Document Information

Date: 1905-07-17
By: Canada (Parliament)
Citation: Canada, Senate Debates, 10th Parl, 1st Sess, 1905 at 770-817.
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PROVINCE OF ALBERTA AUTONOMY BILL.

IN COMMITTEE.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT moved that the House go into Committee of the Whole on Bill (69) An Act to establish and provide for the government of the province of Alberta.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—I said I would take the opportunity when the House was going into committee to make some remarks upon this subject, but upon reflection I shall forego that right, and when speaking on the different clauses I shall take the opportunity to reply to some of the remarks by some hon. gentleman recently.

The motion was agreed to, and the House resolved itself into Committee of the Whole on the Bill.

(In the Committee.)

On clause 3,

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—I believe that this clause might be made a little clearer. It has been contended in this House by some hon. gentlemen that this does not take away any rights which belong to some classes of persons, in the new provinces. I therefore move that the following proviso be added to the clause :

Provided always that no provision of the present Act shall be construed to restrict in any way the rights and privileges heretofore granted to any class of persons in the Northwest Territories.

I believe with this proviso there will be no difficulty, and the clause will be clearer.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—The opinions expressed in this amendment have been the subject of discussion for about five months. I do not think it would be profitable to reopen it, as no possible good can come of it. It is quite clear that this is not germane to this particular clause but to another one. It is a compromise arrived at with the

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approval of the representatives of the two provinces, and it would be very unfortunate if we were to take up the discussion here with a view of making any changes. The opinion of this chamber was expressed in a decided vote given on the second reading of the Bill, because practically that is the only controversial clause in the whole Bill, and I say clearly that the proposition should not be accepted.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Do I understand that the government have decided to refuse any amendment whatever to the Bill?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—No, not any amendment based on sound policy. That amendment is not based on sound policy, because the clause is founded on a policy which has been adopted after the fullest inquiry and discussion, and after the various parties had agreed on it.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I understand from the Secretary of State that it is not a sound policy for the parliament to adhere to the rights and privileges which have been bestowed upon the minority. We are told it is not a sound policy. What is asked by this amendment?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Would it not be better to discuss it when we come to the proper clause.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—No, we will discuss it now. We can discuss that amendment with clause 17, if the government agree to do that. But if not, we will not deprive ourselves of the right to consider this clause now.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—It is not germane to clause 17.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—We will make it germane. I will ask the hon. gentleman or any member of this House if they are willing to infringe on the rights of the minority and are willing to take away what has been already given. If so let them vote against the amendment.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—This provision would crystallize into the constitution all rights and privileges arising from any ordinances that are now in force in the Northwest, which would lead us into an absurdity. A class of persons may have rights or privileges granted to them, which are in no way germane to what my hon. friend has in his mind; but these would be crystallized into the constitution by this amendment.

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—I believe the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry is completely mistaken. The object of the amendment is not to crystallize into law all the ordinances which were passed, but I say that by this amendment all the rights possessed by any class of persons which have been created by law, are to be maintained. That is the only object of the amendment, and I am surprised that the hon. gentleman should be mistaken. For instance there are not only the educational conditions which exist. There is also the case of the language. By the Act of 1875 the French language was permitted in the Northwest Territories and the only aim of this amendment is with reference to the French language, and the clause relating to education.

Hon. Mr. POWER—I am surprised at the hon. gentleman from Lauzon who is generally judicious, and knows what he is about. But I scarcely think he realizes the effect of his amendment. The fact is this might involve any sort of absurdity. For instance at certain times there were certain privileges accorded to the Northwest Mounted Police. This amendment would crystallize those, and take them from under the jurisdiction of parliament for ever afterwards. In the same way, there were dealings with the Indians in the Northwest Territories and if we adopt the amendment, the law with respect to Indians must remain as it is and there can be no alteration. The hon. gentleman must see that this is not the place to make the amendment, and as to the suggestion that he has made now that it applies only to the language—it does seem to me while I admire the beautiful language of France, I think inasmuch as the speakers of that language are only about 4 per cent of the population of the Northwest Territories, that it is not reasonable that the legislature should be put to the expense of duplicating their proceedings. The Germans and Russians have I think really as strong and practical a claim as the French in the Territories, and I think if amendments are to be moved in

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connection with educational matters, the better way would be to move them to the 17th clause when we come to that.

Hon. Mr. BERNIER—The hon. gentleman seems to be quite mistaken about the Russians and those coming from other European countries. There are two classes in this Dominion who have rights which others have not, the British race and the French Canadians. The French Canadians have rights because they were the first occupants of the soil, and the discoverers and pioneers of the country, so that they have the right to have their privileges respected. As to the British race, they have also the right to their language, having taken the country by arms; but as to all others they have no right at all. They came here knowing that this is a British country. They must know, or they should know, when they come here, what are the laws of the country, and they must come here prepared to submit to those laws. Consequently they cannot claim any rights for their language. Perhaps the hon. gentleman from Lauzon (Hon. Mr. Bolduc) would meet the objection of the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry (Hon. Mr. Béique) and the hon. gentleman from Halifax (Hon. Mr. Power), if he were to add to his motion: ‘with regard to schools or languages.’

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—Although not prepared to vote for the amendement, I as one coming from the province of Quebec, hesitate very much to accept the argument placed before the House and country by Hon. Mr. Power, as regards the privileges and rights demanded by the hon. gentleman from Lauzon (Hon. Mr. Bolduc.) The hon. gentleman from Halifax (Hon. Mr. Power), as the hon. senator from St. Boniface (Hon. Mr. Bernier) says, has no right to put our French Canadian people on the same plane as the Doukhobors or Russians or any other class who have been introduced into this country. That is not a proper thing to do. Let our friends representing the French Canadians make their fight, but let us not tell them that they are on the same plane with these people. I heartily endorse the sentiments put forth by the hon. gentleman from St. Boniface, although I am not supporting the amendment; but in view of the fact that the statement has been made that they have no more right than the Doukhobors and Russians, I must say that I disagree with that statement. Our people speaking the French language are entitled to more rights than they are.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—I do not take exception to the object which the hon. gentleman has in view, but I take exception to the form of the amendment.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—So do I.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—It is his right to propose any amendment and it will be for us to support it or vote against it. We have a right to expect that the amendment which he proposes will carry out in terms the object which he has in view, but an amendment of that kind will have the effect of crystallizing, as I have said, languages which we dare not crystallize.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—The hon. gentleman is very fertile in expedients when amendments are suggested, and I thought he would have some amendment ready.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—I will content myself by voting against it.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Inasmuch as the hon. gentleman is not prepared with an amendment, I move that the following words be added to the amendment: ‘In matters of education and language.’ That will bring the amendment quite up to date, and it should be acceptable to him as a French Canadian. He surely will not record his vote against an amendment designed to perpetuate in the Northwest the use of his mother tongue.

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—I am prepared to accept the amendment. I go further; if the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry has anything to add to make the amendment clearer, and render its passage easier, I have no objection to changing my amendment, providing the change will leave the effect unaltered.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Does the hon. gentleman accept the amendment?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—No.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Because it is an absurdity?

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Hon. Mr. SCOTT—No ; not by any means an absurdity.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—Question, question.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—If the hon. gentleman wants to prevent me speaking, he is losing his time. The question will be put when I have done. I do not want to be threatened, and if any one threatens me I will speak until to-morrow morning. This Bill occupied the time of the House of Commons for five months, and I want to have a little time to discuss it here. We have liberty of speech in this House, and I will not submit to any attempt to choke off discussion. We have a government here that will not allow that.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Hear, hear.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—We understand the hon. gentleman is ready to carry out his threat.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I made no threat. The question is this : Have the government decided to resist all amendments proposed here ? If that is their policy, if they have decided that we cannot amend or improve the Bill in any way, we may as well ground arms. Will the government tell us if that is their policy ?

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—I rise to a question of order. I ask that the hon. gentleman be directed to confine himself to the clause now before the committee.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Certainly I shall do so. An amendment has been moved, and the leader of the government has answered by saying that it is an absurdity, and that at this time of the session he would not allow any amendment to be made to the Bill. Did I understand the hon. gentleman aright.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—No ; I did not make use of the word absurdity. I stated a particular policy had been agreed upon by the friends and opponents of the Bill, and I did not think it was wise or prudent for the Senate to undertake to amend it now, because it would not carry in the other House. Of course, when the government submit a Bill to parliament it is open to criticism and amendment at every stage ; and if the opponents of the Bill have a majority, they have, of course, a right to make a change.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I am very glad to hear the explanation ; but, if I understand him, the principal objection to any amendment here is that it would not be carried in the other House.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—That is one reason.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Then we do not need a Senate.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—I do not think the amendment would be carried in this House either.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—That would be settled by the vote ; but if an amendment carried here is not to be accepted by the other House, what is the use of this House ?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—We would have a conference, as we had before on the Railway Bill.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—We will try that conference just now.

Hon. Mr. WILSON—An amendment has been moved to which the hon. gentleman has moved an amendment himself, and I should like to hear it put from the chair.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—My amendment has been accepted by the hon. gentleman from Lauzon (Mr. Bolduc).

Hon. Mr. DANDURAND—Hon. gentlemen when called to preside over your deliberations I decided to take no part in the debates nor to register my name on the division list, but this measure is of such permanent importance and has agitated the electorate to such an extent that I deem it my duty to make an exception to the rule I had laid down for my guidance.

Perhaps if I closely analyzed the reasons that prompted me to speak I would find that the determining one is the following : The question which is submitted to us is a very delicate one in more than one of its features and most difficult of a satisfactory solution. The educational clause finds the people irredeemably divided.

Legislation can only be enacted through the action of one of the two political parties which divide public opinion in this country.

Both parties through their leaders have laid down their respective policy on this educational question.

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It has been stated by some of our parliamentarians that both of those policies were unacceptable to the Catholic minority and that one belonging to that faith showed very little pride indeed if he accepted by his vote the very small pittance contained in this Bill.

If I have the least doubt as to what is my duty in this connection I would have an easy refuge in eluding all responsibility by abstaining from voting.

Some members of the parliament have even gone further. They have accused of cowardice those who differ with them. It is because I felt that one displays more courage in following the policy of reason which we call in French ‘la raison politique’ when it is opposed to the popular reason that I have decided to record my vote in the present instance. It will be an easy task, needing no special courage to go to Catholic Quebec and tell its electors : I have asked more freedom for the Catholic minority and greater rights for the French language.

We of this chamber need not the endorsement of the electors but I hold that one owes them an explanation as to what we conscientiously believe to be the right path to follow on such a momentous question.

What are the policies we have to choose between? The Conservative party asks us to enact no safeguards in favour of the minority except the ones to be found in the constitution of 1867. What are those safeguards to be found in that Act? In the same breath the Conservative leaders, Mr. Borden and his friends in the other House and the hon. gentleman from Calgary (the Hon. Mr. Lougheed) in this chamber inform us that the minority has no rights, no protection, whatever, in virtue of that constitution inasmuch as those rights would date from 1870, when the territories were acquired, and they affirm that at that date the minority had no rights that can be preserved to them now.

Hon. gentlemen, even if we disagree with that legal interpretation of the Act of 1867, what would the minority obtain by the adoption of that policy of the Conservative party as a binding guarantee for the future? If the policy prevailed the legislatures of the new provinces would themselves interpret the constitution. If they adopted Mr. Borden’s interpretation then the minority would be without any protection whatever. If they accepted the contrary doctrine, propounded by the Minister of Justice and the leader of the government, then the minority would remain with the rights and privileges they enjoy to-day and these are the privileges which would be granted them. At all events nothing less could be given them. It has been stated here that the minority would be better off if solely protected by the constitution of 1867, because then it could claim before the courts the restoration of the rights given them by the Act of 1875. My answer to this pretension is : First, that it is legally untenable. Secondly, that even if it prevailed before the courts it is very doubtful if the minority would be then in a better position than under this Bill—as clearly shown by the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry. Third, that the legal interpretation given to the Act of 1867 by Mr. Borden and many of his friends, which would deprive the minority of all rights, would at the same time go before the tribunals with all the risks of the glorious uncertainties of the law. Fourth, that this matter would be unsettled for the next five or ten years to the very great detriment of the country. For these reasons I am unable to accept the policy offered us by the opposition.

Is this Bill acceptable in its present form? I will not preface my answer by discussing our legal or historical rights to a better treatment—speaking always as one of the minority—nor will I ask myself, at this stage, if we could have obtained more from this parliament or the next parliament. I have lived through the agitation this country has just emerged from. I have drawn some lessons from the present crisis. I have realized that in this mixed community one cannot always govern according to his ideals, but in conformity with the conditions that face him. The man who, in this country, adopts as his motto : ‘Everything or nothing,’ is valueless as a force for good and at times a very dangerous citizen. This Bill contains all that the minority can have and expect from the federal parliament. Of this I am certain.

Has the minority under this Bill, a sufficient measure of protection, a sufficient latitude to be able to conscientiously make use of it? The hon. gentleman from Montarville

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has answered in the negative and he has stated his reason. He does not want a school that will give the child but half an hour of religious tuition when the ten preceding half hours may have been employed in poisoning his mind with heterodox doctrines. With all due respect to the hon. gentleman I must state that this argument is absolutely worthless because it is foundationless. The Catholics will either be the majority or the minority in a school district. If in a majority they elect the school trustees, If in a minority they have a right to secede and to have a separate school. In both cases they choose through their trustees a Catholic teacher and that Catholic teacher will not poison the mind of his pupils.

The hon. gentleman from Belleville cited with some surprise a law passed under the union of Upper and Lower Canada, the Act of 1843, which provided:

2. That where the teacher of any public school was a Protestant a separate Catholic school shall be formed on the application of ten or more freeholders, and vice versa if the teacher was a Catholic.

The hon. gentleman could not understand such a provision and treated it as an absurd one. The seconder of the hon. gentleman’s motion for the six months’ hoist (Hon. Mr. de Boucherville) understands this enactment thoroughly because it represents the doctrine of the Catholic Church.

This Bill gives the Catholic minority the right to have their children educated by a Catholic teacher and I claim that this privilege contains the essential principle the Catholics contend for. Whatever the books selected by the state may be, I venture to affirm that they can do no harm in the hands of Catholic children if explained and taught by Catholic teachers.

It has been said that half an hour of religious teaching per day was not enough. I will in answer state the fact that to my knowledge the religious tuition in the Catholic separate schools of Montreal is much shorter than the time given by this Bill. I am satisfied that with the measure of protection to be found in this measure the minority will be able to work its own salvation. That is so far as this educational clause is concerned. As to another part of the amendment of my hon. friend from Lauzon which covers the rights that the French-speaking minority in the Northwest may be entitled to, I want to add a few words. The French minority up to 1890 was entitled to the use of the French language in the proceedings of the council or house of assembly and before the tribunals. There was nothing whatever in the Act of 1875 concerning the French language in the schools. The Act of 1890, proposed by Sir John Thompson, gave the power to the Northwest Council to abolish one of the languages, or in other terms to use the language which the council or assembly should decide upon the proceedings of the House.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—But the hon. member forgot to tell us that in 1877 the French language was introduced in the law.

Hon. Mr. DANDURAND—In 1890 this parliament gave the right to the council or assembly of the Northwest to do as they pleased as to the language to be used in the proceedings of the House. Taking advantage of this right given by the federal parliament, the French language was abolished in the proceedings of the House. This amendment is not for the purpose of restoring that privilege to the French-speaking population which was abolished in virtue of that law. So that all that remains to-day of the privileges of the French Canadians which they have had up to this day is the right to address the courts in their own tongue. The hon. gentleman wants this privilege maintained by this amendment; that is the extent of the hon. gentleman’s demand. By the census of 1901 the French speaking population of the Northwest was found to be 4 per cent. In the last four years hundreds of thousands of people from abroad have invaded those prairies. What is to-day the percentage of the French speaking population in the Northwest Territories? My impression is that it is below 3 per cent. Knowing that the French language has not been once used before the tribunals of the Northwest according to the statements of judges who preside over those tribunals, would it be the part of prudence for our people in the province of Quebec to raise an agitation for the purpose of giving an empty right to their French Canadian brethren in the west? This Bill so far as the educational privileges are concerned

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gives the minority of the Northwest a chance to live in a way that is quite satisfactory to them; and on the whole I feel that we of French Canadian descent who have many privileges and advantages, to which we are entitled it is true, because of our exceptional situation, should be slow in rushing into the fire for things that are not worth fighting for. Occasions will arise when it will be time for us all, in this chamber, more especially, where we should be the custodians and defenders of the just rights of minorities, to appeal for fair-play, to all of our colleagues from the other provinces on large and important questions. I think that on the whole this Bill as a compromise, should be acceptable and will be acceptable to the province of Quebec and to all men of good will.

Hon. Mr. LOUGHEED—I take very grave exception to the manner in which His Honour the Speaker has stated the position of Mr. Borden, of the opposition in the House of Commons, and of myself on this Bill. The hon. gentleman has sought to leave the impression not only upon the minds of this House but upon the public mind that the conclusion arrived at—or, to better state it, the policy arrived at—by the Conservative party, with reference to the intervention of the federal parliament, is owing to the fact that certain opinions exist that the minority have no rights under the constitution, and that therefore we object to the intervention of this parliament in the passage of clause 17. I give an emphatic denial to any such statement. My hon. friend, by the statement of the case made by him, is leaving an erroneous impression on the mind of this House, and endeavouring—I will not say wilfully—to create a public opinion which is contrary to the facts. The position taken by Mr. Borden and those of the House of Commons who supported him and by myself is practically the same position taken by the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry, practically the position taken by the Minister of Justice in the other House, that section 93 of the constitution makes provision for the conservation of all the rights either of the majority or of the minority, and it is not by reason of the fact that some of us may hold a legal opinion, based on constitutional law, that the rights of the minority may be different from those that are represented by my hon. friend that we support that view of the case. We say positively and without fear of successful contradiction that the British North America Act of 1868, the Act of 1871 and the Act of 1886, all of which are to be construed together as part of the British North America Act—and this is specifically stated in the Act—provide a constitution for these new provinces immediately they are called into existence; that whatever may be the difference of opinion as to what the construction to be placed upon section 93 is—and they are only the differences of lawyers—whatever that difference may be, it must be decided by a judicial tribunal and not by a party majority in a parliament assembled for the purpose of arriving at a conclusion decided upon beforehand. I say it would be fatal for the Conservative members of this body or of the House of Commons to urge that a constitutional interpretation should be placed here on section 93, and I appeal to the sense of justice of my hon. friends on the other side that where a substantial difference exists in regard to the fundamental law, as to what the constitution means, should that interpretation be placed upon it by a political body that has been whipped into line by any political party? I say that no tribunal short of the Privy Council can place a proper interpretation upon that Act, and I say that these two provinces which you are calling into existence by these Bills, will never rest satisfied until the interpretation of the Privy Council, the highest court of the realm, be placed upon it to decide what are the rights of the minority. That is the position which the Conservative party has taken upon this subject, a position which has been practically denied by my hon. friend, and which I take this opportunity of setting right.

Hon. Mr. DANDURAND—I did not draw the conclusion that the hon. gentleman was opposed to separate schools. I simply stated that the views held by my hon. friend on the interpretation of section 93 of the British North America Act would have the fatal effect of depriving the minority of all their rights. I do not say because it deprives the minority wholly of its rights, that we should leave the question to the

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provinces; but as a natural and necessary conclusion, I have spoken as I have.

Hon. Mr. ELLIS, from the committee, reported that they had made some progress with the Bill and asked leave to sit again.

The Senate adjourned until 8 p.m.

SECOND SITTING.

The SPEAKER took the Chair at eight o’clock.

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PROVINCE OF ALBERTA AUTONOMY BILL.

The House resolved itself into Committee of the Whole on Bill (69) An Act to establish and provide for the government of the province of Alberta.

(In the Committee.)

On clause 3,

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—I desire to ask the hon. gentleman from Lauzon (Hon. Mr. Bolduc) if the part of his motion referring to education is intended to crystallize into the constitution—as I understand it would do if it was carried—such matters as the rights that pertain to the association of teachers in the Northwest, or such things as may have reference to high schools, or making education compulsory? I could enumerate a dozen different subjects which would be perpetuated for all time to come by this amendment, because this amendment is altogether general in its language. Therefore I think the same objection applies as in the case of the first amendment. It does not cover as many subjects, but it covers much more than the hon. gentleman intends. I desire to say one word in answer to what the hon. gentleman from Calgary (Hon. Mr. Lougheed) said before the adjournment. The hon. gentleman lectured the government for attempting to legislate on what he called a constitutional question, and he tried to give his own interpretation to the constitutional clause. I think the gentleman will admit that that is what he tried to do. I wonder if it occurred to the hon. gentleman that this would apply equally to the hon. leader of the opposition in the House of Commons, when by his first motion he sought to have it declared that the legislature had the exclusive privilege of dealing with education. The only difference is that in one case it was sought to give an interpretation to the constitutional Act which would not be in harmony with the letter or spirit of the constitution. Whereas the interpretation the government has tried to give by the Act now before us is an interpretation which I claim is altogether in accordance with the letter and the spirit of that constitution, and the government is merely following in the footsteps of the legislation passed by parliament in 1875, as I showed the other day. But I may go further, the power which is sought to be exercised by the government by this measure is either within the powers of this parliament or in excess of its powers. If it is in excess of its powers, what would take place? That part of the Act will be declared ultra vires by the courts, as took place in dozens of instances when the government was presided over by the Conservatives. It is well-known that the late Sir O. Mowat and the Hon. Mr. Blake were employed almost continuously for fifteen years in having Acts of parliament passed by Conservative governments declared illegal and ultra vires of this parliament. Whereas, if it is within the powers of parliament, as I claim it is, the government is merely dicharging a bounden duty in putting a clear construction upon the powers of the minority, which according to the promises which were made by this parliament in 1875, and which is according to the constitution—and according to the constitution as admitted by the hon. gentleman from Calgary, because he admitted that the intention of the constitution was that section 93 should apply to all the provinces, whereas the interpretation which he is seeking now to have imposed is an interpretation which would in effect have the Act apply as if the constitution applied from 1870, the time that the territories were taken into the union.

It seems to me it is perfectly plain that the objection which is taken by the hon. gentleman has no foundation at all. I wanted

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to add another word to the member for Lauzon. As far as the language is concerned, I will recall to his mind the following facts : in 1877, it is true this parliament declared that the French language should be one of the official languages in the Northwest; but in 1890, on the vote of the hon. member for Lauzon, and on the vote of several of our friends in this House, power was given to the legislature to change that law, and I find that on a motion moved by the Hon. Mr. Dickey and seconded by the Hon. Mr. Lacoste, the hon. Messieurs Bolduc, de Boucherville, Casgrain, Guevremont, Masson and Robitaille, all leading Conservatives, voted in favour of giving the territorial legislature the power of abolishing the French language; and it was in virtue of that vote that the motion was passed. The only members that voted against it were Armand, Bergeron, Bellerose, Chaffers—he was a Liberal—Girard, McMillan and Paquette, who was also a Liberal.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—I voted for the French language.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—After having the French language abolished in 1890 the hon. member wants parliament to go back to that date and reinstate what he helped to destroy at that time.

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—I do not agree at all with the meaning the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry (Hon. Mr. Béique), gives to the amendment which I had the honour to move at the last sitting of this House. But at the same time, as I am very anxious to please the hon. gentleman and would like very much to see him supporting this motion, I will agree to add to my motion, if it will satisfy him, the words, ‘according to the Federal Act of 1875 or its amendments.’ I may say at the same time that if I voted as he mentions in 1890, it was only giving the right to the council to remove one language or the other from that Assembly—not at all from being used before the courts, because I believe that it is only just and right to permit the poor French Canadians who may be there, and who are not able to speak the English language, to express themselves before the court in the only language they know. I regretted very much a little while ago to hear the hon. member for Halifax saying that if the French had the right to use their language he did not see why the Doukhobors or the Germans should not have the same right.

Hon. Mr. POWER—Excuse me, I did not say Doukhobors.

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—Yes, or Galicians or Russians. I will remind hon. gentlemen that the Doukhobors, Russians or Galicians were not the discoverers of that great northwest. The discoverers of the great Northwest were French Canadians and it was French missionaries who began the civilization there. That is why I believe that a little consideration ought to be given to the French element. I was very much surprised at the same time to hear the expression of opinion given by the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry, as being president of La Societe de St. Jean Baptiste. I thought he would try to favour his compatriots a good deal more than he has done to-night.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—The hon. gentleman from de Salaberry said that the interpretation placed on the Act by the Premier in the House of Commons was not a political interpretation, but that it was a natural explanation coming from the Act itself. I think the hon. gentleman did not read the explanation given by the Prime Minister in the House of Commons. If he had read those explanations he would not have come to this conclusion. The Prime Minister said : ‘Here is the Act of 1875. That Act of 1875 grants to the minority separate schools, and to the majority in each school district the schools they think fit,’ but, added the Prime Minister, ‘since that Act of 1875 was passed, we have had ordinances passed in the Northwest Territories by the legislative assembly of these territories, and what do the ordinances accomplish? They take away the separate schools from Catholics.’ The late Minister of Justice, Sir John Thompson, and the present Minister of Justice, agreed that such ordinances were unconstitutional, and the Prime Minister of this Dominion in reporting the opinion given by Sir John Thompson, said :

‘We are now facing this position. You have on one side the Act of 1875 which has

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not been amended, but on the other hand you have those ordinances, though they may be unconstitutional, to which of them will the British North America Act apply? Will it apply to the Federation law of 1875, or will it apply to the ordinance of 1901.’

The Prime Minister solved the question. He decreed by this law that the ordinances though unconstitutional, though robbing the Catholics of the Northwest of their rights to separate schools—he decreed that these ordinances should be taken as the basis of the rights to be given to-day to the Catholics of the Northwest, and not the law of 1875. I say that if the British North America Act should apply automatically to-day, the Catholics would be in a far better position in the Northwest than they will be under the law which is presented to us to-day. The Autonomy Bill does away with the rights of the Catholics, and for my part, I would have more confidence in the automatic application of the British North America Act than in the application of the law as it is at present. My hon. friend spoke of the French language. What became law in 1891 was this: Up to 1891 the law of 1877 was the law of the country and read thus: Either the English or the French language may be used by any person in the debates of the legislative assembly of the territories and in the proceedings before the court, and both these languages shall be used in the records and journals of such assembly, and all ordinances made under this Act shall be printed in both these languages.’ Such was the law up to 1891, in that year an amendment was made which was merely a proviso, which read in this way:

Provided, however, that after the next general election the legislative assembly may, by ordinance or otherwise, regulate the proceedings and the manner of recording and publishing the same, and the regulations so made shall be embodied in a proclamation which shall be forthwith made and published by the Lieutenant Governor in conformity with the law and thereafter shall have full force and effect.

What was the effect of this amendment to the law? It was simply to permit the legislative assembly of the territories to regulate their own proceedings, to say whether they should be in both languages or in one language. That law was confined to the legislative assembly only; the right of the people to have their laws printed in both languages, the right of the people to have the ordinances of the Northwest Territories printed in French and to have the French language recognized as an official language in the courts of the country—those rights were maintained; and what do we see to-day? We see those rights swept away, and I am sorry to see men like my hon. friend from Mille Isle (Hon. Mr. David) and my hon. friend from de Salaberry (Hon. Mr. Béique) voting for a law which does away with the French language in the territories. I should have hoped that men who every year parade before the people and make grand speeches before their fellow-countrymen in the city of Montreal, as members of the St. Jean Baptiste Society, as president or ex-president of the St. Jean Baptiste Society, telling them to stick to their language and to their mother tongue, and to all their laws and privileges—I should have hoped that such men would not have taken this course, and I am surprised that following immediately those days of patriotic utterances they should come here and vote against the maintenance of the French language. That is the spectacle we have here to-day. These facts will be recorded and put before the people. Those hon. gentlemen say, ‘Oh, we don’t need courage to go down to Quebec and to address the people of that province and make patriotic speeches; no, there is more courage in coming to this House and resisting the government and voting against the government for the maintenance of the French language.’ That courage everybody does not possess.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—I should like to say a word or two in answer to my hon. friend who has taken his seat. I deny that the invocation of the British North America Act would give anything like the privileges that are conveyed in the Act now before the committee. The invocation of section 93 of the British North America Act would, as the hon. gentleman admits, leave the whole subject to the court.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—For interpretation only.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—For interpretation. In the remarks made by the hon. gentleman

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from Calgary (Hon. Mr. Lougheed) if I understood him aright, in the course of his argument he spoke, although not very positively, of the territory entering confederation at the time the imperial order in council was passed, transferring the government to Canada; and although he did not say so positively, he intimated and foreshadowed that possibly the British North America Act would apply at that time. If it applied at that time, what rights and privileges do the minority enjoy? There were in the Northwest denominational schools; they have a right to support those schools. They got no aid from the government, they got no outside assistance of any kind. In the fullest interpretation it would give them the right to establish schools and to pay for them. Then if the courts were to hold that the Northwest properly came into confederation at the time it got a provisional system of government,—which was practically under the Act of 1875,—under the Act of 1875 their privileges were very much akin to that. The proviso reads as follows:—

And further that a minority of the ratepayers therein, whether Protestants or Roman Catholics, may establish separate schools therein, and in such latter case the ratepayers establishing such Protestant or Roman Catholic separate schools shall be liable only to such rates as they may impose upon themselves or to assessments in respect thereof.

That conveys no more than the right to the schools and the right to assess for them—ergo, the right to be exempted from taxation for public schools. That certainly would not give them the privileges and rights that are conveyed under the clause now before the committee.

Hon. Mr. de BOUCHERVILLE—Is that the Act of 1875?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Yes. It is simply the naked right to assess themselves for their own schools and therefore to be relieved from any assessment for public schools. It conveys no authority or injunction to allot to the separate schools any share of the public moneys which are annually granted towards the support of education.

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—Will the hon. gentleman tell us if a section of the Roman Catholics in Alberta or Saskatchewan establish a denominational school, will they, under the Bill we have now before us, have a right to any grant from the government?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—I call it denominational; it is either denominational or separate, one or the other; but I think it is an absolute conclusion. I do not think it is open to argument, and I am quite sure if the clause were submitted to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council—hon. gentlemen know how they have whittled away the rights of the minority in another very important case to which I need not now advert—they certainly would not enlarge the privileges the minority might claim. Now under the Act of 1875 they would certainly not come in for a share of the government allowance for schools, nor have any share in the revenue arising from school lands. I regard that as the most important asset that the schools of the Northwest Territories, whether public or separate, can possibly enjoy, and I will tell you why. We know that throughout the whole of the Northwest and Manitoba two sections in every township are set apart as school lands. We had a return brought down at the instance of the hon. member from Calgary a few days ago, giving particulars as to the sales of those lands up to the present day. I speak now subject to correction, but I think some hon. senator, referring to that return, put the average value of the school lands as high as $10.80 per acre. I estimate $7.00. In many cases I know the upset price—they are sold by auction—was $7.00. I estimate the value of the lands when sold at no less a sum than $50,000,000, the most magnificent asset any country could have at the beginning. It may possibly be more, because my estimate is based on an average price of $7 per acre. Now neither under the Act of 1875 nor the conditions under which the territories came in, would they have a share in those lands. I will read the statutes under which these lands are allotted. It was enacted in 1886, and the clause has never been changed. It provides that the school lands shall be sold at auction, &c. They are sold on very liberal terms and there is this peculiarity about them that they get what is known as the unearned increment. That is, school lands are never sold until the population arises in the locality which gives value to them. If the school lands were sold in advance of settlement, they probably would bring two or three dollars an acre. If they are sold after settlement has gone in, there is no

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difficulty about their bringing a high price. In days to come I have no doubt that school lands will be sold as high as fifteen to twenty dollars an acre. At the low average I put the value of those lands, I do not hesitate to say that if judiciously administered—and I trust they will be administered for all time by the central government—these lands will form an asset of $50,000,000 for the two new provinces. That is something of such immense value that it would be a matter of very great regret if the minority in that country were not to get a share of those lands. In all the discussions and amendments drawn on this very much vexed question, I have constantly had that in my mind, that no arrangement would be complete which would have the subject open to doubt whether the minority should share in that magnificent asset. I will read the law about the school lands.—

All moneys from time to time realized from the sale of school lands shall be invested in securities of Canada to form a school fund, and the interest arising therefrom, after deducting the cost of management, shall be paid annually to the government of the province or territory within which said lands are situated towards the support of public schools therein.

Not separate schools. This Bill provides:

(2) In the appropriation by the legislature or distribution by the government of the province of any moneys for the support of schools organized and carried on in accordance with the said chapter 29 or any Act passed in amendment thereof, or in substitution therefor, there shall be no discrimination against schools of any class described in the said chapter 29.

The law we are now placing on the statute book, which is to be the constitution of the province, provides that there shall be no discrimination in the distribution of the valuable asset which I have described. It is specifically set forth there in language which no court can set aside. So that hon. gentlemen will see they will make a very great mistake in urging the proposed amendment.

Hon. Mr. LOUGHEED—Does the hon. gentleman say that a public school cannot be a Catholic school in the territories.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—That was one of the peculiarities existing there. It may be a public school, but there are separate schools in the territories and where there is a majority of other than Catholics they establish the public school. Where Catholics are the majority they establish a public school also, but at any time they are liable to be out-voted and they can fall back on the separate school. Whether the school is called a public school and governed entirely by trustees of the Roman Catholic faith, or whether it is a separate school per se under the direct control of the Act, in either case provision is made that they shall share, not alone in the sum arising from the sale of lands but also in any moneys that the legislature may vote. The schools are all on a par whether called public or separate schools, and share equally in the distribution of public money. If that amendment were carried it would set aside that asset. No court could decree that they are entitled to any share of that money; it is only under this statute they have a share. Apart altogether from the fact that we are now dealing with that modification, we are adopting an Act which the territories have imposed upon themselves, an Act which Mr. Haultain when he came down here in January last said openly, and publicly repeatedly to the reporters,—his statement which appeared in an interview with the ‘Globe,’ was that if he were the autocrat of the Northwest Territories he would not change the school law one iota. He was made use of afterwards, I will not say why, but he lent himself to an agitation against adopting it. Not that he ever said that if it were in the power of the territories to enact a school law, he would change one particle of it. What he did say was that for the federal parliament to interfere was an assumption of rights which properly belonged to the province.

There can be no forcing, no coercion. The word coercion has been made use of over and over again; there can be no coercion where we say we are willing to take exactly what you have, to accept just what you yourself have decreed, if fair, just and reasonable. Now I say the very fact of our accepting the law of the Northwest Territories made by the people in a tolerant and generous spirit, is infinitely better than any law we could make ourselves here, which would not receive the support and assistance of the people of the territories in carrying it out. There are ten members representing the territories, and we have seven of them

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in support of this Bill in its present form. I say that a Bill that is sustained by the representatives of the people, that has their cordial support, when they are unwilling to admit the right of this parliament to enact a law, is far more valuable than a law which would be far stronger and more in favour of the minority. Because my experience of school laws is this, that it is a matter of administration. It is possible to embarrass the administration of the school law, because it has to be carried through the agency of the municipality under the machinery furnished by the provincial authority—so that unless you have the provincial authority on your side it is absolutely impossible to administer it completely and satisfactorily for the benefit of those for whom it is intended. There are in the British North America Act, as we know, the appellate clauses, but I have never valued the power of appeal to this parliament, for the reason that the parliament of Canada has not the machinery, has not the ability to coerce a local legislature into doing what they do not want to do. That power of appeal, I believe, is adopted from the Act that I passed in 1863. At that time we had no Minister of Education. The supreme power in the administration of our school law was the Superintendent of Education, the Rev. Dr. Ryerson—a very good man he was. He is gone and I am not calling in question his judgment, but a prejudice had arisen in the minds of the people who supported separate schools that he was hostile; that in the various questions that came before him, and as to which there was no appeal from his decision, he took a view adverse to the rights and interests of the minority. To meet the feeling of that time, I put this clause in the Act of 1863, that there should be an appeal at all times, from the decision of the Superintendent of Education to the Governor in Council. The idea of an appeal was borrowed from the existing law at the time. I do not know whether there was a similar appeal in the province of Quebec; I doubt it very much, but there was in the province of Ontario. Therefore I say that this Bill, having, as it has, the approval of so large a proportion of the members from the Northwest, is ten times more valuable than concessions which would be ten times greater with a hostile attitude on the part of the people of the Northwest. If I am well advised, if I have read aright the public opinion of that country—and I have certainly endeavoured to form a just and sound judgment on the views of the people of the Northwest—I myself had evidence which has satisfied my mind, at all events, that the law, as we have framed it now, will be accepted and worked out cordially by the people and the governments of the new provinces. Now if that is the case, and I think there is ample justification for so believing, is it not better to have a certainty than an uncertainty ? rather than to say we will pass a clause here which will have to be settled by lawyers in the courts. It would take eight or ten years before you could get a final decision, and then perhaps not a decision which would satisfy those who expected a different judgment from the court. It certainly would cut them out of a share in that valuable asset of $50,000,000 which I have mentioned. I appeal to my hon. friends who are honest, no doubt, and influenced with an anxious desire to secure for the minority all they can give them. No one can be more desirous of this than I am myself; but the proposition first brought down met, as hon. gentlemen know, with the opposition of the representatives of the territories. The whole ten were solidly arrayed against it, and it would have been folly for us to attempt to press it.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I thought it was the Orange people that were against it ; now it appears that it was the members from the Northwest.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—I never heard the Orangemen were connected with it. I do say that with a solid front of the representative men of the territories opposing it, it is perfectly idle to talk in this age, of imposing a law on a country with democratic institutions, with a local legislature who could thwart and defeat any law in reference to the schools which we might pass here. Supposing there were an adverse government in the province of Quebec, and an attempt was made there to embarrass the minority? Would they not be able to do it ? And would not the same argument apply in Ontario, if opposition was made to separate schools. Would they not be able to thwart them in every way ? Hon. gentlemen

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know that from time to time concessions are made to the minority which the law does not give. Take for instance the collecting of the rates; the municipalities lend their assistance. Municipalities are small democratic bodies; supposing they choose to strangle the separate schools, they have many ways of doing it besides with- holding any grant the law would compel them to give. Therefore what you get with cordiality is worth a great deal more than anything the law will give you without it. I am one of those who never believed in getting the pound of flesh. I believe in peace at any price, and I have found it the best policy to make arrangements. Do not fight for all you are entitled to get, if your opponent is willing to concede anything fair. It is on that ground I am appealing to my hon. friends who naturally take a warm interest on behalf of the people of the Northwest, believing they are going to get constitutional concessions by the line they are taking. I have come to the conclusion that it would be a terrible mistake, that the carrying of the amendment of that kind, even if parliament were to adopt it, would be fatal to the best interests of the people of the Northwest.

Hon. Mr. de BOUCHERVILLE—The hon. gentleman tells us not to display any great vehemence on this question. Did he not himself fight for separate schools?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—I did.

Hon. Mr. de BOUCHERVILLE—Did not the hon. gentleman obtain separate schools?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—I did.

Hon. Mr. de BOUCHERVILLE—Then we are only following in his footsteps. The hon. gentleman has cited the 11th clause of the law of 1875, and told us there is nothing in that clause decreeing that the separate schools can get any money from the government. That is what the hon. gentleman says?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—That is what I said.

Hon. Mr. de BOUCHERVILLE—Can the hon. gentleman find anything in that statute which says that the government shall give money to schools, public or separate? He will not find it there. He will find it in another statute, that they should give money to public schools. The hon. gentleman has said that separate schools are not public schools—is not that what the hon. gentleman says?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—There are some public schools controlled by Catholic trustees.

Hon. Mr. de BOUCHERVILLE—I will quote the opinion of a colleague of the hon. gentleman who I am sure deserves his respect—I refer to the late Minister of Justice, the Hon. David Mills. Mr. Mills said: ‘The fact is, the separate schools in Manitoba, like the separate schools of Ontario, are public schools.’

I suppose the hon. gentleman will not dissent from the opinion of a former Minister of Justice, and a colleague with whom he served. This is to be found at page 1285 of the ‘Hansard’ of 1898.

Hon. Mr. BERNIER—Any school in the Dominion receiving public assistance from the government is a public school. Call them whatever you like, call them dissentient schools as they did in Quebec, call them separate schools as in Ontario, call them what you like in the Northwest, the moment they receive government assistance they are public schools, and consequently entitled to their share of all the assets which may exist for the support of schools. The hon. gentleman is only giving an evasive interpretation of the statute respecting school lands, and he is just pursuing the course which will deprive us of a share in the assets of those schools. If the amendment we are proposing were adopted, we would get our share of those assets; but the course followed by the government will lead the Catholic population on to establish private schools for the support of which they will have to pay in addition to their taxes for the support of public schools; and they will be deprived of their share of the school lands. That will be not only a spoliation of our rights, but also of our share of the public property.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—I want to put on record the motion supported by the hon. gentlemen from Lauzon and Montarville in 1890. When the motion for the third reading of the Act to amend the Acts respecting the Northwest Territories was made, Hon.

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Mr. Bellerose moved, seconded by the Hon. Mr. Paquette that clause 32 of the Bill be amended as follows :—

1. 32. Section one hundred and ten of the said Act is hereby repealed, and the following is substituted therefor :—

1. 1. 110. Either the English or the French language may be used by any person in the debates of the Legislative Assembly of the Territories and in the proceedings before the courts, and both those languages shall be used in the records and journals of such assembly ; and all ordinances made under this Act shall be printed in both those languages : Provided, however, that after the next general election of the Legislative Assembly, such assembly may, by ordinance or otherwise, regulate its proceedings, and the manner of recording and publishing the same, and the regulations so made shall be embodied in a proclamation which shall be forthwith made and published by the Lieutenant Governor in conformity with the law, and thereafter shall have full force and effect.

By striking out the proviso contained in the last lines, and which proviso is in the following words :—

Provided, however, that after the next general election of the Legislative Assembly, such assembly may, by ordinance or otherwise, regulate its proceedings, and the manner of recording and publishing the same, and the regulations so made shall be embodied in a proclamation which shall be forthwith made and published by the Lieutenant Governor in conformity with the law, and thereafter shall have full force and effect.

The Hon. Mr. Dickey moved in amendment to the amendment, seconded by the Hon. Mr. Lacoste,

That all the words after ‘ That ’ be struck out, and the following substituted :—

In the opinion of this House it is inexpedient to renew or continue previous agitation by rejecting the solution of a grave difficulty which is offered by the said proviso, and which has been approved by the people through their representatives in parliament ; and that the said proviso stand part of the Bill.

The question of concurrence being put thereon, the House divided and the names being called for, they were taken down as follows :—

Contents : Honourable Messieurs

Abbott,

Almon,

Archibald,

Bolduc,

Boucherville,

de Casgrain,

Clemow, Cochrane,

DeBlois,

Dever,

Dickey,

Drummond,

Glasier,

Grant,

Guévremont,

Hawthorne,

Kaulbach,

Lacoste,

Lougheed,

Masson,

McCallum,

McClelan,

McDonald (C.B.),

McKay,

McKindsey,

Macdonald,

MacInnes,

Merner,

Montgomery,

Murphy,

Odell,

Pelletier,

Perley,

Power,

Prowse,

Read,

Reesor,

Robitaille,

Ross,

Sanford,

Scott,

Smith,

Sullivan,

Sutherland,

Vidal,

Wark.—46.

Non-Contents : Honourable Messieurs

Armand,

Baillargeon,

Bellerose,

Chaffers,

Girard,

McMillan,

Paquet.—7.

So it was resolved in the affirmative.

That is exactly the situation which we occupy to-day. If there is a difference it is because the agitation now has been ten times greater than the agitation with regard to the use of the French language in 1890 ; nevertheless the hon. gentlemen opposing it were of opinion in 1890 that it was inadvisable to strike out the proviso permitting the abolition of the French language from the Bill, because it would tend to renew the agitation. To-day the same hon. gentlemen are asking us to renew this agitation by going back to 1890 and undoing the work which they themselves did at that time.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—If the question were put as it really should be put, it would not be put in that way. In 1890 when that motion was made, was it proposed to take away altogether the use of the French language ? It was not. The French language was to be left in the courts, in the Legislative Assembly and in every place in the Northwest Territories, except in the framing of the records of the Legislative Assembly. That was the only thing that was sacrificed at the time. In what position do we stand to-day ? We are asked to-day to give up the use of the French language, wherever it may flourish, and we are asked to do that by whom ? By a president and an ex-president of the St. John Baptiste Society in Montreal, by men who every year go before the people and proclaim their love for the French language. It is those men who are opposed to the use of the French language to-day in the Northwest. I congratulate my hon. friends from Montreal, the noble couple in this House who are trying to choke off the use of the French language in the Northwest. More than that, the hon. Secretary of State says that if we adopt that amendment we are doing the greatest possible harm to the cause of the Catholics in the Northwest.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Hear, hear.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Did the hon. member read the amendment ?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Yes, I went over and looked at it.

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Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Then the hon. gentlemen has forgotten entirely what it contains.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—I will give it in a nutshell—that the provisions which we are now passing on shall not in any way prejudicially affect the rights and privileges of any body in the Northwest.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—That is to be found in clause 93 of the British North America Act, and in clause 3 of this Bill, but to that the amendment adds the following words, ‘provided always that no provision of the present Act shall be construed to restrict in any way the rights and privileges heretofore granted to any class of persons in the Northwest Territories in matters of education and language’. Here is an amendment which preserves all that is in clause 3, and clause 17 of the Bill, and because we ask for the continuance of what may be good in the present Bill, and ask that what may be harmful be removed, the hon. Secretary State says, don’t vote for that, you are going to destroy the rights and privileges of the minority in the Northwest. Destroy it in what way? The hon. gentlemen is unable to say how and he can never see it, because he knows well that if this amendment were carried it will destroy nothing, but will simply preserve the use of the French language.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—In listening to the last speech made by the hon. Secretary of State, I was forcibly reminded of the remarks which he made when he moved the second reading of the Bill. His present position is somewhat antagonistic to that which he assumed when he introduced the Bill. If my recollection serves me right, and I think the record will sustain me, the hon. gentleman said in asking the House to support the Bill and reject my motion for delay, that the effect of the Bill was simply to continue the schools as they are to-day, giving a half hour at the close of each days school for religious instruction. That is all we were asked to affirm. That explanation was verified by the Minister of Trade and Commerce. What is the hon. gentleman’s position now? He says it is necessary to make certain provision in order to give to the minority privileges and concessions which they might be deprived of if these clauses that are now in the Bill were not passed. How does he reconcile the two statements? We find the ministers acting in strict accord with their supporters in explaining these clauses, giving one explanation in Ontario and the Northwest, and another in the province of Quebec. The explanations are given to suit the people to whom they are addressed. But the hon. gentleman should reflect that in this House he has the same audience that listened to him a few days ago, and that they have not yet forgotten his former utterances, and it would be just as well for him to be consistent unless he thinks he is talking to illiterate men who cannot understand the distinction between his statements. Now if their schools be public schools, as the hon. gentleman says they are, then the clause of the law which he read provides for the distribution of the money acquired from the sale of the school lands to those schools, whether they are taught by Catholic or Protestant teachers, and are under the control and management of trustees of Catholic faith, or taught and controlled by Protestants. The law provides for a division of the money among the public schools, and if these schools are, as the hon. Secretary of State has told us, public schools, they will get their share.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—I did not say that. I said there were some Catholic schools that were carried on as public schools, and that is where any public school was established.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—But the hon. gentleman said that all these schools were public schools, with the additional right of teaching religion in the last half hour of the school. I am not aware that any Protestant, however antagonistic he may be to separate schools in their entirety, objects to that law—no one having regard for the future and for the proper education of the rising generation, would be opposed to that. If it went no further, it would meet with no opposition. My contention in reference to the Manitoba Bill was that the rights and privileges given to the minority under the constitution should be maintained, and if the hon. gentleman was such an admirer of peace and so desirous of preserving harmony, why did he take the position he occupied in 1895-6? Neither the hon. gentleman nor those by whom he is surrounded can explain or reconcile the different positions they have occupied. Then

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they were prepared to contest the law we sought to place on the statute-book to maintain the rights and privileges of the minority in Manitoba, which had been taken away from them by the party to which the hon. gentleman belongs. More than that, the principal mover in that matter was Mr. Sifton, whom the hon. gentleman—I have the quotation in my hand—denounced, in the discussion on that subject in this House, as a trickster. I quite concur with him in that respect. On that point he and I agree; but since that time he and his party have taken Mr. Sifton to their bosom, and hugged and nursed him as they would a sucking child. Who was it abolished the use of the French language in Manitoba ? Was it not Mr. Greenway, aided by Mr. Sifton ? And yet now these hon. gentlemen are trying to attribute it to the Conservative party, who fought against the abolition of the French language in Manitoba, and who desired to maintain the rights and privileges which the minority had in that province. They are virtuous to-day—why ? because they are in power and are trying to redeem the reputation which they lost on this subject in 1895-6, but the hon. gentleman says, we have the support of the western members, and must therefore have the support of the western people. Does that follow ? Does history sustain that view of the matter ? Has he forgotten the fact that Gladstone went to the people of England on the question of Home Rule and was sustained, because nothing but the abstract principle was laid before the electors, but that when the details of the Home Rule measure were laid before the House of Commons and it was rejected by the Lords on the ground that the people had not been given an opportunity to approve or disapprove of the measure. After the House had been dissolved, Lord Salisbury and the Conservative party were sustained by the largest majority given for many a year in the imperial parliament. Was it not the same with the question of repeal in Nova Scotia ? Sir Charles Tupper insisted upon carrying repeal in the parliament of Canada; refused to go to the people; but as soon as an appeal was made to the people of the province of which he was the representative, they rejected the proposition almost unanimously.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—I might tell the hon. gentleman that there is a great deal of difference between the time of Sir Charles Tupper, when he is speaking of, and the present. There was an agitation all over the province of Manitoba. Everybody knew that the people of Manitoba were not satisfied at that time.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—I am not speaking of Manitoba ; I am speaking of Nova Scotia. I have given instances in political history in which the representatives in parliament approved of a measure introduced by the government, but when the proposition was made and the details were submitted to the people, they sustained the position taken by the opponents of the measure. I was dealing with a case of the kind in the political history of this country in reference to the Confederation Act and showing that although it was carried through parliament, the people of Nova Scotia rejected the proposition as soon as they had an opportunity of doing so.

We heard a good deal about coercion nine years ago. It was in the mouth of every member of the Liberal party from Halifax to Victoria. Coercion was blazoned forth in large capital letters all over the country. My hon. friend does not like the word just now ; it is not palatable to him. At that time I contended in my own province, wherever I spoke, that it was not a matter of coercion in 1895-6; on the contrary that the Bill proposed to give the minority the right to schools which they had when Manitoba came into the Dominion, and which had been taken from them, that it was only a restoration of a right which they had enjoyed. That was rejected by my hon. friends. They succeeded in rousing the prejudices of a large section of the Protestant population of Ontario and in throwing out the Bill, aided in doing so by the French Canadian constituencies of Quebec. They succeeded in turning out Sir Charles Tupper’s government at that time, and now they come back in 1905 and are trying to redeem their reputation by fulfilling the promise they had made to the people whom they then deprived of their rights. Chickens, they say, come home to roost ; in the present instance they are coming home most effectually, and if they return to the hon. gentleman he must not find fault with those who

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felt the effect of the course hon. gentlemen opposite pursued ten years ago. My hon. friend is very pathetic. He can give us very lofty admonitions of peace and harmony which should prevail in the country, and tell us how disastrous it would be if the agitation should continue in the Northwest. I predict that the passage of this Bill with the provisions it contains will create discord and confusion until it has been before all the courts in the realm to settle it. That is all I asked when I moved that it be laid before the courts. The hon. gentleman knows, and no one better, that there is no finality in this legislation. There cannot be a finality in legislation of this kind when we find the most eminent legal minds in the country differing upon the powers which parliament has under the constitution. It is said if the constitution does not give to the minority in the Northwest Territories the rights and privileges that they should enjoy, we ought to give it. I admit that to this extent; parliament has no right or power to concede rights and privileges to a new province, other than those which they derive from the British North America Act. The British North America Act is to the Dominion parliament, being an Imperial Act, just what an Act of this parliament is to the provincial legislators, and we have neither the power, the right nor the authority to confer a power unless the authority is contained in the British North America Act, any more than a province has a right to legislate upon questions not given into their control by the Act passed by the Dominion parliament organizing them into provinces. So that instead of the passage of this Bill being a source of peace, harmony and tranquillity in that country, I repeat you are only sowing the seed of discord and confusion, and until the matter has been settled by the highest court in the realm, you will find neither peace nor harmony prevailing on this question. It is deeply to be regretted that it is so.

My hon. friend referred to the working of the School Act in Ontario. I think I can speak by the book on that question. I have had the honour of being the chairman of the school board for some thirteen or fourteen years in succession, and also chairman of the Grammar School Board, so that when I say I think I know a little of the working of both Acts, I am speaking by the book. When the Roman Catholics in the city and town in which I live were compelled under the law to declare themselves supporters of the separate schools every year or they would be placed under the public school list, we never exacted compliance with that. As was referred to the other day, when the law compelled them to collect their own taxes, we permitted our collector to collect their taxes for them. They levied their own rate; we collected it for them, and they only paid their percentage for the collection, and in every instance we relieved them as far as possible. While many disapproved of separate schools, as fellow citizens and wishing to live at peace and harmony, we not only declared but we carried out the principle of conciliation in every possible respect. My hon. friend referred to myself last night—I am very much obliged to him for the good opinion he expressed regarding me—and he intimated a wish to have more Orangemen like myself. That reminded me of a little incident that occurred in my own town. At a public dinner there, a reverend priest stated to me that he was warned by many people to be very cautious what he did when he came to Belleville, that the Grand Master of the Orange Association was there, and he might expect many difficulties and troubles. At that dinner, in referring to this question he said that he had become acquainted with that Grand Master and all he had to say, priest as he was, that he wished there were more of the order built like him. But the Grit paper, as they usually do, came out next day and attributed to that gentleman the statement that he wished there were more Orangemen in the country than there were. That is as near the truth as we can expect from papers of that character. I shall refer to this section again when we come to the 17th clause, because I want to point out to my esteemed friend the hon. gentleman from Mille Iles (Hon. Mr. David) that he is an ardent supporter and admirer of a very prominent Orangeman who is now a member of the Cabinet. I will quote a speech delivered by that member of the Cabinet when he was in the New Brunswick legislature by which my hon. friend may learn what the true principles

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of that Order are, and perhaps when he gets it from a friend of his own, a gentleman whom he is supporting and a member of the Laurier government, he will not have such a bad opinion of them after all. There are other points to which my hon. friend called attention, but what I rose particularly to refer to was the different attitude assumed by him to-night and that which he assumed when he delivered his first speech. If the law was as he indicated it was in the first place, there was no necessity for the speech he made to-night, because they would have all the rights and privileges under the law that they would have under this measure. Being public schools as he declared they were—and even if they were separate schools they would be none the less public schools because they receive the public money and they must be under the regulations of the public school commissioners to that extent, and consequently would be entitled to their share of the funds arising from the sale of the school lands.

Hon. Mr. DAVID—I have been interrupted by the hon. leader of the opposition and by the hon. gentleman from Stadacona, though I was very moderate. I do not rise with the intention of speaking, but I want to remark to the hon. leader of the opposition in reference to the terrible association of Orangemen, to whom he is reputed to belong, that he is mistaken in the interpretation of what I have said. I never said that I had a bad opinion of those people. I only related certain facts, and said that the Orange people were at the bottom of the agitation which has been going on for some time in Canada. I have only repeated what has been said by all the newspapers, French and English. The resolutions which have been passed in the Orange lodges are known by everybody. Is that association so powerful and so sacred that it is forbidden to speak of it, and comment upon what it does or what it has not done and condemn its action when it should be condemned ? If I am confident that the agitation which has been going on has been raised by the organization, and if I am confident that their deeds and actions deserve to be condemned, if I do it in moderate terms, in polite language, have I not the right to say to the Orangemen what is said with much less reason to our bishops and priests ? Is it more criminal to report what the Orange association is doing in this country and to blame that association than to say what has been said against the Catholic priests and bishops ? I have a right to say what I have said. I have taken great precaution not to say too much. I have taken a great deal of trouble in order that I should not say a word which a member of this House should not say. But naturally I cannot please everybody. And when I said that there was a contradiction between the doings and the words of the chief Orange association, between the position which they took at certain times in the past and that which they take now, when I said that they were not denouncing their chiefs ten years ago because they were fighting with our Catholic priests and bishops on the same ground as the Liberal party, I said they thought they had the right to do it. They thought then it was no crime to be allied with our priests and bishops. As to the remarks made by the hon. gentleman from Stadacona, he said that the president of the St. Jean Baptiste Association should not have taken the ground he has. We have been between two fires, and we do not know on which side there is the most fire. He stated that the ex-president or the two ex-presidents of the St. Jean Baptiste Association are taking such a position against the French language that they dare to vote against such an amendment. I will tell the hon. gentleman from Stadacona that it requires more courage and patriotism sometimes to vote against an amendment than to vote for it. I know very well I will not have to suffer on the hustings for a vote on the amendment but this is a hustings amendment, and they will make use of it on the hustings against the members of the House who have voted against it in connection with the French language. That is their right, I suppose ; but at the same time it is also the right of the members of this House, as it was the right of the members of the other House, if in their conscience they think it would be dangerous to vote for such a motion not to do so ; and if it is more patriotic to vote against it, it is their duty to do so, and nobody has a right to say they are not acting as good French Canadians.

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If it is so difficult to obtain something for our countrymen of the Northwest when the constitution is protecting their rights, if it was so difficult to obtain the Bill before the House as it is, if it was so difficult to come to a compromise and to give justice, how can we hold that when there is nothing to protect the constitution, to protect the rights of the French language, when there is nothing and nobody can show anything in the laws or constitution guaranteeing the use of the French language, how would it be possible to re-establish the French language in the Northwest Territories. The Hon. Speaker of the House and the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry have proved clearly that the parliament could not intervene without violating the principle of provincial rights. Why ? Because they were not right. Nobody can deny that. In 1890 when the Senate voted on behalf of the motion of the Hon. Mr. Dickey, seconded by the Hon. Mr. Lacoste, authorizing the council of the Northwest to decide what they would think proper after the election about the use of the French language or the English language, when that motion was adopted, the hon. gentleman from Lauzon and all his friends by that motion authorized the council of the Northwest to do what they have done. It was a permission given them to decide whether they would continue to use the French language or abolish it.

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—Oh, no, I deny that.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Prove it.

Hon. Mr. DAVID—Oh, yes. It is the same thing. So that the ordinances which were passed were the logical consequence of the permission which was given them by this House, by the House of Commons, and by the hon member from Lauzon, to do as they thought proper.

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—I deny that.

Hon. Mr. DAVID—And those ordinances not having been disallowed, there was only one thing to do. If the hon. members thought that the council of the Northwest had no right to pass the resolution which was passed regarding the use of the French language what should they have done ? They should have obliged the government of the time, composed of their friends, to disallow that ordinance. Why did they not do it ? If they had displayed at that time one-half the zeal which they are displaying now, in an endeavour to persuade the government to disallow those ordinances, then the ordinances would not have been in force ; and they are therefore responsible. They may regret what they have done. It is said that remorse does honour to the conscience of a man. I respect the hon. gentlemen’s remorse, but I regret the position they are in. If the situation is so bad now, if the government cannot do more, it is the fault of those who voted for that motion in 1890, and who did not have the courage to force the government and their friends to disallow the ordinance afterwards.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—I hope the hon. gentleman did not understand me to deny him the right to make any statement he pleased. That is not the line of my argument at all. On the contrary I pointed out to him that he was in error in making the statement, and before I get through I think I will give him the names of the parties who were responsible, to show him the information he received was not correct.

Hon. Mr. DAVID—I say now that taking the position as it is, taking the facts as they are, taking into consideration the ordinances which are in force now, considering all the facts which exist and all the laws which have been passed, the government could not intervene and could not now abrogate those ordinances without giving the right to all those who have opposed the schools to invoke the principle of autonomy and of provincial rights, because it would be necessary once more to put aside, to revoke, to abrogate, to demolish the ordinances which have been passed by the territorial legislature, and which they were authorized to pass by this House and by the other House. There are those who have confidence, as I have, that those amendments may be useless or dangerous—useless first, and perhaps dangerous—and compromise without any practical effect the province of Quebec. The province of Quebec is very generous and shows that she is able to be very dangerous—too generous sometimes—and I am of opinion that in this case the province of Quebec must be prudent, must not go too far, must not ask too much, because without exposing her own interests

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she must preserve her strength for some other time, and must keep her strength in order to be strong and protect the interests of those who rely upon her. It is said that the province of Quebec is the protector of the minority of the French in other parts of Canada, that this is a noble role, and that she has been equal to her task in many instances, but I repeat here that she must not be imprudent. She must not make exaggerated demands and thus appear to her friends, to those whose aid she requires, to be unreasonable, because after all there are two parties. We have a ‘party government, and the province of Quebec cannot do anything to protect the rights of the minority without being able to have on her side a majority of the people belonging to other nationalities and creeds. Let us take the facts practically. What is our position ? We have to choose between two policies, the policy of the government which gives what they say they are in a position to give, doing the most they can on behalf of the Catholics of the Northwest. They are giving half a loaf, but that is better than nothing at all. What is offered on the other side is less than half a loaf—it is a stone. Well, in the interests of the Catholics of the Northwest, those who understand the situation would not do otherwise, if they were convinced the government could not do more than they have done. Supposing Sir Wilfrid Laurier had resigned, what would have been the fate of the Catholics of the Northwest Territories. They would have been thrown upon the mercy of those who have not ceased to complain that the government was doing too much for them.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I do not desire that the remarks of the hon. gentleman who has just resumed his seat should go unchallenged. He is speaking of the noble role played by the province of Quebec in favour of the minority of the other provinces. He cannot claim to-day to take a very great part in that noble role, because he is not fighting for the rights of the minority, he is not fighting for the privileges and rights of the French and of the Catholics of the Northwest. The hon. gentleman is ready, but with the government, which Mr. Sifton brought to his feet, to do away with all the privileges and rights of those provinces. Speaking of constitutional law, speaking of legal obligations, the hon. gentleman must remember that before that there is a question of honour—a question of contract. When those territories refused to accept the government of Canada in 1869, what took place ? A revolt took place, and the authorities of the different governments, imperial and federal, asked for Monseigneur Taché, who was in Rome at the time. He came here; he went to the Northwest, clothed with all the authority, imperial and federal, to make a compact with those people. He made a compact. A Bill of Rights was brought down to Ottawa by the delegates of those provinces, and that Bill of Rights asked for separate schools and for the usage of the French language. That was accorded to the people, and now we see French Canadians in this House of parliament get up and refuse what was accorded to those people by a compact. I congratulate the hon. gentleman for his devotion to the government—not his devotion to the French of the Northwest, but his devotion to the government ; and I congratulate him once more. He said, speaking of the rights of the minority, ‘ You have never disallowed those ordinances.’ Does the hon. gentleman ignore that disallowance was not needed ? If a law is unconstitutional or ultra vires does the usage of that law make it constitutional or make it come within the powers of the legislative body ? Not at all. If a law is ultra vires it need not be disallowed. Every man is at liberty to test that law before the courts and the judgment of that court will settle the question, and when we have the judgment of the courts at our disposal, when any public man can address the courts and ask them to solve the question, why should parliament interfere and disallow laws that are null. Nobody needs that remedy. The disallowance of an Act is a political remedy in the hands of the public men of this country, and it is not when laws are null that disallowance is necessary. It is when Acts are not ultra vires that the application of the power of disallowance may be necessary. The hon. gentleman could not sit down without speaking once more of the Orange people. Well, I will remind him of what took place some two or three days ago. We have in Quebec a paper called ‘ Le Soleil.’ That is the organ

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of the Liberal party. We have in Quebec another paper called ‘L’Evenement.’ That is the organ of the Conservative party. I do not know if the opposition is a very good place for papers to progress, but for one reason or another ‘L’Evenement’ has progressed. We bought ‘L’Evénement’ for the party and it is progressing. The other day we bought a new press. It was an event in the life of our paper and on such occasion we published the paper with three time the number of pages it contained before. What did ‘Le Soleil’ say? It spoke as follows:—

‘L’Evenement’ published yesterday so many pages in honour of the Orange people because it was July 12.

That is the way the Liberal papers are talking to the people of Quebec. We never thought we were doing such mischief at the time, but you may see of what we were accused. More than that. ‘Le Soleil’ said the Autonomy Bill was presented to this House on the 12th of July just to suit the Orangemen. That was the government’s fault because the Bill was introduced by the hon. Secretary of State. Realizing the ridiculousness of this assertion, ‘Le Soleil’ tried to correct it by saying in the last number that it was Sir Mackenzie Bowell who chose that day to present his motion for the six months’ hoist, because he was the grand chief of the Orangemen and that he could not do less on that day than propose the six months’ hoist. That is the way the organ of the Liberal party in Quebec are educating their friends and their own people. I submit these new facts to the consideration of my hon. friend, and when he says the Orangemen are at the bottom of all the trouble about this Bill he knows the facts are not quite as he states. He knows agitation took place when Mr. Sifton came back from the west, and attempted, because he had himself established a kind of separate school of his own in the city of Ottawa, to deceive the public so as to hide his doings. He knows well what agitation came from the cabinet itself. He knows Mr. Fielding followed suit and threatened to step out of the government if the Bill was not changed. It was only through pressure brought upon him by those two ministers that Sir Wilfrid Laurier yielded and consented to withdraw the educational clause, and now all that is said against that first clause of the Bill strikes the government themselves, because it is they that re-enacted that Act of 1875, which has just been denounced by the Secretary of State. We all heard him a moment ago denouncing the Act of 1875. He said it was no good at all; that if the Act of 1875 was taken as the basis of the rights of our fellow countrymen in the Northwest it would amount to nothing, although he was in the cabinet chamber when the draft of the Bill was presented by the hon. Premier of the Dominion, and that Bill was approved by him. That Act of 1875 was made the basis of all the rights which the government wanted to give to the people of the Northwest. And more than that, the Prime Minister said he could not do otherwise than bring in that Bill. He asked the pardon of the House because he brought in that law of 1875 as the basis; he said:—

I am compelled by law and the constitution to do everything I am doing now.

He did it, and the day after he undid it—well it took a month—and after all his reflections during the month’s time we have the result in that poor little Bill which is spoliatory in its character, which robs our people, and gives nothing to the French people and Catholics of the Northwest.

Hon. Mr. SULLIVAN—I hope this drama is about to end. This is a first-class ruction, particularly agreeable to me, and I want all of you, of every denomination, to listen. This is a row among Frenchmen. They are always accusing the Irishmen of having a row, but we have no interference in this. The Irishmen are contented and happy in enjoying the squabble.

Hon. Mr. BOLDUC—The Irishmen never fight.

Hon. Mr. SULLIVAN—They fight quicker and sharper, and are done with it and shake hands over it. I simply wish to say that this is a terrible sight—to have religion so-called talked about in this way. This is not religion—not a particle of it. Religion says, love your enemy and embrace him who persecutes and calumniates you. However with reference to the Orangemen, I want the hon. gentleman from Mille Iles to know that he is wrong. I am not a defender

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of the Orangemen. There are plenty of men here to defend them. But I want the hon. gentleman to know it is a higher class which is implicated in the origin of this matter than Orangemen. Does he think Orangemen would influence the ‘Globe’? Monseigneur Sbarretti might as well try to influence the ‘Globe’ as the Orangemen. I suppose the one might be as successful as the other. No, it could not be possible that Orangemen could influence the ‘Globe.’ I will tell you why. The leading Orangemen with us are Grits or Liberals.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—In what part of the town?

Hon. Mr. SULLIVAN—If the hon. gentleman wishes to know particularly I will give him a private interview with a diagram.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—I met so few of them that were Grits.

Hon. Mr. SULLIVAN—Was the hon. gentleman ever in Kingston?

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—Yes.

Hon. Mr. SULLIVAN—Does he know the penitentiary is there?

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—You don’t mean to say they are there?

Hon. Mr. SULLIVAN—Some of them are. I hope this dissension in the religious element will soon disappear. It is purely politics; it is as plain as a pikestaff, and I am glad I voted as I did. I tell him and those Irish Catholics who voted that way—but there are no Irish Catholics who voted that way—that there is a law higher than the constitution and higher than any laws made by human beings. It is the law of God and of conscience implanted in every man’s bosom, and it would be very wrong to insinuate that any improper motive actuated any man in this matter. I hope not. I told the hon. gentlemen plainly and squarely that by voting for the amendment of the Hon. Sir Mackenzie Bowell they were cutting away the principle; now if they were to approve of the principle of the Bill and then amend where necessary, it would be better tactics to pursue than the course they are adopting. I do not see any use in going on with this dramatic fight between these hon. gentlemen and I hope they will settle this matter. If they do not settle it, we will have to get the sergeant-at-arms to see that no attack is made, because it is assuming bitterer proportions each day. Then we must remember that there are elderly gentlemen in this House, and that as age advantages two organs of the great tripod of life are affected by this meeting to-night, the heart and the brain. Emotion and excitement and worry are extremely bad for a person. If the mind suffers it weakens the heart and the fibre of the heart is weak. Even supposing there is no disease present, elderly men are liable to be severely injured by these night sessions. There is no necessity for them. You can do all the business in the morning and in the afternoon and rest in the evening. I do not object to spending a litttle time in the evening, but I would advise hon. gentlemen to go home now. They have listened long enough to an entertaining discussion, and they had better go home at once.

The amendment was declared lost on a division, and the clause was adopted.

On clause 4,

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—I mentioned the other evening in discussing this question that I thought this was a matter which deserved a little more consideration. The clause reads as follows:

4. The said province shall be represented in the Senate of Canada by four members: provided that such representation may, after the completion of the next decennial census, be from time to time increased to six by the parliament of Canada.

I think we should cut out the last few words of that clause, and make it read, ‘be from time to time increased.’ I will be quite satisfied with that, but I should dislike to see anything in the Bill which would tie us down to six senators. I gave my reasons for this the other day. Ontario has 24 senators and Quebec 24, and it would be highly unfair that we should be confined to six representatives in the Senate if our population increases until it is larger than the province of Ontario. I will not move an amendment, but I wish to raise an objection to the clause.

The clause was adopted.

On clause 6,

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Every 25,367 electors are entitled to one member.

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Hon. Mr. LANDRY—In Quebec the census is taken every ten years and the number given every ten years.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Yes.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—That number will serve twice—every five years.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Yes.

The clause was adopted.

On clause 13,

Hon. Mr. LOUGHEED—When this Bill was read the second time, I objected to the principle incorporated in this section that the government should make a distribution of seats in both provinces. I apprehend, however, that it would be unnecessary for me to occupy the time of the House in pointing out the vicious principle which has entered into this question and without occupying the time of hon. gentlemen, I shall move, seconded by the hon. gentleman from Wolseley, that section 1 be stricken out of the schedule, and the following substituted in lieu thereof:

1. 13. The Lieutenant Governor shall on or before the first day of January next by proclamation under the great seal divide the said province into twenty-five electoral divisions, due regard being had to existing local divisions and population.

I might say I have taken this clause word for word from chap. 3 of 33 Vic., sec. 16, which is known as the Manitoba Act. When Manitoba was carved out of Rupert’s Land and the Northwest Territories, instead of this system which has been adopted, which has been imported into section 13, and for the purpose, I presume, of having a disinterested distribution of electoral divisions in the new provinces, it was delegated to the Lieutenant Governor to divide the provinces into electoral districts, and I think it must appeal to the minds of hon. gentlemen present that a more disinterested manner of dividing provinces could scarcely have been adopted. When the Bill was before the Commons it was proposed that the division of seats should be referred to a judicial committee or a bench of judges, but it was not received with favour by the government. However, I have no desire to occupy the time of the House, as I presume that any remarks of mine or any analysis of the vote or distribution of population in both provinces would be futile.

The amendment was declared lost on division.

The clause was adopted.

On sub-clause 4 of clause 16,

1. 4. Every joint-stock company lawfully incorporated by or under the authority of any ordinance of the Northwest Territories shall be subject to the legislative authority of the province of Alberta if—

1. 1. the head office or the registered office of such company is at the time of the coming into force of this Act situate in the province of Alberta ; and
   2. the powers and objects of such company are such as might be conferred by the legislature of the said province and not expressly authorized to be executed in any part of the Northwest Territories beyond the limits of the said province.

Hon. Mr. BERNIER—What about corporations not now licensed to do business in the Northwest ? There are corporations which are not incorporated by the laws of the Northwest, but by the laws of other provinces.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—It does not affect them at all.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—It only affects corporations incorporated under the laws of the territories.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—I suppose it will be the same as in other provinces. Where corporations chartered by the Dominion go into other provinces they are taxed. Has that question ever been settled as to the right of the province to tax organizations incorporated by the Dominion? I remember bringing this question up, and if my recollection serves me, the hon. Secretary of State agreed with me in thinking that a charter granted by the Dominion parliament or under the Joint Stock Companies’ Act of the Dominion, should not be subject to taxation in the provinces. I know in Ontario they tax the income of a corporation and compel them to take out a license to do business, besides imposing an annual tax. That seems to be in excess of the powers of the local legislature. It is in the line, I think, of imposing a tax upon a commercial traveller from another province. The subject, I understand from the hon. Secretary of State, is under the consideration of the Department of Justice now, and if any decision is come to before the House rises, I should like to know it.

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It is doubtful, however, if the Department of Justice has been able to take up the question yet. I should like the hon. Secretary of State at the same time to call the attention of the Department of Justice to the point I have raised in reference to these licenses. It seems a rather anomalous position that one province should be taxing people from another province who come here to do business. The object of the confederation was to open the door for all business, but we are in the same position in this respect that the Australian colonies were in before the union. Each province had its own tariff, its own rates for railways, &c., and they were foreign to each other, but they began to realize that people of the same race and subjects of the same Crown, living upon the same island, should not treat each other as foreigners. They united, and all that has passed away. In adopting the practices to which I have called attention, we are showing almost the same sectional spirit which once prevailed in Australia, and if it is ultra vires of the provinces, I hope steps will be taken to put a stop to it.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—The hon. gentleman is wrong in his statement so far as Quebec is concerned.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—The discussion is altogether irregular.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—The hon. gentleman from Belleville was allowed to speak without interruption, and if I am prevented from replying, his remarks will go on record and be an injustice to the province of Quebec.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—I was not speaking of Quebec in particular. I was calling attention to a principle, and showing how unfairly joint stock companies, incorporated under Dominion charters were being treated in the provinces.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—By our province ?

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—The province of Quebec is not alone. Prince Edward Island and British Columbia are worse. I am speaking of a general principle. I am very glad that Quebec has such an ardent supporter. I do not see why a reference to laws passed by the provinces which seem to me unfair to companies incorporated by the Dominion should raise the hon. gentleman’s ire. I do not think I was out of order in calling attention to the manner in which commercial travellers are treated in Quebec, Prince Edward Island and British Columbia.

Hon. Mr. BEIQUE—And Ontario.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—And Ontario—they are all alike. I pointed out the manner in which the Ontario government is taxing companies incorporated by the Dominion.

The clause was adopted.

On clause 17,

Section 93 of the British North America Act. 1867, shall apply to the said province, with the substitution for paragraph 1 of the said section 93, of the following paragraph :—

1. 1. Nothing in any such law shall prejudicially affect any right or privilege with respect to separate schools which any class of persons have at the date of the passing of this Act, under the terms of chapters 29 and 30 of the ordinances of the Northwest Territories, passed in the year 1901.

1. 1. In the appropriation by the legislature or distribution by the government of the province of any moneys for the support of schools organized and carried on in accordance with the said chapter 29 or any Act passed in amendment thereof, or in substitution therefor, there shall be no discrimination against schools of any class described in the said chapter 29.
   2. Where the expression ‘ by law ’ is employed in subsection 3 of the said section 93, it shall be held to mean the law as set out in the said chapters 29 and 30, and where the expression ‘ at the union,’ is employed, in the said subsection 3, it shall be held to mean the date at which this Act comes into force.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN moved the following amendment:

1. 17. Section 93 of the British North America Act, 1867, shall apply to the said province with the substitution for paragraph 1 of the said section 93 of the following paragraph :

1. 1. Nothing in any such law shall prejudicially affect any right or privilege with respect to separate schools which any class of persons have at the date of the passing of this Act under the terms of the Ordinances of the Northwest Territories, No. 3, of 1885, or with respect to religious instruction in any public or separate school as provided for in said Ordinances :

(2.) In the appropriation by the legislature or distribution by the government of the province of any moneys for the support of schools organized and carried on in accordance with said Ordinances there shall be no discrimination against schools of any class described in said Ordinances ;

(3.) Where the expression ‘ by law ’ is employed in subsection 3 of the said section 93, it shall be held to mean the law as set out in the said Ordinances, and where the

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expression ‘ at the union ’ is employed, in the said subsection 3, it shall be held to mean the date at which this Act comes into force.

He said : Hon. gentlemen will remember, when I spoke on the second reading of the Bill, that I objected to clause 17 as being based on the ordinances of 1901, and for this reason : The ordinances of 1901, I hold, do not give us any privilege, do not give us separate schools in the sense in which we should have them under the law of 1875, when the territories were first formed, and as given subsequently even in other ordinances. This amendment is based on the ordinances of 1885, for the reason that they give us more than the ordinances of 1901. The ordinances of 1885 provide :

The Lieutenant Governor in Executive Council may appoint and constitute a board of education for the Northwest Territories, composed of five members, two of whom shall be Roman Catholics and two Protestant and the Lieutenant Governor who shall be chairman.

Then section 5 provides :

It shall be the duty of the board to meet twice a year to appoint inspectors, who shall hold office during the pleasure of the board ; to appoint a board of examiners for the examination of teachers ; to provide for the expenses of the board of examiners ; to arrange for proper examination, grading and licensing of teachers and the granting of certificates, such certificates to be of three classes, first, second and third ; to make from time to time, such regulations as they may think fit for the general organization of the school ; to select adopt and prescribe a uniform series of text books to be used in the schools of the section ; to have control and management of the schools of the section ; and to make from time to time such regulations as may be deemed fit for the general government and discipline and the carrying out of the provisions of these ordinances.

Referring to the school books, I may state that the withdrawal of the power to select the text books is one of the worst features of the present Bill. In the decision given by the Privy Council in England, when deciding on that question in the case of the Manitoba law, one of the justices said :

The sole question to be determined is whether a right or privilege which the Roman Catholic minority had previously enjoyed has been affected by the legislation of 1890. Their lordships are unable to see how this question can receive any but an affirmative answer. Contrast the position of the Roman Catholics prior and subsequent to the Acts from which they appeal. Before these passed into law there existed denominational schools of which the control and management were in the hands of the Roman Catholics, who could select the books used and determine the character of their religious teaching.

In a few words, what we consider we are deprived of is given in that quotation. His honour the Speaker to-day stated that we were getting a great boon in the fact that separate schools could be established, that the fact of having those schools would give us other features as desired, whether Protestant or Roman Catholic. If my hon. friend will think the question over seriously, he will come to the conclusion which the hon. gentleman from Wolseley (Hon. Mr. Perley) came to the other day, that they are really getting nothing but the use of the school houses. They are deprived by clause 137 of the privilege of giving religious instruction until half past three in the afternoon. I want to ask my hon. friend from London (Hon. Mr. Coffey), who is the editor and proprietor, I suppose, of a Roman Catholic paper which has always supported separate schools, and from which I have taken this quotation, how he can justify his vote on this question. It says that Buckle’s History of England is taught in the schools there for the reason that it is not under the authority of the Roman Catholics and that history, it says, eulogizes Cromwell and Cranmer and states that regulations had to be drawn up to forbid the worship of images in the churches.

Hon. Mr. COFFEY—Such books can be objected to.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—No, the Roman Catholics have no control of the books. This history further states that Protestants put to death under Queen Mary were put to death for their religious convictions, while those executed under Queen Elizabeth were put to death because they were rebels. I get this information from the ‘ Catholic Record ’ of London, and yet my hon. friend says that the Catholics are getting separate schools, when his own paper declares that the selection of the school books is not under the control of the trustees and that the schools are worthless.

Hon. Mr. COFFEY—Books of the description which the hon. gentleman mentions may be introduced in the public schools of the Northwest Territories, and may also be introduced in the separate schools, but the Catholic pupils will not I am sure study such books and I do not think they can be compelled to do so. I remember well when Collier’s History was read in the public

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schools of Ontario, and I remember that it was put out of the schools because it contained objectionable passages. I remember when Marmion was read in the public schools of Ontario, and an attempt was made to have it used in the separate schools, but we got rid of that in Ontario ; and the same thing can be done in the territories.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—The best way to manage the separate schools is to give the selection of books to the proper authorities. It is not very wholesome for Catholic teaching to have such books used in the separate school.

Hon. Mr. COFFEY—They will not be taught.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—There is nothing in this Bill to forbid it.

Hon. Mr. COFFEY—They will merely put the books out; they will not read them.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—The ordinances of 1901, as I have said, forbid the teaching of religion in the separate schools. They provide that :

No religious instruction except as hereinbefore provided shall be permitted in the school of any district from the opening of such school until one-half hour previous to its closing in the afternoon after which time any such instruction permitted or desired by the board may be given.

That says that no religion can be taught in the public schools, and permits no religious instruction to be given in the separate schools. My hon. friend the Secretary of State fortified his remarks here to-night by saying that Mr. Haultain would not change one iota of the school law.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—So he said.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—He means the Ordinances of 1901—is not that so ?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—Yes.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—We know that Mr. Haultain has been opposed to separate schools and has been determined to destroy them from the day he took charge of the territories until now, and it was under his administration that the ordinances have been passed which have crippled the separate schools. Mr. Haultain is a Conservative, but I do not look upon this question from a political standpoint. I look upon Mr. Haultain as the leading figure, backed up by his Grit friends there, who have crippled the separate schools and passed the ordinances of 1901, which are worthless to Catholics.

Hon. Mr. WILSON—Why did the Tories bring him down to London.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—Just to play the part you would have played if you had been placed in the same circumstances.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I think there was a mix-up.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—I am basing my amendment on the ordinance of 1885 which gave us, as Roman Catholics, separate schools in the Northwest Territories, while the present Bill gives us nothing beyond the privilege of having religious instruction after half past three, but not Roman Catholic separate schools as we understand them and as we want them.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—The hon. gentleman takes the ordinances of 1885 as a basis for the rights of Roman Catholics in the Northwest. Those ordinances are made in accordance with the law of 1875, which declares that every time the legislative assembly of the Northwest enacts laws they shall give the Roman Catholic minority separate schools. It was in accordance with the law of 1875 that the legislative assembly of the Northwest passed this ordinance of 1885, but since that time other ordinances have been enacted by the same legislative body, contrary to the federal law of 1875, for the time being. Will the hon. member for de Salaberry deny that the ordinances for 1901 are against the law of 1875 ? Why the Minister of Justice himself, and the hon. the Prime Minister, state the fact. You have on the one hand the ordinances of 1885 enacted in accordance with the federal law, and on the other hand you have the ordinances of 1901, which are enacted against the law. What does the government do ? It sets aside the ordinance which is according to law and takes the ordinance which is against the law, which robs the Catholic minority of the Northwest of their rights. It recognizes these iniquitous ordinances, these robber ordinances as the basis of the rights of the Catholic minority in the Northwest. And there are people who fall

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on their knees before the Prime Minister and give him all praise because they say this clause of his is a little clearer than the other. The other covered rights ; this one robs the minority of their rights, but then it is clearer. The hon. member from Alexandria has done a just thing to revive those ordinances of 1885 and make them the basis of the rights of Roman Catholics of the Northwest. We will see if the government will recognize those rights, or if they will take the bad laws which deprive us of our rights. If they take the good laws they will show their honesty and their desire to meet the views of the people of that country. If they take the bad laws, which a court of justice would set aside if they were appealed against, if they take ordinances which are illegal and unconstitutional, what will be said in the country ? They will say that the paternal government of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, that man who stands up to fight the battle of his religious compatriots in the Northwest, has set aside the good laws of the Northwest and has taken up the bad laws, that instead of the bread for which the Roman Catholic minority asks, he has given them a stone. That is the skeleton of which the hon. Secretary of State spoke a few days ago that is given to the Northwest. I hope this Senate will not endure such an outrage, and that a majority will be found to accept the amendment of my hon. friend from Alexandria, who chooses as an honest man to take the federal law and the ordinances which are the consequence of that federal law as a basis for the rights of the Roman Catholics for ever. I suppose, Mr. Chairman, you will declare that amendment carried.

The CHAIRMAN—Whatever the House decides.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Judging from appearances everybody in this House favours the amendment.

Hon. Mr. McHUGH—This Bill has been discussed on a very high plane, on lines which with slight exceptions are very commendable. I feel just as strongly in favour of separate schools as does my hon. friend from Alexandria, and that the Roman Catholic people of the country should have a right to educate their children as they think proper.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Hear, hear, but they are not allowed to do so by this Bill.

Hon. Mr. McHUGH—The first right of education belongs to the parents. The hon. member from Alexandria has spoken of the law in Ontario. In this province the Minister of Education has the right to say what text-books shall be used not only in the public schools but in the separate schools, and they have always been careful to use the text-books which would make the scholars most efficient. You may fairly expect that whatever Minister of Education may be in office in these new provinces will see that the best school books are used. We have a Bill before us which guarantees separate schools.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—We have nothing at all.

Hon. Mr. McHUGH—The principle of separate schools is on a foundation which cannot be uprooted. The new provinces will have no power to amend the law in any way to prejudicially affect the Catholic population, but they can make the schools more efficient than they are at the present time. If the separate schools of Ontario had been left as they were in 1863 what kind of schools would we have to-day? The provincial parliament of Ontario, seeing that the schools were not efficient, went on improving them year after year. There was an amendment in 1877, another in 1879 and another in 1886, until they have made the separate schools of Ontario what they are to-day. Are we to expect that the legislatures of the new provinces will be content to do less than Ontario did? I do not think we need have any fear in that regard. So long as the principle of separate schools is recognized and separate schools are to be established you may rest assured that the legislature will see that they are maintained in as efficient a shape as possible.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—What are separate schools?

Hon. Mr. McHUGH—They are not non-sectarian schools, such as many have asked for, but schools where religion is taught. I am only sorry that other denominations do not feel as keenly as Catholics do about religious instruction in the school.

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Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Does the hon. gentleman contend that Catholic schools are not sectarian schools?

Hon. Mr. McHUGH—All schools where religion is taught are sectarian schools.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—What is a separate school?

Hon. Mr. McHUGH—A school where religion is taught.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Take the Protestant schools in the province of Quebec, they are separate schools and they are not sectarian schools.

Hon. Mr. McHUGH—A separate school is a school where people who want religious instruction for their children can have it. If they do not want it they need not have it, but if they desire it they can have the privilege of getting it. With reference to the text-books, I say the trustees and the Catholic teachers can be depended upon that only suitable books for the children are used. They all have to take the one examination; they must have uniformity in most of the text-books, but they must not teach that which is objectionable to any in the community. I feel just as strongly in favour of separate schools as anybody.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—Then why not support an amendment which gives the privilege to the trustees of selecting the books.

Hon. Mr. McHUGH—The trustees have a right to say what education shall be given to the children in these schools, and we have the principle of separate schools, which we would not have had without this clause. I do not want to discuss this question from a political standpoint. I know there has been a little of that on both sides in the discussion. No one party is altogether right or altogether wrong. We have found in both political parties men who have stood above appeals to sectarian prejudices. No one particular party has a patent right to tolerance or intolerance in this country. We have before us a Bill in which the separate school principle is embodied, and it should be satisfactory. We will be satisfied to leave the rest to the people of the Northwest Territories. The hon. gentleman from Calgary told us the other day that it is only a skeleton. I tell him that is a solid foundation, and if he will go to the Northwest and tell the people that the minority in those new provinces are not getting their rights, he can inspire the people to do justice. The hon. member from Wolseley told us that the concession in this clause was a mere pittance. I say to him : Go up to the Northwest and preach that doctrine, and I have every confidence that if these hon. gentlemen would speak there as they have spoken here, the majority of the people in that region will deal, not only justly, but generously with the minority. The Bill, as it is, is the best we can obtain under all the circumstances.

Hon. Mr. COFFEY—I want to add a few words to what I said in answer to the hon. gentleman from Alexandria (Hon. Mr. McMillan). We have a Board of Education in the Northwest Territories, in whose hands I understand the selection of books will be placed. On this Board of Education we have two Catholic members and two Protestant members.

Mr. McMILLAN—Where is that ?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—There is an advisory board.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—Without a vote.

Hon. Mr. COFFEY—Who has the selection of the text-books ? Is it not the Minister of Education ? If there is any objection to the books, the trustees can reject them. My contention is that the two Catholics on the board can object to anything they think should not be used in the separate schools, and such books can be put out. If they are not put out by law, the Catholics have the privilege of appealing to the government at Ottawa.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—The two members on the board are advisory members. They have not a right to vote. They may give their advice, and it may be taken or not.

Hon. Mr. COFFEY—The hon. gentleman will remember that we had at one time a superintendent of education in Ontario who acted in like manner. He sent to the separate schools books which were objectionable, and we very easily got rid of them ; and in these new provinces the same thing can be done.

Hon. Mr. McMILLAN—But we have separate schools in Ontario.

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Hon. Mr. COFFEY—You have them in the Northwest Territories?

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—I regret very much that the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir Richard Cartwright) is absent this evening, because he is a man of broad mind, who does not want to choke off discussion. In opening his speech he stated that this hon. body was entitled to a full and free expression of its views in regard to the position of these two provinces and he invited not only on his own part but on the part of the government a full and free expression of opinion from the members of this House in regard to the Bill now before us. Although he gave that invitation I did not consider it necessary that he should have done so. It is within the rights and privileges—more, within the duty—of every hon. gentleman in this House to express his opinions and views in regard to public measures brought before parliament, and which deal not only with temporary matters but matters to be permanent in the history of our country; and I am not to be told as certain members, even among our own friends have said, that this discussion could be choked off or closed to suit the convenience of any body. The convenience to be suited on this occasion is the convenience of the people whom we represent, and they are entitled to hear from each one of us what we think on this question in whole or in part. To bring myself in order I shall confine myself to what I consider the essential feature of the Bill, clause 17. As members of this House, I do not think we are called upon to criticise very deeply the decisions of the other House in regard to the establishment of these two provinces. I think it falls within the domain and control of the House of Commons to say what ought to be the representation in this parliament, what ought to be the limits of those provinces, what ought to be the rights, civil and political of the people of those provinces. If they had established anything which would constitute a grievance during the existence of that province then it would devolve upon us to remedy what they have done. But on reading that Bill and considering its merits I fail to see that this honourable House has any right to say to the lower House that it has done wrong in regard to the civil, political and material interests of these provinces. But above and beyond the political and material aspects of the question, there arises one more serious, one that affects the life of this country more deeply than Territorial limits, than the question whether there shall be 20 or 25 members and 4 or 6 senators. There lies in this Bill a seed which shall make the provinces of the west a God-fearing country, a country that will respect the laws. On that ground this hon. body who are called upon to safeguard the highest interests of the nation to safeguard the highest morality and all that is noble in a nation, it is our right and duty to say what we think of the measure before us. I salute the entry of two sister provinces into this Dominion. Canada is growing larger and larger, and when this Bill will have passed will be larger not only by territory and population, but larger in liberality and morality. I take my hon. friends from the Northwest as an example of those two essential elements in the development of national life. I take my hon. friend from Saskatchewan (Hon. Mr. Davis) as an exponent of these two ideas which enter into and become the basis of our national life, liberality and morality, and I was proud to sit by him here two or three nights ago and hear him develop the ideas that prevail in the Northwest Territories which unfortunately have no footing and no root in many parts of the province of Ontario. Unfortunately the same liberality, the same spirit of tolerance, which spreads over the prairies of the Northwest does not exist in the province of Ontario. Let the young child give an example to the old one. Let the young child say to the old brother of the confederation, Ontario, that intolerance does not exist on the prairies as it exists in the halls of Toronto, and lodges of Belleville, Kingston and elsewhere; let that go abroad, and Canada will benefit by the new reputation it will obtain that Canada is not only free but tolerant. I thank the hon. senator for the sentiments he expressed on that occasion.

When we establish a new country we have to consider two things. A new country means a new society, and what is society? Human society is based on two elements; first, on mutual respect of one for another—that regards the civil right of society. I have no right to interfere with my neighbour when he wants to put up a

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house on his own property, or to act along the material lines of human life. Where the distinction comes in with regard to human society is when civil government has accomplished that end and the material rights of the citizens are protected. The duty of the state ceases there. It can go no further; but in human society there is another element to be developed, another principle to be asserted before all, and that is the principle or element of spirituality, or what you may call religious life. There the state has no jurisdiction, no control. The state has no right to enter into the home of a man, and tell him to what altar he shall kneel, or what God he shall adore; no right to tell him that he shall live this way or that way; the state has absolutely nothing to do with the religious or spiritual life of human society or of the individual. That is according to natural law. What is society composed of? Society is composed of the family. The family, multiplied into three or four, forms the village, forms the township, and the village and township form the country, the province, the nation. The basis of the nation is the family, and the king of that family is not the head of the state, but the father. The father is responsible for every child born to him, responsible not to the state, but to a higher authority. I hope we are all Christians in this House. Even those who are not Christians recognize a Divinity higher than themselves, although represented in the form of a serpent or stone statue. The most barbarous people have a divinity to bow down to, recognizing something greater than themselves, and therefore the father is supreme master of his own household. Where does the state step in? The state can step in on material lines, and say to the father of a family, ‘that child of yours must be fed and clothed’; and when the father does that he satisfies his duty to the state. Can the state come into the home of the father and say, ‘you shall give that child such instruction such as the state will exact’? The state has no right to do so, has no right to go into the home, and clothe or feed the child so long as the father gives it food and clothing, and the same holds true in regard to the spiritual side of the situation. As long as the father gives the intellectual and moral development, the state has no right to interfere.

If the father is unable to give food and clothing to the child, the state steps in and takes the child and puts it into a place where it is clothed and fed. If the father is unable to give him intellectual or moral training according to his views, according to his conscience, it is for the father to say who shall be his substitute, who shall be his deputy in the matter of education. That state has no right to come into the home of the father and take the child from him and educate it according to the ideas of the state, but the father will say to the state, ‘It is true I am unable to educate the child, I am unable to bring him up morally and intellectually, but I ask from the state a substitute who will represent my views and my conscience in the development of the child. There is the correlative duty of citizen and state. That brings me to another point—we are all Christians here and readers of the bible—

Hon. Mr. DOMVILLE—The hon. gentleman had better speak for himself.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—And hon. gentlemen know the first principle laid down by the Saviour of the world who did not ask for anything too much. He said to legislators such as we are, to the people of the world, ‘Render unto Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.’ Now this question has been debated from one end of the land to the other. It has been discussed in pulpits, in the press, in society meetings and so on, and I ask you as fair witnesses of the fact, has that principle laid down by Christ been observed in the press, been adhered to in the pulpit and exemplified in the state and exemplified by society? No, it has not. The idea is now that you shall give everything to Cæsar and nothing to God. But it is not all that way in Canada. Canada is a Christian country and I am not speaking as a man belonging to any section of the church, but as a citizen who would like to see my young country grow up along the lines of Christian civilization, and Christianity irrespective of sect or anything of that kind within the pale of that great church, because after the study of religion I find Buddha and Mahomet, who tried to elevate human life and make it better than it was, and inculcate good

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principles into it, never attained the same results as Christ has through the system of Christianity. As a student of history, wishing to see my country prosper, wishing to see it happy, and hoping that we shall avoid the troubles which afflict France and Russia and other countries, I ask this House to say that the best kind of civilization that can be followed for the happiness of our young people is along the line of Christianity. But how are you going to follow the line of Christianity if you do not begin at the beginning. I am not going to deal with the constitutional and legal aspects of this question. Hair-splitting in constitutional and legal arguments does not appeal to the Canadian people, but what appeals to the Canadian people is what touches their hearts and what will give them courage to fight the battles of Canada. It is not necessary to know whether the clause is to be interpreted according to the view of the hon. gentleman from de Salaberry or the hon. gentleman from Calgary. What the people of Canada want is a Bill that will allow their children to grow up as they have grown, according to the will of God, for their own benefit, for their own interests and for the sake of our country; and notwithstanding the agitation which has been carried on in Ontario during the past six months, unfortunately for the reputation of our country, the people of Canada as a whole are tolerant, are fraternal, are brotherly. Need I appeal for proof to the past elections? Need I appeal to the city of Edmonton, who said to the people of the East: ‘You know not what you are doing.’ You appeal to us to set aside what is right and just. We will have nothing of it;’ and they elected by acclamation a minister of the government responsible for this measure. Then we come further east to London and North Oxford, and there the appeal is made through the great enlightened press of Toronto, the Toronto ‘News,’ the editor of which paper ought to have known better, and through even our own Toronto ‘Globe’—as an ex-Minister of Finance said in a moment of weakness it fell—through the ‘Mail,’ and through all the other organs of our opponents, they made the most fierce appeals to reject this Bill creating two sister provinces. They were willing to drown these provinces, and cast them aside, because in this Bill there was a little clause giving to the people of the great Northwest a right to teach their children that there is a God over the destinies of Canada, a right to feel that during these hours morality and religion should predominate as against mathematics, and history. And what was the voice of these people? The appeals to London and North Oxford were ‘Keep God out of the schools. We do not want Him in the schools. If you allow God in the schools the Pope will come over here and rule.’ Allow me to pay my tribute of homage and admiration and respect to the electors of London and Oxford. They have given this young Canada of ours a lesson of tolerance notwithstanding that the fangs of bigotry were plunged into the body politic of this country. These fangs were unable to reach the heart of the people, and the electors of those constituencies sent here to represent them two men who stand by the Bill—a Bill not perfect as regards clause 17—

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—No, no.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—I stated that if I had anything to say in this honourable House it would be because I considered the Bill inefficient and incomplete, and I give my reasons for voting for a measure that is inefficient and incomplete. It is because among the many civilized countries we are practically alone to-day on this American continent in that we recognize the Divinity in our schools in some degree. We are alone compared with France—I will not say England, because she has too much common sense to drive God out of her schools. But we have in this clause the last vestige of the Divinity recognized by a Canadian parliament, and as the sun shines through a pin-hole in the wall and enlightens and illumines the cell of the prisoner, so by this clause the Canadian government maintains the right of the divinity, maintains the right of God to a place in the schools, even if it is at half past three in the afternoon. It is a pin-hole through the wall, and the day will come when that wall will be removed from its place to allow the full light of God to illumine the schools of this country, public or otherwise. I am not here to-night to advocate separate schools. And why? We in the minority will have separate schools in

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spite all the opponents of those schools can do. If the state were mean enough to deprive us of that right we would have courage enough to advocate the right of educating our children according to the principles of the decalogue and the Sermon on the Mount. We do not ask you for separate schools; we are prepared to pay for them as is being done in the United States by millions and millions, the same as they are doing in other countries, although not in England. The treasury of England pays for Catholic and Protestant schools. They have done so in other countries and they will do so here if necessary. I say that on this question there can be no two opinions. I am not pleading for Catholics. I am pleading for the masses of the Canadian people. I have in my hand the opinions of statesmen, the authority of Protestant bishops, the authority of the Protestant press, and the history of all that has occurred in the United States. I am here to-night to tell you that a system of schools where the teaching of the gospel is excluded is a system that will lead any nation to ruin and destruction. Canada is to-day in the throes of this agitation, and it is not because the Canadian people wanted it. May I let this honourable House into a secret. Shall I let this country into the secrets of a confidential mission which was given to me in the year 1889. I think some of the principal parties concerned in that agitation are dead or have ceased to exist in public life in Manitoba, and I will therefore give you the history of the agitation, because I consider that history is to the credit of the Dominion of Canada. In 1889 the Hon. Mr. Mercier was Prime Minister of Quebec, and about that time the agitation was started in Manitoba for the suppression of what they called separate schools. The agitation had gone on for a time in Manitoba, the legislature was to be called and a measure was to be proposed. The Hon. Mr. Mercier, of whom I was a friend—and I am proud to say here to-night that Mr. Mercier was one of the best Canadians that ever adorned Canadian life. He was one of the best friends of his province and of the Dominion; he was the only man that got the seven Prime ministers around his table to discuss provincial affairs and their relations with the Federal power.

But in 1889 he said: ‘There is something going on in Manitoba and what is at the bottom of it? I want to find out if the people of Manitoba are really spiteful in regard to our rights and interests. I want to find out if Mr. Greenway and his government are undertaking this measure of suppression of Catholic schools through hatred of our race and religion. I went there quietly and ascertained from ex-Premier Greenway, from Mr. Martin, from Mr. Sifton, the ex-cabinet minister, and from Mr. Campbell,—the entire cabinet—that there was nothing in the nature of hate or prejudice, underlying the agitation for the suppression of the schools. I asked the premier: ‘What is the reason that you are going to introduce this measure into the House?’ He said: ‘Mr. Cloran, you can tell the Prime Minister of Quebec, you can tell your friends in the province of Quebec that the Liberal party does not want to be a party to the suppression of the schools, but there is a man in my cabinet who wants to cover his tracks in regard to certain transactions and he has raised this agitation in reference to schools.’ I will go further and give his exact words. He said: ‘Mr. Cloran, it is a hard thing to say of one’s colleague; but Joe Martin is a scoundrel.’ Now there is the beginning of the agitation for the suppression of schools, from a scoundrel, so pronounced by the Prime Minister of Manitoba in the month of October, 1889; and when I invited Mr. Martin to the Queen’s hotel and asked him why he raised such an agitation, his answer was: ‘You can go to——. We can run our own business to suit our affairs.’ When I called upon Mr. Sifton in his own office, he declared then to me that he was opposed to the suppression of separate schools. When I called on the Grand Master of the Orange Lodge, a gentleman keeping the largest store in Brandon, he said the separate schools should never be abolished. But I said to him, then if you as ministers of the government are opposed to it, why do you allow it to go through? His answer was: Is it not better that I should remain at the head of affairs than to allow a man like Martin to become Prime Minister? And I said, ‘Yes,’ and I went back with that message to the province of Quebec

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and laid it before the Prime Minister of the day. Do you know what would have happened if I had reported otherwise? The Hon. Mr. Mercier who was a politician and statesman at the same time—and this may not please my Conservative friends in the House—would have passed an identical measure word for word with the Manitoba measure in the Quebec House—not for the purpose of taking away the rights of our English-speaking Protestant friends. No he would not think of it. It never entered our minds. We are always prepared to give them more than double fair-play—but he would have passed the measure in the Quebec House abolishing separate schools in the province, and separate schools in that province are Protestant schools. I said: ‘What will you do that for?’ I was not as wise as he was at that time. Why he said, I will force Sir John Macdonald, then Prime Minister of Canada, to disallow my law, and if he disallows my law he will have to disallow Greenway’s law.’ That was the position. I cite these facts to prove that in the beginning of this agitation the feeling was not as strong against individual rights of Catholics as it was intended to be. It was all the work of a few politicians to cover their tracks, as the Prime Minister of Manitoba at that time stated to me.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—That was, never done.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—No it was not done, on account of my report that the people of Manitoba as a whole, the representative men from Greenway down, with the exception of Joe Martin, were not in favour of the suppression of separate schools; and if I had been obliged to report that the suppression of separate schools was due to animosity and hatred of Catholics, then the Hon. Mr. Mercier would have passed a similar law, forcing Sir John to disallow his Act and consequently disallow the other Act.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Everybody in Manitoba was against that suppression and yet the suppression took place.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—I stated that the question of education had been considered by very eminent people, and I desire the House to understand that I am not talking from any sectarian point of view but from the broad point of view of Christianity.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—The hon. gentleman is talking from my seat.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—It is a very good seat sometimes. I am talking from a point of view that will appeal to the people of this country, although it may not appeal to a lot of empty benches or to some of my friends who know more about the question than I do. But they will allow me the privilege of talking over their heads to 6,000,000 people of Canada and I shall begin with one who has a continental reputation in this country, not only in the United States but in Canada and probably in Europe.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—The hon. gentleman is not referring to Mr. Borden?

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—No, he has not been able to express the views this man gave utterance to. George Washington, on his retirement from public office said, in his farewell address:—

Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political morality, religion and morality are indispensable supports.

Remember these are George Washington’s words, (Counsel of wisdom). He proceeds:—

In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labour to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politicians, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and cherish them.

How many pious men throughout this country and the United States do not cherish these principles. It is no later than last week in the conference of a church a bishop said,—

Hon. Mr. DOMVILLE—What church?

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—I think it was the Methodist or Baptist. I am sure it was not the Episcopalian. Last week a bishop declared under his mantle, before his colleagues in the ministry, that nothing of religion should be taught in the schools, that all should be public, that God should not be mentioned. Washington foresaw that 125 or 130 years ago. He said that not merely politicians but pious men should respect and cherish these principles of morality and religion in education. He also said:—

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A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, where is the security for property for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice ? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principles.

These are the words of a man who has founded the most prosperous republic the world has ever seen. Unfortunately the children of that republic have not followed out his advice and his precept—unfortunately, not for him, but for themselves, these precepts laid down by the founder of the American republic have not been carried out in their system of public education, and here let me say that the Prime Minister of this country as well as the Secretary of State were perfectly justified in alluding to the condition of things in the United States and trying to prove that the moral condition of things in the United States was largely attributable to their system of public schools. They were more than justified, and I have in my hand the authority of bishops, of the ‘Protestant Press’ and of the presidents of different universities at Harvard and Yale, telling the people of the United States to be on their guard against the irreligious and godless instruction given to the youth of the United States. We find the press of Canada inveighing strongly against the Hon. Secretary of State and the Hon. Prime Minister of this country for having asserted things about a neighbouring country, saying that they were going from bad to worse in regard to the moral development and practices of the United States people. Not that we on this side of the line are going to claim any palm of virtue higher than theirs; but in argument it is allowable to refer to this matter, and the press in this city have thought fit to write as follows :—

The Public Schools and Religious Education.

It was fearful to eliminate the name of God from the schools as in the United States, and it led to murders and other crimes. There was no country where more improper practices were carried on than in the United States.—Senator Scott, in support of motion for second reading of Autonomy Bills in the Senate.

This is taken from the ‘Journal,’ and that paper comments as follows:—

In using this language the Secretary of State evidently though he could not do better than follow the example which the leader of the government set when introducing the Bill in the House of Commons. Whether, however, Sir Wilfrid will thank him for so close an imitation of what he cannot after reflection have regarded as a very successful portion of his own speech, is a little doubtful. The general view of the Canadian press was that such reflections upon the policy in the first place, and the moral condition in the second, of a neighbouring country, with which it is important we should maintain relations of mutual friendship and respect, were not in the best taste. Senator Scott either did not see or did not heed such criticism, for his language is, if anything, a shade stronger than that of his leader. Canada is in these days making a loud bid for a degree of political independence only short of national sovereignty ; and it would be more in keeping with her claims if her leading public men showed that sense of responsibility in their remarks about other countries which the public men of sovereign nations usually exhibit.

The hon. Secretary of State did not go beyond the truth one iota when he stated that the principal men of the United States, the leaders of thought in the United States, the men who are aiding in the development of the United States, are the men who declare the system in the United States based upon irreligion is a system that is bringing down the nation every day, corrupting its youth and leading it astray. Take the ex-minister of China ; he is a pretty good judge. This is what the ex-Chinese ambassador at Washington, Wu Ting Fang, Chinese Minister to the United States, said at Philadelphia, April 2, 1902 :

I have visited many of your colleges and schools. My candid judgment compels me to say that there is something here that is lacking. Unless that I am grievously mistaken, your system of education is directed merely to mental training. In America you have in your educational system everything but moral training.

The representative of four hundred millions of our fellow-men in the great East, Wu Ting Fang, tells the United States people in the city of Philadelphia, that they had everything in their schools except morality. What can you expect of youth where there is no morality ? Can you get honest men ? Can you get fair honest lawyers ? Can you get scrupulous doctors ? Can you get bankers who will not rob banks and wreck them ? Can you get men on whom the United States can rely ? The Chinese Minister tells the people of the United States that the only thing lacking in their education is morality. Let us see what the little Jap. says. I do not suppose any

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body will laugh at the little Jap. He is the predominating figure in the east, and perhaps will become so in the west also. The little Japanese ambassador to the United States says:

You teach too much mathematics.

And he is no bad judge. The last two years and a half have proved to the world that if there is any student since Cicero who is worth anything it is the Jap. He has learned more in twenty-five years than any other race. He knew nothing thirty or forty years ago in regard to warfare, manufacturing or commerce. He knew very little outside of his own home, and I say to-day that the best student we have ever seen is the little Jap, learning all that we know, learning all the arts of war and peace. The little Jap who thirty years ago was unknown and unthought of, is to-day able through constant love and fidelity to his country, to take a foremost place; and although his God is not ours, our people look to the Jap for an example now. What has made him victorious throughout this war? Is it not the fact that he cares not for death, because he dies for his ancestors and dies for his God. The Jap spoke as follows:

You teach too much mathematics. In Japan we teach our children manners.

And that is what the Hon. Senator Sullivan advocated the night before last. The little Jap continues:

Then we teach them morals. After that we teach them arithmetic, for arithmetic without manners and morals makes men and women sordid.

There is the line of public education in Japan to-day creating one of the foremost nations on earth. They teach their children morals and then they teach them arithmetic, not as we do, not like the United States people, not like the French. We teach them arithmetic, the A B C’s, we teach them history, very often false and badly written; we teach them a lot of stuff, and then during the last half hour, when the poor little things are tired, we allow them to know that there is a God and allow them to know that they owe a duty to their fathers and mothers and a duty to the state; and that is what we get and we are thankful for it. Let us take pattern by these people who know not the true God and who have all kinds of gods, but as many as they have they respect them. The Jap proceeds to quote Holy Scripture, and he says:

Holy Scripture teaches: Train up a child according to his way, and when he is old he will not depart from it.

There is pagan philosophy which should bring a blush of shame to the cheek of every Christian father and mother who says: ‘My child, go not to school to learn respect for your Creator, go not to school to learn respect for your neighbor; go not to school to learn manners; go to school and learn your A, B, C’s and arithmetic.’ Because our government asks this parliament to grant half an hour for the teaching of religion an agitation is raised in this country for which there is no excuse and which is a blot upon the fair name of this country. I say that it is within the rights of each senator to put upon record his views in regard to this matter. They may not bear fruit at the present moment, but in days to come the children of these Doukhobors, the children of these Galicians, the children of these Russians and Mormons, reading extracts from the debates of the Senate will observe that there were men on the floor of this House prepared to stand for the rights of the youth, prepared to stand for what a boy or girl needs; not so much arithmetic, as the Jap says, but what the boy and girl need to know is that over and above all there is a higher authority to whom they owe respect and obedience. In the future days in the Northwest Territories they will pick up the records of the Senate and read the speeches made thirty or forty years previously. How proud we are, old representatives in this Senate, to find glorious passages in the debates of the past appealing to the people for the consecration of the principles of liberty. Are we not proud to read the speeches of Baldwin, Lafontaine, Papineau and others who have illustrated the history of Canada? Let us set an example of toleration and fair-play, of men who want to do for their fellow citizens all that can be done to make them good, moral, God-fearing and patriotic people. I know that I am not speaking to the honourable Senate here to-night, but I am speaking to millions of people who are now inhabiting our country, and the millions who will come to this country in the days to come and letting them know that there

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was on the floor of this House a man who was prepared to stand up for what is best in human life; for what is best in the building up of the country; what is the best for the youth of our country. I stand here prepared to advocate principles along that line. The debate to-night probably will not convince this honourable House, but it is a question of placing our views on record for the benefit of future generations.

Hon. Mr. PERLEY—Nobody will read them.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—I do not care; 40 or 50 years from now they may be read. My hon. friend from Lauzon has alluded to the part played by the Orange Society in this agitation against Catholic schools. I have great sympathy for these people. I believe the most of them are really sincere, but unfortunately like every other good organization there are spirits that get into them and lead them astray. The Orange order is not an order simply for the benefit of religion or religious purposes. It is largely in the hands of our friends the Conservative party. Consequently, when we charge the Conservative party with raising an unnecessary agitation it is their own fault, because after all it is well known to those who have anything to do with public life in Ontario and Quebec, that the members of the Orange organization are good men 364 days in the year. There is only one day in the year when they get a little excited and it is not their fault, but it is caused by the men who control the destinies of that organization. Am I going to blame them? They are taking human means to accomplish a human end, but if they stop at politics and beat the Liberal party with their regular organizations I would have nothing to say. But to keep up the association there are two or three friends, like Dr. Sproule and others, who go among them and get them to pass resolutions which are diametrically opposed to religious toleration and religious liberty. All I have to say is that these leaders are teaching them a bad lesson, which is calculated to develop ill-feeling in this country. I will admit that we felt sore on account of these protests against our religion, denouncing our method of worshiping God and our class of schools.

We have felt bitter in the old days, but for the past 15 or 20 years I take it with the milk of human kindness, and I say, after the twelfth of July all will blow over and things will be the same again. In the meantime I say the leaders of the Conservative party use those good people—and there are no better neighbours than the same men—use them for their own purposes, and when a case crops up they get their lodges together and get some gentleman into the pulpit to make fire-brand speeches. I say we do not care in the least for all that they may say or write or protest against. We simply put it down, I won’t say to ignorance, but to a little fiery inspiration. Still I say that there are just as good men in the Orange Association as in St. Joseph’s or St. Patrick’s societies or any other society, but unfortunately they are made dupes of and we used to suffer in the olden days because of it. I remember in the city of Montreal when people could not walk on the 12th July without heads being broken, but in these days the Orangemen may have a procession every day in the year and they will not be troubled. The sun of liberty, the sun of tolerance is rising in the Orange lodges of the world. In Ireland ten days ago one of the grand masters of the Orange lodge, Mr. Sloan, M.P., of Belfast, a member of the Orange lodge met his fellow Orangemen and said: ‘Boys, it is time we should bury the hatchet, we Protestant and Catholic have been fighting too long and squabbling too long over matters of no account. Let us get together and wipe out these prejudices of religion.’ That is the effect of his speech as reported in our Canadian papers. Let us get together and fight as one man for the liberty of our country, for its improvement and for its welfare. There is the new doctrine that is coming into the lodges of Orangeism, and I welcome that declaration of policy with all my heart. I welcome that declaration of policy from old Belfast, and I hope that the hon. leader of the opposition, who is a power in the counsels of Orangeism in this country will inculcate it into the minds of his followers, that he will get Dr. Sproule, the grand master, to bring it before his lodge and have that principle adopted. Then the

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empire will be united, then the Irishmen will go to battle, not only with courage, but with pleasure—they never went otherwise than with courage. There are many hon. gentlemen here to-night that are good friends of the Orangemen from one end of the country to the other—I do not hold them personally responsible, but I hold their leaders. And let me refer to what happened here five months ago, at the time I was called to order by my hon. friend from Halifax when this Bill was introduced in the House of Commons by Sir Wilfrid Laurier. To my mind the Prime Minister made a most memorable speech, the most effective and the most brilliant speech ever made by any statesman in this Dominion.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Except yourself.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—And if a vote had been taken on that occasion, I venture to say that if clause 16 had stood, there would not have been one man in the House of Commons to vote against it, but unfortunately parliamentary procedure forced them to lay the measure on the table and unfortunately for Canada it gave Dr. Sproule 24 hours to think of it.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—And Mr. Sifton.

Hon. Mr. CLORAN—I will come to Mr. Sifton. I do not spare a man who inflicts an injustice on any class of population of this country, whether it be Mr. Sifton or Dr. Sproule. Dr. Sproule had 24 hours to consider the questions of Sir Wilfrid’s speech. What was the result? Next morning he had his secretary sending out his stereotyped resolutions to every lodge throughout Canada, some 2,000 or 3,000, asking them to denounce in inflammatory language the Bill presented by the Prime Minister, asking them to stand up, if necessary, in arms and rebel against the privileges, what he called privileges accorded under the original clause 16. That afternoon I rose in this honourable House and I attempted to call the attention of the government to the fact that there was a man in parliament responsible to the people who had issued an inflammatory appeal to rise in arms, and I was about to ask the government if they would tolerate such action on the part of any citizens, but before I could get through my hon. friend from Halifax said there was nothing before the House.

True, but there has been a great deal before the House since then, and if that agitation had been nipped in the bud we would not have had six months of debate in the House of Commons, never would the seventy-five members of the opposition have bolstered up a debate for five months if they did not have behind them the resolutions from 2,000 lodges. Never would they have attempted to strangle the rights of the minority as far as they could, if that agitation had been nipped in the bud. But no. The procedure in this honourable House, the same as the procedure in the other House, allowed the agitation to proceed, and we are obliged to be here at 12 o’clock at night, a hot summer night, defending the principles for which the government is prepared to stand and which the opposition at the time was prepared to vote for, if it had not been for the 24 hours delay. There is the position in regard to this agitation. I have no ill-will or ill-feeling against these hon. gentlemen at all. They are doing it for a political purpose. If they did not trespass on ground where they should not be, and interfere with the religious rights of others, I would simply laugh the thing to scorn, but after all when you are attacked by no matter how humble a person, you have to defend yourself. I say the Orange Order has nothing to fear from the Catholics of this country, absolutely nothing, neither through the Pope or Monseigneur Sbarretti. They have nothing to fear from the hierarchy in this country, because if there are defenders of liberty in this Canada of ours who uphold the Gospel and want to see the people happy in our midst, it is the Pope and the hierarchy and the clergy of this country and you never hear our hierarchy or our clergy, either monks or sisters, in the pulpit or on the platform, denounce Protestants or dictate to Protestants how they shall send their children to school. No, they occupy their time with their flock. They do not divide their attention. They do not pass their Sundays in making political speeches and harangues. They pass their time in developing the principles laid down by Christ in the gospel. They pass their time in teaching charity, peace and love to all. How often on a Monday morning you find in the press denunciations of the most fierce character delivered from pulpits of all kinds from

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Toronto, from Winnipeg or from other centres wherever a reporter can find his way. On a Monday morning you are sure to meet with a denunciation of the Catholic people and their way of living and dealing with the children. What have they to do with that? As long as we remain true and faithful citizens of this country, as long as we do not come before the courts of our country, what business is it of theirs? What have these lodges to say in regard to our conduct? This question that has been raised to-day is bound to accomplish great results for the peace and harmony of this country, notwithstanding the contradictory sentiments expressed. When it is all boiled down in the columns of history and considered in cool thought, we will be brothers. We are brothers except on these momentous occasions of the exhibition of bigotry, fanaticism, intolerance, or whatever you may choose to call it. None of that comes from our side. Why do not our brothers on the other side drop it, and give their attention to the material development of the country, and educate their children as they please? We do not interfere with them. But as the father of a family, I say I would rather have my boy and girl follow the example of the little jap, I would rather have my little boy and girl cultivate manners and morals and nothing else, if they could not know anything else without falling into these errors. I appeal to these people to give to their children the education which will make them solid citizens, responsible citizens, and let me say this; not that religious education is to make the boy or girl perfect. Human nature is weak in youth as well as in old age. You never can get perfection in human life. Moral or religious education does not make the boy or girl impeccable. The girl and boy are liable to fall at any moment, and they do fall, even with religious and moral education, as well as those who have none. But what is the difference? A boy who is brought up in a religious home, whose religious education is maintained in the schools, I say has this advantage over the youth who has not had that religious education. A boy who is brought up in a religious school has received a moral and religious education. Another boy perhaps has no respect for anything but himself. He does not recognize any higher authority than himself. He has no God to kneel to. He has nothing to answer to but his own responsibility and what happens. Two of them go on a lark when they commit some little crime, or a big one. The boy who has no moral responsibility goes home without any fear or compunction, and jumps into bed as if he had committed no crime; while the other who has been brought up in the fear of God, who has committed the same act as the other boy, goes home and feels sorry. He says if I had to do it over again I would not do it. You have a chance of making a good citizen of that boy although he has been guilty of a crime. But as to the other, let every one beware, if that boy enters the medical profession he will be the most amiable instrument in producing to-day what is the ruin of the United States nation, the ruin of France; or he may get into the legal profession and he will swindle his client or if he becomes a banker he will think nothing of wrecking a bank and appropriating two or three millions. There is the position of matters. A boy who has the fear of God in his heart—and he can only have it by constant inculcation—is the man that will become a good citizen in the long run. It is really amusing to hear fathers of good families not only in this House but elsewhere stating that it only takes half an hour to inculcate religion into the soul of a child. At the very same time it takes one or two or three years to teach the child the A B C’s, that one and one make two and three and four make seven; and public men, supposed statesmen, want the child to understand and to comprehend and follow the precepts and the principles of the greatest science under Heaven, the most difficult to get at the bottom of, and they give him half an hour in the day when he is tired and used up, while they give him five hours a day to learn the A B C’s. In support of the stand taken by the hon. leader of the government in regard to the condition of things in the United States, in connection with the system of public schools I wish to quote certain authorities not in any way connected with Catholic writers or Catholic compilers but all from Protestant authorities, from Daniel Webster and others, and even from President Roosevelt, who spoke before the Long Island Bible Society as follows:—

There is in the English language no word more abused than that of education. The

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popular idea is that the educated man is one who has mastered the learning of the schools and the colleges.

It is a good thing to be clever, to be able and smart, but it is a better thing to have the qualities that find their expression in the Decalogue and the Golden Rule.

There is President Roosevelt talking of his own educational system. I have another extract from Disraeli, or Lord Beaconsfield, as he is called. Lord Beaconsfield said:

A system of national education without religion will produce a national calamity more disastrous to the state than to the church.

In France the people are trying to drive God and His Son out of the school course, trying to drive God and His representatives out of the schools. A disaster will overtake the country, but will not overtake the church for ‘the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.’

An article by Right Rev. H. Frodsham, who is the Protestant Bishop of North Queensland, in the ‘Nineteenth Century and After,’ pleads for religious teaching in the public schools of that Australian state. These schools are now thoroughly secular, the Acts secularizing education having been passed in the decade commencing 1870. Says Bishop Frodsham:

In the first flush of victory the exponents of secularism logically excluded everything that might be considered to trench upon the peculiar work of the churches. They were guilty even of the vandalism of excising from the late Mr. Longfellow’s ‘Wreck of the Hesperus’ the verse commencing, ‘And the maiden raised her hands in prayer.’

Last week at a conference of the Southern Methodist Society at Alexander, Virginia, the local paper reports that the Rev. Dr. Hammond urged upon the conference the importance of religious education. ‘Leave religion out of the education,’ he declared, ‘and education affords no basis of life.’

I quote from a statement by the Rev. Wm. Dwyer, of Cambridgeport, Massachusetts, on morality in public schools before the Boston educators:

It is possible I know to make a theoretical distinction between morality and religion and there may be some individuals made of better clay than their fellows who are moral without being religious; but, universally speaking, morality is practically impossible unless it finds its motives in religious truth. The attempt to teach morality in our schools independently of religion will inevitably end in failure. Not one of the methods which educators have proposed can possibly succeed as long as positive religious teaching is neglected.

Now as the introduction of positive religious teaching into the public schools under the present system is impossible, it is evident that the defect which I have tried to point out is radical. To the question, then, as to the means of increasing the moral power of the schools, I must answer that nothing can be done toward this end that will have any efficiency until a radical change has been made in the school system itself, a change that will remove the one obstacle to the true cultivation of the moral character of our children. This may involve more than most Americans are willing to permit. Until the change is made, however, I cannot see how our public schools will produce a moral people.

It is indeed a cheering sign that the subject of moral training in the schools is receiving the serious attention of educators throughout our country. If discussed solely on its merits, without prejudice, the problem which the subject presents will soon be solved to the satisfaction of all our people.

A Protestant minister, the Rev. A. C. Dixon, D.D., writing in a Protestant contemporary, says:

A young man in a New York town, after two years in a college where there is a learned professor who has written theological books, informed his mother that he no longer believed in her bible or her Christ. He informed her that three-fourths of the students in the college had been turned from faith to infidelity by the teachings of the learned professor, whose personality was so winsome that they could hardly refuse to believe all he said. In another institution of learning a reformed Jew who flatly denies the deity of Christ and has not hesitated to slander the Virgin Mary, conducts the devotional services in the chapel for a week.

So its seems that Catholics are not the only ones that see the danger of entrusting their young men and women to the unchristian influences of the secular institutions of higher learning.

Bishop Grant, of the African Methodist Episcopalian Church, said at the opening session of the Indiana conference on September 24, 1903:

Say what we will the Catholic Church is wise in providing their own schools to educate their children. They tax themselves from $2 to $2.25 to support these schools. We must learn a lesson from them and build and support our own schools thus seeing to the religious training of our children.

Rev. Dr. John H. Burrows, said to the Christian Endeavourers, at Detroit:

In France the state schools have proved a prodigious ethical failure, because the highest truths and motives of action were not inculcated in them.

He added: Criminal statistics,

in France as well as in America, indicate that there is a horrible failure somewhere in the education of youth.

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The ‘Methodist’ writes editorially, as found in the ‘Literary Digest,’ Vol. VII., No. 7, p. 181:

In our judgment the denominational schools of the land as compared with the purely state schools, are, on moral grounds incomparably the safest. Our state institutions, as a general thing, are the hot-beds of infidelity not less than of vice. We have said and we thoroughly believe that our church should invest $10,000,000 in the next ten years in denominational schools. Why? Because we believe that this system is the American one and the only safe one.

The ‘Christian Union,’ as found in ‘Literary Digest,’ as above, (Independent) says:

The time has come for a vigorous war upon the popular notion that religion can be excluded from any system of education. The secularization of the public schools is false in psychology. It assumes that a child can be divided up, like a tenement, into different rooms, part developed and part left undeveloped. This is not true. It assumes that religion is something apart from life. This assumption of religion is wholly pernicious.

The ‘Outlook,’ a prominent Protestant Journal, says editorially:

Most of the graduates of our schools and colleges pass through a course of study in which religion is ignored. Its place is largely taken by philosophy and ethics, the result is that the student learns to know, think, and feel independently of any recognized religious element. Religion which is at once the mainspring of life, is suffering from a disaffection which arises from the present isolation of religious instruction.

The ‘Churchman,’ (Protestant Episcopal) says editorially:

Of one thing we are sure, if we leave God and Christianity out of the daily round and common task of the school it will be the rare home and exceptional Sunday school that will supply the deficiency and the state will suffer in its citizenship.

The President of Harvard University is at present reviewing the educational progress of the nineteenth century, and The ‘Lutheran’ of January 14th, 1904, gives the following glimpses in advance of the progress he is making. The President of Harvard says:

It is indisputable that the country has experienced a profound disappointment in the results thus far obtained from a widely diffused popular education. We have not escaped an increase of crime and insanity. The popular taste for immoral and unwholesome amusements is stronger than ever. It is well enough for us to say we cannot be responsible for the sins of the nation, that the hopes of the fathers were over-sanguine and that the work of the school must be much more limited than the assumption described. But even with the limits which we of the schools assume to be our field, our own men say we are not efficient.

The correspondent of the ‘Lutheran’ who reported the above, commenting on it, says:

Does not all this mean, in brief, just what the church (Lutheran) is always urging, that education needs to be supplemented by religion? That spiritual culture can alone save America from heathen vice.

The following words by Arthur T. Hadley, LL.D., President of Yale University, were part of an address delivered by him on the 160th anniversary of the Second Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia, and never before published until found in the ‘New York Independent’ of December 31, 1903. In part he says:

There are two extreme views concerning the effects of education on public morality. One is held by the advocates of separate schools; the other is held by the advocates of church schools. The advocates of secular schools believe that good teaching will of itself make good citizens. They hold that a large part of our vice is due to ignorance; and that if you remove the ignorance you will do away with the vice. Up to a certain point all this is true. When you teach your man to write you make him less liable to commit larceny, but you make him much more liable to commit forgery. When you teach a man political economy and law you lessen the temptations and opportunities for acts of violence; but you do not lessen those for acts of fraud. Few of us who have looked into the statistics of education and crime are optimistic enough to deny that they are quite disappointing. The improvement due to the removal of illiteracy amounts to something, but does not amount to so much as we should like to see, or as was promised by the early advocates of our public school system. The opponents of that system often point to these statistical results with ill-concealed satisfaction. They say that such consequences are just what you might expect from any system of purely secular education. They would have the training of the intellect supplemented by a special system of religious education, which should teach the pupil to use his knowledge for the service of God and the benefit of his fellowmen. They look with great apprehension upon the spectacle of free citizens trained in the knowledge of many things, which may prove of use to them individually, but not trained in those ideas of religion and morality which have been rightly regarded as essential to the safety of civilized communities. I confess that I share some of the apprehension of those advocates of church schools; but I am very far from agreeing with them as to the proper remedy. I believe that both in school life and in after life the moral training and the secular training must be so interwoven that each becomes part of the other.

The President of Princeton says in advocacy of the religious idea:

A father may well feel that his son’s refined demeanor would be a poor off-set for his loss of religious faith.

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President Hyde, of Bowdoin College, said before the Massachusetts Teachers’ Association of Boston, November, 1896:

The public school must do more than it has been doing if it is to be a real educator of youth and effective supporter of the state. It puts the pen of knowledge in the child’s hand but fails to open the treasures of wisdom to his heart and mind.

Dr. Butler, of Colby College, Maine, says:

We are beginning to see, that it is as unscientific to ignore the moral and religious element in education as it would be to ignore the facts of physiology, hygiene or psychology. Morals and religion are just as much a necessary part of human life as digestion or sleep. If you do all else and neglect the part that has to do with the sense of individual responsibility to one’s fellowmen and to God, you run immense risk, not only of making all else useless, but of making it a positive menace to self and society.

Professor Brumbaugh, former commissioner of education to Porto Rico, said recently before the Philadelphia Mothers’ Club:—

All persons are divided into three classes—immoral, moral and religious. The immoral person lives below his best thought; the moral person lives up to his best thought; the religious person is willing to accept a guide above thought. Religious principles should be taught in the public schools. A child should be taught reverence for religious things from his earliest period of consciousness.

Dr. Levi Seeley, of the State Normal School, Trenton, N.J., says the more educators come to realize that there is a philosophy of education, the more profoundly convinced are they that there is something radically lacking in the American School System.

The same Dr. Seeley, said in the ‘Educational Review,’ for February, 1898:—

A little less than 50 per cent of all the children in our country frequent any Sunday school. The meaning of these figures is simply overwhelming. More than one-half the children of this land now receive no religious education. Even this feature does not show all the truth. It seems to admit that those who attend Sunday school are receiving proper religious instruction, but every know’s this cannot be granted.

E. D. Ward, of Washington, D.C., in a letter to ‘The Churchman’ (Episcopalian), dated, April 23rd, 1904, says:—

I never pass one of the Roman Catholic church’s many institutions for the education of her children without doing inward obeisance to her wisdom and faithfulness in regard to this all-important duty; or without an ardent longing that our own beloved branch of the church Catholic could have her eyes opened to the great work that she could and should do in the same field.

In the public schools we are confronted by the problem, How much and what religion can be taught? The sacred beliefs of the Christian clash with the heresy of the Jew and the unbelief of the atheist. Consequently, religious instruction, or even observances, have to be done away with or reduced to the minimum. With what results? We have hardly begun to appreciate them yet, though they are already clearly visible around us.

The Roman Catholic church regards this state of things and makes her protest; then, quietly and without loss of time, goes to work to do the only thing that is to be done, erects her own schools and provides her own educational requirements. With what results? Clearly are they, also visible, in her growth and vigour. She reaps abundantly that which she has wisely sown. Do we need to hear again the saying of the wise man of old, ‘Give me your son till he is ten years old, and you may have him for the rest of his life.’

Do we of the Protestant Episcopal church think it a small matter that the youth of the church or the nation be trained up in schools in which the Christian faith is not taught as the all-important element of education? Or is this the time that religious instruction in schools can be safely done away with, when the demands of business and society are making heavier and heavier drafts upon the time of the parents of families and the burden of all instruction, moral and spiritual, as well as mental. is being cast more and more on the teacher and master?

Addressing the Newman Club of Los Angeles, Cal., recently, Charles F. Lummis, the well known editor and writer, who is not a Catholic, delivered a ringing address. Among other things he said:—

The fact is that the Catholic church and its schools are the pioneers in Indian education in America. It was not until 1807 that an English speaking person came to Mexico. In 1617 there were eleven Catholic churches in New Mexico, and all had their Catholic Indian schools. The reason why I am opposed to this campaign (against Catholic Indian schools) is because these are the only schools I know of that are doing the Indians lasting good. Not because of the religion, which is nothing to me, although it is the Indian’s religion to a great extent. I do not believe that one should be taken from his father’s faith or his mother’s faith for the whim of a school teacher. I am judging by the long results. I have not known a child from a Catholic school who had forgotten his parents or his language. I have not known any of the girls that have gone wrong in the Indian towns to have come from a Catholic school. Not one. But I have known a good many from Carlisle and other government schools. Go with me to that exquisitely neat and motherly school of Sister Margaret, at Bernalilo; go with me to the Albuquerque or to the Santa Fe school, and then let a man of the world judge which of those he would choose as a place for his children. If there is any motherly heart in the world, when mothers and fathers have fled away, it is the sister of charity. There is something unselfish in that work of love. But I have learned some things of experience. In boyhood I thought they were terrible, but I have seen, when the black ‘vomito’ raged in tropics, and mothers and fathers fled away from their own

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children and people fell in the streets, those daughters of God picking up the deserted dead and dying. And I have felt their tender mercy myself, and when a man comes to me and says that a child—or a dog—had better be taught by a politician who is rewarded by a place in a government Indian school than by a sister of charity, he wants to bring his fire escape with him, that’s all. And it seems to me that any American, not to say any Catholic American, could not better employ part of his money than in aiding the support of the Indian schools conducted by these noble and unselfish women, now frowned upon and even actively antagonized by the partisan spirit of our politicians.

At a recent meeting of the Milonian Society, a teachers’ club of Brooklyn, Principal D. Claire, of public school No. 211, gave a summary of the most important criticisms of the public schools. Here is an extract from his paper:—

Fighting Bob Evans criticises New England education, our model, in unfitting boys for manly labour. Each morning he says at the Boston navy yard gate came a big line of well-dressed boys with shabbily clad parents, begging me to enlist them as apprentices to save them from the pool-rooms and worse. There were fellows ashamed of their honest parents who had pinched themselves that their offspring might dress like gentlemen. I almost had in my heart the hope that every high school would burn to the ground and every boy and girl would be compelled to work with their hands to make a living as their parents did before them.

Rabbi Hirsch (there are other prominent writers who concur) declares that our present education fails to produce moral fibre. Crime is increasing. Forgers are good penmen. Actors of immoral plays are good readers. Writers of lewd books are masters of rhetoric. Illustrators of obscene literature have been taught how to draw. Embezzlers are skilled mathematicians. All of the arts we teach in school are capable of making vice and crime more effective. The moral balance is lacking. Without it, education is not only a failure; it is in too many cases an evil success.

Judge Fenton, of Boston, says literacy is not enough: I do not ask the criminals any longer: ‘Can you read and write?’ Every one can do that now. They have all been to school. The outside of the cup and the platter have been cleaned. The times demand a vital reform. Education is ready for a complete revolution.

Editor Edward Bok tells his readers every month that it is putting the truth mildly to state that, of all the American institutions, that deals with the public education of our children is the most faulty, the most unintelligent and the most cruel.

The men who speak out thus are not Catholics, and their criticisms cannot be disposed of in that old-fashioned way of saying that Catholics never have a friendly word for the public schools. Protestant critics are now emphasizing the weak points of the system. It is noteworthy that almost all agree with the Catholic critics.

Catholics may not be aware that the late Marcus Alonzo Hanna was really a staunch advocate in high places of the claim of the Catholic church. P. J. O’Keefe, tells of some rare compliments which Mr. Hanna paid to our faith. Some three years ago President McKinley was particularly anxious to learn the Catholic view of the administration’s policy in the Philippines. Mr. Hanna introduced, at a special audience, his life-long loyal friend, Rev. P. M. Flanagan of Chicago, saying:—

Mr. President, I know this man well and can vouch for who and what he is and the great service he has rendered to his church and country; and I want you to bear well in mind his words. And I will go further, Mr. President, and say to you that the day is not far distant when we shall have a greater crisis in this country than that we just passed through. The Catholic church has at all times furnished some of the most loyal defenders of our flag, but look we to it to do more. The day is coming when treason will rear its head and socialism become rampant and in that hour, Mr. President, (and I am not afraid to say it here or elsewhere) the flag must rely on its staunch friends, and among them, in my opinion, our greatest protectors will be the Supreme Court of the United States and the Roman church.

And again, speaking to a particular friend in most scathing terms of the socialistic agitator and anarchist, Mr. Hanna paid this tribute:

There is a crisis coming on which will have to be met, and the sooner the better. There is no place, and there must be none, in the country, for anarchy and treason. In this connection I once said that in the day of trouble the United States must look to the Supreme Court and the Roman Catholic church. I will go further now and say that I believe the best friend and protector the people and the flag of our country will have in its hour of trial will be the Roman Catholic church, always conservative and fair and loyal. That is the power I look to to save the nation.

Wherein, then, does the Catholic Church possess that wonderful power for good which this late lamented and great statesman attributed to her? Certainly in this one fact, that she teaches her children from infancy both in her schools and in her churches that all power and authority of state justly exercised is from God. Herein she has the ear of her children, herein she has the power for good which Mark Hanna attributed to her—and for this she is admired by many, envied by some, a blessing to all and the hope of our nation.

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The great Mr. Gladstone said:

Every system of education which leaves out religious instruction is a dangerous system.

Gentlemen, take that home and sleep on it to-night, and see if the government of Canada has done too much for the Northwest. Ask yourself in your consciences if by clause 17 the Canadian government has outraged the constitution of this country, in providing that the children of the intelligent people of the Northwest may learn to worship God and live with Him and by Him and learn His commandments. Ask yourself if Sir Wilfrid Laurier has given too much to the people of the Northwest or that he has coerced the people of the Northwest, and you will say to-morrow, ‘No, he has not given them enough, but we will vote for it as the best we can get.’

The amendment was declared lost on a division.

On clause 17,

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I object to this clause as it is framed. It says:

(1) Nothing in any such law shall prejudicially affect any right or privilege with respect to separate schools which any class of persons have at the date of the passing of this Act, under the terms of chapters 29 and 30 of the ordinances of the Northwest Territories, passed in the year 1901, or with respect to religious instruction in any public or separate school as provided for in the said ordinances.

This is a change in the British North America Act. What does the British North America Act say? It says:

Nothing in any such law shall prejudicially affect any right or privilege with respect to denominational schools.

I call the attention of the honourable House to the change of the British North America Act. By this clause the father of the Bill has done away with denominational schools and substituted for those schools the separate schools. I contend that the denominational schools and separate schools are not the same thing at all. If you look at the British North America Act you will find by subsection 1 that it deals with denominational schools, and it declares that everything that is enacted against denominational schools which any persons have by law in the province at the union is unconstitutional. Nothing of the kind is provided by the British North America Act in regard to separate schools. Subsection 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act reads as follows:

Where in any province a system of separate or dissentient schools exists by law at the union or is thereafter established by the legislature of the province, an appeal shall lie to the Governor General in Council.

So that there is this difference. The British North America Act by the first subsection assures the existence of denominational schools where those denominational schools exist in the province when the province comes into the union and when it is recognized by law. Subsection 3 of the British North America Act deals with separate schools, and provides that in regard to all separate schools existing at the time of the union or which may be acquired after the entry of the province into the union an appeal shall lie to the Governor General in Council if anything is done against the rights which have been acquired by the minority in regard to such separate schools. So that you have the two things, the denominational schools recognized by subsection 1, and the separate schools recognized by subsection 3. In the Bill which is presented to us to-day, the first clause of the British North America Act is mutilated, and in place of recognizing the denominational schools the Bill declares that it shall be separate schools. I think that may be an oversight.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—No.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Is that done intentionally?

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—There is really no distinction. The British North America Act speaks in two other places of separate schools but different terms are used. In the Manitoba Act we also changed the wording of the British North America Act in reference to that word ‘practice.’

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I do not admit that at all. I contend that the British North America Act by subsection 1, deals with denominational schools and by subsection 3 deals with the other. A denominational school is not a separate school, neither is a separate school a denominational school. The words are not synonymous. A denominational school is a school in which the principles of a denomination are inculcated into the pupils’ minds, but a separate school is quite different. A separate school may be denominational and it may be undenominational. Take for instance the law as it exists now in the Northwest Territories. In.

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a district where the Catholics are in the majority, their school may be denominational then the school of the minority shall be a separate school. It may be a separate school, but it will not be a denominational school if it gives no religious teaching. Take now the province of Quebec; a school in any one of our townships where the Protestants are in the majority, or in Ontario the public school would be a neutral school, a school in which no religion is taught in any way. Where the minority are Catholics the school will be a separate school, but at the same time it will be a denominational school where religion is taught. So that there is a marked difference between separate and denominational schools. It is not the same thing, and by the first subsection of section 93 of the British North America Act, every province in the Dominion is granted its denominational schools, except the Northwest, where we deny that right to the class of persons who would come under the British North America Act, and we insert the words ‘separate schools,’ restricting thereby the rights of the minority. Separate schools are given by the British North America Act under the third subsection, and are subject to an appeal to the Governor General in Council who gives the remedy in case of any infringement of rights, but the denominational schools are assured by law against any infringement on the part of the local authority. I move that the words ‘denominational schools’ be substituted for the words ‘separate schools’ in this clause so as to put the denominational schools in the Northwest on the same footing as they are in the other provinces of the Dominion. This is an amendment which the government should accept.

Hon. Mr. SCOTT—No, it is not.

The amendment was declared lost on a division.

Hon. Mr. McMULLEN—The hon. gentleman is pressing very strongly to change the wording from ‘separate schools’ to ‘denominational schools.’ Does my hon. friend know that there is a Mormon settlement in the Northwest? Is he prepared to extend the same privileges to them?

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—No.

Hon. Mr. McMULLEN—That will do it.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—No. I will prove the contrary.

Hon. Mr. McMULLEN—These people have their schools to which they are now sending their children. If you make this change you include them along with the rest.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—No. The law says: ‘Which any class of persons have by law in the province at the time of the union.’

Hon. Mr. McMULLEN—They will have it under this.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—There was never any law guaranteeing them any schools.

Hon. Mr. McMULLEN—They have it by practice.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—No. That word applies to Manitoba, and not to the Northwest. They must have it by law, and I contend that by the law of 1875, those denominational schools were given to the Catholics. They were given to the majority in the Territories where the majority was Catholic and the separate schools were given to the minority in the different school districts. Hon. gentlemen will see that by restoring the word ‘denominational,’ it cannot apply to Mormons, or Galicians or any other foreigners.

Hon. Mr. PERLEY—I have drawn an amendment in conformity with the utterances of the hon. Secretary of State and the Minister of Trade and Commerce. I beg to move:

To strike out the said first subsection and to substitute therefor the following:

1. 1. In any Act by the legislature of the province, it shall always be therein provided, that the minority or majority in any school district, whether such minority or majority be Protestant or Roman Catholic, shall have the right to have the doctrines of their religious faith, taught during the last half-hour of any school day, to the children of parents professing such religious faith, always provided that teachers, inspection of schools, and examinations, shall be under the control and direction of the provincial government.

The amendment was declared lost on a division.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—That is only affirming the principle laid down by the Secretary of State in introducing this Bill, and affirmed by the Minister of Trade

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and Commerce, and if that be the meaning of the law, why should you leave it open for discussion hereafter. Why not make it plain so that he who runs may read and know what he is doing. It is almost verbatim the language used by the Secretary of State, and if that be the meaning of the clause it should go on record, and be made plain, unless it is the desire to leave it open for discussion in the future and create turmoil.

Hon. Mr. PERLEY—I give notice that I will move that amendment on the third reading.

Hon. Mr. BERNIER—I move that all the words after ‘this Act,’ in the third line of said first subsection, to the word ‘with’ in the fifth line, be struck out.

In striking out those words it would put the Northwest under the operation of the Act of 1875. Whatever may be their rights, they might go to court and have them ascertained. If they do not choose to go to court that is the end of it, and if they are satisfied they may go on. If they go before the court, then their privileges and rights may be determined. Whilst if we tie them down to chapters 29 and 30 of the ordinances they cannot do anything. We are taking away from them all the rights they have.

The amendment was declared lost on a division.

Hon. Mr. LOUGHEED—I move that clause 17 be struck out for reasons already stated, that the British North America Act already automatically applies to the subject of education, and that under clause 3 of the Act the provisions of the British North America Act having been applied to the Bill in its entirety render it entirely unnecessary.

The amendment was declared lost on division.

On sub-clause 3,

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—I move that this section be struck out and the following be substituted:—

1. 17. Section 93 of the British North America Act, 1867, shall apply to the said province with the substitution for paragraph 1 of the said section 93 of the following paragraph:

1. 1. 1. Nothing in any such law shall prejudicially affect any right or privilege with respect to denominational schools which any class of persons have at the date of the passing of this Act under the terms of imperial and federal laws, or with respect to religious instruction in any public or separate school as provided for in the said laws:
      2. In the appropriation by the legislature or distribution by the government of the province of any moneys for the support of schools organized and carried on in accordance with said laws, there shall be no discrimination against schools of any class described in said laws.
      3. Where the expression ‘by law’ is employed in subsection 3 of the said section 93, it shall be held to mean the law as set out in imperial and federal laws, and where the expression ‘at the union’ is employed, in the said section 3, it shall be held to mean the date at which this Act comes into force.

The amendment was declared lost on division.

The clause was adopted.

On clause 24,

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—This is the clause to which I referred the other day with reference to the Canadian Pacific Railway exemptions. I just want to put myself on record in reference to this matter. This is a question where I think, perhaps, the members from the Northwest should state their views. I do not know why this clause appears in the Bill at all. If the federal parliament were within their rights in passing the legislation at the time it was passed before, I do not see that it is necessary to have it in the Bill. But I want to say that at some future time a discussion may arise in connection with this matter. The Northwest will have to be relieved of this some day, and it might be held that it was the duty of the province, or that the province should themselves undertake to negotiate with the Canadian Pacific Railway to get a release of this exemption from taxation. It is a very serious proposition to the people of the west. The federal government gave $25,000,000 towards the building of this road, and we find out—I am not going into the figures, but I have figured it out—that this exemption amounts to more each year than would pay the interest on the $25,000,000. It is taken out of the people of the west. This railway was built for the benefit of Canada as a whole, and that being the case the whole Dominion should when the time comes—as no doubt it will—obtain a release of this. I do not think it should be saddled on the people.

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of the two provinces, because they have no right to pay it. It is the Dominion that should assume the liability.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—What does the hon. gentleman want to pay?

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—If my hon. friend wants to know what we propose to pay I may say this matter was discussed in the other House and the hon. gentleman has read the speeches—

Hon Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—No.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—It is proposed to get a release of this exemption—to buy out whatever rights were granted to the Canadian Pacific Railway Company under their contract. I do not think it would be right to make away with that exemption. If parliament wished to exercise the right they could annul that part of the contract between the Canadian Pacific Railway and the country. But I think we must stick to our contract. It will have to be paid in the near future.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—Does the hon. gentleman approve of clause 24?

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—No, I do not approve of it at all.

Hon. Mr. LANDRY—The hon. gentleman will swallow it.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—Is this not asking too much? It is a grave question, particularly the one raised by the hon. gentleman who has just resumed his seat. I differ from my hon. friend in toto from the view he takes upon the question. The land was not the property of the Northwest nor is it now.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—The land exemption will work itself out, because the lands will be sold. But that is not the question.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—If they are sold they will be subject to taxation and the Canadian Pacific Railway exemption will cease to exist.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—Yes; but as to the rolling stock and road-beds the exemption still exists.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—Unless you want to buy the exemption which exists in reference to the taxation of rolling stock.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—Yes, that is it.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—I do not know why the Dominion government should do that. You would never have got the road if it had not been for the concessions made at the time. The hon. Secretary of State knows the difficulties that they had in trying to get a contractor to build that road. They are aware of the fact that they offered larger concessions than were actually given by the government which succeeded them, and had it not been for these concessions there would be no Northwest to talk about—I mean no people there to talk about. However extravagant the terms of building that road were, they were the only terms upon which capitalists could be secured to build that road, and at that time we supposed we were giving very little as far as value was concerned. You could have bought all that land at one dollar per acre, and when $30,000,000 were advanced to the Canadian Pacific Railway, in the settlement of that claim they paid back $20,000,000; the government took land back to the value of $10,000,000, at the rate of $1.25 per acre. It does seem to me that this kind of argument and demand is downright repudiation. The land was originally bought by the Dominion as a whole. In securing the construction of the road to unite the Pacific coast with the eastern section of the Dominion, the country was pledged to do what they did, and it was thought a good bargain at the time, but because the construction of that road has made the whole Dominion valuable, and particularly that part of the Dominion, the gentlemen who now occupy the country think they own it. I think that the concessions were not too great and that we ought not to have an agitation as to buying them out. They have a right and we have a road. The road has made the country and we should not grumble about it.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—Does the hon. gentleman say that road was built for the benefit simply of those two provinces or for the benefit of the whole Dominion?

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—Certainly not for the benefit of the two provinces alone, because there were no provinces at the time. There were nothing but half-breeds and a few hunters. It was built to develop the country, which it has done.

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Hon. Mr. DAVIS—It was built for the benefit of the whole Dominion.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—Yes.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—Does the hon. gentleman think the two provinces should be loaded up with an exemption on $20,000,000 of property for the benefit of Canada, without getting something in return?

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—They are not loaded up.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—I consider that an exemption which amounts to something over $750,000 a year, with the small population in those provinces, is a loading up. I understand the statement was made by the Prime Minister in the House of Commons that in the near future some steps would have to be taken by the people of this country with the object of making some arrangements with reference to that exemption.

Hon. Sir MACKENZIE BOWELL—That was to please the gentlemen from the Northwest.

Hon. Mr. DAVIS—The hon. leader of the opposition made the statement that he thought something should be done, that some arrangements should be made with the Canadian Pacific Railway, whereby we should get a release of that exemption. So that we have the statement made by the hon. leader of the opposition, and the statement made by the Prime Minister, that they consider it nothing but right that the people should be relieved from that liability, and that something should be done with reference to it. Our object is to put ourselves on record that it is the Dominion government that is responsible and not the people of those two provinces, because we will have two railroads in the future, as I pointed out the other night, and they will build branches all over the west, and the exemptions will be worth more than all the grant we are getting from the Dominion Treasury. In that case I think it would be better for us to go in without a subsidy or capitation tax of any kind, and that we should be relieved of this incubus placed upon us by the government some time ago. This road was built to bring British Columbia into confederation, and to develop the country, and Canada is getting the benefit of it. Canada should undertake the settlement of this liability.

The clause was adopted.

Hon. Mr. ELLIS from the committee reported the Bill without amendment.