19-04-2025
Looking back at 'pioneering' U.S.-Canadian summits at SLU
Apr. 19—Since President Donald Trump took office for his second term in January, he has expressed a desire to annex Canada while imposing tariffs and creating a trade war.
The situation has echoes of 1930 when the Smoot-Hawley Trade Act, designed to protect U.S. businesses and farmers, triggered a global trade war, hurting the U.S. and its trading partners, including Canada. The act may have exacerbated the Great Depression and relations between the U.S. and Canada were tinged with a growing sense of resentment.
On July 1, 1935, C.F. Poste, manager of the St. Lawrence River Power Company in Cornwall, Ontario, was the guest speaker at the Massena Monday Luncheon Club.
"The Canadians as a people like their American neighbors but have a feeling of resentment towards your government due to treaties, the American feeling of, 'We won the war' and the Chicago drainage canal," Poste told the gathering. Poste was referring to World War I. In 1914, Canada, then a self-governing dominion of the British Empire, joined the war with Great Britain. The U.S. entered the conflict in 1917.
Figures from Veterans Affairs Canada reflect more than 66,000 Canadians and Newfoundlanders gave their lives in the war and more than 172,000 were wounded. The U.S. National Park Service reports that America suffered 53,402 battle deaths in World War I in less than six months of fighting.
Another 63,114 died from accidents and disease.
The Chicago drainage canal, aka, the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, was completed in 1900. It was built to reverse the flow of the Chicago River, diverting water from Lake Michigan to the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers, leading to controversies regarding water usage and water levels on the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River. Following an April, 1930 Supreme Court ruling, management of the canal was turned over to the United States Army Corps of Engineers, which reduced the flow of water from Lake Michigan into the canal. Diversions from the Great Lakes system are now regulated by the binational International Joint Commission.
"Canadians do not like the Chicago drainage canal situation, that is, as they claim, lowering the water in the St. Lawrence and the canals in this section. They feel that the government has ruled as to how much water may be diverted but that the rulings are note being held to," Poste said.
'Pioneering' gatherings
Poste spoke in Massena about a month after a multi-day forum on Canadian-American relations was held at St. Lawrence University, Canton. The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace cooperated with Queens University, Kingston, Ontario, and SLU in sponsoring the gathering.
James T. Shotwell, director of the division of economics and history of the Carnegie Endowment, opened the gathering by calling it "pioneering."
"It is the first time in the history of Canada and the United States that representative citizens of both countries meet together to take stock of the fundamentals in their interrelationship in all the varied fields of intellectual, economic, social and political activity."
He predicted the conference would be sort of a "town meeting" — but "a town meeting without authority, really a meeting of citizens of the North American community discussing in utter frankness ... varied points of view."
The Carnegie conferences on relations between the two countries were repeated in 1939 and 1941. In 1936, a book was published on the 1935 conference. "So vast and so complex are these relationships that it seems almost incredible that no serious effort has ever been made to bring to their analysis an adequate measure of cooperative study and discussion," the book's preface states. Economic subjects were a main focus of the 1935 event, with tariffs, trade barriers and "migration" topping the list. John W. Dafoe, prominent Canadian editor, shared his belief that the U.S. must take the lead in world affairs "and thereby regain the moral leadership which he considered this country abandoned at the Paris Peace Conference after the world war was expressed," according to Times files.
A conference planned at SLU for 1943 was scaled back because of World War II. In the decades since, SLU has continued to stress the importance of ties between the U.S. and Canada. As an example, the university offers a Canadian Studies Program. "In our program, we want you to experience Canada first hand. You'll learn from expert professors and think critically about international relations while gaining experience through research and independent study," the program's website advises. "Our faculty's connections with Canadian scholars ensure you'll hear from exceptional guest speakers as you develop a deep understanding of the country's geography, history, economy, politics and cultures."
