Laurier, Borden and a White British Columbia

Laurier, Borden and a White British Columbia DONALD AVERY and PETER NEARY Of the many immigration problems which faced the Laurier and Borden governments, none was more intractable and none politically more dangerous than that of the movement of Orientals into British Columbia. Here indeed was an issue with economic, racial, regional, imperial and international dimensions. As such, its history affords an interesting and unique insight into both the modus operandi of the two governments and the priorities implicit in their policies. The dispute in Canada over Oriental immigration had started long before Laurier came to power; but the economic boom which began after 1896 intensified the existing conflict and in the years 1907-08 brought it to a head. Hence it was a more pressing and complex issue for Laurier and his ministers than it had been for any of their predecessors. On one side stood the spokesmen of the mining, forest, salmon canning and fruit farming industries of British Columbia, who demanded a steady supply of cheap, unskilled Oriental labour. This lobby enjoyed the support ofpowerful central Canadian manufacturing and transportation interests anxious for a closer trading relationship with the Orient. On the other side of the issue stood the forces of a vociferous and uncompromising British Columbia nativist movement, which was rooted in but by no means confined to the organized labour movement of the Province. By the turn of the century the advocates of a white British Columbia had gained the ascendant in Provincial politics. On the national political scene the potential of the issue was shown in 1908 when British Columbia gave a majority of its seats for the first time since 1891 to the Conservatives. In contrast to the temporizing of Laurier, Borden stood squarely on the principle of a white British Columbia - or so it seemed to nativist opinion in the Province. But the reality of the division between the national political parties on the issue by 1908 was more complex; in effect the Oriental immigration question had become one of those 24 issues in Canadian politics which could be readily taken advantage of in opposition but not so easily solved in office. Thus when the Conservatives came to power in 1911 they assumed the same brokerage role as their Liberal predecessors both nationally and internationally - to the disappointment of some of their more rabid British Columbia supporters. That they did so is indicative of the interplay of national and international considerations which made the Oriental question sui generis in the myriad range of immigration issues facing Canada's policy makers. Significantly, the Canadian response to immigration from the Orient varied from country to country. In the case of China, Canadian policy had only, generally speaking, to take account of economic and humanitarian considerations. But the Dominion's relations with Japan were affected both by a treaty of trade, commerce and navigation Great Britain had negotiated with Japan in 1894 and, after 1902, by the Anglo-Japanese Alliance . Policy with respect to immigration from the Indian sub-continent was influenced by the common membership of Canada and India in the British Empire. Again, the community of interest that existed between British Columbia and the Pacific states of the United States on the Oriental immigration issue became increasingly important after the turn of the century; in 1908 it occasioned an important but ultimately unsuccessful attempt by the United States to effect common AngloAmerican action to restrict Japanese immigration. For Canada the crisis over Oriental immigration which arose in 1907-08 occasioned a participation in world politics which was as unaccustomed as it was unexpected. The first Orientals to arrive in Canada were the Chinese, many of whom came north from California during the British Columbia gold rush of the 1850s.I The Japanese began arriving in the 1880s but their numbers did not become large enough to make their presence a political issue until the next decade. East Indian immigrants did not begin arriving in sizeable numbers until 1905. The Dominion government's approach to Asian immigration was markedly different from its policy with respect to American and European immigration. No agents were commissioned, no promotional Revue d'etudes canadiennes literature was distributed and...