BACKGROUND TO CANADA

NZ Services Current Affairs Bulletin, Volume 3, Issue 4, 2 April 1945, Page 3

BACKGROUND TO CANADA

The Oldest Dominion Canada is the oldest and the biggest of the family of Dominions which- make up the British Commonwealth. Her problems, too, are perhaps greater and more difficult of solution than those that face the other members of “ the family.” Certainly some of them are peculiarly her own. They have their basis in history over three hundred years old as well as in that of contemporary times. ' . ... - Unlike Australia and New. Zealand, Canada was ' not first colonized by settlers from the British Isles. The original colonists were French, who came to Canada in the mid-seventeenth century. A little later, in 1670, Charles* ll' chartered the Hudson Bay Company, giving it half Canada and the power to make war. The Franco-British struggle for North American supremacy then began. It ended in 1759, when Wolfe defeated Montcalm on the heights of Abraham, outside Quebec. With that victory Great Britain took over not only three and a half million square miles of territory, but some problems as well which have worried both British and Canadian statesmen down to the present day. These problems largely rise from the relations of two races which have colonized Canada and from the geographical factors involved in so'huge a territory. At first the French settlers were allowed to govern themselves under French civil , law, but it was soon found impossible to rule the whole country under the one code. Accordingly the Government was shared from 1791 onwards between Upper (British) Canada and Lower (French) Canada. Racial differences made this system unworkable also, and, by 1867, federation was accepted as the only satisfactory form of Government. This system, similar to that adopted by Australia and the United States, is in force to-day. Racial Problems New Zealand’s population is overwhelmingly of British origin. But of Canada’s population of almost 12 million in-1931 only half was British. Almost one-third of the people were French and the remainder of Continental origin. But, because the French birthrate is much higher than the English, it is estimated that by 1971. the Canadian population will be 39.6 per cent. French, 38.9 per cent. British, and 21.5 per cent, of other origins. You will notice from the diagram that, apart from the large French population, there are as well large minority groups from other European countries. Dutch, Norwegian, Icelandic, Swedish, German,

Italian, Russian, and many other European immigrants came out to Canada under an officially encouraged scheme forty years ago and settled mainly on the prairies, where development has been in large part due to their efforts. Many still live in their own communities. Little isolated dots of foreign blood, not readily absorbed,” comments Bruce Hutchison, who adds that “ most Canadians do not attempt to understand these people.” The figures quoted indicate the extent of the racial differences. The fact that, though the two main groups have lived side by side for two hundred years, there has been little intermarriage and each race has clung to its own language and culture shows difficulty of the problem. As the French population increases, so may the difficulties, unless a solution is found in a unified national outlook. “ French - Canadian life has been shaped by its profound Catholicism, by the Canadian physical environment, by association and conflict with predominant Anglo-Saxon North America, and by Canadian adoptions of the British institutions of monarchy and representative and responsible government. Religious and cultural loyalties, conscious policies of group concentration and isolation and three centuries of life in the well-defined St. Lawrence home land have preserved the French Canadian people and given them a unique unity and strength. This people is perhaps the most sturdily Canadian and conservative in the Dominion.” The English-Canadian, on the other hand, has more of the outlook of the Englishman or American of to-day. His background is often Scottish or North Country, or perhaps that of the New England loyalists who settled in Canada at the time of the American revolution. “ When he looks abroad he looks to London or New York ; the French Canadian perhaps more to Rome than to either, but almost more to London than to Paris.” The one looks to the State for welfare ; the other to the Church.

Differences of Outlook < -::i- ;■ Jlioru Consequent upon this divergence of outlook the races have remained apart. The French education system is largely clerical; the English mainly lay. There are two different and almost hostile . interpretations of Canadian history. On the question of corfscription the country has been bitterly divided owing to the enforcement of this policy by the English majority on the French minority in the last war. But, as Graham Spry has pointed out, “ the idea of Canadian nationhood, the striving for unity rather than uniformity, the recognition of differences rather than their distinction, common-sense and wise forbearance can slowly ‘blaze the trail ’ to happier relations.” Other writers are less optimistic about Canada’s “split personality.” One, Judith Robinson, points out that much of the difficulty is due to the Quebec Act of 1774 (an enlighted piece of legislation), which guaranteed to the French people security in their religion and language, customs and tenures, under their own civil laws. The British North America Act further improved the position of the French-Canadians by granting Quebec (where the large majority of the population is French) a fixed representation of 65 seats out of 245 at present in the Federated Parliament, whereas the other provinces are represented in proportion to their population. • The first Act effectively insulates the - two races. The second makes French-Canadian support a vital factor in Federal politics. “ And whatever the virtues of the arrangements in terms of peace, in time of national danger they do not make for strong and resolute government or for unity of action.” It should be remembered, too, that the high French-Canadian birth-rate may in time make Quebec’s representation in the Federal Parliament less than that to which she would be entitled on a population basis. . They have lived at Peace But though the races have lived apart they have lived at peace. Occasionaly there will be a flare-up of racial feeling set alight by propaganda that the English have the best jobs, the capital and the power. Or anti-French feeling may find an outlet in Ontario newspapers. But the French-Canadian • knows he is safe in the things he values most— religion, his language, and his laws. Until now the cultural rather than technical emphasis on his education has hindered him-from competing on an equal footing with the young English-Canadian in modern industry. Inherently he is conservative. “ This sole duty—to persist ” has been said to be his race’s watchword. Generally, relations between the two races are good, and many Canadians are optimistic as to further unity in the future. Problems of this nature have never faced New Zealand. Here the aim has been to encourage the Maori to adopt a European

mode of life ; to identify as far as possible his outlook with' our own. It is difficult, then, for a- New-Zealander to appreciate the problems facing a huge country where two races almost equal in population maintain an outlook and culture differing so widely. Yet in a proper appreciation of this problem lies some understanding of the difficulties with which Canada is faced. Geographical Factors The size of Canada further complicates its problems, adding weight to the saying, “ Canada is a difficult country to govern.” It stretches from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from the North Pole down to the latitude of the Mediterranean. In this country, as large as all Europe, “ there are few geographic influences to aid the hands of men in the ready shaping of a single nation.” There are two main barriers to unity of Canadian minds. The Laurentian Shield, a region of “ trees, rocks, water; rocks, water, trees,” runs in an arc from the shores of the lower St. Lawrence, across Quebec through central Canada and the north-western provinces to the Arctic Circle north of Alberta. It occupies three-fifths of Canada and is generally unsuitable for settlement except in small pockets. Further to the west the Rocky Mountains rear up to cut the prairies from the western province of British Columbia. These mountains occupy another fifth of the country. Thus the population is confined to the St. Lawrence Lowlands of Quebec and Ontario, to the great prairies of the west and to the mountain valleys. The two barriers also cut across the east-west axis of the rivers.

Vital to Canadian economy is the great waterway of the St. Lawrence, stretching 2,000 miles from the Atlantic to Lake Ontario in the centre of the continent. From the Great Lakes rivers run north and west, and the railways and airways of to-day roughly follow their routes. It has been this river system and its parallel system of modern communications that has made political union between east and west possible. The population of Canada hugs the thin fringe along the waterways and the trans-continental Canadian Pacific Railway. The great majority live within 200 miles of the United- States border. But the centres of population on the Atlantic Coast are 700 miles from those of central Canada ; Central Ontario is divided by almost a thousand miles of rock and water from the great plains, which are again 400 miles from the Pacific with the Rocky Mountains in between. If you look at the map on pages 8-9 you will appreciate the distances involved and the natural barriers that cut the continent. Add to these the racial and religious problems. - Quebec and the northern parts of New Brunswick and Ontario are largely French and Catholic. The remainder of Ontario, Nova Scotia; and British Columbia are mainly Anglo-Saxon and Protestant. Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, the prairie provinces, are less than half Anglo-Saxon, and here there are large groups of other European nationalities’.

Thus racial difficulties are further complicated by provincial loyalties. This is best illustrated in the', sphere of politics. A Conservative in the low agricultural tariff west differs on the question of tariffs from a Conservative in protectionist and industrialized Ontario, a French-Canadian Liberal in Quebec holds different views on foreign affairs to those of an English-speaking Liberal in Vancouver. A railway worker thinking in- terms, of wages sees freight rates through different eyes from the prairie farmer thinking in terms of costs, though both may belong to the same political party. Economic Resources Though rich in economic resources, Canada has been by no means a self-sufficient country. She has always been dependent upon the sale of a few staple exports on overseas markets. At first the fish abounding on the Atlantic seaboard was the main export to Europe. Then the fur trade developed as the colonists and trappers moved inland. The timber . trade then grew in importance, and as . the forests were cleared wheat was sown. The expansion of wheatgrowing to the prairies confirmed the supremacy of agriculture. Canada remains the world’s .largest exporter of wheat, but her - economy is not founded on wheat alone. She also leads the world in her export of newsprint and non-ferrous metals. She is one of the first three exporting countries of the world and is amongst the first six industrial nations. Also her standard of living is second only to that of the United States. From the rugged expanse of the Laurentian Shield comes much of Canada’s mineral wealth. Gold, nickel, copper, lead, zinc, iron are all found in this area of rock. From the forests comes the wood-pulp and newsprint/ and, ' from . the rivers, unlimited waterpower and electricity. Thus, as well as finding a firm foundation in an abundant agriculture, Canada now possesses the additional economic advantage of active industrialization. Thirty per cent, of Canadian workers are engaged in the primary industries of farming, fishing, forestry, and hunting. Another third is occupied with mining, manufacturing, and construction work. . . • But before the war Canada’s imports were high. She imported from the United States goods to the annual value of five hundred million dollars and from the United Kingdom. goods worth another hundred and fifty million dollars. Amongst the main imports were iron-ore, petroleum, coal, tin, rubber and cotton. These she paid for, in the case of America, from funds held to her credit in London. Because the value of the goods that Canada exported to Great Britain exceeded the value of the goods that Britain exported to her she had available in London a sterling balance which could be used .to meet Canada’s commitments elsewhere. Much of this surplus was converted into dollars and used to pay

for Canada’s imports from America which exceeded her exports to that country and thus created what is known as “an unfavourable trade balance.”

Canada has thus been economically linked with United States, a link strengthened by the similarity of farming techniques in both countries and by the Canadian use of American machinery. American capital, too, has been heavily invested in Canada. Onequarter of Canada’s manufactured products are made in Americanowned factories. Before the war the United States had invested four billion dollars in Canada, and Canada had invested a billion in the States.

This dependence on overseas markets and overseas capital means that economic depression is especially severe in Canada. Because there is not the same demand, the price of her main exports falls steeply. So does the famer’s income. But his costs do not drop as quickly. Nor does the interest bill due on foreign capital invested in Canada. Inside the country this relationship is paralleled. The older centres, Montreal and Toronto, provide the capital for the newer areas of production. “ The farming areas of the west, the mining of the Canadian Shield, the timber regions of east and west, borrowing capital from Montreal and Toronto. to. build railways, roads, schools, or Government buildings similarly face the problems of fluctuating incomes and fixed costs.” War Production : American Co-operation Before the war the restrictive tariffs which both America and Canada had imposed on each other’s goods were being lowered. These tariff walls had been built up over a period of eighty years partly because of American protectionist policy and partly because of the Canadian fear that reciprocity of trade would lead to annexation.' This fear was. not allayed by President Taft’s statement that such reciprocity “ would make Canada only an adjunct of the United States.” Average tariff barriers stood at about 22 per cent. The war has brought about almost complete economic cooperation. The joint defence of North America was agreed upon by both countries in 1940. Joint war economy has logically followed. ■

Before Dunkirk, Canada planned to supply raw materials to Britain for manufacture. The changed situation meant that Canada herself must do the manufacturing. For this aim United States help was essential. In terms, of the Hyde Park agreement the United States undertook to purchase from Canada sufficient supplies and material to cover Canada’s war purchases in the United States. Further, American supplies needed by Canada to manufacture munitions for Britain were charged to Britain’s lendlease account. Canada has not accepted lend-lease or American loans and has repaid the Americans the money spent by them on the Alcan highway. It was also agreed that in the expanding war production of both countries duplication should be avoided.

Finally, both countries swept aside more than a century’s tariff argument by agreeing to pool materials and allocate them so as “ to permit maximum war production irrespective of national boundaries.” An example of co-operation on the agricultural front is the plan that, because of the shortage of vegetable oils, Canada should concentrate on feed grains while the United , States grew the vegetable oils. The war has changed Canada from a producer mainly of raw materials into a highly industrialized nation. In 1939 the value of her manufactures stood at almost three and a half billion dollars. By 1942 it had increased to eight billion. The national income has risen proportionately. For 'war use mew factories, power schemes, mines dot the once isolated or rural countryside. When peace comes jobs must be found for a million more workers than were employed before the war. The Canadian Minister of Munitions and Supply states that he can convert 90 per cent, of these plants to peacetime use. But the goods produced must be sold in Canada or elsewhere. Bruce Hutchison, a Canadian journalist, writing in Fortune', considers that the answer lies in continuation of the co-operation with the United States after the war. “ Unless Canada can sell more to the United States than it sold before the war, or unless it can buy American goods with foreign currencies, it cannot secure the trade necessary to support the kind of economy it has lately erected. American tariff and currency policy is vital to Canada.” (Remember the explanation given of how the balance available in London from the excess of Canadian exports to Great Britain over imports from that country was used to pay off the unfavourable American trade balance.) - . Canadian Government As in the United States, the Government of Canada is divided between the Provincial Legislatures and the Federal Government. The model of the Federal Government is that of Westminster rather than Washington. Detailed powers are allotted to the Provincial Governments by the Constitution’of 1867 and the Dominion Parliament legislates on the residue. The interpretation of the 1867 Constitution rests with the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council of Great Britain, which, ’in the cases that have come before it for decision, has, unlike the Supreme Court of the United y. States’, adhered literally to the letter of the statute. Criticism is ’ sometimes offered that, because of this strict interpretation, the Constitution is inelastic and unresponsive to changing conditions. * The Federal Government consists of two Houses, as does our own. The Senate, conforming to our Legislative Council, is American in its name only. The seats are divided among the provinces, and the Senators who are appointed by the Federal Government hold office for life. In consequence, the party winning an election may find the Senate occupied by Senators appointed

by the previous Government. However, the Senate rarely refuses to assent to legislation passed by the Lower House. The House of Commons follows the English system of representation—each province has seats proportionate to its population—except that Quebec is allotted a total permanent representation of 65 members. Elections are held every five years.

Not only Parliament, but Cabinet as well, must be “ representative ” : this difficulty is not found in the United States, but a Canadian Prime Minister must try to pick his Cabinet so as to include representatives of almost all the provinces. He must, in addition, take racial and religious differences into consideration.

“ Thus, to the diverse influences of geography, race, and religion has, been added the disintegrating force of provincial sovereignty,’ ” says Graham Spry, though he admits the advantages of the system in allowing discussion and compromise on provincial issues in. the Federal Government. “Canadian political parties are conditioned by these sectional and provincial differences. The national party organizations are federations of provincial party organizations. They represent trends in national policy rather than clean-cut issues. The problem of Canadian governance is supremely: the problem of national unity. National unitythe easing of stresses and strains, the softening of rivalries, the diversion of grievances that may nourish ideas of secession, the buying-off or conciliation of battling economic groups. Policy must be formulated, it might almost be said, as a British Prime Minister formulates foreign rather than domestic policy. Thus it is a truism in both legislative and executive Departments that ‘ Canada is a difficult country to govern.’ ” Canada and the United States The increased wartime co-operation between the two great neighbours of the North American continent has already been pointed out. So has the fact that for many years before 1939 economic co-operation had not been as full as might have been desirable. Behind this was the Canadian .fear of absorption into the United-States, a fear which has disappeared along with the American groups who advocated it. With the “ annexation ” worry forgotten, intimate and cordial relations between the two countries were the natural result, and the war has further strengthened their friendship. ' '■

“ What has been done to continue the co-operation of the war years ? ” asks Bruce Hutchison. The machinery for peacetime planning has been provided, but had not been made great use of up until mid-1943, according to this writer. He suggests four positions which Canada may occupy in the post-war world, taking for granted collaboration with the United States.

First, the “ unthinkable situation that she should become an outpost of Britain dominated by Britain’s policy tied to Britain’s

economy though still friendly to . the United States.” As Mr. Hutchison points out, “No one is seriously proposing such a policy.” Secondly, Canada “ can join the United States by outright political union.” This he also. considers improbable as being opposed to the wishes of the majority of the Canadian people. Thirdly, a possibility which, taking into account wartime coordination, he thinks cannot be lightly dismissed. “A sphere of American influence exploited by American capital, supported by whatever American markets its neighbours may choose to give it . . . The question is not one of friendship, but American policy. Should the United States depend on Canada’s political, military, and economic co-operation, provided independently, or should it secure it by a peaceful penetration, a kind of enlightened imperialism ? ” , 1 Fourthly, the policy which Canadians themselves favour according to Mr. Hutchison: “ Canada as a powerful independent nation bound closely to Britain and the United States by sentiment, military agreement, and economic intercourse.” Canada and the Pacific Consequent upon co-operation with the United States comes the question of Canadian interest in the Pacific. Already an important example of United States - Canadian collaboration, the Alaskan Highway running from Edmonton on the United States border across Canada to Fairbanks, has served to strengthen Canadian interest in the Pacific and in China and Russia. But Canada’s interest is mainly in the North-west Pacific and in the economic development of this region jointly with the U : ed States. Air transport in this area gives opportunity for a still greater degree of co-operation for rivalryas each country possesses bases necessary for the Asiatic and trans-Pacific operations of the other’s air lines.

•W. L. Morton, writing in the Far Eastern Survey, considers that “ What Canadians envisage in the Pacific is a close working partnership of the United States, Australia, and Canada complemented by cordial relations with China and Russia. A corner-stone of this broader co-operation will be the joint strategic interest (of Canada and the United States) in the Pacific North-west.” At the other end of the Pacific much the same partnership is hoped for by Australia and New Zealand with the Canberra Agreement as the cornerstone. Canada and the British Commonwealth - ' :< 1 Though Canada may still be dependent on Great Britain for the purchase of her staple exports the market for Britain’s manufactures in the Dominion has been adversely affected and is not likely to return to its pre-war value. The war has forced ■ Canada to produce many of the items she previously imported, and this

she has done, ironically enough, in order to help Great Britain. After the war that help will become, for the Mother-country, rather a hindrance. Canada has now a highly developed capital market of her own and can take care of her own normal needs. Much American capital has been invested in Canada and more is probably available. Here, again, overseas earnings on which Great Britain depended will be lost to her. Britain, Hartley Grattan predicts, will have to capture Canadian and Australian markets with specialized products. “ Basic manufactures will be wanted only in very limited quantities.”

Because of the expansion of British agriculture during the war, Canada’s markets for her agricultural products may be affected. Other markets, outside the Empire, must therefore be found, and not only for staples, but also for the excess of her manufactures over home consumption. Canada’s eyes are already turning to South America.

Canada’s autonomy within the Commonwealth and her natural desire for security, both political and economic, present interesting problems when considered in relation to Canada’s neighbour States. Canada’s geographical link is with the United States. Her nationalism has grown with the war as has her self-sufficiency. Canada and the rest of the Dominions are, in Hartley Grattan’s view, “ moving towards closer relations with their neighbours and direct relations with more distant foreign countries important to them.” This trend, he emphasizes as against the argument of Empire unity advanced by Lord Halifax when he said, “ It is an immeasurable gain if on vital issues we can achieve a common foreign policy expressed not by a single voice, but by a unison of many.”

The suggestions put forward by Lord Halifax were based on the assumption that the peace of the post-war world would depend on the supervision by four Great Powers approximately equal in strength. To maintain her place among the four Britain would need the assistance of the Dominions both in resources and in matters of policy.. The Canadian Prime Minister, Mr. Mackenzie King, contends, on the other hand, that the maintenance of peace depends on something more than the matching of man-power and resources among three or four dominant states. He asserts that a large superiority of power must be preserved on the side of those who intend to ensure peace; but his hope is to see that the necessary superiority is exercised through an effective international system of security inside which the co-operation of the peace-loving nations would be freely sought and given.

In a world of power blocs the smaller nations would have to find refuge with one of the great alliances. Into what bloc would Canada move by geography and economic necessity ? The map scarcely indicates that it would be the Empire alliance on which Canada’s choice would fall.

Canada has travelled a long way since the Pan-American Conference in 1928, when the American delegates were instructed

to oppose Canadian participation on the grounds that her views would be coloured by those of Great Britain. Against this view must be considered that of Canada’s independence (as instanced by her separate and week-delayed declaration of war) and her happy associations within the British Commonwealth. Though by geography she belongs to the American hemisphere, she has never severed her political connections with Europe. “ To-day she is a standing example to the American republics of how it is possible to combine freedom and independence with loyalty to a wider political unit than the nation State. And that, by almost universal consent, is the direction in which the world must move if it is ever to abolish war.”