Cooling Advice

The highly emotional flavor of Canada's new sense of economic nationalism has sent temperatures rising on both sides of the border. Last week Montreal Lawyer Robert M. Fowler, who as president of the Canadian Pulp and Paper Association speaks for Canada's No. 1 export industry, told Canadians to cool off. "In Canada," said Fowler with some warmth, "the simplest way for a public speaker to catch the headlines is to give a rousing speech which masquerades as rugged, independent Canadianism but is really no more than anti-Americanism. This is a cheap and easy way to seek popular acclaim, and it is dangerous and maybe disastrous."

On the sore point of foreign investment in Canada, Fowler pointed out that U.S. and British capital brought new industries, jobs and technical skills to Canada, and opened the door to markets that Canadian industry alone could not have opened. "Was all this a horrible national mistake? We have become foolishly sensitive and critical because we hear that this or that percentage of a Canadian industry is controlled by foreigners. Surely the time has come for Canadians to take this large chip off our shoulder."

Inevitably, said Fowler, economic differences between Canada and the U.S. produce abrasive rubs. "When these divergences of policy occur, we in Canada should not promote them as a show of independence toward the U.S., and the Americans should not, as too often they do, regard them as an example of unfriendliness and even betrayal of the U.S."

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