love and desire to protect the law abiding and the truth seeking citizens of this country.


Mr. J. S. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, as many members of this house know, this is a matter in w-hich I have been for many years very keenly interested, and I must congratulate the government on having introduced a measure providing for the repeal of section 98 of the criminal code. I think perhaps I most admire the Liberals when they are pleading for political liberty; on those occasions they show themselves to the very best advantage.
Section 98 has been used particularly against the communists in Canada. Perhaps it is not necessary for me to say that I am not a member of the communist party, and that I do not agree with many of its principles and methods, but I do not believe in putting my political opponents in gaol. I do not believe in depriving any section of the community of their rights as Canadian citizens.
The outstanding case, as the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) has said, in which this legislation was used, was that of the communists wrho were tried in Ontario. An appeal was taken, which was argued on February 13 and 14, 1932. The unanimous judgment of the court, upholding the conviction charges under section 98 of the criminal code, was delivered on February 19. The first part of the judgment deals with the legal argument advanced on the appeal as to the sufficiency of the indictment, and it then proceeds to deal with the evidence as follows-I quote one paragraph:
The evidence proves that the communist party of Canada is a member of the Communist International of Russia and that instead of determining its own policies, purposes, teachings and aims, it adopted and adopts those of the Communist International, and, therefore. whatever are the policies, purposes, teachings and aims of the Communist International are also automatically those of the communist party of Canada.
I think it should be clearly recognized, as it has not been clearly recognized by the majority, that the communists in Toronto
were not accused and were not convicted of any overt act of violence, nor were they accused or convicted of advocating violence. They were accused and convicted simply of belonging to a certain political organization, which was affiliated with an organization in Russia which did under certain circumstances advocate violence. That does not seem to be in harmony with the rights of the subject here in Canada. If mere affiliation is to be the basis, I wondered the other day when I read an advertisement in the Montreal Gazette of June 13, 1936, whether some other organizations might not be brought into this category. Here is an advertisement reading, Trips to the Soviet Union. Canadian Pacific, general representatives of Intourist, Inc. in Canada. I am not a lawyer but I am inclined to think that if the Canadian Pacific Railway Company had a less prominent position in Canada it might under this legislation be very well charged with being in affiliation with the Intourist agency of Russia which in turn is a recognized agency of the soviet government. That is the kind of argument that was used in Ontario with regard to the communists.
But the effect of this kind of legislation does not stop here. I hold in my hand a pamphlet entitled Communism in Canada, by Superintendent F. J. Mead, reprinted by the anti-Communist League of Canada, Flinflon, Manitoba, with the permission of Major General Sir J. H. MacBrien, of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. I should like to know under what authority Major General Sir J. H. MacBrien permits-let me repeat that, permits-the publication of certain documents. And this document was used as campaign literature in the recent election in Manitoba. I was in Flinflon, and I may say that the whole community there is controlled by an American company, the manager of which is not a Canadian citizen; although he has been resident in Canada for some years he has never yet taken out Canadian citizenship, and yet on occasion he has presumed to say whether or not candidates for election to the dominion parliament shall or shall not hold meetings in that community. And we have this kind of literature published because presumably communism is an illegal organization in Canada

I take it the Ontario court judgment makes it illegal.
Think of the situation that results. As the Minister of Justice points out, it is nothing less than farcical. Communists belonging to an illegal organization have been running as candidates for parliament, as my hon. friend from Winnipeg North (Mr. Heaps) and my hon. friend from Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis) know very well.
3904	COMMONS
Criminal Code-Mr. Woodsworth


An hon. MEMBER:: And lota of others.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, and lots of others all over the country. It is ridiculous that men should be declared criminals, that the communist party should be declared an illegal organization, and yet the government should permit them to run as candidates for parliament, openly to conduct a paper which can be found in the files of this library, and to hold meetings throughout the country. I say it is a farcical situation. I submit that if the communist party is illegal, then its papers, speeches and all that kind of thing should be considered illegal. But I venture to say that the government dare not press that point to its logical conclusion.
Let me give another instance of what this involves in practice. This came under my notice a few months ago. There was a small book shop in Montreal conducted by a Mr. Feigelman.


Mr. VIEN:: The address?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I have his personal address but that is immaterial; it is Montreal. He and his sister conducted this little book stall. He himself was an art student. On January 15, 1934, the police raided his shop under orders from Chief Louis Jargaille. His sister was in the shop. He states that quantities of books, magazines and newspapers were seized by the constables. When asked the reason, Constable Forget replied: "We are seizing all seditious literature under section 98 of the criminal code." The process of confiscation proceeded and copies of E. P. Oppen-heim's books were seized. When asked why the latter were being taken one of the constables replied, "I don't read." This man and his sister appeared in court on January 16. Several other news dealers were arrested. They pleaded guilty under section 98 and were released on suspended sentence. This particular man Feigelman seemed to be more honest than the rest and he pleaded not guilty. He was expelled from the art school which he had been attending, and for a period between January 20 and October 17 he and his sister went through the monotonous procedure of frequently appearing in court, .being compelled to close their shop for half days. At each appearance they pleaded not guilty and in each instance were remanded. The trial finally took place in the fall session of the king's bench, Mr. Justice Loranger being the judge.


An hon. MEMBER:: A queer way of pronouncing these names.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, the pronunciation is bad; I quite recognize that. The result was that Feigelman was sentenced to one month in gaol, his sister being given

suspended sentence. I should like to read a few sentences from the charge of Mr. Justice Loranger to the jury:
We are here in Canada, inhabiting a Christian country, and we have been brought up in that way, and we have no need of those doctrines which are godless, such as communism and all such doctrines, which are spread before our youth, before our young men and girls.
Again:
I read in one of the papers which have been filed here. La Vie Ouvrier, just one sentence which I will translate:
"We must follow the teaching of Lenin, and particularly his teaching of state which he has shown us to be a good one . .. follow his lesson as regards the materialistic war which we must transform into a civil war."
Is that sedition or not? Trying to induce one class of people to war against another, and trying to put capital against the working classes?
It has been decided by the court of appeal in Ontario, and you will have seen it in the papers, that these men of the Communist party have tried again and again to have this article removed from our criminal code by the parliament of Canada, but up to the present parliament has refused to strike out article 98 of the code, which is the protection of our people against such doctrines.
I am quite sure the Minister of Justice will appreciate that. Again:
And this young girl, who seems to be intelligent, knew well these particular pamphlets concerning communism, and where they were, because the constable asked when he went in there for communistic papers, and she took him to the rear of the store and showed him a table and said "Here they are." She knew where they were, and if you or I had been there and had asked for communist literature, she knew where it was, and they were openly offering these to the people, and that is against the law.
What law, may I ask? I know of no such law. I ask the Minister of Justice if there is a law under which communist literature is prohibited. And yet this is how the judge charged the jury. Later he continued:
It is for you to appreciate whether these books, papers, cards, etc. are of such a character as are forbidden by law.
And one other:
On the other hand if you are convinced that the papers are of such a character as I have already said, and that they should not be published and circulated, it is your duty to say so. The court has nothing to do with that.
If those jurymen were at all like the ordinary jurymen I know, they would take that to mean, "Here you have some communist literature; all communist literature is bad; the communists are an ungodly party; we are a Christian country; if you think it is a bad thing to have this literature around, condemn these people." In my own words as a layman, that is practically what the charge to

Criminal Code-Point of Order
the jury meant, and the defendants were convicted. May I supplement the statement of the Minister of Justice by quoting the well known words of Lord Camden?
Where is the written law that gives any magistrate such a power?
He is referring to that of search.
I can safely . answer, there is none, and therefore it is too much for us without authority to pronounce a practice legal which would be subversive of all the comforts of society.... If suspicion at large should be a ground of search, especially in the case of libels

That is, seditious publications.
-whose home would be safe?
The minister has taken the responsibility of urging the repeal of this section, but unfortunately, in my judgment, what he gives with one hand he partly takes away with the other. When he previously introduced, a bill of this kind he said:
We have already in the code sufficient protection in the matter of sedition.
And he referred to sections 87, unlawful assemblies; section 130, regarding sedition, oaths or engagements in societies; 132, against seditious words, libel and conspiracy; 135, against libel on foreign sovereigns; 136, against publishing false news. If we then had sufficient protection, as he said, in the criminal code, I ask him why it is necessary to strengthen the criminal code at this time. It seems to me that the proposed section 4 goes altogether too far. Let me read, it:
Without limiting the generality of the meaning of the expression "seditious intention" everyone shall be presumed to have a seditious intention who publishes or circulates any writing, printing or document in which it is advocated, or who teaches or advocates the use. without the authority of law, of force, as a means of accomplishing any governmental change.
That is very sweeping indeed; it would rule out a very large proportion of the literature which we find on our library shelves to-day. If the minister really wished to carry out what he stated was his intention, he would at least add the words: "in Canada." He used those words when he presented the case; I do not know why he did not incorporate them into the section itself. A man might advocate change by force in Russia or in Italy and yet not advocate change by force in Canada. The provision as it stands is very wide indeed and lends itself to serious abuse. Let me read this passage:
No nation-


Thomas Vien: Where from?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Will the hon. member first let me read it?
No nation ever became truly great save by successful sedition and revolution. The lamp and the torch and the tumult have overcome tyranny. The signature of King John was placed to the Magna Charta, wrenched from him by the nobles; revolution led King Charles to the block; the corn law riots-these were crimes against the law and seditions, but no one hangs his head in shame because of them. "Liberty, equality, fraternity," were no mere catchwords as in the French revolution, but the expression of the earnest striving for the substance that lies behind the words.
I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that under the proposed section such an article would be clearly seditious. Let me say that the statement was uttered by Mr. R. B. Graham, K.C., in proposing the toast to "England." Mr. Graham is a highly placed magistrate in my own city. Mr. Jackson Dodds, O.B.E., of the bankers' association, was in the chair. The occasion was the annual St. George's night dinner of the society over which the president, Mr. Jackson Dodds, presided, and music was furnished during and after the dinner by the regimental band of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry.


Mr. STEWART:: What is the date of
that?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I cannot, unfortunately, give my hon. friend the date of the clipping, but it was-


Mr. BEAUBIEN:: I rise to a point of order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: -it was read into Hansard.


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a point of order. I understand it is against the rules of the house to quote from newspapers at any time. I believe-in fact I am sure-that the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) is reading clippings from a newspaper.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am reading from an item which originally appeared in the Manitoba Free Press. It is not an editorial; it is a news item.


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: The other night I was reading just two or three lines of an editorial in the Manitoba Free Press, but I was called to order.


Mr. DOUGLAS:: A different thing altogether.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, on the point of order: the objection, as is clearly recognized in the house, was taken to reading editorial matter that might influence the decision of the house. I am reading a news
3906	COMMONS
Criminal Code-Point of Order
item that appeared some years ago in a Winnipeg paper and was reproduced in Hansard on May 26, 1931.


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: Mr. Speaker, I should like to have a ruling. The hon. gentleman's reading from a newspaper might have an influence on the fate of this bill.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I suggest that the hon. member should have objected to the readings of the Prime Minister the other day, which occupied, I believe, fully half an hour. He read from newspapers. This is not against ;he recognized procedure of the house.


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: I was called to order because I was reading clippings from a newspaper, and the chairman ruled that I was out of order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The hon. member was reading editorials.


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: The hon. member is doing exactly the same as I did, and I think he should be ruled out of order.


Thomas Vien: On the point of order, when the hon. member began to read a clipping that he desired to give to the house, I asked him what he was reading from. He objected to my interpolation.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Oh, no.


Thomas Vien: Yes. He said, "wait"; he refused to give it. I should like to have your ruling, Mr. Speaker, on this point, that when an hon. member gets up in the house to quote from a document he should first tell us what he is reading from, so as to enable hon. gentlemen to rise in time to a point of order. The hon. member for Provencher (Mr. Beaubien) is now being told by the hon. gentleman who had the floor that the objection was not raised in time.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.


Thomas Vien: Well, Mr. Speaker, on the point of order I suggest that no member of this house should be allowed to quote anything without first stating what he is reading from.


Mr. CHEVRIER (Ottawa):: Mr. Speaker, on the point of order we might as well try to settle this rule once and for all. Paragraph 306 of Beauchesne says:
It is not in order to read articles in newspapers, letters or communications emanating from persons outside the house and referring to, or commenting on, or denying anything said by a member or expressing any opinion reflecting on proceedings within the house.


James Shaver Woodsworth: This does not do that.


Lionel Chevrier: Any time a member refers to or reads articles from newspapers, letters or communications emanating from outside the house which refer to, comment on or deny anything said by a member, or express any opinion reflecting on proceedings within the house, he is out of order. What are proceedings within the house? If one looks through Beauchesne the only reference to proceedings within the house appears in paragraph 13, which reads:
The proceedings of the houses (Senate and Commons) are governed by statutes, by rules and orders adopted by themselves, and by those usages which have grown up in the course of time and consequently become a part of their own practice or are derived from the common law of parliament by which they have consented to be guided in all matters of doubt.
All "rules" are not "standing orders"; they may be sessional orders or merely precedents; but all "standing orders" are "rules."
That is to say, in my interpretation if an hon. member reads a newspaper article that does not refer to or comment on or deny anything said by a member, or that does not express any opinion reflecting on any proceeding within the house, he is in order, and I submit that we should have a clear understanding of that rule since it has created such an amount of discussion in this house.


Hon. FERNAND RINFRET (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, as an old newspaper man I should like to say a word on this point of order which has been raised so often in the last few years. I remember very well, not only from my experience as a member of this house but also from my experience in the press gallery, that in the olden days this rule, which has been in the book for many years, was interpreted in a very broad way and no objection was taken to the reading of newspapers except when they did, precisely and strictly, come within the usages to which the hon. member for Ottawa East (Mr. Chevrier) has just referred. During the last parliament, however-and I am not blaming the previous government for that-the Speaker and Deputy Speaker of that time suddenly became very strict in their interpretation of this rule, and the reading from newspapers was practically forbidden in all circumstances. I resent that, Mr. Speaker, because I still have a great fondness for the profession to which I belonged, and I believe that reading from newspapers should be forbidden only in exceptional cases. There are many good opinions expressed in the newspapers, sometimes even in the editorials, and I believe there are many newspaper men who are just as wise as, if not wiser than, we in the house.

Criminal Code

Mr. Woodsworth
At the same time I believe the same rule should be applied to all, and as this session is just about over I suggest that you should rule again as both your honour and the Deputy Speaker have ruled previously during the course of this session. There is no doubt that the hon. member for Provencher (Mr. Beau-bien) is asking for fair play; he merely wants the rules to be obeyed, and desires that the hon. member who had the floor should be treated as the hon. member himself for Provencher was treated previously.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, no.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I do not insist on that
point; it is not mine. I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that during the recess-and I would also ask my genial friend the clerk of the house to listen to me now-some study should be made of that point, because I maintain that during the last three or four years an interpretation has been given this rule having to do with the reading of newspapers in the house which is absolutely contrary to the custom that previously obtained for a great number of years.


Ernest Lapointe: Mr. Speaker, since the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) has already read what he wanted to read I think this discussion is purely academic. I suggest that this matter of the right to read newspapers should be submitted to the same committee to which the proposal of my hon. friend for Winnipeg North (Mr. Heaps) will be submitted next session, and that we proceed with the business of the house, since time is passing.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Do any other hon. members wish to speak to the point of order? I do not think the point is well taken; I think the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) may continue to read the article. I do not think he is contravening the rule.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, I was trying to point out that there are a great many writers and speakers who advocate or at least defend the use of force under certain circumstances, and they would readily come under this section. Several years ago someone prepared quite a long list of books of this kind. I do not intend to read the whole list, but I should like to mention a few. The Spanish Jesuit, Mariana, devotes an entire chapter of his De Rege et Regis Institutione to a defence of tyrannicide. A whole host of Huguenot writers preach rebellion as a religious duty in such works as Duplessis-Mornay's Defence of Liberty Against Tyrants. Bern's
Rights of Magistrates Over Their Subjects, and the anonymous Whether it is Lawful for the People and the Nobility to Take up Arms. So does the Roman Catholic Rossaeus-probably the Bishop of Senlis-in The True Power of a Christian State. Buchannan, a Scots Presbyterian, follows suit in his De Jure Regni Apud Scotos. Milton contributes to the list no less than four works justifying the rebellion against Charles I-the two Defences of the People of England, Eikonok-lastes, and The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates,-and Locke's Treatise of Civil Government is a defence of the "glorious revolution" of 1688. Any competent political scientist could no doubt produce at a moment's notice a similar index twice as long.
I come now to modern historical works. Macaulay's History of England is another attempt to justify the revolution of 1688. Motley's Rise of the Dutch Republic and the Reverend J. N. Figgis' From Gerson to Grotius, contain glowing panegyrics on the revolt of the Netherlands against Spain.
G.	M. Trevelyan's England Under the Stuarts traces all our liberties to the revolt against Charles I. A. W. Tilby's British North America, Sir George Treveiyan's American Revolution, and George III and Charles Fox, Ramsay Muir's Short History of the British Commonwealth, Basil Williams' Life of Chatham, and the Cambridge History of the British Empire are all so incautious as to praise the American revolution.
It would seem to me, Mr. Speaker, that it is an extremely serious matter lightly to put on the statute books any legislation that might be used against certain sections of the community. I hold in my hand a book obtained from the library, where I gathered quite an armful descriptive of the doctrines and history of communism and fascism. This particular volume is typical; it is The Defence of Terrorism, by Leon Trotzky, from which I will read just a sentence or two:
But the revolution does require of the revolutionary class that it should attain its end by all methods at its disposal-if necessary, by an armed rising; if required, by terrorism. A revolutionary class which has conquered power with arms in its hands is bound to, and will, suppress, rifle in hand, all attempts to tear the power out of its hands....
In this sense, the Red Terror is not distinguishable from the armed insurrection, the direct continuation of which it represents. The state terror of a revolutionary class can be condemned "morally" only by a man who, as a principle, rejects (in words) every form of violence whatsoever-consequently, every war and every rising. For this one has to be merely and simply a hypocritical Quaker.
I do not in the slightest agree with the sentiments expressed by Trotzky, but my point

Criminal Code-Mr. Woodsworlh
is this, that under section 98 of the criminal code as it now stands, Mr. Hardy, who handed me this book, might be held guilty of belonging to an unlawful association, or at least of coming under the provisions of that section. But I am afraid that he could also be held guilty under the proposed new section, because this outstanding declaration from Trotzky which I have just read is being circulated by the librarians of this house. I think it is a very good thing that it is in the library, so that we may know what people are thinking. But it could come under the proposed section as I read it. No one suggests that we are going to arrest the librarians of this house, but if this same book were found in a little book store in Toronto or Montreal the operators of that store would come under the proposed subsection 4 of section 133. That is not as it should be.
I am glad that the Minister of Justice recognizes that a rule of this kind might work both ways. In a recent review of Social planning for Canada, a L.S.R. book, Mr. V. W. Bladen in the Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science has this to say:
The writers surely underestimate the resistance likely to be put up by the owners of property and by all those who still hope to own property or are dependent on such owners. The fundamental assumptions of the writers are quite evidently based upon a conception of the capitalist class as nice quiet people anxious to cooperate in carrying out the will of the people.
Suppose by any stretch of the imagination that the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation came into power with a mandate to carry out a socialist program, and suppose there were certain people highly placed, such as those described by the Minister of Justice, who made an investment of half a million dollars and in the course of some thirty years reaped a reward of something like $15,000,000. Supposing the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation undertook to deal effectively with a situation like that. Possibly there might be some resistance. There might be some at least who would advocate armed or forcible resistance. Under those circumstances they would come very definitely under this section. So that perhaps it might be well for this parliament not to go too far at this time. I remember the old scriptural motto: with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.
I do not think there is much more that I need say. It strikes me as very strange that this strengthening of section 133, subsection 4, should come from the Liberal party. I was looking the other day over some notes with regard to the trial of Joseph Howe in 1835,
[Mr. Woodsworth.J
and this is what he was charged with in those days:
The jurors of our Lord the King upon their oath present that Joseph Howe, late of Halifax in the county of Halifax, printer, being a wicked, seditious and ill-disposed person, and being a person of a most wicked and malicious temper and disposition....
That is taken from his speeches, volume 1, page 28. Nothing harsher could be said concerning those who to-day are regarded as radicals.
I go back now one hundred years to a time when in Ontario an agitator, an immigrant by the name of William Lyon Mackenzie, published a paper that had very harsh things to say about the government. This is a matter concerning which something is known by those of us who come from Ontario, hence we are coming into modern history. As a matter of fact my own people, at that time Wesleyan?, stood with Egerton Ryerson against the rebels.


Ernest Lapointe: Shame!


James Shaver Woodsworth: It might interest
my hon. friends to the right to know that I treasure my grandfather's sword with which he joined some of the loyal citizens who were armed in 1837 to keep William Lyon Mackenzie in order.


Richard Bedford Bennett: His descendant is not
doing badly in that regard.


Ernest Lapointe: Hear, hear.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I suggest that the reversals in judgment which history brings about warn us to consider carefully the legislation we propose to place on the statute book. Some of us may not altogether agree with the action taken by William Lyon Mackenzie in those days; we think that if he had been a little more patient he might have accomplished by peaceful means what he sought to accomplish by force. But in any case most of us are disposed to think that he did a great work. Does this kind of judgment apply simply to the past? Some of the great movements of history have been initiated by men who advocated force. I happen to be one who does not advocate force, either in the international or in the national sphere, I am very frequently condemned for taking that position. But it does seem to me passing strange that it remains for the Liberal party under the leadership of the grandson of William Lyon Mackenzie to put on the statute book this clause:
... everyone shall be presumed to have a seditious intention who publishes, or circulates any writing, printing, or document in

Criminal Code-Mr. Cahan
which it is advocated, or who teaches or advocates, the use, without the authority of law, of force, as a means of accomplishing any governmental change.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Presumption of guilt.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I would ask the
minister to reconsider his decision. I have not spoken about Quebec.


Ernest Lapointe: If the leader of the opposition supports my hon. friend I would probably consider it.
Mr. 'WOODSWORTH: I recognize the fact that some of the old Rouges of Quebec look back upon those who advocated force as being among those who broke the tyranny of the old regime. I do not believe we should be lenient in our judgment of those who lived in the past and at the same time refuse to recognize the desperate plight which forces many to-day to use extreme language or advocate extreme measures.
I do not want any misapprehension; I believe in bringing about these changes by orderly and peaceful methods. That is the belief of the organization with which I am associated, but I am forced to protest against this kind of legislation which may be used against particular sections of the community.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) has referred to an order in council passed in September, 1918. Whether for good or ill, I believe I drafted that order. Exceptional circumstances had arisen in Canada, prior to the termination of actual fighting at the front. I was asked by the Canadian government to .return from the United States, where I had been chairman of an executive in charge of about fifty factories manufacturing munitions for the Allies, a work which I had been requested by the British government to undertake. Those factories having been taken over by the United States government, after it entered the war, I was asked to take the position of director of public safety in Canada.
I believe I must have bundles of documents in my possession, among my souvenirs, disclosing that at that time sedition of the worst kind was being advocated tnroughout Canada, such advocacy being sustained through the expenditure of hundreds of thousands of dollars which were being sent to Canada in part through Finland and1 in part from Germany through the United States. Secret printing presses had1 been established throughout the dominion for the publication of seditious documents. Within a few weeks I was able to ascertain the exact location of thirty or forty of these printing establishments which were
secretly turning out seditious documents and circulating them throughout Canada, partly among the population of the west, whose maternal language is different from our own. Then, the printing presses were used partly for the output of seditious documents to be circulated elsewhere. For instance, there must be records in the Department of External Affairs showing that at one time the government of France made a protest to the government of Canada in which they stated that the Y.M.C.A. huts at or near the front, and certain other soldier aid societies, the work of which was being carried' on chiefly by Canadian women in France, were circulating among French soldiers as they returned from the front the most seditious literature written in the French language, which was causing a great deal of irritation in the French army. We found that a public appeal had been made in Canada for literature to send to the soldiers at the front. Large packages of this seditious literature had been prepared by those carrying on the agitation in Canada; it had been sent to the Y.M.C.A. and to the soldiers' aid societies as literature suitable for circulation among soldiers near or returning from the front. Our societies were being used to circulate that literature among the French soldiers who were welcomed at Canadian Y.M.C.A. huts and canteens.
We found, too, that a large amount of alien money was being used for this purpose. And so finally in order to deal with it effectively under the War Measures Act the order in council, to which the Minister of Justice has referred, was passed. There was inserted the provision, of course, that it should continue in force only while Canada was engaged in war. The substantive statute under which the order in council was made was one of the war measures acts and therefore the period in. which the order in council could be enforced was the duration of the war and until the final termination of war activities.
Reading section 98 as it now stands on the statute books one may have certain objections to some of the sections dealing with procedure. I suggest that the seizure of property on order of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police may be an exceptional measure at this time. I suggest that the right to search, as outlined in the section, may be more than ample, and should be reconsidered by parliament. If the Minister of Justice had made a reasonable redrafting of the section so as to conform with similar provisions in other laws I believe the modifications could be adopted by the members of the group to which I belong. But I do say that anyone who seeks to bring about any governmental, industrial or economic
Criminal Code-Mr. Cahan

change within Canada by the use of force, violence or physical injury to person or property, or by threats of such injury, or who teaches, advocates, advises or defends the use of force, violence, terrorism or physical injury to property should be amenable to the law of Canada. In my opinion the continuance of democratic institutions in Canada depends upon the prohibition of such evil attempts to overturn any government in this country. If in due time the leader of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation obtains a majority in Canada and in accordance with the will of the people forms a government, then certainly any body of the minority who might undertake by force or violence to put that government out of office, or by threat of violence to intimidate it from taking such action as the parliament of that day may desire to take, should become amenable to the criminal law of Canada. I feel profoundly with regard to that; we must protect democratic institutions in Canada, and if there are some provisions of procedure or otherwise in section 98 which should be amended, let us have an amendment of them, but let us preserve the main purpose and intent of the statute as expressed in section 98, subsection 1, and also in section 98, subsection 8. Now what the minister has done, in order to camouflage what purports to be a complete repeal of section 98, is to make an addition to section 133 dealing with sedition.
Let us consider the matter fairly. There is no codification of the criminal law in Great Britain, and the criminal law of Canada was the common law of Great Britain until 1892, when the Canadian criminal code was first drawn and enacted.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Plus statutory cases.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Plus statutory cases, and
the code has been amended from time to time, but the common law of Great Britain applies so far as it is not repugnant to the criminal code of Canada. In England it has been felt impossible to codify and express in exact terms the common law of England in regard to sedition, and Sir John Thompson and those who engaged in 1892 in the work of preparing the criminal code of Canada also decided that such codification was impossible of accomplishment at that time. But in dealing with- the advocacy and use of force to bring about governmental changes in Canada it has been deemed advisable, and I think it is advisable from the experiences we had in the early years after the termination of the war, to place on the statute book this section of the criminal code dealing with that particular crime. And [Mr Caban.]
it is there. I grant that if I were drafting this section again, in view of the present conditions, I would advise that the right of searches should be restricted and certain other procedure that is therein provided should be limited, but I believe that the main purpose and- intent of the statute should be continued in force.
Although the Minister of Justice has gone a certain distance in amplifying section 133, so as to camouflage the results accruing from the repeal of section 98, I do not think he has gone sufficiently far, and I do not think the section which he proposes, section 4 of this bill, which' adds a new subsection to section 133, is sufficiently broad or sufficiently comprehensive to prohibit the actual use of force for the purpose of overturning the government of the country. Therefore I think that prohibition not only of the advocacy of force and intimidation, but also of the use of force and intimidation, should be placed upon the statute book, whether in 98 or in section 133 is immaterial to me, but it should be there, and it should be expressed in language so clear and indubitable that any magistrate in a country district who is first called upon to investigate with regard to the application of this law will not have to search through a thousand cases and hundreds of decisions of the British courts to ascertain what the law of sedition really is. In accord with the purpose of parliament in codifying the law in 1892 we, in now amending it, should make clear that the use of force or the advocacy of force for the purpose of overturning the government of the country is made a criminal offence, in terms so clear that the ordinary justice of the peace and the magistrate of the country district will thoroughly understand the law. We should make the way for him so clear that even a man of ordinary intelligence could not err in the pursuit of that path.
At one o'clock the bouse took recess.
The house resumed at three o'clock.


Mr. J. R. MacNICOL (Davenport):: The new subsection 4 of section 133 as proposed by the bill before the house may well be characterized by that well known slang expression, "That is a mouthful"; and if two words are added to that one may say, "That is a mouthful of teeth," because subsection 4 of section 133 puts back into the criminal code a great deal of what has been taken out of it by the repeal of section 98.

Criminal Code-Mr. MacNicol
I wish to associate myself with some of the remarks made by the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe), and also with some made by the former Secretary of State (Mr. Cahan). I have spoken previously in support of section 98, having taken the opportunity on more than one occasion to express the view that a number of the subsections were unnecessarily severe. I had occasion to worry a little myself last summer in connection with section 98. When I returned from the United States, bringing with me a few expositions on communism, I felt a bit nervous and I went to see the deputy minister of justice, who, after looking wise for a moment or two and turning over the pages, assured me that I was within the law in bringing them into the country. The sections in that regard were unnecessarily severe and I felt that the onus of proof being on any one attending a meeting to show that he was not committing an unlawful act was perhaps a little strong, and also the subsection pertaining to owners of halls and people attending meetings. In the main, however, the whole section was a defence for those who believe in law and order and who are not disposed to advocate force or any other measure to upset the present governmental system.
I was amused at the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodswort'h) pointing out to the minister so early that subsection 4 of section 133 might not be too popular, not only, I assume, with himself, but perhaps with his group. I propose to support the minister in putting in subsection 4 of section 133, but I would point out that all of those organizations which he had in mind this morning and to which he referred generally as having denounced the late government for maintaining section 98, will now howl their heads off against subsection 4 of section 133. A good many of the organizations did protest against section 98, and as one reads over the initials representing their names one cannot help thinking that they look like a lot of alphabet soup instead of the names of parties. We shall likely see them continue to do what they did before. Take, for instance, U.L.F.T.A., Ukrainian Labour-Farmers' Temple Association. I have no doubt they will protest against subsection 4 of section 133, and the N.U.W.A., National Unemployed Workers' Association, who have protested before, will likely protest again. The Workers' Ex-Service Men's League protested before and will undoubtedly protest again, and so will the U.F., the United Front, the C.L.D.L., the Canadian Labour Defence League, and the Y.C.L., the Young Communists' League. I hope the minister will not pay attention to their protests but will maintain subsection 4 of section 133.
During the last election all the candidates I came in contact with who opposed the Conservative party denounced section 98, making a bogey out of it, and reading into it much that is not there. They held it up as something to be feared. In my own riding the communist candidate was particularly loud in his attack upon section 98, but in due course he retired from the field, throwing his support over to my Cooperative Commonwealth Federation opponent. I am not charging the C.C.F.'ers with communism or anything of that sort. Since they have been sitting so close to the gentleman on their immediate right they have more or less got rid of such characteristics. But subsection 4 of section 133 does restore to the act practically all of what subsections 3, 4, 8 and 9 of section 98 contained. For instance, subsection 3 of the present section 98 pertains to speaking, writing and publishing seditious articles or words and subsection 4 refers to the distribution of literature of that description. Subsection 8 has to do with the printing, circulating and distributing of communistic or revolutionary literature or words, and subsection 9 again refers to circulation. If we read the new subsection 4 we shall find in it, in the main, those features I mentioned as being at present in subsections 3, 4, 8 and 9 of the present act. The proposed subsection 4 of section 133 reads:
(4) Without limiting the generality of the meaning of the expression "seditious intention" everyone shall be presumed to have a seditious intention who publishes, or circulates any writing, printing or document in which it is advocated, or who teaches or advocates, the use, without the authority of law, of force, as a means of accomplishing any governmental change.
I propose to support that, because I feel that it will go a long way towards preserving law and order in this country.
The Minister of Justice more or less intimated that everyone in Canada, or that all organizations in Canada except the Conservatives were against section 98. Well, there were many people who were against section 98 but there were also many broadminded people, not all Conservatives, who were in support of it; and none supported section 98 more strongly and brilliantly than did the late editor of the Toronto Globe, who in the last session of parliament frequently sat in the press gallery of this house. He took a very prominent part in defending section 98 against the attacks of the fellow-

Criminal Code-Mr. MacNicol
ship-I have forgotten the name of the organization-with which a number of the professors of Toronto university were associated.


Ernest Lapointe: Was that Mr. Anderson?


John Ritchie MacNicol: I am now referring to the late Mr. Anderson. He took a very strong stand against the attitude of that fellowship, the full designation of which I have forgotten, and those associated with it who were denouncing what they regarded as interference with free speech and asking for the repeal of section 98. In view of what you, Mr. Speaker, said this morning I suppose I am in order in quoting some words from the Toronto Globe on January 16, 1931:
This matter of "free speech" which is agitating the fellowship and has brought forth the protests of sixty-eight college professors is but a red herring across the trail.... The police have taken action to protect the community against the invasion of foreign propaganda, openly promoted to supplant Christianity by atheism. . . . Pages of evidence from soviet publications could be quoted to show how this propaganda is being advanced in all foreign countries, with the object, first, of causing trouble of every kind, and then of setting up a soviet administration.
The abolition of section 98, as it stood, would have permitted them to do that. Under subsection 4 of section 133 they will still be restrained. I continue to quote from this article:
Call it "freedom of speech" or anything else, it is still Bolshevik propaganda, which has no place in an honest and upright country.... The communists seeking "freedom of speech" are the aggressors, trying to introduce here and elsewhere an alien cause by talk, text, and force of arms. It is not British, Canadian, or Christian. Why should red-blooded Canadians soft pedal and hack away before their machinations? Why should they be asked to do so?
A well known paper in western Ontario, independent I believe in politics, namely the Woodstock Sentinel-Review, refers to this subject in an issue published during December, 1934. I am not going to quote the article, but it is a strong and intelligent pronouncement, entitled, Section 98 Necessary.
Something was said this morning about the labour organizations. One of our best known labour papers is the Labor Leader. It has a very wide circulation-I believe, about 30,000 to 40,000.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Where is it printed?


John Ritchie MacNicol: It is printed in Toronto.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Nobody knows about it.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Well, labour workmen know about it.


Abraham Albert Heaps: No, they don't.


John Ritchie MacNicol: And I myself know a good deal about working men, having worked with them for many years. This paper heads a very strong article, published in October, 1935, under the caption, Section 98 Must Stand. I admit these articles were written before the Minister of Justice introduced, in this present bill, subsection 4 of section 133, which, as I said at the beginning, puts back in the criminal code much of what section 98 contained.
Then the Lindsay Warder of November 14,
1935,	quotes something that struck me very forcibly, a pronouncement made by the Rev. Father Bryans of Montreal.
Father Bryans was addressing a meeting in Toronto last week and while he was in the city Father Lanphier had an interview with him on this question.
That is, on the question of the repeal of section 98.
In answer to queries from Father Lanphier he emphatically stated that, in his opinion, ninety-five per cent of the agitation for the repeal of section 98 during the last campaign came from communists-
He is quite right in making that statement -or communist organizations and those of the great Liberal party who listen to the claptrap from those organizations.
-or communist-inspired sources and that practically all of the propaganda in pamphlet form on this question that flooded the country was of "red" origin. Father Bryans also expressed his firm conviction that it would be a foolhardy, ill-advised and very dangerous move for the new government to make any move to remove this section of the criminal code.
Of course subsection 4 of section 133 puts back into the criminal code much that section 98 had in it, and I doubt whether, were these writers writing to-day, they would complain as strongly as they did in the articles I have quoted.
Then the Mail and Empire of February 21.
1936,	has an article headed Section 98 of Criminal Code Protects the People. I have said, and it is Worth emphasizing as frequently as possible, that subsection 4 of subsection 133 has the merit of putting back in the act much that was contained in section 98.
Subsection 1 of section 98 refers to unlawful associations. I have been wondering whether the people will have under subsection 4 of section 133 sufficient protection against the propaganda of what otherwise would be unlawful associations. One of the books to which I referred a few moments ago and concerning which I visited the office of the deputy minister of justice-entitled Why Communism?-gives a complete argument and outline of how to start revolution, not only

Criminal Code-Mr. Heaps
in this country but also in the United States, and tells how it is being organized in many other countries. We read almost every day in the papers about troubles in France, in Belgium, in Spain, in Mexico, in Uruguay and other states as well as in a great number of cities. I am convinced that a great deal of that trouble is being organized by unlawful associations or associations that should be unlawful. On page 32 of this book I find these words:
We communists say that there is only one way to abolish the capitalist state, and that is to smash it by force. To make communism possible the workers must take hold of the state machinery of capitalism and destroy it.
How are we going to prevent the publication of propaganda such as that? On page 33 I find these other poisonous words:
The working class is placed in this capitalist society in a position where to live it must fight. This fight, to be effective, must be aimed not only at the capitalists but also at their state. And once the fight is effective enough it must inevitably lead to the smashing up of the state.
That is the objective-the smashing up of all states outside of Russia. And then another paragraph on page 33:
Not much acumen is needed to realize that economic struggles can not remain purely economic. When you strike, when you form a picket line, the state in the shape, of policemen and armed thugs rushes to the aid of the employers.
That is not very good language to use regarding the enforcement of law in civilized states. Then on page 51 we have this statement :
We communists say it is the duty of the workers to fight against capitalist terror, against manifestations of fascism, against the oppression of other nations. We say it is in their interests to fight. We appeal to the class interests of the workers and the exploited masses of the population. Stand guard. Offer resistance to capitalist terror. Fight for your right to organize, to assemble, to strike. Break the capitalist dictatorial rules directed against you. Do not submit. Strike back. In unity is your strength.
I shall not read any more, but the book is full of these arguments on how to commence a revolution. They are subtle arguments and very appealing to those who care to fall for them. In the course of their argument they make a strenuous attack on organized labour. I am one of those who believe in organized labour. I am not a member of any labour organization but I have seen some of the good work that has been done by organized labour. Anyone who has had to do with thousands of men must have come in contact with the well known labour leaders, and I have always found them to 12739-249
be gentlemen of the first order, imbued with the best possible feelings towards labour generally, generous in their attitude and ready to cooperate and discuss matters. Here is what they have to say in a second book entitled Programme of the Communist International. They describe organized labour in this way:
A cynically commercial, and imperialistic secular form of subjecting the proletariat to the ideological influence of the bourgeoisie is represented by contemporary "socialist" reformism. Taking its main gospel from the tablets of imperialist politics, its model to-day is the deliberately anti-socialist and openly counter-revolutionary "American Federation of Labour."
The American Federation of Labour has been a safeguarding influence, not only in connection with employment and better working conditions but also in regard to law and order in both the United States and Canada. As between the communists and the American Federation of Labour I certainly would support organized labour.
In conclusion I wish only to say that I support the action of the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) in putting back into the act many of the protective parts of section 98. He has inserted them in subsection 4 of section 133, and I congratulate him on having done so. I feel quite confident that he will be strong enough to resist the pressure that may be brought to bear on him by communistic and semi-communistic organizations to have these provisions repealed.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I wish to make just a few observations in connection with this bill, Mr. Speaker, and to say a word or two in reply to the hon. member who has just taken his seat. In my opinion there is a great deal in common between the communist party and the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. MacNicol). They have both calmed down to such an extent that they are hardly recognizable. When you compare the speech just made by the hon. member for Davenport with the speeches he made in this house on the same subject a year or two ago you would hardly know it was the same member.


John Ritchie MacNicol: We did] not have the amendments to section 133 then.


Abraham Albert Heaps: And) so it is with the communist party; since they wrote the articles from which my hon. friend has quoted their attitude has changed completely in regard to public matters. Anyone who reads what they publish to-day and observes their actions will hardly believe they are the same people of a year or two ago. May I point out to the hon. member for Davenport that to-day the com-

Criminal Code-Mr. Heaps

munist party belong to and support the American Federation of Labour, so if my hon. friend says he is a supporter of that organization he is in pretty good company as far as the communist party are concerned.
I should like to make one other reference to the remarks of the hon. gentleman, who claimed there was a newspaper published in Toronto, called the Labor Leader, with a circulation of about thirty thousand. Well, Mr. Speaker, I have been in this country quite a number of years and have been associated with the labour movement for a long time. With the exception of a few people in Toronto hardly anyone knows anything about that newspaper. It is published now and then, as a rule on the eve of an election or when some important issue is being considered, and when an election campaign is in progress this newspaper is usually found to be supporting high tariffs and the Conservative party. Further than that, I would suggest that perhaps my hon. friend who has just taken his seat might know where the funds come from with which that newspaper is published; I do not know.
Now I desire to say a few words in regard to this bill. I am extremely glad that the government have seen fit to repeal section 98 of the criminal code. I do not think that section ever should have been placed on the statute books of this country. It has given power to the police which I do not think was ever warranted and' which has not been contemplated in other parts of the British empire. The .police have authority under section 98 to search premises without warrants or, as we say, without the due process of law. Why should the authorities, the police, be permitted to search a person's home or store and confiscate property without knowing, in some instances, what they are confiscating, without following the ordinary process of law? I do not think anyone in this house can defend a measure of that kind. When the raids took place throughout this country in 1919 I know the police went into homes without search warrants and took possession of whole libraries, which were not returned' to the rightful and proper owners. A number of books were taken from my own home, books which could have been found in almost any library in Canada. I do not think there can be any justification for an act of that kind remaining on the statute books of the Dominion of Canada.
The word "sedition" is not and cannot be defined and is not defined in any of our statutes. It is an indefinable offence; as has been stated time and again in this house,

sedition depends very largely upon the time and place the act is committed or the statement is made. When we look back over some of the things that the crown have claimed to be seditious within the last few years I think it must be agreed that a most ridiculous interpretation has been placed on section 98 of the criminal code. I should like to indicate what some people in Canada have said on which they have been charged with sedition:
Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees, and that write grievousness which they have prescribed;
To turn aside the needy from judgment, and to take away the right from the poor of my people, that widow's may be their prey and that they may rob the fatherless.
The following words also were part of the charge against a person whose name I will mention in a moment:
And they shall build houses and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them.	_
They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat: for as the days of a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
Those are quotations from the book of Isaiah, yet it was the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) who was 'accused of sedition in the courts of this country for quoting from the bible what I have just read. That was done under section 98 of the criminal code, and if it was done ait that- time it is quite possible it might be done again if the section remains.
Some of my hon. friends are timid about individuals using language which might be regarded as seditious. After all, who ultimately is the judge of what is seditious? Is it not for a jury to decide? Who is the final jury? Is it not the people of Canada? In 1919 a number of people in Winnipeg were charged with seditious utterances and seditious conspiracy and were convicted of that charge, yet immediately after their conviction they were returned by enormous majorities to the legislature of Manitoba. They were elected to that legislature while they were incarcerated in the gaols of that province. And the present mayor of Winnipeg, who has been elected for two terms by fairly large majorities, majorities representative of all the people of that city, is one who was sentenced to gaol for seditious conspiracy in 1920. The thing becomes ridiculous when a few people set themselves up as judges of the law and send people to gaol who after all represent the viewpoint and convictions of a majority of the people of any community.

Criminal Code-Mr. Wilton
It has been claimed by some that we should not allow certain statements to be made. There are, I think, no hon. members of this house who believe in the advocacy of physical force. I think we are all opposed to that. The very fact that we run candidates in elections, that we try through our limited means to bring the majority of people in Canada to our way of thinking, is in itself a vindication of our ideas on this question. But we do say that if you want to stop people from giving vent to seditious utterances the best way to do it is to remove the causes of dissatisfaction. At the present time there are a good many causes for people in this country to be dissatisfied, yet we find very little advocacy of force from any source, even from the communist party.
Ideas cannot be killed by force. If an idea is not worthwhile it will die, and ideas that are worthwhile will grow in spite of all opposition; for in the final analysis that which is right and logical is bound to come out on top. Ideas are like a seed planted in the ground. If the seed is good and it has the sunshine it will sprout and grow, perhaps into a beautiful flower; but if the seed is bad the same sunshine will kill it. Let all ideas come out into the open and I am satisfied that ultimately the logic and good sense of the people will determine what is right and what is wrong. If we try with any sedition laws to suppress freedom of speech it is a grievous mistake; consequently I am glad that the Minister of Justice and the government have taken the responsibility of doing away with section 98. But I regret to observe that while doing away with section 98, in which there are certain definitions as to what the authorities may do, they bring in a wide clause the interpretation of which is so indefinite and uncertain that I would ask the Minister of Justice at a later stage to state to the house whether he himself can give an interpretation of what the clause actually means.
The second line of the new clause reads:
... every one shall be presumed to have a seditious intention ...
Does that mean that a person who may be charged under this clause is presumed to be guilty?


An hon. MEMBER:: No.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Well, that depends entirely on the interpretation that is placed upon it by the judge. According to my understanding of the interpretation given to it even by lawyers, it is that the presumption of guilt is upon the accused instead of its being incumbent upon the prosecution to prove him guilty.
12739-249 J
It is also unfortunate that "force" has not been more clearly defined. Again if is a question of interpretation. In 1920 a glance would have been interpreted by a judge in Manitoba as the use of force. I am wondering whether the law as we have it without this subsection 4 would not have been sufficient to cover the situation. There are quite a number of sections in the existing law that would take care of a person who advocates the use of force for the overthrow of government. It is a mistake to put into any act a clause such as this, so ambiguous and capable of being interpreted in so many different ways. Perhaps when we come to the committee stage the Minister of Justice will be good enough to give to the committee his interpretation of this particular section, because for myself, having at times listened to the interpretation of sedition by judges and lawyers, I have a feeling that if a person were brought before the courts of this country and charged under subsection 4 he would be likely to have as much difficulty in proving his innocence as he might have had under section 98.


Mr. H. E. WILTON (Hamilton West):: Following the remarks of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woods-worth), for whom I have a very high personal regard, I should like to make a few comments on what he said. The hon. member says he does not agree with all the policies of the communists-one noted his emphasis on the word "all." Personally I find it very hard to understand how any good Canadian citizen can agree with anything that the communist party stands for in Canada or elsewhere, a party whose chief aim and object is the overthrow of organized government and absolute disrespect for law and order.
It seems to me the only people who need to fear section 98 are those who are likely to break it. Reference was made by the hon. member who preceded me to a mayor who had been sentenced to gaol because of a breach of this section. I do not know why even a mayor should be exempt from the laws; if he breaks them he should be penalized. We do not make our laws only for the common man, or the man in a lower position, and there is no reason why we should exempt the mayor of any city.


Abraham Albert Heaps: He was not mayor at the time he was sentenced.


Herbert Earl Wilton: You said so.


Abraham Albert Heaps: No.


Herbert Earl Wilton: My knowledge of communistic effort has been extensive because I have come into close contact with it in public-
Criminal Code-Mr. Wilton

municipal life. Having watched its development over a period of two or three years I know something about the organization. I know they hold secret meetings in private homes; I know they are teaching their children to have no respect for law and order. They are advocating everything that is disrespectful to the social structure and laws of our country. When the police are not watching they distribute seditious literature, which is prepared for them in a basement headquarters within a stone's throw of Times square, New York. That literature is transmitted to them by some means throughout different parts of Canada where their efforts are concentrated. It is found on city streets in the mornings. They come out of their places like rats out of holes in the middle of the night, and distribute it throughout the cities. They post boys at factory gates to hand it to the workers, and they get away with it until they are caught by the police. Those are the people whom section 98 is designed to cover. No law abiding, self-respecting Canadian citizen need fear section 98. The communist party as I know it and as I have seen it operate are leeches on society in every manner, shape and form of which it is possible to conceive. They refuse to acknowledge allegiance to their king; they stand in groups in public places and refuse to remove their hats when the national anthem is sung; they bury their dead without religious rites, and they ignore everything that is decent and right in the laws of our land.
There is a tendency on the part of many good citizens to treat the communist agitation lightly. Some say, "Oh, why raise an agitation? They are not very strong; they cannot do much harm; perhaps it is better to leave them alone. Let them say what they like and do as they like; they will never be able to become the law makers of Canada or break the structure of our legal system. Why bother with them"? I feel keenly in this matter, and I urge that it is one to be considered seriously. It is a matter of much more serious import than the average Canadian realizes. Many years ago a man named Noah walked about on the face of the earth telling the people to come into his ark, that it was going to rain. He told them there was going to be a flood and that they would be drowned. They laughed at him and called him an old fool. When he began building the ark they gathered around and watched him, persisting in calling him an old fool. But when they were in water up to their necks, standing on the highest points they could reach, they realized the truth of Noah's statement.

Not many years ago a man named Lloyd George stood in his place in the British parliament and warned parliament against the war preparations of Germany which were being carried on under the very nose of that parliament. They laughed at Lloyd George; but when they were in mire and muck up to their knees, and when they stood in the blood of their fellow human beings, they realized that little Lloyd George had been telling them the truth.
The red movement in Canada is a menace which must be taken seriously, if we are to prevent the downfall of responsible government. No loyal Canadian wants to see the downfall of Canadian government; we prefer law, order and civilization. But we are heading for a downfall unless we treat the red menace seriously and do not choose to sit back and laugh at it. The red menace in Canada is not to be laughed at. People now living will live to see and realize its seriousness. There are those who say that red policies will never come in our time. I say they are coming in ouy time unless we are prepared to take the menace seriously.
Section 98 of the criminal code is in existence to take care of those who defy our law, who defy our social progress and who would tear down and wreck our civilization. I say to hon. members that the red movement is a menace within reach of us; it is something against which we must protect the public and our children, otherwise we may go through the same process as did the people in Noah's day.


Mr. C. E. JOHNSTON (Bow River):: Mr. Speaker, when the hon. member who has just taken his seat (Mr. Wilton) referred to Noah's invitation to the people of his day to come into the ark lest they be faced with chaos brought about by a flood, I could not help recalling what took place during the last election campaign. It was said that those who did not vote for the Liberal party would be faced with chaos.


Mr. McLEAN (Melfort):: They took the
warning this time, but they did not in Noah's time.


Charles Edward Johnston: Let us
interpret the word "chaos." It seems to me that chaos would indicate a chaotic state, and a chaotic state must necessarily be one in which there is terrorism. As I read the section I wonder why some who preached the doctrine to which I have referred were not prosecuted under it. Well, that did not happen. My point is that because of the ambiguity of the section and its multiplicity of words and expressions, it could be made

Criminal Code-Mr. Johnston
applicable to almost any one or any condition, and I believe the government should be commended most highly upon repealing it. In my opinion it is a violation of private privileges. It seems to me to be in the nature of a warlike emergency, as was intimated by the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe). I do not think we are so much in danger of anything so terrible as some speakers would have us believe as to need the drastic warlike emergency measure contained in section 98. There is another thing that should be considered. The power is given to the police to appoint anyone to go into a private residence to confiscate literature. The home is the sacred possession of every citizen, and as this section now stands, homes may be invaded by outsiders on practically any excuse they may wish to present. This certainly needs repealing.
Paragraph 4 of section 98 refers to meetings. I am of the opinion that it would be hard to enter any meeting which in some way did not come under this section. This practically prohibits anyone advocating a change in the form of government. During the last election there was considerable cry for reform, especially monetary reform. Some very strong statements were made by all parties in connection with this. There were some very strong references by the Liberal party to the Conservative administration, and ' similar statements were made by the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation in regard to both the Liberals and the Conservatives. Social crediters had something to say about all the others, and I think it was coming to them. It is hard to tell just how serious all these statements might have been when considered in the light of section 98.
As I listened to the speeches this afternoon I was convinced that the purpose of this section was to get after the so-called communists. I should like to make it quite clear that this party is not associated in any manner or form with socialism of communism. That being so, we have nothing to fear from section 98, but our endeavour is to see that all citizens are treated fairly. One of the most essential things in a democratic country is freedom of speech. If we represent a policy which is so weak that it cannot stand the test of argument and fair debate, then I think it will automatically go down. It is the consensus of opinion that all these subjects should be debated from all angles. If this section is allowed to remain, I believe it will curtail the expression of opinion and thought. As the minister indicated not so long ago, a man should not be condemned for expressing an opinion, but he should be punished for deeds and acts. I
do not think this is made clear in the legis lation under review.
I did not intend to deal with this matter at any great length, because it has been gone over pretty thoroughly. But I think I should say something in view of the fact that I have received so many representations from different groups and organizations all over Alberta and in other parts of Canada. I have had complaints from labour organizations. I have attended the meetings of a great many labour organizations, and with the exception of one, held in Banff about a year ago, I never heard any indication whatever of violence. Reforms of one kind and another were advocated, but only on the one occasion did I hear anything that could be interpreted to be at all in the form of violence. I think this legislation could have been applied to that particular meeting I have had representations from railway employees' organizations in different parts of Alberta, and I do not believe anyone can accuse those men of any criminal intent or anything of that kind. I have had them from farmers' organizations, and I have had them from individuals in every occupation.
After I read section 4 of the bill I went down to the library where I found a great many socialistic books. I read1 portions of them, some of which were similar to those referred to by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. The thought came to my mind that if this section were allowed to stand the library and all those associated with it would necessarily come under its provisions. The section refers to those who circulate such literature. Many of the news stands and those people who publish periodicals of different kinds would come under this section if a literal interpretation were put upon it.
Perhaps it might not be well to have this bill sent back to the committee to be reconsidered, but the minister should give some consideration to this section. I think the original intention of section 98 was to apply to any extreme acts, and perhaps insufficient consideration was given to the wording. With a little further thought it seems to me it could be changed to cover fully such actions as have been mentioned.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Mr. Speaker, in view of the character of the debate I feel I should make at least a few remarks. May I say at once that the maintenance of national liberty is dependent upon the restraint of individual liberty. That is a strange statement which at first may appear to be contradictory, but it is not. There oan be no such thing as the maintenance of national liberty among the peoples of this country unless there is a
Criminal Code-Mr. Bennett

restraint of individual liberty. Further, the extent to which the nation enjoys freedom and liberty depends upon the extent to which restraint is carried out. If the restraint is undue upon individual liberty, then there is resentment. On the other hand, if it is inadequate, liberty becomes licence. I do not think it can be gainsaid that that is a fair statement of the situation.
Further, the laws which thus restrain the individual liberty for the well being of the nation as a whole are enacted not for the law abiding citizen but as restraints upon citizens who would convert liberty into licence. We have a statute which was passed in 1919, some seventeen years ago, which is still in full force and efficiency. During the last few years it has been openly defied because under our jurisdiction the provinces must maintain criminal proceedings. The dominion can only take certain preliminary steps, and it rests with the attorneys general of the provinces to say whether or not the law shall be carried into effect.
In the midst of political disturbance and difference it frequently happens that men ally themselves to a particular course of action from which they find it exceedingly difficult to separate themselves when their better reason and stronger judgment tell them they should. I have read declarations with respect to section 98 on the part of those charged with responsibility, stating what course they would pursue, and I know perfectly well that in their saner and calmer moments those who made the declaration, if they were correctly reported, would have had no intention to aid and succour and abet those who had been openly defying the law. During the last few years we have had open expressions of defiance of the law. In the leading case to which reference was made this morning by the minister, namely, the Buck case, Chief Justice Mulock, speaking for the whole appellate division of the Ontario court, indicated that the opinion of that court was that what had transpired constituted an offence under the provisions of section 98. Let us see whether or not we have any adequate safeguards outside of that statute-I am talking about the substantive provisions of it. What does it indicate? May I answer that question by saying that it does not indicate anything that the people have been led to believe it does. There has been so much misrepresentation as to what this section means-because in the very nature of things it is somewhat longer than a statute intended to convey that meaning ordinarily would be-that I am sure there

has been a great deal of misapprehension on the part of many people. First of all it aims at unlawful associations; and the Chief Justice of Ontario pointed out that we had in Canada determined, by the verdict of a jury as well as by the admissions made by those who were charged and who in some instances conducted their own defence, that it took its direction from another organization, which organization had its foundations and its home in a foreign land, and that it was part of the declared purpose of that organization to effectuate by force the ends intended or purposed. Notwithstanding what my opponents may say to the contrary, none of us for a single moment desire to restrict or curb liberty of speech. The address of Erskine, the advocate, is hardly conclusive as to the judicial interpretation of a statute. Erskine, the advocate, was one of the greatest of his time, but in arguing his case upon the evidence submitted to a jury it can hardly be contended that he is making declarations of high principles of law. In the advocacy of the so-called iniquities of section 98 men have been led to believe that it is much more harmful and restrictive than is necessary to maintain national liberty. Let us look at it for a moment:
Any association, organization, society or corporation, whose professed purpose or one of whose purposes is to bring about any governmental, industrial or economic change within Canada by use of force, violence or physical injury to person or property, or by threats of such injury, or which teaches, advocates, advises or defends the use of force, violence, terrorism, or physical injury to person or property, or threats of such injury, in order to accomplish such change, or for any other purpose, or which shall by any means prosecute or pursue such purpose or professed purpose, or shall so teach, advocate, advise or defend, shall be an unlawful association.
I venture to think that in the quiet calm of his own home, if I were discussing the matter with any hon. member sitting opposite me who thinks differently than I do on large public questions, he wouid say, "I think it is a perfectly sound and proper thing, Mr. Bennett, that we should have this definition of unlawful assemblies or associations; and I agree with you, Mr. Bennett, that there should be a law against men carrying on, by association, efforts to destroy by force and violence and injury to persons the institutions of the country." I feel perfectly certain that my bitterest opponent opposite, in the quiet calm of a room discussing the matter, would agree that this is desirable-highly desirable.
The next section deals with a matter of procedure with which I am not in sympathy

Criminal Code-Mr. Bennett
and never have been since the end of the war, because it provides for the seizing and forfeiture of property on the warrant of the commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. That is not the general purpose of our law, to clothe an official with that authority under a special aft of this significance. But what amused me was this. One would think that there were no such similar provisions in the laws of the country. What about gaming devices? What about houses of ill repute? What about the question of the right of police officers and chiefs of police to seize property, with or without a search warrant in some cases? What about the issue of warrants by magistrates, justices of the peace, and judges of county courts? All these things are provided for in the statute. To us some of them seem trifling because our attention has never been directed to them, but they have been there ever since we have endeavoured by statute to clarify the criminal common law since the days we started, in 1892, to codify the law consequent upon the report primarily of a British commission and the work of Sir James Fitzstephen. But leaving that out, I wonder whether hon. members would take the trouble to turn up the code and look at the sections with respect to search warrants, the right to enter a property and seize things, to arrest people, and matters of that kind. All this is so simple that we take it for granted and do not for a moment give thought to it when we are dealing with section 98.
Subsection 2 of section 98, to which I have just referred, is am extraordinary section, and my personal view would be that as a matter of procedure, in view of present conditions, it would be better if it were removed. But when we come to subsection 3, which relates to persons who act as officers of these unlawful associations, does anyone suggest that it is not. desirable to have punitive power, so far as this country is concerned!, with respect to them?-not so much for the purpose of punishing in the first instance as for the purpose of ensuring, by placing on the statute books this legislation restricting our individual liberty to that extent, that the nation as a whole may have that measure of liberty which is synonymous with our institutions. Then you go to the next: what constitutes evidence of membership in an association. That is a matter that is debatable. Whether or not these clauses are adequate, or whether we might not amplify them, as to what constitutes evidence that one is a member of an association, I will not further labour. But these provisions of that subsection indicate that if certain conditions exist there is a presumption that a man is
a member of that association, a presumption that may ibe rebutted by cogent evidence.
Subsection 5 is only an amplification of what we have had as the law of the country for a very long time. If a man rents a house knowing that it is to be used for prostitution, he cannot recover rent. That is fairly clear amd the reason is obvious. If he rents his house for the purpose of having it used as a gambling joint, he is in the same position, and we have merely said in this subsection that the owner of a build'-ing who knowingly .permits meetings to be held in it for the promotion-the promotion, mark you-of the destruction of our institutions, by force and injury to people, makes himself liable. But he must have knowledge, and unless you can prove that he has knowledge there is no responsibility. In other words, it is the old story:	If a man
has knowledge of the fact that certain things are to be done, improperly or illegally, or that certain property of his is to be used for improper or illegal purposes, he cannot escape the result of his own acts, and we have here said that he should be liable.
Subsection 6, which also is a matter of procedure, provides for a search warrant being issued, and there is nothing in that subsection that derogates from the general principles with respect to the issue of search warrants. It is a statement of the conditions under which a search warrant may be issued for a given purpose.
There follow further provisions in clause 7 as to the procedure to be adopted. Then you pass into the realm of sedition, about which the minister was speaking this morning. Here we have provisions against the publication of seditious books and the circulation of books and newspapers, and obviously, if we are going to have these provisions, against the importation of such books and newspapers. The next clause deals with the duty of government employees, who have had brought to their attention evidences of the commission of the offences to which I have referred, to take immediate steps to remedy the conditions so far as it may be within their power so to do.
Apart only from the procedure indicated in the subclause to which I specially directed attention, is there anything in section 98 which reasonable citizens should desire to have removed? Is there in this chamber any reasonable citizen who will say: I am not prepared to make that sacrifice of my individual liberty for the preservation of the liberty of the state as a whole? That is the test. Is there a single individual sitting
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here who will say: It is not right that I should make this surrender of my unquestionable complete liberty for the purpose of advancing the interests of the nation and which I do in the manner that is indicated, by passing this statute? It is true that some of our friends connected with labour organizations at one time believed this section capable of being used against strikes, and I understand that a legal opinion was given that there was some question of that kind. I have always said, and I repeat, that if there were any doubt upon that point it could easily be removed, but for my own part I believe, and I think the law officers of the crown, that is the Department of Justice, were clear on the matter, that there is nothing therein contained that could be regarded, by any possible stretching of language, as capable of being utilized against those engaged in a strike which under our law is lawful.
The minister proposes to repeat the section in its entirety. If his purpose were to amend it along the lines I have suggested, or any lines that his judgment might indicate as being more desirable, I would not for a moment question it. But in these days is it desirable to repeal that section? Take this city of Ottawa. On the staff of Ottawa university is a very learned professor who has given a great deal of time to the investigation of this situation, and whose pamphlets are worth reading. I wonder if it is known to what extent there exists in this very city, according to evidence that is now available, if any hon. member desires to ascertain by investigation what the situation is, a condition to meet which certain associations are being promoted and men are giving of their money to combat to the best of their ability. In one or two parts of this city will be found what are known as friendship houses, which are endeavouring to improve the situation by bringing home an adequate appreciation of conditions to the minds of those who are filled with, shall I say, very extreme views as to the desirability of remedying by force present day conditions.
There would have been no progress in this world unless there had been freedom of speech, unless the ideas of men of broad vision had been communicated to their fellows. The communication of ideas which are advanced, extreme, radical, has never been restrained in this country unless the direct result has been that which is contemplated by sections 131 and 136 inclusive of our law, that is sedition. This morning the minister was speaking on the subject of sedition. As a matter of fact we have on our statute book

to-day a law against seditious words, which are punishable by imprisonment up to two years. The minister complained that under section 98 the punishment is extreme. But the punishment is only what may be, not what has to be, and when you say that a man "may" be punished by imprisonment for twenty years you might just as well have said forty, as far as the section is concerned, because the discretion rests with the court, after a verdict of guilty has been found, as to what the measure of the punishment shall be. In the case of those to whom he alluded this morning the punishment, of course, was far removed from twenty years.
I am correcting only one thing the minister said during his remarks to-day. He said that Buck was released by the same government or kind of government that was responsible for this section. I believe on analysis he will find that that is not quite correct. What happened in Buck's case is an exemplification of the very principle to which I have referred, that one prisoner should not be treated differently from another because of the character of the offence for which he has been committed. Buck was committed under section 98. He was in the penitentiary. The report on his case was just the same as on a man who was convicted, let us say, for stealing. The report was of good conduct within the terms of the penitentiary regulations, and when a prisoner has served half his term, which is the usual time, whether the conviction be for theft or for any other offence, if the other conditions have been complied with, the executive power has the privilege, which under regulation is the general rule, of giving him a ticket of leave or permitting him to be released on parole. That was done with Buck. It was done for two reasons: one, because he came within the regulations; two, because if he had been treated differently from others it would at once have afforded an opportunity for those- who desired to say, and who prepared themselves to say, by communications they sent to the government of the day, that we were treating this man differently from other prisoners and that we, the executive, were imposing upon him a punishment that was not imposed upon other prisoners lodged in the penitentiary who had earned for themselves a ticket of leave or release on parole. Unfortunately I happen to know that that is the attitude that was taken by those who had to deal with him in that respect.
Under these circumstances we ask ourselves whether a case has been made out for the repeal of the section, or for its revision. Along

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the lines indicated by the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Cahan), embodying views which I think have been held by many of us for a long time, it may well be that the procedure could be improved, and that with regard to the power conferred upon the commissioner of the mounted police it could be said with great truth that in these days, a long time after the condition that existed in 1918 or 1919, a search warrant issued in the ordinary way would be ample protection of the people of the country as a whole.
There remains one other matter. In 1928 the same minister who is now Minister of Justice was dealing with this matter. I think he said that he had moved five or six times that the section should be repealed. At that time he proposed to restore the section which dealt with freedom of speech. He said, on April 23, 1928, page 2303 of Hansard:
At the same time section 133 which existed at that time was repealed and I intend to move an amendment in order to reinsert section 133. This was done last year and in the years previously, and it is only due to a mistake that this bill did not contain that provision. I think the house will see that parliament obviously went too far in 1919 when the section which I am now going to read was repealed.
That section reads as follows:
No one shall be deemed to have a seditious intention only because he intends in good faith,-
(a)	to show that His Majesty has been misled or mistaken in his measures; or
(b)	to point out errors or defects in the government or constitution of the United Kingdom ... ; or
(c)	to point out, in order to their removal, matters which are producing or have a tendency to produce feelings of hatred and ill-will between different classes of His Majesty's subjects.
If we look at the law as it now stands, Mr. Speaker, we find that since then there has been a change to some extent and that the sections dealing with seditious offences are sections 130 and following. Section 133a is now part of the criminal code of Canada, and in terms it is substantially the same as the amendments the Minister of Justice proposed to move in 1928. Section 133a reads:
No one shall be deemed to have a seditious intention only because he intends in good faith,-
(a)	to show that His Majesty has been misled or mistaken in his measures; or,
(b)	to point out errors or defects in the government or constitution of the United Kingdom, or of any part of it, or of Canada or any province thereof, or in either house of parliament of the United Kingdom or of Canada, or in any legislature, or in the administration of justice; or to excite His Majesty's subjects to attempt to procure, by lawful means, the alteration of any matter in the state; or,
(c)	to point out, in order to their removal, matters which are producing or have a tendency to produce feelings of hatred and ill-will between different classes of His Majesty's subjects.
That is a part of the criminal law of Canada, and therefore it is unnecessary to reenact it. That was placed in our statutes in 1930. But the minister, no doubt intending to say, "I have repealed section 98 but I have enacted a provision that will be equally effective," proposes to provide for cases of sedition under the sections to which I have referred. I do not agree with the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. MacNicol) that under any circumstances this section can be regarded as equivalent to section 98, for section 98 does a great and useful purpose by defining unlawful associations and providing methods of dealing with them. Section 130 and the following sections deal only with seditious offences; that is the heading in the criminal code. After defining the various offences for which adequate punishment is provided we find the following words in section 133:
Seditious words are words expressive of a seditious intention.
2.	A seditious libel is a libel expressive of a seditious intention.
3.	A seditious conspiracy is an agreement between two or more persons to carry into execution a seditious intention.
Now the minister proposes to add, as paragraph 4, these words:
(4) Without limiting the generality of the meaning of the expression "seditious intention" everyone shall be presumed to have a seditious intention who publishes, or circulates any writing, printing or document in which it is advocated, or who teaches or advocates, the use, without the authority of law, of force, as a means of accomplishing any governmental change.
In other words by this proposed subsection we create a presumption that anyone who does what is indicated here is guilty of a seditious intention. That is, anyone who (1) publishes; (2) circulates (a) writing (b) printing or (c) a document in which it is advocated, or who teaches ot advocates the use, without the authority of law, of force as a means of accomplishing any governmental change, shall be presumed to have a seditious intention. That, of course, is a rebuttable presumption but it places upon the man at once the onus of satisfying the court and jury, if there be a jury, that the intention which is presumed against him does not in fact exist. But that does not deal with the sections that have to do with unlawful associations. As was stated this morning, though not at length, by the former Secretary of State (Mr. Caban), these are illustrations but they do not constitute an all-embracing definition of sedition or of
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seditious offences. The common law of England is elastic and not rigid in that sense, and when the effort was made in Great Britain, as in Canada, to provide a definition for sedition or seditious offences it was felt that to endeavour to confine these offences within the narrowing boundaries of a definition would be against the best interests of the state. Therefore we have left the common law provisions as they are, but in at least several instances we have undertaken to indicate what are within that definition. We have not defined but we have said that certain offences fall within that definition, and those offences are indicated by the law.
In section 98 as it now stands we have provisions with respect to unlawful associations and the activities of officers of such associations which I do submit in all sincerity should not be repealed at this time, though one might desire to repeal some of the provisions that deal with procedure in that regard.
That is all, Mr. Speaker, that I desire to say with respect to the matter. I protest against this change in these days of uncertainty and unrest, knowing as I do the conditions right in this city and knowing of the activities that are going on and how much those activities have been modified, as the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Heaps) said this afternoon. Why have those activities been modified? Because of the arrangement recently made between Russia and France. Apparently, according to the information that has been given me, instructions have been issued that there must be a modification of the attitude of the Third International and those who spoke for certain interests in Russia, as indicated in the judgment of Chief Justice Mulock in the Buck ease. That has been modified, and the reason is clearly apparent to everyone. But what assurance have we that that modification will continue? We have no assurance whatever, and the repeal of this legislation will be accepted by those who have been carrying on propaganda in this country so actively during the last four years as giving them added opportunities and greater scope for their seditious operations.
The finding, for instance, of the four judges in Saskatchewan should not be overlooked in this regard. That was a commission, certainly not friendly to the late administration by any stretch of the imagination; the conduct of the proceedings did not indicate any friendliness on the part of those responsible for it. But the finding of that commission-and I was surprised that they went as far as they did-made it perfectly clear that there existed a common purpose and that if

necessary force was to be relied upon to accomplish certain ends. In the light of that fact; in the light of the conditions that exist in this city to-day, to my knowledge and the knowledge of many members of this house; in the light of what we read from day to day of the literature that is circulating and the secret gatherings and meetings that are held, is it desirable to leave this country without any provision to take the place of section 98, if you do not like it in its entirety, with nothing that will have a similar effect in dealing with unlawful associations and those who are associated in the creation and maintenance of such association?


Mr. ROGERS:: Would the right hon. gentleman permit a question?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Certainly.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Does he believe that the penalties imposed by section 98 would be effective either to prevent or to arrest the growth of unlawful associations as defined by section 98?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have not the slightest doubt that they have been and will continue to be, if they are allowed to continue on the statute book. I will agree at once if the Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers) desires me to say that if I were drafting the statute I would not have set the penalty at a maximum of twenty years, but we know that penalties and sentences are wholly within the discretion of the judge who administers the sentence. I know also that in the case to which reference was made this morning the sentence was for a very much shorter period than the limit set by the statute. It does not follow, unless the statute says "not less than," that the sentence indicated has to be imposed. For instance, under the Post Office Act there is a very drastic provision which in some instances leaves no discretion to the court as to the sentence that must be given. But in this case it was left entirely free and in the discretion of the presiding judge to determine the punishment, the maximum being twenty years. As I said, it might just as well have been forty; for no judge would think it desirable to impose a sentence of twenty years for the offence in question. There is a disparity between the sentences under section 98 and those under the other sections of the act, but that cannot be taken to militate against its effectiveness.
When the minister asks whether I think the continuance of the section would have a salutary effect, I say yes, beyond peradven-ture. It is a matter of individual opinion. I may have drawn wrong conclusions from

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the manifestations of what I regard as seditious activities which have come to my notice. I may draw a stronger conclusion than my hon. friend the Minister of Labour would draw. That is a matter of individual opinion. But there is one thing that is not a question of opinion: are these efforts being made? Does there exist in this country any assembly or body of men and women who are urging upon their fellow citizens that force should be used for the purpose of accomplishing their end? The answer obviously must be in the affirmative. I will undertake to prove to the Minister of Justice this very night in this city, if he will give me time and come with me, that they exist. It may be that their force and effect has been overstated; about that there may be difference of opinion. There is a tendency on the part of some to exaggerate their importance. I am not doing one or the other; I am not minimizing, nor am I magnifying. I state the fact. Now, under these conditions, should we leave the Dominion of Canada in 1936 without any provision against that type of unlawful assembly and those who constitute its membership? That is the real issue. The proposed subsection 4 of 133 does not touch that. It merely says that one who does certain things is presumed to have a seditious intention. But that does not touch this question at all.
I regret that the minister has seen fit to make so sweeping a change. Had he at an earlier point in the session afforded an opportunity for a more complete discussion I have little doubt that hon. members of this house on every side would have been glad to cooperate with him to the full in endeavouring to provide in an intelligent way against what I think every hon. member will admit is an evil. And getting back to my original observation, if it is thought that the provisions are too drastic, if the restraints imposed upon the individual are greater than are necessary for the purpose of maintaining liberty in this nation, then we of course could take appropriate remedies to deal with that situation. If on the other hand the evil exists, then it is our duty to place such appropriate restrictions on the individual liberty of those who are threatening our institutions by force as will ensure to the body politic that measure of liberty the maintenance of which is essential if our civilization is to be preserved.
There are those who say it would be a good thing if that civilization were done away with, and force is the only way it can be accomplished. That is what they said in Russia. Those who deify Lenin and those who follow in his footsteps say: Unfortunately you will find
there is only one way to deal with the situation, and that is by force. I recall the night that the report came out of the revolution in St. Petersburg. As I came out of the old museum building I happened to meet Sir Wilfrid Laurier and we stopped and discussed the matter for a moment. I pointed out that the last dispatches indicated that they had gone to the point of carving up the body of an-old admiral into cubes and dropping them under the ice as food for the fishes. I always remember the answer he gave. He said: Yes, these excesses are similar to what happened in the days of the French revolution; the very excesses will in themselves bring about the inevitable reaction. We now know that the excesses have brought about a reaction. But the period of time that elapsed between the commission of the offences against-shall I say, using a mild term-the amenities of civilization, and the day that the reaction began, was so prolonged that the effect upon the world as a whole has not yet been measured. I am not fearful at the moment that we are going to have an uprising in this country which will bring about by force similar results; not for a moment. Neither do I desire in any sense to magnify the possible result. But I do desire to point out as strongly as is within my power that unless we make some provision against such unlawful assemblies and those who constitute the membership in them we have not taken the steps to restrain individual activities and individual liberty that are essential to the maintenance of our national liberty. That in my judgment is quite clear.
Of course I am not unmindful of the argument that prevails in some quarters: "Let the commons repeal it; there is another chamber." But I am not impressed with that argument. The evidence of history is that after the commons house of parliament has acted in a matter five or six times, or after a government which has come fresh from the people with a great majority has passed certain legislation, neither in England nor on the continent or elsewhere has there ever been manifest a desire on the part of another chamber differently constituted as to views upon public issues to take action sharply different from that taken by the commons. There has always been in second chambers that recognition, which is sometimes designated by -harsh critics by another name, that recognition of the will of the people having asserted itself in a particular way, and the willingness to follow the pathway bla-zed by the commons.
I do not believe the Canadian people, if the question were submitted to them to-day by a plebiscite and they understood section
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98, would desire to have it repealed. They would undoubtedly desire to have it modified, and I think along the lines I have suggested. I can do nothing with respect to the passage of this legislation. The government has announced that it proposes to repeal section 98. It has the power, and contends that it has the mandate to do so. I shall content myself with merely making this protest and asking the clerk at the table to record that the second reading of the bill was carried on division.


Mr. ANOUS MacINNIS (Vancouver East):: Mr. Speaker, before the bill is given
second reading I should like to say a few words. First of all may I say that from observations made this afternoon by hon. members to my right I am more and more convinced of the similarity between the Conservative and communist minds. The hon. member for Hamilton West (Mr. Wilton) could not understand anyone supporting views advocated by communists. He seems to forget that soviet Russia, the only country which has made any approach to the communist state-and of course it is not communist; they admit they are neither communist nor socialist-and the only country about which one thinks when he hears a reference to communism, was invited by the nations of the world, at a time when the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) was representing Canada, to participate in the activities of the League of Nations. That is clear proof that even a communist state or representative may have something of value to offer at this time.
Shortly after the leader of the opposition made his now famous radio talks prior to the session of 1936 I made a statement which appeared in the press to the effect that I was glad the then prime minister was going to do some of the things we had advocated for so many years. For that announcement a vote of censure came from communist sources. I believe it is time we departed from such childish attitudes of mind.
In connection with this legislation we of this group find ourselves in much the same position as we have been when other legislation has been before us. I am convinced that the present measure is an improvement, despite the language of section 4 of the bill, which I hope the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) will find his way to amend before final passage of the measure. The repeal of section 98 is desirable. People will have less difficulty in giving expression to their thoughts, even in regard to our so-called! institutions, without fear of being punished for so doing.

Beginning his observations the leader of the opposition said that the maintenance of liberty depends upon the restraint of individual liberty. That is true. To some extent the liberty of the mass depends upon the restraint of the liberty of the individual, and I am convinced that any government should, and must have sufficient powers to maintain order. But after I say that I must add that governments 'have functions in addition to that of the maintenance of order. [DOT]They m.ust find out why disorders arise, and must remove the cause not by repression but by making the necessary social and economic adjustments which will make disorder unnecessary. People do not become disorderly just for the mere joy of doing so. Of course some may, but I suggest the great majority do not. It is very difficult indeed to get people to act in an orderly fashion to remove an injustice in legal ways, let alone in a disorderly manner.
On various occasions in the debate reference has been 'made to Russia. That which* took place in Russia was the inevitable thing which would take place in any country governed as Russia was governed. The masses in Russia had no other recourse, no other possibility of making changes except through the use of force. I shall read briefly from the works of an author for whom I have great regard. Lord Macaulay, in his essay on Milton, dealing with the situation in England during the civil war of 1649 makes a case analogous to the situation in Russia in 1917. He writes:
Many evils, no doubt, were produced by the civil war. They were the price of our liberty.
Many evils undoubtedly followed the revolution in Russia, but is there anyone to-day who would want to put Russia back under the czars? There is not.
Has the acquisition been worth the sacrifice? It is the nature of the Devil of tyranny to tear and rend the body which he leaves. Are the miseries of continued possession less horrible than the struggles of the tremendous exorcism?
If it were possible that a people brought up under an intolerant and arbitrary system could subvert that system without acts of cruelty and folly, half the objections to despotic power would be removed. We should, in that case, be compelled to acknowledge that it at least produces no pernicious effects on the intellectual and moral character of a nation. We deplore the outrages which accompany revolutions. But the more violent the outrages, the more assured we feel that a revolution was necessary. The violence of those outrages will always be proportioned to the ferocity and ignorance of the pepole; and the ferocity and ignorance of the people will be proportioned to the oppression and degradation under which they have been accustomed

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to live. Thus it was in our civil war. The heads of the church and state reaped only that which they had sown. The government had prohibited free discussion; it had done its best to keep the people unacquainted with their duties and their rights. The retribution was just and natural.
Is that not an accurate picture of the situation which maintained in Russia prior to the revolution of 1917? If in Canada we wish to make changes orderly, as they must be made, then we shall have to seek the causes of disorders, and not try to repress them by unwise laws. Lord Macaulay continues;
If our rulers suffered from popular ignorance, it was because they had themselves taken away the key of knowledge. If they were assailed with blind fury, it was because they had exacted an equally blind submission.
It is the character of such revolutions that we always see the worst of them at first. Till men have been sometime free, they know not how to use their freedom. The natives of wine countries are generally sober. In climates where wine is a rarity intemperance abounds.
And at a later point:
Ariosto tells a pretty story of a fairy, who, by some mysterious law of her nature, was condemned to appear at certain seasons in the form of a foul and poisonous snake. Those who injured her during the period of her disguise were forever excluded from participation in the blessings which she bestowed. But to those who, in spite of her loathsome aspect, pitied and protected her, she afterwards revealed herself in the beautiful and celestial form which was natural to her, accompanied their steps, granted all their wishes, filled their houses with wealth, made them happy in love and victorious in war. Such a spirit is liberty. At times she takes the form of a hateful reptile. She grovels, she hisses, she stings. But woe to those who in disgust shall venture to crush her! And happy are those who, having dared to receive her in her degraded and frightful shape, shall at length be rewarded by her in the time of her beauty and her glory!
I think it behooves hon. members to read those sentiments. In doing so they will realize that we can make progress only by continually seeking out the things that cause unrest. We have on our statute books a great many laws for the maintenance of order, but we have very few to prevent the exploitation of our people. We can make any law in this parliament bo maintain order, but let us try to make a law that seeks to prevent the exploitation of the masses of the people and immediately the question of its constitutionality is raised. Immediately it is taken to the courts.


Norman McLeod Rogers: There is obviously a distinction between the two types of statute. No one has ever questioned the competence of the dominion parliament to deal with criminal law, but when we consider the other
type of legislation to which the hon. member has referred, that is, social legislation, a considerable doubt as to competence has been entertained by the Department of Justice over a very long period of time.


Angus MacInnis: That is the very point I wish to make. If this parliament had been intent on bringing about a better social organization, more economic equality and more social justice, then long ago it would have had the necessary constitutional authority to pass the necessary social legislation.


Norman McLeod Rogers: By consultation with the provinces.


Angus MacInnis: By consultation with the provinces and by necessary changes in the constitution. Where there is a will there is a way, and these things can be done. What is the government going to do with the reform legislation passed last year which has been declared ultra vires? Is it going to let it go at that and say that nothing can be done about it? We will not get over these difficulties by increasing the military and police forces and building more penitentiaries. You can remove those conditions only by removing the social conditions which give them birth. I quote again from the same author:
There is only one cure for the evils which newly acquired freedom produces; and that cure is freedom. When a prisoner first leaves his cell he cannot bear the light of day; he is unable to discriminate colours, or recognize faces. But the remedy is, not to remand him into his dungeon, but to accustom him to the rays of the sun. The blaze of truth and liberty may at first dazzle and bewilder nations which have become half blind in the house of bondage. But let them gaze on, and they will soon be able to bear it. In a few years men learn to reason. The extreme violence of opinions subsides. Hostile theories correct each other. The scattered elements of truth cease to contend, and begin to coalesce. And at length a system of justice and order is educed out of the chaos.
Many politicians of our time-
This is about one hundred years ago, but the same is true to-day-
-are in the habit of laying it down as a self-evident proposition, that no people ought to be free till they are fit to use their freedom. The maxim is worthy of the fool in the old story, v7ho resolved not to go into the water till he had learnt to swim. If men are to wait for liberty till they become wise and good in slavery, they may indeed wait forever.
If men are to continue to live under the exploitation and misery which obtain under present economic conditions without making a protest, they will surely wait forever. It is only by protesting and by drawing attention
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to these conditions that you can get. parliaments and governments to act.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There is no limitation on that right.
Mr. MaoINNIS: None whatsoever, but a person would almost think there was a limit because of how little of it has been done.
I do not want to occupy the time of the house in speaking further in this connection. I have not the necessary legal training with which to judge the value of the present bill. As I said in the beginning, I believe it is an improvement, but before the bill passes I hope the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) will find some way to define more clearly section 4. We will have so much accomplished, but it will not prevent our asking for more if more is necessary.


Mr. J. T. THORSON (Selkirk):: Mr. Speaker, I shall be very brief in what I have to say. I support entirely the remarks of the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) when he introduced this measure. I should like also to commend the right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) for the very moderate tone of his contribution to this debate. I am opposed to the retention of section 98 in our criminal code on two grounds. In the first place, I think it constitutes, if not directly then by implication, a threat to the right of free association. In the second place, I think it has been demonstrated through the course of time that this section is neither effective nor necessary for the safety of the state.
Our democratic system and our democratic institutions are under attack the world over, and it ought to be the duty of every person to maintain our existing democratic institutions so far as it is within his power to do so. The continued existence of these democratic institutions depends upon the maintenance of certain fundamental and precious rights. These are the rights of freedom of thought and speech, freedom of religion and freedom of association and assembly. These are the springs of progress and reform; they constitute the most precious heritage that we have derived from Great Britain, which has always been the home of individual liberty. In recent years we have seen the devastating results of the dictatorships that have been set up in various parts of the world, with their destruction of free institutions and their negation and denial of personal liberty. We must resist every encroachment upon every one of these fundamental rights.
I think we are all agreed that freedom of speech is essential to progress. New ideas are

necessary to reform. Our social system is far from perfect and we ought not to be too quick to find anything seditious or revolutionary in new ideas that may be advanced. Anyone who has read history knows that rebellion has often been the father of liberty, and that the rebel of yesterday is often the patriot of to-day. Indeed, the greatest reforms that have taken place have been the result of courageous attacks against existing institutions and what was then constituted authority. We ought to preserve in this chamber the right to criticize; we ought to preserve that right not only for ourselves but for every free citizen of this country, because freedom of opposition is essential to good government, just as essential as the government itself. Freedom of criticism outside this chamber is something that ought not to be curtailed in any way.
We have guaranteed freedom of religious thought and religious observance, and have gone a long way in this country to see that this great right is maintained. Yet there are people in Canada who would like to take away that right of religious freedom. Once you take away one right who can say when the next will disappear.
Perhaps the most valuable of the rights I have referred to is the right of free association, and it is because we feel that this right is threatened that we are opposed to the retention of section 98.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But the hon. gentleman
would say that it would have to be association for a lawful purpose, would he not?


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: 
Richard Bedford Bennett: Surely the hon. gentleman does not mean his statement just as he has said' it, -because that would mean unlawful associations. I think he must intend some limitation.


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: I would allow the right of association, and would not wish to see any interference with that right. If any member of an association is guilty of a breach of the peace, the law of sedition and the general law of the country relating to the preservation of the peace will be sufficiently wide to cover his particular case. There are certain rights that we possess, such as the right of free speech and free association, rights that are so valuable-


Richard Bedford Bennett: But free speech is limited.


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: Exactly. It is limited in the same way that the right of free association is limited when it comes to a question of the individual who breaks the law. The point I
wish to make is that reforms can come only as a result of organized effort, and we ought not to put any obstacle in the way of those who seek to associate with one another for the prosecution of necessary reforms. When it comes to breaches of the peace and questions affecting the safety of the state, we have ample legislation to ensure our interests in that regard. I shall deal with that aspect of the matter in a moment.
I think it will be generally agreed that, so far as this subject is concerned, this is the mildiest debate that has taken place in this house and that speakers throughout the debate have adopted a more moderate tone than in similar previous discussions. This legislation has passed the House of Commons, I believe, six times, and been rejected by the Senate. On a number of occasions in former debates the opposition to the repeal of section 98 was based upon the ground that the section had never been used and that, therefore, there was no harm in its retention. But it has recently been used.
In the course of this debate a good deal has been said about communism, and I should like to add a few words on the subject. In my opinion communism in this country is a bogey. I do not believe we need have any fear of it if we insist upon the maintenance of our individual rights and liberties. I also suggest that communism will never be put down by what may be described as the iron heel of ruthlessness; any attempt to suppress communism by force will strengthen communistic activities rather than weaken them, for martyrdom begets sympathy and it creates followers; that has been the history of such movements in the past and it has been our experience in recent years. The most effective course to follow in our combat with communism and the best weapon we can use is to remove the causes of discontent, for communistic leaders feed their followers upon discontent. The next best course is to bring communism right out into the open. I say to the right hon. leader of the opposition that the release of the communist leaders on parole was a more effective step towards the diminution of communistic strength than was their arrest and conviction. When they were arrested and convicted, the effect was to drive their activities underground. When they were released and were free to appear on every platform as leaders of communism, the people had an opportunity of listening to them and their activities were brought out into the open. We know the result at the last election. They had, I believe, eleven candidates in the field in the dominion. Nearly
392S
Criminal Code-Mr. Thorson

all of them lost their deposits; many of them got very few votes. I recall my own experience in meeting communistic activity in the constituency which I now represent. At the end of my speeches we had question time. At that time the communist agents were there; they followed me from place to place, particularly in those polls which had been strongly communistic. The people enjoyed immensely the questions and the answers that were given those questions. In polls where communistic activity had been strong, so strong in 1930 that the votes in such polls were almost solidly communistic, the people had been listening to communistic propaganda for the past five years, had heard the promises made by the communist leaders, had been examining what had been placed before them by the communists. At the last election support of communism almost disappeared, or if it did not disappear, it dwindled in many cases to negligible proportions. I think that indicates the best course to follow.
In my opinion the right hon. leader of the opposition made the best argument in support of the repeal of section 98 that could possibly be made when he said that the provincial authorities had refused to enforce it. The reason they did so is, no doubt, that public opinion was against the enforcement of the legislation. When a statute reaches the point where it no longer holds the support and approval of public opinion the time has come for its repeal.
Particular use has been made of the bogey of communism to frighten the people of Canada against the activities of communists, particularly in districts where the people are of foreign origin. While I am speaking on this subject I desire to say a few words on behalf of one class of foreign-born Canadians, the Ukrainians. There is a good1 deal of communistic activity among the Ukrainian people of this country, but nowhere is there fiercer opposition to the progress of communism than among the Ukrainian people. Their organizations are fighting it ceaselessly and are carrying on against it a more intense drive than anj'one else. It is out in the open; in my opinion, there is no need to fear in the least the progress of communism so long as we maintain and insist upon our full rights of individual liberty and freedom. I would also point out that the main leaders of communistic activity in this dominion are not of foreign origin; they are of English or Scottish origin.
The danger of communism has been magnified particularly in the province of Quebec, where the Liberal party has been pictured as

though it wyere in league with communism. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Nothing could be falser than the cartoon on this subject which was published widely in the province of Quebec, portraying the Liberal party as being the friend and the ally of communism. The principles of Liberalism are fundamentally different from those of communism.


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: On this subject, sir, I wish to say a few words in French to my friends from the province of Quebec. They know that the great principle of Liberalism is individual liberty and that the Liberal party will safeguard the rights they hold sacred. The hon. members from the province of Quebec, whose speeches in this house I have listened to with pleasure, express themselves sometimes in French and sometimes in English. But when using the French language, they too often create the impression that the right to speak French in this house is the exclusive privilege of Canadians of French origin. I feel that I should protest against that claim because this right belongs to every hon. member of this house irrespective of his origin.


Ernest Lapointe: Hear, hear.


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: This is the first time that I venture to address this house in French, but, sir, when I endeavour to do so, I exercise a right which is as much mine as yours.
What are our most valuable rights? I think you will agree with me that they are freedom of speech, liberty of creed, and the right of free association. My hon. friends the members from the province of Quebec will allow me to tell them one thing: If you tolerate any encroachment on these rights, even on that of free association as was done in section 98 of the criminal code, the door will be wide open to attacks against other rights which you prize even more dearly. Who could then tell where such encroachments would stop? If you are careful to safeguard all individual rights, you will have no cause to fear the inroads of communism.
(Text) We are in even greater danger in this country, Mr. Chairman, of falling into fascism than of being overcome by communism. There may be some value in the philosophy underlying some of the teachings of communism, much as we may be opposed to the manner in which communism was sought to be established in Russia, but I can see no value in the fundamental philosophy of fascism. Men give up the struggle for democratic government when they lose faith in themselves. It is then that they want action. It is then that they demand strong men to carry on

Criminal Code
government. It is then that they are prepared to surrender their personal liberties. When men have reached that stage they are in a state of despair. I do not believe there is any need for despair. I believe that under our democratic system of government we can bring about necessary reforms if we give proper attention to them and if we allow full and free play to the force that we should derive from the full exercise of our rights of free speech, freedom of assembly and freedom of association.
We have now had section 98 in the criminal code for some seventeen years. The provincial authorities have ceased to enforce this section. Labour organizations are opposed to its retention. There are serious defects in many of the details of the section. It has not proved an effective means of combatting the advance of communism. It will not be an effective means of combatting the advance of fascism, nor is it necessary for the preservation of the state. We have ample other legislation for the purpose. If any member of any association or organization is guilty of endangering the state the general law is wide enough. Certain offences against the state are provided for by the law of treason. The general law of sedition is as wide as it is safe for such a law to be. It is elastic; its application depends upon circumstances. We have sedition generally; we have seditious libel and seditious conspiracy, all designed for certain circumstances and certain occasions. We have laws against riots, riotous assembly and unlawful assembly. I would say that the legislation we already have is quite sufficient for the preservation of the state without making any unnecessary encroachment upon fundamental rights which are essential to progress and reform.
For this reason, and for the reasons I have already mentioned, I feel that section 98 constitutes an unwarranted interference with the right of free association; that it has not been effective in accomplishing its purpose and that it is not necessary for the preservation of the state. I am very glad indeed to support the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) in everything he said, and will support the second reading of this bill.
Motion agreed to on division, bill read the second time and the house went into committee thereon, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
Section 1 agreed to on division.
Section 2 agreed to.
On section 3-Permits.


Ernest Lapointe: I have an amendment to this section, which has been 12739-250
suggested by the attorney general of British Columbia. After the word "property" in the third line of page 3 the word "or" should be inserted, so that the section will read, "or for use in connection with his profession or occupation."


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think that is right. I was looking at this section the other day, and I thought the word "or" was lacking.


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver):: I move accordingly.
Section as amended agreed to.
On section 4-Seditious offences.


Ernest Lapointe: In order to clarify the language, as well as the meaning, of this section, I would add the words "within Canada" at the end of the section, which then would Tend, "any governmental change within Canada." I have found that in the United' States that is the wording used, "against the government of the United States."


Richard Bedford Bennett: It will be recalled that the original section of the act provided for a case where efforts were made to destroy the oonstitued government of the united kingdom, or of Canada, or of any of the provinces. "Within Canada" is not quite as broad sis that provision of the section, which was generally accepted1 as not being an unfair provision as far as that phase was concerned.


Mr. NEILL:: Would this not very much
weaken the possibility of conviction? All that would be needed would be for the seditious language to be in general terms; then the accused could plead: Oh, I was referring to any governmental change not in Canada, but in some other country. As long as he used such words as "overthrow the government," that is all right, so long as he did not say "overthrow the government of Canada." Even if the language used' were related: to a neighbouring friendly state I do not know whether we particularly want to give shelter to those who, perhaps just within the border, want to carry on an extensive propaganda against the government of a neighbouring state. But I particularly call the attention of the minister to this point; as long as they couch their seditious utterances in general languge could they not plead that this section did not apply, if it contains the words "within Canada"?


Ernest Lapointe: The
language used will certainly serve to interpret the meaning. I really believe it is 'better to restrict the section in that way. If somebody talks about Haiti or some other country in

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distant parts of the world where there may be trouble, I do not see why our law should' make that a crime. And as I said, the legislation, of other countries contains a similar limitation; they restrict the scope of the provision to their own country.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The section I had' in
mind is section 133A:
No one shall be deemed to have a seditious intention only because he intends in goor faith-
(a)	to show that His Majesty has been misled or mistaken in his measures; or
(b)	to point out errors or defects in the government or constitution of the United Kingdom, or of any part of it, or of Canada or any province thereof, or in either house of
arliament of the United Kingdom or of
anada, or in any legislature, or in the administration of justice; or to excite His Majesty's subjects to attempt to procure, by lawful means, the alteration of any matter in the state; or
(c)	to point out, in order to their removal, matters which are producing or have a tendency to produce feelings of hatred and illwill between different classes of His Majesty's subjects.
I think there is a point to what the hon. member for Comox-Albemi (Mr. Neill) has said. It seems to me, having regard to our geographical position, that we are making matters a title difficult, if we have some of the highly skilled persons with whom I came into contact during the last few years in dealing with the question. I shall not mention names, but they will say: Oh, I was not saying a word about Canada; I had not the slightest intention of saying anything about Canada; I am just saying that this is a rotten way to govern a country. That is exactly what they will do.


James Shaver Woodsworth: For many years England was an asylum for political refugees, from Italy, Austria, and was even used as a base from which they carried on their political propaganda. They were welcomed even by ministers of the government. For example, if anybody thought that Haile Selassie had been improperly put out of his kingdom I do not know why there might not be some people in this country or in England who might do something to assist in restoring him to his throne. I assume .the Italians are now the de facto government of Ethiopia. I think the united kingdom can look after itself without our worrying about what some might say about what might happen in Great Britain, and as for the country near by, I was reading just a little while ago that book of Sinclair Lewis's, It Can't Happen Here. Some may recall that the nazi people, or some acting very much along nazi lines, are portrayed as having set up a gouvermment in
,Mr. E. Lapointe.]
the United States. In that story Canada is represented as being an asylum for those seeking to get away from the outrages that prevailed in the United States. If anything of that kind happened I do not know but what a good many of us would welcome such refugees, and it might be difficult to prevent them from carrying on political propaganda. Surely the whole purpose is to protect anything that may need protection here in Canada. As I said this morning, as the clause now stands it would mean that we would have to rule out of our libraries a great part of the histories now found there. It would mean that all except convinced pacifists would have a great deal of difficulty in expressing their opinions as to the possibilities of force.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think that is hardly a correct statement. But is there not some international law that creates an obligation upon us in this regard? The minister will no doubt recall that when there was organized in London a conspiracy against Napoleon III, considerable discussion arose, and it crosses my mind that the general rule of international law among friendly peoples is that those who are agitating against the destruction of an existing form of government in other countries shall not find opportunity to carry forward such propaganda in a friendly country.


Ernest Lapointe: There is another section of the code which relates to offences against foreign sovereigns. There is a provision relating to His Majesty the King and his countries or dominions; there are sections 78, 79, 80 and 81. There is a section somewhere that makes it an offence to use offensive language towards sovereigns of other nations. But what I rise to say is that if we have nothing in tthe criminal code, the ordinary law would apply with regard to sedition. As the hon. member for St. Law-rence-St. George (Mr. Cahan) said this morning, anything -under the common law which is not repugnant to any statute of Canada applies in this country. Everything which, under the common law, relates to seditious offences in Great Britain, applies to Canada, except when we have something which would be repugnant to it. I do not believe that this amendment was necessary at all, except to make the section clearer. As we say in the section, the provision has not the effect of limiting the generality of the meaning of the expression "seditious intention." Anything that is seditious outside this provision continues to be seditious. But when the offence is that of circulating or printing a

Criminal Code
document in which is advocated the use of force as a means to accomplish governmental change in Canada, we have a special offence for which provision is made in the amendment before us. But it has not the effect of taking away other seditious offences. For instance, reference was made to provincial legislatures. The provision in that regard will still exist. May I call the attention of the committee to the fact that in section 98, which is being repealed, the words "within Canada" are used. I want to repeal section 98, but I do not wish to 'replace it by something which will be more strict.


Mr. CAMERON (Cape Breton):: I believe the addition of the words "within Canada" serve to clarify and carry out the law. The criminal code expressly states that where we have not legislated by parliamentary enactment. the law of England as it stands to-day and as it stood at that time applies. If there # are any omissions in a statute we still have the common law of England to fall back upon. It is my opinion that cases of sedition will not be tried before county magistrates as was suggested by the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George. They will be tried in courts before trained judges.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I did not say "tried"; I used the word "investigated."


John Charles Alexander Cameron: There are other provisions in the criminal code which cover what should be our friendly relations with other countries. I do not think it is competent for us to legislate what is sedition in another country. In fact, I cannot recall the name of the case-if I had the memory of the leader of the opposition, I might do so-but I cited it within the year, and I remember that it dealt with a distinguished Frenchman who was tried in England for uttering seditious language against-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Napoleon III.


John Charles Alexander Cameron: ' The Frenchman was acquitted because it was held that he had the right of free speech in England. In defending him his counsel said, on behalf of the prisoner, that one of the greatest sights injured innocence could see was the prisoner in the box looking upon twelve jurymen of his country, of Which country they were for that trial. Right nobly they maintained that tradition and the man was acquitted.
I believe the section covers all any person could ask for by way of protection against seditious utterances calculated to overthrow the government of Canada. One argument was made to the effect that by repealing
section 98 we were weakening our law and offering an invitation to evilly disposed people to continue preaching seditious doctrines. May I remind those who make that argument that our law, even section 98, does not begin to compare with the law as it stood in Russia in 1917 or in France before the revolution. The laws of neither country, harsh as they were, in the slightest degree prevented the revolutions; on the contrary I believe they contributed largely to bringing them about.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to..
The CHAIRMAN:: Is section 4 as amended agreed to?


Abraham Albert Heaps: Would not the Minister of
Justice be good enough to try even to a limited degree to give us some idea of what he means by the use of the words "everyone shall be presumed to have a seditious intention." This expression is causing a great deal of perturbation and even lawyers who have read it believe it could be interpreted widely. If the clause carries in its present form, unless we have some explanation from the Minister of Justice there may be placed upon the clause an interpretation which would place the presumption of guilt upon any person arrested for sedition. Then, possibly he would express his ideas upon the words dealing with the advocacy of force. The interpretation by some judges has been far from satisfactory, and when the clause was inserted in the present bill I was wondering whether the minister had in mind only physical force.


Ernest Lapointe: As to
the first point raised may I say that in any prosecution it will be the duty of the prosecutor first to prove an overt act. The prosecutor will have to prove that the accused person has published or circulated a writing or document in which force is advocated, or that by words that person has incited the use of force. When this is done the seditious intention is presumed. Perhaps the wording might have been different, but first of all there will have to be proof that the accused person has advocated the use of force; he is not presumed to be guilty of having advocated force, until that has been proved. When such proof is offered, seditious intention will be presumed from the fact that he has committed the act. That places a different complexion upon the objection of the hon. member.
I know what the hon. member has in mind in connection with the second point he raises. My right hon. friend referred to a legal opinion offered by counsel for the labour organization, in which it was stated that the.
Criminal Code

word "force" in section 98 might be interpreted as other than physical force. For instance, in strikes there would be picketing and that sort of thing. The reason this particular counsel held that opinion was that after the Winnipeg strike Mr. Justice Metcalfe said the prisoner had stated that he wanted to use force to obtain redress for labour, and that he was referring to the moral force employed by the labour organization during the strike. Surely that would not apply in this section; this applies only to governmental changes. The word "force" as it appears in this section means physical force only.


Mr. STIRLING:: Would the minister
indicate whether the words "publishes or circulates" would apply to a person who sells the article?


Ernest Lapointe: Yes, it would.
Section as amended agreed to on division.
Section 5 agreed to.
On section 6-Nuisances.


Mr. CHURCH:: I had intended moving an amendment to this clause, but I shall not do so. While I have no objection to the technical change being made in this case, I think something should be done about what are commonly known as common nuisances. There is one form of common nuisance which takes the form of night noises in our residential districts. During the recess I hope the minister will look into the amendment in the British laws to deal with this matter. There is nothing so hard on the human system as noises at night. There are many people in our asylums to-day who should not be there. They are there because of nervous disorders and diseases, in some cases brought about as a result of the depression. In the old country amendments of this kind are brought down in the first week of the session. I do not say that the minister is to blame, but I think these bills which refer to the liberties of the subject, should be brought down early in the session. Some of the officers of the department should look into the law with the idea of dealing with these noises at night.


Ernest Lapointe: I shall be pleased to consider my hon. friend's suggestion. I would be ready to extend the time, because it is at six o'clock in the morning that I suffer most.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I see only one difficulty in this section. How can you say that an offence under the criminal code is not a criminal offence?
[Mr. E. Lapointe.)


Ernest Lapointe: I see the point raised by my right hon. friend. Of course I am not responsible for this, as the section is already in the statute. Possibly this defect can be remedied in some other way.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 7 agreed to.
On section 8-Vagrancy.
Thomas Langton Church: I think this clause goes a little too far, so far as our young people are concerned. If the minister will look at the criminal code I think he will find that paragraph (a) of the vagrancy section will cover everything which it is sought to cover by this clause. I should like to say a word or two about the high school youths who go to northern Ontario. The other day I read in the house a letter which I had received from a reputable commercial traveller. This gentleman said that he had been at Kirkland Lake, which some of the members visited recently, and he had found many of these young boys stranded there and unable to get work. Many of them have been arrested in these places as vagrants. Paragraph (b) of section 238 of the code is being widened by the insertion of the word "or." These young people are ready to take any work they can get.


Ernest Lapointe: They do not come under this provision.


Richard Bedford Bennett: This helps them.


Thomas Langton Church: I had a letter from a clergyman there who tells me that many of these young people left home with the honest intention of getting work. Many of these mines use European labour to a large extent and there are no jobs for these young people. I think paragraph (a) of section 238 of the criminal code is sufficient so far as these single young people are concerned.


Alan Webster Neill: Would the words "or family" refer to a man's wife and children or to his parents?


Ernest Lapointe: The words would refer to his wife and children.


Alan Webster Neill: Only?


Ernest Lapointe: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 9 agreed to.
On section 10-Possession of instruments or disguise.
Thomas Langton Church: I should like to revert to clause 9. I believe that clause should be -edrafted. The amendment is to add the

Free Foreign Trade Zones
words "or street, road, highway or other place." I know of three Toronto high school boys who belong to the baseball team but who took a friend's car.
At six o'clock the Speaker resumed the chair and the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.



PRIVATE BILLS


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 104, for the relief of Harry Candlish Coughtry.-Mr. McPhee.
Bill No. 105, for the relief of Jean Malkinson Goldenberg.-Mr. McKay.
Bill No. 106, for the relief of Edith Lillian Astroff Nevitt.-Mr. Jacobs.
Bill No. 107, for the relief of Lillian Gladys Cheney Perry.-Mr. Plaxton.
Bill No. 109, for the relief of Albert Leonard Johnson.-Mr. Ross (Moose Jaw).
Bill No. 110, for the relief of Reva Marcus. -Mr. Factor.
Bill No. Ill, for the relief of Ethel May Luckie Atkinson.-Mr. Factor.
Bill No. 112, for the relief of Edythe Mary Ross Brown.-Mr. Jacobs.
Bill No. 113, for the relief of Joseph Paul George Marcoux.-Mr. Jacobs.
Bill No. 114, for the relief of Adjutor St. Jean.-Mr. White.

[Stage Direction]
The house in committee on Bill No. 101, to incorporate The Order of Italo-Canadians- Mr. Denis-Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
Sections 1 to 12 inclusive agreed to.
On the title.
Thomas Langton Church: I do not oppose this bill. No doubt this society exists for many good purposes, but it will be seen that the powers and the objects are all provincial. I do not see why this parliament should be asked to incorporate this society when it can get all its powers from the province. I think it is a mistake for parliament to interfere with property and civil rights in this way. As I say, I am not opposing the bill, but I think it is a mistake to follow such a course. The objects in view are almost entirely provincial, and in my opinion this is a matter for the province of Quebec.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I know of this society. It is in the city of Montreal and has had a provincial charter for a number of years. It
merely wishes to extend its activities to other provinces. I do not think the fact that the powers are provincial is an objection. The senate went into the bill carefully and I commend it to the committee. The society is a very worthy one.


Thomas Langton Church: I have no doubt that the society does a good deal of commendable social work, but in my opinion it is very largely provincial.


[Stage Direction]
Title agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.

Mr. W. A. WALSH (Mount Royal) moved:: That the order of the house for the second reading of Bill No. 88 (letter 02 of the Senate), intituled: "An Act to incorporate Quebec and Montmorency Railway Company," be discharged, and the said bill be withdrawn.
He said :	Mr. Speaker, in connection with
this bill, I ask your permission and the permission of the house to withdraw it for this session. Evidently there has been some slight misunderstanding in connection with the bill and the object it has in view, and in order to allow those who are interested in securing the passage of this 'bill an opportunity to educate those who are at the present time, apparently, somewhat opposed to it, I would withdraw it for this session, and' hope to have the privilege of reintroducing it at the next session.
Motion agreed to and bill withdrawn.



FREE FOREIGN TRADE ZONES

[Stage Direction]
Hon. H. H. STEVENS (Kootenay East) moved the second reading of Bill No. 108, to enable the establishment, operation and maintenance of free foreign trade zones.
He said:	This 'bill was introduced in the
other chamber. The only reason I mention that is to shorten my own remarks, by saying that it was before a committee of the senate that examined into the matter very carefully and reported it unanimously, and' it was forwarded to this house in due course.
A brief statement of the bill is to this effect, that it authorizes the government by licence to permit provinces, municipalities, or public agencies to establish in any suitable port of Canada what is known as a free port zone. Some had the idea that a free port meant a port free of charges. That, of course, is not correct at all. It simply means an area within a port where goods may be received without entry through customs and may there be reprocessed, manufactured oU-o-od jn any
Criminal Code
[Stage Direction]
way and resKipped by export or admitted to the country under the usual customs regulations. I suppose the most outstanding free port in the world is that of Hamburg. Many others have been established in various parts of the world. I believe it was nearly twenty-five years ago that I personally brought this question up in the house and on several occasions during the next ten years I suggested or urged the establishment of free port zones in Canada, but parliament prior to some years ago had not seen fit to approve. However the idea or the policy of free port zones has considerably progressed since those days, and there are many such zones established in various countries of the world, detailed information regarding which may be foundi in the printed evidence of the senate committee which has been distributed to all members of the house. The bill does not impose any charge on the state. It is a permissive measure authorizing the government to license these public agencies to establish such a free port zone if, when and as the government may decide. As section 19 of the bill reads:
No provision of this act shall be read as imposing or intending to impose, directly, indirectly or consequentially, upon His Majesty or upon the public revenues of Canada any expenditure or expense-
And so on. So, without delaying the house at all, I would ask that the bill pass its second reading, and, I hope, pass at this session of the house.
Hon. J. L. ILSLEY (Minister of National Revenue):: This bill is a very important measure; it has come to the House of Commons at a late stage in the session, and the government has not had an opportunity of considering it in all its implications. I have read the bill, and I have read some of the representations-very strong representations-made against the bill to the senate committee that considered it, but I do not propose to go to-night into the subject of its merits. It has manifestly come to us at so late a stage that we cannot consider it as we should consider a bill of this importance. I therefore, Mr. Speaker, beg to move the adjournment of the debate.
Motion agreed to and debate adjourned.



CRIMINAL CODE AMENDMENT

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed consideration in committee of Bill No. 96, to amend the criminal code-Mr. Lapointe (Quebec East)-Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
Thomas Langton Church: At six o'clock I was saying a few words about section 9.


Frederick George Sanderson: I am in the judgment of the committee, but my recollection is that section 9 was passed and that we were at section 10.


Thomas Langton Church: No, Mr. Chairman. At six o'clock I was speaking on section 9. It could not have been carried. I was speaking when you rose.


Ernest Lapointe: That is a mistake; the section carried; but I should be quite willing to let my hon. friend go back to section 9.
On section 9-Motor cars.


Thomas Langton Church: I do not wish to be unfair. I am trying to put this bill through. Later on I propose to help the house a little to hurry along. I think this section is an improvement, but I hope that in the recess of parliament the minister will consider the position of first offenders in the matter of what I was referring to at six o'clock as joy-riding. I mentioned the case of three young people belonging to a baseball team. They took out for two or three hours the car of a gentleman who was connected with them, and on coming back they were arrested; under the present law they are liable to imprisonment for a year. They have never been in any trouble before. I suggest that during the recess of parliament this motor car question should be referred to the law officers of the crown and something done to take care of matters of this kind. I believe this bill should have come down in the early days of the session, because it is a law reform affecting the most important thing we have, the liberty of the subject. In the dying days of the session many of the lawyers have gone home, and this bill does not get the consideration it should. I hope in the recess the minister will look into the matter carefully.


Ernest Lapointe: I have much sympathy with those who want to enjoy themselves in the way my hon. friend suggests, but if this section is not amended as provided in this bill those young people who, without any right, take motor cars for the purpose of joy-riding are liable to be charged with theft, which carries a much heavier penalty. On the whole I think it is better to make the amendment.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 10

Possession of instruments of disguise.
Ernest Lapointe: I have an amendment, inserting the word "vaultbreaking" after the word "housebreaking" in line 27.

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Mr. ELLIOTT (Middlesex):: I move accordingly.
Section as amended agreed to.
Sections 11 to 20 inclusive agreed to.
On section 21-Defence of insanity.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Is there not still a six man jury in Alberta? The number in Manitoba and Saskatchewan was reduced to six, and if the Alberta jury is still six in number I think that province should be mentioned also.


Ernest Lapointe: I know the law has been changed as far as Saskatchewan and Manitoba are concerned, but I could not say as to Alberta.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am told that the number is still six in Alberta, so I think we had better add that province also.


Ernest Lapointe: I am advised that there has been no change in Alberta.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Then Alberta should be included also, if there is a six man jury there. This question of the sanity or insanity of an accused who sets up the plea of insanity under the old section of the code was decided by a jury of twelve, which is the usual number. But if Alberta still has a jury of six this section should read, "or in the provinces of Saskatchewan, Alberta or Manitoba by any six jurors." Otherwise you would leave Alberta with the twelve jurors trying an issue of insanity while in that province there is no provision for more than six jurors.


Mr. TUCKER:: In Alberta all juries are and have been composed of six men. This amendment provides that if there is an insanity issue directed before the trial proceeds, it shall be tried by twelve jurors except in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. If you do not specifically include Alberta in this section it will, I think, be found that the insanity issue will have to be tried by twelve jurors in Alberta, because this is a special provision for the trial of an insanity issue before the accused is given in charge to a jury. Of course, after he is given in charge on the main issue, there would be no necessity for mentioning Alberta, because they have always had juries of six in that province. That point of course is covered elsewhere.
As far as I am concerned I should like to see twelve jurors try these issues in all provinces. I do not want to hold up the committee but I am very much against six man juries in criminal cases. Of course, if you are going to have a six man jury try the main
issue, I suppose it is logical to have a six man jury try the insanity issue as well, but I think many lawyers in Saskatchewan and Manitoba now agree that the twelve man jury is the right jury to try people, charged with serious crimes, rather than a six man jury which really is not a jury at all under English law.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The other day the
appellate division of the Supreme Court of Manitoba decided that a six man jury was valid.


Walter Adam Tucker: Yes, because the parliament of Canada had enacted that a six man jury should try cases in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. As far as I am concerned, however-and I think many lawyers in Saskatchewan would agree-a six man jury never should have been established for criminal cases. Most lawyers held the opinion that it was quite all right to establish six man juries for civil cases, but when this was done that was used as the basis for asking that a six man jury should be established for criminal cases. I believe the experience has been that when you cut your jury from twelve to six the tendency is towards trial by judge and no longer trial by judge and jury, because six men are more readily subject to the influence of the opinion of the judge. It will soon be commonly urged that since you have got down to six man juries the next step should be to do away with juries altogether and have trial by three judges sitting together. Personally I see no reason why, when citizens accused of a crime in the rest of Canada can demand that they shall not be found guilty	except by	a jury of	twelve men,	wein the	west when	so accused	should be in	theposition of being liable to be found guilty by six men. Anyone can see that the chances of being found guilty unanimously, as must be the case in criminal matters, by a six man jury are practically double the chances of being found guilty by a twelve man jury. Ever	since the	beginning	of Anglo-Saxonjurisprudence the jury has been composed of twelve men, and personally I should like to see that practice brought back. I do not agree	with the	six man	jury system	for
criminal cases. I hope the Minister of Justice will secure the opinions of some of the organized legal bodies in Saskatchewan and Manitoba during the next year or so, and I think he will find that the opinion of most lawyers is that in criminal cases we should go back to the twelve man jury.


Ernest Lapointe: I understand that this change, which was made under the former administration, was brought about
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at the request of the provincial authorities of both Saskatchewan and Manitoba. As far as Alberta is concerned, under the Alberta Act that province had the right to keep the jury procedure as it was in the old Northwest Territories, and that is still the case, so it does not come under the present section.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But will it not come under the present section?
As it is now it covers all Canada except Manitoba and Saskatchewan, in terms which are exact and precise:
If such issue is directed before the accused is given in charge to a jury for trial on the indictment, such issue shall be tried by any twelve jurors, or in the provinces of Saskatchewan or Manitoba by any six jurors.


Ernest Lapointe: Of course it was the same drafting before, and still Alberta was under special laws. But my right hon. friend is right when he says that as the section appears the whole of Canada except Manitoba and Saskatchewan would require twelve jurors. I am told by my officer that Alberta does not come under this section at all.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I do not know how it is possible to legislate for all Canada and leave out one province.


Ernest Lapointe: I believe that all the provinces which are excepted could be named in this section. However I shall take that into consideration, and possibly next year we shall do as we have done this year, correct these little anomalies as they appear. We have corrected many this year, and I know some still remain. This appears to be one.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I do not want to delay the work of the committee, but I find it difficult to accommodate myself to this. Here is a section which reads as I have indicated; when a plea of insanity is set up, as seldom arises, the law of Alberta says there shall be six jurors. Counsel will say: No, it is provided by section 21 of a federal statute passed in 1936 that except in Saskatchewan and Manitoba the number shall be twelve.


Ernest Lapointe: I agree with my right hon. friend that it seems anomalous.


Frederick George Sanderson: Shall section 21 carry?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No; it is either right or wrong. The minister says he agrees with me. Let us include Alberta; that is the short way to do it.


Ernest Lapointe: I am afraid it will necessitate other changes. Alberta is dealt with-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, under the Northwest Territories Act.


Ernest Lapointe: It looks strange but that is the position as it exists. If we change it, there may be no bad effect, but I would rather postpone this clause and see whether the matter could be dealt with in the way my right hon. friend suggests without interfering with some other clause.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Ear be it from me to stand in the way of a minister of the crown.


Ernest Lapointe: I shall undertake to see whether this can be done, and, if so, have it done by the senate.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Section 22 agreed to.
On section 23-Commencement of act.
Alan Webster Neill: Why the delay?


Ernest Lapointe: I am informed that it is the usual practice to give notice to the various provinces of amendments to the criminal code.


Thomas Langton Church: Before the committee
passes the bill I have the consent of the Minister of Justice to bring up an amendment. The amendments are set out in Bills Nos. 5 and 57. I did not discuss this on second reading because there was so much discussion. But these are two of the most important bills dealt with this session. The minister promised me that the bill would be given consideration and in the committee I could add Bills Nos. 5 and 57. Owing to the length of the session I do not wish to delay the committee more than four or five minutes.
Bill No. 57 relates to motor cars. We have spent considerable time discussing one clause of an act which concerns only eight or nine people in Canada, and here is Bill No. 57 which concerns the lives of nine thousand people who will be killed and of more thousands wounded, yet we stand still and do nothing. I would urge consideration of this bill. I do not believe many hon. members have ever seen it. The bill did not get the consideration it should have had. It relates to level crossings, driving under the influence of liquor; it proposes to stop racing and cutting in; it provides that a person having caused death shall not drive for two years, and for women jurors on the trial of a woman accused, and it deals with cases where a charge of manslaughter arises out of the operation of a motor vehicle, providing that there may be

Criminal Code
a conviction for culpable negligence, a jury to decide whether the accused is guilty or not guilty.
The other bill had to do with giving people time to pay fines. I propose to substitute for the present law the law of England, known as "time to pay.'-
I am not asking the committee to adopt these bills to-night, but I say that the country from coast to coast is crying out to this parliament to stop this slaughter on the highways. It is one of the crimes of this age. Some of us here may be knocked down by a motor car and not be able to come back next session. Transportation should be the means to an end, and not an end in itself. What I suggested early in the session was that we should have real law reform in this country. Constitutional, parliamentary, cabinet and law reform are among the most important matters before us. The minister told me that he would not oppose it if I added some of these amendments to the bill. He was most sympathetic in regard to this question. I ask him if he will be kind enough during the recess to have his law officers look into this question of death on the highway. Hundreds of thousands of people are killed every year all over the world. They do not get a chance; they are just sent to eternity in five seconds. Our law is away behind the times; it was made about the time the motor car came into use. The minister requested me to let the bill stand. Some hon. members want to discuss the bill.
If no action is taken this session I am going to continue to press this bill and I hope at the opening of next session a committee of both houses of parliament, as was the case in England, will be appointed to take up this question of law reform, death and accidents by motor cars, the terrible toll of life and the question of the level crossings, and bring the law up to date. In England by taking action they have reduced these accidents fifty per cent. I admit that this matter is partly in the control of the provinces, but the criminal law is federal. Some people driving motor cars are not fit to drive them. In these days a motor car or a motor truck is a death dealing instrument in the hands of those who do not know how to handle it. As evidence of that fact we need only read the lists of week end fatalities during the summer months. We could fill these 245 seats five times over with the people badly injured since the first of January in the city from which I come, and of that number there were twenty-four deaths.
I am asking the minister to give this matter careful consideration; he has promised to do that. I would ask that it be considered early in the next session and that a committee of
both houses be appointed to see if we cannot get some relief from the great numbers of tragedies on our highways. Dear knows we are far enough behind the times as it is, and while I do not want to press the matter at this time-I would like to see prorogation come quickly; the house cannot close quickly enough for me-I should like to see something done. The minister told me that if I withdrew Bill No. 5 he would give it consideration. I am asking him to do so, because I do not want to see him knocked down, and in view of the speed with which motor cars pass this building it is possible that he could be. I would like to see him five a good many more years.


Ernest Lapointe: So far as Bill No. 5 is concerned may I tell the hon. member I have communicated with the attorneys general of the provinces. Six of them have replied, and generally may I say that they are not in agreement with the delayed payment of fines suggested by the hon. member. Under section 739 of the criminal code, which deals with summary convictions, under the law magistrates have the discretion to allow a limited time for the payment of fines. That provision may be sufficient to meet most of the cases the hon. member has in mind. However I am prepared to give the matter full consideration during the recess and to discuss it again with him at the next session.
The other bill to which he has referred deals with an important matter, and it too will be fully considered. The hon. member would make it an offence to cross railway tracks without first having come to a stop, and having started again in low gear. There are many objections to the proposal. We have received strong objections from almost every automobile association including the Manitoba Motor League, the Canadian Automobile Association, the Hamilton Automobile Club and the Nova Scotia Motor League. They state that the provision would be unfair to motorists, particularly to visiting tourists, and would be impossible of enforcement. They claim, too, that the danger would be increased, because after starting their engines in low gear the motorists might have a tendency to stall their motors in the middle of railway tracks. However, it is a fact that in my own province of Quebec this is one of the traffic regulations, although it may not always be observed by motorists. I would hesitate at this time, however, to make it an offence not to abide by such a regulation.
The other proposal of the hon. member is to make it an offence for a driver to operate
Criminal Code

his motor car while under the influence of alcohol. The present law states that he shall not do so "while intoxicated." This proposal would involve an important change and would also involve difficulties in connection with the interpretation of the expression "while under the influence of liquor." If, by some magistrates, a man who has had one drink were ruled to be under the influence of liquor, such a law would be dangerous. Of course, when prohibition was in force in Canada conditions might have been different, but in these days the liquor traffic is legal, and one drink taken by a man who drives his car should not, according to the judgment of many, be considered a crime. I do not know whether my hon. friend has a chauffeur, but if such a law were enforced those people who can afford the services of a chauffeur would be in a better position than the poorer people who cannot afford chauffeurs and would have to abstain altogether from having even a drink of beer, when in charge of their motor cars. I believe it would be well to give this matter more consideration, and again I promise the hon. member that I shall be pleased to do so.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Frederick George Sanderson: Shall the title carry?


John Charles Alexander Cameron: I beg
the indulgence of the committee to revert to section 19. I am sorry I did not notice how drastic it was when it was passed.


An hon. MEMBER:: You are too late.


John Charles Alexander Cameron: Perhaps I am; but there are some lawyers in the house who will be kicking themselves when they go home if some change is not made. I refer to the fact- that by section 19 it is made obligatory upon a person committed fourteen days before the sitting of the court to make his election within ten days of that sitting as to whether he is to be tried by a jury. I think that is a provision which is entirely too drastic in its scope and effect.


Ernest Lapointe: This
change has been requested by eminent legal authorities in various provinces, and more particularly by the Attorney General of Nova Scotia. It is for the purpose of avoiding heavy expenditures by the crown and to compel the crown to summon witnesses and to submit the case to the grand jury. When a true bill is found the accused elects whether he will go before the district judge rather than before a jury. I think on the whole the change commends itself because the

accused person will have all the time necessary to make his election, and the crown will not be compelled to incur heavy expenditures.


Walter Adam Tucker: Might this also apply
to a case where a person might elect for trial by a magistrate under part XVI of the code? Would he have to elect within the time specified in this measure? I have not had time to look the matter up. Can the minister tell me whether a person desiring to be tried by a magistrate under part XVI would be required to elect within the time specified in this section.


Ernest Lapointe: No; that would not apply; it would apply only to those who are on bail.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Who are committed.


Walter Adam Tucker: A provincial magistrate
in Saskatchewan can try any case a district court or county court judge can try. I would like to know whether this would require an election ten days ahead in cases where prisoners desired to be tried by a magistrate, under part XVI.


Ernest Lapointe: A man
has to be committed or sent for trial.


Walter Adam Tucker: After a person has had a preliminary inquiry in Saskatchewan and is committed for trial, he can then elect to be tried by a district court judge or by a magistrate under part XVI. I would like to know whether he must elect within the time specified in this section if he wishes to be tried by a magistrate.


Ernest Lapointe: This applies only to a case that comes before a jury. He has to make an election to go before a jury or to 'be tried by either a magistrate or a district court judge.


[Stage Direction]
Title agreed to.
Bill reported.
Mr. LAPOINTE (Quebec East) moved the third reading of the bill.
Motion agreed to on division, bill read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. FERNAND RINFRET (Secretary of State) moved the second reading of and concurrence in amendments made by the senate to Bill No. 78, to amend the Dominion Elections Act, 1934.

Income War Tax Act
He said: These amendments will be found on page 520 of the votes and proceedings. There are some slight changes made by the senate to conform with the amendments to the Dominion Franchise Act in connection with qualification of voters. These amendments have been submitted to the chief electoral officer and approved. The senate also suggests an amendment to the title of the bill, which would read "provide for dominion by-elections". I do not think there is any objection to that.
Motion agreed to; amendments read the second time and concurred in.


Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Marine):: Mr. Speaker, I beg to move:
That a message be sent to the senate acquainting their honours that this house disagrees with their amendments to Bill No. 17, an act respecting the National Harbours Board, for the following reasons:
1.	Amendment 1 makes impossible reemployment of many officers and employees of present harbour boards who have long years of service, and in addition would seriously handicap the board in the conduct of its many competitive business operations.
2.	Amendment 2 arises out of amendment 1, and is not otherwise required.
3.	Amendment 3 proposes restrictions that serve no useful purpose and which are not presently imposed on other government services.
4.	Amendment 5 is permissive only and confers on the board no new authority. The government holds the view that the step specified by this clause is not desirable at this moment.


Alan Webster Neill: Where are these amendments to be found?


Clarence Decatur Howe: In the votes and proceedings of Wednesday, June 17.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.


James Lorimer Ilsley: These amendments are to be found in votes and1 proceedings commencing at page 468 and continuing to the middle of page 470. I do not think it will be necessary for me to go over these amendments in detail. We are prepared to accept nearly all the amendments; perhaps I should say we are prepared to accept all the amendments, with one qualification. It will be noted in the middle of page 470 that a clause A is added to the bill, which clause amends section 257 of the Customs Act in such a way as to impose a
maximum penalty of one thousand dollars instead of a maximum penalty of two hundred dollars. That is acceptable, but the clause which was amended contained the minimum penalty of fifty dollars, which we regard as very important. The senate omits any minimum penality. Therefore, I beg to move:
1.	That with the exception of clause A, the amendments made by the senate to Bill No. 67, an act to amend the Customs Act be concurred in.
2.	That with regard to clause A, that clause be amended by inserting therein immediately following the words "one thousand dollars" in the substituted section 257 the following words "and not less than fifty dollars."


Alan Webster Neill: Would it not be advisable to say "not exceeding one thousand dollars?" Is that not the customary language used?


James Lorimer Ilsley: This is the senate's amendment, and we are accepting it.


Alan Webster Neill: Under this amendment a man would be fined one thousand dollars or nothing.


James Lorimer Ilsley: It is quite possible that the hon. gentleman is right about that. We have taken it to mean not more than one thousand dollars and not less than fifty dollars. I think the hon. gentleman is right, but there are two views. I remember quite distinctly that sections of that kind are open to the construction that they mean not more than the amount mentioned. We shall either have to change that or to let it go through as it is.
Motion agreed to; amendments read the second time and concurred in.



INCOME WAR TAX ACT


James Lorimer Ilsley: There are fifteen amendments made by the senate, most of which are very minor; but a few are of some importance. I move:
That a message be sent to the senate to acquaint their honours that this house agrees to their fifth, sixth, tenth, eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth and fourteenth amendments to Bill No. 75, an act to amend the Income War Tax Act, and disagrees to their first, second, third, fourth, seventh, eighth and ninth amendments for the following reasons:-
Because, respecting the first amendment, paragraphs C and D of the first schedule of the act are "enacted" by section two of chapter forty of the statutes of 1935, not reenacted. To "reenact" is to enact again in the same terms. These paragraphs were enacted by the act of 1935 in terms different from that of the repealed paragraphs.
Because, respecting the second amendment, the first schedule of the act is repealed in precise words by the act of 1932-33, and a new schedule "enacted." The schedule is, therefore, not "amended."
Broadcasting Corporation

Because, respecting the third, fourth, eighth and ninth amendments, the reasons for disagreeing to the second amendment apply equally to these amendments, and further, because these changes would have the effect of substituting a new and incorrect method of drafting the enacting words in a clause of a bill, a method contrary to that which has constantly been followed up to the present time, and would further have the effect of disrupting the uniformity of our statutes.
Because, respecting the seventh amendment, the word "and" would be substituted for the word "or," which is already in the act, and the effect would be contrary to the desired intention of the section, which is that a company shall be liable for the tax "if it should fail to file the annual return or to pay the said filing fee," that is, the company shall be liable in either case.
And further, that this house, with respect to the fifteenth amendment made by the senate agree to their amendment with an amendment to their amendment as follows:-
For the words "of said subsection (8)" substitute the words "of this subsection," for the reason that the words "of said subsection (8)" would be part of subsection (8) itself. As the words are incorporated in the subsection, it is preferable to use the words "of this subsection"; and
That the clerk of the house do carry the said message to the senate.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.


[Stage Direction]
Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Marine) moved the second reading of Bill No. 103, respecting broadcasting.
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time, and the house went into committee thereon, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
Sections 1 and 2 agreed to.
On section 3-Corporation constituted.
Richard Bedford Bennett: With respect to the use of the words "representation to the principal geographical divisions of Canada," does that mean the provinces?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Not necessarily. For purposes of broadcasting we consider the geographical divisions tc be: 1. British Columbia; 2. the prairie provinces; 3. Ontario; 4. Quebec;
S.	the maritime provinces.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Sections 4 to 7 inclusive agreed to.
On section 8-Objects of the corporation.
Clarence Decatur Howe: Paragraph (i) seems to have no particular purpose and there has been some objection to it. It reads:

(i) collect news relating to current events in any part of the world and in any manner that may be thought fit and to establish and subscribe to news agencies.
I have not given notice, but if there is no objection I would ask my colleague to move that this paragraph be struck out.


John Campbell Elliott: I move that the paragraph be struck out.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: What is the object of striking it out when it is only permissive? Is it desirable that a commission of this kind should have the power to do just what this paragraph outlines, not compelling them to do it? What were the objections?


Clarence Decatur Howe: In this matter I am not too sure of anything, for I believe that we are all experimenting. If anyone thinks that the paragraph should remain; that it is valuable, I shall ask my colleague to withdraw his amendment. The paragraph was taken from the British Broadcasting Corporation.


Richard Bedford Bennett: When Mr. Gladstone
Murray was in this country the question was discussed with reference to the powers conferred on the British Broadcasting Corporation, and the committee will find those powers, practically in terms in this bill. He pointed out that considerable value attached to this provision, and in Great Britain it was a source of substantial revenue, if I remember aright. It is only permissive.


John Campbell Elliott: If it is the wish of the committee I ask that the amendment be withdrawn.


Mrs. BLACK:: May I say to the minister
that as far as the Yukon is concerned the radio is almost entirely worthless. I assume this is the case because the station on the island or at Vancouver is not sufficiently strong to carry the wave lengths. It may interest hon. members to know that while we had an idea of the general result of the election, which we gathered from telegrams, we had no idea of the members and no idea of the enormous majority of the government. All the news we got during the campaign was from San Francisco. All the news we gat from overseas comes either through Alaska or through San Francisco. It may be of some interest to the committee to know that when I came here during the early part of the session I asked my deskmate who Mr. Sage was; I had never heard his name before.


Clarence Decatur Howe: In the sessions of the radio
committee the fact was brought out that several parts of the dominion are in the same position as that described by my hon. friend,

Broadcasting Corporation
and it will be the purpose to extend existing facilities as rapidly as funds will permit. Unfortunately our funds are limited, but we are slowly improving.
Amendment withdrawn.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to. [DOT]
Section 9 agreed to.
On section 10-Approval of governor in council necessary respecting certain expenditures and disposal of property.
Richard Bedford Bennett: Why is it thought desirable that this corporation shall be solely under the control of the government? We had hoped that broadcasting in Canada might be out of the hands of governments. An effort was made in that direction; indeed, I think it was an accomplished fact, and the commission acted without considering the political effects of its conduct. Section 9 states that the corporation shall not enter into any negotiations without the consent in writing of the minister. I can understand that in its application to governments, but with respect to other matters, on this other point, everything is under the control of the governor in council. In other words, this becomes a department of government, with all the political abuses that follow from making this public utility an arm of government. I object to this. I do not wish to take up too much time about it, but I must enter a protest against the way in which this is being done. It really means that the administration have taken this great utility-I might use that word-and placed it completely under the control of the government. Because, if they say they are going to appoint a general manager, what has that to do with the matter? He has to come and see the government before he does anything. That means that the policy of the government is to be the policy of this administrator, and I do not think any man can be secured who will put himself into a position where he has to be the tool of the government to do what he is told to do. One can understand this provision that the corporation shall not seek any concession from or enter into negotiations with any British or foreign government without having first obtained the consent in writing of the minister, because that is an exceptional matter. But when one comes to section 10:
Notwithstanding anything contained in this act, the corporation shall not, unless the approval of the governor in council has first been obtained:-	_
(a) enter into any agreement involving any expenditure in excess of $10,000.
That means that the government of this country is running the broadcast.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I think the remarks of my right hon. friend are quite unfounded. Section 9 is taken holus-bolus from the British Broadcasting provision.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No. Just look at the bill.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I shall read it in a moment. The purpose of it, I think, it quite obvious. Negotiations with other countries are conducted through the Department of External Affairs.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I said I quite understand that.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Passing on to the second matter, that is simply a limitation on expenditures. As a matter of fact the late government imposed on the present commission a more stringent restriction than that.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Because we had not the money.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The present commission cannot enter into a contract for more than $5,000 without the consent of the governor in council.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Because we had not the money.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Well, we have no money now. The position is exactly the same.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The government can lend them some money.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I challenge my right hon. friend to show in any paragraph of this measure that there is any more government control in this bill than there was in the last. As a matter of fact it will be found that in this bill there is more latitude for the corporation than there has been in the past three years.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I should be glad to accept the minister's-


Clarence Decatur Howe: I accept the challenge, and ask the right hon. gentleman to prove, as we go along, the statement he has made.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The word "challenge" would seem to be a rather warlike expression on the part of so peaceful a minister, so near the end of the session. If he looks at section 16 he will see at once that the difference is that the governor in council has to provide the corporation with a working capital of $100,000. When the former commission came into being we were not able to do even that. That has been the trouble. The Canadian people have not realized that this limitation imposed upon the financial assistance which could be given the radio commission necessarily restricted its activities. But in the present case we are contemplating, with the working
Broadcasting Corporation

capital it receives from the government, it is going to be able to do many things, and those things are under the control of the government. The old commission did not have anything to function with. As it did not have anything to function with, conditions were against it creating liabilities.


Clarence Decatur Howe: It had $1,700,000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes. It got those as advances in connection with licence fees. All the revenues of the commission have to go to the corporation. I am only pointing out that if the government provides it with capital and imposes limitations, that is an entirely different matter from not providing it with capital and imposing no limitations.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I do not accept that as proving the point of my right hon. friend.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 11-Acquisition of property.
Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: There have been coming
to me resolutions from many church groups throughout western Canada, and in particular from the province of Saskatchewan,. Rather than occupy the time of the committee with observations of my own I shall read just one of these resolutions:
This conference would strongly urge upon our federal parliament the adoption of legislation and regulations which will bring all radio broadcasting stations in Canada under definite unified control through its national commission or corporation, with a view to securing satisfactory restrictions upon the commercial use of our Canadian radio stations.
We would further urge that every effort be made to improve the standard of quality in program broadcasts throughout the week, and that such Sunday broadcasts be encouraged as will strengthen and unify the moral and religious life of our nation. We urge also that commercial advertising, sports competitions, and political propaganda be banned from our Canadian radio stations on Sundays, in harmony with our Canadian ideals for one day in the week free from commercial interests and partizan political controversy.
I think that speaks for itself; it is hardly necessary to elaborate upon it. I draw it to the attention of the minister.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Sections 12 and 13 agreed to.
On section 14-Moneys received to be deposited in bank.
Clarence Decatur Howe: Before this section carries I
desire to point out a difference under this bill, as compared with the prior bill, in financing the corporation. Previously the corporation was financed by an appropriation of parliament which has amounted each year, I 
think, to $1,500,000. This bill provides that the fees collected for radio licences shall be paid to the radio corporation, and while an appropriation is (being made this year to bridge the gap, in future appropriations of parliament will not be made. That being the case, I think we should amend this clause by striking out the words:
and. of the service to holders of private receiving licences in the suppression of interference from local electrical sources.
The net revenue from licence fees last year amounted to $1,490,000, and the cost of suppressing radio interference was about $180,000. Therefore, to let this clause stand without an amendment would mean that the revenues of the commission would be considerably curtailed.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They would be about


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes. I think there is much
to be said for making the control of interference a function of the Department of Marine, for the present, at least.


Richard Bedford Bennett: At the general expense.


Clarence Decatur Howe: At the general expense, yes.
Control of interference has to do with other than radio broadcasting. It has to do with the radiotelegraph and matters of that kind. It may be that in a year or two receipts from licence fees will create a larger fund and we may again be able to include this item, but I may point out that, in effect, the government has been paying this cost in previous years, and we think that until fees come in more largely we should continue to do so. An encouraging sign is that our collections to date in respect of licence fees this year are equal to those received' to the end of September of last year, so people are evidently getting "licence-conscious."


Richard Bedford Bennett: What amount of the
collections made was transferred to the commission last year?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Parliament voted the commission $1,500,000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Because the money went into the consolidated fund.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The licence fees were paid into the consolidated fund. The net amount, that is the fees less the cost of collection, amounted to $1,490,000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is, that went over to the commission?

Broadcasting Corporation


Clarence Decatur Howe: No, that went to the receiver general. The vote to the commission was the vote of parliament in the amount of SI,500,000.


Mr. ROSS (Moose Jaw):: Has the minister or the commission ever taken into consideration that there should be a difference in licence fees between urban and rural parts of the country? In the first place, there is not the same interference to be looked after in the rural parts as there is in the urban parts. In the second place, people who have radios in the cities can hook them on to the ordinary electrical current, and it costs them very little to carry on with their sets, whereas people in the country have to buy costly batteries and have them recharged several times throughout the year in order to have the radios running on the farms. I think the department should take into consideration imposing a very low fee for radio in the rural parts of the country and a higher fee in the urban parts, because people with radios in urban centres have not anywhere near the cost to meet in running a radio that is involved to the people in the rural parts.


Mr. TAYLOR (Nanaimo):: I think it should be noted that there is a misprint in the reference at the side of this section.


Frederick George Sanderson: I understood the minister to say that there was an amendment.


John Campbell Elliott: I move that paragraph (a) of subsection 1 of section 14 be amended by striking out all the words after "administration" in the seventh line thereof, to the word "such" in the tenth line.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Alan Webster Neill: Since we are on the subject of the suppression of interference, has the minister given any consideration to empowering his officials to force people who have machines which produce interference to have such machines adjusted? Sometimes a man, to save an expenditure of perhaps two or three dollars, will put the radios of a whole community out of business, and apparently there is no authority for these officers to do more than point out the situation. If the man chooses to be a hog and says, "Well. I don't care," there is no remedy. Surely it would be easy to give the officials some authority to force such people to remedy the difficulty. The cost involved might be limited in some way, but where the cost is only trivial the officials should have power to compel the person causing the interference to remedy the condition. I do not suggest that a
man should be compelled to put in machines costing perhaps three or four hundred dollars, but where it is a case of pure hoggishness in order to save a trivial expenditure, such as installing a little gadget on a fan, for instance, it is not fair to the other people in the district to allow such a condition to continue.


Clarence Decatur Howe: If my hon. friend will read section 23 he will say that we have taken fairly complete powers in that regard. I may say that while we had no power to enforce the act previously, according to the report of the commission out of some 16,000 investigations only in some twelve individual cases was there refusal to comply with the request of the department, which I think is a very good record. However, under section 23 we take complete power to enforce these regulations.


Mr. FAIR:: Before this section is carried I should like to endorse the suggestion of the hon. member for Moose Jaw (Mr. Ross). I have heard quite a number of kicks since the licence fee was increased, and I know the cost of operating battery radios in the country is high. In many cases it is also inconvenient at times to have the batteries charged, because it must be remembered that many people using these battery radios may live as far as thirty miles from the place where the batteries are charged.


Clarence Decatur Howe: 
Richard Bedford Bennett: It would be difficult to find a similar section conferring such powers upon any other commission. In this case half a million dollars is to be made available to the corporation by and under the control of the governor in council, not the corporation.


Clarence Decatur Howe: This is something entirely new, in order to allow the corporation to function properly. That is, they are allowed
Broadcasting Corporation

the privilege of borrowing not more than $500,000 to undertake a project which they could not have undertaken in any one year. The difficulty at present is that the construction of a new high powered station is out of the question 'because it is impossible to appropriate sufficient money in any one year. If the corporation can show the government that the revenues are such that over three, four or five years they will be able to amortize a loan of that kind, under this section they are able to borrow from the government sufficient funds to carry on such a capital expenditure. I hardly think that is restrictive.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But unfortunately section 17 does not say that, and that is why I direct attention to it; it is not in accordance with the recommendations of the committee. The section does not even say that the money is being loaned. It says that the governor in council may authorize the construction of the work, and-
-on the recommendation of the minister, may authorize the Minister of Finance to place to the credit of the corporation from any unappropriated moneys in the consolidated revenue fund such sura or sums as may be necessary to carry out such construction, extension or improvement of capital works: provided that the total amount which may be so authorized for the said purposes shall not exceed five hundred thousand dollars.
(2) Such moneys so advanced shall bear such rate of interest and shall be amortized on such terms and conditions as may be fixed by the governor in council.
But the section does not say it is a loan. The money is just placed to the credit of the corporation, and subsequently provision is made for the interest rate and so on. Previously we were not in a financial situation to make any such provision, although such requests were made.


Clarence Decatur Howe: What is the complaint of my
right hon. friend? What is the restrictive feature?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think there should be something to indicate that it is a loan.


Robert Fair: I do not see very much to the argument of the minister with regard to the cost of upkeep of the wires, because those wires have to be kept up for the cities, and the country gets just what the cities do not need.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Sections 18 to 23 inclusive agreed to.
On section 24-Recommendations regarding private stations to be made by corporation.
Clarence Decatur Howe: There is an amendment to be moved to this section. I may say there has been a misunderstanding with regard to the situation. We have been accused in parliament and in the press of taking powers that the minister did not have previously, but I think hon. gentlemen who read the present bill will find that it is the same as the previous act, under which the minister made the decision after consulting with the broadcasting commission. In this case we are going a step further and requiring the approval of the governor in council, which I think is a very proper improvement.


John Campbell Elliott: I move that subsection 1 of section 24 be amended by adding after the words "it may deem fit" in line 45, the words: "The approval of the governor in council shall be obtained before any licence for any new private station is issued."


Richard Bedford Bennett: Does the early part still stand, the part reading:
The minister shall, before dealing with any application for licence to establish a new private station or for increase in power, change of channel, or change of location of any existing private station, or making any regulations or changes in regulations governing the activities of private stations, refer such application or regulation to the corporation-
Does that stand?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Then it goes on:
-and the corporation shall make such recommendations to the minister as it may deem fit.
Then what follows?


Frederick George Sanderson: The amendment adds after the words "it may deem fit" in line 45, the following: "The approval of the governor in council shall be obtained before any licence for any new private station is issued."
Section as amended agreed to.
Sections 25 to 28 inclusive agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.



COPYRIGHT AMENDMENT ACT


[Stage Direction]
The house in committee on Bill No. 55, to amend the Copyright .Amendment Act, 1931- Mr. Rinfret-Mr. Sanderson in the chair.

On section 1-Infringement of copyright.
Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I do not intend to deal at any great length with the bill, which has already been referred to on two different occasions during the course of the session. I merely wish to remind the committee that this bill deals solely with performing rights of musical compositions. In practice the different sections of the bill are consequent upon the inquiry conducted by Judge Parker, appointed by the former government to inquire into the business of the Canadian Performing Right Society.
The act of 1931 provided for a commissioner to make an inquiry into the fees charged by a society, holding a number of copyrights. The inquiry took place in 1935 and the report was handed to the government during October of that year.
By an additional bill also introduced by the former government in 1935 a stay of proceedings while the inquiry was going on, was enacted, and inasmuch as the legislation was made necessary to allow this government to give effect to the inquiry conducted by Judge Parker, therefore the stay of proceedings has been continued ever since. It is absolutely urgent that this parliament at this session give the Secretary of State, who is in charge of copyright, the proper authority to give effect to some of the proposals made by the commissioner.
The report, which I have tabled and which I am sure is in the hands of everyone interested in the bill, made several recommendations. I just want to point them out in the order in which they appear in the bill.
The first section deals with a definition of private profit. The second section deals with the filing of appeals and the appointment of an appeal board. Then a subsection is introduced to prevent factious and unwarranted legal proceedings, also the recommendation of the judge. The last two subsections give the Secretary of State authority to make an adjustment of fees from January, 1935, when the tariff of fees was filed by the performing right society, until the date the appeal board which is proposed to be instituted makes its first report. I do not wish at present to say any more, but come to the first clause which is for the consideration of the committee. This is as recommended by Judge Parker, a clearer and more complete definition of what constitutes a performance without private profit. In the act of 1931 it was provided that no infringement of copyright could take place in a performance without private profit, one for religious, educational or charitable purposes. In another subsection it was pro-
Copyright Amendment Act
vided that that should also include any agricultural exhibition or fair held under dominion, provincial or municipal authority. It is proposed in this first section of the present bill to make a clearer definition of what is a performance without private profit.
I now draw the attention of the committee to the first subsection of section 1, the underlined words:
Provided, further, that such performance shall be deemed to be given without private profit if the only fees which are paid are paid to individual performers and that no fees or commissions are paid to any promoter, producer or contractor for services in promoting or producing the performance.
That is concerning performances for religious, educational or charitable purposes. I want to make it very clear that we are not now proposing the principle that the performer might be paid while the owner of the copyright might not be paid. The question is that we are dealing with the small rights of performers. It often happens that in a charitable concert, or performances of a certain kind, you may have most of the performers performing gratuitously, but if there happens to be a performer who receives a consideration for his work then in cases which have appeared before the court some judges have had doubt as to the meaning of the legislation. It was also the opinion of the judge who held the inquiry that the intention of the legislation in 1931 in defining private profit regarded the profit of the performance as a whole, and not that of the individual performer.
As to the second subsection, dealing with agricultural exhibitions, we propose a similar definition. I must say that on that subsection hon. members from all provinces and from all directions have come to me suggesting a change, finding that the proposed subsection was not complete. Therefore I have been convinced by the representatives of the people in different provinces of the need to make that subsection even clearer, to include industrial exhibitions together with agricultural, and to make another change which has also been suggested, namely, that the performance shall be deemed to be given without private profit if only individual performers or their agents were paid, provided such fees are not dependent upon the attendance at an exhibition or fair. I shall ask my colleague to move the amendment in order that it may be before the committee. I could say more, but I shall give the right of way to hon. members who desire to present their views, and shall be prepared to give all information required.

Copyright Amendment Act


John Campbell Elliott: I move:
That clause 1 of the bill be amended by striking out subsection (viii) and substituting the following:
The performance without private profit or any musical work at any agricultural, or agricultural and industrial exhibition or fair which receives a grant from or _ is held under dominion, provincial or municipal authority, provided that such performance shall be deemed to be given without private profit, if the only fees which are paid are paid to the individual performers or their agents, and provided further that such fees are not dependent upon the attendance at the exhibition or fair.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: termined by Canadian law. But, second, it was clear that the countries which had adhered to the Rome convention had the right with respect to their own nationals to enact so-called domestic legislation, and in the fourth article of the Rome convention it was provided that:
Consequently, apart from the express stipulations of the present convention, the extent of protection, as well as the means of redress secured to the author to safeguard his rights, shall be governed exclusively by the laws of the country where protection is claimed.
That section gave a wide liberty to the parliament of Canada and provided that, except as rights had been stipulated in express terms by the Rome convention, foreign nationals would be subject to the domestic legislation of this country. Furthermore, it was ascertained before the commission, and by evidence given, that no Canadian author was affected because at that date no Canadian author had been admitted as a member of the performing right society of Canada. It was also common ground that copyright in the vast body of these musical works was no longer vested in the original author but had been assigned to the publishers of music at the time or about the time of the first publication of these works; and it appeared that, to a very considerable extent, the whole matter of forming such a combination in Canada rather partook of the nature of a racket in which the publishers of music were to obtain a super-monopoly and control of musical performances in Canada.
But a very considerable part of the complaints against the operations of the Canadian company was due to complaints made by those who broadcast music and by those who receive music by means of broadcast through the receivers for which they obtain dominion licences; and I think one of the main controversies which were from time to time reported to the office of the Secretary of State was with regard to excessive charges made or demanded by the Canadian Performing Right Society from the broadcasting companies as well as those who receive music through the ordinary receiving apparatus. But the Rome convention provided in 11 bis:
(1)	Authors of literary and artistic works shall enjoy the exclusive right of authorizing the communication of their works to the public by radiocommunication.
(2)	The national legislations of the countries of the union may regulate the conditions under which the right mentioned in the preceding paragraph shall be exercised, but the effect of those conditions will be strictly limited to the countries which have put them in force. Such conditions shall not in any
fMr. Caban.]
case prejudice the moral right (droit moral) of the author, nor the right which belongs to the author to obtain an equitable remuneration which shall be fixed, failing agreement, by the competent authority.
The moral right is provided for in article 6 bis of the convention, which is the right of the author to object to any distortion, mutilation or other modification of the said work which would be prejudicial to his honour or reputation, so that reservation of the moral right of the author does not now concern us, except this, that article 11 bis does provide that by domestic legislation a competent authority may be appointed which shall see that an equitable remuneration may be fixed. Therefore the controversy which arose with respect to the Canadian Performing Right Society has simmered down, in so far as this bill before the committee is concerned, to some way of fixing an equitable remuneration for performing rights such as those which are dealt with by the Canadian company. Under the bill of 1931 it was provided, on the recommendation of the committee of that day, that if complaints were made to the governor in council, then, the governor in council having proceeded by the appointment of a commissioner, and the commissioner having heard the evidence and reported, it would be competent for the governor in council by order of the governor in council to fix the rates of remuneration which were equitable in the case. Complaints came to the notice of the department, and, pursuant to an order numbered 169 dated January 28, 1932, Mr. Justice Ewing was appointed a commissioner to make an inquiry and report, on the petition of six broadcasting stations in the province of Alberta: Edmonton Journal Limited, CJCA; Calgary Herald Limited, CFAC; the Alberta Pacific Grain Company Limited, CKLC; the Albertan Publishing Company Limited, CJCJ; the Voice of the Prairies Limited, CFCN; Lethbridge Broadcasting Limited, CJOC. Evidence was taken by Mr. Justice Ewing, who made a report dated June 29, 1932. Mr. Justice Ewing found that the company, instead of filing a list of the specific musical productions over which it claimed to have copyright, had filed with the Department of Secretary of State catalogues of publishing companies, aild he found that those catalogues included many works in which copyright no longer existed. He says:
A casual examination of the catalogue showed that it contained numerous works of the old masters such as Mendelssohn, Chopin, Beethoven. Mozart. Schubert, Handel. Haydn and Verdi, all of whose works are in the public domain.

Copyright Amendment Act
That is, copyright no longer existed in those works. He continues:
As these catalogues have been sent from England, the representatives of the society at the hearing were unable to offer any explanation. A request for information was cabled to England and a reply was received to the effect that these works had been "rearranged" and that these rearrangements had been copyrighted.
The judge proceeds:
This may or may not be entirely correct, but in any case these catalogues contain musical works which are not in the society's repertoire. For instance, the list contains operettas or operas as a whole whereas the society can only license instrumental excerpts for these operas. The society claims that as a matter of technical compliance with the act it may file lists of works in respect of which it claims this authority to license, and the fact that these lists contain other works over which the society has no control would not affect the filing.
Then in regard to the list of fees filed the judge reports:
In my opinion the intention of the act is- not, as is suggested-that the society shall be permitted to file a list of fees perhaps extravagantly high but at any rate bearing no relationship to the actual fees which the society intends to collect and then to proceed to collect any fee it chooses provided only that such fee is not more than is prescribed in the statement filed.
The judge proceeds to quote the schedule of fees, and he finds that the fees are based upon the power output of the broadcasting station. Then he adds:
The result is that the society has filed a statement of fees for broadcasting stations but it is clear that these are not the fees which it proposes to collect and to that extent it has not complied with clause "B" of section 10 of the act.
The judge then proceeds:
While several matters entered into the fixing of a proper fee to be paid by a broadcasting station for broadcasting copyright music, it was generally admitted that the basic determining factor is the number of people reached by the station in question, that is to say, the "audience."
He proceeds to show that the western companies were being charged approximately the same as the broadcasting companies in the larger centres of Toronto and of Montreal; and he adds:
In fixing the fees the society has left out of consideration the population within the service range of the station. When the facts as to service range, coverage and relative populations were brought out in evidence, the representative of the society very properly admitted that the statement filed was made up without appreciating some of the factors above mentioned as affecting western Canada and this
situation ought to be remedied. Without taking advantage of an admission so made, it must be said that the society has proposed to collect excessive fees from the petitioners.
Then he gives what the society thinks would be a fair price to be charged to certain of these complainants, and he says:
I think it would not be unfair to divide this sum-
That is, the sum claimed:
-by five instead of ten in order to correct the results of inequalities of population.
After receiving this report of Mr. Justice Ewing I was sent by the government as a delegate to Geneva. While there Mr. A. Boosey, who stated to me that he was the executive director of the British company, visited me and discussed the terms of this report. He stated that if the government would refrain from taking action by order in council to fix the limit of the general charges, he would undertake to communicate with his officials in charge of the Canadian company, and see to it that reductions were made in the fees and an amicable adjustment reached on an equitable basis. On his assurance I made no report to council asking for an appropriate order in council to be passed dealing with the Ewing report. But instead of complying with the assurance then given, Which I repeated to the president of the Canadian society in an interview with him after my return, the Canadian Performing Right Society apparently assumed that it could go on making these charges and increasing them at will without making any reasonable effort to come to an amicable understanding with the other interested parties.


Frederick George Sanderson: Order. I regret to have to interrupt the hon. member, but I must inform him that he has spoken for more than forty minutes.


Alan Webster Neill: I would suggest that we follow the practice adopted the other evening, and now that I have spoken the hon. gentleman can continue.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I would suggest that the hon. gentleman be allowed to continue. At the same time, in consideration of the fact that I greatly desire to have this bill sent to the senate for to-morrow morning, perhaps the committee will consent to sit a little after eleven o'clock if that is necessary to put the bill through.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: After the legislation of 1931 was passed the Canadian Performing Right Society filed a tariff of fees, on June 18, 1931. It then filed a supplemental tariff on September 2, 1931; then it changed again by with-
Copyright Amendment Act

drawing the supplemental tariff on the 6th October, 1932. Then, after I had received the assurance of the executive director of the British company which controlled half the shares of the Canadian company, that Mr. Justice Ewing's report would be considered and adjustments would be made in compliance therewith, a further tariff was filed on the 5th January, 1934, dealing only with broadcasting. Then another complete tariff, the third tariff, was filed on the 29th January, 1934, and on March 10, 1934, another amending tariff was filed. On July 11, 1934, another tariff was filed which was limited in its application to public parks, and again on the 12th July, 1934, another tariff was filed with regard to performance of new works.
The general tendency of all these changes was not in compliance with the report of Mr. Justice Ewing but to insist upon a further increase in charges and fees to the broadcasting stations. In the early autumn of 1934 those who were interested in the use of music, broadcasting companies, hotels and other organizations, protested so vigorously that I asked the president of the Canadian Performing Right Society to meet representatives of the broadcasting companies at my office, and they met on October 26, 1934, in Ottawa. I went into the whole matter with the president of the Canadian Performing Right Society in the presence of ten or twelve persons representing these various broadcasting companies and other interested parties. I then agreed, in order that the Canadian Performing Right Society might have a further opportunity to come to an amicable agreement with the broadcasting interests, that I would not ask for an inquiry for a period of three months, in which time I was assured by the president of the Canadian company that efforts would be made to reach an amicable settlement of the difficulties.
This three month period expired on the 26th January, 1935, and I was informed that no agreement had been reached. Yet in the face of the facts as they then existed, and despite the consideration that had been shown from year to year and time to time by the Department of the Secretary of State to the Canadian society, that Canadian society formally filed on the 30th January, 1935, a new tariff, still further increasing the rate and, incidentally, suggesting that they were not going to comply with the request and the suggestion I had made in regard to an amicable settlement. Therefore on the 22nd March, 1935, the governor in council appointed His Honour Judge Parker a commissioner under the Inquiries Act and under the provisions (Of the Copyright Amendment Act, 1931, to

make a further inquiry into the facts and to report. Matters had then reached such a stage that no minister in charge of a department, who had any self-respect at all, could further delay taking action in this matter.
Judge Parker made his report on October 29, 1935, and hon. members will at once perceive that the former Secretary of State had then no official authority in the matter. But I do commend my successor in office that in a matter of great public interest such as this, in respect of which neither of us had any personal interest whatsoever, and in respect of which each of us was merely anxious to preserve and protect the public interest, be proceeded upon receipt of this report to consider ways and means by which the report might be carried into effect. It is not for me to suggest that I might have found other ways and means. But I do personally commend the policy pursued by my successor in this respect, because he has proceeded by this bill to provide for the constitution of an independent tribunal to review complaints. If I had received that report I think, from my knowledge of the facts, that I might have proceeded directly by an order in council fixing the fees. My successor has adopted a rather more conservative course. By this bill he has provided for the appointment of an independent commission to which applications may be made in case excessive and inequitable charges are made by the Canadian Performing Right Society.
Judge Parker reported certain facts. Dealing with the increased rates filed in 1935, he says, on page 34:
A comparison with the fee charged for a one hundred watt station under the 1931 tariff shows a great increase, and the stations required to pay the increased fee naturally objeoted and complained that the new tariff charged was excessive and unreasonable.
That is, the new tariff filed after the previous complaint had been brought to the attention of the Canadian Performing Right Society and after Mr. Justice Ewing's investigation and report. Then a comparison is made between the charges in England and the charges made in Canada, and Judge Parker finds that in view of the scattered population, particularly in the west, it is unfair to charge the same amount per receiving set as is paid in a country so closely settled as Great Britain. He finds that the charge made in Canada should in his opinion be reduced to a rate of 7\ cents per receiving set, which is not very much below the prevalent charge in Great Britain at the time.
Then, again, with regard to the use of these musical compositions in theatres and

Copyright Amendment Act
public buildings of that kind, the Canadian Performing Right Society does- not charge a fixed fee for the performing rights in individual musical compositions, but it charges a rate based upon the entire seating capacity of the theatre or public place in which the performance takes place. And Judge Parker finds in that connection that in the rural districts, the country towns, especially in the country towns of the west, public buildings have been erected and theatres provided for large audiences, exceptional accommodation for exceptional occasions, and because a musical performance may be given to a small audience in one of these larger theatres he finds that it is unfair to charge, not according to the numbers of the audience, not in accordance with the tickets paid for, but upon each seat of the large seating capacity of these buildings whether occupied or not.
Then, with regard to the society's increase of charges, raising a certain minimum fee for matinees and other theatrical performances from S10 to S30, Judge Parker finds that the evidence makes it clear that the raising of the minimum fee was done under pressure of Mr. Mills of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers. It was not looked upon with favour by the directors of the Performing Right Society of London, England. The raising of the minimum fee in the United States by Mr. Mills was reluctantly followed by the Canadian Performing Right Society. Mr. Jamieson, the president of the Canadian society, however, said in justification, in his evidence, that he regarded the theatre tariff as inadequate and that he only waited to raise the rates in Canada until the rates had been raised in the United States. Then Judge Parker finds that his comparison of the two tariffs shows that in some cases the fees of the Canadian Performing Right Society are higher than those of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, and in no case are the fees in the 1935 tariff of the Canadian society less than the fees in the 1934 tariff of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers.
Bearing these facts in mind, and having regard to the fact that ten cents per seat in the past has been acceptable to the Canadian Performing Right Society and was not strenuously objected to by the larger theatres in Canada, he finds that it seems a fair conclusion that the rate of 1931 should not be changed and that the 1935 tariff is unjust and unfair.
Then near the close of his report he says:
... it seems only fair and reasonable that the Canadian Performing Right Society, Limited, should extend that concession-
A certain concession made:
*-to all theatres, and especially to those in the west where they are suffering from drought, and to other places in the east where the towns were dependent upon one industry, and that industry is not now in operation. The theatres were built some time ago and a seating capacity provided when conditions were more prosperous. You have in the maritime provinces, for instance, districts dependent solely upon coal mining and districts dependent solely upon lumbering. Both of these industries, according to the evidence, are at a standstill, and in some localities the percentage of people on relief is very considerable.
I do not think I need proceed further, but I wish to state that when the committee of this house, of which I was chairman, considered the copyright amendment bill of 1931, Mr. H. T. Jamieson, President of the Canadian Performing Right Society Limited, gave his final evidence just before the committee brought its proceedings to a close. Mr. Jamieson stated that certain organizations including the Canadian National Railways and the Toronto Daily Star refused to make contracts with his company until it was placed under government regulations. As chairman of that committee I proceeded to inquire as follows:
Q. Quite so. Do they not attach to their refusal to pay a demand for regulation, that is, as I understand their position, they think that, in case a difference arises with you as to what is a proper compensation, there should be an independent tribunal, by agreement or arbitration or otherwise, to which an appeal could be made to determine whether yqpr demands are reasonable?
A. Well, Mr. Atkinson admitted to me that our tariffs-not demands, our tariffs-were reasonable, and he said it was simply a matter of principle with him, that he would not negotiate with us until we were under government regulation. I said, pay those reasonable tariffs meantime and let us settle the other question later, but they refused.
Q. Just one moment. Is it not a fact-I do not wish to submit the whole record-but is it not a fact that in the evidence before the committee in the British house of Commons it was shown that your British Performing Right Society had entered into contracts for short terms, and at the expiration of those contracts higher rates W'ere demanded, which, in many eases, were regarded by at least the users as exorbitant.
A. Well, sir, there were some increases asked for by the British society, but those increases were asked for only after there had been very considerable accession to the membership for one thing, and only after there had been accessions of many other affiliated European societies.
Q. That, to my mind, represents a valid consideration in support of increasing your royalties and charges, but it is not conclusive as to whether the increases which you demanded under those circumstances, you holding a monopoly, should not be submitted, in case of dispute, to some independent tribunal or to arbitration.
Copyright Amendment Act

A. As Mr. Hawkes could show you in detail, he having knowledge of the operation of the British society, those so-called demands were merely the ideas of the British society as to the increased value of their repertoire.
Q. Why do you refuse really to submit your prices to arbitration, or to the determination of an independent tribunal? I am not here to say that a single charge you ever levied is excessive. But you have a monopoly of 90 per cent of modern music, and, in case of dispute, your views not being accepted by the music user, why should there not be some independent tribunal to which you, as a monopolist with 90 per cent of all modern works in your control, should submit your charges.
The final answer of the witness was:
A. Because we do not know that these rates to be fixed would be fair and reasonable.
The conclusion of the committee was that this being a super-monopoly, combining what had originally been a great number of private monopolies now vested in the Canadian corporation, its charges should be subject to an independent tribunal. That independent tribunal is provided for in the terms of the bill now before the committee.
As the hour is advancing I shall postpone ;o another session a discussion of other matters to which I had intended to refer. At the same time may I commend the principle and policy of the bill-and I speak only for myself and from my own official experience- which the present Secretary of State has introduced for the purpose of creating an independent tribunal to whom those who have grounds for complaint may make such complaints, receive a decision and obtain an equitable adjustment.


Herbert Earl Wilton: Mr. Chairman, from my
knowledge of the activities and demands of the performing right society I think it might well be compared with a cross-word puzzle. In the first place I doubt very much whether the officials of that society know exactly what they want, and I am quite sure that the public from which it tries to derive its income does not know what it is all about. I question, further, whether hon. members Know the meaning of it.
If the government is desirous of relieving tne public from a great and unnecessary nuisance, it should enact such legislation as would curtail or better regulate the aetivities nl this organization. Since the opening of the session hon. members have been circularized from time to time with literature pertaining to the passage of this bill, -much of which literature has been misleading and incorrect. Certain statements made therein require answering. It was stated that the hotel proprietors had admitted the principle that radio loud speakers in private rooms

should be included in the performing right society licence. The hotel proprietors through their association claim they never made any such admission; yet we know that hon. members have been circularized to the effect that the proprietors had agreed. As they have recorded at their association meetings, the hotel proprietors state that the tariffs filed by the performing right society in 1934 and 1935 are too complicated, and the prices fixed too onerous. Mr. George O'Neil, President of the Ontario Hotel Association, is quoted as saying that the 1934 tariff was satisfactory. Mr. O'Neil's own statement is that he never made any such admission. Mr. O'Neil does not admit that the tariff of 1934 was or is reasonable. Still hon. members have been advised through circulars sent to their office from time to time that Mr. O'Neil and the association had agreed to this kind of thing. That is -the sort of unfair work which has been going on in an effort to put this thing through. The performing right society now admit that the minimum fee of $30 is too high. They are willing to accept $10 when it is paid voluntarily.
His Honour Judge Parker was appointed a commissioner in March, 1935, to conduct an inquiry into this matter. Considerable evidence was taken in various parts of Canada, and in October, 1935, Judge Parker submitted his report. In that Teport he classified the performing right society as a monopoly. In passing, I should like to refer to a statement made by the former Secretary of State (Mr. Cahan). He said that the fee of ten cents per seat was acceptable to the theatre owners. I know for a fact that such is not the case. The theatre owners have protested vigorously against this fee of ten cents per seat. In fact,, they protest against paying anything to this society because they feel that its whole activities are piratical; that it has no licence or right to collect any fee from them. Judge Parker classified this society as a monopoly, and it certainly is a monopoly in every sense of the word, and then some.
I should like to cite one case which came to my personal attention. A certain business man had occasion to employ an orchestra in connection with his restaurant. He was approached by a representative of this performing right Society and told that his fee for the year would be $72. Just how the society arrived at that fee of $72 the restaurant man did not know, and the representative of this society could not tell him. The proprietor of the restaurant said he would not pay it; that he would go to court first, and after considerable dickering the representative of

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the society took S12 and gave a receipt in full.
I mention this case to justify the statement I made at the outset of my remarks, that the performing right society does not seem to know itself what it is all about or what it wants. It demands $72 of a fee and accepts $12.
As I understand it, the Copyright Act was designed to protect the author and publisher against duplication, publication and distribution. If you purchased a copyrighted book you would not expect to have to pay some society an additional fee because you read it. Country fairs, race tracks and such places are affected by the operations and activities of this organization. The Toronto exhibition bands are concerned, and so on. This society claims the right to step in and collect a fee every time you use a piece of copyright music, which you have already bought and paid for. This is a vicious system of abstracting money from the public.
The tabulated list of music is so lengthy that it is understood only by a few. It is hard to understand just what ,the list does contain. I telephoned the copyright branch in Ottawa a few days ago to ask if certain pieces of music were on the list, and I was advised that they could not tell. I am also informed that no Canadian author or publisher receives one penny of the money thus collected. If you engage an orchestra to furnish entertainment, this society steps in and demands the payment of a fee for every piece of music played, although it has been bought and paid for. When an author produces a piece of music and it is published, the author receives his pay from the publisher and through royalties on the sale of copies of the music. The publisher gets his profit from the sale of copies of the music. But if you or I buy a copy of that piece, take it somewhere and play it in public, we have to pay an additional fee. If we play the piece three, four, five or a dozen times in one evening, we must pay the special fee for every time we play the piece.
If the activities of this society continue, it will not be safe for a man to whistle a tune on the street or play a mouth organ; if he happens to play or whistle one of the pieces on this list, this society could rightly collect a fee from him. In the best interests of an already overburdened public this society should not be allowed to operate in Canada.


Mr. MACKENZIE KING:: Might I interrupt my hon. friend for a moment? It is getting on toward the hour of adjournment and I do not know whether hon. members would be agreeable to continuing this evening's sitting. If so, it would be necessary to have the motion put before eleven o'clock. I do not think it would be reasonable to ask hon. members to take up any other business than the bill we are discussing at the moment, but if hon. members would be agreeable to continuing with this bill, say until midnight, I would move accordingly later on that the rule requiring adjournment at eleven o'clock be suspended and that we continue the sitting until midnight. I am suggesting this because the senate will want to consider this bill to-morrow, and refer it to one of the committees of the senate. If we do not conclude the discussion this evening, we could get it over to the senate fairly early to-morrow.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again this day.
Progress reported.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING
(Prime Minister) moved:
That standing order No. 11 be suspended, and that the present sitting of the house continue until midnight this day.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed consideration in committee of Bill No. 55, to amend the Copyright Amendment Act, 1931-Mr. Rinfret- Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
On section 1-Infringement of copyright.
William Lyon Mackenzie King: I thank my hon. friend for permitting me to interrupt.


Herbert Earl Wilton: I shall not take up very much more of the time of the committee. I want to repeat what I just said, that in the best interests of an already overburdened and overtaxed public, this society should not be allowed to operate in Canada. It is a racket; it is unfair; it is unjust, and it should not be tolerated. Assume that I purchased twenty or thirty copies of a musical orchestration; I pay for them at the regular price, out of which the publisher and the retailer receive their profits. The author receives his payment from the royalties paid. Place that music in the hands of an orchestra and have it played behind closed doors privately, and so far as this association is concerned it is O.K.; but admit the public and in steps the performing right society and demands the payment of a special added fee, not once but for each time a piece of music is played. It is almost im-
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Mr. WERMENLINGER:: The ground has been so well covered by those who have preceded me that I shall not delay the committee. I congratulate the Secretary of State (Mr. Rinfret) upon having introduced in this bill one of the recommendations of Judge Parker with respect to the copyright appeal board, and I also congratulate the late government, through its Secretary of State, the present member for St. Lawrenee-St. George (Mr. Cahan), upon having introduced into the copyright amendment act of 1931 two subsections providing for a stay of proceedings, whereby I take it that we are now

allowed to discuss this question. There are no amendments in the bill now submitted, but though I approve the principle of a copyright appeal board I should like to know whether that board will be easy of access to the small performers or licencees, allowing them to make their complaints in such a way as to secure justice. If this appeal board is to be stationed permanently in Ottawa, it stands to reason that people, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, will have to travel at their own expense to submit their complaints to the board. On the other hand, if the board were itinerant it could go from one end of Canada to t'he other and that would involve an extra charge upon the exchequer of the country. These are the alternatives.
The question is this:	Are we going to pay
just for the benefit of other countries? Every member of this house is aware that not one Canadian author, composer, arranger or publisher gets any benefit from the Copyright Act. Though I congratulate the Secretary of State on having introduced one of the recommendations submitted by Judge Parker, I must say that this will not appease the dissatisfaction which exists in Canada to-day, because out of 10,000 shares, if I may use that term, there are 9,998 that do not belong to this country; and our own Canadian authors, whether they be of Anglo-Saxon origin or French-Canadian, have no show and are not entitled to any share in the profits. There may be four or five who at one time were registered in Washington and obtained American citizenship and they will benefit to a certain extent. But as the saying is, where there is smoke there is fire, and if there is dissatisfaction and suspicion from the Atlantic to the Pacific there must be something wrong. I am not casting reflections on anybody nor am I calling anything a racket; I do not say that there is a nigger in the wood pile. I say, however, that there are thousands of small operators, hotelkeepers, theatre owners, owners of dance halls, and men of initiative who engage orchestras and bands, who are getting no consideration at all. We cannot afford to have unrest in this country at the present time. If even a small proportion of the small operators, the users, the licencees, as the Canadian Performing Right Society wish to term them, express dissatisfaction, it is not for the good of the country that their protests should be disregarded. I say that with a full recognition of the eloquent speeches which have been delivered in this house on behalf of the authors, and I am glad to see that the hon. member for Ottawa East (Mr. Chevrier) is now in his seat. When

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the hon. member made his plea last February on behalf of the authors, I admit that I fell for it. But are the authors getting the money that they should get? I ask: Are they?


Lionel Chevrier: Yes.


Edgard Jules Wermenlinger: Well, let me tell the hon. member that I have before me correspondence which challenges that assertion. How can they get their money? The law requires and each week the Canadian Performing Right Society imposes upon the users the task of making a report of the titles and of the names of the authors, but in this correspondence I have received the writers state that they have made no reports of either titles or authors' names. Under those circumstances how can a proper distribution be made of the moneys collected for the authors? I could refer to some of these letters, but this afternoon it was mentioned that we should not quote newspapers or letters, and I shall abide by the rule even before it is enforced. But the point is: How can the authors, the composers, the arrangers, the publishers, get the amount that they should receive if no report is made of whose music was used? I thought there would be an amendment of this bill this afternoon. Unfortunately there is none. I would have suggested that a committee of this house should have studied the whole problem from A to Z, because there is dissatisfaction, and where there is dissatisfaction there is unrest.
We cannot afford at this time to have our money go without just cause to foreign countries. An analysis made in 1934 of music broadcasted or performed showed that eighty per cent of the fees in respect of our copyrighted music went to the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, which has fifty percent of the shares of the Canadian Performing Right Society. The other part ol the fees being paid to the London Performing Right Society. Now, if eighty per cent goes to the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and twenty per cent goes to the London Performing Right Society, which includes eighteen affiliated societies, and is where our educational music and training in music comes from, I am unwilling to believe that our money is well spent. I admit, with regard to the creation of the appellate tribunal, that it is an improvement on what the 1931 copyright amendments gave us, but it seems to me that we in Canada are giving money to somebody to take our money away. I ask hon. members to think about this matter to-morrow morning, and decide if I am wrong, because not one composer, not one author in Canada is receiving any benefit.
Our composers, our authors, our arrangers, who give us some nice programs on the radio and in dance halls, concert halls, recreation halls and community halls, do not receive anything. Yet we have to pay just the same to the Canadian Performing Right Society, which is composed fifty-fifty of American authors, composers and publishers, who, by the way, were not parties to the Berne convention and were not even parties to the Rome convention. The Berne convention in 1886 had to do, I believe, with copyright. As far as I understand, the definition of copyright is this: It means the exclusive right of multiplying copies of an original composition. Try to find something else in either the Encyclopaedia Britannica or Larousse; you cannot.


Lionel Chevrier: Why does my hon. friend not look into the law? That is the place to find it, not in the dictionary.


Edgard Jules Wermenlinger: But in 1928, let me inform the hon. member, there was a convention in Rome, because the progress of mechanical and electrical instruments had come to the fore. Those who were organized thought they could reap more profit by taking the benefit of anything that was reproduced either mechanically or electrically. But if inventions continue to multiply as they are doing at present, the author of The Peanut Vendor and the author of Yes, We Have No Bananas will be reaping a benefit which no one in this house, no matter how hard he tries to work, can hope to equal. My point is, I think clear. I listened to the speech delivered by the original promoter of the bill, the hon. member for Kootenay West (Mr. Esling), and the speech in rebuttal by the hon. member for Ottawa East, and I was greatly impressed. But I say that the hon. member for Ottawa East has laid too much stress on the Berne convention, the Rome convention, and on what should belong to authors for the product of their genius. If eighty per cent of our money collected under copyright goes to the United States and twenty per cent goes to the London Performing Right Society with the eighteen affiliated societies, the comparison is clear and the conclusion is plain. Where does the educational music come from if not from the old country? The author of Yes, We Have No Bananas is not deserving of so much as the author of In a Monastery Garden, by Ketelby, or the waltzes of Strauss. The small broadcasters, the small performers, the small theatre owners have no option in the choice of their music. Whether they just use music written by Jean-Baptiste Lalonde or Jean-Baptiste Le-
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francois, jigs and reels, they have to pay the author of The Peanut Vendor, and the authors of the jigs and reels get no reward, as the hon. member for Ottawa East says, for the products of their genius.
I wish to be fair, sir. I have no prejudice. I have heard all the arguments for and against. I have read all the newspapers, and I shall not quote one of them. I have been in that game for the last thirty years as an orchestra leader, a bandmaster and a lealer in reproduction instruments, and I know the game. But I wish to inform the hon. member for Ottawa East, who so ably and so eloquently, on January 19, presented the case for the authors, that although I believe him to be sincere and honest I cannot agree with his arguments, for this reason. Ninety per cent of the time, when an author composes one of these love ballads, he goes to work and sells outright his rights, privileges and everything. Therefore he gets no money afterwards; it goes to those who have organized so as to take these assignments.
Let me conclude my remarks, Mr. Chairman, by saying that I want justice for the publishers and justice for the men who, in a shrewd and businesslike way, have formed this lovely little bit of machinery called the Canadian Performing Right Society. If their cause is just they have my support one hundred per cent, and on the other hand I want justice for the authors, so ably represented by the hon. member for Ottawa East, so long as those authors have the courage to attend an inquiry such as that conducted by Judge Parker and make out their claims. If they do not appear at such an inquiry it must be because they are not interested, and if they are not interested it is because they have assigned their rights, boots, hats, shirts and coats. I wish to be just. Look at all the correspondence I have had in connection with this Canadian Performing Right Society. I shall not quote it, but I shall say this: If you wish peace in this country do not forget the man operating a small theatre, or the man conducting a small dance hall and employing extra help. Do not forget the man who has an orchestra. If he is threatened with a lawsuit and out of that orchestra of six or seven pieces he has to drop one man, you are putting one man out of work. I know it is too late to propose any amendment, but we should have this problem studied by a committee where we could go over the whole matter thoroughly. I should like to do that, because it is my line. We could give justice to everyone; there would be no protests and

no recriminations. If any part of our population figures that it is being discriminated against we are not working for the peace and comfort that we should have in Canada. I should like to talk all night, Mr. Chairman, but I shall not do so.


Mr. GRAYDON:: I had intended originally, Mr. Chairman, to make my remarks on a subject such as that now before the committee somewhat extended, but in view of the fact that at this stage of the session it seems unpopular to make a long speech-I am not so sure that it should not be unpopular at any time during the session-I shall be very brief indeed and simply bring to the attention of the minister and the committee the situation as we find it in the banner county of the Dominion of Canada, the county of Peel.
I should like to preface my remarks by saying that as far as music is concerned we in that county are vitally interested, because there we have annually the largest amateur musical festival put on in any county of its size in the Dominion of Canada. Contributions come from various sources to enable that to be done, and for that reason perhaps I may be excused for telling the committee that the people of my riding are intensely interested in the fact that at various times they have had to pay money to an organization such as the performing right society.
Without going into the legal or constitutional aspect of this matter in any way may I just point out that one of the real difficulties with which the people are faced in connection with these charges is, I believe, the fact that no one seems to know what the charges mean and where the money is going. Perhaps that might appear to be an unfair statement as far as the society is concerned. I have no desire to say anything unfair, but I have in mind particularly four halls in the county of Peel, one in Streetsville, two in Brampton and one in the village of Bolton. The organizations controlling these halls are finding it difficult to make ends meet, as most people who come from rural ridings will understand, and when the performing right society comes to the owners or managers of these halls this is what happens: In the first instance they ask for $30 from these people and finally, in connection with the Orange hall in Brampton, accept an adjustment of something like $25. Then they go to the Odd Fellows' hall in the same town and agree to an adjustment of $14.88. Then they come to the Odd Fellows' hall in Streetsville, in the middle of a dance, and suggest that $2 should be paid and finally

agree to take S10 for the year. In these circumstances perhaps I may be pardoned for suggesting that such practices are scarcely fair to the owners of the halls.
I should like to make a suggestion to the minister. I do not wish to interfere with any legal rights which may belong to the society, but after all I think, if there have to be such charges, there should be some standardized scale of fees. The average person in the country believes that if the society asks for $30 and accepts $14.88, there must be, as my good friend from Verdun (Mr. Wermen-linger) suggests, a nigger in the woodpile somewhere. It is not fair to the performing right society to have that impression abroad. That is something which should be corrected. In addition we have six of the best rural agricultural fairs in the riding. I think, so far as they are concerned, being supported largely by the people of the rural sections, and the halls being kept up by people who have great difficulty in making ends meet, it would be in the interest of all concerned if no fees of any kind were charged to either halls in rural sections or to rural fairs. I make that suggestion without going into any extensive argument, but it is something which should be given consideration. I suggest to the minister that he should make that change so that the people of the rural parts of the dominion will not suffer by virtue of the operations of the performing right society. I have no desire, nor have the people of my county, to avoid paying for something for which we should justly pay, but in the present position they feel that an injustice is being done, and therefore I bring this question to the attention of the minister.


James Samuel Taylor: Can the minister inform the committee how much a year the Canadian Performing Right Society is getting out of the country?


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I shall note that question. I understand that hon. gentlemen want to speak on the question generally, so perhaps it might be better to finish that part first.


James Samuel Taylor: I was going to speak on this subject, but I feel that it is not the time now to go into it. This is too serious a matter to be rushed through in the last moments of the session. But I urge on the minister that this is a very serious matter and we should have a committee to deal with it in the course of the next session if at all possible.
Copyright Amendment Act


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I can give that information now:
Canadian Performing Right Society Limited Statement of cash income for the period April 6, 1930, to January 5, 1935
Fiscal period ended- April 5, 1931.. .. April 5, 1932.. .. April 5, 1933.. .. January 5, 1934.. . January 5, 1935.. .


Mr. BETTS:: The remarks of my colleague from Peel (Mr. Graydon) lead me to say a few words about the amendment proposed by the Postmaster General (Mr. Elliott), with the idea of relieving fairs and exhibitions from the necessity of paying a licence fee. I am entirely in accord with the principle of that amendment, 'but I am not at all sure that the amendment will serve the purpose intended. As hon. members know, these fairs, great and small, from the Toronto exhibition down to the smallest county fair, serve a most excellent object. They are set up for the purpose of encouraging an interest in agriculture, of improving agricultural methods and products, and also of giving a certain amount of diversion and entertainment to a class which gets very little, that is the farmer. The Parker report made it abundantly clear that the feeling of the commissioner was that these fairs, great and small, should not pay a licence fee to the performing right society. That feeling has been expressed in other forms. For instance in Ontario the legislature has relieved all fairs and exhibitions which are conducted by societies set up under the Agricultural Societies Aot, which .includes every fair in Ontario-and it will be found that in other parts of the dominion fairs are set up under similar legislation1-from paying any amusement tax. That provision is found in the Amusements Tax Act of Ontario, R.S.O. 1927, chapter 32, under the regulations which are part of the act, which provides that the following fairs and exhibitions are relieved from paying any tax: Canadian National exhibition, Central Canada exhibition, Western Fair Association, Royal Winter Fair, Ontario Provincial Winter fair, Ottawa Winter fair, and two annual fairs held by any society organized under the Agricultural Societies Act.
Now the objects of the various societies so organized are set out in chapter 71. I shall not read them, because time is passing and we want to get through. But I think I need not stress the fact that these fairs serve a most excellent purpose, and surely these people should be relieved from this tax.
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The amendment moved by the Postmaster General is, I know, directed towards exempting these fairs and exhibitions from the payment of fees. It does that defining the term "private profit" used in the act. The amendment, if I took it down correctly, reads:
Provided that such performance shall be deemed to be given without private profit if the only fees which are paid are paid to individual performers or their agents.
I urge with all the emphasis I can that that will not have the effect of relieving most of these fairs and exhibitions from payment of a licence fee, for this reason: Most of those fairs and exhibitions, eertainly the larger ones, allow concessions on their grounds, perhaps a small company conducting a sidte show, and the concessionaire will receive profit, which under the amendment I take it would be a fee. In other words, there will be very few fairs in which the only fees paid are paid to individual performers or their agents. If the only fairs and exhibitions which are to be exempt are those which qualify under that amendment I say that these various entertainments will be in just as bad a position as they are in now
It is not as if the performing right society were loath to assert its rights in the courts, because it will be remembered that in 1931 this house made an attempt to do just what we are trying to do now, that is relieve the fairs and exhibitions from the necessity of paying a licence fee, and the ink was hardly dry on the amendment before the society sued the Toronto exhibition. I shall not go into the case, but those interested may find it in 70 Ontario Reports, 34. The result was that the performing right society shot a large hole through the amendment of that date. My submission is that they will be just as zealous in attacking the present amendment. I think we require something better than that. I venture to suggest to the minister that perhaps we have been adopting the wrong touchstone or wrong criterion in determining what is private profit. The point is that all these exhibitions are organized for the purpose of stimulating interest in agriculture and improving agricultural conditions in the districts in which they operate. They are not designed for the purpose of making private profit for anybody. The acts under which they are set up, the Agricultural Societies Act of Ontario, and similar acts in other provinces, provide that if there is any profit resulting from the fair or exhibition such profit shall be devoted to the purposes of the society. That is to say, the profit shall be held from one year and used the next year. But it is not private profit for any person. It may be returned to the authority, whether

dominion, provincial or municipal, which makes a grant in aid. Practically all these exhibitions receive help from one governmental source or another. I submit it is not a matter of importance that some minor concessionaire on the grounds makes a small profit or that he does not, and it certainly is very undesirable that the fact that some such small operator does make a profit should render the exhibition or fair subject to licence. I move in amendment, seconded by Mr. Esling-


Mr. ESLING:: No.


Frederick George Sanderson: It does not require a seconder.


Frederick Cronyn Betts: That is good. I move:
That section 1 of Bill 55, an act to amend the Copyright Amendment Act 1931, be amended by substituting for subsection (viii) the following subsection, namely:
(viii) The performance without private profit of any musical work at any agricultural, or agricultural and industrial exhibition or fair which is held under or receives a grant from or is promoted by dominon, provincial or municipal authority, provided that such performance shall be deemed to be given without private profit, if the only profit accruing to the society, board, or corporation or other authority holding the exhibition or fair is applied in the furtherance of the general purposes for which such society, board, corporation or other authority is constituted, or has returned to any dominion, provincial or municipal body such grant of money in aid of the said exhibition or fair.
The amendment will protect these fairs, great and small, and I submit they have a right to protection. The hour is late, and I shall not enlarge upon my observations.


Frederick George Sanderson: May I point out to the hon. member for London that there is already an amendment before the committee.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I was going to call that to the attention of the chair.


Frederick George Sanderson: I do not think the
hon. member is in order in moving another amendment, unless the one now before us is disposed of.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: The chairman is right.
My colleague has moved an amendment; the suggested amendment of the hon. member for London is an alternative one.


Frederick Cronyn Betts: Yes.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: We cannot deal with the hon. member's amendment until we have disposed of the one before the chair.


Frederick Cronyn Betts: I shall have an opportunity
to move it after the amendment by the Postmaster General is disposed of.

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Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: It will remain, on the
record, in Hansard.


Lionel Chevrier: It cannot be accepted as an amendment, because it does not amend.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: The hon. member intends to move it after the amendment now before us is disposed of.


Lionel Chevrier: The situation would be the same .then as it is now.


Frederick George Sanderson: We already have an
amendment. Is the amendment to clause 1 moved by the Postmaster General agreed to?


William Kemble Esling: It is regrettable that we
should be kept here at this late hour. The bill went to the committee two months ago, and as we have not been swamped with legislation I think it might have been considered earlier. Notwithstanding some observations made to-night I should like to share the views of some hon. members that the work and genius of a composer are his personal property to dispose of as he pleases. It is unfortunate that Canadian authors and composers have been forced out of the picture. The only way in which they could possibly get into the picture would be through the operation of the Canadian Performing Right Society, which is not a very happy avenue of recovery. This would more properly be entitled a bill to control the operations of the Canadian Performing Right Society than an amendment to the Copyright Act.
Probably there is not a member in the house who has not received some sort of protest from some portion of the dominion against the arbitrary activities of the Canadian Performing Right Society. We may admit that such a society is necessary. There are performing right societies in England and in other European countries. Then there was the Havana convention which takes in the South American countries.
The operations of the Canadian Performing Right Society have prompted a great deal of antagonism and, as I have said, there have been protests from practically every portion of the dominion. If those complaints are justified they exist simply by reason of .the fact that this parliament has made them possible because of the statute. By the same token parliament can remove the difficulties; it can remove any cause for complaint against the operation of the Canadian Performing Right Society.
As early as February, I received complaints from my district. We ought to get away from the legal aspect of the question, if we can, and get the views of the man on the street,
the man who does not understand what all this means. Copyright legislation does not appeal to many of us, but this bill is a matter of real interest to every hon. member because it affects every constituency, every municipality large or small, every community in which there is a broadcasting station, a theatre, a hotel, a restaurant, a skating rink, an entertainment hall or any public place in which music is played. The Canadian Performing Right Society is simply a subsidiary of the American Society of Authors, Composers and Publishers, and of the Performing Right Society of England, with the latter of which are affiliated the various societies throughout Europe. Each country gives these societies authority to issue licences and to collect fees for the performance of music. They saw that apparently Canada was a fertile field, and the Canadian Performing Right Society was organized. What were the assets? It was simply an assignment of the alleged control of two million pieces of music. No person knows whether those who assigned them to the Canadian Performing Right Society had any title to them. That society to-day does not know to what music it has title; it could not tell you, under any circumstances. But it is quite willing to assume that everything in the air belongs to it. They continued such arbitrary actions as the issuing of licences and the collection of fees. They fixed a minimum charge of $10 per annum. They virtually said to users of music in Canada: We control from two to three million pieces of music; some time within the twelve months to follow you will use some of those pieces; we shall not be there to check you up, so we are going to charge you a minimum of $10 per annum. There was not much said about this charge. As a matter of fact, the public generally were not cognizant of the operations of the society. But they became cognizant in 1935 when this minimum charge was raised to $30.
Forget about the large restaurant or hotel in the east, but think what this means to the modest restaurant or hotel in the west. A representative of the performing right society walks in and tells the proprietor that he w'ants $10. He shows him a list of the cases they have successfully prosecuted. The restaurant man does not know exactly what he is paying the $10 for, but this collection is always punctuated with a legal threat. The representative comes in again and asks for $30. When he is asked why, he simply says that they have raised the rates. That is all there is to it, and if the man will not pay, they threaten to sue. Such operations do not tend to promote very good feeling. You are
Copyright Amendment Act

required to make an application and attached to the application form or the bill or whatever it is, in many instances, are slips of paper showing the various cases which have been successfully prosecuted. Whenever authors or composers pool their works in such a society, it becomes inevitably a monopoly. This monopoly increased its rates and the result was the appointment of Judge Parker as a royal commissioner to make an investigation. To some extent, this bill is based upon the recommendations of Judge Parker.
This performing right society with its usual arbitrary attitude does not admit the right of this parliament to fix its rates or to interfere in any way with its operations. These operations are being conducted by virtue of the provisions of the Copyright Act, which permits the society to issue licences and to collect fees, and I submit that this parliament, therefore, has authority to remedy the arbitrary tactics of the society. The society takes refuge behind the fact that Canada is a signatory to the Berne convention. That may be so, but there is no obligation in that convention which delegates to this society or any similar society in another country the power to fix or regulate rates. As the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Cahan) said, the Berne convention gives the signatories all the rights and privileges of the other countries which are signatories in so far as the copyright laws of those countries govern. In other words, as has been stated before, the recognition of possession, the extension of protection and the means of redress are governed entirely and exclusively by the copyright laws of the country in which such redress is sought.
We come now to England. I must say that the Performing Right Society in England1 did not approve the Canadian Performing Right Society raising its rates, but the American company which practically controls the situation told the Canadian directors to put on more pressure and get more money. So the fees were arbitrarily increased to a minimum of $30. It must be remembered that that is a minimum charge, the fee being raised in accordance with the returns on the various pieces of music which are played. In the old country the rates are arranged to some extent by negotiation or arbitration, but in this country there has been no such thing as negotiation between the Canadian Performing Right Society and users of music. The society simply say: We want so much or we will sue you. Even with the arbitration and negotiation that went on in the old country, there were protests against the fees charged. Only recently the British Board of
[Mr. EslingJ
Trade made a recommendation to His Majesty's government that the British delegates to the forthcoming convention in Brussels should indicate to the convention that where excess charges are made by bodies which control a number of copyrights, legislation be brought down to do away with the copyright monopoly.
While the bill introduced by the minister may appear on its surface to have some merit, I am absolutely opposed to any further expenditure of money from the public treasury for the purpose of facilitating the collection of fees by the Canadian Performing Right Society. That is all it amounts to. This society has been so arbitrary in its actions as to require the expenditure of some $17,000 for the purpose of conducting an inquiry by a royal commissioner, and the appeal board set up by this bill will mean an expenditure of some $30,000 or $40,000 per annum.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: Perhaps my hon. friend will allow me to correct him? The members of the board will receive no remuneration. I am presenting an estimate of $1,000 to cover expenses for the coming year, which figure is far from the figures mentioned by my hon. friend.


William Kemble Esling: I shall accept the minister's explanation. It may be that the members of this board will receive no remuneration, but they will receive travelling and living expenses. I do not think the minister believes for one moment that all the disputes in connection with hotels, restaurants and broadcasting stations will be settled in Ottawa. That is not the intention of this bill as it provides that the members of the board shall receive travelling and living expenses. To receive those expenses in connection with a federal activity is a pretty good job at any time, even without salary. In addition to the travelling and living allowances to be paid to the members of this board, there will be the fees for the experts who appear before the board. Who will those experts be? They will be the representatives of the Canadian Performing Right Society who will appear before the board to try to prove that their fees are moderate and within reason. They will be paid from the federal exchequer.
Let us look at this matter from another angle. Why should1 the Secretary of State not appoint from his own department someone thoroughly familiar with the act, or why should the Minister of Transport not appoint a member of his department thoroughly familiar with radio and, to be fair, appoint a third member from the Canadian Performing Right Society? In view of the fact that

Copyright Amendment Act
this bill is intended to smooth out the wrinkles I suggest that the performing right society should foot the bil'l. There is no reason why one dollar should come out of the federal treasury in order to carry out the purposes of the act.
The hon. member for St. Lawrence-St.George has pretty well gone over the question of fees. No one knows anything about fees. The hon. member for Ottawa East will no doubt give us to-morrow a very full refutation of the adverse criticism made to-night, but what do we find in connection with fees? I submit that we are on very good ground when we take Judge Parker's report and any evidence submitted during the course of his investigation, and he shows that the society is collecting on the basis of ten cents for every receiving set in the dominion. If you inquire from the radio department you will find that there are about a million of which they have knowledge and a few hundred thousand more about which they do not know; you may be sure that the performing right society does not overlook any number of receiving sets, and their fees are allocated accordingly. But in the old country, instead of ten cents the fee is only 7| eents. What the man in the restaurant, what the man who runs an hotel or a skating rink says is this: "I have paid for a federal licence for my radio and the broadcasting station pays ten cents for every receiving set in Canada. Of what use' is my radio if I must pay for the music that comes out of it?" The situation is ridiculous. If the broadcasting stations did not pay a blanket rate, the matter would be different. Take skating rinks. They can use only half a dozen records or so. They use gramophone records on which royalty has been paid, and these records are adapted to a certain rhythm for skating. They have loud speakers and they play the music over and over again. Well, they want to know why they should have to pay a minimum fee of $30 a year to the performing right society.
I would not hesitate to accord to that society every consideration in the world if there were Canadian authors or composers participating in the revenues collected by the society. As a matter of fact the society has said: "We are extending an invitation to Canadian authors and composers." Yes, they did, but only since Judge Parker submitted his report, because he said that in 1934 he could not find that one dollar went direct to a Canadian author, composer or publisher. It is true that some of them joined the society in the United States, and I know that to-day some Canadian authors are being invited to join.
I want to say one thing in conclusion. I am going to advocate that when this society goes to any man to collect $30, it should be required to present him with a list of the compositions to which it claims title. It is only since this house met that the amateur dramatic society of Toronto wanted to put on the Pirates of Penzance, and what happened? They wanted to broadcast it for seven minutes and the president of the dramatic society said: "We shall have to go to the performing right society and ascertain .what we have to pay them." Well, they found that the fee was $61 for seven minutes, but the broadcasting station said no, and they put the matter into the hands of a solicitor and discovered that the Pirates of Penzance was in the public domain. The performing right society had no copyright in it. If that is done in one case, is it not reasonable to suppose that the people throughout the dominion have been generally mulcted? Those who come from the prairies know what it means for a man to put his brand on a steer that does not belong to him. There is a distinct place in society for such a man. Is there any difference between putting your brand on a steer that does not belong to you and putting your brand on music that is not your property and attempting to collect a fee for the use of it?


Frederick George Sanderson: Shall the amendment carry?


Lionel Chevrier: The amendment does not carry. I am in the hands of the committee. I understood that we were to rise at twelve o'clock but I shall go on if the committee is agreeable.
Progress reported.
On motion, of Mr. Mackenzie King the house adjourned at 12.10 a.m. (Saturday).
Saturday, June 20, 1936