Liberal Split in Canada The speech in which Mr. Hepburn,
Liberal Premier of Ontario, last week repueir.ed his allegiance to the Liberal Government at Ottawa brought to a head a quarrel which has long been threatening. Mr. Hepbum's attack on the Federal Government was founded on its refusal to take strong action against the activities of the American Com- mittee for Industrial Organisation in Canada, and especially in Ontario, where it has come into bitter conflict with Mr. Hepburn, and on Mr. Mackenzie King's " paternal " attitude to unemployment relief. Mr. Hepburn believes that Canada's export trade depends on keeping costs of pro- duction low, and that trade union activity must be curtailed, and unemployment relief cut, to that end. Holding such ideas, he has great sympathy with M. Duplessis' Conservative Government at Quebec, which has given much evidence of a desire to found a " corporative " State, with racialist and even secessionist tendencies. The alliance of Mr. Hepburn and M. Duplessis has considerable dangers for the Federal Government, which depends for its majority on Liberal votes in Ontario and Quebec. But, with the possibility that a Federal Liberal Party will be formed in Ontario, it is doubtful if Mr. Hepburn can carry the Province with him at the next election ; and his political ideas cannot be reconciled with the aims of Mr. Mackenzie King who, unlike him, is a Liberal in more than name. * * * *
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