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(Special to the Gleaner)
Toronto, May 22nd, - The Grand Opera House was crowded last evening on the occasion of Sir Richard Cartwright’s address, on the political situation, and his review of the work of the last session. Sir Richard had said the Tories had to-day a well organized system of government by bribery, the likes of which had never been seen in the country. He referred to the great extent to which people were taxed to meet the extravagance of the Government and said the country was in a far worse position now without any worthy cause, than the United States was in 1867. He urged the necessity of educating ourselves and the public generally to a higher sense of public duty if we can. It would have been impossible for the events of which he had spoken to have occurred in this country unless people to a very large extent had lost control of public affairs. For the attainment of these objects we need two things: first, to alter very materially the present constitution of the Senate, which is not now in accordance with the honest representative institutions; a body which represents nobody; which is daily becoming more and more a mere partisan machine at the disposal of one man, who certainly has good cause for dealing as he pleases with it, because it is to him that the greater portion of members owe their positions. The Liberty party should endeavour, if possible, to obtain some better system of representation in the House of Commons itself, by which the honest vote of this country can have its full weight and by which it may be made impossible for a few corrupt men to hold the balance of power between the great mass of the electors, who in spite of all that has happened are on the whole honest and fair in their desire for a better state of Government. He had found in various discussions, particularly with the younger portion of the Reform party, that there appear to be in many quarters a considerable feeling of unrest, a considerable amount of discontent and doubt, as to the stability of our present form of Government, and anxiety as to what, in the long run, is likely to be the future of Confederation. He could not wonder that it should be so, and it is a wholesome sign to see men beginning to discuss and agitate these questions. As our country becomes more consolidated by and bye, our people will naturally aspire to a more independent form of existence than we now have.
This was a question which, he said, might well be faced and discussed. The latter part of the address was pitched in a high political key. It dealt with the future of the Dominion as a matter of speculative politics, and in the course of his treatment of this theme, Sir Richard discussed the pros and cons of, first, annexation to the United States, to which he expressed himself as strongly opposed; second, an independent national existence, the time to discuss which had arrived; third, Imperial Federation, which he thought did not appear to have as yet gained any footing in the Mother Country, and forth, a large confederation of all English speaking nations. The initiative in this matter is to be taken by Canada, and especially by Ontario, in connexion with the celebration this year of the U.E. Loyalist Centennial. The various branches of the Anglo-Saxon race have already a common language, common laws, common literature, and common institutions. If in addition to these they had a common navy, a common flag, and a common coinage, they might grow from close to closer to Confederation as the German bund developed into the German Empire.