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The National Policy—Old and New*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2014

V. C. Fowke
V. C. Fowke*
Affiliation:
University of Saskatchewan
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Extract

The Canadian system of protective tariffs has long been known as the National Policy. Professor Underhill describes this designation as a stroke of genius. We gladly bow to the judgment of Professor Underhill, with one proviso, namely, that we may regard this description of the protective system as a stroke of political genius, and not necessarily as genius in the abstract and absolute. No one can doubt the political sagacity of the appeal made to the Canadian electorate in 1878 which claimed for the Conservatives an exclusive proprietary right to the formula for nation building. In retrospect we can readily recognize the contribution of the protective system to the creation of the Canadian nation. We are, nevertheless, by no means able to identify the protective system as the only nation-building instrument of the past century of Canadian history.

Professor Underhill does not, of course, attribute to Sir John A. Macdonald the genius which he finds implicit in the designation of the protective system as the National Policy. This indicates the exercise of proper caution, for it is clear that Macdonald displayed little originality in thus describing the tariff system. Many years ago Professor O. D. Skelton stressed the evolutionary nature of the concept of the National Policy and referred to the term as “a phrase which Rose devised, Hincks stamped with his approval, and Macdonald made current.”

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science/Revue canadienne de economiques et science politique , Volume 18 , Issue 3 , August 1952 , pp. 271 - 286
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1952

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Footnotes

*

This paper was presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Political Science Association in Quebec, June 5, 1952.

References

1 Underhill, F. H. “Political Parties and Ideas” in Brown, George W., ed., Canada (Berkeley and Toronto, 1950), 336.Google Scholar

2 Cf. Skelton, “General Economic History, 1867-1912” in Shortt, Adam and Doughty, A. G., eds., Canada and Its Provinces (Toronto, 1914), IX, 146.Google Scholar

3 On March 7, 1878, as the House moved to go into committee on the Budget, Macdonald introduced the resolution: “That this House is of the opinion that the welfare of Canada requires the adoption of a National Policy, which, by a judicious readjustment of the Tariff, will benefit and foster the agricultural, the mining, the manufacturing and other interests of the Dominion. …” See Canada, House of Commons Debates, 1878, 854.Google Scholar

4 From 1920 to 1924 the Dominion government spent $236 million on waterways and harbours. Over the same period the two railways spent $700 million on road and equipment and $150 million on hotels, telegraphs, and steamships. Of a total increase of $200 million in current expenditures by all governments in Canada from 1921 to 1930, the Dominion proportion was only $33 million. Of a total increase in outstanding debt of one and one-quarter billion dollars over the same period the Dominion proportion was only one-quarter of a billion including the Canadian National Railways. See Report of the Royal Commission on Dominion-Provincial Relations (Ottawa, 1940), Book I, 116, 128.Google Scholar

5 Ibid., Table 30, 117.

6 Ibid., 116.

7 Ibid., 116 n.

8 The federal proportion was increased to 75 per cent of the total as of July, 1931. The special committee of the House investigating the possibility of a pension plan in 1924 estimated that their proposals would involve a total eligible list of under one hundred thousand and that the annual cost to the Dominion would approximate ten or eleven million dollars. By 1950, 282.6 thousand persons were drawing the pension at a cost of $90 million to the Dominion and $30 million to the provinces.

9 Cf. Report of the Royal Commission on Dominion-Provincial Relations, Book I, 163.

10 Ibid. In addition the Dominion advanced $106 million to the four western provinces to assist them in carrying their share of the burden.

11 Quoted by Claxton, Brooke, “Social Reform and the Constitution,” Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science, I, no. 3, 08, 1935, 410.Google Scholar

12 The Employment and Social Insurance Act, Statutes of Canada, 1935, c. 38Google Scholar; the Weekly Rest in Industrial Undertakings Act, ibid., c. 14; the Minimum Wages Act, ibid., c. 44; the Limitation of Hours of Work Act, ibid., c. 63; a new section 498A of the Criminal Code, ibid., c. 56, s. 9; the Dominion Trade and Industry Commission Act, ibid., c. 59; the Natural Products Marketing Act, ibid., 1934, c. 57, amended 1935, c. 64; the Farmers' Creditors Arrangement Act, ibid., 1934, c. 53; amended 1935, c. 20.

13 The complete resolution was, “That, in the opinion of this house, a special committee should be set up to study and report on the best method by which the British North America Act may be amended so that while safeguarding the existing rights of racial and religious minorities and legitimate provincial claims to autonomy, the dominion government may be given adequate power to deal effectively with urgent economic problems which are essentially national in scope.” Canada, House of Commons Debates, 01 28, 1935, 217.Google Scholar The Special Committee of the House of Commons on the British North America Act reported on June 19, 1935, merely urging the necessity of a Dominion-Provincial conference on the matter. Cf. Claxton, , “Social Reform and the Constitution,” 431.Google Scholar

14 For fuller discussion of the judicial features of the New Deal legislation see, e.g., Claxton, “Social Reform and the Constitution,” and Scott, F. R., “The Privy Council and Mr. Bennett's ‘New Deal’ Legislation,” Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science, III, no. 2, 05, 1937, 234–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15 Professor Scott comments on the decisions in the two agricultural acts as follows: “The Dominion, helpless though it may be by marketing legislation to save the farmer from economic destruction can wait with open arms to receive and comfort him on his reaching the point of insolvency.” “The Privy Council,” 241.

16 The Minimum Wage Act, the Limitation of Hours Act and the Weekly Rest in Industrial Undertakings Act.

17 In re Regulation and Control of Aeronautics in Canada (1932) A.C. 54.

18 In re Regulation and Control of Radio Communication in Canada (1932) A.C. 304.

19 See, e.g., Employment and Income with Special Reference to the Initial Period of Reconstruction, presented to Parliament by the Minister of Reconstruction, 04, 1945, 13 Google Scholar and passim.