Join grand plan of confederation

This year marks the 150th anniversary of Canada, so every Sunday we are looking back at editorials from our predecessor newspaper, The Daily British Colonist and Victoria Chronicle, in 1867.

One hundred fifty years ago today, Confederation was top of mind.

The discussion in the Legislative Council on Amor De Cosmos’ motion on Confederation will be perused with more than ordinary interest. Of all the political questions now engaging public attention, none is more entitled to our warmest sympathy and support than this grand scheme to merge the conflicting interests of the British people in Northern America, and to fuse them into a great and powerful nation, independent of, yet not entirely severed from the parent country that gave it birth.

With the progress of this scheme, now in course of incubation, is the destiny of this country closely, vitally interwoven. To stand aloof while westward Ho! is the cry and the line of the march advances toward the Rocky Mountains, throwing open to us the portals through which we may expect to derive immediate and rapid prosperity, would be suicidal in the extreme.

The opportunity is now offered to us of ridding ourselves of debt, cheapening government, lessening taxation and taking equal strides with our brethren on the other side in the march of civilization.

Shall we let it slip, and allow our supineness to rise up in judgment against for time to come?

It may be, as remarked by the hon. colonial secretary, that provision will be made in the Imperial Act for our admission at any subsequent period, but we have seen how Imperial Acts can be pared and shorn before emerging from the hands of the three estates of the realm, and is it safe to hang our destinies on the cast of a die?

We should be acting more wisely to give prompt expression to our desire to become members of the great confederation, either by a public meeting or in some other practical form.

A resolution unanimously passed, or a monster petition from the inhabitants of this and other sections, would materially strengthen the hands of our legislators who are so ably moving in the matter, and will leave Governor Seymour no pretext — should he seek one, which we are not inclined to think he will — to refuse compliance with the wishes of the people as expressed through their representatives.

Who will move in the matter? It but needs, as our hon. senior member remarked in the house, the first note to be sounded to find an echo in every inhabited portion of the colony. The Daily British Colonist and Victoria Chronicle,

March 12, 1867