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Date: 1865-06-28
By: Montreal Witness
Citation: “The Politics of Mystery and Suspense”, Montreal Witness (28 June, 1865)
Other formats: TBA

THE POLITICS OF MYSTERY AND SUSPENSE.

The uncertainty which for several months past has hung over the destiny of Canada exerts a very depressing influence. A year has gone by since the new policy of a Confederation of the Provinces was inaugurated, and the measure was long since hurried to a conclusion through the Legislature. From that time we are at a standstill. Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick, two of the partners in the new Confederacy, have rejected it. Our principal ministers have gone to England as a delegation, our national fate being committed to the discretion of three or four gentlemen. Since then we have only rumors of their doings, and of the intentions of the Imperial Government, but nothing reliable. Some ministerial papers speak confidently of the great success which attends the exertions of the delegates, while opposition papers affirm just the contrary, and, after all, the real state of Canadian affairs remains an impenetrable mystery.

Shall we have Confederation or not? We cannot have it unless the refractory Provinces of the Gulf change their mind, and they are not at all likely to do it, unless some external pressure is brought to bear upon them. This the Canadian delegates have the credit of having recommended in London, although their friends deny it, and, it is to be hoped, have good ground for doing so. All the good we might expect from Confederation would be paralyzed if the Maritime Provinces join us under a sense of compulsion. We are assured that such will not be the case, and that they will be left at perfect liberty to decide their own course. But, at the same time, we hear that the British Government will withdraw from them favor and protection until they join the Confederacy and the refusal to pay hereafter the salary of the Governor of Prince Edward Island is a first step in that direction. It is useless to attempt disguising the fact that this is an external pressure brought to bear on the reluctant people, which they will not fail to trace to Canadian influence, and justly too. We have been the first movers in the scheme; it has originated in the Canadian Legislature, and been urged less for its own sake than for helping out of a bad fix our political parties, and now our ministers are in London to press it upon the Imperial Government. Under these circumstances it is evident, that if the Maritime Provinces join us, they will come as unwilling partners, and bear us no kind feeling for having been, more or less directly, the promoters of coercion among them.

The negotiations of the ministerial delegates are supposed, however, to refer mainly to the question of defence, fortifications, and loans, under imperial guarantee. The Gazette has semi-official information that a formal decision upon the demands of the Canadian government would be given to our ministers on the 10th inst., and probably announced in Parliament on the 12th. If such be the case, the country will soon be relieved from that prolonged uncertainty which is extremely injurious, and shakes confidence in the future. Whatever our national fate is to be, let us soon know it, even if it be for the worse. Every one then will be able to shape his course, instead of being held in a state of suspense and disastrous inactivity. The Canadians surmises that inasmuch as a new imperial parliament is soon to be elected, and Mr. Gladstone is likely then to become prime minister; nothing definitive will be done till then in reference to Canada. The new parliament will decide whether it is best to retain the connexion of the colony or not, while Mr. Gladstone will be very adverse to any expenditure for the sake of Canada.

When, however, the Gazette, the Globe, and the Minerve, supposed to be the best informed papers as to the movements of the delegates, speak of their success, they can scarcely mean anything else, but that the fortifications will be built, and the imperial guarantee will be secured to a Canadian loan. This success is certainly one at which the country will have little cause to rejoice. The eventuality in view of which the great system of defence was to be inaugurated, has passed by. The American war is over, and the Federal armies are being disbanded. If an invasion of Canada was seriously contemplated by our neighbors, it would already have taken place. The time for it is now gone. Every day renders it more improbable. Morally, politically, and physically, the causes and facilities for aggression are on the wane. As a nation we would be held demented by the rest of the world if at the present juncture, burdened with debt as we are, and in the midst of financial depression, we were to rush into new and unprecedented sacrifices to ward off a danger after it has well nigh ceased to be. The uncertainty of our future relations with the British Empire, and the mystery with which our Government have shrouded their movements, have given of late free scope to annexation discussions. This it is no use to deny or attempt to conceal. Even the French Canadians, whom Mr. Cartier represented, at the Fishmongers’ dinner, as looking upon annexation with “perfect horror,” are now discussing the question with favor, even in such moderate papers as L’Ordre; and the Minerve sorrowfully owns to the progress of the abominable heresy. It only requires now the much vaunted success of our ministers in London, in order, by the increase of our debt and taxation, to give a great impetus to the movement. And then it will be found that those who talked in such overbearing language in behalf of loyalty and fortifications were the blind but industrious promoters of that annexation they so indignantly deprecated.