passed, contemplating the holding of a Subsidiary Conference if the matter could not be settled otherwise. In the following year (1908) another inter-departmental committee was arranged in Downing Street, under the presidency of Sir M. D. Chalmers, with a view to modifying the Bill so as to meet the objections which had been raised. As to procedure, the Committee argued that, since colonial naturalisation laws could have no effect outside the colony, Imperial legislation was indispensable, in order to give them extra-territorial effect, which could be no curtailment of self-governing powers. They further proposed to insert a statutory condition that in the United Kingdom the applicant should 'adduce evidence of good character and evidence that he has an adequate knowledge of the English language.' The Committee's report was circulated and further correspondence ensued, conducted now through the new 'secretariat' of the Imperial Conference, but without avoiding the roundabout methods of negotiation. In the case of South Africa the business was interrupted, the several Governments feeling that the whole matter should be referred to the Union Government which was about to be established. No Subsidiary Conference was held, the negotiations being continued by correspondence up to the next session (1911) of the Imperial Conference. By that time the South African Government had already passed a Naturalisation Act (No. 4 of 1910), in which the term of residence was fixed at two years, racial differentiation was omitted, and provision was made for recognising British certificates. The latter amenity had now been established in Canada also, by a special Act of 1906. In Australia naturalisation continued to be governed by a federal law, passed in 1903, which adopted the two-year term of residence and excluded aboriginal natives of Asia, Africa, or the Pacific Islands. With the exception of those, it franked aliens who had been naturalised in the United Kingdom.

Within the present limits of space it is possible to indicate only the salient features of the protracted controversy and the final solution. The constitutional question and the difficulty arising from diversity of local naturalisation laws have already been mentioned. Closely connected with the last named was the third great

obstacle, which was sheer misunderstanding. In South Africa, New Zealand and Australia, not only the public, but many of its leaders were haunted with the idea that their countries could not become parties to any joint scheme of complete naturalisation without opening their doors to a possible flood of undesirables and Asiatics, whom they would be obliged not merely to admit but to endow with political rights. Visions of Asiatics swarming over from Hongkong and Singapore, where the conditions of naturalisation are very easy, or even viâ Britain, clouded their horizon.

This apprehension arose from the popular confusion, which had so long prevailed, between the ideas of citizen and subject. The notion persisted that somehow subjecthood per se conveyed political rights, including a right of entry to any part of the King's dominions, and a right to vote in the case of a country possessing elective institutions. As we have already seen, subjecthood does not in itself carry any such rights, and so the apprehension was entirely groundless. The strength of the fallacy had, however, been sufficiently apparent as an obstacle to progress for the Committee of 1908 to take pains to demolish it once for all. They insisted that the Naturalisation Bill had 'very little bearing on the coloured race question'; in fact, that question was a matter' entirely untouched by the present Bill.' Naturalised aliens, they pointed out, were to have only the same rights as naturalborn British subjects, who already numbered some 260,000,000 of Asiatic and African origin. If those rights were really any danger to the self-governing Dominions, that danger could hardly be affected by the addition of a few more persons to so vast a total. 'Any colonial law' (e.g. an immigration or a franchise law) 'affecting the coloured race, which applies to natural-born British subjects, must apply equally and continue to apply to naturalised persons.' When next the Imperial Conference met, in 1911, the true appreciation of the matter had taken root, and the old apprehension had almost died. It was a point which had never troubled Mr Deakin, who represented the Commonwealth at the previous session in 1907. But his Labour successor, Mr Fisher, ably assisted at the Conference of 1911 by the late Mr Batchelor, had shared with Sir Joseph Ward and the Vol. 220.-No. 438.

C

South Africans the fear that somehow the proposed Imperial Bill might 'override' the racial policy of those Dominions. In 1911 it was nearly superfluous for Sir John Simon to repeat that there was nothing in the rights of a natural-born British subject-which are the utmost that naturalisation can ever confer-that could 'the least affect the legislative power of each and every Dominion either to exclude' a coloured British subject 'or, if he comes inside the area of a Dominion, to deny him privileges which white people or persons speaking a European language enjoy.'

Having thus touched upon the three most contentious points of this ten-year negotiation, let us now consider the ultimate agreement which was reached at the Imperial Conference of 1911. The general aim may be summed up in two postulates, (1) that a British subject anywhere should be a British subject everywhere, and (2) that the process of naturalisation should be uniforın. As an obvious corollary to the first, and as part of the arrangement of the second, it had always been felt that, if anywhere the conditions of naturalisation include a certain period of prior residence, residence in any part of the Empire should count for that purpose, superseding the existing rule that the whole of the prior residence, or of the intended future residence, must be in that part of the Empire where the certificate is asked for. But as to uniformity' of process, there was room for differences of opinion, arising from differences in the conception of what is meant by Imperial unity. All would agree that the process of complete naturalisation should be uniform throughout the Empire, at least in the sense that it should be effected in the name of the common Sovereign and under constitutional laws. But to go beyond that, and demand that in each part of the Empire the statutory conditions for being received into the King's ligeance should be identical, or even 'substantially the same,' is to raise an issue between two different conceptions of Britannic unity, of which the one idealises uniformity, while the other discerns a truer harmony in diversity. Representing the latter school, Sir Wilfrid Laurier advocated as a guiding maxim in this matter, 'uniformity of effect, diversity of method.' Apparently he wished to solve the problem quite simply by means

of an Imperial Act, if necessary, giving extra-territorial effect to the naturalisation laws of the Dominions, quite regardless of any local variations in the period of residence or any other conditions. By this simple expedient any confusion which would arise in any country from the co-existence of two kinds of naturalisation, the local and the world-wide, would be avoided altogether.

In principle Sir Wilfrid Laurier's plan could hardly be resisted at the stage which the discussion had now reached. The autonomists, if they ever had any real ground for alarm, had already won the day. The object of the Bill in its application to the Dominions,' said the Committee of 1908, 'is to give extra-territorial effect to the laws passed by the local legislatures.' If so, it could hardly be demanded as a matter of principle that the conditions prescribed by those laws should be everywhere identical. The actual objections made to Sir Wilfrid Laurier's plan were based, however, not on Imperial principle, but on local and administrative convenience. The Australian ministers feared that under such a system foreign immigrants would evade the intention of the Australian naturalisation law, which prescribes two years' residence, by first getting naturalised in neighbouring New Zealand, where there is no requirement of prior residence. To meet this difficulty Sir Joseph Ward began to speak of amending the New Zealand law in that regard. But the British Government cut the Canadian proposal short with a decisive objection of their own. They could not possibly consent, the Home Secretary (Mr Churchill) declared, to accept in the United Kingdom the certificates of any persons who had not spent at least five years within the Empire. Their objection was grounded on the modern tendency of social legislation in Britain, illustrated by the old age pensions law and the insurance law, to which Mr Churchill specifically referred. The pecuniary benefits conferred by this class of legislation are confined to British subjects, though aliens have the privilege of contributing to the cost. Apparently the Government feared that if naturalisation were made any easier there might be a larger influx of pauper aliens, intent on insurance or pensions benefits.

One would have thought that the risk apprehended by

the Home Office might be met by safeguards independently of naturalisation law. The immigration restriction law of 1905 might be stiffened, and a special period of prior residence might be required as one condition of receiving an old age pension, as in Australia.* But whether or not their resistance was really prompted by the instinct of preserving Imperial control, the attitude of the British Government excluded Sir Wilfrid Laurier's proposal and threw the Conference back upon the inferior plan of having to tolerate a dual system, under which 'local' and 'world-wide' naturalisation would everywhere co-exist, unless in any part of the Empire the former were abolished. The 'Imperial' or world-wide status would contain the local, but the local would not contain the Imperial. The compromise actually arranged was that, under powers to be taken by the United Kingdom and conferred on Dominion legislatures by the Imperial Act, world-wide naturalisation should be granted by local law to any alien who, in addition to any other requirements, (1) has resided not less than five years within the Empire, or has served the Crown for five years out of the last eight years; (2) is of good character and has an adequate knowledge of the English or other official language; and (3) intends to reside within the Empire or serve under the Crown. A proviso that the last twelve months must be spent in the country where application for the certificate is made, overcomes some obvious difficulties. For instance, the discretion of the responsible minister would be hampered if he could discover nothing about the applicant without having to seek information oversea. As the proposal stands, the minister could easily find out the alien's record and reputation for the last twelve months at least. It was suggested that the several Governments might exchange lists of persons to whom naturalisation had anywhere been refused, so as to check such persons if they applied in another part of the Empire.

It was not found practicable to redraft the Bill in time for the matter to be finally settled at the Conference. Moreover, some of the Dominion ministers felt that it was not their proper function at the Conference to

* For examples of this, see Cd. 5273, p. 155.