STATUS OF CANADA

Hawera Star, Volume L, 16 January 1931, Page 7

STATUS OF CANADA

“DOMINION'' OR “KINGDOM.’ FORMED PROPOSAL RE VIA ED. Mr. A inland Lavcrgno, a dated December 10.) The name “Dominion” ns applied to Canada, is .becoming unpopular here since the Imperial Conference ot 192 •muted equal status until the Alotnei f' tl Kou that the 1930 Imperial Conference lias accorded the, Dominion Government the right to deal directlj with «i the dioice of Governor-General— A ictioy, ‘ 1 • w iU 1.0 known liere in futuie—it only to he expected that “Dominion will disappear. ftmada racing toward nation noon.. W own djsplomate vepvesiutatives "broad, "'ill press _ io > **“> alteration of the name of hei status | to “Kingdom of Canada.’ The step; will give rise to criticism elsewhere that she is heading out of the Empire. The replv to such criticism will be. “At least we are not headed toward' the United Stivtes, where Kings and Kingdoms ard not constitutionally nonular.”. The charge will not halt the momentum of the present movement, if one gauges Canadian sentiment accurately.

PREVIOUS: HISTORY RECALLED It is not the first time the “Kingdom”. idea lias been advanced, bn John MacDonald, first Premier ot Confederate Canada, was •strongly _ m favour of it and fought for it when the British North America, Act, the constitution of Canada, was framed and passed in 1867. In one of the six draft bills discussed by the pie-C-on-federation convention, held m London in 1866, the term ‘ Kingdom of Canada” appeared, but m the final draft the word “Kingdom” was dropped . L-ong after, in the summer of 1889, Sir John MacDonald wrote to. Lord 1 Knutsford, then Colonial Secretary : “A o-reat .opportunity was lost m lob/ when the Dominion was formed out of the. several provinces. This remarkable event in the history of the British Empire passed almost without notice. The declaration of all the provinces that tliev desired as one Dominion to remain a portion of the Eimpire showed what wise government and generous treatment would do, and should have been marked as an epoch in the history of England. This would probably have been the case had Lord Carnarvon who, as Colonial Minister, had sat at the cradle of the Dominion remained in office. His ill-omened resignation was followed by the appointment of the late Duke of Buckingham, who had as. his adviser the then Governor-General, Lord Monck — both good men, certainly, but quite unable, from the constitution of their minds, to rise to the occasion. The union was treated by them as if the British North America Act were a private bill uniting two or three English j parishes. WHAT MIGHT HAVE! HAPPENED. “Had a different course been pursued—for instance, had united Canada been declared to, lie an auxiliary kingdom,” added Sir John MacDonald, “as it was in the Canadian draft of the bill. I feel sure (almost) that the Australian colonies would ere this have been applying to b© placed in the same rank as the Kingdom of Canada.” A .postscript gives some further inside history :—“On reading the above over, I see that it will convey the impression that the change over from “Kingdom” to “Dominion” was caused) by the Duke of Buckingham. This is not so. It was made at the instance of Lord Derby, then Foreign Minister, who feared the first name would wound the susceptibilities of the Yankees I mentioned this incident in our history to Lord Beaconsfield at Hughenden in 1879, who said, ‘I was not aware of the. circumstance, j but it is so like Lord Derby—a very 1 fellow, but who lives in a reign of perpetual funk.”