Neighbors

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THE relations of Canada and the United States are unusually intimate and important, and will become even more intimate and more important as the Dominion grows in population and power and as the United States becomes more conscious of that growth than she is at present.

It is true, of course, that they loom far larger in the eyes of a Canadian than of an American. That is natural. The United States is a great World Power, with interests and contacts in every corner of the globe. If Americans cannot indulge in that Britannic boast that the sun never sets on the Empire they can console themselves with the thought that it never sets on their influence. Canada, on the other hand, as an international unit, is at the very beginning of her career. In world affairs, as a state apart from an empire, she has hardly commenced to make her influence felt. At the present time, indeed, she really has only two immediately important external problems: first, her relations with the other members of the British Commonwealth of Nations; and second, her relations with the United States. All else is subordinate to these, and the Dominion's external policy must for some time center about their handling.

The phrase "Canada's relations with the United States" almost invariably brings to the American mind a vague reminder that Canada is a sort of northern extension of the United States, a delightfully wet place for a vacation; that there are millions of American dollars and hundreds of American branch factories in Canada; and that the Dominion, in spite of tariff walls, is the Republic's best customer -- a proud position for any country to achieve.

It is not intended here to examine these more material aspects of our relations, but rather those which, in default of a better word, may be designated "political." More particularly it is desired to touch on two phases of these political relations: the first, certain influences affecting Canadian-American relations; the second, certain problems arising out of these relations, considered in the light of those influences...