Reference has been made to the facts that Big Business has up to the present been unable to get control of the reins of government in Canada, that the courts have been kept comparatively free of political influence and that the doors of underground politics are not easily pried open by corruption. Why is this? Canadians would fain take unction to themselves that it is owing to their superior national integrity, but this is nonsense. Exuberant forest growth is always characterized by some fungus and dry rot. How has Canada escaped so much of this fungus excrescence of representative government? To get at the reason for this it is necessary to trace back for a little space the historic growth of Canada's form of government. We speak of Canada's constitution being the British North America Act. As a matter of fact, Canada's constitution is more than an act--more than a dry and hard and inflexible formula to which growth must conform. Rather than plaster cast into which growing life must fit itself, Canada's constitution is a living organism evolved from her own mistakes and struggles of the past and her own needs as to the present. Canada's constitution is not some pocket formula which some doctrinaire--with apologies to France--has whipped out of his pocket to remedy all ills. Canada's constitution is like the scientific data of empirical medicine; it is the result of centuries' experiments, none the less scientific because unconscious. One need not trace the growth of government to the days prior to English rule. When England took over Canada by the Treaty of Paris in 1763, the main thing to remember is that the French-Canadian was guaranteed the free exercise of his religion. This--and not innate loyalty to an alien government--was the real reason for Quebec refusing to cast in her lot with the revolting American colonies. This was the reason for Quebec remaining stanch in the War of 1812, and this is the reason for Quebec to-day standing a solid unit against annexation. We must not forget what a high emissary from Rome once jocularly said of a religious quarrel in Canada--Quebec was more Catholic than the Pope.