Empire Day in the schools of Ontario: The training of young imperialists

3. Les fondements des griefs formules a l'endroit du regime "traditionnel" on ete resumes de fac;:on plus systematique dans J. L Migue et G. Belanger, Le prix de la sante, Hurtubise HMH, Montreal "1972, principalement aux chapitres I et II, pp. 13 a 57. 4. La recommandation du Comite Hastings se lit comme suit: "The development by the provinces ,in mutual agreement with public and professional groups, of a significant number of community health centres, as described in this Report as non-profit corporate bodies in a fully integrated health services system". Le caractere monopolistique de l'organisme n'est done pas explicitement pose par le Comite. Cependant par !'importance des ressources que le Comite voudrait voir consacrees a ce plan, par le sens qu'il donne au "fully integrated health services system" tout au long du rapport et par la conception d'ensemble qu'il propose de !'organisation du secteur, ii ne fait pas de doute que le Comite envisage, a l'instar de la Commission quebecoise d'Enquete sur la sante et le bien-etre social, un systeme oti la majorite sinon la totalite des soins de preEmpire day in the schools of Ontario: the training of young imperialists ROBERT M. STAMP The publication in 1970 of Carl Berger's important work in Canadian intellectual history , The Sense of Power: Studies in the Ideas of Canadian Imperialism, 1867-1914, stimulated considerable discussion of the nature and workings of Canadian nationalism and/or British imperialism in the years prior to the First World War. Berger argued quite convincingly that the promoters of imperial unity in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were really Canadian nationalists . "Canadian imperialism was one variety of Canadian nationalism - a type of awareness of nationality which rested upon a certain understanding of history, the national character, and the national mission." 1 Berger limited his study to the "intellectual contents of Canadian imperialism rather than its workings at the political level." A focus on schooling in early twentieth century Ontario, particularly on the introduction of 32 miere ligne seraient dispenses dans le cadre des centres locaux de sante. 5. On trouvera un resume de ces travaux dans A. P. Ruderman, Economic Characteristics of Community Centres, Report to the Community Health Centre Project, Special Appendix I, (mimeo) 1972. 6. Je resume ici les corollaires de !'analyse economique des institutions a but non lucratif. Pour un resume plus formalise de cette analyse, le lecteur pourra consulter J.-L. Migue et G. Belanger, "Toward a General Theory of Managerial Discretion," Public Choice (forthcoming), XVI (Spring, 1974). 7. Le lecteur pourra consulter a ce sujet M.S. Feldstein, Economic Analysis for Health Service Efficiency, North Holland Publishing Co. Amsterdam 1967, pp. 187-222, et "An Econometric Model of the Medicare System'', Quarterly Journal of Economics, vol. 85, no 1, fev. 1971, pp. 1-20. 8. La tMorie des associations est sous-jacente a ces propositions . Voir a ce sujet M. Olson, The Logic of Collective Action, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1965. "Empire Day," provides an opportunity to test the Berger thesis in operation at a working level that affected all members of the younger generation. The hypothesis of this article is that Empire Day celebrations were widely supported by both students and the general public as long as the majority of English-speaking Canadians could equate Canadian nationalism and British imperialism . As the twentieth century advanced, declining support for the concept of imperial unity plus the counter lure of American ideals destroyed the climate in which Empire Day festivities had first blossomed. Empire Day remained viable only as long as the Berger thesis itself possessed continuing relevance. Although Education Minister George Ross is usually credited with introducing Empire Day in the schools, the idea originated with Mrs. Clementine Fessenden of Hamilton. Mrs. Fessenden was a prominent clubwoman in the city, well known through her active role in such groups as the Hamilton Council of Women and the Wentworth Historical Society. During the summer of 1897 she wrote to various Ontario and Quebec newsRevue d'etudes canadiennes papers requesting that "school boards and others be visited and petitions circulated asking the endorsation of a movement looking towards...