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Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la m6thode. 32X 1 2 3 4 6 t I i ■ 1 ■^- /4-. r THE MANITOBA SCHOOL QUESTION BEING A COMPILATION OF THE LEGISLATION, THE LEGAL PROCEEDINGS, THE PROCEEDINGS BEFORE THE GOVERNOR- GENERAL-IN-COUNCIL. I II 1 AN HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF THE RED RIVER OUTBREAK IN 1869 AND 1870 ITS CAUSES, AND ITS SUCCEBS AS SHEWN IN THE TREATY— THE MANITOBA ACT AND A SHORT SUMMARY OF PROTESTANT PROMISES. JOHN S. EWART. TORONTO : THE COPP, CLARK COMPANY (LIMITED), PUBLISHERS. 1894. LB2511 HA t-5 tUriR' 143537 y s TO THE MEMORY OF Alex., Archbishop of St. Boniface, O.M.l. MY CLIENT AND FRIEND. THIS WORK IS INSCRIBED In the hope that it may be of some avail in that struggle for liberty, to which was arduously given so much of his failing strength. fOHN S. EWART. V p' CONTENTS. ClIAPl'ER I. Paoh. British North America Act 1 Manitoba Act 1 Manitoba School Acts prior to 1890 2 Manitoba School Acts, 1890 3 Act regulating the reference to the Supreme Court 5 Chapter II. Barrett vs. The City of Winnipeg — Affidavit of Dr. Barrett 6 •* Archbishop Tach4 7 " Dr. Bryce. 8 " Mr. .Hespeler 10 " Mr. Poison 10 " Mr. Sutherland 10 Judgments of Canadian Courts 11 Chapter III. Logan vs. The City of Winnipeg — Affidavit of Mr. Logan 11 • ' Bishop Machray 12 Letter of Mr. Howell 16 Affidavit of Mr. Hay ward 16 ** Mr. Poison .17 *' Dr. Bryce 18 " Mr. Wood 19 " Mr. Cumberland 20 " Mr. Howell 20 Chapter IV. Privy Council Judgments in both cases 21 ▼i CONTENTS. CUAPTRR V. PlOB. PfltitionB to Dominion (lovernment and Actions of fiovernmont thereon — Petition of monihers of U. C. (Church, August, 1890 28 Order-in-Council 4th April, 1891 31 Petition of inenihera of It. C. Church, 20th Hepteniber, 1892 M " Archbishop Tacht'-, 22nre8ented 67 Order-in-Council, 22n«l February, 1893 68 •• " 22nd April, 1893 68 «• •' 8th July, 1893 69 " " 3l8t July, 1893 70 Case submitted to Supreme Court 70 Judgments of the Supreme Court 72 Petition of R. C. Hierarchy 112 Order-iu-Council, 26th July, 1894 118 FA.RT II. LR'n'ERs, Lfxti'hes and Articles ok the School Question. Arch. Tacho — Thinks his ideas with regard to religious instruction in soliools fully corroborated in England 123 " — Are the Public Scliools of Manitoba the Continuation of the Protestant Schools of the same Province 't 139 Bishop Machray, Adtlrcss before Anglican Synod, 1889 160 " " " " 1893 170 Rev. Dr. King, Lecture, Manitoba College 179 Rev. Principal Grant, Letter 196 Rev. Dr. Duval, Sermon 198 Mr. James Fisher, Speech in Legislative Assembly 206 Rev. Dr. Laing, Letter to Mr. Ewart 214 Mr. Ewart, Reply to Rev. Dr. Laing 217 •' Open Letter to Mr. Greenway 220 " Reply to Criticisms 231 " The Week," Leading Article 241 Mr. Ewart's Reply 243 Leading Article : 247 Leading Article 251 Mr. Ewart's Reply 262 Leading Article 254 ''0NTKNT8. VU Paoii. Mr. D' Alton MuCarthy, Article 1»56 Mr. Kwart, Ihiiib in tho .Scliools 263 Dr. Hryuo, Tho Mnnitoha School Question 'J77 Mr. Lo Suoiir, Stute Kducatioii ami " Inmn " *J>S4 Mr. Kwurt, Tlie Manitolct School (^ucntiou 'JIM) Mr. Joatiph Martin, Kxtiact fiom .\(ltlreiig : .S04 Hon. Mr. iiiiiiricr, Kxtract fioni Speech 'MU> Mr. D'Alton McCarthy, Kxtract from Speech .'{(IT ^ TlIK .> vr. I. II. IK. IV. V VI. VII. VIII IX X XI XII XIII XIV. XV XVI XVII XVIIl MANtTditA Arr as a Tkkatv. -1'kotkstant I'iiomisks. — Introductory . . 'HI The Ued Kiver Settlers .'{M — Cau.ses of the Outbre.ik — I'roceed with the Surveys .SIO — Hon. Wm. McDon^all at IVml.ina .'{.'C) — Novemher and early l>ecemli(M' at Ittd liiver ■'{•_".• — Mr. Mcl)()iij,'all, still at I'emliina ;«(> — " ('all to Arms," and what came of it ,'< H — Mr. McDouHall still at rend)ina .^45 — Canadian Commissioners — Delegates to Ottawa — Tro- visional (iovernmeiit M47 — The Portage Kscapade .■{")') — The Prisoners -Thomas Scott. : ,St)() — The Legislative AsseniMy .SG4 — The lied Kiver Delegates and the List of Kigiits — The Manitoba Act .StJG — Ked Kiver iluring the absence of Delegates .S7S — Return of one of the Delegates .'{82 — Col. Wolseley — Outrages against the Metis — Fenian In- vasion 384 — " Kebelhon " and Success 389 — Protestant Promises 394 PART I. CHAl'I'KR I. THE STATUTES. TIh* t'u'Ht ro(|uiHilo for a |»r()(i«r uiidorKtiindiiiir of the Muuitoba School C'HHe is fiiiniliuiity with the HtiitiitcH. ThoH(i are : y extended to the dissentient schools 01 the Queen's Protestant and Roman Catholic subjects in Quel)ec. (t3) Where in any Proriun' a Mi/.tli'in of separate or dissentient srhools ejcists by lav) at the Union, or is therenj'er estahlished by the Leyislature of the Province, an appeal shall lie to the Governor-General in Council from any act or decision of any Provincial authority aflfecting any right or privi- Manitoha Act. In and for the Province the said fiCgislature may exclusively make laws in relation to education, subject and according to the following pro- virtions : (1) Nothing in any such law shall prf judicially atfect any right or privi- lege with respect to denominational schools which any class of persona have by law or practice in the Pro- vince at the Union. (2) An appeal shall lie to the Gov- ernor-General in Council from any Act or decision of the Legislature of the Province, or of any Provincial [1] THE STATUTES. [Part I, lege of the Protestano or Roiiiau Catholic miuority of tlie Qiieen'a sub- jects in relation to education. authority, aOFecting any right or privi- lege of the Protestant or Koniau Catholic minority of the Queen's sub- jects in relation to education. is. ■■ A- (4) In case any such Provincial law as from time to time seems to the Governor-Ciener.il in Council requisite for the due execution of the provisions o.^ this section is not made, or in c:i,£.e any decision of tlie Governor-General in Council, on any appeal under this section, is not duly executed by the proper Provincial authority in that behalf, tlien, and in every such case, and as far only as the circumstances of each case rei^uire, the Parliament of Canada may make remedial laws for the due execution of the provisions of this section, and of any decision of the Governor-General in Council under Lhis section. (."?) In case any such Provincial law as from time to time seems to the Governor-General in Council requisite for the due execution of the provisions of this section is not made, or in case any decision of the (tovernor-General in (Council on any appeal under this- section is not duly executed by the proper Proviucial authority in that behalf then, and in every such case, and as far oidy as the circumstances of each case may require, the Parlia- ment of (Janada may make remedial liiws for the due execution of tlie pro- visions of this section, and of any decision of the (•nvernor-General in Council under this section. Application of B. N. A. Act. Do the piovisions of tlie B. N. A. Act just quoted apply to Manitoba, or is Manitoba governeil solely by the corresponding, provisions in its own Act ? Tliis question depends upon the construction of section two of the Manitoba Act, which is us follows r " 'The provisions of the B.N.A. Act, 1867, shall, except those parts thereof which are in terms made, or, by reasonable intendment, may be held to be specially applicable to, or only to aftect one or more, but not the whole of the Provinces now compositig the Dominion, and except in so far as the same may- be varied hi/ this Act, be applicable to the Province of Manitoba in the same way, aad to the like extent, as they apply uo the several Provinces of Canada, and as if the Province of Manitoba had been one of the Provinces originally united by the said Act." Manitoba School Acts Prior to 1890. The following is a summary of the Provincial legislation prior to the passing of the statutes of 1890 — those which gave rise to the controversy. It is taken from the judgment of Mr. Justice Dubuc in the case of Barrett vs. Winnipeg. " Under the said provisions of our constitution, the Provincial Legislature,, at its first session, in 1871, passed an ' Act to establish a system of Eilucation in this Province.' By the said Act, the Lieutenant-Governor in Council was empowered to appoint not less than ten, nor more than fourteen persons, to be a Board of Education for the province, of whom one-half were to be Protes- tants, and the other half Catholics ; also one superintendent of Protestant. fachools and one superintendent of Catholic schools, who were joint secretanea of the board. Chap. I.] THE STATUTES. "The duties of the Board were described as follows : ' Ist. To make from time to time such regulations as they may think Kt for the general organization of the common schools ; 2nd. To select books, maps and globes to be used in the common schools, due regard being had in such selection to the choice of English books, maps and globes for the English schools, and French for the French schools, but tlie authority hereby given is not to extend to the selection of books having reference to religion or morals, the selection of such being regulated by a subse({uent clause of this Act ; 3rd. To alter and subdivide, with the sanction of the Lieutenant-Governor in Council, any school district established by this Act. ' " The general board was divided into two sections, and among the duties of each section wc liud the following : ' Each section shall have under its con- trol and management the discipline of the schools of the section ; it shall make rules and regulations for the examination, grading and licensing of teachers, and for the withdrawal of licenses on sufficient cause ; it shall pre- scribe such of the books to be used in the schools of the section as have reference to religion or morals.' "By section 13, the moneys appropriated to education by the Legislature were to be divided equally, one moiety thereof to the support of Protestant schools, the other moiety to the support of Catholic schools. "The first board appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council was composed of the Bishop of St. Boniface, the Bishop of Rupert's Land, several Catholic priests, several Protestant clergymen of various denominations, and a couple of laymen for each section. " The said statute was amended from time to time, as the country was be- coming more settled, and new exigencies arose. But the same system prevailed until the Act of last session ; the only substantial amendments were that, iii 1875, the board was increased to twenty-one, twelve Protestants and nine Roman Catholics, and the moneys voted by the legislature were to be divided between Protestants and Catholics in proportion to the number of children of school age in the respective Protestant and Catholic districts. " The more noticeable change in the system was that the denominational distinction between the Catholics and Protestants, and the independent work- ing of the two sections became more and more pronounced under the different statutes afterwards passed. Section 27 of the Act of 1875, c. 27, says, that the establishment of a school district of one denomination shall not prevent the establishment of a school district of the other denomination in the same place. "The same principle is carried out and somewhat extended by sections. 39, 40, and 41 of the Act of 187G, c. 1. "In 1877, bye. 12, s. 10, it was enacted that in * no case a Protestant ratepayer shall be obliged to pay for a Catholic school, and a Catholic ratepayer for a Protestant school. ' " So it is manifest that, until the Act of last session, the school system, created by the Provincial Legislature, under tlie provisions of the constitu- tional Act, was entirelj- based and carried on, on denominatior:il principles as divided between Protestant and Roman Catholic schools." Manitoba Statutes of 1890. The following is a summiu-y of the Statutes of 1890, taken from the same judgment : At the last session of the legislature, two Acts were passed in respect to education. The first one, c. 37, abolished the Board of Education heretofore existing, and the office of Superintendent of Education, and creates a Depart- ment of Education which is to consist of the Executive Council or a committee- f y THE STATUTES. [Part I. thereof, appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council, and also an advisory board composed of seven members, four of whom are to be appointed by the Department of Education, two by the teachers of the province, and one by the University Council. Among the duties of the advisory board is the power " To examine and authorize text books and books of reference for the use of the pupils and school libraries ; to determine the qualitications of teachers and inspectors for high and public schools ; to appoint examiners for the jmrpose of preparing examination papers ; to prescribe the form of religious exercises to be used in schools." The next Act is, the Public Schools Act, c. 38. It repeals all former statutes relating to education. It enacts, amongst other things, as toUows : Section 3, "All Protestant and Catholic school districts, together with all selections and appointments to office, all agreements, contracts, assessments an rate bills heretofore duly made in relation to Protestant or Catholic schools, and existing when this Act comes into force, shall be subject to the provisions of this Act." Section 4, "The term for which each school trustee holds office at the time his Act takes effect shall continue as if such term had been created by virtue of an election under this Act." Section 5, " All public schools shall be free schools, and every person in rural municipalities between the age of five and sixteen years, and in cities, towns and villages between the age of six and sixteen shall have the right to attend some school." Section 6, "Religious Xexercises in public schools shall be conducted according to the regulations of / the advisory board. The time for such religious exercises shall be just before / the closing hour in the afternoon. In case the parent or guardian of any pupil I notifies the teacher that he does not wish such pupil to attend such religious \^ exercises, then such pupil shall be dismissed before such religious exercises take ^ place." Section 7, "Religious exercises shall be held in a public school entirely at the option of the school trustees for the district, and upon receiving written authority from the trustees, it shall be the duty of the teacher to hold such religious exercises." Section 8, " The public schools shall be entirely non-sectarian, and no religious exercises shall be allowed therein except as above provided." It provides for the formation, alteration and union of school districts in rural manicipalities and in cities, towns and villages, the election of school trustees and for levying a rate on the taxable property in each school district for school purposes. Section 92 enacts that "the municipal council of every city, town and village shall levy and collect upon the taxable property within the municipality in the manner provided in this Act and in the Municipal and Assessment Acts, such sums as may be required by the public school trustees for school pur- poses." Section 108, which provides for the legislative grant to schools, has the following sub-section: "(3) Any school not conducted according to all the provisions of this or any Act in force for the time being, or the regulations of the Department of Education, or the advisory board, shall not be deemed a t)ublic school within the meaning of the law, and shall not participate in the egislative grant." By section 143, "No teacher shall use or permit to be used as text books, any books in a model or public school, except such as are authorized by the advisory board, and no portion of the legislative grant shall be paid to any school in which unauthorized hooks are used." By section 179, "In cases where, before the coming into force of this Act, Catholic school districts have been established as in the next preceding section mentioned (that is, covering the same territory as any Protectant district), such Catholic school district shall, upon the coming into force of this Act, cease to exist, and all the assets of such Catholic school district shall belong to, and all the liabilities there- of be paid by the public school district. " / I / .r .Chap. I.] THE STATUTES. Act Regulating Referen'ck to Supreme Court. Tlie Act under which the reference was made by the Governor- General in Council (infra) is 54, 55 Vic, Cap. 25, sec. 4. Section 37 of the said Act is hereby repealed and the following substituted therefor : ,37. Important questions of law, or fact, touching provincial legislation, or the appellate jurisdiction as to Kducational matters vested in the Governor-in- Council l)y "The British North America Act, 1867," or by any other Act or law, or touching the constitutionality of any legislation of the Parliament of Canada, or touching any other matter with reference to which he sees ht to exercise this power, may be referred by the (iovernor-in-Council to tlie Supreme Court for hearing or consideration ; and the Court shall thereupon hear ana consider the same. 2. The Court shall certify to the Governor-in-Council for his information, its opinion on questions so referred, with the reasons therefor, whicli shall be given in like manner as in the case of a judgment upon an appeal to the said Court, and any judge who differs from the opinion of the majority shall in like manner certify his opinion and his reasons. 3. In case any such question relates to the constitutional validity of any Act which has heretofore been, or shall hereafter be passed by tlie legislature of any Province, or of any provision in any such Act, or in case for any reason the Covernment of any Province has any s])ecial interest in any such question, the Attorney-General of such Province, or in the case of the North- West Ter- ritories, the Lieutenant-Crovernor thereof, shall be notitied of the hearing, in order that he may be heard if he thinks fit. 4. The Court shall have power to direct that any person interested, or where there is a class of persons interested, any one or more persons as representatives of such class, shall be notified of the liearing upon any reference under this section, and such persons shall be entitled to be heard thereon. 5. The Court may in its discretion request any counsel to argue the case as to any interest whicli is affected, and as to which counsel does not appear ; and the reasonable expenses thereby occasioned may be paid by the Minister of Finance and Receiver General out of the monfy« appropriated by Parliament for expenses of litigation. 6. The opinion of the Court upon any such reference although advisory only, shall, for all purposes of appeal to Her Majesty in Council, be treated as a final judgment of the said Court between parties. 7. General rules and orders with respect to matters coming within the jurisdiction of the Court under this section may be made in the same manner, and to the same extent, as is provided by this Act with respect to other matters within its jurisdiction ; and, in particular, such rules and orders as to the judges making them seem jest for the investigation of questions of fact involved in any reference thcicunder. 6 BARUETT V. WINNIPEG. [Part I. CHAPTER. II. BARRETT v. THE CITY OP WINNIPEG. In November, 1890, proceedings were taken to test the validitv of the Provincial Statutes above summarized. The form which tho proceedings assumed was an application by Dr. Barrett (a Catholic ratepayer) to quash a by-law of the City of Winnipeg passed under the authority of the statutes. The following affidavits were filed upon that application. Dr. Barrett's Affidavit. I, John Kelly Barrett, of the city of Winnipeg, in the county of Selkirk and province of Manitoba, make oath and say : 1. That I am a ratepayer and resident of the city of Winnipeg aforesaid and have resided in the said city continuously for the past Hve years, and am a member of the Roman Catholic Church. 2. On and prior to the thirtieth day of April last a school distrct (having some years before been established) existed in the city of Winnipeg, and such school district was under the direction and m tiiagement of the corporation known as "The School Trustees for the Catholic School District for Winnipeg, No. 1, in he province of Manitoba." 3. The said corporation has established and in operation a number of schools in Winnipeg, under the provisions of the various provincial statutes relating to schools, to one of which, namely, St. Mary's school, situate on Hargrave street, I have for three years past sent my children for instrution, which children are aged respectively ten, eight and five years. 4. That the said St. Mary's school is still in existence and the same teaching and religious exer ises are continued as before the passing of the said Act, and my children still attend said school. 5. The paper writing now shown to me marked with the letter "A " is a true copy of By-law No. 4S), passed by tne Council of the city of Winnipeg, on the fourteenth day of July last, and the same is certified under the hand of the clerk of the said city and under the corporate seal thereof. 6. The said paper writing so certified as aforesaid was recieved by me from said clerk. 7. 'Ihe paper writing now shown to me marked with the letter " B" is a true copy of By-law No. 483, passed by the Council of the City of Winnipeg on the twenty-eighth day of July last, and certified under the hand of the Clerk of the City and under the corporate seal thereof, and such paper writing was received by me from the said Clerk. 8. I am interested in the said By-law by virtue of being a resident and ratepayer of said city. 9. The paper writing now shown to me marked with the letter " C " is a true copy of a requisition sent to the Clerk of the said city by the School Trustees for the Protestant school district of Winnipeg, No. 1, on the twenty- eighth day of April last. 10. The paper writing now shown to me marked with the letter " D " is a true copy of the requisition sent to the Clerk of the said City by the School Trustees for the Catholic School disti'ict of Winnipeg, No. 1, in the Province of Manitoba, on the twenty-ninth day of April last. 11. That the estimate of uU sums for the lawful purposes of the City of Winnipeg for the present year, as required to be made by section 283 of the Chap. II.] BARRETT V. WINNIPKO. •esident and Municipal Act, passed in the fifty-third year of the reign of Her Majesty Queen V'ictoria, chapter 31, were based upon the two requisitions above referred to, copies of vhich are marked with the letters "(J" and " D," as aforesaid, which requisitions were presented to the Council of said city on the iifth day of May last. 12. That the amounts of .'$75,0(K) and §2,550, mentioned in the said exhibits "C" and " \)," respectively, form part of the sum $377,744.43 men- tioned in said exhibit " A." 13. The efl'ect of the said bydaws is that one rate is levied upon all Protestants and Koinan (Jatliolic ratepayers in order to raisci the amount men- tioned in said exhibits " C" and " D," and the result to individual ratepayers is that each Protestant will have to pay less than if he were assessed for Protestant schools alone, and each Roman Catholic will have to pay more than if he were assessed for Roman Catholic schools alone. 14. I have read the affidavit sworn to in this matter on the third day of October instant, by the Most Reverend Alexander Tachu, and I say that so far as the same lies within my personal knowledge the same is true ; as to the rest, I believe the same to be true. Archbishop Tachr's Affidavit. I, Alexander Tache, of the town of St. Boniface, in tlie County of Selkirk, and Province of Manitoba, Archbishop of tlie Roman Catholic ecclesiastical Province of St. Boniface, make oath and say : 1. That I have been a resident continuously of this country since eighteen hundred and forty-five as a priest in the Roman Catholic Church, and as Bishop tliereof since the year eighteen luindred and fifty, and now am the Archbishop and Metropolitan of the said Church, and I am personally aware of the truth of the matters herein alleged. 2. Prior to the passage of the Act of the Dominion of Canada, passed in the thirty-third year of the reign of Her Majesty Queen Victoria, chapter three, known .as the Manitoba Act, and prior to the Order in Council issued in pursuance thereof there existed in the territory now constituting the Province of Manitoba, a number of effective sciiools for children. 3. These schools were denominational schools, some of them being regu- lated and controlled by the Roman Catholic Church, and others ))y various Protestant denominations. 4. The means necessary for the support of the Roman Catholic schools •were supplied to some extent by school fees paid by some of the parents of t)ie children who attended the schools and the rest was paid out of the funds of the Church, contributed by its members. 5. During the period referred to, Roman Catholics had no interest in or control over the schools of the Protestant denominations, and the members of the Protestant denominations had no interest in or control over tlie schools of Roman Catholics. There were no public schools in the sense of State sciiools. The members of the Roman Catholic Church supported the schools of their own Cliurch for the benefit of Roman Catholic children and were not under obligation to, and did not contriiiute to the support of any other schools. 0. lu the matter of education, therefore, during the period referred to, Roman Catholics were, as a matter of custom and practice, separate from the rest of the community, and their schools were all conducted according to the distinctive views and beliefs of Roman Catholics as herein set forth. 7. Roman Catholic schools have always formed an integral part of the work of the Roman Catholic Church. That Church has always considered the education of the children of Roman Catholic parents as coming peculiarly within its jurisdiction. The school, in the view of the Roman Catholics, is in a large measure the " children's church," and wholly incomplete and largely abortive it religious exercises be excluded from it. The church has always 8 BARRETT V. WINNIPEG. [Paht 1. insisted upon its children receiving their education in schools conducted under the supervision of the church, and upon them being trained in the doctrines^ and faith of the church. In education the Roman Catholic Church attaches very great importance to the spiritual culture of the chihl, and regards all education unac9ompanied by instruction in its religious aspects as possibly detrimental and not beneficial to children. With this regard the church requires that all teachers of children shall not onlj' be members of the church, but shall be thoroughly imbued with its principles and faith ; shall recognize its spiritual authority and conform to its directions. It also re(iuire8 that such books be used in the schools, with regard to certain .subjects, as shall combine religious instruction with those subjects, and this applies peculiarly to all history and philoso])hy. 8. The Church regards the schools provided for by "The Public .Schools Act," and being chapter 38 of the Statutes passed iu the reign of Her Majesty Queen Victoria, in the hfty-third year of her reign, as unfit for the purpose of educating their children, and the children of Roman Catholic parents will not attend such schools. Rather than countenance sucli schools, Uoman Catholics will revert to the system of operation previous to the Manitol)a Act, and will establish, support and maintain s^.iools in accordance with their principles and faith as aforementioned. 9. Protestants are satisfied with the system of education provided for by the said Act, "The Public Schools Act," and are perfectly willing to send their children to the schools established and provided for by the said Act. Such scliools are, iu fact, similar in all respects to the schools maintained by thti Protestants under the legislation in force immediately prior to the passage of the said Act. The main and fundamental difference between Protestants and Catholics, with reference to education, is that while many Protestants would like education to be of a more distinctly religious character than that provided for by the said Act, yet they are content with that whicli is so pro- vided and have no conscientious scruples against such a system ; the Catholics, on the other hand, insist and have always insisted upon education being thoroughly permeated with religion and religious aspects ; that causes and effects in science, history, philosophy and aught else shouM he constantly attributed to the Deity and not taught merely as causes and effects. 10. The effect of " The Public Schools Act " will be to establish public schools in every part of Manitoba where the population is sufficient for the purpose of a school, and to supjdy in this manner education to children free of charge to tliem or their parents further than their share, in common witli other members of the community, of the amounts levied under and hy virtue of the provisions contained in the Act. 11. In case Roman Catholics revert to the system in operation previous to the Manitoba Act, they will be brought in direct competition with the said public schools. Owing to the fact that the public schools will be maintained at public expense, and the Roman Catholic schools by school fees and private subscription, the latter will labor under serious disadvantage. They will be unable to afford inducements and benefits to children to attend such schools equal to those afforded by public schools, although they would be perfectly able to compete with any or all schools unaided by law-enforced support. 12. When in the foregoing paragraphs I speak of the faith or belief of the Roman Catholic Church, I speak not only for myself and the church in its corporate capacity, but for its members. Rev. Dr. Bryce's Affidavit. I, George Bryce, of the City of Winnipeg, in the County of Selkirk, in the Province of Manitoba, Professor in Manitoba College, make oath and say : 1, That I have been a resident of the Province of Manitoba since the year 1871 ; that I am the minister of the Presbyterian Church, longest resident in Chap. II.] BARRETT V. WINNIPEG. » the province ; that I have been in constant communication with the officers and councils of tlie church, having been the lirst Moderator of the Synod of Manitoba and the North-west Territories of the Presbyterian (!liurch in Canada, and I am personally aware of the truth of the matters herein alleged. 2. That I am familiar with opinions of the Presbyterians of the jjrovince in the years immediately sui-ceediug the entrance of Manitoba into Confederation in 1870, and am aware that the Presbyterians of this province did not claim to have the church schools, which liad been previously voluntarily maintained by them or by the church for them, continued to them at cost to the general public. .3, That in founding Manitoba College, in November 1881, I took over the highest class of Kildonan school as the l)eginning of the college, which had thus far continued a purely church institution, and for which I never heard the claim advanced that we were entitled to any consideration under the Manitoba Act ; indeed, I have always considered the Government schools as entirely different and, up to 1871, unknown in the country, and for several years we did take younger students into our church college who might have been educated in the (ioverument schools alongside. 4. That about the year 187(5 a strong agitation took place in the province to have one pu})lic school system established, but this agitation failed to obtain eCFect in legislation. "). Tiie Presbyterian synod of ^lanitoba and the North-west Territories, which represented the largest religious bodj' in Manitoba, passed in May, 1890, a resolution heartily approving of the Public School Act of this year, and I believe that it is approved of by the great majority of the Presl)yteriau8 of Manitoba. 0. Tliat the Presbyterian Church is most solicitous for the religious educa- tion of all its children. It takes great care in the vows i-ecpiired of parents at the baptism of their children, and in urging its ministers to teach from the pulpit tiie duty of giving moral and religions training in the family. It is most en- ergetic in maintaining efficient Sunday schools, which have been called the "children's church," and in requiring the attendance of the children at tlie church services, which is made a gre.it means of instruction. I think it is our firm belief that this sj'stem joined with the public school system has pro- duced, and will produce, a moral, religious and intelligent jjeople. 7. That the Presbyterians are thus able to unite with their fellow Christians of other churches in having taught in the public schools (which they desire to be taught by Christian teachers) the subjects of a secular education, and I cannot see that there should be any conscientious objection on the iiart of the Koman Catholics to attend such schools, provided adequate means be provided of giving elsewhere such moral and religious training as may be desired ; but on the other hand there should be many social and national advantages. 8. I believe all Presbyterians are anxious to have science, history and I)hilosophy taught in such a manner as will intelligently recognize the divine purpose and influence in human affairs, but certainly I cannot desire to teach, as Avould be covered by the plea sometimes advanced that the instrumentality of evil and the deeds of bad men should be " constantly attributed to the Deity," nor do I believe the tendency of the public school as established in Manitoba at present to be toward any atheistic or irreligious goal, but that it will follow the current opinions of the settlers of Manitoba, a rema.kably large number of whom are religious and intelligent. 9. That instead of it being a detriment that public schools will be ' ' establish- ed in every part of Manitoba where the population is sufficient for the purpose of a school," it will be a benefit, as up to the present time large numbers of Koman Catholic children scattered through the general population have been able to get no education, and are in danger of growing up an illiterate class. iy saa 10 BARRETT V. WINNIPEG. [Part I. 10. That when ill the foregoin;^ paragraphs I speak of the helief of Pres- byterians, I speak simply of wliat I consider their belief to be, and I speak only for myself, as it is a privilege for every I'rosbyterian to think for himself, and to l)e directly' re8[K)nsible to (Jod, and in my opinion tiie general feeling of what are known as tiie Protestant denominations is as I have indicated above. Mr. Hkspkler's Affidavit. 1, Wm. ilespeler, of the County of Selkirk, in the Province of Manitoba, financial agent, make oath and say : 1. That for the last seventeen years I have been a resident in the Province of Manitoba. 2. That for upwards of seven years I was a member of the Board of Education for the said province. .3. To mj knowledge. His (irace Archbishop Taeho, Archbishop of the Roman Catholic ecclesiastical province of Manitoba, has been a meml)er and chairman of the ('atholic section of the late Hoard of Education for four years, and I believe for a great deal longer. 4. That priests and leadiui,' laymen of tlie lionian Catholic Church M^ere members of the Catholic section of said board, and a number of priests of said Roman Catholic Church were inspectors of schools under said l)oard. .'). I am satislied that the School Acts in force in this province prior to the first day of May last, were acceptable to the Roman Catholic Church. jMk. Polson's Affidavit. I, Alexander Poison, of the City of Winnipeg, in the County of Selkirk, in the Province of Manitol)a, health inspector, make oath and say : 1. That for a period of iifty years I have been a resident in the Province of Manitol)a. 2. That schools which existed prior to the Province of Manitoba entering (Confederation were purely private schools ani« were not in any way subject to public control nor did they in any way receive public support. 3. No school taxes were collected ])y any autiiority prior to the Province of Manitoba entering Confederation, and there were no means by which any person could l)e forced by law to support any of said private schools. 1 think the only public revenue of any kind then collected was the customs duty, usually four per cent. Mk. SuTHPuiLANP's Affidavit, I, .John Sutherland, of the parish of Kildonan, in the County of Selkirk, in the Province of Manitoba, farmer, make oath and say : 1. That for the period of lifty-three years I have l)een a resident in the Province of Manitoba. 2. That schools which existed prior to the Province of Manitoba entering Confederation were purely private scliools, and were not in any way subject to public control, nor did they in any way receive pu' lie support. 3. No school taxes were collected by any authi rity prior to the Province of Manitoba entering Confeder.ation, and there were no means by which any person could be forced by law to support any of said private schools. I think the only public revenue of any kind then collected was the customs duty, usually four per cent. Chap. III.] LOOAN V. WINNIPEG. JlTDOMKNTS IN BaKRETT V. WINNIPEG. n The Jii)j)lication to quash the By-hi\vs was made to Mr. Justice Killain, who, on the 2ltli NoveuilxM", l^'9(), (lisinissud tlie applimtion — ill elfoct deciding that the Mauitol)a Statutes were valid. An appeal was taken to the full Court, but witiiout succe.s8. On the 2nd February, 181)1, the appeal was dismissed, the Chief Justice and Mr. Justice Bain holding that the legislation was valid. Mr. Justice Dubuc, however, dis.sented, his opinion l)eing that the Statutes were ultra vires. A further appeal was taken to the Supieme Court of Canada, and on the 28th October, 1891, the Court (comprising tive judges) unani- mously held the Acts to be ultra vires. A further appeal was takcm to the Privy Council, and on the 3()th day of Jidy, 1892, judgment was given rev(Msing tin; decision of the Siipi-eme Couit, and holding that the legislation was valid. Six jndges heard the appeal, viz. : Lord Watson, Lord Mac- Naghten, Lord Morris, Lord Hannen, Lord Couch and Lord Sluind. (The judgment is given in full below, just after the state- ment of the Logan v. Winnii»eg case.) CHAPTER III. LOGAN V. THE CITY OF WINNIPEG. In December, 1891, proceedings similar to those instituted by Dr. Barrett were taken by Mr. Ale.\'. Logan, an E[)i.scopalian. Ui»on this api)licatiou the following atiidavits were read : Affidavit of Mk. Logan. 1. I was born in the year eighteen liinidretl ami forty-one, at Point Donglass, in the Eed River settlement in Rupert's Land, and 1 liave always resided at the said Point Douglass, and still reside there. 2. The said Point Douglass is in the parish of St. John, in the Province of Manitoba, and is within the territorial limits of the Citj' of Winnipeg, and I am a resident of the said city of Winnipeg and a ratepayer thereof to a large amount. 3. I am, and always have been, a member of the Cluirch of England. 4. At the time of the union of the Province of Manitoba A\-ith Canada I was married and had two chililren. 5. At and for many years prior to the said union, there was a parochial denominational school of the Church of J'.ngland within the said parish of St. John, and within the territorj' now comprised in the City of Wiiniipeg, and the said school was a day school conducted by teachers appointed by the Ohurch of England Bishop of Ruperts Laud, in which, and in addition to the t 12 LOOAN V. WINNIPEG. [Part I. ordinary siihjects taught in gclictola, tlm catecluHni of thn Church of Kiiglaml was taught, and tho pupilH in said school wcro instructed in religious sulijects according to tlie tenets of the t'iiuruh of England. t). The said sehctol wa-i continued up to, and for some time after, the union of the naid I'rovinee with (.'anathv, and the same 8clio(d still exists in a moditied form, ami I attended said school as a pupil before saitl union and received my primary education therein. 7. I was well acquainted with the said Red Uiver settlement before and after said union, and 1 say tliat at the time of said union there was established in each j)arisli of the Church of England throughout said settlement a parochial denominational school, and in some parishes more than one of such schools, and in all sucii schools teachings in religious subjects according to the (Jhurch of England faith were conducted in a manner similar to the said school in the parish of St. Jolin, and tlie children of English church parents attended said schools and no other schools. S. Save and excc))t the said llnglish church parochial school of the ])ari8h of St. John anil St. John's College, wliich also belonged to the Church of Kngland, and except a private school kei)t by the Nuns on the property of the late William Drever, there was not at tho time of said union any school or educational institution in existence within said territory now included in the city of Winnipeg. 9. The territory comprised in the City of Winnipeg covers an area of about twenty sipiare miles. 10. The paper writing hereunto annexed and marked with the letter " A"^ is a certified copy of the above-mentioned by-law of the City of Winnipeg, No. 514, and said copy was received from the City clerk of the City of Winnipeg. 11. In and by said bydaw a rate is levied for school jmrposes of four and two-tenths mills in the dollar upon all ratepayers alike, and upon ptn-sons of all religious denominations alike, and the moneys so raised are intended to be used in the support of ))ublic non-sectarian schools pursuant to the provisions of the I'ublic Schools Act. \'2. I have not yet paid my taxes for the year one thousand eight hundred and ninety-one imi)osed under said by-law. l.S. 1 have at the present time three children of school age, uamely, one of the age of fourteen yeai's, one of the age of eleven years, and one of the age of fiVe years, and I claim the right to have my children taught religious exer- cises in school according to the tenets of the Church of England, and I claim that such right was secured to me and other members of the ( 'hurch of England, at the time of said union, by the provisions of the Manitoba Act. 14. I do not .approve of the manner in which religious exercises are taught in schools where they are so taught under the provisions of the Public Schools Act, and 1 claim that the tax for the support of schools imposed upon me by said by-law, and pursuant to said Public Schools Act or by any other Act of the Legislature by which I am compelled to contribute for the support of schools not under the control of the Church of England, prejudicially affects my rights as a member of the Church of England, and if compelled to pay such tax I and other members of the Church of England are less able to support schools in which religious exercises and teachings in accordance with our form of worship could be conducted. Affidavit of Bishop Machray. I, the Most Reverend Robert Machray, Doctor of Divinity, of the City of Winnipeg, in the Province of Manitoba, the Bishop of Rupert's Land, make oath and say : 1. In the year 1865 I was appointed by the Crown, on the recommenda- tion of the Archbishop of Canterbury, under the sign manual of the Queen, Bishop of Rupert's Land. Chap. III.] LOOAN V. WINNIPEG. 13 ea of aljout 2. The (lidi-ese of UinnTt's Land, in ISO'i, covered the wholi- of the North- WeHt Territories of Canailii, the diHtriot of Keewatiii, the prcsiiit rroviiu-e of Manitoba, .md that portion of the westerly part of the I'rovince of Ontario lying westerly of tiie height of land and runninj; lietween Kat INirtage and Port Arthur. • , , • , H. Snl)se(|Uontly the diocese was suhdivided into eight l)ishoi)ricH, one of wliicli, still known as Uujiert's Ijand, consists of tlie Province of Nianitolia and that portion of the I'rovince of Ontario referred to ahove. The whuk- of tlio said original diocese of Kupert's Land is now called the ecclesiastical )iripvince of Uupert's Land, of which I am the Metropolitan, and I am also Hishop of the smaller diocese of Itupcrt's Land last above described. 4. I have continued to be Bishop of the old iliocese of Rupert's Land first above described, ami of the smaller dioce.se last above described, ever since my appointment in liS(ir». 5, I rpon my arrival in the diocese in 18()5 I found there existed a groat want of schools for the education of the youth, and I at once set about reorganizing St. .John's (.'(dlege, and in 18(1(5 1 opened it for higher education, aiitl it has so continued ever since, and I commenced as soon as I could the reorganization of the system of primary schools, of which I fountl most vacant. (), I endeavoreil to start at least one parochial school in eacli parish where there was a missionary of the (Jhurch of Knglaml, and I so far succeeded in this work that with the assistance of the L'hnrch Missionary .Society of the Church of England there were under my care in 18«)7 fourteen common parochial schools within the Hed ISiver settlement, as well as schools at the missions in Manitoba outside tlie settlement and missions in the interior. 7. In the year 18()!( there were sixteen schools regularly organized for the teaching of boys and pirls in the different parishes in the said lied Kiver settlement, inclusive of Westbourne and Scanterbury. 8. I iind that in my address to the synod of Kupert's Land, delivered on the 29th day of May, 18(57, I used the following language with reference to the schools, viz. : " Passing now from the college to the coinmon schools, I rejoice to say that there has been, during the past half year, a full opportunity for learning the elements of education — reading, writing and arithmetic — from the extreme end of the Indian settlement up to Westbourne, with the single exception of the small parish of St. Margaret's at the High Blurt", and in tiiat parish a very creditable subscription Avas promised towards the salary of a master, so that I trust by another year even that blank may be supplied. And I believe the distances to be travelled to these schools are not greater than are frequently performed in our home parishes in England and Scotland. Exclud- ing the school at Westbourne, which remains on the Church Missionary list, being about thirty-live miles beyond the settlement, we must look to the maintenance of fourteen schools. Of these, eight have hitherto been supported by the Church Missionary Society at a cost of £285 a year. The society said some time ago that this help must at once cease." And in my charge to the synod of Uupert's Land on the 24th day of February, 1869, I used the following language: "Schools have been estab- lished in every parish, but the effort to maintain them has been a difficult one, from the larger amount now required to obtain the services of a schoolmaster and from frequent resignations. The whole question must, however, socm be grappled with. There must be some distinct regulations laid down delining the conditions under which grants from the diocesan fund are to be given, and some plan of diocesan inspection will be necessaiy. But before we can obtain all we could wish with our schools, I feel we must be able to provide still larger salaries and have trained teachers. How to secure such a training has been a good deal in my mind, but I do not yet see the way to the accomplish- ment of what I wish." And the statements therein made by me on those two occasions are, I believe, true in substance and in fact, and are given in the reports of the synod published at the time. U LOO AN V. WINNII'KO. (Pakt L 0. 'I'll!) MchnolH which wore catnliliHheil an ahovu mit forth contiiiiuMl until thu i>Ntii))iiHliiiieiit lic HL'hooU l)y the lawH f i'a(!h parisli, ami in soini' viwvh tln'rii wtjre two nu)l evm tlirito parochial hcIiooIh in ono iiarinh. 'I'hu hcIiohIh wuri; opfut'il and eloHt'cl with fortn>4 of prayer, an>*l '''""> ^(>^ Htiitc to ilciiKiiiiniitiiiiial MohiHiln, prfjiuliiMiilly (illt'fti* th«! ii>{htH iiml |)>-ivilfj^t'H of tho |M'ri|il)' liiiloii^iii^ to till! Church of Kll^lnllll witli rcMpiiot to tho ih>iioiiiiiiiitioiiHl Mchooiri which tht-y hiitl l>y iiritcticc, iiinl wure lawfully vXL-rciiiing, buforu iiiul »l thu union of tliiH rrovinct! with Ciiiwula. 'J((. Hifoio tlio union I, with the lulviiu of my Mynoli«he0 I was deeply disappointed ; and 1 believe that by that .Act, if sejiarate Bchixds do not receive state aid as well as the schools under the Act, tho chililren of parents of the Church of linglaml have been prejucUeially atl'ected. 24. Before the Act of 1S!M> was jiassed, 1 expressttd my views on the schools cpiestion, and on the rights of the )ieople of the Churcli of iMigland, tinder the Manitoba Act, in my charge to the synod, given on the 'iOth day of October, 188!), in which I used the following language: "Though we have not now any primary schools, it is not because, in view of tlu! church, such schools are of small importance. The day was when we had a church )»riniary school wherever we had a clergyman. T'hat was "ur position when this Province was transferred to (.Canada, and it seems probable that the Dominion intended to recognize such efforts in the past ami to protect the school interests that then existed. But our church saw such advantages in a national system of schools, and such reason to have contidence in the administration (jf it, that it went heartily into it, trusting that the schools would be worthy of a Christian people and give an education in which the first, namely, the religious interests of the children, would not be lost sight of. And I may say that ^lie only reason which has led me for so many years to give up time that I could ill spare to be a member of the Board of Kducation has been the hope that, by conciliatory action, 1 might help in securing a measure of religious instruction reasonably satisfactory at once to ourselves ami the other religious bodies." 25. One of the schools conducted by the Church of England as herein- before mentioned, was situate in the parish of St. John's, which parish now forms a part of the City of Winnipeg, and said school was situate at the time of the union of this'Piovince with Canada in a territory which now forms part, of the territory of the CUty of Winnipeg. I -■ 'U. il HU.. r ! if 16 LOGAN V. WINNIPEG. [Paut I. 26. Said schools of the Church of England were supported in part by funds of the church, in part by voluntary subscriptions, and in part by fees vohm- tarily paid by members of the t'Fiurch of England and by the j)arents and guariiians of children attending sucli scliools, and were in no way supported or aiiled by funds raised by general rates or taxat'on. Till' above artiilavit was made on the Srd of December, 1891. On the 18tli of the same month the followinj^ letter appean^il in a Winnipeg newspaper, written by the gentleman who usually acted for the Bishop, and who was engaged npon the liOgan application : To the Editor of' The Trihnnc. Sir,— A good deal of controversy has been going on in reference to the attitude of tiie Bishop of Rujtert's Land on the nu)tion to ([u;isii tlie city by-law. That .application was not nuide by or on behalf of the Ciiurcii of Englaiul. It was iu)t promoted or fostered in any waj' by tlie Hisliop, and tlie affidavit made by him was nu rely a voluntary statement of facts antl views which could have been forced from him uniler a supiena. The judgments by the Supreme ciuirt judges in liarrett ?•.•*. Winnipeg point to the ; "obable conclusion that the other denominations having scliools here fit the time of the transfer have eipial rights with the Ronnvn Catliolics to denom- inational schools, if this is a good law, then at any time hereafter any niend)er of the (.'hurch of England or any I'resbyterian might (puish anj' by-law here- after passed, which imposed rates upon all Protestants in support of one system of schools in which religious teachings were carried on, materially ditl'erent from the religious teachings carrieil on in the schools of the denomination at the time of the transfer. Should this be held to be the laM', then any act passed by the Local Legis- lature interfering with these rights would be ultra rhr/i. When our constitution makers gave the Local Legislature power to legislate as to schools, was that power made ( 1 ) subject to the rights of each of the above named three (lenominations to teach their j)eculiar religious doctrines in the schools, or was it simply limited (2) to I'rotestaut as distinguished from Roman Catholic or (3) were there really no rights reserved to religious teach- ings in the public state-aided schools ? it is certainly important to settle there principles at as early a date as possible. Only a portion can be settled by Barrett m. Winnipeg, but all can be settled by the two cases being at once carried to the I'rivy Council. If rights were reserved in the Manitoba act to denominations these rights are the rights of each individual ratepayer beh)nging to that denomination rather than the rights of the denomination, and it is as difficult to understand how a denomination or a church couhl set the law in motion as it is to under- stand how a denomination or the head of a church by any acts or omissions could deprive a ratepayer of a right conferred upon hini by a statute. Yours truly, H. M. Howell. Affidavit of Mr. Haywakd. I, Robert Henry H.ayward, of the City of Winnijieg, in the Province of jNLanitoba, accountant, make oath and say : 1. I am now and have been for the past ten years a resident of the City of Winnipeg. 2. I am and have been for a number of years past a ratepayer of said city. 3. I am a member of the Church of England. 4. The religious exercises conducted in tlie public 8c1k)o1s of the City of Winnipeg at the present time are those prescribed by the advisory board of the iili Chap. III.] LDQAN V. WlJfNIl'KG. U DeiKirtiiifiit of Ktlucatioii, puistiaut to tht; provisions of tlie Public Schools Act, ami such exercises consist of reailiiig, without note or conuuont, of certain selections from the autliorized Enjjlish version of cho Hilile, oi tlie Douay version of the Bible, and tlie use of a form of prayer. '). The said selections from the Scriptures are not taught, but are simply read witiiout connucnt, and neither the catechism of the C'hurch of Kngland nor any .)ther catechism is taught in said schools, nor is any religious instruc- tion given in said schools beyond the reading of said selections from the liible, and tlie reading of said prayer. (). Thi! printed pamphlet now produced and shown to me and marked as exhibit " H" to this my aflidavit, is a printed copy of the regulations of the saiil advisory board regarding religious exercises in public schools, and the said pamphlet was received from the Department of Education for the province of Manitoba. 7. I have read over tlie certified copy of the above mentioned by-law, which is annexed to the affidavit of Alexander f.ogan, sworn to herein on the 3rd day of this present month of December, and wliich certified copy is now proiluced and shown to me at the time of making this affidavit, and is marked as exhibit " A " to this affidavit. 8. In and by the said by-law a rate is levied for school purposes of 4^^ mills in the dollar upon all ratepayers of the (.3ity of Winnipeg alike, and upon mem- bers of the Church of Kngland as well as upon members o{ all other religious denominations, no distinction being made in respect of religious denominations, and the moneys so raised are intended to be used in the support of public non- sectarian schools established pursuant to the provisions of the Public Schools Act. 9. The effect of said by-law is that members of the Church of England are compelled to pay a tax for the support of public non-sectarian schools in which there is not religious teaching according to the tenets of the Church of England. 10. 1 have one boy of school age, namely, the age of 1.3 years, and although I am compelled by the said by-law and by the Public Schools Act to contribute to the support of said public schools established under saiil Public Schools Act, I send him to a school established by the rector of the English church parish of All Saints, in the said City of Winnipeg, and under control and mn.nagement of the said rector, where he receives religious instruction according to the tenets of the said Church of England in addition to ordinary school instruction, and I voluntarily pay fees for his tuition at said school, and I do not send him to any of the said public schools. 11. There are many other boys in the said ('ity of Winnipeg sent by their parents, who are resident ratepayers of the City of WinnipcL and members of the Church of England, to the said All Saints' School, for reasons which I verily believe are similar to my own. Affidavit of Mu. Polson. I, Alexander Poison, of the City of Winni])eg, in the County of Selkirk, in the Province of Manitoba, License Inspector, make oath and say : 1. That for a period of fifty j'ears I have been a resident of the Province of Manitoba. 2. That 8cln)ols which existed prior to the Province of Manitoba entering Confederation were, so far as tlie people were concerned, purely private schools, and were not in any way subject to public control, nor did they in any way receive public support. .Itteiidance at such .schools was voluntary, and only the parents or guardians who had children attending school paid any fees. There was no law or statute as to schools. The sclmols were under the direc- tion of the clergy or the governing bodies of one of the three churches, the llomaii Catholic, the Church of England and the Presbyterian. 2 *epn«^nHver heard under the as entirely I years we have been 3 Province I to obtain 'erritories, day, 1890, ar, and I Iterians of religious I of parents \\ from the lily. It is lieen called Ihildren at II thhik it |rstem, has lansin this address >llege, on to purely I there is a ctent now Instruction Ixrches are: taught. Does the continuance and extension of this system promise a solution of the educational difficulty ? By no means. Less injurious prokvbly in its operation, it is even more indefensible in principle than the one which has been so freely criticised. BMrst, it is in direct violation of the principle of the separation of church and state. It is unnecessary, indeed it would be quite irrelevant to argue this principle here. It is that on which, riglitly or wnmgly, the state with us is constituted. I do not understand it to mean that the state may not have regard to religious considerations, such as it shows when it enforces the observance of the Sabbath rest, or that it may not employ religious sanctions, as it does when in its courts of law it administers an oath in the name of (Jod : but I do not understand it to mean that the state is neither to give material aid to the operations of the church in any of its branches, nor to interfere with its liberties. Each, wliile necessarily influencing the other, lias its own distinctive sphere, and must bear all the responsibilities of aijtion within that sphere .... Second, the system of separate or sectarian schools operates injuriously on the well-being of the state. However useful it may b-i to tl»e church or churches adopting it, enabling fhem to keep tlieir youth well in hand and to preserve them from any danger to faith and morals which might result from daily contact with those of a different creed, it is in that measure hurtful to the unity and therefore to the strength of the state. It occasions a line of cleavage in society, tiie highest interests of which demand that it should as far as possible be one. It perpetuates distinctions, and almost necessarily gives rise to distinctions which are at once a reproach and a peril . . . . Surely the state sliould not, unless compelled to do so, lend the law and the authority support of public moneys to a system of education which so injuriously affects its unity and therefore its stability aiul well-being . . . But if a purely secular system of education is deemed in tiie highest degree objectionable, and a denominational or sectarian system only less ob- jectionable, what is it proposed to establish in their place ? I answer, a system that the main work of the school ought to be instruction in the various secular of public, unsectarian, but not non-religious schools. It is admitted on all hands branches. Its primary aim is to tit those in attendance for the active duties of life. But .as not inconsistent with this aim, rather as in a higher degree sub- servient to its attainment, it is desired that the religious element should have a definite place assigned to it in the life of the school ; that it should be recogxiized to this extent at least, that the school should be opened and closed with prayer ; that the Bible, or selections from it, should be read daily, either in common, or in the Douay version as the trustees may direct ; that the moral- ity inculated should be Christian morality, and that the teacher should be at liberty to enforce it, and shoidd be encouraged to enforce it by those con- siderations, at once solemn and tender, which are embraced in the common belief of Cliristendom. A system of public education of this kind, in which religion has a definite but at the same time strictly guarded place assigned to it, ought to be acceptable to the great majority of the people of this Province. It has certainly much to recommend it. It has no sectarian features, and yet it is not godle.ss. lieligion is recognized in it in such form and degree as to make it possible to give a high tone to the life of the school, as to secure more or less familiarity with the contents of scripture on the part of every child, and as to make available for the teacher those lofty and sacred sanctions which have in all ages been found the most effective instruments in the enforcement of morality." • Affidavit of Mr. Wood. I, Edmund iVI. Wood, of the City of Winnipeg, in the Province of Mani-- toba, Esquire, make oath and say : 1. I am an officer employed by the Government of Manitoba, and occupy^ 20 LOGAN V. WINNIPEG. [Part I. 'I'lli.ii ! i:- I! I I ii( the position of chief clerk in the Department of Municipal Commissioner, and am also employed in the Public Works Department, and know the facts herein deposed to be true. 2. Pursuant to chapter 25 of the statutes passed in this Province in the tifty-second year of Her Majesty's reign, the (Government of the Province of Manitoba erected a building to be used .as tlie Manitoba Deaf and Dumb Insti- tution, the erection and completion of which buildijig with its furniture cost over *18,()()0. .3. The Government of the Province of Manitoba have for several years pajt carried on at public expense a school for the teaoliing of the deaf and dumb, and that school is now being carried on at an annual cost of about ^7,500.00. 4. This money is paid out of the general funds of the Province, and the school is open to all classes of people of every creed and belief. 5. The school is purely non-sectarian, and is for the education in a purely secular way of all classes of children. Affidavit of Mr. Cumberland. I, Thomas Dickey Cumberland, of the City of Winnipeg, in the Province of Manitoba, Barrister, make oath and say : 1. I have examined the Dominion Government census returns of the census of the Province of Manitoba taken during the year 1886, and I find that the population of the said Province shown by said census was 108,640. 2. From the said returns I find that the five leading religious denomina- tions in the said Province were according to the said census in number as follows, namely: — Roman Catholic, 14,651; Church of England, 23,206; Presbyterian, 28,406 ; Methodist, 18,648 ; and Baptist, .3,296. 3. I have been a resident of the Province of Manitoba since the year 1881' 4. I believe no material ciiange has taken place in the relative numbers of the different denominations aforesaid since the year 1886 in Manitoba. Affidavit of Mr. Howell. I, Hector Mansfield Howell, of the City of Winnipeg, in the Province of Manitoba, Esquire, make oath and say : 1. I have resided in this province continuously for the last twelve years. I have travelled over large portions of this province, and am familiar with the general state of its settlement and the distribution of its population. 2. Tlie chief city of the province is the City of Winnipeg, with a present population of about 25,000 people. There are two other towns with population of about 4,000 each, and there is a large number of villages with population ranging from 200 or 300 to 1,000 people. 3. According to the last census taken in this year, there is reportean was content to rely on the arguments advanced on behalf of Mr. Barrett, while Mi". Barrett's advisers were not prepared to make common cause with Mr. Logan, and naturally would liave been better pleased to stand alone. The controversy which has given rise to the present litigation is, no doubt, beset with difficulties. The result of the controversy is of serious moment to the Provinci! of Manitoba, and a matter apparently of deep interest throughout the Dominion. But in its legal aspect the question lies in a very narrow compass. The dixty of this board is simply to determine as a matter of law viiether, according to the true construction of the Manitoba Act, 1870, having mfm ■MM! ii',:! u <)•) PRIVY COUNCIL JUDGMENTS, 1892. [Part I. regard to the state of things wliich existed in Manitoba at the time of the union, the Provincial Legislatnro has or lias not exceeded its powei's in ])asHing the PuVdic Scliools Act, 1890. Manitoba became one of the i)rovince8 of the Dominion of Canada under the Manitoba Act, 1870. whicli was afterwards confirmed by an Imperial statute known as the British North America Act, 1871. Before the union it was not an independent Province, with a constitution and a legis- lature of its own. It formed part of the vast territories which belonged to the Hudson's Bay Company, and were administered by their otHcers or agents. The Manitoba Act, 1870, declared that the provisions of the British North America Act, 1867, with certain exceptions not material to the present question, should be applicable to the Province of Manitoba, as if Manitoba had been one of the provinces originally united by the Act. It established a legislature for Manitoba, consisting of a Legislative Council and a Legislative Assembly, and proceeded, in section 22, to re enact with some modi- fications the provisions with regard to education which are to be found in section 93 of the British North America Act, 1867. Section 22 of the Manitoba Act, so far as it is material, is in the following terms : — " In and for the Province the said Legislature may exclusively make laws in relation to education, subject and according to the following j)rovisions : — (1) Nothing in any such law shall prejudicially aflect any right or privilege with respect to denominational schools which any class of persons have by law or practice in the Province at the union." Then follow two other sub- sections. Sub-section 2 gives an " a))peal," as it is termed in the Act, to the Governor-Ceneral in Council from any Act or decision of the Legislature of the Province, or of any provincial authority " affecting any right or privilege of the Protestant or Roman Catholic minority of the Queen's subjects in relation to education." Sub-section 3 reserves certain limited powers to the Dominion Par- liament in the event of the Provincial Legislature failing to comply with the requirements of the section or the decision of the Governor- General in Council. At the commencement of the argument a doubt was suggested as to the competency of the pj-esent appeal in consequence of the so-called appeal to the Governor-General in Council provided l:)y the Act. But their Lordships are satisfied that the provisions of sub-sections 2 and 3 do not operate to withdraw such a question as that involved in the present case from the juris- diction of the ordinary tribunals of the country. Sub-sections 1, 2 and 3 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, 1870, differ but slightly ft'om the corresponding sub-sections of section 93 of the British North Ameiica Act, 1867. The only important difference is that in the Manitoba Act, in .sub-section 1, the words "by law" are fol- lowed by the words " or practice," which do not occur in the corres- ponding passage in the British North America Act. These words were no doubt introduced to meet the special case of a country which M Part I. Chap. IV.] privy council judgments, 1892. 23 he time eded its became lanitoba statute le union a legis- i which eved by that the certain iplicable e of the gislatnve gislative ne modi- re to be ;, 1867. 3 in the f];islatnre »jecb and such law jsj)ect to y law or they sub- id in the cisioii of uthority Roman lucation." lion Par- o comi)ly overnor- ument a .ppeal in eral in itied that ithdraw le juris- ions 1, 2 slightly British .8 that in are fol- |ie corres- !se words •y which 4 had not as yet enjoyed the secui-ity of laws ijroperly so called. I., is not |it'rliiii(S very easy to detine precisely the meaning of such an expression as " having a right or privilege by i>ractice." But the object of the enactment is tolerably clear. Evidently the word "practice" is not to l»e construed as eipiivalent to "custom having the force of law." Their Lordshi{)S are convinced that it must iiave been the intention of the Legislature to preserve every legal I'ight or |)rivilege, and every benetit or advantage in the nature of a right or privilege, with respect to denominational schools which any class of pei-sons practically enjoyed at the time of the union. What, then, was the state of things when Manitoba was admitted to the union? On this point their is no dispute. lb is agreed that there was no law, or regulation, or ordinance with respect to education in force at that time. There were, therefore, no rights or privileges with lespect to denominational schools existing by law. The practice which prevailed in iVIanitoba liefore the nnion is also a matter on •which all parties are agreed. The statement on the subject by Arch- bishop Tache, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of St. Boniface, who has given evidence in Barrett's case, has been accepted as accurate and <;omi)lete. "There existed," he says, "in the territory now constitu- tinsr the Province of Manitoba a number of effective schools for child- ren. These schools were denominational schools, some < f them being, regulated and controlled by the Roman Catholic Church, and others by various Protestant denominations. The means nece.ssaiy for the support of Roman Catholic schools were supplied, to some extent, liy school fees, paid by some of the parents of the children who attended the schools, and the rest were paid out of the funat the establishment of a school district of one denomi- nation should not prevent the establishment of a school district of the other denomination in the same place, and that a Protestant and a Roman Catholic district might include the same territory in whole or in part. BVom the year 1870 until 1890 enactments were in force declaring that in no case should a Protestant ratepayer be obliged to i)ay for a Roman Catholic school, or a Roman Catholic ratepayer for a Protestant school. In 1890 the policy of the past nineteen yeai-s was reversed j the denominational system of public education was entirely swept away. Two Acts in relation to educa- tion weie jtassed. The first (53 Vic, c. 37; established a Department of Education and a board consisting of seven members known as the "Advisory Board." Four members of the board were to be appointed by the Department of Education, two were to be elected by the ])ublic and high school teachers, and the seventh membei- was to be appointed by the University Council. One of the powers of the Advisory Board was to prescribe the forms of religious exercises to be used in the schools. The Public Schools Act, 1890 'o.'i Vic, c. 38), enacted that all Protestant and Roman Catli)lic school districts should be subject to the provisions of the Act, tnd that all public schools should be free schools. The provisions ot the Act with regard to religious exercises are as follows : — "6. Religious exercises in the public schools shall be con- ducted according to the regulations of the Advisory Board. The time for such religious exercises shall be just before the closing hour in the afternoon. In case the ]tarent or guardian of any pupil notifies the teacher that he does not wish such pupil to attend such religious exercises, then such jmpil shall be dismissed before such religious exercises take place. 7. Religious exercises shall be held in a public school entirely at the option of the school trustees for the district, and upon receiviu',' written authority from the trustees, it shall be the duty of the teachers to hold such religious exercises. 8. The public .schools shall be entirely non-sectarian, and no I'eligions exercises shall be allowed therein except as above provided." The Act then provides for the formation, alteration and union of school districts, for the election of school trustees, and for levying a rate on the taxable 2G I'HIVY ('OUNOIL JUU0MENT8, 1892. [Paut j. ])ro|tnrtv in nacli scliool district for school purposes. In cities the nninicipiil council is r(«juireil to levy ami collect upon the taxal)lH ju'operty within the municipality such sums us the school trustees may r(i(piiro for school purposes. A portion of the legislative j^raut for (ulucational pur[)oses is allotted to puhliu schools; Ixit it is pi'ovid(>d that any school not conduct(!d according to all the jn-ovisions of the Act, or any Act in force for the time heing, or th» regulations of the Department of Kducation, or the Advisory Board, shall not he deemetl a public school within the mcianing of the law and shall not pja-tici- pate in the legislative grant. Section 141 provides that no teacher shall use or |)erniit to he used as text hooks any books except such as are authorized by the Advisory Hoard, aiul that no portion of the hfgislative grant shall be i)aid to any school in which unauthoriz'jd books are u.sed. Then tliere are two sections (178 and I7'J) which <;all lor a passing notice, because, owing upparently to some misappre- liension, they are spok(!n of in one of the judgments under api>eal as if their effiict was to confiscate Roman Catholic property. Th(;y aj)ply to cases where the same territory was covered l>y a Protestant school district and by a Roman Catholic school district. In such a case Roman Catholics were really placed in a better position than Protestants. (Jertain exemptions were to be made in their favour if the as.sets of their disti'ict exceeded its liabilities, or if the liabilities of the Protestant school district exceeded its assets. But no corres- ])onding exemptions wei-e to be made in the case of Protestants, ^uch being the main provisions of the Public Schools Act. bSOO, their Lordships have oo determine whether that Act prejudicially affects jiny right or privilege with respect to denominational schools which any class of persons had by law or practice in the [)rovince at the union. Notwithstanding the Public Schools Act, 1890, Roman Catholics and members of every other religious body in Manitoba are free to establish schools throughout the province; they are tree to maintain their schools by school fees or voluntary subscriptions; they are free to conduct their schools according to their own religious tenets without molestation or interference. No child is compelled to attend a jmblic school. No special advantage othei- than the advan- tage of a free education in schools conducted under public management is held out to those who do attend. But then it is saiil that it is impo.ssible for Roman Catholics, or for members of the Church of England (if their views are correctly repiesented by the Bishop of Rupert's Land, who has given evidence in Logan's case), to send their children to public schools where the education is not superintended and directed by the authorities of their clmrch, and that, therefore, Roman Catholics and members of the Church of England who are taxed for public schools, ami at the same time feel themselves com- ))elled to sup[)ort their own schools, are in a less favorable ])Osition than those who can take advantage of the free education provided by the Act of 1890. That ma./ be so. But what right or privilege is €lIAP. IV.] PKIVV C(>UNCIL JUDGMKNTS, 1H92. IT violated or projiuliciiilly uflV'fted l)y the luw/ It is not tlii^ law tliut iH in fault; it is owin;^ to ivli<,'ioii.s coiivictions, wliicli cvcfvliody must respect, and to tln^ teacliin;,' of tlicor cliureli, that Ltonian (Jatliolicsand the Miembers of tlie Church of Kni^hind tind tlu'insclves unahh) to |»ar- take of advantages wiiich tht! hiw otlois to all alike. 'I heir Lordships are .sensilde of the weight which must attach to the unanimous decision of the Supreme (Jourt. Th(!V have anxiously eonsiden^d tlit^ able and elahorate judgments by wliich tliat decision has btien sup- ported. But they are ui\able to agree with tlu^ opinion which the learned judges of the Supreme Court have expressed as to the lights and privileges of Roman Catholics in Manitoba at the time of tho union, They doubt whether it is permissible to ref(!r to the course of legi.slation between 1871 and 1 8'JO, as a means of throwing light on the previous practice or on the constriiotion of the saving cliiuse in the Manitoba Act. They cannot assent to the view, which seems to be indicated by one of the membeis of the Supreme Court, that jtublic schools under the Act of 1890 are in reality Protestant schools. The legislature has declared in so many words that the (Uiblic schools shall be entirely unsectiirian, and that principle is carried out throughout the Act. With the policy of the Act of 18t)0 their Lordships are not concerned. But they cannot help observing that, if j the viinvs of the respondents were to jnevail, it would be extremely j difficult for the Provincial Legi.slature, which has been entrusted with the exclusive power of making laws relating to education, to provide for the educational wants of the more sparsely inhaV>ited districts of ; a country almost as large as Great Britain, and that the powers of i the legislature, which on the face of tlie Act appear so large, would be limited to the useful but somewhat humble olhce of making regula- tions for the sanitary conditions of scliool-houses, imposing rates for | the support of denominational schools, enforcing the compulsory attendance of scholars, and mattei'S of that sort. In the result tlujir Lordships will humbly advise Her Majesty that these appeals ought to be allowed, with costs. In the City of Winnipeg v. Bareett, it will be proper to reverse the order of the Supreme Court with costs and to restore the judgment of the Court of Queen's Bench for Manitoba. In the City of Winnipeg v. Logan, the order will be to reverse the judgment of the Court of Queen's Bench and to dismiss Mr. Logan's application xnd di.schage the rule nisi and the rule absolute, with ■costs. ^issammm •-'8 PETITIONH AND OKDKHS IN (JOUNCII<. [Paiit I. chaptp:r v. PETITIONS TO DOMINION GOVERNMENT; AND ACTIONS OP GOVERNMENT THEREON. Bufoi-eiKM' to tilt! provisions of tlio B. N. A. Ai't imd tlio Miinitobii Act (.s(Mf |>ii;,'o I) will show tliiit under ctu'tiiin oirciiinstiinccH »v rtiligious minority lias ii riy some of the parents of the children who attended the schools and ti est was- paid out of the fimds of the church contributed by itb members. 4. During the i)eriod referred to Roman Catholics had no interest- in or control over the schools of the Protestant denominations, and the Protestant denominations had no interest in or control over the schools of the Roman Catholics. Tijere were no public schools in the sense of State schools. The members of the Roman Catholic Chiu-ch supported the schools of their own church for the benefit of tho Roman Catholic children and were not under obligation to and did not contribute to the support of any other schools. 5. In the matter of education, therefore, during the period referred to, Roman Catholics were, as a matter of custom and prac- tice, separate from the rest of the community. 6. Under the provisions of the Manitoba Act it was provided that the Legislative Assembly of the province should have the exclusive right to make laws in regard to education, subject to the following provisions: Chap. V.l pktitions and ordkkh in council. 29 {[) Notltiny ill liny Hiicli lll^»' kIiuII |»i»'jiniiciiilly ufl'crt any ri«lit or itrivili'i;*' witli n'spcct to ilciiomiiiiitioiml ncIiooIs wliicli any cIiimh of iicrsoiiH have liy law or |inu'tici> in tin' |iroviiu't' at tin- iiiiioii. (li) All appeal sliall lit! to the ( lOVcM'iior-) i«MU)ral in Council IVoiii any Act or »• Protcntant or Koinaii (,'atliolic minority of the (^iiccii's Kul)jcctH in nilation to «'(lucation. i'ti) In caH(! any siicli provincial law as from time to time HeeiiiH to the (Jovernor-CJeiieral in Council rc(pii.sito for lh(! clue execution of the proviHions of this neotion is not maile, or in caw) any deciHion of the (Jrovernor-deneral in Council, on any appeal tMider this section is not duly executed \ty the pr()p«!r provincial authority in that Itehalf, then, and in every such case, and as tir only as tim ciicumstanceH of each case require, the Parliament of Canada may make remediul laws for tlui duo execution of the provisions of this section, and of any decision of the Oovernor-General under this section. 7. Durinjf the tirst session of the Lejjislative Aswuildy of the Province of Manitoba, an Act was passed relating to education, the oll'ect of which was to continue to the Roman Catholics that separate condition with reference to education which they had enjoyed previous to the erection of tlie province. 8. The efi'ect of the statute, so far as tlie Roman Catholics were concerned, was merely to organize the etioits which the Roman (!atliolics had pnjvioiisly voluntarily made for the education ot their own children. It provideil for the continuance of schools under the sole control and management of Roman Catholics, and of the educa- tion of their children according to the methods by which alone they believe children sliouhl be instructed. 9. Ever since the said legislation, and until the last session of the Legislative Assembly, no attempt was made to encroach upon the rights of the Roman Catholics .so coiiHrnied to them as al)ove men- tioned, but during said session statutes were passed (53 Vic, chaps. 37 and 38) the ert'ect of which was to deprive the Roman Catholics altogether of their separate; condition in regard to education ; to merge their schools with those of the Protestant denominations ; and to require all members of the community, whether Roman Catholic or Protestant, to contril)ute, through taxation, to the support of what are therein called Public .schools, but which are in reality a continua- tion of the Protestant schools. 10. There is a provision in the said Act for the apjiointment and election of an advisory board, and also for tho election in each muni- cipality of school trustees. There is also a provision that the said advisory board may prescribe religious exercises for u.se in schools, and that the said school trustees may, if they think tit, direct such religious exercises to be adopteil in the schools in their res|)ective 30 PETITIONS AND ORDERS IN COUNCIL. [Part I. I il districts. No furthoi" or other provision is raatle with reference to religions exercises, ami there is none with reference to religious training. 11. Roman Catholics regard such .schools as unfit for the purposes of education, and the children of Roman Catholic parents cannot and will not attend any such schools. Rather than countenance such schools, RoniJin Catholics will revert to the voluntary syslem in operation previous to the Manitoba Act, and will at their own jn-ivate expense establish, support and maintain schools in accordance with their piiiiciples and their faith, althongh by so doing they will have in addition thereto to contribute to the expense of the so-called Public Schools. 12. Your petitioners submit that the said Act of the Legislative Assembly of Miinitoba is suJ)versive of the rights of Roman Catholics guaranteed and confirmed to them bv the statute erectinir the Provinc" of M-tnitoba, and prejudicially affects the rights and privileifes with respect to Roman Catholic Schools which Roman Catholics had in the Province at the time of its union with the Dominion of Canada. 13. The Roman Catholics are in the minority in said Province. 14. The Roman Catholics of the Province of Manitoba therefore appeal from the said Act of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba. Your I'hTinoNKRS therefore pray — 1. That your Exctillency the Governor-General in Council may entertain the said appeal, and may consider the same, and may make such provisions and give such directions for the hearing and consid- eration of the said ajjpeal as may l)e thought proper. 2. That it n\ay be declared that such Provincial lasv docs preju- dicially affect the rights and |)rivileges with regJird to denouiinational schools which Rouian Catholics had by law or practice in the Pio- vince at the union. 3. That such directions may be given and provisions made for the relief of the Roman Catholics of the Province of Manitoba as to^ Your Excellency in Council may seem fit. And your petitioners will ever pray. tALKX., Arch, of St. Boniface. Henri F., Ev. d'Anemour. Joseph MessiER, P.P. of St. Boniface. T. A. Bernier. J. DUBUC. L. A. Prud'homme. M. A. GiRARD. A. A. LaRiviere, M.P. James E. Prendergast, M.P.P. Roger Marion, M.P.P., and 4,257 more names. Chap. V] petitions and orders in council. Order in Council. 4th April, 1891. 31 That on the consideriition of the Privy Council of Canada of tlie two Acts aforesaid, the following report of the Honourable the Minister of Justice, dated 21st March, 1891, was a|)i>roved by His Excellencv the Governor-General in Council on the 4th day ot April, 18'91, viz.:— Dkpautment of Justicp:, Canada, 21st March, 1891. To His Excellenci/ the Governor-General in Council: The nndersiijned has the honour to rejiort upon the two Acts of the following titles ])as.sed by the Legislature of the Province of Manitol»a at its session held in the year 1890, which Acts were I'e- ceived by the Honourable the Secretary of State on the 11th Apiil, 1890: — Chapter 37, " An Act respecting the Department of Education," and Chapter 38, " An Act res[)ecting the Public Schools." The first of these Acts creates a Department of Education, con- sisting of the Executive Council or a committee thereof appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council, and defines its powers. It also ci'eates an Advi.sory Board, partly ap{)ointed by the Department of Education and partly elected by teachers, and defines its powers. The " Act respecting Public Schools '" is a consolidation and amendment of all previous legislation in I'espect to Public scliools. It i-epeals all lesjislation which created and authorized a S3'steni of separate schools for Protestants and Roman Catholics. By the Acts previously in force either Protestants or Roman Catholics could establish a .school in any school district, and Protestant ratepayers were exempted from contribution for the Catholic schools, and Catholic rate[)ayers were exempted from contribution for Protestant schools. The two Acts now under review purport to abolish the.se dis- tinctions as to the schools, anil these exemptions as to ratepayers, and to establi.sh instead a system under which Public Schools are to be organized in all the school dist';icts, without regard to the religions views of the ratepayers. The right of the Province of Manitol)a to legislate on the subject of education is conferred by the Act which created the Province, viz., 32-3.S Vic, chap. 3 (The Manitoba Act), section 22, which is as follows : — " 22. In and for the Province of Manitolia the said Legislature may exclusively make laws in relation to education, subject to the following provisions : — " 1 1.) Nothing in any such law shall prejudicially affect any right or privilege with respect to denominational schools which any class of persons have by law or practice in the Province at the union. 32 PETITIONS AND ORDEHS IN COUNCIL. [Paiit. I. " (2.) An appeal shall lie to the Governor-Genefal in Council from any Act ov decision of the Legislature of the Province, or of any Provincial authority Mftecting any right or priviNige of the Protestant or Roirian Catholic minority of the Queen's subjects in relation to education. " (3.) In case any such Provincial law as from- time to time seems to the Covernor-General in Council requisite for the due execution of the provisions of this section is not made, or in case any decision of the Governor in Council, on any a))peal under this section, is not duly executed by the i)roper Provincial authority in that behalf, then, and in every such case, and as far only as the circumstances of each case require, the Parliament may make remedial laws for the due execu- tion of the provisions of this section, and of any decision of the Governor-General in Coimcil under this section." In the year 187", when the "Manitoba Act" was passed, there existed no system of education established or authorized by law, but at the first session of the Provincial Legislature in 1871 an " Act to establish a system of education in the Province " was |)assed. By that Act the Lieutenant-Governor in Council was em; towered to ai)[)oint not less than ten nor more than fourteen to be a Board of Education for the Province, of whom one-half were to be Protestants and the other half Catholics, with one Superintenden jf Prote.-stant, and one Superintendent of Catholic schools. The Board was divided into two sections, Protestant and Catholic, each section to have under its control and management the discipline of the schools of its faith, and to prescribe the books to be used in the schools under its care which had reference to religion or morals. The moneys appropriated for education by the Legislature were to be divided equally, ona moiety thereof to the support of Protestant schools, and the other ujoiety to the support of Catholic schools. By an Act piissed in 1875, the Board was increased to twenty- one, twelve Protestant and nine Roman Catholics ; the moneys voted by the Legislature were to be divided between the Protestant and Catholic schools in j)roportion to the number of children of school age in the schools under the care of Protestant and Catholic sections of the Board respectively. The Act of 1875 also provided that the establishment in a school district of a school of one denomination should not ])revent the establishment of a school of another denomination in the same district. Several questions have arisen as to the validity and effect of the two statutes now under review ; among these are the following : — It being admitted that "no class of persons" (to use the expres- sion of the ManitoV)a Act), had " by law," it the time the province was estiblished, "any right or privilege with respect to denomina- tional (or any other) school," had " any class of persons " any such right or privilege with res{)ect to denonunational schools " Vjy practice " at that time? Did the existence of separate schools for Roman Chap. V.] petitions and orders in council. 33 whether, assuming the I'equire an affirmative ansver tbrogoing Catholic chikh-en, supported by Roman Catholic voluntary contribu- tions, in which their religion might be taught and in which text books suital)le for Roman Catholic schools were used, and the non-existence of any system by which Roman Catholics or any other, could be com- pelled to contribute for thesupportof schools, constitute a "right or privi- lege" for Roman Cacholics " by practice" within the meaning of the Manitoba Act? The former of these, as will at once be seen, was a question of fact, and the latter a question of law, based on the assump- tion which has since been proved to be well founded, that the existence of separate schools at the time of the " union " was the fact on which the Catholic population of ^Manitoba must rely as establishing their " ritflit or privilege" "by practice." The remaiiiing question was questions, or either of them, to the onuritments now under review, or either of tlicm, affected any such "right or privileged" It becomes apparcnit at the outset that these questions required the decision of the judicial triljuiials, niore especially as an investi- gation of facts w;is necessarv to tlieir determination. Proceedings were instituted with a viesv to ol)taiuing such a decision in the Court of Queen's Bench of Manitoba seveiul months ago, a)id in course of these })roceedings the facts have been easily ascertained, and the two latter of the three qiiestions above stated were i)resented for the judgment of that court with the arguments of counsel for the Roman Catholics of Manitoba on the one side, and of counsel for the Provincial Governmsnt on the other. The court has [)ractically decided, with one dissentient opinion, that the Acts now under leview do not " prejudicially affect uny right or privilege with respect to denominational schools " which Roman Catholics had by " practice at the time of the Union," or, in brief, that the non-existence, at that time, of a system of public schools and the consequent exemption from taxation for the support of public schools and the consequent freedom to establish and support separate or " denominational " schools did not constitute a " right or nrivilege " " by practice " which these Acts took away. An ajipeal has been asserted, and the case is now before the Supreme Court of Canada, where it will in all probability, be heard in the course of next month. If the appeal should be successful, these Acts will be annulled by judicial decision; the Roman Catholic minority of Manitoba will receive protection and redress. The Acts purporting to be repealed will remain in operation, and those whose views have been represented by a majority. of the Legislature cannot but recognize that the matter has been ditiposed of with due regard to the constitutional rights of the province. If the legal controversy should result in the decision of the Court •of Queen's Bench being sustained, the time will come for Your Excellency to consider the petitions which have been presented by 3 34 PETITIONS AND ORDERS IN COUNCIL. [Part I. and on behalf of tlie Konian Catholics of Manitoba for redress under sub-sections 2 and 3 of section 22 of the " Manitoba Act," quoted in the early part of this report, and which are analogous to the pro- visions made by the British North America Act, in relation to the other provinces. Those sub-sections contain, in effect, the provisions which have- been made as to all the provinces, and are obviously those luider which the constitution intended that the Government of the Dominion ishould proceed, if it shouiil at any time become necessary that the Federal powers should be resorted to for the protection of a Protestant or Roman Catholic minority, against any Act or decision of the Legislature of the province, or of any provincial authority, affecting- or privilege" of any such minority "in relation to> any education, " right Respectfully submittal. John S, D. Thompson, Minister of Justice. Petition 20th September, 1892. Prior to the date of the following petition judgment had beeit given in the Privy Council in the cases of Barrett v. Winnipeg and. Logan V. Winnii)eg, as set out at page 21 : To His Excellency the Governor-General in Council : The humble petition of the undersigned members of the Roniaa Catholic Church, in the Province of Manitoba, and dutiful subjects. of Her Most Gracious Majesty, doth hereby respectfully represent that : The seventh Legislature of the Province of Manitoba, in its third session assembled, did pass in the year eighteen hundred and ninety an Act intituled "An Act respecting the Department of Education," and also an Act respecting public schools, which deprive the Roman Catholic minority in the said Province of Manitoba of the rights and privileges they enjoyed with regard to education previous to and at the time of the union, and since that time up to the passing of the- Acts aforesaid. That subsequeiit to the passing of said Acts, and on behalf of the • members of said Roman Catholic Church, the following petition has been laid before Your Excellency in Council (Set out at page 28) : That on the consideration of the Privy Council of Canada of the- two Acts aforesaid, the following report of the Honorable the Minis- ter of Justice, dated 21st March, 1891, was approved by Hia Excellency the Governor-General in Council on the 4th April, 1891,. viz. : (Set out at page 31.) Chap. V.] petitions and ordehs in council. S8 That a recent decision of tlie Judicial Conuiiittee of the Privy C iincil in England having sustained the judgment of the Court of Queen's Bench of Manitoba, upholding the validity of the Acts afore- said, your petitionei*s most respectfully represent that, as intimated in said report of the Honorable the Minister of Justice, the time has now come for Your Excellency to consider the petitions which have been presented by and on behalf of the Roman Catholics of Manitoba for redress under sub-sections 2 and 3 of section 22 of the " Manitoba Act." That your petitioners, notwithstanding such decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy C/Ouncil in England, still believe that their rights and privileges in relation to education have been prejudicially aflfected by said Acts of the Provincial Legislature. Therefore, your petitioners most respectfully and most earnestly pray that it may please Your Excellency in Council to take into considei-ation the petitions above referred to, and to grant the con- clusions of said petitions and the relief and protection sought for by the same. And your petitioners will ever pray. Saint Boniface, 20th September, 1892. Members of the Executive Committee of the National Congress. T. A. Bernier, Acting President, A. A. C. LaRivieke. Joseph Lecomte. James E. P. Pkendekgast. J. Ernest Cyr. Theo. Bert rand. Secretaries '{t H. F. Despars. M. A. Kervalk. Telesphore Pelletier. Dr. J. IE. Oct. Lambert. Joseph Z. C. Auger. A. F. ]\Iartin. E. Versailles. Goulet, Jr. Petition 22nd September, 1892. To His Excellency the Governor-General in Council: The humble petition of the undersigned, Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Church in the Province of Manitoba, respectfully sheweth: — 1. That two statutes, 53 Vic, chap. 37 and 38, were passed in the L( ,.ative Assembly of Manitoba to niei'ge the Roman Catholic Schools with those of the Protestant denominations, and to require all members of the community, whether Roman Catholic or Protestant, to contribute, through taxation, to the support of what are therein called Public Schools, but which are in reality a continuation of the Protestant Schools. 36 PETITIONS AND OKDERS IN COUNCIL. [Part I. 2. That on the 4th of April, 18/0, James E. P. Pendergaat, M.P.P. for Woodlanils, transuutted to the Honoural)le tlie Secretary of State for Canada a petition, signed by eight nieuihei-s of the Legis- lative Assembly of Manitoba, to make knovvn to His Excellency the Governor-General the grievances under which Her Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects of the Province of Manitoba were suffeiing by the |)assation of the two said Acts, respectively intituled : " An Act res])('cting the Department of Education," and " An x\.ct respecting Public Schools," (53 Vic, chap. 37 and 38). The said petition ende(l by the following words: Your))etitionoi's, therefore, humbly pray that Your Excellency may be ])leased to take such action "and grant such relief and remedy as to Your Excellency may seem meet and just." 3. That on the 7th of xVpril, the same year, 1890, the Catholic section of tlie Board of Education, in a petition signed l)y its Presi- dent, the Arehl»isliop of St. Boniface, an(l its Secretary, T.A. Bernier, "most respectfully and eai'nestly ))rayed His Excellency the Covcrnor-General in Council that said last mentioned Acts (^S Vic, chap. 37 and . 8) be disallowed to all intents and [»ur])oses." 4. That on the I'Jth of April, 1890, the undersigned brought before His Excellency .some of the facts concerning the outl)reak which occurred at Red River during the winter of 1869-70; the part that the undersigned was invited, by Imperial and Federal authori- ties, to take in the )jacilication of the country ; the promise intrusted to the undersigned in an autograph letter from the then Governor- General that the people of Red River " may rely that respect and attention will be extended to the diflerent religious i)ersuasions ; " the furnishing the under.sijrned with a proclamation to be made known to the dissatified population, in which proclamation the then Governor- General declared: "Her Majesty commands me to state to you tliat she will be always ready, througli me as Her representative, to redress all well-founded grievances." By Her Majesty's aiithority I do there- fore assure you that on your union with Canada "all your civil and religious rights and ))rivileges will be respected." In the strengtli of such assiirauce, the people of Red River consented to their union with Canada and the Act of Manitoba was passed, giving guarantees to the minority that their rights and privileges, acquired by law or practice, with regard to education, would be protected. The cited Acts, 53 Vic, chap, 37 and 38, being a violation of the as.surances given to the Red River population, through the Manitoba Act, the undersigned ended his petition of the 12th Api'il, 1890, by the follow- ing words: — " I therefore most respectfully and most earnestly pray that Your Excellency, as the representative of our most beloved Queen, should take such '^ ops that in your wisdom would seem the best remedy against the evils that the above mentioned and recently enacted laws are preparing in this part of Her Majesty's domain." 11 I i ! Chap. V.] petitions and orders in council. 87 5. That later on, working under the above mentioned disadvan- tage ard wishing for a remedy against Uiws which affected their rights and privileges in the matter of education, 4,267 members of the P ''iin Catholic Church, in the Province of Manitoba, on behalf of themselves and their co-religionists, appealed to the Governor- General in Council from the said Acts of the Legislature of the Province of Manitol)a, the prayer of their {)etition being as follows : — • "(1) That Your Excellency the Governor-General in Council may entertain the said ap[ieal, and may consider the same, and may make such provisions and give such directions for the hearing and con- sideration of tlie said appeal as may be thought proper. "(2) That it u)ay be declared that such Provincial law does pre- judicially affect the rights and jjrivileges with regard to dciuomina- tional schools which Roman Catholics had by law or practice in the province at the union. " (.3) That such directions may be given and provisions made for the relief of the Roman Catholics of the Province of Manitoba as to Your Excellency in Council may seem tit." G. That in the month of Maich, 1891, the Cardinal Arolibisliop of Quebec and the Archbishops and Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church in Canada, in a petition to His Excellency the Governor- General in Council, slieweth that the 7th Legislature of the Province of Alanitoba, in its third session assembled, had jjassed an Act intituled, "Au Act res[)ecting the Department of Education," and another Act to be cited, "The Public School Act," which deprived the Catholic minority of tlie ))rovince of the rights an0 instructed. Between the time of the passai,'e of the said Act and prior to the statute next hereinafter referred to, various Acts were passed amending and consolidating the said Act, but in and l)y all sucii later Acts the rights and privihfges of the Roman (Jatholics wore acknowledged and conserved and their separate' condition in respect to education continued. 9. Until the session of the liOgislative Assembly held in tli(? year 1890, no attempt was made to encroach upon the rights of the Roman Catholics so coutirnunl to them as abose mentioned, l)ut ihiring said sf.ssion statutes were passed (b'i Vic, chaps. .37 and o8) theetlect of which was to repeal all the j»r<'vious Acts; to deprive the Roman Catholics altogether of their se[)anite condition in I'egard to education; to merge their schools with thos(^ of the Protestant denominations; and to reipiire all meml)ers of the community, wheoher Romau Catholic or Protestant, to contribute, through taxation, to the support of whiit :ire therein called public scliooLs, but which are in reality a continuation of Protestant schools. 10. There is a provision in the said Act for the a[)pointment and election ol an advisor\ board, an ' also for the election in each disti'ict of school trustees. There is also a i)rovision that the said advi.sory lioard miiy prescribe religious exercises for use in schools, and that the said school trustees may, if they think fit, direct such religious extM'cises to be adoptcnl in the schools in their resijcctivo distriots. No further or other provision is made with reference to religious training. 1 1. Roman Catholics regard such schools as unfit for the pui'poses of education, and the children of Roman Catholic parents cannot and will not attend any such schools. Rather than countenance such schools. Ronuvn Catholics will revert to the vohint.iry system in opeiatiou previous to the Manitoba Act, and will at their own private expeust! establish, supi)ort am) maiutuin schools in accordance with their ])rinciples and their faitli, although by so doing they will have in addition thereto to contribute to tlu; expense of the so-calhnl pul)lic schools. 12. Your petitioners submit that tiie said Acts of the; Legislative A.ssembly of Manitol)a are subversive of the rights of Roman Catholics ifuarauteed and confirmed to them 1)V the statute erecting' the Pi'oviuci! of Manitoba, and prvnjudicially affect the rights and privileges with I'espect to Roman Catholic schools which Roman Catholics had in the province at the time of its union with the Dominion of Canada. 13. Your petitioners further submit that the said Acts of the- Chap. V.] petitions and ouokks in council. 41 Lejjislativo Assenildy of Manitoba are siihvorsive of the ri;j;lits and' privileges of Roman Catholics provided for by tin- various statutes of tlie said Loyislative Asscnibly prior to tins passing of the said Acts, and atlect the rights and privileges of the Honian Catholic minority of the C^ueiJii's sul)j(!cts in thi^ said province in relation to education, 80 provided for as aforesaid, therol)y otVeiuliiig botii against the British North Ai.. erica Act and tiie ISIanitolta Act. 14. tloman Catholics are in a minority in the said province, and have been .so for the last fifteen years. 15. Tlio Roman Catiiolics of the Province of Manitoba, tlioreforo, appeal from tlie said Acts of the Legislative Assenil)ly of the Province of Manitoba. Your petitioners therefore pray — 1. That Your Excellency the Governor-( Jeneral in Council may entertain the said appeal and may consider the same, and may make such provisions and give such directions for the hearing and consider- ation of the said ap[teal as may be thought proper. 2. Thiit it may lie declnriMl that the said Acts (.')ll Vic, chaps. ."57 and 38. do prejudicially alleet the rights antl privileges with regard to denominational schools which 1 toman Catholics ha.l by law or practice in the province at the union. 3. That it niiiy be dcchireil that the snid last mentioned Acts do affect the rights and privileges of the llomau Catholic minority of the Queen's suV>jects in relation to education. 4. That it may be d(.'clarcd that to\''our Excellency the Governor- General in Council, it seems reijuisitc* that the provisions of the statutes in force in the Province of Manitoba piioi' to the passiigt; of the said Acts, should be re-enacted in so far at least as may be necessary to secure to the Roman Catholics in the said province! the right to build, maintain, etpiip, manage, conduct and sup[»oi't the.se schools in the niiiiuuir provided for l)y tlu' .said statutes, to secure to them their ))ro|)ortionate share of any grant made (jut of tin; [)ultlic funds for the purposes of education, and to i-elieve such membeis of the Roman Catholic Church as contribute to such Roman Catholic schools from all payment or contribution to the support of any other schools; or that tla^ said Acts of 18'JU should be so modilied or amended as to effect such (lurposes. 0. And that such further or other dechiration or order may be made as to Your Excellency the Governor-General in Council shall, under the circumstances, seem ])roi)er, and that such directions may be given, provisions made and all things done in the premises for the pur[iose of affording i-elief to the said Roman Catholic minority in the said province ns to Your Excellency in Council may sc^em meet. 42 PKTITIONH ANT) ORDRRS 1\ COUNCIL. Part T. Aiul your potitionocH will over |)niy< tAij:x., Arcli. of St. nonifacp, O.M.I. T. A. Hkhniku, President of tlio Niitioiml ('onsfroHH. .Ia.mks Ki. P. PiiKNDKitiiA.sT, Millie »lc la Villt) (It! St. Bonifiico J. AMiAiti), O.M.I., V.O., mill Hl)out 137 otlmiH. JoiIV S. EWAHT, CotuiSi'l for fliJi liininDi. ddtliolic inlnorili/ In (he J'nu'itice of Manitoba, PRESENTATION OP THE PETITIONS. Tlio petitions were rofeircd Ity the (Tovcnior-fiioiieriil in Couiieil to n siil)-coiiiuiitt('o of the ('ouiu'il. The; .siih comniittfio sat on the 26th November, i8U2, when Mr. Kwart, (.2. C, ou behiilf of the )>etitioiier8, orally pie.sonted the ptititions. Tlie nieinl)er.s of the 8nb- coinniittee pres(Uit w 're : The lion. Sir .fohu Thouip.soiWpre.sidini^), the Hon. Mr. Howell, 'uul the Hon. Mi'. (Jliapleau. Tiie Hon. Mr. Oiii met was also present by invitation to hear tin? argument. As Mr. Kwai't's address was n^pcated in moi-e extended form when he appeared before the fall Coun>!il it is not thought proj)er to insert it liere. Ohder in Council, 29th Decemuicr, 1892. The Committee of the Privy Council have had under consideration a report, hei-eto annexed, from a sub-committee of Council, to whom were; referred certain memorials to Your Excellency, coinphiniiig of two statutes of the Leproved, together with p copy of the report of the sub-committee of Coiuicil, be transmitte»i to the Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba. John J. McGee, Clerk of the Privy Council. cmvr. v.] pktiti0n8 and ohi>khs in' counoil. Hki'oht ok Suu-Cummittkk. 43 To ntn E.i'cfl/i'iiri/ the (lovernoMieHerat in Conncil : Tlie Hul»-committtM' to wlioiii wero retVrnnl fcrtuin lueinoriiils, nddrcHHcd to Your KNofllt'iicy in (.'oinu-il, coiii|iIniiiiiiL( ot" tAVO stutiitoH of tlic L('i,'iHliitiir(' of Sl:iiiitol»;i, rt'liitiiii^ to «'(liicatioi:, piisHud in the HCMsion of l^'JU, liiivo tlie lioiioJir to imiko tlio following ropoi't : — The tii'st of tliPHo incuioHiils is from tlip otliccrs and cxocutivo committee of tlu* " Niiiional (^onyrc^ss." nn orjj;iiniziition wliicli seems to Imve b('(Mi ostiihlisliod in .hint'. IS'JU. in Miinitol)ii. TliiH nienioiial sets forth that two Acts of the Iiei,'isIiitiiro of Manitoba, passed in IS'.MI, intitided r(,'s|i(>c;tively, "An Act respecting the J^epiirtment of Kdiieation" and ''An Act r, referred to as the subject of the ap[ieal, ;ind intimated that those statutes woidd jirobably be held to be ultra vires of tiie Legislature of Manitoba if they were found to have prejudicially affected "any right or privilege with respect to denominational schools which any class of persons had, by law or '€hap. v.] petitions and orders in council. # t^ practice, in the province, at the union." The report suggested that questions of fact seemed to be raised by the petitions, which were then under consideiation, as to tlie practice in Manitoba with regard to scliools, at the time of tlie union, and also questions of law as to whether the slate of facts then existing constituted a " right or privilege" of the Roman Catholics, within the meaning of the saving clauses in the Manitoba Act, and as to whether the Acts complained of (of 1890) hull " ])iejii(licially ailected " such " right or privilege." The leport sets foi'th that these were obviously questions to be decirs could be taken u]) and dealt with, and that if the allegations of the petitioners and their contentions as to the law, were well founded, tliere would be no occasion for Your Excellency to entei-tain or act upon the appeal, as the courts would decide the Acts to l)e idtra vires. The report and the minute ado])ting it. were clearly Itased on the view that consideration of the coin] 'aints and ai)p('al of the iiomau t'iitholic minority, as set foi'th in the petitions, should be deferred until the legal eontrovei'sy should be determined, as it would then be ascertained whether the appellants should liud it necessary to jtress for consideration of their ajiplication for riulress under the saving clauses of the British North America Act and the Manitoba Act, which seemed, by their view of the law, to provide for ))rotection of tlin rights of a minority against legislation (within the cotni)etenoe of the legislature), which might interfere with rights which hail been conferred on the minority, after the union. The memorial of the " Congress " goes on to state that the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, in England, has upheld the validity ot the Acts complained of and the " memoiial " asserts that the time has now come for Your Excellency to consider the petitions which have been [)iesented by and on l)ehalf of the Roman Catholics of ]Manitol)a for redress under sub-sections 2 and 3 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act. There was also referred to the sub-committee a memorial from the Archbishop of Saint Boniface, complaining of the two Acts of 1890, before mentioned, and calling attention to former petitions on the same subject, from members of the Roman Catliolic minority in the province, iiis Grace made reference, in this memorial, to assurances which were given by one of Your Excellency's predecessors before the passage of the Manitoba Act, to redress all well founded grievances and to respect the civil and religious rights and privileges of the people of the Red River Tenitory. His Grace then prayed that Your Excellency should entertain the appeal of the Roman Catholics of Manitoba and might consider the same, and might make such directions for the hearing and consideration of the ap))eal as might be thought proper and also give directions for the relief of the Roman Catholics in Manitoba. umm 46 PETITIONS AND ORDERS IN COUNCIL. [Part I. The sub-committee also had before theiu a inemoranduin inaile by the " Conservative Leaj^ue " of Montraal remonstrating against the (alleged) unfairness of the Acts of 1890, before referred to. --Soon after the reference was made to the sub-connnittee of the memorial of the " National Congress " and of the other memorials just referred to, intimation was conveyed to the sub-committee, by Mr. John S. Ewart, Counsel for the Roman Catholic minority in Manitoba, that;, in his opinion, it was desirable that a further memorial, on '^ehalf of that minority, should be j)resented, before the pending application should be dealt with, and action on the part of the sub-committee was therefore delayed until the further petition should come in. Late in November this supplementary memorial was received and referred to the sub-committee. It is signed by t' > Archbishop of Saint Boniface, and by the President of the "National Congress" the Mayor of Saint Boniface, and about 137 others, and is piesenced in the name of the " Members of the Roman Catholic Church, resident in the Province of Manitoba." Its allegations are very similar to those hereinbefore recited, ay being contained in the memorial of the Congress, but there is a further contention tliat the two Acts of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba, passed in 1890, on the subject of education, were *' subversive of the rights and privileges of the Roman Catholic minority provided for by the statutes of .Manitoba prior to the ])ass- ing of the taid Acts of 1890, thereby violating both the British Noith America Act and th^ Manitoba Act." This last mcutioned memorial urged : — (1.) That Your Excellency might entertain the appeal and give directions for its ()roper consideration. (2.) That Your Excellency should declare that the two Acts of 1890 (cliapters 37 and 38), do prt^udicially affect the rights and privileges of the minority, with regard to denoniiiiational schools, which they had by law or practice, in the province, at the union. (3.) That it may be declared that the said Acts affect the rights and privileges of Roman Catholics in relation to education. (4:.) That a re-enactment may be ordereil by Your Excellency, of the statutes in force in Manitoba, prior to these Acts of 1890, in so far, at least, as may be necessary to secure for Roman Cotholics in the pi'ovince the right to build, maintain, ifec, their schools, in the manner provided by such statutes, and to secure to them their pro- portionate share of any grant made out of public funds of the province for education, or to relieve such members of the Roman Catholic Church as contribute to such Roman Catholic schools from payment or contribution to the support of any other schools ; or that these- Acts of 1890 should be so amended as to effect that purpose. Then follows a general prayer for relief, ' Chap. V.] PETITIONS AND ORDKRS IN COUNCIL. 47- In making their report the sub-committee will comment only iipon< the liiht :;;?'»orial pi-esented, as it seems to contain, in effect, all the allegations embi'iced in the former petitions which call foi- their - consideration and is more specific as to the relief which is sought. As to the request which the petitioners make in the second paragraph of their j>rayer, viz : "That it maybe declared that tlie said Acts (53 Vic, 37 and 38) do prejudicially affect the rights and privileges with regard to denominational schools which the Komaii Catholics had by law or practice in the [)rovince of Manitoba at the time of the union," the sub-committee are of opinion that the judgment of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council is con- clusive as to the riirhts with regard to denominational schools which the Roman Catholics had at the time of the union, and as to the bearing thereon of the statutes com))lained of, and Your Excellency is not, therefore, in the opinion of the sub-connuittee, properly called upon to hear an a))peal based on those grounds. That judgment is as binding, on Your Excellency as it is on any of the parties to the litigation, and, therefore, if redress is sought on account of the state of afl'air3> existing in the province at the time of the union, it nuist be sought elsewhere and by other means than by way of appeal under the sections of the British North America Act and of the Manitoba Act, which are relied on by the petitioners as sustaining this a})])eal. The two Acts of 1890, which ai-e complained of, must, according to the opinion of the sub-committe'>. ')e regardetl as within the powers of tlie Legislature of Manitoba. \>uo it remains to be considered whether tlie api)eal should be entertained and heard as an appeal- against statntes which are alleged to have encroached on rights and privileges with regard to denoniiiuitional schools which were ac([uired by any class of ])ersons in Manitoba, not at the time of the union but after tlie union. The sub committee were addressed by counsel for the petitioners as to the right to have the appeal heard, and from his argument, as welL as from the doc\iments, it would seem that the following are the grounds of the appeal : — A complete system of separate and denominational schools, i.e., a system providing for Public Schools and for Sejjarate Catholic Schools, was, it is alleged, established by Statute of Manitoba in 1871 and by a series of subsequent xVcts. This system was in operation until the two Acts of 18'J0 (cha[)ters 37 and 38) were passed. The 93rd section of the British North America Act, in conferring ])ower on the provincial leg slatures, exclusively, to make laws in relation to education, imposed on that power certain i restrictions, one of which was (sub-section 1) to preserve the right with respect to denoniiiuitional schools which any class of persons had in the province at the union. As to this restriction it seems to- impose a condition on the validity of any Act relating to education,. m^ 48 PETITIONS AND ORDERS IN COUNCIL. [Part I. and the sub-caimittee have already observed that no question, it aeenis to them, can arise, since the decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. The third sub-section, howevei*, is as follows : — " Where in any province a system of separate or dis'sentient schools exists i)y law at the union, or is thereafter established by the legislature of the province, an appeal shall lie to the Governor- General in Council, from any Act or decision of any provincial authority, affectiiii; any right or ])rivilege of the Protestant or Roman CatlioHc minority of the Queen's sultjects in relation to education." Tiio jNIanitoba Act passed in 1870, by which the Province of IMonitoba was constitiited, contains the following provisions, as regards that province : — By section 22 tlio ])0wer is conferred on the legislature, exclusively, to make laws in relation to education, but subject to the following I'estrictions : (1.) "Notliinn'in any law sliall prejudicially affect any right or privilege with I'espect to denominational schools which any class of persons have, by law or j)ractice, in the [trovince, at the imion." This restriction, the sub-committee again observe, has been dealt with by tlie judgment of the Judicial Connnittee of the Privy Council. Then follows ; (2.) "An apjieal shall lie to the Governor-General in Council from any Act or decision of the Legislature of the pi'ovince, or of any provincial authority, affecting any right or ])rivilege of the Protestant or Roman Catholic minority of the Queen's subjects in relation to education." It will be observed that the restriction contained in sub-section 2 is not identical with the restriction of sub-section 3 of the *J3rd section of the British North America Act, and (juestions are suggested, in view of this difference, as to whether sub-section 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act applies to Manitoba, and, if not, whether sub-section 2 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act is sufficient to sustain the case of the ai)pellants ; or, in other words, whether, in regard to Manitoba, tlie minority has the same protection against laws which the legislature of the ])rovince has power to pass, as the minorities in other provinces have, under the sub-section before -quoted from the British North America Act, as to sepai'ate or denominational schools established after the union. The argument presented by counsel on behalf of the petitioners •was, that the present appeal comes before Your Excellency in Canada, not as a request to review the decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, but as a logical consequence and result of that decision, inasujuch as the remedy now sought is provided by the British North America Act, and the Manitoba Act, not as a remedy Ohap. v.] petitions and ordkrs in council. 4» to the minority against statutes which interfere with the lights which the minority had at the time of the union, but as a remedy against statutes which interfere with rights acquired by the minority after the union. The remedy, therefore, which is sought, is against Acts which are intra vires of the Provincial Legishiture. His argu- ment is also that the appeal does not ask Your Excellency to interfere with any rights or powers of the Legislature of Manitoba, inasmach as the j)Ower to legislate on the subject of education has only been conferred on that legislature with the distinct reservation that Your Excellency in Council shall have jjower to make remedial orders against any such legislation which infringf^s on rights acquired after the union by any Protestant or Roman Catholic minority in relation to separate or dissentient schools. Upon the various questions which arise on these petitions the sub-committee do not feel called upon to express an opinion, and so far as they are aware, no opinion has been exjjressed on any previous occasion in this case or any other of a like kind, by Your Excellency's Government or any other Government of Canada. Indeed, no application of a parallel character has been made since the establishment of the Dominion. The application comes before Your Excellency in a manner differing from i; pi)lications which are ordinarily made, under the constitution, to Your Excellency in Council. In the opinion of the sub-committee, the application is not to be dealt with at present as a matter of a political character or involving political action on the part of Your Excellency's advisers. It is to be dealt with by Your Excellency in Council, regardless of the personal views which Your Excellency's advisers may hold with regard to denominational schools and without the political action of any of the members of Your Excellency's Council being considered as pledged by the fact of the appeal being entertained and heard. If the contention of the petitioners be correct, that such an appeal can be sustained, the inquiry will be rather of a judicial than a political character. The sub-committee have so treated it in hearing counsel, and in permitting their only meeting to be open to the public. It is apparent that several other questions will arise, in addition to those which were discussed by counsel at that meeting, and the sub-committee advises that a date be fixed, at which the petitioners, or their counsel, may be heird with regard to the appeal, according to their firs^ request. The sub-committee think it proper that the Government of Manitoba should have an opportunity to be represented at the hear- ing, and they further recommend, with that view, that if this report should be approved, a copy of any minute approving it, and of any minute fixing the date of the hearing with regard to the appeal, be forwarded, together with copies of all the petitions referred to, to i«Mi|i 90 PETITIONS AND ORDEKS IN COUNCIL. [Part L His Honour tlie Lieuteimnt-Govei-nor of Manitoba, for the in- formation of His Honour's advisers. In the ojunion of the sub-committee, the attention of any person who may attend on behalf of the petitioners, or on behalf of the Provincial Government, should be caDeil to certain preliminary questions which seem to arise with regard to the appeal. Among the questions which the sub-committee regard as preliminary ai*e the following :— (1). Whether this appeal is such an appeal as is contomplateci by sub-section 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act, or by sub-section 2 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, (2 ). Whether the ground set forth in the petitions are such as may be the subject of appeal under either of the sub-sections above referred to. (3). Whether the decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in any way bears on the application for redress based on tlie contention that the rights of the Roman Catholic ininoiity which accrued to tht;:>i after the union have been interfered with hy the two statutes of 1890 before referred to. (4;, Whether sub-committee 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act apj)lies to Manitoba. (5). Whether Your Excellency in Council has power to grant such orders as are asked for by the ))etitioner, assuming the material facts to be as stated in the petition. (6). Whether the Acts of JNIanitoba, passed before the session of 1890, conferred on the minority a "right or privilege with I'espect to education," within the meaning of sub-section 2 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, or established " a system of sej)arate or dissentient schools," within the meaning of sub-sectioi. 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act, and if so, whtther the two Acts of 1890, complained of, affect "the right or pri\ilege" of the minority in such a manner as to warrant the present apj)eal. Other questions of like character may be suggested at the hearing, and it may be desirable that arguments should be heard upon such preliminary points before any hearing shall take place on the merits of the appeal "Respectfully submitted, Jno. S. D. Thompson. M. BOWELL. J. A. Chapleau. T, Mayne Daly. Chap. V.] APPEAL TO GOVKUNOU-GENEKAL. 51 ARGUMENT UPON APPEAL TO THE GOVERNOR- GENERAL IN COUNCIL. Notice having been given to tin; Province iiufl to the repre- sentative ot" the Roman Catholics, the Governor-(Tenftral in Conncil sat to hear argument on the 2 1st (hiy of .raniiary, 18'.K3. The following is a very accm-ate account of the proceedings taken from The Empire : — Ottawa, Jan. 22. — It was an historic scene which was enacted yesterday in the Privy Council ohamhei- here — historic because for the first time in the history of the Dominion an appeal was being heard by the Governor in Council under the provisions of section 1)3 of the Confederation Act. Following the precedent set by the sub- committee of the Privy Council, which heard the preliminary argu- ment, the proceedings yesterday were open to the public. Kvery leading newspaper in the Dominion hud its representatives present, while about a dozen gentlemen represented the great Canadian public. Among the more notable outsiders present were Rev. Father Lacombo, the famous N.W. missionary ; Mr. L.iriviere, M.P for Provenichnr; Mr. Dernier, the new Senator from Manitoba, and ex-Ald. -John Heney, of Ottawa. Solicitor-General Curran alsu dru[)[>ud in lo hear what was going on. Hon. Mr. Ives governed the meeting in his capacity as President of the Privy Council. Seated at his rigiit hand was the Hrst minister, Sir Joliu Thompson, and on his left Hon Mr. Bowell, the senior Privy Councillor. Then ranged about the round tal)le, commencing at Sir John Thompson's right according to seniority, were : Sir A. P. Caron, Hon. John Costigan, Hon. Mr. Foster-, Hon. Mr. Elaggart, Hon. Mr. Patterson an t)it>ir kiiul ; and tliat lloiiian (^itliolii'H slionld fillicr (1) al)nndon odunition altogi^tlici , or (2) al>imd(Mi tlu'ir i(>'i^fi(»n. or {',\) |)rovid(> privatn hoIiooIs for thcnisclvHs liosidcH |>iovidiii;^ pnldic schools tor otlicrH. A spirit of toli-ranct* and of j:[ood s»MiS(% lio\v Hrown and Hon. Alex. Mackcnzii^, liv(>d to extend tlicir sympathy and support to tho Hou>an ('atholioR in th(?ir strut^ylo for tlio ri^ht to ( Incato their ohildrpn !IH the> thouj^ht prop(>r. The reHidt of this pi-olonjjed and l)etter conHiot made two things tolnral)ly clear : — (I ) That Pi-otestants and Roman (Catholics wore wholly irroconcilahle upon tiiis (pieHtion of education, and (2) that from time to time as one generation oxc(>eded another, we might expect a recrud«'senc() of attempts by religious majorities to coerce the nii.iorities into tluMr way of thinking. It was under these circumstances, and to tho Dominion or the provinces ? It was a niattei- of local concern and woulil be most natiirally assigned to t'.ie provinces ; but that would be to leave the Protestant minority in Qubec, and the Roman Catholic minority in the other juovintjes at the nuMry of opposing majori*'ies. A compromise was adopteil — a compromise so es.stMitial that without it confederation could never have tak(>n place (as Sir Oliver Mowat tells us) and the compromise was this, that the provinces should have jurisdiction over education, but should in th»M>.\tn'''ist( of that jurisdic- tion be subject to certain restrictions and limitations for the pi-otection of minorities. These restrictions and limitations were of two kinds — tiist, the prininces weie to have no power to j-rtjudicially alfect any right or privilege witli i<>spect to denominational schools which any class of ])erson8 had l)y law at the date of the union, and second an appeal should lie to tli(> (roveruor-Ceneral in council whenever any right oi' privilege of the n>ligious minority was atl'ected in any province in which sei)arato .schools had been once established, whether before or after the union ; and the Coveinor (Jenei-al could (!all u))on the legisla- tures to ))ass laws tor tlii' purpose of carrying out his award. Tiiat was the compromise agreed upon ; the i)rovince in the matter of education shall not be omnipotent : as to some matters they shall have no power at all — they nnist not ))rejudicially aft'ect rights existing at the union : as to other matters their power shall be subject to a[)peal, and their work subject to revision, by the Governor-General iji Council. Now let nie point out that the Confederation Act speaks of two classes ui" rights and privileges ; first, those wliich existed at the \inion, •Cum-, v.] MR. KWAHT'h APDHKRI. 85 uikI sccoml, tlioHct wliicli ciiiiiK into oxiHt«inon aft((r tin* union. A ]>i'Ovin('o \h alwolufculy |iownrl«'ss to pn'jutlii'o iUii rij^lits vvliich oxiHted at tin* iniioii, l)iit as to tlioHc wliicli ninut into oxistniK!!' iif'IctrwurdH — tlioHC! (jroatnd hy tlm piovinct! itHcIf — tin) |imviiif<' yavc, aiul tlio ]>rovinf!B can tako away, Kultjuct only to Hnptti'viHion by iho (Jov(M'nor- <}«n<'ral in ('onn«;il ami liy tin* FHKHH. [I'AMT I. I i CoiiiiniHco <() tiik** tlmt vitnv of iil to tlit> ( «oviiMl iu Council; iind tlmt llml l)i>inir tlii> i'i>in'>ily ]iriiviil(>il l>y Ntntiilt', tlicio rouM Im< no irnn'ily hy ii|t|)tMl to tln'conrls At (list lln'ir I .Di'dsliipH \v(>i'(< nuii'li liikcn willi tliiN view, nml inti«n'ii|)l<<*| [\\{\ iii-;;uin<>nl ii|)Oti tli<> ni< rits to JMMir wlmt (■(i\niH(tt lind It) Hiiy n|ion llio |H>iii(. 'rill' iTHiill Wiis the «'oni|)l<'(f o\ I'ltliiow of 111*' itlfii, nnr I Iml. tlio |>oinl iir, lu'rlmpH I luny Im> iillo\vt>il to i|uoii> tVoni tlio nMimrUs ot' juil^jcs loul counsel nitulc (lurint; (lie Mri;uincn( : Till- Alinrncy (icuciid (cnunscl tor iMiv Hnrii'll) — " I contend tlmt Hul) sect ions "J iiml it do not depend on iillvii rin'x at nil. Sul»-secl ions 1! and l\ d(>pend on ll\e I'rotestanl or ('allioiie nunoiity Iteini; aide to make a case, liefore the (lovernor (leneral on petition, tlmt other leyisialion is nvpiired. Il, does not susi^est t hat, the Act which the Governor is ,i(oinu[ to consider is an ii/fru rlris Act. It miyht he perlei'tly le<;ilimat<> and lawt'ul. pass«'d liy the I'l-oviniual |jej,dsh»tili'n within its nan'ow«'st powers." Sir Horace l)av(>y (counsel t'or IManitoha (tovcrnnuMit) — " My Lords, the ditrerence l»et\v»'«»n my h>arned fri<'nd the .Attorney- (Jeneral's view ai\d lh(> view which I presented to your Lordships appears to nu' to tinii upon the constiMmtion and elVect which he puts upon siilvsectitMis '2 and .'V Now, there at onc(! I must take issuo witli him. 1 do not ai^ree that suh section 'J does relate to anything but what is ?;//nr riri's. I cannot t'or inyKcIf fVanu^ the proposition which wcndd lead to the inference that suh-sectioii '2 was intended to deal with cast>s which w<»r(> n/()'n in a niattiM' of this kind a particular lemedy is pointed out in the statute which confers the right, of course that special remedy must ho followoil. Lord Watson--" Assuming that they have done what they have powt r to do — umler the constitution of Manitoba, 1 mean — if they were establishing sejiarato und dissentient schools, a system of sepai"- ate or dissiMuient schools, then tlu>ir acts with regard to these .schools might come under section iJ." Mr. Mct^'arthy — "That is what I was venturing to contend could not be done." Lord Watson — "The right to deteiniine whether the province has exceeded its powers or not is ono thing, but undoubtedly wliat is con- templatcil here is not cases of excess of power by the Provincial Le:,nsl,iture. but cases where, acting within their power, tluy have nob pone what tlie minority thought justice. Sub st>ction 2 would suggest this : that the Dominion Legislature were under the impression that- that there might be provisions within the i)ower of t-ln; Pri)vincial CiJAi'. v.] Mil. KWAHTH AriDUKHH. dT lit'^iHliit.iiro wliicli wiiiilil iiiri<'-t. rlio I'i^litH ot' tJicH)' |M>i'N Imviii^ inl iiinih'il Iiih iiitiiili<)ii of roii- tiiiuiii^r llin lU'^riiiiK'iit, l.nitl Sliiiinl Hiihl : "/MIn tlic inliiinil.ion yoii liiivn Im'iii-iI \{. will iiol Ixt a vnry lio|M>riil ar^iiiiit'iil, to Niiy tlitt IxuhI of W," I Id '•nliiii^ U\ |,on| \V;iImom. " nh<|oiililci||y wliiit in (•()nlt>ni|»liil('il " in lln' hitimhI muIi .section " iH noi imhi-h of ttxccHH of power l»y tli<( Provinoiiil Kcyi.sliilint', Imt cuhi'n wliere, iirtin;^ witliin tlirir power, tliey liave not done wlmt tlm niinoiily tlioM;;lil jiiHtien." And, indeed, tlie matter HceniH to nie. witli all iliderenee to tlioHo wlio iir^U(Hl ot li(trwise, to Ixt not open to <|iiesl ion. < >t' what poHHdtle utility Ih u powdr to appoiil from an nltiui rirrn statute, and what ral(;d from. Such aro tho ahsui'dilies which ar(! fitidinj^ Home curi'oncy - (!V(!n in the newspaperH. Ai^ain, we ciui otdy appeal from a statute which afU'cts rii^hts or pi'ivilejjes. We must he al)lo to show that wo are hurt. But how can an •nUra vires Act affect riyhts, priviJegeH oi' anythin<^ else? How couhl we, jiossihly Hay that mi ii/lni vins Act had injureil us ( The; statute j^ives an appeal in some cas(! or another. (Jhsarly it must he from a statute;, a real, vcM'italile statute, and not from a form, tisjturo or simulacrum of u statute. Allow mo to answer this arijument in anotlier way. Let us suj»- pose that the draftsman of the .Munitoha Act desired to prohihit tho Legislature from passiiijj; certain laws, ami to provide a renif^ly in case tho [)roliihition were disi'ogarile 1, how would he have ])rocoedde ? T58 MR. EWART S ADDRESS. [Part I. The first sub-section would, no douot, have been drawn as it appears, but the second i/ould clearly have been in this fashion : An appeal shall lie to the Governor-General in Council from any Act of the Legislature prejudicially affecting auch rights or privileges. But, instead, as I shall proceed to show, that sub-section is in no way -connected with the preceding clause, but, on the contrary, provides for a totally different set of circumstances. In my address before a .committee of your Honorable Council, on the 26th November last, I entered into a more minute comparison of the language of the two sub-sections for the pui-pose of showing their dissimilarity, of showing how impossible it is to contend that they stand in the relation of prohibition and remedy than I intend to undertake to-day. My remarks upon that occasion were very fully reported, and have been, thanks to the enterprise of the press, widely circulated. An official report also, I am informed, is in the possession of the Council. I shall, therefore, abstain from a repetition of the argument to be -derived from such a comparison, contenting myself by pointing out in a few words that there is nothing in common between the two sub-sections : 1. Under sub-section 1 an Episcopalian 6r Presbyterian, as such, could complain (it was so held in the Logan case); while under sub- section 2 they could only complain, if at all, as belonging to the body of Protestants. 2. Under sub-section 1 any Protestant could complain ; while ■under sub-section 2 no Protestant could complain unless Protestants were in a minority in the province. As a concrete example, Mr. Logan, as an E[)iscopalian, had a sufficient locaa standi before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council ; but he never could appeal under sub-section 2, because the Roman Catholics, and not the Pro- testants, are in the niinoritv in Manitoba. 3. Under sub-section 1 an Act is ultra vires, and there can be no appeal from it, there being nothiug to appeal from ; while under sub- section 2 ai: appeal is given from Legislative Acts, which must be hdra vires, in oi'der to be Legislative Acts. 4. Under sub-section 1 the rights preserved are tiiose " with respect to denominational schools"; while under sub-section 2 those referred to are "in i-elation to education." The distinction between thene expressions is the A'ery ground-work of the decision of the Judicial Committee of the Council. 5. Undei' sub-section 1 there nutst be a prejudicial affecting of a right; while under sub-section 2 there need beno ])rejudice. Plainly, the two snb-s])eal is given in respect of rights acquired by practice. If this be conceded, as it probably will, the only point for debate is, whethei the statutes giving the rights and privileges must have been passed prior to the union ; or, is ther-e an appeal from a statute passed after the union] Clearly, I say, the latter, and for several reasons : Firstly — There was no statute relating to education in Manitoba prior to the union ; and to confine the appeal to the violation of fiuch statutes is again to argue that we must appeal from nothing must not have a word to at all : and even worse this time, that we say for ourselves when we do appeal. Secondly — There is nothing in the statute appeal to the case of rights acquired before which limits the the union. The ort the Protestant schools, and have to support their own out of tJKMr ])riviite purses Were there any (lis))08ition on tlie part of the Manitoba (lovoi-nuu'nt to act fairly with the lloman Catholics, I Siiy that their schools in the (38 districts and in the eight wo.uld never in any way have been interfered with ; and as to the other four the resources of civilization need not be largely drawn upon in order to find some easv solution of the circumstances there existinir. The absence of four good men from a city might aflbrd ground for the destruction of the whole population, but surely the presence of four bad ones would not be thought to supi)ly satisfactory reason for the same comprehensive action. So far I have been endeavoring to prove that power to deal ■with the present appeal exists. Before closing, however, I desire, -with all deference and respect, to contend that not only has His Excellency in council this power, but that it is his bounden duty to hddv the appeal, and to adjudicate thereon as its merits may require ; that the constitution has given to the Catholic minority of the Queen's subjects in Manitoba, as a right, an apjieal from Acts of the Legislative Assembly ; that His Excellency in Council cannot decline to hear «ucli an appeal, an 1 cannot refuse, whether out of I'egard for the Legislature, or for any other reason, to deliver a judgment upon tlie merits of the case when brought before him. It is a well-known rule for the construction of statutes that where functions of a public nature are bestowed upon individuals, such persons have no right to refuse to exercise their powei'S. The rule includes cases in which jurisdiction of a judicial character is given. Even when the language of a statute is permissive — the judge may do so and so — yet that is always held to mean that if a proper case is made out he shall do so and so. Allow me to quote a passage from Maxwell on Statutes (pages 295-6): "It is a legal, or rather a constitutional principle, that powers given to public functionaries or others, for public purposes or the public benefit, were always to be exercised when the occasion arises." And again : "But as regards the impei'ative character of the duty, it was laid down by the King's Bench (R. v. Hastings, 1 D. and R., 48), that words of pei-mission in an Act of Parliament when tending to promote the general benefit, are always held to l>e compulsory ; and as regards courts and judicial fui .ctionaries, who act only when appealed to, the sam« rule was in substance re-stated by the Common Pleas in laying down that whenever a statute confers an authority to do a judicial act (the word "judicial" being used evidently in its widest sense), in a certain case, it is imperative on those so authorized to exercise the authority when the case arises, and its exercise is duly applied for by ■& party interested and having a right to make the application ; and m Chap. V.] Mil. kwakt's ADDUKSS. es tliiit the excrciso dopondH, not on tlio diHcnjtion of tlio fonrts or jiulrjcs, but iipDii proof of the piirticiiliir wise (mt of wliicli tlii! powor arises." Oiii- SiiproiiK! Court Act (as I liavo said) pi-ovidos tliat "An appeal sliall lie to tlio Supronjo Court li'oui all liual ju(ljj;nu!nt8 " of ])i()vincial coui'ts. The Manitol»a Act, in similar t(5rnis, provides that " An appeal siiall lie to the; Governor-Cenoral in Council from any Act or decision of tint Lnj^islature of the province!." What would we say of the Stiprenio (jom-t, did it refuse to hear an appeal, or l()d((al with it as justice i'(!(|uired, menily hecause the cm u, involved .SOUK! political or otherwise troublesouie (question '? With all proper i-esjiect, and for identical reasons, I say that Ills Kxcffllency in (,'ouncil cannot decline to exercise the iuipoi'tant powers by the Manitoba Act confei'rcMl upon him for the protection of the Roman Catholic minority in that jjrovince ; and I Inunbly claim as a right that the i)etitions shall be heard and adjudicated upon. The recent order in council is beyond doubt correct, if I may be permitted to .say .so, in asserting that if His Excellency has jurisdiction "the enquiry will 1)0 I'ather of a judicial than of a political character." If-then 1 have shown that there is j)ower to entertain the appeal, it appears to be indubitable that there is a constitutional duty to enter- tain it, and to dispose of it as justice and the right of the minority shall lequire. Should it be thought that I ara, in this contention, ))ixtting my claim to a hearing on the merits upon too high ground, let me urge this fuither reason why such a hearing should be accorded us. Although His Excellency in Council can make a remedial order, that order has no binding effect upon anyone. It is the Parliament of Canada, and that body only, that has the right to interfere with the legislation of the provinces. It is, however, a necessary pre-requisite of parliamentary jurisdiction that the initiative should come from His Excellency in Council. This body is, as it were, a grand jury having power to put a matter in train for the trial, but having no final judicative function. The question which a grand jury has to answer is not, Is the prisoner guilty 1 but. Is there a fair prospect that a petit jury will find him so] And in much the same way, although I freely admit that the cases are far from being rigorously parallel, I contend, that if His Excellency in Council shall find that there is a fair case for the exercise of parliamentary jurisdiction, then the initiating order ought to be made, so that Parliament may debat«» and dispose of the matter. And in considering whether there is a reasonable prospect of Parliament granting relief to the Roman Catholic minority in Manitoba, we must not forget, for it is an extremely important consideration, the action of Parliament in former years. Passing over other instances of its action, with the mere assertion that •during the last thirty years there has been no break in the steadfast consistency with which both political parties have adhered to the M M« \>.\\ \«v?> A\o»«>rM, \V\u\ \ I i \n SMvi \'>\\\\\\\\<' >K\\\\\f\ i\\ \\\i^ ^•\\\,'\\\ \H\\\\vn i\« ilin 'SiM\ UnMH Vw.i *i«<^o.n1 .>;>'>»« \\\ \'^',\ il\«> I t'uhl'ynni> hI Nt'W Kniii't^* Lit l^iMv ^^«'\r> )>!V»iNti'n U\ \'\\\ , }\ «^\'Ht^n «»i >i»>|»'Ui(ii< ni'ltmO'i In iliiil ^^^^^V^\^l■^« Vho>^' \\ iVi. ihi\vUN\t» \\o \\\\)\\ \\ \\\\\\\\\ \\\ |||.< I'!m'.>IIi>»(i>\ \^\ xNnw^^o'iI, i\\^«\ IVwIyiWWt^ui \\:\\ WW \\\>\\v \\\\\u\W\\\\\\ \\\ {\\\* iniUtt'»' th>^N 'it )\<\\\ vvsth >v1\>^^'\\>>»> 1.^ lh\<\UN nUi' In i>i>l!U\.l t« io»lil. H !!■ NNS*h(-«<, iA|N\S'rti*n\u\)\\i\\\ \*ni< «i>y o» -un "lu- ^ni It \ii»il \n» lt>ul'iliMlu> v]\\-xA\%'>\S\\\ \\\ \\\\\\'\\.A\ \^yA\S\\\iV.>- \i" ^{\\\W^ *\\\w\\\\\ I>im||mhI|(HV»mI V\>r i'«\U>N\v n\)4 )>n>.'ni *« '• -•■ iA|»!»ll'nr thn M»vv»>»mu»Mll • T^■^t il\> •' Vi-i )iM>i*nil» )»(m'ii>i| In i\\M ^^^^^\ ^^IxV, M\\\ 1\iV|<«»rt ll>i»t u \\\ w ><» m n\i\.|llli>.| -U (l\i> \\v\\ ji^vMiniU \M i^ysx-iM-ittMyt \\\M nn«^mtM\'' w !\^ »v>vvy>»n\\ ihi> l'U't>i' \niviinit\ o\ II, in (V, NVl^'iv^ fijjWiN^s, hiAWNt^V, ^^^ \\\^i ^y\\''\\\\:\UA\ «l\'>vv tlw> (\\ll •tinnlllt'iUn'n xM" t^t> ^v.n\ ^Vxv\n'*»'' In thi^ nun^Nv^lA \\:\'t ^ ItWjtv nnn\Ut>v who ili'tliml tx-* WMv tvv tW >\x:\n\ ^yuMyon \\lni>\\ \\i\') \\ vm nn\il\ -.ninmi'i- n >n t*<\'.M \M' t)\o \'u)>in)\«> n\inov\iv rlu- ri'iil-ihumt' \\\' \<\\ \^'^^'^>%\\\\-\:. ywii h\\\\\\^ \\\\\\\\\\vA \\\<^ V.m , t l\i> Hi>n Nit ('iwllyMU ^K'>u\ ^\n \f<7^^ ^^^^n^i1^t iho ^ni^ilt^v ^rt'oiv tNuli-nni-ni II. > ilu-n NV'iN ilix> KxMiirtn t^^t1^^^1\v >v.\no\'itA S^^ Now ^^innswInK n\i«hl i»ImhI»v wlix^t' All !^n'>iMVtm«M\< \\A«. n\\>\o\< rt«i 1\^1U^^^>« • Vhf\\ on iW '''','*'il\ MiVN. tS7'\ lln^ Uo\iso .nI' ^^^n\^n^M\^ 'nl.*!*)!-!! fW f^^Uo^^\n^i^^''^^'»^1'(n^n y> llin\-ti> icmvu <>>!«»« tW ^\^)x•> tA^MV«!>H>< \n sAixi >vstNlni\xM\ Ivih n>M U(M>n «tv\li'^nil -, mnl t>>!M .^ InimMo As* K^ ^Mv«!x)^tx\^ i(> UiM N^ V^nt Hov MiVi<>-<(V will Iv jfv,'nNl\ |>l nsx^ hov >nl\ni^n»>> \\\tl\ lln> 1 ,^>^^^l!^(n^l> ol Nf>x^^^ "tok t<^ »Mvniv Mix^h a mxv^\i\\\vtixM\ oI" il\«* "^i^y.l \<'( tHwInill Vho snx^nA^n-KMM Wr^s o.-^vritsi h\ \\^ iw 7;<. In\l t\ix:\\\\ in (In* tfi1Th>VU\ . tn j^s l>(^<\^^V. Wj^s •\ liUii^' noniUrV who Wi>li< fs\\M s ;y <\»S0 M\ wl»ii>l\. !\ltl\OUi{ll INvHsn-K'r.i 'hsx'5 »<•> inviv.^vMion \xh;Mow\. yo< b\ \>\ovw ln>hniny xod'H, »n<^ in iiTiTJiivKsVi^Wx"- 1sn!;;«!is^\ u ui>^\os<«Ni \n\\v io (l\o )>olioy Al" i^ir pUy t<^ wino>^tiw*. i\'*i\ ^ Iv rt slunlow »>!' a »Io\»I>1' »» t>0 .<>>)><'>«< u\ iW )MVsvnt o.»si\ in w i\\<'h. In- tho utMiou ii* iVrnvii. 1 tvuxt it waII Iisvo inHv^hoti^MV It" !U\\»m>o \\n'* w. ^^MiKt 1 t>*t<^r hiw t<> t-ho >vto xM' Ust s«\«w«Nn with ivhM'xMyot' tv) tl\<^ iilUk V lilt «'(t\ltl'*M ^i^iii^k^n f\1 I liiiiiiltiv miiIukK, lliM«f/(Mv lli((l fill llil't ikh'uiu, (iI'im, lf( of/|^r llml IViilliiiiU'iil itifM ImvK (lM\T/«^ Im ( Ifr c/lKfK'll I llMVI« UlMllnlll II ll»"(l 1(1 KMKW't (ll»<((l Mlln(/(>(ll«'( \l\f MiM M(|^l(f»(hhf wlilt'li I Inn I' (KMf (''((iiiil'-h'l I (tK'f 'IctI III vlml I l(fK'». xnM t IdU t< lltllllt' II iImK Hull IIk' M'|lli(M I'l lll»i«l'> (|H''flll'i(i' 'iKI/lll lo lr/« n«1 Ittllnvt i| • I Tlil'i I'l ltd !t|i|iMf(| i'M(((» Vfrifiit,/i>«fi All '\ Tlif imhiiiiiIm mI'I liiilli III llii' |p»l III III! II|i|iI'mI M. Till' iji'i'l'tliiii 'll l||i. .Iidll'liil I '(piiiiMillo'' M III lliK iMiili'idliiii llml (li/i >l^^/|f((| tui\i rU'it.lU' * t''f IMikiIImIhi Ai'I Iiii iiI'Ih'i 'i imiimIv ihm'-Iv iiuii'iii»t nihil i'l nfdl d'lf iiiurtt'»(^*} 'ttil li IIIm I'lvi'i'lli'ld'V lid' ' J'lvi'i'idir IJi'id'nil in '''nirfil fintt ffn.vri"«!«ii'(fF 'if M'lO, I'lild'i'i Idij lid ill" iiilidiiily M iit«lil 'II (if('/il"i^" 'Mith ri-»yf'<:t t,*t dijid'Ml Inn wll.lild III" dd'iididd /i|' '(iili M""fi'di i nl' nt-t^litrti Wl t(f fi^A iMiidiliiliii Ai'l.; iiidl i"iliilili'ild''l fi MVM'"(fi nil' •<"|riir(if'i dr 'flKiOfffi'inhj HI'IiiiiiIm williiii III" iiiMidiiiL,' iif Midi .MM'M'di .'» 'if ■{"'•lii'm />.'» i^ MrAf |l N \ Ai'l , 'Hid III" l-wo Acl'i'il iKflO (d|V."f,/./|, \ii'^iiui\ lyit-^tmii, ?iut;W. iIiiIiIm iidd Id i vil"i4"'i, Id Mid ll diiidid'f ii'i \(f w»irr/ird, lhinri;( 'ff hJi^i a|[»|>Hliiiii. M\N(ld III" "oiH'lilHioii mI' Ml, lO'/'iirl/n tir'fntohfit, ffon Mr. f /<^^ iMildimii'i'd llml, M ciifiididfiiiidi'/ri hn/l \)i:rfi rM-^iv/'d from fth^-- lidiiili'iiniiM Idvi'ifKir III' Miifiiloliii ridil'iHinj^ » <-^>\,y- hf 4, If.ttAr frr,rn Mm Piiiviiii'iiil Hi'ii"t,Mi y in wlii'li \iiHl»,t^.*\ Minh f,hf^ f/>p,''H nf f^-x'tt'iorf^ |it'ti| liy llid ( iiiVMiior (Jiifdind in coiinoil '■.f,t(i^iAh.irif^ '■»f fth'^ iwo HtiitiitdH of Miinif.oliH, rdlatin^ to fMlnoafci'm, f/ftwfyl in th** .viwnori ■;i-.r^ 68 I'KTITIONM AND OUIHOUS I\ <'(»UN('II,. [Paht I. of 1800. witli aoi>(>ii)|)tiiiyin;j: ilonii'iontH. IimiI hccii duly incnivtMl IVoin tilt' I'i'iv V (^)llu^•il :it OtliiwM. 'rii(> I'loviiH'iiil Scciiiliirv <-oiiclni|()H lii« 'cMcr lis InllowM . "I :iin iiislriicloil to nay tliiit Vour Mniioi-'s <»()vi>rmn<'nt Iiiih dtM-idiMl thai, it is not iict'OHsary to Im5 nipn'Sfiitctl at llic licMrin.ij; of llic i»|)|nMl on tli dcsii-cil to Im> licard, TIkm*' was no i(>spons(«, \vlinn'n|ion (lie Pn>sidiMit ot'tlu' I'rivy ("ouikmI rcniaiKcd "Wo will consult ii|»ou tlu< sulijwt if the |»ul»lio will kindly it'lirc." Wiicrcuiton the |>nl)li»' i'i>(ii(diud rodross fioni Vour Kxcolloncy with vos|H'ot to (HM'tain statutes of that provinoo iclatinj; to oduciitioii, iiro of o|>iniou that the important (juostions of law which w* v(! HUL^a[osted in the ivport of iho sub-connnittoo to whont siiid petitions were re- feiTetl should be authoritativoly Htttthsl boforo the appeal which has been assented by said petitions be furtlun* proceeded with. The joinniitteo, therofoiv, advise that .a casc! be pro[)arod on this subjecc, in accordance with the provisions of '.lie Act, 5'l■^^f) Vict., cliapter 'Jft, and they reconiniend that if this report bo approved a copy thereof be transmitted by t.degraph to His Honor the fiieut- onant-Governor of Manitoba and to John S. Ewart, counsel for the petitioners, in order that, if they be so disposed, the Government of Manitoba and the said counsel may otter suggestions as to tlie pre- paration of such a case, auil as to the cpxestions whicli should be embraced theix'u. John J. McGee, Cle)'k of ike Privy Council. Order in Council, 22nd April, 1893. On a report dated 20tl» April, 18^3, from t)ie Acting Minister of Justice, submitting in conformity with the order of Your Excel ■ lency in Council, dated 22nd February, 1893, and under the pro- visions of the Act 54-55 Vict., cap. 25, a draft wliich be has had Oil A p. v.] IMVni'lONH AND OKDKUH IN ('0I:N(!I(,. (7ourt of Ciiiiinlii frtr iiciu'in;; and coiiHiilt'iatioii t.(iiir|iiri<{ rti'tiiiii stntiiti-H of tlir PioviiKio of Maiiitolxi i')'latiiii{ lo (Mluciitioii, niiil Mm; incinoi ialn of cfitiiiii politionci's in M;iiiili)liii ('(iiii|iliiiiiiii;; tli(^i')-of', Tlio C()iniiiitt(*<', on tlm icfoinciKlation of tli«i Acting MiiiiHtni* of .ruHlicn, udviHn timt, cfrliru'd copirH of tim iIimH lio trniiHiiiifctfil, r()H|M'c|,iv()ly, t,o f,li(* Lit'iitcinuit ( Jovcnior of .\Fuiiitol»ii anil lo Mi', Jolin S. Kwart, counH**! for tin* iM-tilionrrH, in onli'i' that, if tlicy I)M HO ilis|Mm(Ml, tilt! (iovn'inuiMit of Manilolia and (Ik; Haid connHol for tlio |i(^tilioii('rH niav olVci- any sn^^^'t'stions oi oli,'"rva,li()nH wliicli Micy iriay desire lo make with r<\s|ii(!(, to mn'li caHc, and tlm (lUOHtioiiH wliicli Rlionld Im» (!inhnic(.'d therein. All of whieh is reHixictfiilly Hiiltinittod toi' Y^onr Kxcellenciy's tippruval. doilN J. M()(«KK, (Jlerk of the Prioj Council.. OKniiK IN rJouNcii,, Rtm Ji'i.v, I.s3 of the IJritish North America Act, 1MG7, or l)y sul>- section 2 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, 33 Victoria (IB7U), chapter 3, Canada? 2. Are the grounds set forth in the jietitions and memorials «uch as may be the subject of appeal under the autliority of the Hub- sections above referred to, or either of them I 3. Does the decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy- Council in the cases of Harrett v. the City of Winnipeg, and Logan v. the City of Winnipeg, dispose of, or conclude, the application for redress based on the contention that the rights of the Roman Catholic minority which accrued to them, after the union, under the •statutes of the province, have been interfered with by the two statutes of 1890, complained of in the said petitions and memorials ■? 4. Does sub-section 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act, 1867, apply to Manitoba] 5. Has His Excellency the Governor-General in Council power to malco the declarations or remeilial orders which are asked for in the said memorials and petitions, assuming the material facts to be as stated thei-ein, or has His Excellency the Governor-General in Council any other juiisdiction in the premises'? G. Did the Acts of Manitoba relating to education, passed prior to the session of 1890, confer on or continue, to the minority, a " right or |)rivilege in relation to education," within the meaning of sub- section 2 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, or estiiblish a system of "separate or dissentient schools within the meaning of sub-section 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act, 1867, if said section 93 be found to be applicuble to Manitoba ; and, if so, did the two Acts of 1890 compliined of, or either of tliein, affect any right or privilege of the min<. ity in such a manner that an appeal will lie thereunder to the Govt cnor-General in Council ? 'fj I Order in Council, 15tii August, 1893. The committee on the ror:ommendation of tlie acting Minister of ■Justice ailvise that pursuant to the ])rovisions of the Act 54-55 Victoria, chapter 25, the Attorney-General of the Province of , I'lj 72 JUDGMENTS OF THE SUPREME COURT. [Part L ji^ Manitoba be notified that in accon'ance wi^li an Order of His Excellency the Governor-General in Council tbited the 3 1st day of July, 181)3, a case touching certain statutes of the said province relating to education, and the nicnorials of certain petitioners com- plaining thereof, was referred to the Supreme Court of Canada for hearing and consideration, and that such case will be heard at the next ensuing sittings of the said court, to wit, on the third day of October next, or so soon thereafter as may be. The committee ftn-ther advise that a like notice be sent to Mr. John 8. Ewart, Q.C., of Winni[)eg, counsel for the [)etitioners. The committee advise that the Attorney-General for the Province- of jManitoba and Mr. Ewart be requested to acknowledge the receipt of such notice respectively. The committee sul)mit the same for Your Excellency's approval. John J. McGee, Clerk of the Privij Council. JUDGMENTS OP THE SUPREME COURT. The Chief Justice : — This case has been referred to the court for its opinion by His Excellency the Governor-General in Council, pursuant to the provisions of " An Act respecting the Suprenie and Exchequer Courts," Revised Statutes of Canada, chapter 135 as amended by 54 and 55 Victoria, ch. 25, sec. 4. Six questions are propounded which are as follows : (Here follow the questions. See page 71). To put it in a concise form, the questions which we are called upon to answer are whether an appeal lies to the Governor-General in Council either under the British North America Act, 1S67, or under the Dominion Act establishing the Province of Manitoba, against an Act or Acts of the Legislature of Manitoba passed in 1890, ^v hereby certain Acts or parts of Acts of the same Legislature, previously passed, which had conferred certain rights on the Roman Catholic minority in Manitoba in respect of separate or de- nominational schools, were repealed. The matter was brought before the court by the Solicitor- General, on behalf of the crown, but was not argued by him. On behalf of the petitioners and memori.ilists who had sought the intervention of the Governor-General Mr. Ewart Q.C. appeared. Mr. Wade Q.C. appeared as Counsel on behalf of the Province of Manitoba when the matter first came on, but declined to argue the Chap. V.] judgments of the supreme court. 73 case, and the court then, in exercise of the powers conferred by 54 and 55 Vic, cluipter 25, section 4 (substituted for the Revised Statutes of Canada, chapter 135, section 37), requested Mr. Christopher Rolnnson Q.C., the senior member of the bar practising before this court, to argue the case in the interest of the Province of Manitoba, and oa a subsequent day the matter was fully and aljly argued by Mr. Ewart and Mi-. Kctbinson. The proper answers to be given to the ([uestions propounded depended principally on the meaning to be attached to the words "any right or privilege of the Protestant or Roman Catholic minoi'ity of the Queen's subjects in i-elation to e(lucati<»n" in sub- section 2 of section 22 of the ]V[anitoba Act. Do these words include rights and jDrivileges in relation to education which did not exist at the union, but (in woi'ds of section 93, sub-section 3 of the British Xorth America Act) have been " thereafter established by the legislature of the proAiiice," or is this right t)r privilege mentioned in sub-section 2 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, the same right or privilege which is previously referred to in sub-section 1 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, viz.: one which any class of persons had by law or practice in the province at the union, or a right or privflege other than one which the Legislature of jNIanitoba itself created ? (The learned Chief Justice here quoted sec. 93 of the B.N. A. Act, sub-sees. 1 and 3 ; and sec. 22 of the Manitoba Act, sub-sees. 1 and 2. See page 1 ) It is important to contrast these two clauses f>f the Acts in (jues- tion, inasmuch as there is intrinsic evidence in the later Act that it was generally modelled on the Imperial statute, the original Con- federation Act ; and d\e divergence in the language of the two statutes is therefore significant of an intention to make some change as regards Manitoba by the provisions of the later Act. It will be observed that the British North America xVct, section 93, sub-section 3, contains the words, "or is thereafter established by the Legislature of the Province," which worfls are entirely omitted in the correspcjiiding section (section 22, sub-section 2) of the Manitoba Act. Again, the same sub-section of the Manitoba Act gives a right of appeal to the G(»\ernor-General in Council from the Legislature of the province, as well as from any provincial authority, whilst by the British North America Act the right of appeal to the (.TO^■ernor-General is only to be from the Act or de- cision of a provincial authority. T can refer this diflcrence of expression in the two Acts to nothing but to a deliberate intention to make some change in the operation of the respective clauses, I do not see why there should have been any departure in the ^lani- toba Act from the laniruaire of the British North America Act unless lis Iff i tmtmmntmKii 74 JUDGMENTS OF THK SUPRKME COURT. [Part I. it was intended that tlie meaning should he diiferent. On the other hand, it may well he urged thiit there was no i-eason why the pro- vinces admitted to cont'etleration should have heen treated differ- ently ; why a different rule shoukl prevail as regards Manitoba from that which, l)y express words, a|)plied to the other provinces. On the other hand, there is, it seems to me, much force in the considera- tion, thiit whilst it was reasonable that the organic law should preserve vested lights existing at the union from spoliation and interference, yet every presumption must be made in favor of the constitutional right of a legislati^•e body to repeal the laws which it has itself enacted. No doubt tnis right may be controlled l)y a written constitution \vhich confers legislative powers, and which may resti-ict those powers and make them subject to any condition which the constituent legislators may think fit to impose. A notable instance of this is, as my brother King has pointed out, afforded by the constitution of the United States, according to the construction which the Supreme Court, in the well-known " Dartmouth College case," put upon the provision prohibiting the State I^egislatui-es from passing laws impairing the ol)ligation of contracts. It was there held, with a resxilt that has heen found most incv>nvenient, that a Legislature which had created a private corporation cowld not repeal its own enactment granting the franchise, the reason assigned being that the grant of a franchise of a coi-poration was a contract. This has in practice been got ovev b}' inserting in such Acts an express rese/vation of the right of the Legislature to repeal its own Act, But, as it is a prima Jacie presumption that every legislative enact- ment is subject to repeal by the same body which enacts it, every statute may be said to contain, an implied provision that it may be revoked l\v the authority wliich has i)assed it, unless the right of repeal is taken away by the fuudaniental law, the over-riding con- stitution which has createtl the Legislature itself. The point is a new one, but having regard to the strength and universality of the presumption that every legislative body has power to repeal its own laws, and that this power is almost indisp^nsal^le to the useful exercise of legislative authority since a great deal of legislation is of necessity tentative and experijnental, would it be arbitrary or unreasonable, or altogether unsupported by aniilogy, to hold, its ji. canon of constitutional c(jnstruction, that such an inherenv right to repeal its own Acts cannot be deemed to be withheld f r )m a legislative body having its origin in a written constitution, unless the constitution itself, by express wortls. takes a\vay the right J I am of opinion that in construing the Manitoba Act we ought to proceed upon this princijile, and hold the Legislature of that province to have absolute powers over its own legislation, untrtLmmelled by any appeal to federal authority, luiless we find some restriction of its rights in this res2:>ect in express terms in the constitutional Act ? Chap. V.] judgments of the supreme court. 75 Then, keeping this ruV of c()nstructif)n just adverted to in view, is there anything in the terms of sub-section 2 of section 22 of the j\ranitol)a Act ])y wliich the right of appeal is enlarg(Hl, and an appeal from the Legishiture is expressly added to that from any provincial authority, whilst in the Bi-itish North America Act, section •.);], sub- section 3, the appeal is confined to one from provincial authority only, which expi-essly or necessarily implies that it was the intention of those who framed the constitution of Manitol)a to impose upon its Legislatui'e any disability to exercise the ordinary powers of a Legis- lature to repeal its own enactments t I cannot see that it does, and I will endeavor to demonstrate the correctness of this opinion. It might well have been considered by the Parliament of the Dominion in passing the Manitoba Act that the words "any provin- cial authority " did not include the Legislature. Then, assuming it to have been intended to conserve all vested rights — " rights or privileges existing by law, or practice, at the time of the union " — and to exclude, or subject to federal control, even legislative inter- ference with such pre-existent rights or privileges, this prohibition or control would be provided for by making an Act or decision f)f the Legislature, so interfering, the subject of appeal to the Governor- General in Council. If, however, the words of section 93, sub-section 3, " or is here- after established by the Legislature" had been repeated in section 22, the Legislature would have been in express and unequivocal terms restrained from repealing laws of the kind in (juestion. which they had themselves enacted, excejtt upon the conditions of a right to appeal to the Governor-General. If it was intended not to do this, but only to restrain the Legislature of Manitoba from interfering with "rights and privileges'" of the kind in (juestion existing at the union, this end would have been attained by just omitting altogether from the clause the words "or shall have been thereafter estab- lished by the Legislature of the province." This was done. Next, it is clear that in interpreting the Manitoba Act the words *'anv provincial authority '" do not include the Legislature, for that expression is there used as an alternative to the "Legislature oi the province." It is not to be presumed that ^lanitoba was intended to be ad- mitted to the union upon any different terms from the othei' provinces, or with rights of any greatei' or lesser degret^ than the other {provinces, ^ome dift'erence may have been inevitable owing to the difference in the preexisting conditions of the several provinc(»s. It would be rea.^onable to attribute any difference in the terms of union, and in the rights of the province, to this, and as far as possible, by inter- pretation, to confine any variation in legislative, powers and other matters, to such renuirements ;is were rendered necessary by the circumstances and conditions of Manitoba at the time of the union. ■«i m I li m 76 JUnOMKNTH OK THl'; iSUI'UKMK COUHT. [Part I. iil:: Now, 1(>(, us st'f wli;i(, would Itc tlu' ("H'ci't prohibition contained in sub-section I of section !).'? of the Pritish North America Act, i>e nllni virion of the lj(>bec) ufter confederati(tn have conferred increasctl rights or privilcj^'es in relation to (>ducation or minorities, I st-e iiothiiiL;' to hinder tlieiu from rept>alinu; such Acts ttt the exti'iit of doiiij;' away with the additional rights and pri\ ilea's so i-onfcrred bv their own lenisla.tiou without beini;- subject t(» any condition of ajipeal to federal authority. Whal is meaiiti by the term "i)rovincial authority"! The Par- liament t)f the Oominion, as shown by the Manitoba Act, hold that it does not include the Legislature, for in sub-section '1 of section '-'2 tliev use it as an alternative expression and so exiiressly distin^uisii it from the Lej^jislature. it is true the Ih'itish North .Vmerica Act did not emanate from the Dominion Parliament, but iievertlu^less the construction which that Parliament has put on the Pritish North America Act, if not biiulini;' on judicial interpreters, is at least entitled to the highest respect and consideration. (Secondly, the words "provincial authority" are not apt words to describe the Legislature, and in ord<>r that a Provincial Legislature should be subject(>d to an appeal, when it merely attemiits to recall its own Acts, the terms used should be apt, clear and unambiguous. To return, then, to the cases of Ontario and Quebec, should any "provincial authority," not including in these words the Legisla- ture, but interpreting the exju'ession as restricted to administrative authorities (without at present g<»ing so far as to say it included eoui'ts eal to *he Governor-General. Sec pnniices not having had any denominational schools at tlie time of the union, there is nothing in their case for sub-section 1 ro\in('es now under eonsidei'ation from re)ie;din,i;' any law wliieli they had themselves enacted ci'i\ile«;',.s, nor would any Act ho repealing their own enactments he subject to a]>])eal to the Governor- (leiieral in council. 'i'iiii'dly AN'e iiave the case of the Province; of Manit.oha. Here, apitlving the construction hefoi-e mentioned, the provincial powers ill relation to (Mlucation would he not furtlna" restric^ted hut somewhat enlai'ged in com]>arison with thos(^ of the; other j)rovinces. Acting upon the presumption that in tin; ahsencie of exprc^ss words in the Act of the Dominion ParliauKMit, which eimbodies the constitution of the province, withholding from the Legislature of the province the nominal right of altcM'ing or repealing its own Acts, ■we must hold that it was not the intention of Parliament so to limit the Legislatui-e by the organic law of the province. What, then, is the result of the legislation of the Dominion as regards Manitoba? What altect is to be given to section 22 of the Manitoba Act? By the first sub-i^ection any law of the province prejudicing any I'ight or privih^ge with respect to d(Miominational schools in the province existing at the union is ^dtra virex and void. This clause was tlie subject, and the only subject, of interpretation in Barrett v, Winnipeg (1) and the point there decifled was that there was no such right or privilege, as was claimed in that case, existing at the time of the admission of the pr«»vince into tin; union. Had any such right or privilege been found to exist there is nothing in the judgment of the Privy Council against the inference that legisl-'i' on imi)arting it would have been unconstitutional and void. tt decision has, in my ojiinion, but a very remote application he present case. The second sub-section of secticm 22 of the Mai iba Act is as follgws : — An appeal shall lie to the (governor General in Council from an- Act or decision of the Legislature of the province or any other Provincial thority affecting any right or privilege of the Protestant or Roman Catholi lority of the Queen's subjects in relation to education. I put aside as entirely irrevelant here the question whether it was, or was not, intended by this sub-section 2 to confer < in the Privy Council of the Dominion appellate jurisdiction from the provincial judiciary, a ijuestion the decision of which, I may say in passing, might well be iutluenced by the consideration that the m '0 "^I'i (1) [1892] A C. 445. 78 JUDGMENTS OF THE SUPIIEME COURT. [Part T. #' power given to Parliament by the British Xortli America Act t<» create Federal courts had not at the time of the passage of the Manitoba Act been exercised. The first subject of appeal is, then, ai.y Act or decision of tl\e Legislature of the province affecting any right or privilege of tlie minority in respect of the matters in question. Now if we are to hold, as I am of opinion we must hold, that it was not the intention of Parliament })y these words so to circumscribe the Legislative rights conferred by them on Manitoba as to incapacitate that Legislature from absolutely, and without any subjection to federal control, repealing its own enactments, and thus taking away rights which it had itself conferred, the right of appeal to the Governor-General against legislative Acts mus* be limited to a particular class of such Acts, viz. : to such as might prejudice rights and privileges not conferred by the Legislature itself, but rights and privileges which could only have arisen before confederation, being those descril)ed iu the first sub-section of section 22. That we must assume, in the a])sence of express words that, it was not the intention '^)f Parliament to impose upon tiie Manito1>a Legislature a disability so anomalous as an incapacity to repeal its own enactments, except subject to an ai)peal to the (lOveriior-General in Council, and possi])ly. tlie intervention of the Dominion Parliament as a paramount Legislature, is a proposition I have liefore stated. Therefore, the right of appeal to the Goverm)r-General in Council must be confined to Acts of the Legislature allecting such rights and privileges as are mentioned in the first suit-section, viz.: those existing at the union when belonging to a minority, either Fix testant or Catholic. Then there would also be the right of appeal from any provincial authority. T will assume that the description "])rovincial authority"' does not apply to coui'ts of justice. Then these words "p"i,vincial autlu.rity" could not, as used in this sub-secticm 2 of section 22 of the Afaiiitoba Act, have been intended to include the Provincial Legislature, for it is expressly distinguished from it, being mentioned alternately with th ' Legislature. " An appeal shall lie from any Act or decision of th ^ Legislature or of any "provincial authority," is the language of the section. It must then fipply to the pi'oviacial executive or administrative authorities. No doubt an appeal would lie from their Acts or decisions, upon the ground that some right or privilege existing at the date of the admission of the province to the Federal Union was thereby prejudiced. In this respect Manitoba would be in the same position as Ontario and Quebec. XTnlike the cases of those provinces, and also unlike the case of the avo maritime provinces, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, there woidd not, however, in the case of Manitoba, be an appeal to the Governor- General in Council from the Act or decision of any " provincial Chap. V.] judgments of the supueme court. 70 >t auth(»rity," upon tlie Lrrurse be under the control fif the courts ; they could thei-cfoi-e ])e conii)elled, by the exercise of judicial authority, to conform themselves to the law. Much greater would have ly.^en the difference between ^NFanitoba ri. ' the other provinces if we were to hold tliat whilst, as regards tht i\- ,\'inces of Nova tSc(jtia and New Brunswick, their Legislatures could eaact .a separate school law one session and repeal it th(^ next, without having their re]tt»aliug legislati(»n called in <[uestion by a]>peal, and whilst, as regards Ontario and Quebec, although rights and privileges existing at confederation were made intangibk! by their Legislatures, yet finy increase or additictn to such lights and privileges which these Legislatures might grant could be withdrawn by them at their own pleasure, sultject to no federal levision, yet that the l.>egislation of ^lanitoVja, on the same suljject, should be only revocable subject to the revisoiy power of the (jovernor- General in Council. I have thus endeavored to shov.' tliat the construction T adopt has the affect of placing all the provinces virtually in the same position, with an immat*^rial exception in favor of Manitolm, and it is for the purpose oi demonstrating this that I have referred to appeals from the Acts and decisions of provincial authorities, which are not otherwise in question in the case before us. That the words "any provincial autluirity " in the third sub- section of section 9.3 of the British North America .\ct do not include the Legislature is a conclusion which I have I'eached not without dithcidtj^ In intrepreting the Manitoba Act, however, what we have to do is to ascertain in what sense the Dominion Parliament in adoj)ting the same expression in the ^lanitoba Act 80 JUDGMKNTS OF THE SUPHRME COURT. [Part I. iuider.stood it to have been used in the British North America Act. That tlioy imd(M'sto(»d these words not to include tlie Provincial Le protected hy the Governor-CJeneral a^^'ainst any suhsecjuent h';,'islation, by either a Protestant or CathoHc majority in after years'/ In tlie present reference, hein/^ a^ain called u[)on to construe thi.s same section 22, but as if sub-section I wjih repeahnl or wiped out l)y judic'al authority, we must, I think, take into consideratioi* the historical fact that the Manitoba Act of 1870 was the result of the negotiations with parties who agreed to j )in arul form part of the Confederation as if they were inludntants of one of the provinces originally united l)y the British North America Act, and we must credit the Parliament of Canada with liaving intended that the words "an appeal shall lie to the (lovernor-deneral in Council from any act or decision of the Legislature of the province, or of any provincial authorit)', affecting any right or privilege of the Protestant or Roman Catholic minority of the Queen's subjects in relation to education," (which are also the words used in the 93 section of the British North America Act) should have some effect. The only meaning and effect I can give them is that they were intended as an additional guarantee or protection to the minority, either Protestant or Catholic, whichever it might happen to be, that the laws which they knew would be enacted inunediately after the union by their r-General in Council, should such subsecjuent Act of the Legislature affect any right or privilege thus secured to the Protestant or Catholic minority by their own Legislature. In my opinion the words used in sub-section 2 : "an apppal shall lie from any Act of the Legislature," necessarily mean an ap})eal from any statute which the Legislatui-e has po\eer to pass in relation to education if (it tlie time of the passing of such statute th(!re exists by law any right or privilege enjoyed by the minority. There is no necessity of appealing from statutes which are ultra vires, for the assumption of any unauthorized power by any local Legislature under our system of g(jvernment is not remedied by appeal to the Governor-General in Council but by coui-ts of justice. Then, as to the words "right or privilege" in this sub-section, they refer to some right or privilege in relation to education to be created by the Legislature which was being brought into existence, and which, once established, might thereafter be interfered with at ml '' ■ . f. I, ■ - M y$i I «>. ^ ^m Ta /a '/ IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 l^|28 |2.5 U£ 1^ III 2.2 I.I ife I 40 1.25 1.4 2.0 1.8 1.6 Photographic Sciences Corporation /. ^ .^^ip.. .% S^M^ .V^ «- A I/. ^ M :\ \ [V <\! ^ \ 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 871-4303 1 ? , ^ c\ \ ^ 0^ lit 84 JUDGMKNTS OF Ttl ", SUPHEMK COURI [Part I. the hand of a lociii majority sf) as to affect the Protestant or Catholic minority in relation to edueation. It is clear, therefore, that the (lOvernor-General in Council has the right of entertaining an appeal by the British North America Act, as well as by sub-section "-' of section 22 of the Manitoba Act. H(! has also the power of considering the application upon its merits. When the application hi'is been considered by him upon its merits, if the Local Legislature refuses to execute any decision to which the (»overnor-General in Council has arrived in the premises, the Domiiiion Government may then, under sub-section 3 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, pass remedial legislation for the execution of his decision. In construing, as I have done, the words of sub-section 2 of the 22nd section of the Manitoba Constitutional Act, which is, as regards an appeal to the Governor-General in Council, but a repro- duction of sub-section 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act, except that the clear, unequivocal and comprehensive words "from any Act or decision of the Legislature of the province" are added, I am pleased to see that I am but concurring in the view ex- pressed by Lord Carnarvon on the 19th February, 1867, when speaking of this right of appeal to be granted to minorities when a local Act might affect rights or privileges in matters of education, as the following extracts from Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, 3rd series, February 19th, 1867, show: " Lord Carnarvon — *' Lastly in the 93rd clause, which contains the exceptional provisions to which I referred, your Lordships will ob- serve some rather complicated arrangements in reference to educa- tion. I need hardly say that this great question gives rise to nearly as much earnestness and division of opinion on that, as on this, side of the Atlantic. This clause has been framed after long and anxious controversy in which all parties have been represented, and on con- ditions to which all have given their consent. It is an understanding which, as it only concerns the local interests affected, is not one that Parliament would be willing to disturb, even if in the opinion of Parliament it were susceptible of amendment ; but I am bound to add, as the expresssion of my own opinion, that the terms of the agreement appear to me to be equitable and judicious. For the object of the clause is to secure to the religious minority of one province the same rights and privileges and protection which the religious minority of anotlier province may enjoy. The Roman Catholic minority of Upper Canada, the Protestant minority of the Province of Quebec, and the Roman Catholic minority of the Maritime Provinces, will thus stand on a footing of entire equality. But in the event of any wrong at the hand of the local majority, the minority have a right to appeal to the Governor-General in Council, and may claim the application of any remedial laws that may be necessary from the central Parliament of the confederation." Chap. V.] judgments of the supkemb court. m ik.^'1 85 This being so, the next point of inquiry is whether the Acts of 1890 of Manitoba affect any right or privilege secured to the Catholic minority in matters of eiJucation after the union, for we have now nothing to do with the incjuiry whether the Catholic minority had at the time of the union any right by law or practice, that point, as I have already stated, having been decided adversely to their con- tention by the decision of the Privy Council in the case of Barrett v. Winnipeg (1). By referring to the legislation from the date of the union to 1890, it is evident that the Catholics enjoyed the immunity of being taxed for other scht»ols than their own, tlie right of organiza- tion, the right of self-government in this school matter, the right of taxation of their own people, the right of sharing in Government grants for education, and many other rights under the stntute of a most material kind. All these rights were swept away by the Acts of 1890, as well as the properties they had acquired under these Acts with their taxes and their share of the public grants for education. Could the prejudice caused by the Acts of 1890 be greater than it has been 1 The scheme that runs through the Acts of 1871 and 1881 up to 1890, as Lord Watson, of the Privy Council, is reported to have so concisely stated on the argument of the case of Barrett v. Winnipeg (which is printed in the Sessional Papers of Canada, 1893), appears to have been that "no ratepayers shall be taxed for contribution towards any school except one of his own denomination," and I will add that this scheme is clearly pointed out in arts. 5 and 7 of the conditions of union above already referred to, which were the basis of the Constitutional Act. Now, is this a legal right or privilege enjoyed by a class of persons] In this case the immunity from contributing to any schools other than one of its own denomination was acquired by the Catholic minority qud Catholics by statute, and Catholics certainly, at the time the legislation was passed, represented a class of persons comprising at least one-third of the inhabitants of the Province of Manitoba. It is unnecessary, I think, after reading the able judg- ments delivered in the case of Barrett v. Winnipeg (2) to show by authority that the right so acquired by the Catholic minority after the union by the Act of 1871 was a legal right, and that if it is shown by subsequent legislation, enacted by the Legislature of the Province of Manitoba, that there has been any interference with such right, then I am of the opinion that such interference would come within the very words of this section 22 of the Manitoba Constitu- tional Act, which gives a right of appeal to the Governor-General in Council from "any Act of the Legislature" (words which are not in section 93 of the British North America Act, but are in sub- section 2 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act) affecting a right Hi (1) [1892] A C. 445. (2) 10 S.C.R. 374; [1802] A.C. 446. 86 JUDGMENTS OF THE SUPREME COURT. [Part I. acquired by the Roman Catholic minority of the Queen's subjects in relation to education. The only other question suVimitted to ils I need refer to is the 4th question. Does sul)-8eotion 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act, 1867, apply to Manitoba? The answer to this question is to be found in the second section of the Manitoba Act (33 Vic.) which says "from and after the said date the provision ' of the British North America Act shall apply, except those parts thereof which are in terms made, or by reasonable intendment, may be held to be, specially applicable to, or only to affect one or more, but not the whole of the provinces now comprising the Dominion, and except so far as the same may be varied by this Act, and be applicable to the province of Manitoba, in the same way, and to the. like extent as they apply to the several provinces of Canada, and as if the province of Manitoba had been one of the provinces originally united by the said Act." The Manitoba Act has not varied the British North America Act, though sub-section 2 of .section 22 has a somewhat more comprehensive working than the sub-section 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act, in relation to appeal in educational matters. A statute does not vary, or alter, if it merely makes further provision it is simply an addition to it. The second sub-section is wider but does not vary at all from the third sub-section of section 93 of the British North America Act, save in this that there is an addition to it, that it includes it, and goes beyond it by adding the words "and from any Act of the Legislature." The third sub-.section of the British North America Act provides that in two cases there is tt) be an appeal. There is nothing inconsistent in the Manito])a Act which says that in all cases there shall be aa appeal, it goes beyond the British North America Act, it does not vary it, but leaves it as it is and adds to it. We see that by the opinion expressed by some of the Lords of the Privy Council, how far the right of appeal extends under section 2 of the Manitoba Act, for in the argument on that question before the Privy Council, Sessional Papers, No. 33(f, 33/), 1893, we read, at p. 134, that when Mr. Ram (counsel) was arguing on behalf of Mr. Logan in the case of Winnipeg v. Logan he said : "I venture to think that under sub-section 2 what was contemplated was this : that apart from any question, ultra vires or not, if a minority said, ' I am oppressed,' that was the who party had had to come under that secticjn 3 and appeal to the Govern- ment." Lord Hannen added : " It has a right to appeal again.st any Act of the Legislature." And Lord Shand : " Even intra vires." This being also my opinion, I will only add that, having already Chap. V.] judomests of the supreme court. 87 atated that I think that we shouhl read the Manitoba Constitutional Act in tlie light of the British North America Act, and that it was intended, as regards all civil rights in educational matters, to place the province of Manitoba on the same footing as the provinces of Quebec and Ontario, and that sub-section 1 of section 22 having been enacted for the purpose of protecting rights held by lawor practice prior to the union, but which have been delared not to exist, I am of the opinion that sul>section 2 of section 22 of ihe Manitoba Constitutional Act provides for an appeal to the Governor-General in Council, by memorial or otherwise, on the part of the Roman Catholic minority contending that the two Acts of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba, passed in 1890, on the subject of education, are subversive of the rights and privileges of the Roman Catholic ratepayers not to be taxed for contribution towards schools, except those of their own denomination, and that such right has been, acquired by statute subsequent to the union. For the above reasons, I answer the questions submitted by His Excellency the Governor-General in Council, as follows : 1. Yes. 2. Yes. 3. No. 4. Yes. ' 5. Yes. Taschereau J. — I doubt our jurisdiction on this reference or consultation. Is section 4 of 54 and 55 Vic. ch. 25 which purports to authorize such a reference to this court for hearing " or " con- sideration intra vires of Parliament? By which section of the British North America Act is Parliament empowered to confer on this statut(3ry court any other jurisdiction than that of a court of appeal under section 101 thereof? This court is evidently made, in the matter, a court of first instance, or rather, I should say, an advisory board of the Federal Executive, substituted, pro hac vice, for the law otficers of the Crown, and not performing any of the usual functions of a court of appeal, nay, of any court of justice whatever. However, I need not, at present, further investigate this point. It has not been raised, and a simihir enactment to the same import has already been acted upon. This is not conclusive, it is true ; but our answers to the questions submitted will bind no one, not even those who put them, na}', not even those who give them, no court of justice, not even this court. We give no judgment, we determine nothing, we end no controversy ; and, whatever (iur answers may be, should it be deemed expedient, at any time, by the Manitoba Executive to impugn the constitutionality of any measure that might hereafter be taken by the federal authorities against the provincial legislation, whether such measure is in accordance with, or in opposition to, the answers to this consultation, the recourse, in * 'A ■1 88 JUDGMENTS OF THE SUPREME COURT. [Part L the usual way, to the courts of the country remains open to them. That is, I presume tlie consideration, and a very legitimate one, I should say, upon which the Manitol)a Executive acted by refraining^ to take part in the reference, a course that I would not have been surpi'ised tt) see followed by the petitioners, unless indeed they are assured of the interference of the federal authorites should it eventually result from this reference that, constitutif>nally, the power t<» interfere with the provincial legislation as prayed for exists. For if, as a matter of policy, in the public interest, no action is to be taken upon the petitioners' application, even if the appeal lies,, the futility of these proceedings is apparent. Assuming, then, that we have jurisdiction, I will try to give, as concisely as possible, the reasons upon which I have based my answers to the questions submitted. Tn the view I take of the application made to His Excellency the Governor-General in Council by the Catholics of Manitoba, I think it better to invert the order of the questions put to us, and to answer first the fourth of these questions, that is, whether sub- section 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act applies to Manitoba. To that question the answer, in my opinion, must be in the negative. That section of the British North America Act applies to every one of the provinces of the Dominion, with the exception, however, of Manitoba, for the reason that, for Manitoba, in i special charter, the subject is specifically provided for by section 22 thereof. The maxims lex posterior derogat priori, and specialia generah/nts derogant, have both here, it seems to me, their application. If it had been intended to purely and simply extend the operation of that section 93 of the Bi'itish North America Act to Manitoba, section 22 of its charter would not have been enacted. The course since pursued for British Columbia and Prince Edward Island would have been followed. But where we see a different course pursued we have to assume that the difference in the law was intended, I cannot see any other reason for it, and none has been suggested. True it is that the words " or practice " in sub- section 1 of section 22 are an addition in the Manitoba charter which the Dominion Parliament desired to specially make to the analogous provision of the British North America Act, but that was no reason to word sub-section 2 thereof so differently as it il from subsection 3 of section 93 of the British North America Act. Then this difference may be easily explained, though its consequences may not have been foreseen ; I speak cautiously and mindful that I am not here allowed to controvert or even doubt anything that has been said on the subject by the Privy Council. It is evident, to my mind, that it was simply because it was assumed by the Dominion Parliament that separate or denominational schools had previously been, in that region, aiid were then, at the union, the Chap. V.] judgments op thk supreme court. 89 basis and principle of the educational system, and witli the inten- tion of adapting such system to the new province, or rather of continuing it as found to exist, that, in the Union Act of 1870, the words of sul>section 3 of section '.'3 of the British North America Act, " where in any province a system of separate or dissentient schools exists by law at the union, or is thereafter established by the Legislature of the province," were stricken out as unnecessasy and inapplicable to the new province. And I do not understand that the Privy Council denies to the petitioners their right to separate schools. However, the reason of this difference between the constitution of the province and the British North America Act cannot, in my view of the question, bring much assistance in the present investiga- tion : the fact remains, whatever may have l)een the reason for it, that no appeal is given to the minority, in Manitoba, in relation to the rights and privileges conceded to them since the union as dis- tinguished from those in existence at the union, They have no rights but what is left to them by the judgment in the Barrett case ; and, if I do not misunderstand that judgment, the appeal they now lay claim to is not, as a logical inference, thereby left to them. And in vain now, to support their appeal, would they urge that the statute so construed is unreasonable, unjust, inconsistent and contrary to the intentions of the lawgiver ; uselessly would they contend that to force them to contribute pecuniarily to the maintenance of the public, non-Catholic, schools, is to so shackle the exercise of their rights as to render them illusory and fruitless, or that to tax, not only the property of each and every one of them individually, but even their school buildings, for the support of the public schools is almost ironical ; uselessly would they demonstrate the utter impos- sibility for them to efficaciously provide for the organization, main- tenance and management of separate schools, and the essential requirements of a separate school system without statutory powers and the necessary legal machinery ; ineffectively would they argue that to concede their right to separate schools, and withal, deprive them of the means to exercise that right, is virtually to abolish it, or to leave them nothing of it but a barren theoiy. With all these, and kindred considerations, we, here, in answering this consultation, arc not concerned. The law has authoritatively been declared to be so, and with its consequences, we have nothing to do. Dura lex, aed fex. Judex non constituitur ad leges refonaandaa. Non licet judicibua d*' legihua judicare, aed secundum ipsas. The Manitoba legislation is constitutional, therefore it has not affected any of the rights or privileges of the minority, therefore the minority has no appeal to the federal authority. The Manitoba Legislature had the right and power to pass that legislation ; therefore any interference with that legislation by the federal authority would be tdira virea and unconstitutional. m —■^T^: 90 JUDGMENTS OF THE SUPREME COURT. [Part I. By an express provision of the British North America Act of 1871, it n\ust not In* h»st sight of, the Dominion Parliament has not the power to, in any way, alter the Manitoba Union Act of 1870. For these reasons I would answer negatively the fourth of tlie questions submitted, and say that, in my opinion, sub-aecticm 3 ctf section 93 of the British North America Act does not apply to Manitoba. I take up n(»w appeal claimed by the first of these questicms : Does the right of the petitioners exist under section 22 of the Manitoba Act ? And here again, in my opinion, the answer must be the negative, for the reason that it is conclusively determined, by the judgment of the Privy Council, that the Manitoba legislation does not prejudically affect any right or privilege that the Catholics had by law or practice at the union, and if their rights and privileges are not aflfected there is no appeal. The rights or privileges mentioned in sub-section 2 of section 22 are the same rights and privileges that are mentioned in sub-seciion 1, that is to say, those existing at the union, upon which sul>section 3 provides for the interference, in certain cases, of His Excellency the Governor- General in Council, and it is as to such rights or privileges only that an appeal is given. The appeal given, in the other provinces, by section 93 of the British North America Act as to the rights or privileges conferred on a minority after the union, is, as I liave rems" ^d, left out of the Manitoba constitution. Assuming how- eve -nat the Manitoba constitution is wide enough to cover an ..,|»peal, by the minority, upon the infringement of any of their rights or privileges created since the union, or assuming that section 93 of the British North America Act, sub-section 3, applies to Manitol)a, I would be inclined to think that, by the ratio decidendi of the Privy Council, there are no rights or privileges of the Catholic minority that are infringed by the Manitoba legislation :!0 as to allow of the exercise of the powers of the Governor in Council in the matter, as the Manitoba statutes must now be taken not to prejudicially affect any right or privilege whatever enjoyed by the Catholic conununity. It would seem, no doubt, by the language of both section 93 of the British North America Act, and of sectit)n 22 of the Manitoba charter, that theremay be Provincial legislation ■which, though i)tt7'a vires, yet might affect the rights or privileges of the minority so as to give them the right to appeal to the Governor in Council. For it cannot be of tdtra vires, legislation that an appeal is given. And the petitioners, properly disclaiming any intention to base their application on the unconstitutionality of the Manitoba statutes, even for infringement of rights conferred upon them since the union, urge that though the Pri^y Council has determined that the legislation in question does not aifect the rights existing at the union so as to render it ultra vires yet that it does affect the rights Chap. V.] JunoMEyTs of the sitpremk court. n conferred upon tlieni l»y the Provincial Lejyjislature since the union, so as to give them, though infra vires, an appeal t«» the G(»vernor iu Council. I fail to see, lutwever, how tliis ingenious distinction, for which I am free to admit l)oth the liritish North America Act, and the Manitoba special chartei", give r(M)m, can lielp the petitioners. I assume here that the petitioners have an appeal upon rights or privileges conferred upon them since the union, as contra-distinguished from the rights previously in existence. The case is precisely the same as if the present appeal was as to their rights existing at the union. They might argue that though the Privy Council has held this legislation to have l)een intra vires yet their right to appeal sul)si8t8, and, in fact, exists l)ecause it is intra vires. But what would be this ground of appeal ? Because the legislation affects the rights and privileges they had at the union. And the answer would 1)6 one fatal to their appeal, as it was to their contentions in the Barrett case, that none of these rights and privileges have been illegally affected. Now, the rights and privileges they lay claim to under the Provincial legislation anterior to 1890 are, with the additions rendered necessary by the political organization of the country to enable them to exercise these rights, the same, in principle, that they had by practice at and l)efore the union, and which were held by the Privy Council not to be illegally affected by the legislation of 1890. And I am unable to see how, on the one hand, this legislation might be said to affect those rights so as to support an appeal and, on the other hand, not to affect the same rights so as to render it ultra vires. The petitioners, it seems to me, would virtually renew their impeachment of the constitutionality of the Manitoba legislation of 1890 upon another ground than the one taken in thr Barrett case, namely upon the rights conferi-ed upon them since the union, whilst the controversy in the Barrett case was limited to their rights as they existed at the union. But that legislation, as I have said, is^ irrevocably held to ha\e been intra vires, and it is not open to the petitioners to argue the contrary even upon a new ground. And if it is intra vires, it cannot be that it has illegally affected any of the rights or privileges of the Catholic minority though it may lie preju- dicial to such right. And if it has not illegally affected any of those rights or privileges, they have no appeal to the Governor in Council It has been earnestly urged on the part of the petitioners, in their attempt to distinguish the two cases, that in the Barrett case it was only their liability to assessment for the public schools that was at issue, and, consequently, that the decision of the Privy Council, binding though it be, does not preclude them from now taking, on appeal from the provincial legislation of 1890, the ground t\ ) 'S 1 j I ^'1 -»T. "^V^'i'^T^^ "Jw^- 92 JUDGMENTS OF THE SUPRBMK COUKT. [Part I. that this l(!gisl>iti()ii sweeps away the statutory powers coiicedy vested with the powers essential to the organiza- tion and maintenance of a sch(K»l system that had been granted to them by the previous statutes, are subversive of those rights and privileges and prejudicially affect them. They might cogently urge in support of that proposition, and might, perhaps, have succeedeil in convincing me, that to take away a right, to cancel a grant, to repeal the grant of a rignt, to revoke a privilege, prejudically affects that grant, prejudically, injuriously aflfects that privilege. They might also perhaps have been able to convince me that the license to own real estate, the authorization to issue debentures, to levy assessments, the pf)wers of a corporatic)n, that had been granted to them, constituted for them rights and privileges. And to the objection that no appeal lies under section 22 of the- Manitoba charter but upon rights existing at the union they might perhaps have successfully answered, either that section 93 of the- British North America Act extends to Manitoba, or, if not, that the legislation of Manitoba in the matter, since the union, prior to 1 890, should be construed as declaratory of their right to separate schools, or a legislative admission of it, a legislation required merely to secure to them the means whereby to exercise that right, and that, consequently, their appeal relates back to a right existing afj the union, so as to bring it, if necessary, under the terms of sectioa 22 of the Manitoba Union Act. However, from these reasons the petitioners are now precluded. If any of their rights and privileges had been prejudicially aflfected this legislation would be ultra vires ; and it is settled that it is not idtra vires. And the argument against their contention is very strong, that it being determined that it would have been in the power of the Manitoba legislature to establish, in 1871, at the outset of the political organization of the province, the system of schools that they OlIAP. v.] JUDOMKNTS OF THE 81IM1EME COUHT. •8 aduptf-fl ill 1H!»0, hy tlic statiitfs wliicli tlio potitioiiors now com))laiii of, it fiiiinot Ih' tliiit liy tlifir ndMptiii;,' mid r»'^'uliitiii^' a .syHtciii nf Heparate si'lionls, tlinuj^li not oli|iji.'t'd to do so, Uwy, Wtu'vcv, hound tlie t'utun' <;»'ii«'i'atioMs of tin* )iroviiic»> to that jioHcy, so that, as long Ht least as there would he even only one Hoinan Catholie left in tlio pfovinte, the le^iislature should he, for all time to come, deprived of the ])o\vpr to alter it. thouffh the constitution vests them with the jurisdiction over education in the jn'ovince. To deny to a legislative IxMly the right to rejH'al its own laws, it may Im^ said, is so to curtail its powers that an express article of its constitution must ho shown to support the prop a ^'i ^ I; hi' y-t JUHUMKNT8 OV THK Sri'UKMB fOUUT. [Part L of Auf^UMt, 1H90, WI18 siKiu'tl liy His (iraco tlu' Aivlihishop of Ht. Bonifaru aii proviiu-f nititli-d tlinii to prorurit, by iipprulH to His KxiM'llniry iii Couiu'il untlcr Hrction "22 <»t' tliu Maiut4>))a Act, tlie aiuiuliiitMit and rrpral of ))i'o\ int-ial Acts, 53 N'ic, ch. 'M and 38, not\vitlistaiidiii>( tliat these Acts liad Im-i-ii (U'clar»'nact. The petition of N<»vend>er, 1892, is however framed with a further contention. It is Nignud by HJH Grace the Archbisliop of 8t. Iloniface, T. A. Jiernier hh president of the Inxly caUed the National Congress, James E. P. Prendergast as mayor of St. Uoniface, J. Allard, (). M. I., V.U., John 8. Ewart and 137 others. The petition sets oi»^ crbatim the matters alleged in the first twelve paragrajilis of the above petition of Augu.st, 1 890, and it then proceeds. The pretension (»f the petitioners th«>refore appears to be that the 22nd section of the Manitoba Act entitled the petitioners, notwithstjinding the judgment of the Privy C- section, and so likewise the remedies provided in the 3rd sub-section relate to the same rights and privileges, and to the better secui'ing the enjoyment of them. The 2nd and 3rd sub-sections are designed as means to redress any violation of the rights preserved by the section. To suV)ject any Act of the legislature to the appeal pro- vided in the 2nd sub-section, and to the remedies provided in the 3rfl sub-section, it is obvious that such an Act must be passed in violation of the condition su])ject to which any jurisdiction is conferi'ed upon the Provincial Legislature to make lav/s in relation to education, and must therefore be idtra virex of the Provincial Legislature, for the language of the section expressly excludes from the Provincial Legislature all jurisdiction to pass such an Act. The jurisdiction, whatever its extent may be, which the Provincial Legislature has over education being declared to be excessive, there can be no appeal to any t)ther autiiority against an Act passed by the legislature under such jurisdiction, and any Act of the legislature passed in violation of any of the provisions in section 22, subject to which the jurisdiction of the legislature is restricted, is not within their jurisfliction and is therefore ultra vbyx. The appeal, therefoi-e, which is given by the 2)id sub-section must be only concurrent with the right of all persons injuriously affected by such an Act to i-aise in the ordinary courts of justice the question of its constitutionality. If any doubt could be entertained upon this point it is concluded, in my opinion, by their Lordships of the Privy Council in Barrett v. Winnipeg and Logan v. Winnipeg, (1), in the following language : "At the commencement of the argument a doubt was suggested as to the competency of the present appeal, in consequence of the so-called appeal to the Governor in Council provided by the Act, but their Lordships are satisfied that the provisions of sub-sections 2 and 3 do not operate to withdraw such a question as that involved in the present case from the jurisdiction of the ordinary tribunals of the country." If an Act of the Provincial Legislature which is impeached upon the suggestion of its prejudicially affecting such rights and privileges as aforesaid is not made by the 2nd section of the Manitoba Act vltra vires of the Provincial Legislature it cannot be open to appeal under sub-section 2 of that section. The section does not. (1) [1892] A.O. 446. id lie \t, 2 it m les jet Ito- lot. Chap. V.] jctdombnts op the supreme court. 99 profess to confer upon the executive of the Dominion or the Dom- inion Parliament, any power of interference whatever with any Act in rehition to education passed by the Provincial Legislature of Manitoba which is not open to the objection of prejudicially affecting some right or privilege with respect to denominational schools, which some class of persons had by law or practice in the province at the union ; all Acts of the Provincial Legislature jiot open to such objection are declared by the section to be within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Provincial Legislature ; and as the Acts of 1890 are declared by their Lordships not to be open to such objection, and to have therefore been within the jurisdiction of the Provincial Legislature to pass, those Acts cannot, nor eun either of them, be be open to any appeal under the 2iul sub-section of this section. It has been suggested however that tlie rights and privileges, whether conferred oi- recognized by the Acts of the Legislature of Manitoba in force prior to and at the tiuK^ of the passing of the Acts of 1890 and which were therel)y repealed, were within the protection of the 2'2iid section and that this was a matter not under ctnisideration in Barrett v. Winnipeg and Logan r. Winnij)cg (1) ; and that therefore the right of appeal under sul)-section 2 of section 22 ag.'iinst such repeal does exist notwithstanding the decision oi rlie Privy Council in Barrett v. Winnipeg and Logan r. Winnipeg (2). This contention appeals to have been first raised expressly in the petition presented in October, 1892, althougli it is impliedly comju'e- hended in the paragraphs of the petition of August, 1890, which is repeated verbatim in that of October, 1892, wherein the Act of the Provincial Legislature of 1871 is relied upon as having had— "the effect to continue to the Roman Cathtdics that separate condition with reference to enlucation which liiey had enjoyed previous to the creation of the province, and, in so far as Roman Catholics were concerned, merely to organize the efforts which the Roman Catholics had previously voluntarily made for the education of their own children and for the continuance of schools under the sole control and management of Roman Catholics, and of the education of their children according to the methods by which alone they believe children should be instructed." But this statute of 1871, and all the statutes passed by the legislature of Manitoba ir. relation to education prior to 189l), were specially brought under the notice of their Lordships of the Privy Council, and were fully considered by them in their judgment as already pointed out, and if the repeal by the Act of 1890 of the Acts of the Provincial Legislature then in force in relation to education constituted - violation of the condition contained in section 22, subject to which alone the jurisdiction of the Provincial \- 1^1 (1) [1892] A.C. 445. 2) [1892] A.C. 446. 100 JUDUMKNTS OF THE SUPKBMIC COUKT. [Part 1. IjOgislature to make laws in nilatioii to nducatiou was restricted, it is inconceivable to luy uiin rejjealed b}' the Acts of 181)0, or which placed those Acts when })assed in any different position from that of all Acts of a legislature, which constitute the will t»f the legis- lature for the time being, and only until repealed, — and nothing which warrants tlu^ contention that thc! repeal of those Acts by the Acts of 181)0 constitued a violation of the condition in the 22nd section subject to which the jurisdiction of the legislature was resti icted ; and nothing, therefore, which gives any appeal against such repeal. Whether or not the .'Ird sub-section of secti the whole scope and spirit of this legislation to provide for Par- liament intervening, not where the Provincial Parliament has acted beyond its powers — that I could conceive — but to allow the Domin- ionParliament to intervene, not to correct mistakes where the Provincial Legislature has gone wrong and exceeded their power." In an interruption at this point by their lordships, Lord Mac- naghton asks: " Supposing some rights were created after the union, and then legislation had taken those rights away? " This ([uestion is not directly answered, but afterwards (}). 44) Sir Horace thus continues : "It all comes back to the same point, that the Protestant and Roman Catholic minority have a right to come with a grievance to the Governor General. What is that grievance ? Why, that they are deprived of some right or privilege which they ought to have and are entitled to enjoy. If they ai'e not entitled by law to enjoy it they are not deprived of anything, and it would be an extra»»i'dinary system of legislation, having regard to the nature of this Act, to say that the Dominion Parliament has in certain cases to sit bj' way of a court of appeal from the Provincial Parliament, not to correct mis- takes where the Provincial Parliament has erroneously legislated on matters not within its jurisdiction, but on matters of policy. If that be the effect to be given to these sub-sections, I venture to submit to your lordships that it will have rather startling consequences, and it will for the first time make the Legislature of the Dominion Parlia ment a court of appeal, or give them an appeal, from the exercise of the discretion of the Provincial Parliament, or in other words, it will place the Provincial Parliament in the position that it will be lialjle to have its decisions overruled by the Dominion Parliament, and therefore in a position of inferiority." Chap. V.] judumknts of tub supreme court. 1U& I have quoted at great length liecause of the strong preHentation by eminent counsel of that view, and to show that the attention of their lordships was powarfuUy drawn to the provisions of sub-section 2. The full report shows that all the sub-sections of the two sections of the two Acts were exhaustively discussed. In the judgment their lordships say that: "Subsections 1, 2, and 3 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, 1870, differ but slightly from the corresponding sections of section 93 of the British North America Act, 1867. The only important differ- ence is that the Manitoba Act in sub-section 1 the words " by law " are followed V>y the words "or practice " which do not occur in the corresponding passage in the British Nt th America Act, 1867." There would be a marked and very considerable difference between the corresponding clauses, if in the one case rights and privileges of the religious minority were recognized as subjects of protection when- ever acquired, while in the other case they were not recognized as subjects of protection unless they existed at the time of the passing of the constitutional act. Not wanting to put undue stress upon this, let us look at the clauses for ourselves. In sub-secbion 1, Manitoba Act, there is an express limitation as to time; the rights and privileges in denomina- tional schools that are saved are such as existed, by law or practice, at the union. But in sub-section 2 nothing is said about time at all ; and the natural conclusion upon a reading of the two clauses together is that, with regard to the rights and privileges refer* :d to in the latter clause, the time of their origin is immaterial. Such also is the ordinary and natural meaning of sub-section 2, regarded by itself. Read by itself it extends to cover rights and privileges existent at at the time of the act or thing complained of. The existence of the right, and not the time of its creation, is the operative and material fact. And this agrees with the corresponding provisions of the British North America Act, where sub-section 1 refers to rights, etc., acquired before, or at, union, while sub-section 3, in terms, covers rights, etc., acquired at any time. In any other view there was clearly no necessity to add the words "or any Act of the Legislature" in the remedial provision of the Manitoba Act, for such Act would be wholly null and void under sub-section 1. There is, indeed, an undeniable objection to treating as an appealable thing the repeal by a Legislature of an Act passed by itself. Ordinarily all rights and privileges given by Act of Parliament are to be enjoyed sub modo, and are subject to the implied right of the same Legislature to i-epeal or alter if it chooses to do so. But the fundamental law may make it otherwise. An illustration of this is afforded by the constitution of the United States, which . t| ■I :k ■■■■ -ji 'if 'i :i \:\* prohibits the States, but not Congress, from passing any law |( J 106 JUDGMENTS OF THE SUPREME COURT. [Part 1. impairing the obligation of contract, and this has l)een held to prevent the State Legislatures from repealing, or materially altering, their own Acts conferring private rights, when such rights have been accepted. It does not extend to Acts relating to Government, as, for instance, to public otticers, municipal incorporations, etc., but it extends to private and other coi'porations, educational or otherwise, and also to Acts exempting incorporated bodies, by special Act, from rates or taxes. These are irrepealable, and the constitutional provision has been found onerous. It is certainly anomaUms under our system and theory of parliamentary power, that a Legislature may not repeal or alter in nny way an Act passed by itself. Still weighty as this consideration is, I can give no other reasonable interpretation to the Act in question than that, under the constitution of Manitoba, as under the constitution of the Dominion, the exercise by the Provincial Legislature of its undoubted powers in a way so as to give rights and privileges by law to the minority in respect of education, lets in the Dominion Parliament to concurrent legislative authority for the purpose of preserving and continuing snch rights and privileges, if it sees fit to do so. By the British North America Act it was not clear whether the •words "act or decision of any provincial authority," covered the case of an Act of the Provincial Legislature, or was confined to Administrative Acts, but in the Manitoba Act the words explicitly extend to an Act of that Legislature. Any ambiguity in sub-section 2 of the Manitoba Act is, I conceive, to be resolved in the light of the corresponding provisions of the British North America Act. As the provisions of the British North America Act are to be applicable, unless varied, I think it reasonable that ambiguous provisions in the special Act should be construed in conformity with the general Act. Passing, however, from it as a matter of construction, it does not seem reasonable that Parliament, in forming, in 1870, a constitution for Manitoba, intended to disregard entirely constitutional limita- tions such as were three years before established as binding upon the original members of the confederation. On the contrary, by the addition of the words "or by practice" in 1st sub-section, and of the words " or any Act of the Legislature " in 'Jnd sub-section, and by the provision of section 'J."i providing for the use of French and English languages in the courts and Legislature, there is manifested a greater tenderness for racial .and denominational differences. Further, unless sub-section 2 has the meaning suggested, the entire series of limitations imposed by sub-sections 1 , 2 and 3 are entirely inoperative. For the Judicial Committee has in effect declared that no right or privilege in respect of denominational schools existed •Chap. V.] judgments op the supkbmk court. 107 by of ed ?s. Ire ed prior to the union, eitlier hy law or practice, and therefore there was nothing on wliich suh-Hection 1 could practically operate ; and a.s there was clearly no system of separate or dissentient 8chtK)ls estalilished in Manitoba hy law prior to the union, the provisions <»f sub-sections "2 and 3 are inoperative if the rights and privileges in relation to education are to be limited to rights and privileges before the union. There is no doubt that this construction limits the powers of the Ijegislature and restrains the exercise of its discretion, but the same thing may l)e said of the eifect of an appeal against •' any act or decision of any provincial authority " in Nova Scotia or New Bruns- wick, in ca.se either of such provinces were to adopt a system of sep- arate schools. The Legislature might not choose to pass the reme- dial legislation necessary to execute the deci.sion of the Governor General in Council, and the Dominion Parliament could then exercise its concurrent power of legislation in eflfect overriding the legislative determination of the Provincial Legislature. The provision may l)e weak, one-sided, as giving finality to a chance legislative vote in favour of separate schools, inconsistent with a proper autonomy, and without elements of permanence, but if it is in the constitutional system it must receive recognition in the court of law. Assuming then that clau.se 2 covers rights and privileges when- soever acquired, the next question is as to the meaning of the words "rights and privileges of the Protestant or Roman Catholic minority in relation to education 1" Here again, I think, we are to go to clause 3 of section 93, British North America Act. I think that the reference is to minority rights under a system of separate schools, and that it is essential that the complaining minority should have had rights or privileges under a system of separate or dissentient schools existing by law at the union or thereafter established by the legislature of the province. The generality of the words under clause 2 of the Manitoba Act is to be explained by clause 3, section 93, British North America Act, and to have the same meaning as the corresponding words in it. The two remaining questions then, are : Was a system of separate or dis.sentient schools established in Manitoba prior to the passage of the Manitoba Education Act of 1890? And, have any rights or privileges of the Roman Catholic minority in relation thereto been prejudicially affected? One of the learned judges of the Queen's Bench of Manitoba thus succinctly summarizes the school legislation of Manitoba in force at the time of the passing of the Act in 1890: " Under the school Acts in force in the province previous to the passing of the Public School Act of 1890, there were two distinct sets •of public or conmion schools, the one set Protestant and the other Roman Catholic. The board of education, which had the general ;1 10» JUDUMKNTM UK TIIK flUPKKMR COl'llT. [Part I. tniiiiaKotm^nt of t\\v public s«'Iiih)In, wan dividtnl into twoNcctioriH, one coin|H)K(Hi of tlii^ IVotcMtuitt iiiciiiImm'h aixl one of tlio K((inati Catholic imMnlxu'N, and rach Hootion liad it.s own MU|)(«fiiit»'nd«'nt. Th« Hchool (liHtrictM wore doHif^natcd Prott'stant or Hoinaii Catholic, an the civmo ini^ht Imv Tim ProtcHtant hcIiooIh were under the imin«MUate control of truHteeH electinl l»y the ProtcHtant ratepayers of the diHtrict, and the Catholic Mch«M»lH in tht- same way were under the contr<»l of truK- tees elect««l hy tim lloinan Catludic ratepayerH; and it waH provideli8hed by the Act of 1881 was not in ttirms, ami, eo nomine, a system c. separate or dissentient schools, and if the constitutional provision reijuires that they should be such in order to come within the Act, then the minority did not have the requisite rights and privileges iix respect of education. As to tin's, I have had doubts arising iVom the opinion that, where rights and privileges have no other foundation thin the legislative authority whose subse([uent Acts in affecting them is impeached, the restraint upon the general grant of legislative authority should bo ap[)lied only where the case is brought closely within the limitation. At the same time, wo are to give a fair and reasonable construction to a remedial provision of the constitution, and ai-e to regard the substance of the thing. Now the Roman Catholics were in the minority in 1881, and are still, and a system of schools was established by law, under which they had the right to their own schools — Catholic in name and fact — under the control of trustees selected by themselves, taught by teachers of their own faith, iind supported, in part, by an assessment ordertnl by themselves upon the persons and property of Roman Catholics, and imposed, levied and collected as a portion of the public rates, the peraons and property liable to such rate being at the same time exempt from contribution to the schools of the majority, i.e.y Protestant schools. This, although not such in name, seems to me to have been essentially a system of separate or dissentient schools, of OiiAP. v.] JunoMf.xTs or the suprkmr couht. 109 the Hiiiiin ^(Mioriil typo uh tli<> H<>|>urut(' Rchool Hyntcni of Ontario, tiiui giviii;{ tlioritfoi'ii to t)i(> niinoi'ity riglitH (uid |»rtvil<>^(m in rolution to (tducHtion in tlio HciiHe of Huh-Hoction '2, Hcotion 22, Manitoba Act, imd Hub-Huction i), Hoction OK, ItiitiHlt North Aniorica Act. It iH tiMin that the Hchooln of tho majority wore ProtoHtant HchoolH, and that thn majority hud tho Hunu* ri^ht an thu minority, hut I do not think tliat tluH rcndcrH tho minority RchooU any tho h^HH OHHcn- tiully Noparato Hchooln of tho Hoiiiiin (!atholicH. In Queliec tho majority HchoolH are i'iviU'>,'0 of tho Roman Catliolic minority in thiH HyHtoni of Hoparato schooJH projndicially afToctod hy the Act of 1800] And if HO, to wiiat extent < In tho jndgnient of the jndicial committee in Tho city of Winnipeg V. Barrett (1), Hpeakingof tho right there claimed on behalf of the rightH and privilogoH which tiiey had by practice at tho time of the union, thoir lordHliipH say: '* Now if tho state of things which the archbishop de8cril)eB as exist- ing before the union had been established by law, what would have been the rights and privileges of the Honian Catholics with re8|>ect to denominational schoolsl They would have had, by law, the right to establish schools at their own expense, to nniintain tlioir schools by school foes or voluntary contributions, and to conduct them in accord- ance with their own religious tenets. Every other religious body which was engaged in a similar work, at the time of the union, would have had precisely the same right with respect to their denominational schools. Possibly this right, if it had been defined or recognised by positive enactment, might have had attached to it, as a necessary or appropriate incident, the right of exemption from any contribiition under any circumstances to schools of a different denomination. But, in their lordship's opinion, it would be going much too fur to hold that the establishment of a national system of education, u|>on an unsectarian basis, is so inconsistent with the right to set up and main- tain denonunational schools, that the tw j things cannot exist together, or that the existence of one necessarily implies or involves immunity from taxation for the purpose of the other." The rights and ])rivilege3 of the denominational minority under the Act of 1881 and amending acts, were different from the assumed rights in denominational schools which the same class had by practice ut the time of union. It could not be said to be merely ** the right to establish schools at their own expense, to maintain their schools by school fees or voluntary contributions, and to conduct them in accord- ance with their own religious tenets"; it wai? a right as Roman Catholics bv law to establish schools and to maintain them through the exercise by them of the state power of taxation, by the imposition, (1) [1892] A.C. 446. 110 JUDGMENTS OP THE SUPREME COTRT. [Part L levying and collecting of rates u))on the pei-sons and property of all Roman Catholics, such persons and property being at the same time- exempted from liability to be rated for tlie support of the public schools of tlie majority, then denominated and being Protestant schools. By the Act of 1890 the Protestant schools are aljolished equally with the Roman Catholic schools, and a system of public schools set up, which is neither Protestant nor Roman Catholic, but inisectarian. The question then is whether the language of their lord- ships is applicable to this state of things, and whether or not it can be said (changing their lordshi|)'s language to suit the i'aots) that tlie establishment of the national system of education upon an unsectarian basis is so inconsistent with the right to set up and maintain by the aid of public taxation ui)on the denominational minority, a system of denominational schools, that the two cannot co-exist; or that th(! exist- ence of the system of denominational minority schools (supposing it still in existence) necessarily implies or involves itnnmnity from tiixa- tion for the purpose of the otlier. It lather seems to me that no reasonable s^'steni of legislation eoidd consistently sook to embrace these two things, viz: 1st, the support ot' a system of denominational schools for the minority, maintainable through compulsory rating of th'3 persons and pro})n'ty of the minority ; and 2nd, the support of a general system of f:>ting all persons and property, both of the major- ity and minority. The efi'ect of such a scheme would be to imj)ose a double rate upon a part of the community for educational purposes. The logical result of this view would be that by the establishment of a general non-sectarian system (as well as by the abrogation of the se})arate school system) the rights and privileges are previously given by law to tlie denominational minority in respect of education were necessarily affected. Of course the minority would obtain equality by giving up their schools; but the present inquiry at this point is whether a right acquired by law to maintain a system of separate schools has been affected by an Act which takes away the legal organ- ization and status of such schools, and their means of maintenance, by the I'epeal of the law giving these things, and which subjects the persons and property of the denominational minority to an educational rate for general non-sectarian schools, instead of leaving them subjected to an educational rate for the sup[)ort of the separate and denomins.- tional schools. It is time that by the Act of 188 1 and amending Acts, the exemption was an exemption from contribution to the Protestant schools, and the schools under the act of 1890 are not Protestant schools; but the substantial thing involved in the exemption under the Acts of 1881 and amending Acts was, that the ratepayer to the sup- port of the Catholic schools should not have to pay rates for the supiKtrt of the schools established by the rest of the community, but should have their educational rates appropriated solely to the sup|K>rt of tl.eir own schools. This was an educational right or privilege . ~:d.Jiti- Chap. V.] judgments of the supkemb court. Ill accorded to them, in relation to education, under a system of separate schools established by law, which the legislature, if iwssessing absolute or exclusive authority to legislate on the subject of education without limitation or restraint, might very well with- draw, abrogate or materially alter, but which, under the con- stitutional limitations of the Manitoba Act, can be done only siibject to the rights of the minority to seek tlie intervention of the Dominion Parliament, through the exercise of the concurrent legislative authority, that thereupon becomes vested in such parliament, upon resort being first had to the tribunal of the Governor-General in Council. Although there are points of difference between this case and what would have been the case if the prior legislation of Manitoba had established a sy.stein of separate scliools following precisely the Ontario system, I cannot regard the difference as other than nomiiial, and 1 treat this case as though the Act of 1881 and amending Acts distinctly estiiblislied a system of separate schools, giving for the general public a systen\ of undenominational public schools, a.nd to the C.itholic minority the right to a system of separate f;ohoolsc In .such case I do not see how the passing of such an Act as the Aat of 1890 coulil fail to be said l>y abolishing the separate schools) totttect the rights and i)rivileges of the minority in respect of educa ion. Willi some changes of phraseologv, and some change of meth'^d, I think that what has been done in the case before us is essentially the sanif. If the clauses of the Manitoba Act are to have any meaning jit all, they must apply to save rights and pi-ivileges which have no other foundation originally than a statute of the Manitoba Legislature. The constitutional pi-ovision protects the separate educational status given by an Act of the Legislature to the denominational minority. The view that the effect of this is to restrain the proper exercise by the Legislature, of its power to alter its own legislation, is met by the opposite view that there is no impi'oper restraint if it is a constitutional provision, and that in es*"ablishing a system of separate schools the Legislature may well have borne in mind the i»ossibly irrepealable character of its legislation in thereby creating rights and privileges in relation to education. I therefore answer the questions of the case as follows : 1. Yes. 2. Yes. 3. No. 4. Yes, to the extent as explained by the above reasons for my opinion. r». Yes. 6. Yes. li 112 PETITIONS AND ORDKKS IN COUNCIL. [Part I. Petition op the Cardinal, Archbishops, and Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church in Canada, May, 1894. To His Excellency the Govet nor-General of Canada in Council : May it Please Your Excellency, — The petition of the under- signed. His Eminence the Cardinal Archbishop of Quebec, the Most Reverend Archbishops and the Right Reverend the Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church in the Dominion of Canada, devoted subjects of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, humbly sheweth : 1. Since the establishment of the Province of Manitoba until 1890, the public schools of the province, as established by law, were either Protestant or Catholic schools. They all enjoyed the same rights and received respectively their legitimate share of legislative gi*ants. They were independent one fi'om another, being conducted, directed, and suppoi'ted by the respective sections of the population for which they were established. The system gave such satisfaction that it was the cause of no complaint, and the two sections of the population with their respective schools lived in peace, concord, harmony, and mutual good-will. 2. In 1890 laws were passed changing the school system and replacing it with enactments which are, for a poi-tion of the com- munity, a source of grief, regret and hardship. Practically, and in spite of all assertions to the contrary, the result of the new system is purely and simply the legal suppression of all Catholic schools, and' the maintenance of all Protestant schools, with all the rights and jM'ivileges they enjoyed previous to the school laws of 1890. Catholic schools are abolished by law, while Protestant schools have nothing to suffer from the new enactment ; nay, they gain by it, as the Catholic ratepayers have now to help to the support of Protestant schools, which are exactly what they were, and to which, naturally, Catholic parents cannot conscientiously send their children. 3. The Public Schools Act of 1890, being 53 Vic, ch. 38 (now ch. 127 of Revised Statutes of 1891) decrees, in sections 241-242, that "in cases where, before the coming into force of this Act, Catholic school districts have been established, covering the same territory as any Protestant school district . . . such Catholic school districts shall cease to exist." The law has been put in force wheresoever it could be applied j for instance, in Winni[)eg, Brandon, etc. There the Catholic trustees have ceased to be recognized since the 1st May, 1890, while the Protestant trustees remained in office and caused taxes to be levied on Catholic as well as Protestant ])arents, notwithstanding the fact that no Catholic children are attending the said Protestant schools. Ohap. v.] pp:titions and orders in council. 113 4. Section 192 says: "Religious exercises in the public schools shall be conducted according to the regulations of the Advisory Board." It is, therefore, lawful to have prayers and leligious exer- •cises in the [mblic school of Manitoba, provided the same are fixed •and determined by the Advisory Board. Just now all the members of the said Board are Protestants, and, owing to the condition of the country, it is clear that Catholics will never have but very little influ- ■ence, if any, in the said Board " Therefore, Protestant children will be allowed to ))i"ay according to their parents' desire, while Catholic children are deprived of the same liberty, and this under the penalty of forfeiting their legitimate share of public money, because in order to secure to his or her school the government grant, the teacher nnxst declare under oath that no prayer or religious exercise, excej)t as pi-escribed by the Advisory Board, has been used in the school. Suppose a school attended exclusively by Catholic children, with a Catholic teacher, the said school would be deprived of the legislative grant, should the teacher or the pupils cross themselves or make use of the Hail Mary. 5. Keligious instruction is not prohibited in the Public Schools •of Manitoba ; in that respect, and under the heading of morals the regulations framed under the old system by the Protestant section •of the Board are retained under the new system ; " Stories, memoiy gems, sentiments in the school lessons, examination of motives, didactic talks, teaching the ten Commandments, etc., are means to be employed." All this, of coui-se, is to be used from a Protestant point of view, so much so that the actual chairman of the Advisory Board, who has always been the chairman of the Protestant senion of the Board of Education, and who is no less a personage than the Archbishop of Ru|>ert'8 Land, declared befoi*e the Synod, in 1893, that the aV)ove quoted privileges " ai'e not small things in themselves, but they are doubly important because they carry with them for the teacher a degree of liberty in his teaching of what may come before the classes in their literature and otherwise," and His Grace adds : ^'The teachei-swho ignore these exercises can hardly be realizing their position as Christian men." The liberty above mentioned is naturally for Protestants alone because it is enacted that those public schools are "non-sectarian," that is to say, that no Catholic teaching can be permitted while iacilities are afforded to zealous and intelligent Protestant teachers to impress upon their pupils their own religious convictions. See appendix A, pamphlet by Archbishop Tach^, April, 1893, and appendix B, Dr. J. R. Morrison's paper read before the Junior Liberal Conservative Association, of St. John, N. B., February 13th, 1894. 6. For the last four years the Catholics of Manitoba have been subjected to unfair and unjust treatment resulting from the change in 8 4 .11 j; immrm m i miMTmmm i m m niiii -'""T"^ : iiiiiiiiii 114 • PETITIONS AND 0RDBR8 IN OOUNCrL. [Part I. tho Hchool laws in 1890. Tlieynsked in vain for relief. Insteaii of » remedy, tliey have been made tho victims of a freHli injustice, tho new Manitoba hiw, 57 Vic, ch. 28, assented to on March 2nd, 1894. The chuise 151 of the Public School Act of 1890 reads as follows: " Any school not conducted according to all the provisions of this or any Act in force for the time being, or the regulations of the department of education, or the Advisory Board, shall not l»e det-med a p(d)Iio school within the meaning of the law, and such school siiall not participate in the legislative grant." To this provision, in force since 1890, has been added this year the section 4 of the new law, which rear and authority, and it siiall be the duty of the said council to take charge of all the propei'ty of such school district, real and personal, and to administiT the same for tho benetit of the creditors of such school district, if any." Such is the real position of the Catholics of Manitoba, tliorigh all their school property has been acquired with their own money, without any help from Protestant ])inse or public fund, and ii» Protestant municipalities the Catholic school property, real and personal, goes to the beni'fit of Protestitnts. 8. The example given in Manitoba has been partly followed in the North-west Territories. There the Catholic separate schools have been retained, but in virtue, of the Ordinance No. 22, A.D. 1892,^ they are depiived of theii' own libei'ty of action and of the character which distinguishes tliom fi-om other schools. So that, in reality, the Catholics of the North-west are reduced, partly at least, to the hard- ship imposfcd upon their brethren of Manitoba. In both cases the result is very detrimental to the cause of education and really has in both cases created bad feelings, dissensions, and the most deplorable results. See appendix C, memorial of Archbishop Tache, March, 1894. Li'ia!^^^JrM-i--^*;ikLi>i,..i. ^■lAfJWt^'l. ^A^., -Vi Chap. V.] PETITIONS AND ORDERS IN COUNCIL. 115 9. The undersigned take the lilx^rty to affirm that they deeply regret the condition of affiiirs above iiientionod. The painful experience of the Catholics of Manitoba and tlie North-west Territories is also resented by the Catholics of the Dominion. The undersigned have no hesitation in stating that a sinular feeling certainly exists among many Protestants, who, though sejiarated by faith, are united with the Catholics in a sentiment of justice, fair play, and desire for the prosperity of their common country. The undersigned appreciate the political advantages enjoyed by Canada and have no desire for any other regime, satisfied that there is, in the institutions of the country and in the spirit of justice and conciliation which prevails among its inhabitants, a remedy against what, just now, is the subject of their complaints. The Canadian constitution acknowledges equal rights for all citizens, and for all classes of citizens. Therefore, CantJians should not be oppressed because they are Catholics. 10. The undersigned cannot shut their eyes to a fact closely connected with the history of their country: Catholic missionaries have not waited for the facilities and material advantages, now offered by Canada to bring thereto the light of Christian civilization. On the contrary, they were the first pioneers of the saciad cause and they sealed their missions with their blood. Without fear or hesitation they buried their existence among the most barl)aious savages, whom they tamed and induced peaceably to hand over their own country to the Canadian authorities. The Catholic missionaries accompanied that noble task on the banks of the Saskatchewan and Red Rivers, as well as on those of the St. Lawrence and the Ottawa, and they did this, when alongside of the crosses they planted, tliey fondly resteil their gavel on the Jleur de lis flag. Everyone knows that the same missionaries, while their eyes were yet moist with the tears they naturally shed, when they had to .sever the ties by which their whole existence had hereto been bound up, were as faithful to British dominion as they had been to the banner of the land of their origin. It is well known that it is largely due to the fidelity of Canadian Catliolic apostles that England owes the quiet possession of the noble colony which France had j)]anted on the St. Lawrence and its tributaries. What then hap))ened among the inhabitants of La Nouvelle France, was possible solely because its inhabitants were Catholics, and because England had respected their religious convictions. The knowledge of what they allude to, renders more incomprehensible to the undersigned the fact that the Catholics of Manitoba and the North-west are badly treated because they are Catholics. 1 1 . Catholics believe in the necessity of religious instruction in schools. This conviction imposes upon them conscientious obligations. v/Al&MMi^-.'**- ■'^■■' 216 PKTITIOXS AVU OUUEHS IN COUNCIL. [Part I. and these obligations give tliern rights of which they connot be deprived. They ciinnot be satisfied by the saying, others do not believe as you do, therefore you must change your convictions; others are satisti«^d and even wish that their chihlren should be In'ought up and educated in such a way, therefore, you Catholics, yt u cannot htand asitle, or, if you do, do so at your own exj)ense. Such an argument is neither fair nor just. Tilt; undersigned, ])astors of .souls, are at one with their flocks, in insisting on the rights they claim, and they are fully determined to preserve them in their integrity. There is in this a (juestion of justice, of natural equity, of prudence and of social economy, closely connected with the fundamental interests of tlie country. The Catholics, being under the obligations of educating their children, according to their faith, and the religious ])rincii)les they profess, have, in our free country, the right of establishing their separate schools, and that right they must be allowed to exercise, without being forced to the burden of double school taxes. The undersigned also take the liberty to state, that the Federal Parliament has endowed the schools of Manitoba and the North-west with a large domain, in assigning to the sup[)ort of such schools the eighteenth i)art of all j>ublic lands. Those lands are Canadian property, and how could the Federal Parliament consent to deprive the Catholics of these countries of their legitimate share in the profit derived from such lands, simjjly because this class of citizens adheres to its religious convictions a.nd wishes to comply with conscientious obligations'? See appendix D, " A page of the history of the sciiools of Manitoba," by Archbishop Tache. 12. The undersigned petitioners are fully aware that Manitoba and the North-west Territories were received into confederation, after promises made to the first inhabitants of that vast country in the name and by the authority of Her Majesty. The immediate representatives of our beloved Queen assured them, that " respect and attention would be extended to the different religious persuasions and that, on their union with Canada, all their civil and religious rights and privileges would be respected." In the estimation of Catholics, their i-eligious rights are not respected and their religious persuasions ai-e not treated with respect and attention, when there are difficulties thrown, by law, in the way of securing to their children an education, conducted in accordance with their religious convictions. 13. The undersigned, while petitioning as they do, repudiate the idea of interfeience with political parties, or with the direction of affiiii's, purely political or lemi)oral. Their sole object is to secure for the Catholics a protection, needed for the accomplishment of their religions obligations, and it is in that view, and in that view only, Chap. V.] petitions and orders in council. 117 i that they petition His Lxcellency the Governor- General in Council, and ask the lionorable members of the Henate and the House .)f Commons of Camuhi, of whatsoever party they may be, to lielp in a fair settlement of the actual difficulties. Therefore, your petitioners humbly pray His Excellency the Governor-General in Council : 1. To disallow the Act of Manitoba, 57 Vic, chap. 28, 1894, and intituled " An Act to amend the Public School Act." 2. To give such directions and make such provisions for the relief of the Roman Catholics of the province of Manitoba, as His Excellency in Council may seem fit, with regard to the Manitoba School laws of 1890. 3. To communicate with the Lieutenant-Governor of the Noi-th- west Territories, in order that, by amending ordinances, redress should be given to meet the grievances of which the Catholics of the North-west complain on account of the Ordinance No. 22, assented to at Regina on the 31st of December, 1892. And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray. (Signed), E. A. Taschereau, Cardinal, Archbishop of Quebec. Alex. Tach6, Archbishop of S.. Boniface, < ).M.I. C. O'Brien, Archliishoj) of Halifax. Edward Charles Fabre, Archbishop of Montreal. Joseph Thomas Duhamel, Archbishop of Ottawa. John Walsh, Archbishop of Toronto. James Vincent Cleary, Archbishop of Kingston. L. N. Begin, Archbishop of Cyrfene, Coadjuteur of His . Eminence Cardinal Taschereau. J. Vital Grandin, Ev. de St. Albert. L. F. Lafleche, Ev. des Trois Rivieres, O.M.I. Isidore Clut, O.M.I., Ev. D'Arindele. Emile Grouard, Ev. d'Ibara, O.M.I. Vic. Apost., Arthab., MacKenzie. Albert Paschal, O.M.I., Ev. de Mosinopolis, Vic. Apost. Paul Durieu, O.M.I., Ev. de New Westminister. L. Z. Moreau, Bishop of St. Hyacinthe. John Cameron, Bishop of Antigonish. J. Sweeny, Bislioj* of St. John, N.B. James Rogers, Bishop of Chathiim. James Charles McDonald, Bisliop of Charlotteiown. J. N. Lemmens, Bishop of Victoria and Vancouver. T. J. DowLiNG, Bi.shop of Hamilton. Denis O'Connor, Bishop of Loudon. V m mitium iMi^aBm*ti^'^'>^' 118 I'KTITIONS AND OUDRHH IN COUNOIIi. [Pakt I. R. A. O'Connor, HiHhop of IVtoihorougli. AtiKXANDi'iu MacDonkll, HiHilop of Aloximdria. .losKiMl Kmaui), HiHliop of VullcytieM. Paim, S. iMUtuyuK. BiHliop of Sliorhrooko. Maximr I>KrKi-i,K8. HiHlH)p of Dnizipiini. Ki-i'UKOK (tHAVKL, Misliop of Nicolot Anduk Ai,ni:uT Hlaih, Kv. do St. (}(Minaiii df KiiuouHki. Nahcissk Zi"rnnuN liOURAiN, Kv. do Ovtlit>re ot Vicaiio ApoHloliipio do Pontiar. M. T. LAUUE«"guK, Kv. do Cliicoutiini. Ohdeu in CoirNriL, 26tu July, ISOl. Tlio Conimitto*' of tlio Privy Council have had undor consideration a memorial adilressod to your Kxcolloncy in Council by His Eminence (^irdinal Taisohoroau, Archhiahoj) of Quelwc, and l>y the Roman C^itholic archlnshops and l)i8hoj)8 in Canada, on the subject of the laws relating to education in the Province of Manitoba and in the North- west territories. The uuMuorial sets forth the condition of the public schools in the Province of Manitoba from the establishment of the province until 1890, and pmceeda to state that "In 1890 laws were paissod changing the school systeni and replacing it by other enactments which are, for a jwrtion of the community, a source of grief, regret and haixlshij>." The nu'morial assorts that " the result of the new system is purely and simply the legal suppression of all Catholic schools, and the maintenance of all Protestant schools, with all the rights and privileges enjoyed previous to the school laws of 1890," and that the " Catholic mtopayers jiavo now to help to the support of Protestant schools, which are exactly what they were, and to which naturally Catholic parents cannot conscientiously send their children." The memorial proceeds to state in detail some of the provisions of the enactments of Manitoba in 18v»0, which ai*e claimed to have the elfect previously stat^id. It further states that ** for the last four years the Catholics of Manitoba have been subjected to unfair and unjust treatment resulting from the c'lange of the school laws of 1890"; that *' they asked in vain for relief; instead of a remedy they have been iiia^-e the victims of a fresh injustice in the new Manitoba law, 57 Vic, chap. 28, assented to on Mareh 2, 1894," one of the pixjvisions of which forbids aid to be given by any municipality to any school not conducted according to the school system adopted in 1 890. The effect of this enactment is stated by the memorialists to be "that no municipality, even one exclusively Catholic, without a OlIAP. v.] I'KTITIONS AND CMIDRRS IN COUNCIL. IIU fliii^l*! ProtcHiunt in itn limitH, Iiiih any powor to lovy ii Hin^lo dollar for (y'atlioliu hcIiooIh, vvliilo a Oatliolic inuniui|Hility, wIi(M-<> tlinre aro 10 Pt'otoHtant (iliildron, Ih oltlif^ed hy law to lovy on all tli*' (JatlinlirH iih w«»!l uH on tlio |MM*«ntH of tho 10 ProtoHtant (ihiK'ron, thn money r«'(niiro(l for tlio nduoation of tho 10 ProtoHtant cliiMr'Mi." TIio mem- orial coniplaiiiH aJHo that tho onactmont of 1H94 " deureoH thooonfiHca- tion of all hcIiooI propurty in all tho (iiHtrictH, which do not Huhinit thoir hoIiooIh to tho now law," ovon thou^^h tho H'.ihool proporty may havo lM!on aotpiirod i)y CatholioH with thoir own monoy. Tho moujorial furthor Htaitos that in tho North-west torritorioH "the Oatholic soparato hcIiooIh havo hee given to meet the grievances of which the Catholicii of the North-west complain on account of the ordiuanco No. 'i'2, of 1892. The committee, having ttiken all those matters into consideration, have the honor to recom.nend that a copy of the memorial above refernfd to, and also of this report, if approved, be transmitted to the Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba, with a recjuest that he will lay the .Slime before his advi.sers and before the Legislature of that province ; and that copies of the same be also sent to the Lieutenant-Governor of the North-west, with the recpiest that he will lay them before the Executive Committee of the Territories and Ijogislature thereof. The committee beg to observe to Your Kxcellency that the state- ments which are contained in this memorijil are matters of deep con- cern and solicitude in the interests of the Dominion at large, and that it is a matter of utnu..t importance to the people of Canada that the laws which prevail in any ortion of tin* Dominion should not lie such as to ufcasion complaint of oppression or injustice to any class or por- tion of the people, but should be recognized as estublishing p((i feet freedom of etpialitv, especially in all niatters relating to religiun and religious l)elief and practice; and the committee thei-elore iiumiily advise that Your Excellency may join with them in ex])ressing the most earnest hope that the Tjegislatures of Manitoba and of the North- west respectively may take into consideration at, the earliest possible moment the complaints which are sot forth in this pc.'tition, and which are said to create dissatisfaction among Roman Catholics, not only in Manitoba and the Northwest, but likewise throughout Canada, and may take s|)eedy measures to give redness in all the matters in relation to which an}' well-founded complaint or grievance be ascertained. The committee advise that a copy of this re|)oi't be sent to each of the memorialists. y y i\ )f >r i» ill t- 1© t t le h r- ;t \ y PART II. Letters, Lectures. AND Articles ON The School Question. ■11: 1 ; ■tf.mwtj'T'i'V*. ?»■' ■ tai«y» iS ^2 ,.«'j»;««' CHAITKK I. ARCHBISHOP TAOHE. Thinks iiih Idkah with kkoarp to Rrlkmoch .htruction in Schools fully CouRonoiiATKi) in Knciland. ■%>_ (Letter to The Fri-e Prein- Anyiut, 18SIK) Sir, — In the beginning of tli« eHtiililislmuMit of ('uiuuliiin authority in this country, there was little difKculty in Heuuring denoniinational schoolH. After they had been recognized by law, eilbrtH were made to change their character, Imt since 1877 nothing was attempted publicly in that direction. During these last twelve yeai*H the cause of education has made great jtrogreHs in Manitoba; the fact is, there are few new countries, if any, which have a larger development in that direction. Visitoi-a of intelligence are in i-eality very much astonished at the harmonious and etKcacious work of our system; as a rule, the population is satistied with the management of the Hchools, by the respective Boards, and if we can judge this management by the rasult, surely there is not much reason for complaint. I am i>er- fectly aware that the system in itself does not meet the views of everyone. There are men, earnest and honest, who would like that it had never been established, but these very men, precisely for the same reasons, are anxious to avoid rash measures or violation of the rights of othei-s. Since last week there has been a -good deal of talking and writing about the question of schools. Withoiit attaching too much weight to what might have been said under certain impulses, or to please certain parties, I am fully aware of tlie importance of the question, and feel confident th:it no government will attempt any measure violating the acquired rights of any important section of the people of Manitoba. 1 cherish the idea that our public men are not to be guided by the narrow ideas of bigoted individuals who think it is a glorious thing to attack others and a meritoriotis one to do harm to their neigh bora. Ignorance is so great among such narrow-minded men that they think, and they say, that our system of schools is to be changed because it admits of religious instruction in conformity to the wishes of the parents, and, to show more blindness, they say tliat the ideas which have been predominant in our system are " mediaeval relics, fit for priestly-ridden people ; that they are ideas behind the times, and not in accordance witli the spirit of the age ; anti-British, and un- woi-thy of an Englisli cout»trv." ' f 123] MMi 124 LETTEK OP ARCHBISHOP TACHB. [Part II. These, and similar repeated attacks have suggested to me the thought of bringing before these men the knowledge of what has occurred in England at a very recent date, and to show thereby that the views, entertained by Catholics and many Protestants in Manitoba with regard to religious instruction in elementary schools, are nob so adverse to English wishes and practice as the advereai'ies of our schools believe and say. Of course, I have not the pi-esumption of furnishing information to educated men, who devote some attention and time to the cause of education, but I think I will say something new to many who had no chance to consider the facts I am abouc to recall. The facts I am going to speak of ai-e in connection, with : — 1 . The Royal Commission appointed 'o inquire into the working of the elementary educiition Acts in England and Wales. 2. The work accomplished by that commission. 3. Conviction expressed by the commissioners. 4. Some of their conclusions and recommendations. Of course, I can only touch on the subject in a very light and inadequate manner, rhe gigantic work of that commission is shewn by the reports, of which a copy lies on my table, and is contained in nine large qiiarto volumes, forming nearly five thousand pages and mostly in doulile columns. It may seem ridiculous to endeavor to bring within a small compass, adequate information with regard to such a labor, but Kis the work is inaccessible to most, I hope I may be Dardoned in writing a few lines in reference to it. 1. ROYAL COMMISSION. ' The 15th of January, 1886, a commission was appointed to enquire into the working of the Elementary Education Acts, England and Wales, and that by a royal proclamation which reads as follows : "Victoria R. "Victoria by the grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Queen, defender of the fiiith. To our right ♦^^r'lsty and well beloved councillor, Sir Richard Assheton Cross, Knight Grand Cross of our most honorable Order of the Bath, one of our principal secretaries." Tlien are given the titles of nobility, of official or social position, of twenty-one other members of the commission, Avhose names are i'e|)eated below "and our trusty and well beloved George Shipton, Esq. Greeting. " WJierejs we have deemed it expedient that a commission should forthwith issue to enquire into the working of the Elementaiy Education Acts in England and Wales. Chap. I] LETTER OF ARCHBISHOP TACHE. 125 "Now, know ye, that we, reposing great trust and confidence in your knowledge and ability, liave authorized and appoint, and do by tliese presents aiitliorize and appoint you the said Sir Richard Asheton Cross, Henry Edward Manning, Cardinal Archbishop, Dudley Francis Stuart, Earl of Harrowby, Frederic Earl Beauchamp, Frederic Bishop of London, Charles Bowyer, Baron Norton, Anthony John Mundella, Sir Francis Richard Sandford, Sir John Lubbock, Sir Bernhard Samuelson, James Harrison Rigg, Robert William Dale, Robert Gregory, Benjamin Frederick Smith, Thomas Daniel Cox Morse, Charles Henry Alderson, John Gilbert Talbot, Sydney Charles Burton, Thomas Edmund Heller, Bernard Charles MoUoy, Samuel Rathbone, Henry Richard and George Shipton, to be our commissioners for the purpose aforesaid. And for the better effecting the purpose of this our commission, we do, by these presents, give and grant unto you, or any six or more of you, lull power to call before you such persons as you shall judge likely to aftbrd you any information upon the subject of this our commission ; and also to call for, have access to and examine all such books, documents, I'egistera and records, as may afford you the fullest information on the subject, and to inquire of and concerning the premises by all other lawful ways and means whatsoever. " And we do further, by these presents, authorize and empower you, or any six or more of you, to visit and personally inspect such places in our United Kingdom as you may deem expedient for the more effectual carrying out of the purpose aforesaid. " And we do, by tliese presents, will and ordain that this our commission shall continue in full force and virtue, and that you, our said commissionei-s, or any six or more of you, may from time to time proceed in the execution thereof and of every matter and thing therein contained from time to time by adjournment. "And we do further ordain that you, or any six or more of you, have liberty to report your proceedings under this our commission from time to time if you shall judge it expedient so to do. " And our further will and pleasure is that you do, with as little delay as possible, report to us under your hands or seals, or under the hands and seals of any six or more of you your opinion upon the several matters herein submitted for your consideration. " Given at our Court at Saint James, the fifteenth day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six, in the forty-ninth year of our reign. By Her Z>Iiviesty's command, Richard Ashetox Cross. On the 10th of Marcli, 1S86, Her Majesty appointed the Honor- able E. Lyulph Stanley us substitute to the Right Honorable H. J. Mundella, who had resigned his seat upon the commission. m \f ^r *Jk^ii^ Mm i2r. LBTTKU OF AKCIIBIHIIOP TACI!^. [Part II. I At a liitoi' puriotl Mr. HormuHl C Molloy witlvlnnv from tho coimuisHion. His place was fillod l>y tlio I)>ike of Norfolk, who was ajipoiuteil a ooinnuHsioiier on tho I5th of Juno, 1887. There \h no iloubt that the oonnnisHion is purely English, it emanates fn)m our belovoil Qiioen, and is addresseil to some of her moat distinguislaMl suhjocts, seleotod on accoiint of their known ability, as well as their love for their country. These twenty-five commia- sionei-s have for tho tiehl of their labor, England and Wales ; there is nothing of foreign proclivities in these men. Most of them are Protestants and lielonging to different denominations ; their social position identifies them with all that is honorable and fair ; their loyalty to the Crown does not admit of iloubt ; the trust of their Sovereign imposes upon them the duty to meet her views as fully as possible ; ho we can be aasui-ed that such a commission commands respect and attention, not only in England and Walew, but through all tho immense domains of Her Majesty. Let us i-eviow what has been accomplished by this commission of Royal appointment, composed of men of distinction and ability, and entrusted with a sacred cause. 2. THE WOKK OF IIIE COMMISSION. The work of tho commission is iaimenae, and will give just cause of surprise to those who believe that tho question of oducat ,n can be fairly and sutliciently discussed in a political speech, or a careless letter to the press, or by a fanatic who thinks it is only necessary to appeal to paasioiis. I invite those who are not accpiainted with the ollorts of the said oonimission to pay some attention to tho short analysis 1 take the liberty of pul)lisliing, and which sutlices to give a striking proof of the conscientiousness with which a nuvtter of such grout moment as the cjiuse of education i.s approached in the very heart of the Hritish Empire. The Royal Commissioners immetliately after their appointment set to work with a zeal worthy of themselves and of the trust with which they had been honored by their beloved Sovereign. Tho inipiiry lH\gan on the 20th of January, 1880, and lasted until July, 1888. The commissioners themselves state in their reports to Her Majesty, the sources from which they gather their information and sj\y : ** After considering the numerous applications received from |)ei'sons desiring to give ovidonce before us, we determined to summon rei)resentatives of all public bodies who were in any way concerned with the administration and working of the elementary education Acts, and of all chisses of pei-sons whom the.se Acts, most immediately affect, in addition to such other witnesses as, either from their s[>ecial knowledge, or from their experience, we thougiit likely to furnish Chap. 1.] LKTTEH OF AHCUBI8U0P TACH^. 127 vnlimble infoniiution. No repreHentative witnesfl, bo far as w*» know, IiHB beoii precluded from giving evidence before ns." " Mr. Patrick Cumin, Secretary to Your MnjeHty's Etlucation De])artmont, wan the first witness called, whom we heard at great length. We next examined several of Your Majesty's Chief Insnectoi-s of scliools ; and these witnesses were followed by rejire- sentatives of the leaving educational societies. *' Thirteen consecutive meetings were exclusively devoted to the evidence of the elementary teachers. In many instances, doubtless, they express the views of a large and influential organization of their professional brethren whose carefully formulated opinions had been, at an early state of our inquiry, placed in our hands." "The management of Public Elementary schotols was the subject which next occupied o»ir attention , iiine managers of different kinds of schools appeared l>eforc us, and gave us the l>enefit of their long and varied ex[)eriences." " After these the representatives of school boards were called. Our next grou]> of witnesses consisted of represont«itives of voluntary schools. These gentlemen were followed V)y an equal number of members of school attendance committt^es. " The Welsh bi-lingual difficulty has received our attention. " Full evidence has also been tendered to us on the subject of the religious instruction given in public elementary schools. Six of the leading advocates of the policy of 8e|)arating religious from secular instruction in daily elementary schools, five of whom belong to difl'erent non-conforn)ist bodies, also appeared before us." The first report of the commissioners was j)re8ented to Her Majesty in 188G, the second in April, 1887, and the third in July 1 887. The three are the minutes of the evidence gathered from the oral witnesses mentioned above. The three reports fill three large (puirto volumes in double columns, with an aggregate number of 2,421 pages; to arrive at that result the Royal Coirimissioners sat for 95 long days ; they called 151 witnesses; scrutinized their ideas and views on education by asking 5'J,80[) questions, to which these witnesses gave as many replies. Besides the 95 days devoted to hearing oral testimony, tlie Commissioners sat 51 other diiys to complete their work. They conducted "an important statistical inquiry on an ext TACIIK. [Part II. teachovH. A circular 'vns also ailth'osHinl to the prinoipalfl of all the ©xiHting training colloges." Tho kiiowltHlgo tliuH acquinHl was talmlatfd and v/aH roportod to lK)tli II«m80H of Parliament in 1888 and tillH a (juarto volume of 487 |)HgOH. Not satiafiod with stioh an aocutnulation of tontimony, tho Royal Oommission pul)li.sh«>d fnrthor information obtained in answer to in«]uirieH made by anoth»;r circular addresssod to tho principals of training colleges in Kngliind and Wales in receipt of a governnjent grant ; the answers being published in a separate volume. To this may be addetl Of) pai)ers furnisheil to the commission and published by their order. The conmussioners, to facilitate the study of their wonderful work, caused an index to evidence and also a digest to fcliis evidence to be prepared, the two covering no less than 580 |>age8, quarto. Intfiresting repoi'ts, from outside of the mother country were obtained through Her ISIajesty's diploma J ;• agents, and are reported ay the commissioners in a separate volume of 335 pages. These accounts of the condition of elementary education in certain foreign countries were appreciated by Her Majesty's commission, and widely differ from certain foreign notions recently published. True, the German empii-e has been consolidated in such a way that, in some re8i)ect8, it is foremost on the list of nations ; but it would bo a great mistake to believe that this result has been obtained by the 8tat« divorcing from religion or banishing the teaching of religion from its schools. The Royal Commission proves otherwise : — " In Prussia in all the elementary schools the religious instruction is compulsory as well as the other branches of instruction. The religious instruction is given by the teacher, exceptionally by clergy- men ami by special teachera of religion." " The religious instruction is obligatory on all the scholars. Also for the religious instruction of the minority provisions are made, partially at the expense of the state : for this pupose means are regularly granted by the government." " Saxony — Religious instruction is given in the schools of the state. In Protestant schools by the master ; in Catholic schools by |)riestiS." "The religious instruction is obligatory on all the scholars. But A minoi'ity of Catholic scholars would be taught by a local Catholic priest." '• Wurtemburg — The schools of the state give religious as well as secular instruction ; the third part of the school time is devoted to religious instructions. The greatest part of the religious instruction t:s given by the teacher." " The religious instruction is not obligatory on all the schohu's ; the minority may take part in the religious instruction of the Cfiap. M LKTTKK OF AnCHHIHIlOP TACFIK. 129 tniijoiity ; l»n(. if tlu^ pmonts |»rofor tliiit tlioir chiMron may not do so tli*'V nifiv Im) <'Xciih(m1. " " Bavuria. -Jii tlio scIiooIh of tlin Htiitc! ndij^ioim education forms part of tlin cmiicnlum, and is yiven by the parish |»iiost." "The roliifioMS instniction is obliyatorv on all tli(! scliolars." Kxliaustive otlKM- information is fnniisliod by tlio lloyal Coin- niission ; not only al»o\it tlio Gorman Kuipin*, but even juany otlici- countrioH, and no doubt it is d(!sirablo to wo its interosting reports within ren/'h of tho mon who wish to s|)eak and write about ndigious instruction and moral training in scliools, partly oi- wholly, supported by the state. The above analysis, short as it is, Huffices to prove that, veiy likely, there are few among those who talk about education laws, who havo taken so much trouble as the Royal Commission of England to satisfy themselves what direction ought to be given in order to secure tho good of individuals, the happiness of families, and the welfare of nations. I invite my countrymen, whoever they may be, to weigh the ■conviction arrived at by the Royal Commissioners, after an investiga- tion of such magnitude, that it could be considered as a waste of money, time and intelligence, were not the great cause of education at stake. 3. CONVICTION EXPRESSED. The conscientious conviction of the Royal Commission is expressed in their final report in a volume of 500 pages, by itself a valuable source of infornuition and a kind of synopsis of the whole inquiry conducted with such zeal, patient labor, and wonderful results. The final report is divided into seven parts. Part I. deals with the existing law. Part II. relates to the existing state of facts. Part III. treats of the machinery fur carrying on elementary education. Part IV. is confined to the education and instruction given in public elementary schools. Part V. deals with the government examination, the parliamen- tary grant, etc. Part VI. treats of local educational authorities. Part VII. consists of a summary of leading conclusions and recommendations. Only two of the seven parts have a general character, the five otliers being of more local ap{)lication. I will quote largely from Part TV., that is to say, from chapter first of that part, on religious &\\d moral training; and which covers from page 112 to 127. The 9 130 LETTER OF ARCHBISHOP TACH^. [Part II. divisions with letters ])refixecl are mine, and the quotutiou is taken pasaim, but continues through the chapter. (rt) Panunount Importance of Religious and Moral Training ia Schools — "Having l)een commissioned by Your Majesty to incpiire^ iuto the Working of the Elementary Education Acts, we should fail in our duty did we not review the religious nioral eft'ect of the present system, and of the provisions made by law for enabling and controlling religious as well as secular instruction. While the whole commission is animated by one and the same desire to secure for the children in the public elementary schools the best and most thorough instruction in secular subjects, suitable to their years, and in harmony with the requirements of their future life, it is also unanimously of opinion that their religious and moral training is a matter of still higher importance alike to the children, the parents and the nation, though the views of its raembei's differ as to the method whereby this object of supreme moment should be attained." (6) The parents insist upon Religious Instruction in schools — "Upon the importance of giving religious as well as moral intruction, as part of the teaching in day public elementary schools, much evidence was brought before us. . . All the evidence is ))ractieally unanimous as to the desire of the pai-ents for the religious and moral training of their children." (c) Religious instruction given in English .schools. "Tlie answers we have received to circular A 3, testify that out of 385 school boards, 348 give daily religious instructioii, and 123 have religious examinations ; and out of 3,496 teachers of departments, who have sent in replies to circular D, 3,161 say that they give daily religious instruction, and 2,372 vsay examinations in religious knowledge are held annually. {d} Sunday school and home religious instructions deficient. — " We must add that though we highly value the influence of Sunday schools, it is admitted that many scholars in elementary scliools do not either attend then» or any place of worship, and that their parents are often too ignorant or too indifferent to give their children any religious instruction. Such children, therefore, are entirely dependent upon instruction in the day schools for any knowledge of the scriptural truths which ought to be the common heritage of all the people in a Chi*istian countiy. We hope that the religious and moral training in all board schools may be I'aised to the high standard which has been attained already in many of them, and that it will be made clear that the state, wliile scrupulously maintaining its pro- visions for safe-guarding the rights of conscience, does not wish to discourage any of the managei-s, teachers, and members of school boards, connected with any of the elementary schools of the country who are endeavoring to bring up their children in love and obedience to God." Chap. I.] LETTEll OF ARCHBISHOP TACH^. 131 (e) Inspection of relij^ious instruction reconunended. — "The need for annual inspection of leligious instruction in hoard schools corre- sponiUng to that made l»y the diocesan inspector in church schools, in pnsence, esjjecially of the strong competition to which religious instruition is exposed by the restriction of tiie government exam- Lj iti.;,, to secular subjects, has been recognized in evidence before us by the representatives of many important school boards ; and we gather that a movement is extending itself for securing tliat an annual examination should be held with a view to test the efficiency of the scriptural instruction." (/) Grant to Christian schools not an endowment to religious education. — " We cannot, therefore, concur in the view that the State may be constructively regarded as endowing religious education when under these conditions it pays annual grants for secular instruction in aid of voluntary local effort to schools in which religious instruction forms part of the programme." (ff) Prohibition of religious teaching an injury to parents' con- scientious feelings. — " But while we are most anxious that conscientious objections of parents to religious teaching and observances, in the case of their children, should be most strictly respected, and that no child shoxild, under any circumstances, receive any such training contrary to a j)aront's wishes, we feel bound to state that a parent's conscientious feeling may be equally injured, and should be equally respected and provided for, in the case where he is compelled by law to send his child, for all his school time, to a school where he can receive no religions teaching." "This grave injnry to conscience may easily now arise in the case where a .single boaril or voluntary school suffices for the whole school supply of a district, or where only one school is within a reasonable distance of a man's home. In that school, as we have .seen it at this moment the case, with a certain nimiber of voluntary and board schools, the Bible may not be read or taught, and there may be no religious teaching." (A) Proposal to prohibit religious in.«tructions in schools repudi- ated. — "The views of those who would remove from day elementary schools all religious teaching and observance have received our atten- tive consideration." " Those who hold this view in favor of purely secular schools did not shrink from urging before us, through the witnesses who repre- sented them, that the State should take the extreme step of prohibit- ing religious instruction in public elementary schools." " Even those witnesses, however, who strenuously advocated the secularization of public elementary education, most emphatically declared that they regarded religion as the true basis of education, and only contended for its exclusion from the day school in the belief that it could be provided in some other and better way." 133 LETTER OF ARCHBISHOP TACHB. [Part II. " In questions of this character it is impossible to have negative jn-ovisions which luive not also a jjositive side. Thus, for children to attend day schools in which no religions teaching was given would, in the opinion of those who think that the daily lessons should lie accompanied with religious teaching, be practically leading them to undervalue the importance of religion. They WoulJ hold that the impression left upon the children's minds would be that • eligion was a matter of inferior moment, at all events, to that secular teaching which they were acquiring day by day." " In support of the contention that leligious instruction should be excluded from the day school, it was further urged by Dr. Orosskey that it makes an undesirable tax on the teacher's energies. But, on the other hand, we have had brought before us trustworthy testimony, some of it from teachers themselves, that, as a body, they would con- sider it a great loss if they were debarred from giving Bible lessons to their scholars. Moreover, the religious instruction given by teachers, we have been told by the Rev. J. Duncan, greatly increases the moral influence of th'' teacher. The moral character of teachers themselves. Archdeacon Norris, formerly Her Majesty's inspector of schools in various populous counties, thinks, would suffer if they were forbidden to impart religious instruction, and, finally, against the attempt, on this or any other ground, to prohibit teachers from giving moral and religious instruction in their schools, Mr. Cumin, secretary of the committee of Council on Education, emphatically protests. He believes that many excellent teachers would absolutely refuse to be resti'icted in their teaching to secular subjects." " It was urged that religion was dishonored by being included in a programme consisting chiefly of secular subjects." " But we have no evidence tending to show that these results actually occur, and it can scarcely be supposed that if such were found to be the result, i-eligious bodies and school boards would still continue to make such great efforts as we find they now do in order to maintain an efiicient system of religious instruction in the schools for which they are responsible. On the other hand, we have positive evidence that children who have received religious teaching in the day school arc better prei)ared to protit by Sunday school teaching and to become themselves teachers in Sunday schools." "But were there more weight due than we have been able to attach to these and other like reasons foi- prohibiting elementary teachers from giving religious instruction in the day school, there are j)0sitive arguments of great value in favor of the princii)le of religious instruc- tion being given by the teachers. We have spoken of the evidence tending to show that teachers, as a body, would strongly oppose its removal out of their hands. Even more to ije considered, in our judgment, are the wishes of the parents." lai'ge body of witnesses, consisting among others of Her Chap. L] LETTEK OF ARCHBISHOP TACH^. 133 Majesty's inspectors, teachers, ami managers, speaking both for hoard and voluntary schools, deposed before us to the j,'reat value which the parents generally set on the religious instruction given to their child- I'en in the day school." '* We are convinced that, if the State were to secularize elementary education, it would be in violation of the wishes of the parents, whose views in such a matter are, ve think, entitled to the first considera- tion. ..." " Many other children would have no other opportunity of being taught the elementary doctrines of Christianity, as they do not attend Sunday schools, and their [i public C'lfuiontary school." "Ami lis we havo found with regret that in recent years this branch of the insj.etitor's duty has not received the attention it de- s«M'Vt;d, we, therc^fore. think it necossarv to make it a distinct recom- UKMidation that it should Ite cionsidered the Hrst duty of Her Majesty's inspectors to incpiiro into and report upon the moral training." "Aftor hr-iring the ai'guments for a wholly secular education, we have come to the following conclusions : "(1.) That it is of the highest im|)ortance that all children should receive rtiligious and moiid training. (2.) That the evidence does not warrant the conclusion that such religious and moral training can be amply provided otherwisi; than through the medium of elementary schools. (3.) That in schools of a denominational chaiacter, to whicli parents are compelled to send their children, the parents have a right to require an ojjerative conscience clause, so that care be taken that the children shall not suffer in any way in consequence of tneir taking advantage of the conscience clause. (4. ) That inasmuch as parents are con)pelled to send tlieir children to school it is just ami desirable that, as far as possible, they should be enabled to send them to a school suitable to their religious connections or preferences. (5.) We are also of o)>inion that it is of the highest importance that the teachers who are charged with the moral training of the scholars should continue to take part in the religious instruction. We should regard any separation of the teacher from the religious teaching of the school as injurious to the moi-al and secular training of the scholars." May I respectfully ask those who might read the above quotations to pause over them, and say if I'eally they could consider as unpro- gressive, or unreasonable, or adverse to the enlightenment of the growing generation, the men who conscientiously entertain the same views as the Royal Commission with regard to religious instruction in the elementary schools. 4. — Conclusion akt Recommendation. Part VII. of the final report consists exclusively of a summary of leading concluaions and recommendations. It seems that the convic- tions expressed and the conclusions arrived at, as quoted above from Part IV. of the report, could be considered as sufficient recommenda- tion on the part of the commission. The distinguished comurissioners judged otherwise, and, wishing to see their views carried into effect, they thought proper to have Part VII. of their report exclusively tilled up with their conclusions and vecommendations. Some are ClIAf. I.] LKTTEK OF ARCIIHI81I0P TACIll 135 n»erfi re|«;titionH of wliiit luul heen hruI before ; noverthelcHs, tlie 0()iiiii>issi<)iiers attachod Huoh importtiiice to tlmrn that tlioy ditl not fthi'ink from repeating tliein again. Tlujv hroii'dit tin; Haiuo concluHions and rooouiinendation.s from inimWur 1 to 198. I will select out of them thirty luimhers which have a more direct n^lation with certain objcctiouH raised against our fichool lawH and their application. The iniml)ei.i, tlie rea look to tlii^ llil)l<' for iiiHtnictioM ('onecniin^' iiioiiiIh, aiul tiikit itM wonlN for tlio (locliinitioii of wliiit in iiiornlity, ho wo look to tli(> hhiiio iiiHpintd Noiir*'*' for tli(> HMiictioiiH liy wliifli tlicy iiiny lin ('imlthul to y liiivo Icarnril (o 1m' ri^lit." '*((U; 'I'lial tlio (uidoiuMi docN not warrant tlio conoluHioii tliat rcli^ioim ai\d moral training can \w aiiijily providod otlKtrwisc tliati through tlio nuMliiiii) of (^IcnuMitary hi'IiooIh. "(C'J) 'riiat in tlio n\H{> of a i'onsid«>ral)l» nuiiibor of cliildiiMi, if thoy li^ioiiH instriiftion and training from tlio tcariicrH in the )tultlic (>l»'nn'ntary hcIiooIh, tlicy will nicc^ivti none, niid that this would he a matter of tho gravcHt coiu'crii to tlm Htatc." "((}l\) That all r»>;j;iHtorH Hhould \)v initrki'd l)oforo tho rciii^ioim ti'achinjj; and oltHcrvanci'H iM^^jin, Hcnipulou.s earn luiing taken, in accordaiu'o with tho IctliM' ami spirit of the Kdiiaition Act to provide? for tho oast> of ohildiTii whoso paii-nts ohjc^ct to such tt'iichiii!,' and ol)Horvancos." '\()4) That it is of tho higlxvst iniportanco that tlio toarlmrs who ar»' charj^iMl with tho nn)ral trainin,u[ of tho soholars should continue to take part in tho rclitjious insti-iiction, and that any sc^paiation of tli(> tcaclicr from the rcli<;ions t(!aohin>» of tim school would 1)0 very injurious to thcj moral and secular trainina; of tlu? scholai-s." •'(Gr>) That wo cannot recoinmenil the i>lan which has licen sujljj^ested of reliu;ious iiisti'uc^tion to he <;[iven by v«>luntin'y teMclicirH on the scliool premises out of school hours. That such a plan would lie no i>llicient substitute for thi; e.xistin;,' system of utiliziuL; the .school stair and th(> house? of school attendance for this imrpose, a system which has taken deep root in tho country, and apitears to give genei'al satisl'actit)n to tho panuit-s." ",06) That tho stato cannot ho constructively regarded as eiulow- ing religious education, when, under tho conditions of the Act of 187(>, it pays annual grants in aid of voluntary local offort for secular instruction in schools, in which i-eligious instruction forms part of the programme." "(09) That inasmuch as parents aro compolled to send their children to school, it is just and desirable that, as far as possible, they should 1)6 enabled to send them to a school suitable to their religions, convictions or pi-efei^ences." "(70) That in schools jf a denominational character to which parents are comi)elled to send their children, the parents have a right to requii-e an oj)erative conscience clause, and that care be taken that Cm A I- r.] liKTTKH OK AI((!lllllN||r)P TACIII^. ;j7 tli(< cliihli-nii hIiiiII not Hiilli*!* ill any way ill conH(><|ii(;ncn of tlittir tiikiii^ «lvaiitiig«^ of tli*> (;oiiHfi<*ii('(t clMilHn." "(71) 'riiiitllic itliHi'Mci' of any Htilmtantiiity t(nicli (lit-<*(^tion, witliout (!oin|ii()miHiii}{ hUII liiL^lior intt'i'< Hlandpoint troni whii'li it iH i'<;;^'ai'(h>d, lh(M'(i \h ^ood ^{I'ound for (■oncliidin , H\ ot th(( Act of 1871' to tho managf'rs of V(jliintary schools." "(75* That incrcascfd support should ho <^ivon hy tho stat<5 to tho nmial uloiiumt of training in our .schools, almost tho only rofcrcnco to tho importanco of such matters niudo l)y tho Htato hoing that which is mad(! in tho (/odo nnd(M' tho head of disciplin((." "(70) That gonoi'al, fundamcntfil and tixod instructions to Hor IVlajostyV. iiispcctorH should ho laid down as to mf)ral tiainin<^, making it an oHSontial condition of tho otlicioncy of a puhlic (ilonicMitary school, that its toachings should compri.so such matters as iiiHtniction in duty and roveronco to paronts ; honor and truthfulness in word and act; hoiu'sly, considoration and respect for others ; ol»odi(iii(;o, cleanli- ness, good mannor.s, purity, tenip(!ranco, duty to counti-y, tho discouragomont of had language, and the like." " (77) That it should be tlio first duty of Hor Majesty's inspectors to inquire into and report upon tho moral training and condition of tho schools, under tho various heads set forth, and to iiiipri!.SH upon tho managers, teachers, and children the priuuiry importance of this essential oloinent of all education. "(H6) That wo aro opposed to the introduction of a sot of ofKcial government text hooks ; but that, with the view of indicating to managers and teachers the range and study intended to be covered by the requirements of the code, a more or less extended programme ■Mil 2^--'rTS-ik^....:.-i:-n-'^!f^^ 138 LETTFF OF ARCHBISHOP TACH^. [Part II. slioukl be pnWislied for eacli subject, similar to those iulopted in the science and art directory, witli a view of showing witliin what limits th" official examinations sliould lie confined ; and also, tliat in the &j buses for pupil teachers' detinitions, in programmes of studies, wh leave no doubt as to their interpretation, are specially required." ' ' '' ' That the provisions of the code, which i-equires that if only one cia^s subject is taken, it must be ' English,' shouhl be repeal 'd." "(108) "That in Wales permission should be given to take uj) the Welsh langiiage as a specific suVyect ; to adopt an optional scheme to take the place of English as a class siilyect, founded on the princi))le of substituting a graduated system of translation from Welsh to English, for the jtresent requirements in English granmiar ; to teach Welsh along with English as a class subject ; and to include Welsh among the languages in which candidates for Queen's scholar- ships and for certificates of meiit may be examined." "(109 ) "That the introduction of elaborate apparatus for gymnastic exercises into playgroumls is not to be recommended. "(138) That the staio should continue to recognize voluntary and board schools as together forming the national provision for elemen- tary education ; and that both ought to continue to participate in equal conditions in the parliamentar}'^ grant." I need not repeat that the commission, whose work I have so highly reviewed, is entirely English, and that its conclusions should not be treated lightly, at least by those who constantly make an a{)peal to their British oi-igin or British proclivities. For my part, I will not h'^sitate to say that I felt a particular pleasure in ascertaining once more that my views on religious instruction in the schools, far from being adver.se to those entertained in the mother country, are in perfect harmony with them. In my estimation, the school is the church of the children, and there only, in many instances, could be realized the words of the best friend of children when He said : " Suffer little children to come unto Me." Yes, Chiistian j>arents, suffer your little ones to go to Christ through the religious and moral training they ought to receive in their respective elementary scliools. For the " Lord is a God of all knowledge," and that which brings children nearer to God cannot be an impediment to the acquiring of true and useful knowledge. These are the cherished ideas of my life ; stud}', experience and observation, and the testimony of the most illustrious men of all ages and countries, have confirmed me in these ideas and, in reality, they are, as quoted above, the conclusion ai-rived at by the Royal Commission appointed by our beloved Queen to inquire into the workinsr of the Elementarv Education Acts of England and Wales. Thanking you for granting me the space in your journal, I remain, your obedient servant, t Alex., Archbishop of St. Boniface, O.M.I. CHAPTER II. PAMPHLET BY ARCHBISHOP TAOHB. Answering the Question: "Are the Public Schools op Manitoba THE Continuation of the Protestant Schools op the same Province." 20th April, 1S9S. Having learned that tlie Judicial Coinmittep of the Privy Council had rendered a decision contrary to tlie interests of the Catholics of Manitoba on the school question, I thou-jht it my )»nblic (\ilholic hcIiooIm, mainlains the public I'rotoHtant Hchools. of which they aro in reality but tho continuation. 1. ()m> Rkoimk. The Provinct^ of Manitoba was admitted into Canadian Con- f(>(lcration on the ir)th -'uly, \H~0. It bejran to or:ja.i\i/,e in September. Its lirst ])ailiament wjis summoned for ami opened tho lAth day of March, 1871. One of tho lirst tasks of tho now leojisliitun* was the (piestion of pul)lic instruction, and on the 3rmbly of tin; now l>rovii)ce had to look, atid in fact did look, into tho constitution of Canaila — the Hritish North Ar.ierica Act, 18(57, dau.so 93, and into tho constitution of the Province of Manitoba — "Manitoba Act, 1870,"' clause 'J2, for guidance in their task. They «'asily found there two things : 1st. That tho provincial authorities aro not ab.,.)luto in niatters of education. 2n«l. That, regarding tho .same matter, tho constitution of the whole Dominion, and tlu> constitution of Manitoba both rccogni/od that tin; "Subjects of tho Queen," formed two «liH'ercnt .sections, named respectively "Protestant" and " Uoniau Catholic," and that, oven if ono of tho sections was in a minority ia any jn-ovince. Th(^ two montionetl sections existed in tho Provinc(5 of Manitoba. A census taken by tho government towanls tho end of 1870, had just ascertained the numerical relation between the two grouj)S, as well as that of the whole population. 12,228 waa tho total population. The Catholics had i-egiatered more than all tho othem taken together ; they were then the majority of the Queen's subjects, while the Protestants were the minority. It waa decided, neverthe- OlIAP. If.) I'AMI'IILKT IIY AltnillllFIIIOl' TAOIIli. 1« 1«>HH, tliiit IK) iiitoiiiion Hliniild ho paid to tlio (lifFdroiico and tlmt tlie two w'ctioriH Hlionid lui (roiiHidorod aH (!({tial in ntinilxtr. Tlio ('(iiiality of nuinliciH, Hupiiortcd liy o(|iiality of riglitH, diotaUid natiirally tlio ••(Umlii// "♦' i»iivil();^('H and oldi^ationw, lionco tlio following diHpoHitioim niiido l)y tlio IliKt law of our syHtorn of oducation. 1. 'I'lio liioiitotiRiit (iovt'i'iior ill ('oiui(;il tnnyap[Kiint not Ichm tlinii ton and not nmr)! tlian foiirtdtin ptMHoim to ho n hoard of odiicatirin for tho i'rovincf) of Manitolta, of whom ono-half Rhail ho I'rotoHtanta and tho other half (JathoJicB. 2, Tho liioiitonunt (iovctnior in Ootiiicil may appoint oiio of tho I'rotoHtant inomhorH of tho hoard to ho Riiporiiitondont of I'rotoNtant hoIiooIh, and ono of tho (jatholic inomhorH to ho HUporiutondoiit of tho (Jathoiic Rcliooln 10. KnvM Hoction nhall have uudor itH control and inanagoniout tho diHciplino of tho Hchooln of tho noution. 11. It Rhall make rulon and rogiilationa for the examination, grading and hooimiiig of tho toaohorn 13. Krofii tho Huin appropriated hy the l^ogiHlaturc for common nchool education, there flhall tirat he paid the inuidcntal oxpenaoH of the hoard and of the Hootionn, and tho residue then remaining uliall ho appropriated to the support and maintainatico of common schoolfl, one moiety thereof to tho Hiipport of I'rotofltant boIiooIh, and the other moiety to the support of Catholic schools. TliJH logJHlation Hatictionod tho rightH and privilogos to de- nominational Hcliools, onjoy(«I hy tho population, hy jn'actico, l)efore tlio union with Oanada. Tho law niado tho Hchools denonunational hotwoon Koinan (Jatliolics and ProtoHtantH, according t(> the distinction ox|)roHH()d in tho constitutional diH|»oHitioti8 ostahlishing the Canadian confodoration and tho Province of Manitoha. Th«) inoniaso of tho population and otlior circumHtanceB required amendments to the first law. Vj.it; lot it ho remenihered, those Hmendments did not alter the 'undamental principle on which the school systom rested ; on the contrary they fortified and supported it more and more. fn 1875 the numerical equilihrium had ceased, the Protestants had increased in numhers more rapidly than the Catholics; hence certain dispositions of the Act 38 Vic, chap. 27. Its first clause fixed at twelve? the numlier of Protestant mouthers of the Board of Education, and at nine the numher of Catholic memhers. (Jlause 4 Hays : Tho Hum voted hy tho TiOgiHlaturo for common school purpoHos ihall l)o divided liotweon tho I'robestant and Roman (Jatholic aectioiiH of tho hoard in pro[)ortion to tho numher of chiMren, aged from 5 to 16 years, aii^ mm • > *ai«i(aaiffi^.>w^.^'t tfia^^ ■i^m!kM!jmm^ii,j:i^m^mKKKSW' 142 PAMPHLET BY AllCUUISUOP TACU6. [Part II. What was to be the nature of this new law, resulting from experience, reflection and work ] Had the population manifested any desire for an' change in the principles and general direction determined by the first laws on education ? Shall legislators, to answer their own aspimtion, and those of their own constituents, enact radical modifications in the system already adopted 1 No, the principles remained as they were, their application had given general satisfaction, the interested parties were pleased ; the characteristic aspect of the school laws of Manitoba not only remained what it was, but received a new impulse, in the law passed after ten years of experience. Let us examine it, and if it is necessary to understand its true spirit, to resort to long quotations, the i-eader will pardon them as they seem necessary to comprehend the situation. The government being the first executive authority of the law, the latter indicates the duty of the former in the following clauses and sub-clauses. 1. The Lieutenant Governor in Council shall appoint, to form and constitute the board of education for the province of Manitoba, a certain number of persons not exceeding twenty-one, twelve of whom shall be Protestants and nine Roman Catholics. 9. 'J'he Ijieutenaut-Governor in Council shall appoint one of the Protestant members of the board to be superintendent of the Protestant schools, and one of the Catholic members to be superintendent of the Catholic schools. The government who has the custody of public monies muct act as follows in dividing the amount voted by the Legislature for the school. 84. The sum appropriated by the Legislature for common school purposes shall be divided between the Protestant and Roman Catholic sections of the Board of Education, in the manner hereinafter provided, in proportion to the number of children between the ages of five and fifteen inchisive. 8ft. The provincial treasurer and one other member of the Executive Council, to be appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor, shall form a committee for the apportionment of education funds and legislative grant, between the Protestant and Roman Catholic sections of the Board of Education. . . . The Board of Edii.cation mentioned in the law, and whose mem- bers are appointed by the Government, is to be i-enewed, and must act accoi'ding to the following clauses : 3. It shall be the duty of the Board : (a) To make from time to time such regulations as they may think fit for the general organization of the common schools, (b) To make regulations for the registering and reporting of daily attendance at all the common schools in the province (c) To make regulations for the calling of meetings 5. The board shall resolve itself into two sections, the one consisting of the Protestant and the other of the Roman Catholic members thereof ; and it shall be the duty of each section (a) To have under its control and management the schools of the section. . . . (b) To arrange for the proper examination, grading and licensing of the teachers. ... Chap. II.] PAMPHLET BY ARCHBISHOP TACHjfi. 143 (c) To select all the books, maps aud globes to be used iu the schools under its control, . . . {(l) To appoint inspectors, who shall hold ottice during the pleasure of the section appointing them. . . . The superintendents are the executive otMcera of their respective sections, and as such their duties are well defined in the Act. The school districts had attracted the solicitude of the Legislature, which, on that important point as well us on the rest, was unwilling to disturb the basis on whicli rested the wliole school systeu). Hero are the principal dispositions of the law on this point : 12. (a) The establishment of a school district of one denomination shall not prevent the establishment of a school district of the other denomination in the same place, and a Protestant aud a Catholic district may include the same territory in whole or in part. SUPPORT OF SCHOOLS. It was not enough to establish a system of public and free schools, where all the children could be admitted and instructed ; it was absolutely necessary to provide for the expenses and maintenance. The rules to be followed for the partition of the public moneys and the legislative grant, have been alrefidy qiioted from the law. It may be mentioned now how to provide for the Vjalance of funds I'equired for the construction and sup])ort of the schools. 25. For the piirpose of supplementing the legislative grant it shall be the duty of the boards of trustees of all school di-stricts from time to time to pre- pare and lay before the municipal council an estimate of such sums as may be required for school purposes during the current school year. The said council, employing their own lawful authority, shall forthwith levy and collect the said sums by assessment on the real and personal property within the school district, and shall pay over the same to the said board of trustees as collected. 30. The ratepayers of a school district, including religious, benevolent and educational corporations, shall pay their respective asseL^sments to the schools of their respective denominations, and in no case shall a Protestant ratepayer be obliged to pay for a Catholic school, or a Catholic ratepayer for a Protestant school. NORMAL SCHOOLS. The 30th May, 1882, the Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba assented to an Act "To establish Normal Schools in connection with Public Schools." This Act, 45 Victoria, chap. 8, is a complement of the preceding, and does not in any way alter the main lines traced before. Here is its first clause : 1. The Protestant and Catholic sections of the Board of Education are hereby respectively empowered (a) To establish in connection with the Protestant public schools of the City of Winnipeg, and with the Roman Catholic public schools of St. Boniface, normal school departments, with a view to the instruction and training of teachers of public schools in the science of education and the art of teaching. ,is*^.s*(«,*n>*»j*Mi*5«MJ,Sfa)ijaiii(^^ ;^iSfi)jia«ateft:?a«i»\,;il.-33l 'XSff- 144 I'AMI'III-KT HY AlUMIIIlHllor TA(MI|1;. [Paiit II. if Tho iiltnvp tncntioiuvl ActH, 44 luul 45 Viti., \v(M'o miihmkIciI (luring (lie fullmviiii^ y<'iirR. lint no iiioililioiition wuh iikuIo in (,lio fundiiinMntiil principle of tlio lawn Unit 1 liiivo niuiuftl. 'V\w old rou;inio tliiit (*o(|(<, oii(> in itH origin, Itn'Miiut iltiiil in itH iippliontioii to tlin wliolo pi'ovinoo, in onlin- to l'ufllitnU> (Mluciition, while Hiilonrininl- ing tlio juHt (l«'Rir(!H of lli«> piirontH nml riMnovintj tlnHric^tion that is a natural conH(Mpi(>n('i> of the ilouiination of a portion of tho popnhi- tion ovor (ho other, I hav(^ no inl«>)ition of eonnneneinij a disHertation on the nierit or Hhoi'tooinin^H of the old school Iunvh ; I am looking after \'nrlH, an*l will not delay with praise or oondenniation of theori«;H and convic- tionH, whieh have tlieir opponents and supporteiu My own viewH on the niatter of education are not (ho object of thiH essay ; J consider tho facts as thtiy <y the nomination of a school hoard. No one in the ]>rovinco was tw-ojficio niomher of tho board ; all its nuMultors were appointed by \!>e (Jovernnunit ; the choice was restricted only by the consiileration that tho law entertained for tho religious oon- vic(i«>ns of the ])opnlatioi). It was also the executive! of tho province which romitUnl to the board and its sections tho pul)lic money voted by the liOgislatun; for the maint»Muvnce of schools ; the law oqinilly ju'otectod all the religious beliefs ; the faith of some parents did not deprive their children of the legitimate share of the piiblic money to which they were entitled as citizens of Manitoba of school age. Tho (lovornment knew what was going on each year. OlHcial reports were submitted and ac(piaint»>d it with all that was interest- ing in tho province regarding schools. The whole was laid before the repivsontative.s of the people, to whom the Cjovernment ?s responsible. Nothing was concealed, th(>ro were no privileges, no exclusion in the .systtMu : oipial iniiividual rights were oepuilly protected. The Hoard of Kiducation was a s(>coi\d factor in the system. In ordi^r that it could accomplish its pen their channels, increase the volume of tlunr waters, become stronger or weaker ; tho course could be more or less rapid, more or less regular, according to circumstance, but they had always to run on parallel linos; the law, in maintaining them withiii those parallels, prevented encroachment or confusion, in order that they could continue their course, spreading everywhere the C/MAP. fl. PAMPniii niul tlin odiiiiiitioii H^r«*oiil)ly to tlio ooii- vi(!t.i()iiH of l.lin |iiirf«iitH, pf'iiiiiMiiii,' tin* coimcMtMico of evuryotio to 1»iih(Im( fr«!oly mikI to a»;knowli'(|(^() in tlio law a |»i'ot tion ami not a tvi'iinny. Alon^Hiiloof tlicM* pnnillt!! (MiinMits wno |ilann«;ni/.TaHH(Ml hy the aetionn or ouiisHioiiH of the other. If they exercised influence with one anotlier in any wny, it wuh merely through a gen«irouH (uuulation whieli eontiil>uted to the gen(!rnl welfare. The exiHtence of ProteHtant hcIiooIh alongside of (Jiitholic rtchools never inteifenid witli the good relations Iwtwecui citizens and neigli- hors ; tlio res\ilt was (juite dilferont, as alliiinerovince8. After quoting tlm above, I couhl easily fiomonstnite the falsity aned U[)0ti Catholic schools, both with regard to their teaching of secular branches and to their social, religious and moral influence, iJut no, f must remember what I promis(!d to |)rov(», and not allow myself to becan-iod away into side issues. My contention is that tho non-Catholic public .schools under the old regime wore really Protestant schools. There is no doubt that tho Catholic section of tho lioard of FMucation faithfully discharged the duty imposed upon them, that of establishing and controlling their schools, according to Catholic vitjws. ft is ecpially certain that tli(! Prot(!Stant section of the sumo board wen; also faithful to their trust. Thoy established and controlled their schools, according to Protestant views. Here is what their superintendent, J. B. Somerset, wrote, on [mgo 27 of his rei)ort, already mentioned : The development of the mofl nature is a primary requiHJte in any system of education. The hoard, recograzing this i)rinciple, has provided for the most careful inquiry into the character of its teachers, and for such 10 M no t'AMi'iii.i'r ii\ vin MiiiHiHir iaiiii!; |P\iti II I ■ o^VJo'-i i>( (> :\il(iMi> till- |iin\ii)i|i"i nil 'IniMlitiii Itiilli ctMuiiiiUMl ill tlii' Mil'lc, ami. ni)i|i il t>\ nil I'vntfnlmH (li'ii.miilitiHotin. I iiiM'il i\o1 Hivv lliiil. ill Hi> wiiliiiix. Mr Miiiiii'f.i'l lu'lril in ilm ml i»('lit\11' ol llii' Piott tliiill Hoftiiiii III (|ii> Itiiiinl i>l I'ltliiiiil Hill ; nniiii' ;\ M)i 111') ollii'inl K'poil, \('i\ i'liilior:i(i> mill cIi'mmIv wnlti'ii, piiM mIcmI no roni iMilii'hoM in |>!iv1itiiiiiM\( , nnr in lln- ihi'mm, nm nin \\ In i c nhic in n Ml SoniiMHi'l \\io(i> liiM inpovl mnl ronl iinn'il in Im mh nl'lri'; "l'Xrl\ Hi'linol rnl.'iMf'lli'i) mill ill nprl ill loll. llUilit llli' rlllllnililv nl llli- I'loti'sf Mut Hi'i'tinii nl tllo Idiniil nl I'lltii'iiliiiii lor MniiilnliM, 'jIiiiII Iw npi'iii'il mill rloBctl il.iily Willi ^H(VVvii\il on tlm onviM nl till' niitliniiv'il MflinnI ti>ui«li>rM, iiIwuvm iiii-liiilniu 'In' l.nvil'M nr.ixi'r. irni'.ili'il Inyclln r li\ IcuriU'i ■iinl |in|iil'i rlH II \{'\t \u\o\{ ill llii' I'l iiIi'hImIiI Mi'linnjii iif rho IliMi' wlnill 1 Mniiiinlin " rin' soinitnii' IcHsnii in I'in'li Mclinnl wlnill Inllnu llii' n|M'iiinL! I'lmii. mnl whnlt ni'.'in>v nni innn- tlinii lillcnii nniniti'H ilivil\ . " " Tin' piU'ils nl' oiK'li m'linnl. Iiniii Htiimlfinl llii nn iipw Mfi, 'ilnill ln' ImiiuIiI tn vi'i'i'.if iVnin iiK'inniy llin tnii I'oniiiintnliiniilH .'iinl llir .i|iii«l li m' i i ii il, niiil oiii' Inilt liniiv >\('iUl\ nniv lin ili'Vnlci) inlliiM i'mi rim' iiinl hucIi nllirf linn in innnnci s .iiiil inni;il« ;is in.'i.\ Im' pi nrlii'iiltli 'Minn 111 s|n(n oi' .ill llm inodls linn'liifori' niiiininriilcil. hoiiii |ii'n|il. I'onlt'inl (I'Ml tin I'lolnnlmil schools V\ I'll' liol 'Iniiiin. Siiii'lv 1lin\ were in>1 in llm nshninllon ol jlnvsn who, \vy\ itn|il'0|»"i |y, iih" i\\o word sivtMvimi toiinliinn; n-t inomiiiii) iho ii'tichiii!) ol II"»".iii (\ilholu' dot'tvim' ; Intl it is niniin'slioiiiilily I'l'iiniii llnil i hose ' .hoois \V(MO scot.'iriiui 111 iho oslinnilion ol tliosn who nllncii lo llm woiiIm tlm lilonil simiilit'.'it ion. or, il' \ori liKc i1 hnlior. 1 will •\\ I liosn Boliools won' nvroh ;in.l siiiiplv I'rolosijinl sohool rrolisimii III trtrl. ,'»s woll lis in nmim; rrt>lost!Ui( l>v llmso who oonl ii'lloil ;inil «iii\v loil Ihoin, jis llmii scolion ol iho homil, llmir sii|it'ri iili'inlniii , (lioiv inspootois, olc. cliv T loso si'liools wcic roll's! ,111 1. Ill I hi soloi'lioii of llm hooKs used hy llm to.nlmrs, pupils liotli in schools tind lilii'Mnos, 'I'liox wen* rrotostjinl In (lioiv ^nli^io^^s cm'i visos ;iinl thoir " s\ sicnnitic voliijions inslrnolioii imoi'ploil I'v ll ISO VroiisliUil »lononiin;\t ions, "" Tliosn schools \vnf«> riotcsliinl iiy 1 1 Nvho sn]>portO(i tlioni. rioiosl.nils ;\1oih> Ix'insj; ofiUi'il upon tor llnii ohjool ; thov wor<^ mIso Vi-ot(^stMnl lor (lioso who jillciidod (Imiii. .is Proii^simit ohildn'n .'iloiu^ lunl iln> right. It is so nuioh tlnMniMi^ jislonisliino; (o diMiy to tlios(» sohools llm ti-iu^ ohartuMtM- whioh (lislinijnislHvi thoin. (hjii M llm n'ly. wilhont- ImsitMlimi mh withoul inlontion to tMisnuro t.lio i!;ood iMith tM' .inyoim ; those iiistiln- tions wore Frotostnnt puhlic schools ms w<^11 tis Iho ollmrs worn <, atholio public schools, both sliowing tlioir ttuo oolors in iiooordKiici.' <*I|M> M I I' VMt'llf.l'^T nv MM'KdtMM'il' l>r (((f). w •jlll llic \ \|iiiii(Mli(i. ii»i»l ii'i liiHv (irovi'l''! Iiy nil till' >(i'liiiiil liiWMiif' Miiitlnli I iiinlci lln'olfj if<|,/iiii(<. I I '( Ml- Ni w I; en I Ml, Mm iiii; |(IM\ i'.| I lull, liildi I' t III ImI ,vr IMjMl. llcTI' Wl'lh PiMtf'Hilllll |ll|ll|ir H'-IkMiIh ill Mllllilollll, I hIiiiII (If 'K'^mI I'i 'I' lll'rIlMf.rHiM lllill till' Hfli'iiil h\mIiiii, iinw ill v(i(/ti<', Im ii'iIIhIi^ I»iiI tlii-ii f'lfififiil- iiliiiii fvi'ii wlii'ii III'' hrv i|i'siLjiMil"M lliciii iind' r l|i»'lil!r! of |/iiMir! Hrli'inlH. Mv |ii'i'if will I'Mvi'i' llic fiillowiiij/ Miilij<'i't,M : Till' MilliiiliiMl ml inn iuhI ('ihIio ii( |iiilili<' h' li'i'ili , lli'' ii'iiiiiiniti'iri nC llii'ii iiiMiiiM'tdiH. |l|•of(•^HO(^ iiii'! hIhH , lie 'li'iici' (if lli'ii iidtikf ; Ilii' ili'lfi miiiiil i'lii iiiid (II ml ic(. (if tl cii ii'lilli»ll'lllhlll mill iniitinl 'I'liC A'-f n'i V\f., f)i)l(i. ."i7, ifl- Ijlllli'il: "/Nil Ai'l. l!i'fi|i<'cl |||K llii' h"|i;il I liiMil »>f K'lll' (ili'ifi," ('-(I'Im ilH liilliiWM ill ilM I Kill clniiHi- : I'liiin Miirl iiflfi III!' Mm*, ildv 'if Miiy, A.(' |Sr'<|.'Tl,v 'if I'Vi'iy l«','; f,l)IH IdhI till' HillllC (lli vil»'J^»'K. (IImiihi' I 'il I III- siiiil A(:l,Kn,yK: 'i'lii'ii' hIimII III' n i[i|iii,i liiii-iil, (if ( 'lii't)il,j((ii. "A-liicli r-'finll ';'> ixi^t, '(f 1,1 i*j t'Xi'i'iil i\ I' I'liiini-ll or II '•■iiiiiipi'f'c tli'icif, )i|i|)()i(il,'(l liy l,h« )i''.iit<:fimit-«'>v':r'i'ir ill I'liiiiii'il. I iiiiiii'ilinh'ly Imldii' lli" iKiw.^iiii; 'if l.liin A':t. I.li'- '•X'-fiutiv- '/iiihmI IiihI iicIciI ill Kinli II, W)iy llmt, no y,\\\ci-\i: ( Inlli'ili'; ';oiiI'l join <>r I'-rnniri wiili iIh'Iii 'I'll!' iiK'nihi'iH ')f I.IiIh '•xfiiilivM o'liirir;!) w-n;, ^,\»t.rt;Uir(;, nil I'rnlf'HtiiiilH ; IIim lioiini-alilii l,li''A tl,'i?-n';y (>'rii»'nil hfi'l f;>in«i'-'l )i\n osyii it|i|iiiini mill' hh Mii|ii'iiiili'n'l''!it 'if Ui'; l'r'»l,<*l,arit, k';1»'»')I hi-iJ.m,h III' lln- I'diuil of Kiliiciilinii ; In- '''itiliiiii' '1 l,li<- fiinct.ionH 'if f.liJif, 'ttVicf, iiH iiH'iiilici- ;i,tii| li'i^iil iidviKor (if tli" I >c|i!i,iliii''iil, of K/iii':?!* i'^f;. Mi-t linlini'iilili! (•oll(;iigi|('.'4, nH cli'.dM'! fo tlic (»'i-';l.H (>f thf; li ;l 148 PAMPHLET BY ARClllilSIIOP TACU^. [Paut II. Protestant section uiidoi' tlio old of the new acliool tKlinipislnition. msfinirt, became ex-otticio nuMubers (Jlause IV. of the same act says : Thore shall be u board as hureinafter provided to be known as the advisory board, and clause f) says : Said board sliall consist of soven meinbcra. The disposition of tlie hiw is such that it is morally im|!os/»iblo for Catholics to become members of this new oi'ganization ; the seven members will be and are Protesta'it as well as the five members of the executive council. Therefore, twelve Protestants continue the work of the twelve Protestants who formed the Protestant section of the board of education under the old regime. His Loidship, the Bishop of Kupert's Land, chairman of the old Protestant section of the board of education, is chairman of the new advisory board ; the liev. Dr. G. Bryce, memlier of the old board, is also member of the new board ; all the clerks are not only Protestant, but some are the same as under the old law. The Inspecto7-s — AW the Catholic inspectoi-ships were abolished, but the Protestant inspectorshii)8 were preserved. Three old incumbents were maintained in charge, and the two others were replaced by Protestants. While dismissing all the Cytholic inspectors a new inspectorship was created for the Mennonites, and one of their denomination was brought from the United States to till the situation. The numerous functions of the new comer would seem strange under the new law, if that law was not in reality a continua- tion of the old system as far, at least, as Protestants are concernetl. Preparation of Teachers — Each section of the old boaixl of educa- tioa had its normal schools ; those for the Catholics were abolished, while the Protestant normal schools were quietly continued, and the ])rincipal of the Normal Protestant School of Winnipeg was main- tained. I l»ray my j-eaders to observe that I s:iv nothing against the character or the qualification of any of those aliove mentioned ; but I say this: His Lordship the Bishop of Rupert's Land continues to be the head of the Anglican church in the province ; the Rev. Dr. G. Bryce is always the Rev. Dr. G. Bryce; the other members of the school administration are as much Protestant to-day as they were previous to the 1st May, 1890. J am glad to believe it, all are honest and sincei-e ; therefore, it seems evident to me that they cannot have accepted the management, the control or the action they exercise in the scliools attended by all the Protestant children of the province without being determined to protect the religious convictions of those children, in conformity with the desires of their parents. How is it possible for them to direct, to protect, to teach, to form the <:eachers and the pupils of the schools without r>, certain tendency to bias in conformity with their own personal convictions 1 Chap. II.] PAMPHLET n\ AROIiniSHOF TAOilll!. U9 Is it possible for Miiy one to l)e ProtoHtunt in every respect, every- where, iintl iilwivvH, except in the school, of which the sinne ])orBon lias tlie control and direction, with the power of intorpretinj? and execnting the law I To illustrate the ditliculty, let us suppose that the actual school laws should remain what tlioy are to-day, l)ut that a complete chaiii,'e is made of the persons who apply and interpret them; let us su|)po8e that all the members of the <;.)vernment are Roman Catholics ; that all the members of the advisory boanl and the staff of the Department of Educuition are also Roman Catholics; that all the inspectors, principals and teachers of the Normal schools will be also Roman Catholics ; what would Protestants believe of the religious teaching in the schools of Manitoba/ What would the " K(pial Righiers" think, say oi- write / Pardon my sincerity, 1 am also an ecpial righter, and I say that when all those connected with the schools are Piotestant, it is but natural that such schools should be Protestant. The Choice of Books — No one can deny that the books a.sed in the schools have a great iniiuenc(f on the teaching. As ic has been shown, under the old regime, one of the duties of the Protestant section of the Board of Education was T<) 8(^lect all the books, maps and globes to bo used in the schools under its control. Under the new regime here is what is read in clause 14 : Said advisory l)oard shall have the power to examine and authorize text books and books of reference for the use of pupils and school libraries. Evidently the advisory board is in this the continuation of the Protestant section of the old board. Surely there is no temerity in adding that the school books used by the pupils and pi'ofessors, and also the reading books placed in the libraries, will be at least in a great pro})ortion Protestant, and very often absolutely hostile to Catholic ideas. The most superficial examination of all that is said and written everywhere suffices to demonstrate the injustice there would be in placing Catholic children in the obligation of using books chosen only by Protestants. Religious Exercises — One of the numerous reasons proving that the schools, now called public, are but the continuation of the Protestant school of the old regime, is the fact that the exercises and religious and moral teachings are identically the same. The prayers adopted and the passages selected in the Scriptures, by the Advisory Board, are nothing but what had been adopted and selected by the Protestant section of the Board of Education. The prayers and readings from the Bible are not the only religious exerci^ies in use in the public schools ; there is, under the title of " morals,'' a whole mine, which the professor can explore, in order to induce, In the minds of his pupils, the religious convictions he has himself, an it \i ■i I I u iiMism&nut^ I r :? lf)0 i'AMI'lll.KT IIY AHCIim>rao tici'H. 'I'lio tciiclicr'H iiilliiciii'i' Mild ('\,'iiii|il('. (^urii^iit inciilriits, stories, nn iiinrii fl'IIIX, H(i'oiii|)t to action, didactic talivs, IcainiiiK' tlic Ten ( 'oiniii.'UKlinciits, etc., arc incaiis to 1)0 employed. i'loijiaiiiinc of studies fell' the |)id)li« Hcliools of Matiltoli.'i, adojited .'^<*|it. 1st, JSiH, and readoptod Seiit. Ist, I.S!)-J. Moi'als — {ii\ Duties to H«df. (A) Miitl. •< (o otIierH. (<■) JMities to statu. ('/I I >iiti(s to animals. To e^.tllllli^ll t lie |i,il)it of rii_'lit doin^{, insti'iietioii in moral principles must lut accompanied \>\ traiinnj^in moral priiu- tices. The teai'hei ^ illllilenee and e\aili|)le. ('iirrent incidents, stories, memory j;ems. Mciitimcnts in the school lessons. I.N.'imination of motives that proinjit to action, diilactic talks, teai'hin^ the Ti'ii ('omm.iiiilmeiits, I'tc, are means to lie employed. A grout oifoi't of iiniiojniition is noi, necessary to discover, in tlic aliovo linos, a eonipltdo assortnient td' ndiijions aims, (dl'ensivo and defensive, |)UL at tlie dis|»osititin re is still less doiiht on tlie cert.iinty of tliis result when a professor is guided hy the pieecding |irogramme. What eiinnot l»o saini*t h<;1u)()Ih wliicji coiijil ill (!oiiHci(;ii<-(i Im> IVctiiiotitod by (!allii)liu <*tiilili'rii 'I'lif iit'w law wislii'H (liin no iii>ii'<>, Imt. roiitiiiiicH in fiivoi' •of I'lutcstiiiit rliililiiMi tlm Hclnxdn tiny loiiiiinly IiihI. Olliciiil docii- liicniH show till) iiiijiiNt iliHliti(;(.ioii iiitroiliuMMl by tlio pnirlittti iiiul n|i|>li('iitioii of t ii(t ni>w law. riidn llio old rci^inif, I'rotcMtaiit sdiools won< not for Catliolio cliiidrcn. who had no lii^lit l,o thcni, und, us tho hiiIiooIh of tin.' ni-w rr;rini(f lU'it l)Ut thu (;ontininition of tli't fornii'i'ly I'rotnstiint/ hiiIiooIh, onn intist not iio too iiukOi Mstoiii,sh)'d to Hnc that ('iitholic (;hi!dn>ii ai(! ('((Miitod ri/i inont under I.Iki ihiw oiyaniz.ition than tln-y wcro fr>rnM'il\'. ihu^ may iM'ilia|».s lie Hur|iriH('d at t.lin fact that Hithooln boasting' of Itciiiir national, ki'(«|> no ai't'oiint of tiio (iliildicn of ii liolalijd |>ait of the nation. What I say hen' wonhl |aolialily not Ixi bclicvi^d if 1 lionld not |>i'uvc it l»y an otlicial doiMiiiH'iit wIiohi- andicii- tifity cannot Ixi dnninil. ThiH docunmnt Ih rntithid, " Uc^port of tho l)t'|iartinfnt of Kdncation, Manitoba, tor tho year 1 89 1," adilnwHcd to the Ijieiilcnant-' Joviii'iior and Hi;.,'n(!il by tim I ronoral)l»« Daniel McLean, ineinlKir of thn (Joverninent, anress(!S in figures the systematic excbiHion of which ('atholic children are tho victims under tho new law. SCHOOL I'OI'lILATIOV. Mij Hnmitrkmin thr. adjinnimj statoucnt. Total Nuinhur Schodl of I'upilH Year. Population, IvcgiHtered. These figures show but the Pro- testant childr(fn, ami are takcMi from 1S71 issl 7,000 817 4,919 tl:e i-(!ports of the superintendents of Protestant schools under the olil re- ef mm I8S2 9,()4l 0,972 ymio. 188;} 12,340 10,831 18-1 14,129 11.708 No account is taken and no men- IMS.") ir),8r)0 1.3,074 tion made of Catholic childr(Mi whose ISSG lo,s:u l.^),92r> enumei-ation may be found in tho 188 7 17.0U0 10,9 iO oflicial leports of the superintend- 1 888 18,8.")(l IS. 0(10 (Mits of (,'atholic schools under the 1 889 •J 1 ,47 1 1 8, :;.")> old regime. 1890 2o.()77 2.3,2-")0 I8;jl 28,078 23,87 1 h^ Ui ^^'-^''mmsmtmmtAmmmsm,^'^. .^^ ■■■ w .. . -? ■'.,. /^v,:ii:ift?^«^B^l^l»i«'S«;sre^ .rim^m^m^imm.*mim«^"^' 162 PAMPHLET BY ARCHBISHOP TACHjfe. [Part IL If the department had had in view to prove that tho schools under its direction were but the continuation of the former Protestant scliools^ it could not have employed a stronger argument than the one con- tained in the figures of the preceding table. Formerly all the schools were public, the Catholic as well as the Protestant, and vice versa. The census taken under oath by each of the two sections were docu- ments equally official, and are kept on record in the offices of the Government. How is it that the administration of the public schools of the day, which are also qualified as national, can leave out the whole Catholic school })opulation and merely mention the Protestant children, and that when die statistics are gathered from 1871, when Catholic children were the most numerous] Why two weights and two measures? why should a part be counted for nothing and the other part taken as the whole ? Ratepayers. — Previous to 1890, the non-Catholic public schools of Manitoba were Protestant, in name as well as in fact ; to-day the same schools have kept their character, but have lost their name ; true, it is a loss, but the loss is compensated in a large measure. In all i)laces where there was a Catholic district covering the same ground as a Protestant one, it was decided by the law that all assets of the Catholic schools would become the property of the Protestant scliools, which would then be called public schools, to be supported by the school assessments of Catholics as well as of Protestants. Let it be kept in view, the provision of the law was the same, even in a district where there might be but one school with only ten Protestant child- ren, although in the same place there would be schools enough to accommodate several hundred of Catholic children. Yes. by the terms of tliis law, in such a case, the school tj'ustees charged with these hundreds of children would disapjieai', to make room for trustees named by the parents of the ten Protestant children. The new law.s, while permitting the Protestant schools to continiie to develop and to prosper, are so prejudicial to Catholic schools that already many liuve iieen closed and others are on the point of meeting the satiie fate^ while the rest are maintained, but witli difficulty. I give Winnipeg as an illust^-ation : The Catholics have in the city five educational establishments, frequented by over five hundred children. Under the old regime, the Catholics of Winnipeg had their own school trustees,^ as the Protestants had theirs ; the limits of the two districts were not similar, nevertheless, the Attorney-General in 1890 decided that the Catholic school trustees would not be recognized anymore. This decision entailed the confiscation of all appertaining to the Catholic school trustees in favor of the Protestant board. Fortunately, the Catholio establishments belonged to corporations that the school law could not reach and the Catholic children remained where they were. There was something reached by the decision of the th^n Attorney-General ; it is the assessment levied on Catholics. For three yeara past the Chap. II.] PAMPHLET BY ARCHBISHOP TACHl!;. 1D» school taxes of tlie Catholics, instead of turning to theii* benefit, are ai)plied to help the schools where Catholic children do not attend. The Catholic schools of Winnipeg, deprived of the assessments of their supporters, deprived also of their legitimate share of the public money, are left to the good-will of the ))arents, helped by the self- deniiil of the teachers. I have witnessed the jeginning and the growth of the city of Winnipeg; at all times I have admired the liberality of its inhabi- tants ; it is perfectly well established that the people of Winnipeg give freely and generously. How is it that in the same city we find an unjust meanness such as the one perjjeti'ated against the Catholic scliools of the place? I know that several of the best citizens are ashamed, when thinking that money is taken even from the ])oorest Catholics to help in educating the children of Protestants, even of some of the richest. Unfortunately, this sentiment has not reached the main body of the citizens, and the meanness is still being enacted. Its injustice is so much the more manifest that the School Board has not sufficient accommodation, we are told, even for the Protestant childi'en. What embarrassment it would be for that School Board if, at a fixed dav, all the Catholic children of the citv would "O and ask for their place in the public schools, to the maintenance of which theii- parents are forced to contribute. The ignorance of the financial position made for the Catholic schools by the new law can alone account for the affirmation made by the noble lords of the judicial connuittee of the Privy Council. Their Lordships surely were not aw.ire of the bitter sarcasm they used when they said, "In such a case tlie Roman Catholics were really placed in a better position than the Pi-otestants." The Friends of the Public Schools. — In 1890, the government first intended to completely secularize the prinuiry instruction, but it met with such i-emonstrauce that it modified its bill, merely abolishing the Catholic schools iind securing that the Protestants would be left with such schools as they had themselves framed by the "introduction of systematic religious instruction accepted by all their dei.ominati(ms." The pitrtizans of secularization are dissatisfied with the religious }U'actices maintained in the schools ; they would like to see the disappearances of pi-ayers, of the reading of the Bible and the " means to be em[)lo3'ed," according to the i)rogramme prescribed in the new as well as in the old schools. Complete secularization is not without 8Uj)porters in different classes of citizens, but the Protestant clergy '* en masse " look at it as the most dangerous thing afte?" the Catholic teaching. The rev. gentlemen accept with enthusiasni the new laws because, while repudiating the Catholic doctrine, they do not admit of secularization and because they are in reality but the continuation of the Protestant schools, such as some of the clergy and laity of the different denominations have made them, through the Protestant section of the board of education. rar-#:'< m lot PAMPHLET JJY AJ{CHmSHOP TACIIlS. [Pakt ir. It is very diliicult to iina^iiie wliat 1ms heen printed in the press and wliiit Ims liei-n said in dlHt'iont ]>olitical and religious meetings to prove, sometimes indirectly, but always with evidence, that the school (|U(\sti(Hi of Manitol>a is purely and simply a religious one. I will not make any ([notations, it would take a large volume to rei)roduce what has Iteen s;ud cooly and in a hecoming manner, hut it would take many large volumes to contain the violent language, the accusations and insinuations of all sorts against that scarecrow, that people dressed and stull'ed according to their ideas, and which through stupidity or malice they call the " Romish church." In the midst of this coarse and al)sui'd trash, had anyone, just and disinterested, the couragt; to raise his voice to iippeal to common sense or to the most elementary sentiments of justice, what has not been said against such perscms ] They were so many Judases, traitors to the Protestant cause, sold to Kome. to the Archl)ishop, to the hierarchy, and other stupidities of the kind. I beg the ituuler's j)ardon for making even a passing allusion to all these painful occurrences. I do it merely to prepare for the following question : Why become so blindly sectarian in upholding a school .system, if not because the system itself is sectarian? Wliy such a])peals to fanaticism, made in season iind out of season, everywhere and on every opjyortunity, if not because the sc1uh)1s spoken of are in reality what the people pretend they are not, Protestant schools : but enough on that humiliating aspect of the question. I will now prove that the public schools of Manitoba have .secured the otticial approbation and the support of the rt^ligious denominations, which had most contributed to mould the Protestant schools under the old regime. The Presbyterians assemlded in synod in Winnipeg, the 22nd of November, 1892. The question of public schools was again discu.ssed at great length ; the Rev. Dv. llobertson moved a series of politico- religious resolutions, which he sup])0i'ted l)y a speech of the same character; contending among other similar reasons : Tliat a system of separate schools (read Catholic schools) could tend to fortify a sentiment of nnnexatioii. The Rev. Peter Wright : Had very much pleaain-e in seconding and in cordially and gladly supporthig the resolutions ; the latter did not at all contoniplato doing away with any of the existing religious exercises. If they diil he would not secoml them, i'higage only Christian men and women. While there were exceptions, there 'vas no class of peoi)le for whom he had a higher respect tiian the school teachers ; and a Sunday seldom passed that he did not give thanks fi'om his pulpit for the help rendered him iu elnuv h work by (Christian school teachers. The Rev. Dr. Pringle : Uegards separate schools as a curse to any prfivinoe or any town. He was glad we were Tiot left to tlio altei'iiative of separate or secular schools ; if we were, he would go in with his might for secular schools. OhAP. II.] PAMPHLET Ti\ AUCHBISHOP TACIIlt;. 155 Tlie Rev. Princii>iil King oi)i)osed the last four resolutions of Dr. Robertson saying : It was a mistake to bring such (luestions before this church court to make their beloved synod the tool of some political party. He washed his hands clear of the whole thing. The venorahle doctor also said : That he could nut agree with the sentiment of one speaker, looking to the relegation of religion to the church and family alone. He moved as an anieudnicnt to Dr. Robertson's resolutions tliat all the clauses be omitted except the first one which reads as follows: That this synod, in accordance with the position takcjn at previous meetings of synod, in favor of national schools established in Manitoba in 1890, desires to express its continued anxiety for their complete establishment througiiout the bounds of this synod. The ))ro]>osition was ado])ted. The Rev. Principal King then moved another I'esolntion, seconded by the Rev. P. Wright. Tliat the synod, in harmony with the decision of the general assembly of 1889, on the subject of religion and instruction in the jmblic schools, would earnestly deprecate any change in the existing school law of the province of Manitoba, in the direction of the withdrawal or the abridgment of the right now enjoyed by the people. . . . He thinks that such abridgment would be both dishonoring to (iod lud injurious to the interests of the state. The resolution was ado])ted. I confess that I understand nothing in ordinary, language if all these a>SHrtion.s of the Picshyteriau synod do not mean : (1) That the Catholic schools must l)e l)y all uieans done away with ; (2) that secular schools must also be opposed ; (3) that one must use every effort to maintain the actual schools with the continuance of their religious exercises. In other words, and according to my proposition, the Presbyteiian synod proved that the actual public schools, are and should not cease to be but the continuation of the Protestant schools of the old regime. Dr. King, himself, in 185)2, affirmed his views as similar to those in the general asscndily of l^8S). One member of the synod, the Hev. Dr. Bryce, fearing that some- body might think there was in tlie resolution of his confrere something in favor of secularizing the schools " which was not .so read from the Act all the clauses providing for religious exercises in the schools," and to "prove that the synod ought to firmly and decidely take a stand." The i'(!verend speaker exhil)ited to the asseml)lv a precious gem of the first sectarian water. People would hardly believe it, but the assertion was made in full synod and nobody was reported as having objecteil. I l)eg ])ardon fiom the noble lords of tlie judicial committee in dai'ing to quote the words of a most zealous chami)ion of public J '9 i-ii '\m ^ia^-i>Wiifed>feAWWPl8{»lilL«ilftilfllrt 156 PAMPIIIKT IIY AKCIimSllOP TAfllll [Paut IL scIiooIh, who in tlm iniilst of i\\^^ synod of liin clinivli thouylit proiHjr to 8iiy (Tlui Winni|>.>g Dnif'/ Tribune, Nov. 23. 18U2.): Tho notion of tlio I'reshytorian ImmIv fts repruaenting tlio Htroiigcst roligiouB dcuoiiiiiiivtioii ill tho North-west in (luolnring for ntitionnl Hohooh on two j)r('viouH ocoasionH, whioli dochirntion wfts Bi'iit to tlio IVivy Coiinoil, had oil nnportiuit olVoot upon tlio dooiHion whioh was givon. WtM'c tluH idlirniiition made so HoIiMunly, truo, tlu; judicial annuls of CJnMit Hritnin would liavi; to rocord that tin; hitrh»iHt trilainal of tho ompiro, undur tho prunHuro of tho dcclaratioiiH of Prcshyti^rian synods of Winnipoj^, Iwnl givon a decision contrary to tho saorod interests of education among tho Catholics of this provinco. An Anglican synod met on the 11th January, l>S9;?, in Winnipeg, under th(^ presiihuicy of His Lordshi[) the Bishop of Rupert's Land. The meeting numhered more than one iiunditul and twcMity meniUers, comprising the chief of tlu; chn-gy and laity of the church of lOngland. The Hight I{(>v. president delivered his charge; most of it heing on ihe religious teaching in the jirimary schools. His Lordship express(>d arguments and motives which are found in all Catholic treatises on the sul»i<'ct and substantiatetl Uv statistics. Hero are quotations from the cliarge : Tlio known exclusion of religious toaohing 'uakoa religion itself felt as something extra and superHuous. . . I'uro secular education has boon aoooinpanied hy the deterioration of tone and character in tho young. . . tho eiloits to supply religious education indopendently of thesoliool failed. . . Keligious instruction will be givon systeniatioally by few parents, not at all where most needed. Speaking of " What would happen in Kngland if tho jiresent assistance to separate schools were to cease," His Lordship described at the same time what would happen in Manitoba and says : Many schools would bo closed, many others would give but inferior education, still enough will be carried on; that a governineiit system of secular instruction might call itself national, but would be so in name not in reality. T have already stated that the Metropolitan of Rupert's I^and, after having been for nineteen years the president of the Protestiint section of the board of '"cation, is since president of the advisory board for the public sch ■' ; He is consequently perfectly aware of the value of the religious exercises, prescribed by each of the.se two boards and here is the euumoatiou and ap[U'eciation made by His Lordship. There is a short prayer concluding witli tho Lord's Prayer. There is a reading of a passage of tho Bible. In the teaching of morals, there are tlie ton commandments. Now, these are not small things in themselves, but they are doubly important, because they carry with them for the teachers, a degree of liberty. Yes, the bishop knows the value of wliat has been chosen and '\'K Chap. IT.] I'AM I'll LET nV ARCH1U81I0P TACHE. 157 |M'eHcril)C(l, undor IiIh prosidenoy, for teuching tho childrou of lu» €liui'cli, HH well i\M otiior ProtcHtaut cliildron, and lio addH ; Tho tcftchom who ij,{in»ro these oxcroisos can hardly he realizing their {xtsition as ('hriHtian men. After 80 Hpoakiiig tlio proHident of tho Anglican Hynod gave the following advice : I think tho Hvnod would do well to pasB a resolution, exprcsfting the hone that there would he no interference with the present religious exorcises in public schools. The charge of tho Metropolitan met with full approval and the committee appointed to report on it, [jresentod the following : (2) Hesolved, that while this synod would gladly see a larger measure of religious teaching in our schools than at present prevails, it trusts that every t that there would be a certain amount of religious iustruction in the (pul^lic) schools. It is evident that the Anglican Synod (1) repudiates the purely secular schools as dangerous to all ; (2) that on the contrary it recognizes the absolute necessity of religious instruction in public, schools; (3) that it affirms that the Anglicans in giving up their parochial schools, had no doubt that the public schools would continue to give religious instruction ; (4) that the .synod nicognizes that in fact the public schools have religious exercises, that are not small things in themselves, but that are doubly important, because they carry with them for the teacher a degree of liberty in his teaching. (5) that the synod pledges itself to resist to the utmost any measure tending to diminish the religious instruction actually given in public schools. To all that, Mr. Mulock, a member of the synofl, adds : That as soon as the Protestant bodies agreed upon what they wanted, the government was willing to take action. ':«i.^ite«iai*^'*x>iS*l^-9^,-4i,-::fai(B^^ !Iic schools of Manitoba arc nolliini; ors and my afioctions for nearly half a century, they will have them until my last day. I am a Canadian. I was boin and I have lived in Biitish possessions; my allegiance is, therefore, to tho Crown of England; my conscience and my heart repudiate anything that shoidd bo contrary to my (jbligations as a British subject. 1 feel happy to live und(!r the protection of the glorious banner of tho l^ritisii em))iie. Can I be a ti'aitor to my allegiance because 1 desire that the soft breeze of liberty should wave the noble standard towards my coreligionists, as well as towards my other countrymen, in order that everyone may enjoy the pi'otection and impartiality to which all are entitled in return for their allegiance 1 tALEX., Arch, of St. Boniface, 0.]M.I. I ); :M1 i* "^'^'"^ \.."."_1!L_,!!!". ^-"— ■^'""'■■- ' i ''iirrOTiffl«liiH(iiifirif'i ti r iiMili-i iilii i i i i ii iiiir i i ii in li i ii Hiliii li pi CHAPTER III. ADDRESS Delivered by the Bishop of Kupekt's Land Before tiik Anglican Synod, December, 1889. I have thought it might be well to publish in a separate form the I'emarks I made to the Synod on the subject of primary education. In addressing the Synod I did not think it :'esii'able to discu.s8 the pi'obable change in the method of Iminif*- \tio i. I confined myself to the qi istion of religious teachiu T. .; i; idc>n; ified as I have been from the beginning with the past : iutJiii ' "atifm of our provincial system of education, I do not think t.\mX ii "ill be out of place for me to make some remarks on this subject ■ ^his publication. I believe that the Board of Education has been in the execution of its trust a faithful servant of the State, and impartial in its administra- tion. It is my opinion, too, that the State has been exceptionally well served by the successive superintendents of education, and I think it is a subject of regret that the Province has lost the experi- ence and administrative ability of the late superintendent. There ia grave objection to the Department of Education being treated like an ordinary department of the Government. Usually there is a Minister who decides everything in his department, and an assistant, with j)erhaps half the salary, who acts as Deputy Min- ister. But in this department the real administrator should be, if possible, a scholar ot fair if not high university attainments, well acqiiainted with educational questions and methods. And as his value will be largely increased by experience and knowledge of the country gaijied by years of office, he should be a permanent official. Now, it is impossible to secure and retain a valuable man of such attainments N\ithout a liberal salary. To expect always these qualifications, even to a very moderate degree, in the statesman receiving for politicid reasons the Ministry of Education, is out of the question. And it would scarcely be right to make such a man the mere clerk of the politician for the time in office. Besides, it will be difficult for the Minister in this country to be credited with the absolute determination of all the questions rising out of school matters without giving suspicion of political partiality and embitter- ing those whose wishes he disregards. Ou the other hand, I readily admit that it would bo an advantage that the Government should have a closer connection with the Board of Education than it has had in the past. The exi)enditure of the grant for edncaticm as proposed by the board is now voted by the Governor in-Council, and it seems right that the Government should thus be responsible for the [160] €hap. hi.] THE BISHOP OF UUPEKT's LAND. m •expenditufo. But the Boird of Education feels tlmt it is by it« special iiifonnatioii ii more competent authority. Thus, there is apt to be friction, if the Governor-in-Council thinks j)ropor to reject any of the estimates or proposals of the board. This would be avoided if, as r hav(! .suggested in the addiess to the Synod, one of the Minis- ters ()(!cupied the position of chairman of the 13oard of Education, Criticisms that have l)een made on the addresses of Dr. King and myself, .suggest one or two remarks. I have seen it represented that w<* would prefer the present system of separate schools to any merely scciihir system. And I do not hesitate to say that I would ; but at the same time I think this an unfair way of ))utting the matter. There is much in the present .syst(!m that is objectionable that could b(f removed. Under proper restrictions I see a measure of justice and no injustice in sej)arate schools, and I do not think that it will l)e easy to do away with then». However the Roman Catho'' • authorities may .approve of the subjects of religious teaching t' o Protestants would agree upon, they will acce|)t no teachers l)iit f^a/ own. The groat majority of Roman Catholic children will, there. '■", be sent to their own private; schools, howc^ver inferior, rather t'" ) t State schools not under Roman (Jatholic insti'uctors, wli(!Lhei oil ' be I'oligious teaching in them or not. If thei't; is no rtsligious teacii- ing there will be but the stronger expression of dislike. 'JV d;" ■vill conu; when one, if not both political parties, will discov*- i .at it is undesirabli! for the State to have this inferior secular instruction, and unjust to the Roman Catholic section of the conimuiiity, that while getting no State aid for its private .schools it siiould have to (•outrii)ute to the supj)ort of the state schools. And the .separate schools will I'eappoar — possil)ly in an objectionable form, if Proti>st- ants allow the threatened secularization of the the [xiblic .school.s, they may expect to see in a i'o.w yeai'S these two classes of state schools — Roman Catholic and secular. Will that be satisfactory? [t is sometimes said that the religions teaching at pres(int in the Pi'otestant .schools does not amount to much. It is still far from siiiHcient, but there has been a gradual iniprovfMuent. The Protest- ant Board of Education has, however, never been chosen to ie])re.sent the opinions of the churches. I have been all along aware that .several of the meml)ers did not share my views — atone time certainly 1 would have been in a small minority. But T have sdways regarded an attitude unfriendly to religious teaching in the sciiools for our children, as so unnatural for religious men, that I have hoped for the gradual ovei'coming of the prejudices so that a more sati.sfactory system might be introduced. As long as the school law placed no obstacle in the way of the adoption of a fuller system of religious instruction I felt able to work on the Board, and look forward to this. I am, indeed, perfectly satisfied with the religions subjects now pre- .scribed for the Protestant .section. I wish for nothing' more — onl)' 11 162 THE Hisnoi' OK UUPERTS LAND. [Part IF. I , 163 Hut on this I do not oaiv, uh hisliop, to luMrcss yon. I would Kiniply Hiiy tliiit I oonsidtu- that the hcst way tor l\\v. udininiHtratiou of our Hoiiools wonhl ho to adopt tho En one of tho ininisr,«M8 would occupy the poHition. which I finve had tho honour to till for so many yt'iifs and preside over the board of education. He cuuld tlius rciae.sent and carry out the policy of tho {govern nient without any great call on his time, while a porr.ianent otHoial, ti com- petent scholar, well accpiainted with educatii)n questions and methods, as deputy minister or superintendent of education, could be tho real administrator, and a small board of independent g(intlon)en, conversant with education, could still bo responsible fo" the decisions come to. But a more serious (piestion is that of t!'<; education to be given in our common schools. It is certainly most (lesiralde that the people of this country should be thoroughly aunilgamated. I, therefore, greatly prefer that the young |»»'ople of our communion should be educated with the other young people, with whom tiiey will aftor- warda work. But we must ask what is th(i education to be given? Js it to be an education, that will keep out of view those Divine sanctions, which are the real foundation of morality, an education that is to take no notice of that to which we owe our modern civilization, and from wliich we receive the hope of our life — our Christion faith. I believe that such an education will in the end be a poor one both for the individual and the nation. The Bible reiterates, " The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge," and again, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." The noble question tliat opens the Westminster Shorter Catechism — one ot t]ie standards of the Presbyterian churches, is " What is tho chief end of man? And the answer is "To glorify God and to enjoy Pliir. for eveiv" It seems a miserable education for the futui'o of the man that could ignore tho very end of his being. Education should be a training for the lature help and guidance of the man in all his interests. In the ))resent day it is too much the notion that education is the filling of the mind with information on all po.ssible subjects that may come iu usefully, and every science and branch of knowledge puts in its claim, but after all the true ■education is not so much a laving in of facts as the training of the mind for its future exercise, and can that be called a wise and true training that loses siiihl of the most important princi- ples for the guidance of the man / Those who most value education, who most recognize and appreciate its tremendous [)ower, cannot but be constrained by their sense of the danger of any defect in this. I would call attention to an important passage in the report of the late Royal Commission on Primary Education appointed in England in 18l)6. This Commission contained leading men of all the chief religious bodies, and inchided prominent advocates of secular schools. But though they differed on many questions, and especially on the wisest way of imparting religious knowledge, they agreed in one ill 164 THE lilHIIOP OF HUI'KUTS LAND. [Pakt II. iiiOHt remiiikiil>l<' roncliiHion ; — " Tliut whilst we doHire to Hfoure for tlio cliildit^ii ill tim |»iil)lic fU'incntiiry mcIiooIh tlio Ix'Ht mid nioHt tli()i'ou<{li iiistnictioii in st'culiir sulijcctH, niiitiil)i«> to tJK.'ir ycuirh, and ill I iniioiiy will) tin* r('(|iiiiiit.s, and tii« nation. Various classes of ohjcct ions Inivo Ix'cn raised to reliirions worship and leachiii;,' in primary schools, hut only one seems tu me a serious one, and tlnit is timt it is not feMsil)le on account of our divided Christianity. ( >tlier olijeclions seem to nie without force in view of the greatness of tlie desired end. Those nlleyiiii; want of reality and the encournuement ol hypocrisy wouM, i fear, eipially iipply to family worslii[) and divine service. 'I'liose pointin;;' to a lessening,' of the regard for the Milile ai'e mainlv ima'dnai'v. 1 attended a school wln're there was daily Uilile instrucLion ; J also attended a Sunday .school, and i am pi'ihjctly unconscious of any dillei'i^nce witli rej;ard to the lUhle in the two cases, oi' any h'ssc^niii'' of reverence or regard lor th(! I'ihle from tliere heini,' lessons from it in (hiily school, on the p.irt of myself or any one having tlmse lessons. Ohjections setting forth want of (pialilication on tlie part of the tcacliers simply point to anotlier remedy, wliere this is felt to he the case. I have; full conlidence in the hody of teachers in this province; and we may exp(K!t still greaun- reason for confid(Mice when the country pas.ses out of its pioneer stage. 'I'he minority of the PiUglish commission admit as regards England "it is with exceptional )>leasure that we reoidl the deep impression which has heen made upon us hy thi' liigh moral (piality of most of the teachers whom we have examined." It will ho the fault of the country if this is not the testimony that we have a right to expect. 1 am sure that ordinarily we should all he only too glad of the hel]) of the ])resent teachers in our Sunday schools. As the eminent Principal of Queen's University, Dr. Grant, lately .said: " If the teacher is an unworthy man and wishes to insinuate evil teaching, he can do so in connection with any suhject. In that case he is not tit to he a teacher at all. This may he safely left in the hands of the trustees of each district." For myself, I heartily agree with the majority of the Royal Commissioners, " that it is of the highest importance that the teachers who are charged with the moral training of the scholars should continue to take part in the Chap. Ill ] TIIK IIIHIIOP OK RUPERT'h LAND. 165 roligiouH iiiHtniction, uiul that iiny Hopunitioii of thn teuchor from th« religiouH touching of tite hcIiooI would Ito iiijtiriouH to tlio moral iind ••"^culiir training of tho HcholiirH." There iH Htill another chws of oljoctiouH to relij^ionn Uiachiiii,' in schoolH, on itccount o( its inburticiency iind ncgloct of what is coMHiih'red the pi-oper aim of religious teaching. Now, aH far hh roHultH are concerned, I am afraid the Hamo olnjfctioii might he raised to the Sunday school instruction, which tho.sc ohjectdrs wouhl depend on. There uiay, ii!fh'"fl. l»f> thi' best religious tearhing applitid most tenderly to the heart and conscience, and yist there may he no loving response from tho heart of tho child to CJod. ''Thy face, Uod, will I siick." Ihit whiit; v\o look to God's grace for the changing of the heart and drawing it to love and serve God, still wo tind that tho Spirit of God deals with us as leasonahle beings, ami a provision of knowledge of the things of God is a divine preparation for the soil receiving tho good seed. The Euntich of Ethopia was prepared for the m, of whom they have not hoard?" Tho makers of this class of objections think little of any religious instruction which is not an application of certain special i>ortions of God's truth to tlm heart, in that I differ from them. I think there is great value in the acquisition of the information given us in the Bible, and in tho inculcation of morality from its divine source. So far I would agree with these objectors that it is not desirable that religious teaching according to their view should be a subject of daily j)ractice. That I would leave largely to the Sunday school, though the judicious and faithful teacher will make use of pi'oper opportunity. I am quite conscious that, as there may always be too much of the best, so there may be too much of religious teaching. The tinie given to it shoidd be carefully limited and the subjects should be largely historical. But even those who favor secular schools feel the necossitv of some moral training. The minority of the Royal Commissioners give a long list of moral duties that they would enforce on the children. Most of the English school boards have regular religious instruction, but the Birmingham board is an excejjtion. It has replaced the Word of God by "outlines" of lessons on honesty, truth- fulness, obedience to parents, and some forty moral duties. Let us see the working of such a system, where it is in full force as in the Australian colony of Victoria. An inspector, we are told, when examining the chil ' en in a primary school asked the question " Why should we obey our , irentsl" The child referred to the divine sanc- tion of the 5th commandment. The inspector replied — that he could not give any marks -he answer should have been, "because they feed, clothe, and educate me." Thus you see in this system ol)edience to parents is simply a moral duty as taught by the natural conscience — what is the real worth of this 1 When Bi.shop Horden began to PW mm 160 THE BISHOP OF HUPEHT's LAND. [Part IT. teacli tlie radians of Kii])ert's Hou.-ie, lie gave them a lesson on the ath comnuinilnient. Hf liad four men of the tribe ])laced before him. He asked the tirst who killed his father, the second who killed his mother and so on. Each answered ' I did,' and we are told, the confession excited no feeling in the crowded buihling. 7t liad Ijeen the way of the tribe. When old jicople became a burden to the wandering family, thev were told thev had lived lony eaouijh and were i)ut out of the Way. We, indeed, beloved brethren, strike at the whole edifice of our morality, when we remove this foundation — "Thus saith the Lord." How often in the history of the world has this sentence of Holy Scripture been realized: '' Proi'essing themselves to be wise, they became fools." The conclusion of the majority of the Royal Com- missioners seems unanswerable : "That the only safe foundation, on which to coristruct a theory of morals, or to secure high moral condncf, is the religion, which our Lord Jesus Christ lias taught the world. That as we look to the Bible for instruction concerning morals and take its words for the declaration of what is morality, so we look to the same inspired source for the sanctions by which men may be led to p'actis«3 what is there taught, and for instruction concerning the hel])S by which they may be enabled to do what they have learned to be right." It is very jileasant to find the Bishop of London, of the Church of Englaii-? Alas! In these busv davs in how few Ikmucs would thev be combined? The instruction in Sunday schools is of course of great value, but that value is imnieasurabiy increased where there is careful instruction in the day school. . nt at best it would be very ])ai-tial in its extent and often, as we have reason to regret, not very efiicient. As regards England, the oommissioners rej)ort "that the evidence does not warrant the conclusion that religions and moral training can be amply provided otherwise than through the medium of elementai-y schools. That in the case of a considei'abl(> number of children, if they do not receive n^ligious instruction and training Irom the teachei's in the public elementaiy schools, they will i-eceive none, and that this would be a matter of gravest concern to the state." It is true that in this country the full effect of a secular system of education will not ha immediately felt. We have a fine body of sett- €hai'. hi.] THE BISHOP OF RUI'ERT's LANIJ. m lei'.s. There proltably ii^ no town in wliicli the people attend clinrch better than in Winnipeg, I ])i'esiinie that in our present towns most ot the children attend Sunday school, and though in the country dis- trii'ts they can only to a limited extent do this owing to tlie distance of children from Sunday Schools, yet the feeling would be in fiivor of attendance. But this country will not always be in this happy condition. We must look forward to larger jjopula- tions and careless classes, as seen not only in the old countries of Europe, but in the United States. And then the result will be deplorable. We see in France secular education in its full develop- ment. "Not only is no word of religion taught, but the very name of God is in strictness forbidden to be uttered." Is it strange that unbelievers themselves almost tremble for the future of that country. The master of one of the schools in Paris, himself a pi'ofessed mater- ialist, when questioned, said that he believed that in ten years few of the boys in his school would even know the name of Christ otherwise tlian as a matter of liistory, and that he himself even viewed with •apprehension the consequence of such a change, for although a mater- ialist, he felt by no means certain that materialism would be capable of supplying the wants of a nation. But it may be thought that there is no danger in a Britisli colony of going on to this extreme. It is, dear brethren, only the legitimate end of the seculai' system. I have already referred to the colony of Victoria. The school system there is not yet absolutely ' Godless/ as in France. It has yet only reached the stage of being ' Christless,' but it is stated that it has been sei-iously i)roposed to make the thin Theism still left in the text Ijooks still thinner by " omitting any statements that might be offen- sive to our Chinese fellow-citizens." But though the name of God is not yet forbidden, how Christ, our Saviom, seems to be dishonored ! One of the text-books in English contains Longfellow's little ballad *' The VVieck of the Hesperus." But it is given in a mutilated form. The touching stanza of the child in its distress has been cut out: "Then the maiden clasped her hands And prayed that saved she niiglit be, And she thought of Clirist, v lio stilled the \Vave on tli'j Lake of (Jalilee." It is said by an Australian contributor to the London Spectator that all similar I'eferences to Christ and Christianity have Ix'on I'entoved, and that ^lessrs. Nelson &. Sons, the {(ublishers, hiive Invd to i)ul)lish special editions of their school series for this colonv. care- fully ])urged of all taint of Christian fact and sentiment. Thus that blessed nam", which is above evciy nauu^ is pi'actieally treated like an im]troper ])assage in a heathen Latin writer. Surely a Christian may ^veil say tliat an enemv hath done this. It was not bv .such faint- MB mamam \ 168 THE BISHOP OP RUPEKTS LAND. [Part II. hearted Christianity that our i-eiigion spi-ead in its fii-st days and our fathers got the faith. In face of such a fact we may well ask, are we,, the Christians of to-day, at all awake to the preciousness of what has been committed to ns J Do we understand tlie vast res|)onsibility that rests upon us? What a condemnation tlie possibility of such results- is of our divided Cliristianity ! How it calls on us to enter our inner chamber and pray the last ])rayer of our Lord with His disciples before His death '' tliat they all may be one, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe tliat Thou has sent Me." And how strange it i.s, even from a literary point of view, that in a day when information of all kinds is crowded in on the pupils, it should be thought ))ro}Kn' to withhold the infoination which is aljsolutely necessary for the intelligent reading of all our litei-ature ! Fancy a reader of Milton ignorant of the lacts of the Bible ! I have left myself little space to speak of that which is the really formidable oVyection, that it is not feasible with our divided Christian- ity to formulate a scheme of religious teaching which will be accept- able to all religious bodies. With regard to this I simply say that I think there should be no ditficulty in drawing up a sdierae, giving a very considerable — to my mind a \'ery adequate — amount of religious, teaching, which should not be inconsistent with the teaching of any of the chief bodies. In the first ])lace, I give my entire adhesion to the following resolution, which I understood was passed unanimously at the last ge.ieral assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Canada: "The general assembly still adheres tirnily to the belief that the Bible should be made in the public schools the object of regular systematic instruction, and i-ejoices to believe that a rule to this effect, combined with a conscience clause, giving lull relief to every objector, and with H clause empowering trustees to dispense with such instruction when they consider it expedient, would be most acceptable to the different branches of the Christian church.'' I think it. perfectly ])Ossibk) to agree on an adequate selection of lessons that might be taken either from the authorized English version, the Douay version, or a French version, as trustees of any school might ))refe}'. In the- second place, I approve of a second resolution of the Asseml.>ly : " The General Assembly acknowledges receipt of a communication from the Anglican Synod of the Diocese of Toronto on the subject cf religious instruction in the public schools of Ontario, and expresses its. sympathy with the object therein contemplated." The communica- tion referred vo suggested the preparation by representatives >A the several religious bodies of a " Short Compendium of the Chief Tratha of Christian Faith and Practice." This I should like to see. I think the compendium better be confined to the Apostles' Creed, the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Commandments — which are the common lieritage of all Christendom. Such a manual would probably by no* means contain all even in these that everyone could wish said, but ib. \ Chap. III.] THE BISHOP OP RUPERTS LAND. 169' could contain the cLief truths of our faith and yet have nothing objectionable. Further teaching could be given in Sunday Schools or when young jjeople are prepared for Confirmation or the Lord's Supper. The Genei-al Asseml)ly ai»pointed a conuuittee, which among other duties, had to take steps to secure the co-operation of otlier branches of the Christian Church. I should be very glad if we were to intimate to their authorities here oui- desire to co-operate. Dear brethren in the Lord, we are a Christian people, and shoidd he Them K T very jealous of our faith. This is the Divine assurance that honor Me, I will honor." There can be nothing unreasonable in this that we should require in the education of our young people that which we regard as of primary importance for tbeir future. There may be Jews and other unbelievers in Christ wishing to send their children to the ])ublic schools— there should be a stringent clause protecting their children from the religious instruction and guaranteeing that they suffer in no way from this. The Roman Catholic Church might give its sympathy and aid in all that I propose, but we cannot look for this. In that case I simply say that I should infinitely prefer that the Roman Catholic Church should continue to have separate schools under satisfactoiy conditions for the State, to our schools being without instruction. I have taken u\) a longer time than I important subject. I hold no extreme On the contrary, I am very conscious in addressing you that there are not many likely to fill my position, who may be expected to take secular education or be more religious like in speaking on this views on this question. more generous view of giving to children unsuitable and excessive dogmatic a broader and averse to teaching. And, therefore, some weight may be given to my words when I say that the establishment of a system of secular instruction means, I doubt not, a ceaseless agitation. At the present moment the members of the Church of England in England are paying yearly three millions of dollars (£600,000) in voluntary subscriptions to support 11,8'.J0 separate schools for 2,006,880 children in schools built b}' voluntary subscriptions, to the amount of seventy millions of dollars (£H,000,000). The members of our church here may not have much of this spirit at present, or, if they have, may not be al)le to show it, but the day may be expected to come when they will. Having spoken already at such length, I cannot touch on other matters to-day. I desire, then, simply to commend our deliberations to the guidance of God's Holy Spirit, that our Church may be an instrument for promoting the glory of God and the salvation of men. l i JllliMiMlli CHAPTER lY. Extracts ox Primary Education* from the addkkss of the BISHOP OF RUPERT'S LAND To THE SVXOD OF THE DlOCKSE, JANUARY, 1893. I In f.dcli-essiiig the synod I abstained from remarks on jirimary 'education, as the courts had Ijefore them the question wljether the provincial school act was constitutional or not. Even now only the grave consequences to be appi'ehended force me to take up the subject. For the question enters soniewhat into that political stiife for which it is well for the Church, if ])ossible, to keep away, and there is •evidently much difficulty in the existing circumstances of the province in securing what the friends of religious education would wish. There are some who speak of religious education as something that is outside tU£ ^>rovince of the state. I feel a difficulty in under- standing such a position in the c.ise of anyone who realizes its importanc'3 either for the individual or for the state. For as regards the state and civil government, b elief in a personal God behind the moial law is surely the strongest, and in fact the only, satisfactory sujiport for it, and experience shows that this belief is the most influential motive for inducinsr obedience even to the laws of the state. The state, therefore, fo?~lts own advantage should seek that its children s houl d have a religious education. i\)r~arX^hristian state to §etjj|S(^lf against this seems a dishonoring of God and disastrous to its b(\st interests. But in enforcing the necessity of religious education there must be no d('[>reciatioii or ilisparaging of the best secular education. No one can desire to return to a estate of , things common enough not lon<>- atfo, when there was little instruction I of any kind even of a religious character. This is practically the case \ among those Roman Catholics whose ignorant condition and large proportion of criminals are sometimes thrown against the friends of leligious education. Still a thorough teaching of the Bible with wholesome hom_e_discipline will, witri\'ery jioor secular instruction, train_ivp_a tliou^itful, intelligent, honest, and capable ])eople. This was the case in Scotland in days of the old parish schools. In England until recent years there was no state pronsion for education, and in general therr^was'Tio proper instructl^on T()r{li(rcominon l)eople_ — in count, -v jiarishes often only a dame's school conducted by a respectabi':' .Ideily woman who could do little but read. One thing is cleai'. A gnod r^pciilar rducation is a necessity of our age. " 'Life question is whs t ih its probal)le effect if unaccompanied by religious [170] Chap. 1Y.] the nisHOP of kupekt's land. 171 instruction, For education is not simply the inij^arting of useful knowledge, tliougli as mucli of this as is consistent witli the real training of the mind is well, hut education is above all the inculcating of soTiTuT ])rincii)les of life, and the strcngtliening of the mental powers and conceptions. Tennyson well said in his " In Memoriani." " Who lovt not knowledge? Who shall rail Against her beauty? May she mix With men and prosper? Let her work i)revail ! But. . . . Let her know her place ! She is the second, not the lirst. A higher hand must make her mild, If all be not in vain, and guide Her footsteps, moving side by side With wisdom, hke the younger child : For she is earthly of the mind. But wisdom, heavenly of the soul." As the Ai'chbishop of Canterbury said in his opening address at the Folkstone congress : It is on character infinitely more than on material knowledge, that all which is vital \o the power and estate of tnghind turns. It is truth which has made her free. He quoted the following ))assage of William Law : The youthb that attended upon Socrates, Plato aud Epictetus were thus educated. Their every day lessons and instructions were . . . upon the immortality of the soul, its relation to (iod, the beauty of virtue and its agreeableness to the divine nature, upon the dignity of reason, the necessity of temperance, fortitude ami generosity, and the shauio and folly of indulgini^ our passions. Now, as Christi,.uity has, as it were, new created the moral and religious world, and set everything, that is reasonable, wise, holy and desirable in its true point of light — one might naturally supjjose that ev^ery ( 'hristian country aljounded with schools for the forming, training and practisiuj^ youths in such an outward course of life as the highest prece[)ts, the strictcHt rules and tliH subliinest doctrines of Christianity require. This loft;- ideal may unattainable, but it is hard to imagine that any religious per.srH, can do ofcl than aim at a measure of it and regret that any difliculty should \>- in tlii) v. / of religious instruction. But the ditlereuces in l)elief certainly create a real difKculty. 'I'he question is wlietiier the Toss from the .absence of reliL as teaching is not so grave that every etiort must l)e made in the interest ali! if the child and the state to overcome tlie difficulty as far as possible. Tl.s is siniph' all that time will allow me to consider witli you to-day. There lias been now considerable opportunity for forn au a judgment on tlie probable effects of pure secular education. ISuch an education has existed in France for over ten years, and in the Australian colony of Victoria for twenty yeaiu So perfect is 'he educational system in this colony that only one out of two hundred of school age was absent from school. Very full evidence has been nrnm Kmam mma 172 TUB BISHOP OF RUPEKTS LAND. [Part II. collected of the effects, more or less traceable to this instruction. I cannot, in my limited time, lay it but very partially before the Synod ; but, with the consent of the Synod, I shall, at my own expense, plat-e some valuable papers and speeches on the subject in the ai)pendix of the Synod report. At present I wish to point out certain inferences that may clearly be made out from these papers. 1. Pure secular education leads to a growing want of appreciation of the importance of religion — and so to an inditferention, if not hostility to religion. The known exchision of religious teaching makes religion itself be felt as something extra and superfluous, with which the children should not be troubled, and which is of secondary imj)ortance. This has a most deadening effect on the religious feelings of the young, and thus, as lias been said, silence on religious, topics during the school hours proves to be a measure of positive hostility to faith. This is found to be the case under the most favorable circumstances, when the parents are church-going and there is still in the communit}'- a degree of religious earnestness. Thus in Wales, where the ;)eople ai'e professedly religious, but in which most of the board schools, especially numerous there, have established pure secular education^ we are tcld that, while the young weaver or tinplater used to go to Chuich, Chapel, and Sunday School almost without exception, now they loaf about the country lanes on Sundays in dozens. It need not, then, bu wondered at, that where the tone of the community, as in France, is largely antagonistic to religion, the supposed neutrality of secular education develo])s into •->. vehicle for infidelity and atheism. Mmy Frenchmen affirm ti.at religious neutrality has proved unattainable. They say it is impossible. 2. Pure secular education leads to a growinj^' unfamiliarity with Hoiy Scripture. "The fact has to be faced," reports Mr. Russell, a teacher of long experience, and now inspector of sc)v lis iu Victoria, " that a very large per- centage of our state school pupils are f^rowing into adult life with little or no knowledge of the Bible. " ~ - And this unfamiliarity is not at all confined to those who do not atfead Sunday Srhools. An English clergyman thus writes of tne Sunday Schools he visited in Victoria and New Zealand : '* I noticed the ignorance of the Bible, which extends to familiar Scriptural biographies. While in respect of intelligence and general knowledge the children were quite up to the level of children of the same age and class educated in the "BSHfelemfentarjT schools in England, they fell considerably . below th em in religious knowledge. " Archdeacon Stretch, of Melboui'ne, says that once there was not this deficiency. He remembered when the elder classes could pass a highly creditable eyaraination in both Testamentg7~15iil now a cliild Chap. I Y.J TEE BISHOP OF RUPERTS LAND. ir« is rarely found who knows anything of the ohl Testament, and as for tlie knowledge of the new, it is for the most part of the very thinnest descri[)tion, It seems, then, that the efficiency of the Sunday School depends on tli'i ))ossession of an amount of religious knowledge not there acquired. 3. Pure secular education has Ijeen accojnpanied by a deterioration of tone and cliaracter in the yoinig, as marked by want of resjject for"" ))areiits, elders, masters and superiors, by a neglect of the Sabbath, by a lawless and insuboidinatc carrinye, and the ijrievous fact of rather an increase of crime than tliiit ('teci'ease, wliicli should follow the very improved secular instruction, if it was h ealt hy. The Victorian Year Book states that 12, 109 male criminals wei-e convicted in 1880, and *2l>,189 in 1890 — that 31 Mere convictcnl of nnirder or man- shiughter in 1880, and ')C) in 18!)0 — that 245 were convicted of crimes of I'obbeiy with violence in 1880. and 405 in 1890, while the j)ropor- tion of educated criminals in 1880 was 71 jxu- cent., and in 1>90, 89 per cent. We i-ead that in France th(! houses of corr(!ction ai-e gorged with l)oys and girls. Juvenile crime is increasing at a ti-uly tVigJit- ful rate. In 1880 tliei'e were o,00G prisoners uiid(M' IG; in 1888 tliere were 7,351 ; yet: in France the number of childien of .school age is ac*-'ially decreasihg. The late chief of police in Paris, after stating that the young crimnals sprang up like weeds between the cracks of the pavement, said it was the natni-al fruit of the ".segjiliirization law." One of tlie French judges has cidled ])ublic atter^M; to the fact that the increase of juvenih? crime was beyond doubt . .yincident with the changes iiiti'OiluceaiTTiTo pul.'lic instruction. The "oDVinal report to uhe Prefect of the Seine, i>v tlics insi)ectors of workshops and factories in Ptiris, states : We have noticed uitli jiaui tliu lack o!" moral instiaictioii in tlio.se chiklrcn {the juvenile euiployees), althougb tbes' Uave attended the courses of morals in the schools they show little trace of i*^. It is an uni>Ieasaiit tluty to report, Mr. I'refect, that for Avant of moral edac;vi:ioii the children are losing al' Motions of respect and duty, and are hecoining addicted to bad language. Their miscon- duct in the pulilic street is often scandalous, and many employers will no longer engage apprentices, on accomit of the troubles tliey cause. It is high time to put au end to these moral disasters. In Wales there is a general complaint with resi)ect to the young of waywardness of co)iduct, bad language, disobedience to })arents, intolerance of rejtroof. 4. The attempt to teach morals apart from the Divine sanction of the Bible utterly fails. In Frajice, while at! religious instruction is forbidden, provision is made for instruction in moral and civil duties. The minister of public works instituted an inquiry and a|)pointed a commission to conduct ■ I '1 I '!!I^mieMl,:> 174 THE HISIIOP OF UUl'KKTS LAND. [Part II. The conclusion Moral teaching it. Reports wore imulo by the inspectors of schools, of the conuuis.iionei' was: The religious sontiment is iiisci>.iral)lu from morality, cannot be effectively given without its aid. We Imvo exactly the same repoit from Victoria. The reports of the inspectors of schools, all laymen, tell one storv. Extracts will be given from a number of them in the ai)pen(lix. Time will only allow me to say that the purport of their reports is that there is now little moral teaching in the Victoria schools, that that little is felt to be perfectly ineilective, and that the want of a standard of api)eal, such as the Scriptures, is a fatal objection to the expedient of using a text book in morals instead of teaching religion. 5. The efforts to supply religious education independently of the schools fail. Three ways suggest themselves: By family instruction, by \visiek day instruction out of school hours, by Sunday school. As to the first, religious education will be given systematically by few parents, not at all where most needed. The Bishop of Manches- ter, formerly Bishop of Melbourne, thus exi)lains what happened with the other methods in Victoria: The ministers of the different bodies met the children on the week days. I '"'onswere tried before the schools began, after they finished, and on the kiiibiifday holiday, but they imiversally and signally failed. But you may say surely the churches did something on the Sunday, if they could not on the week day. I was told, " Oh, yes, the Sunday schools will make up for all the defects of the secular system." But these are the facts. In 1883 there were 7H per cent, of the children of school age attending Sunday schools. Seven years later, in 1890, there were only .39 per cent. No wonder 1 If parents and children alike believe that religious instruction may be neglected, how can you expect them voluntarily to attend a Sunday school ? In Franco the oxperic'i ^e has been the .same. The schools were closed on one day in the week besides Sunday, " that parents, if they so desired, miglit have the 0[)portunity of glutting their children instructed in religion outside of the .school buildings." And the Protestants, overjoyed at the abatement of the priest's influence, and relying on the potency of their Sunday and Thursday classes, welcomed in fact the new law without reserve. But they have been undeceived. They now agree in declaring its results deplorable. The Thursday classes have failed them. The religious instruction on one day is found insufficient, and even the attendance on Sunday schools has alien ofi". Lastly, a system of pure secular instruction fails to be a national system with any truth. Denominational schools gradually rise up, and are maintained at great cost. Notwithstanding the excellent secular instruction in theFrench schools, out of the whole live anda-half millions of primary scholars in 1890, more than one-fifth (in Paris two-fifths^, ClIAP. IV.] TIIK lUSHOP OF RUPERT. S LAND. 175 were in private! luitl (leuoiiiiimtioniil scliool.s, and yearly the diffeienco le.s.s('ii8. In 18i)0 the whole nunilter of Hcholai's in primary schools lell oft' by nearly 22,000, owing to the ilccrease in children of .school age, but while the public schools lost ov( r -tO/JOO, the other .schools gained nearly 20,000, 1 have hitherto avoided releriing tothe United States, as, thougli the evds of which I have spoken are lamentably nppanjnt there, it is e no deficiency in the secular instruction. Kven our host town parishes are not in a financial position yet to do this, and dis- oharu''' the pi'(e that there will be no interference with the present religious exercises and autliorizing the appointment of a committee to deal with any oppor- tunity that may present itself in conference with other bodies or otherwise, for securing a measure of religious instruction. In the meantime we should do all we can. The clergy should exert tliem- selves to establish Sunday schools. Care must be ttiken tKat they do not occupy the time merely in interesting the children with stories or in giving addresses with good advice, but that they instruct their classes in the fidness of the Christian faith. That is often a different thing. In the Catecliism with its teaching on the Commaniiments, Lord's Prayer, Creed, and Sacraments, and in the collects, epistles, and gospels bringing before the chiMren during the year a very full view of tlic cotmsel of God, we have an admirable course of instruc- tion. With this there should be combined Scriptural lessons partly historical and partly exhibiting the teaching of the day or season. A union school can never adequately take the place of a Church school. It may be very useful where a Church school cannot be maintained .as long as it is not made subservient to the interests of some special denomination, but the usual instruction of a union school, however useful in its place, can only supply the scriptural foundation for the full systematic instruction in the faith, which the children of the (Church should have. Secondly, the clergy should impress on their people the duty of bringing their children and young people to Church, and of having them sit beside them. The Sunday School is invaluable, but it must .not take the place of the Church of God. 12 ...^. ^.^ ^. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-S) 1.0 1.25 14^1^8 |2.5 U* -.n nil 2.0 1.1 IV^I III™ ^ Illlli4 6" V] <^ /2 m V ^;i '^> /A Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, NY. 14SB0 (716) 873-4503 A \ c iV V % "<^>. 6^ '^,* <> ^ ^ 6^ r^ 178 THE BISHOP OF RUPKUT's LAND. [Paut ]I. Aftei the foniuil opening of the afternoon sitting Arclidcucon Fortin jjresented the report of the connnittee appointed to consider his Lordship's address. Tlie rei)ort was as follows, so far as relates to education : — Your conunittee, in common with the whole synod, have heaul with i)rofoundest interest the weighty and supremely imi)oitaiit deliveiance of his lordsliip as to the disastrous effects of a purely secular system of primary education. In view of the facts cit(;tl and the considerations urged by his lordshij), this committee would propose the following motions for the adoption of the synod : 1. Resolved, that this synod cordially thanks his lordship, the metropolitan, for the words which he has addressed to it on the sub- ject of primary education ; and would respectfully request him to allow of the combination into one pamphlet of that part of his charge, along with those other papers on the same subject to which he referred, so that such a pamphlet may be very widely circulated through the whole province, with a view to informing and moulding public opinion on this subject. 2. Resolved, that, while this synod would gladly see a larger measure of religious teaching in our schools than at present prevails, it trusts that every effort will be made, both by the educational authorities and by the Christian public generally, to render existing regulations on the subject as widely operative and efficient as possil)le. 3. Resolved, that whatever changes in the school i)olicy of this province may in the future be required for the satisfactory solution of the educational problems with which, as a province, we have to deal, this synod stands [)ledged to resist to the utmost any attem[>t to secularize our public schools. 4. Resolved, that his lordship the metropolitan be requested to name a committee of this synod whose duty it shall be to give special and continuous attention to the subject of religious education both in its general beai'ings and in its special relations to the educational policy of this synod, with power to take such action as may seem to- them from time to time to be desirable. CHAPTER V. EDUCATION ! NOT SECULAR NOR SECTARIAN, BUT RELIGIOUS. — EJV THE — REV. J. M. KING, D. D. A Lecture Delivered at the Opening of the Theological Department of Manitoba College, Winnipeg, October, 29th, 188'J. The subject of coininon school education is one which is likely to engage in the near future the public mind in this inovince to an extent which it has not hitherto done. Important changes are fore- shadowed as in contempla^ionT An attempt is to \)e made, it appears, to terminate a system which, however accordant with the views of a section of the inhabitants, can never, and e.specially as it has been wrought, be other than unacceptal>le to the great majority. The best thanks of the country ate due, one need not hesitate to say, to any government which makes an honest endeavour to remedy the existing evils and place the matter of })ublic school education on a more satisfactory basis. The subject is confessedly one of moj'e than ordinary difliculty, even as it is one of the verv last imi)ortance. It has not, indeed, any very close or obvious connection with the work with which, whether as arts or theological students, we are to be engaged. It is neither a question of j)hilosophy nor of theology, strictly sj)eaking ; yet it has claims upon o\ir attention at this moment as one of tlie colleges of the province, which only a few questions, whether of philosophy or theology, jjossess. It is at lea.st a live question and may soon become a burning one. The present lectui-e is given, not as an adequate or exhaustive discussion of the subject, but as a humble aid to its better undei-standing by the people of this province, with whom, it is to be hoped, its ultimate settlement within the limits of Manitoba will be found to rest. Numerous questions are raised when we direct our minds to the consideration of this subject. What form should i)ubliG school education assume ; education, that is, the details of which are determined and its cost met in j^art at least by the state 1 Should it be i^estricted to the elementai-y branches, or should it embrace the higher branches also ? Should it be entirely free or only partially so "? In particular, should it be purely secular ? or should it be at the same time religious, and if religious, in what [179] 180 LECTURE BY REV. J. M. KING, D.D. [Part II. form is the religious ehMueut to Hml place? Wliat I have to say tliis evening will have reference to the la.st only of these questions, whicli, however, is also by far tlie most important. A j)urely secular system of education : one, that is, in which there shoi'ld be no attempt to combine leligious instruction or religious intii ence with the teaching of reading, grammar and other such brarches, has some strong and obvious recouimendations, especially in the present divided state of religious opinion. Fii'St, it is in strict accord with what apptnii-s to be the modern view of the function of the State. According to this view, it is no j)art of this function to teach religious truth. That lies wholly within the domain of con- science, a domain which a power wielding the sword may not enter. Civil government, it is claimed, has been instituted for quite other purposes than that of pi'opagating religious opinions, however true and however important. To use its resources fo)- this end is to misuse them, and in doing so even to r^juder a doubtful service to the truth which it has es[)0used. Again the purelj' secular system of education escapes numberless difficulties which are apt to arise when religious teaching is made to form an integral part of the system. There is no longer any question of what kind and amount of Cliristian instruction should be imparted. There is no more any room for the jealousies of rival denominations, so far as the school system is con- cerned. No branch of the Church, Protestant or Catholic, can feel that another is getting the advantage of it, when all are treated alike, the religious opinions of all being equally ignored. Within one « veiy ;,'(>m'iMl at-copl on this point. The aim surely is, or at at l(!ast ought to be to make gooil citizens, as far as education can bo supposed to make such ; citizens who. by their intelliLfence, their industry, their self control, their respect for law, will tend to b uild nn a stoug and prosperous state ; citizens whose instructed minds, whose trained powers, whose steadfast pri]ici|>les will soive to promote t!ie puT)[ic \v7'TFare. This, and hettTier more nor less, must l)e the aim of the public schools in the view of the state, and as far as suj)i)orted by it ; not more, — it ovei-shoots the mark when it seeks to develop the purely spiritual (jualities, tlie graces of a religious life, except as these are subservient to the ori'ji^iiation and growth of civic virtues ; and not less, it fills as far shorti of the mark when it is viewed as designed simply to give instruction in reading, arithmetic and other such branches, and thereby to promote intelligence and to train intellect. 'I'he idea of the institution is most defective, so defective as to be virtu- ally misleading, which makes the school sin) ply a j)lace for imparting knowledge, or in addition, an intellectual gymnasium. It should be b«'yond question, that tiie state, in undertaking the work of education, can only find an aim at once adequate and consistent in the preparation of the youth, so far as public education can prepare them, for the parts they have to play in civil life. In a single._wo_rd, the aim of the i>ublic school is to make good citizens, or to train the youth of the state, that they shall become good citizens. But to make good citizens, the school must make good men. Chi Lvact er is at least as requisite as intelligence, virtuous habits as trained intellect, to the pro))er equijonent foi" life. The prosperity, whet|ieju4>f the individtial or of theState, rests on a treaclierous basis, wjiich does not rest on integrity and self control. It is often the precursor of ruin. Against that ruin, learning whether of the school_oi" of the college, is but a feeble barrier. Nay, learning divorcee! from morals, disciplined intellecrTTTsengagod from the control of virtuous principle may only make that riiiu more s[)eedy and more complete, may have no other result than to give us more skilful swindlers, or more expert thieves. In this way, the school instructing the mind and cultivating the intellectual facilities while disregarding the moral nature, constitutes a real danger and may become a positive injury both to the individual and to society. In any case it must be obvious that the good man is necessary to constitute the good citizen, and the education thei'efore, which is to promote the society and welfare of the state must be capable of forming good men — it must at least aim at doing so. But to make good men there must Ite moral teaching and moral training ; that is, there must be bQth instruction in the principles of morality and the ettbrt to see that these principles are acted out by those in attendance on the school. The virtues of truthfulness, purity, gentleness, self-control — the virtues which go to <:uw. v.] LECTl'RE HY HKV. J. M. KING, D.IJ. 183 miUc; i^ooil mon — if in any sense native to t\w soil of our fiillen namre, tliime cases punished. The conscience nnist he appealed to. The sense of duty must he • cultivat'd. The habit of obedience must he taught. It is true that the public school is not primarily a s chool of morali ty any more than it is primarily a sc hool of reli gion, hut a teacher charged with the ovemght of chihh'en for five or six hours a day during the most formative pei-iod of life, may not ignore the moral nature, as it reveals itseTTe'^eTy hour in liis j)resence. He must rebuke or punish indolence, falsehood, rudeness, malice, even as he must encourage diligence, truthfulness, purity and gentleness. For him to be indifferent or iieutial in the conflict between good ancTevil, which goes on in the school-room and the play-ground, as really as in the business mart or the legislative hall, of which the heart of the youngesT""?rhiTcris the seat, as undeniably as that of the busiest adult, is virtually to betray the cause of right ; and in mercy at once to the child and to society, he must make his sympathy with goodness, with right character and right conduct, clearly and decisively felt. At any rate, if the public ficiiool is to be the seed-plot of noble character, of generous vii-tues, and not simply of scTjohistic attainments, if it is to fiuoiish society with good citizens, and not simply with smart arithmeticians or possibly with apt criminals, there must be found in it, not only methodical instniction and careful intellectual drill, hut amid all else, as the occasion offers or requires, morarteaching and moral influence. The jtresiding genius in every school, a genius which may i)e often silent but which should never sleep, ought to be a lofty and generous morality. But (and this forms the last link in the argument against a purely secular system of education) moral teaching, to b3 effective in the highest degree, or in any degree near to the highest, must lean on religion and be enforced by its considerations. It is this position «si»ec'.ally that the apologist for a purely secular system refuses to accept. It is claimed that it is possible to teach morality, and morality of a high kind, without introducing the religious element in :iiny form. Everything turns here on what is meant by the teaching ■of moi'rtlity. If l)y this is meant simply pointing out in words what as proper and dutiful in human conduct, defining the duties which u ssmmaamL^^. 184 LECTURK UY KKV. J. M. KING, D.D. [Pakt. IL men owe to each otlier, then it is possible. ^Tho siunnmrifa of morals which are found in the agnostic literature of the jMMiod, not tlie less excellent that they are, in good part, Ijorrowed without acknowledgment from tTuT Bible, demonstrate its possibility. But to how little purpose are duties pointed out in the school-room, or anywhere else, if there are no considerations presented enforcing^ their performance, no sanctions of a high anil sacred kind to secure them against neglect or violation. The whole end contem|)lated in the teaching of morality, is to bring the teaching into practice, to have the precept translated into action. And the main difficulty in the attainment of tHis eiul, as everyone knows, has always been iu connection, not with the rule, but with the motive ; it lias always been, not to point out the direction in which the life should move, but tal»le of pffcotively doiiii,' so. And while the churchos. Protestant and Catholic, aro activt", tluuo ar<' no donUt many rhildicn and yoiint{ |ii'isons not found in u'tuudauc ..MU ^'"' Salihath schools vvitli which they have dotted tho surface of our vast country. The s gittt^red iiaturn of tiie settlonients reni'ii'tic.s of oonduct, v^iL for (nokiiij,' no\)U'. mikI virtuotiH action, n-li<,'ioii.s ti iitli. tTir- truths of our coiimioii ('llri^stillnitv — in other words, the chiciitinn must not ho ahsohitrly scouhir. Tho wi'lfaro of the chihl nnrir.ciple, and likcdy to be pernicious in operation, is it necessary to say that a right-minded man will feel that he has no liberty to employ it to accomjtli.sh any end, however desirable? Truth and right disdain tlu; aid of such weapons. The lloman Catholic church errs, indeed, as most Protestants think, in claiming the absolute ri^httq^rogulate and control the education of its youth. TFTs'ircraim which tlie Tjlate, if it would preserve its independence, cannot afford to concede — cannot allow to be put in operation in schools supported by public funds. But that church has hold of a great truth when it asserts, everywhere and always, that education should be religious, that instruction in the fundamental |)rinciples of morality should go Jiand injiand with instruction in reading and arithmetic. As a Protestant, I am unwilling that it should be left to it to be the only witness for this important truth —important alike to the State and to the Church, and that the Piotestajit churches, through their abandonment of it, should be to that extent placi^l at a disadvantage in the conHict, whether with .sceptical thought or with depraveil conduct. In the interests of Protestantism, therefore, as well as of the puVdic well- being, 1 would venture to ask those whom my words can reach, or my oj)inions can influence, to think twice before they give their consent to tlie banishment of the Bible and religious exercises, and the fundamental truths of the Christian religion from the schools in which the youth of this jirovince are to be taught. If Rome desires to see Protestantism weakened, as we may presume it does, it could wlsli nothing better than to see it take the twjn_systeius of agnostism and secularism for its ally in tlie matter of public school education. A purely secular system of education being open to these grave objections, it is only what we might expect, to iind it condennied more or less stronsrlv bv the various Christian bodies. Our own church has testified during recent yeai-s with increasing unanimity and force, to the importance of the religious element in the instruction given in the public school, and to the desirability of - L^ii) j*:r% 188 LKUTUKK UY HKV. J. M. KIKU, D.D. [Paht II itM Immii^^ oiilur^«>)l nitlicr tliiiii retliiccd iind t'lU* Iuhh cliiniiuttod. And ill tliJH r('8)H>cl it liiiH uiily n'tlocted th*i trend of opinion union^ thouglitful CliriHtiim |>eo|tlo in genend. Accordingly corrcspondinj^ iiction liiiH IxMMi tiikon l»y tlio courts of the otli«'r chnrclu'H. A v«)ico nmy have Ixjon raiwd lioro and there in favor of a puit'ly Hocidur HyHt(!ni, under th(t idea that it in deniaii(U>d liy the princi' le of tho Reparation of Cliureh and State, hut the prevailini; opinion itas been and in unniistakahly a^niinst it or any approacli to it. The truth is, it is not (litHcult to observe tiie existence thr«)Uj,'liout tho country of a deepening; conviction of tlie danger to the state and to public morals, witliout which the state can have no stal)ility, of a system of educa- tion in witich religion has no )>lace. ^s it is in our country,^ is it elsewhere. In some of the Australian colonies, where the syateia has been for some time established, it encounters only a fiercer opposition from tho Christian boilies as its results became more apparent. It is not easy to state with exactness what the reuults have beea of the purely secular system of education, where it has been intro- duced, how far it is responsible for the greater prevalence of certain forms of crime in our dav. It is easv to state what, reasonini; from general pi-inciples, we would expect the results to be ; but it take& time, not one year but many to develop fully the consequences of of such an experiment. I could not help, however, being struck with a jHiragraph in tho Edinburgh /Scotsman for September 2l8t. In Scotland, if I mistake not, the question of religious instruction is left with the school board of each locality. At the time when the system was introduced great opposition was oHTered in a. certain stirring and somewhat radical border-town of Scotland, to any form, of religious instruction in the public school. Now, in the paragraph, referred to, the provo.st of that town is reported as saying, " Matters were getting so bad that he thought the magistrates would have to meet and appoint a piiblia-Adiipi>er. They were reluctant to send boys of such tender years either to prison oi- the reformatory, and he thought the appointment of a public whipper was the only way of successfully co|)ing with si;cli misconduct. Not only parents, l)ut teachers were greatly to blame for the reprehensible conduct of the youth of the town who did not seem to be gettmg the right kind of tuition at school." Is the alternative, then, the Bible in the school, or tlie^ whip^iiug jtost at the police court? And, if so, who would hesitate which to ctroose 1 With these words I pass from the consideration of the purely secular system of public education. I do not know for certain that it is the intention of the government, or of any member of it, to propose its introduction into Manitoba. Hints, indeed something like assurance to this effect, have found their way into the public press. Should this prove well-founded, and the attempt be made to institute OiiAP. v.] LKCTURR HY RKV. J. M. KINO, D.D. 189 a RVHtem of pvtMic hcIuhiI iiiHtruotion, in which loligioii Hlmll ho recoj^nizfil only hy its exi'lusion, I Hiul it ditHciilt to holicvo that the prPHent Houh<', nunilKMini^ muny tliouyhtfiil, C'hristiiin ni<'n, wln-n it iH fnlly 8('i/,o(l of tiic <|iU'.stion, will give tonuch ii nioiiHUio its Himctioii. In fal ami HU|t|iort of many wliosn voi(Mrha|i8 too Hcltlom. on pnltlic (|iio8tioii8. Tlio hope may ho ontor- taine-%i^a!&«;.e*'^ 192 LECTUUE BY REV. J. M. KING, D.D. [Part II. possibly also, though one would desire not, to the Roman Catholic church. But with a conscience clause, such as would be ))rop3riy ini ;luded, excusing attendance on the religious exercises, where so desired by the parents, there "MTDttW'be no just complaint in the case of the former. The number of peojile in the province who do not accept the New Testament, even with the addition of those wlio accej>t neither the Old nor the New, who do not believe in God, is not larij;e, it may be hoped, will never be large ; it cannot be reason- ably claimed that the Bible should on their account be excluded from the j)ub]ic school. It would be a travesty alike of justice and of ])opular government that a mere fraction of the community should virtually dictate the form which public education is to assume contrary to the wishes of the great majority. The people of the province as a whole abide by the Christian faith. The statistics of the several Christian ])odies, the amount of money contributed within the province for religious purjioses, show the keen and general interest which th(^ inhabitants take in the matter. Well, the schools are theirs, are sustained by their money. Surely they have the uncontestable right to give a place in them to their common Christian beliefs, especially where these are seen to be in a high degree helpful, if not indeed iiuli.spensable, to the ends for which the schools exist. The system, while so far meeting the views of Roman Catholics, as it is distinctly religious, will possibly be objectionable to them as a body, though certainly not to all, as not going far enough. They would desire that the public schools should be free to teach, not only the great common beliefs of Christendom, though these surely embrace, if not all that is most vital, yet enough to enfoi'ce the highest morality, but also the distinctive doctrines and rites of the Roman Catholic Chni-ch. 'I^he teacher, while sustained by public funds, must be free not only to read the Holy Scriptures in the vereion most approved by the parents, but to read out of them, or to read into them, the worship of the Virgin Mary, the invocation of saints and whatever is held by the Church of Rome. Now I would not willingly be a party to inflicting injustice in any section of the ■community, and there are special reasons why the claims of our French-speaking Roman Catholic brethren should be fairly and, if possible, even generously considered. They were early in this western land. They have done much, and at great cost — cost not of money only, but of toil and suflfering from the native races. But this claim — the claim to teach the distinctive doctrines and rites of their Church in schools sustained by public moneys — is one I have no hesitation in saying, and as entertaining much regard for some among us by whom it is made, I say it with regret which the state ought not to concede, should not feel itself at liberty to concede. It is a privilege, which under the system proposed, is not granted to Any other church. No other desires to have the opportunity to ''-± Chap. V.] LECTURE BY REV. J. M. KINO, D.D. 193 teacli the distinctive doctrines of Presbyterianism, or Methodism, or even of Protestantism, in the public school, or if any cherish such a wish it would be very properly denied them. There is no room, therefore, to speak of injustice to a class who happen to be in the minority, when exactly the same privileges are granted to them ■which are granted to other classes of the community. If it is a matter of conscience with the Roman Catholic church (it is obviously not with all its members) that the whole body of the faith, as held by it, should be taught even to the youth in attendance on school and in the day school. I see nothing else for it than that they should estaljlish and support from voluntary contributions the schools in which such teaching is to be given. But it were surely far better that our Roman Catholic fellow-citizens should unite with us in securing a distinct recognition of our common Christianity within the public school, leaving what is distinctive, and what in.,ny on the one side and on the other feel to be very important to be taught to the children in the Sabbath school, or in the church, or, better still, jn the home. 'T^ statement is sometimes made — it has been made more than once of late in our city — that the ground now taken implies a denial of right to the Roman Catholic minority in the province, one as real •as if the privilege of separate schools were withdrawn from the Protestant minority in Quebec. But the schools of the majority in Quebec are, as we might expect — distinctively Roman Catholic. The catechisms and formularies of the Church of Rome are taught in them. It is surely to pi'esume on our ignorance to institute in these circumstances a comparison between the position of the minority in our own province and that of the minority in the province of Quebec. It is to trifle with our intelligence to affirm that the denial of separate schools in the one case would be on jt par with its denial in the other. The two cases are really essentially dinei'ent. No well instructed and impartial mind can put them on a level. The attempt will no doubt be made to belittle in various ways the importance of such recognition of religion in our public schools as has been advocated. It will be said, as it has been recently said by a journal published ir. another province, but with special reference to the situation in this one, that little importance is to be attached to religious teaching of a general character, teaching, that is, from which the distinctive doctrines of the several Christian bodies have been eliminated. For such an assertion there is no good ground whatever. The reverse of '1 would be nearer the truth. All the most powerful motives to good ■conduct, all the most efi'ective supports of morality, are found within the common creed of Christendom. They are not the exclusive property of any of the churches. If the unsectarian teaching, there ibre, of the public school would not be influential and influential for 18 HM '^CIiiiii«tS*-»i!rM%ii:viKi i^iUf^m^ I 194 LECTUUK HY HKV. J. M. KINU, D.I). [Part 11. gotxl, it woulil bo {\\iv riitli or two. N(!vertliele.ss, as it floats over our lionu^s, it ri'presents the power of Kngland. And even so, the divine name invok(!d in the opening exercises, the optMi Bible on tho (hssk, holds up to t'.!ueli((r ami selH)lar alike, the presence and the majiwty of (rod. It is true, the exercise may be in soim* cases little more than a sei^nly form, just as tho exercise of private or domestic worship may bo only a form, uiuler cover of which the worshipper dismisses himself only the more securely to a day of unrelieved worldliness. Ihit this possibility is not supposed to constitute a valid reason for discontinuing the cxerci.se in the latter cas(> ; nor should it bo in the foi-mer. It is a reason why school trustees should have more regard to Christian characttM- than they often have, in the choice of i»ersons to be the moral as well as intellectual guides of our youth. This suggests another objection which is sometimes raised. How few public school teachers, it is said, are really tit persons to conduct the religious exerci.ses ref(M-red to? My ac(juaintance with the taachei's of the province is not sutliciently large to enable me to answer this question. Some of them, I know, are among the best, the most con.sistent and earnest members of the several churches, and if others are of a diilerent character — if the religious jtrinciples or the lial)its of any of them are of such a kind as to make the conduct of public prayer by them, or even the jmblic reading of the Bible, an incon- gruity, something like a farce, then in any case, wlietlun' there are I'eligious exercises or not, they are obviously not fit persons to superintend the intellectual and moral training of the youth of this or of any other province. It is not the least important consideration connected with this question, though it is often one lost sigh t of , that the mode of its settlement must have a very marked influence on the character of the public school teachei-s as a class. Eliminate the religious element entirely, make the relation of the teacher to his pupil, just such as that of the tradesman to his apprentice, only that the one teaches reading, writing and arithmetic, the other a trade or handicraft and the general character of those in the profession will be lowered. There will still be those engaged h\ it of high moral and religious princi})le, but the prospect of exercising the profession, and the actual exercise of it, will no longer furnish the same incentive to the cultivation of Chap. V.] LECTURB HY IIBV. J. M. KINO, D.D. 195 such ))i1nci')le. Almost the rnvorso. K(3ligioii will Ijo a sort of dis- (lualiHuation, or at leaHt inconvenience, inaHiuuch as the teachei-'s nioutii niuHt lie Hhut within the school, not only on all which he IioUIh numt HacriHl, hut on all which lie has found nioHt helpful to his own goodnesH. Now the real attainment may full helow the Htandard, will often fall below it in this impeifect world. It will sc^ldom rise above it. With the standard changed, with the [losition of the tea(!her low(>reil by the elimination of the religious element from his sphere, the character of the profession as a whohj will be in time lowered also to the invariable injury of the youth and, therefore, of the country. The final B«ittlement of the cpiestioti, which is now agitating the cofumunity, may be remote. It is possible it nuiy Vje the work of years. Let us cherish the hope, that, when it is reached, it may be one which will not signalize the trium])h of any political or ecclesiastical party, but one in which good men of all parties can take pride, and as the result of which the care and training of our youth shall become an object of greater solicitude to the people of the province, and the ])rofes8ion of the teacher, accordingly rise in general estimation. Gentlemen of the college — whether in the theological or in tlie arts course, be pre[)ared to contribute your part in accomplish- ing such a settlement. Your experience in this institution may perhaps throw valuable light on the question to you, as it has helped, if not to shape yet to strengthen, my convictions on the subject. On the benches of this college there have sat during tlio six years of my connection with it, and there sit to-day representatives of almost all the religious denominations in the proA'ince, Ej)iscoi)alian, Methodist, Baptist, Roman Catholic, and, of course, Presbyterian. The Bible h.is been read every morning and its teachings have Ijeen enfoi'ced, as occasion offered or semed to require. In addition you have been led in pi-ayer l.»y the members of the staff in turn. No one, so lar as I know, has taken offence. No one has asked to be excused attejulance at the religious exercises on conscientious grounds. We have afiTT am sure, been helped by these exercises. The tone of the college^ life has been assuredly raised thereby. Why take away then altogether from the public school that which we have found at once so inoffensive and so u-seful? Let the politician give us some better answer than this, that the Homan Catholic Church, her priests at least, demand that wej shall either tolerate her sectarian schools or ex\)o\ the Bi Me — their Bible as well as ours, from the |)ublic schools, and expel it from the public schools with what result 1 To make it j)ossib]e foi them to recommend or even sanction the support of these schools by their people? Not at all ; their avowed princijjles would forbid it ; but to give them obviously and undeniably the godless character which will go far to justify their condemnation and rejection of them. . ., ■MP ■-W-JW7 CHAPTER VI. THE REV. PRINCIPAL GRANT. (Letter to The Sun— November 16th, 16'S9. ) I accept your invitation to address a Manitoba juidience on the subject of Religion in the Schools, and will endeavor to be brief. Public schools are a necessity in a free state. Freedom cannot exist where „ne people generally are uneducated. For freedom is not the mere power of choice, or the right to choose good or evil. No one has a right to do wrong. Freedom menus insight of what is good, and the power to do the good, against all forces of prejudice or passion. Educate the people, therefore ; that is, make them intel- ligent and moml if you wish them to remain free. The state is bound in self-defence to see to it that a public school is maintained in every district. The matter cannot be left in the hands of parents, for many of them are either careless or blindly selfish. The best school is the family. That, then, is the best public school which is most like the family. The teacher is in the ]>lace of the parent for the time being, and wh it would be thought if the state said to the parent : 'You must not refer to religion when speaking to your children!' Schools will be good only if you succeed in getting good teachei-s, and you will not get good teachers if you deny them reasonable libei'ty in their work, that is, liberties within the boundaries of regulations laid down by the goverimient as expressing the reason and conscience of the community. As a rule, there can be only one school in each district. That is the case in every one of our provinces. It is especially so in Manitoba, where for various reasons population is more sparse than in the older provinces. A system that is dual from top to bottom is, therefore, a great political blunder.. What should be the character of the religious exercises or instruction in the school 1 This is the question that divides men most, and yet I have always found the difficulty to be theoretical rather than practical. Now, in i)olitical arrangements there can be no greater mistake than blindly following a theory,* without regard to facte. It is asserted vehemently that the school must be wholly Secular in chai'acter, because there are diflerences of religious opinion in the district. But there are far wider and more numerous differences in the country than in any one school district, and yet [196] Chap. VI.] THE RBV. PRINCIPAL GRANT. 197 that does not hinder the Senate from having a chaplain, and the House of Commons from beinj? oi)ened with prayer. No one objects to the appointment of publicly paid chaplains to our penitentiaries and asylums, or to our army, and navy ; or, where the ship is small, to a regulation that the captain or doctor shall read prayers. A day of thanksgiving to God is annually ordered. One day in seven is rigidly protected by law, and ordinary labor is forbidden thereon. All these things may seem unjust a?id even oppressive to some individuals, but the state is not likely to forego common rights on their account. We are a Christian people, anth^Noi'vml>i'r, tSSlK) Isji.. r>J:13— " Aiul all thy cliiUlron hIiiiII Im tuuglit of tlie Lord : utul iu;ront hIiuII be tliti |u'«co of tliy cliildren." I liiul inteiuUvl to Hpoiik to yoti (ipon the public Hohool (pKwtioii some weeks paHt, but. iinderstiiiulinf^f tliat the lioiioreil priiioipnl of Manitoba college inteuded to make it the Hubject of his lecttire at the opening of the theological department of the college, I felt it most courteous that the field, ^so far as Knox church pidpit was concerned, should be left untrannueled. And no nuitter what may bo tho various shades of opinion upon the subject I am sure we shall all feel deeply grateful to I3r. King for his very able introduction to, and discussion of, the qu(>stion which, more than any other, is now engaging the public mind. In tho briefer space allotted to me T shall not bo able to deal with the question in full, but can discharge at least my sense of duty to the formation of public opinion upon tho subject. Tho matter is one that deals with the highest moral well being of individuals and society — this is its apjlogy for a i)lace in the pulpit. It is your concern and mine to see th.at our children shall be taught of tho Loi'd, that groat may be the peace of our children. And I wish to say at the beginning, the very dignity and sacred concern of the subject should keep all who speak n|)on it, in the attitude of striving for truth more than victory, and clothe them with a charitai>le spirit, that the spirit of liim whose essence is love, may guide us to a wise and beneficial issue. In the School Times for November, an editorial, upon the desired change of the University from a mei'e examining body to a teaching body, speaks of the ministei-s of the council in this disrespectful language: "The clergy, as a matter of course, are opposed to the change." — which was not true — "but," it goes on to say, *' the clerical mind is a mystery anyway, and we would not be much surprised at them opposing anything." Is that a proper way for an organ devoted to educ vtion to put bofoi"e tli« mind, that is being educated, the whole body of men whose end in life is to teach religion and momlsl Comment is unnecessary. I do not know the writer of that editorial, but it savors more of the petulancy of immaturity than the wisdom of experience — the unguanled expression of one who [198] OiiAP. VTT.l TIIK KKV. rm. DlfVAL. 199 liHH f(>lfc litUn ofiln) woiylit of tliii iiiomi roH|iot>Hil)iIity wliioli atUiiids tlio foriiiiiiioti of tiiiiidH tliiit iiro to form Hociirty ivthI Hliiipo tiio doHtiny of tlid nUiU\ iiiid \vlii(!li, ill thoHO of (!X|i(!rioiioo, Idih WoKott^'ii ut loHHt ilui uriu'.n of |)ni(l(>iic(). ll(!foriii(MH 111(1 (•Mj^a^ii(!ral (MJiioaiioii of itH pcopht. Tho Htato niUHt tiicn-fon) iiujuiro what is the hest niodn of securing education, l»oth to iiinintain itsfdf, and to secure the end for which it exists, naiiHfiy, the hiyhest wcll-heing of the people — (Jan it ho left to private (fiiterpiise'? Oenturies of failure have proved this impossihie. Can we accept the Uoinan Catholic idea that the church is the only authorized teacher'/ Without halting to controvert that dogma upon th»5ological grounds we find (I) That it would be such l)a^.. 200 THE REV. DR. DUVAL. [Part IT. development of constitutional principles which will trend gradually^ but certainly, toward equality of rights. The plain ground taken in the United States is that the govern- ment has no power to specialize any denomination or class to a right not enjoyed by all others. And Roman Catholics ought not to claim it for themselves. And the more so because in their schools the education is not simply to make good citizens, but Ronian Catholics. On the cQiitrai'y you could not tell in one of the so-called Protestant schools to what denomination teacher or pupils belonged, except upon special enquiry. Teachers there are simply seeking to bring up the children to Christian morality, leaving all peculiar tenets to the respective churches and families whence they come. It is an error, therefore, for any one to think that the Province of Manitoba is seeking to do with a Catholic minority what it would not like Quebec to do with a Protestant minority. Mani- toba proposes to do away with even the name Protestant schools, much less Protestant influence. She proposes state schools in which you could not distinguish the denominational bias of any teacher. If Quebec will do this, we will all be satisfied — and this can be done. In the State of Ohio I have had a sweet spirited Roman C.itholic lady teaching my children in one of the classes of the public schools, and she never obtruded any peculiarity of her church upon them. But while it is unwarrantable for the I'espective sects to set up separate schools, upon public funds, to propagate their peculiar tenets, and while I believe the government should inaiigurate one system of schools for general public education, I believe it necessary that these schools should have some religious influence exercised over reading of God's word them— it might be as simple as the solemn and prayer. This is not inconsistent with the separation of Church and State, The prophet can ever exhort the king while he does not rule him. Religious influence is not ecclesiastical influence. The church does not monopolize prayer- -prayer is native to the soul. Tacitus, the heathen, speaks with surprise of a tribe of Fins no degraded as not to pray. It was Franklin, not a confessed Christian, the philosopher friend (not in every sense) of Voltaire, who with tremulous solicitude for unity of spirit in the founders of the great American republic, pleaded in terms akin to inspiration, notwith- standing the principle of separation of church and state, for prayer to the source of all Grace for guidance in the national councils. If, then, the people desire prayer at the beginning of their children's- studies for grace to mould the mind and purify the heart, it is their natural right to have it. No minority, be it agnostic, infidel, Jew or Roman Catholic, has the right to deny to the majority this natural right; while, on the contrary, the majority has no Chap. VIT.] THE REV. DR. DUVAL. 201! light to compel thn minority to conform in any iittitucle of mind or heart contrary to its conHcience ; nor iloes tlie majority wish them to* com form. Members of Conj^jress have the right to stay away from prayer ; so in our hcIiooIh those wlio wish can he excused. And that is all the right that the minority has in such a case. Suppose an intidel should go to Congress and say, " I am elected to Congress, but so long as your great niajority have prayer I will not come in." What would the maje.sty of sixty millions of people reply ] Would it say, " Well, we will just put it all away to satisfy you]" No; but tliey would say : "We do not interfere with your conscience, you can come in or go home, just as you | (lease. You can attend prayer or come after it. The Sovereign Law is the state's collected will, which sits empiess crowning good and repressing ill." (2) And what is said of prayer applies to the reading of the Bible; the church does not ujonopolize the Bible. It is the good book from which churchi-s draw tlieir instruction and strenirth. But it is al.so the source of intellectual and moral strength to countless souls that are not allied to any church. Chri.st is the Light of the World. The Christian principles which that book contains, have for ages been a part of the common law of European civilization, and especially of the people of the British Isles and their colonies. When our fathers came to this continent thev came in a general sense as a Christian and Bible-loving people. They read it before starting on- their dangerous voyage, and prayed to the common Lord, of whom it speaks, for protection by the way. By its instruction and in its Spirit they gave thanks upon their arrival. They set up homes in its faith; their hearthstones were blessed by its presence ; their marriages and baptisms were solemnized under the sanctions of its ti'uth ; tlieir funerals were conducted with the sym])athy of its grace. It has been with us tl'.e symbol of the presence of God guarding the sanctity of the oaths of testators and witnesses in courts of hiw. Our liberties were born out of it and are sustained by its spirit. Our literature is- filled with it. It is the warp and woof of our whole social character and there are few, indeed, to dispute that it is the secret of the virtue and greatness of the peoples who.se lives it controls. This being so, call it what you will, "Word of God" by the Christian; "Great Work in Moral Science " by the Agnostic — the people have in it a great heritage, and the majority of the people have a prescriptive right to continue its influence in some way as a factor in ]>ublic education, especially when they impose on no one's conscience — religious or non-religious scruples — excusing all who desire to be excused, from any participation in its instruction. Our Jewish fellow-citizens. Agnostics or Roman Catholics, could not ask more if they have any regard for the rights of the majority, the integrity of the country, and the conscientious duty c.r that majority to regulate the country and guide it toward what they deem its highest well-being. And mmmmm f 20'i Tiiii! nrv. nn imvAt.. (I'Airr II <>H|M>i'iii)ly why onr nttiuiiii ( 'iilli(i|ii< ft'llnw rili/.iMiH mIhiiiIiI oltjiM't to Niii'li Mil iKljiMtiiioni, N*>«>iiiu lliiit (liov I'liti liol'l tlii'ic own Mili'fM in (l\i'ir IihihIh.oi, if in tln> nmjority, rlinimo IIh' hounv vciHiitn to Im> rt'iul, oi l»i' t'XiMiHi'tl iVoni nil, uh llicv iimy ••I«m'I. 'I'Ih' ih'oviikm* iltM'H not wiHli to ilo iIm'iii injiiHtiiM', To Iciivo tlic lliltio out of llio Ni')ioo)i« woiilil H<><>in lo niiilti' iIioho hcIiooIh iiiiirr olijt>i-lii)tiMlili* lo llictii, upon (lio |>l(>ii of t«oill('H'r. hiiiy«'ii well |toinlH out, it IH not ii uiiitliT of "till' I'liitli" in tlio t'ulliolic t'lnnfli tlinl iIm> SiMiptiiit* hIiiiII not Itc roiid, Imt it Iihn Ihmmi tlio policy of tli«> li'injui'n of tliiit ohnifli, lor wltnl Hconn'tl to tlicni yoitii nml HiiHii'ii'nt roiiHniiM, to iliHfnnriiu^o itH iiMulin^ innon^ llit> roinnion poopio, iimi " n ninllni' of p«>lii'y. " lu> woll HiivH, ""'uniiol l»inil t ln> conHcit'iico," Ami Koimmii ('nll\oli(> nnthoriticH mi' not ii^ifoil in ohjcction lo t.ln» rcinliiiif of ilio llil)ii> in pnMii' hcIiooIh. < 'iiiilinnl Miinniii!; Iiiin pnliliHlifil Ihh \i('\\s to tlio worlil l)y Hiiyinjj; "I tiin ^Itul t,linl. llii' llildo Ih iciitl in ("ntliolio mill l'i-of«>Htnnt ClniKtimiH linvo ninny fiinilmn<>nliil prinoiploH in limniony ; cnon^li. imloixl, lo nnito in ii HyHlt'in of uiitiiMial hoIiooIh nn plnn, cipiitnlilo to nil, thai will ni:iko tlu> )>rovini>o lioniou[»'n»'onH. pro]u;iHHHivo mwi hmI'o, Ciinnot, fail to in\pn»sH tlio pnlilio niiml with the holiof thai onr Koinan ('al.holio oilizntii>l ; ami, in tho ahsotnv' of that, tho policy of the* iion allilialion anil (lisponition to .j-aw from tho oonntry tho Htrotiirth to nitiinaloly oonti\>l it. 1 hopo wo may not havo losiHon (>von to Huspool it, Ami now witli itigard to tlioso of non t MiriHtian HontiniontH, 1 rtp|xvil to thoni to think HOiioiiHly hoforo Ihoy oppoH(» (MiriHtian inthuMioo in tho pnhlio schools. Ami to Ihoso yonnjj«fnlly. Tho idea of a system of schools without any roliju;ioua inllnonco, whom tho .low and Ohristian, ajjnostio and intidol, can all ho on tho samo footinjj;. hooiiih indeed hroad and gononnis. Ihit it is as spocious as l)road, an dangonius as goiuMVUs. You aiv to lusk on whoso footinij yon aro putting all. Is it not hringing all down to tho footing of tho agnoHtic? is it not asking. pcrhai>s, ninety per C(»iit. of tho people whoso hOuIh have gmwn to the idea that in all their ways they should acknowledgo (rod. that He might dinvt their paths, to say in this most important way. " Wo will not acknowle«lgo Him, and don't euro whether Ho diiVK?t« our jwth or not I" And you ask men of position, faith and Iri'Hlly princijile, to do this lor the sake of a small minority who are at l>est negative on the subjot't. And you do it heedlessly. You do it while this gixwt majority is willing to excuse this minority from any {participation in the feature to which they object. (2) You do it to try a dangeivius ex|>eriment Daniel Webster, in a masterly , wliMi, l(y wlidiri, Iimh it'\m\itUH tiiifli h«'Mi »'X«li|il» vciitiir*' tlic iiiMtiil w<>ll lii'iii^ (if IIiIh |ii(ivini'«< ii|i(iii fi iioHtnini (Imt \iim Iim'I mm liiNldi'icf WMi'i'Miit I'lorii lliit VHiioiiH hcIimoIn (if ii'|iiitiili|<' psv'liio |iliyHiri(iiiH ' 'I'Im< f>x|M>i'itii« tni(;lit. w«* fx|i«'t-l. it to I'liil iiriirMii^ t)iOK« Ichm mIiIh to ii|i|ii«>ciM((t llio rnotivPH fiiiiiiHliftl \ty |iliil(m(i|i|iy, I liiivn ill 11 h^MiT (Vdrn l)r, |)iiiy(«ii, tlio chho oC ( !orii»'ll I'lilvfTKifcy. l\ WMH " rolllMllMl IIH M. M<'CI||m|' KclirXil ll||f| III! rcl i(^i')IIH t flicll i !)(/ WMH to li«< MiiiiMf^l, il' nnl< iiroliiliitfil. Tint olijfct, wum to |ii)'Vfiit i«-liui'MiN liiiiH in klin iMirNiiit of ititx|ioritii«'tit liiul l»»'fn fiiiily ivwl, urnl wliilf Pi»'Hiil»'?it Wliitn WHH nimi'iit. mm Ihh ron'iyii tniHHidti (or tlm f^ovciririiMit, t|i»i vi('«> |»icMiil«Mit, liiniHcir iiti iivow«'(| it^rioKtic, fwitriffl tli»' pniloi of flifl ( Niii^rfmHioiiiil piiHtfH', tlio l(«'v. Mr 'l'yl»M, orio Stit,iii(|iiy nij^lit, iiikI, iiliiiilftly Hiiid : " Mr. 'VyU'r, we rniiHt, liiiv«t |ir«'ii('liiii^ itt, t.li<- I 'nivjirKity.' Tlio pHHtor with Hiir|)riHo, ro|ili«»(|, "Wluit.? l>o you Hay tliat, ? Ami piiiy why?" " MociniHn wf* cMiirioh do our work withrxit it." " Why not I" " |{li(;fitioii on tho part of tlio stiidoiitH; tln^y riiiiHt l>« tiiovrd. And an inatLorH aro, tli'ty (;an ho iriovtid hy moral ronsidfira- tioMH and relij^ionH HmitirnontH," 'l'li»! n'Hidt waw tho hiiilding of Haxo(Iha|»(d and tho cndowninont of its |inlpit hy Mr. Haj^c's son. Anposed wise men of having no thought untincturerl with religious prejudice — a judgment itself born of narrowness and inexperience. It was Dr. Guyot, the classmate and com])eer of Agassiz who, as pro- fessor of geology and physical geography, revolutioniwid America in the study of geography, who delivered 6ve Imndred lectures on the moral development of the world ; who in his own study tfsMA^^^i^^*^^*--^*^!!^^ 'iSJMimi. 204 THE REV. DR. DUVAL. [Part II. said to me : ** It makes no difference whether a man is Atheist or Theist, Pagan or Christian, he can never be in harmony with the universe until he accepts and walks by this law that the dirt is to serve the vegetable, the veji;etable the animal, the animal the intellectual, the intellectual the moral, whose soul or animating substance is the spirit of God." Such thought from a scientist leads us not only to the truth that the moral is the true end of education, but that its perfection is gained through religious unity with the spirit of Go.l ; and this truth is being more and more felt by deep thinkei's. If, then, education is to be looked upon, not as a lop-sided, but full development of the whole man in the harmony of all his parts, we must not neglect to daily weave, in the textures of our children's character, the sentiments of reverence and love, trust and gratitude toward God ; for if these be lacking, the texture will be coai-se, the character incomplete and mcHU, and the coming generations will fail to manifest those sentiments toward their fellow-men in the degree that they are due. You get no power to make your grateful flowers grow that is not froui the sun in the heavens. If there are men who will not listen to a preacher of the gospel on the subject, let them listen to men of science and philosophy. And to those who think intellectual culture will accomplish everything let them know that the ante-Christian civilizations had their highest intellectual culture synchronous with their most beastial depi-avity. While philosophy controls in a good degree a few deep thinkers, it has never held back the mass of society from corruption. Not only is intellectual culture unable to give moral security — it often destroys- it. Victor Cousin, the profoundest of the French philoso])hers, in an address before the Chamber of Peers, decl .red that " any system of school training which shar])eiis and stiengthens the intellectual powers without supplying moral culture and religious principle, is a curse rather than a blessing." Gentlemen, this is worthy of your thought. Mr. Herbert Spencer, after profound reseai'ch in human culture, says : " The belief iu the moralizing effects of intellectual culture is absurd." Dr. Thomas Arnold, the eminent educator, of whom it was said, "If elected to Kugby, he would change the face of education all through the j)ublic schools of England," has said, " If, having learned all that they (scientific and literary institutions) can teach us, the knowledge so gained shall hide fi'om us our moral ignorance and make us look on ourselves as educated men, then they will be more than inefficient or incom))Iete — they will have been to- us positively mischievous." Professor Townsend quotes as indis|)ut- able the aphorism that " mere intellectual training does not inspire patriotism or reduce crime," and beforo we make haste to set aside that great book frotn a controlling influence in public education, let. us hear the words even of P)ofessor Huxley ; " I have always been strongly in favor of secular education, in the sense of education with- Chap. VII.] THE REV. DR. DUVAL. 205 out theology ; but I must confess I have been no Uiss seiiously i^er- plexed to know by what practical measures the religious feeling, which is the essential bisis of conduct, was to be kept up in the utterly chaotic state of opinions on these mattei-s, without the use of the Bible, By the study of what other book could children be so humanized T The idea of the respective churches and families being sufficient to offset the moral defect in every-day public education, has its fallacy in a misconception of the nature of the soul, which is a unit. You cannot say to Professor B.: "Take my boy and educate his intellect, and then I will send him to Dr. C. to train his spiritual nature." You might as well say to A., who has been eating imnioderately, " Go now and pray the ])ain away." Religion is to condition the whole life of a man, to bring his every thought, feeling, and action into harmony with vij-tue. This position I took in a lecture before the Educational Association of the State of Delaware in 1882, and, so far, have seen no reason to change it. Prussia says: "Whatever you would have appear in a nation's life you must jjut in the public schools," I have no altei-native to men tion ; I believe the province should have one system of public schools; that they should be under Ciiristian influence, and that, with the proper concessions to the consciences of individuals, there will be no injustice to any man. And I am willing to trust the people of Manitoba, under the guidance of God. to keep with integrity that heart which has hitherto thrown, through all their social body, the pure red blood of their better life. ■■;!»i^ik%>Mtii^mmtKmm>^i \»»^'^*^te«;sMi^#sfifiis^^ ! ,. ■" i CIIAPTKH VllI KXrHACT rilOM A SPEECH OF MR. JAMES FISHER, M.P P. ( l)r!ir'<' A-isrinlih/, :?nil Mitrrh, 1S!>?.) 1 now turn to Jinollici-, tuu\ t\ (liU'crcMil. pliMsi^ of l\\v (|n(»Ht.i()n. T s>H)|)iist> it will not lt(^ (l(>nio(l tliat (Ikm'o is a ycnoiMl o(iinion mnong (lie Pro((>,st;int niJijovity in this jimviiu'o t.liut tlio ctluontional clanHos in I lie ('ontVtIoraliou Aot, urotoctinja; or purport in sj; to protoot tlio ( ":itlioli«' n\ii\il that if the piihlic men of the Protestant faith had not failed in their alving correctly as to what the general impression is. I will tptoto from Mr. Palton Mct^irthy. Addrt>ssing a great Protestant meeting in Ottawa in DeciMubev of 1S8l), he said ; — W h;\t have we to hoant of as the eiitcenio of tlio Act of ITiiioii ? A separate soln^ol system iiiiposcd on tlio pooitli^ of froc Ontario by their own votes? No Search tlic records ami yoii will liiul that the Act for the settlement of tlio separate school (|uestion was imposotl on tlie pooplo of the Fppi r I rovince l>y the vote of the pooplo of the l^iwor Province, and against the will oi the people of the I'ppor Province. It is (M\tirely correct to say that it was hy the votes of the French representatives of Lower (^anachi, and against the votes of the I'opre- sentatives of ITppiu' Canada, that the separate school system was tinallv st>tth>d in Upper Canada in lSt»3, and so far I tpiite agree with the speaker. Mr. Mct^arthy then takes up the eilucation clauses in the li N, A. Act, atul continues : — Search the H. N . A. Act and you will soo that it was attcmi)tiO(l to he fa-stened on yen for all time hy this oruanie law, the IV X, A. Act, as a part of tlio liargain niatlo at the time of (\ifiT7'Tt?ra^on. That and similar onaotmcnts have wo to thank for the present state of alVairs ; that ia the result of Lord Durham's well meant labours. Ho hrougiit ua togothor, thinking that tho Knk'lish majority would ultimately govern ; ho hrought us together with tho belief that lie was doing the greatest possible bcnotit to ua and to tiioni. Wo came touetlier ; we assembled in a oomnion parliament, but by the skilful direction of the French t'anatlian vote, and the desire for power among tho Kiikrlish and consoipicnt division among them, tho French Canadians were idtimately able to place their feet on our neoka and iinnoso laws on ua contrary to our will, and we camo out of partnership taking tho smaller share of the assets . [2tH)] 5 " l^.v;■^•v^?";r' Chap. V1II.| hikkoh (»k mil jamks kihiikh, m.pi'. 207 PoHHihIy iliis InnyuHf^f may Ito ()[ioii to two iiiwuiiiii^B, Ijiit I hikIcihImikI IIk^ Htiitrinciit timt tlio Hfpanito Hcliool «yHt«Mn was '*att»'m|>t«Ml to lt(> InHlfMUMl on im" \ty tlio H. N. A. Act, t(j iikniii tliat it was Hoiimtliiiif/ Hoiifflit to lui fastciK^fl on PiotoHtaiits l»y (/'atliolics. Tliat may lio iMr. haltoii MoUaitliy'H opinion, Imt I want to ssay if (liiit lie liiH nicfUiin;^' tluit tlnTo is not a woid of truth in it ; and to prove tlint I am ri^^lit l(!t in«^ iniincnsc niiijority aro h'rcncli llonian (Jatlioiics. Tliey had in tin' provjnco two HyHtcms of moIiooIh as they had in this provinco licfon* |S!K). In (Mitnrio tlio ('atlioiicH hud thfiir Hfipaintn hcIiooIh ; in t^iM'|)(>(! tln> l'iot( .stunt minority hiid their (lisKontient H(!hoo!s. WIkmi th(! propoHilion lor (JonfiMlnration caine up tlio Prote.stant minority in (.^uehor woro nxcoodiii{);ly afraid tliat thoy wcaild ho put under tins control of the Catholic majority of that pravincf! in roHpeet to education. They made two demMiida aR a condition of union, liiHt, that theie would ho a proviHion in the coiiHtitution whore- by any riijhts that they had at the Union in resjKfct to their schools hIiouIiI nevcu' he taken away from them, no that the legislature of t^uehec skould have no power to interffue with tla^se rights, and second, that hefore tliey entered the Union the school law shoidd he amended so as to HMnovo cerltiin ohjections then made to it by the Protestant minority. Tln^y denifinded that the school law should bo improved so as to satisfy them, as a minority latfore the Union, in order that in the futnr«! they would have the law as amended guaninteed to tluMn. Oik; of the changes they demanded, as I recollect the history of it, was that th' y should have a separate board of education. Now it is fair to state that the position of the Protest- ant minority in Quiibec was in my opinion (liferent altogether from that of the (Jatholic minority in Ontario. fn the latter the system of the majority was non-sectarian, in Quebec it was a Catholic system. It was natural therefore that the Protresenting Lower Canada. Spenking in the Confederation deliatc; on ludialf of that minority at an early p«!rif»d in tlie debate, he .said : Another rincftion which he hiid propoHed to ])ut had reference to the oducdtionnl Hyateni f)f Lowei- (Iana« aware that this was a question nn which there was a great deal of feeling in this section of the province amongst the Hnglish-sj)eaking nr the Protestant class of the population. >^?nong that class there was no phase or feature of those threatened cli)m<;e8 which excited so much alarm .as this very question of education. Well, the Minister of Finance had said that the i I ■iSafii ^1»*ai^'*Mi«i.5'^3al«^^ 208 SPEECH OF MK. JAMES FlSHBIt, M.PP. [Pakt II. ■Government would ln-ing tlown amentedly exercise very considerable influence ui)i>n the discussion of the Confederation scheme, ami probably in the last resort from several menibers from Lower ("auada. On a subsequent date Mr, Holton said : Tlie English I'rotostants of Tjower Canada desire to know what is to be done ni the matter of ediu'ation before the final voice of the peo])le of this country is pronounced on the ((uestion of Jon federation. To this statement Sir John Macilonald replied ; "There was a good deal of apprehension in Lower Canada, on the part of the minority there, as to the possible effect of Confederation on their uglits on the subject of education, and it was the inten- tion of the (lovernment, if Parliament ajjproved the scheme of Confederation, to lay before the House this session certain amendments to the school law to operate a^a sort of guarantee against any infringement by the majority of the rights of the minority in this matter. . . Before Confederation is adopted the (ioverinnent would bring e of disquieting these fears of the Protestant minority from his province, Mr. D'Ai'cy McGee, an Irish Catholic from Lower Canada, said : I have no doubt whatever, with a good deal of moderation and a proper degree of firmness, all that the Protestant minority in Lower Canada can require by way of security to their educational system will be cheerfully granted to them by this House. The Hon. George Brown, the noted champion of national scliools in Upper Canada, had given special attention to the education clauses, and he recognized fully the deep anxiety felt in Lower 'Canada on the question. Referring to tlie satisfaction that existed I ■ Chap. VIIL] speech op mb. james fishek, m.pp. 209 in Up|)(!r Canada with the existing urmngements as to education, he dechirod that : It was not so as regards Lower Canada, for there were matters of wliich the Britisii popiUation have long complained, and soiiic amenchnuritH to the existing school Act were rocinirod to sucure them e(|iial justice. \Vell, when this point was raised, gentlemen of all parties in liower Canada at once expressed themselves prepared to treat it in a frauk and conciliatory manner with a vitiw to removing any injustice that might l)e shown to exist ; and on this understanding the educational clause was adopted by the (Confederation. Sir K. P. Tache, then Prime Minister, in further reply to the fears expressed by Mr. Sanborn, said : Mr. Sanborn gave exprpssion to the fear that the Protestant English element of Lower (lanada would l)e in danger if this measure should pass. He said as much as this, that in the Legislature of Lower Canada Acts might be passed which would deprive educational institutions there of their rights, and even of their property. But if the lower l)ranch of the Legislature (that is, the provincial one) '/ere insensate enough and wicked eur jgh to commit some flagrant act of injustice against the Knglish Protestant portion of the com- munity, they would be checked by the genera' (that is, the Federal) govern- ment. Hon. Mr. Dorion, the chief of the Rouge party of Quebec, referrc ■ to the demand made by the Protestants of Lower Canada for protec- tion, and expressed his sympathy with them in these terms : There is at this moment a movement on the part of the British Protestants in Lower Canada to have some protection and guarantee for their educational establishments in this province put info the scheme of Confederation, should it be adopted ; and far from fincling fault with them, I respect them more for their energy in seeking protection for their separate interests. I think it but just that the Protestant minority should be protected in itg. rights in every- thing that was dear to it as a distinct nationality, and should not lie at the discretion of the majority in this respect, and for this reason I am ready to extend to my Protestant fellow-citizens in Lower Canada, of Britisli origin, the fullest justice in all things, and I wish to see their interests as a minority gixaranteed and protected in every scheme which may be adopted. Hon. Mr, Laframboise, a French expressed himself in this candid way : There is one certain fact, and that is that the Protestants of Lower Canada have said to the Government, " Pass a measure which shall guarantee to us the stability and protection of our educational system and of our religious institutions, and we will support your scheme of Confederation ; unless you do so we will never support you, because we do not wish to place ourselves at the mercy of a local legislature, three-fourths of the members of which will be Catholics." I admit that in doing this they have only done their duty ; for who can say, after all, what ten years may bring forth. Sir John Rose, one of the most prominent representatives of the Lower Canadian minority, expre.ssed his sense of the keen feeling that prevailed among his jjeople in these terms : • It is a very grave and anxious question for us to consider, especially the minority in Lower Canada, how far our mutual rights and interests are respected and guarded. Catholic from Lower Canada, 210 BI'KKC'II OV MU. .lAMICH IMHIIKU, M.H'. [Paut 11. ii A^iuii Sii- .lolin HoN(< r«i| nniml \vi(li Hticli HulV^mu'ds lliivt (hi)H(' will) oonm iiftor uh will Icol thiit tli y -iro piotiM'tcd in nil tiny Imlil »loftr. And Mjjtiin lie hmvh : liookin^ at tlio RoltiMiic. then, from the Htiin(l|ioiid' of nil I'/iiLrlifili I'lotcHtaiit in Lower Cnnadn. U>t int> hoo wliotlicr tlio inti'ii'stR of tlioHc ol my own riuio and reiiijion in tlint w'ctioii nrc Hnfcly and |n-o|»'ily ^iiinrded. 'riieic nrc (M>rtniii points upon wliioli they feel the grentest inten'Ht. nnd with regnnl to which ifc \H hut proper thnt they xhonld he nHRiueil tlinl theru nre aiillioieiit Hnf(>giinrds piwided for their preBervnIion. And ontv nioro Sir «)ohn Koho dorliut'H : 1 helieve tluH in the HrRt time nImoRt in the liiRtory of Lower ('nnmln thnt tlu'i-e has heen any excitement or movement or nuitntion on the iini t of tho Knglinh I'l-oteHtniit popidntion of Lower I'aiindn in reforeneo to the eommoti school <|iieHtion. (Hear, henr.) It iH the liiHt time in (he liiHtory of tho country that there haB heen any seriouH apprehenHion nrouHod nmonnHt (hem rojjardin^ tho elementary etlucatioti of their children. ... I would ask my honorable friend, the Attorney-Oeneral Ktwt, whether tho Byntem of educa- tion which is in foivu in liower Canada at the time of tho proclamation in to remain and be tho nyBtom of oduontion for all (imo to como ; and that what- ever riglUs are uivon to either of tho ndigioun Hootions alinll oontinno to he guaranteed to tliom. To this livst question of Sir -John Roso, Sir (Jloorgo ( Jartior unswtMvd : It is the intention «if the Oovornment that in that law thoro will ho a provision (hat will secure tho I'rotestant minority in Lower (Janadn such man.'igement .and control over their schools ns will satisfy them. Col. lliuiltnin, a militant Protostant frotn Uppor Canada, said : An opposition to this schomo hivs hoon very decidedly oxprossed l»y a certain section of tho Protostiint minority in Lower Canada. I am aware from jxM-son.'d intorcoui*8o with many gontlomon holonging to that Boution of tho community that they ilo feel a very strong aversion to this Bohomo hecnnse, us they s!\y, it will place them at tho mercy of tho l<'ronch-('anadians. . . . And 1 must sjky. for my own part, that I do think tho Protestant minority have some grounds for ♦his fear. ... 1 sp-eak what I know when I say thoro is a feeling of distrust on tho part of a groat many of tho ProtoBtants of Lower Canada. 1 liavo tronbletl honorable nienibors, Mr. Speaker, with soniewlmt long extracts from the Confederation (hdiate. J wisheil to impress on the Ilonse that thmughont that discussion, from the hogimiing to the end of it, there was hardly a question raised about the rights that were to be ])rotectr(l by these educational clauses, except for the Protest'Mits of Ixiwer Canada. Hartlly one word. Tho only sug- gestion that was made on behalf of Roman Catholics was, that if, in answer to the demands of the Prote.stjints of Lower Canada these safeguards were given, it would be only fair that the Catholics of II ClIAl'. Virr. I Hl'KKCMI OK MH. .lAMKH KIHIIKH, M.I'P, 211 U|)|M>i- ('iiiimiIh hIiouIiI Iihvo I,Ii(i HiiiiKt pr<)t«''ftioii ncM'onloti Miniii. AikI (litt 1)1(1)1(1 and liiir mikI tolcniiit H|*ii'it of I'i'otcHtiuitH liko (^'or'^o Itrovvii kimI <«iilt, Miick(t tJciiKinf, \vii.4 aimed ab in a niann«M' HalJHt'actory to all claHHeH. 'I'lio llonH(» will now mm how ntt(»rly far froni tlio tnitli in iIm» oft-ntpdatod and ^(tncially a(!('(nl il / It is worlli while to fri'MJl ilioHi< inii-it'Hliiig cvkiiIh in oonnoetion with iM\r )>oHi(ii>n io ilnv. 'PIn' 'ln\e(imi»>tH Wfie (IniH j>lin'»>il in M n\oHt M\\l<\vtntl ptwilinn 'l'l\i« Pritd'Hiiml niiimiilv of <.^ni'lM>r luHiti\i>lv it'inMfil (o foiiin inln ( 'iinl'iilrtiHinn il' llicv <'o\tlil not fiv\ tlu'ir Inw mni'itilcil, iind ili» hsKimI \o cunn' in nnlil ilii'v yol i(, ni\il nnli'MH if whb gnnrnnh'i'il to llii-ni 1'ov nil tin\t> (o fotni'. Tlic tlilllcnitv IIhih llni-mtMnng till' I'nion wuh solvotl l>v Hie Ui i 'lulict. tlic gii'iU ohii't" of ll\»> <'iUhoIi'" K»»>nt'linn'n ti>mi'M(«nting l.mvt'r rmunln. Me «rti.l io l1>i> r»n>(«>niu>l>oo liMH n pnilintnonl ol' ilR mvti, one ol' IIb IWhI. AcIm will ho to p\»t \inon its Rtntnto l>ooU tlio Inw tliitt wo fnnlil not got oti oni' «tnt\iook lnM-»> to dny." Tluit, I any, wns tln> |uoniiHo given Ity thnt V'»i*noh t'nlholio ohicr, nnd tho rroloHtiinlH of liowci- ( 'iniinlii iooV liis wonl I'ov it. 'Vliey lieli«>v<'i| ll\ut tln» ))roiniHt> of n |tnMii' mnn. Hv>lon\nly giv»>n on a soloinn oot-aRJon i\nil n-Hpccling a Holeinii olain^ of rt wvtion of tln> poopltv wonM lio Holcnntly voHpodcil, mnl it >VrtH ivs])«vt«vl. I \\o\\'\ know w1\(>(Ih>i- it wan in (lie liiHt or tlto ROivn»l s«^Rsi(>\i o\' tin' (.^iu'licc l,ogiRlntni"o thai it was ilono, Iml (hat pixMnisi' was oaniod otit in g»h>il faith. Sir (loorge rnrlior wnn hiin- soil ohvttvl to tha« 1 ,ogislM(\n-o, in\tl 1 lu»liovo ho songht olootiiai with tho ono puvposo ot lioing in a posit io)\ to i-nny out his Rolonni plotlgo. and so lio gH>t tho juomisoil law pasHOtl Tho odnoationnl oIiimhoh rt»K>ptotl in 1S(^.^ jM\>vi.lo(l. as 1 havo said, only for (ho Hiilognnnling of rights tho n\inority had at th<> tinn> of tho union. Sir (Joorgj^ Oartiov thon^t'oiv foiuul hitnsolf in this position. Mo oould not, iH'fojv tho ostaMishniotU of tho ntiion. givo tho I'rott'starits of t^uolioo what ho had )M\Mnisod to givo thoni ; ho hml to go nnd got tho lx\siisl;)tnvo of (^>nol>oo tv> giro it. lUit (ho Confodoration sohonio, as t.lion sottlod. did not pn>vido tor protooting oi- siitoguat'diug rights that might Iv oi-oatod l>y tho l,ogislat\nx> of ty^iiohoo aftor tho tniion. To ct^tvt tliis p»ir|H>so it was tnnvssary to n\odity, or rathor t«> widen, tlio odnoiUivMial olausos. When. (h(M"oloi"o. tho (tovornmont oon»ph»tod thoir drftt't V\'>nt'odoia(ion Aot thoy insortcd in it this further pi-o- vision. that not o»dy should tho rights of tho n\ij\ority at tho time of tho union with ivs|>ivt U< soh(>ols ho porpo(Ui«tod and n(>v(-r taken away tVtMn tlunn, hut that if any legislation was passod with regard to thoni at\ov tho union, hy any provinoial logislatutr. the rights oivatod thoixnindor oould i\'»vor ho (akon away fnnn thoui. 1 have attiMuptod to show you. Mr. Speaker, and I trust 1 havo offoivvi sut^ioiont ovidonoo to ^atvsfy tho House that thoio has hoon a jnisappivhonsion. to say tho least, as to the cause of these clauses CiiAi'. VIII I Hi'i'K'if or tun. .ni^tf,^ pinkkr, m.pp. 219 (i|i|i('(iiiii^ in llin ('(iiif('i|»ii(irMiri Ad ('if Mi«« |ii'ot(>( 'if the Ikui. ^mi) l«>rri'«| in tlif* Hf(ifii(«* wif.li M vii'W cliiodv In \tri>li'<'M\m Mio I'rotfHt.Mfit rninniil V in lJn> niiilntcMiiMcc .if wlidt llicy f li'>iij;|i>. t heir I»l{mI find jiihI cij^lilM I witnl. to .'ii'tw if it will nvci \iv rliMiy»«r| Hj/Min, in IVliiniJnlin nf, ImihI, tliat. MiIh wmh ii Hclicnif. (if (lie liomiin f 'ni,liolir«. Ami yel I lenil )i few miiiiit/H iit;«>('li (if liin licrc, (|clivi'i)«l in Kcliiiiiii y, \Mf(), in wlii(di he uneH tlio folldwiny InnyiLiyf Id tlic H/mie cirfw-f ; I it fr'iKi Mk- I'rdvinc'' (if ''ritftri(» will cull 'III t.liJH lldiiHc fdf it,M iii'l (,(i lildt (iiif, tlic MC|in.rftt.(' Hcliddl cIhiiw frurri till' MiIMmIi Ndilli Aim'tica Act, wliidi limitu aii'l f(tttcrM flic iicdplc 'if th/ifc I'liiit r-lMiiMc w/iH cnrric'l liy n iimidrity df Krcriohf 'ftfiftdinii", 'ifid lldVIIK'l' wiiH iiiiiiiiHCil it|idii till- |i<'dplc (if Oiitnrid fiLdiiiiMt tlicir will nri'l I ntn Bdiry td 'lilf'-r fi-diii my li'ni. Ii'/idci dii ttiiit i|iicntidii. lie Icllx iih aii'l I never feel iiidre liiimiliiifcl tlmii wIk^ii I lienr fiiiii Hpeak 'ni tliftt Hiilij(^(»t -thftt' lie |ifirtiei|iiit(*(1 ill itripdHiii({ Hint He|inrnt(i Meliddl nyftterri ii|i'iri iim. If Mr. MdCiuMiy whh H|ii'«kini/ (»f the ifn[io«iti(in (if tlie Bfilifiol HyHl(Mii (III I '|i|i('r ( 'iiriiulH in tlit! lirHt |il)i(;(<, lie whh Hpniikin^ the tiiith, liiit if he ii|i|iliei| it U> the l». N. A. Aofc IiIh »tit«nient whh uttorly withdiit fdiindHtidfi. Ah (I mutter df ftict, Lower f 'afiU'liiuiH were rnor« Htronj/ly d^icidfwl — I nienn their leiiilinj^ in(«n wer(* — (ij^ninHt (!drifederiiti(»ri thiin II|i(ier < 'iintidiiinR were. It whh the II|i|ier (Iiinadiiui merriherH, indeed, that enrri«(d (/dnledenition, imd many of th'i leiidini/ Krenehrneti of Quebec w(>i'e iij^ninHt it, Ko thiit it eoiild not Ik^ true, mm «us<^eHt,ed Wy Mr. hiiltoii MiiCiftilhy, thiit these liniitHtioriH in tli*! I'. N. A. Act w«!ro iinpoHed M|ion iih iib tin* dictation of l/»wer (JHnHdH. •^WfWiiPIHBIBISiSiP ■nmMUl ■■* ^ '%'^>:i*imm4Mtmm.w*m-j!^ I'immmtMM initmi . ^^^!4HMm.i^ i; ('IIAI'TKU IX. THE REV. DR. LAING'S LETTER TO MR. EWART. Tiir, Manhk, Dundah, Ont., John S. Kwaut, Ksg. Mmr/i .'.'»./, tSir>. DcHV Sir, — Vour two open Icttci-H on llio IMiiiiitoliii Soliool (^noH- lion* liuvc IxH'M \m{ in niv liunds hy a friiMul. I Inivc rend llmni widi inUMVHt. In tluMr ntnin poHitions I fully ii>(i«m'. 'I'Iic t|U('H(ion lis wo K(H» today in tln' I'russian aj);ilati«)n, and tli<> propoHcd Httli An»ondinrnt to the Constitution of tlH> United StatcH, ia world-wide, and will not !)(> settled aa lon^ as a Uoine olainia (1) to be TIIK (^liinvli ; ('J) as sm'li to liave dominion over lvinu[H and legialaturnH, and to aUsolvo from ol)edienc(> Ity tli«» faithful to all laws det^lanMJ by Konie to he wronji ; (M) to have the ri^ht to inteifere in eivil athiirH, and l>e reeojjnized as |>oss«>ssiny; civil riji[hts nn a rJnireh in ovory nation. The ooniliet ltetw<»en this Ahsolntisin and liil)erty will never cease until the latter has won tlu^ day. All this I aeknowl(Mlj;ro and, then>fore. to use Hon. A. Maekenzio's phrase, as a " political exijfenoy," owinj; to shanjefid party feelinsj; among non-Koman . 'atholios, the education of the young must he eonduettnl in view of the /' cf that the lioman Hierarchy <'laims the jus Dirinnm to con»|Md the people which it dominates io suhmit their judgment and will to its dictations and control. Seeing this, 1 presume in ISlanitoha, as in Quehcc, we shall have separate state-supported schools for Uoman (^vtholit's. 1 am far from thinking that the puhlic school system of Ontario, or of 185)0 in Manitoba, is ideally or theoretically the right one. viz., " Secular e»lucation with ;) v»>Htige." I am strongly in favor of use by the State of the liihie .-is the text book in nu)rals which is pn»ferable to any other. In this I am gliul to have the supi)()rt of Prof. Huxlej*. What T complain of is, that while in Quebec the Pmtestant schools can and do teach religion as they deem best, th«^ lilxM-ry to do this is taken from us in Ontario and Manitoba, and devotional exercises are put in place of i*eligioua or rather Biblical moral instruction. And why is this donel (1) We are told because Pi\)testAnts cannot agree among themselves. This I believe to be untrue ; we cau, if we get the chance. ('J Because it would he unfair to Jews and Agnostics to put in the Christian Bible. Not to dwell on the conscience clause, this is also a false i-eason. If the *See pages 219 and 231. ClIAl'. IX.l UKV. I>H. LAINO TO Ml(. KWAKT. 2\!i hililr JH tlio ItoHt iiioi'iil ^iii^i(t.ivn iih wnll iiH |K)Hitivr<, fiml it. iH int.olnniiii t.o hiiv ; (!liriHtiiui |)(>o|il<> tuny not. ^ot ilio lif'st linok iincHUNn otlicrH t,liiiik it. iH not. what < 'liriHl.iiinH iifliini it Ih, vi/., tli»» VVonl of (lod. l',\) IliM-iiMHo in ()nt(iri<» we liiivi' found, HH cJiiiiiMMl liy till' liitn Ar(?hl>iHlio|) liyncli mid Kiitlinr Htiitt'uid, tliiit tlio Honiiin ( 'iilliolicH not onl" Imvf tlio r.irliiHtvr rij^lit to Inivc tlioir hcIiooIh controlifMJ liy tlio liicnircliy, l»nt. tliiit tlio liifinintliy, an rr.j>re- H/'nflnif tlio Uoniiin ('utliolii; tnxpnyn-H, wlio may -It*' |iiil)li(r Hf^hool Hii|i|ioi't<>rH, havo tlio ukiMT to oliji'ct t,o ntij hook that in oppoHcd to tli(< KoniMn (!atlioli(! doctrin*^ or (Miurnh intoi-tiHtH. ft '\h tlio Rouian ('ntlinli(« prirsthnoti in Ontario, not tlio poopio, who provnnt our I'roli'Htant youth Ixiin^ inHtrn(!t.'nomina- tioiiH havo had \\w ri^ht (in Ontario) to oHtahliHli Moparat«! hoIiooIh for thciuHolvoH HJiould thoy dosiro to do Hr». Hut with trif1ins{ oxcoj)- tiouH tlioro liaH not heen a Hymptom of an ctl'ort on the part of I'rotcHtantH to avail thomnolvoH of tho privihtj^o." Now you will pardon mo wlion F say that Htatoinont iH far, far from fair or accord- ing to law oi' fact. (1) No dnnomiwilion cftn havo a hcIiooI aH hucIi. A Soparato Hchool caimot ho known mm KpiHcopalian, MothodiHt or F*resl»ytorian ; in li'.w it iHonly /'roteninnl, i.e., non-(!atholic. t2) A Hoparito ProtoHtant hcIiooI can only ho oHtahliHlxtd whon a Homiiii Oatholi.; toa(!lior in omployod in tho puhlio hcIiooI of that Hoction. In many plao^H a Roman C/atholic toachor \h omployo«l in tho piihlic Hohool : tho law allows this; hut unloHH thoro Ih prioHtly intorforenco or floman (*atholic toxt-hooks an; illof^ally uh(u1, or altara ])ut up and Roman ('atholic worship practisod in tho HchoolhoiisoH no ohjcotion \h mado. In Homo plac(!H tint priost, who hy law cannot be a tnistoo, novertheloHH through Roman (Jatholic trusteeH gets tho control of the Hchool. (3) As a matter of fact, oflTortH to have Separate HchoolH have been successfully opposed, and in one instance valu ;'ole school pro- perty was sold for $5 to the Roman Catholic Separate School Board. (4) If a Protestant Separate school is established, it cannot exercise the privileges conferred by law on the Roman Catholic Separate school. A study of the Ontario Act will prove this exclusively. If Protestants had like privileges our Public School system would not exist for a year. Hence everything has been done ' to make Protestant Se[)arate schools die out, while Roman Catholic schools have been sedulously cherished. , nnB ■ i.-^'mm 91 rt ttHV. tm. rAfWn TO Mtt WWAHt. IPaiit II. ;1 (P*) If tbi' rlnni'li of Kn^lnnil iti'iiplc rmilil iH iliv()l niHiln it riDliiiH nf flMt>f> tniU«H to llu' <'hnii'li of I'lnifliiml Mi>|iii»nto Mi-httnl i) «niili| ltt< i|i>tu> In miiiiv I'nm'H. nnil lln' pnlilir hi>I»oi>I wonM In- Iio|m'|i'mmIv ri iiijili'd, liiil I lit' linv will not nlli»\v ll»li('H «'liun\H MM n Minnv Mi'i« j»ri>miiltli« t»f HcIiomI Arf, |M(l:< Von will Ni<»>, tl\(>ri'foH>. llii> inJMHlii'o of Hii> Oiilmio ln« ■ (I) It fj;ivi»« llii< noninti rnll\olif ilonoinintilioii iMnii'tH ili>niiii pvii'Htliootl, « III! im* )n>( rnli'|iiiM>»M, In cnnlrnl Hh* Hl>)>!\ll\lr Si>l\Ooln. Wlu|(< |*tO«»>M(Mni l(»UI|. fyci«|l( (IM I'nli'pMViM''* nml vlsitojn in thi< Pulilii" hi-IiooIm, wliidi Intli't piiviloKM iM'lonas to till' pticMt hIko i."M It nllo«M Itoninn < 'nllmliiM in n ilisttii't. tln-onifli thcit- prifHlM. to innnniii' tln' imlilir hcIkxiIm ; miil |niti'ti('i\llv tho viijlit lutM Ix'oti ncl«t)o« li'diit'il l>v Hon. A ( VookH, t« W KosM, uml t>. Mownt. if tlti« Honinn t'lilliolif (•li'ii!\ hk nvrh do olijt'ct, to n'\is(» ttnd inli'ifoio willi tin* I>ooInol>iM' HVHii'in wi-io in opotntion lioro if wonlil lie nl lonst t'itii (M Ml Hi'ltools l>o oitlicr ntmiiin t'nfliolic nc I'mlcHliinf. \''1\ All si'liooN Im> tniu\!ti>i>il In Hommt I'lilliolicH m I'lolfHlmil^ wiili ont tho intoit('»i>i\i'o of t no otln'f (.'M All luopoil v ol fni'li lie Insi'il 1\>v tltoif h\\\\ Holtools mtii i\«)t for (lie Hn)>|totl of fin' oflicc. (4) Ho lij);ioos invttnotion l^o ^ixon in imo'Ii i\h llio pitronlH iIi'mIio. 'I'IiIh wnnld bo fi\it Now. sir. witon I took this in Imnd I diil not nionn to wiifo r\i snoh lottotlt I t^Uo tln> lilx'itv of Hondinir von wlint I liitvo ]ntMisliod ott (ln> nni>stii>n. I lo^K witli nnxionn conci'in on llic tnipoit;tnt is<5tio of tliis school unostion, not only in IMnnitnlni nnd TrttMnlM. lM\t it\ (lottttitttv tuid tho I'nifod SintoH. 'I'lioto cnn lie lint otv" ti\i:t1 isstto. liK>itA to pjuotita to I'dtionto tlioif cliildion, lint licfoio tlu^t IS n\n'h«»d tltoi-o toitv '>«> ntnoh iio\tl>lo. Asking yiMtv kii\d fofl>oi»fnniv, 1 lun, yov:.^ ti-nlv. John liMNii N.H — l>r. I/Miitu iloaii-os thni it sltotild l>o tunUMsfood " lliiit flio hKivo lottof wrts i\ot wvitton fof pnliliottion, l«n■f?J>^' rnfuDht in Rnswor to rt pviuUp noto. It is not. fln»vofofo, to Im> i('«riifdt»d uh ii full st>»tnnont of l^v lirtii\<)'s position -thut lio lins otifofnlly Htiitod in two panipliU^ts pnMishod in 1884 nnd 1887. His cliiof di'siro in to hnvo ivliu:io\is instttiofiot^ sfiv«»n iti tho pnhlio sohools ; ntnl lio oontondH ajpunst tho wninsr done to other ohntvhoa l>v ttllowing stiit.<» pdnca'ioti to Iv «\MU.!\>llod In tho HontMU t^rttholio olefjfv, wliilo Ti-otosttmts cannot Iv i»llo\\'«>i tho t»so of tho Kilde ovon in ^(ivin^ volij^ioiiH instruotion to their ohildivn. lMV.)ii\Rp, fot-aooth, .'10,000 llunuin Ofttholio ohildivn in i'^titario attend the pnblic hcIiooIh." cMArrKii X MR IDWART'8 BFIPLY TO THE REV. DR. LAINQ. WfVNffro. /'//// \fnTrh, iHUn. I'KAH Mnt, I liMVc \{\nA wiUi rrnifJi irit^>r»'«f. urifl j(fat,irK!«f,ifm. Ml" |f(t»( iiri'l |piiffi|ilil«tM wliidi v'lii w/'fc kind '«rioiiKh k Hmt (iH fi'iinan rutholifH li)ivr« tlif-ir xrli'-olH \u f hf'mH''lv»'« I'loffHtiifitH hIiouM I»»i wx'umWA HiffiilMf |iri vilr>j^»'N. Yf;n 'lo not. iiHk.tiN f iifHlcfHtiind yoii, Mint, f»H<',ft Pfot,<>Ht»int, (loiiOrtiiriarioTi hIiohM fi<' allowpxl to H«'|inr(it»i itHolf, \a\\ tfiiit. all f'rot^Htiints toj^^tli^r slioiiM fonst.it.nt/? a olfiHN (|i I I nf yniir " \f\\\i^\n" ), and Kf (»»'rrriift/''l t<» rrif»'l'l \\\(nr w\\l«f!'''l all whooh undfir Ht>'t,iit/»ry rnanaycrrM'nt,.* W»' arc flHT'-foic ai^rcri'l iipf»Ti thf fiinflanif-ntal [»arts f»f t.hft f,.ftflienfifl l»y Hio faitlifnl to all laws, ftc," dof-s not in any way A^fcX our lo^iKlation d it. Thf fhinrh cld'nnM to control lej^islatioTi in TJana/la as to education yoii say. Well, many a man asserts imfoiinded claimft t/) his. neighbor's property. It is not a wrongful claim which hurt^; it; ia. the power to enforce it tliat is injurious. Catholics have no jy>wer to accoTn|»lisli anythinjf in Canada other than through lawful and • And MariitoV>a Protestantd approvert of the deprivation.— (En,) l i' ii ' ■ li ii MdM&iyiSMiii 218 \ I MR. EWART TO REV. DR. LAING. [Part II. <5onstitutional means, equally open to all. That they claim to have authority is unimportant. They must play the game with the same counters as other people. The Legislature does not grant privileges to Roman Catholics, and withoid them from Protestants, because of any " claim," but for other reasons. And this brings me to the second point, which is that Roman Catholics play more skilfully and earnestly than Protestants ; and hence alone (as I see it) the denunciation of them. What do we charge against them 1 That they are better disciplined, act better togethei', are more homogeneous, and, takin<^ their creed by authority from their church, instead of by authoi'ity from the Bible, they naturally subordii. tte their views to those of their Bishops. As fittingly might well-justified rebels complain of the discipline of the regular army. It hurts them, it easily overtiirows them, but what is the i-emedy 1 Clearly not assertion that discipline is unfair, but counter discipline. You cannot properly object to the I ishops and Priests acting as officer. Your clergymen aj-e the oi)posing officers, and once a year you hold a council of war — but your army will not fight. You say that Protestants want religious education in the schools. I think it is the Ministei-s, and not the peojjle who so advocate ; just as you think it is the priests, and not the Catholic people, that want their religion taught in the schools. And I put this to you : The Protestants can obtain in Ontario anything they really desire in reference to the schools. Why do they not take what they want 1 You answer me, Politics. But I reply, Politicians pluy to the majorities when they are in earnest. Do you not sometimes feel oppressed with the indifference, the dead inertia, of Protestants, not only with reference to this subject, but to others which to you seem far more important? Believe me. Sir, if Protestants for six months set their hearts upon Protestant religion in the schools, the politicians would tumble over one another, that they might be the firat to give it. Test Catholic sincerity in the same way. Here in Manitoba where there is no pretence, or little, of the people being priest-ridden, the politicians know perfectly well that Catholics vote, almost to a man, for religion in the schools. The liberal candidates in the last Dominion election know it to their cost. Perhaps you may have noticed in the Week a criticism of pamphlets. I have sent a reply, of which I send you a copy, "bears upon the second point to which I have alluded. my It With kind regards, I am, yours sincerely, John S. Ewart. CHAPTER XI. OPEN LETTER PROM MR. EWART TO THE HON. MR GREENWAY. in ^ 2nd January, 1892. To The Honorable Thomas Greenway : S'K, — Believe me it is only after much hesitation that I have determined to write a word of criticism upon the policy of your Government. Nearly four years ago I welcomed your accession to power as the introduction of a new and brighter era of Government in Manitoba. Mr. Norquay's Government, I had believed, was not ■only incapable and subservient, but extravagant and corrupt. I .hailed the advent of a Liberal administi'ation, as promising relief from Ottawa domination, and from usless and knavish dissipation of our income. I must needs, therefore, have some more than ordinarily good .reasons for publishing any adverse criticism of your conduct of affairs, immediately, or shortly, before your appeal to the constituencies. Not that I boast myself much of a factor in elections, for which, indeed, I have long since been convinced I am singularly ill adapted. But I ■do think that you should either have the benefit of my vote, and any influence I may possess, or that I should be able to offer to myself, and others, satisfactory reasons for witholding them. Judging from recent public utterances you appear to have determined to appeal for support, not upon the general character of your Government, but upon the very worst feature which has distinguished your tenure of ofiice. You thus challenge an expression of opinion upon one question; and if you are successful you v/ill properly •claim that your views have received public endorsation. ic.; do not ask us to vote confidence in your Government, btit to give you a mandate and justification for a continuation of your efforts to abolish all distinction between Protestant and Catholic in reference to educa- tion, even to the amendment of our constitutional Act should its provisions be found to stand in your way. We are, therefore, not asked to vote for, or against, a Liberal Government, or a good Government, but for, or against, the indefinite • continuation of the present deplorable ferment and turbulence anent the school question. Upon that question my mind is made up. I have recently had occasion to make as thorough a study of it as my •ability permits. It is one requiring study and dispassionate considera- [219] ■kMMiiill 220 MR. EWART TO THE HON. MH. GREENWAY. [PaRT II tion. It is a many sided question, but yet one upon which people are liable without reflection to jump to unwarranted conclusions. May I ask a patient ear, and a tolerant mood, while I shortly review the subject. I base my complaint against your Government uj)on two grounds : (1) Upon the ground that your legislation and policy are in direct violation of election pledges, and (2) upon the ground of their inherent badness. The St. Francois Xavier election was held on the 12th January, 1888. Every one knew knew that the life of the Harrison adminis- tration depended upon the success, in that contest, of the Hon. Mr. Burke ; while his defeat would mean your accession to oflBce. The constituency was largely French and Roman Catholic. Mr. Burke was of that nationality and denomination. His opj)oiient was an English Protestant. Politically, tlie majority had hitherto been favorable to the Conservative Government. You undertook the difficult, and seemingly liopeless, task of turning the Conservative majority into a Liberal one ; of prevaling on the French Catholic Conservatives to support the English Protestant Liberal. You appealed to the electors for g")vernment condemnation upon the ground of extrava- gance, wastefulness and general mismanagement. In this appeal you were meeting wtih unexpected s' 'jcess. To ofiset your arguments strong efforts were made by the Government to induce the electors to believe that the Liberals were the natural enemies of the French and the Catholics. Mr. Joseph Martin and other Liberals, with great earnestness, repelled the charge, asserted that they were entirely in sympathy with the French Catholics, and distinctly promised that their language and institutions should be conserved. By means of such promises the Liberals carried the election, and four days afterwards you, sir, were sent for to form a new adminis- tration. To assist you in this work you personally called upon His Grace, the Archbishop of St. Boniface. You found him too ill to meet you. At his request you made your communication through Vicar-General A Hard. You proceeded to assure the Archbishop that yoii were in entire sympathy with him upon the two questions of Cutholic schools and French language ; that it would be the policy of your Government to maintain them inviolate, and you requested that His Grace would name some one who would be acceptable to his^ people as a member of the Cabinet. The Vicar-General listened to your promises and request, and agreed to meet you in Winnipeg at nine o'clock the next morning. He did so meet you, and then told you that His Grace was extremely gratified with your protestations of good will ; that he believed that Mr. Prendergast had the con- fidence of his people, and that inasmuch as politics, apart from defence of his flock, were outside his sphere, no opposition would be made to the Government as far as he was concerned. You gave the r Chap. XI.] mr. ewart to the hon. mb. gbeenway. 221 same assurance to the Liberal French men>bers of the House ; and you thus were enabled to meet the general elections with Mr. Prendergast as a colleague in your Cabinet, and several French Catholic candidates in your ranks. After the election you had as supporters five out of the six French meiub*»rs. These pledges, sir, have all been broken ; and power obtained with the assistance of Roman Catholics has been prostituted to their overthrow. This is my first argument against you. What answer have you to make \ It is not that there suddenly arose any public demand for the reversal of a system in which every- one had acquiesced for nineteen years. No, sir, the public mind was at rest upon that question. It was not, 1 am convinced, that your Cabinet h?d carefully considered the question, and had determined that thei-e was something so essentially detrimental in tho existing system that an instant end must be put to it. Your action, therefore, has the appearance of mere wanton viola- tion of pledges and excitement of religious animosities. From this charge, however, for my part I am glad to relieve you. The story, as I read it, runs thus : Mr. Joseph Martin, your capable but im- petuous and head-strong Attorney-General, with that utter disregard of the feelings, interests or rights of others which did so much to mar the usefulness of his efforts, of his own mere motion, determined to abolish both the Protestant and Roman Catholic schools, and to set up in their stead a system of purely secular schools, without any vestige of religious instruction or religious exercises. No sooner thought than said ; and, at Portage la Prairie, he announced that at the next session it should be done. You did not attempt, sir, to conceal that this announcement was made without your knowledge or approval. You made no secret of the fact that you entirely dis- approved of it, but you were not strong enough to thwart Mr. Martin's purpose, and you allowed yourself (under threat of resigna- tion, probably) to be driven into acceptance of his policy. But the public had to be rcyterian. Synod by resolution distinctly approved of it. His Lordship the Bishop of Rupert's Land does not like the new Act, which takes away the power of Protestants to mould their schools to their liking, and introduce more religion should they think proper to do so. But he was never dissatisfied with the Act of 1871. All his complaint was. that he did not quite approve of the way in which Protestants used their power to do as they pleased. The Act was all right, but his. views were those of the minority and did not prevail, and he did not insist upon them. (c) The assumption may further be shewn to be erroneous by reference to the Province of Ontario. There the Catholics have for many years had their schools, and all Protestant denominations have had the right to establish separate schools for themselves should they desire to do so.* But with trifling exceptions there has not been a symptom of an effort on the part of Protestants to avail themselves of the privilege. These considerations, sir, show conclusively that the assumption, that if the Catholics are allowed their schools, the other denominations will demand separate schools, and so national schools will become impossible, is without foundation. Before leaving this point allow me to remind you that the- separation of the Catholics does not affect materially even the economical management of other schools nearly as much as may be generally supposed. With the exception of the cities there are very few places in which the population is of a mixed character. In the districts in which the Catholics have schools there are very few, and sometimes no, Protestants. You will therefore see that the Catholics being in this way grouped, the Protestant schools are not affected by their existence to any appreciable extent. Should the reasoning from pi'inciple, sir, which I have attempted, appear to you too abstract and inconclusive, allow me to put the matter before you in practical form, admitting, as I do, that abstract principles of government must oft-times be modified by circumstances. The object of school legislation is the education of the people. I ^1 *This statement is not quite accurate (see the Rev. Dr. Laing's letter page 216), and the argument thereby loses much of its force. See, however, the reply to Dr. Laing page 217.— Chap. XI.] mr. ewart to thk hon. mr. orbenway. 227 7 r e L WH^~' J This is to be attained by (1) setting up scliools, and (2) getting children to attend them. Attendance may be secured ( I ) by coeicion, or (2) by persuasion. Persuasion is preferable, and coercion only to be resorted to as an extreme measure. Thus far you agree with me. Let us apj)ly our notions to Manitoba. There are here (for the jmrposes of my argument) two bodies of people. ( I ) The Protestants wan*" their children to attend undenominational schools, with a vestige of religion in them. (2) The Roman Catholics make it a matter of conscience that their children shall attend Catholic schools — to them undenominatioiial (that is irreligious schools) are wi'ong. Now, sir, having in mind that our pmctical object is to get the children to go to school, what are we to do 1 We can select one of four courses. ( I ) We can please one of the bodies, and set up undenomina- tional schools (with a vestige); (2) we can please the other body, and have the system altogether denominational; (3) we can please neither of them by setting up purely secular schools; or (4) we can please both of them, by allowing all those who want undenominational schools (with a vstige) to have theirs that way, and those who want Catholic schools to have them also. You pay your money and you take your choice. Recalling, once more, that our object is to persuade people to send their children to the schools, which of the four systems would you select 1 Is it not clear that children will be sent to schools approved by the parents, and witheld fi-om those to which they, rightly or wrongly, object 1 How then are you going to fill your schools'? By having them approved by the whole public, or by a majority only ] You see my point. But you may reply, that if the Protestant denominations are willing to give up denominational schools for the sake of the advantages to be derived from common schools, the Catholics should also be willing to do so. If there is no use in repeating that Catholics cannot do so (which is a sufficient answer), let me point out that Protestants give up nothing. As between denominational and common schools, they prefer the latter. And none of them would; argue that the example of the Catholics in refusing to agree with them would cause them to change their opinion. Catholics have separate schools in Ontorio, but that has never been given as a reason why Protestants should give up the undenominational schools they enjoy, and each sect set up for itself. As you see, sir, and know, the Protestants are satisfied with the non-sectarian schools — the vestige being still visible, and they will be satisfied with nothing else. It is useless, therefore, to assert that they give up something for uniformity's sake, and to argue that Catholics should be willing to follow their example. They give up nothing, but Oatholics are asked to surrender what to them is sacred. It is neither fair, nor- just, nor reasonable to expect them to do so. But perhaps your desire is to bring the Catholics into line with; 228 MR. RWART TO THE HON. MR. GREENWAY. [PaRT II. ProtestantR upon tlje question of education ; to remove religious ani- mositie.s l»y uniting the children in connnon schools 1 And do you seriously believe, .sii', that the best means of ending intolerance is to commence the Governmental practice of it ; that Catlioli^s can be coerced into brotherly love ; and that the first and last step towards the removal of antipathies, is to aggravate them? Should I desire your friendship, sir, do yon think 1 should commence by giving you a slap in the face J You are not ignorant, sir, of history, nor are you unfamiliar with human nature. A moment's reflection would tell you that your j)resent course is the very worst for your asserted purpose. All experience shows that people will not be driven into tlie acceptance of an opinion or course of action. But the spirit of intolerance and religious animosity burns still as fiercely as ever in many breasts, and once more it is thought that coercion must succeed in establishing the much sought for uniformity. It will fail, sir, as it always has failed when attacking religious opinions. Do you imagine that you can succeed where kings and czars and autocrats and parliaments and physical persecutions have failed 1 Do you not see that as coercion ceases, bette)" acquaintance and natural kindness heal the breach and make for the desired harmony and unanimity 1 Believe me, sir, Protestants and Catholics are mutually intolerant because they are mutually misunderstood. Did you ever read ■Cardinal Newman? Let no Protestant pretend that he can argue the Catholic question, intolerantly asserting that they ai'e stupidly wrong, until he has read their controversial writers. Your plan was tried, sir, as you are aware in Upper Canada. You remember the bitterness of the struggle. For years Separate Schools, and Representation by Population, were the leading questions upon the platform and in the press. George Brown and Alexander Mackenzie fought fiercely against the re-establishment of separate schools. Orangemen and Catholics threshed away at the old, old questions, and left them where they found them. It was a fiei'ce and savage fight — Protestant and Catholic once more proving how little education had done for either of them. It ended in 1863, as it only oould end, by the full concession of the separate school principle. Mr. McKenzie's words, with reference to this memorable contest, spoken twelve years atterwai'ds, ought to have weight with you, and with every one who seeks to form an opinion on the subject. He said : I believe in free schools, in the non- denominational Hystem ; and, if I could persuade my fellow countrymen in Ontario and Quebec, or any other province, to adopt that principle, it is the one I would give preference to above all others. For many years after I had a seat in the Parliament of Canada, I waged war against the principle of of separate schools. I hoped to be able, young and inexperienced as I then was, to estabUsh a system to which all would yield their assent. Sir, it was found to be impracticable in operation, and impossible in political contingencies. You will also remember the New Bi'unswick phase of the ques- ax;ni-t^Tae:xs.-.u Chap. XI.] mr. ewart to the hon. mr. oheevway. !29 /U ill tion. Liti<^iitioii revealed the fiict tlmt in that Province tlie Catholics were completely at tlie niorcy of the majority, ami the majority appeared t ) he liinposed to deal ImrHhly with them. Tiio matter waH dehatcd at length in the Dominion House of Commons in wliich you tlien had a seat. You listened, I have no douht, to Mr. Mackenzie's speech in which he d(!clared that the Upper Canada settlement of the question in 1863 was a fair and reasonable settlement and tiiat he felt bound to give hia sympathy to those in otbor Provinces who believed they were laboring under the same grievuncea tliat the Catholics in Ontario complained of for years." You cannot have forgotten sir, that after listening to that speech you joined with the great majority of both sides of the House in passing a resolution which requested the Imperial Government to use its influence to the end that the Catholics might have their .sciiools. While quoting let me also cite the opinion of Principal Grant, who is not deficient in Presbyterian combativeness. In his opinion the concession made in Upper Canada to the Catholics was '"a good pructical compromise." And now, sir, for what purpose would you re-open this question, surcharged as you know it to bo with all bitterness and angry dispu- tation] How amicably Protestant and Catholic, in Manitoba, have worked in matters relating to education has been a matter of thankful remark. You throw them into discord and enmity by arousing the long doi'mant sectarian antipathies. You may, sir, live to see theni at peace again, each with schools after their own design, and perhaps you may learn to say with George Brown: I point with glad thankfulness to the banishment of religious jealousy and discord that so long rent our country. Yes, sir, you may live to be tlmnkful. but it will be because of the early defeat of your present policy; and your thankfulness will be mixed with the bitter regret that it was vour hand that fanned the flame, if it did not light the match. For what purpose, again I ask, do you pur.sue this course? You are aware, sir, that in doing so you are out of sympathy with the Liberal party, and that your policy is hurtful to that party, as antagonizing' Catholics in all parts of the Dominion. It is not, then, for party purposes that you -do it, and I have said that it is not of your own designing, and has not your approval. For what purpose then? Am I driven to the conclusion that it is merely to sustain your own Government in power — for merely personal purposes'? Are you willing to violate election pledges ; to renounce political principle; to injure your own political party; to provoke ferment, unrest and confusion in so important a matter as education ; to set divines at each others throats ; to arouse all the passions and hatreds and contem{)ts inseparable from religious contro- veraies — to keep yourself in ofl&ce 1 230 MR. EWART TO THK HON. MH. ORKKNWAY. [^AIIT II. It \H announced, that hIiouIcI you he heaten in tlu* Privy Co>'ncil you intend to continue the ugitiition ami Heok an amendment of the constitution. You arc perfectly aware that an anu'iidment cannot he obtained ; that hoth ])arties in the Dominion parliament would iiIiiioki unnnimouHly vote ajjainst it. You could not even pretend that Manitolta had a peculiar grievance, for hIic has the Kanie control over education as Ontario and Qiiehec. Knowing then that an amend- ment cannot he obtained, why would you seek if? Why perpetuate and intensifv the animositv and turmoil which vou have aroused 1 "Why continue to injure your political party, and violate your jjledges and principles? Much as I regret it, sir, I can see no reason other tlian — to keep yourself in office. I presume I need not ask you frankly to tell nio whether you have not more or less contempt for people whose votes you can wheedle out of them in this way — who have passions, there, ready to take the place of their judgments, at llie bidding of a politician at election times? Sir John A. Macdonald carried the last elections by appeal- ing to passions. You. sir, may do the same. Or possibly you may find that you have not, with sufficient dexterity, stirred up, to proper intensity, religious animosity — that your jacks have not, for some reason, jumped at your pull of the string ; in which case, sir, you will serve for a ])arable, and be likened " unto children sitting in the markets, and calling unto their fellows, and saying: We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented !" One word more. I see that some would advocate that if Catholics are entitled to be separate in this matter of education they should be left to get along as best they can; that they .should be left disorgan- ized. Can religious antipathy suggest a more unreasonable proposal? It means this: That if the Catholics are by law entitled to have separate schools you would prefer seeing them weak, struggling and inefficient, rather than organized and ca])able — you would have Catholic children uneducated, rather than educated as Catholics! Such intolerance is not creditable to those who advocate the course, and is not indigenous to the western prairies, I think, or capable of transj)lantation there. I would that I could see anything but an election cry in this agitation. I believe that our province is indebted to your Govern- ment for many things, But you have cast your pledges, your princijjles, your party and your record to the winds, and have adopted a cry which, while it may answer your expectations for a time will certainly recoil upon yon ere long; and meanwhile will work incalculable and irremediable mischief. I am sir, youra with much regret, John S. Ewart. CHAPTER XII. MR. EWART'S REPLY TO CRITICISMS. I To the Editor of the Free Press : 20th January, 1892. Sir, — My letter to the Hon. Mr. Greeiiway has evoked couiiter- vuiliiii; arguments ot" various kinds and qualities. I shall reply to one kind tirst — the kind which answors arguments by personal attack : 1. "You are a lawyer, and were paid to write the letter. True, I am a lawyer. Untrue, that I was, or am to be, paid or remunerated in any way by Catholics, Free Press, or other body, j)aper, or person, whonisoever. The letter was written without the knowledge or solicitation of anyone. 2. " You wrote another former letter, inconsisteni with the pre.sent one, and the F)\ Press refused to publish it." The document referred to was an essay (not a letter), written, as are many such for my own delectation and self-improvement. It was not *' inconsistent with the present one." It was not refused publication by the Free Press, or any other paper. It is in my house, and may bo read by •anyone who will honor me with a visit. 3. *' You have de.serted your party." Query : If Mr. Greenway abandons the Liberal party, must I do the same in order to — remain a member of it 1 If Mr. Greenway votes one way in 1875, and another way in 1890, must I chanufe my vote in order to — vote the same way as before 1 If the Liberal party advocated separate schools for New Brunswick, where tlie law gave thcui none, am 1 a renegade if I advocate separate schools for Manit iha, where the law provides for them ? I shall be content to be called a traitor when I act as such, but I reject the title when bestowed merely because I refuse to duplicate the vacillations of any particular fugleman. Most of the other arguments (published, as well as privately communicated) may best be met, I think, by a restatement of the case. But first let us see how far all (or nearly a^^ can go together. 1. The state may protect itself from ignoi'.uce and consequent vice, and for that purpose insist upon a measure of education. 2. It may do so by erecting schools ; and compelling, if need be, [231] 232 MR. EWART S REPLY TO CRITICISMS. [Part II. children to attend them. It is much better to secure voluntary attendance. John Morley recently said (On Compromise, p. 102): Those who have thought most carefully and disinterestedly about the matter are agreed that in advanced societies the expedient course is that no portion of the community should insist on imposing its own will upon any other portion, except in matters which are vitally connected with the maintenance of the social union. 3, The state has nothing to do with religion. It has no 0[)inion upon the question of Protestantism v. Catholicism, or both versu^ Agnosticism. In its view all classes are equally sensible and sincere Mariolatry and Predestination are to it equally right and equally wrong — which is right cannot be known. In its opinion all are entitled to exac*;ly the same rights and privileges. ** Absolute liberty, just and true liberty, equal and impartial liberty, is the thing that we stand in need of," (Locke's Introduction to his Letters on Toleration). These are the principles frequently cited against me. I adopt them, and ask that my opponents v/ill not refuse to pursue them to their logical conclusions. Let me hereafter speak of them as the third admission. 4. As a corollai-y : Legitimate ends of goA , "nment (such as education), ought to be attained in such way as will least conflict with religious freedom. 5. Subject to the principle of state self-protection, )arents have a right to mould the character of the education of their children as they please — that is to make it Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Catholic, secular or otherwise. 6. The great majority of Protestants believe in secular schools with religious exercises. (This is the meaning of the passage in my fo»mer letter, that Boreas misunderstood, and therefore condemned as bearing "absurdity and insincerity on its face.") The great majority of Catholics are opposed to such schools antl desire denominational schools. For the purpose of the argument let it be assumed that the community is divided into these two classes. For the sake of those who refuse a ihesion to the third admission I beg to quote from John Locke's first letter on Toleration. (Letters, they were, more needed, perhaps, in 1689 than 1892; yet still much needed). But if one of these churches hath this power of treating the other ill, I ask which of them it is to whom the power belongs, and by what right ? It will be answered undoubtedly, that it is the orthodox church which has the right of authority over the erroneous or heretical. This is, .in great and specious words, to say just nothing at all. For every church is orthodox to itself ; to others erroneous or heretical. Whatsoever auj' church believes, it believes to be true ; and the contrary thereunto it pronounces to be error. So that the controversy between these two churches about the truth of their doctrine" and the purity of their worship, is on both sides equal ; nor is there any judge, eithei at Constantinople, or elsewhere upon the earth, by whose sentence it can be determined. The decision of that question belongs only to the Supreme Judge of all men, to whom alone belongs tne punishment of the erroneous. Chap. XII.] mr. ewart's reply to criticisms. 23a great rlesire it be I ask will be right of words, others e true ; roversy purity ihci at 1 be Judge € And again (3rd Letter) : God never gave the magistrates authority to be judge of truth for another man. Dr. Bryce wrote as follows (Free Press, 18th Dec, 1889) : Prelate and Presbyter, Cancm and Salvation Army captain, Agnostic champion and Methodist exhorter, and their followers, should in the eye of the state all be equal. Now, remembering this third admission, let me answer the objection most frequently urged. It is tliis : " The common schools are not Protestant. They are entirely unsectarian. There is no religion taught there, and therefore no reason why Catholics should not attend them." My Protestant friend, can you believe that it is precisely because '' no religion is taught there " that Catholics disapprove the place 1 Catholics believe (as do also in a modified form His Lordship the Bishop of Rupert's Land, the Rev. Principal King, and a large number of Protestant divines) that teaching should accompany and permeate the secular lessons ; that one ought not to be separated from the other ; that history, philosophy and the rest should be taught with their religious aspects constantly in view ; and that separation of teaching into secidar and religious leads to infidelity and vice. I do not ask you to believe this, I do not myself believe it (using the word " religious " as they use it) I merely wish you to acknowledge that such is their belief, and so far as the state is concerned — which is right cannot be known. Perhays I can help to make my point clearer by putting "the boot on the other leg." Suppose that the state were to set up music halls thi'oughout the province and provide by local taxation for Sunday lectures of educational value garnished with classical music. The Protestant conscience would be outraged. Catholics would see nothing improper and might reply : " Why do you object ? There is no religion there." " That is^ exactly the ground of my objection," would retort the Protestant. "You are unreasonable," might answer the Catholic ; "surely if you go to church in the morning you can attend a lecture in the after- noon. Too much religion is unreasonable." My Protestant friend, you have no more right to judge how much religion Catholic children ought to have during the week, than have Catholics to prescribe your limit on Sunday. Which is right cannot be known. Again, Catholics believe their maxim, " Extra ecclesiam nulla solus ; or, as taught at St. Boniface " Hors d-ent denominations were able and willing to support their respective separate schools, what would be done with the scattered remnants of population, those who would regard it as an infringmciit upon their rights of conscience to compel them to choose between the denominational schools? If all citizens were either Catholics or Protestants, and the Protestants were as homogeneous in their religious views as the Catholics, the question would be greatlv simplified. Even then, however, there would ai'ise the serious question whether the state should have nothing to do with preparing its future citizens for citizenship. On the whole, is it not pretty clear that the fairest settlement of the difficulty is secular teaching by the state, and religious teaching by the i)arents and the churches'? ;e ;e e Article in "The Week," 22nd April, 1892. We i-eceived from Mr. Ewart, too late for its intended use, a note sup])lying a few words which had been accidentally omitted from his letter on the Manitoba School Question, which appeared and on which we commented last week. As Mr. Ewart deems the omitted words of special importance to his argument, we repeat the sentence iud context with these words supplied : — The argument now runs this way : The state ought to protect itself from vice by education. Religion is " an indispensable factor in all education every day in the week." Therefore it is the duty of the state to educate; but to have nothing to do with religion ! The tnie Protestant should observe that his conclusion, " it is the duty of the state to educate " is contradicted the moment he asserts that it is not tlie duty of the state to teach ' ' an indispensable factor in all education." The correction, it will be observed, does not affect our position in the slightest degres ; because, as we have before seen, there is no •contradiction whatever between the Protestant's conclusion that " it 252 I !1 MR. EWART's reply TO "THE WEEK." [PaRT IL is the duty of the state to educate," and his assertion that " it is not the duty of the state to teach an indispensable factor in all education" — meaning religion. The fatal fault in Mr. Ewart's argument is his failure to observe that in the first proposition the Protestant, whose views we attempted to interpret, uses the term " educate " only in a very restricted sense — as was, we think, clear from the whole tenor of our reasoning — k) denote merely such elementary and rudimentary mental training as is deemed indispensable to intelligent citizenship. In the logical terminology, of which Mr Ewart seems fond, his syllogism is made worthless by the vice of an "ambiguous middle term." To suppose us to assent to the statement, " It is the duty of the state to educate," using the word " educate " to include the whole training of the child, mental, moral and religious, is to credit us with giving away our case, with a simplicity so transparent that it would hardly be worth the while of a clever logician like our correspondent to expose it. Mr. Ewart's Letter to "The Week," 29th April, 1892. To the Editor of The Week : Sir, — It would not be proper for me again to intrude upon your columns any lengthened discussion. Permit me, however, to note, with pleasure, the very close approximation to a\ hich the discussion has brought us. We agree : 1. That the state ought to protect itself from vice by education (or a modicum thereof). 2. Catholics may " unite and organize for the establishment and support of schools for the education of their children, on any plan, and according to any system, which they deem best, so long as the intellectual education provided is sufficiently thorough to meet the reasonable requirements of the state in regard to citizenship." 3. " There could be no objection " '* to confer corporate powers " upon them, to enable them so " to unite and organize." 4. But these powers should not "enable compulsion to be used to make any one contribute to, and patronize, a denominational school against his will." 5. The state may properly raise money by taxation for the- purposes of education. 6. There is nothing " more unjust than for it to use the taxes paid by the Catholic to aid the propagation of the doctrines which- the good Catholic detests " (rightly or wrongly is immaterial). Chap, XIIL] mr. ewart's reply to " the week.' 253 7. Or, by parity of reasoning (let me add, without agreement possibly), to use it in diffusing a purely secular education " which the good Catholic detests " (rightly or wrongly again immaterial ; but that he is right, a large number of Protestant ministers would warmly testify. Possibly even you, sir, would baulk at the French notion of a purely secular education). 8. And what more just (can we not agree?) that Catholics (united and organized by the state for the purpose of education) should be permitted to pay their own taxes, if tbey desire to do so, to their own schools, instead of having them applied to the erection of "rudderless warships " which they detest. You have agreed to proposition three and four. If we add to these, proposition eight (almost self-evident, I think i we have the separate school system in Ontario ; for there, as you .re aware, it is purely optional with a Catholic whether he pays his taxes to the Catholic schools or to the public schools. There is no "compulsion." If it be said that the Catholic schools receive a ratable share of other moneys, again I answer that that is not " a necessary part of the system. It might be an easily-answered argument for the stoppage of the supplement, but not for the abolition of the schools." JOHX S. EWART. "i "1 Ised Inal Ithe- (The foregoing letter was mailed before Mr. Ewart had received the issue of the Week of 22nd April. After reading the article in that issue he forwarded an addenda to the above letter as follows. It reached Toronto too late for publication). "Allow me one word of direct reply, necessary perhaps for the cur.sory reader. In your issue of the 22nd April you reconcile the statements. " It is the duty of the state to educate ; but to have nothing to do with religion," which " is an indispensable factor in all education eveiy day in the week," by explaining that the word "educate" is used "m a very restricted sense ... to denote merely such elementary and rudimentary mental training as is, etc." I so understood you. Bit this in no way removes the contradiction. Re-state the proposition and see : " It is the duty of the state to provide some education, but to have nothing to do with religion which is an indispensable factor in all education." I think that you over- looked the effect of your universal " all " ; nor can you now restrict that word, for you first used the expression as equivalent, or at least not in contrast, to my assertion, that a true Roman Catholic " insists upon all education being permeated with religion." Your reply was, ** The true Protestant certainly attaches no less value to religion as an indispensable factor in all education, every day in the week, than the most devout Roman Catholic." '.r^ 254 ARTICLE IK "the WEEK." [Part II. Article in The Week, 29th April, 1892. Willie we are glad to find ourselves at one with our correspond- ent, Mr. Ewart, on several points in regard to the school question we have been discussing, we are sorry to find that, in order to guard against being suppo^ed to give consent, by silence, to propositions from which we emphatically dissent, and which seem to us to involve educational and ])olitical pi-inciples of the very first importance, we are obliged to recrf v^ the subject. In so doing we shall merely point ou, 's b>'i . ;• a£> we may be able, the points of difference which we deem >" vdai. cental importance. To Mr. Ewart's first six propositioi. ' .vv ii..ii.e no exception. The assumed "parity of reason- ing " in tht; i v£nti», we are quite unable to concede. " The things compared — religious .octrines" and "secular education" — are uttei'ly disparate, for the purposes of this argnment. With the one, as we have shown, the state has no right to interfere in any way whatever ; the other, as a matter of self-protection and national well- being it must of necessity include within its domain. Hence, "while nothing could bo more unjust than for it to use the taxes paid by the Catholics to aid in the j)ropagation of the doctrines which the good Catholic detests," the same element of injustice is not at all present, so far as we can see, when the state uses those taxes for the purpose of imparting the " purely secular education " which we are agreed it is the province and the duty of the state to secure ainongst all classes of its citizens. As this secular education is a necessaxy part of education, it seems a little absurd to speak of the Catholic as detest- ing it. If it be said that the emphasis is on the " purely,^^ the reply is easy. The education need not be purely secular, because the good Catholic parent is at liberty to mix as mu6h religion with it as he pleases. Hence, when we have eliminated the fallacy that lurks in the word " purely," the alleged injustice which would certainly be px'esent if the state school prevented the Catholic parent, or guardian, or priest, from infusing as much i-eligion as he chooses into the educa- tional process, as it goes on from day to day, vanishes. We may just observe, further, that the mere fact that a Catholic, or any other citi- zen, detests a certain thing, does not of itself prove that the thing is wrong or unjust. That must be demonstrated on other grounds. Many citizens, both Catholic and Prptestant, it is to be feared, detest paying their fair share of the necessary taxes, but that does not make it unjust for the state to collect those taxes. Two points more and we have done with the Manitoba School question for the ])resent. Fi-om Mr. Ewart's eighth proposition we are forced to dissent squarely. First, there is a broad and funda- mental difference between our admission that corporate powers may be conferred upon Catholic (or any other) citizens to enable them to Chap. XIII.] ARTICLE IN "THE WEEK." "Ids' SIX unite and organize for voluntary educational work, and tlio jjroposi- tion with which our correspondent asks us to agree. The pai'en thetical clause which he has introduced, " united and organized b the state for the jmrposes of education," introduces the very i)rinc'rle against which we have been protesting from the first. The stii " has, we hold, nothing to do with uniting and organizing Catholics or Protestants for educational or any other purposes. The state has to do only with citizens as citizens. To organize one particular sect for educational purj)0se8, and to pledge all its resources and all the machinery of organized society for the carrying out of those purposes, a principal part of which is the teaching of the doctrines and ritual of that denomination, would be to violate some of the most fundamental principles of politics. In the second place, to so organize the mem- bers of a religious sect, with the understanding, which the proposition in question implies, that the members of *■ sect are to be exempt from tlie payment of the taxes necessary ft, tl> maintenance of the public schools, which are admitted to b ner uy for the safety and well-being of the state, would be ti .. 'd \/rong to wrong. It will not do to say that the state may p .v 30 n the same way with all other denominations, for the result residuum of the future citizens would ) the very classes whose presence, in evc educational system a necessity. vf< id still be that a large unprovided fc ■ and these of '^uimunity, makes the state- jhool we mda- may m to s M -■Tri •BM ! « CHAPTER XIV. THE MANITOBA PUBLIC SCHOOL LAW. By D'Altos McCarthy, Q.C, M.P. Public interest is centred more on the fate of the School Law of Manitoba, and on tlie novel, and unexampled, proceedings that are now ))ending before the Privy Council at Ottawa, with a view, if it be possible, to tind a reasonable pretext to overturn the decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, which affirmed that the Act was constitutional, than perhaps on any other matter now engaging attention — thi necessity of tariff amendment possibly only accepted. The proceedings refeired to are, in themselves, and quite irrespec- tive of the deep interest which, for one cause or another, is felt by a great majority of Canadians in the fate of the measure, sufficient to excite attention, and even to create alarm. For here we have an Act of a Provincial Legislature, which has been passed with the approval of a great majority of the people interested — the inhabitants of Mani- toba — after it had run the gauntlet of the law courts of the Dominion, and of the highest legal tribunal of the Empire, assailed by a procedure unknown to the law, and before unheard of. This extraordinary attack is made before a body composed of politicians-r-the Dominion Cabinet — who, whatever 1 3 their qualifications in other respects, are not, it is safe to say, conspicuous for that impartiality, and freedom from bias, respecting a matter of great political importance, which we are accustomed to associate as an indispensable attribute of those who wear the ermine, and administer justice in the name of the Sovereign. It is not proposed to discuss the merits or the demerits of the. Public School Act of the Prairie Province, as to which the !:;iuds of most thinking peoj)le of the Dominion are already made up. But rather is it intended to direct attention to the last function which the Privy Council of Canada has Si^bumed the right to take part in — to examine by what authority a new, and hitherto unknown, legal tribunal has unexpectedly manifested itself — and to consider, with all the gravity and earnestness that such an enquiry demands, whether the rdle, that the Privy Council is now engaged in playing, is permitted by the Manitoba Constitution, the British North America Act, or by any other law known to the British constitutional system. * Keprinted from The Canadian Magazine, March, 1893. [256] Chap. XIV.] MR. d'aLTON m'cARTUY. 267 ft will V)e remeinbereu tlmt the loj^iility, or constitutiomility, of the Act was iinpugnod on this jjrouiul, that iilthougli, wcr'^ to prevail, it would be extremely difficult for the Provincial Legislature, which has been entrusted with the exclusive power of making laws relating to education, to provide for the educational wants of the more sparsely inhabited districts of a country almost as large as Great Britain, and that the powers of the Legislature, which on the face of the Act appear so large, would be limived to tne useful, but somewhat humble office, of making regulations for the sanitary condition of school-houses, im- posing rates for the support of denominational schools, enforcing the compul- sory attendance of scholars, and matters of that sort. This authoritative judgment ought, one would have thought, as indeed most Canadians did think, to have ended the controversy that had now i*aged, exciting much embittered feeling in the Province and great interest throughout the Dominion, for a period of nearly two years, in which the somewhat unfortunate, not to say unseemly, ex- hibition was presented of the Dominion Government assailing the -oonstitutionality of a provincial Act, as to which the Government, as such, had no ground of complaint. But it seems that the end was not yet ; for, unhappily for the peace of the Dominion, Sir John Thompson made a report to the Council, which was approved, ostensibly to show why the Public School Act should not be vetoed by the Governor-General, but as some supposed to postpone for a season the unpleasant duty of deny- ing the petition of the Roman Catholic Episcopacy of the Dominion 17 m w 258 Mil. d'alton m'cartiiy. [Part II. of Ctuuulii (inchuling the Cardinul,and Biuhop Cameron of AntigoniHh), wlio pniyeil His Excellency in Council to afford remedy to the provincial legislation . . . and tliat in the most elKcacious way. In this report the Minister of JuHtico said, amongst other things, that it became apparent at tiie outset that these questions, namely, whetlier the School Act did prejudicially affect any right or privilege which the ISonuin Catholic had hy law or practice at the Union, required the decision of the judicial tribunal, more especially as an investigation of facts was necessary to their deturmiuatioii ; And went on to say, If the legal controversy should result in the decision of the Court of Queen's Bench (which had been in favor of the Province) being sustained, the time will come for your Excellency to consider the petitions which have been presented by and on behalf of the Itoman Catholics of Manitoba for redress under sub-sections 2 and 3 of section 22 of the Manitoba Act, etc. , etc. Tlie decision of the Queen's Bench of the Province has been upheld, and the event, therefore, lias hap[)ened, which, as Sir John Thompson advised His Excellency, would require that the petitions which had been presented should be "considered;" and the Minister further explained his meaning by adding that Those sub-sections contain in effect the provisions which have been made as to all the provinces, and are obviously those under which the Constitution in- tended that the Government of the Dominion should prevail, if it should at any time become necessary that the Federal powers shonld be resorted to for the protection of a Protestant or Roman Catholic minority, against any act or decision of the province or of any provincial authority aiffecting any right or privilege of any such minority in relation to education. The parties interested in having the provincial legislation annulled were not slow to take advantage of the loop-hole which the Minister of Justice had suggested, based, it must be said, on a construction of the Manitoba Act unique and unprecedented; for to no one before had it ever occured in relation to the kindred subject of the New Brunswick School Law, on the analogous legislation which was in force respecting the four old provinces, that the question involved in the consideration of the policy of the School Law of a province was sub- ject to 1*6 view by or before the Dominion Cabinet. Accordingly petitions were presented, emanating from a body or *' organization," as the report of the sub-committee styles it, called "The National Congress " (" National," it is presumed, as representing the French nationality sentiment), and from the Archbishop of St. Boniface, complaining of the two Acts of the province respecting education^ passed in 1890, the constitutionality of which had been upheld; and Chap. XIV.] MR. D ALTON M CAIITIIY. 2.')0 iilled lister m of jfore iNew Iforce the sub- ingly iion," Lonal l-encb [face, ^.tion^ and both i»etition8 jn'aycd for roch-ess uudor sub Hections 2 and 3 of section 22 of tho Manitoba Act to the Go'"d under (I) wide n'.iding, that you may know (hat (ho road to your own opinion has hocn over many a noMci- tliinki^r now stark in tho Sohwoidnitz di(>oh ; (2) ox|)ori(Mico, that you may have soon your own most chctrishod opinions u;o to tho ditoh ahead of you (" riu> latter part of a wise man's life is taken up in (-urinf; the t'ollies, prejudioes aiid false o|)inions lu^ had contracted in the fornun*," said Swiff) ; and (3y a certain synipatln^tic and imagimitive power, that you may i)atiently investii^ate the foundations antl streni^th of opposiui; opinion, and he able to appreciate its arguments, not from your own point of \\o.\v, but from that of your op|)onentH. You must couu> to the cpuvstion as an eiupiin^r - not with he;idy confi deuce, arroifantly assertinjif infallibility and completed investiifadon ; but, on th(^ contrary, with open mitid ready and willing to reexamine your best beloved beliefs in the light of that which may bo urged against them — a very rare frame of n\ind. If tho (piestion be one upon which you have no very fixed ideas, tho possibilities are that your mind will receive its first (and last) impression from the first ]>orson yo\i meet, whether nurse or ]>hilo3opher. But if it be a question of jKilitics or religion, and you have arrive«l at tho age of — say puberty- -what prospect is there for the clearest truth, as against the stupidest falsehood which may have theretofore, in some way or other, got into your head '? I am not blaming you, although for like otTence yon are con- stantly turning up your intellectvial nose at other jteople. I am not even saying that you, in your individual list of beliefs, have sub- scribed to a single false one. All that I am intending is to '•beseech yovi, in the bowels of Chri^^t, think it possible that you may be mis- taken " — in some small, but specified, oiio of these, beliefs, if you cannot admit as to two of them ; it will do you good as a commence- ment. You can look back over the little history you know, and grant that had other people doubted in any smallest measure theii* inerrancy, oceans of blood, and infinitudes of misery, would have been spared ; but for yourself you se(^ no lesson there, for were tliey not all wrong, and is it not clear that you are right 1 Ah I there's the rub, yon are right — be it a " melancholy notion " or not, " all generations of men were lost and wrong, only that your little section of a generation might be saved and right." You and i/our " ultimate infallible credo are 7iot bound for the ditch. 1 pray you, do try and remember that all these poor Schweidnitz fellows had likewise, every one of them, seen a clear route across the Pagan and Mahometan stupidities, but nevertheless were plainly, as we now see it, every one of them, ticketed for the ditch. Aye, and did veritably go there^ they and their hypotheses, and are liow plainly not right. And ■v^lien joi come to think e, it, why should you be infallible, and all the- V i 11(1 Chap. XV.] MU. JOHN 8. KWART. 205' (liU'h ()(;cii|»mitH, and porliaps ji Ijii'^o innjority of tlioHO hHII oiilHido of it, iiKlultitalily wroni^ ( 'I'cll iu«i tlint, you liavd Htiidiod morn d('((i»ly, inoH! diligently, and with gr(!atility tliini tliey, and [ sliall accdpt your answer. 'Pell nio nuMcIy that you " know " that V )n are right, and I .shall nu^-ely traiiHlate your "know" into " niy father told me," and wondiu- that you did not know enough to do that for your.se|f. Will you let nuf t((ll you sonu^thing ( llcro i.s a fun(hiniental and, you think, (easily .solvahle qucistion, viz., that relating to tolerji- tion of contrary opinion, n^ligious or other. Fict mo shortly rovi(!W it for you. Plato* pre.scrihod thus for unltolievcTS : fiot tlume who have boon made wliat tliey are only from want of under- staiitliny, and not from nialitu; or an evil nature, Ix; placed hy the judge in the house of reformation, and ordered to Hiidcr iinpriHoninent during a period of not leHH than live yearH. And in the meantime let them have no intercourHO with the other citizens, except with members of the nocturnal council, and with them let them converse touching the iin])rovenient of their souls health. And ^vhen the time of their imprisonment has expired, if any of them ho of sound mind, let him he restored to sane company, hut if not, and if he bo condemned a second time, let himbe punished with death. Ma to 10(18 wrong. Pagan Emperorrt (knowing that they w(!ro fight) perHecuted and j)ut to death thousands of (Jhristians, and Christians did the same for Pagans in proportion to their {Mjwer. Piujaiis and Christians v)ere lorony. Roman Oatholics (knowing that they wore right) persecuted and put to death thousanf univers, consciences, was alien to the views of t'>«' whole ai of (piite modern introduction. It was not knowi even in the l'rf)testant part of it, till the Mcventee! Catholics and Protestants, indudiny Calvi wrong. Hobbes J in 1658 said : ' freedom and lilicrty of it worhl. hulecd, it i.s i\\ in (yhristendom, not century. Knox, etc., etc., v)ere they tolerate not their king, ng religion, do violate their ml yjositive ; nor is there any Christians, or men of what religion soever whatsoever law he maketh, though it be cou' faith, contrary to the divine law, both natunil judge of heresy among subjects, but tlieir own civd Koven^ign. For hereay is nothing else but a private opinion obstinately maintained, contrary to the opinion which the public persem — that is to s.iy, the representant of tb? commonwealth — hath commended to be taught. My which it is manir-^st thac- \& ! M i !:iP^' .*? ^m 'e, >, le- ' 1*W9, X., 009 ; .Jowetf s Translation, IV., 421. ♦ History of Free Thought, Note 1.5. {Leviathan, cap. 42. I I 266 MR. JOHN S. EWAKT. [Part II. an opinion publicly appointed to be taught cannot be heresy ; nor the sovereign princes that authorize them, lieretics. For heretics are none but private men •that stubbornly defend some doctrine prohibited by their lawful sovereign. Which heretics he counselled, could ti ey not comply with the king's requirement, to go off courageously " to Christ by martyr- dom," and leave the land in peace. Ilohbes was wrong. John Locke gained for himself much renown by his noble plea for toleration, and was, we think, much in advance of the day when he wrote (1689) ; but he makes this qualification :* Lastly, those are not to be tolerated who deny the being of a God. Promises, covenants and oaths which are the bonds of human society can have no hold upon an atheist. The taking away of God, though but even in thought, dissolves all. Besides, also, tliose that by their atheism undermine and destroy all religion, can have no pretence of religion whereupon to chal- lenge tlie privilege of a toleration. Locke was tvrong. Bishop \Varburton,f in 1736, insists in the strongest terms upon the natural I'ight of every man to worshiu God according to his con- science, and upon the criminality of every attempt on the part of the state to interfere with his religion : With religious errors, as such, the state has no concern. And it may never restrain a religion except when it produces grave "civil mischiefs." In asaerting, however, that: Religion, or the care of the soul, is no^ .vithin the province of the magis- trate, and th;i^ consequently matters of doctrine and opinion are without his jurisdiction, this must always be understood, with the exception of the three funtlamental principles of natural religion — the l)eing of God, His providence over human affairs, and the natural, essential difference of moral good and evil. These doctrines it is directly iiis office to cherish, protect and propagate, and all oppugners of them it is as much his right and duty to restrain, a.H any the most dagrant offenders against public peace. And the reason of this exception, he says, is obvious : The magistrate concerns himself with the maintenance of these three fundamental articles, not as they promote our fut'tre happiness, but our present. . . . They are the very foundation and bond of civil policy. Without them oaths and covenants and all the ties of moral obligation upon ^which society is founded are dissolved. Warburton was wrong. Rousseau, in 1761,| drew up a civil profession of faiths and prescribed that : If any one declines to accept them, 1 e ought to be exiled, not for being impious, but for being unsociable, incapable of sincere attachment to the laws, 'Or of sacriticing his life to his duty. If any one, a'ter publicly r^icognizing * First letter on Toleration, p. 31. t Alliance of Churoh and State. JContrat Social iv., viii., 203. Chap. XIV.] MR. JOHN S. EWART. 267 these dogmas, carried himself as if he did not believe them, then let him be niintshed by death, for he has committed the worst of crimes — he has lied before the laws. Jioiisseau was uyrong. Blackstone, the great English jurist, in his commentaries (1765) wrote : Doubtless the preservation of Christianity as a national religion is, abstracted from its intrinsic truth, of the utmost consequence to the civil state, which a single instance will sufficiently demonstrate. The belief in a future state of rewards and punishments, the entertaining just ideas of the moral attributes of (he Supreme Being, and a firm persuasion that He superin- tends and will finally compensate every action in human life (all which are clearly revealed in the doctrines and forcibly inculcated in the precepts of our Saviour Christ), these are the grand foundations of all judicial oaths which call (lod to witness the truth of those facts which perhaps may be only known to Him and the party attesting. All moral evidence, iherefore, all confidence in human veracity, umst be weakened by irreligion and overborne by infidelity. Wherefore, all affront to Christianity or endeavors to depreciate its efficacy, are deserving of human punishment. Blacksioae wa^ wrong. Burke, in 1773, in a speech in the House of Commons, alluding to the argument that if non-conformity were tolerated, atheism would gain protection under pretence of it, ■if' : If this danger is to be apprehended, ii you are really fearful that Christ- ianity will indirectly suffer from this liberty, you have my free consent: go directly and by the straight way and not by a circuit ; point your arms against these men who do the mischief you fear promoting ; point your own arms against men . . . who by attacking even the possibility of all revelation, arraign all the dispensations of Providence to man. These are the wicked Dissenters you ought to fear ; these are the people against whom you ought to aim the shaft of the law ; these are the men to whom, arrayed in all the terrors ci Government, I would say : You shall not degrade us into brutes. These men- -these factious men, as the luaorable gentleman properly called them — are the just object of vengeance, not the conscientious Dissenter. . . . . Against these I would have the laws rise in all their majesty of terrors to fulminate such vain and impious wretches, and. to awe them into impotence V)y the only dread they can fear or believe. The most horrid and cruel blow that can be offered to civil society is through atheism. Do not promote diversity : when you have it bear it : have as many sorts of religions as you find in your country : there is a reasonable worship in them all. The others — the intldels or outlaws of the Constitution, not of this country, but of the human race — they are never, never ta be supported, never to be tolerated. Under the S3'stematic attacks of these people, I see some of the props of good Government already begin to fail — 1 see the propagated principles which will not leave to religion even a toleration Those who hold revelation give double assurance to their country, Even the man who does not hold revelation, yet who wishes that it were proved to him, who observes a pious silence with regard to it, such a man, though not a Christian, is governed by religious principle. Let him be tolerated iu this country. Let it be but a serious nligion, natural or revealed — take what you can get — cherisli, blow up the slightest spark. ... By this proceeding you form an alliance, offensive or defensive, against those great ministers of darkness in the world who are endeavoring to shake all the works of God, established in ■M I ' I 111 268 MK. JOHN S. EWART. [Part II. order and beauty. Perhaps I am carried too far, but it is in the road which the honorable gentleman had led me. The honorable jjentleman would have us fight this confederacy of the powers of darkness with the single arm of the Church of ]"]ngland. IStrong as we are, we are not yet equal to this. The cause of the Church of England is included in that of religion, not that of religion in the Church of England. Burke was wrong. Paley writing in 1785* perceived No reason why men of different religious persuasions may not sit upon the same bench, or figlit in the same ranks, as well as men of various or opposite opinions upon any controverted topic of natural philosophy, history or ethics. Every species of intolerance which enjoins suppression and silence, and every species of persecution which enforces such injunctions, is adverse to the progress of truth ; forasmuch as it causes that to be fixed by one set of men, at one time, which is much better, and with much more probability of success, left to the independent and progressive inquiry of separate individuals. Truth results from discussion and from controversy ; is investigated by the labors and researches of private pe* ns. Whatever, therefore, prohibits these, obstructs that industry and that liberty which it is the common interest of mankind to promote. In religion, as in other subjects, truth, if left to itself, will almost always obtain the ascendency. But after so much good sense he adds : Under the idea of religious toleration, I include the toleration of all books of serious augmentation ; but 1 deem it no infringement of religious liberty to restrain the circulation of ridicule, invective and mockery upon religious subjects ; because this species of writing applies only to the passions, wejikens the judgment, and contaminates the imagination of its readers ; has no tendency whatever to assist either the investigation or the impression of truth ; on the contrary, whilst it stays not to distinguish between the authority of different religious, it destroys alike the influence of all. Paley was im'ong. He underrated, or rather migrated altogether, the f'uiu tion of ridicule in argument. This is somewhat of a formidable list of names to collect together for the mere purpose of condemning their opinions without a word of argiunent. Plato, typical of every body down to the seven- teenth century (Pagans, Protestants and Catholics), Hobbes, Locke, WarbiU'ton, Rousseau (Voltaire may be added), Blackstone, Bui'ke, Paley — all more or less wrong, and you and I right] Yes, you say, most certainly we are — and from Chelsea we may still hear reverberating, '• He will always do it, I suppose." And we, the infallibles, have our opinions, too, upon the ques- tion of free trade versus protection, no doubt ; although perhaps we are old enough to have changed them, at the same time that our lprtund for your charge (although not for your lack of politeness); and possibly you may not have yet much improved in wisdom ! (This is a consideration which should give you a little pause before throwing stones at others.) On the other hand, if you have never so characterized yourself, should you not treat with the same leniency and respect those who continue to hold the opinions which you have abanfloned. There is a possibility tliat they have been always right. There is no such possibility for you ! Your insight into your own mistakes, as well as into those of others, you reckon as final, and you go upon it as such ! — " He will always do it, I suppose, in one or the other way." It is worth while paying attention to the way in which you came by some of your opinions Looking about you, you seem to observe that as a rule the son inherits the opinions of his father, in much the same fashion as he does his real estate. In fact, family opinions seem frequently to be appurtenant to the family possession; as the lawyer would say, they run with the land. Lord A's estate produces oak trees, and liberal politics ; while Lord B's i)roduces beech trees, and tory politics. Neither of the noble Lords had anything more to do •with the formation of their opinions, than with tlie growth of their trees — both came to them ready made. And now when they assert that trees and opinions are clearly their own, I agree ; and in each case for exactly the same I'eason — because they quite lawfully inherited both. This is all very trite, no doubt, but what, perhaps, is not so very trite, is that it applies to yourself, and that you do not think that it does. (I am taking one chance out of a thousand.) You see that it ajiplies to everybody else : but everi/body else sees that it applies to you. If you do hold the opinions of your father, may it not be because his trees were oaks], and that your boasted insight is lii>^if.ed to the ascertaiiiment of what kind of ideas you were born with ? Your opinion then (be it live oak, or dead basswood, merely) is that Plato, and the rest, were indubitably wrong. ISTot stupid, you say, but under the influence of sujjerstition, or other properly discarded rag-tag : dominated to some extent by their uncultivated environment, grovelling in the darkness out of which we have arisen to such effulgent light. Yes, my friend, without having read a word of these men, you condem them ; but what are you going to say about m 270 MR. JOHN 8. RWART. [Part II. ! I li 1 i! ' nl all those of your conteinjiomries who disagreo with you — effulgent light notwithstiuuling ; people who believe that all society is hooked and buttoned together by religion, and that the button-lop[)ers must be stopped that society niiy not reLurn to original nudity anJ baibarisui. I do not wish to argue these points with you, I merely want to ask you, what do you say about all these contemporaries ] That you are I'ight, and they are wrong, and that you can prove it ] That may be so, but they tell me precisely the same thing, namely, that they are right and you are wrong, and that it is the easiest thing in the world to demonstrate it. Now, no one objv'^cts to your holding your ojunions, as well as vour trees ; to the advocacy of your opinions, and to the supplanting of all other trees with oaks, if you can convince the owners of them that the thing ought to be done. The point I want to come at is this, that your opinions are not entitled to one whit gi-eater deference or respect (even should they be concurred in by vast majorities) than are the opinions of others. Frankly, and unreservedly, will you go with me that far] You believe that all opinions not harmful to society should be tolerated. A great many other jjeople say, *' yes, that is true, but atheistical opinions are harmful and should therefore not be tolerated." You reply that "atheistical opinions are not harmful." This is not a question of principle, but a question of fact — Are atheistical opinions harmful to .society 1 — and it is a fact that we can- not agree about ; several centuries of endeavoring to do so having proved that matter to us. What then is to be done? Perhaps w© can get some help by a technical statement of the argument : — Opinions harmful to society ought to be suppressed : some people (A) believe atheistical opinions to be harmful; while the others (B) believe that they are not ; therefore the some people (A) ought to have their way, and such opinions ought to be suppressed. You see clearly that this conclusion is wrong ; but how does it help you to yours: If the conclusion is not right that the some people (A) must have their way, and the opinions be suppressed ; neither is the other conclusion right, that the others (B) must have their way and the opinions be tolerated. If we cannot decide whether the opinions are harmful or innocent, (A) has as much right to have his wav as (B), has he nof! Let me suggest a solution, for there is no impasse here. (A) wants the opinions of (B) suppressed ; he has no right to interfere with other people's opinions, unless they ai-e harm- ful to society ; on him therefore lies the onus of proof that the opinions that he seeks to suppress, are harmful. If he cannot prove this (and in the supposed case he cannot) nothing is done ; and the decision is net that (B) is right, but that (A) has not made a case for interference with him. The normal condition is liberty. Let him who desires to circumscribe it prove his right. If he cannot, then he has no title to interfere. Chap. XV.] MR. JOHN S. EWAllT. 271. But why elaborate all tliia ? No one now-a-days thinks of interfering with opinions. Think you so, my friend ? So far I have been endeavouring to gt '^ you to agree with nie upon general principles, (before procee l^^ I/. .ce- loving fathers that thev are old women, and that a fighter is the highest tyi)e of the English gentleman. You are right, of couree, and they wrong ; but again I plead for liberty. Or, i)erhaps, you bfilieve that education is a vicious thing, unnaccompanied by religion, and that the State is turning out ''clever scoundrels" instead of worthy citizens. You insist u[)on religious instruction in all the schools. You quote all our old authorities, a great many of our new ones, and piles of most convincing statistics, to prove that societ\ is held together by morality, and that there can be no morality without religion ; and, so far from being shocked with the idea of setting child against parent, you would pray that "it might be the means under Providence, of," etc., etc. Beyond per- adventure, your "little section of a generation" has arrived at the " ultimate infallible credo" but, once more, let me remind yon that Jiiany jieople, your equals in intelligence, believe that the religion Chap. XV.] MR. JOHN 8. EWART. 273 you want taught is mere superstition and nonsense, which should be educated out of the parents, and not into the children. Once more, I say, let there be liberty. Perchance Sabbatarianism is your particular hobby, and you believe that a nation which "desecrates the Sabbath " will be cui-sed of God. You probably, therefore, want the commandments, and particularly the foiu'th, learned by heart by every Canadian child. It is not enough for you to teach your own children so, but you insist upon the childi'en of people, who think your Sabbatarianism Puritan fudge, to be taught that their parents misbehave themselves shock- ingly on Sunday. I repeat, let us have liberty. Or is the abolition of alcoholism your particular ambition 1 Then you desire that the deplomble effects of fermented liquora should be impressed u[K)n the rising generation — the body ; God's temple) should be kept pure from the degrading thing ; nine-tenths of the vice, sin, and shame are its offspring, etc., etc. All, beyond doubt as well founded as are the arguuients to support all the other isms of which you make so little ; but, for the last time, I tell you that thousands of excellent people believe you to be a mere crazy bigot, and would much rather have your children taught to think so, than that theira should be trained to think like you. There must be liberty. And so I would have no isms in the schools at all 1 you ask — no Imperial Federation, no Militarism, no Pietism, no Sabbatarian- ism, no Anti-Alcoholism ] Quite the contrary, my friend ; I would have all these, and every other ism, of such like, you can think of, in the schools; but upon this one condition, that the parents of all the children should be willing to have them there. In the name of liberty, I would say to the parents, certainly you have a right to teach, or have taught to your children anything you like, so long as you can agree about it. 1 would not ask that a whole province should be unanimous before Sabbatarianism could be taught in a single county ; nor that a whole county should be made unanimous before militarism should be taught in one of its school districts ; nor even that a whole school district should be unanimous before Imper- ialism should be taught in one of its. schools. What does the ])rinciple of liberty require 1 This and nothing moi'e, that parents should not be i-equired to subscribe to the school rates, and at the same time have their children taught some ism that they abhor ; and, on the other hand, that where the parents of all the children in any school desire that an ism should be taught, taught it ought to be. And I shall add, that when I speak of unanimity I mean practical unanimity, and not such as would make it necessary to include all mere eccentric or isolated opinion, of every ordinary or extraordinary sort. We can never expect to have theoretical |)erfection in the application of «ven undoubted doctrines to all possible conditions and contingencies. 18 274 MR. JOHN 8. EWART. [PaRT II. as Let me gather up some conclusions. Education can be conceived something entirely apart from all isms. Nevertheless in the community are many people who desire to have particular isms taught in the schools. Liberty requires that children should not be taught isms to which their parents are opposed. But at the same time liberty does not rt.iquire that childi-en should be allowed to grow up entirely illiterate. Liberty further requires that whore the parents of the children of any one school desire that a particular ism should be taught, taught it ought to be. And it further requires that in arranging the schools, reasonable facilities ought, if possible, to be given for the combination of such children in separate schools. Tt would be the antipode of liberty that such combination should be prevented in cases in which it did not materially interfere with the eflSciency of other schools. Let me put a concrete case. In the Province of Ontaiio there is a large number of Roman Catholics who believe that their children would be very improi)erly educated were they sent to secuUir schools or even to schools which Protestants would approve of. In that case, what does the principle cf liberty require 1 Mei-ely this, that opportunities should be given for the combination of Roman Catholics in certain of the schools, if that can be done withoiit dis- turbing unduly the efficiency of the other schools. They desire that an ism should be taught to their children. By all means let it be so, if it costs nothing, or very little, to other people. Liberty to them, and all others, should be accorded even at some expense to the com- munity, for one of the objects of our institutions is to afford as mach individual liberty as possible. The opportunities they desire may, without loss to the community, be given to them in two sets of cases r (1) v/here the population is dense, and yet mixed, (in these cases there will be room for two sets of schools); (2) in districts where the population is spai-se, but entirely Roman Catholic. Against the propriety of granting facilities for separate schools in these cases, there can be nothing said without intolerance, and the breach of our most cherished principles of liberty. One word of application to the Manitoba schools. The Rev. Dr. Bryce, one of the bitterest opponents of the separate schools, has recently stated as follows : Out of 719 school districts in Manitoba, when the Act of 1890 was passed, 91 were Catholic. Of these all but a very small percentage are in locali- ties almost entirely French. I may add that of the " very small percentage " there were only four school districts in which the population, although mixed, was not large enough to support a school of each kind. Our principle of liberty, applied to Manitoba therefore, requires that in all but four out of the 91 schools the Catholics ought to be allowed to have their way^ and to teach their religion to their children if they wish, provided Chap. XIV.] MR. JOHN S. EWART. 275 Dr. has out only that the just I'equirements of the State with reference to secular learning are observed. Acting upon the very contrary doctrine, namely, that of intolerance, consciously or unconsciously having in view the hindrance of the teaching of the Catholic religion as some- thing dei)raved, Manitoba has said to a large section of her people, unless you undertake to stop teaching your own religion, to your own children, in schools to which no one goes except those of your own faith, we will not permit you to organize yourselves together for the instruc- tion of those in whose education the whole community has a decided interest. We would rather see them illiterate, than Catholi'i ; but we hope to avoid illiteracy by driving them into adoption of secular schools, under stress of financial difficulties with which we shall sur- round them. And so we have, even in the last decade of the 19th century, the spirst of intolerance as rampant and vigorous as ever ; although with this difference principally, that whereas in the past the churches have had their innings, and the unbelievers have had to do much active fielding, the parsons are now out, and are finding it tolerably difficult to keep within limits the scoring (they are receiving) ; for all of which, in my humble judgment, the churches have themselves to thank. Love your enemies was always their doctrine, but never their practice. And now their day has come, and while the Tudors would not have allowed any one to teach unless under license from the Bishop, modern regulations require the Bishop himself to have his certificate, and charge him straightly not to say a word concerning that which he believes to be the essence of all education. I dc not mean to imply that unbelievera have now a monopoly of intolerance. What T would rather say is that, in my ojnnion, the most intolerant people of the day are the sceptics (I speak, of coui'se, of the class) ; that it is they (not merely those so avowed, but that very much larger class that is practically unbelieving, although still pronouncing the shibboleths) that are the most determined in their hostility to the Catholic religion being taught in the Catholic schools. Lwrge num- bers of believing Protestants, no doubt, agree with them, and the rancour of many individuals among these cannot be exceeded ; but very many of this class would be glad to accord liberty to the Catho- lics could they but get a little of it themselves. That they cannot da so is due, I believe, to those who deem religion not to be of the high- est importance — that is, that scepticism avowed and unavowed (per- haps repudiated, but nevertheless dominating), is now at the wicket. I know that sceptics believe themselves to be the most tolerant of people, but I am convinced that my estimate of them is correct (Rousseau required all his citizens to be tolerant, having first directed to be exiled, or executed, all who would not subscribe and live up to. 1 270 MR. JOHN S. BWART. [Part II. his profession of faith). Buike, a hundred years ago, spoke of athe- ists as holding those principles which will not leave to religion even a toleration. And Priestly* a few years earlier wrote : The most unrelenting persecution is to be apprehended not from bigots, but from inhdels. A bigot who is so from a principle of conscience may pos- sibly be moved by a regard to the conscience of others ; but a man who thinks that conscience ought always to be sacrificed to political views has no principle on which an argument in favor of toleration can lay hold. To the writers of those days I shall add one of the most brilliant of the present — John Morley,t himself by many thought to be a mere secularist, because free from the cui-rent dogmatic religion : That brings us to the root of the matter, the serious side of a revolution that in its social consequence is so unspeakably ignoble. This root of the mat- ter is the slow transformation now at work of the whole spiritual basis of thought. Every age is in some sort an age of transition, but our own is char- acteristically and cardinally an epoch of transition in the very foundations of belief and conduct. The old hopes have grown pale ; the old fears dim ; strong sanctions have become weak, and once vivid faiths very numb. Reli- gion, whatever destinies may be in store for it, is, at least for the present, hardly any longer an organic poA* er. It is not that supreme, penetrating, cop- trolling, decisive part of a man's life, which it has been and will be again. . . The native hue of spiritual resolution is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of dis- tracted, wavering, confused thought. The souls of men have become void. In 'i-e void have entered in triumph the seven devils of secularity. And so secularism must have its day, and show what of weal or woe there is in it. It may be the " ultimate infallible credo'" but it, too, most probably will sink into the ditch and become a dead body, and another warning for all lat«r cock-sure philosophers. Upon this it is not necessary that an opinion should be offered by one whose liumble belief is that Our little systems have their day ; They have their day, and cease to be, and that for the most part we are but children crying in the night, " and with no language but a ciy." Let us, I say, while our particu- lar little system is disappearing, have peace ; let us have sympathy and tolerance, the one for the other ; and whether these or not, at the I'^ast let us have liberty. * Essay on the First Principles of Qovernnient, 290. t On Compromise, 136. CHAPTER XVI. THE MANITOBA SCHOOL QUESTION.'' By Grorob Bryce, LL.D., "Winnipeg. Mr. John S. Ewart, of Winnipeg, wrote in the July number of the Canadian Magazine a readable and erudite article entitled " Isma in the Schools," in which, though the field of treatment was much wider, yet our schools were plainly the objective point. Mr. Ewart discusses at some length the subject of toleration and writes many melancholy extracts embodying the intolerance of our forefathers. These citations from the writings of the great, and may we not say the good, of the past, would make us pity the I'ace, did not Mr. Ewart embraco himself and all of us with the rest, and describe us with a touch of raillery as " we, the infallibles." We may well admire his adroit and good-humored use of the hon mot of Oliver Cromwell to the Scottish General Assembly : I beseech you in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mis- taken. No doubt M; . Ewart regards the writer, whom he calls " one of the bitterest enemies of the separate schools," as the direct lineal ecclesiastical descendant of the Scottish Assembly. It must be con- fessed that those descended from the race to which Mr. Ewart and the writer belong have a great deal to tight against. The " perfer- vidum ingenium " of which we have heard so much as a Scottish characteristic, overcomes the best of us. We must all plead guilty to a charge made by a brilliant litterateur against the Scottish people, that " their obstinacy is truly sublime." Indeed we can all heartily join in the prayer of that fellow countryman who pleaded for heavenly direction, saying : " Lord, thou knowest gif I dinna gae richt, I'll gang far wrang." So Mr. Ewart's five columns of extracts ranging from Plato to Paley, each one dismissed with just a spice of dogmatism, — "War- burton was wrong," " Burke was wrong," and the like — lead us to conclude that Mr. Ewart's own doctrine of toleration neds some examination. * Reprinted from the Canadian Magazine, September, 1893. [277] 278 REV. DR. DHYCE. [PaRT II. Carlyle, a favorite of Mr. Ewart, suggested in one of his lectures that toleration may be abused. He says : Well, aurely it is good that each of us be as tolerant as possible. Yet, at oottoin, after uU the talk there is and has been about it, what is toleraiico ? Tolerance has to tolerate the unessential, and to see well what that is. Tolerance has to be noble, measured, just in its very wrath when it can tolerate no longer. But, on the whole, we are not altogether here to tolerate ? We are here to resist, to control, and vanquish withal. We do not tolerate Falsehoods, Thieveries, Iniquities, when they fasten on us ; we say to them. Thou art false ; thou art not tolerable ! We are to extinguish falsehoods and to put an end to them, in some wise way. Nor has Carlyle, in the trio — Falsehoods, Thieveries, Iniquities — exhausted the intolerable things. We do no tolerate injustice, dis- loyalty, anarchic tendencies, or official stupidity, against which it has been said "even the gods fight in vain." We say to them "Get thee behind me; thou art false; thou art not tolerable." What a genuine ring there is about the words of the sage of Chelsea ! There is a false — hate it, exclude it, destroy it. There is a right— a true — search for it, and treasure it up when you find it. It is hard to find, as all truth is ; but it exists ; it is worth the toil, and sweat, and tears, and blood, of the search. Contrast with this Mr. Ewart's doctrine. My right is your torong ; my wrong is your right. One for me is as good as the other for you. Th'- is no fixed right. There is no hope of reaching a common 8 ird. durely this is what Mr. Ewart means, for he says (page 362) : If we cannot decide (and Mr. Ewart says we cannot decide) whether the opinions are harmful or innocent, A has as much right to have his way as B, has he not? Or again (page 361) : Your opinions are not entitled to one whit greater deference or respect than are the opinions of others. Plainly Mr. Ewart believes there is no common standard of opinion ; that there can be no consensus of right ; that there can be no invariable moral princi]>le in man which can serve as a basis of agreement, and hence of truth. That being the case, then each mtist be allowed to believe, and act, as he likes. One man's opinion may be harmful to society, but the man says it isn't so. His opinion is as good as mine. He must have liberty. Society is thus debarred from interference with him. Absolute, unrestrained liberty to do as he may choose must be given him. To the mind of the writer, these ai*e the elementaiy principles of anarchy. In making this statement, the writer is not condemning Mr. Ewai't, who is a prominent and useful member of our Winnipeg com- <3hap. XVI.] REV. DR, BRYCE. 279 munity, but simply stating the inevitabb drift of the opinions ad- vanced by Mr. Ewart, for lie says : Religious and irreligious opinion ia in the category of the debatable ; the true policy with reference to all such questions is perfect liberty. Or again : In the name of liberty, I would say 'to ^the parents, certainly, you have a right to teach, or have taught, to your children, anything you like, so long as you can agree about it. Now it is the pontention of the writer, in opposition to these views : 1. That the state has a right to form and enforce an opinion of its own at variance with the opinions of many of its subjects, or, in other words, whrre it sees cause to disregard the " j)erfect liberty " claimed by Mr. Ewart A few insi,ances may suffice. The state may rightly insist on the education of all the children in it, whether the parente approve or disapprove. Ignorance is a public danger: the prejudice of a parent in favor of illiteracy may not be permitted. Mr. Ewart is compelled to admit this, when he says : But at the same time liberty does not require that children should be al* lowed to grow up entirely illiterate ; Though he had just stated that : Liberty requires that children should not be taught isms to which their parents are opposed, knowing perfectly well that one of the commonest isms or pre- judices, many people have is resistance to the education of their child- ren. The state may compel vaccination, although, as every one knows, a good many of the inhabitants of the Province of Quebec are are as much opposed, in the very presence of smallpox, to the vac- cination of their families, as they are to their educatioki. The state in time of epidemic may rightly dismiss the schools, and prevent people from meeting for public worship, if the public health would thereby be endangered. Kvery one knows the great powers of expropriation vested in the state by which the rights of the individual may be trespassed upon, although in every rightly constituted state the individual is entitled to compensation. It is surely useless to show further how Mr. Ewart's doctrine of '^perfect liberty," unwarily advanced by him, would render the existence of the state impossible. 2. The writer further contends that the state, being founded on justice, may not give special privileges to any class of its subjects. Lieber says : Everything in the state must be founded on justice, and justice rests on generality and equality. The state, therefore, has no right to promote the private interests of one, and not of the other. This is a genemlly admitted principle. What does Mr. Ewart propose 1 He proposes that the people of Manitoba should have their IH*('. 2«0 REV. DR. BRTCE. [Part II. iniblic schools, and that one denomination should be singlnd out ftnci be allowed to teach their " ism " in certain schools to be controlled by them. He was most strenuous, when pleading the Roman Catholic position l)efore the courts, in insisting that Episcopalians and Pres- byterians had no rights in the same way. Though they had schools in the Red River settlement, yet Mr. Ewart contended that their sectarian wishes might be disregarded, and that they had no rights except as bulked together with half a dozen other sects as '• Protest- ants.' Is that justice? Further, the state has now said there shall be public schools for all classes of the ])eople in Manitoba. Its exact words are : The public schoola shall be entirely non-sectarian. No one maintains that the ordinary subjects of education are not within the scope of the action of the state. They are subjects taught by the Roman Catholics everywhere, as well as by others. Nobody proposes that the Roman Catholics shall '* have their children taught some ism that they abhor." Since the Roman Catholic people are,^ *' all, but a very small percentage, in localities almost entirely French," they have local control of their schools. Is there the slightest ground for Mr. Ewart's unwarrantable statement that, acting from intolerance, Manitoba has, consciously or unconsciously, in view the hindrance of the teaching of the Catholic religion as something depraved ? Manitoba has simply declared, as the Privy Council has decided she had a right to do, that the pixblic schools shall be non-sectarian ; and the Manitoba educational authorities are doing their best justly and temparately to carry out the law. But the mild, gentle-faced tolerance that Mr. Ewart so adroitly pleads for, is not the reality for which he is arguing. He knows perfectly well that the school which he regards as the creation of so many parents wishing their " ism " taught " so long as they can agree about it," is not the reality. Mr. Ewart's theoretical school involves an element just as objectionable to the Roman Catholic Church as the public schools contain. The Roman Catholic objec- tion to the public schools is that they are not under the control of the Church. It is the question of authority that is at issue. See how ruthlessly the bishops in Quebec crushed out the aspirations of Mr. Masson and his associates ! Read the assertion of the position of the Church in the pastoral of the Roman Catholic bishops of the United States, and see its arrogant claim of control. To have recog- nition by the state of the teachera which its religious orders provide, and to decide what text-books shall be used in the schools are most strenuously insisted on. Under the late separate school law in Manitoba no text-book could be used in the Roman Catholic schools without the approval of the " competent religious authority.'^ CflAP. XVI.] REV. DR. BRYCE. 28r SO Mr. EwHvt's decentnilizing, and ulfcra-democratic, suggestions for overcoming the difficulty will be met with the same disfavor as the Public Schools Aot of 1890. To have a portion of the schools of Manitoba, say one-eighth, with the relative proportion probably decreasing, organized separately under the control of the authorities- of a special church ; to have that church dicttiting the chamcter of the teaching, certificating teachers, and tixing its imprittiatur on the school and its work, is contradictory to the fundamental idea- involved in a state, is an "imperium in imperio," which a free people may justly unite in addressing with Carlyle's words : •' Thou art not tolerable." 3. The writer contends that religion is outside of state inter- ference, unless religion invade the state's domain. Render to Cteaar the things that are Oaesar's, and to God the things that are God's," is more than ever coming to be recognized by large numbers of Christians, and by those outside of Chiistianity as well, as the true principle. The declaration of Jesus Christ, My kingdom is not of this world, is best interpreted by the statement that the sphere of the Churchy of which Christ is the king and head, is outside that of the state. The school of thought in which Mr. Ewart, and the writer, were brought up in Toronto taught this so certainly, and the concensus, of opinion of the vast majority of people in Canada and the United States is so strongly in favor of it, that possibly it is hardly worth while to argue it further. The limitation, however, is somewhat necessary, that the state- may interfere in the religious sphere. The case of Mormoni.sm is one to the point. There a so-called religious doctrine is regarded by the state as destructive of social order and is so repressed. Certain- churches regard marriage as a religious contract ; the state, for cause, dissolves the marriage thus formed, by granting a divorce. Religious bodies, which in their worship destroy the peace of the- Sabbath and interfere with public convenience, are rightly checked by the state. But on the whole, the trend of modern thought is to allow as- great liberty as possible to religious opinion. This is willingly allowed where Mr. Ewart's " perfect liberty " cannot be permitted. Probably most would say that should Roman Catholics, or others,, desire to educate their children in private schools, at their own expense, so long as illiteracy does not result, it would be well to allow it. But where this is permitted, for Roman Catholics then to- put in the plea of exemption from the public school taxes is plainly unjust ; for it would violate the condition of equality on which the- stAte is founded, were this allowed. Many i'rotestants prefer to< 282 HKV. DR. HRYCE. [Paht II. ediicato thuir childroii iit privnto hcIiooIh and donoinintitionul H(>ininarioH. Tliey luH'er drHain of aHkiii<( uxernptioii from tlio public huIiouI taxes. No one I'iikIioh to their aid to donoiincu t)io Htatu as purHO(Mitin<{ tlioni. Anil here, too, coihch in the opportunity for j,'rantin^ a lurj,'(! amount of lilxn-ty to those who desire special " isms " taught their children, and who are willing to ])ay for it. If some parents wish their chililren hroaght up imhued with the principles of " lmp(>rial Federa- tion and Militarism," private enterprise provides such schools, and we might name them, to which they may ho sent. The state may deem it wise to shut its eyes to this so long as illiteracy is avoided. Should others desire their cliildren to be immersed in the doctrines of "Pietism, Sabbatarianism and Anti-Alcoholism," for them, too, private, or church, enterprise will supply schools, such as we nught name, and the state may shut its eyes again so long as general education is not neglected. So with schools to educate the young in Conservatism or Dogmatism, in Anglicanism or Agnosticism. One may express doubt as to the wisdom of such a course on the part of parents ; but they may enjoy the luxury, by paying for it. When, however, such an one approaches the s'^ate to demand ex- «m])tion from paying his public scho.)l taxes, the Privy Council, the Iieople of Manitoba, and, we venture to think, common sense unite in saying : " The public schools are for all : they may be use 1 by all ; thou art asking an advantage over thy fellow subjects : thy claim is not tolemble." Nor does our advocacy of the principle of the separation of church and state justify Mr. Ewart's dithyrambics at the close of his article, where he says : "And so secularism must have its day, and show what of weal or woe there is in it. It may be the ' ultimate infallible credo ' ; but it, too, most probably will sink into the ditch and be- come a dead body, and a warning for all later cocksure philosophers." The public schools of Manitoba are supported by the vast majority of the religious people of Manitoba. And in Manitoba the religious education of the children is not neglected. The Church, the Sunday School, and the family circle, are all agencies for cultivating the reli- gious life of the young. The ])ublic schools of Manitoba are essen- tially the same as the public schools of Ontario. In Ontario the second and third generations of the population have grown up under this system. The writer has seen many countries of the world, but can say with firmest belief that nowhere will be found a more intelligent, sober, and religious people than the people of Ontario. There are probably fewer secularists or infidels in Ontario than in any population of its numbers in the world. As the writer has said elsewhere, if there be a defect either in Ontario or Manitoba, it is because the Church has not done its work thoroughly ; it is not the fault of the public school. In conclusion, the writer is of opinion that the people of Manitoba -'II Chap. XVI] RKV. DR. UKYCE. 283 Ijiivo followed a winer, and nioro patriotic, courHe tlmn tliat Huj^^ostod by Mr. Ewart, with liiH Ihx and iinpliiloHophic plan of ho calltMJ toloia- tion. Tho problem facing Manitoba waH unique. The province waH nia«le up of people of many nations. ItH Rpeech is polyglot, with the majority KngliHh-Hpoaking ; it Iuih eight or ten thousand IcelanderH ; it liaH tifUmn thouHand Cterman-H| leaking MennoniteH ; it Iuih Home ten or twelve thouHand French-Hpeaking lialf-breedH and Quebecers ; it han coiiHidei'able numberH of PoUhIi JewH ; it haH many HungarianH and FinlandorH ; it haH Gaelic-speaking Crofter Bettlements. Tho Icelandei-H petitioned the educational board, of which the writer is a member, for liberty to have the Luthei'ans prepa»T heir candidaten lor confirmation in the schools : tho Mennonites with hingular tena- city have demanded separate religious schools : the French had tlieir Catholic schools, and tlieir spirit may l)e seen when their late super- intendent, Senator Bernier, refused to consent to a Protestimt being a meml>er of a French-Canadian society ; many of the other foreigners are absolutely careless al)out education. What could patriotic Manitobans do] They were faced with the prospect of whole masses of the population growing up illiterate. The Mennonites, who came from Russia, are more ignorant to-day as a people than when they came from Russia eighteen years ago. Yes, British Manitoba has been a better foster-mother of ignorance than half-civilized Russia had been. The only hope for the province was to fall back on the essential riglits of the province, and provide one public school for every local- ity, and have a vigorous effort made to rear up a homogeneous Cana- •dian i)eople. It lias required nerve on the part of tho people to do this, but the first steps have been taken, and in the mind of most there is the con- viction that the battle has been won. And yet the people of Manitoba are not intolerant. They are, as Mr. Ewart knows, a generous jjeople. Last year the general election in Manitoba turned on this question. There was no abuse of Cath- olics, or Mennonites, or foreignei"s. There has not been the slightest ■animosity manifested. Violence was unknown in the campaign, or at the polls. There was simply the conviction that public schools are a great necessity for the province ; that they are the only fair system yet devised for meeting prevailing ignorance ; and that in order to make us a united jieople, a patriotic love of our province demands this expedient. Our French-Canadian and Mennonite fellow-countrymen are com- ing to see this. Among both of these classes the public schools are spreading. The Department of Education and advisory board are both in a thoroughly conciliatory mood, and earnestly desire every locality to avail itself of government co-operation and the government .grant. So mote it be ! I**!' n CHAPTER XVII. STATE EDUCATION AND "ISMS."* By W. D. Le Sueur. Professor Bryce has done well in replying from his own point of view to the " readable and eruilite article," as he styles it, of Mr. Ewart, entitled *' ' Isms ' in the Schools," which appeared in the July number of this magazine. Seldom, in my opinion, has a more erron- eous position been taken up (on the subject of public education) than that invented for himself by Mr. Ewart, and were it not that the question at issue is one which calls a great deal of passion into play, the common sense of the community might safely be left to do justice to that gentleman's paradoxes. As it is, it hardly seems to me super- fluous, even after what Professor Bryce has written, to attemjjt a further brief exposui-e of the fallacies which Mr. Ewart has offered as his contribution to the Manitoba School Question. The tii-st part of the article is that which has won commendation for it as erudite, and consists of a passably long anay of instances in which various authorities, of more or less weight in the intellectual world, had held and expressed erroneous views on a certain subject — to wit, toleration. After citing their sevej-al opinions, the writer asserts that Plato was wrong, that Pagan emperors and Christian ecclesiastics were wrong, that Hobbes and Locke and Warburton were wrong, that Rousseau and Blackstone and Burke were wrong, that Paley was wrong ; and then, turning round on the render, asks him whether, like a kind good man, he will not admit that he also may be wrong. It seems to me that most of us would have been prepared to make the admission without the ]n'essuie of such a preamble ; nor do I see how the preamble fale demand them, and a legislature has no warrant for passing them, apart from a popular demand. If, then, the demand ceases througliout a large section of the community, should schools, and taxation for schools, still be forced on that section ] I cannot see that they should. At least, the only case in which they should would, in my .humble opinion, be wheu the resulting ignorance —if ignorance resulted in the section concerned — became a clear and specific source of danger to the rest of the community. It would not be right, however, to pi'esunie that ignorance would result, nor should any rash theorizing be indulged in as to the eflfects of an ignorance not yet a develoi)ed fact. I plead for liberty, not the liberty to seek out " isuis," and get them imposed by rough-shod majorities upon prostrate minorities, for I am too much impressed by Ml'. Ewart's preamble for that ; but I plead for liberty in the sense of the lightest, and simplest, and least intrusive, form of government, consistent with social order, and the largest possible exen^ption for all of us from legalized fads and "isms" and theologies. We can make or choose all these things for ourselves, and enjoy them privately to the top of our bent ; but why in the name of common sense and common justice should we seek to impose them by force upon others'! 19 4^, M m CHAPTER XVIII. THE MANITOBA SCHOOL QUESTION. By John S. Kwart, Q.C. In th«i July nuinbor of tho Canadian Miujazine, I pleaded for liberty of thought and opinion. Vh one argument, I suggested that jiossihly even the cockiest higot might l»e wrong ; and I mentioned a. few out of the millions of opinions that had already gone to the ditch. Might his not go too 1 I beseech you in the bowels of Christ, think it ponsible you may be mistaken. After seven pages, I summarized the proposition, to which 1 had " been endeavoring to win assent," as follows : (1) That human thought is, even the best of it, upon social and religious questions far from infallible ; (2) That other people of e(iual intelligence, who honestly differ with us, jvre as likely to be right as we are ; (.3) That religious and irreligious opinion is in the category of the debatable . . . ; (4) that the true policy, with reference to all such questions, is that of perfect liberty ; for the onus of proving the harmfulncss of opposing opinion cannot be dischargecl. Then follow four pages whei-ein I applied these principles to the schools. The Rev. Dr. Bryce in the September nuniber, makes reply, ansbyteriun Synods thank (>od annually that it is still there; while Roman Oatholics Itemoan its character. At pn'scut religion is taiiglit, but taught itcrfuuctorily. in«lir(M'tly, cii-cuitously, and as though people were ashamed of it. This may be taught, and that may not. The Hible may be read, but it must Ix^ read " without note or comment." The meaning of words, prol)ably, cannot be given ; tlie local customs, or notions, must not iw referreci to ; the eoniu'Ctlon with the ])i'evious chapt of the means to be employed for "instruction in moral principles," are " stories, menu)ry-gems . . . didactic talks, teaching the Ten Commandments, etc." Should the professor again write ui)on the school question, I beg of him to tell us : (1) Whether, working inider these prescriptions, religion is, or is not, taught in tlai schools; (2) whether religion ought to be taught in the schools; (3) if yea. how it comes that his maxim, " that religion is outside of state interference," leads to state-directed religion in state schools. And let me anticipate one of his replies : " Ves, there is religion in the schools, but it is purely of a non-sectarian character," I shall still (1) ask him to apply his maxim, or to submit to its amendment, so that it shall read " Religion, other than non-sectarian religion, is outside of state interference;" but further (2) I shall beg \\\\\\ to remember (as said D'Israeli) that " a non-sectarian religion is a new religion." " Non-sectarian," is it? Look at the ** Form d Prayer," and tell me if any Jew or Unitarian would join in it. Read at one sitting a Presbyterian and a Roman Catholic catechism, and see what they would respectively make of ** teaching the Ten Command- ments." Will Dr. Bryce say that he would consent to Roman Catholics, in their way, " teaching the Ten Commandments " to Protestant children? Ot course he will not, but he thinks it quite if ,1" Chap. XVITT.] MK. JOHN S. KWAKT. 297 right in tlio imm« of *' patriotiHin," and of •' homoj(en«aty," and of "a nnitiHl |H>o|)l(\" to rK(|iiii-« Koinan Catliolit; chiMron to take tlioir i(h'aH from Proti'Htant t«*aclnM-H. Ah \w miyH, " a patriotic Iov«i of our rdrix ! One more effort to niaite niysclf underHtcMxI. [n n)y July article, (^noting from Dr. Uryce, I Haid tliat of tlie ('atholic hcIiooI diHtrictH : All liiit a very Hiiiidl percentage nro in localitieH nlinoHt entirely Krunoli. And I added : Mnnitoha Iwih hhIiI to ii large nection of her people : UnU'MH ynii tniilcrtnko to Htop tencliing your own religion, to your own children, in hi^IiooIh to which no one gouH exce|)t tlume of your own fiiith, we will not permit you to organi/u yls riHM'ivcvl. In addition to secular instruction, the child- ren were taught the way of salvation, iis believed by the parents of eveiy child in the school. The state, true to principhs inter- posed no obstacle. It allowed as "great liberty as possible." It did ni>t interfere. It did not oppose. It did not oli- ject. Then Manitobans ("as Mr. Ewait kt\ows, a gencMous |)(>ople") infomied these poor paiishioners, that unless they wovdd coiise telling tli(> children about J«>sus, they woidd be depiivc'd of their orgatiiz.Uion, they would lose their share of the public moneys, and might g«'t along as best, (or as worst) they could. Since then the Government (the piH>ple have not yet approved the step) has hud th(> astounding hanlihood to send agents to these p(K)r people to syni- ]>iitluze with them, and to urge them to forego their conscientious convictions, in order that th(>y uimv have the ju'cuniary advantages of which, f(»r their religion's sake, they were deprived. Than this his- toiy i intoh'rant, and, but that it is done without proper relleotion, more base, I use the word «leliberately. These people have been taught to believe, and do most tlatroughly believe, that it is theii- duty to provide a certain kind of education for their children. It is not proposeil to remove this belief l)y argument. It is pmposed to tempt tlu'se people with money to act coi\trary to their belief. If the worrotlering this suggestion, namely, that if, at any time, he tloes heartily join in the prayer of that fellow-oonntryman, who pleaded for he.avenly tbreotion, saying, " Lonl, gif I dinna gae richt, Tiiou knowest I'll gang fi>r wrang." the ])iY)per hymn for the occasion would be, in my humble opinion, '• For those at sea " -far, far at sea. Failing i-elief by this method, I am afraid nothing lemains but the traditional surgical operation. Si quid per jocum dixi, nolito in serium convertere; for Though they may gang a kenuiii wraug, To 8tep aside is human. e(I tiiiHcoiiHtructiou at thn hamlH of Dr. Bryc«f, have, at thoHn of Mr. Le Sneur, Hharod tho goiioral fate. Thin latter giuitloinan hwmuh to think that oiio of my coiitontioiiH was, that becanso opinion might be erroneous, theM;fore we ought to shun the reRponsihility of putting any of our opinions into practice. This is not my "therefore," nor the proper " tluu-efon! ; " but this ratluM' : that as our opinions ukaii bi; erroneous, we ou'^ht not unnexdHsarilji to ride rougli-shofi over tlie opinions of others — that while acting upon our opinions, we should p»-oceed, not as if they were cei'tain to be right, but as ij\ poHsibli/, tfu,., mi(jht he wronij ; and that, therefore, if in our (economy, scope can l)e left, or made, for the free ))lay of contrary opinion, hift or made it ought to be. A general may be of the opinion that the enemy is 40,000 strong. He ought to act upon that opinion ; but he would he a fool if he niiide no provision for a 8uditals, Catliolic scliools. In such case Aldern)an (J piopo.ses that, inasmuch as the people are not agreo|)le will make no use of them. Could not Alderman B have given them a better idea ? Mr. Le Sueur gives mo credit, also for the idea of handing over local minorities to local majorities, without any check from the general law of the land. My article was, as I un^Jerstand it, one long argument against this idea — against the exercise of the power of majorities ; and 1 am indebted to my critic for the great support which he gives 'le. The single sentence in my article which has led Mr. Le Sueur astray refers to unaniviities, and not to majorities and minorities at all. " Practical unanimity," or the disregard ot merely " eccentric, or isolated opinion," I, for one, can by no means translate into a " majority vot^^" And if I am asked, '• What power does he look to, to check a school-district which, dispensing with practical unanimity, wants to introduce some fad into the school by a majority vote ? " the answer is very simple : I look to the "check from the general law of the land," which my critic makes me say that I do not look to. I must have some little license to speak for myself. Passing from these misconceptions, Mr. Le Sueur says that the State may, therefore, be said to get a mandate to establish secular schools. Does the state get any similar mandate to teach theology in the schools. I beg to recommend these sentences to Dr. Bryce, and to Mani- tobans in general. There is more point in them, I venture to say, than will be admitted ; for they avoid the inconsistency of arguing from the principle of entire separation of Church and State to the practice of teaching some certain limited religion in the schools, and the exclusion of a few degrees more of it. But Mr. Le Sueur is speaking beside the facts. If there was any mandate about which Manitobans were more emphatic than another, it was that the schools should not be secular. For the rest, the mandate of the majority was to continiie non-sectarian schools, and the mandate of the minority to re-establish the old system. Mr. Le Sueur's argu- ment, leading, as it does, to secular schools, therefore, may for present purposes be disregarded. The subject is interesting, but purely academic, so far as the pending controversy is concerned. I have to thank Mr. Le Sueur for another sentence : Liberty Cunsists in being as little governed as possible, and in having the largest possible scope left for private initiative. Apply this to district X and some scores of other districts in Manitoba. In them, the Catholics, if "governed as little as possible," will be required to keep their schools up to certain secular standards ; and will not be forbidden (for it is unnecessary) to comment on the Bible-reading of the day, if unanimously they desire to do so. Am I Chap. XVIIL] MR. JOHN S. EWART. 305 not light ? Is it in the name of liberty, or of tyranny, that all such comment, when unHnimously desired, is by law stringently prohibited? Is this imposing the will of other people upon them, or is it freedom to act as they like 1 Mr. Le Sueur is more successful, if I may be allowed to say so, when he advocates the rights of the Catholics to " be allowed to count themselves out," as he expresses it. Suppose this was done,, and that the Catholics of district X applied for a chrter under which they could organize themselves for the support of education. This would not, surely, be refused them, so long as every other good purpose is being aided in similar fashion. The charter having been granted, suppose that the Catholics in district X all became members of the Association, and agreed to pay certain rates per annum into the exchequer, and to charge their properties with the amounts, Mr. Le Sueur woiild, I think, see nothing wrong in all this. How far would he then be away from the separate school system 1' He will say that the arrangements would be purely voluntary. He is aware that in Ontario every Catholic must support the public schools unless he voluntarily supports some separate school. Make the law the same in Manitoba, and give each school district a separate charter, or provide for all by one general law as you wish. Tha^ difFeience, if insisted upon, would not cause much grumbling or discontent. Mr. Le Sueur is, I think, more with me than with Dr. Bryce to whom,, nevertheless, he says, " well done." '^l I ri id le I CHAPTER XIX. Extract from an Address by MR. JOSEPH MA.RTIN, M.P. (Be/ore the Liberal Club, Winnipeij, '20th Feb. ISO4.) Tlie next question was liow far sliould the government go in the matter of education? And here he would like to turn aside for a minute to s|)eak on the existence of separate schools. They were aware that a considerable section of the community were not in favor of the government undertaking the education of their children, and were of opinion that secular and religious training should be given in the same school. He regretted that the carrying out of the i)rinciple3 in which he believed should have met with such bitter opi)Osition, but his attitude was due to deep conviction of the rights of the case, and to no peraonal issue. He denied the right of the state to deal with the question of religion. It must be decided by the individual. It was agreed that a state church in Canada was an impossible thing. Then if that wei'e clearly followed up it would appear that any inter- ference by the state with tlie question of religion would not be in accordance with the principles of our constitution. Roman Catholics said tliat the pi'oposed legislation in favor of separate schools was a violation of their constitutional rights, but ti)e courts had disproved this assertion, and for his part he believed that the Roman Catholics would be found willing to submit to the law of the land, even when contrary to their personal opinions. He was himself not satisfied with the school act, and had never been so. He had made a strong effort to have the })ul)lic schools, controlled by the Government really made national schools, with religion obliterated. And he was now moi-e convinced than ever that that was the only school which could be justified as constitutional. They said that the state had no right to interfei'e with the different denominations, but had the right to interfere in the matter of religion ; but he contended that they could not do the one without the other. It had been urged by satisfied supj)orters of the Act that none could complain of the devotional ele- ment introduced, as it was of the broadest nature, but they found that the Roman Catholics had the very greatest objections to this provision of the Act,and he was dissatisfied himself, and was glad many Protestants shared his objections. It had been said, that in the event of his opinions being adopted our public schools would be Godless schools ; [304] ■»#'» GlIAP. XIX.] MR. JOk '.PH martin's SPEECH. 305 but by many staunch supportera of the school Act it had been privately admitted to him that the religious exet-cisos practised in the schools at that time were without value. But as a matter of sentiment, they added, — Oh, as a matter of sentiment, perhaps — but he could not undei'stand such an argument. Of what value was the form if no good resulted; and of how much harm was it productive if it acted as a stirrer up of strife ? The Konjan Catholics had honestly stated that in their belief the two forms of education should go together. The Protestants admitted, on the other hand, that it was impossible to have religious training in schools, and only asked that it be recognized, insisting, however, on imposing their views on othere in that respect, Rather than that small amount of religious training should be done away with in the schools, the Protestants said they would prefer the old state of affairs. He would leave it to his audience to determine which was the more honest stand of the two. I in 3d »g r 1 ao (MIAITK.H XX. KxTHArr K«(>M Si'KKCn OV HON. MR. LAURIBR. !! I ! I :mi !> livm \i('li(>V(>r in rioviiuMMl riyhl.M, In tln> hoiniiiion Hoiist* ol" t'oiniuons \ htwf slooil \\\\ \\tv (lie mi)i(ion ol' (he Intc Aicli- hishop 'rMolH\ M \\\:\\\ w l>o. 1 Ix'licvc. wiiM r('v»>it'(l 111 lliis I'lttvincc liy I'lirmi ;niii i"o(V I < An'lil>isl\o|i mhiI I Iiosc who simit'll i1 with him. iuul the «'oiiij>l.iint which vviis immiIo wms iIimI lliiMiOVt^i nnicnt of lMin»il.>il>;i I spcnk Ikmc in <.h(> prcsiMH't' of (lio UKMnlxMs of the (?«>\(M nuHMU liiul fuloptod h'iiishition which, instivul of int|>osiu<;- TnMio Schools y\\w\\ (ho minority, impos(>n the otho\ (>rnmen( of Mjinitolm d(Mii«>d the sti)t(Mncnt in toto. Thcx did not admit tiuU t he leyishil ion hiid that elVi>ct Thev did \\o\ admit th:U the leuislalion was to have tho olVect Ky\' soudinsj; Komai\ (\»tlu>lic children to I'l'ote.slant soIiooIh, I [»!ud to til*' (JoTcrnment. H(>r«' is a siinpl(> (piestion of fact \o\\ h;\YO to det(>rmiin' whether the statenuMits are tine or not ; hnl insteail of doinij (hat. (hey \ven( on app<>alini; to the courts anre true, (hat Catholic I'hildren li.ad Keen t'orocd to atten.i rrotost^mt .schools — if (ha( were trn(>, i( would lie such an oiUraiiv upon tho rights of conscionoo that no o»)niinnnitv would ponuit it. I said upon tho Hoor of the House of (-oiuniouN: — "Prove to me that tho complaint o\' tho Uoman Catholic minority is true, that (heir rights are oulrasred to this oxt»>n(, (hat. insd'ad of soudiug tV. >ir children to schools wIum'o (hero is no religious (eaoh- ing, (hoy are loivod (o send (heir children to schools where there is rt^ligiotis toaching, not their own, and I will lu> prepared to go Itefore tho poo)>le of Manitoba and toll them th.at such legislation shouhl not stand. 1 have nodiing olso to sav m NVinnipog than what I liave said on tho tioor of Parliament. it\ Quehoo and olsowhore. [im] CHAITKK XXI. KiXTItAHH liMM lii'on making a (ilanior, iJiiil. Iitt wcMild tatlior liavo Mo|iaratli^ion ooninioti t(» l.li«» wlioln pnoplti taiij^lil, in tlio Hftliooh. Altlioiigli lili(M(i wnio Honm |ino|i|() in tliin roiiiilry wlio did not Ixjliffvo in any icli^ion, tliiMr nundior wmh Hninll, and it would \m a torrildn hardHliip to lint |)(M)|)l(t ^cnoially if tlio word (tf (lod worn tlio ordy book (»x»!ludod from tlio h(!IiooIh. Suroly, lio Haid, thorn worn in tlio llil)l(^ cliaptfirH on wliioli all noidd a^^rnn and wliidli would not |troinotn Hcotarinniani. Jlut lin wan not nicaiiinfr to diotatn to tlin OO.OOO p(M)|iln of tlin Nortliw((Ht. Iln wr)uld lot tlinni do UH tliny tldnk hoHt, and niakn tlin clioion tliny ww lit, wlintlmr it l)n Hnparatn, or Hocidar hoIiooIh, or tlin Ontario HyHtnui of IMiMio HcIkhjIh. Ml Ih' itv ad il- ls ore not aid ft I i Ml [307] SI i t' PART III. The Manitoba Act AS A TREATY. PROTESTANT PROMISES. a^!l BY JOHN S. EWART. II CHAITEU I. INTRODUCTORY. Wlicn it iH urgnd on l)olialf of tlio Roman Catholic minority, that tli(f Maiiitolta Art was tlm result of nt';^otiation and tf«'aty, botwtMtn tlio Ked Kivor H(»ttltuous, hut ignorant sneor, that "tho iled River settlers" were nothinj^ more than "a fcsw Red River priests, and half-breeds "; and sometimes with lofty patriotism, that " Her Majesty did not barter terms with rebels." It is the object of the succeeding pages to prove: — 1. That the provisions of the Manitoba Act were the result of negotiation and treaty. 2. That the Imperial Government refused to sanction resort to military measures, to force " the sovereignty of Canada on the popula- tion of Red River, should they refuse to admit it"; and agreed to it only " provided reasonable terms are granted to the Red River settlers." 3. That the Dominion Government sent, to the settlers, commis- sioners, who invited them to send delegate's to Ottawa. 4. That delegates were sent to Ottawa in pursuance of the Gov- ernment's request. b. That "the Red River settlers" who sent the delegates, were not " a few Red River priests and half-breeds "; but on the contrary, that ])rior to the depai-ture of the delegates, and as a result of three general elections held in the settlement within a period of four months (Nov. 1869; Jan. 1870; and Feb. 1870, a Provincial Assembly and Government liad been set up, Established, and concurred in by the almost unanimous vote of the freely chosen representatives of the set- tlers. 6. That protracted negotiations took place daily at Ottawa, between the delegates and a Committee of the Dominion Government, lasting from the 23rd Ajjril, to 2nd May; and that on this latter date an understanding was arrived at, and the Manitoba Act introduced into the House of Commons. It was passed 12th May. [311] I "41 m 312 INTRODUCTORY. [Part III. 7. That the delegates forthwith returned to Red River, carryino; with them the Act, which was accepted by the Legislative Assembly by unanimous resolution, amidst enthusiastic cheering :— "That the Legislative Assembly of this country do now, in the name of the people, accept the Manitoba Act, and decide on entering the Dominion of Canada, on the terms proposed in the Confederation Act." 8. That while the establishment of self-government, without the sanction of Her Majesty, was undoubtedly illegal, yet that the whole movement found its sufficient causes (1) in the attempt to transfer the people of Red River, and their territory, to the Dominion of Canada "like so many head of cattle" (i i Col. Wolsely's phrase), without a word of communication with the settlers upon the subject, without a hint as to the form of government to be imposed ujMjn them, without a suggestion as to policy with reference to the ownership of lands, and without the slightest evidence of good- will; (2) in the " anticipation by the Canadian Government of the transfer," by un- dertaking "certain opei-ations in respect to land," thus "giving occasion to an outbreak of violence; " (3) in the overbearing and insult- ing conduct of representives and agents of the Dominion Govern- ment, and in their open threats, and endeavors to possess themselves of lands claimed by the Metis; (4) in the utterly illegal, and criminally reckless, efforts on the part of agents of the Dominion Government, and others, to establish authority over the settlers; and (5) in the turbulence, and absurd agitation and resistance, of the Canadian party, after the great majority of the settlers had concurred in the necessity for the establishment of a Provincial Government, and after every part of the settlement had elected representatives in its Assembly. 9. That thei-e was no rebellion against Her Majesty, or the Sovereignty of the Empire; that there was a well-regulated defence against unauthorized agents of the Dominion Government — for Canada had no jurisdiction in the settlement until after " the troubles " were all over; that the only object of the Metis was to obtain assur- ances as to the form of government proposed, as to their titles to lands, and other matters, about which it was reasonable that their rights, interests, and desires, should have been consulted. 10. That the object of the Metis was attained, and large and im- portant benefits procured by their action. 11. That, upon the whole, the conduct of the Metis throughout the movement was characterized not only by great moderation and self-control, ^;nt by a regard for legal forms, and constitutional action, which, remem. -tiring the character and education of the people, must be regarded as striking and surprising. 12. And that the passage by the Manitoba legislature of the school Acts was a violation of faith pledged to Catholics, upon at least three several occasions : — Chap. L] ^TBB MAWrrOBA ACT A TRBATT. 313 (1) It was a violation of the spirit and true intent of the Manitoba Act — of a treaty entered into under the direction, and with the sanc- tion and approval of the Imperial Government. (2) It was a violation of pledges made to the Catholics in 1876> when the Catholic members of the Manitoba Legislative Assembly agreed to the abolition of the Provincial Senate, and thus to the abolition of the strongest guarantee for the maintenance of minority rights. (3) It was a violation (most flagrant, and heartless) of the pledges made in lJ:?88, on behalf of the Liberal party in Manitoba, at the election (St. Francois Xavier) which enabled it to defeat the Harri- son Government, and thus p^ved the way for its own accession to office. As the pages which follow are in some sense an argument (although it is hoped a perfectly fair one) the writer has italicized words in many of the quotations to which he desires to call attention, and thus in many cases saved the repetition of language, with obvious remarks as to its relevancy. This has been done so frequently that it is better to guard the reader in the Introduction, rather than by repeated foot-notes. ./ OUAITEU TI. THE RED RIVER SETTLERS. Tlio ir»th (Ifiy of July, 1S7() (noto it woll). is iho (ln((^ upon wliicli t\\o Nortli Wostcrn 'IVMrilotv was lulinittcd into, mul Ix-oiiiuo part of tlip Dominion of (\'inatlti ; and otMiscipuMitly tlio «l«to iit whicli all claim to jnvisdiotion. on (ho part of tlic HudHon's Hay Company oamc to «M\(1. Vor sorno yoai-s prior (o ihat tialo, IiOwovjm", tlio Com- pany had with iiuMvasiivjj; dillioulty, maitdainod its authority ; and in the piwious NovomluM" ( 1>(>1>|, that authority had boon complotely auporsod<>d hy tho promotors of tho Provisional ({ovc'rnmiuit. In truth, tho powoi- of tho Company to ostahlisli oourts of law, and to puni.sh criminals, was novor woU-sottlod or aoUnowlodyfod. Dtiring long years, when tho only whiu^ people wore oitlnn* asaooiatod with tho Company, or woiv at all ovonts not .mtaijonislio to it, t.horo was little disposition to qnostion tho dospotio power which its olHoo assertod, Put the advent of •' Canadiaiis" bent upon competition with the Oom)>any, and of a "Canadian party, ' iit once put in qttostion the legality antl authority of its proooodings ; anil the Company, feeling its position to be far from soc\uv, tirst parleyed with those who treat«nl its piMooss with oontompt, and (inally .submitted to auch humiliating compmmises as it could socuiv. (,)no historian* puts it thus : " So long as the peoplo of tho country wore in ii Bt.ito of »H>ftoo, order and oontiMitmont, it w.a8 ixoithor a liar»l, nor an expensive undertaking to frame and carry out the few laws neoess.'vry for their guidance ; hut when unprincipled men put then\ at deliance, and preached to the otlierwiso quiet settlors that they were abused people, then tho Hudson's B.ay (\>mpany found that it re- ^uiretl both money and force to carry out the laws."' The papulation of tho Ked Uiver .setthMuent in 1S70 was com- |H>sed of about 2,000 whites, .^.000 Knglish half breeds, and r>.000 Fnnoh half breeds or Metis, f There wa.s a cro.ss division into three parties, viz.: the English, the French, and the Canadians. "Thk Frknoh H\i,F-rtKKKn, called also Metis, and formerly Uois-HruU^ is An athletic, rather jjooddookinj;. hvely, excitable, wisy-going being. Koud of A fast pony, fond of merry -niakini?, freedie.irted, open-handed, yet indolent and improvident, lie is a marked feature of border life. Being excitable, he can be roused to acts of revenge, of bravery, and daring . . . The .Metis, if a frien;!, is true, and cannot in too many ways oblij^e you .... bonis Kiel was undoubt- edly the embixi'mcnt of the spirit of unrest and insubordination in his race. Tril>es and peoples do at times tind their porsouilication in one of tiieir num- Mr. Bejrs. t See Donitnion Census, 1871. [ i)'* J Chap. TT.] TIIR MANITOHA Af)T A THKATY. :ji5 her. Aml)itioun, vniii, onpnhle nf iiinniriiig noiiMdoiioe in the hrniuitN of the igitornnt, yet violent, vnoillnting ntitlio«l8 by tlioHO now |)oo|)lo, wiu) hold tho niothotls of both in a>nton)pt. Koadstor an«l niuHtang, aliko, want to know what is going to 1h> dono, and espooia!' why anything is boing d(M>o, prior to tho transt'or of tho territory to Canuda. Hoadstor and nuist^vn^ WW. givon to undoi*8tiind that thoy an> to havc^ nothing to Rjiy \\\w\\ tho snbjoct. Uoadstor and niustang waiiting to know wln> is to rulo thoin, and with what kind of bridles and bits I Hoadstor and ninatrtng objooting that thoir drivoin havo not yet bought them, or got title to thorn ? What nonsense ! Nonsense, perhaps, but I'oatlst^M' and mustang Ciin kick, ono patiently, tlie other sonu>what wildly ; ami kick thoy do, tivo men being killed in tho sequence of it, HS will hoi^aftor l>o ivlated. Does the alK>ve fairly indicate tho causes of the outbreak ? It does. Tho pn>of is overwhelming. Until the ir>th July, 1870, the Canadian (k>vernment ha«l no more right to exorcise jurisiliction at Retl River tlian had tho Presi- dent of the lTnit*Mi St^iU>8. \M< this clearly Iw borne in mind — there could by no possibility l)e a rebellion against Canaactmbly occupied. As the survey progressed some of the " Canatlian party " laid claim to such parts as pleiused them, and t*>ok |Kvs8e.ssion of them by ploughing fu«'ro\v8, or by driving in stakes carrying their names. " Wild mustang " is unable to watch all this with that perfect e<]uanimity, antl stoical indifTerence, which a philosopher, in the most advanced stages, might be ex|)ected to exhibit. On the contrary lie [316] Chai'. TIT] TIIR MANITOIU ACT A TKKATY. 317 It gi'owH t'i-(>ti'ul, iipiirolioMHivo, iiKltgiiiiitt, mi^ry ; iin, ri>|inriml to Ottnwn uh followM:— "I tiiiil tliiit II (!<)iiRi tln^nuMif irritiitioii (ixintn ntiion^ tJoMintivn |)i)|)ii1iiirii linlinn title liiiviiiK Ihhmi liiRt nxtiiiKiiiNlioil. ... In ooiiiMM'tion tlioiowitli, / iinmld rrilcriitr to you tny (MMiviitioii, iin i)x|»r<>HH«ttiiwii, t.lint no tiin«^ rIiouIiI l)(f loHt. 'I'lic ticdOHRity for prompt notion in inoni (ippiiroiit to mo now tliiin it Rconind ovon tlion. . In tlio nionntimi>, tin* I'^rtMich linlf- I)I'(><>iIh, who ooMRtitiitn nitoiit ono-foiirtli oi' on«!-tlftli (hkv \\,\M^) romIh), of tlio Hottli!m<>nt, nro likely to prove i\ tnrhiilent olement. I'liiR (^IdRR Iiiih i^ono ho far nn to tluontnii violunou nliotiM Hiirvoyn liu nttemptud to he made." Aft« to rnninrk the iitioany feeling whi(!h exifltR in tho liiilf-hroetl mill Indinii eloinoiit, with reKnril to wlint they onrd. J. Stouoiiton Drnnih, P.L.S., Hod Hivor Sottloinent. I liavo tho honor to bo, sir, Your obediunt Hurvant, F. Bkaun, tSucrplary. '^1 m he *' Procoecl with the HurveyH" ! Col, Dennis and tho Hettlora Hay, "Settle these title iiiattoi'H as 'the (ii'Ht queHtion of importance '." After the di(!ieultieH had Herioimly commenced, the Cana hIiowu, lunl tlion put down !i<(ain, Hnnly, on tlio chiiinH : — " TIhw olmins liiivo no light htM*e ; t«k«f thoni of!', and yourHclvwH too!" (\)l. I >(>nniH liHH no iilt«M'nativo ; " procood witli tlio Hurv(\yH " haH l)Ooonu> iniposHJltlo. and no gathorin^ up the oiuiinH ho inakoH hin way south (»> tho Itoundary. thcu-o to report to Mr. MoDouj^all. and reo(Mve further inipossihlc or(h>rs As he journeys h't us ]ieruH«i the testin»ony ot' some of the historians, and otliers, as to thecaus(!sor the outlireak. Hkv. Dk. BKYtiK's Trstimony. Tlie Kev. l)r. Hryce, wltose writin^is show litth^ synipatliy witli thos(» who w(M(' tryino; to get terms fi'om their j)roposed new masters, tesliti«>s as follows : * " SuHii'o it to say that tl\o liivxty iUition of the (^fviiadiaii (iovcrimu'iit in soiidiiiii roMiimakors ai\«l survoyors to tlio North- wosfc, liot'oro tlio traiiHtVr ha«l 1)0011 lu.ulo, tho uiiwiso coiKhiot of a imiulior of thoso fororiinnorH, and tho natural foar of tho itoil iJivov pooplo that tlioir intorostH wouhl ho nogloototl, arcoinil for the rixiihj To thoso must lio aihloil tlie I'ostloss oharaotor of tho Kronoh hal -luvods, who. as iiuutors ami tradors. wjm'o aooustoniod to tho usi; of liro-ar'.iis. hml a horoditary liout to iiisuhordiiiation, and wore led by a fow daring loailors. " M\\. BvxHi's Tkstimony. Mr. Hi>o[!>'s "History of the lied Kiver 'rroubh\s" is by far the most oomplete aeoount (ditainalile of the ev»»iits it deals with. Mr. IV'sig r<>si(U'(l at Fort (»;»rry throuiiliout the wlioU? piM-iod, and k(>pt a carefully compiled iliary. not only of «n'ents, but of tho rumors and anticipations ot the days as they passed. His story has therefore much intt>r(»st. At ]»\iio '21, he says : — "Soon aftor Col. Doiiniahadooninionood his surveying operations through- out the sottlonient, thoso sanio men began to lay elaiin to all the most valuable s])ots of land not actually belonging to the settlors. The plan adopted was as follows : — When a lot w.va chosen by an individual, ho proceed ed to cut a fur- row round it with a plough, and then drive stakes with his name marked upon them into the ground here and tliero. This was considered sulliciont to give the claimant a right to tlio land ; and in this way hundreds of acres were taken possession of, for the ])urpo8e of speculation. It seemed, as soon as there ap- peared a certainty that the Hon. Win. McDougall was to betiovernor, that tho men, who professed to bo his frientls in Ued Kiver, made it a point to secure as much of the country to tliemselves as possible. It is notorious that the prin- cipal one in this movement, the leader of the so-called Canadian party, staked oti sulliciont land (had he gained possession of it) to n.iake him one of the largest landed proprietors in the Dominion. Can it he woiufcred at if the pcopk looked with disniiij/ ot this irhole.'^o/i' iisiirfHition of the soil? la it sitrfrrisiiKj if tkeif /oresau' the piniictiovs of the vert/ men who actfd as ursiirpem as likeh/ to cotne t7-ue, nanieli/, that the natives were to be stoamped by the incoming' stran(iers." 'Tr.o Pncvisional Governments in Manitoba," p. 3. OlIAP. III.] TlIK MANITOUA ACT A TIIKATY. 31i> Mn. MoTavisii'h Tkhtimony. Mr. M:'riiviHli, who whh (lovonior of the ]Iu(Ihoi)'h Hay f!oin- pany at Koit (lany, it) a l<'tbi(r to Mr. McDougall, at Peiiihina, (0th Novf^inhor, IHCiD) thiiH dolioatcly wayH tho kuiiid thing: — • " tt JH iiii(|ii(\Htioiinl)lo tliiit thn iirvRorvntioii of tlio pitldio ppAou in tho para- iiKMiiit fluty of (!V«!rv govcniinoiit ; but whilo in (tnlinary circutiiHtniioPH it ini^lit ltt> roHHonalilt! oiioukIi to onnt upon uh tlio oxchmivo roflponNitiiiity of prcBorving tho pul)liu poiuu;, it nuiy porlmpH at thu Banio tiiiio admit of (lou)>t wliothor Honu) ilcgioi) of ii^HpoiiHihility did riot alno rcHt upfni othtTs in a oaso of HO uxuvptionai a charaolor an thin- -a oaau in wliicii not nieroly a wliolo (MUintiy is trauHforrod, liiit also in a certain hhuho a wlioio prtophs or whern at Uia^t tlu) political condition of this people untler^ocH huoIi a j^reat oliiinge ; nnd it 111(11/ iiKircin'i'r Iw a, i/iicx/ioii wli'-t/icr, nil t.hf piiii of (he Ihniiiiiiim, thi'. priiiiiii- iKiri/ (irriiiiiji'iiii'ii/s/iir iii/rodifiii'i /lidt rlifiinir linri' prncfiilri/ ii/inti niirh ii jiinf mill iimiriiff njifirrriiilioii nf llif riniiilrij, iiinl llic pi'nilhir /I'l'/imjn iiiiil IiiiIi'iIh (if i/s fn'iijih', aH (Ml Hucli an oc.ciiHion whh dcHirahlc, if not almoiutcly (^sKtMitial, and wliotlior tlu) o(nn|)li(Wi(.ionH hy wliicli we are now Hurrounded may not, to a great extent, ho owing to that encMinmtanee. " TlIK liisiioi' or TvIIpkht's Land's Tkhtimony. 'l'h(! Aii;;lionn UiHhop of Knpeii'H liHiid, on tho Gth DecfMiih^r, 18GD, wroi(* aH folhtwH to (/'ol. l>(;nniH, who wmh thnn «Migu^'prc an niiHcttkd feclivif in the iiiiiiiln of thi'peo/ile as to the. form of iforernmeiit that wan likely to he tntalilinhed, ami a ijetieralfear anil, anj'.iety that their intereMH miijht he sacrificed, inasmucli as there had been no ])reviou8 comnmnication with them, with a view to ascertaining the exact i)olitical situation — and forming a system of government ap[)ropriato to the country. The Fretich half-breeda were evidently n 320 OAU8K8 OF TIIK OUTHKKAK. [Paut hi. joaIouh (tf tho notion of thu HikIroh'h Hny Co. witli n^giinl to tho tnuiHfor of the territory iiiiluaH tlioy Hharwl in th« ])iiyniunt. ThiR fooling wiw piirtioipAtod in to iv oortain oxtont l)y tito otiior oIiinhon of tlio inliiihitiintH, niinn>ly, tlio KngliHli hiilf-hrocila and tho Ciiniuliim Hotth>rH. Hoforo I roiicliod tho torritory I wiiH told that thoro wivh an niioaay fooling." I TiOUi) Dukfkkin's Tkstimony. liOnl Duftbrin in a dtispiitch of lOth l>sse88ion by the (tovornniont of Canada, antl themselves cast adrift ; their rights to the soil would be invaded, their hounes taken from them, enor- mous taxes would be levied, and the most absolute tyranny forced upon them. They would be l>ought and sold like slaves. With these views firmly estab- lished in the very liearts of the populace wc cannot wonder at the popularity of the movement which was created to resist to the death what some called Camu dian coercion. Our only astonish nwnt is, all thimjs considered, tluit there was not more blood ajtilled, and more cruelties practised than there were.'' •* The mad freaks of Colonel Dennis and Captain Cameron did not a little ♦" increase the hostility of the forces of Kiel, and Mr. Macdongall's presence on the bonier was a constant menace to the rebels, wlu), with wonderful forbear- ance, committed scarcely any violence to hivi or his immediate staff." Major Boulton's Tkstimony. Major Boulton was not only a participant (upon the Canadian side) in the events, but was for a time one of Kiel's prisoners. His history of the " rebellion " is nevertheless wonderfully fair. He tells us (Reminiscences of the North- West Rebellion, pp. 61, 75, 52, 58) : — " There did not seem to be any disposition on his (Riel's) part, or that of his people, to oppose the cession of the country to Canada ; but the opposition Chap. Ill] TIIK MANITOBA ACT A TUKATY. 321 of lu> olV<"»' Hpot, wo holit'lil witli pIciiHiiro tlio lulvcnt of tho l.i(Mitotinnt-<>ovoriior, (viid wuru iliHpoHcil to jiin'H niproHontntivo in tho nnnio light. In thiH wo n^proHi'iitoil tlio imihition iind liopoH <»f ('nnndn, in hiiving ho niiignili- cent a doninin atlilud to hor houndiiiiui, tho vdliiu of which, boing rimidont in tho (joiintry, wo thoroughly nppnuiiiitod. IVr ronlil not I'liter into tlir /'frtinifM of tkosr who iiirre altonl tit In' Hithjt'fti'd to a ni'w orifrr of thinyH, the rjirt of whirh, no one, nt this time, rould know." " Phis wiiH foUowud hy a Htirvoying party, undor ('<»lonol Donnin, tn run tho meridian linus and lay thu foundation of tho futuruBurvuynof thu turritory, upon thu Ainorioan princiiilu of H<|uaro hlookn, containing oix huntlrud and forty acroR oaoh, with a road allowan(!u around tho four Hidun. Thin /trocefidinff rt'infed a fci'limj of hoHtilit;/ oinon^f Ihf fHtpulation, which had not lifen ran- united, and were, not cofinizanl of any itolicu profMUiuled, or that miyhl be jtur- sued towardn them, in reijard to their holdin{/n." "Homo of tho party wore struck with tho beauty of tho countrv in the noighhorhoo *■'»,- 323 CAUHRH OR TliK UUTUKBiUi;. Col. Wolhlky's tbstimony. [Pai^t Ul. Ool. WoIhIhv, 118 in whII known, Um\ tlio ('X|M>'ther. With the exception, therefore, of the small handful of Canadian adventur- ers already alluded to, no one residing in the settlement in 18G9 was pleased with the arrangement, and many were loud-spoken in denouncing it. Where such active elements of di icontent existed, it may easily be imagined how simple it was to fan the smouldering embers into a Hame of active rebellion. . . . Unfortunately the arrangement entered into had an air of pur- chase about it, and a cry resounded throughout the Northwest that its inhabit- ants were being bought and sold like so niani/ cattle. ^Vith such a text the most commonplace of democrats could preach for hours ; and poor indeed must have been their clap-trap eloquence it an ignorant and impressionable people such aa those at Red River had not been aroused by it. The surveyors were at work all through the auttimn of 1869, tnd in prosecuting their operations frequently ran cfiain-Hnes across the farms i f men ' December, 1870, p. 206, fl. Chap. TIT.] THB MANITOBA ACT A TR«ATY. 323 whone lanriHarif thrtf could not itpfnk, ntul with whom thfi/ hail no feelinffn iu com- mon. A report noon ijot iiWrowl that th« ('nnnilian (}ov«nmont iiit«n(lfl<>fl- nflHiing thuinnelveH of all tiiti Uiitl, for tli« piirpoiie of nlloting it ainoiigntthu hoiit of emiuraiit« who, minor nniil, w«ro to follow the cfttahlinhnient of thu now onler «>t thiri((it. A largti proportion of farmers cculfl produce no title- (leeiU to the landn they clainieoui(all reachttd H'ort (Jarry, wan never even uomniuuiuated with. One would have thought that common civility, if not political tact, would have caused the Ottawa Ministry to have informed him in writing of Mr. McDougall's appointment, and of the date at which hi« arrival might ht- expected , the old (Jiivernor'H co-ojieration and anHiHtanoe in estahliHhing the now «>rder of thingn might, with advantage, have been Holicited at the Hame time. No ex/daittttioiiH were tnnde an to what wan to he the jtolicy of Canadii in itn ilealinni with J{iii>ert'H Lanil. In fact the people of that country were ho thoroughly igiutred, they were eiisily led to believe that their material interestH would be ho aUo, in favor of the eniigrantH that rumor, and the (Can- adian Burveyorfl, Haid might uhortly be expected to arrive at lied River." Captain Huysoiik's Testimony. for (Japtiiin HuyRche accoinixmiecl tlie ex|)edition to Red Rivor, iiiul testificH as followH : * " In these negotiations l)etween the fludscm's Bay f)ompany and the Imperial and Dominion (iovernmenta, it iloen not a/tpear that the feelinyH of the little colon}) at Red liiuer were taken into account at all. The French Kmperor had not then set the world the example of a plebiscite vote ; the concurrence of the people so vitally interested does not appear to have been asked, nor was any guarantee that their rights and privileges should be respected held out as an inducement to the settlers to acquiesce (luietly in the new order of things. Though there can l>e no doubt that they would have been fairly and justly treated by (Janada, yet it cannot he a wonder to any impartial person that they did not take quite the same view of the matter, but objected to be transformed from a crown colony to a "colony of a colony," and handed over to the Dominion, bon gr6 mal gre, like so many heiul of cattle. During the summer of 1869, a surveying party under a Colonel Dennis, of volunteer fame, had been engaged surveying the country, and dividing it into townships, etc. , for future allotment by the Canadian Government. The proceedings of this party had given great ofifence to the French half-breeds. The unsettled state of the land tenure, as regards the lulf-breeds and Indians, not unnaturally excited apprehensions in their minds that their lands would be taken from them and given to the Canadian immigrants, and the injudicious conduct of .Home of the members of Uu surveyinrf party, who put up claims, here and tliere, to tracts of land that they happened to take a fancy to, ditl not tend to allay these anijrij feelings. The irritation raised by these causes operating together on the uneducated French half-breeds culminated on 10th October, 1869, in open opposition to the surveying party : a binii'i of some eighteen men, headed i>y a man named Louis Kiel, stopped one of Colonel Dennis's surveying parties and compelled them to discontinue their operations. . . . * " The Red River Expedition " p. 3 B. m -.mi 324 CAUSRH OP TilK OOTIillKAK. [Paut hi. On 'J4th Novoinhur,* Kiel, with an nrniud pnrty, took imsRoonioii of Fort (inrry, oHti>iiMil>ly to prtwiMit itH fnlling into tint IiauiIh of Mr. MoDoiigdll, but in reality to ohtain fiindn anountry. Thuy knew, or oiiuht to havo known, tint light in which th(otia- tionH worv viowud hy tint puoph; under their rule. If they were awar« of the fueling of diHuontent, they ought frankly to have Htated it to the Imperial and ('anadian (ioverntnentH. If they were ignorant of the diHcontent, tho ruHponHihility of hucIi wilful hlindneHH on the part of their otIicerH niUHt wtit upon them. For more than a year tli(!H(^ nctgotiations have heen actively proceoded with, and it wan the diilii of t/if Cinnpniin to linre jtri-parcil tin' /ii'o/tie utuif'T Uh rule for the rfiiitujf ; and havo explained tho procautionH taken to protect tho intereHtn of the iidiahitantn, and to have removed any niiHapprelxui- flioiiH that may havo existeil among them. If uppenrH that no xttpn o/ nin/ kind, in that direction, were taken. The people h(fi hven led to nuppone that thei/ have heen noUl to (Utnadti, with an utter diHretjard o/ their rif/htii and ponitum. Tho roHiHtanco of theae miHguided people ih evidently not .'unnt the noverei^pitij of Her MajeMtif, or the tjovernnient of the Ifudmn'H Itay iJompany, hut to the aMMumplion of the (Government of Canada. They profoHS thomBolvoH natiHiied to remain aH they are, and that if the present MyHtem of government were allowed to continue they would at once dinpurHo to their homes. " ItisohviouH, then, that the wisoHt courHo to jturHUc in, for the present, to continue the authority of the Company, which the insurgents appear to respect, while steps are hoing taken to remove the misapprehensions which oxist, and to reconcile the people to tho change. An;/ h'lHty attempt hy the Canadian Oovernment to force their rule upon the innuryents wouUl jn-ohahly result in an armed reHiHtance and hloodnhed," It veqnirod no seer ho to propliHHy, and no ^nsat statesman ho to divine. But, unfortunately, while resort to force waH deprecated, and postponement of change of government arranged, at Ottawa, Mr. McDougall proceeded to act as though tho change had already heen accotnplislied, as though ho were already Governor, as though force were the only course in honor open to him ; and this, as was probable, resulted " in armed resistance and bloodshed." iin if ' ' •:tf V: S' '«*Atoi^,Mx^, - xt ic-^ iij%Mi>.»(«u«aHM«^ CHAPTER IV. THE HON. W. MACDOUOALL, AT PEMBINA. The Hon. W. McDougall was the Minister of Public Works, upon whose reconinieudation (as we have seen) Colonel Dennis was " aiithoiizod to proceed with the surveys." It had been determined that after thi^ transfer of the territories to Canada he should be the liieutenant-Governor, and should frame and administer the laws for the prairie land. In anticipation of the transfer he had been directed to ])roceed to tlie settlement in order to make investigations and ))reliminary arrangements. He arrived at Pembina on the 30tli October, 1869, on the American side of the international boundary, and about 60 miles south of Fort Garry, where Col. Dennis, unable to " pmceed with the surveys," joined him on the 1st November. By this time " standing on the chain " has developed into a detormiuiition on the part of the Fi-ench, to prevent, by force, if necessary, the entrance of Mr. McDougall into the settlement ; and the " wild mustangs " have thrown up a barricade across the road, with intent to defend it until assurances and information are obtained. The " patient roadsters," meanwhile, have expressed themselves in this way : — " We feel confidence in the future administration of the government of this country under Caiuidiau rule. At the same time, we have not been connuUed in anif way aa a people, in entering the Dominion. The character of the new government has been settled in Canada without our bevKj consulted. We are prepared to accept it respectfully, to obdy the laws, and to become good subjects ; but when you present to us the issue of a conflict with the French party, with whom we have hitherto ?ived in friendship, backed up as they would be by the Roman Catholic Church, which appears probable by the course at present being taken by the priests — in which conHict it is almost certain the aid of the Indians wouhl be invoked and perhaps obtained by that party — we feel disinclined to enter upon it."* Everything, theiefore, now depends upon tact and diplomacy. Taking possession of the territory illegally, and without deigning information as to intentions — " proceed with the surveys," has productnl arined resistance by the Fi-ench, and stolid indifference on the part of tlie English. A change of attitude may still avert all violence. What will Mr. McDougall do ? In his despatch to the Secretary of State (5 1st Oct., 1870) he Siiys : — " This morning I determined to send Mr. Provencher . . . . to Fort Garry, if permitted to go so far, with a verbal message to Governor McTavish announc- * Dennis Report, 27th Oct., 1869. [326] Chap. IV.] tllE MANITOBA ACT A TUEATY. 327 iiig my arrival within hia jurisdiction, and claiming his protection for myself and party. Mr. Provencher was instructed to ascctain from the insurgents, by friendly conference, it possible, their object, and the extent of the force at their command. He was instructed to assure them of the determination of the (rovernment to deal (quietly with all classes, and to respect existing rights without reference to race or religion. Rut he was to explain to them that uiifil the new gove.rnvient wan ortjamzed, ami so lotuj an they remaitml with armx in their hanils, no official communication could be had xinth them by ine or any one on my behalf." Two days aftin-wai'ds Mr. Provencli(U- returned, and reported to Mr. McDougall that li(5 had not been |>ennitted to proceed further than tlio Sale Ri"er, where ho had talked with the leaders of the men : — " I was 8urpri8eM it ! ' .TiS HON. MK. MAODOtUJAM,, AT rRMRINA. [PAUT III. ho oniihlod tlio " lovul " |>iu*tv to ootitradiot ImIhc ro)ior<» iih io (\ouulian intonlionR. hut " ovouicl titvfc; t'oimnintirntioii irilh iiu<)(fi- cidl fhrsonx" * ; auiJ for (ho iVNt wmh on^ngoil ii\ making " oH'oitH to aroKftfi the loifaf jyoph of (lio sottlomont for w fight." t (>nr oiin hunily think thut this was (ho host, niotliod of aling with |M»oph» \vh«>s<» gonoral ooniplitint wsik (hh roportoti l>otl» I)V < 'oI. l>nis. and Mr. Pinnonohor). "(hat (hoy liail no( Itoon oonHultod on tho utnv politioal ohani«(\s ahont to (ak«^ phu'o " ; nioro partioniarly whon (h»)so jmm'soVis \\m\ con\o (o " un-i(>v.'«(rtnil ohodionoo. (ill tho ty^uocn'H pioolinnation iRiBBiicd."} Ho hin»s«»ll'. i( sooiuh. was. in i>oality, a nioro " nno(Hoial |torHon.'" Whilo ho is thuH \V!u(ing, and pr<>|>Mvi»ig. (or (h(» 1h( of hoooniltor. whon ho l\o|>os (o l)ooon»o " odioial," and (o havo I'oroo.s ojiiollod suthoiot\t to " prooot>d wi(h (ho snrv(>ys." ni(»iinwhih> rofusin!!; all " oonnnunioalion with »n»o(VuMal poraonR," lo( ns ri'tnrn (o Kod I'ivoi-, and ixHHMint tho ovtMits of (ho Mu>nth. * Mr. Mi»ol>«niu:ftlVR loiter to So.irtnry of Sti\1<>, .Will Nov , IHOfl. ( Mr. Mi»olV\iR.'xll's loHor lo Seon'divv of State, 'l»i\ Oeo., 1S(W. } Mr. Mftol>oujrftlVslp»(orto Iho So.-rotrtv.v of Stuto, Hth Nov.. KS(W. CMIAITKR V. NOVEMBER AND EARLY DECEMBER AT RED RIVER. W hi 1(1 Ml-. IVlcl)(ni>^nll MwnitH Uin lut, of Dncmnlmr, wImui lin nxpnt'tH to l((> lii(MMniiHtil/ ( lovniiiof, tlin HottloiH iim iicil, iiiiu;Mvn. TluMr f^ricvniKicH me ali'«ul pcilMoUy i«)HHonnMo. Anil if it Im> Htiiil ilmt Mr. M(!l)niignll, hh a KiitiHli Huljoct, IumI an nnioli right t/O (;onin into thn tnrritorinH, hh iliny had to \m thni-o — that tlmy w(pli(>*l that thcMr opponition was not to a llritiHh Hiihjnot, hut l«i a pcrHon claiming to roproH«'nt, with powor, a colony that had no groatwr juriHtliotion in tho territory than had South AuHtralia. I(. may tie juHtly ad(h«l, too, that tlioir act whh not thn firHt tluit wan illogal. Who can anHWor Karl (iranviII«)*H indictmont of tho Oanadian floviM-nmnnt, that it liad "givon occaHion to an outhn-ak of violence," l»y undertaking "certain operatiouH in rcHpect of land," "in anticipa- tion of tho trauHfor" of tho territory to (Janada'f The outlireak wa« H vigorouH protf'Ht agaiiiHt thoHo certain operationn in roHpect of land," which to tlie Hottlers bore such HiniHter aspect. And the opponition was not of nuch wild chanu;tor an one woidd hftvo expected from unbridled " muHtnngH." On the contrary thoy Hurrounded their proceedingH with much regard to hsgal form, and coiiHtitutional UHage. Indeed, nothing iH more forcibly itiiprcKBed upon the Htudont of thiH period than the Htrong paralleliHin betwcfin itK events and those of the American rovolutioJi, in regard to the di8|»lay of legal ability, the observance of legal forms, and the gradual increase o? resistance, woll-pioportioned to the more strenuous efforts to enforce sovereignty. Council of Asmdhoia. Prior to tho period at which wo have now •irrivod, the government of tho tft upon the mind of the present writer, after a perusal of all papers aoce.ssil>le to hini, is that while ofUcially the Couneil protested Against all resistance to Mr. MeDougall, and while, officially, (gover- nor MeTavish issued a proclatuation denouncing those engaged in it, yet that privately the Governor, and nuiny of the (Jounoil, were not aorry that an aittenipt was heing made to extract information as to the future government of the ten itory ; and that all, without excep- tion, were convinced that the Canadian G()vernnn'nt had brought the trouble upon itself. On the 2r)th October, 1869, the Oouncil \nM a meeting The fol- lowing is an extract fix)in the minutes: — "The Council mianimously ex prosscd their repnthiitiou of the outnigeous procoediiiga referred to hy the President, but feeling strongly impressed with the idea that the parties concerned in thnni nuist be acting in utter forgetful- ness, or even perhaps ignorance, of the highly criniinKl character of tlieir actions and of the very serious conseipiences they involved, it was thought that by calm reasoning and advice they might Ih) induced to al>andon their dangerous flchomes before they had irretrievably committed themselves. With this object in view, therefore, Mr. Kiel and Mr. Bruce, who were known to hold leading positions in the party op|)osed tn Mr. McDougall, had been invited to be present at the niectiu(j^ of the Council, and on being (piestioned by the Oouncil as to the motives ami mtentions of the ])arty they represented, Mr. Riel, who alone addressed the Council on the occasion, substantially said, in the course of a long, and somewhat irregular, discussion, that his party were perfectly satM/ied with the present Government and wanted no other ; that they ohjected to any Onvernment com in (J from Canada without their beiixj con-vdtai in the matter ; that they would never admit any (loveruor, no matter by whom he might be appointed, if not by the Hudson's Bay Company, unless delegates were previously sent with whom they mi(]ht negotiate as to tlie terms and conditions iniiler which they would acknow- ledge him ; that they were uneducated, anlace they would j)robably be crowded out of a coimtry which they claimed as their own that they knew tliey were iu a sense poor and insignificant, but that it was just because they were aM'are of this that they felt so much at being treated as if they were even more insignificant that thoy in reality were ; that their existence, or at least their wishes, had been entirely ignored ; that if Mr. McDougall were once here most probably the Englisii -speaking population wouhl allow him to be iust.dled in office as Gover- nor, and then he would be our " Mjvster," or King, as he says, and that there- fore they intended to send him back ; that they consitler that they are acting not only for their own good, but for the good of the whole settlement ; that they did not feel that they were breakini} any law, but were simnly artimj in defence of their own liberty ; that they did not anticipate any opposition from their English- 8{^>eaking fellow-countrymen, and only wished them to join, and svid in securing tlieir common rights ; that they might l)e opposed by some Canadian party in the country, but for that they were quite prepared ; ami that they were deter- mined to prevent Mr. McDougall ironi coming into the settlements at all hazards. 2iui, November 1869. If the opposition to Mi-. McDougall was to be effective, Riel saw that the jwssession of Fort Garry was all Chap. V.J THK MANITOBA ACTT A TNKATY. 331 ftflsentiHl. Hh ]uid no atitiputliy to, or fenr of, die Conn|>Hny ; btit a far loHH ubio inaii wouM Imve at once coinprehotuled tli(> (iiHatlvantHf^es of liiH poHitioii, were tin; ''Canadian party" onrw installod witiiin the fortitioationH. Th« HtopH lie took are related in Mr. McTavisli'B letter to Mr. Mc])()Ugall (Nov. 0th, 1809) :— "The occurreiloo to which I have alhuleil in th« precodiiifj paragraph a« beiiiu HeriouH is this, that on the aftornoon of Tuemhiy, the 2nd innt, 'i niiniher of thoau daring people Huddenly, ancl without the leant intimation of tlieir intention to make such a move, took poHHeHsion of the gates of Fort (larry, where they placed themHelveH iimide and outHide the gateH to the nund)er, in all, of about 120, and where, night an■• «i| v-iiig 332 NOVKMMKW ANI> DRrRMntCn AT nWII WIVRH. PAItT ttt. Kiol'R iv»R»>n for inking ^M>WHOKsio\» of Kort (^n-ry is givpt* hy h\\\\- Bplf ir\ luR lottoi to l,i«Mit»»»»nn( ^^>v^>nn»v MovriN {IM Jim , 1873 :) "On iho followinn lUv. In»(^'' MoOonnrvU) iMitotnl fho I'vovirn'o, ntiil p\v>«i»r\v,anU KiMt iJnny. \xiih n vio« of takinK np hin rcsidiMiOf nt ihfl Kont <^f HMVovnmont. Vhc noli Bt.vlfil RoMicm tlion took up « vrry tlni>ni<>i)inu sHituiic ,vuon)f«t UK, Tliov tullti'il o\ tnlnu^ l-'oit «5av>v Tho Unoxvlpilnoor t\u» Bohf>nn\ \x\\\t>l\ \ro \v«Mv nfrnid «onM ho \\t\\\vA o\\t, minui'stcit in un (ho \don <>f «»M/\n(j fhi' l''int ; i\}\t\ \v<> onii<>rtV(>n>i\ to Urcp Ale. Mol*onntill at rt tlis- tAuoo in or.lov (lint Iur p.nty. Ml»n>l\ wove so l\ostili' to otic ijiton'titH, niiHht not, »»nilov sn.'li o\n'ntn!«tnn<'('», fifi ponROBsnvn of tho govoinnu'nt of \\\\\ nftt.iv«» o<^nn(n•.'■ o\>t th«> conounvtivM*, \n\t hIro \vitlion( tli<> opposition, o|' tlio Kn^linlt; l\i<^l now l>ont his oi\(MfiioH \ipo<\ onlisliny; (Ih'ho luttor tipoti liia nido. rtninNc (Innn to .u-tion in ilotonoo of (h(>ivo\vn intoiOHtM. With this ohjR\(l(Mvt ano '•cpivsfnt.itivcn of the ^'ronoh-Bpp|lUin^ popnlftt.ioii of 1\»iport"s \Ar.\\ in t\>nnoil (tl»o inv.-xifors of onr riulitu otMii^ now oxpcUfil), .•\hv.<.lv aw.nv of v.Mn- Rvnipnthy. ntft- tivos fn%m the following plaivs, vi? : St. Maigftfct'B I St. .1 ainos" 1 KiMonan 1 .St. Andivw'n I St. I VtOl'R 1 St. .lohn's 1 lloailmglv 1 Si. M,-»vv> 1 St . r«nlR 1 St., rloniont's 1 Town of \Vinni|>cjj: '2 in ovilor to form ono Ixvly with tho RlH>vp('onnoil, oon«iRt.intt of 12 nunnhors, to oonsulov tlio pivsont |>(>litioal st.ito of tho ooiintry. ami to adopt Buoh inoRsnroR AS niA\ Iv »loonio«l Iv^st for tho fntiiiv wolf.nv of tho saino. A mooting of tho aUovo (\Minoil will l>o lioM in tho t\>int Moubp at Koit (lany. on rnos.iav, tho ItUli ilay of NovoiuIhm-, at which the invittil roproBon- t^ativos Mill attxMid. 1\v onior of the rre»i«lent, \Vi\MrF<;. Nov. J). I-oi'is KiK\,, Secretary. Kl(Vtions woiv ho]d in |Mii*su;inoo of this ivqnost, and tho following English ix->pivsont4Uivi»s woro sonl to iho tVunoil. », J, „. , S Honrv MoKenney. TownofWinmiK-g j„ k o'l.jno. Kihionan lanioa Hosa. St. .lohn's Maurice lx>wnmn. St. TauIs l>r. Hinl. St. .\nilT\'w'8 l>»mahl (lUnn. Si, Olonients Thomas Hunn. St. IVtor's Henry Prince, St Jamos" Kobert Tait Hoa*lingly William Tait. St. Anne's G«orge Gunn. Tor tAce- la -Prairie John tJarrioch. ('map. V.\ riiw MANl^MIl^ act a rnKATr, M.'in 1 1 wttiilil liiivi^ Ihmmi (lllHtMilt In linvn rimmiioiI t,wp|vi» iiicn lioMfif niititlnil, or i|iitilil)(Ml, {,n tcpn'RiMit (li( iliHtrictH Iwm mI' IJkmh, at, Icon!,, Wf>n> tlit'ii iin'mltiMH nl" \]\i> ('fninr'il nl' AHMiiiiliitin, Tlin ('oiini'll n\' Nincniltfr (l«'l, if. nn Itn fiilltMl;, hmI, on tdo lOdi, I7»li, '2211(1, r.h,\ mill ',!flli of Nnv.'iiilM.r. " 'I'll*' jii'oi'dPiliiiun loniiltoil in Mio Kiniiitli iiH'riilx-rn (l'>i>|iiiiii|{ flifir inh>rit)i(iii to fdiin n I I'ltviRiontil ( Juvt'iiinu'iit. fur fhr inn-jniHr of hrtithiff ii'ith tuiimhi fur tlir f'ntinr ifofrvinnnif of fhr I'ninifrii, itml ni tlic hhiiim liinf (lioy n» l<)ii|{liRlt (IcJp^nti'N w*>r(> imt, prfpfirfil to ufl ill MiiB fiin'iui'iii'v, williinit (iist iMiiiMitliini; llio ncitpli' wJkiki tJioy roiiro* m'litt'il, it WHB ilcciifiMl t.li»i t!iM fiiiivciilidii nlMUilil li« aiIJuiiiik^*! till VVftdiiHwItty, tlio l«t Dei-eiiiltni'. "* fnf, Prrfijuhrr, fSftH Mrntiii^H fur ilintMiHHHidti «»f fcliin |tr()|ioniil Imving lii'inn ln>lil in llio <'niiHtiliUMH'i»'R (tliMnn in Winnipn^/, wliMrn tho (Jrtimtliiiii party wuh H(i(Hi>/PHt, Imitij^ '""y "« liv»>ly tin tli(»H« »if liitfl ymu'H), tlin KinKlinli i|(>l<*){iitnR tiint (in tlni Int l)iH>f!Mih(tr for Rnpiimtn (>t»tif(M('n('(». At rt (M)l(M'k, (i.tn., (if tlin Hiuiin day tlin Krnnch iirid Kn^liRh dnlnnfttnR mot tdKntlmr, wlinii tlin rdriiinr prfwuitod a Mill of KiglitH fill* (liROUNnioit. Tlin Hill, liiid tlin a(!tioii updti it appnar in an oiudoNurn Rent with a roport niado liy Mr. IVI(?l>diij(i|iIh linvn tlin ri^lit t(i clont tlinir own l/«t({iMlntiirA. 2. 'I'lint the lif^KiRlAttirn liftv(( pnwnr to pnnn nil l«wii IoorI t(» tliB kflrritory over tli« v('(ti of tliw hlxiMMitivc liy n two tliiuls voto. .'). 'I'hnt no Aiit of tlin Doiniiiioii I'lirli/iiiicnt (loitnl to tlin Territory) he tiiuiliiiH on tilt! p(*opl»< until nniK'tioiKMl Ity tlu^ l.nKinlntiird of tli(i 'r(trrit,ory. 4. 'riittt nil Hlinriirw, iiin>{i«trntoR, I'oiiHtnlilos, Ruhool c<»mjiiiHHioii()rB, etf)., et(3., Iio plectiMl liy tlin pnopln. 5. A fr(>(! lioin(>Ntnn( l»y mil with thri n»iar(ist lino of rnilrond within n tnrni of (ivo ynniH ; tho Iniid grnnt to ho Hul»joot to the Loonl li(>ginhitiirn. H. 'I'lint for ntorin of four ynniH, nil militnry, csivil, nnd rnuni(;ipAl oxponRON lio pnid out of tlin Doiiiinion fiindn. {). Thnt tho militnry hn (Mitnponod of tho inhnhitnntn now oxintin^ in the Territory. 10. 'I'hnt tho Knuliih nnd Kruicli InnminKon ho Gommon in tho f,«!t{ifl]/ituro and CoiirtH ; nnd nil I'lihlio Dooiimnntn nni| Aotn of liO^inlntiiro he piihfinhod in both languagoH. li. That tho judge of tho Hii promo Coirt upoak the Kngliah and French lauguagoi. ■I 'Ufgifit' illfitur}', p. 97. 884 NOVBMBBR AND DBCRMBBR AT RICD RIVKR. PaRT III. 12. That treaties be concluded and ratified between the Domiuion Government and the several tribes of Indians in the Territory, tit ensure peace on the frontier. 13. That we have a fair and full representation in the Canadian Parliament. 14. That all privileges, customs and usages existing at the time of transfer be respected. " All the above articles have been severally discussed, and adopted by the French and Knglish representatives, without a dissenting voice, as the conditions upon whicii the people of Rupert's Land enter into Confederation. The French represHutatives then proposed, in order to secure the above rights, that a dele- gation be appointed, ancl sent to Pembina to see Mr. McDougall, and ask him if he could guarantee these rights by virtue of his commission, and if he coald do so, that then the French people, would join, to a man, to escort Mr. McDougall to his [lovernmeut seat, liut on the contrary, if Mr. McDougall could not guar- antee such rights, that the delegates request him to remain where he is, or return till tlie riglits be guaranteed by Act of Canadian Parliament. " The English representatives refused to appoint delegates to go to Pembina to consult with Mr. McDougall, stating they had no autliority to do so from their constituents, upon which the Council dissolved. "The meeting at which the above resolutions were adopted, was held at Fort Garry, on Wednesday, December 1st, 1869. One cannot help regretting this refuaal on the part of the Englisn to send delegates to Mr. McDougall. As a Vjasis of negotiation the list of rights cannot be thought to be unreasonal)le. At all events the English believed it to be fair and proper. Why did they not send delegates to present it 1 The present writer is disposed to think that the real, and only, difference between the English and French, at this period, was that the latter were determined to negotiate tir.st and be governed afterwards ; whereas the former were willing to reverse the order. The English, therefore, while willing to present the List of Rights, were not willing to refuse Mr. McDougall's entry into the settlement pending discussion of it. The result, as will appear hereafter, justitied the French view, that better terms would be obtained by adopting their methods, rather than taking what would, without pessure, have been conceded. The events of November and early December, at Red River, may- be summed up in this: — Riel and his friends had formed themselves into a Provisional Government; they had by a display of force com- pelled Mr. McDougall to leave the territory and denied him re-entry ; they had taken possession of Fort Garry, the principal and strongest fort in the settlement; a Council of 24 persons freely elected by the different parishes had been formed; this Council had met and con- sulted, had adjourned in order to obtain the views of the constituents, had met again and agreed upon a list of rights, but had disagreed upon the policy of resistance pending the discussion of the.se rights. On the other hand the Canadian party was only less openly active because of the restraint put upon them by Mr. McDougall. As yet Canada had no jurisdiction, and Mr. McDougall no more legal authority thaa be lid, Ghap. v.] THK MANITOBA ACT A TAEAT.Y. 335 Riel. He would not therefore sanction the belligerent proceedings pro- po8eiio8e(l, ought to have refrained from all pi-eparations upon his side: should have left Fort Girry to bo seized by his oppon- ents (as, after the 1st December, they Keized the other Hudson's Bay Fort); should have mildly waited to be capturcid and shot ! Let it be frankly iiduiitted (but upon both sides) that in the eye of the law all this was irregular and illegal ; but let it be also acknow- ledged that "the Canadian Covernment " first gave the "occasion to an outbreak of violence" by " certain operations in respect to land"; that Riel, withstamling these oi)erations, endeavored to juiiitify, as well as fortify, himself by obtaining the sanction of Coimcillors elected by the people; and that if he seized Fort Garry, it was to prevent it falling into the hands of his enemies — it was a strategic measure, necessarily incident to the general design, namely, that the settlers must be consulted before their political status is changed. This further niiist be observed — and it is a remark which will apply to the events related, as well as to those to come — that the sever- ity of Riel's actions increased in direct proportion to the opposition which was offered to him by the Canadian party. The French settlers were determined upon negotiation first, and government afterwards; the English settlers thought this reasonable, but were not willing to fight for it; the Canadian party were determined to fight agai si it by "hasty attempt ... to force their rule upon the insurgents," »vith the result of "armed resistance, and bloodshed." We are now lar enough advanced in the recital of the events to .say that the Canadian party (and not Riel) was the cause of all the difficulty at Red River. In the Canadian party must be included Col. Dennis and his body of surveyors, and also Mr. McDougall and his entourage. Mr. McDougall's blameworthiness (apart from his direction to "proceed with the surveys,") was principally in that he allowed him- self to be misled as to the state of feeling in the settlement ; in his refusal to comnuinicate directly with any " unofficial per- sons "; and, finally, in that he illegally directed Col. Dennis to levy war upon the people. Upon the others of the Canadian party lies heavy responsibility. Some of them, in times but r 'cently passed, had shown the example of opposition to, and defiance o;, the Hudson's Bay Company. By their unconcealed contempt for the Metis, and hy ; 1. % ,^iHPi WH\* ■.mdi f 4mwn^iaM»'<«>i»»«o<<><*'- S86 NOVBMIIRH AND DBCKMUKU AT RKU ItlVKR. [PaKT III. "cortiiin oponitiotis in livtid," thoy liad plainly pointnd to thuiiiHolvoH us tho Hiipjunor huooj^hhoih, not to way mustoi-H, of tlio '* illitonitn lialf- hrocdw." Wluiti tlio Kronch dnnuuitlod no;;otiiition prior to imw gov(M'nnHn»t, it waH not tho Kn^liHh sottUir, hut tli<^ Canadian party that placod itKolf in opposition, and Htirmd up, to tlm host of its pow««', rac(< and n)lijj[ioiiH antipathy. WhiU» tho (%)nn(Ml of AHsiniWoia was counH«>lling Mr. MoDongall to rotiirn to Canacht as a stop " not only OHHontial for th« p(>a«! of th» country, hut alsoadviHahlo in thointoreHt of tho oHtahlishnuMit, in th<» future, of the (}ov(irnni«'!iC of Cnnada,"* it waa tlm Canadian party that not only urged him to the contrary course, hut offered, iipon their own re.sponsihility, to institute armed 0|)poHition to Kiel. * Heo|)n^'e 3:U. .• -.«.•<• I" 'A 8; in CHAPTER VI. MR. MoDOUOALL STILL AT PEMBINA. Tlio ^^«al iHt of DHC(>in))«r ih tipproiiching, uiid wo iiiiiHt rotiirn to Mr. McDougitll. WImt lio did, and why he did it, he Hhall hiiuMolf narrate (Report to Secretary of State): — " Hir, I have the honor to report that I am still at Poinbina in the territory of the United Htatoa . . , and unable, in conHe(|Uonce of the continued ORCupation of the road l)y armed men to proceed to Fort (Jarry. " I have further to report that / fiave not recAvrd any iiiHtruc.l.ion for v:^ { adanre on anil after the day <»f the transfer of the territory to ('ana*'-., nor any notice of the Order-in-Council, which haH no douht been passed to elFect it. " In tho»e circumstances I am compelled to act unon the general powers and directions of my commission, and of the Acts of Parliament, Canadian and Imperial, which seem to hoar upon the case. " 1 have accordingly prepared a proclamation to he issued on the 1st day of Decend)er, reciting so much of the several Acts of Parliament as seemed neces- sary to disclose the reiiuisite authority, and stating, by way of recital, the fact of surrender by the Hudson's liay (Company, acceptance by Her Majesty, an«l transfer to Cana tenau-Qovernor proceedetl a8 foIlowH: " I do hereby require, and command, that all andsingulntrthe public officers and functionaries, holding office in Rupert's Land, and the North Western Territo'y, at the time of their admission into the Union as aforesaiil, txri/itimj thi' pnhlir officer or functiondrif at the heiul .// 1 1 thai nintrat ton of ajfUiri, eace," proceeded as follows : — " By virtue of the above commission from the Lieutenant-Governor, I now hereby call on, and order, all loj'al men in the North- West Territories, to assist me by every means in their powor, to carry out tre same, and thereby restore public peace and order, and uphold the supremacy of the Queen, in this part of Her Majesty's Dominion. Given under my hand at the Stone Fort, Lower Settlement, this 6th day of December, A.D., 1869. J. S. Dennis, Lieutenant-Colonel." On the same day a further order was sent to " the enrolled Cana- 'dians at Winnipeg," in which Col. Dennis said : — ' ' I cannot be a party to precipitating such an event just at the present time, and m%ist there/ore reiterate viy orders of the 4th inst. , to the enrolled Cana- dians, to leave the town, and establish themselves at Kildonan school-house," etc. All this organizing, drilling, proclaiming, haranguing of Indians, and calling to arms, had its quite natural, but (strange to say) to the Canadians, wholly unexpected, effect upon Riel. Until this time Dr. Sohultz, aiid the other Canadians who resided at Winnipeg, within gunshot of Fort Garry, had taken part in the public meetings, and exercised openly their influence against Riel. Col. Dennis seized the Lower Fort on the 1st December ; assembled the Indians there on the 2nd ; issued his " call to arms " on the 6th. Riol responded by paying Dr. Schultz's house an unfriendly visit on the night of the 2nd ; a still more unfriendly one on the night of the 3rd : and by establishing a state of siege a few days afterwards. Col. Dennis continues : — " 7th Dec. — She brought a verbal message from Dr. Schultz to me . . . that some forty Canadians were in a state of siege in Lis house ; that they could not go out either to get food or water, and begged for help. This, it is dear, would not have occurred, had my previous orders, te^ieatedly (jiven, for the Canadians to leave the toivn, been obeyed, . . . Thinking however of the moral effect on tlie object I had in view, should the Canadians be captured, it seemeil a duty to relieve them, if possible, and believing, as Mrs. Black said, the French in the town were not more than fifty in number, that on the mere appearance of a considerable body of inen coming from the Lower Fort, the French guard would fall back on Fort Garry, and so leave time for the besieged party to come out and return with us, and that the relief could be efifecteu in this way, without necessarily having had a collision, I determined on that course. " I found, however, that the requisite force would not be forthcoming. Indeed, there appeared to be a/i entire absence of tlve ardor which existed previously . . . and it became evident that the project for the relief of the Canadians must fall to the ground." Desiring to investigate how it was that the settlers thus refused to go to the relief of tlie Canadians, Col. Dennis called a meeting of " the leading men in the Scotch settlement " : — ' ' 7th Dec. — I speedily beuamo satisfied that the only condition on which the Scotch people would now arm and drill would be to act strictly on the defensive. Chap. VII.] the Manitoba act a treaty. 341- Indeed, I was informed that a public meeting held in the vicinity, had just broken up, at which delegates were appointed to visit me at the Stone Fort, without delay, to request that aggressive measures might for the present be abandoned. . . . Taken altogether, it appears to me probable that the resort to arms, to put down th French party at the present time, mu§t be given up. I shall not, however, discontiiuie the drill going on in the several parishes, believing that such will not be without good moral effect on probable negotiations. " Two days afterwards Col. Dennis wrote to Mr. McDougall, saying : — " You may rely upon it, these people are fully in possession for the winter, and say themselves tnat with the promises they have of Fenian and Fillibus- terers' support, they will be able to hold the country. / should not be surprised but they may get many people here to join them too. I think they would do any- thing, many of them, rather than offend the French now, as (they say) they see per " list of rights " tltat the French nsk nothing very unreasonable." Col Dennis' ** call to arms " was issued on the 6th December. " On the 7th of December Kiel harangued his men in front of Dr. Schultz's house, and in the course of his speech he produced a copy of Col. Dennis' commission, which he read aloud, and then, throwing it on the ground, he trampled it under his feet." Before night Dr. Shultz and his Canadians (forty-five in all) had surrendered, and been marched off to Fort Garry. " The moral effect " of organizing, and drilling, seetns to have been really more immediate than Col. Dennis anticipated. In fi>ct lie sadly mistook not only the number, but the kind, of men he had to deal with ; he succeeded, not in frightening them, by " mere appearance, " as he had hoped, but only in goading them on to severer action. On the 6th December Col. Dennis issued his " call to arms." On the 7th he called a public meeting to ascertain the feeling of the people ! On the 9th, after his actions, and the stubbornness of the Canadians, had resulted in the imprisonment of forty-five persons, he issued the following : — " liOWBR Fort Garry, Ked River Settlement, Dec. 9th, 1809. " To all whom it may concern : — " By certain printed papers of late put in circulation by the French party, communication with the Lieutenant-CJovernor is indicated, with a view to laying before him alleged rights on the part of those now in arms. I think that course very desirable, and that it would lead to good results. Under the belief that the French party are sincere in their desire for peace, and feeling that to abandon for the present the call on the loyal to arms, would, in view of such communication, relieve the situation from much embarrassment, and so contribute to bring about peace, and save the country from what will otherwise end in universal ruin and i. l>onniH, mul, it is pi-OHnu)r MoTavish. ami the ('onnoil of AsHiiii- boia, but leaving, hy (ho tleh»y, arouHed hittor (M\iiii(ioH, and lieivo |»aH- sions, wluoh ncM-o not to ho allayotl without l)hHHlHh«'d. I'rior to h»avitig he had tho hmniliation of having to aokn«)wh»dgo to (lovornor MoTavish { U> IVo. ) th«t hisussuinptiou of tho ponition of |jif'Ut(M\ant Oivornor, and all Imh othor olhoial aotw, woro possihly illegal: " If, in omisoipionoc of tho action of the l>on\ii)ion ( Jovfiimnout, tho Rniron- dor ami tr.wsftM- of tlii' oo»ntry did not tako plaoo on tho tiist of Doooinltpr. ne piwioHBly a^rood \\j>oi\. tlion pou aro tho (Miiof l'',x«'ontivo Ottioor as hcfoio. and rosi>onsihlo for llio uroscrvation of poaoo, and the enfoioenn'nt of tlu' law". And so Ml". MoDongall turns his hack upon (tovornor INloTavish and tho Hod Kivor poopl(\ heaving thom to tight it out, or sottlo it, as Ix'st thov oan. (\nild ho h\\\ Imvo takot* sonn» of tho (^madiiuis with hin\ i\\] would have l>oot\ woll; l>\it with thoni still in the tonitory, thoir pvido, ton»p«>rarily, in tlioir pookots, and Roni;> of thoir pnokots tomporavily, in gaol — tho olonn>nts of further tnnihic wore not wanting. Hofoiv ]vu'ting with IMr. MoDongal! it will he well to quote from the despatoh to him of tho (\anMdian Seoivtary of State (!24 Dee. 18()5)): "Sir, — Your desmtcli, er, and its onolosures A.v"^ IV roAohed this ollico on th<> 18th inst , ami were promptly laid before tho (tovor!\or-(ienoral and (\ninoil. " .Vs it wo\dd ajijiear. from those documents, that ?/(>» lidvr u.fcii thr Qiircn'n riti'inf wiihovt Nrr oiifhoriti/, nftnf'utof to Hrr Ali\irst>/ arts irhich shr hns vot yrt fX'r/ornxd, •led to aHsiue you that the grave ooournMioes winch you report have oceasi(>ned here great anxiety. " The exertion of unlitarv force against the misguided people now in arms, even if under the s.ano(iou of ^aw, w;v» not to he hastily risked, considering the fearful cotisecpiences wliich might ensue were tl\e tndi.'^ns — many of them l)ut recently in contact Mith tlic white inliahitaut'J of the neighl»oring 8thiid issued .as coming from the Queen was a false one, iuul it was strange to perceive the complete revulsion of feeling that took place among the settlers generally. Jf there was one tiling more than another that assisted to strengthen the h.-nuls of Kiel It w.is that. Teople who piofessed to be supporters of the incoming govermnent at once cooled in their ardor, .and this led the way, more than any- thing else, to place Kiel in the position which he afterwards held." (JIIAI'TEH IX. CANADIAN OOMMISSIONBRS-DBLBOATBS TO OTTAWA-PROVISIONAL OOVBRNMBNT. OaiiiKla IkmI now to v^'tvncn linr stopH, I for rn|>i'nHotit,Htiv(;H had (Mul«>avoiii(Ml Ity foroo, and (uh it appeared to tho HnttloiH) \>y fiitiid, to iiiipoHn a now ((ovni'mncnt npon a poopin wlio had lon^ occupifMl thn (MMintry. Kon;n and tVatid had aliko i'aihvl, and 'hn ptmition of KinI had thornlty Ihmmi inininaHurahly Htrnnythonod. Fow of tho HetUnrs now (pK^Htionnd (ho wiHch^nt of hin poli(!y of nogotiati<»n prior to j^ov- ernninnt. Mo had boooino a HtatoHinaii and a horo. Undor thoHO oiriMiniRtanooH ( 7anaptod tho tnotiiodn iinnal to tho Htron^or — nioth()rH that hor olIicialH liad aotod wronj^ly, who Hont to thoni throci roproHontativoH (and aftorwardn a fourth) to «pii«t thoir a|»prohonHionH, to oxphiin hor policy, and to A'in thorn ovor to hor Hi(io. And th«! nion woro woil chosen. They woro tho Vory Rev. Grand Vicar Thilianlt, Col. do Halaljorry, and Mr. l)onald A. Hniith. Tho iimtructionH of tho two former boar date the 4th Doc, 1809, and en- tniHt to thoni " tho delicate tnnk of ropnwintiji^ the vip,v)(t and polict/ of thiH f^ovornniont to tlio people of the HiidHon'H Hay Territory," and continue tliuH : — " I think it luuiocoRHary to iriako moro thnn n paHHin^ rnU'.rouv.c. U> tho nrlit itf folhj oiiit iinlisnr/.ion ftttrihut«!(l to jwthouh who liavo aHHiirnod to r«!|>riit who have u(;tMMIBRI0NR«8. [Vwxr III. fnnod en(rau«f» into ilio HoUliMuont. Il«>w will tlioy rwoivo nojfo- tintoi-H I Thev luivp nlwitVH |>n»foHso»l to ho luixioiiH io iliHOunH liiRd, him! W }f«n»>ni(»(l iirtorwnrds. Vicnr (i«»m»rMl 'riiihiuilt. iiniv»>(l iii, Fort (Jurry on tlic 2(W,li Po- oonilnM-. liaviuy; loft Tol. do HaliiluMTy nt INMiibina, IIIh roport, liim tho following : - " 1 at omv informni Iho I'lvsidoni timt I \vi\s noni l>y the ('iu\mliHn Oov- «?n»uont. with Col. ilc Sivli»hoity, mid tluit I wishiil to know nt oiu-c wlictlii"' thftt, lion jjontloinnii MonUl lie pciinittod to onlor Kcil IJivo'. After nonn>nion»- ont*' ivtlofion. ;»n«l in viow of tho nuBnrftnco that I if.ui' liitn, fliaf. his int.i>Krity niifj;lit ho v« 1i«mI on, I was toM that \\v would Ito B«>n( for, ami ihat liiMiiinht oiitor as Roon as possihh' ; ami, nooot-dinnly, on fho tUh of .lanviary, I had tho plejwuro of «(>h*oniinfj my oonipanion." roiUH>rninij; Mr. Siuilli's !UTi\al Mr. HofjU ^^'^^ *'"' following?: — " On tho '27t.h of lMvi>mhor, Uonahl A. Smith in company with Mr. Hftr- disty, of the Hudson's Kay «'ompaiiy H«MviiM>. arrived at l'"ort (Jarry. and woro n\ot at tlio fitxio hy Kiel, wlio d<ssession, «hieh wore found to liavi' little, if any, I'on- nootion with the atVairs of the eoiintry, and. on doelarinu that (hese wore tho iMily doenmont^ ho h.id with him, he was admitted into tno l''ort. It was not until sometimo afterwards that it hoejimo known that Mr. Smith was a eom- missioner from ("an.ula, .although Kiel h.ad some idea that ho kiuw more than ho would disoh>so, and t horoforo kept a strict watch .over hin movonn!ntfl, and would not allow him outside tho Kort w.alls."* Ill his ivport tho tti-aml Vicar t'tirtluM* says: ~ " Wo immediately communicat»'d our instructions to tho rrosidont and hin Oouncil, ami thov weiv taken into *' tivat witli thom, hut that they would, at tho same time, ho very glad t«m-siui8, and your rights, to lahour ^ir tho improve- meut of yountry hy making a road in order to oommunicato more easily with t^anada," etc. " ltnrli-»i)w!riiijrii thai it /i(».< l^eoi dfCfived in thf I'hoid' of those fmploi/t'x whoKf /^»,<:rt ritittproniiscif it in thr It ri-it,)r>i ; hut it xlroiKjh/ ■coiuionm the orhiirary oct-n of those porticulor emploi/es who hore so shomefulhj ahvi>cd it," i'ofifiiifiicf. " .\t the olotory to hotli jiarties. 'rin'u tho President, after thanking u.s very courtetui.sly, withmit indeed giving us any otlicial jvsauranco, gave us n-'Ason U^ hojv that we might .irrive at a satisfactory settlement, tolling us he would Kxtk into the matter with his l\>uncil, which seemed sutliciont for «s At the moment, ami that he wouhl give us an answer later. What coutrih- * Bcftr's History, 'Wl, ' Oil A p. IX,1 THR MANITOIU An Mntnliniynn Iim wnn l«>nviiiK Mm linll. ( loldiutl, Hnid li«>, iliiirfc lio ill 11 liiiiry to li>iiV)>, if, in itnilMiltIn I iiiiiy I'litnmt yon willi k ooiri- niiniiion, wliii^li oniiiiot Imt Im< iiKr)>i>nl)|)t t.o you." \{M WHH nvidniilJy VMiy (liHl.iiiHffiil of Mr HiiiifJi. Wliil« tlin oMii>r (l('l»«KMfnn worn hIImwim! full lilMTiy, IVlr. Hiiiitli himmiih Io Ikivo l)(«(ii k(>|tt uiiilci' HtiicI, Hiirvpilimifo. Tlio diflnrfliuxi in toiui IwtwHon ♦,lio ropnitH of \\\{i (liiiiid VicMi mihI Ml- Hmitli. rIiowh oli'iirly ilin lonHuii for (lio hi -, ho niiid ho hiid honnl of my nri'iviil lit I'omliiim, ami wiin iilioiit to nomi oil' ii (intty to hrin^ mo in I thon norom|)iinioil him to ii room o('(!ii|iioil liy ton or i< ilo/,on mon, whom ho intro- dncoil to mo iiH momlioi'H ot tho '* rroviMJotiHl Oovornmont." Mo ro(iiiont<«l to know tho pni'iioit of my vinit; to whioli I lopliod in HnliRtftmio, tlnit i whh con- tiootod with tlio IImiIhoii lliiy ('omiifiny, Imt iiIho hold n oonniiinnion from the 4 'limidiim Oovornmont to tlio poopio of Itod Kivor, and would lin proparod to Iiroiluoo my orodontinlH hh hooii im thoy, t/ir /u'djilr, woro willing to roooivo rrin. wiiH thon (iHkod to tiiko ttn oiith not to iittompt to lonvo tlio {''ort that nitfht, nor to upHot thoir ^ovortnllollt loually oHtaldinliod. 'i'liin roipioHt I porom|>torily rofuHod to ooni|)ly with ; hut Haul that l»oin^ vory tirod, I had no d»)Hir«( to «»» outnido tho gato that night ; and promisod to tako rin iinmii/ia/f Hfc/m /irrrihly to ujiMif till' HDHiillvil " l'ri)riiiii)iiii/ Uovrriivuiil," li'fftil or Hliyiil, (in if mii/lit, hi', wUhoiif fivHt innioinirinii titij infiHfhui t» fuHiiig to coinuiniii(;at() with " unodicial poiHoiH," and iiioanwiiile tlirniit(!ning grmit tliingH. 11(5 HayH in offVicfc ; -^ I hold a cointiiiHHion to tlin /;w///« of Rod Uivo', iind I will pro- duoo it " HO Hoon aH tlmy, the pHopli:, aro willing to irwjivf ni»! " ; and 1 will tako '* no iniiiicdiato Ht«tpH foroihly to iijiHot tho Ho-calh^d Pro- viHiotuil (Jovfirninont . . . unfhitii f, JivHt mminmciiiy my inlnnllon to do no." Why could not Mr. Hniith liavo saifl, plainly, " I am \u:rv. ' to reniovo any niiHiipprolioiiKionH wliioli niay (;xi.st . . . and to report on th(? beHt inodo of ([uioting, and roinoving, hucli diHOontentn and diH,sntiH- faotioiiH*.* My orraiid is (sntircly poacofd, and J havo no authoiity to ap[>(!al to forco. Wlintaro your griovancoH'l" Horo h« was in the *apo hiH Coinniliwloii, p ;147. It in not Intendnd to awicrt. that Mr. .Smith's fondiifit, of the nexutiaiioii;! wan uiiwIhc. Mr. Hkkk, a c.ouwi-iMit authority, Ih of ojiiiiirm that the iniH«ion wan charaotcri/.ed l)y much Hkill. That Mr. Hiuith'8 treatint'iit by Kiel was the natural outcome of the attitude he aHHUined, is the the imiiit attempted in the text. * M |,1i, rit' -'>S ."'^■■1,1 348 MASS-MEETING. [Part III. ad i,» be held in the opon air, 20 dtgrees below zero. The Verre Lavellier, Mr. Thomas very presence of the discontented and dissatisfied, and to them he hints ot force instead of investigation ; he will appeal to " the people," and not bother with the disaffected ; and yet he was sent to call, not the rigliteous, but the sinners, to repentance. One can hardly wonder that he was treated as though he meant what he said. Nevertheless, he had his way, and a mass-meeting of the settlers was called for, and held on, the 19tlj January (hereafter referred to as the Mass-meeting). " So many were present that thf °,m' : and this hen the thermometer stood nl ■.; meeting lasted some five hours. "On motion of President Riel, secoi:itk« granted by Canada, which, however, that gentleman dia not feel sufiicientl/ authorized to do. The result of this was that the list of rights was review. \ clause by clause by Mr. Smith, and his opinions taken upon the several artic:- conta . ed in it, so far as the probability of their being granted by Canada wa^ conce"ned."* About the same time two of the Canadian commissioners invited the Council to send delegates to Canada with power to negotiate. The New Nation has the following account of the invitation as made to the Council : — •' Father Thibault — We were trusted by the Canadian Government to a certain extent (cheers) ; and as such we counselled this course — a course whioh we were sure would be good if the people of the country could adopt it, viz.: — to send a delegation to the Canadian Government in order to treat with the Canadian Parliament. This delegation should be invested with the necessary power to negotiate for what the nation wants (cheers). I must say, of course, that tliis is more advice than anything else. But at the same time I am cer- tain that the delegation would be well received by the Canadian Government. " Mr. Smith — This being the case, and looking at the suggestion put for- ward by the Very Rev. the Grand V^icar, with reference to a delegation from this country to Canada, I have now on the part of the. Dominion Government, and as authorized by them, to invite a delegation of the residents of Ked River to meet, and confer with, them at Ottawa (cheers). A delegation of two or more of the residents of Red River, as they may think best : the delegation to confer with the Government and Legislature, and explain the wants and wishes of the Red River people, as well as to discuss and arrange for the representation of the country in Parliament (cheers)." Thereupon it was moved by Mr. Ross, seconded by Mr. Riel, and carried unanimously : — ' ' That inasmuch as the Canadian Commissioners invited delegates from this country to Canada, to confer with the Canadian Government as to the .-affairs of •Begg's History, 267. p \m ;; ' ■;tr 350 THE PROVISIONAL OOVKRNMENT. [Part III. this courtrv, and as a cordifil reception has been prumised to said delugatee : Be it therefore resolved that the invitation be accepted, nnd that the same be signified to the Coniuiissionera." On the 8th and 9th of Februaiy, according to Tke New Natifm, speeches, of which the following are extmcts, were delivered : — "Mr. Rtrl -Hut there has been a spirit of moderation and friendship under all this earnest working; to secure the rigiit3 of the people. One of these days^ then, manifestly, we have to form a government in orcier to secure the safety of life and property, and establish a feeling of security in men's minds, and re- move a feeling of aj. prehension which it is not desirable should continuo for a moment " Mr. Ross — The tone and senbe of Mr. Kiel's speech this morning, the spirit it breathed, and the object at which it was aimed, were such as to command our approbation. We can no longer waive this (juestion (cheers). We are not in a satisfactory position in this settlement at present. We feel that we are met here to take such steps as may be best for the future welfare of the coun- try. We must deal witli this question of government. I hold it to be our duty before we sei)arate to come to some basis of a government in which we can work on a common civuae - the good of the whole country (cheers). The fact- is, we have no option in the matter. We must restore order, peace, aud quiet- ness to the settlement. '* Mr. Sutherland — I would like to say that we did not take any active part in the proceedings alluded to, because we did not see our way clearly. Many of our people to-day sav that they did not consider these proceedings at. all necessary. "The greater part of the list of rights which has been drawn up we expect to get at all events. The commission given to Mr. McUougall in- cludes in the main your bill of rij^hts ; and on these grounds we did not con- sider it neccessary to join in the former proceedings. But at pi-esent we occupy a (Uffercut po.nHo)i, mid are. tvillin;) to form a government for tfie nuke of har- nioni/ and jood will. We are wUliny to go as far as we can with our friends on the other side, and form a government. Another point is, that it is gen- erally felt that by joining the Provisional Government, jur people incurred too- much responsibility, and threw away a certain portion ot loyalty. We are all British subjects, aud the general inquiry among our people was how far it would be right and proper for us to join a Provisional Government unless we have legal authority for so doing, and where can we get that authority. . , .In order to clear away my own doubts I went with Mr. Fraser to see Gov. Mc- Tavish, I asked his opinion as to the advisability of forming a Provisional Gov- ernment. He replied, " Fortn a government for God's sake, and restore peace and order in the settlement" (cheers). "Mr. Ross— The greatest difficulty the English people had to come into a union with their French brethren was the legality of the Government. We did not like to go outside of the law, lest it might involve us in responsibilities which we did not like to incur. The difficulty is, I conceive, now done away with. The mfn in this county who has, if anybody has, legal authority — authority from England, has told us plainly that for his part we are at perfect liberty to go forward aud form any government we think best for the welfare of the country. (Cheers). "Mr. Eraser, seconded by Mr. D. Gunn, moved that the committee previously appointed to draw up the list of rights, be reappointed to discua» and decide 07i the basis of details q/ the Provisional Oovemment, which we have agreed is to be formed for Rupert's Land and the North- West Territories. — Carried, with the substitution of Mr. O'Donoghue for Mr. Schmidt, who was- absent. Chap. IX. THE MANITOBA ACT A TREATY. 351 The following is the report of the conimi'ctee : — "1. That the Council cunBut of twenty four nierabers ; twelve for the Eogliih and twelve for the French-speaking population. "2. Each aide shall decide as to the apiiointmeut of its own members of Council. "3. That Mr. Jas. Koas be Judge of the Supreme Court. "4. That all Justices of the Peaoe, Petty Magistrates. Constables, etc., retain their places, with the exception of Mr. Deose, J. P., whose place shall be taken by Herbert Laronce. "5. That Henry McKwnney be Sheriff an before. " 6. That Dr. Bird bo Coroner aa before. "7. That the General Council bo held at the Hu^ie times and places a» formerly ; and that the Petty Court be held in five diatricta (naming tnem). " 8. That Mr. Bannatyue be continued poatmaster. " 9. That John Sutherland and Roger Coulet be CoUectora of customs. "10. That the President of the Provisional Government be not one of the twenty- four members. "11. A two-thirda vote to over-ride tlie acta of the President of theProvi- aional Government. " 12. That Mr. Thomas Bunn be Secretary to the Provisional Government and Mr. Louis Schmidt, Under-Secretary. " 13. That Mr. W. B. O'Donoghue be Trcaaurer. After some discussion the report was adopted and Riel elected President of the Provisional Government " without a dissenting voice" — the chairnmn (Judge Black), Mr. Boyd, and Mr. Cummings, not voting. The President then nominated as delegates to Canada, the Rev. Mr. Ricliot, Judge Black, and Alfred H. Scott (one of th? membera for Winnipeg); and a general election was directed to be lield for the formation of an Assembly composed of 24 representatives from every portion of the colony. "It Ntaa now near midnight, and aa soon as the decision of the convention was known the guns of Fort Garry thundered out the news, which was answered by a few partiea in the town in the ahape of bonfires and fireworka — the latter, curious to say, were those intended for the celebration of Mr. Mc- Dougall's entrance into Ked River ; and it may therefore be imagined that the individuals who made use of them on the occasion we have been describing were very well pleased with the results of the convention. Governor McTav- ish, Dr. Cowan and Mr. Bannatyne were released that same night, and a promise was given that the rest of the political prisoners would be set at liberty soon afterwards."* "With reference to the abdication of Governor McTavisli, Lord Dnfferin reported (Despatch 10 Dec, 1875): " On the other hand, it is to be noted that when the proposal to constitute a Provisional Government was mooted in the convention, a certain portion of the English deputies declined to take part in the proceedings, until they had ascertained whether or no. Governor McTavish, the legal ruler of the territory, still considered himself vested with authority. A deputation accordingly was- appointed to wait upon him in his sick chamber, for this gentleman had unfortun- ately during many previous weeks been suffering from the mortal diseaae of which *Begg, 272. I'i '.'■Hi 362 THE PR0VI8IONAL OOVBRNMRNT. [Part III. he soon after died. In reply to their enquiries Governor MoTaviah told them t\iAt he conitidered kin jurudiction had been aholinhed by the proclamation of Mr. McDougall, that he toon a "dead nuvi," and that t/w.j/ had then-fore, better con- struct a government of their own to maintain the i>eace of the country. Koturning to their colleauuus, the (loi»iitation announced to the convention what Governor MoTaviah ha»tmmmim: '^'mtMrntHfii 3J\4 TIH", I'OUTAUK KHCAPADK. Vaut III. ki\o\v \\\\t\{ w.iB >i;j[ <> f>1 tlx' l'\iil.. Soiiu' of the i»'0)i'(' hud ftioiitlH ninoii^ tlio |>ns>i>i>orR. . '111(1 wiMf aiiMiniH uliont (Ix'ir Hiifi'l \ . KninorH civnic froiii imn> to Uww that ihcv wrfc Hiillriinjj; tVnin chmi' fouliixMiKMit iiml were ill-ti'ciilcd. AttiM)H)'i'r, iiiiiKiit oh o inisi'io)) i]t /« «<<'. Mi/ oi'ili is from VoliWil Ihiniit, niiTi tir< i\ u\ 1 1 l<\ ili) ))iii nhlios/ to k'n p Ihiihjs <)iiir/, . , , " An \t was known that 1 liad j>r<'viou»lv disi'odia^cd snch 'it tonplH, (lie nn'ctiiins tor thf }imiiow(' of oinam/atioii were liclil Hci'ii'tly, and i"forination withhold from nio. Ivit when I diHi'ovcrcd (hat that tlu-v were' dctci niincd (,0 f;o, \ t«dt it tnv duty to aooonipany th(>ni. and ondonvoi- to Ut'(>|( thcni to tho I'jiitiinatt' ohji'ct for wliich llicy liad liccn or^ani/cd, . . . " We took ((Ml' iio|>at(nn', hphily arnu-d, n\any of tin' men having; oiih/ mil,' chilix. . . . " 'I'his tryiuij; n\ari'h of sixty niih-s. intluiiit tnoisporl, itinl ii'itliitiil pro- visions, tho hohtiicss of tho undovtaUnig will In- nccii to he ^i(>at. . . . " Stniu' of tho sctth'i'H. sct'ing us arnv(> at Kildoiiaii, woic alannod at tlie sudden luin alVairs had taken 'rlit' aetioii of the eonveiil ion, they eviieeti'd, was nihutt 111 hriiiij it pnu'il'iil s,)/nlii)ii iM' f/ir iiillirvllit .1, wliieli they had hoped w«>v.id h( realized, hut ///' iippnu-iUhu ot' iinotlur ormul /ori'r mi tin' siriit- cost oil thiir hopis to (fir viiiii." Mnjtn- HouUon i:;iv(>s it. us liis o|>ii»i(in (liut. (lio ndcusc of Hicl'.s jiri.soncis \v;is ;i i'ons(>(|U(Muv" of the I'oilusj;!' lisinii. 'I'liis in a miHl.nkcv y\v. Pouiiltl A. Smith, icsidine;, as ho was. ai Winnipeg, hail uiueh IxMtcr opportvinity tor jiin, says : " Without its intervention the juiHOuers W(Uild undoul)t(>dly have lieen 10- loasod. "* Major Boulton admits too that .• — " Ueforo leaving Portage la Trairio, wo had, of eourse, no knowl(opulation, a few d;ws before, "f Mr. Hosjg rohitc's tho ovoiitvS with oh)S(> oiroinnstautiality. From his aivount. all tho prisoiiors woro ndoasod on tho ovouiiiir of th<* 10th Fobruarv. whilo Norquay (Major Uoultou's mos.soinjor) diil not rt»aci» Kiol until the morning of tho llith ! Tho t\)uncil of Forty had soparatoil only on tlie 11th. Somo of tho prisonors woro roloa,so«l almost at once, ami all tho ot hoi's by tho ovoning of the Ifith. The dolay was oansoil by the disinclination on iho part of some of tlio prisonoj-s to t^tko tho oath n. 1 to take up arms against the Provisional Crovornn\ont. When Norquay arrived at Fort Garry, Kiel was able to I'eply : — "Fort Garky, Feb. 16th, 1870. " Fki.i.ow OorxTRYMKX, —Mr. Norquay came this nioriuugwith a message, and even he has been delayed. He will roach you time oiunigli to tell you tliat for my part I understiind that war, horrible civil war, is the destruction ot this country ; and Schultz will laugh at us if, .after all, he escapes. We are rea-.iv tn|Miimi))ilit.y "f^ <"ii' |>'<^'*t' '^''t' M'- VVilliiiiii Mo'CnviRli linR nnktMl yoM, for the hiiUm nf (JotI, l.n form himI coiiiplcU' Ui»' I't'ovinionfil (lovt'iiiiiif'iit. )'i)itr rfiirem-iitiitirrs hiirr Juiiiiil iim on tlidt ground, Who will now foiri»( iind d'fBfcroy llorl llivtir Hcllicincnt. liOiMH Kiki,." Mr. Hill * Mirrf^f'H vvitli Mr. I'.cirj/ : — "On Mil' iiHHcnililiii)^ of f.lio pcoiih^ nt, K ijilonfui, »i incctini^ wan hcM, iim'I 'IVirri Nonpiiiy iipiioinlt'd l,o proct!"' to r'ort (Jarry, ivri of Uio priHontTR. liy Uin f.inn!, howovor, tlmfc 'roin had nwndiod tho Kort, fcho deRJrod (Mid had li('<>n iicdoniplipihi'd. " N(»(.vvil,liH(.iiiiiliiii^ (lint, (,lin " j^noit, iniijdril v " '»! I.Iim Hpt.th-iM (IIh- (ipiirovod (lid mnvcinoiil, ; flint it " ciiiHt all tlioir Ii«»|mh f,(» tlin winds"; tliiit it r(Miil(ir<'i| iiiiposKildn " n, |ni(i(!o('iil Holiition of tlin of authority, tli»> rij^ht, nut riinrtdy to protcHt. ajraiiiHt Hiich a < InvcriiiiK^iit, Init to niuko wnv upon it, and to arrest, niid d»'l,ain as |irisuni'rH, tlioso whom tlmy dMcniMd to l»o its |iai tizaiis. Amonj; the iirisonors was a liftll'lirMfvl iiMniMfJ Parisian. Tln^ unroi-tniiataf!i! now appoar(!d to ho gooil, wfnni tho nnxfc tiiorning information was hmmmv*")! that (iliaii^dd, for a tiiiM!, tins wlioio aHfioct of aff'airR — namt'iy, that young Siithtjiland had hofiii hIioI hy ['arisinn, who, tiavirit; hiic- i;eud('d in tmiuiping from Imr j^iiard, and nit'<;ting liiH victim riding along the rivMM' on tho icf!, lir(Ml at him, wounding him in. tho wrint. Young .Siitliorlaiid then partly f«««W«i«MW««^W«^^ 956 THE PORTAGE ESCAPADE. [Part III. now been shetl, and for it the Portage men were directly rej)onsil)le. If it he .said that had there been no liiel, there liad been no Portage men, it is not difficult to reply that had there been no McDougall, and no Dennis, and no Canadian party, there had been no Riel. The opinion of the " great majority " soon made itself telt. Col. Dennis had issued Iris " call-to-arms " on the 6th Decembei', and liad withdrawn it on the 9th. The Portage men joined with the lower settlement party on the llth February, and on the 16th they had determined to disj)erse to their homes. But meanwhile the Metis had been thoroughly aroused, seven hur'vi of them had been brought together, and the excitement of threatened vfar, and the death of Parisien, with its savage accompaniments, had set wildly flowing the hot " mustang " blood. English and French had but a few days ago met in friendly convention, and now by the foolishne.ss of a few of the " members of Col. Dennis' surveying party who had been left behind bv the conservator, when he started back with Mr. McDoujjall for Canada,"* all the good that had been accomplished by conciliation was roughly undone. Col. Dennis bv his " call-to-arms," his musterings and haranguings and organizing? had consigned 45 persons to imprisonment at Fort Garry. The only result of the Portage escapade was to send 48 more to the keeping, this time, of men who felt that vengennce was now more in order than further forbearance. The last of the tirst {)arty of prisoner's had been released on the 1 5th February, in a sj)irit of friend- ship and union. On the 1 7th, amid anger and hate, the Portage piirty came to occupy their places. Riel, with some show of reason, now regarded himself as the head of a duly oi'ganized government. In point of law, the Queen's sanction not having been obtained, the proceedings were technically irregular: but this does not .seem to have occurred to any of tiie representatives at the Council of Forty, whether English or French. The Provisional Government, too, whether legal or illegal was the onl>/ authority in the si'ttlement. The government of the Hudson's Bay Company was too weak to preserve order even prior to the adveii*'i of Cv»i. Dennis; its authority had now been completely ended, and superseded, by the asstnt of its governor, and the action of the people. What government, moreover, it may well be asked, did the Port- age men propose to set up, that would have bad better right to acknow- ledgment? Were we to regard Kiel's government as that of mere usurpers, its o})ponents could claim no higher status than that of those they attacked. They, at all events, had not even the .semblance of authority, or warrant, either from the Queen, or from the people. It must be remembered, too, that the now established govern- ment was, and was acknowledged to be, merely provisional — organ- ized for the purpose of negotiating for, and obtaining, information, and * Begg 288. I |y "^ was nis ; the l'»ort- |now- rnere It of lance I)l0. |/ern- and Chap. X.] THE MANITOBA ACT A TREATY. 357 assurances as to the new form' about to be imposed uf)on them, and to preserve order in the mean' ime. It must also be remembered that, 80 far, no force not necessary i'or the accoinplishment of these objects had been resorted to. That .iiel was always polite and considerate; that the personification of a lace of "wild mustangs" was always selt- controlled, and deferential, is not pretended; but that moderation, wisdom, and self-control, were displayed, in marked degree,* is strongly evidenced by the fact that throughout all the stormy and exciting incidents hitherto related, not a drop of Vdood had been spilled for which Kiel was responsible — hundreds of Metis, armed and eager to fight with Canadians whom they hated, for the contempt shown them, and not a bullet has yet searched its billet ! That Riel — now President by the voice of the people — was greatly angered, and much inflamed, by the Portage episode ; and that he regarded it not only as an attack upon the Government set up by the people, but also as an absurd and criminal breach of the peace, requiring, in the interest of the community, to be put down with strong hand, are abundantly ap})arent. In the heat of the moment four of the new batch of {)risoners (their leader. Major Boulton, and three others)were condemned to be shot. Almost immediately after- wards the three were pardoned, but it was not without much entreaty that the Major's life was given him. Mr. Donald A. Smith, who was one of the interceders, thus relates the events : — " Riel was obdurate and said that the English settlers and Canadians, but more especially the latter, had laughed at and despised the French half-breeds, believing that they would not dare to take the life of anyone ; and that, under these circumstances, it would be impoHsible to have peace nnd estahfifhed order in the countrij ; an example must, therefore, be made, and he had tirmly resolved that Boulton's execution should be carried out, bitterly as he had deplored the necessity for doing so. I reasoned with him long and earnestly, until at lengtli, about ten o'clock, he yielded ; and addressing me, apparently with much feeling, said, " Hitherto I have been deaf to all entreaties, and in now granting you this man's life," or words to that effect, "may I ask you a favor?" "Anything," I replied, " th-it in honor I can do." He continued, ^^ Canada /las disunited m.s, will you ii^e your influence to re-unite us ? You can do this, and without this it must be war, bloody, civil war !" I answered that, as I had said on first ooming to the country, I would now repeat, that, "I would give my whole heart to effect a peaceable union of the country with Canada." " Me ica7il only our just rights a,s Britlnh svhjects," he said, *^ and we want the Enylish to join us simply to obtain these." "Then," I remarked. " I shall at once see them, and induce them to go on with the election of delegates for that pur- pose ; " and he replied, " If you can do this, war will be avoided ; not only the lives, but the liberty of all the prisoners will be secured, for on your success depend the lives of all the Canadians in the country." He immediately pro- ceeded to the prison and intimated to Archdeacon McLean that he had been induced by me to spare Captain Boulton's life, and had further promised to me that immediately on the meeting of the Council shortly to be elected, the wJ .ole of the prisoners would be released, requesting the Archdeacon, at the same time, to explain these circumstances to Captain Boulton and the other priHoners." 1 ' See letter Arch. Tach^ to Seoirett^rv of State, llth March, 1870. 'i>^^>imiti.^^mmati,-i>m^^--. CHAPTER XI. THE PRISONERS. -THOMAS SCOTT. It will be remembered that on the 7th December, 45 Canadians had been taken from Dr. Schultz's house, as a rejjly to Col. Dennis' " call-to-arms," and confined as prisoners in Fort Garry. The guard kept ujjon them was not sufficient to prevent the escape of some of them, and othei's, as cause for apprehension disappeared, were released. On the 2nd January, Nimmons escaped. On the 3rd, 6 or 7 were released.* On the iJth, "a number of the prisoners escaped through a window of the court house."! "I<^ was at this time also that Mr. Thos. Scott escaped.''^ " On Sunday, 23rd January, Dr. Schultz succeeded in making the escape from prison."§ The Council of Forty closed with the establish nient of a Provisional Government, and the election of Riel as its President, on the 10th of February. On the 12th, Riel liberated 16 prisoners.|| Shortly afterwards "all the prisoners, except 24 were released ; those remaining having, from some misunderstanding, refused to sign or take the oath not to take up arms against the Provisional Government." ** Finally on the 15th Febi'uary, all the prisoners were induced to sign a paper agreeing to keep the peace and all were released, tf To this extent Riel must be held accountable, that he arrested and locked up, those whom he thought to be dangerous to the success of his movement; hut per contra, this must be credited to him, that he interfered with no others ; and that he released those arrestee' as he became assured of their neutrality. The majority of the prisoners seem to have steadfastly refused to give any such assurance until after the Council of Forty had unanimously agre<'d upon the establish- ment of a Provisional Government, and that Riel sliould be President of it. This was, as we have seen, on the 10th of February. The union of the English and French, thus accomplished, and the general acknowledgment of the new government, removed the scruples of the prisonei's, and opened an easy way to accommodation and release. On the 15th they signed, and were released. On the 17th, as we have seen, 48 of fie Portage men came to fill the vacant cells. Thomaa Stot*; wac a Canadian and one of the most active against Riel. He had oc m t, ap wu'i Mr. Snow's surveying party, and miist have been of turuu^eat and quarrelsome disposition, for when Mr. Snow decli len tj )>tty iii.n certain sums wl ich he demanded, he with * Begg 207. Jb. Wi. ilb. lib., 246. 1358] lb., 276. •*Ib.,277. tt Ib„ 284. Chap. XL] THE MANITOBA ACT A TREATY. 309 a few otliers, dragged their chief to a river and there as Mr. Snow states " he was forced under threats and grievous bodily hai m to pay to Scott and others of +he working party, the sums opposite their resj)ective names." He Jmd had some quarrel with Rid, and there existed j.nvate enmity Vjetween tlie men.* Scott was among those who had assembled at Dr. Schultz's house about the time of Col. Dennis' " call-to-arms," and was arrested about the same time as the Schultz party of 45 was imprisoned (7th Dec). He escaped about the middle of January, and early in February joined the Portage party with a view of attacking tl"j French, and shortly afterwards he made a descent upon a house wliere he thought Riel was, with a view of arresting him.f Scott was one of the 48 taken prisoners by Riel — the only result of the Portage escapade. There he seems to have coiiducted himself in turbulent, swaggering fashion, for which on the 1st of March, he was placed in irons. Even here his tongue was uncontrolhible, and at length he succeeded in inflaming his keepers to such an extent that a short session of an irregular court martial condemned him to be shot. The court apjjears to have been little more, if anything, than a pretence. Scott's fate was evidently fixed in advance — he was not even present at his own trial. Great efforts were made by his friends to save his life, but this time Riel was thoroughly enraged, and proved completely inexor- able. The poor fellow was shot (4th March). This was Riel's great mistake. 'I o him it may have appeared an imperious and unfortunate necessity of peace, but it cannot so appear to one now calmly studying the events of the time. The Canadians had evidently made their last attempt at resistance. Riel had the "great majority" of both English ami French on his side, and had merely to continue in the constitutional methods voted by the Council to attain all that he could properly desire. One cannot read the able desjjatch to Earl Carnarvon by Lord Dufferin (10th Dec, 187^ and not agree with the conclusion "that all the special ple».estable to the half-breeds of all origins and creeds, almost unani- mously, who had beon brought up to like and respect the patriarchal rule of CHAPTER XII. THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY. The election of members of the Council of the Provisional Gov- ■ernment (or Legislative Assembly, ai it was afterwards called) were held on the '26i February. This was the third set of elections that had been held. The fiist (as may be remembered) was held about the middle of November, 1869, when twenty-four members were elected as a Council (the Council of November), " to consider the present political state of the country, and to adopt such measures as may be deemed best for the future welfare of the same." The second was held in pursuance of the resolution passed at the mass-meeting, when forty representatives were chosen (the Council of Forty), " with the object of considering the subject of Mr. Smith's commission, and t ' H, cide what would be best for the welfare of the country." Those forty representatives had resolved to establish a Provisional Govern- ment, consisting of a president and a council of twenty-four members, and had directed elections for membership of this Council. These last elections having now taken place, the Assembly met for the despatch of business on the 9th of March. Amongst a mass of other business, resolutions were passed as follows : — " That notwithstanding the insults and sufferings borne by the people of the Northwest heretofore — which sufferings they still endure — the loyalty of the people of the Northwest towards the Crovm of England remains the same, pro- vided the rights, properties, usages, and customs of the people be respected, and we feel assured that as British subjects such rights, properties, usages and customs will undoubtedly be respected. " That the Constitution of the Provisional Government for Rupert's Land and the Northwest Territories be now drawn up — that a committee be appointed to draft the same and submit it for the approbation of the Legisla- tive Assembly, and that said committee be composed of French representa- tives ; The Hon. the President, and Hon. Messrs. Lepine, O'Donoghue, and Bruce ; English representatives, Hod, Messrs. Tait, Bird, Bunu, and Jas, Ross, Esq., Chief Justice. The following is the preamble and the principal clause of the con- stitution as adopted : " That we the people of Assiniboia, without disregard to the Crown of Eng- land, under whose authority we live, have deemed it necessary for the protection of life and property, and the securing of those rights and privileges which we are entitled to enjoy as British subjects, and which rights and privileges we have seen in danger, to form a Provisional Government, which is the only acting authority in this country and we do hereby ordain and establish the following constitution. [362] Chap. XII.J THE MANSTOBA ACT A TREATY. 363 "That all legislative authority be vested in a President and Legislative As8eml)ly composed of the inenil)ers elected by the pi-ople, and that at any future time another House, called a Senate, shall be established when deemed necessary by the Legislature." The business of the Assembly terminatod on the 26th March, according to the report in the New Nation, as follows: — ''The President tlien addressed the House, announcing that the business of the session was over, and urging i^trongly on the members the duty of doing all in their power to promote a Kpirit if conciliation amomj the people." Some prejudiced persons will read these ))age8, and continue to assert that the actors, in the tivents related, " were nothing more than a few Red River priests, and French half-breeds." That the assertion may be made move difficult, the names of some of the English-speaking representatives in the Assembly are here given : — A. G. B. Bannatyne, W. i'raser, Thos. Brison, Geo. Gunn, John Norquay, E, Hayes, A. H. Scott, Dr. Bird, Wm. Tuit, etc. Any one at all acquainted with the settlers of 1870, will at once recognize that some of the most prominent of the English-speaking section of them were among the members of the Assembly. If this be not enough, it may be added, that both in the Council of Forty, and in the Legislative A.ssembly, the English, and not the Fi-ench, took the leading part in the debates, and work of the session. For example, it was Ml'. Sutherland (now Senator) and Mr, Eraser, both English, who formed the deputation to Governor McTavish, for the purpose of consulting him, as to the propriety of forming a Provisional Govern- ment ( )age 350). It was on motion of Mr. Eraser, seconded by Mr. Gunn, both English, that a committee was appointed, to decide " on the basis of details of the Provisional Government, which we have agreed is to be formed " (page 350). It was Mr. Scott, seconded by Mr. McKay, both English, who moved the resolution affirming loyalty to the Crown, " notwithstanding the insults, and sufferings, borne by the people of the North-west heretofore — which sufferings they still «ndure " (page 362). It was upon motion of Mr. Bunn, seconded by Mr. Bannatyne, both English, that it was resolved, " That the Constitution of Provisional Government for Rupert's Land, and the North-W'st Territories, be now drawn up." And, finally, the the resolution declaring that the people of Assiniboia " have deemed it necessary, for the protection of life and property ... to form a Provisional Government" (page 362), was moved by Dr. Bird, seconded, only, by Riel. ^1: ''4 '.'»ii CHAPTER XIII. THE RED RIVER DELEGATES, THE LIST OP RIGHTS AND THE MANITOBA ACT. It may be remenibeie See page 340. [364] Chap. XIII. i J THE MANITOBA ACT A TttEATY. ^65 1 :he Noitli-West sliiill not enter into the (Jtmfedrnition, except us a proviiu't", to lie styled mid known ii.s tht! Province of Assinilmia, und witli all the rif^hts and inivileges common to the diH'ereni, Provinces of the Don»inion. 2. 3. 2. That we have two repre- sentatives in the Senate, and four in the Hou.so of Commons of Canada, until such time as an increase of population entitles the province to a greater representa- tion. 3. ThattheProvinceof Assini- boia shall not be held liable at any time, for any portion of the public debt of the Dominion con- tracted before the date the said province shjill have entered the Confederation, unless the said ])rovince shall have first received from the Dominion the full amount for which the said pro- vince is to be held liable. 4. That the sum of $80,000 be paid annually by the Dominion Government to the Legislature of the province. 5. That all properties, rights and privileges enjoyed by the people of this province up to the date of our entering into the Confederation be respected, and that the arrangement and con- firmation of all customs, usages and privileges be left exclusively to the Local Legislature. federation of the Dominion of Canada as a province, with all the piivil('g<'s coninion with idl the iliderent Provinds in the Dom- inion. That this province be govcined : 1. By a Lictit. -Governor, ap- pointed by the (jJdveinor- General of Canada. By a Senate. By a Legislature chosen by the people with a respon- sible Ministry. 2. That, until such time as the increase of population in this country entitles us to a greater number, we have two representa- tives in the Senate, aiul four in the House of Commons of Canada. 3. That in entering the Con- federation, the Province of the North-West be completely free from the public debt of Canada ; and if called upon to assume a part of the said debt of Canada, that it be only after having received from Canada the same amount for which the said Pro- vince of the North-West should be held res[)onslble. 4. That the annual sum of $80,000 be allotted by the Dom- inion of Canada to the Legislature of the Provinces of the North- West. 5. That all properties, rights and privileges enjoyed by us up to this day be respected, and that the recognition and settlement of customs, usages and privileges be left exclusively to the decision of the Local Legislature. IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 ;!:■- IM I.! •^ 1^ 111112.2 lU 1^ ..in^ ^ lis IIIIIM 1.8 1.25 1.4 1.6 .4 6" - ► V] <^ /}. /y V '/ M Hiotographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, NY. 14580 (716) 872-4503 C> 366 THE DBLEJATES AND THE MANITOBA ACT. [PaRT IIL 6. That duririij the term of five years the Province of Assini- boia sliuU not be subject to any direct taxation, except such as mi<^ht be imposed by the Local Legislature for municipal or local purposes. 7. That a sum equal to eighty cents per head of the population of this province be paid annually by the Canadian Government to the Local Legislature of the said province, until such time as the said population shall have in- creased to ()00,000. 8. That the Local Legislature shall have the right to determine the qualifications of members to represent this province in the Parliament of Canada, and in the Local Legislature. 9. Tliat in this province, with the exception of uncivilized and unsettled Indians, every male native citizen who has attained the age of twenty-one yeare ; and every foreigner being a British subject, who has attained the same, and who has resided three years in the Province, and is a householder ; and every foreigner, other than a British subject, who has resided here during the same period, being a householder, and having taken the oath of allegiance shall be entitled to vote at the election of members for the Local Legislature and for the Canadian Parliament. It being understood that this article be subject to amendment exclusively by the Local Legislature. 10. That the bargain of the Hudson's Bay Company in respect to the transfer of the government 6. That this country be sub- mitted to no direct X/axation except such as may be imposed by the Local Legislature for municipal or other local purposes. 7. That the schools be separ- ate, and that the public money for schools be distributed among the different religious denomina- tions in proportion to their re- spective population according to the system of the Province of Quebec. 8. That the determination of the qualifications of membera for the Parliament of the Province, or for the Parliament of Canada be left to the Local Legislature. 9. That in this province, with the exception of the Indians who are neither civilized, nor settled, every man having attained the age of twenty-orte years, and every foreigner being a British subject, after having resided three yeare in this country, and being pos- sessed of a house, be entitled tO' vote at the elections for the members of the Local Legislature, and of the Canadian Parliament, and that every foreigner other than a British subject, having resided here during the same period, and being proprietor of a house, be likewise entitled to vote on condition of taking the oath of allegiance. 10. That the bargain of the Hudson's Bay Company with re- spect to the transfer of govern- Chap XIII.] the Manitoba act a treaty. 367 of tbis country to the Dominion of Canada be annulled so far as it in- terferes with the people of Assini- boia, and so far as it would affect our future relations with Canada. 1 1 . That the Local Legislature of the Province of Assiniboia shall have full control over all the pub- lic lands of the province, and the right to annul all acts or arrange- ments made or entered into with reference to the public lands of Rupert's Land and the North- West, now called the Province of Assiniboia. 12. That the Government of Canada appoint a commission of engineers to explore the various districts of the Province of As- siniboia, and to lay before the Local Legislature a report of the mineral wealth of the province within five years from the date of entering into confederation. 13. That treaties be concluded between Canada and the different Indian tribes of the Province of Assiniboia, by and with tht ad- vice and co-operation of the Local Legislature of this province 14. That an uninterrupted steam communication from Lake Superior to Fort Garry be guar- anteed to be completed within the space of five yeara. raent of this country to the Do- minion of Canada, never have in any case an effect prejudicial to the rights of the North- West. 11. That the Local Legislature of this province have full control over all the lands of the North- West. 15. That all public buildings, bridges, roads, and other public works, be at the cost of the Do- minion Treasury. 16. That the English and French languages be common in 12. That a commission of en- gineers, appointed by Canada, ex- plore the various districts of the North-West, and lay before Uie Local Legislature, within the space of five years, a report of the minerals of the country. 1 3. That treaties be concluded between Canada and the diflerent Indian tribes of the North- West, at the request and with the co- operation of the Local Legisla- ture. 14. That an uninterrupted steam communication from Lake Superior to Fort Garry be guar- anteed to be completed within the space of five years, as well as the construction of a railroad con- necting the American railway, as soon as the latter reaches the in- ternational boundary. 15. That all public buildings and constiiictions be at the cost of the Canadian exchequer. 16. That both the English and French languages be common in sill 't \ 'hi I •■I. 368 THE DBLBQATES AND THE MANITOBA ACT. [PaRT III. the Legislature, and in the courts, and that all public (iocumeiils, as well as all Acts of the Logisla- turc, be publLshuU in both lan- guages. 17. That whenas tho French and Knglish-.speaking people of Assiniboia are so nquiilly divided in niunbcrs, yet ho united in their interest.s, and so connected by commerce, family connections, and other political and social re- lations, that it has happily been found impossible to bring them into hostile collision, although re- |)eated attempts have been made by designing strangers, for reasons known to themselves, to bring about so ruinous and disastrous an event. And whereas, after all the trou- ble and apparent dissensions of the past, the result of misunder- standing among themselves, they have, as soon as the evil agencies referred toabove were removed, be- comeasunited and friendly as ever; therefore, as a means to strengthen this union and friendly feeling among all classefi, we deem it ex- pedient and advisable ; That the Lieutenant-Governor, who may be appointed for the Province of Assiniboia, should be familiar with both the English and French languages. 18. That the Judge of the Su- perior Court 8i)eak the English and French languages. 19. That all debts contracted by the Provisional Government of the Territory of the North- West, now called Assiniboia, in consequence of the illegal and in- considerate measures adopted by the Legislature, and in the courts; and that all public documents, as Wfll as the Acts of the Legisla- ture, be published in both lan- guages. 17. That the LI 'itenant-Gov- ernor to be appointed for the Pro- vince of the Noi'th-Wt'sr, be faimil- iar with both the English and French languages. 18. That the Judge of the Su- preme Court speak the English and French languages. 19. The sanie. Chap. XIII.] tub Manitoba act a treaty. 369 Caiiadiiin officials to bring about a civil war in our midst, be paid out of the Dominion Treasury, and that none of the members of the Provisional Government, or any of those acting under them, be in any way held liable, or re- sponsible, with regard to the movement, or any of the actions which led to the present negotia- tions. 20. Tlte same. 20, That in view of the pres- ent exceptional position of As- siniboia, duties upon goods im- ported into the province shall, ex- cept in blie case of spirituous liquors, continue as at present for at least three years from the date of our entering the confederation, and for such further time as may elapse until there be uninter- rupted railroad communication between Winnipeg and St. Paul, and also steam communication between Winnipeg and Lake Su- perior. These lists may be referred to hereafter as lists Nos. 3 and 4, in order to distinguish them from the list (p. 333) prepared in December by the first Council (list No. 1) ; and the list (p. 349) formulated by the Council of Forty in February (list No. 2). Attention is called to paragraph 7 in list No. 4 : — " That the schools be separate." There is no reference to schools in list No. 3. Hence the dispute. Did, or did not, the Provisional Government demand that the schools should be separate 1 On the one hand is produced what is said to be " the official copy, found in the papers of Thomas Bunn (now deceased) secretary of Kiel's Government." This is identical with list No. 3. Mr. Begg in his history gives this list No. 3 as the true one, and accompanies it with a copy of the instructions given to the delegates. That such a list is among Mr. Bunn's papers is sufficient to show that it had actual existence. It is no evidence, of course, that it was not superseded (as already two others had been superseded) ; and Mr. Begg, although careful and trustworthy, may have been misled through not having heard of a subsequent list. The best, and only direct, evidence that has been adduced upon the subject, is the sworn testimony of the Rev. Mr. Ritchot (himself one 24 |1 % I, ,•^70 TMK OKl.KUAVRS ANO THK MANITMHA ACT. Paht lit. 'f (1)0 «IoIoij;i> iiuinlor of SooU ( 1.^74), and \vl)(>n no on i> con Id IIUVO llll.i HUy obj«v( in inisstt»iii\sj; (he I'mMs. At (lint trisd Mr. Hitcliol |»ro- dnccd list No. I. und swore i\\:\{ i( wiim the linl ojiven to liin\ !»h h dele>j:ite. (^ll\(>r evidence, und ol' vet v sdona; cliiunclef. uuiy '»' i>diled : — AOer iniidi conHnll;)(il\n A. Mucdonidd nnd Sir (tcorsfc (':utier. on the one h;n\d. Mn«l the Hev. Mr. Kilcliol lunl .lndinit(ed (o the de|eirn((>H .m that wlncii the (Jovenin\ent was |ue|>!ire.l to concede The |{e\ Mr. Kit dr.»r( cl\ol ni.t ie ol >s(M\ aliens in wn(ini> npen all (lu' clanses m (he .-Mil 1 sent (hen\ to the Minisiers. Section 1 1' ol' (he dt;i(( deult, M nil the schools, nnd (he following' ;ire (he ol>sei-\ a(ions made n| »oi» i( In Mr ll\i(cho( ••<\'(ti> clause (Haiit la Micmo mii> cello dc 1" Vctc .Ic I' Aiiicriunc Hiitainiiinu' d\i Ni>vd. t'eiifi^rc, jc I'nUci pii'Ki' .-niisi, online innicipe tiinil;iint'ii(al, le jinvilCue des ccelcs RC|i;n('c» dans (end' In plenitude ct, m ccli. ewt cenifennt' ;\ Tarticlc 7 dc nes iiiHtnicdons. " ( riiis claiiHc Itciiiji; (lie same ;»n (lie Untisli Neitli .\incricii \v\. ceiifiMH, so 1 intci'pu't it, as fmiilaiiicntal prni(Mple, tlie privilege of separati' sclinuls to tl 10 t'nUcHt evteiit, .•ni«i ni tl it is t/ ifitriiiiti/ with luiir/i ol iiiir visfi iirtii)tis. Inttnnal e\idenc<>. too, is not wanliniv in siipporl ol" Mr. Kitchot'H statcMiitMit. ra'as^riph 1 of list No I lor (he ik'W )>i\ninc<\ and ;i Senate was ivinnted, altlioiiirh t he expiMise of it was inncli onp'cted (o. List No. ,'1 savM nothiic' ;ilion( a Sena((> Au;ain lis( Nc. 1 gtarauiaph 7) «leiiiands "tlia( the schools he .sep,iiii((\" and were inser(ed to that end in th(» M.mitoha .\ct. List. No. d d cl:Uls(>s savs n»>thins; .ahoni schools. It would he s(rain,M» if l>o(h (liesn ]>oin(s could have !;o(, hy chanc(>, in(o (he Mani(ol)!i \e( — an Act which, as W(> shall soon see. was the result ot elahorate neijotia lions with tliC deles?ates. It may he adiled that, list No. .'I asks (hat (In* ^iroviiuv shall he " styh^l and known as (h(> Province ot Assinihoia." List No. 4 su!is;<>s(s no name. It is inconciMvahle (hat (h<> dominion should have didil>«Mately refused to adopt the nann> " Assinihoia." had it heen ask«>d. I'oithe nominion lias since (hen called a lari;«> part of the tenitori<*s hy that very luune. ("■ompari.soi^ oi' the lists will show ihat No. ',\ was prohahly (he drat't. and N(\ 4 the tinally revised I'orm of the list of riglits. Oh.serve that while No. 4 often arred to, hut freipienlly in nieix^ verhal expivssion. .ludi<;e KournitM-. of (lie Supreme t'ourt, in his recent judgment adopts No. 4 as the true list (.see p. 82). Theiv can be no donht that 't was a list of the Provisional (.Tovernment. and not that of the Oonncil of Forty (No. 2), tliat fornnnl the basis of negotiation. The iiidical dilVerence i)etween these lists lies in this, that the list of the Council of Forty is based upon the iUiKV. XMI.| TltK MAVITMfU Arr A THWATY. art Bf'illoimMit lHM•(^lnill^ ii Inii ilmv, nrnlcf ^nvniitiirtiiliil (Mmfinl fr«nn OliiiwM ; wIh'H'hh tlii' liiwl, itilii'l<> mI" t,lii« ullicf HhIh (wIii'Uii'i- No .'I, or No. 4) riMjuit'CH lluil iJin H)>M.I) oiicm Ii(>coiiio a proviiicn, willi locul jrovnnmiciil r hih'Ii. Ami Miin wiih lUMvinli'd, nMJifiiif^li niucli ii^iiiiisl, III)' ( 'iiiiiuliiiii ()ov)>i niiu'iit'R dfRiov Kiio>ikIi Iiiih Ihmmi Hnit' iilMtnt IJh'mc difri'iPii*. IjIhIh uC IM^^IiIh. TIio iin|Miil:i ol IIh> coiirrovcrHy in iml,. |,ii t,lii> uiiiid oC l.lu' |»icHi'iit wiitor, V(«rv f^ii'iil. rin' iiiiil»iiiiitint of tifiity Ih tiilu'M nwiiv. I'll) IIiIh Ih not n (nir wiiv of |(»ol tlion flmt R(>|tMrMli' hcIiooIm Mini ol|i(«i' lliini^M, not \i'\ ; llic fH'fct of IIiIm, ko fur mm (Im- HcltlcrB nr«' cont'crncil. Ih tlnil |Im> odl'i- of llin Kt-tllcis (.Mkini^ (lio olfor MM n nlioli') Ih n'ji'fi.cd liy * 'MniidM, Mnd OiiiiMdM liy lii-r IVlM.nitoWfi At'l, niidifM (I ••otint(>r |iro|iMHition. wliifli (•(»nntoi- iiioposilion Ih a('ri>|it('d liy tln' scHIimh Lot it lio lonicinlificd that wIm-ii tlio MiinitoliM Af't WMM pMMscd, till' Icnitoiy Inid not yot li<>c(»ino ''nna- dinn, Mini iIimI <'iiiiMdM wmh nndoi' lni|i<>i'iMl dix'ntion to n*>^otiii(o with, and. il poMHililo, lo HnliHly lh<* HottloiH. Tiooim wcro not to he iiHfid nidosM " ri'MHonMltlc ti'iinn iiro fjnudod to the lied llivf>c Hft tlorH." VVIicllicc. I hcioloio. tin* HcttN'fH MHkod (or HcpMrMtn Hfihooh, or tin* idnn, (•Miiic IVoni ('miimiIii, innki'M no din't'ii'nri' mh to tlm n^Hiilt. In (litlior cMHc tli<' Miinitohii Ai't WMH M tr(!iity. (HfMniny our Hitjlit of sill tnchnifrMliticH, it Ih not dinifinlt, how- ever, to Hi'o wlu'K' tlm itloii of Hnpiirate Hidiools (miimh from. Whether Ijirtl No. l Ih Mutln-ntid (>r not, it Ih cIi'im- timt it wan the one iiHod liy (ho Ucv. Mr. liit»!liot; tha( it was that j^eutlcman who took the leadinj^ part in tho noirotiatioiiH ; and that the idoa of Hcpfirato Hf;hr»f)lH oaino iVom nlaiiHc Hovc^n of that list No. 4. (lnuiuln fJioni/hf,, at all nvcntH, tha( soparato HehoolH had hcen dtunanded ; aceed'-d to that deiinind ; and lh(f Provincial AHHtMuhly ai/retvl to it, aK hIimII proKcntly appear. The deleyateH had no Hoonor arriverl in Ontario that two of thorn weni arrested aH acoeKHoiies to tlio murder of Thomas Hcott. It w(»uld appear as Ihoiijrh iiutliin({ wan (o he left iitidone, that Htnpidity eonhl devise, to incenHe onco more the HettleiH f)f Hed Itiver. The dele- gatcH were in (Janada on the expre.sH invitation of the (iovfirnment, and tlieir coming had Iteen eagerly looke.d forward to, lioth hy fcho Imperial an THK MAMTOIU Al'T. | I'aUT III. noidior o( whom hml mtytliinx to do with Si>ot('H ilonth. TIuh wuh tho v«'s»ilt : — " Mr. 1.O0H. after tlu> opoiiin^ of tlio onmt, infornxMl hi« l.ititlnhip, iUnl lio hitil liail n ooMviM-N.itiiU) with tho witnonnoM nitomh'il to hnvi* Ihmmi fiilh'd, aikI witti the pnvrtto niMm>outor //»' I'vi , siifixrin) Ihot Hi- fviifniiw he voiilii ;>»•<»• iiurr «Ait/i/ not just tfp d rommHtiil. \h neither tlio ('rown tior the jirivntn prtweoHtor enuhi jinxlxicc any further «ron(V to tho anvHt. of tho tloh»jj;i»toH : — " Notluun oohKI well lieve l>eeii more untowanl timn tln« turn of ntrnira. In Addition to the feelings to whioli it nmy give rise w\thiu the limits of tho Do- minion, it oAunot fail t(> aroiise AUfter, ami poRniMy the desire for retaliating moAsutvs, in the minds of Uiel and his followers when the ni»ws reaches Kort (lArry. It hAS prevented me seeing the delegates, and delayed the opening of negotiations. The Ministers join with me in deploring the ev«>nt, hut nrn uii- Able to prevent a privAte individuAl, over whom tliey have no eontrol, fnmi Availing himself At his discretion «>f tho onliiury forms And procoss of law." No ivtHlirtting niort-suiva ut Hod Uivor onHiinoon said tlmt tho urrivHl of tho «lologiitos lia«l l»(»oi» oagorly lot>ko«i lorwanl tt>, by Iwth tlio Iinporiiil and (Vnndian authoritioH. Prior to thoir arrival, numorouH tolograntH had paHHod hotwoon tho two gi>vonnnont«, with ivfoi-onco to tho organization of a military orial Oovornniont had «hH'linod to asHont to tho U80 of foriM\ ui\til roaaonahlo torina of sottloniont had boon grantod. On tho 5th of Maivh Karl Gmnvillo tolographod : — " Her Majesty's (ti>vornmont will givo proposoil military aHHistaneo, i>rO' iHd4>d renMnahle terms air tjranteti to tho lied Uivor sottlcrs." And on tho 2'2nil March a ni tho Un»l<»r-Soci'otary of the cf)loi\io8 dirocts that " tn>op8 should not ho employed i» forrimj the noiyreujnty of Canntla on tho population of Ue«l Rivor, should they rofusu to admit it." On tho 17th Majxjli Earl (iranvillo oablod : — '* lx>t mo know by telegram when you ku<)w dclogatoa have startotl from Fort Garry." On tho 4 til A]>ril tho frovornor-GoiUM'al tolographod : — "Thoy say the dologatos arc coming." And on tho 7th as follow.s :— " l^astof tho dologatos is oxpeotod at St. Paul on Thursday, tho 11th ; tho others arrived there to-day, and may reach Ottawa on Saturday, tho 9tli." On the 9th Earl Gmnville cabled " Let me know as soon as you can by telegram result of negotiations with Red River delegates." ClIAl'. XII I.) TMK MANITOIIA A«'T A TKRATY. .173 On tlin '2'.\ri\ oC April, Knil OninvilltHliiiH iiifuniMMl tlio (lovnnior- UoiH'rnl : "<'nnnv«>riHiM>iit on nil portioiiR of (,h<> hoMIimh' ' liill of nulitn.'" Tlio ni'^ittiiilionH willi (Im ^l«>l^'^lll(f«> nirrictl on liy Hir .Fnlm A. Miu'i| Ity the ^itvcniini'iir lo lion (MtiiiiniMi'o loi- tliitt |)iir|H)H(*. 'riu» iliU'fviowH cxIoiiiIimI IVtim tlin 'J.'litl A|>iil l<» llin '^inl of May, ooiilcnMU'OH (iiUinj^ plaro on llir 'J.'Inl 'jr»lli. 'JCih, jTlli, 'JHtli, 'JiMli anil IMKli April, anil (li(> Hinl nl' May. On tlni .'tiil ul" Miiy, tlin ( Juvriiior- (ionoral wuh hIiIo Im i'hWIi': " Ni'miitiilioMH wiMi (lMMlulfj{ut<'H I'lfmiMJ HnliHfimtitrily." Tu MiiH Mxrl (Imnvilln ivpliixl (iKMi May): " I take lliiN oppiiitniiity of oxpiimniitK Mi)> Hiil.iHri»i( 'inDii'iiui (idviTiiirn-iit nml till'
  • lr^iiti'fi Imvc cfinM' (o rin imili'i«t(iii(liii>{ dw In llir ti'iiiiM on wliifh (Iip nvlllv- mciilH (tu I fir Itiil h'ivrr Mhoiihf hr miniUlnf iiilit l/ir iiniitii." TIhw papiTH Hhonltl Iip HiiHiriiMil. (.o hIiiiw that, no^ntlalionH wiM'n rnrrinl on with (lii< ilnlrj^ali'H an iU>li'^aliHtin^ t,o ipiiitr thn connniHHiDn wliirli tlio ili'li'^ati'H rairiiMl wiUi Uk'Mi ami tJio oHiuial ai'kni)\vl<>il^ni(iia in ('onticil, liy tli« lint liiitriiRtdd to your k(iupiiif( with tlii'Ho pri^Hoiitfl, whiuli liHt ootitaiiin thi' 'ittnHrunix mi't /iri)/iiiniHiniM uiiifrr whirfi tin' iitii/ili' itf AMniiiihoin. would cotimnl tu iiih r Vunfittfrxliun with tho oth(!f I'l-ovinucH of Canada. "Hignml thiH !22nd Maroh, 1871. My Oidor, TnOMAH Ml'NN, tSirri'Idrff of Sliilr. OriAWA. April LT.th, IH70. " OicN'irKMKN, I liavii to acknowlcdf^o tlio rfcript of your luttf?- BtabiHu that an tliouglit material to iloterniine wjiothur tlio rlnlo^atoH wore 374 THE UELE0ATE8 AND THE MANITOBA ACT. [PaRT III. received officially as ilelegutew from the Provi«ionul Government, or merely uh dclej^ates of tlie people, tli(! present writer has no Ix'sitatiou in saying, that the evidence corrohorati^H the .sworn Htatcnicnt of Sir John A. Macdonald (Ix'fore the Common's Gommittoe, May, 1874); " tludjre Hlfick took iiio uside and stated that tliey liad received and brought witli thein an aiitliority from l{icl, as (^liief of the I'rovisioiial (ioveniiiieut, to act on behalf of that I'rovinional (Jovcrnnient, ami also a certain claim, or Bill of IJij^hts, prepared by that>;overnment. He asked me what was to be d(mo with the authority, and the IMll of Rights. I told him they had better not 1)0 produced, as the (iovernor-(>eneral could not recognize the legal existence of the rrovisional (Jovernment, and W(mkl not treat witli them aa such. / stuU'd ho\L'i')'ir, that the cliuniK aHHvrtcd in the hixt mentioned '^ Hill of Riiitiil diHcuHHioim wliicli linh, the victory will he valued duly in BO far as you nharu thoir joy and their hherty. 'I'he winning of their rights will possesH value in tlicir eyea, only if you claim thoao rights with them. " We poaaesH to-day, without partition, almost the half of a continent. The expulaion and annihilation of the invadera haa rendered our land natal to ita ohihlren. Hcattervd throughout tliis vast and rich country, but united to » man, — what matters distance to ua, ainco we are all brethren, and are acting for the common good ? " Kucognizvd by all clasaca of the people, the Government reposes upon the good will anil union of the inhabitants. " Its duty, in otiicially informing you of the^ i'tical changes vtfectcloral)h' lesults. But let the people feel reassured. Mlovated l)y tlie grace of Providence and the aull'erings of my fellow-citizens to tlie higliest position in tlm government of my country, 1 proclaim that peace reigns in our midst this day. 'I'he government will take every precauticr. t'» pn-veiit ti\is peace from being disturbed. While internally all is thus returning to order, externally also niattcMs are looking favoralile. Canada invites tlu; lieil Kiver people to an amicable arramienu'iit. She otters to guarantee us nglisli. He said : It is a matter of sincere congratulation, gentlemen, that we have been enabled to meet here at this time under a condition of public affnirs on which we may congratulate ourselves (hear, hear and cheers). You have each been, in your several parishes, among your {)eople, and have been able to join in congratulations that you have; had the lappiuess, some of you, to avoid the misfortune which, at one time, threatened all (hear, hear). But this is i)ast ; and none are, I am sure, sorry that they have heard the last of it (cheers). Our business now is to act — to show the people that we deserve their couHdence by securing to them what they deaire and expect of ua (cheers). .■■r,-^-%' Chap. XIV.] the Manitoba act a treaty. 379 '* Hon, Mr. McKay — Put at the same time I have observed in the other reports which have reached us that some importance is attached to one idea, namely, that the people here are divided, and that the conditions on which we were to receive Canada had been changed before they left here, with the Commissioners. It ix true that then' han been a cha)i(je, hut it ix / thbik one for the better, as the terms proposed in the long run could more eanily l)e assented to, than those agreed on in the convention. Some changes were fnund to be necessary by the executive, and tliey bad to be (juickly decided upon, as the Commissioners were expected in Canada, and the people here were anxious to see them starting to Ottawa. Hence the manner of making the alterations. But I would like to place them before the House so that lion, members might judge for themselves. Hon. Mr. Bunn, the .Secretary, was with us while the alterations were being made, and so limited wiis our time for the work that we h.id to work day and night in order to linish and enable the CommiHsioners to start at the time they did. 'I'he (lommissioners, of course, had certain powers in regard to these dem.ands, but before anything was linnlly settled they were instructed that the approval of the Legislative Assembly of this country was necessary,— so that while complying with circumstances, we had at the same time a saving clause that the ratification of the action of our Commissioners tlepended altogether on the will of the Legislature of this country (cheers). To-morrow, if it is the wish of the House, I will place on the table the List of Rights as given the Commissioners printed in English and French. '' Tqk President then (9th May) closed the session and intimated that in the event of anything otHcial coming from the Commissioners in Canada he might call a special session of the Legislature." " The 24th May, Queen's Birthday, was celebrated in good style ; peoj)le assembled in parties all over the settlement to enjoy them- selves —horse-racing was the principal feature of the day — but, alto- gether, so much good feeling existed between all classes, that one could only wonder at the change from a fewr weeks previous."* •Begg, 377. £1' #!' -S\ w ^•fSflabW};.,;, CHAPTER XV. RETURN OP ONE OP THE DELEGATES. The Rev. Mr. Ritchot reached Fort Garry on the 17th June, and on the 24th a special session of the Legislative Assentbly was held to hear his report. He had brought with him a copy of the Manitoba Act, which he explained at length to the members. The following extracts from The New Nation detail the proceedings which ensued : "Hon. Mr. Bunn — I have much pleasure in proposing a vote of thanks to Bev. Mr. Ritchot. We must all feel indebted to that gentleman and his co- delegates for the successful manner in which their work was performed, for the risk incurred, and the time, trouble, and expense taken in its accomplishment (cheers). In the first motion placed before our Parliament at its first session, I took the liberty of expressing our confidence that England would attend to the wants of our people as soon aa they were made known ; and she has done BO (cheers). From the report brought by Rev. Mr. Ritchot, it will be found that that confidence was not misplaced, but that England is Old England still (loud cheers). I have much pleasure in proposing a vote of thanks to our dele- gate Mr. Ricthot (cheers). Hon. Mr. Bannatyne seconded the motion. " Rev. Mr. RrrcHox — For myself I have expressed about the same thing to the Governor-General and Sir Clinton Murdock. I told them that the people had expelled Mr. McDougall, but were sure that as soon as England knew their causes of discontent she would be willing to satisfy them (cheers). " Hon. Mr. Schmidt heartily endorsed the vote of thanks to Rev. Mr. Ritchot. The resolution passed amid loud cheers. " The President — We have seen the Manitoba Act — have heard the re- port of our delegation — and now we have to proceed to something else. Is it the intention of the House to pronounce on the Manitoba Act ? " HiN. Mr. Schmidt— I would move that the Legislative Assembly of this country do now, in the name of the people, accept the Manitoba Act and de- cide on entering the Dominion of Canada on the terms proposed in the Con- federation Act (cheers). '* Hon. Mr. Pottras seconded the motion, which was put and carried, the members cheering enthusiastically. " Hon. Mr. Schmidt — I will now make another motion consequent on the former ones. I propose that we welcome the new governor on his arrival (cheers). The motion passed unanimously. " The Prfsident — We must not expect to exhaust the subject. If we have the happiness soon to meet the new Lieuteiiivnt-Governor, we will have time and opportunity enough to express our feelings. For the present let me say only one thing — I congratulate the people of the North- West on the happy issue of their undertakings (cheers). I congratulate them on their moderation and firmness of purpose, and I congratulate them on having trust enough in the Crown of England to believe that ultimately they would obtain their rights (clieers). I must, too, congratvlate the country, on passing from under this Pro- visional rule to one of a more permanent and satisfactory character. From all that can be learned, also, there is great room for congratulation in the selection of the Lieutenant-Governor which has been made. For myself, it will be my duty and pleasure more than any other, to bid the new Governor welcome on 1.380] Ohap. XV.] THE MANITOBA ACT A TREATY. 381 his arrival (loud cheers). I would like to be the first to pay him the respect due to his position as representative of the Crown (cheers). Something yet remains to be done. Many people are yet anxious and doubtful. I^et us still pursue the work in which we were lately engaged — the cultivation of peace and friendship, and doing what can be done to convince these people that we have never designed to wrong them (cheers) ; but that what has been done was as much in their interest as our own (hear)." The Rev. Mr. Ritchot then spoke as follows : — * ** As delegate, you will understand, of course, that my position was a very difficult one. The Manitoba Bill passed ; but you will observe it difiTored from our Bill of Rights, and, as delegates, we could not say if the people of the North- West could accept it. Hence, though fully alive to the fact that we had many friends in Canada — in the Legislature as well as out of it, — we could not express to them our sense of gratitude. The only thing we coulil do was to thank them for their sympathy. But now that our work, and that of the Canadian Parliament has been ratified by this House, my desire is, first, to thank the people of this country for the noble stand they have taken on this question. I have to thank the Canadian Ministry — particularly Sir John A. Maodonald and Sir George Cartier — for the liberal Bill framed by them, with the assistance of the delegation. I have to thank the . Dominion House of Commons and Parliament generally, for while 1*20 voted with us, only eleven were found against us. I have to thank also the Queen of England, whose subject I have always been — whose subject I am to-day. But, above all, I have to express thanks and gratitude to a higher power than all others ; I have to thank an over-ruling Providence for having been led through so many difficulties and dangers. Nor must we, at this time, think harshly of those who did not dare to come with us and demand rights ; for it was a very risky and imprudent thing. That we succeeded is due to Providence. We have succeeded — but we have seen how difficult the task was. Why ? Because we were divided. But now that we are united, we will be a strong people, and our little province will be the model province of Confederation. We will have an influx of strangers here. We want them, and will be glad to receive them. But let us be intelligent enough to distinguish between the good, and those who only came with selfish ends — to work against uf,. Let mo add to what I have stated, in regard to the Manitoba Act, that, at first it was intended that Portage la Prairie should be left out of the province. This had been opposed by the delegates — those who worked for it were the enemies of the Portage — and as soon as Ministers understood the matter fully, they included that district in the Bill. I would, for my part, like it to be well understood that all I have done in the past has been done in good faith, and with a desire to serve the country. I have never tried to work against any part of the people. As one of the delegates, 1 brought the Bill to Canada, and on that Bill worked for the people of the country, as a whole, without distinction. I offer my sympathy to every denomination in the countrj', and will repeat that, if there were some among us who did not dare to oppose McDougall, they were, perhaps, right. While in Canada, let me say in closing, not only had we all the sympathy and attention we could have expected, but admi"ation was expressed for the stand taken by the people, who had, it was neld, shown themselves to be a reflective, prudent people — wise to plan — resolute to act — so that, although jeopardized through dangers of the greatest magnitude, they passed almost unscathed through the crisis. It is easy to raise objections to the Manitoba Act, starting from an American point of view. I have heard many such objections. But these possess no weight with us. "After the reverend gentleman had spoken as above, the assembly adjourned." *Beggr, 379. n !it I. >9 ii^y iii'' ii CHAPTER XVI. COL. WOLSBLBY-OUTRAQBS AGAINST THE METIS -FENIAN INVASION. On tlie !24tli of Au<;usfc, 1S70. ("ol. Wolaeloy iirrived at Foi-t Garry witli tlie expcditioiiiirv force. No amnesty havinu; heon yot pro- cl.iiiutMl, Hu'l crossi'd into tlie United States. He returned in Marcli of the following; year, ajul remained until February, 1872, when Sir John A. M:icdonald ijav»! him $1,000, and the Hudson's Bay Com- pany <:;ave him finHiU'B History of Manitoba, 388. [382 J h SI 8( m Chap. XVI, j tiik Manitoba act a tkeaty. 383 Britinh blood ; rnwardH for CHptur^H ; indip^naiit d«nunciiitionH of de- linquent imd diliitory niii<{iHtratoH, Huoh uh ditrkciK^d ilm air when Scott was killed. Tlio news went to Ontario as an ordinary •• item," and was jtubliHlied (77te Daily Telegraph) tinder tlio caption "A misckeant dispc^sed of." NcvorthclcsH it was to tlieso very miscnnintH, that Canada, littlo morn than a year afterwards, turned for help and protection, and turii<>d not in vain. To-diiy they are rebels, liaiulitti, robberH, inis- cieant.s; to-niorrow th(\v shiike hands with the Lieutenant (lovernor of the Province of Manitoba, and find their courage, loyalty and patriotiNUi beyond ade(|uate prai.se! O'Donoghue haoplo will remain well assured, notwith- standing all that has, and can bo said. The foolish frenzy into which the Province of Ontario worked itself, while in absolute ignorance of all the facts, has left its drift of beliefs and prejudices, such as will require the lapse of another hundred years or so, wholly to remove. It might, by possibility, shorten the time a week or two, could the ques- tion be widely pat, and fairly answered, Against whom was the rebellion? THE REBELLION WAS NOT AGAINST HEK MAJESTY THE QUEEN, OB BRITISH SOVEREIGNTY. This much at all events is perfectly clear, and a short review will easily demonstrate it, 6'h Nov., 1869. Rial's first published declaration calls upon the English-speaking settlers to elect 12 councillors, ' ' in order to form one body with the above council, • . . to consider the pre- sent political state of the country, and to adopt such measures as may be deemed best for the future welfare of the same " (p. 3.32). 24.th Nov., 1869. The meetings of the Council ''resulted in the French members declaring their intention to form a Provisional Government, for the purpose of treating with Canada for the fxUure government of the country " (p. 333). 2nd Dec. 1869. English and French at the Council agreed upon a List of Rights^ and the French desired to send a deputation to Mr. McUougall to confer with him thereon (p. 334). 8th Dec, 1869. A proclamation is issued declaring, " That we refuse to recognize the authority of Canada, which pretends ta have a right to coerce us, and impose upon us a despotic form of government, still more contrary to our rights and interests as British subjects, than was that government to which we had subjected ourselves, through necessity, up to a recent date (p. 335) That meanwhile we hold ourselves in readiness to enter into- such negotiations with the Canadian Government as may be favorable for the good government and prosperity of this people " (p. 336). 19 Jan., 1870. At the mass-meeting, Riel declared his position as an English subject. [387] 1?- I . 388 " KEUELLION," AND SUCCESS. fPAIlT III. fith Feb., 1870. The Council of Forty upon a motion seconded by lUel, liuterinined to send delegates to confer with the Canadian Gov- ernment as to the affairs of the country. 19 Feb., 1870. Riel declared to Mr. Donald A. Smith '* We want only our just rights a» British nuhjecta." March, 1870. The Legislative Assembly resolved, " That notwithstanding the insults and sufferings borne by the people of the Northwest heretofore — which sufferings they still endure — the loyalty of the people of the Northwest towards the Crown of England remains the same, provided the rights, properties, usages and customs of the people be respected, and we feel assured that as British subjects such rights, properties, usages and customs will undoubtedly be respected." 7th April, 1870. A proclamation of the Provisional Government declared that, " We have always professed our nationality as British subjects." (p. ,376.) and gave as a reason for stopping Mr. McDougall, that he forgot "the rifrhts of nations and our rightn as British subjects." (p. 376.) If doubt remain, read the proclamation of 9th April (p. 377); Riel's speech, 26th April, (p. 378); the account of the celebrations of the Queen's birthday (p. 379); the proceedings of the Legislative Assembly after the return of the delegates (p. 380); and finally remember the loyal assistance rendered by Riel and the Metis against the Fenians and filibusterers — "that if the half-breeds had taken a different course, I do not believe the province would now be in our possession." If doubt still remain let the following authorities be cited: Sir John A. Macdonald, before the Commons' Committee deposed as follows: "The armed resistance was a very aggravated breach of the peace, but we were anxious to hold, and did hold, that under the circumstances of the case it did not amount to treason. We were informed that the insurgents did not desire to throw off allegiance to the Queen, or sever their allegiance from the Empire, but that their action was in the nature of an armed resistance to the entering into the country of an officer, or officers, sent by the Dominion Government." Sir George Cartier, in a memorandum of 8th June, 1870, when acting as Minister of Justice, said: — " First, there is no doubt that there was a strong feeling of antagonism, unanimously it may be said, in the half-breeds of all races and religions, against the introduction of Canadian authority into the settlement ; but at no time be/ore, or during the troubles did those feelings exist against the sovereign power of the Queen, nor even against the political rule of the Hudson's Bay Co." The Canadian Government, by an Order-in-Council ' 1 6th Dec, 1869) adopted a report of Sir John A. Macdonald, in which is found the following : — "The resistance of these misguided people is evidently not against tlie sovereignty of Her Majesty, or the government of the Hudson's Bay Company Chap. XVII.] the Manitoba act a treaty. 389 but to the assumption of the government by Canada. They profess themselves satisHed to remain as they are, and that if the present system of government were allowed to continue, they would at once disperse to their homos." Nor was tub Rebellion against the Hudson's Bay Company. The extracts above given are ample to prove this stateineiit. Rebnllion against, and defiance of, that company had been commenced and carried on somewhat suf^cessfully, before Kiel's appearance, not by the half-breeds, but by the Canadian party ; and that deHanoe and resist- ance had gone to the extent of the rescue by violence of those in gaol. If it be said that Riel seized one of the forts of the company, it may well be replied that if this, an incident of a struggle with Canadians, be rebellion against the company, then that the Canadians were also rebels against the company, for they, just as unceremoniously, seized another of the forts. The truth is that the company had received a mortal wound by the passing of the Confederation Act, and its coup- de-grdce, by the Act of the Dominion Parliament (1869), which in advance of the transfer made provision for the future government of the North-West. It was in its death-agonies when the Canadian surveyors commenced the operations, and was as little able, as, unfor- tunately, was its Governor (througii illness) to take any part in the struggle between settler and Canadian. Both sides treated it as defunct. Against whom then was the "rebellion"? A Minister of the Crown is said to have described it as a " rebellion against the Hon. Wm. McDougall." And if the word is to be retained, the present writer cannot suggest a better sentence in which to place it. And what was the measure of success attained] for by that we are told we must to some extent judge it. To answer this question we must compare the position in which the half-breeds would have occupied had there been no resistance, with their position under the Manitoba Act — their position in two respects, first as to form of government, and second as to lands, language, education, etc. As to form of government the answer is not difficult, for the Dominion Parliament had declared, prior to any outbreak, the manner in which it was intended to govern the territory.* A Lieutenant- Governor, and a Council of seven to fifteen persons, were to be ap- pointed by the Government at Ottawa "to make provision for the administration of Justice therein, and generally to make, ordain and establish all such laws, institutions and ordinances as may be necessary. " The Lieutenant-Governor shall administer the government under instruc- tions from time to time given him by Order-in-Council." And the Council was to have such powera " as may be from time to time conferred upon them by Order-in- Council." *See the Statute, 82 and 83 Vic. o. 3. 1. 7 390 " REHKLLION," AND 8UCCK88. [Part III. Tn other words, it branch, or agency, of the Dominion Govern- ment waH to be eHtiibliHhcd ut Winnipeg, while the head-oHice re- mained at Ottawa. And this ])olicy the Dominion Government en- deavored, thronj^h its dele<;ate8, to induce the settlers to accept.* Ifnder the Manitoba Act tlie settlenxtnt at once became a Pro- vince, with ail the powers enjoyed by all the other Provinces ; and with the same proportional i-epresentation in the Dominion Parlia- ment. This is point number one gained by the " rebellion against the Hon. Mr. McDongall." Altliouj,'h a very substantial point, it was not the princi|)al one. The (juarrel has been traced to " certain operations in land " of sin- ister aspect — the settlers particularly wanting to know what is to be- come of the land ; wiiat is the significance of all this surveying and staking ont? This was the principal topic debated between the Do- minion Government and the Red River delegates. Until then no policy had been adopted by the government, and is impossible to say what, liad there been no resistance, the future policy might have l)een. All one can say is that the delegates obtained more than the government would for some time, (biring the negotiations, consent to give ; and one may judge from that whether, without a lever, they wonld have succeeded so well. By the Manitoba Act (1) all grants of any estate made by the Hudson's Bay Comi)any were to be con- firmed by grant from the Crown ..n fee simple ; (2) all titles by occu- pancy with the sanction of the company were to become estates in freehold ; (3) all pereons in peaceable possession were to have pi-e- emptive rights; (4) rights of connnon and of hay-cutting were to be adjusted; and (5) 1[, 400,000 acres were to be distributed among the children of the half-breeds ! This is j)oint number two gained by the " rebellion against the Honorable William McDongall." Then there was the language question - English and French are equally divided, what language shall be officially used f Section 23 of the Manitoba Act provided in a manner quite satisfactory to a population equally divided, that both languages should be used — a provision which the English (in a spirit of " English fair play "), now that they are in a majority, have completely disregarded ; and by statute, so far as they can, have repudiated. This was point number three gained -by the " rebellion, etc." And, lastly, there was the question of education, settled also to the satisfaction of an equally divided population — as it had been .settled long before in Ontario and Quebec. Settled ? Everyone, at the time, thought that it was settled ; but owing to some looseness in the drafting, the present position is as in- dicated in one of the best of the Toronto periodicals : " That the cunbtitution of the Province does not provide for the perpetuation of separate schools is now certain. But it is scarcely less certain that it was *8ee Letter of Instructions, Hon. Mr. Howe to the Rev. Mr. Thibault. 4th Dec, 1869. •<^IIAP. XVII.] TIIK MANITOBA ACT A TREATY. 391 Ihe intention of thf. oritjinal /ramfm of that constitution to secure their perpetw ation. Such being the case, it would neom at tirat thought that thu provincial authorities nhould, as honorable men. be guitlod by thu intention, riitliur than by the letter of that uhartur. . . . Hut ncre a v:iriotv of considerations present themselves to modify or reverse these conclusions.' Among whiclj are nuiiUKl ( 1) "Tlio juHtico and the wisdom of the iiitwiition " ; (2) That the expectation " that the new province would he peopled to a very great extent by nieinherH and adherents of the Roman Catholic Church has utterly failed of realization"; (.'i) and that there can he no re8t until the intention is violated or set aside. A Holetnn compact is made, and is to be violated, ( 1 ) because it was not a wise one to enter into ; (2) because the i)arty attacked is not so strong as it was thought it would bo (in which case it would have looked after itself) ; and (3) because the stronger party is rest- less — public opinion, once more, become too sensitive ! If Cath olios so reasoned it would be denounced as "Jesuitical casuistry ;"and fathered upon their supposed principles that " there ought to be no faith kept with heretics " ; that the " end justifies the means," etc. But such bare-faced word-juggling is not a whit worse than the bare-faced repudiation of the acknowledged agreement, some of the in- cidents of which must now be related. \t m CHAPTER XVIII PROTESTANT PROMISES. Almost every step in the constitutional history of Canada has been accompanied by assurances given to Roman Catholics. (Pro- testants have also received assurances, but they are not detailed heie.) The capitulations of Quebec and Montreal provided (1759 and 1760) " That the free exercise of the Catholic, Apostolic and Roman Religions shall be preserved." The Treaty of Parin (1763), containing the cession of Canada from France to Great Britain, had the following : — " His Britannic Majesty on his side agrees to grant the liberty of the Catholic religion to the inhabitants of Canada ; he will consequently give the most precise, and most effectual orders, that his new Roman Catholic subjects may profess the worship of their religion, according to the rites of the Romish Church, as far as the laws of Great Britain permit." The Quebec Act (1774) — the first Imperial Statute as to the government of the colony, 14 George III., cap. 83, sec. 5, enacts that *' , . . subjects may have, hold and enjoy the free exercise of the religion of the Church of Rome subject to the King's supremacy . . . and that the clergy of the said Church may hold, receive and enjoy their accustomed dues and rights, with respect to such persons only as shall profess the said religion." The Constitutional Act (1791), 31 George III., cap. 31, sec. 42, provides that " Whenever any Bill shall be passed containing any previsions which shall in any manner relate to, or affect the enjoyment or exercise of any form, or mode of religious worship ; or shall impose or create any penalties, burdens, disabilities or disqualifications in respect of the same ; or shall in any manner relate to. or affect the payment, recovery or enjoyment of any of the accustomed dues or rights," etc., then the Royal assent was not to be given until thirty days after the Bill should have been laid before the Imperial Parliament. The, Union Act (1840,) 3 and 4 Vic. cap. 35, contained the clause just quoted. The Confederation Act (1867) has the provisions with reference to education already quoted (p. 1), and provisions for the official use of the French language. The Manitoba Act, and its safeguarding clauses have already been referred to. [392] Chap. XVlII.j PROTKSTANT PROMISES. 393 The assurances which rendered that Act possible, and acceptable, must now be collected. They are : — 1. In the instructions to Col. de Salaberry and the Rev. Mr. Thibault, Comniissionei'S from the Cnnadian Government to the Red River Settlement, is the following ; — " You will not f&il to direct the attention of the mixed society, inhabiting the cultivated borders of the Red River and Assiniboine, to the fact which comes within your daily knowledge and observation, and is patent to all the world, that in the four Provinces of this Dominion, men of all origins, creeds, and complexions, stand upon one broad footing of perfect equality in the eye of the government and the law ; and that no administration could confront the enlightened public sentiment of this country, which attempted to act in the North-West, upon principles more restricted and less liberal than those tohich are fairly established here." 2. In the letter of instructions to the other Canadian Commis- sioner (Mr. Donald A. Smith) from the Governor General there is the following : — ' ' The ^^eople may rely upon it that respect and protection will be extended to the different rei iijiotts denoininations ; that titlfiB . . . ; and that all the franchises which have existed or which the people may prove themselves qualilied to exercise, shall be duly continued or liberally conferred. "In declaring the desire and determination of her Majesty's Cabinet, you may safely use the terms of the ancient formula, that ' right shall be dune in alt cases.' " 3. In a letter written by the Governor-General to Mr. McTavish, then the Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, about the same date (fith Dec, 1869) is this: " And the inhabitants of Rupert's Land, of all classes and persuasions, may rest assured that Her Majesty's orovernment has no intention of interfering with or setting aside, or allotoing others to interfere with the religions, the rights, or the franchises hitherto enjoyed, or to wTiichthey may hereafter prove themselves equal." 4. About the same time (7th Dec. 1869) the Canadian Secretary of State wrote to Mr. McDougall ; " You will now be in a position to assure the residents of the Northwest Territories : "1. That all their civil and religious liberties will be sacredly respected. " 7. That the country will be governed, as in the past, by British law, and according to the spirit of British justice. " 5. That these assurances might carry all the weight of Her Majesty's name, the Governor- General issued a proclamation (6 Dec, 1869) having the following: " By Her Majesty's authority, I therefore assure you that, on the union with Canada, all your civil and religious rights and privileges will_Jic..v€*pected, your properties secured to you, an-t»j«i.«Mtoj,^.jw,^,-,^.^ 400 PROTESTANT PROMISES. [ Part ITI. " I, William Forbes Alloway, of the City of Winnipeg, in the County of Selkirk, banker, do solemnly declare that 1 have seen and read tlie statutory declaration of the very Ilev. Vicar Oeneral Allard, made before Alex. Hagyart, a Commissioner of the B. U., etc., on this first day of April, A. 1). I8!)2, and I say that I was present as therein stated bv him, and I di(t on saiil first occasion introduce the Hon. Thos. Greenway to the Vicar General, and I say that the account of said interview, as set out in said declaration of the Vicar General, is true in substance and in fact. " I was present at the whole of the said interview and heard all that tran- spired between the Vicar General and said Thos. Greenway. "J further say that I waspresentat my banking office on the following d?>; when the Vicar General and the said Hon. Thos. Greenway met according to appointment made the day previous, and I heard most of the interview which took place between them on that second day, and I say that the promises and pledges as set out in the Vicar General's said statement were repeated in the said second interview, and the said Greenway then expressed himself as very much gratified with the attitude assumed by His Grace the Archbishop towards his Government, and expressed such satisfaction not only then, but in my presence afterwards. " And I make this solemn declaration, conscientiously believing the same to be true, and by virtue of the Act respecting extra-judicial oaths. W. F, Alloway. " Declared before me this Ist day of April, 1792, at the City of Winnipeg, in the County of Selkirk, aforesaid. J. Stewart Tuppkr, A Commissioner in B.R., etc." All Compacts Broken — The assurances just referred to were given by the liberal leaders in 1888, and thereby they gained office and a majority. In 1890 the same men crushed their Hy — they passed the School Acts ! And thus the humiliating history of Protestant promises ends : — In 1867, to the Province of Quebec — Let us form a Confederation — a Dominion ! Have no fear. The rights of minorities shall be always safeguarded and protected. Rupert's Land and the North- Western Territory, should they join, are to be admitted, " on such terms and conditions, in each case, as are in the addresses expressed, and as the Queen thinks fit to ;vpprove, subject to the provisions of this Act,"* — minorities there, too, shall be justly dealt with. lie 1870, to the French Metis — Lay down your arms ; join the Canadian Confederation. Your religion, your rights, your privileges will all be respected. " Right shall be done." In 1876, to the French members of the Manitoba Legislature — Give up the Legislative Council, which is useful only as a constitutional check. You have nothing to fear. Your rights will " never be trampled on." The majority will never "be found oppressive." B. N. A, Act, Seo. 146. Chap. XVIII.] PROTESTANT PROMISES. 401 Should you concede, you may he sure the niajority will recognize your "generosity and never forget it." In 1888 to the Electors of St. Francois Xavier : — Elect the Liberal candidate. We have no iiloa of interfering witli Catholic institutions. We give you a " ))ositive pledge in the name of the Liberal party, that we will not do so." In 1888 to the Archbishop of St. Boniface, and the French candi- dates : — We are ** willing to guarantee under our government the maintenance of the three existing conditions with regard (1) to separ- ate Cacholic schools ; (2) to the official use of the French language ; (3) io the French electoral divisions." Two short years after the last of these solemn pledges, they are all torn to shreds and cast to the winds ! Yes, yea ; his faith attesting nations own, 'Tis Punic all, and to a proverb known. Memory has dimmed the fitness of the word " Punic " to express the lowest jjossible depth of treachery and perfidy. For an appro- priate substitute Canadians need search neither ancient history, nor modern geography. Sidney Smith in 1827 closed his celebrated essay on " Catholics " with words which, sage and true then, have special application now. They shall close this work also : "To THE No-PoPERY FoOL. " You are made use of by men who laugh at you, and despise you for your folly and ignorance* ; and who, the moment it suits their purpose, will consent to emancipation of the Catholics, and leave you to roar and bellow No-Popery 1 to vacancy and the moon. "To THE No-PoPERY ROGUK. "A shameful and scandalous game, to sport with the serious inter- ests of the country, in order to gain some increase of public power ! " To THE Honest No- Popery People. " We respect you very sincerely — but are astonished at your exist- ence. " To THE Catholics. " Wait. Do not add to your miseries by a mad and desperate re- bellion. Persevere in civil exertions, and concede all you can concede. All great alterations in human affairs are produced by compromisa." *Ignoranoe of this, namely, relating to the Catholic priesthood : — " No other body of men have ever exhibited a more single-minded and unworldly zeal, refracted by no personal Interests, sacrificing to duty the dearest of earthly objects, and confrontinfr with undaunted heroism every form of hardship, of suffering, and of death."— Lecky's History of European Morals, II., 835.