THE NATIONALIST ERROR.
The leaders of our Nationalist School have for years strenuously
laboured to pervert the mind of our French-Canadian compatriots by the
false pretensions that we were, in some mysterious way, coerced to
participate in the European War. Even previous to the days of the South
African conflict, they boldly took the stand that Canada should, on no
account, and under no circumstances whatever, participate in what they
called the Wars of the Empire--_les guerres de l'Empire_. Canada, they
affirmed, had only to defend her own territory if attacked.
Fully appreciating how insidious and dangerous such theories were, I
endeavoured to show, as forcibly as I could, that there had been no
attempt by England at coercion of this Dominion to help her in the
struggle against Germany. Of course, as previously explained, Great
Britain being at war with the German Empire, the whole British Empire
was at war. But no one in England ever intended to propose to force the
colonies to engage actively into the fight. The Imperial Parliament
would certainly not have taken into consideration any such proposition.
But is it not plain and beyond discussion that we, _ourselves_, had the
undoubted right to intervene in the war to the extent that we would
consider it our bounden duty to do so?
Evidently we could not remain neutral in the great conflict. At the very
moment that Great Britain was at war with Germany, Canada, a British
Colony, was part and parcel of the belligerent Sovereign State, the
British Empire. By an incredible misconception, the Nationalist leaders
confounded _neutrality_ with _non-participation_ in the war, if we had
so decided.
To be, or not to be, neutral, was not within our constitutional rights.
If Germany, either by land or by sea, had attacked our territory, as she
had the undoubted belligerent right to do, would it have availed us an
iota to implore her mercy by affirming that we were neutral? Could we
have pretended that she was violating neutral territory?
No one with the least notion of International Law would for a moment
hesitate to give the true answers to those questions.
But the very different question to participate, or not, in the war, was
for us alone to decide according to our constitutional charter. We have
freely, deliberately, decided to do our share in the great war. We
continue and persevere in our noble task, freely and deliberately.
It is admitted by all that under the actual constitutional organization
of the Empire, the Imperial Parliament could not require the autonomous
colonies to participate in the war. But no one can assuredly deny to
that Parliament the right, in the case of an imminent peril, to
formulate the desire that the autonomous colonies would help Great
Britain to conjure the threatened calamity.
But, in the present case, the Imperial Parliament has not even been
under the necessity of expressing such a legitimate wish, for the
obvious reason that the colonies at once took their patriotic stand in
favor of the cause of England and her Allies. If the colonies had not so
decided, of their own free will, it is most likely that the Imperial
Parliament would not have expressed the wish for the assistance of the
Dominions overseas.
The hearty support granted by the colonies to Great Britain, to develop
its full value, had to be spontaneous, enthusiastic. Such it was, such
it is, and such it will be to the last day of the conflict which
victorious conclusion we are so strongly determined to achieve.