Empire Lost - Andrew Stewart [5]
My fiancée Joanne endured the writing of this book and sacrificed a great deal to support its completion—thank you always. This book is, however, dedicated to my parents. They have supported my scholarly endeavours throughout these many years always without hesitation despite the sometimes less obvious path that I chose to follow. None of this would have been possible without them.
The analysis, opinions and conclusions expressed or implied are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Joint Services Command and Staff College, the UK Ministry of Defence or any other government agency. Any errors of fact are the responsibility of the author.
The Great Experiment
The inter-war period marked the first serious attempts to provide a scholarly answer to the question 'what were the Dominions?'1 Although many ideas were put forward, there was, however, an obvious sense of reluctance about precise definitions; during a parliamentary debate in 1921, when David Lloyd George asked for an explanation he was told that to provide one would be dangerous.2 A decade later, a leading Australian politician expressed what had become an increasingly familiar and commonly held view when he compared his own country's connection with Britain to that of a family relationship. As such he did not 'want the relations of myself and my children to be determined by rules written in a book, to which each of us must refer to discover who is right and who is wrong'.3 At the same time, there also existed a sense of profound conviction that the Empire had its basis on a higher level. Lord Curzon believed that it was one of the instruments used by Providence for the benefit of mankind. Lord Rosebery, speaking to students at Edinburgh on the British Empire, saw its achievements being directed by human hands and minds but was also certain even the 'most heedless and most cynical must see the finger of the Divine' in its long history. Lord Blanesburgh, speaking publicly in January 1933, had argued that it was essential to preserve the Commonwealth of Nations as 'a civilizing force', one which would if needed be 'the final protector of Western civilization'.4 Lionel Curtis, one of the leading Imperial thinkers, thought that the British Empire and Commonwealth would eventually evolve into a federation in which the British government would provide the central authority; once again, he believed that this would bring not only order but spiritual fulfilment.5
In the early days of colonial governments the Parliament at Westminster was the supreme legislative authority for all British possessions. It had the authority and jurisdiction to legislate and did so for every part of the British Empire. The refusal of settlers in what became the United States of America to recognize the right of the Westminster body to impose taxation upon them when they had their own legislature which had the power to, and did, tax them ultimately led to the American revolution and the end of the first British Empire. The catalyst for the Dominions' creation was, however, John Lambton, more commonly known as Lord Durham, who was sent to what was then termed as 'the Canadas' in 1838 to investigate two rebellions of the previous year and produced, by way of response the following year, his detailed and celebrated 'Report on the Affairs of British North America'. In his view the colonists were capable of having an elected legislature, making their own laws and generally governing themselves, in short a modified form of responsible government with a legislative union of Upper Canada, Lower Canada and the Maritime Provinces. The 'British North American Act' became law on 1 July 1867 and with it a Dominion under the name of Canada was legally established, a confederation of several Canadian provinces agreed upon by Canadian statesmen. This, at least in part, was intended to help safeguard against lingering hostility from south of the border where a Bill had been introduced into Congress proposing that Canada should be made part of the United States. A federated