In 1921, when I came to Canada, Canadian economics was “colonial” in character; English and American influences blended but there was little native thought or work. The re-establishment of the Canadian Political Science Association in 1929 (it had been founded in 1913 and had foundered in 1914) was a symptom of the growing strength of the native elements, and it quickly contributed towards further strengthening of these elements. Harold Innis had foreseen this and worked hard but quietly for the development of the Association. He had recognized, too, the necessity for a Canadian outlet for Canadian writing on economics; not because the Canadian papers then being written could not be published in English and American periodicals but because he foresaw a great stimulus to Canadian economists to write more when they had their own journal. The example of the Canadian Historical Review with its effect on Canadian historical scholarship was not without influence. With the support of E. J. Urwick, Harold Innis had been able in 1928 to establish Contributions to Canadian Economics, published by the University of Toronto Press. Then in 1930 came the first of the new Proceedings of the Canadian Political Science Association (called volume II, since volume I had been published in 1913), edited by Clifford Curtis and printed by the Jackson Press in Kingston.

Economics first appeared in a Canadian university curriculum more than eighty years ago; thirty years later several universities were offering groups of courses in economics that could qualify a student for the equivalent of an honours degree in economics; but it is only in the past thirty-five years that a steady flow of scholarly writing in Canadian economics has developed. The twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of this Journal provides an appropriate occasion to review briefly the expansion of economic scholarship in Canada.

The first university course in political economy to be offered in Canada was in 1878 when the Department of Philosophy at Queen's University introduced a course of lectures based on Adam Smith, Mill, and Jevons. Ten years later, in 1888, Adam Shortt was appointed lecturer in political economy and in 1891 he became the Sir John A. Macdonald Professor of Political Science. The University of Toronto appointed its first professor of political science in 1888, and (Sir) William Ashley gave lectures in both political economy and constitutional history. McGill entered the field in 1899 when Dr. LeRossignol of Colorado was appointed visiting professor for one year. In 1900 Stephen Leacock was appointed lecturer in political science, and in 1901 (Sir) William Flux was brought over from England to occupy McGill's first chair in economics. The succeeding chairs of political economy in Canadian universities were occupied by A. L. McCrimmon at McMaster in 1904, E. Bouchette at Montreal in 1907, and A. B. Clark at Manitoba in 1909.

It is well to state explicitly at the outset that the society considered in this essay is the sovereign democratic state, that is, a modern Western nation, where law is made and enforced by a responsible government within the context of representative institutions. Only a free society living under democratic government confronts or deals with social problems—problems of and for society as a unit. It is assumed that public opinion is committed to the general ideal of a practical maximum of individual freedom and freedom of association, hence to a minimum of enforced or “jural” law, prescribing or restricting personal conduct. That is, it holds to the ideal of association by free agreement or assent, subject to the state and its laws. The concepts are imprecise, and to make them workable and definite is a major function of law and government.

The field of association to be chiefly considered here is that of “economic” relations. In the form now prevalent in the Western world, free economic association is a historical novelty, in origin closely intertwined with democracy or political freedom. It will be argued that these and other modes of freedom are in fact inseparable aspects of “liberal” culture. “Liberal” culture arose through a radical and historically swift transformation of the order which prevailed in mediaeval Western Europe. Without looking farther back in history, what is important is the antithetical character in essential respects of mediaeval and contemporary society in their structure and operation and in their accepted ideals.

It was a strange caricature of the Red Indians which emerged as the “noble savage” from the scrutiny of the statesmen and the philosophes of the second half of the eighteenth century. “Mild and hospitable when at peace, though merciless in war beyond any known degree of human ferocity,” the “Indian was indebted to no one but himself; his virtues, his vices and his prejudices were his own work; he had grown up in the wild independence of his nature.” So wrote Alexis de Tocqueville, emphasizing a great truth but suggesting an important untruth. For the Indian was indeed independent in spirit, and his vices and many of his virtues were alien to Europeans. But however independent his nature might be, he was not economically independent. The Chipewa chief who met Alexander Henry at Michilimackinac in 1761 expressed much of the splendid independence of the Indians: “Englishman, though you have conquered the French, you have not yet conquered us. We are not your slaves. These lakes, these woods and mountains, were left to us by our ancestors. They are our inheritance: and we will part with them to none.” Alexander Henry, however, was present at Michilimackinac precisely because he knew that the Indians were not independent economically; he had gone up, and he stayed up through the dangers and vicissitudes of Pontiac's rebellion, because there was no doubt at all that, despite his savagery and despite his independence, the Indian would trade for European goods as soon as they were brought within his grasp.

“The Recent History of Professionalism in Relation to Social Structure and Social Policy” by T. H. Marshall was published by this Journal twenty years ago. It has since become a classic; and may be fittingly celebrated in this anniversary issue. Its classic quality lies in the skill with which Marshall worked enduring themes with current trends and problems into a common web. He defines professions as, in effect and with some other characteristics, those occupations in which caveat emptor cannot be allowed to prevail and which, while they are not pursued for gain, must bring their practitioners income of such a level that they will be respected and such a manner of living that they may pursue the life of the mind. There are certain problems which surround such occupations in all times.

The current changes noted by Marshall are the ever greater dependence of modern society upon professional services, an increase in the variety of such services and in the number of the professions, and the tendency for many practitioners of the older professions and for most or all of some newer professions to work in organizations with an employer, rather than to set up a shop to which clients come, one by one, are served, and pay for the service. He also noted that while the community at large is in all times and places concerned with the manner in which professional services are performed, this is especially so in our times; indeed, the community at large is the client of some new professions and, in increasing measure, of older ones.

Since the outbreak of the Second World War the Commonwealth has passed through profound and rapid changes and does not cease to change. Its nature may seem more difficult than ever to define and classify with precision, its conscious purpose as a group of states more elusive, and its role in the world more mysterious and imponderable. To some unfriendly observers its positive influence in matters that count now appears nebulous, almost to the point of non-existence. To those keenly interested and deeply devoted, it presents difficulties. It has no formal constitution, few political organs of its own except of an ad hoc and inchoate kind, and little on paper that explains aims and prescribes procedures. Polished generalities from the Balfour Report, which before 1939 passed muster in describing its ethos, may not be irrelevant, but need careful scrutiny to determine whether under contemporary circumstances they retain much meaning.

When all this is said, the fact remains that the Commonwealth continues to live as an active, global, free association. Its members at any rate recognize its existence and the Queen as its head; they are confident of being attached, not to a phantom or mirage, but to an association unique in character, which to an indefinable degree influences their formulations of policy. For them Commonwealth relations are a part of foreign or external relations, but a special part, governed by attitudes and procedures peculiar to itself. In political ideas and traditions, moreover, the Commonwealth has substance. This fact is really fundamental to everything else, for in history and logic it is prior to everything else, and determines everything else. With it this paper must begin.

Judging the accomplishments of the past by the standards of the present, perhaps each generation must make its own attempt at understanding the great masters. It has been said that “Ricardo was the first to present a complete model—one which, for all its faults, was self-consistent and displayed the whole economy as a single interdependent system.” The present paper is an attempt to isolate that self-consistent model and to set it out rigorously. Anyone trying to isolate it must be painfully aware of the possibility that what he is removing may be more valuable than what he is preserving. However, the criterion of consistency leaves him little choice. Having isolated the self-consistent model, he must relate it to our own thinking. The latter emphasizes aggregation, occupies itself increasingly with the underdeveloped two-thirds of the world, and sees no “law” of diminishing returns outside agriculture. In these three senses it is becoming more Ricardian.

Consider three sectors, each producing a homogeneous product or service, that is, a consumers' goods industry, a producers' goods industry, and a labour household sector. The subscripts used to designate the three sectors are c, p, and l, respectively. The consumers' goods industry is facing a production function having one output and three inputs in it. The output consists of consumers' goods, the inputs consist of labour services, services rendered by durable man-made producers' goods, and services rendered by indestructible nature-given land.

It is far from easy to decide, at any given moment, whether the state of a particular branch of intellectual inquiry is to be described as healthy or unhealthy, as full of promise or stagnant and moribund. The criteria of advance are not clear and personal bias may distort judgment. Development seems to take place not in a smooth upward trend but in a series of discontinuous steps. What seems at first sight to be a period of inactivity or even decline may on a longer view turn out to be merely a necessary pause preparatory to further growth. Anyone undertaking to appraise the present state of an intellectual discipline such as economic history must therefore be aware that his task is a hazardous one.

There is no scarcity of evidence to suggest that economic history is at present in critical condition, at least in the United States. Traditionally tied to both history and economics and called upon to meet the expectations of each, it has always led a somewhat precarious existence. At least since the First World War its relationship to economic theory, always debatable, has become tenuous, until today it is a common experience to find in the same university department economic historians who know little economic theory and find no use for what they do know, and economic theorists who know little history and have no interest in learning more. This alienation has proceeded far beyond the normal differences of emphasis that might be expected to exist between specialists in the inductive and the deductive methods. Economic theory today, in most of its branches, neither draws on economic history for its data nor goes to economic history for empirical verification. Economic history, for its part, commonly uses only the crudest of the tools in the economist's tool-box, and displays almost complete indifference to the refinements in analytical methods that occupy the theorist's working time. The consequences of this divorce have been unfortunate for economic history. Some would say they have been unfortunate for economic theory also.

The public face of events is often very different from their true inward nature. Sometimes it is possible so to arrange things that the real facts have been wholly concealed and a harmless but false conclusion is drawn from events. The appointment of John Buchan as Governor General of Canada in 1935 is a case in point. MacGregor Dawson, like everybody else, drew a conclusion from that appointment which can now be shown to differ from the actual constitutional lesson which emerges from the evidence. He said: “Mr. Bennett stated in 1936 that when Lord Tweedsmuir's name was being considered, he, as Prime Minister, first discussed the matter with Mr. Mackenzie King, the Leader of the Opposition, so that the Governor's appointment was in effect quite non-partisan in character inasmuch as it carried the approval of the leaders of both major parties.”

This arrangement of bi-partisan recommendation, he said, “may prove to be an accepted practice.” Whatever its practical advantages, a moment's reflection will show that it is hardly in accord with the theory of responsible government. Furthermore, the events which led up to this particular appointment were far more complex, and lead inescapably to a rather different set of conclusions.

The role of “interest” or “pressure” groups in the United States congressional system has been subjected to analysis by American political scientists for at least three decades, but it is only in the last four or five years that studies have appeared of their role in the British cabinet system, and only one major study of an interest group has appeared in Canada. This disparity in interest is the result no doubt of the more vocal and widespread manifestation of the influence of pressure groups in the wide-open congressional system, but one has the uncomfortable feeling that their less obtrusive role in the cabinet system has been equated with a lesser importance in the political process.

Like the sociologist, the political scientist may be interested in groups as organizational or power systems, in the sense that they are private governments, or he may extend or even limit his interest to the relations of these private governments with each other and with public governments, particularly in the manner and extent of their influence on public policy. For the political scientist concerned with public administration, interest will be extended to the role, if any, played by groups in the execution of public policy. From all three aspects, the medical profession as an interest group is a happy choice for examination, for not only does it provide insights into private government, and have a major influence on public policy, but it seems safe to state that in Canada, at least, no other private group is as deeply involved in public administration, and this despite the fundamental antipathy between the healing arts and bureaucracy.

The political theory of Louis XIV is contained for the most part in the King's manuscripts which repose in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. These include the longest and most fruitful source, the Mémoires de Louis XIV pour l'instruction du Dauphin, some of his letters, and some of his miscellaneous short pieces. Many of the several thousand additional letters which Louis wrote either have been destroyed or scattered far and wide. There are a number of editions of his works but they have been almost entirely literary and designed for the popular market.

In spite of the plethora of literature on Louis XIV and his grand siècle (1638–1715), no systematic exposition of his political theory has ever been published, though a number of authors have touched on his ideas in passing, including the historian Lacour-Gayet who promised a study of Louis' political theory but completed only a preliminary survey of its antecedents. The purpose of this paper is to attempt in brief compass to remedy this deficiency.

Louis XIV is a classic example of a political thinker whose ideas are frequently alluded to but rarely examined. The popular tendency to refer to him as the prototype of all autocrats suffers the usual inadequacies of a stereotype; it overlooks the subtleties in his theories which greatly affect their interpretation. In order to avoid semantic wrangles it may be useful to follow the broad lines of Aristotle's analysis of monarchy presented in his Politics, Book IV, chapter x.