ion of Christ, even with the divisions which exist among His
followers, are allowed to be taught.' He went on to contrast the
schools of Canada, wherein Christian dogmas and morals were taught,
with those of the United States, where they were not taught, and to
point out the resulting difference in moral standards as witnessed by
lynching, murder, and divorce statistics.

The great majority of Catholics and a {241} minority of Protestants, or
their ecclesiastical spokesmen, regarded the school as a means of
teaching religion as well as secular subjects, and wished secular
subjects, where possible, to be taught from a distinctly religious
point of view. A small minority were in favour of complete
secularization of all schools. The majority of Protestants would
probably have favoured some non-denominational recognition of religion
in the schools, and would judge denominational teaching by the test of
how far this would involve herding the children apart and putting
obstacles in the path of educational efficiency and of national unity.

But was parliament free to grant the provinces the liberty to decide
the question solely in accord with what the majority might now or
hereafter think expedient? On the one hand, it was vigorously
contended that it was free, and that any attempt to limit the power of
the province was uncalled for, was an attempt to petrify its laws, and
to revive the coercion which Sir Wilfrid Laurier himself had denounced
and defeated in 1896. The recognition of separate schools in the
British North America Act, the critics continued, applied only to the
four original provinces, and there was probably no power, and {242}
certainly no legal obligation, to extend the principle to the West. On
the other hand, it was argued that Section 93 of the British North
America Act--introduced at the instance of the Protestant minority of
Quebec, and designed to protect the interest of all minorities--morally
and legally bound the whole Dominion; that the Manitoba Act of 1870
confirmed the principle that the Dominion could give a new province
only such powers as the constitution provided, which meant control over
education _subject to the minority's privilege_; and that parliament,
by unanimously establishing separate schools in the North-West
Territories in 1875, had still further bound its successors, or at
least had shown how the Fathers of Confederation interpreted the
constitution.

To many, however, the a