The Constant Dilemma

Last week, more clearly than before, Canada saw the shape of her constant dilemma: How to reconcile membership in the British Commonwealth with her geographical position, her national aims.

The country had been brought face to face with this dilemma by an ill-timed speech of Lord Halifax, in Toronto two weeks ago. In it he had proposed that Britain and the Dominions share equal responsibility in the shaping of Commonwealth foreign policy. This suggestion, innocuous to U.S. readers, was enough to cause violent debate in Canada.

Beyond controversy was one point on which all Canadians agreed. There could be no subordination of Canada's sovereignty or her interests to those of Britain. The question was: Did Lord Halifax' brand of co-responsibility necessarily entail such subordination?

Inevitable Rivalry? Canada's Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King thought that it did. Sharply he voiced Canada's fear that she might be crushed in an "inevitable rivalry" between great powers. Said he: "Could Canada, situated as she is between the United States, the Soviet Union and the British Commonwealth, support such an idea [of rivalry]?"

Not for one moment was Mr. King willing to support the idea. He had already said that he preferred to postpone an election. But that did not mean that he would not call one. That depended on the opposition. Grant Dexter, associate editor of the Winnipeg Free Press, closer to Mr. King's line than other newsmen, suggested last week that one wing of the Prime Minister's Progressive Conservative opposition is anxious to challenge him on foreign policy. Wrote Dexter: "The curious thing is that they [the Conservatives] are just as certain the Canadian people will vote for a single-voice policy for the Commonwealth as the Liberals are that the people will refuse it."

One Against Many. There were other Canadians who felt that the issue of one against many voices for the Commonwealth oversimplified Canada's dilemma. They believed that Canada's own interests would not necessarily be compromised if she accepted responsibility in the Commonwealth policy. So far Opposition Leader John Bracken had refused to accept battle on Mr. King's terms.

Toronto's moderately Conservative Saturday Night, summed up Mr. Bracken's position: "His nightly prayer must be a desperate petition that his less restrainable followers be stricken dumb until the Halifax speech is forgotten. If they can only be kept quiet there is a possibility that the question of whether Canada should enter into a sort of consultative alliance with other nations of the Commonwealth may be considered in an atmosphere of reason, free from the exaggerations of an electoral campaign."

Something more than Canada's own interest was at stake. Canadians knew that on their decision might well turn the future of the British Commonwealth.

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