THE outbreak of the war
of secession in the United States and the events which marked its
progress had, as we have seen, forwarded the work of confederating
Canada. The conclusion of that war left questions of great
difficulty and delicacy to be settled by the statesmen of Great
Britain, the United States and the young Dominion. In this
settlement Macdonald was compelled to take a prominent part.
Scarcely any other portion of his political career was subjected to
more hostile criticism than this; on no other point in his public
life was he more confident that the ultimate judgment of history
would ratify his conduct and acknowledge the patriotism by which it
had been actuated.
Great Britain's
largest and most immediate interest in the questions at issue lay in
the large claims for damage made against her by the United States on
account of the injury inflicted on American trade and shipping by
the Southern cruiser Alabama, which had been fitted out at a British
port, and, it was claimed, had been allowed to escape through lack
of the precautions due on the part of a friendly government. The
questions which more immediately concerned the Dominion were the San
Juan boundary dispute on the Pacific coast; the settlement of claims
for damages inflicted on Canada by the Fenian Raids of 1864-5-6,
organized and directed from American territory in violation of
international law; and above all the recognition of her exclusive
right to the inshore fisheries of all Dominion waters. Intimately,
though indirectly, connected with the last question was that of
trade relations between the United States and Canada.
The prosperity of the
Dominion had been profoundly affected by the change in American
trade policy adopted after the war, in order to deal with the vast
debt accumulated during its progress. The reciprocity treaty
negotiated by Lord Elgin in 1854 had proved of great advantage to
Canadian trade ; nor can it be doubted that it had corresponding
advantages for the United States. But even if its retention had been
possible under the strongly protective system now adopted by that
country, the anti-British current of feeling prevalent at the time
would probably have determined its abrogation; and in March, 1866,
this was finally effected at the instance of the American
government.
With the denunciation
of the treaty, the right of American fishermen to pursue their
occupations in Canadian waters passed away. Repeated attempts to
secure a renewal of reciprocal trade having failed, Canada was now
bent on asserting her exclusive right to all the inshore fisheries
off her coast, which, are among the most valuable of her national
assets, and had been the chief consideration granted in 1854 in
return for commercial reciprocity. American fishermen, on the other
hand, showed the greatest reluctance to give up the privileges they
had temporarily enjoyed under the treaty; they omitted to take out
licences as required by the Dominion government; and the danger of
collision between them and the marine force established for fishery
protection was constant and great.
The destruction
wrought by the Alabama had caused much irritation of national
feeling in the United States, as had the Fenian raids in Canada. An
attempt had been made to settle the Alabama question by what was
known as the Johnson-Clarendon Treaty, but this treaty the senate at
Washington had refused to ratify, thus leaving unsettled what
threatened to be a permanent source of ill-feeling and a possible
cause of war between the two countries. The fishing disputes were
now added as a further cause of irritation. While there was a
prevailing sense of insecurity on all sides and much anxiety to
remove every cause of international friction, the failure of the
first treaty made it difficult for England to reopen the
negotiations. The initiation of renewed discussion came from the
Dominion government, which saw clearly that any prolonged delay in
asserting Canadian rights might prejudice the just claims of the
Dominion in the matter of the fisheries, while other questions
equally required imperial consideration. During the year 1870 the
Hon. Alexander Campbell was sent to England under an
order-in-council which directed him to consult the imperial
government concerning "the proposed withdrawal of troops from
Canada; the question of fortifications ; the recent invasions of
Canadian territory by citizens of the United States, and the
previous threats and hostile preparations which compelled the
government to call out the militia and to obtain the consent of
parliament to the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act; the
systematic trespasses on Canadian fishing grounds by United States
fishermen, and the unsettled question as to the limits within which
foreigners can fish under the treaty of 1818." The strong
representations which Mr. Campbell was instructed to make gave the
British government an opportunity to take action, and it suggested,
through the British ambassador at Washington, the appointment of a
joint high commission to "treat and discuss the mode of settling the
different questions which have arisen out of the fisheries, as well
as all those which affect the relations of the United States towards
Her Majesty's possessions in North America." In reply the opinion
was expressed that to settle the differences generally known as the
"Alabama claims" would also be "essential to the restoration of
cordial and amicable relations between the two governments " and
should therefore be one of the subjects treated by the commission.
To this proposal the
British government agreed, "provided that all other claims, both of
British subjects and citizens of the United States, arising out of
acts committed during the recent civil war in that country, are
similarly referred to this commission.
An agreement having
thus been reached, both sides proceeded to name their commissioners
plenipotentiary. [The representatives of Great Britain, on the
commission were:—Earl de Grey and Ripon, president of the Privy
Council; Sir Stafford Northcote, M. P. ; Sir Edward Thornton,
British minister at Washington; Sir John A. 'Macdonald, premier of
Canada; Montague Bernard, Esq., professor of international law in
the University of Oxford. The American commissioners were the Hon.
Hamilton Fish, secretary of state; the Hon. R. C. Schenck, United
States minister to Great Britain; Judge Samuel Nelson, of the United
States Supreme Court; ex-Judge E. R. Hoar, of Massachusetts, and
George H. Williams, of Oregon.]
Under the
circumstances it was only natural that the imperial government
should wish that Macdonald should be one of the members of the
commission. The request that he should so serve placed him, as
leader of the Conservative party and premier of the Dominion, in an
exceedingly delicate position. The wide extension of the subjects to
be discussed and settled, beyond what had been originally suggested
by the Canadian government, gave him diverse ground for anxiety and
hesitation in accepting the appointment. No one knew better than he
the importance of maintaining friendly relations between the empire
and the republic, nor could any one have been more keenly alive to
the certainty that, if a collision should come between the two great
powers, Canada would be the chief arena of conflict and destruction.
On the other hand, he knew how fixed was the belief throughout the
Dominion that, in diplomatic contests with the United States, Great
Britain had almost invariably been outwitted, and that in
consequence Canada had suffered severely, especially in the
delimitation of her territory. He was fully aware that any further
sacrifice of Canadian interests, made even for the maintenance of
peace, would be met by a storm of opposition throughout the
Dominion, and that any public man in Canada who agreed to it would
imperil his reputation and almost certainly wreck his political
career. The personal risk taken in accepting the appointment would
therefore be great. Another consideration could not but weigh
heavily with him as leader of his party and of the government. The
commission was to meet towards the end of February, and service upon
it would entail prolonged absence from Ottawa at a time when
parliament was in session, when critical questions were under
discussion, and when a vigorous opposition was preparing for the
general election soon to come on. To his absence at this time he was
accustomed in later years to attribute the weakening of his
parliamentary position in 1872, when a general election took place,
and, indirectly, his defeat in 1873.
In the exhaustive
speech with which, on May 3rd, 1872, he moved in the Dominion
parliament the ratification of the clauses which depended on the
consent of Canada, he dwelt upon the perplexities which surrounded
him at this time.
"I had continually
before me," said he, "not only the imperial question, but the
interests of the Dominion of Canada, which I was there especially to
represent, and the difficulty of my position was, that if I gave
undue prominence to the interests of Canada, I might justly be held
in England to be taking a purely colonial and selfish point of view,
regardless of the interests of the empire as a whole and the
interests of Canada as a portion of the empire ; and on the other
hand, if I kept my eye solely on imperial considerations, I might be
held as neglecting my special duty towards this my country, Canada.
It was a difficult position, as the House will believe, a position
which pressed upon me with great weight and severity at the time."
And again: "When the proposition was first made to me I must say
that I felt considerable embarrassment and great reluctance to
become a member of the commission. I pointed out to my colleagues
that I was to be one only of five, that I was in a position of being
overruled continually in our discussions, and that I could not by
any possibility bring any due weight from my isolated position. I
felt also that I would not receive from those who were politically
opposed to me in Canada that support which an officer going abroad
on behalf of his country generally received, and had a right to
expect." Writing to the governor-general, through whom the offer of
a seat upon the commission had been conveyed to him, he says: "My
first impression was that it would be better for Canada not to be
represented in such a commission. But then we must consider that if
Canada allowed the matter to go by default and left its interests to
be adjudicated upon and settled by a commission composed exclusively
of Americans having adverse interests and Englishmen having little
or no interest in Canada, the government here would be very much
censured if the result were a sacrifice of the rights of the
Dominion. England would at once say that the offer to be represented
on the commission was made to Canada and that it was declined." His
colleagues in the cabinet, when consulted, were unanimously of the
opinion that he should act upon the commission. Even then, before
giving his final acceptance, he thought it necessary to fortify his
position as a commissioner on certain points which he considered
vital from a Canadian point of view. He secured from the imperial
government a definite statement that it fully recognized and would
firmly uphold Canada's exclusive right to the inshore fisheries, and
a further declaration that no sale of these fisheries or concession
in regard to them should be finally agreed upon until formally
ratified by the parliament of the Dominion. On these preliminary
conditions he consented to serve, though only then with many
misgivings. "I contemplate my visit to Washington with a good deal
of anxiety," he writes to his friend, Sir John Rose. "If anything
goes wrong I shall be made the scapegoat, at all events as far as
Canada is concerned. However, I thought that, after all Canada has
done for me, I should not shirk the responsibility."
Leaving Sir Georges
Cartier, senior member of the cabinet, in charge of the leadership
of the House of Commons, he left Ottawa for Washington, where the
commission held its first meeting on February 27th. After anxious
discussions, which extended over several weeks, the Treaty of
Washington was signed on May 8th, 1871.
Throughout the
progress of the negotiations Macdonald, having first received
permission to pursue this course, kept his colleagues at Ottawa
fully informed concerning the drift of the discussions in a series
of letters addressed to Sir Georges Cartier and Sir Charles Tupper.
From these documents and from the exhaustive speech in which, a year
later, he submitted for the ratification of parliament, the clauses
of the treaty which affected Canada, we are able to gather a clear
idea of the extremely difficult part he had to play.
When he reached
Washington he found among the American as well as the British
commissioners, a genuinely sincere desire for the reconciliation of
all differences. But behind the commissioners was the American
senate, which it was well known would reject any treaty which
interfered with certain fixed lines of American policy. Reciprocal
trade was the equivalent given by the United States in1854 for the
Canadian fisheries, and Macdonald knew that popular opinion in the
Dominion looked upon this as the only adequate equivalent that could
be given now.
The American
commissioners, however, stated from the first, as had been
anticipated, that under the newly-adopted trade policy of the
country this was impossible. Equally prompt was the refusal to allow
Canadians a share in the coasting trade. They offered instead one
million dollars for the fisheries in perpetuity. To any such
permanent sale Macdonald strenuously objected on high national
grounds. He pointed out to the head of the British commission "that
it would be out of the question to surrender for all time to come
her fishery rights for any compensation however great. That we had
no right to injure posterity by depriving Canada, either as a
dependency or as a nation, of her fisheries, and in my opinion any
surrender must be for a term of years renewable by either party, or,
what would be preferable, for an unspecified period, but liable to
be terminated by either party. That the fisheries were valuable in
themselves, and would, with increasing population, become annually
of more value; but the value of the catch was of less consequence
than the means which the exclusive enjoyment of the fisheries gave
us of improving our position as a maritime power. That Canada
possessed infinitely more valuable fisheries than the United States,
with better harbours, and if we pursued the exclusive system
vigorously, we might run a winning race with the United States, as a
maritime power. That were our fishing ground used in common by our
own and American fishermen the latter would enjoy the same training
as ourselves. . ."
One serious check,
deeply affecting Canadian feeling in regard to the work of the
commission, was met with at an early stage of the conference. It had
from the first been fully expected that Canada's claims for
compensation on account of the Fenian Raids would be one of the
subjects brought before the commission. Through what was apparently
an oversight on the part of the British ambassador it was found,
when the commission met, that these claims had not been expressly
included in the terms of reference formally agreed upon. When the
question of their inclusion was brought up at the conference, the
American commissioners stated that they had no authority to deal
with them, and that they could only do so under revised
instructions.
After some
consultation by cable with Mr. Gladstone's cabinet which was then in
power, definite directions were sent to the commissioners to
withdraw these claims. At the same time the British government
assumed entire responsibility for the losses Canada had sustained,
and intimated that, if necessary, a money payment would be made by
way of compensation. The reason for this withdrawal of claims quite
as well founded as those created by the depredations of the Alabama,
has never been made clear, but in all probability it must be
referred to the strong desire felt in England to remove all
hindrances to the completion of a treaty.
The failure to
consider the claims for the Fenian Raids naturally caused great
disappointment in Canada and seriously affected Macdonald's
political outlook. Later, when stating the case in parliament, he
had no hesitation in fixing the responsibility for the failure. "It
was" he said, "the fault of Her Majesty's government in not
demanding in clear language, in terms which could not be
misunderstood, that the investigation of these claims should be one
of the matters dealt with by the commission. . . . . England was
responsible for that error. England had promised to make the demand,
and England had failed to make it. Not only that, but Her Majesty's
government had taken the responsibility of withdrawing the claims
altogether ; and Mr. Gladstone fully assumed all the
responsibilities for this step, and relieved the Canadian government
of any share in it, when he stated openly in the House of Commons
that the imperial government had seen fit to withdraw the claims,
but that they had done so with great reluctance and sorrow for the
manner in which Canada had been treated. Canada, therefore, had
every right to look to England for that satisfaction which she had
failed to receive. . . . She did not decline that responsibility. .
. ."
He pointed out,
however, the unwillingness of the Canadian government that the
compensation should take direct pecuniary form. "We were unwilling
that it should be the payment of a certain amount of money, and
there were several strong reasons why we should prefer not to accept
reparation in that shape. In the first place, if a proposal of that
kind were made it would cause a discussion as to the amount to be
paid by England, of a most unseemly character. We should have the
spectacle of a judge appointed to examine the claims in detail, with
Canada pressing her cause upon his attention, and England probably
resisting in some cases, and putting herself in an antagonistic
position, which should not be allowed to occur between the mother
country and the colony. It was, therefore, in the last degree
unadvisable that the relations between Canada and the mother
country, which throughout have been of so pleasant and friendly a
character, should be placed in jeopardy in that way."
The alternative which
he proposed was that an imperial guarantee should be given by Great
Britain for a considerable loan which the Dominion had to raise for
public works and defence. This, he pointed out, would not cost the
motherland a sixpence, but would confer a greater advantage upon
Canada than any direct compensation likely to be given. This
proposal was accepted, the guarantee was given by Act of Parliament,
and, it need scarcely be said, has never put the slightest burden
upon the British taxpayer. Even after the Geneva arbitration had
mulcted her to the extent of fifteen millions of dollars, Great
Britain never took steps to renew the Fenian claims, nor did the
United States ever volunteer compensation.
It is not in the
sphere of international diplomacy that we must look for ideals or
very high examples of justice.
Another disputed
question was soon eliminated from the discussions by an agreement
which Macdonald fully endorsed as fair and reasonable. The San Juan
boundary dispute had arisen from the ambiguity of a clause in the
treaty of June 15th, 1846, by which the Oregon boundary was supposed
to be finally settled. This clause read as follows: "From the point
on the 49th parallel of north latitude, where the boundary laid down
in existing treaties and conventions between Great Britain and the
United States terminates, the line of boundary between the
territories of Her Britannic Majesty and those of the United States,
shall be continued westward, along the said 49th parallel of north
latitude, to the middle of the channel, which separates the
continent from Vancouver Island; and thence southerly through the
middle of the said channel, and of Fuca's Straits, to the Pacific
Ocean; provided, however, that the navigation of the whole of the
channel and straits, south of the 49th parallel of north latitude,
remained free and open to both parties." The imperfect direction
laid down left it uncertain whether the Island of San Juan, near the
coast of Vancouver, was British or American territory. The 34th
Article of the Treaty of Washington provided that: "The respective
claims of the two governments should be submitted to the arbitrament
and award of the German Emperor, who should decide therefore,
finally and without appeal, which of the claims is most in
accordance with the interpretation of the treaty of June 15th,
1846."
Macdonald had no
hesitation in defending this decision in the Canadian parliament
when the treaty was under consideration. He said: "The only other
subject of peculiar interest to Canada in connection with the treaty
. . . is the manner of disposing of the San Juan boundary question.
That is settled in a way that no one can object to. I do not know
whether many honourable members have ever studied that question. It
is a most interesting one, and has long been a cause of controversy
between the two countries. I am bound to uphold, and I do uphold,
the British view respecting the channel which forms the boundary as
the correct one. The United States government were, I believe, as
sincerely convinced of the justice of their own case. Both believed
that they were in the right, both were firmly grounded in that
opinion; and such being the case, there was only one way out of it,
and that was to leave it to be settled by impartial arbitration. I
think the House will admit that no more distinguished arbiter could
have been selected than the Emperor of Germany. In the examination
and decision of the question he will have the assistance of as able
and eminent jurists as any in the world, for there is nowhere a more
distinguished body than the jurists of Germany, who are especially
familiar with the principles and practice of international law.
Whatever the decision may be, whether for England or against her,
you may be satisfied that you will get a most learned and careful
judgment in the matter, to which we must bow if it is against us,
and to which I am sure the United States will bow if it is against
them."
The emperor gave his
decision in October, 1872. It was unreservedly in favour of the
American claims, and the Island of San Juan was thereupon evacuated
by the British troops.
The Fenian claims
having been dismissed and an agreement reached on the question of
the San Juan boundary, the matter in debate narrowed down mainly to
the Alabama claims and the Canadian fisheries. Macdonald had never
anticipated, nor had the Canadian government thought, when making
its original suggestions in regard to the fisheries, that these two
questions would be grouped together and dealt with as a whole, as
they now were, for the purpose of the treaty. When the commissioners
had finally come to an agreement to submit the Alabama claims to
arbitration, it was urged that if the fishery question were not
settled, the ratification of the whole treaty by the senate would be
endangered.
Instead of the full
reciprocity, which had been given in return for the use of the
fisheries by the United States in1854, their commissioners now
offered to admit free of duty coal, salt, lumber and fish. With the
exception of Macdonald all the British commissioners were willing to
agree to this proposal, but he strenuously opposed its acceptance,
holding that the compensation was wholly inadequate.
He pointed out that
the import duty on coal and salt was so unpopular throughout the
States that it would soon, in any case, be taken off, and that
Canadian fish and lumber were both necessities to the American
consumer, who would himself have to pay the duty, so that this
concession conferred little advantage upon Canada.
He therefore claimed
that, in the absence of reciprocal arrangements, only a considerable
money payment by the United States could make the bargain equal.
Standing between the American commissioners keen to make the best
bargain, and the English commissioners equally keen to secure a
final treaty, he writes: "The absurd attempts of the United States
commissioners to depreciate the value of our fisheries would be
ridiculous if they were not so annoying. They found our English
friends so squeezable in nature that their audacity has grown beyond
all bounds." A proposal was now made to submit the amount of
additional money payment to arbitration. But to arbitrate about the
value of one's own undisputed property was a very different thing
from arbitration about a disputed and doubtful right of possession.
Against this Macdonald's colleagues at Ottawa took strong ground.
They telegraphed: "We are sensible of the gravity of the position
and alive to the deep interest which Canada has in the settlement of
all disputes between Great Britain and the United States. The
queen's government having formally pledged herself that our
fisheries should not be disposed without our consent, to force us
now into the disposal of them for a sum, to be fixed by arbitration,
and free fish, would be a breach of faith, and an indignity never
before offered to a great British possession. The people of Canada
were ready to exchange the right of fishing for reciprocal trade
rights to be agreed upon; but, if these cannot be obtained, she
prefers to retain her fisheries, and she protests against the course
which, against her will, is being pursued with reference to her
interests and property. We were never informed that the fisheries
would be inextricably mixed up with the Alabama question, and could
not have apprehended that an attempt would be made to coerce us into
an unwilling disposal of them to obtain results, however important,
on other points of dispute. Our parliament would never consent to a
treaty on the basis now proposed. . . ." But this strong expression
of opinion came too late to influence the decision of the home
government, which sent direct instructions to the commissioners to
agree to the proposal for free fish and a money compensation to be
settled by arbitration, subject, however to ratification by Canada.
Macdonald was now in
an awkward dilemma in view of the opinion of his cabinet and the
warmth of Canadian feeling on the question. His first impulse was to
withdraw from the commission rather than subscribe to terms which he
did not approve and which he believed the Canadian parliament would
reject. Against this step his colleagues on the commission strongly
protested, as it would probably wreck the treaty on which so many
hopes had been based. His second and wiser thought was to remain on
the commission in order to watch over the interests of Canada in
regard to the navigation of the St. Lawrance and of the canals, the
bonding privilege, and other minor matters which had come under
consideration, while reserving his freedom of ulterior action on the
main issue. Further reflection convinced him that, in the interests
of the empire and of Canada itself, the treaty should be maintained,
even though it involved sacrifices on the part of Canada. On April
29th, two days after a decision had been reached, he writes to Dr.
Tupper at Ottawa: "The rights of Canada being substantially
preserved by reserving to her the veto power as to the fisheries, I
am sincerely desirous that a treaty should be made, as it is of the
greatest importance that the Alabama and San Juan matters should be
settled, especially the former. The expectations by the American
people of a settlement of these matters have been strung to a very
high pitch, and the disappointment, in case the negotiations end in
nothing, will be very great. If this attempt to settle the Alabama
question should fail, no peaceable solution of it is possible, and
the war cloud will hang over England and Canada .... "
Later he writes to
his friend Sir John Rose: "I at first thought of declining to sign
the treaty. That would have been the easiest and most popular course
for me to pursue quoad Canada and my position there, and, entre nous,
my colleagues at Ottawa pressed me so to do. But my declining to
sign might have involved such terrible consequences that I finally
made up my mind to make the sacrifice of much of my popularity and
position in Canada, rather than run the risk of a total failure of
the treaty. . . . I am quite prepared for the storm of attack which
will doubtless greet my return to Canada. I think that I should have
been unworthy of the position and untrue to myself if, from any
selfish timidity, I had refused to face the storm. Our parliament
will not meet till February next, and between now and then I must
endeavour to lead the Canadian mind in the right direction."`
The full storm of
opposition criticism which he expected, and even more, fell upon him
during the months which elapsed between the conclusion of the treaty
and the meeting of parliament. He was freely denounced as a traitor
who had sacrificed the interests of Canada to gain imperial
approval. Contrary to all expectation, however, the people of the
Maritime Provinces, who were more deeply interested than any others
in the fishery clauses, accepted this portion of the treaty as
likely to work out well in practice. Meanwhile Macdonald had
laboriously striven to convince his colleagues in the cabinet that
the treaty as a whole should be heartily endorsed. Difficulties had
arisen between the United States and England in regard to the Geneva
arbitration of the Alabama claims, and in consequence the meeting of
the Canadian parliament was delayed till the last possible moment to
see whether these difficulties would be overcome. When an agreement
had been reached and the House met in 1872, Macdonald moved the
ratification of the clauses, to which Canadian assent was necessary,
in one of the most carefully prepared and weighty speeches of his
public life. "I believe," he said, "that the sober, second thought
of this country accords with the sober, second thought of the
government, and we come down here and ask the people of Canada,
through their representatives, to accept this treaty, to accept it
with all its imperfections, and to accept it for the sake of peace,
and for the sake of the great empire of which we form a part."
One of the closing
paragraphs from a closely reasoned speech, which occupied more than
four hours in delivery, must here suffice to illustrate the breadth
of view with which he recommended the treaty to the approval of the
Canadian people.
"I shall now move the
first reading of this bill, and I shall simply sum up my remarks by
saying that with respect to the treaty I consider that every portion
of it is unobjectionable to the country, unless the articles
connected with the fisheries may be considered objectionable. With
respect to those articles I ask this House fully and calmly to
consider the circumstances, and I believe, if they do fully consider
the situation, that they will say it is for the good of Canada that
those articles should be ratified. Reject the treaty, and you do not
get reciprocity; reject the treaty, and you leave the fishermen of
the Maritime Provinces at the mercy of the Americans; reject the
treaty, and you will cut off the merchants engaged in that trade
from the American market. Reject the treaty, and you will have a
large annual expenditure in keeping up a marine police force to
protect those fisheries, amounting to about eighty-four thousand
dollars per annum. Reject the treaty, and you will have to call upon
England to send her fleet and give you both her moral and physical
support, although you will not adopt her policy; reject the treaty,
and you will find that the bad feeling which formerly and until
lately existed in the United States against England will be
transferred to Canada: and the United States will say, and say
justly, 'Here, when two nations like England and the United States
have settled all their differences and all their quarrels upon a
perpetual basis, these happy results are to be frustrated and
endangered by the Canadian people, because they have not got the
value of their fish for ten years.'
"It has been said by
the honourable gentleman on my left [Mr. Howe] in his speech to the
Young Men's Christian Association, that England had sacrificed the
interests of Canada. If England has sacrificed the interests of
Canada, what sacrifice has she not made in the cause of peace
between those two great nations, rendering herself liable, leaving
out all indirect claims, to pay millions out of her own treasury?
Has she not made all this sacrifice, which only Englishmen and
English statesmen can know, for the sake of peace? For whose sake
has she made it? Has she not made it principally for the sake of
Canada? Let Canada be severed from England—let England not be
responsible to us, and for us, and what could the United States do
to England? Let England withdraw herself into her shell, and what
can the United States do? England has got the supremacy of the
sea—she is impregnable in every point but one, and that point is
Canada; and if England does call upon us to make a financial
sacrifice ; does find it for the good of the empire that we,
England's first colony, should sacrifice something, I say that we
should be unworthy of our proud position if we were not prepared to
do so. I hope to live to see the day, and if I do not, that my son
may be spared to see Canada the right arm of England, to see Canada
a powerful auxiliary to the empire, not, as now, a cause of anxiety
and a source of danger. And I think that if we are worthy to hold
that position as the right arm of England, we should not object to a
sacrifice of this kind when so great an object is attained, and that
object a lasting one.
"It is said that
amities between nations cannot be perpetual. But I say that this
treaty that has gone through so many difficulties and dangers, if it
is carried into effect, removes almost all possibility of war. If
ever there was an irritating cause of war, it was from the
occurrences arising out of the escape of those vessels, and when we
see the United States people and government forget this irritation,
forget those occurrences and submit such a question to arbitration,
to the arbitration of a disinterested tribunal, they have
established a principle which can never be forgotten in this world.
No future question is ever likely to arise that will cause such
irritation as the escape of the Alabama did, and if they could be
got to agree to leave such a matter to the peaceful arbitration of a
friendly power, what future cause of quarrel can, in the imagination
of man, occur that will not bear the same pacific solution that is
sought for in this? I believe that this treaty is an epoch in the
history of civilization; that it will set an example to the wide
world that must be followed; and with the growth of the great Anglo-
Saxon family, and with the development of that mighty nation to the
south of us, I believe that the principle of arbitration will be
advocated as the sole principle of settlement of differences between
the English-speaking peoples, and that it will have a moral
influence in the world. And although it may be opposed to the
antecedents of other nations, that great moral principle which has
now been established among the Anglo-Saxon family will spread itself
over all the civilized world. It is not too much to say that it is a
great advance in the history of mankind, and I should be sorry if it
were recorded that it was stopped for a moment by a selfish
consideration of the interests of Canada."
It only remains to be
mentioned that a decision more satisfactory to Canadians than the
San Juan boundary award, more satisfactory, indeed, than any
previously arrived at in arbitration with the United States, awaited
the clauses of the Washington Treaty providing for compensation for
the use of the fisheries. A commission appointed to consider the
question met at Halifax in 1877, and after prolonged enquiry
conducted by some of the most brilliant counsel of the United States
and Canada, awarded to the Dominion the sum of $5,500,000 as a
reasonable equivalent for the excess in value of the Canadian over
the American fisheries mentioned in the treaty. In spite of a strong
minority protest made by the American commissioners, and much
grumbling in the press of the United States and in congress, the sum
was finally paid into the Dominion exchequer. This award furnishes
the fullest justification of the firm attitude taken by Macdonald
throughout the whole affair in establishing the value of what Canada
was asked to relinquish. It gives special point to his own confident
prediction made in parliament, that "when as a matter of history,
the questions connected with this treaty are enquired into, it will
be found that upon this, as well as upon every other point, I did
all I could to protect the rights and claims of the Dominion."
The Washington Treaty
marked the opening of a new era in the history of imperial
negotiations. Treaties affecting Canada had hitherto been made for
her by the mother country alone, which was alone responsible for
their execution. Now for the first time a colonist, acutely alive to
the special interests and claims of his own section of the empire,
qualified better than anyone else to represent them, and responsible
for his action to the electorate of Canada as well as to the Crown,
was asked to accept plenipotentiary power, along with colleagues
from the United Kingdom, in framing a treaty which affected the
empire as a whole in its relation to another great power.
Doubtless the
precedent is one which should, and will, become the rule in dealing
with the concerns of those vast territories and increasing
communities which in various parts of the world are growing to a
national status under the British Crown. It is impossible to imagine
that these great dependencies of the empire can allow affairs in
which they have a supreme interest to be settled without that full
voice in arriving at decisions to which their interests entitle
them. But it is equally impossible to imagine, in the present
condition of the world, any system by which the treaty-making right
can be divorced from the power, based on naval and military
strength, which executes treaties and gives them efficiency.
Cooperation seems therefore the only possible future of national
diplomacy for British people. It implies an increasing breadth of
view in the colonial statesmen, as well as a clear grasp of the new
relations of the empire on the part of the statesmen of the
motherland. Macdonald's experience in connection with the Washington
Treaty proves that, for the new tasks laid upon the colonies, men
are needed with political courage as well as clear insight. It
required a strong man to hold the balance justly between interests
which were local and those which were broadly imperial. Canadian
opinion has now, as he fully expected, ratified his judgment. But at
the moment he accepted great responsibilities and faced great risks. |