erman Emperor as arbitrator approved the American claim to
the island of San Juan in the channel between Vancouver Island and the
mainland.*

* See "The Path of Empire".

With the most troublesome boundary questions out of the way, it became
possible to discuss calmly closer trade relations between the Provinces
and the United States. The movement for reciprocal lowering of the
tariffs which hampered trade made rapid headway in the Provinces in the
late forties and early fifties. British North America was passing out of
the pioneer, self-sufficient stage, and now had a surplus to export
as well as townbred needs to be supplied by imports. The spread of
settlement and the building of canals and railways brought closer
contact with the people to the south. The loss of special privileges
in the English market made the United States market more desired. In
official circles reciprocity was sought as a homeopathic cure for
the desire for annexation. William Hamilton Merritt, a Niagara border
business man and the most persistent advocate of closer trade relations,
met little difficulty in securing almost unanimous backing in Canada,
while the Maritime Provinces lent their support.

It was more difficult to win over the United States. There the people
showed the usual indifference of a big and prosperous country to the
needs or opportunities of a small and backward neighbor. The division
of power between President and Congress made it difficult to carry any
negotiation through to success. Yet these obstacles were overcome. The
depletion of the fisheries along the Atlantic coast of the United States
made it worth while, as I.D. Andrews, a United States consul in New
Brunswick, urged persistently, to gain access to the richer grounds to
the north and, if necessary, to offer trade concessions in exchange. At
Washington, the South was in the saddle. Its sympathies were strongly
for freer trade, but this alone would not have counted had not the
advocates of reciprocity convinced the Democratic leaders of the bearing
of their policy on the then absorbing issue of slavery. If reciprocity
were not arranged, the argument ran, annexation would be sure to come
and that would mean the addition to the Union of a group of freesoil
States which would definitely tilt the balance against slavery for all
time. With the ground thus prepared, Lord Elgin succeeded by adroit and
capable diplomacy in winning over the leaders of Congress as wel