When I had finished, Lord Charles Beresford made a speech that was quite friendly to my proposition, saying, “that the time had arrived when we had to do something to bind the Mother Country and the Colonies more closely together, and to do something also by which we might mutually benefit by the trade of the Empire, in view of the enormous competition directed against us by the rest of the world.”
Sir Guilford Molesworth and Mr. Ernest E. Williams then spoke strongly supporting me. They were followed by Mr. Faithfull Begg, who made a short but remarkably clever speech. He began by saying, “Is this the London Chamber of Commerce? Can I believe my eyes and ears? I have sat here and listened to what I am satisfied was the strongest attack upon Free Trade that has been heard in these walls in two generations, and in an open discussion no one has said a word in defence of the old policy. I was a Free Trader and I can no longer support the principle, but will no one say a word in defence of the old cause?” This taunt brought up a Mr. Pascoe, who used a number of stock arguments of the Cobden Club school. General Laurie, Admiral Sir Dalrymple Hay, Sir S. B. Boulton, and the Chairman, Sir Fortescue Flannery, then followed in speeches distinctly favourable to my proposition, and the meeting closed.
The effect of this meeting cannot be better shown than in the editorial comments of the Financial News of the next day, the 14th June, 1902:
It was indeed a remarkable gathering which assembled at the London Chamber of Commerce yesterday to hear Colonel Denison speak upon the National Food Supply and cognate trade questions; and the essential feature of the meeting—more essential if Colonel Denison will allow us to say so, even than his own speech—was that to which Mr. Faithfull Begg drew attention when he announced his surprise that in a discussion upon Free Trade versus Protection, no one, in that erstwhile typical house of Free Trade, stood up to champion the old cause. Most of those present were in Mr. Faithfull Begg’s own position; they had recently been forced by the logic of events, from acquiescence in or championship of Free Trade, into a conviction that it would no longer do. True, Mr. Faithfull Begg’s challenge brought forth a solitary advocate of the discredited philosophy; a young man to whom the meeting listened with obvious impatience; for as General Laurie said, every one of his points had been answered in advance by the lecturer, and the quality of his arguments might be gathered from the fact, that among them was an assertion that, as an explanation of our adverse trade balance there was no question as to there being anything in the nature of an export of securities in progress! That this should have been the only voice raised upon the Free Trade side would be a mightily significant circumstance in any gathering of business men; but to those who are familiar with the London Chamber even in its recent history, the significance is greatly heightened. For a body professedly independent, there was, until the other day, no association in England (unless it be the Royal Statistical Society) more thoroughly and openly upon the Free Trade side in the economic controversy. With the surrender of the London Chamber of Commerce it is really time to dictate conditions of peace.
This was a conclusion to my campaign far beyond my most sanguine expectations. It was a coincidence that about the time I concluded my campaign at this successful meeting, Dr. Fred W. Borden, Minister of Militia of Canada, who had lately arrived in England, in an interview with Mr. I. N. Ford, representative of the New York Tribune, stated that I represented nobody’s views except my own, and pretended that he did not know of me even by name, until Mr. Ford let him understand that he was too well informed for that to be accepted. In an interview with one of the London newspapers he also spoke in a hostile manner of me and my views. As he had been quite friendly to me personally when we had met a day or two before, I was at a loss to account for his action. After consideration, I came to the conclusion that the Canadian Government had taken up some new position upon the question of preferential trade, and that I was wrong in my previous belief that I was working directly in their interests and in accordance with their views in a general way.
Mr. Ford telegraphed on the night of the meeting to his various papers across the Atlantic, the following account of my concluding words at the London Chamber of Commerce:
Colonel Denison closed his series of addresses in the United Kingdom on a tariff for Imperial Defence by a speech before the London Chamber of Commerce in which he announced that he represented the British Empire League in Canada, and had accomplished his purpose. This had been to raise the question of a British tariff for defence and business. The subject had been discussed in Parliament, and had been taken up by the Press throughout the Kingdom. The Dominion Ministers would be in England next week, and the responsibility for carrying the question into the Imperial Conference or dropping it altogether would be theirs not his.
When I sailed for home Mr. Ford cabled:
Colonel Denison will sail for Montreal to-day. He has gone so far and so fast in presenting the plans of the British Empire League of Canada that neither Imperialist nor colonial has been able to keep abreast with him. His views on a war tax around the Empire are not considered practicable by the Canadian Ministers, but the energy with which he has forced the business side of Imperial Federation upon public attention here, is generally recognised.
The Annual General Meeting of the British Empire League was held on the 7th July, where the Hon. George W. Ross and I represented the Canadian Branch. I moved a resolution which Mr. Ross seconded. I spoke as follows: