Dear Editor,
We have just passed a momentous day in our nation’s history with barely a nod to it.
I refer to the 250th anniversary, on Oct. 7th, of the passage of The Royal Proclamation Act of 1763 in the mother of all Parliaments, Westminster.
The legislation, under Liberal Prime Minister George Grenville, in effect created Canada, even though it wasn’t so named at the time, and eventually prevented the United States of America from carrying out its so-called ‘manifest destiny’ of expanding northward.
The Act ordained four principles for the new country Britain and France were carving out:
• It would be a democracy.
• It would live by the rule of law.
• Aboriginal rights would be protected.
• Veterans would be rewarded for their loyalty, basically with land grants.
In a roundabout way, the Act set the foundation for many of the rights Canadians enjoy today, rights many people in countries far and wide still do not have.
That the anniversaries — particularly this year — of the passage of the Royal Proclamation of 1763 are never officially noted, never mind celebrated, is not only puzzling, but appalling.
We basically have a founding Constitution that was then, and still is, quite remarkable for the freedoms it sanctioned for its people.
How sad!
But, I well recall sitting in the Parliamentary Press Gallery in the House of Commons late one quiet afternoon when, for some unknown — but likely dubious and devious reason — a small group of Members of Parliament suddenly rushed a resolution through tossing the historic and noble ‘Dominion Day’ into the garbage can and replacing it with ‘Canada Day’.
As a French commentator in Paris scoffed at the time, “Can you imagine what would happen if a group of ruffian French politicians tried to surreptitiously retitle Bastille Day and call it ‘France Day!’”
Well, we can, the population of France would have rioted in the streets.
Paul Conrad Jackson,
Sylvan Lake