Lawrence Martin On The Integration of Canada And The U.S.

Lawrence Martin, Pledge Of Allegiance:

The Americanization of Canada in the Mulroney Years

(Toronto: McClelland & Stewart Inc.; 1993), pp. 7, 8.

‘Even though the inevitability of continental integration seemed written in almost every statistic of Canada-U. S. relations, no one was supposed to recognize the trend enthusiastically or recommend the speeding up of the process.

Canadians had always frowned on such talk.

A merging of the continent was viewed as possible only by hostile, never felicitous means.

Prime Ministers spoke of closer ties only gingerly, and mainly in the context of economic necessity. To do otherwise was to wound Canada’s national pride.

 ‘In the first decades following Confederation [1867], Canadians were suspicious of the covetous designs of Presidents Grant, Harrison, and Teddy Roosevelt, all of whom saw merit if not practicality in Manifest Destiny, the doctrine invoking the United States’ right to “overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the development of our multiplying millions.”

To Roosevelt, the most learned among them, the adoption of Canada made perfect sense. As Americans, Canadians “would hold positions incomparably more important, grander and more dignified than they can ever hope to reach.” . . .

 ‘The difference between the two countries was such that fifty-six years past after Confederation before an American president set foot in Canada.

If the first visit, the 1923 Vancouver stopover of Warren Harding, provided any kind of lesson to the Americans, it was to keep a distance. Harding cut short the game of golf after six holes, due to what was thought to be the beginnings of a heart attack. Dinner left him in worse condition he suffered ptomaine poisoning and an acute gastrointestinal attack. He left Vancouver that night, collapsed during a speech in Seattle the next day, and died a week later.’

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