24 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
of companies with provincial objects, property and civil rights, adminis- 
tration of justice, and generally “all matters of a merely local and pri- 
vate nature in the province.” It will be remembered that the national 
or general government of the United States is alone one of enumerated 
powers, whilst the several states have expressly reserved to them the 
residuum of power not in express terms or by necessary implication taken 
away from them. In their anxiety to avoid the sectional and state 
difficulties that arose from these very general provisions and to 
strengthen by constitutional enactment the general government of the 
Dominion, the framers of the British North America Act placed the 
residuary power in the parliament of Canada—in the words of the law 
that parliament is allowed “ to make laws for the peace, order and good 
government of Canada in relation to all matters not coming within the 
classes of subjects by this act assigned exclusively to the legislatures of 
the provinces.” 
But despite the earnest effort that was made by the Canadians to 
prevent troublesome questions of jurisdiction too constantly arising 
between the general and provincial governments, the courts have been 
steadily occupied for a quarter of a century in adjusting the numerous 
constitutional disputes that have arisen in due course of law under the 
union act. Five large octavo volumes of nearly four thousand pages 
now contain the decisions that have been recorded by the judicial com- 
mittee of the privy council of England and the courts of Canada. Dis- 
cussions are frequently arising in the legislative bodies on the varied 
interpretation that can be given to the constitution on these very points 
of constitutional procedure and jurisdiction which the framers of the 
federal union thought they had enumerated with great care. But it is 
in this very reference to the courts that the strength of a written instru 
ment of federal government lies. In Canada, as in all other countries 
inheriting English law, there is that great respect for the judiciary which 
enables the people to accept itsdecisions when they would look with sus- 
picion on the acts of purely political bodies. We need look only to the 
experience of the United States to test the value of judicial opinions on 
constitutional issues. The following remarks of a very judicious writer, 
Professor Dicey,’ may be appropriately quoted in this connection : 
“The main reason why the United States have carried out the fed- 
eral system with unqualified success is that the people of the union are 
more thoroughly imbued with constitutional ideas than any other exist- 
ing nation. Constitutional questions arising out of either the constitu- 
tions of the several states or the articles of the federal constitution are 
of daily occurrence and constantly occupy the courts. Hence the people 
become a people of constitutionalists ; and matters which excite the 


! The Law of the Constitution,” 3rd ed., p. 167. 
