DOMINION OF CANADA. 



279 



That Canada in the future, as in the past, is desir- 

 ous of cultivating and extending trade relations with 

 the United States in so tar a? they may not conflict 

 with the policy of fostering the various interests and 

 industries of the Dominion which was adopted in 1379 

 and has since received in so marked a manner the 

 sanction and approval of its people. 



Mr. Jones of Halifax (Liberal) moved an 

 amendment . 



That in any arrangement between Canada and the 

 United States providing for the free importation into 

 each country of the natural and manufactured produc- 

 tions of the other, it is highly desirable that it should 

 be provided that during the continuance of any such 

 arrantrement the coasting-trade of Canada and of the 

 United States should be thrown open to vessels of 

 both countries on a footing of complete reciprocal 

 equality, and that vessels of all kinds built in the 

 United States or Canada may be owned and sailed by 

 the citizens of the other and' be entitled to registry in 

 either country and to all the benefits thereto apper- 

 taining. 



Sir Eicliard Cartwright, in supporting his 

 motion, said : 



"I will take two facts alone, which ap- 

 pear to me, and I think will appear to this 

 House, to be of very great importance in this 

 connection : and of which I have here as ab- 

 solute evidence as it is possible for any man 

 to have. I will take the movement of the 

 population in this country in the last quarter 

 of a century, beginning in the year 1861 and 

 going down to the year 1886, which is the last 

 moment for which I have absolutely accurate 

 statistical information. What are the>e tacts? 

 Sir, they are facts which I state with pain. 

 But I say that we have here incontestable evi- 

 dence that in these twenty-five years, one in 

 every four of the native-born population of 

 Canada has been compelled to seek a home in 

 a foreign country, and that of all the immi- 

 grants whom we have imported at great cost, 

 three out of four have been compelled to fol- 

 low in the track of that fraction of the native- 

 born population. 



" The formal reports of the United States 

 show that in the year 1860 there were 249.000 

 men of Canadian birth in the United States; 

 that in ten years they had grown to 490,000 

 souls, and that in 1880, there were 707,000 Ca- 

 nadians in the United States. It must be re- 

 membered that that by no means represents the 

 total exodus of our people, because, when you 

 come to deal with such large numbers as these, 

 you must allow for the death rate which pre- 

 vailed in the twenty years from 1860 to 1880. 

 That death-rate, after careful examination, I 

 believe to have been about 74.000 in the first 

 decade, and 120,000 in the second, in all equal 

 to 194,000. it is clear, therefore, that between 

 1860 and 1880, for some cause or other, which 

 it is not my present purpose to analyze, at least 

 650,000 Canadians found homes in the United 

 States. 



" Apply another test. If you choose to turn 

 to the report of Trade and Navigation, which 

 the Minister of Customs with commendable 

 promptitude has laid on the table, there you 



will find evidence which ought to convince this 

 House that within the last fourteen or fifteen 

 yt-ars. although there has been a considerable 

 increase of population but far inferior to that 

 we ought to have had there has been, and it 

 is a noteworthy fact, a very large reduction in 

 the total volume of trade. Here is the hon- 

 orable gentleman's own blue book laid within 

 these last few days on the table of the House, 

 and from that I see that in 1873, fifteen years 

 ago, the total volume of trade was 217,500,- 

 000, with a population of 3.750,000; that, to-day, 

 with a population which honorable gentlemen 

 opposite estimate, though incorrectly, at 4,800,- 

 000, our total volume of trade and exports is 

 $202,000,000, being $15,000,000 less than it 

 was fifteen years ago, although we have 1,000,- 

 000 people or thereabout more. Apply an- 

 other test. I find in 1873 the average per 

 head of exports and imports amounted to $58 

 odd; according to the honorable gentleman's 

 own statement, the average per head 01 ex- 

 ports and imports to-day is $41.50. 



In twenty years the Government have tre- 

 bled our debt, in twenty years they have trebled 

 our taxes, and when the budget comes to be 

 brought down I think the House will find that 

 the liabilities of the people of this country are 

 very far indeed from being fully discharged or 

 measured even by our present enormous debt. 

 Again I say for the moment I suspend my re- 

 marks on their failure to create an impor- 

 tant interprovincial trade. That is a question 

 which requires a little more discussion than it 

 suits me to give it at the moment; and here 

 again I ask my friends from the maritime prov- 

 inces, when the time comes, to contribute for 

 the information of the House their views as to 

 the success which has attended our efforts to 

 create a trade in that direction. Nor will I 

 dwell just now further on the lamentable fail- 

 ure after the expenditure of over $100.000,000 

 of public money, to produce or obtain any ade- 

 quate settlement of the Northwest. But I 

 will say a word or two as to the utter failure 

 to obtain any adequate return from our great 

 public works. The public accounts are here, 

 and those public accounts show that the 

 people of Canada have expended well nigh 

 $200,000,000 in the construction of railways 

 and canals and divers other improvements. 

 Time was when we hoped those would give u* 

 something like an adequate return, directly or 

 indirectly, but the time has now arrived when 

 we find these expectations very bitterly disap- 

 pointed. How now stands the case? I take 

 the public accounts for 1887. and I find, all 

 told, a charge of $3,970,000 for the expenses of 

 operating those public works, and that is the 

 nominal charge. The real charge, if our ac- 

 counts were kept as any other country on earth 

 would keep them, would be nearer $4,500.000, 

 or, at all events, $4,250.000 than $3.970,000. 

 What do we get as a return? We get a total 

 income of $3,270,000. Not only do we not 

 receive one farthing of interest on the outlay 



