Elder Advice

Thinking Inside the Box - 67

Week 67.

Canada Day is next week. 154 years ago a British Parliament voted on Canada’s founding document, the British North America Act. Canada was on the verge of being the first colony of the Empire to become an independent nation.  Unsurprisingly to anyone who knows Canadians, an apology proceeded the event: “I must unaffectedly ask for the forbearance of the House,” the Earl of Carnarvon and Colonial Secretary said as he introduced the BNA Act to the House, “and I will not detain you long”. After all, Parliament had some significant legislation to consider, memorably including the Criminal Lunatics Bill and a pressing debate over a proposed dog tax.

Up in the aptly named “Strangers Gallery” were a number of Fathers of Confederation including George-Etienne Cartier, George Brown and Sir John A. Macdonald. There has never been a time since when so many important Canadians were in one place - that didn’t have to be Zambonied first.

The Fathers were no doubt nonplussed, mistakenly believing the historic moment would be treated accordingly. They watched as the House made a single change to the proposed BNA Act – wisely amending the description of those entitled to vote in Northern Ontario, from “every British Subject” to “every Male British Subject”. Good thing. Had they not spotted the issue, there would be no need later for suffragettes in Moosonee.

Admittedly, there was also some concern expressed over the inclusion of an appointed Senate in the Act. Some of those in the Mother of Parliaments presciently observed that such a body would ultimately be stuffed with partisan hacks, cronies, duffers and Duffys. And all manner of other undesirables. But, in the end, they conceded the mistake was Canada’s to make.

Elder Advice likes stories. Particularly those about Canada’s awkward descent down the colonial birth canal. To emerge - not kicking and screaming - but full of apologies to all present for the inconvenience. Because those stories are quintessentially Canadian: empty of egos and violence, full of quirks and quiet action, bits of bumbling and incremental progress. And people who often thought they had better things to do with their time.

Now it must be observed that, in 1867, their Lordships and everyone else in London, may have been somewhat distracted. Not by the fact that Karl Marx was somewhere about, finishing the manuscript for Das Kapital, but by a raging cholera epidemic. But however inattentive British parliamentarians were, is it still remarkable that you can scour Hansard – the Parliamentary record of debate - for those days and not find a single mention of the Fathers of Confederation. Not even Sir John A MacDonald. Without whom We the North would not exist.

Which brings Elder Advice to the point: a place he visits as frequently as his limited abilities allow.

The weeks leading up to Canada Day this year have witnessed what should be unacceptable to right thinking Canadians. Statues of MacDonald in Charlottetown, Kingston and even Picton are gone. Charlottetown, where Sir John A. and others brought the disparate, quarrelsome provinces together and fashioned the modern nation of Canada. Kingston, which he represented in government for most of his political career. Picton, the quiet town in Prince Edward County where he established his reputation as a formidable lawyer. Elsewhere across the country, spineless governments and institutions continue to scrub his name from public buildings and public memory in the face of threats of those ignorant of the facts, and inaction of those who should know better.

Let Elder Advice unpack what is so thoroughly wrong with this picture.

First, I will make the charitable assumption that those who now say Sir John A. is not worthy of commemoration, or even respect, are unaware of his well-known herculean and successful efforts in the process of Confederation and his commitment to a critical national railway to link peoples in a country over 5000 km wide. The modern nation of Canada exists and works because the political institutions, systems and infrastructure Macdonald laboured on throughout his political career. Without them, a central plank of our national identity – that whatever we are, we are not Americans – would be missing. In fact, we would undoubtedly be Americans. And French would join Spanish as an unofficial language. Along with English.

Second, I am certain those who advocate for Sir John A’s posthumous cancellation have not the faintest notion of his many other worthy deeds and progressive thinking. If they did, they would know that:

Black lives mattered to Sir John A. He fought consistently for legislation to preclude extradition of escaped slaves from the U.S. and inhibit cooperation with those who hunted them;

Women’s rights mattered to Sir John A. He championed legislation that would give voting rights to unmarried women and widows who owned property. Critics who now whine how insufficient such efforts were, would do well to remember he made them in 1885;

Minority rights mattered to Sir John A. He was outspoken in supporting the immigration of Jewish and Chinese people at a time when such views were more than unfashionable;

Labour rights mattered to Sir John A. He legalized trade unions in Canada; and

There has never been a Canadian since who was so devoted to nurturing the fraught relationship between English and French Canada and the fragile political coalition that maintained it.

So, in the case of MacDonald, it is not simply the failure of those who condemn him to consider his efforts and achievements objectively, consider his faults in the same way, and avoid the trap of measuring the latter against the standards of the 21st century. In the case of MacDonald, it is the failure of those who condemn him to bother finding out what those efforts and achievements were.

Third, a favourite client of mine is a self-described wine connoisseur. He can distinguish among over 700 different bottles, just by looking at the labels. Anyway, he also knows nothing about history: “What about residential schools?” he asked, “Wasn’t McDonald the genocidal villain who invented them?”

I would agree with him, but then we would both be wrong.

The objective record reveals that MacDonald believed, consistently, that indigenous peoples should become equal citizens of Canada. He was concerned that their traditional ways of life were in peril in the late 1800s, as a consequence the acts and omissions of many people, in and outside Canada, over the previous 200 years. None of whom was Sir John A. MacDonald. He was convinced that assimilation over time was the only certain way to ensure the survival of native communities and the practical solution he and others devised was to offer them schools that would teach their young people farming and industrial skills. Schools that were run by the very religious institutions that were already present in the communities, heavily involved in educational activities, and which presumably had developed some measure of trust.

“The great aim of our legislation, MacDonald admittedly said, “has been to do away with the tribal system and assimilate the Indian people in all respects with the other inhabitants of the Dominion as speedily as they are fit to change.”

There is no doubt that the concept of residential schools was horribly flawed and its implementation, which included separation of young children from families, even worse. While it was a decision made with what were, by 19th century standards, “good intentions”, it is certainly a decision that would never be made today, as we wallow in the luxury of 150 additional years of knowledge and experience. Today - when we have come to understand that the least problematic way to assist indigenous peoples is to work with them to create semi-autonomous territories with viable economies to preserve the vital aspects of their cultures. To expect such thinking from a 19th century politician, is patently unreasonable.

And anyway, what is always overlooked is that attendance at residential schools was voluntary in Sir John A MacDonald’s day. Permit Elder Advice to repeat that: Attendance at residential schools was voluntary. As it had been since the 1600s when the first residential schools were established by the Catholic Church in Quebec. Attendance only became compulsory after 1920 - thirty years after MacDonald’s death. Those engaged in the hunt for villains would do better to focus on those responsible for that decision. Let Elder Advice help you. Duncan Campbell Scott, the Deputy Superintendent-General of Indian Affairs from 1913, will be the first name on the list.

As none of this information is secret, why are authorities meekly packing up the nation’s memorials to its most important Father of Confederation this year? Defacing, tearing down or removing statues rightfully erected to commemorate those who more than redressed any required balance - in Sir John A.’s case, by extraordinary acts of leadership and nation building - is simply wrong. For those participating in this street theatre, assuming their critiques are made in good faith, it is an elemental failure to act on facts and not on feelings. For those who permit it, it is a craven abandonment of the obligations of leadership, and a sad reminder of how readily Canadian governments and institutions now capitulate in the face of a trending hashtag.

I would say it would be enough to drive Sir John A. to drink. If I did not already know how short a trip that would be.