320 TRANSACTIONS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. [VoL. II.. 



the welfare of the ruling class. If an oligarchy governs, the first and- 

 great aim is the benefit of the oligarchy. Similarly with respect to a. 

 party, and the consequences are the same whatever party may govern.. 

 This rule has always obtained, and we may rest satisfied that it will be 

 the rule to the end of time. If, therefore, our object be the welfare and. 

 well being of the whole people, it is perfectly clear that the whole and 

 not a part must govern. It becomes a fundamental necessity, therefore, 

 that some way must be devised by which we shall obtain government 

 by the whole people, or by representatives or deputies of the whole 

 people, if we are to make any advance in the art of government. 



It is quite true that in Canada we follow much the same methods as in^ 

 Great Britain, where representative institutions took their origin, where 

 the greatest experience has been obtained, and where we look for the 

 highest perfection. It is undeniable that elections determined by the 

 numerical majority of votes, and the division of the electors themselves, 

 into two great parties, are methods which have been practised in the 

 mother country more or less since the latter end of the reign of 

 Charles 11. It must nevertheless be admitted that the numerical 

 majority system is but a rough and ready means of choosing representa- 

 tives, and that party government is found in the United Kingdom as. 

 elsewhere to be productive of serious political evils. Moreover, even if 

 these traditional methods be held to be the only available means of 

 carrying on government in a country which has emerged from feudalism,, 

 the circumstances of their application on this side of the Atlantic are not 

 the same. Here the whole people are on equal footing. There is no. 

 privileged class, all are equal in the eye of the law, possessing identical 

 rights and privileges. It is our pride to be in close alliance with Great 

 Britain, and our boast to be an integral portion of the British Empire^ 

 but in local government we possess the fullest measure of independence, 

 retaining control of our own affairs, untrammelled by the hereditary 

 rights and practice which spring from past social and political con- 

 ditions. In the mother country there are ways and usages which are 

 historically intelligible, and among them may be classed the political 

 methods we have named ; the circumstances on this side of the Atlantic 

 are however different, and there will be less difficulty in discarding 

 such ways and usages, if they are found seriously to impede progress or 

 interfere with the essential principles of representative government, " the 

 government of the whole by the whole." 



In Canada we have been accorded full liberty to manage our own 

 affairs substantially in our own way. There is no cast iron rule which 

 we are bound to follow ; there are no theoretical impediments to consti- 



