by Greg Malone
On October 18 Mackenzie King had what he described as “a most delightful and refreshing conversation” with Lord Addison [the new secretary of state for dominions affairs] at the Dominions Office.… In a word, the British Government are to allow the people of Newfoundland to decide on its future in some convention to be held in the coming year.…
The Government here would like to see Newfoundland a part of Confederation. They do not wish to see the Island fall into the hands of the U.S.22
Having concluded the secret agreement with the Canadians, Lord Addison informed the War Cabinet in November: “I now propose, with the approval of my colleagues, to make my proposed statement [on Newfoundland] in the House of Lords at an early convenient opportunity.… [The draft statement] has also formed the subject of confidential consultations with Canadian authorities.”23
Nothing would go to Newfoundland now from London that was not first reviewed by Ottawa. On December 1, in accord with their agreement, the Canadians received an advance copy of Lord Addison’s statement on the terms of reference for the Newfoundland National Convention:
Top Secret. It will be the duty of the [Newfoundland National] Convention to review all the alternative courses open to the Island and to make recommendations to His Majesty’s Government as a basis for a National Referendum. It is fitting, therefore, that it should be given wide terms of reference and these will take the following form:
To consider and discuss amongst themselves as elected representatives of the Newfoundland people, the changes that have taken place in the financial and economic situation of the Island since 1934 and bearing in mind the extent to which the high revenues of recent years have been due to wartime conditions, to examine the position of this country and to make recommendations to His Majesty’s Government as to possible forms of future Government to be put before the people at a National Referendum.
… Our relations with Newfoundland have been so special and Newfoundlanders have played such a gallant part in the war that it would, I know, be the wish of all to assure to any new Government which may take over the Island the fairest possible start. But we must, above all, be careful not to promise what we may not be able to perform, and the special difficulties of our financial position over the next few years may well preclude us from undertaking fresh commitments. As your Lordships will understand from what I have said, the object of the procedure proposed by His Majesty’s Government, is to enable the people of Newfoundland to come to a free and informed decision as soon as possible on their future form of Government. I know that this House, which has always been solicitous for the welfare of the people of the Island, will wish them well in the exercise of their choice.24
With this somewhat unctuous announcement, Newfoundland was effectively cut loose from the motherland after four hundred years, their “special relations” cancelled out by Britain’s “special difficulties.” As Norman Robertson noted in his memo of December 1 to Mackenzie King:
Top Secret. The statement is obscure and perhaps intentionally so as to whether the convention is expected to recommend a single scheme or to propose alternatives.… The statement warns, however, that the United Kingdom cannot make any financial commitments at the present time. This will, no doubt, disappoint many Newfoundlanders and may induce them to look for other alternatives.… I suggest our best course is to make certain that neither the statement itself nor the method proposed for consulting the people of Newfoundland should prejudice due consideration of confederation.25
For his part, Prime Minister Mackenzie King observed:
Also I thought the British Government had used “form of government” deliberately, the significant matter to be decided at present being whether the Commission form of government would continue, or a responsible government, either within the island itself or as part of some larger confederation.… Mr. Robertson agreed that, in the circumstances, he would not suggest [any significant] alteration of the memorandum.26
Vincent Massey, the Canadian high commissioner in London, was doubtful: “The words ‘as to possible future forms of Government’ might be held strictly to rule out the possibility of Newfoundland joining the Canadian Confederation.”27 The Dominions Office quickly allayed his fears. In a telegram marked “Important. Top Secret,” Lord Addison informed Robertson that “Canadian authorities can be assured that there is no risk of any such narrow interpretation as is suggested being placed upon terms of reference.”28 Having arranged the terms of reference for the Newfoundland National Convention to Canada’s satisfaction, the British government was finally ready to announce the plan to the Newfoundlanders.
5
THE FAIREST POSSIBLE START:
THE NATIONAL CONVENTION
On December 11, 1945, Dominions Secretary Lord Addison, with Canadian approval, read his statement about a National Convention in Newfoundland to the House of Lords. Governor Humphrey Walwyn then announced it to the people of Newfoundland. Canadian High Commissioner Scott Macdonald immediately reported local reaction to Ottawa:
Confidential. There was considerable excitement in St. John’s yesterday when an announcement was made over the local radio that the United Kingdom Government was about to make its long deferred statement on the future government of Newfoundland. The statement itself was listened to with great attention by all classes of people and is, of course, the one topic of conversation this morning.
… The Governor tells me that he has consulted six of the leading men on Water Street. They were rather alarmed at the prospect opened up by the British statement and were inclined to take the view that Britain had let them down.
… The reference to Britain’s inability to continue to help them financially has, of course, not escaped them and they seem quite ready to draw the necessary inferences.1
The National Convention proposed by Lord Addison was based on a proposal initially put to the War Cabinet by A.P. Herbert after the Goodwill Mission to Newfoundland in 1943. The Dominions Office and Lord Addison had, however, made two fundamental changes in the wording of the terms of reference, which would enable the UK government to override the Newfoundland Convention and do exactly as it wished. Herbert’s proposal had suggested that a “national Convention should be set up after the war … and empowered to discuss and determine … the form of government to be recommended both to the Newfoundland people and to the United Kingdom Government.”2 Lord Addison’s draft eliminated the word “empowered” and changed “discuss and determine” to “consider and discuss.” Newfoundland’s elected delegates to the National Convention might “discuss amongst themselves” all they wanted, but they had no power to determine anything. All they could do was recommend to Lord Addison the course he should choose. In other words, the National Convention had the same authority to discuss and recommend as did Governor Walwyn or Alexander Clutterbuck, and certainly much less than Prime Minister Mackenzie King had to recommend to the dominions secretary the course he should take. In his Constitutional Proposal for a National Convention, Lord Addison had given himself every power, and Newfoundland none. Not surprisingly, the statement was loudly condemned in Newfoundland.
And there was another problem. What forms of government were the Newfoundland delegates to consider other than a return to self-government? What other possible forms—plural—of government were being considered by Lord Addison and Prime Minister Attlee? Any half-way measure of representative government and union with the United Kingdom on the Northern Ireland model, with Newfoundland MPs sitting in the Houses of Parliament in London, had been ruled out. Union with the United States was not under consideration. What was left, a local monarchy or a dictatorship? As Attlee had suggested, the Newfoundland constitutional process was now open to “various possibilities.” Obviously, the only other form of government acceptable was confederation with Canada. The unstated British option was implicit in the terms of reference for the National Convention and the door left open for the dominions secretary to act on it when the time came.
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bsp; The announcement of the National Convention was greeted in Newfoundland with the full range of emotions, from joy to anger. The people had waited a long time for any developments on the constitutional front, and the fact that action was finally at hand was itself a cause for relief. At the same time, the potential problems presented by this National Convention and its deliberately vague terms of reference were immediately apparent to serious and thoughtful people who, along with the general population, were soon plunged into a state of confusion and doubt. In the Daily News Albert Perlin devoted his “Wayfarer” column to the dilemma created by the Dominions Office:
This is a fact-finding board we have to elect and not a parliament of the people’s representatives. How many realize this? Whose duty is it to see that this fact is recognized? The Convention has not the power to decide. It has power only to recommend. And there is genuine uncertainty as to its legal right to recommend in view of the limited choice set by the Amulree Report, the Joint Address, the Newfoundland Act and the Letters Patent, and yet the Convention is to be asked to recommend for inclusion on a ballot paper any form of government it may desire, regardless of the restrictions imposed by the only relevant documents. For the language of the Letters Patent and all the documents on which they are bound is that “when the Island is again self-supporting and on request of the people self-government shall be restored.”
As for the Convention it may study documents, it may debate them, it may turn itself into an investigating committee with the Commission [Government] as its victim, it may divide on one very point and become a platform for demagogues, it may become a centre of operations for pressure groups, it may elevate itself into a Parliament and imagine it has parliamentary prerogatives, but whatever it does or does not do, it has power only to recommend the choices to be placed on the referendum ballot paper and even its right of full freedom in this connection is suspect. In the final analysis, it can recommend what it likes and the Dominions Office may throw out all its recommendations.3
Two years previously, after the return of the Goodwill Mission to London in 1943, Paul Emrys-Evans, the parliamentary under-secretary for dominions affairs, had assured the House of Commons that the Dominions Office was committed to “take steps to ascertain what machinery would be most acceptable to Newfoundland public opinion.”4 This promise was not honoured, and it is doubtful there was ever any intention of doing so. The Dominions Office was well informed by its agents on the Island, and officials there knew that the machinery now proposed of a National Convention was almost wholly abhorrent to Newfoundland public opinion. They decided to establish it anyway and “brazen it out,” as they would do in Newfoundland at other critical moments.
The promise made in the British Parliament to consult the people of Newfoundland was meant for British public opinion alone. So, while one thing could be promised in the Houses of Parliament in London, the opposite could be delivered in St. John’s. This dichotomy was possible in part because of the British Parliament’s traditional reluctance to interfere in the Dominions Office’s management of imperial affairs. As Robert Holland states: “The desire to keep imperial and colonial issues out of the parliamentary arena … was to be a consistent feature of official British psychology in decolonization.”5 James Maxten, leader of the Independent Labour Party, called the Commission of Government in Newfoundland “the biggest blot” on the British democratic system, a statement that was not challenged by the House. MPs were generally relieved by Lord Addison’s statement announcing the National Convention. They failed, however, to examine the fine print, where they would have discovered that this new constitutional creation was just as undemocratic as the Commission.6 It was not lost on Perlin and other commentators that the elaborate window dressing of the National Convention was merely a framework for the entrance of Confederation onto the constitutional stage:
Two sound views on the political situation have been expressed by Mr. C.E. Hunt and Mr. A.M. Fraser in papers read to the University Women’s Club. Neither can be accused of political prejudice and their opinions on the issue of Confederation are a refreshing counterblast to those who would railroad the people into a course they might afterwards regret they had not explored in detail before taking the plunge. Mr. Hunt, apart from his general comment that there was no ground for defeatism, said that it was difficult to see how negotiations for Confederation could be opened by the National Convention. Mr. Fraser emphasized that the decision to confederate would be irrevocable and therefore necessitated patient and conscientious expert discussion and consideration. He said also that he thought union, if it were desired, would have to be sought under a sovereign government of our own choosing.
These are sound views. They oppose nothing. They condemn nothing. They merely point out the gravity of the course we would follow in considering Confederation and indicate their belief that only a sovereign government of the people should conduct negotiations of so far-reaching and delicate a character.”7
C.E. Hunt was one of the most highly regarded men in Newfoundland—a brilliant businessman and scholar, dedicated to Newfoundland—but he was not permitted to serve on the National Convention because he did not meet the new residency requirements. A two-year residency requirement for eligibility for election to office had been a pet condition of Governor Walwyn even before the Goodwill Mission in 1943, when A.P. Herbert had discussed the possibility of an elected convention with the governor in St. John’s. Lord Addison had agreed with Walwyn that “this requirement would … suffice to secure the election of candidates who were genuinely resident in their various districts, and would effectively prevent the planting out of agents, with a view to their election, by business or other interests in St. John’s or elsewhere.”8 The British were determined that Water Street merchants, mostly anti-Confederates, or their lawyers, would not dominate any elected body and control political events in Newfoundland. The principal people representing rural districts in Newfoundland, even if they were from the district, often had their main residence in St. John’s.9 There had never been a residency requirement in Newfoundland elections before the National Convention, and the result of its implementation in 1946 was to deprive the Convention of many qualified candidates.
Major Peter Cashin also failed to qualify for the residency requirement because he had lived in Montreal for several years. But in Cashin’s case, Walwyn made an exception for fear of a riot. Cashin was a popular man. The son of a prominent political family and a political personality in his own right, Cashin had been minister of finance in the Squires government until he accused the prime minister of falsifying minutes in council and embezzling public money in 1929 and crossed the floor. He immediately developed a reputation as the protector of the people’s rights. He was one of the few to speak out against the establishment of the Commission of Government in 1933, though, ironically, his earlier actions had unintentionally led to the end of responsible government. Cashin liked Canada, however, shortly after war’s end, he returned to Newfoundland and gave a series of broadcasts in which he condemned the plan to establish a National Convention as a violation of the terms of the Newfoundland Act. Any consideration of Confederation, Cashin insisted, was a matter for decision between Canada and an elected Newfoundland government. A fierce nationalist, Cashin became the spokesman for responsible government as factions developed out of the National Convention. These opinions brought him into immediate disfavour with Scott Macdonald. He appears in many dispatches from the high commissioner, who once described him as a “rabid and not very substantial character, although a few people with whom I have spoken regard him as an honest and outspoken champion of the common man.”10
At the Dominions Office, Lord Addison declared himself satisfied that, “with the safeguards mentioned, it [the National Convention] should give us the results we desire.”11 Yet, officially, the department was at pains to make clear to Newfoundland and the British Parliament that it had no particular result in mind for the country. Such a preconceived outcome wou
ld be highly improper. The only men privy to the real agenda in St. John’s were Governor Walwyn and Scott Macdonald
The run-up to the election for the National Convention in June 1946 was a busy time for the new Canadian high commissioner. Since his arrival in St. John’s in 1944, Scott Macdonald had been exploiting the contacts made by his predecessor, Charles Burchell, and reporting on his progress to Norman Robertson at the Department of External Affairs. He identified these people in his “Very private and Confidential” memo as pro-Confederation and listed some of them:
Mr. Justice Dunfield; Mr. Cyril Fox, K.C., one of the leading barristers in St. John’s (shortly I believe to be appointed a Judge); J.B. McEvoy, who has one of the largest law practices in St. John’s. (He says no hope for Nfld. except in union with Canada and is the lawyer for practically all the Water Street merchants, all of whom are bitterly opposed to Confederation. From that point of view, he might be considered as a possible member of the Commission.); Chief Justice Horwood of the Supreme Court of Newfoundland.
All these men, and there are others, have expressed their views to me privately but would not do so publicly at the present time, but certainly would do so if a Commission were appointed to make an investigation.