England, Canada and the Great War Part 16

As previously stated, the American Revolution brought for ever to an end British absolutism in the new continent. Henceforth, liberty and autonomy were to be the two foundation stones of a new colonial Policy which, far from disrupting the Empire as the autocratic one had done, was to cement its union so strongly as to make possible the gigantic military effort she has displayed for more than the last four years.

The Treaty of Paris brought the Seven Years War to a close. Once more the peace of the world was temporarily restored. By the Treaty of Paris, Canada was ceded to England, our "Nationalists" say. If so, how can they pretend that the extension of British Sovereignty over the regions which have become the great autonomous Dominion of Canada was an undue manifestation of British conquering Imperialism?

An intelligent and impartial student of the early settlements of the two continents of America can only draw the conclusion that the New World has not been the theatre of the operations of British Imperialism. Its first real attempt was tried--with much laudable success--in 1867, by the federal union of the Canadian provinces, decreed by the Sovereign legislative power of the Parliament of Great Britain, at our own request and in accordance with our own freely expressed wishes.

Australia is the second autonomous colony of England in extent and importance. It comprises nearly all the territory of the Oceanic continent, so called from the geographical position, in the Pacific Ocean, of the Islands forming it. New Zealand is the second group of these Islands. It is another autonomous British colony, called, since 1907 "THE DOMINION OF NEW ZEALAND".

Those two Dominions have a combined territorial area of more than 3,000,000 square miles--almost as large as the whole of Europe--with a population of six millions rapidly increasing. Their two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, each having a population of 700,000, are great commercial centres.

If British Imperialism has had anything to do with the bringing of Australia and New Zealand under British Sovereignty, it must be admitted by all fair minded men that it has worked its way in the most pacific manner. Deservedly renowned British explorers--Cook, Vancouver, and others--discovered and took possession of the Oceanic continent in the name of their Sovereign. Welcomed by the aboriginal tribes, they raised the British flag over the fair land of such a promising future in the latter end of the eighteenth century--Cook in 1770. It has ever since been graciously waving, by the sweet breeze of the Pacific, over one of the happiest peoples on earth, enjoying the blessings of interior peace and all the advantages of the political liberties conferred upon these great colonies, more than half a century ago. As a matter of fact, England has organized her Australasian possessions into free autonomous colonies at the very dawn of their political life, dating from the middle of the last century, when they began that splendid progressive advance developing more and more every year.

Is it not evident, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the settlement of the Australasian colonies by England, so satisfactory and so promising, has not been brought about by the illegitimate ambition of an unmeasured Sovereign aggrandizement by a guilty sort of Imperialism.

The establishment of British Sovereignty in the Indian country, immense in extent, wealth and population, is one of the greatest events of the historical development of the British Empire.

I shall not say that all that took place in the government of India deserves a blind approval. That British authority was much too long left in the control of a company was a misfortune. Under such a regime abuses were sure to develop and increase. They did and were energetically denounced--more especially on that day when Sheridan rose to such an eloquence, in the House of Lords, that a motion of adjournment had to be carried, to allow the peers to recover the free control of their minds before rendering judgment in the case brought before their tribunal, impeaching Warren Hastings.

The rule of the Indian Company was abolished, in 1858, by _The Government of India Act_.

In 1876, the ill.u.s.trious Disraeli--Lord Beaconsfield--took the statesmanlike decision of adding a new prestige to the British Crown and to the Sovereign wearing it. He had Parliament to adopt the _Royal t.i.tles Act_, by which Her Majesty Queen Victoria was proclaimed EMPRESS OF INDIA.

Such, in due course, and without any trouble, was accomplished that great political evolution which subst.i.tuted, for populations numbering more than three hundred millions of human beings, an Imperial system in place of the deplorable government by a company. For the last sixty years, the new regime has given peace, order and prosperity to India.

A French publicist wrote as follows:--

After troubles of nine centuries duration, India has recovered peace under the tutelage of England, the best colonizer of the peoples of Europe. England has rendered an evident service to India. She has freed her from the intestine wars tearing her since her historical origin; she has given her a police and an administrative system.

Nations, like individuals, are not perfect. To judge equitably, impartially, the government by a Metropolis of the regions under her Sovereignty, one must not only be scandalized at her failings, but must take the broader view of her whole history in appreciating its final good and commendable results. So judging the government of India by England, every impartial mind must conclude that, on the whole--and more especially for the last sixty years--it has been beneficient. It promises to be still more so, as a consequence of the admirable share India is taking in the present war.

Egypt and the Soudan have a territorial area of 1,335,000 square miles, with a population of 15,000,000. I pride to be one of those who congratulate Great Britain to have freed the ancient and glorious Egyptian country from Turkish tyranny. A proclamation, dated the 18th of December, 1914, has finally placed Egypt under England's protectorate with the agreement of France.

In the chapters respecting the Soudanese and South African wars, I have shown how satisfactory has been the rule of Great Britain in those African countries.

It being ever true that the earth was Providentially created for men to live in the legitimate enjoyment of the blessings of peace multiplied by the fruits of their labours, the Egyptians and the Soudaneses have every reason to congratulate themselves for their liberation from the Turkish barbarous yoke, and for the protection they receive from one of the most civilizing nations.

I sincerely believe that this short review of the respective situation of five of the princ.i.p.al component parts of the British Empire, is sufficient to form the honest conviction that if England has practised Imperialism, she has done so for the real benefit of the peoples living under the aegis of her Sovereignty, the most favourable to colonial political liberty.

CHAPTER XXIII.

BRITISH IMPERIALISM AND POLITICAL LIBERTY.

British history, for the last century and more, proves that Imperialism is not naturally incompatible with Political Liberty, nor with the respect due the national aspirations of divers ethnical groups. The unity and the consolidation of the Empire made their greatest strides since the close of the war which resulted in the independence of the neighbouring Republic. As previously explained, they were the outcome of the very wise and statesmanlike change of colonial policy then adopted by England. The days were to come when they would be put to the severest test and would prove more than equal to its greatest strain. Those are the days which the British Empire is living through, with brilliancy and heroism, amidst the dazzling lightning and the roaring thunder of an unprecedented military conflict, with every prospect of surviving its sufferings and sacrifices with a still stronger political structure.

The same evolution by which Great Britain was to reach the summit of Political Liberty by the final triumph of the new const.i.tutional principle of ministerial responsibility, was spreading to her far overseas Colonies. Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Newfoundland were successively granted const.i.tutional charters based on the same principles as those of the inst.i.tutions of the United Kingdom.

As I have already said, Imperialism becomes dangerous and deserves the severest condemnation, only where and when it is the instrument of autocratic absolutism. It causes me no alarm whatever when it is developed under free inst.i.tutions, guaranteed and protected by ministerial responsibility.

Whatever said to the contrary, by prejudiced and designing writers, imbued with the extravagant notions of a narrow and fanatical "Nationalism", Canada, the most important of the autonomous Colonies of the British Empire, is freer than ever. Like all the other nations, she suffers from disastrous events shaking the whole worldly edifice, but she is none the less the absolute mistress of the initiative of whatever efforts she considers her duty to make under those trying circ.u.mstances.

England has imposed nothing upon Canada, has asked nothing from Canada, since the beginning of the war. She has, of course, accepted, with much pleasure and grat.i.tude, the help we have freely offered and given her.

Let our "Nationalists", in their inspired unfairness, say, if they like, that Canada, like all the Allies defensively fighting, was forced in the conflict by the imperious necessity of the situation created by those who expected to reach the goal of their ambition. But they have no right to charge Great Britain to have coerced the Dominion, against her will, to join in the struggle which the British Government had done their utmost to prevent.

If it was not giving to this work too wide a range, I would like to undertake an historical sketch of all the good the British const.i.tutional system has produced in the United Kingdom and in the Colonies. I shall quote only a few of the most important examples.

In my opinion, the one development in England's history, since the close of the eighteenth century, most interesting to the French Canadians, is certainly that which resulted in the emanc.i.p.ation of the Roman Catholics of the United Kingdom.

To persuade my French Canadian countrymen of the good to be wrought by the patriotic use of the British inst.i.tutions, I explained to them that at the beginning of the last century, the Roman Catholics of the United Kingdom enjoyed no political rights. They were neither electors, nor eligible to the House of Commons. They asked that justice be done to them. True statesmen, high and fair minded, admitted the justice of their claims and supported them. The ensuing political contest lasted more than twenty years.

To obtain the proposed change in the long standing laws of the realm from an exclusively Protestant electorate, was indeed a great task to accomplish. The public men supporting the Roman Catholics' claims were courageous and eloquent. They carried the day. Have not the true friends of political freedom every reason to congratulate themselves that a great measure of justice granting political rights to Roman Catholics was voted by an Electorate and a Parliament exclusively Protestant.

King George IV, through fear that his Royal prerogative might be impaired by the change, was hostile to it. He was persuaded to agree to the measure by Sir Robert Peel, the life long opponent of Roman Catholic emanc.i.p.ation. Whatever were the religious convictions and feelings of Sir Robert Peel, he was a statesman of a high cla.s.s. As all the leading public men of England, he had a broad conception of the duties of the chief adviser of the Crown, and of the true spirit of the British const.i.tution. The voice of the nation having spoken in no uncertain sounds, the national will must be followed. He plainly said so to His Majesty who yielded. Then, in a most admirable speech, he--Sir Robert Peel--moved himself the pa.s.sing of the bill granting justice to the Roman Catholics, carried it through the two Houses of Parliament and had it sanctioned by the King.

A great act of national justice always receives its due reward. The Roman Catholics have been faithful and loyal subjects. George IV and his successors have lived to see many evident proofs of their loyal devotion, more especially since the opening of the present war.

The final success of the free discussion of the question of granting to the Roman Catholics of the United Kingdom all the rights enjoyed by the British subjects of all the other religious denominations, carried in spite of difficulties not easily overcome, is certainly one of the greatest and most honorable triumphs that Political Liberty has ever obtained. I was often deeply moved at reading the historic account of that most interesting debate in Parliament, on the public platform and in the press. More and more, the conviction was firmly impressed on my mind and soul that a great people accomplis.h.i.+ng a grand act of justice gives a most salutary example to posterity deserving the admiration and grat.i.tude of all generations to come.

I was only appreciating with justice and fairness the part played by England in Canada, in telling my French Canadian countrymen that they enjoyed the political rights of British subjects many years before the same privileges and justice was granted to the Roman Catholics of the United Kingdom. That much in answer to the charge of our fanatical extremists that England and her Government always wanted to oppress the French Canadians on account of their religious faith.

Without going back to the eventful days of _Magna Charta_ and of the _Bill of Rights_, both embodying the fundamental const.i.tutional principles which were finally bound to overcome the last pretentions of absolutism of yore, I considered a short review, in broad lines, of the work performed by the British Electorate and the Imperial Parliament, during the last century, would help in destroying in the minds of my French readers the prejudices forced upon them by "Nationalist" writers.

That great work is princ.i.p.ally ill.u.s.trated by eight important measures of general interest.

I have just mentioned that most honourable one emanc.i.p.ating the Roman Catholics of Great Britain.

Shortly after, it was followed by that abolis.h.i.+ng the Corn Laws after a protracted and very interesting discussion. That important measure was also carried on the proposition of the same Sir Robert Peel, for a long time its determined opponent. The manufacturing population, increasing so rapidly, would soon have been starved by the continuously augmenting cost of bread. Sir Robert Peel foresaw the fearful consequences sure to ensue, if no relief was granted to millions threatened with hunger. He was, as I have already said, too much of a statesman to hesitate in doing his duty. He gave up his own opinion and advised his Sovereign to do away with the Corn Laws, the repeal of which he had Parliament to vote.

With the advent of Queen Victoria, ministerial responsibility for all the acts of the Sovereign became definitely the fundamental principle of the British const.i.tution.

Complete ministerial responsibility, once fully recognized in Great Britain, was without delay granted to all the British colonies having representative inst.i.tutions.

The abolition of slavery all over the British Empire is, every one must admit, a political development of first magnitude, one doing the greatest possible honour to the great nation having first taken the glorious initiative of granting to the black race the justice ordered by Christianity. It is undoubtedly a very valuable reform to the credit of England.

The Imperial Parliament realized that the const.i.tutional regime of the United Kingdom could not bear all the fruits to be expected from it with an electorate restricted to privileged cla.s.ses. To support such a splendid edifice, admirable in structure and strength, a larger basic foundation, more solid, laid deep in the national soil, was required.

After a long political struggle, freedom was once more triumphant in the Motherland. The first great Reform Bill of 1832 was the starting point of successive legislative enactments, enlarging the franchise, calling to the exercise of political rights various cla.s.ses of the people, bringing up the British electorate to the glorious standard of being one of the freest, the most enlightened, and most independent in the world.

The crowning measure of this extensive political reform has been the Bill of 1917 providing for the addition of some 8,000,000 voters to the roll, including about 6,000,000 women.

The rotten boroughs of old were abolished and replaced by a much better redistribution of electoral divisions.

Dating from 1867, great autonomous federal colonies, with full Sovereign rights in the administration of all their interior affairs, have been created by Imperial charters. The Canadian, Australian, South African, and New Zealand Dominions, of a total territorial area exceeding 7,000,000 square miles, with a total population of over 25,000,000, nearly 20,000,000 of which belong to the white race, have commenced their new political career with all the confidence and the hopes inspired by their free inst.i.tutions.

Finally, the Imperial Parliament pa.s.sed a law granting Home Rule to Ireland. Unfortunately, the war, so disastrous in many ways, prevented the immediate carrying out of the will of Parliament, certainly representative of that of the nation. But this vexed question must at last be settled once for all. It is to be hoped that the day is not far distant when it will be removed from the political arena by a solution satisfactory to Ireland, to England and to the whole Empire.

Besides all those very important measures of political reform, the British Parliament has pa.s.sed many laws of urgent social improvement.

The crowning act of the Imperial Parliament has been its determined att.i.tude for the maintenance of peace through a long series of years.