1144 ADMINISTRATION AND LEGISLATION [PART V
United States naturally produced elaborate discussion in the
United Kingdom, and served as a basis for an amendment
to the address in reply to the King’s Speech on the opening
of Parliament in February 1911. But it is no new policy in
Canada : it is the sequel of many years of steady progress.
Reciprocity with the United States, which is naturally
called for by the proximity of the States, has been the subject
of tentative efforts from very early times, and a considerable
measure of reciprocity was secured in 1854 by Lord Elgin’s
treaty. Up till 1866, when the treaty terminated at the
instance of the United States, the policy of reciprocity was
accepted by every party in Canada, and the efforts of the
Dominion Government, which came into existence in 1867,
were devoted to securing a continuance of the arrangements.
For that purpose steps had been taken in anticipation of
confederation in 1865 by Mr. Galt and Mr. Howland, but
these efforts were unsuccessful. In 1868 the first tariff of
the Dominion was adopted, which included in the schedules
an offer of reciprocity in natural products, which, with modi-
fications to suit changed circumstances, was a feature of all
Canadian tariffs down to 1894. In 1869 the Canadian
Minister of Finance in Sir John Macdonald’s Government
made offers to Washington which amounted to an offer of
a very considerable degree of reciprocity, but these offers
were rejected. In connexion with the negotiations of the
Treaty of Washington in 1871, Sir John Macdonald, with
the approval and assistance of the Imperial Commissioners,
offered to concede access to the Deep Sea Fisheries of Canada
in return for a renewal of the treaty of 1854, but this offer
was also rejected.
Sir John Macdonald resigned in 1873 in connexion with
the Pacific Railway scandals, and the Liberal Ministry which
succeeded him. in accordance with the national policy, which
' Pope, Sir John Macdonald, and Willison, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, supple-
ment each other’s accounts of these transactions. See also Biggar, Sir
Oliver Mowat, ii. 567-634; Hopkins, Sir John Thompson, pp. 273-89 ;
Canada Sess. Pap., 1885, No. 34 ; House of Commons Debates. xxi. 295 seq.,
457 seq. : Sifton in Toronto World, August 23. 1011.
