I was indeed most astonished to read Mr. Bourassa's inference from those words that Sir John A. Macdonald had affirmed the absolute equality of powers of the Imperial and the Canadian Parliaments.
If the opinion expressed by Sir John A. Macdonald could be so interpreted, he would have affirmed—what was radically wrong—that under the new Constitution, the Canadian Parliament would have, concurrently with the Imperial Parliament, absolutely the same powers. What did that mean? It meant that the Canadian Parliament, just as the Imperial Parliament, would have the right to edict laws establishing Home Rule in Ireland, regulating the government of India and the Crown Colonies, granting constitutional charters for the good government of the Australian and South African Dominions, &c., &c.
Surely it is not necessary to argue at any length to prove that Sir John A. Macdonald never for a moment entertained such an opinion. What he really said, in the above quoted words, was that within their constitutional jurisdiction, within the limits of their respective powers, the two Parliaments stood in the same position, respectively, with regard to the people of England and to the people of Canada. It was equivalent to saying—what was positively true—that the British Ministers and the British Parliament were responsible to the people of England, and that the Canadian Ministers and the Canadian Parliament were responsible to the people of Canada,—both of them within the limits of their respective constitutional powers.
If the Canadian Legislature had enjoyed all the constitutional powers of the British Parliament, she would not have been obliged to pass addresses asking the latter to enact a new charter creating the Federal Union of the Provinces. She could have repealed her then existing constitution and enacted the new one by her own authority. But that she could not do. She could not repeal the old, nor enact the new charter.
But the most extraordinary is that Mr. Bourassa went so far as to declare that Canada should have participated in the present war only as a "Nation," meaning, of course, as an independent Sovereign State.
On reading such a preposterous proposition, at once it strikes one's mind most forcibly that if Canada had really had the power to intervene in the world's struggle as a "Nation," she would have had the equal right to the choice of three alternatives.
First:—Declare war against Germany and in favor of the Allies.
Second:—Remain neutral.
Third:—Declare war against Great Britain and fight for Germany.
For it is obvious that all the Sovereign States—and Canada like them all if she had been one of them—had the Sovereign Right to fight for or against Great Britain, or to remain neutral. Of course, I am merely explaining in its entirety the Right of a Sovereign State. I surely do not mean to say that Canada, had she really been such a State, would in any way have been justifiable in joining with Germany in her dastardly attempt to crush Civilization in the barbarous throes of her domination.