What Mr. King said and did about parliamentary government constitutes his most important and distinctive contribution to the development of our constitution, and to Canadian political ideas. This is partly because parliamentary government is the very essence of our constitution; partly because Mr. King had an enormous amount to say about it, and an unrivalled opportunity to put his ideas into practice; and partly because this is the one field in which his ideas were completely original.

This is notably true of his theory of the Crown. Two facts about it are unmistakable. First, he did not believe in the “rubber stamp” theory. In the 1926 crisis, he said three times, once in the House of Commons and twice in his opening campaign speech, that there would be circumstances in which the Crown would be justified in refusing dissolution. He also said, before the vote on the Robb motion, that if Mr. Meighen's Government were defeated, and did not resign, the Governor-General should dismiss it, and he himself would take responsibility for the dismissal. This is about as far from the “rubber stamp” theory as anybody could get. Second, except in its remoteness from the “rubber stamp” theory, Mr. King's theory was startlingly different from the received doctrine of British parliamentary government. A single example will dispel any doubts. If there is one firmly established point in British constitutional practice, it is that a retiring Prime Minister has no right even to offer advice as to his successor, let alone have it accepted.

Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk was a central figure in the windy discussions of the theory of capital and interest which occupied a prominent place in economic literature in the 1890's. The two volumes of his Kapital und Kapitalzins were translated into English in 1890 and 1891, which meant that his views were generally known to English-speaking economists. An American student of economics, Charles Whitney Mixter, who was aware both of Böhm-Bawerk's writings and of his high prestige, was therefore elated to find that an earlier and obscure Scotch-Canadian writer named John Rae appeared to have foreshadowed Böhm-Bawerk's theory of capital in some important respects. Mixter somewhat hastily announced his discovery of “A Forerunner of Böhm-Bawerk” in an article with this title in the Quarterly Journal of Economics for January, 1897. Today this label would perhaps be regarded as faint praise and happily it was quite wrong. Mixter's error had arisen out of a misunderstanding of Rae's ideas and it was soon corrected, although not before it was repeated by Irving Fisher.

Mixter's find was enthusiastically acclaimed by Fisher who wrote in February, 1897:

No economist who is interested in the theory of capital in any of its aspects can afford longer to let Mr. Rae's investigations go unread. His work is a magnificent specimen of true scientific method and a rare example of orderly and convincing exposition. His style too is easy, forceful and captivating and his fund of ready illustrations commands instant admiration. Not the least remarkable feature of this many-sided work is the clear conception of sociology, or “Natural History of Men,” which it contains. It is difficult to realize that Mr. Rae wrote before that science was definitely founded. In short, the “New principles of political economy” is truly a masterpiece, a book of a generation or a century. It was written before the world was ready for such painstaking analysis. Now that its merits have been pointed out by Mr. Mixter, it is sure to be accorded a high place among the classics of economic science.

Few subjects are exposed to more pitfalls than those concerned with public opinion since the student is so completely influenced by the phenomena he attempts to describe. Objectivity may be improved by considering its development over a long period of time but even a description of this character must register the results of an astigma adjusted to present environment.

Freedom of the press in the United States emerged as a result of a clash with restrictive policies in Great Britain in the eighteenth century. Attempts of the mother country to extend such policies to the colonies involved an attack on the moulders of public opinion at a most sensitive point. Newspapers had developed in relation to printing establishments set up for the purposes of printing laws for the various assemblies and to the post office through which news and advertisements were collected and from which they were distributed. The stamp tax of 1765 imposed a heavy burden on a commodity which sold at a low price and was not to be tolerated by those chiefly concerned. They provoked an agitation which secured its withdrawal. It was followed by controversies leading to the revolution which attracted the contributions of able writers. The active role of the press in the revolution was crowned by a guarantee of freedom under the Bill of Rights.

I have taken as the basis of my presidential address the subject of Municipal Finance and its significance for provincial-federal relations. This is a subject of deep interest to me, and one which I think has not been given the consideration it warrants. It is an aspect of public finance which is of real importance, particularly in a federal state.

I do not propose to spend any time discussing the importance of local government. I know some authorities question the future place and use of local government so I shall simply state that I regard it as having a permanent and significant place in our structure of government. It is valuable for the training and interest which it gives to a large number of citizens, making them sources of information and political experience within the community. It serves a useful purpose by keeping many local and controversial issues out of the range of provincial and federal decision. That is, when problems can be settled locally, it means less detail and argument in the administrative and political fields of provincial and federal governments. It also permits, within its scope, a closer approximation to government by the people than is possible at any other level.

The rapid growth in size and strength of the trade union movement has been one of the most revolutionary developments on the North American continent during the past ten to fifteen years. The very size and scope of this movement, and the tremendous impact which it has had on the national economies of the United States and Canada, have given rise to widespread agitation for greater governmental intervention and control in industrial relations.

This agitation has created a serious dilemma. There is as yet no clear and consistent body of principles by which to determine in what manner and to what degree governments should seek to regulate labour-employer relations. There is little agreement as to what the primary objective of governmental policy should be. Should it concentrate on reducing strikes and lockouts to the absolute minimum? Or (which is not the same thing by any means) should it be concerned primarily with encouraging collective bargaining as a means of achieving stable and harmonious day-to-day relations? Should it seek to bring about an exact “balance of power” between organized labour and employers by an equal distribution of legal privileges to and equal restrictions upon each party? Or is its primary duty to protect the rights and liberties of individuals against the possible abuse of power by either or both parties?

It is apparent to the most casual observer that Guatemala possesses natural advantages which, if properly utilized, should make it possible for the Republic to achieve a relatively favourable position among the nations of the Americas both in living standards and in economic stability. Yet development down to the middle of this century has barely scratched the surface of these latent possibilities.

Behind this paradox lies the unusual nature of Guatemala's endowment. Geological history has given this mountainous, tropical country extremely fertile volcanic soils and a range of altitudes which offers a wide variety of climates. Yet, by the same token, the rugged and broken topography has hampered transportation and communication and created such obstacles to all types of development that potentially productive areas still remain virtually inaccessible. These same factors tend to perpetuate the cultural isolation which continues to characterize large segments of the rural population of the Republic.

There are, of course, many other problems besides transportation and communications. For example, the Pacific coastal plain–the most promising agricultural area in Guatemala–will remain largely unproductive until its malaria and other debilitating diseases have been conquered. In a population predominantly rural settlement tends, at present, to be concentrated in the central and western highlands where a large Indian population cultivates marginal land on a subsistence basis, while more productive agricultural areas frequently lack labour.

In Britain the public corporation has for some time been almost universally regarded as the appropriate form of organization for publicly-owned commercial undertakings, but the only common article of faith underlying this agreement is the negative proposition that such undertakings cannot be run efficiently by organizations on the lines of government departments, staffed by civil servants. Beyond that there is nothing approaching unanimity, either between or within the political parties. And now that the nationalization programme of the Labour party is substantially completed (and, with the important exceptions of road transport and steel, substantially accepted by the Opposition) attention centres increasingly on those questions which remain in dispute.

Foremost among these is the question of public control: how much control? and by whom? The scheme adopted by the Labour Government rests on two premises: first, that by eliminating the motive of maximizing profits, nationalization eliminates much of the need for external controls, since the industries may now be expected to devote themselves wholeheartedly to public service; and, second, that the equity interest which passes from the shareholders to the general public can only be exercised by a minister of the Crown, answerable for his actions to the public's representatives in Parliament. Thus, while the various nationalized industries differ from each other in a number of respects, all may be classified together under the general description: “public corporations, strong minister type.”

The socialist movement in Great Britain has been characterized by a combination of dynamic reformism and liberal reasonableness which is all too frequently lacking in the histories of left-wing movements in other parts of the world. While this may be explained to some extent by the traditional character of English habits of thought and political institutions, one organization is, more than others, responsible for the preservation of the liberal philosophy in an age of great social change. The Fabian Society came upon the scene when the economic foundations of that change were already well established. The development of the new industrialism had shown inequities and injustices which called for radical measures of economic reform. Yet while this economic change had been taking place, political institutions had undergone a considerable measure of liberalization. The latter was a development highly valued by the economic revolutionaries, and the Fabian Society was, from the very first, an effort to combine the two desiderata—to change the economic structure of society while preserving the democratic political achievements so newly gained and so highly prized.

The important early Fabian writings which dealt with matters of abstract economic theory were motivated by the belief that the great unsolved questions of the day were the economic. During the latter part of the nineteenth century, from 1870 on, the economic world was stricken with controversy. The placid perfection of the Ricardian classicism had been shattered by the frontal attack of the marginalists and the usurpation of Marx.

No one in England would claim that the radical readjustments of the national economy necessitated by the Second World War had yet been completed. Nevertheless, it is undoubtedly true that much progress has been made, in many ways even beyond the pre-war level of attainment, since the fighting came to an end; and certainly the past five and a half years have been a period of intense activity, aimed perhaps not so much at reconstruction of a former economic system but rather at building a structure which should be more in accord with popular aspirations than the kind of economy that prevailed before the war.

This interpretation of fundamental objectives is supported by a quick review of the tasks confronting Great Britain as she emerged from the war. First, and of immediate concern, was the delicate process of transition to a peace economy, involving the innumerable interlocking problems of switching manpower and physical resources back from war service to the purposes of a more peaceable way of life. Then there were more deep-seated problems to be faced, such as the replacement of physical assets, both social and economic, destroyed during the war or rendered obsolescent while the economic system had been concentrated upon the overriding purposes of war production. Along with these went a whole network of complicated problems of monetary reorganization, arising largely from the facts that in process of financing war requirements Britain's international position had been dramatically changed, from the status of a creditor country to that of a debtor, that her international reserves had been heavily reduced, and that her export trade had been ruthlessly sacrificed as part of the larger strategy of war. Finally, and underlying all these, was the widespread demand for the establishment of an economic system which should serve the needs of the people more effectively and more equitably than in times past, above all, one which should guarantee to every willing and competent citizen the continuous opportunity of remunerative employment. Naturally, there was wide disagreement about the best means of securing all these ends; but the ends themselves were generally accepted as necessary and worthy objectives.

Seldom read today, Bentham's Constitutional Code (1820-1832) nevertheless ranks among the most significant political treatises of the last century. It contains an extended statement of the ideas of Philosophic Radicalism on the eve of their partial victory in the Reform Bill of 1832. It must be nearly, it may be actually, the last work of any important figure of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. At the same time it is one of the first works in which through the fog of doctrinaire radicalism there can be seen fairly clearly the characteristic features of the contemporary state with its extreme centralization, its myrmidonian corps of bureaucrats, its elaborate administrative apparatus, and its miscellaneous services to the public. There are few books of a century ago in which the contemporary political scientist, provided he can overcome initial hurdles of style and manner, ought to feel more at home, if only because he will find there the twentieth-century student's interest in institutions and the emphasis on administration that plays so large a part in the study of government today.

The Constitutional Code may be regarded as Bentham's view of the best possible commonwealth—a Utilitarian Utopia. Like all Utopias it was the product of disappointment with the here and now. It is well known that Bentham turned to systematic consideration of constitutional questions only after repeated failure to persuade the rulers of England to accept his legal reforms and especially his Panopticon scheme for a model prison.

The comparative student of man's work learns about doctors by studying plumbers; and about prostitutes by studying psychiatrists. This is not to suggest any degree of similarity greater than chance expectation between the members of these pairs, but simply to indicate that the student starts with the assumption that all kinds of work belong in the same series, regardless of their places in prestige or ethical ratings. In order to learn, however, one must find a frame of reference applicable to all cases without regard to such ratings. To this end, we seek for the common themes in human work. One such theme is that of routine and emergency. By this I mean that one man's routine of work is made up of the emergencies of other people. In this respect, the pairs of occupations named above do perhaps have some rather close similarities. Both the physician and the plumber do practice esoteric techniques for the benefit of people in distress. The psychiatrist and the prostitute must both take care not to become too personally involved with clients who come to them with rather intimate problems. I believe that in the study of work, as in that of other human activities and institutions, progress is apt to be commensurate with our ability to draw a wide range of pertinent cases into view. The wider the range, the more we are forced to find a fundamental frame of reference.

Adequate descriptive accounts of the Newfoundland fisheries have more than once been given, and it would be superfluous to attempt another within the limits of this note. Only a few of the essential features of the industry need be called to mind as background to a more analytical discussion of its problems and prospects.

Newfoundland and codfish have been almost synonymous terms for 450 years, ever since John Cabot brought back to Europe his reports of the teeming fish in the vicinity of the island. Although with the passing years other fisheries have been developed, especially herring, lobster, salmon, seal, and whale, the cod fishery remains by far the most important branch. The other fisheries, although in the aggregate important, are still subsidiary and for the most part are followed by men who are cod fishermen as well.

The economic importance of the fisheries derives chiefly from the fact that together they form an industry which easily takes the lead in giving employment. It may even now be true that a majority (although not a large one) of the population depends either directly or indirectly upon the fisheries for its main source of livelihood. Over the long run, the number of fishermen seems to be decreasing. In 1935 the number was about the same as in 1891, and shows a considerable decline from the numbers engaged in the intervening census years. During and since the recent war there has been considerable fluctuation in the numbers of fishermen, but there appear to be somewhat fewer today than in 1935.

In a previous paper on the Canadian upswing, 1921-9, it was discovered that the general level of activity in Canada rose only gradually, in the main, from 1921 to 1924 while a sharper rise occurred in the latter half of the upswing. It was also seen that the accelerated rise of both domestic investment and consumption expenditure contributed to the rapid expansion of national income in the latter half of the upswing, the decline in absolute consumption being an important factor explaining the relative lethargy in the first half of the upswing.

This paper is concerned with some of the external factors which may have been partly responsible for the peculiar pattern of the Canadian upswing. For instance, was the slowness of the Canadian recovery in 1923-4 partly due to depressed conditions abroad and a consequent depression of Canadian export industries? As a prerequisite to testing such hypotheses, the relative strengths of the British, American, and Canadian upswings must be determined.

Apart from the voluminous literature on pragmatic issues of employment policy written after the appearance of J. M. Keynes's General Theory, relatively few authors have probed the conceptual foundations of unemployment theories. The object of this essay is to review or reinterpret the main analytical systems that have been used in attempts to explain unemployment, to discuss their relevance to reality, and to suggest an alternative model.

Consistency as an Optimum Property of Classical General Equilibrium Systems. Classical general equilibrium theory, in particular Pareto's system, may be interpreted in two ways: either in the sense that once the equilibrium values of the variables are realized, the economic system will remain stationary as long as the parameters of the equations remain unchanged; or, and this applies to Pareto more than to Walras, in the sense that the equilibrium values, in a certain competitive framework, represent an “optimum” situation, any deviation from which involves a welfare-loss.

The set of equilibrium prices and quantities is the solution of a system of equations implicitly assumed to be consistent. The equilibrium values are in fact those that render mutually compatible the results of the maximizing behaviour of individuals, given the psychological and technological parameters and the initial distribution of assets. In order to yield an equilibrium solution, a system of equations must be consistent. But, although consistency is necessary for an optimum solution, it is not sufficient.

For some time past the market has been flooded with books and articles on the weaknesses of modern liberalism. They differ on many points, but on one at least they show a remarkable degree of agreement. What liberalism lacks, it seems, is a truly living faith. The Communists are united throughout the world in passionate allegiance to the doctrines of orthodox Marxism, and are inspired thereby to prodigies of self-confident action. The supporters of constitutional democracy, on the other hand, are paralysed by doubts and self-questionings. The only way to remedy this situation, so the argument runs, is to restore liberalism as a fighting faith, and to arm liberals with a doctrine at least as sure and fanatical as that of their enemies. Attempts to discover such a doctrine, or laments for its non-existence, have become one of the staple products of current political thought.

Out of this background there has emerged a movement which is best described as “The New Fidelity.” “The Revival of Christianity” would be a more usual, but less accurate designation for this particular current of thought. For true Christians love of Christ is the end of human existence, and everything else is significant only as a means to that end. The New Fidelity is distinguished not by faith in Christ, but by faith in faith. Starting from the proposition that the end of human existence is to achieve political and social stability, it regards belief in Christ as a desirable and even indispensable means to the attainment of this end. Unlike Christianity, it has its eyes fixed not on a heavenly but on an earthly kingdom.

The limitations imposed upon the central and provincial governments by the Canadian federal system have been discussed elsewhere in some detail. But almost no attention has been paid to those difficulties of maintaining an efficient structure of local government which arise from the prior existence of two superior tiers of administration. This does not imply that there has been no interest in local government, but that interest has been partial and spasmodic. Many theories have been formed concerning the role of the provinces, but few have examined the proper role of municipalities. There could be no constitutional argument to focus opinion: local government lies unequivocally within the realm of provincial power, and in an age and a country where legal dispute and politics have gone hand in hand, the affairs of roads and sewers, dog-catchers and relieving officers have seemed prosaic and uninteresting. Education is in a class of its own, for it has been elevated to the arena of constitutional conflict. Outside that arena educational administration has been the concern of only a few interested groups.

Local government has no deep historical roots in Canada. It was discouraged by the French administration, and no counterpart to the New England town meeting appeared. After the Revolution, British policy was hostile to any local demonstrations of independent action. Lord Durham regarded this as a major weakness, and Lord Sydenham set about remedying the deficiency.

The phrase “Progress and Poverty” in this title is borrowed from Henry George, but in this paper it is applied to a geographic paradox much broader than the one the famous single-taxer had in mind. For Henry George the principles implicit in the expression were universal; but the paradox of the inevitable survival of poverty in spite of economic progress existed within the limits of each nation or even of its smallest community. Progress and poverty as Henry George saw them were ubiquitous and inseparable companions. The progress and poverty referred to in the present paper are, it is true, inseparable companions in history; but the contrast is not between classes within one country or region, but, more generally, between different countries, between different regions of the world.

As for the disequilibrium mentioned in this title, it is broader than that about which so much has been written recently and which is sometimes referred to as “the Dollar Problem.” The condition referred to here is not merely a condition of the present day; it is very old. It embraces the dollar problem and many others. It is not exclusively economic but has implications of equal importance for political and social life. It is the disequilibrium which arises from the persistent disparity in rates of technological progress between different areas or regions of the world.

Much of the activity relating to the support of agricultural prices in Canada is conducted under the authority of the Wheat Board Act and the Agricultural Prices Support Act, but the programme in its broadest sense involves other legislation and a variety of government policies. Part of this programme originated in the inter-war period and earlier years. This paper, dealing with various aspects of the programme, is introduced by a brief outline of background developments.

Governments, both federal and provincial, have traditionally been concerned in the main with activities aimed at increasing efficiency in the production and marketing of farm products. These have included experimental and scientific research; efforts to improve the quality of plants and animals; the introduction and enforcement of grades and standards for marketing; and extension work designed to acquaint farmers with useful information as it became available.

During the First World War this pattern of activity was enlarged. At that time the federal Government took over control of the marketing of wheat. It gave to a body known as the Board of Grain Supervisors authority to fix the prices and to market the crops of 1917 and 1918. This proved to be the forerunner of a development that has since come to occupy an important place in government activity.

This paper is primarily an impressionistic sketch of an on-going piece of family research. No conclusions can as yet be offered. Instead, I intend briefly to suggest a frame of reference for the study of family hostility as well as enumerate some of the procedures of field work used in the present project.

Much has been written about the family by many sociologists of various persuasions. Yet a large part of this phase of sociological effort leaves one dissatisfied. Admittedly data on our own types of family structure are hidden from clear view precisely because of their familiarity as well as their privacy. But this fact is not sufficient to account for the disparity between the experienced complexity of family life and the sparsity of published details made significant by a sustained and incisive theoretic orientation. Headway could be made by the use of a frame of reference which combines sociological with psychological considerations, without confusing them, and which draws its vitality from the impassioned analyses of the structure of large-scale social systems and of individual character as begun by Weber and Freud. At the present time family research seems on the whole to have made little consistent use of the leads of kinship analysis and to have by-passed a cumulative effort at spelling out the empirical details of the social structure of various types of American families. As it is, we hear much about the family as a “unity of interacting personalities,” about processes of accommodation or conflict, or about the kinds of valuation that marital partners place upon one another; yet we hear little of the intervening details which, in their fullness, would give us a sense of how indeed a family as an on-going concern functions and how the inherent or emergent demands of its social structure are met, how the social structure of a family is related meaningfully or functionally to the rest of the social system, and how any given family of orientation dissolves into successive families of procreation.