Bent Andreassen who is an avid contributor to the debate in 'The Antioligopolists' Forum' on Facebook asked me a very important question today
and one which deserves a thoughtful and detailed response. He asked why conservatives in Canada sold out to ‘progressivism’? To understand we must
examine the following. Who were the original conservatives in Canada? Who were
the Classical Liberals in the English sense? What did each believe and why?
Where and when did these beliefs originate?
Let us begin with the British conquest of New France and
the battle for Québec: The Battle of the Plains of Abraham,13th of September
1759, was a pivotal moment in the Seven Years' War and in the history of
Canada. A British invasion force led by General James Wolfe defeated French
troops under the Marquis de Montcalm, leading to the surrender of Québec to the
British. The resulting colony would swear allegiance to the British Crown yet
continue to pay tithes to the Catholic Church, live under Civil Law and endure
the seigneurial system, an institutional form of land distribution established
in New France in 1627 and officially abolished in 1854. In New France, 80 per
cent of the population lived in rural areas governed by this system of land
distribution and occupation. It was also a form of feudalism.
However, in what is now Ontario, as well as on the East Coast,
something very different happened. It is said that roughly one half of the
population of the original 13 Colonies in what would become the United States
were not in favour of armed rebellion against the King. Although many of them
were Classical Liberals as well as religious dissenters, they believed that
discourse and debate would eventually cause the King to relent and end the
injustice of taxation without representation and grant them representation by
population. During the Revolutionary War many of the loyalists lost their land
and were forced to take refuge in the British colonies to the north and east.
Their loyalty to the Crown had cost them a great deal yet we also owe an even
greater debt to them. Loyal to the British Crown they may have been, but they
were no fans of absolutism and tyranny. They had reform on their minds to
create a freer, more democratic and open society. Unlike their American
cousins, these settlers, now known as United Empire Loyalists, used reason,
discourse, and parliamentary debate to bring about democratic reform. It took
much longer than the American Revolution had done to bring about suffrage yet
the slower more discourse based process established a vital tradition in
Canadian politics, that of reasoned, tempered debate. This group of liberty
lover therefore became our first liberals in the English sense of being
Classically Liberal. They favoured free trade, laissez-faire, maximum personal
liberty under law, and a minimum of government intrusion on personal freedoms,
low taxation and the freedom to worship and associate with whomever one wished.
This group was comprised of farmers, small business interests, tradesmen and
religious dissenters such as Methodists, Presbyterians and the like.
So, who opposed them? Why the Tories of course! Tory is
still the name used to describe conservatives in Canada. What did the Tories
represent? The Monarchy, the Church of England, the status quo and keeping the
underclasses in their place. Who supported the Tory point of view? Senior
government officials, military officers, the judiciary, bureaucrats, the High
Church clergy, bankers and big business interests who hoped to maintain the
stable British, stayed, status-quo. The entitled in other words.These folks were certainly not interested
in sharing their privilege with the common rabble.
In understanding our history, we may begin to appreciate
where the loyalties of differing voters are most likely to lie. It is also
reasonable to assert that people today often vote based upon family loyalties
irrespective of how political parties have changed over the years. It was the
Classical Liberal element in Canada who did the most to move the nation toward
democratic reform, it is also reasonable to state that it was the Tories who
did the most to establish the institutions and system of governance required to
support such reforms. Our first Prime Minister Sir. John A. MacDonald, who was
a Tory, is renown for centralizing sufficient power (a great deal less than we
have today) to unify the Dominion while driving an impossible railroad across
the continent. Without his unifying vision the nation as it exists today would
not have been possible.
In this way and in the historic sense both Liberals and
Tories added greatly to the Dominion of Canada. Yet sadly this is woefully and
blatantly no longer the case. Each has deserted its original vision and
therefore lost its validity only to be replaced with a miasma of postmodern
nonsense which hasn’t an ounce of historical or philosophical integrity. The
moment we forget where we have been, we cannot possibly know where we are so that we may steer a course toward more responsible government. The lack of
philosophical and spiritual insight informing today’s political discourse is
stunning. It is small wonder that religions from abroad are replacing our
ancestors’ deep passion for Christianity, and the free and open society it gave
us! You may read my blog about the co-opting of Classical Liberalism by
postmodernism here;
https://therealistsadvocate.blogspot.ca/2017/03/the-coopting-of-liberalism-by-social.html
