Vol. 3 No. 8 



Agricultural and Industrial 



Progress in Canada 



* 



A monthly review of Agricultural and Industrial progress in Canada, 

 published by the Department of Colonization and Dzvelopment of the 

 Canadian Pacific Railway at Montreal, Canada. 



MONTREAL 



August, 1921 



Essentials To Canada's Prosperity 



" TT is obvious that two great things are 

 necessary to this country's prosperity" 

 - said Mr. E. W. Beatty, President of the 

 Canadian Pacific Railway, when interviewed 

 recently. "One is the backing of foreign capital 

 for new enterprises in order that our national 

 wealth may be properly realized and the second 

 is more people to aid these industrial conditions, 

 extend the farm areas under cultivation and by 

 their number and financial solvency ease the 

 burdens of the country." 



"We should do everything we legitimately 

 can to firmly establish the resources of Canada 

 in the minds of those 

 whose financial support 

 is so essential and we 

 should be very careful 

 not to frame our immi- 

 gration policies on the 

 principle that a tempor- 

 ary depression and tem- 

 porary unemployment 

 is a justification forbar- 

 riers against the intro- 

 duction of a good type 

 of immigrant into this 

 country. 



"It seems to be the assumption that im- 

 migration is like a tap that can be turned on 

 and off with absolute freedom. This is not the 

 case. It must be a continuous flow of the right 

 kind of people if we are going to carry our 

 burdens with anything approaching ease. By 

 all means let us exclude permanently those un- 

 desirables from the slums of large cities and 

 from countries, the complexion of which makes 

 it impossible for their people to be assimilated 

 into this country. We know now what type of 

 immigrant succeeds in Canada. We can point 

 to races, the representatives of which contain 



no idlers in this country people who are 

 nationally and naturally thrifty and hard 

 working and rarely, if ever, become a charge 

 on the community. We know too the type 

 of people who add nothing to the product- 

 ivity of the country, who are parasites living off 

 others by their wits but increasing not at all 

 the national estate or the economic strength of 

 this country. We do not want and should not 

 encourage these people. 



"Coupled with an active desire expressed 

 through a sane immigration policy to obtain 

 settlers of the right type for Canada should be 

 a system of acceptance or rejection at the port 

 of embarkation so as to reduce to a minimum 



the sometimes almost 

 inhuman practice of 

 returning rejected im- 

 migrants from a Cana- 

 dian port. This could 

 be readily arranged, of 

 course, in the case of 

 all British immigrants 

 but would be somewhat 

 more difficult in the 

 case of continentals 

 where the system is of 

 the greatest import- 

 ance. 



"I see nothing in the future which would 

 render desirable unduly restrictive measures in 

 the matter of immigration." 



In his allusion to immigrants easily assimil- 

 ated, none of which have become charges upon 

 Canada, Mr. Beatty, excepting naturally those 

 from the British Isles, had in mind the people 

 from Scandinavian countries, from Holland and 

 from Northern Italy. To people of this type it 

 was his obvious opinion that no barriers should 

 be erected, that their coming was essential to the 

 well-being of Canada and to the lessening of the 

 tax burdens of Canadians. . _. */ 



