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"We have at the front of this building [Canada's Parliament]
a tower which is called a peace tower.... No one who looks
over it carefully can call it a peace chamber. It so
clearly, one might almost say so brazenly, though
beautifully, glorifies the institution of war. That sort of
thing will never lead the young men and young women of
Canada to think of new methods. It will simply lead them to
think of the glory of the old..."
- Agnes MacPhail, 1928
In about an hour, I'll be walking down to the cenotaph (war
memorial) at the bottom of the hill for the remembrance day
ceremonies there.
As usual, I am of two minds about attending. On one hand, it
concerns me that the glorification of veterans' sacrifices
in recent years is part of a return to militarism that I
abhor. On the other, it is clearly important to remember
"man's inhumanity to man" so that we don't take that path
again.
In 1928, Member of Parliament Agnes MacPhail proposed that
the government of Canada create a Peace Department. What
follows is the text of her speech in Parliament on that
occasion. It's what is on my mind as I make my annual trip
down to the memorial ceremony.
INTERNATIONAL PEACE
MOTION FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENT
Miss AGNES C. MACPHAIL (Southeast Grey) moved:
That, in the opinion of this house, the time has come for
the establishment of a government department for the
promotion of peace and international understanding.
She said: Mr. Speaker, in rising to speak to this motion
asking for the establishment of a department to work for
peace and international understanding, I assume that all
hon. members in this chamber are anxious to bring security
to our country, and that any differences we have in the
matter relate to the methods to be employed in bringing
about peace rather than to any doubt as to the desirability
of securing peace. I conclude that we all want to have
security at home and friendship abroad. At one time almost
everyone, possibly indeed everyone, had confidence in
military preparedness and war as methods of bringing about
security and of settling international differences. But I
think that no one will now deny that that confidence in
military preparedness and in war which used to be so
complete has been very much shaken. Still while some to-day
have simply scrapped the old way and have found a new
method, and are relying upon the development of good will as
the greatest security that we could find, there are others
who, while they have not perfect confidence in war or in
preparedness for war, still think of these methods as the
best to adopt. Then there are others of our citizens and of
citizens of the world who stand between the two ideas and
are not quite sure in which faith to rely. The last war with
its frightful loss of life and treasure caused all of us to
think of this subject as one of very great importance. Not
only did Canada lose sixty thousand of her very best men,
but the world lost ten million of its best men, and if we
are going to view this question from the point of view of
humanity we must consider that loss of ten million young men
a dead loss and one that will cause concern to every citizen
in the world, including the citizens of Canada.
The cost of the last war was greater than that of any
previous war, although all wars
[Page 1174 Col. 1]
and all preparations for wars in the past have been
exceedingly costly. So great has been the cost of preparing
for and carrying out wars that in the first twenty years of
the twentieth century, fourteen countries spent the
fantastic sum of $61,000,000,000 in preparation for and
carrying out war. England alone to-day spends on war or
preparation for war fourteen shillings out of every twenty
shillings of her national expenditure. The United States
spend 82 cents out of every dollar on war or preparation for
war. The total debt of the United States prior to the •war
was $1,125,000,000 and to-day it stands at between
$18,000,000,000 and $19,000,000,000. How much greater even
that that—and that is a terrific increase—must be the
increase in the debt of such countries as France and Germany
because of the war? In Canada the exact figures are not
available, but certainly more than fifty cents out of every
dollar of our national expenditure go to pay for wars past
and preparation for wars to come. Some claim—and they may
have figures to substantiate their claim, but I do not have
them under my hand—that two-thirds of every dollar of
Canada's expenditure goes for this purpose. When one thinks
of these figures, the amount of money involved alone, one
thinks of what the spending of this money for the good of
the people could have done. I have not any doubt at all that
had the one fantastic sum I mentioned of $61,000,000,000
been spent to bring knowledge, a high standard of living and
happiness to the common peoples of the world, wars would by
now not be necessary. The house, however, may not agree with
me in that. More and more people are coming to believe, and
even people in high places are stating quite fearlessly,
that they believe security must come by means other than
military preparedness. There are many statesmen one could
quote, but I am going to confine myself to very brief
quotations. The first one is Field Marshal Sir William
Robertson, who was Chief of the Imperial General Staff from
1915 to 1918. That is, he was a military man trained in
military tactics, and indeed he must have been a very
successful one to have filled that position in those
stressful years. In speaking of war—I am quoting from The
U.F.A. of December 15, 1927, and this report appeared also
in the daily press of a few days previous—he said:
War has become a wholly detestable thing, and is almost, if
not quite, as disastrous to victors as to vanquished.
Never in history were preparations so complete or so
widespread as during the fifty or sixty years previous to
1914, and yet never were wars so frequent as in that period.
[Miss Macphail.]
[Page 1174 Col. 2]
A little later on in the same speech he is reported to have
said:
Every man and woman should energetically support all efforts
made for devising some more sensible and humane way of
composing international differences than the destructive and
futile methods upon which reliance has hitherto been
unsuccessfully placed.
That is the only conclusion I can reach after a military
career covering on Sunday next, a period of exactly fifty
years.
So that this great British gentleman, who had been trained
in a military school for fifty years, comes to the
conclusion, speaking first, I suppose, for British men and
women, and afterwards for all men and women, that they
should set themselves to the task of finding some other and
better way of settling international disputes.
Every one was sorry and grieved at the death quite recently
of Field Marshal Haig. I wonder if we are willing to honour
his memory by heeding his words. On one occasion he said:
I urge you to a crusade paving for its object the freeing of
the whole world from the devastating scourge of war.
I might mention too such outstanding work for a new
international spirit as was done in Great Britain by E. D.
Morrell, now gone, and as has been done by Lord Robert
Cecil, Ramsay MaeDonald and the Right Hon. Arthur Ponsonby.
These are all men of high standing in British public life
and they all take the stand that we shall not get security
through military preparedness; that we are simply wasting
money, and that military preparedness cannot bring about the
thing we are seeking for, namely, security at home and
goodwill and friendship abroad.
Whatever may be the opinion of members of this house as to
the degree of military preparedness necessary, or as to the
advisability of disarmament, I think every hon. member will
agree that such things as ignorance, suspicion and fear must
be got rid of before we can have permanent peace. While it
is true that other things cause war, these three, ignorance,
suspicion and fear, leave the common people of all countries
the prey to the propagandist in the hours of crisis. It
makes them willing to bear these crushing burdens of debt
caused by armaments, because, through lack of knowledge,
they are led to believe that they must endure this
staggering taxation in order to bring security to themselves
in their own country. We have not in Canada, and indeed not
to any extent anywhere in the world, studied constructively
the art of making peace or the technique of peace. I think
the technique of war has been studied by some of the most
astute minds in all
[Page 1775 Col.1]
countries; but had the same amount of energy, had the same
wealth, had the same knowledge of the psychology of the
people been used to promote peace as has been and is yet
being used in Canada to promote preparedness for war—because
I am afraid it is still being done —we would to-day be far
on our way towards the settlement of international disputes
by some method other than war, and it would be true to-day
that the institution of war in Canada would not be the
respected institution it is. No one can doubt that in Canada
the institution of war is a most respected one which the "
best people" like very much. I have noticed that these
people, when questioned, do not admit it; but in following
the votes of money and the comments in the house on the
subject of war, one cannot help concluding that the
institution of war is still a respected one. I view this
condition with alarm.
I do not however question the patriotism of those people in
the house and in the country who believe that that is the
way to be a patriotic citizen. I grant quite freely that
they are patriotic people, and they are working for what
they believe is the best thing for their country. I simply
question their wisdom, not their patriotism. On the other
hand, often in the past in this house, the patriotism of
people like myself and those who think with me has been
questioned. They think we are not patriotic, that we do not
love our country. One might ask, what is patriotism? Surely
it is loyalty to a group; but sometimes we forget that we
owe loyalty to many groups. We cannot have too much loyalty,
either absolutely or in comparison with the loyalty of other
peoples. But we can have too much loyalty to one group,
forgetting the other groups to which we also belong. We are
more and more coming to know that everyone of us belongs to1
that group which is known as humanity, and that we do owe a
very great loyalty to, that largest group of all—humanity.
For Canadians, for a Britisher, for a citizen who is a
member of the British Commonwealth of nations, it should not
be difficult to build a larger loyalty out of our present
loyalties, because our loyalties have grown to include not
only our own country and the mother country, but a group of
countries which cover a large part of the surface of the
earth. Surely then we ought to be willing, and mentally and
spiritually able, to take the lead in the world in
developing a still larger loyalty that will not stop until
it has included the whole shrinking world. It is worthy of
note, too, that patriotism is not an innate thing; it is
[Page 1175 Col. 2]
cultivated, and it will be just what we train it to be. If
we train, the children and the young people of this country
to view patriotism as a very much bigger thing than we have
thought of it in the past, then, within one generation, if
we set about it with decision and a desire to win, we shall
have a new patriotism, which, while not making light of the
love of our own country, will expand to cover the needs of
all countries.
Canada's position geographically makes her a country that is
important in the history of the world at this moment.
Geographically we belong to one continent. Politically we
belong to another continent. There is no good reason why we
cannot be the interpreter of the one continent to the other.
Then, too, the Canadian mind is used to a large framework.
Canada is a large, if not too thickly populated, country,
and the Canadian, mind can move with ease from Halifax to
Vancouver, surely with much more ease than the European mind
can move over the same distance. That should make it easy
for us to give the world a lead in learning to cover
mentally a larger space. The international mind is really
nothing more than a mind that does not stop at the bonders
of one's own country, but bridges that gap that lies between
one's own country and other countries, and bridges it
sympathetically.
Canada is young. As countries go, we are merely a youth, and
youth always looks to the future. In looking to the future,
and. not to the present, we must all realize that we need to
build the security of the world on something more stable
than military preparedness. We have had since the end of the
great war a very great many memorials to the brave who gave
their lives in the service of their country during that
awful conflict. My own personal opinion is that many of the
memorials which are supposed to lead us to think of the
service and love and devotion of those who died simply
glorify the institution of war. I think that the formation
of a peace department would be a fitting commemoration of
the devotion and sacrifice of the 60,000 Canadians who died,
if we remember what was said during the war and directly
after, fighting a war that was to end war. We have at the
front of this building a tower which is called a peace
tower. I was greatly interested in going through it and
looking over it carefully, and my conclusion was that it is
a very exquisite piece of work, but that it is misnamed. No
one who looks over it carefully can call it a peace chamber.
It so clearly, one might almost say so brazenly, though
beautifully,
[Page 1176 Col.1]
glorifies the institution of war. That sort of thing will
never lead the young men and young women of Canada to think
of new methods. It will simply lead them to think of the
glory of the old; and it is not a fair way of putting the
thing up to the young people of Canada, because the truth of
war is not told, only the glory of war, not the misery, not
the death, not the disease, not the broken hearts, not the
shattered lives. Nothing of that is told at all; it is just
the glory of war. I wonder who named the tower the peace
tower. It is a queer idea of peace. A name will not bring us
peace, I am sure of that.
Canada since the world war has been drawn more and more into
world currents. There is an evidence of that in our
appointing ambassadors to the different countries of the
world. We have also been given a place on the council of the
league of nations. All these things show that we are,
whether we like it or not, becoming citizens of the world.
But up until now very little of anything has been done by
the Canadian people or the Canadian government to prepare
Canadians for the new responsibilities which are ours. A
department of peace would act as a focus or centre for peace
thinking and peace activities. While there are some engaged
in peace thinking and peace activities at the present time
in Canada, they are scattered, and they have no help
from—well, I will leave it at that: they have no help. They
are the rank and file of the people, many of them, and it is
hard for them to get the knowledge they desire. There has
been no lead given in peace activities in Canada, with one
or two notable exceptions which I shall mention later. I
believe that under the British North America Act the
Dominion government has jurisdiction over war and peace in
so far as control rests in Canada. It is therefore the
business of the Dominion government, rather than of the
provincial governments to help the people to find some new
way of settling international disputes. Canada has a long
and indeed a very honourable history in the settling of
disputes through conciliation, and the most noted of all is
the Rush-Bagot treaty which was made at the end of the war
of 1812-14. In the histories which I studied and from which
I taught this treaty was given some prominence. To be exact,
I think some sixteen pages were devoted to the history of
the war and two paragraphs to the peace, but still two
paragraphs was something. They told, and told
sympathetically, of the importance of the Rush-Bagot treaty,
which disarmed the border line between Canada and
[Miss Macphail.]
[Page 1176 Col.2]
the United States, which from that time on has been an
example in peaceful settlement to the whole world. But in
the new histories now used in Ontario, a copy of which I now
hold in my hand, as many pages are devoted to the war, but
there is not one single line devoted to the Rush-Bagot
treaty; it is not even mentioned. I am not familiar with the
history texts used in the other provinces, but the children
in the schools of Ontario reading these histories do not
know anything about the Rush-Bagot treaty, do not know
anything about the greatest incident of that period of the
history of United States and Canada, because no one will
doubt that the peace treaty was much more important than the
war. This treaty shows that Canada in the past has been
interested in finding new methods rather than relying on the
old. In the case of the Rush-Bagot treaty we prepared for
peace, and we had peace. I think that is logical. The old
idea that if you prepare for war you will have peace is a
fallacy. If you prepare for war you will have war, and if
you prepare for peace you will have peace. The International
Joint Commission, which has been in existence for some
seventeen years and has settled over twenty differences
between Canada and the United States, has been mentioned
twice, just lately, in far-flung parts of the world. I am
quoting from an editorial that appeared in the Citizen of
March 1, 1928:
Recently Charles Evans Hughes spoke of conciliation between
Canada and the United States at the Pan-American Conference
in Havana, where he submitted the plan of the International
Joint Commission as a model method of maintaining peaceful
relations between neighbouring countries. A few days later,
the League of Nations security committee at Geneva listened
with keen interest to a description of the working of the
commission. The Canadian member of the committee Dr. W. A.
Riddell, told how this model scheme of conciliation has
worked successfully in dealing with over twenty cases in the
last seventeen years. He recommended the adoption of similar
permanent boards of conciliation between other nations whose
frontiers adjoin.
The editorial continues:
Dr. Riddell urged that security could be increased more by
disarmament than by military measures.
I want the government to tell us if Dr. Riddell was speaking
on their behalf. If so, are not the words which he used in
Geneva and the action of the government in straight
contradiction? If it is true that security comes through
disarmament, then why is it that our military estimates have
been increased from eleven million dollars in 1925 to
eighteen million dollars this year? An
[Page 1177 Col. 1]
explanation is due the country. The hon. Minister of Justice
(Mr. Lapointe) recently addressed the Ottawa branch of the
League of Nations Association and gave expression of his
views. He said:
The only way of securing peace is by what is usually called
moral disarmament, and that moral disarmament can be
obtained only when a strong public opinion, the opinion in
the shops, in the factories, on the farms, in the
universities, in the schools, when opinion everywhere is
deeply and intimately convinced that war is a calamity and
the worst of all calamities.
These are noble words, and I feel that the hon. minister
believes in their truth. So I am going to suggest to the
Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) that for the good of
Canada and the good of the world he request the Minister of
Justice and the Minister of National Defence to exchange
portfolios. I anticipate the Prime Minister will say that he
does not want to form a new department. Personally I am
quite willing to accept a department of defence through
security and goodwill, with the hon. Minister of Justice at
its head, if he is allowed to do what he wants to do. In
looking over the personnel of the cabinet I have often been
puzzled to discover who are the military members. Who are
they? They all look so peaceable that I am amazed at what is
happening. It is quite clear that some of the ministers are
pushing things from the military side. There is no excuse—if
there is, I shall be glad to hear it—for the increase in our
military estimates, and for the aggressive development of
war psychology in the Dominion.
I do not wish dogmatically to lay down what a department of
peace might do, but I hope I shall not tire the house too
much by offering a few suggestions as to the work of such a
department. I would have suggested by resolution a peace
bureau either in the Department of External Affairs or the
Department of Secretary of State, but I did hot wish it to
be shoved off into corner while a department to bring
security through military measures was given a better place.
Already we have a full-fledged department of war, although I
notice that in the debate on the motion of the hon. member
for Wetaskiwin (Mr. Irvine) the Minister of National Defence
said that his department is not preparing for war, but for
peace; that really he is a minister of peace. I am glad to
hear it, but in the face of the activities of his department
I regret to say there is nothing on which I can rest my
belief, much as I should like to accept his declaration.
[Page 1177 Col.2]
A department of peace should be twofold in character. First,
it should have general supervision of an extensive program
for peace throughout Canada. Secondly, it should cultivate
friendly relations with other countries by promoting our
knowledge of other people with regard to their cultural,
moral and social achievements. This would be very
interesting to Canadians, and we have very much to learn
along this line. Then, too, it should encourage the work of
international institutions, including the League of Nations,
and make known their work to our people, so that we would be
made acquainted with all the machinery that has been set up
in any part of the world for finding new methods of settling
international difficulties. I think that such a department
should also study the causes of war, and by frank discussion
present evidence revealing the wastefulness and
ineffectiveness of war. It might also make clear to our
people some of our own mannerisms that offend the
sensibilities of other nations. I do think we have a British
superiority complex which must be very offensive to other
nations, and cannot be making any contribution to the
harmony of the world. This department would quite naturally
work in cooperation with all agencies that wanted the data
and other material which it would collect. It would develop
the will to peace through education by working with peace
societies, schools, churches, labour associations, women's,
farmers' and social clubs, and any other Canadian agencies
whose efforts in the direction of peace could be made more
effective by such co-operation. The department could also
prepare a list of speakers, who, while not employed by the
government, could, through the department, be made available
for addressing public meetings—speakers who were authorities
on some one phase of this great question. Our government
departments issue booklets, pamphlets, posters and films,
and there seems to be no good reason why a department of
peace could not use the same means to make known to the
Canadian people the truths regarding peace and war.
And how little money it would cost the government to make a
gift of books for the promotion of peace. These books could
be issued to our public and school libraries. We have Rhodes
scholarships in this country. We might establish peace
scholarships on a somewhat similar plan, allotting a
scholarship to each province. The Rhodes scholarships I
think are confined to young men, but I would want these
peace scholarships available to young women as well. The
winners of these scholarships would go abroad each year to
[Page 1178 Col.1]
study along lines which would make them better world
citizens and at the same time better citizens of Canada.
It has occurred to me—I do not claim any originality for the
idea—that we might very well establish a yearly peace award
for the best work done in the cause of peace. This award I
suggest should be given by the government and might be
confined to Canadians or be made open to the citizens of any
country. The award would not be confined necessarily to the
greatest contribution scholastically to the peace of the
world, but to the best work to this end along any line.
We have a military college where young men are prepared to
be warriors. Why not establish a college to train young men
in promoting peaceful understandings throughout the world?
This would be far better work and those engaged in it would
become much better citizens, with all respect to the
graduates from the military college. Then instead of making
grants for the training of cadets in summer camps—and but
for these grants the cadet movement would not continue for
another five years—the government might use the money to
much better purpose for the establishment of summer schools
to promote the study of international friendship. I imagine
a great many Canadians would be glad to get together for a
few weeks to secure a better understanding than they possess
today of the problems of the world. In fact I should think
that the work of this department would be very interesting;
it would be unlimited, adventurous and wholly positive
rather than destructive as is military training at the
present time. Such a department would call to the highest in
us; it would call out our mental and spiritual attributes,
challenging them, rather than the physical, which is on the
lowest possible plane.
My words this afternoon may seem quite futile; all words on
this subject may seem futile. But what are disarmament
conferences, even conferences of the League of Nations,
conferences to promote good will, unless they are backed by
a conviction on the part of the peoples of the world, the
common people, the rank and file of the nations? It is my
opinion— it may or may not be right—that the common people
of Canada, certainly the farmers, and I believe the common
people generally, are exceedingly concerned that the
government, and we working together with the government,
shall strive to find some new way of settling international
disputes. The common people are sick of war; they are tired
of the glorification of it. The swank that goes with it
to-day does not carry much force in the country. In
international politics, as in every-
[Miss Maophail.]
[Page 1178 Col.2]
thing else, the misfortune is that our aim is too low. The
real crime after all is low aim, and by aiming high the
government or any international body will call out the
latent idealism of the common people. And after all the
latent idealism of the common people is the greatest force
for peace in the world to-day.
In closing I would ask the government not to consider the
matter lightly, because it is not a trivial subject; it
includes within itself all others and is the most important
subject facing mankind to-day. If we do not find some new
way there is nothing surer than that, if we keep on for
another twenty-five years as we have been going since 1918,
we shall have another war whether we like it or not. Nothing
can prevent it if we keep preparing for war.
You can find the full text and images of the original
source here:
http://vitacollections.ca/southgreymuseum/24786/data