76 QUEEN'S QUARTERLY. 



adherence to monarchy as an insuperable objection to close relations 

 with the United States. Development on both sides of the boundary 

 line, more especially on the American, has transcended that old- 

 fashioned objection. So may your dread of one particular type of 

 organization be transcended. Apart from that there are two con- 

 siderations whose value impresses me : 



1. The Empire must organize to survive; and it is above all 

 necessary to survive. 



2. Our connection with the Empire, our association with the 

 widest sweeps of world-politics which it will bring us, is our coun- 

 tervailing advantage to set against the bulk and wealth of the United 

 States. Deprive us of that, insist on perpetuating our present 

 maimed and imperfect citizenship, and we shall be at a standing 

 disadvantage in dealing with the Republic. It is our special duty to 

 make ourselves as strong and as good as they are; only in equality 

 can there be union ; and for us the road to full citizenship is through 

 Imperial organization. 



By Imperial organization I do not mean immediate formal union 

 such as is hoped for by Imperial Federationists. The phase imme- 

 diately in front of us is that of national development, and it will 

 probably outlast our time. When we have done with it I should ex- 

 pect some movement towards the closer linking of the Five Free 

 Nations to be in order. Also, as soon as possible there must be a 

 substantial increase of the armed strength of the Empire, probably 

 by national rather than by Imperial machinery. 



One other remark. In part of your letter you turn aside from 

 the thesis " Would Imperial Union be desirable ? " to a discussion of 

 that other thesis, " Would Imperial Union be practicable ? " I shall 

 not follow you in that; so far I have seen no satisfactory plan of 

 Imperial federation proposed; nor, what is far more important, 

 have I seen any plan devised for bringing any plan what- 

 ever to pass. I am content to work along the plan of na- 

 tional development, of organizing fresh centres of strength, 

 in Lord Milner's phrase. But I must observe that your arguments 

 as to the impracticability of Imperial Union have this pe- 

 culiarity — that every one of them would have applied with equal 

 force to a certain project of union which a man named Alexander 

 Hamilton was busy advocating just before the year 1787. I have a 

 strong suspicion that they were duly advanced then. The physical 

 .obstacles to American federation in 1787 were greater than the phy- 

 sical obstacles in the way of Imperial federation to-day. And at 



