Newfoundland History

Inclusion of Newfoundland

 

[For the source of this document, see the end of the article.]

Inclusion of Newfoundland in the Canadian federation is a step in the right direction. For a real alternative is NOT the one which now appears on the surface, that is, that Newfoundland should try to go back to the separate "Old Colony" status which she held prior to the financial difficulties in the thirties.

The real choice is whether or not Newfoundland should join Canada now or join the United States a few years later.

If Newfoundland were to call it quits, and say to Uncle Sam, "Please take us in, too", as a sort of bankrupt relation, it might well start an avalanche of the same sort of thinking right across Canada.

This would be bad.

If British democracies are ever to enter into a marriage with the United States it should be on a self-respecting and equal-rights basis -- and not because we find ourselves political bankrupts.

Inclusion of Newfoundland in the Canadian federation points ahead to the day of honorable union of all democracies. Exclusion of Newfoundland, after she has voted for it, would clearly point to crumbling of what is left of the British Commonwealth.

Source: Elmore PHILPOTT, "Inclusion of Newfoundland", in Vancouver Sun, July 30, 1948, p. 4. Article transcribed by Claude Bélanger.

 

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