HOW CANADA SELLS NATIONAL RIGHTS.

Marlborough Express, Volume XXXIX, Issue 115, 18 May 1906, Page 4

HOW CANADA SELLS NATIONAL RIGHTS.

Me, J. A. Hobson, the well-known writer on economic subjects, writing in the " Daily Chronicle" on the future of Canada says:—

The example of the United States in lavishing her rich natural resources upon iniportunat3companiesandprivate"adventurers has been imitated by Canada. The " cream " of the country has been handed over to the Canadian-Pacific Railroad in land grants, some 20,000,000 acres, of which 12,000,000 in the North-West are now offered for sale at prices varying from 3.50 dols. to 10 dols. an acre. The entire land grants to railroads amount to over 30,000,000 acres. Nor are railroads the only beneficiaries. One-twentieth of the entire North-West was assigned to the Hudson Bay Company in extinction of its claims when the Dominion took over the North-West Territories. Most of the rich mining lands, especially coal, have been given away, or ;sold for a mere song, to a few big capitalists. The best coal lands in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick have gone ; the rich deposits of Vancouver Island arc-chiefly under the control of Dunsmuirs ; the Dominion Coal Company and the Nova Scotia Steel and Coal Company own virtually the whole of the Sydney coal fields ; the best ccal lands in Alberta belong to the C.P.R.

A perhaps still 'greater menace to the future independence of the Canadian people is the alienation of the valuable water powers which she possesses in such great abundance. In the olectric age on which we are entering''this water power may become the chief factor in the industrial development of, Canada, and its owners may control the destinies of the nat!o.i. For lighting, transport, and for certain industrial naes in Canadian cities water power is already used. The province of Quebec has already committed the folly of selling'outright, mostly to Americans/ her best powers, and though Ontario is now awakening to a wiser state of mind, much has been already lost.

The.case of the Ottawa waters, lying between Quebec and Ontario, is typical ; a few great pulpmills, electric power, and street railroad companies have secured by free charters virtually the whole water power, so much that even the city water works is in danger of being denuded of its pumping povyer by dams and channels made by these companies. The forests of Canada are, of course, one of her greatest assets. In Quebec alone the public forest domain extends over 74,000 000 acres. Nevertheless, concessions of valuable forest lands, amounting to several thousands of square miles are held by great firms, who buy up huge tracts with the same avidity which English landlords displayed in the " gcod old days " of the Corn Laws.

This widespread reckless alienation of land, mines, forests, and water powers has virtually handed over the control of the future of Canada to a group of economic potentates similar to those who to-day rule the destinies of the great American Republic, The same triangle of capitalist forces is aeon, railroads, financial companies, industrial trusts, and the greatest of these is the railroads. It requires little study of the map of Canada to porceivo that the railroad is there a more potent ruler than in any other country of the world. The whole of Canada to-day is a thin trickle of population and of industry along a long drawn out railroad. The Canadian Pacific Railroad is by far the greatest institution in the country. It is rightly known iis "the government on wheels," In one sense it deserves the power it; wields. Its investors had the courage and faith to stake their money on the future of the country at a tinio when the Government quailed before the ,

risk and the expense. For this lack of courage and of faith the people of Canada will pay a heavy price—the price of their economic liberty.

The C.P.E. is not merely the only road from East to West, but it is by far the richest landowner in the country. It advertises for sale " 12,000,000 acres of choice lands in Manitoba, Assiniboia, Saskatchewan, and Alberta"; it owns the chief tolegraphieg£§gf;eni of Canada; its fleets of steamers crTtes the Atlantic, plying between Montreal and Liverpool; while its fast service on the Pacific forms the shortest and best route to Japan and China, another line connecting with Australia ; it owns a score of the finest hotels in Canada. In order to live conveniently in Canada, you must continually buy permissions from the C.P.E. At present the C.P.R. is an amiable despot; its interests dictate a certain generosity; it must facilitate and encourage immigration, settlement, and industrial 'development. Not until the major .part of its lands are sold, and thriving cities have sprung up along its lines, involving a great carrying trade, will the real menace of the greatest railroad monopoly in the world emerge. It is true that by that time there will be other transcontinental roads, the Grand Trunk (which, though failing to extort the huge land grants given to its precursor, has entrenched itself behind immensely valuable public subsidies) and possibly two other companies. But even if these systems remain separate as financial units their competition, save at certain points, must remain utterly ineffective. The owners and controllers of these railroads will bo the masters of Canada ; the real government of the country, so far as the prime welfare of the people is concerned, wiil be theirs; whenever they need the assistance >of the State instruments these will be..at their disposal. Have the people any" real security that the interests of profit-seeking railroads Bhall continue to be the ' interests of the great mass of working and consuming citizens, that a sufficient "natural harmony" exists between the production of railroad dividends and the progress and welfare of a nation ?