CHAPTER V.

PHYSICAL DIFFICULTIES.

THE first argument usually urged against any scheme for the establishment of an Imperial Federation is, that the want of geographical unity in the Empire, and the distances by which the several countries which it is proposed to unite are divided from one another, increase the difficulty of communication to such an extent that it would be impossible for any central authority to discharge the duties of even a Federal Government for all of them. The argument is one which must be met. Unless it can be proved that the legislative and executive duties usually assigned to a Federal Government may be fulfilled for the whole of the Empire by authorities located in London, there is clearly no use whatever in considering either the means by which the necessary framework of government might be created or any detail of the scheme effected. Before adopting any piece of machinery it is necessary to be sure that it will prove competent to accomplish the work for which it is designed.

The argument against Federation on the ground of physical difficulties is asserted by emancipationists in the most uncompromising terms. Mr. Mill tells us that 'countries separated by half the globe do not present the natural conditions for being under one Government, or even members of one Federation.' Our reply is that experience contradicts this statement. In the cases of

THE EMPIRE ALREADY A FEDERATION.

6

75

the Roman, Russian, and Spanish Empires, countries thus divided have remained under one Government for centuries; and, in the latter case, bad as was the old Government, the substitutes do not seem to be any improvement on it. Still more decisively is this theory confuted by the fact that the very countries now in question have been, and are, under one Government; and by the fact which we have already noticed, and which is admitted by Mr. Mill himself, that the ruling powers of the United Kingdom already constitute, to some extent, a Federal Government, and the countries comprising the British Empire a Federation."1 a Federation." The Imperial Government has the exclusive control of diplomacy, and of questions of peace and war, in its hands. It garrisons every part of the Empire, and, until lately, supplied all the armaments needed for its defence. It appoints the head of the local Government in every Colony, and through him can, when it pleases, exercise a very considerable influence on even local legislation.

Experience proves, beyond the power of dispute, that the Imperial Government can exercise these prerogatives efficiently, successfully, and to the satisfaction of the Colonists, all over the Empire. But these include all the administrative duties of a Federal Government, with the single exception of that of raising a revenue. To obtain the grant of this revenue, however, it would be requisite that the Executive Government should be able to assemble, whenever needed, the Legislature empowered to grant it, which would consist of representatives from both the British Islands and the Colonies; and that, the grant once made, the Government should be able to levy it. Could the Federal Government assemble the Federal Legislature, and levy the federal revenues as needed, there

1 Representative Government (people's edition), p. 132.

can be no doubt of its ability to discharge all its other duties, for they either have been discharged by the Imperial Government in times past or are being discharged by it to-day. Let this truth be carefully borne in mind, and many of the mountainous difficulties of imagination will quickly subside into molehills of fact.

It is maintained, however, that to assemble such a Legislature would be an impossibility, in consequence of the vast distances by which the several parts of the Empire are separated from one another. Mr. Smith says:-'We need not discuss in detail the possibility or expediency of summoning from the ends of the earth people who could not be convoked in less than six months to decide whether England should go to war upon some question solely affecting herself, and not admitting, perhaps, of an hour's delay.' Were the facts correctly represented by Mr. Smith, we should agree with him. But here he finds it convenient to forget, or ignore, circumstances which clash with his theories. He seems to think that the world is to-day in the same state as it was in former generations. Does not this-horror of horrors! -seem to indicate that he is imbued with something of the spirit of an impracticable Tory? The difficulty of assembling the Legislature is always much exaggerated. Fifty years ago, there might have been some force in the plea that its accomplishment was impossible; but such a position cannot be maintained to-day. Distance, for purposes of communication, has been annihilated by the electric telegraph, and, for locomotion, reduced about three-fourths by steam. At the beginning of the present century it required almost a week to send a summons for the convocation of Parliament from the seat of government to the remoter parts of the United Kingdom, and another week for the representatives of these parts to rea London. Now, the summons could be sent to the

CONVOCATION OF THE LEGISLATURE.

77

furthest limits of the Empire instantaneously; consequently, the only delay would be that of travelling from the Colonies to the legislative halls. What length of time would this journey consume? At present the run between Ireland and Quebec is made week after week in nine or ten days, and mails and passengers from London are delivered in Toronto within eleven, and vice versâ ; and, on the completion of the Intercolonial Railroad, it will be possible to save another day by fixing the Canadian port of departure at Halifax. Thus it seems that Canada is practically as near London to-day as was Caithness or Donegal at the beginning of the century. In the case of Australia, mails are now delivered in London within seven weeks. There is no doubt that New Zealand can be reached by Panama in the same time, and it seems probable that, by using first-class vessels, some few days more may be saved. As these latter points are the most distant from England of all parts of the Empire, the time consumed in travelling from them to the seat of government would determine the period within which the Federal Legislature could be convoked; and, judging from the facts before us, we should say that the time necessary for its convocation would be nearer six weeks than the six months alleged by Mr. Smith to be the shortest time in which that process could be effected. Is this too long to admit of the countries so divided being united in one federation? Should anybody reply in the affirmative we would remind him that, prior to the completion of the Pacific Railway, Oregon was practically almost as far from Washington as Australia or New Zealand is from London to-day; and that even the completion of that great work has not reduced the time necessary for passing between the two points to much less than that in which a voyage from Canada to England can now be accomplished. It takes seven days

to travel by rail from New York or Washington to San Francisco, and three and a half more to reach Portland, Oregon, by steamer. The Pacific Railway has been opened for only a few months. Prior to its opening California had been for nearly twenty years a member of the Union, although during these twenty years the most expeditious route to that State was by steamer to Aspinwall, thence across the Isthmus to Panama, and thence again by steamer to San Francisco. The accomplishment of this journey required twenty-four days, and three more were needed to reach Oregon. Here we see that countries two-thirds as far, in point of time, from Washington as Australia need be from London, have been for nearly a quarter of a century loyal members of a democratic Federation; and that even to-day they are no nearer to the seat of government than Canada is to Downing Street. Is not this fact a sufficient answer to those who assert that the distances which divide the British Empire render the maintenance of its integrity or the assemblage of a Pan-Britannic Parliament an impossibility? Twenty-eight days' travel has been proved to be consistent with the integrity of the democratic American Union, and the assemblage of its Congress. Why, then, should forty or even forty-five days' travel be inconsistent with like results in the case of a Federation in which the conservative ties, both moral and constitutional, would be much stronger than they are or can be in the States? Experience has proved, in the case of the British Islands, that distance, measured in hours of travel, as great as that which now divides England and Canada, does not constitute any obstacle to the efficient working of a legislative union. Why, then, should it be declared to form an insuperable obstacle in the way of working the lighter machinery of a federal union? And when, in the United States, countries practically as distant from the seat of