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The Acadian Recorder lamented: “‘We don’t know each other. We have no trade with each other. We have no facilities or resources or incentives to mingle with each other. We are shut off from each other by a wilderness, geographically, commercially, politically and socially. We always cross the United States to shake hands.’” Joseph Howe, as usual, put it more pungently: “‘Take a Nova Scotian to Ottawa, away above tidewater, freeze him up for five months, where he cannot view the Atlantic, smell salt water, or see the sail of a ship, and the man will pine and die.’” “Unlike …

Unity/Diversity: The Canadian Experience More…

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“…to strengthen the Federal Parliament is to start Canada on the way to a dictatorship;” (Too late). “It has not been the purpose of this article to criticize the Privy Council for the part they have played in this, but merely to emphasize the fact that, to a large extent, the constitution is not so much a historical document as a series of legal decisions, many of them delivered with what would appear to be a certain bias.” Clark, E.R. “The Privy Council and the Constitution” Dalhousie Review, Volume 19, Number 1, 1939 https://dalspace.library.dal.ca/bitstream/handle/10222/62371/dalrev_vol19_iss1_pp65_75.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

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“As the Civil War began, most Nova Scotians favoured the northern cause. While little was known of Abraham Lincoln, it was generally felt that the Republican party was pledged to a crusade against the dreaded institution of slavery. This all Nova Scotians could support. As the war progressed, however, many Nova Scotians began to have second thoughts about the struggle. To begin with, it had become apparent that the Republican party was very reluctant to abolish the institution of slavery in its entirety” “While Wade had been saved, the Haligonians had to face the consequences of their action. The Northern …

Second Chesapeake Affair: 1863-1864 More…

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“The agricultural produce of the fertile Island found a ready market in industrial New England between 1854 and 1865. Exports to the United States fell from £120,928 in 1865 to £21,633 in 1866, while imports only slipped slightly.16 The cheap food that fed immigrant workers in New England mill towns during the Civil War now came from other sources. Stagnation gripped the Island economy, in spite of minor illicit trading with American fishermen. While Canada had been able to open some alternate markets after the collapse of reciprocity,1 7 Prince Edward Island had virtually no place to turn. Canadian farmers …

Annexation in the Maritimes? The Butler Mission to Charlottetown More…

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“Canada has not one but three national games. First and foremost is ice hockey. Secondly, there is the sport of determining whether a particular area or piece of legislation ought to be under federal or provincial jurisdiction. In both of these games a winner emerges periodically before the next series begins. Canada’s third national game-assessing the Canadian identity never ends and has never declared a winner.” “…historically one very important ingredient in the Canadian identity has been an attitude which can best be labelled as “anti-Americanism”.” “In Nova Scotia, the Halifax merchants and the military establishment strenuously opposed the Revolution. …

The Anti-American Ingredient in Canadian History More…

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“THE American war of independence against the German despot George III of England lasted, in the opinion of an early American historian, eight times as long as it need have done, because the thirteen colonies fought as sovereign states. In Fiske’s words: “Had there been such a government that the whole power of the thirteen states could have been swiftly and vigorously wielded as a unit, the British might have been driven to their ships in less than a year.” “What exactly was the fundamental difference between the confederation or “league of friendship” and the federal constitution drafted by the …

Federal Union in America More…

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“In the general election campaign of 1935, eight of Canada’s nine provincial Prime Ministers, all heading Liberal administrations, urged the election of the Liberal Party, headed by Mr. King, to Ottawa. The citizens of Canada heeded this advice only to find, less than three years later, internal strife multiplied. In the interim, moreover, only one province, Quebec, has changed the political character of its administration. Apparently, the deplorable state of national disunion, so evident at the present time, is caused by circumstances and conditions far removed from the labels of political parties“ Shane, H. “Canadian Disunion” Dalhousie Review, Volume 18, …

Canadian Disunion More…

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“However, our chief interest in this matter lies not in the practical actions of statesmen but rather in the editorial opinion on this subject as expressed by the Halifax newspapers. Of these the Acadian Recorder was one of the first and most persistent champions of inter-provincial consolidation.” “By 1864 the question of B. N. A. Union had not yet become a strong political issue between parties. Both Liberal and Conservative party organs favored the scheme in principle, realizing that it was “pregnant with weal and woe to the people of British America.” As to the difficulties involved in the achievement …

The Halifax Press and B.N.A. Union 1856-1864 More…

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“We have gathered here to affirm a faith, a faith in a common purpose, a common conviction, a common devotion. Some of us have chosen America as the land of our adoption; the rest have come from those who did the same. For this reason we have some right to consider ourselves a picked group, a group of those who had the courage to break from the past and brave the dangers and the loneliness of a strange land. What was the object that nerved us, or those who went before us, to this choice? We sought liberty; freedoms from …

“The Spirit of Liberty” More…

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“It now rested with Nova Scotia to give her decision. When Mr. Tilley’s government were first defeated at the polls, it seemed to Dr. Tupper, the Nova Scotian premier, impolitic and unnecessary to press the question in the sister province. Now, however, that New Brunswick had accepted the principle of union, it became incumbent on Nova Scotia to deal with the matter. For reasons which, no doubt, were in his opinion sufficient, Dr. Tupper decided and Sir Fenwick Williams, the lieut.-governor, acquiesced in the decision-that no dissolution should take place, but that the existing House of Assembly should be asked …

Political Experiences in Nova Scotia, 1867-1869 More…

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“…in the Maritimes Confederation was the remedy for no particular evils, and it was an issue to be decided on its merits. It promised practical benefits of course, but it offered few practical solutions for Maritime problems. Confederation raised new problems: it did not solve old ones. In Nova Scotia these new problems erupted quite suddenly in public debate in August, 1864, with the first appearance of the Canadian visitors. The debate thus begun filled the pages of the newspapers. In Halifax four of the major newspapers carried an editorial on Confederation in virtually every issue from that time on …

Halifax Newspapers and the Federal Principle, 1864-1865 More…

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THE HON. JUDGE PATTERSON “UNDER the above title Mr. Laurence ]. Burpee 1 has edited and published 2 a series of letters written by Howe while in England in 1866-7, opposing the passage of the British North America Act, to William J. Stairs, 3 one of the Vice Presidents of the League. Howe was himself the President, and its Constitution which Mr. Burpee gives in an Appendix is unmistakably his work. In expressing his thought in crisp sentences, where every word tells,. there was in Nova Scotia no one aut similis aut secundus to the great Tribune.” “True to its …

Joseph Howe and the Anti-Confederation League More…

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“In Nova Scotia only the clever political footwork of Charles Tupper kept his province from vetoing the plan. Bu t as soon as the new Dominion was formed Nova Scotians expressed themselves in no uncertain terms. Of 18 men elected to the House of Commons in Ottawa all but one, Tupper himself, were pledged to break away from what Joseph Howe called the “Botheration” Scheme. In a provincial election 35 of 37 elected members were anti-Confederationist.” “And while secession never found such an organized voice as in Nova Scotia where elections were won on it, it is still a word …

The Cradle of Confederation: Some Reflections More…

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“It will be remembered that while the Canadian parliament adopted, by large majorities in both Houses, the scheme of Confederation agreed upon by the delegates from the several provinces at the Quebec Conference, the parliament of Prince Edward Island rejected it; and the people in New Brunswick, to whom it was submitted by the Government of that province, by an enormous majority voted against it. Without New Brunswick the proposed union was for Nova Scotia impossible.” “What would the Legislature of Nova Scotia do during the session of 1866, now that New Brunswick’s position had changed? It was notorious that …

An Unexpected Incident of Confederation in Nova Scotia More…

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“It will be a salutary experience for the post-World-War II generation to be reminded that “the Maritimes” is not a homogeneous unit with a common tradition. There were considerable differences in the views held by each of the maritime colonies and there were, especially within the oldest of these, deep divisions of opinion. This division of opinion was usually well expressed in their press. The four colonies together supported more than eighty journals-Halifax itself, with a population of only 30,000, had eleven-and Dr. Waite, speaking through them, describes brilliantly the interplay of local and national forces and reveals the negative …

Review Article: Confederation More…

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