for

(1) The responsibility is negligible. If British subjects were a select fifty or sixty, we could readily understand the necessity for minute care with reference to addition to their numbers. But any difference between British and Canadian ideas as to fitness citizenship cannot be thought to supply a reason for excluding those who reach our standard from association in an allegiance which embraces some hundreds of millions of all sorts and classesmillionaires and paupers, philanthropists and anarchists.

(2) At the present time if an alien naturalized in Canada should go to a foreign country, he is supplied with a passport

"ensuring to him the good offices of His Majesty's diplomatic and consular representatives" (a).

Technically the man, during his absence from Canada, would not be a British subject, but, nevertheless, he gets his passport. If he had been completely naturalized he would be treated in the same way.

(3) The only case in which British international responsibility would be increased would be in the possible event of a colonially naturalized alien appealing to the British government for armed protection, rather than for mere diplomatic good offices. Danger of that sort is not sufficiently imminent to justify asking our assent to political subordination.

(4) However, if I am wrong in saying that Canadian legislative authority is now complete, and if the suggestion which I have made are insufficient for the removal of objections to Canada receiving unqualified authority to deal with naturalization, there remains, in any case, our objection to the British parliament legislating for us. Let us receive such constitutional authority as we ought to have, and let us never assent to the creation of law in Canada except by ourselves.

Other Objections to the Bill. Among other objections to the proposed bill, it may be observed that while the bill perpetuates local naturalization, it provides not only (as we have seen) for complete naturalization, but for a mixture of the two sorts-an extraordinary new creation. For if Australia and Newfoundland should adopt the bill, and Canada and New Zealand should not, and if Australia conferred naturalization on a Frenchman, the recipient (according to the proposed bill) would be neither completely nor locally naturalized. He would be British in Australia (as before) and in the

(a) Br. Interden. Rep. 1908. Cd. 5746-1, p. 238.

United Kingdom and Newfoundland (under the bill) but in Canada and New Zealand he would still be French. Sir Wilfrid's maxim at the recent imperial conference was, "A British subject anywhere; a British subject everywhere."

Summary: The proposed bill is objectionable, therefore, for the following reasons:

1. Because it contains legislation effective in Canada. It assumes to declare that persons naturalized in the United Kingdom shall have certain political rights and status in Canada.

2. Because our authority to deal as we wish with different peoples and races is at present admitted, and we cannot agree that it should be reduced to that which we may be able to convince the Privy Council is conserved to us by an ambiguous saving clause.

3. Because the bill provides for complete naturalization proceedings in Canada under its own provisions, and not under Canadian statute. Our assent, indeed, is needed; but, if we do not assent, we can never confer complete naturalization. And if we do assent, we come under the operation of a law not made by our own parliament.

4. Because we have already complete legislative authority with regard to naturalization, and the proposed bill reduces that authority to mere local naturalization.

5. Because it is absolutely essential for the good government of our country that we should have complete control over such an important subject as naturalization.

6. And because if our legislative authority is not now ample, it ought to be extended-not by offering to permit us to place ourselves under regulations made by the British parliament, but by enabling us to legislate for ourselves.

In the Future: Thus far I have written with strict regard to the nature of the political relations which now exist between the United Kingdom and the self-governing dominions. I now desire to call attention to the illustration which the whole discussion very forcibly affords of the futility of continuing to speak of those countries as forming parts of an empire. The difficulties that we have encountered arise solely from the fact that, instead of an empire, we have to deal, practically, although not nominally, with independent kingdoms. No one ever imagined that in an empire there could be anything but unity of citizenship-that there could be a variety of local laws providing for local citizenship. And it may be worth while to indicate the nature of the effect which would be

produced by a declaration of Canadian independence by the fact that the United Kingdom and Canada had become separate kingdoms subject to the same king.

In that case Britons would be British subjects, and Canadians would be Canadian subjects. Each in the country of the other would retain his own status, but at the same time would not be an alien. In other words, a Canadian in England would be a Canadian, but would not be (as an American would) an alien.

If we were to be guided solely by Calvin's case, (a) we might be inclined to go further and say that the Canadian would rank in England as a natural-born subject there. Calvin was born in Scotland during the unions of the Crowns of England and Scotland, but prior to the parliamentary union of the countries (that is while they were separate kingdoms subject to the same king), and the English court held that he was, in England, a natural-born subject, and as such could hold lands here. "Legiance", it was said, "is a quality of the mind and not confided within any one place." Legiance was regarded as a personal relation between the king and the man, and a subject in one part of his realms must, therefore, be equally a subject in every part.

That was quite in accord with feudal conception, but the decision failed to supply answer to the further question which arose in the Stepney case (b), namely, if Hanoverians, born during the union of the crowns of the United Kingdom and Hanover, were natural-born subjects in England, what were they after the dissolution of that union? Plainly they could not, after the separation, continue to be British, and if from that it necessarily followed that, during the union, they could not have been, in all respects, naturalborn subjects, all that could be said was (as per Lord Coleridge):

"It has long been settled that while the crowns of two countries are held by the same person, the inhabitants of the two countries are not aliens in the two countries respectively."

After the declaration of Canadian independence, then, Britons and Canadians will be subject to the same king; each will have a distinct and seperate nationality; but neither of them will be aliens in the country of the other. We shall not be fellow-citizens, but we shall be fellow-subjects.

(a) Rul. Ca. Vol. 2, p. 575. (b) 1886, 17 Q.B.D. p. 54.

COPYRIGHT.

The British government is proposing that the British parliament shall pass, with reference to copyright, legislation applicable to Canada of a character somewhat similar to that proposed with reference to naturalization. For reasons, however, that will shortly be mentioned, the proposal is one that we need quarrel with only upon the ground of suggestion which it contains of departure from our practice of self government.

With the exception of the conduct of our foreign relations, the only subjects of government with respect to which our legislative powers have been supposed, in late years, to be of limited character are naturalization, merchant shipping and copyright. I have shown that so far as naturalization is concerned, the supposition is not well founded, and that with reference to shipping we have not experienced any practical embarrassment. Copyright has been recently our only subject of quarrel, and, as in every other contest, our point is at last being conceded.

The trouble commenced with the passing of the imperial statute of 1842 (5 & 6 Vic. c. 45) which as Sir John Thompson afterwards said:

"Was immediately attended to with great hardship and inconvenience in the North American Colonies" (a).

and which was assailed with most vigorous protests.

In 1846 Lord Grey acknowledged that British interference was indefensible, and announced that

"Her Majesty's government proposes to leave to the local legislatures the duty and responsibility of passing such enactment as they may deem proper, for securing both the right of authors and the interests of the public” (b).

In his despatch of the 31st of July, 1868, the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos declared to the Governor-General that

"the anomalous position of the question in North America is not denied” (c). In 1892, in a most elaborate report, the imperial department officials said:

"Admitting, as we must, that the present state of the Canadian law is unsatisfactory" etc. (d).

Lord Cranworth, in his judgment in Low v Bouverie (L.R. 3H. L. 100), said:

"That His Majesty's colonial subjects are by the statute deprived of rights' they otherwise would have enjoyed, is plain."

Mr. Justice Moss (Smiles v. Belford, I Ont. App. 436) puts the matter fairly and tersely when he says that the effect of the law

"is to enable the British authorities to give an American publisher a Canadian copyright."

The principal trouble with which we had to contend was the attitude assumed by the United States. That country declined to grant copyright to any book unless the type from which it was printed was set within the United States. British copyright on the other hand was given to any book that was first published in the United Kingdom, and by "published" was meant merely "the issue of copies of the work to the public." No application to any official was necessary-no certificate was needed. An American offered his book for sale before issuing it elsewhere, and he had copyright throughout the whole of His Majesty's dominions.

Canada declared that that was unfair. We wanted to give American authors a taste of American law. But we were not permitted. It would really never, never do. The United States would not like it. And British authors made our position unnecessarily galling, for instead of arranging with a Canadian publisher for the supply of books for Canada, they sold Canadian territory to their United States publisher who made such terms as they pleased with Canadian houses.

The situation, therefore, was this:

(1) An American author set his type at home, sent a few copies to London for sale, and thus secured copyright throughout the King's dominions. The Canadian copyright statute requiring him to do certain things and obtain a certificate was declared to be ultra vires to be unconstitutional (a).

(2) If a British or Canadian author desired United States copyright he was obliged to set his type there. Afterwards he shipped his plates into Canada, and struck from them such copies as he wanted for the home market. I have myself done so.

(3) The Canadian market for British books was treated by British authors and publishers as an appendage of the American.

To remedy that humiliating state of things the Canadian parliament passed a bill (1889), but the Colonial Office refused to advise

(a) Smiles v. Belford, 1 Ont. A.R., 436; Imperial Book Co. v. Black, 35 Can. S.C. 488