The National Policy, the CPR and Chinese Railway Workers

Let's start with a question

In 1871, Canada promised British Columbia a railway across the continent: over the rocks and muskeg of the Canadian Shield, across the Prairies and through the Rocky Mountains. At the time, Canada had only about 3.7 million people.

It took fourteen years, a scandal, a change of government and the work of thousands of labourers, including about 15,000 Chinese workers, to finish it. Who should get the credit? And who paid the price?

The Pacific Scandal, 1873

In the 1872 election, Macdonald's Conservatives accepted large sums of election money from Sir Hugh Allan, a Montreal businessman who wanted the contract to build the railway. When this became public in 1873, Macdonald's government resigned. Alexander Mackenzie and the Liberals took over and built the railway slowly, in sections, partly using lakes and rivers.

Macdonald won the 1878 election and returned to power.

The National Policy, 1879

Macdonald's National Policy had three parts, designed to work together:

1. Tariffs on imported goods, so Canadians would buy goods made in Canadian factories, mostly in Ontario and Quebec.
2. A transcontinental railway, to carry settlers west and their grain east, and goods made in central Canada west.
3. Settlement of the West, with homesteads for farmers who would buy Canadian goods and ship grain on the railway.

Perspective check: the National Policy helped central Canadian manufacturers. Many farmers in the West and the Maritimes complained that tariffs made what they bought more expensive. And "settling the West" depended on First Nations and Métis lands.

Building the CPR, 1881–1885

• In 1881, the Canadian Pacific Railway company (CPR) signed a contract with the government. It received $25 million and 25 million acres of land on the Prairies, plus sections of railway already built.
• William Van Horne, the general manager, pushed construction across the Prairies very fast.
• The hardest parts were the Canadian Shield north of Lake Superior and the mountains of British Columbia.
• The company nearly went bankrupt in 1884–85.
• On November 7, 1885, Donald Smith, one of the CPR's financiers, drove the last spike at Craigellachie, British Columbia. The first transcontinental passenger train left Montreal in June 1886 and reached the Pacific coast in July 1886.

Chinese workers: building the hardest section

In British Columbia, the contractor Andrew Onderdonk could not find enough workers. He recruited Chinese labourers, some already in BC after the gold rush, some from California, and thousands directly from southern China.

• Between 1880 and 1885, about 15,000 Chinese labourers worked on the BC section.
• They did some of the most dangerous work: blasting tunnels with explosives, building on cliffs above rivers, and working through cold winters.
• They were usually paid about half, or less, of what white workers received for the same work, and often had to pay for their own food, camping gear and supplies.
• More than 600 Chinese workers died from accidents, disease (such as scurvy) and harsh conditions. Many families in China never learned what happened.

Thanks? No: a head tax. As soon as the railway was nearly done, in 1885, Parliament passed the Chinese Immigration Act, which made every Chinese immigrant pay a $50 head tax. No other group had to pay this. The tax was later raised to $100 (1900) and $500 (1903). Also in 1885, the federal Electoral Franchise Act excluded Chinese people from voting in federal elections.

In 2006, the Government of Canada apologized for the head tax.