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Two Speeches on the Union of the Provinces (^fMKiTWO SPEECHES ON THE UNION OF THE PROVINCES, BY HON. THOS. D'ARCY M^GEE, M.R.T.A., MINISTER OF AGRICULTURE, CANADA, Ac, &c. PRINTED BY HUNTER, ROSE & CO., 26, ST. URSULE STREET. 1865. — aI THE UNION OF THE PROVINCES Note.—At the request of several friends throughout the Province, the following Speeches, (the first delivered at Cookshire, County of Compton, December 22, 1864, the second in the Legislative Assembly, on the 9th February, 1865,) have been printed in their present form. Quebec, March 1, 1865. Hon. Mr. McGrEE on rising, was received my own views on the nature of the constitu- with cheering, and said : tional developments which have been pro- Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen,— jected by the late Colonial Conferences, to show on what principle the project stands, I promised my respected friend, your to illustrate by comparison and contrast the county member, Mr. Pope, to meet him at merits of our design, and to show, in closing, the recent public dinner given to my col- its special adaptability to our present situa- league, Mr, G-alt, at Sherbrooke, and to come tion as British American Provincial com- over here with him to Compton to speak to munities. you on the subject of British American Union. I was, greatly to my regret, prevent- THE TIME FAVORABLE. ed, by a sudden and sharp illness, from being At the start I cannot but congratulate the present at the Sherbrooke dinner ; for there people of all the Provinces on the fortunate is no public man in Canada whose services to conjunction of circumstances which makes the Union deserve all honorable acknowledg- this the best possible time for a searching ment more than Mr. G-alt—(cheers)—and examination and a thorough overhauling of there is no place in the country I had rather our political system. When I was in the u discuss this question than in the Eastern Eastern Provinces last summer—when the Townships." (Cheers.) I am here to make Conferences were still a thing to come— good your member's promise in my behalf, appealed on behalf of the project to the press and I am deeply thankful that I am able to and the public there, that it should not be be here, and have still a voice to raise in prejudged, and I must say I think a very behalf of this cause. (Cheers.) This is a great degree of forbearance and good feeling border country—it is a country actually was manifested in this respect. But I should undergoing its colonization—it is the home be sorry, speaking for myself, n,ow that the of a mixed people, various in origin, in stage of intelligent discussion has been language, and in creed—and, therefore, a reached, now that we have got something very fit place to consider propositions which before us to discuss, that such a vast scheme must interest men of all languages, ori- should pass, if that were possible, subsilentio. gins, and creeds, which involve all our So far from deprecating discussion now, I future relations among ourselves and with should welcome it, for there could not be, our neighbours, internal and external. So there never can be, a more propitious time far as I can help it, gentlemen, I will not for such a discussion than the present. trouble you with what has been said before (Cheers.) Under the mild sway of a Sove- by my colleague in the Grovernment at other reign, whose reign is coincident with respon- meetings; but I will endeavour to give you sible government in these colonies— Sovereign whose personal virtues have ren- It was with a view to contribute my mite at dered monarchical principles respectable the present stage of the discussion, that I even to those who prefer abstractedly the accepted Mr. Pope's kind invitation, and am republican system—with peace and prosperity now here to offer you as clear a view as I can at present within our own borders—we are put into words, of the process of reasoning called on to consider what further constitu- and observation by which those who com- tional safeguards we need to carry us on for posed the late Conferences arrived at the the future in the same path of peaceable decisions at which they have arrived, in progression. relation to the constitution and powers of the UNION, THE MOT D'ORDRE. General and Local Governments in the future And never, surely, gentlemen, did the Confederation. fHear, hear.) You have probably all read in the newspapers wide field of American public life present so busy and so instructive a prospect to the what purported to be the text—and it was very the text the conclusions thoughtful observer as in this same good near —of arrived at have no doubt all read Mr. year of grace, 1864. Overlooking all minor Yon Brown's explanations at Toronto, and Mr. details, what do we find— the one prevailing Galt's further explanations at Sherbrooke and all but universal characteristic of Ame- ; you have probably also seen two other rican politics in those days ? Is it not that expressions of opinion, on the general ques- " Union" is at this moment throughout the entire new world the mot d'ordre of States tion, in the journals of the day, one from the Honorable Mr. Dorion, who is op- and statesmen ? If we look to the far South, we perceive a Congress of Central American posed to all union, except some sort of Federation of the Canadas ; another from the States endeavoring to recover their lost Honorable Mr. Hillyard Cameron, who unity; if we draw down to Mexico, we would prefer a legislative to a federative perceive her new Emperor endeavoring to much union. I don't say that if it could be had establish his throne upon the basis of union ; by common consent, I would not be prepared if we come farther north, we find eleven to agree with Mr. but a legisla- States battling for a new Union, and twenty- Cameron ; tive union, our circumstances, was five on the other side battling to restore the under simply out of the question. might as old Union. (Cheers.) The New World We well ask for the moon, and keep asking until has evidently had new lights, and all its could get it. (Laughter.) It was a states and statesmen have at last discovered we question between some form of federative that liberty without unity is like rain in the union or no union at all ; and I am not at all desert, or rain upon granite— it produces prepared to say with Mr. Dokion, and never nothing, it sustains nothing, it profiteth was, that the greater union is not the most nothing. (Cheers.) From the bitter expe- desirable, if conditi ns can be settled satis- rience of the past, the Confederate States all parties. (Cheers.) It seems have seen the wisdom, among other things, factorily to and in saying so I intend no shadow of giving their ministers seats in Congress, to me— of disrespect to the honorable member for and extending the tenure of executive office Hochelaga that the man who can seriously fifty per cent beyond the old United States — maintain that union is not strength, that five period ; from bitter experience, also, the comparatively small communities, most enlightened, and what we may consider or six allegiance, existing side by the most patriotic among the Mexicans, owning a common side on the same continent, in the presence desiring to establish the inviolability of their of much larger communities owning another executive as the foundation of all stable allegiance, would not be stronger and safer government, have not hesitated to import, united than separate, that such a one puts not " a little British Prince/' but an Aus- himself of the pnle of all rational argu- trian Archduke, a descendent of their ancient out ment. kings, as a tonic to their shattered constitu- THE DEFENCE QUESTION. tion. Now, gentlemen, all this American experience, Northern, Southern and Central, I will take as an instance o the irration- is as accessible to, us as to the electors of Mr. ality of such an argument—the particular Lincoln or Mr. Davis, or the subjects of the question, the great test question remaining Emperor Maximillian : it lies before us, an between Canada and England : the question open volume, and invites us to well read, of defence. (Hear, hear.) The future mark and digest its contents. (Cheers.) General Government has reserved to itself; — — saving the sovereignty of England, the con- was issuing his rather inconsistent declaration trol of our militia and military expenditure. against a political union as among other Every one can see that a war with England reasons, wholly unprofitable in a commercial and the United States would be largely a point of view—and in favor of a commercial naval war, and such a naval war as the ocean union as all that was to be desired in itself, has never before seen— (hear, hear)—a war at that moment, the first steamship, laden that would interest and stir the heart <$&. with breadstuff's, direct from Montreal to England even beyond the pitch that m ade her**- "ISTewfoundland, was dropping down the St. staid merchants astonish Lloyd's in 1813, Lawrence, as a result of the partial and brief with u three times three cheers/' when they intercourse, brought about between the two heard that the " Shannon" had fought and communities, through our Conference at Que- captured, and carried the " Cheseapeake" a bec ! That is a fact not very important in prize into Halifax harbour.
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